The rise of Theodore Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [12]
Men, too, feel the power of his charm. Even the bitterest of his political enemies will allow that he is “as sweet a man as ever scuttled a ship or cut a throat.”98 Senator John Spooner stormed into his office the other day “angry as a hornet” over Brownsville, and emerged “liking him again in spite of myself.” Henry James, who privately considers Roosevelt to be “a dangerous and ominous jingo,” is forced to recognize “his amusing likeability.”99
His friends are frank in their adoration. “Theodore is one of the most lovable as well as one of the cleverest and most daring men I have ever known,” says Henry Cabot Lodge, not normally given to hyperbole. Crusty John Muir “fairly fell in love” with the President when he visited Yosemite, and Jacob Riis claims the years he spent with Roosevelt were the happiest of his life.100
Yet, for all the warmth of the handshake, and the squeaking sincerity of the “Dee-lighted!” there is something automatic about that gray-blue gaze. One almost hears the whir of a shutter. “While talking,” notes the Philadelphia Independent, “the camera of his mind is busy taking photographs.”101 If Roosevelt senses the presence of somebody who is likely to be of use to him, either politically or socially, he will instantly file the photograph, and with half a dozen sentences ensure that his guest, in turn, never forgets him. Ten years later is not too long a time for Roosevelt to call upon that man, in the sure knowledge that he has a friend.102
Theodore Roosevelt’s memory can, in the opinion of the historian George Otto Trevelyan, be compared with the legendary mechanism of Thomas Babington Macaulay.103 Authors are embarrassed, during Presidential audiences, to hear long quotes from their works which they themselves have forgotten. Congressmen know that it is useless to contest him on facts and figures. He astonishes the diplomat Count Albert Apponyi by reciting, almost verbatim, a long piece of Hungarian historical literature: when the Count expresses surprise, Roosevelt says he has neither seen nor thought of the document in twenty years. Asked to explain a similar performance before a delegation of Chinese, Roosevelt explains mildly: “I remembered a book that I had read some time ago, and as I talked the pages of the book came before my eyes.”104 The pages of his speeches similarly swim before him, although he seems to be speaking impromptu. When confronted with a face he does not instantly recall, he will put a hand over his eyes until it appears before him in its previous context.105
The small hard hand relaxes its grip, and the line moves on. Guests barely have time to greet the First Lady, who stands aloof and smiling in brown brocaded satin at her husband’s elbow. She holds a bouquet of white roses, effectively discouraging handshakes. The White House’s most brilliant entertainer since Dolley Madison, Edith Kermit Roosevelt is also its most puzzlingly private. Nobody knows what power she wields over the President, but rumor says it is considerable, particularly in the field of appointments. For all his political cunning, Roosevelt is not an infallible judge of men.106
“More lively please!” an usher calls at the door of the Green Room. The velvet ropes lead on through the East Room, down a curving stairway, then out into the sunshine.107 The crowd disperses with the dazed expressions of a theater audience. There are some perfunctory remarks about the diplomatic display, but mostly the talk is about the man in the Blue Room. “You go to the White House,” writes Richard Washburn Child, “you shake hands with Roosevelt and hear him talk—and then you go home to wring the personality out of your clothes.”108
THE PRESIDENT CONTINUES to pump hands with such vigor that his last caller passes through