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Martin's support of Dewey was well known. But he had agreed in open caucus with his Pennsylvania rival, Governor Jim Duff, who was an anti-Dewey and pro-Vandenberg man, to hold the state's delegates together indefinitely and wait for some strategic moment to make their bargain. Now Ed Martin posed, sitting on a sofa, with his arm snugly around a smiling Tom Dewey. Dewey aides announced a press conference for later in the day; the rumor spread that not only Ed Martin but New Jersey's Governor Driscoll would be there. The wise guys said: "There goes the ball game."
Downstairs in the ballroom, the Dewey camp continued to present its bland and beckoning front to the world. While the opposition gnashed its teeth, the Dewey camp staged a fashion show. Delegates' wives sat on gilt chairs, an orchestra played lively airs and a squad of models paraded summer and fall clothes. Crooned Mrs. Edward J. MacMullan, arbiter of Philadelphia society and mistress of ceremonies: "Here you may feast your eyes on the world of fashion . . . Her bathing suit is white Lastex which fits like a second skin . . . This delectable creature is wearing the sort of dress of which we ask, 'Do we have a good time in it?' Get it?"
"No Deals." Sixteen floors up in the Rose Room, some 400 photographers, radiomen, television men and newsmen assembled for the Dewey press conference. Dewey walked in—a small, compact, aggressive man. For the space of five solid minutes, while photographers shot him, radiomen adjusted microphones, moviemen flapped their arms around his head in signals, he held his mouth in a radiant, frozen smile. "How do you feel, Governor Dewey?" In an emphatic baritone, pausing after each word, he said: "I feel swell."
Dewey told newsmen little they wanted to know. He used the moment for its psychological effect on the enemy. He exuded victory. Delegations had been calling on him all day. He rolled off a list: Oklahoma, Maine, Alabama, Indiana, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Oregon, Wyoming, Rhode Island. It was probably the high point of the war of nerves. "I have no understandings, arrangements, bargains or deals with anyone in the United States for anything," he said.
On Wednesday four more blows fell on the bewildered opposition. Halleck announced that he would indeed deliver Indiana. Driscoll announced for Dewey, although his delegation was split. Senator James P. Kem came out of the Missouri woods, rushing for the Dewey camp. And right at his heels was Governor Robert Bradford of Massachusetts.
That night, having done all he could, Tom Dewey and his handsome wife, the former Frances Hutt of Sapulpa, Okla., settled down in their dignified hotel room, with its mulberry walls and rose drapes, to listen to the nominating speeches on television. The Governor was quite composed.
Companions in Distress. What, through all this, was happening to the opposition? As early as Monday, Candidate Robert Taft had phoned Jim Duff—who was trying to hold the fort for Arthur Vandenberg—and invited him to a conference. They met at the Drake Hotel, in the penthouse apartment of John D. M. Hamilton, who was national chairman of the G.O.P. when Alf Landon was its candidate.