Frank Herbert - Committee Of The Whole

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Committee of the Whole

Frank Herbert, 1965

Chapter I

With an increasing sense of unease, Alan Wallace studied his client as they neared the

public hearing room on the second floor of the Old Senate Orace Building. The guy was too

relaxed.

'Bill, I'm worried about this,' Wallace said. 'You could damn well lose your grazing rights here

in this room today.'

They were almost into the gantlet of guards, reporters and TV cameramen before Wallace

got his answer.

'Who the hell cares?' Custer asked.

Wallace, who prided himself on being the Washington-type lawyer - above contamination

by complaints and briefs, immune to all shock - found himself tongue-tied with surprise.

They were into the ruck then and Wallace had to pull on his bold face, smiling at the press,

trying to soften the sharpness of that necessary phrase:

'No comment. Sorry.'

'See us after the hearing if you have any questions, gentlemen,' Custer said.

The man's voice was level and confident.

He has himself over-controlled, Wallace thought. Maybe he was just joking ... a graveyard

joke.

The marble-walled hearing room blazed with lights. Camera platforms had been raised above

the seats at the rear. Some of the smaller UHF stations had their cameramen standing on the

window ledges.

The subdued hubbub of the place eased slightly, Wallace noted, then picked up tempo as

William R. Custer - 'The Baron of Oregon' they called him - entered with his attorney, passed

the press tables and crossed to the seats reserved for them in the witness section.

Ahead and to their right, that one empty chair at the long table stood waiting with its aura

of complete exposure.

' Who the hell cares?'

That wasn't a Custer-type joke, Wallace reminded himself. For all his cattle-baron pose,

Custer held a doctorate in agriculture and degrees in philosophy, math and electronics. His

western neighbors called him 'The Brain'.

It was no accident that the cattlemen had chosen him to represent them here.

Wallace glanced covertly at the man, studying him. The cowboy boots and string tie added

to a neat dark business suit would have been affectation on most men. They merely accented

Custer's good looks - the sun-burned, windblown outdoorsman. He was a little darker of hair

and skin than his father had been, still light enough to be called blonde, but not as ruddy and

without the late father's drink-tumescent veins.

But then young Custer wasn't quite thirty.

Custer turned, met the attorney's eyes. He smiled.

'Those were good patent attorneys you recommended, Al,' Custer said. He lifted his

briefcase to his lap, patted it. 'No mincing around or mealy-mouthed excuses. Already got this

thing on the way.' Again, he tapped the briefcase.

He brought that damn' light gadget here with him? Wallace wondered. Why? He glanced at

the briefcase. Didn't know it was that small ... but maybe he's just talking about the plans for

it.

'Let's keep our minds on this hearing,' Wallace whispered. 'This is the only thing that's

important.'

Into a sudden lull in the room's high noise level, the voice of someone in the press section

carried across them: 'greatest political show on earth.'

'I brought this as an exhibit,' Custer said. Again, he tapped the briefcase. It did bulge

oddly.

Exhibit? Wallace asked himself.

It was the second time in ten minutes that Custer had shocked him. This was to be a

hearing of a subcommittee of the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee. The issue was

Taylor grazing lands. What the devil could that ... gadget have to do with the battle of words

and laws to be fought here?

'You're supposed to talk over all strategy with your attorney,' Wallace whispered. 'What the

devil do you ... '

He broke off as the room fell suddenly silent.

Wallace looked up to see the subcommittee chairman, Senator Haycourt Tiborough, stride

through the wide double doors followed by his coterie of investigators and attorneys. The

senator was a tall man who had once been fat. He had dieted with such savage abruptness

that his skin had never recovered. His jowls and the flesh on the back of his hands sagged.

The top of his head was shiny bald and ringed by a three-quarter tonsure that had purposely

been allowed to grow long and straggly so that it fanned back over his ears.

The senator was followed in close lock step by syndicated columnist Anthony Poxman who

was speaking fiercely into Tiborough's left ear. TV cameras tracked the pair.

If Poxman's covering this one himself instead of sending a flunky, it's going to be bad,

Wallace told himself.

Tiborough took his chair at the center of the committee table feeing them, glanced left and

right to assure himself the other members were present.

Senator Spealance was absent, Wallace noted, but he had party organization difficulties at

home, and the Senior Senator from Oregon was, significantly, not present. Illness, it was

reported.

A sudden attack of caution, that common Washington malady, no doubt. He knew where

his campaign money came from ... but he also knew where the votes were.

They had a quorum, though.

Tiborough cleared his throat, said: 'The committee will please come to order.'

The senator's voice and manner gave Wallace a cold chill. We were nuts trying to fight this

one in the open, he thought. Why 'd I let Custer and his friends talk me into this? You can't

butt heads with a United States senator who's out to get you. The only way's to fight him on

the inside.

And now Custer suddenly turned screwball.

Exhibit I

'Gentlemen,' said Tiborough, 'I think we can ... that is, today we can dispense with

preliminaries ... unless my colleagues ... if any of them have objections.'

Again, he glanced at the other senators - five of them. Wallace swept his gaze down the

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Frank Herbert - Committee Of The Whole

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