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"What's the point of being alone? We like each other. We're such a good team! We have the same ideals, the same aims in life, similar opinions-we belong together. "
"There's more to marriage than that. "
"I know. And I long to take you in my arms. " He moved his arm, as if about to reach out and touch her, but she crossed her legs and turned aside in her chair. He withdrew his hand, and a bitter smile twisted his usually amiable expression. "I'm not the handsomest man you've ever met. But I believe no one has ever loved you as I do. "
He was right about that, she reflected sadly. Many men had fancied her, and one had seduced her, but none had shown the patient devotion of Bernie. If she married him she could be sure it would be forever. And somewhere in her soul she longed for that.
Sensing her hesitation, Bernie said: "Marry me, Ethel. I love you. I'll spend my life making you happy. It's all I want. "
Did she need a man at all? She was not unhappy. Lloyd was a constant joy, with his stumbling walk, his attempts at speech, and his boundless curiosity. He was enough for her.
Bernie said: "Little Lloyd needs a father. "
That gave her a pang of guilt. Bernie was already playing that role part-time. Should she marry Bernie for Lloyd's sake? It was not too late for him to start calling Bernie "Daddy. "
It would mean giving up what little hope she had left of finding again the overwhelming passion she had felt with Fitz. She still suffered a spasm of longing when she thought about it. But, she asked herself, trying to think objectively despite her feelings, what did I get out of that love affair? I was disappointed by Fitz, rejected by my family, and exiled to another country. Why would I want that again?
Hard as she struggled, she could not bring herself to accept Bernie's proposal. "Let me think," she said.
He beamed. Clearly that was a more positive answer than he had dared to hope for. "Think as long as you want," he said. "I'll wait. "
She opened the front door. "Good night, Bernie. "
"Good night, Ethel. " He leaned forward and she gave him her cheek to kiss. His lips lingered a moment on her skin. She drew back immediately. He caught her wrist. "Ethel. . . "
"Sleep well, Bernie," she said.
He hesitated, then nodded. "You, too," he said, and he went out.
{II}
On election night in November 1916, Gus Dewar thought his career in politics had come to an end.
He was in the White House, fielding phone calls and passing messages to President Wilson, who was at Shadow Lawn, the new summer White House in New Jersey, with his second wife, Edith. Papers were sent from Washington to Shadow Lawn every day by the U. S. Postal Service, but sometimes the president needed to get the news faster.
By nine o'clock that evening it was clear that the Republican, a Supreme Court justice called Charles Evans Hughes, had won four swing states: New York, Indiana, Connecticut, and New Jersey.
But the reality did not hit Gus until a messenger brought him the early editions of the New York newspapers and he saw the headline:
PRESIDENT-ELECT HUGHES
He was shocked. He thought Woodrow Wilson was winning. Voters had not forgotten Wilson's deft handling of the Lusitania crisis: he had managed to get tough with the Germans while at the same time staying neutral. Wilson's campaign slogan was: "He kept us out of war. "
Hughes had accused Wilson of failing to prepare America for war, but this had backfired. Americans were more determined than ever to remain nonaligned after Britain's brutal suppression of the Easter Rising in Dublin. Britain's treatment of the Irish was no better than Germany's treatment of the Belgians, so why should America take sides?
When he had read the papers Gus loosened his tie and napped on the couch in the study next to the Oval Office. He was unnerved by the prospect of leaving the White House. Working for Wilson had become his bedrock. His love life was a train wreck, but at least he knew he was valuable to the president of the United States.
His concern was not just selfish. Wilson was determined to create an international order in which wars could be avoided. Just as next-door neighbors no longer settled boundary disputes with six-guns, so the time must come when countries, too, submitted their quarrels to independent judgment. The British foreign secretary, Sir Edward Grey, had used the words "a league of nations" in a letter to Wilson, and the president had liked the phrase. If Gus could help bring that about his life would mean something.
But now it looked as if that dream was not going to come true, he thought, and he drifted into a disappointed sleep.
He was woken early in the morning by a cable saying that Wilson had won Ohio-a blue-collar state that had liked the president's stand on the eight-hour day-and Kansas, too. Wilson was back in the running. A little later he won Minnesota by fewer than a thousand votes.
It was not over after all, and Gus's spirits lifted.
By Wednesday evening Wilson was ahead with 264 electoral votes against 254, a lead of 10. But one state, California, had not yet declared a result, and it carried 13 electoral votes. Whoever won California would be president.
Gus's phone went quiet. There was nothing much for him to do. The counting in Los Angeles was slow. Every unopened box was guarded by armed Democrats, who believed that tampering had robbed them of a presidential victory in 1876.
