U.S. At War: Mister Speaker

(5 of 5)

In the living room, near the pink-tiled fireplace, Sam has a flat-topped, eight-legged desk, flanked by pictures of Robert E. Lee and Franklin Roosevelt. Upstairs is his den, lined with volumes of Texas history. The Rayburns live well: breakfasts of ham & eggs, biscuits and honey; lunches and dinners of fried chicken or steak, great slices of cold tomatoes and sliced Bermuda onions, cornbread and homemade jelly, and homemade ice cream cranked out in an old-fashioned freezer by Bobby, the colored cook. The steaks are from Rayburn cattle, straight from the frozen-food locker in Bonham.

When Sam is home he helps in the chores, visits in the Bonham general store, rides about the ranch to inspect his 200 white-faced cattle. Sam's favorite spot is the one-story ranch house, nestled in a grove of oak trees. Here is no telephone, no mail delivery; only a yawning fireplace, walnut beds, and electric stove for steak broiling and an old-fashioned icebox, usually filled with watermelons. Here, on the hot summer afternoons, Sam Rayburn lolls around, often in his shorts, letting the sweat roll down his bald head. Or fie inspects the solid fence-posts hewed out of bois d'arc (pronounced, in Texas, bo-dark), or sits popping huge chunks of red watermelon into his mouth from the end of a rancher's stiletto, or plays a little dominoes with his brothers. (They usually win.) At night he can sit on a rope-bottomed chair in the tall grass and gossip with his friends, while his two terriers catch cicadas and Hereford cattle low in the distance.

This is home, and Sam likes it. As he left the ranch ten days ago to return to Washington he drove to nearby Denison to board the Katy's Bhiebonnet. Driving in his tan Pontiac through the windswept streets of Denison, Sam heard the loafers under the broad store awnings call: "Good luck, Mister Sam."

Sam Rayburn needed the good wishes of all Texans—which he has 365 days a year—and then some.