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    Not Democrat, I said. You want to go third party.
    Right, Huey said. He looked at the bottle, shrugged, took another sip. We could probably beat him in the party if we went all out for it but we’d bust it wide open and then he’d probably go third party on me and split the thing. No, we’ll do it ourselves. The money is there. Don’t worry about the money.
    Just have my ass there, I said. That’s what you’re telling me?
    That’s what I’m telling you, he said. Listen, you don’t like this guy anyway. That’s no secret. And I’ll tell you something, all right? He held the bottle out to me. I shook my head. (They have me down for a drunk but it is all part of their misunderstanding. No one goes as far as John Nance Garner has by being a simple drunk. Of course there are other factors.) Here it is, Huey said. I want to be a one-term president, that’s all. I’ll step aside in ’40. You can have it then.
    You got it all figured out, I said. What a generous offer.
    I’m serious, he said. If I can’t make this thing work in one term, I can’t do anything in two. Besides, I don’t want to be president all my life. I want to lie down here in the sun, run the dogs, know me another woman or two. But I got a few plans. In ’40 I can put you over the top.
    I didn’t believe a word of it. Up to this point I had pretty well taken what Huey had said as he had presented it, but this part was not to be believed. It didn’t bother me, of course. Long view or short, you cultivate the situation more or less as it is found and don’t push for explanations. I’ll think about it, I said. It’s going to be ugly stuff. The Republicans want to be heard from.
    Republicans! Huey said. Who they got? Hoover again? Charles Evans Hughes? Maybe Styles Bridges? I say the word Hoover three times a day until November, I don’t have to say anything else. So much for the Republicans. Franklin will be tough but with his vice president jumping ship and every man a king, I think I got a chance. You think I have a chance, Big John?
    Yes, I said, I think so. I want to think on this some.
    Don’t think on it too long, he said. You’re getting first offer and best offer but you aren’t the only one, you understand. There are a lot of people outside the parishes who see things the way I do, who would be happy to come along. The next person I ask is Rayburn. You think he’ll turn it down?
    I don’t know, I said.
    Well I do, Huey said. He turned it down. Conditional. He said I should ask you first, courtesy of the line of succession and all that. But if you don’t want it, he said, I should ask him again. That good enough for you?
    I’ll have another sip of that whiskey, I said. I do declare that ain’t bad whiskey, considering.
    Yeah, Huey said. You know, I looked down at the blood on the floor of the Capitol and I said, it could have been my blood and no one would ever have known what I could have been. There are moments that change you, Big John. Maybe you’ve had a few.
    I think I’ve had one just now, I said. I took the whiskey bottle from him and palmed it. It felt like a grenade in my hand. I ran my palm over it, up and down, down and up, then drank deep. I’m tired of this job, I said finally, this is a shitty job. Maybe you can give me something to do besides hold a gavel and wait around for you to drop dead.
    We’ll have plenty for you to do, Huey said. We’re gonna be a goddamned team, Big John. And in 1940, things work out the way I hope they will, you can have the whole goddamned thing. We’ll probably be in a war by then anyway, ain’t doing you no favors.
    * * *
    Landon was a clown. Huey was right, the Republicans had nothing, there was no way that they could campaign, nothing that they could say. That was the summer of the dust bowls, the failed crops, the riots in the Capitol. Roosevelt wanted me to step down when he got the word, and then he threatened to impeach me, and then he said he’d send me out