by Herman Wouk
But, you object, the theme of the new age is socialism. I am not so sure of that. Even so, Karl Marx, the scruffy Mohammed of this spreading economic Islam, built his strident dogmas on the theories of British economists. He created his apocalyptic visions in the hospitality of the British Museum. He read British books, lived on British bounty, wrote in British freedom, collaborated with Englishmen, and lies in a London grave. People forget all that.
The sun has set. It will get dark and cold quickly now. The intelligence officers are beckoning me to their lorry. The first stars spring forth in the indigo sky. I take a last look around at the dead of El Alamein and mutter a prayer for all these poor devils, German and British, who turn and turn about sang “Lili Marlene” in the cafes of Tobruk, hugging the same sleazy girls. Now they lie here together, their young appetites cold, their homesick songs stilled.
“Why, ‘twas a very wicked thing!”
Said little Wilhelmine.
“Nay, nay my little girl!” quoth he—
Pamela Tudsbury writes: “The telephone rang just at that moment, as my father was declaiming the verse with his usual relish. It was the summons to the interview with General Montgomery. He left at once. A lorry brought back his body next morning. As a World War I reserve officer, he was buried with honors in the British Military Cemetery outside Alexandria.
The London Observer asked me to complete the article. I have tried. I have his handwritten notes for three more paragraphs. But I cannot do it. I can, however, complete Southey’s verse for him. So ends my father’s career of war reporting—
“It was a famous victory.”
The airplane was humming above the weather now, the sky was bright blue, the sunlight blinding on the white cloud cover. Slote slumped sadly in his chair. He had come a long way from Bern, he was thinking, not only in miles but in perception. In the hothouse of the Swiss capital, under the comfortable glass of neutrality, his obsession about the Jews had sprouted like some forced plant. Now he was coming back to realities.
How could one arouse American public opinion? How get past the horselaugh of “Der Fuehrer’s Face,” the acid cynicism of Fenton? Above all, how overcome the competition of Kidney Ridge? Tudsbury’s piece was touching and evocative, describing a great slaughter; but there was no Kidney Ridge for the Jews of Europe. They were unarmed. It was no fight. Most of them did not even comprehend that a massacre was going on. Sheep going to the slaughter were uncomfortable to contemplate. One turned one’s eyes elsewhere. One had an exciting world drama to watch, a contest for the highest stakes, in which the home team was at last pulling ahead. Treblinka had small chance against Kidney Ridge.
50
IN September 1941, Victor Henry had left a country at peace, but with isolationists and interventionists in a screechy squabble, the production of munitions a trickle, despite all the “arsenal of democracy” rhetoric; the military services shuddering over Congress’s renewal of the draft by one vote; a land without rationing, with business booming from defense spending, with lights blazing at night from coast to coast, with the usual cataracts of automobiles on the highways and the city streets.
Now as he returned, San Francisco from the air spelled War; shadowy lampless bridges under a full moon, pale ribbons of deserted highways, dimmed-out residential hills, black tall downtown buildings. In the dark quiet streets and in the glare of the hotel lobby the swarms of uniforms astounded him. Hitler’s Berlin had looked no more martial.
Newspapers and magazines that he read next day on the eastbound flight mirrored the change. In the advertisements, all was bellicose patriotism. Where heroic-looking riveters, miners, or soldiers and their sweethearts were not featured in the ads, a toothy Jap hyena, or a snake with a Hitler mustache, or a bloated scowling Mussolini-like pig took comic beatings. The news columns and year-end summaries surged with buoyant confidence that at Stalingrad and in North Africa the tide of the war had turned. The Pacific was getting short treatment. Sketchy references to Midway and Guadalcanal, perhaps through the fault of the closemouthed Navy, miserably missed the scope of these battles. As for the sinking of the Northampton, Pug saw that if released the story would have been ignored. This calamity in his life, this loss of a great ship of war, would have been a dark flyspeck on a golden picture of optimism.
And it was all mighty sudden! Island-hopping across the Pacific in recent days, he had been reading in airplanes and waiting rooms scuffed periodicals of the past months. With one voice they had bemoaned the dilatory Allied war effort, the deep German advances into the Caucasus, the pro-Axis unrest in India, South America, and the Arab lands, and Japan’s march across Burma and the Southwest Pacific. Now with one voice the same journals were hailing the inevitable downfall of Adolf Hitler and his partners in crime. This civilian change of mood struck Pug as frivolous. If the strategic turn was at hand, the main carnage in the field was yet’to come. Americans had only begun to die. To military families, if not to military columnists, this was no small thing. He had called Rhoda from San Francisco, and she had told him that there was no news of Byron. In wartime, no news, especially about a son in submarines, was not necessarily good news.
His orders to BuPers and the talk with Spruance were much on his mind as the plane bounced and tossed through the wintry gray skies. The key man at the Bureau for four-striper assignments was Digger Brown, his old Academy chum. Pug had drilled the ambitious Brown, who couldn’t learn languages, through three years of German, boosting him to top grades which had raised Brown’s class standing and helped his whole career. Pug expected to be ordered back to Cincpac without trouble, for nobody in the Navy swung much more weight right now than Nimitz and Spruance; still, if there were any bureaucratic shuffling about it, he meant to look Digger Brown in the eye and tell him what he wanted. The man could not refuse him.
What about Rhoda? What could he say in the first moments? How should he act? He had been puzzling over this while he flew halfway around the globe, and the quandary was still with him.
In the dark marble-tiled foyer of the big Foxhall Road house, she wept in his arms. His bulky bridge coat was flecked with snow, his embrace was awkward, but she clung to him against the cold wet blue cloth and the bumpy brass buttons, exclaiming through sobs, “I’m sorry, oh, I’m sorry, Pug. I didn’t mean to cry, truly I didn’t. I’m so glad to see you I could DIE. Sorry, darling! Sorry I’m such a crybaby.”
“It’s all right, Rho. Everything’s all right.”
And in this first tender moment he really thought everything might turn out all right. Her body felt soft and sweet in his embrace. In all their long marriage he had seen his wife in tears only a few times; for all her frothy ways she had a streak of stoical self-control. She clutched him like a child seeking comfort, and her wet eyes were large and bright. “Oh, damn, damn, I was going to carry this off with a smile and a martini. The martini is probably still a SCRUMPTIOUS idea, isn’t it?”
“At high noon? Well, maybe, at that.” He tossed his coat and cap on a bench. She led him hand in hand into the living room, where flames leaped in the fireplace, and ornaments glittered on a large Christmas tree that filled the room with a smell of childhood, of family joy.
He took both her hands. “Let’s have a good look at you.”
“Madeline’s coming here for Christmas, you know,” she chattered, “and not having a maid and all, I thought I’d just buy a tree early and trim the darn thing up, and — well, well, SAY something!” She shakily laughed, freeing her hands. “This captain’s inspection is giving me the WIM-WAMS. What do you think of the old hulk?”
It was almost like sizing up another man’s wife. Rhoda’s skin was soft, clear, scarcely lined. In the clinging jersey dress her figure was as seductive as ever; if anything, a shade thin. Her hip bones jutted. Her movements and gestures were lithe, fetching, feminine. Her comic waggle often spread fingers at him when she said “WIM-WAMS” brought back her roguish charm in their first dates.
“You look marvelou
s.”
The admiring tone brought instant radiance to her face. She spoke huskily, her voice catching, “You would say that. And you look so smart! A bit grayer, old thing, but it’s attractive.”
He walked to the fire, holding out his hands. “This feels good.”
“Oh, I’m being ever so patriotic. Also practical. Oil’s a problem. I keep the thermostat down, close off most of the rooms, and burn a lot of wood. Now, you WRETCH! Why didn’t you call me from the airport? I’ve been pacing the house like a LEOPARD.”
“The booths were jammed.”
“Well, I’ve been FALLING on the phone for an hour. It kept ringing. That fellow Slote called from the State Department. He’s back from Switzerland.”
“Slote! Any news of Natalie? Or of Byron?”
“He was in a terrific hurry. He’s going to call again. Natalie seems to be in Lourdes, and —”
“What? Lourdes? France? How’d she get to Lourdes?”
“She’s with our interned diplomats and journalists. That’s all he said about her. Byron was in Lisbon, trying to get transportation back, last Slote heard. He’s got orders to new construction.”
“Well! And the baby?”
“Slote didn’t say. I asked him to dinner. And do you remember Sime Anderson? He called, too. The phone never stopped ringing.”
“The midshipman? The one who ran me all over the tennis court while Madeline giggled and clapped?”
“He’s a lieutenant commander! How about that, Pug? I declare, these days if you’ve been WEANED you’re a lieutenant commander. He wanted Madeline’s phone number in New York.”
Staring into the fire, Pug said, “She’s back with that monkey Cleveland, isn’t she?”
“Dear, I got to know Mr. Cleveland in Hollywood. He’s not a bad fellow.” At her husband’s ugly look she faltered, “Besides, she’s having such fun! And the MONEY the child makes!” The firelight was casting harsh shadows on Victor Henry’s face. She came to him. “Darling, how about that drink? I’m frankly all of a QUIVER.”
His arm went round her waist, and he kissed her cheek. “Sure. Just let me ring Digger Brown first, and find out why in hell I’m here on Class One priority.”
“Oh, Pug, he’ll only tell you to call the White House. Let’s just pretend your plane’s late and — why, what on EARTH is wrong, sweetie?”
“The White House?”
“Well, sure.” She clapped a hand to her lips. “Oh, LORDY. Lucy Brown will have my HEAD. She swore me to secrecy, but I just assumed you knew.”
“Knew what?” His tone changed. He might have been talking to a quartermaster. “Rhoda, tell me exactly what Lucy Brown told you, and when.”
“Dear me! Well — it seems the White House ordered BuPers to get you back here, p.d.q. This was early in November, before, well, before you lost the Northampton, Pug. That’s all I know. That’s all even Digger knows.”
Pug was at a telephone, dialling. “Go ahead and make that drink.”
“Dear, just don’t let on to Digger that Lucy told me. He’ll ROAST her over a slow fire.”
The Navy Department switchboard was long in answering. Victor Henry stood alone in the big living room, recovering from his surprise. The White House was still for him, as for any American, a magic expression, but he had come to know the sour aftertaste of serving a President. Franklin Roosevelt had used him like a borrowed pencil, and in the same way had dropped him; paying off, politician fashion, with the command of the unlucky California. Victor Henry bore the President no grudge. Near or far, he still regarded the masterful old cripple with awe. But he was resolved to fight off, at any cost, further presidential assignments. Those sterile shorebound exercises as flunky to the great had all but wrecked his professional life. He had to get back to the Pacific.
Digger was out. Pug went over to the fireplace and stood with his back to the blaze. He did not feel at home, yet in Janice’s cramped cottage he had. Why was that? Before going to Moscow he had spent less than three months in this house. How huge it was! What had they been thinking of, to buy such a mansion? Once again he had allowed her to chip in some of her own trust money, because she wanted to live in a style beyond his means. Wrong, wrong. There had been talk of putting up lots of grandchildren. What a bitter memory! And what were the summer slipcovers doing on the furniture in chill December, in a room smelling of Christmas? He had never liked this garish flower pattern on green chintz. Though he could feel the fire heat on his jacket, the chill in the house seemed to pierce to his marrow. Maybe it was true that serving in the tropics thinned the blood. But he could not remember feeling so cold before, on returning from Pacific duty.
“Martinis,” Rhoda announced, marching in with a clinking tray. “What about Digger?”
“Not there.”
The first sip made a fiery streak down Pug’s throat. He had not tasted alcohol in months; not since a spell of heavy self-numbing after Warren’s death. “Good,” he said, but he regretted agreeing to the martini. He might need all his wits at BuPers. Rhoda offered him a plate of open-face sandwiches, and he commented with assumed heartiness, “Hey, caviar! Really cosseting me, aren’t you?”
“You don’t remember?” Her smile was archly flirtatious. “You sent it from Moscow. An Army colonel brought me six tins, with this note from you.”
“For when we meet again,” the scrawl on shoddy Russian paper read. “Martinis, caviar, a fire, AND…especially AND…Love, Vug
It all came back to him now: the boisterous afternoon when the Harriman party had shopped in the one tourist store still functioning, in the National Hotel, months before Pearl Harbor. Pamela had vetoed all the shawls and blouses; an elegant woman like Rhoda, she had said, wouldn’t be caught dead in these tacky things. The fur hats had seemed made for giantesses. So he had bought the caviar and scrawled this silly note.
“Well, it’s damn good caviar, at that.”
Rhoda’s warm glance was inviting a pass. That much, Victor Henry had often pictured: the sea captain home from the wars, Odysseus and Penelope heading for the couch. Her voice was dulcet. “You look as though you haven’t slept for days.”
“Not all that much.” He put both palms to his eyes and rubbed. “I’ve come a long way.”
“Haven’t you ever! How does the good old U.S.A. look to you, Pug?”
“Peculiar, especially from the air at night. Solid blackout on the West Coast. Inland you begin to see lights. Peaceful blaze in Chicago. Past Cleveland they start dimming down again, and Washington’s dark.”
“Oh, that’s so typical! No consistency. This ungodly mess with shortages! All the talk about rationing! Off again, on again! You never know where you’re at. And the HOARDING that’s going on, Pug. Why, people BOAST about how clever they’ve been, piling up tires, and meat, and sugar, and heating oil, and I don’t know what all. I tell you, we’re a nation of spoiled HOGS.”
“Rhoda, it’s a good idea not to expect too much of human nature.”
The remark cut his wife short. A doubtful look, a silent moment. She put her hand on his. “Darling, do you feel like talking about the Northampton?”
“We got torpedoed and sank.”
“Lucy says most of the officers and crew were saved.”
“Jim Grigg did a good job. Still, we lost too many men.”
“Did you have a close call yourself?”
Her face was eager, expectant. In lieu of some affectionate move, for which he felt no impulse, he began to talk about the loss of his ship. He rose and paced, the words running free after a while, the emotions of the terrible night reviving. Rhoda listened shiny-eyed. When the telephone rang he halted in his tracks, staring like a wakened sleepwalker. “I guess that’s Digger.”
Captain Brown boomed heartily, “Well, well, Pug. Made it, did you? Great.”
“Digger, did you get a dispatch from Cincpac about me?”
“Look, let’s not do any business over the phone, Pug. Why don’t you and Rhoda just take it easy and
enjoy yourselves today? It’s been a long time, and so on and so forth. Heh heh! We’ll talk tomorrow. Give me a ring about nine in the morning.”
“Are you tied up today? Suppose I come down right now?”
“Well, if that’s what you want.” Pug heard his old friend sigh. “But you do sound tired.”
“I’m coming, Digger.” Pug hung up, strode to his wife, and kissed her cheek. “I’d better find out what’s doing.”
“Okay.” She cupped his face in her hands, and gave his mouth a lingering kiss. “Take the Oldsmobile.”
“It still runs? Fine.”
“Maybe you’ll get to be the President’s naval aide. That’s Lucy’s guess. Then at least we’d see something of each other for a while, Pug.”
She walked to a little desk and took out car keys. The unselfconscious pathos of Rhoda’s words got to him more than all the flirting. Alone in a cold house, bereaved of her firstborn son — whom they still hadn’t mentioned, whose picture smiled from the piano top; her husband home after more than a year away, rushing out about his business; she was being very good about all this. This sway of her slender hips was beguiling. Pug wondered at his own lack of desire for her. He had an impulse to throw off the bridge coat he was donning, and to seize her. But Digger Brown was expecting him, and she was dropping the keys into his hand with an arch little flip. “Anyway, we’ll dine at home, won’t we? Just the two of us?”
“Sure we’ll dine at home, just the two of us. With wine, I trust, and —” he hesitated, then forced a ribald lift of the eyebrows, “especially and.”
The flash in her eyes leaped across the gulf between them. “On your way, sailor boy.”