“No, | mean my so-called marriage is all image. Pat and | have not, you know, slept together for many years. My God, | was the President of the Unites States, and | couldn’ t even get laid by my own wife.”
“Sir, you don’ t really want to talk about this--"
“And I’ Il tell you where it started. During the Cuban Crisis in October ' 62. Boy, Kennedy sure won a helluva lot of points on that one. And it could’ ve been me confronting Khrushchev. | mean a real international shootdown, not just waving my finger at him in Safire’ s goddamn makeshift kitchen.”
“That would have been the logical extension of your Russian trip.”
“| tell you, the unspeakable frustration of not being in a position to negotiate that missile thing. | just couldn’ t get it up for Pat, plus the pressure of the California campaign was going on then too. And after we lost that election, she started talking about a divorce. We compromised with separate bedrooms.”
Suddenly | stood up, walked around my desk to where Haldeman was sitting, and | ran my hand back and forth across the top of his crewcut. | am not very physically demonstrative, but | had always wanted
to do that. Still, this was almost a spontaneous gesture.
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