Allan was silent with shock. He suddenly realized that Cornelia had spoken the truth. Laura had been his ‘comforter,’ his ‘shrine.’ But Cornelia had been his love, in spite of all she had been and all she was.
“What romantics men are, no matter how old they get!” said Cornelia. “I’m sorry if I’ve just kicked over another one of your delusions, my dear. You look very shaken.”
“Let me get you another drink,” said Allan. Cornelia watched him leave the room and she laughed to herself, and lit another cigarette. When Allan returned she saw that he had put on a tie and a coat. We’re to be formal, now, she thought with amusement. Why was it that men who wished to remove themselves from personalities always put on ties and coats? Did that make them feel less vulnerable? DeWitt was vulnerable. One never saw him other than impeccably and formally dressed. Once Cornelia had asked him, during a dinner, if, like aristocratic Mohammedans, he went to bed with his wife fully clothed and with gloves on his hands.
Cornelia gave him news of the family; Allan listened politely. He had acquired only one gesture of the old: he twiddled his fingers against his thumb, as if rolling pills. “But of course, you aren’t much interested in any of your grandchildren except Alex,” said Cornelia. “And that puzzles me; you disliked Dicky so, and could never stand him.”
“You are wrong,” said Allan. He thought of that morning so long ago when he and Richard, Lord Gibson-Hamilton, had talked in the English dawn. He remembered the young Englishman so often these days; he remembered the morning light on his kind and diffident face, and the ringing assurance of his voice at the last, when he had reaffirmed his faith in God and man. “You are wrong,” repeated Allan, while Cornelia stared at him in surprise. “I loved him; I still do.”
A strange expression ran over Cornelia’s face, almost like relief. “A nice young fellow,” she commented carelessly, looking at her cigarette. For a few moments they sat in silence, both thinking of Dolores and her husband. “I wish,” said Allan, almost inaudibly, “that my brother Mike could have met him. They would have had a lot in common.”
“Oh, yes, your brother,” said Cornelia, and she smiled almost gently. “He told me so much of you, when DeWitt was ill. Too bad that he remained only a monk. He died some years ago in India, didn’t he? What makes men become missionaries, anyway? Some psychiatrist told me that they do that to compensate for some guilt in their youth, or something equally nasty.”
A gust of anger began to blow in Allan. He remembered, just in time, that his friend George Richberg had warned him to husband his anger for necessary occasions. He also remembered what his doctor had told him only a month ago. So he swallowed his rage and answered with quietness: “That’s stupid. I can’t recall a single vice in Mike. But you wouldn’t understand. There are men who prefer, above all other things, to serve God. Their love for God is so tremendous that it is the only thing in their lives.”
Cornelia laughed. “You know, I never get over your speaking of God so easily and naturally. You’ve certainly become a different man. … God? What God? A remnant of primitive superstition.”
Allan did not answer. Cornelia was goading him, as she had always goaded him. He detached himself from her. But he had loved her. Did he still love her? He studied her earnestly, the haggish but fascinating face, the verve, the magnetism, the charm. I suppose I still love Cornelia, he thought. All at once he was compassionate for this robust and hearty and ribald woman who had never had compassion for anyone in her life—except perhaps me, thought Allan. He would forever be grateful to her for this tenderness, which now had left her forever. He would forever pity her because some part of her had been truncated, or had not been included in her personality.
“I’ve seen Tony three times the past year,” said Cornelia. She was becoming restive, and she glanced at the diamond watch on her wrist. “He complains he never seems to catch up with you; when he is in Rome, thinking to meet you, you are in London. When he is in New York, you’re off in Los Angeles. And so it goes.”
“He calls me at least twice a week,” said Allan. “And I write him regularly.”
But Cornelia’s restless mind was off again. “I can’t get over how young you look,” she said musingly. “By the way, I understand Miles has become fond of you and that he sometimes visits you out here.”
“That’s true,” said Allan, and his face closed. Cornelia sipped at her drink and her hazel eyes widened and stared fixedly over the edge of her glass. “We’re having a little trouble with Miles. He has the most extravagant ideas these days. He takes entirely too much authority on himself, even though he is only executive vice-president. But I—I mean DeWitt—is quite able to control him.”
“Are you trying to find out what Miles and I talk about?” asked Allan, smiling a little sadly. “You aren’t in the least subtle, Cornelia. I don’t intend to tell you, however. You know, I’m not very interested any longer in the road. We discuss it only briefly. We talk of other things.”
“I thought so,” said Cornelia, and put down her glass. Now her expression was very unpleasant. “And that brings me to why I am here. I am going to divorce you, Allan, for desertion, mental cruelty, and all the other things my lawyers can think of. In fact, I’m leaving for Reno very soon.”
“Divorce me?” asked Allan with disbelief. “Are you out of your mind, Cornelia? You are looking toward seventy, now, and I’m in my late seventies. What in hell for? A divorce?” He stared at her. “You aren’t thinking of marrying again, at your age, are you?”
“Well, that’s complimentary, I must say. My doctors tell me my biological age is about forty.” But Cornelia laughed. “I can live practically forever, and I intend to. No, I’m divorcing you for quite another reason. You’re an embarrassment to me these days. Your association with that New York newspaper Jew, Izzy Richberg—you with your newspapers, and he with his, screaming ‘havoc’ all the time. You writing a monthly editorial for his yelling sheets. Really, ‘at your age,’ to quote your own words, it’s ridiculous. A crusader. I never liked Izzy; frankly, I think he’s a sensation-monger, and it’s dangerous to be a sensation-monger against the present Administration these days.”
Allan had flushed a deep crimson. “Very interesting,” he said, keeping his voice down. “So, it seems that for the first time in the history of this country it is ‘dangerous’ to disagree with the party in power. I don’t believe it. I don’t think Roosevelt is that kind of man. I don’t agree with many of his deas—but after all he respects the Constitution.”
“It is dangerous to disagree,” said Cornelia. “A sensible person acknowledges the facts. Roosevelt? Who cares about him? There are powerful people behind him who manipulate him.”
“I know more about that than you do,” said Allan. “I know all about those people. Mr. Roosevelt doesn’t. If he ever learns—it might kill him. It is our duty to try to inform him. To alert the country. I can’t talk about this with you, Cornelia, for you’d either sneer at me incredulously, or you’d know exactly what I mean, and still sneer to try to divert me.” He paused. He looked at her grimly. “There’s your brother Norman. An assistant to the Secretary of Commerce, European Department. He is in charge, as you know, of assigning commercial attachés to European embassies.
“He was appointed to that post on the ground that he is a ‘liberal.’ But you and I know exactly what he is. There are hundreds of his kind now in government posts in Washington. How did they get there? How did they manage to infiltrate into very important positions, which will have tremendous weight on our domestic and foreign policies? Who are the villains who sought them out, and appointed them? Who are the many unseen men who hate America so much that they want to destroy her? We intend to expose them all.”
Cornelia’s eyes narrowed on him until they were gleaming yellow slits. She sat in thoughtful silence for a few moments. Then she said, “You don’t know what you are doing, or perhaps you do. Everything you say in your papers, everything Izzy says, is laughed at by th
e American people. But the men you attack aren’t laughing; they are out for you. They have ways of destroying men like you and Izzy, and they’re prepared to use them.”
“Did Norman tell you that?”
Cornelia only smiled. She shrugged, and drank. “Don’t talk to me of ‘freedom of speech, and the press,’” she said. “One of the most powerful newspapers in New York hates you and Izzy; they rarely have an issue without an attack on you and your ideas. Inspired attacks, I suppose you’d call them. I’m a realist. I don’t want to be part of your ruination. I don’t want to be associated with you, even by our marriage. The road is in danger, by your being my husband, even though you’re retired. Remember the last Sunday issue? They had a violent article by Gregory Sanders about you. ‘Malefactor of great wealth, who opposes all progressive and liberal reforms. … Millionaire reactionary.’ And such. That is dangerous for the road. Yes, Norman has warned me. I repeat, I’m a realist. Realists don’t try to change history; they accept it.”
Allan turned to his wife. “Norman? He warned you, eh? And what does Norman promise you about the road? For he did promise you something.”
Cornelia turned her cigarette over and over in her fingers. “Let me make this clear to you, Allan. I don’t like the situation any more than you do. I suppose what you’ve told me is the truth. But once again, I’m a realist, and the road is more to me than anything else in the world, as it always was. If I divorce you—and I admit I don’t mind the idea at all—the road won’t be mentioned in connection with your activities again. Norman has promised me that. How I hate him! How I always did!” Her face became violent for a moment, and Allan moved toward her almost involuntarily, his hand extended. But she did not take it; she shook her head, rejecting. “I’m sorry I was emotional for a moment or two. We have to accept the fact that hundreds of Normans are now in power in Washington. We dare not antagonize them, whether we are railroad magnates or shopkeepers. They are determined to silence all their enemies. I don’t want to be pilloried as one of them, by being married to you.”
“And this is America,” said Allan softly.
“This is a new America,” said Cornelia. “It’s the America you prophesied was coming, centuries ago, it seems. You were right. So, being a realist, I want to adjust to it. If I adjust to it, and the others like me, we’ll be spared in ‘the coming New Order,’ as Norman calls it.”
Allan sat down and just looked at her, and again he was compassionate. “America means nothing to you, then?”
“Not particularly, my dear. But my money does.”
Allan sighed. “I won’t oppose your divorce, Cornelia.”
“That’s good. I knew you wouldn’t. You couldn’t have, anyway. You deserted me. But I thought I owed it to you, considering the wonderful young years we had together, to tell you first.”
Now Cornelia’s face gentled. She put out her hand and laid it on his knee. “My dear, my dear,” she said, and was silent a little. “Allan, it isn’t too late to stop your work. There is your Foundation for the Preservation of the Constitution. You’re pouring tens of thousands of dollars into it regularly, and you’ve gotten a number of powerful men like yourself to contribute to it. You cover the country with pamphlets and ‘libertarian’ books. You issue leaflets and even a newspaper in its name. Norman hates that Foundation more than anything else you do.”
“I’m glad,” said Allan, and he lifted his head triumphantly. “I couldn’t have had better news. One of these days Norman will face the Senate, and his accusers will be there, and with him will be hundreds of men like him. One of these days the people will know all about him and his kind—through the work of men like me and George Richberg; through the work of our Foundation. Through the scores of fine speakers we send out all over the country. The Normans can’t silence us. And one of these days they’ll stand before the nation they betrayed, and answer to it.”
He smiled at Cornelia. “In a way, I’m glad you are getting a divorce. I won’t have to leave you anything then. I have already made a will leaving the greater part of my money to the Foundation, and my newspapers. The family is well provided for, with its own fortunes.”
“And we intend to keep them.” The dark scarlet thread of Cornelia’s lips twisted. “With Norman’s undercover help.”
She stood up, and Allan rose with her. She contemplated him quietly, and her hazel eyes were very still. Then she put her arms about his neck and kissed him on the lips, very simply. He held her to him. He was not sure, but he thought that a little moisture touched his cheek. “Good-by, my dear,” said Cornelia. “Good-by—Allan.”
Allan worked far into the night on a pamphlet he was writing, on an editorial he was doing for one of George Richberg’s most influential newspapers and on an editorial he was finishing for one of his own. The yellow oil-lamps glimmered; the face of the round white moon poured through the windows; great yellow moths and myriads of other insects crawled and flew against the screens. Night birds cried to the sky; trees murmured endlessly in an ancient language. Allan wrote on. Occasionally he reached with an absent-minded gesture to a bottle of pills and swallowed a tablet, especially when the familiar cramping pain in his chest heightened with his growing weariness. Once or twice he thought: This damned old body of mine! I’m a young man in my spirit, and I could work forever. But this shriveling flesh gets in my way.
At ten o’clock George Richberg called him from New York. It was good to Allan to hear that rich and determined voice, which had such fortitude, such courage, behind it. “When do we get that editorial?” he demanded in his affectionately dictatorial way. “Well. I didn’t call you about that. I was just anxious about you. Why don’t you join me for a short vacation at my home in Maine? You haven’t the time? What damned nonsense. Here I am, with a bad heart, and I work like three dogs, but I take a holiday at times. And I’m younger than you are.” There was an undertone of anxiety in his voice. “Look, we can’t have you dying on us, or something, Allan. I promised Tony. …”
Allan frowned. “You promised Tony? He’s an old woman. I feel in perfect health, George.” He told his friend of his whole conversation with Cornelia that day. George listened without interrupting. Then he said, “Poor old girl. And think, too, of the poor old boys like her, in just the same position. They don’t know that they’re the first on the lists of liquidation—if the devils once really control the country. Hope you aren’t worrying too much about the divorce. Take things easy, won’t you?”
When Allan hung up he had a satisfied feeling. His loneliness had gone. The night was filled with the presences of his friends, everywhere, men who were working as he was working. Courage, courage, he said to them. Don’t despair. Hell never prevails. But let us never relax, not even for a moment. The enemy does not relax; his mind is always cool and clear and focused on the deadly plans he has for the world. He does not drink, for he wishes to be conscious at every moment of all that is said about him, and he wishes to see all that can be seen. If you must drink for pleasure and for social gaiety, be certain of your company, for your enemy has a thousand ears and a thousand eyes; he is ubiquitous. He is a distinct personality, stern, rigid, cruel, and coldly intellectual and hating; he was born as he is; he can never change himself. He is as old as death, as old as the world, but each generation sees him born anew. Watch for him, but have courage. You are stronger than he, for God is with you.
Allan picked up his pen again and resumed his rapid writing. In his editorial for George Richberg’s largest newspaper he wrote: “I voted for Franklin Delano Roosevelt because he declared that any political power which is entrenched too long becomes a danger to free institutions. I agree with him. A law should be passed which prohibits any one man serving more than two terms as president. It is not likely that the tradition laid down by George Washington will ever be violated, but I fear such an attempt will be made. A third term is unthinkable to the American people at this time; they might not find it unthinkable in the future. Therein lies the dang
er. A president under such conditions is no longer the leader of his party; he is its slave. An opportunity is also presented to certain elements in his party to press its more sinister designs—and there are sinister designs among sinister men in any political party. Long power assists them in carrying these designs to their ultimate conclusion. …”
The moon flooded the room, but somewhere in the distance there was a sound of faint thunder, as if a giant had turned over on the earth.
Allan picked up a small pamphlet written by Norman deWitt six months before, in which Norman expressed his cold aversion for the President. “While it is uncivilized for one to deride a man for any physical handicap, it is the opinion of many that Franklin Delano Roosevelt is a symbol, in his person, of the distorted and unhealthy deformity of capitalism.”
Yet, thought Allan, he is there, in a high and powerful position in the government. Who is so strong in this government to keep him where he is? He thought of the evil men sleeplessly working behind the façade of constitutional government, men whose names were not yet known, except to a few like himself. He thought of their minions who were already teaching corruption in the secular colleges in every corner of the nation, who were already seizing control of the public means of communication through radio, books, newspaper columns, and moving pictures, who were moving silently into the public schools of America, armed with their monstrous philosophy of hatred, envy, and murder.
Their creatures had written of the first Roosevelt cabinet: “The new Wall Street hunger and war cabinet. … Yes, the New Deal may prove to be fascism. The smiling India-rubber liberal in the White House is destined to destroy all remaining American liberals.”
But a change in propaganda was subtly taking place now. It had begun with the recognition of Russia by the United States; it had gathered force with the rise of Hitler. The hidden and evil men—so smilingly and disastrously belittled by the President, in all sincerity—were preparing to use him and his party for their own awful ends. Why can’t he see? thought Allan desperately. How can he believe they are so small a group, so impotent a one? Their name is legion. There is no spot in all the world which does not bear the lesions of their disease.
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