The Man

Certainly, too, he had had every reason for feeling worried in recent days. The White House press room, and his own Oval Office, had been filled with nerve-racking reports about the Hurley trial, the pros and cons on the possible ba

Yet here he was, and it was not bad at all. He felt relaxed. He felt welcome among his own. The speech would likely be well received. And as for Julian, whom he had seen momentarily with the reception committee, that small, reticent boy seemed utterly miscast for the violent role that Leroy Poole had said he was playing. Yet, reconsidering the last, Dilman retained one misgiving: would Poole have dared hurl such a charge as a lie, knowing how easy it would be for him to check it out?

Suddenly, he heard the words “-give you, ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States!”

He realized that the learned, dusky face of Chancellor McKaye was turned toward him, that there was scattered applause from up front, and that his turn had come at last.

Dilman rose, accepted his degree, accepted the Chancellor’s handshake. Then, putting the beribboned degree aside, he mounted the rostrum, extracting his triple-spaced typed speech from beneath his gown, placed it on the lectern under the curve of microphones, and smiled at the unsmiling black sea stretching before him. “Chancellor McKaye, my fellow citizens-” he began, hearing not his voice but its curious echo in this building-encircled outdoor arena.

The first of the speech went well, he felt. Although Talley, Fla

Now, a little more uneasily, but keeping his voice deliberate and clear, he entered upon the controversial portion of his address. What he might say had been speculated upon in the press, on the airwaves, the entire week. Today what he said would be official. T. C.’s advisers had agreed that the a

Now, as his eyes skipped to the words ahead, his voice faltered. He was not used to a

“You are aware, also, that the Department of Justice and I have been studying evidence of the activities of these super-government, super-American societies and organizations,” he read, “composed of extremists of the right and left, of white and black, responsible for fomenting such dangerous unrest in these critical times when we must preserve unity and peace at home to maintain strength abroad.”

He held his breath, and then, leaving his deliberate ma

“Extraordinary challenges to our way of life, we have decided, must be met promptly and firmly by extraordinary countermeasures within the law. Drastic crimes against our government must be met and punished by drastic executive action. Recently, whatever its motivation, a deplorable crime occurred in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. A county judge was kidnaped and taken across two state lines, to be held for human ransom. The leader of the abduction was caught by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and is now standing trial, and his individual case will be decided, without prejudice, on its own merits. The concern of your government, however, has been with the factors behind the crime itself.”

He no longer looked up from the printed words. His gaze was directed to the carefully prepared text. He read from it with measured emphasis.

“Irrefutable evidence, examined by objective minds, has made it clear that the Federal crime was not perpetrated by irresponsible individuals, but was an act of organization policy. The abduction, we now know, was committed by the activist Turnerite Group, which has been financially backed by the Communist Party, as the first act in a premeditated strategy to subvert our laws, our country, and take the administration of justice into its own hands. Such activity ca

There was a thin crackling sound that interrupted Dilman, a sound similar to that of an eggshell breaking, and it distracted Dilman and made him lift his face to the microphones. He saw at once that it had been an egg, a raw egg that had hit the microphones, broken and splattered, now spilling its liquid yolk down upon the page of his manuscript.

Bewildered, he looked out over his audience and saw that a curious thing was happening before his eyes. The black mass, so inert, so silent, had come alive like dark amoebae breaking apart, moving, under a giant microscope lens. The rear two-thirds of the throng was surging forward, pushing and upending the faculty and dignitaries from their folding chairs on the fore part of the campus lawn.

Suddenly there were red, white and blue signs and ba

And, assaulting him like so many angry black fists, from beneath the signs, behind them, around them, he could hear a single choral chant screamed out by the infuriated horde: “Down with traitor Dilman! Down with traitor Dilman! Down with traitor Dilman!”

Petrified, eyes wide, mouth agape, Douglass Dilman saw the air suddenly filled with flying, churning objects. Dozens of eggs exploded on the platform around him, against the front of the rostrum, and then followed the rotten apples, gnawed chicken bones, chunks of red watermelon and green rinds.

The single chant, hoarse and hating, began to fragment into a hundred shouts of individual protest, shrieks di

Instinctively he recoiled at the fury of protest, lifting his arm to shield his face. He could hear police whistles, see the swaying comber of officers in blue, clubs out, bowling over the photographers, as they formed a chained line to protect him from his people. The wood platform on which he wavered now rocked with footsteps, the Chancellor, regents, deans, and Secret Service agents crowding about him to save him.