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Disturbed by the loud chatter outside, Leo and Bartlet came out of their offices at almost exactly the same moment. Seeing Sam sitting on the floor, pigeon in his lap, worm in hand, Leo called angrily: ‘I thought I told you to take that damn bird outside, Sam.’ The chorus of reaction to his suggestion made him even more cross. And the sight of the President walking towards the alcove made him uneasy. He stood in the doorway to his office as Bartlet approached the crowd of people. ‘Sam, what you got there?’ ‘POTUS pigeon, Sir.’ Immediately, Sam realised that what he had just said was probably very, very disrespectful. Knowing that he was using the President’s secret service acronym was bad enough. But now Bartlet knew that they’d named a bird after him. A sick bird at that. ‘Why?’ ‘He’s got a broken wing, Sir…’ The President wasn’t sure whether to be angry or amused. ‘Sam, this isn’t a veterinary clinic. And sitting there isn’t helping Toby with my speech for tomorrow’s dinner thing, is it?’ ‘No Sir.’ ‘Leave it alone. You don’t want it to get stressed. Birds are very sensitive to stress, you know.’ There was a silent collective groan from the people around Sam as a Bartlet lecture on bird stress levels loomed. Within moments, they had all melted away, leaving Sam with the pigeon sitting on his knee. ‘Yes Sir.’ Sam lifted the bird back into the box and covered it with the sheet. As he walked past Leo’s office, Sam saw Josh, smirking, sitting on the edge of Leo’s desk. The smirk faded as Leo snapped: ‘Get your ass off my desk Josh. There must be a dozen chairs in here.’ Strengthened by rest and food, the pigeon began to get restless by late afternoon. When Sam uncovered the box, lifting the pigeon out, it half-flapped, half-fell onto the floor and began to walk about. Sam watched it for a few seconds, then got up to retrieve it. This proved to be a harder task than Sam anticipated. ‘Cathy!’ After a few minutes of fruitless chasing, having to tell everyone who walked in to: ‘Mind POTUS!’ Sam decided he needed help to catch the bird. Within a few more minutes, it became clear that, lacking a net of any kind, catching the bird was going to be almost impossible. What it lacked in flight, it made up for in running ability. Eventually, disturbed a second time by the noise outside their offices, both Leo and the President stood in their doorways. They watched, exchanging occasional amused and slightly annoyed glances as some of the brightest minds in the land were repeatedly outwitted. By a flightless pigeon. Ron called across: ‘Want me to shoot it, Sir?’ He was surprised by the vehemence of Josh’s anger. ‘Ron! You want to use the bird for target practice? What kind of person are you?’ Sam stopped chasing POTUS and looked across. ‘What did you just say?’ Josh stared at the floor. ‘Well, after all it’s been through, you can’t just…’ Realising everyone was either staring or laughing at him, Josh went back into Leo’s office and slammed the door. Apparently startled by the sudden loud noise, the pigeon stopped. It seemed to look round the room, then dropped to the floor. Sam rushed to pick it up, cradling it in his arms. ‘It’s okay, POTUS, don’t be scared. Uncle Josh was being nice. Really.’ Exchanging a ‘does that man really write world-class speeches?’ look, Leo and the President went back into their offices. But not before Leo had called across to Sam: ‘If that thing’s still in here in an hour, I’ll let Ron take care of it.’ Sam took the bird outside, lifting it out of the box. He looked around the Rose Garden. ‘I started a hole just here. There were a load of worms just a little way down.’ He lifted the plastic water dish out of the box and laid it next to the patch of scraped earth. Then he walked back inside, just in time to hear Josh’s disgusted comment: ‘What the Hell happened in my sandwich box?’
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