The Sound of Thunder

by Taylor Caldwell

  He looked up at Harry, whose eyes had squeezed together in the intensity of his study of the young man. Gil said desperately, “It’s hard to explain. My family—they’re not poor—”

  “Look, son,” said the intuitive Harry, in a rough and brutal voice. “I can read you like a book. I wouldn’t be where I am now if I didn’t understand people without a lot of footnotes. You’re scared as hell. You’d like to be here but you’re afraid to be. You’re afraid you wouldn’t make it. And you’re afraid you’d have to be on your own. You like the nice downy nest you’ve got somewhere. If you come here, you’d be kicked out of the nest? Am I right? Looks like it, the way your face is boiling up.

  “Let’s be honest. You’ve got a real genius for light satire, with malignance seeping around its dancing edges. You could develop that, and amount to something. If you wanted to put in the time and the study. But there’s a limited market for the best of satire; we’ve got practically all the market there is. You’re no Mark Twain, one of the real humorists. Satire and humor are two different things: satire is like high piquant seasoning; humor’s got love and compassion and depth in it, as well as laughter. You’d never be a humorist. Frankly, you haven’t got the soul. So satire is your business. You’d be quite valuable here sorting it out of the stuff that pours in here. And you can go on from Mr. Thor to other characters as you meet them.”

  He half threw himself across the desk so abruptly and with such savagery that Gil involuntarily pushed back his chair. “Why in hell can’t you make up your mind?”

  Gil said, and his voice almost trembled, “My family believe—want—me to be a famous, serious writer.”

  Harry slowly straightened up. He stared at Gil with bullish antagonism. “And you don’t believe a word of what they say. You know better. You know what you are and what you can do. It isn’t enough, eh? You’re not scared of your family; you’re scared of yourself. You haven’t any belly.”

  He creaked in his chair. “You’re not a solid, really serious writer. You’re no Tolstoy. Or London, or Balzac or Dickens or Conrad, or Thackeray. When you learn that, and if it isn’t too late, write me a letter. In the meantime we’ll look over these new stories.”

  His eyes were points of fury. “Good-by,” he said.

  Gil stood up. He felt an answering fury and a deathly shame. He started out of the room just as an editor, with a green eyeshade, entered. The editor blinked at him uncertainly. “Oh, hello,” he said. But Gil pushed by him and was gone.

  “D’you know that young bastard?” asked Harry, lighting a cigarette with fingers that enraged him by trembling a little.

  “I’ve seen his picture, somewhere,” said the editor, puzzled. He pushed up his eyeshade. “Yes, I’m sure of it!” He snapped his fingers, frowned. “Why, that’s Edward Enger, the delicacy prince! C. C. Chauncey’s! What do you know about that? There’s an article about him this month in Harper’s! What’s he doing here? Trying to buy the magazine?” and he laughed.

  “You’re crazy,” said Harry. “He’s only twenty-one; he’s at Yale. Student. Get me a copy of Harper’s!”

  The magazine was brought, and the two bent over it with excitement. The article was admiring but acute. They studied the photograph, the older face, the harder, more powerful face, the more intellectual face, the sterner and more bitter face. But the strong resemblance was there, though the resolution and force were not. “Portrait in iron,” said Harry, “copied in wax.”

  They rapidly skimmed the article. The names of brothers and sister—“David Enger, famous pianist; Sylvia, promising director and producer of plays; Ralph, studying in Paris; and Gregory Enger, at Yale, majoring in English, editor of the university paper …”

  “Gregory Enger! Gil Enderson!” said Harry, and swore with mingled amusement, regret, and disgust. “I wondered why he had a box number!”

  “Shall we run a piece about him?” asked the editor. “Gil Enderson, really Gregory Enger, brother of Edward Enger? Scoop!”

  Harry considered, with deep concentration. Then he shook his head. “Hell,” he said with pity. “Want the kid to be thrown out on the street? Out of his nice warm downy nest? What’d he ever do to us?”

  Gregory, dazedly wandering in the streets in the warm New York sunshine, felt that he had drunk something too acrid for endurance. His heart beat painfully. There had been the smell and the life in The City’s offices. There was where he belonged! But he could never be there, never know it. The risk was too great—because of Ed. Ed had the money. He, Gregory, hated those who had money, the bastards!

  CHAPTER V

  When men were proud of what they had created, it was rare to find jealousy among them.

  So Edward Enger had found with S. S. Pierce’s of Boston. Years ago, when he had bought the Goeltz property, he had visited S. S. Pierce’s almost humbly. He was received with the utmost courtesy and was compelled to take many notes, so profuse and generous were the suggestions, so patient and kind were the executives, buyers, advertising men, managers, and the clerks themselves. Young, he had been despairing that he could ever approach this perfection, this influence, this pride, and the absolute faith lavished on S. S. Pierce’s by their customers. “We buy and sell nothing but the excellent,” said one of the gentlemen whom Edward interviewed. “Anything else wouldn’t be worthy of us, and it would be an offense to our friends. Quality. That’s the keynote. Customers must trust you absolutely.”

  “Caveat emptor,” Edward discovered, had no place at S. S. Pierce’s. He also found that these busy gentlemen could spare the time to sit down with him and discuss his problems and his ambitions with the most attentive sympathy. If they thought he was wrong, they said so; if he had an original idea, they applauded. He returned to Waterford with his bundle of notes and spent months studying them, to his great advantage. His pride was not hurt when customers in various big cities told him enthusiastically, “C. C. Chauncey’s reminds me so much of S. S. Pierce’s.” Rather, he was highly pleased.

  He did not want to start as modestly as his mentors had started, and therefore, after long study of the Pierce methods of merchandising, he approached George Enreich for much more than had been originally agreed upon. George had said nothing; he had gone, unknown to Edward, for his own scrutiny of the establishment in Boston. Then he had advanced the money. “You are in competition with them, my Eddie, but I have the conviction that this will not alarm or annoy them.”

  The Goeltz property had been bought. Then, to the astonishment of the people of Waterford and their ominous predictions, Edward had rebuilt the property entirely. There were six floors now, in this April of 1914, and the shop and its departments covered an area of half a block. Small old houses adjacent had been purchased, removed, and the shop extended.

  In an era of small shops and small windows Edward introduced, in Waterford, huge expanses of plate glass. He invented his distinctive labels for his shops in other cities, and for the outlets in other stores who would carry some of his products. The Waterford shop, however, was what William called The Home. It serviced all of New York State, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Ohio. Customers came from Albany and from New York City, from Buffalo and Cleveland, from Newark and Pittsburgh.

  The vast store in Waterford ran from Gelston Street to the rear on Kingman Street, and it was the wonder and pride of the city. Glass, beautiful lighting, clerks in white jackets, managers in frock coats and striped trousers, carpeting and scattered chairs for weary customers, and rest rooms “like palaces,” all mingled together to make a trip to C. C. Chauncey’s an event. There was no dark wood anywhere or dark counters or dim spots. The areas—“acres,” some people said in awe—of counters glowed with glass and light. Islands stood in inviting places, heaped with esoteric imports. There was a special “wine cellar” downstairs in a cool basement, where customers could linger over cobwebbed bottles and champagnes and liqueurs and whiskies, with a deferential and knowing clerk in attendance to advise or discreetly suggest. Big wagons stood
in line at the rear, loading and unloading, and motor vans busied themselves at the many doors. There was a special candy shop carrying only the best imported of “Chauncey brand” sweets, glacés and brittles, a honey shop, a special meats shop, a coffee shop, a tea shop, all small and beautifully decorated, off the main shop and reached through arches.

  The executive offices were on the third floor. Here business was done not only for local purchasing but for business abroad. Here letters flowed in a steady river to the C. C. Chauncey warehouse in New York, and to outlets and to out-of-town Chauncey shops. Here conferences were held between Padraig Devoe and his assistants and advertisers, and William MacFadden and his own circle. Here was the board room where Edward met with his officers once a month. Here, in offices, typewriters clacked and files slammed and clerks and stenographers bustled. Here was the heart of the enterprise. On the fourth floor was the experimental kitchen, to which visitors were invited. The other top floors were storerooms.

  Edward’s office was larger than that of his officers and was furnished in the style of his home: rich Oriental carpets, heavy velvet, and leather furniture, two chandeliers, brocaded draperies. He often worked till midnight, his big windows lighted brilliantly, while the only sounds were that of men unloading the wagons and the vans. Sometimes he would go downstairs to the silent shops, light them here and there, and simply wander, looking at everything, occasionally making reproving notes, investigating, studying. He lived only two lives, that of his family and that of his enterprise. He liked to pick up a porcelain pot of honey, with his impressive label upon it, and open it and taste it, and put it on a plain English biscuit. Sometimes he went into the kitchens and brewed himself a cup of coffee, and ate a sandwich made of his best imported English or Polish ham. He would sit, then, on a table and eat contentedly. During the day he would only descend to the shops when his buzzer sounded to indicate that a valued customer needed special attention or pampering. Otherwise, his peaceful and agreeable moments were spent alone.

  There had always been a restlessness, a seeking, an insistent quality, in him which had prevented what ordinary men fatuously called happiness. When the interviewer from Harper’s had asked him naïvely if he had had a happy childhood, he had stared at the man with amusement and irritation. “What do you mean by happy? It’s as hard, as impossible, to define as truth. If you mean, was my childhood a mélange of lollipops and ice-cream cones and picnics and songfests and children’s games and cakes and playgrounds and circuses and jumping and laughing and running aimlessly and shouting like a wild animal, and living like a wild animal instead of a human being, then I must say no. Happiness, as you define it, perhaps, can only be enjoyed by mindless creatures, by foxes and squirrels and deer and birds, and, most probably, by worms. It’s a dream world and one possibly inhabited by the feeble-minded. No thinking and reasoning creature, even a young child, would find anything stimulating in such a world. Oh, I’ve been reading the new magazines, with their insistence on ‘happy childhoods.’ What do the fools mean? There’s something wrong about this unhealthy and morbid preoccupation with children. Children are adults in the making, and they have harsh minds as well as emotions and little bodies.”

  He had paused then, and had continued. “I should say that I had an interesting childhood. I worked hard. I never regretted it; in fact, I’m grateful.”

  He believed this now, with absolute surety. He himself did not understand the heavy sense of depression that fell on him when he spent a few brief moments with his parents, or heard the voices of his brothers and sister, or caught the laughter, the shrill meaningless laughter, of children playing on the streets. He occasionally suffered from what he had designated as “stomach trouble,” and would impatiently swallow soda mints (a specialty of C. C. Chauncey’s) or aspirin tablets. Sometimes the pain in the region of his chest became almost unbearable. He never consulted a doctor.

  The interviewer from Harper’s asked about his lack of a wife. Edward had smiled. “I’m too busy,” he had replied. He did not speak, of course, of the current lady who lived in the best hotel in New York and whose expenses he paid and for whom he bought jewelry and furs. She sometimes met him in Albany, but never in Waterford. He was getting tired of her, though she was young, entertaining, and pretty. She had been his friend for almost six months now, and it was time for a change.

  He was alone, this warm late April night, in his office. It was nearly ten o’clock. The broad windows stood open, and the air was like balm, sweet and languishing. Edward’s big mahogany desk was neatly piled with letters and pamphlets. The chandeliers moved and swayed gently in the gusts of a fresh breeze. They cast reflections, like pale ghosts of themselves, on the paneled walls. A wagon or two rumbled on the way home. Street lights blinked outside. Then there was a far complaining of approaching thunder, and all at once lightning flashed and the sound of the breeze quickened to wind.

  Edward never could recall at what precise instant he thought suddenly of suicide, not vaguely, but with power and compelling force.

  The instant before he had been preoccupied with an important decision. He had made the decision and he had known it was good. He had also known that he was hungry, even after the plenteous dinner at home. He had decided to visit the experimental kitchens and treat himself to his best brand of coffee and some spiced imported meat in a sandwich. He had contemplated the idea with pleasure.

  And then, without warning, he had thought of suicide, and had leaned back in his chair and had considered it simply. Why? he asked himself curiously. The impulse became more demanding. It was like a command which must be obeyed. Objectively, he examined the idea, coldly and analytically. Debts? Of course, they were mountainous, but they could be overcome in time. Health? It was superb. Disappointments? No. David’s agent had just jubilantly written him that the Carnegie engagement was assured, and that David had just received an offer from Albany, where he would play on April twenty-third, tomorrow. The rest of the family? With the exception of Sylvia, all was well. Business? It had never been better, even in these days when there was an uneasy feeling abroad, everywhere, a kind of formless premonition of disaster. Within a month he would open two new shops in other cities. He came back, in his thoughts, to his family.

  Sylvia, whom he disliked more than he disliked the other members of the family, could not be the cause of this command to die, a command not accompanied by any despondency or despair or hopelessness. He considered Sylvia for a moment. Only he knew the real cause of her sudden illness and collapse, and he would not speak of it even to her. Padraig Devoe had married Mrs. Maggie McNulty in Buffalo over a month ago. Damn it, he had been disappointed, but it was Padraig’s business and not his. He was positive, too, that Padraig had never once suspected that Sylvia loved him. There was no guile in Padraig. After the marriage, upon which Padraig had sent him a quiet telegram, Padraig had completed his business and had returned to his apartment in New York, and his offices in the importing branch of C. C. Chauncey’s. Edward had wired his congratulations and had ordered an expensive gift for the couple. But Sylvia had suddenly collapsed and had been forced to go to bed. A specialist from Albany had been called for her. He could not understand that mute white anguish, that silent torment, that speechless misery. He had concluded that Sylvia was too thin, that her health was frail, that she had been working too hard, that she must rest and then travel.

  Edward had proposed a trip to Europe. Sylvia, whose face was as white as her pillows, had only moved her head weakly in refusal, had then turned her face to her brother. The agonized and malign accusation had stood like a fire, for a few moments, in her dark eyes. You! said her eyes. You! You’ve done this to me! Edward had understood the accusation. His first impulse had been to curse, deride, and turn away with contempt. He wanted to say to his sister, “What have you, you wretched scrawny thing, you egotistic thing, in comparison with Maggie McNulty, who looks and acts and speaks and laughs like a woman? She has importance, presence, fame. But more than any
thing else she’s a woman, a warm armful, a woman who loves to live.”

  He had lived all his life in an atmosphere in which his parents and his brothers and sister had either silently or openly accused him. He had felt defensive until he was fourteen. Then the accusations had alternately angered and amused him. They had become insignificant, finally. He had come to the true conviction that the strong are invariably accused by the weak, and that such accusations arose from a sense of guilt or inadequacy, and that to understand this was to destroy pride and self-love, intolerable to a man’s spirit, even if that man was a weakling. To bear the guilt or inadequacy at all, men must find a scapegoat on whom to heap their faults of character, or their secret flaws of personality or performance or sin.

  Edward had not said or done what he had been impelled to say and do, because he had suddenly pitied Sylvia as well as despised her. It had been a long time since he had pitied anyone, for the years had contracted his warmth and emotional responses to a small nugget of iron, impervious and resistive. So his pity for Sylvia had so surprised him that he had left her room hastily. He was afraid that he might relent, might offer sympathy. That would be disastrous for Sylvia. So long as she believed no one was aware of her love for Padraig she would survive. “Men have died, and worms have eaten them,” thought Edward cynically, “but not for love!”

  In the last few days Sylvia had begun to listen to her parents’ urging that she go to Europe “for a rest.” She had commenced to eat again, and even to read. When Edward visited her room, she spoke to him curtly and averted her eyes, but her words were polite if listless. Padraig was due in town in a few days, and he must be prevented from coming to this house. It was a nuisance, but there it was.

  It was not Sylvia, or anyone else, or anything else, which had commanded Edward to die. It had surged inexorably up in him like an imperious mandate, without sound or pain or desolation. It was simply there, a fact. He was not afraid of it, and did not shrink from it. All at once it seemed the completely sensible and intelligent thing to do. Everything else in the world became two-dimensioned, faceless, colorless, without flavor. It was not that he felt distaste or repugnance or weariness for his life. He liked his life. But in comparison it was nothing to this darkly secret urge to die.