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Chapter I: Northern Shambhalla

“I have been thinking of you holding the casket- the sacred, most precious casket. And I have thought of the New Country going forth to meet the seven stars and under the sign of the three stars. And I have thought of the admonition 'Await the Stone.' We await the Stone and we welcome you again to this glorious land of destiny. We think of the people of Northern Shambhalla and the hastening feet of the successor of Buddha and the Lightning flashes and the breaking of the New Day."

August 1, 1940

Henry Agard Wallace. The new Vice President now that Cactus Jack had been booted off the ticket. A liberal and a weird one at that. A lot for the press to dig into. In fact, they'd already begun. Mencken could smell it in the air.

The Hearst man didn't even wait for Henry to ask for questions. He just yelled his question across the press room. "Mr. Wallace, do you repudiate the Guru letters?" The Hearst man grinned as Henry Wallace did much the opposite. Mencken pricked his ears up.

"I won't talk to a Hearst stooge." Funny, Mencken thought, Iowans are usually nicer.

"So you won't say if these letters are real?"

"You're a Hearst stooge."

Mencken could already see the mistakes. He was letting this hack get him worked up.

"You won't repudiate your occult fascination, Mr. Wallace?" Another Hearst man, of course.

"I won't talk to a Hearst stooge." Wallace just shook his head and looked down to his podium. He hadn't expected this. He wasn't much of a politician. More of a dreamer. Probably what got him in trouble. Everyone in the press room could spell blood. Everyone jumped in on him.

A chorus of "You won't say-!" Wallace looked up from his podium, suddenly alight with some passion.

"I won't say anything of the sort! What I will say is this: American fascism won't have jackboots, it will have the typewriter! It will come in the shape of men like you!" The room wasn't really silent for that, but the sheer power of the man on stage seemed to muffle everyone else. Finally, Mencken raised his head above the crowd. The Sage of Baltimore was standing and everyone noticed it.

"Am I a stooge or a fascist, Mr. Wallace?"

The power was gone, and Wallace loosened up. Still looked as if he was about to die.

"No, I wouldn't consider you anybody's stooge."

"Now, Mr. Wallace we've all written love letters to make us blush in more sober times......Do you repudiate the letters the stooges refer to, Mr. Wallace?" Mr. Wallace looked to show some anger for a moment. An imbecile hard even to fathom...... just say yes or no and make it a story in the margins....... Wallace grinned, for God knows what reason. "I will handle that in my own time."

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Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Edward J. Flynn and Stephen Early sat in the smoking room of the White House residence. There was only a lone light in the room as they waited silently for the guest. Then in came the Iowan, his heavy, dull footsteps letting them know his approach. Early and Flynn turned towards him as he walked in.

"Mr. Wallace." Roosevelt didn't move from his chair, didn't pause in his smoking, didn't move to look at his running mate. "Do you know why you're here?"

Henry Wallace shook his head and said no. That word hung in the air for a minute as Roosevelt twirled the smoke from his cigar before him.

Roosevelt spun in his chair with a cruel look on his normally gentle features. "You don't know! You don't know! Just shows you're too much of a damn fool to have even ended up here!" Wallace leaned back, shocked to see Roosevelt so.... perturbed, especially towards him.

"Ed, tell Mr. Wallace why he is here."

Flynn was the head of the Democratic National Committee, another New Yorker just like FDR. "Mr. Wallace, you are being asked to resign as the Democratic nominee for the vice-presidency of the United States."

"Why?" Wallace said, with an innocent, idiotic look on his face. Roosevelt tried to stand at that but quickly sat back down, red faced from anger and the effort. "Why, Mr. Wallace? Because you're a damned fool, thats why. D'you know who I just got off the telephone with?" Roosevelt didn't let him respond, his cigar almost falling from his mouth. "Of course you don't, you're too much of a damned fool!"

Early cut in over the president. "George Gallup. He says we lost five points against that barefoot lawyer. Says we'll lose even more when the man rants about it. Maybe lose more after that if the mustache gets hold of it too. All because of you."

Wallace took that in for a moment. They can't get rid of me, I have the liberals, I have the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party, I have the students and the..... "You need me on the ticket and- Labor won't stand for Garner." Wallace said reflexively.

"Who ever said anything about Garner?" Roosevelt smiled. If John Nance Garner opened his mouth over this...... "Now keep your mouth shut, Wallace. You are going to resign tomorrow, as nominee and Secretary and you are going to hightail it out of Washington if you ever want a job in this country again."

"Who's replacing me, Mr. President?"

"It doesn't matter, Wallace. You're out."

"I have a right to-" Roosevelt leaned forward to interrupt. "You have no rights in my party or my administration, Mr. Wallace. You serve at my discretion. Now, get out and go."

Wallace stood up, tears nearly in his eyes. He wasn't a politician, that was for sure. How did Roosevelt not realize that earlier?

After he left the room, Flynn turned to the President. "So who's replacing him?" Roosevelt gave a smile.

"I don't know. Maybe John Nance Garner." Edward Flynn hoped that was a joke.

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"Clyde..... you're the only man I can trust in these matters." J. Edgar Hoover tousled his hair and fidgeted behind his desk. "You know what we've had the boys doing, right?"

"Yeah, John." Clyde Tolson just stared at his boss's desk- his alter ego's desk. Hoover got up from his desk, pulling his chair out abruptly, and began to pace. "I know Tom Dewey. I like Tom Dewey."

"I know, John."

"He asked me to do this." Hoover let out a long sighing breath. "Its only a security policy. If Roosevelt pulls it dirty, I have enough for Dewey to get dirty too."

Hoover strolled over to his desk and sat down again. "I don't care if I'm caught. Roosevelt can't fire me. Or you, Clyde."

Or me. Clyde noticed that he was only an afterthought. Thats what he was to J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI. An afterthought.
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