He canceled a meeting with a Congressional delegation that afternoon and went to his bedroom, a surprising move for a very fit President. He shut the large door behind him and personally drew the drapes. In a bureau drawer was a red telephone. He waited until 4:15 p.m. exactly, then picked up the receiver.

"I want to talk to you," he said.

"I've been expecting this phone call," came a lemony Voice.

"When can you get to the White House?"

"Three hours."

"Then you're not in Washington?"

"No."

"Where are you?"

"You don't need to know."

"But you do exist, don't you? Your people can perform certain extraordinary things, can't they?"

"Yes."

"I never thought I would have to use you. I had hoped I wouldn't."

"So had we," came the voice.

The President put the red phone back in the bureau drawer. His predecessor had told him about the phone one teary day the week before he resigned. It had been in this very room. The former President had been drinking heavily. His left leg rested on a hassock to ease the pain of his phlebitis. He sat on a white doughnut pillow.

"They'll kill me," said the former President. "They'll kill me and no one will care. They'd celebrate in the streets if I were dead. Do you know that? These people would kill me and everyone else would celebrate."

"That's not so, sir. There are many people who still love you," said the then Vice President.

"Name fifty-one percent," said the former President and blew his nose wetly into a tissue.

"Ever the politician, sir."

"And what do I get for it? If John Kennedy did what I did, they'd think it was a little boy's game and some sort of joke. If Lyndon Johnson did it, no one would find out. If Eisenhower did it…"

"Ike wouldn't do it," interrupted the vice president.

"But if he did."

"He wouldn't''