“How can we guarantee that?”

“Could you deploy U.S. troops near Birmingham, but not actually in the city? That would demonstrate support for the agreement. Connor and Wallace would know that if they misbehave, they will forfeit their power. But it would not give the whites the chance to renege on the deal.”

They talked it up and down for a while, and in the end that was what they decided to do.

George and a small subgroup moved to the Cabinet Room to draft a statement for the press. The president’s secretary typed it. Press conferences were usually held in Pierre Salinger’s office, but today there were too many reporters and television cameras for that room, and it was a warm spring evening, so the announcement was made in the Rose Garden. George watched President Kennedy step outside, stand in front of the world’s press, and say: “The Birmingham agreement was and is a just accord. The federal government will not permit it to be sabotaged by a few extremists on either side.”

Two steps forward, one step back, and two more forward, George thought; but we make progress.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Dave Williams had a plan for Saturday night. Three girls from his class at school were going to the Jump Club in Soho, and Dave and two other boys had said, casually, that they might meet the girls there. Linda Robertson was one of the girls. Dave thought she liked him. Most people assumed he was thick, because he always came bottom of the class in exams, but Linda talked to him intelligently about politics, which he knew about because of his family.

Dave was going to wear a new shirt with startlingly long collar points. He was a good dancer—even his male friends conceded that he had a stylish way of doing the Twist. He thought he had a good chance of starting a romance with Linda.

Dave was fifteen but, to his intense annoyance, most girls of his age preferred older boys. He still winced when he remembered how, more than a year ago, he had followed the enchanting Beep Dewar, hoping to steal a kiss, and had found her locked in a passionate embrace with eighteen-year-old Jasper Murray.

On Saturday mornings the Williams children went to their father’s study to receive their weekly allowances. Evie, who was seventeen, was given a pound; Dave got ten shillings. Like Victorian paupers, they often had to listen to a sermon first. Today Evie was given her money and dismissed, but Dave was told to wait. When the door closed, his father, Lloyd, said: “Your exam results are very bad.”

Dave knew that. In ten years of schooling he had failed every written test he had ever taken. “I’m sorry,” he said. He did not want to get into an argument: he just wanted to take his money and go.

Dad was wearing a check shirt and a cardigan, his Saturday morning outfit. “But you’re not stupid,” he said.