Fifty Degrees Below. Kim Stanley Robinson
Who said that?’
‘Oscar Wilde.’
‘Please. I mean, I see his point, but don’t quote Oscar Wilde to me when I’m trying to think like Abraham Lincoln.’
‘Wilde may be more your level.’
‘Ha ha.’
‘Wilde was witty just like that.’
‘Ha ha ha.’
Charlie gave up tweaking Phil in favor of contemplating the mud-stained statue of the sixteenth president. It was a great work: massive, brooding, uneasy. The big square-toed boots and obviously handmade broadcoat somehow evoked the whole world of the nineteenth century frontier. This was the spirit that America had given to the world – its best gesture, its exemplary figure.
His oversized hands were dirty. The great bearded head looked sadly over them. The whole interior space of the building had a greatness about it – the uncanny statue, the high square ceiling, the monumental lettering of the speeches on the side walls, the subdued people visiting it. Even the kids there were quiet and watchful.
Perhaps it was this that woke Joe. He yawned, arched back in his seat, whacked Charlie on the head. ‘Down! Down!’
‘Okay okay.’
Charlie went back outside to let him down. Phil came along, and they sat on the top step and let Joe stretch his legs behind them.
A TV crew was working at the bottom of the steps, filming what looked to be a story on the memorial’s reattachment to land. When the reporter spotted them, he came up to ask Phil if he would make a comment for the program.
‘My pleasure,’ Phil said. The reporter waved his crew over, and soon Phil was standing before the camera in a spot where Lincoln loomed over his left shoulder, launching into one of his characteristic improvs. ‘I’m sick of people putting Washington down,’ he said, waving a hand at the city. ‘What makes America special is our constitution, and the laws based on it – it’s our government that makes America something to be proud of, and that government is based here. So I don’t like to see people wrapping themselves in the flag while they trash the very country they pretend to love. Abraham Lincoln would not stand for it –’
‘Thanks, Senator! I’m sure we can use that. Some of it, anyway.’
‘I should hope so.’
Then a shout of alarm came from inside the building, causing Charlie to shoot to his feet and spin around, looking for Joe – no luck. ‘Joe!’ he cried, rushing inside.
Past the pillars he skidded to a halt, Phil and the TV crew crashing in behind him. Joe was sitting up on Lincoln’s knee, far above them, looking around curiously, seemingly unaware of the long drop to the marble floor.
‘Joe!’ Charlie tried to catch his attention without causing him to topple off. ‘Joe! Don’t move! Joe! Stay there!’
How the hell did you get up there, he didn’t add. Because Lincoln’s marble chair was smooth and vertical on all sides; there was no way up it even for an adult. It almost seemed like someone had to have lifted him up there. Of course he was an agile guy, a real monkey, very happy on the climbing structures at Gymboree. If there was a way, he had the will.
Charlie hustled around the statue, hoping to find Joe’s route up and follow it himself. There was no way. ‘Joe! Stay right there! Stay right there till we get you!’
A group was gathering at Lincoln’s feet, ready to catch Joe if he fell off. He sat there looking down at them with an imperial serenity, completely at ease. The TV cameraman was filming everything.
The best Charlie could think to do was to request a boost from two willing young men, and clamber onto their shoulders as they stood on Lincoln’s right boot and wrapped their arms around his calf. From there Charlie could reach up with his arms and almost reach Joe, although at that point it was a balancing act, and things were precarious. He had to talk Joe into toppling over into his hands, which of course took a while, as Joe was clearly happy where he was. Eventually, however, he tipped forward and Charlie caught him, and let him down between his legs onto the two young men and a nest of hands, before falling back himself into the arms of the crowd.
The crowd cheered briefly, then gave them a little round of applause. Charlie thanked the two young men as he collected the squirming Joe from other strangers.
‘Jesus, Joe! Why do you do these things?’
‘Look!’
‘Yeah yeah, look. But how the hell did you get up there?’
‘Up!’
Charlie took some deep breaths, feeling a bit sick to his stomach. If the TV station ran the story, which they probably would, and if Anna saw it, which she probably wouldn’t, then he would be in big trouble. But what could you do? He had only taken his eye off him for a second!
Phil got back in front of the camera with them, heightening the chances it would make it to the news. ‘This is my young friend Joe Quibler and his father Charlie, a member of my staff. Good job, you guys. You know, citizens like Joe are the ones we have to think about when we consider what sort of world we’re going to be handing along to them. That’s what government is, it’s making the world we want to give to our kids. People should think about that before they put down Washington D.C. and our country’s government. Lincoln would not approve!’
Indeed, Lincoln stared down at the scene with a knowing and disenchanted air. He looked concerned about the fate of the republic, just as Phil had implied.
The reporter asked Phil a few more questions, and then Phil signaled that he had to go. The TV crew shut down, and the little crowd that had stayed to watch dissipated.
Phil phoned his office to get a car sent, and while they waited he shook some hands. Charlie roamed the sanctum with Joe in his arms, looking for routes up to the great American’s lap. There were some disassembled scaffolds stacked on their sides against the back wall of the chamber, behind Lincoln and next to an inner pillar; it was just conceivable that Joe had monkeyed up those. Easier than doing a dirretissima up Lincoln’s calf, but still. It was hard to figure.
‘God damn, Joe,’ Charlie muttered. ‘How do you do this stuff?’
Eventually he rejoined Phil, and they stood on the steps of the memorial, holding Joe by the hand between them and swinging him out toward the reflecting pools, causing Joe to laugh helplessly.
Phil said, ‘You know, we’re swinging him right over the spot Martin Luther King stood on when he gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. He is really touching all the bases today.’
Charlie, still a little bit shaky with relief, laughed and said, ‘Phil, you should run for President.’
Phil grinned his beautiful grin. ‘You think so?’
‘Yes. Believe me, I don’t want to say it. It would mean endless hassle for me, and I haven’t got the time.’
‘You? What about me?’ Phil was looking back up into the building.
‘Endless hassle for you too, sure. But you already live that way, right? It would just be more of the same.’
‘A lot more.’
‘But if you’re going to run for high office at all, you might as well make the biggest impact you can. Besides you’re one of the only people in the world who can beat the happy man.’
‘You think so?’
‘I do. You’re the World’s Senator, right? And the world needs you, Phil. I mean, when the hyperpower goes crazy what are the rest of us going to do? We need help. It’s more than just cleaning up the city here. More even than America. It’s the whole world needs help now.’
‘A godawful fate,’ Phil murmured, looking up at the somber and unencouraging Lincoln. A bad idea, Lincoln seemed to be saying.