"Just as there are undoubtedly things you could learn from me." Russell stared at Santos and then, with the air of a man confiding a great secret, went on. "I know about the universe, you know."
Santos stared at Russell, as if seeing the man for the first time, and blinked, trying to collect his thoughts beneath the gaze of a man who was suddenly staring at him with a tele-evangelist's intensity. What the hell was Bingo Bob on about? "You know about...the universe?"
Russell rose, his hands behind his back, and began to pace, looking out the window at the city below. "When I was a boy, I was crazy about flying saucers. I read Galaxy, Astounding, all the sci-fi magazines, I saw every sci-fi movie at the old moviehouse in Grand Junction - my old man thought I'd flipped my lid." Russell smiled, his usual aw-shucks demeanor returning. "When I was thirteen, I heard that there were lights in the sky over by the old silver mine - so of course I snuck out there with a flashlight and tried to see it." He smiled. "Kids! Anyway, the next thing I know, there's a big silvery saucer hovering overhead and pulling me inside."
Santos laughed - and suddenly realized, with horror, that Russell wasn't joking. It wasn't that he was afraid of Bingo Bob - a man a decade his senior and inches of height and pounds of muscle lesser, but he realized that Russell had been this close to the Presidency, and this close to the nomination, the whole time. He should have gotten up and made an excuse to leave - but somehow the urgency on Russell's face froze him in his seat. "What happened after that?"
"Oh, they took me into their spaceship and told me things. Amazing, terrible things about the universe." Russell returned to his spot next to Santos, his hands folded before him. "How the universe centers around the United States government - and how if you want to be anybody in this world, you need to go into politics. But that wasn't the best part. They told me how the universe works!" He laughed, no. nearly chortled in his joy. "Let's be men here, Matt. I'm not the sharpest man, or the most charismatic man - but I've succeeded in politics because I know how the universe operates."
"I...okay," said Santos, finally making a decision and rising to his feet. "Listen, this is a very important conversation to me, but I need to give Josh a call to let him know how things are going - do you mind if I use your telephone?"
The Vice-President bolted to his feet, color high in his cheeks. "What's my wife's name, Matt?!" Russell stared at Santos, a look of sudden, desperate urgency on his lined face.
Santos blinked - and was struck by the sudden, unsettling realization that he couldn't remember the name of Bob Russell's wife! Russell seemed to pick up on his hesitation and moved towards him, speaking slowly and calmly, and Santos realized that Russell was trying to calm _him_ down. "She's the Second Lady of the United States and the wife of a major Presidential candidate. Why wouldn't you know this? I'll tell you why. _Because that's not how the universe works._" He stepped back, having drawn too close to Matt for his comfort. " My wife's name is Karen, by the way. Sit down, won't you, Matt?"
To his surprise, Santos sat - and listened to Russell speak.
"...I just couldn't think of how to do it!" Russell was walking back and forth in front of Santos, still wearing those ridiculous boots, gesticulating with more energy than Santos could ever remember seeing from him on the stump. "I did everything the aliens suggested, had my own chain of theaters by the time I was forty, all up and down western Colorado, but nothing was working! Armstrong and Crandall had approval ratings through the roof, and Johnson was five years younger than _me_, he was never going to retire! And then I remembered what they told me."
"That...the universe likes a scrappy underdog?", said Santos carefully, repeating some of the advice that Russell's friends had given him.
Russell looked at Santos for a moment, realizing that he honestly had no idea what was going on his colleague's head, then decided to continue anyway - unburdening his secrets "YES!" Russell clapped his hands together. "So I realized - there I was in the middle of western Colorado, right in the heart of the Sagebrush Rebellion. That area is as Republican as the day was long - everyone there thinks that Democrats are a bunch of Communists out to steal their sheep. So what better way to get elected to office against an entrenched incumbent like Johnson than run as a Democrat? No one would ever believe a Democrat could win office in western Colorado - so what better way to win? So I ran against Johnson as a Democrat, played up the folksy outsider bit, and what do you know? There I was, on my way to Washington!"
"I have to admit," conceded Santos, "I used to wonder why you weren't a Republican. You're not that different from someone like Vinick."
"Oh, don't get me started on that guy!" declared Russell, pointing somewhere in the direction of the likely Republican Presidential nominee. "Have you ever listened to Vinick speak? Really speak? The man is a Rockefeller Republican who somehow walked out of a time machine and into the Senate - and then into the Presidential nomination?! Pfah!" Russell scratched his chin. "I wondered about that, you know - why would the universe let the Republicans nominate someone like Vinick, who doesn't even believe half the things Republicans believe. Until I realized something, just the other day." He snapped his fingers. "The universe. Loves. DEMOCRATS!" He raised his arms like a preacher pronouncing Hallelujah.
Santos thought about that, then said, "Don't you mean the universe loves liberalism? I mean, if both the Democratic and Republican nominees are liberals, that's gotta be a sign of where it stands."
"Yes yes, of course," said Russell, waving his hand. "The universe wants Democrats to win, but just in case, it wants a Republican they can root for, just so the contest between them looks interesting. If you had some conservative fundie, who wanted to ban abortions and put prayer in every school in America, then the election would be _boring_ because we all know who would win!"
"Have you talked to your staff about this?"
"My staff! Ugh, biggest mistake of my life…" Russell dropped back into the chair next to Santos. "I thought I had it all figured out." He leaned forward, ticking points off on his fingers. "You take a smart young man who's been under the thumb of the older generation, you pair him off with a smart young woman who's been jerked around by her boss from the beginning, and bam -" he snapped his fingers. "Instant chemistry!" He put his hand to his chin reflectively. "But no, it didn't work. The universe didn't care at all."
"Well," said Santos, his tone low and thoughtful. "Maybe that means you don't know how the universe works." He made a mental note to edit this part of the conversation out if he ever spoke to Joshua Lyman about it. "If you were wrong about the universe, uh, wanting your staff members to become romantically involved, what else have you been wrong about?"
"I thought for sure Bartlett was going to die," admitted Russell. "I know, I know, that makes me sound like a ghoul - but I thought oh, well, the universe loves drama, so they're going to kill him off and have this untested, scrappy underdog President come into power. That's why I tried to yuk it up with those people working for him, so we'd have a good relationship when I got in. That's not going to happen now, there'd be no point in making me President for a year. The universe loves Jed Bartlett. I knew he was going to get the nomination, you know, the moment he got into the race eight years ago. Think about it, Matt…"
Russell found a sheet of scrap paper in his pocket and began doodling - Santos could see heavy lines on the sheet, suggesting that Russell had done a lot of doodling on the hotel scratchpad. "The Democratic Party's coalition is made up of blacks, Mexicans-uh, Hispanics," he said at Santos's look, "women, your more liberal Catholics. It was ridiculous to think that somebody like Jed Bartlett, the governor of a tiny state that's almost all white, whose primary base of support is college professors and dairy farmers, would get the nomination - what, he gives good speeches? He's honest? He's a man of virtue?" Russell threw back his head and laughed heartily - a little too long and loud for Santos' comfort.
"But they did nominate him," Santos reminded Russell, if only to keep the man from laughing any more. "So what happened?"
"Universe loves him," said Russell tersely. "Universe loves a scrappy underdog - and it loves him the most. Only way to explain how he magically overcomes party politics, money, demographics. I've tried to figure out why - it must be something about the man. He's a New Englander, he's educated, he's loyal to his wife...it's like he's the opposite of Hoynes, but Hoynes isn't quite right either. It's like looking at a reflection but not being able to see the real thing...and look at you, Matt! Nobody even heard your name until a few years ago - but now you're about to be nominated for Vice-President of the United States! The universe loves underdogs, and longshots - and it likes to add multiculturalism." He shook his head. "Anyway, Congressman...you won't tell anyone this, right? I haven't told a soul since Lionel Tribbey, and we all know what happened to him."
"Of course not," said Santos, rising to his feet. "You know, I really do need to call Josh Lyman - and my wife, while I'm at it." He hesitated a moment, then shook Russell's hand. "I'll call you tomorrow morning about the VPship. Thank you for speaking with me, Mr. Vice-President. It's been...enlightening."
Later, in his office, Santos gave Josh Lyman a much-abbreviated version of his conversation with Russell. After some consideration, he'd decided to keep the Vice-President's unique perspective under his hat for the time being. Forcing a resignation would only cause a scandal - and he was still stung, deep in his conscience, by his hasty words about Deborah Baker. "So I just don't think I'm going to do it. I can't let that man be President. I know that may make things difficult, but everything will be all right." He smiled. "The universe loves an underdog, right?"