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He looked at Senator Thomas, who's a good Mormon, and the Senator came forward. The Pope had these rosaries in his hand, several of them, and he said to the Senator, ‘Usually the black ones are for the gentlemen and the white ones are for ladies, ordinarily--which will you have?'
“The Senator looked embarrassed. He said, ‘I would like to have both, thank you.'
“So the Pope gave him the two, looking as though this had slightly amused him, you see.”
I think Otis was the next person coming up, and the Pope said, “Would you like two, also?”
Otis said, “No, no! just a black one, thank you.”
So the episode passed. I only learned this end of the tale from Otis just a few years ago when I happened to tell him about the night the Senator asked me to go to Rome.
It was a kind of irresponsibility that Senators--I don't think they're all subject to it, but travelling Congressmen are very subject to that kind of irresponsibility. They don't stay with the job. They're very likely to fly off, and they expect you to write them a speech and then they read the speech all right without any digesting of the content.
At any rate, the Senator got back from Rome. They stayed another day, I think, looking around and seeing the sights. They got back from Rome just the day after the conference had adjourned, and we were all making our preparations
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