Page 132 of Jackie

I pause. Bobby still doesn’t trust him. Just yesterday he called Johnson “the usurper.”

“You’ve never liked him,” I said. “But we weren’t always fair. We ridiculed him.”

“He never knew.”

“It was still awful.”

Bobby looked at me, his eyes level. “I won’t let him take credit for what Jack did.”

“He and Lady Bird have been kind to me, and I am grateful. They’re going to let the White House school stay open so Caroline and her friends can finish the year.”

“He wants your support. Ask him to rename Cape Canaveral after Jack. Jack would’ve wanted that.”

“Jack wouldn’t want me to ask.”

“He dreamed of putting an American on the moon. Renaming Canaveral is a way to say that.”

Then, because it is Bobby, I agree.

—

I learn that the caparisoned horse is called Black Jack. The night after Caroline’s birthday, I write to the secretary of the Army to inform him I’d like to buy that horse when it is retired.

…

Thanksgiving Day. We go to visit Jack at Arlington, then fly to Hyannis Port.

Rose meets us downstairs. “I have to keep busy,” she says. “I can’t stop praying.”

I go to find Joe. He is in his room, waiting for me. This man who cannot move or walk, can barely speak. The ambassador. The king. The maker of legends. We were all so certain then. His face brightens when I come in. I sit in a chair by his bed, hold his hand, and I tell him the story of his son’s death. I talk around the gap of time where my mind is still scrubbed out.

I tell him that Bobby and I will make good decisions about Jack’s library. I tell him they want me to tell the story, not just of Jack’s death but his life, because if we don’t tell it, others will, and those others might tear him apart and try to dismantle his legacy. So they’re asking me to do this. We’ve chosen a writer named William Manchester to create an official account. I ask Joe if he remembers Manchester and that other book he wrote, Portrait of a President, the one Jack liked.

I stare at the bureau as I tell Joe these things, tracing the knobs and inlay, whorls of wood through the lacquered finish.

Joe makes a little sound. Tears flood his face.

“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I’ve said too much, haven’t I? You see, there is just so much in me right now, and I feel you should know everything. I want to make sure this all makes sense to you.”

His eyes search mine and, in his eyes, I can see that for him, as for me, everything is meaningless now.

…

The morning after Thanksgiving, I call Theodore White and arrange an interview.

“I will do this,” I tell Bobby. “I’ll do all these things you’re asking me to do, because that’s what Jack would want. But when it’s over, I need to disappear.”

—

Theodore White arrives that night in a heavy rain. I sit on the low sofa. He sits across from me.

“How can I help you?” I say.

He reminds me we spoke in the morning on the phone. I called and asked him to come.

“I will tell you the story,” I say.

—

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