by Belva Plain
“Oh!” gasped Emily. “How can you say such a thing? It’s young men like him who will save us all! I just wish we had such a son,” she added, looking almost indignantly at the retreating back of Meg, who had followed Hennie into the kitchen.
“They only say that because they have no son, Aunt Hennie,” Meg whispered.
A lump filled Hennie’s throat. “You think so, Meg?”
“Oh, yes. I saw the movie Birth of a Nation. It was horrible, the young men wounded and suffering so—” The girl clapped her hands to her mouth. “Oh, I’m sorry! It’s stupid of me to talk that way to you.”
Awkward as always, with her pink pointed elbows akimbo, her prominent little stomach, and her kind, concerned face, she touched Hennie’s heart. Thirteen was a difficult age at best. And Hennie felt tight kinship.
“That’s all right. You’re a lovely girl, Meg. You understand.”
In the middle of winter, in 1917, the German government warned of the start of unrestricted attack by submarines; not long afterward the threat was carried out. Unarmed American merchant vessels and their defenseless crews were torpedoed to the bottom of the sea. Harmless fishing schooners, too, went down, and German submarines were sighted off the Long Island shore. In despair, Hennie and Dan looked at one another over the top of the morning newspaper.
“Times that try men’s souls,” Dan said.
He kept up the old arguments with Paul whenever they were together, which was no longer as often as it had been years before.
“We must keep ourselves peaceful, an example to the rest of the world, in spite of all,” he insisted.
Paul was not so sure.
“I find I’m not very sure of anything anymore,” he said, which remark might have seemed, to the ordinary hearer, either banal or enigmatic; for Hennie, who knew rather a good deal about Paul, the words were neither.
However, she had her own heartache: sometimes it seemed that she, with Dan, stood almost alone against the onrush of war. One by one now, the old idols fell and went over to the other side. Samuel Gompers promised the support of the unions should the nation go to war. Even the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace caught the war fever, and Carrie Chapman Catt, the suffragist, Hennie’s earliest heroine, pledged the women of her organization to help the war effort if need should come. So Hennie mourned, and mourning, marveled that the world around them could be in such high spirits.
Getting and spending were everywhere: theaters were filled; on Fifth Avenue, carriages were being outnumbered by Pierce-Arrows, chauffeur-driven; new shops were opening to meet the new need for glittering luxury, from platinum watches to silk shirts. The city was lively. Fashionable couples went tea-dancing at the Plaza. Women bobbed their hair à la Irene Castle, and did the tango wearing egrets on their little satin hats.
“They’re making fortunes already,” Dan said gloomily.
The Allies needed everything, as well as credit with which to buy: grain, tools, medicines, ammunition, cloth, steel, coal, iron, leather, wire, powdered milk—they needed everything. The securities and commodities markets boomed; factory orders soared; railroads were jammed and warehouses crammed; real estate tripled in value and everyone, from lawyers to shippers, felt the zest of expansion. A whole new crop of millionaires was born.
One evening, Alfie rang the doorbell. Leah had just come in from work. In the kitchen, Hennie was spooning cereal into the demanding mouth of young Hank, who, in shirt and diaper, was happily perched on his grandfather’s lap.
“Have I surprised you? I couldn’t wait till tomorrow. I had to phone Emily and tell her I’d be late for dinner, because I’ve got such news for you.”
Alfie’s smile was so bright, like laughter contained, that Hennie could only think he had news of Freddy, that Freddy was coming home, or perhaps was already hiding behind the door.
“Is it Freddy? He’s coming home?”
“No, no, nothing like that, I’m afraid. But very, very good all the same.”
Alfie looked around for a place to put his derby, and since there was none in the crowded kitchen, where every surface was covered with something that belonged to Hank—bottles, bibs, or a ragged cloth animal—he held it on his lap.
“You remember, quite a while ago, oh, I should guess it’s three years now, when you gave me a plan for a radio direction-finder?”
Dan corrected him. “Not for the finder, just for a little part of it, a tube.”
“Well, whatever it was—I’ve told you I never can understand this technical stuff of yours—but anyway …” Alfie paused, relishing what he had come to say, building it up to a crescendo. “Well, it’s been sold! Finn and Weber Electroparts, that’s the subsidiary company, is putting it into production! And it’s going to be a howling success, Dan. It will make you rich, Dan, and it will make me richer. It’s a regular windfall! I wouldn’t have believed it was true, if I hadn’t got this check in my hand. Look,” he said. “Take a look at that.”
Dan took the check over the baby’s head. Puzzled, he turned it over to see the back of it.
“I don’t understand this, Alfie.”
Alfie wore his familiar dimpled smile, one that almost made his cheeks burst.
“Why, it’s easy! Just read: what does it say?”
“It says, ‘Pay to the order of Daniel Roth—twenty thousand dollars.’ ”
“What?” cried Hennie, dropping the spoon.
“Twenty thousand dollars!” Leah repeated.
Alfie tipped the chair on two legs. He relaxed, pleased and proprietary, as if he had given a beautiful, unexpected toy to a child and was now sitting back to enjoy the child’s rapture.
“I don’t understand,” Dan said again, frowning.
“Well, Dan, it’s just your first share of the sale price, that’s all. I took stock in your name, you see, as well as my own, fifteen shares for each of us, yours because the invention’s yours, and mine for making the contact.” Alfie’s eyes narrowed, giving his face a canny expression. “You’ve got to know how to handle these things. Of course, I had my lawyers’ advice all the way through. We’ve arranged to take a greater share of the profits as dividends in the form of stock. That helps with taxes, naturally.… You look perplexed.”
“I am perplexed.”
“Well, never mind. We’ll sit down quietly one evening, you and I—no, what am I saying? I’m so stirred up, I’m not thinking straight. Not one evening, but one day. I want you to meet my lawyer at his office. He’s first-rate, and he’ll lay the whole thing out clearly for you, advise you on investing, too, because”—and here Alfie chuckled—“you’ll be getting a whole lot more of these nice checks, my friend, and you’ll want to handle them wisely, make them grow.”
“All that money for this little tube! A gadget,” Dan said. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“Oh, it makes plenty of sense! That little gadget is worth a gold mine in the right hands, as you see.”
“Whose hands? Who wants it?”
“The War Department, Dan, that’s who wants it! You’ve got a government contract! And it’ll go on forever, all through the war that’s coming, sure as shooting, and after that, too, because, as Larry Finn explained it roughly, it’s being used for radio direction-finding, which is only in its infancy. Right now, though, they can already keep track of an enemy ship, when they have two or more transmissions and—”
Dan raised his hand. “The War Department. I don’t sell the work of my brain to the War Department, Alfie. You should know that.”
Alfie stared. “Are you crazy? You don’t sell—”
“No, I don’t. If, as you say, this thing is to be used to find ships at sea, that means sending human beings to their death at the bottom of the sea. And you think I want that kind of money?”
“Dan, you are crazy, crazy as a loon. War isn’t a game. It’s survival. People get killed. My God, your own son’s over there fighting and you—”
“Leave my son out of this discussion, please.”
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“You keep interrupting me! What I’m trying to say is, trade goes on during wars, the same as any other time. And why shouldn’t it? A man’s entitled to the fruits of his labors. Why shouldn’t you be paid by the War Department or anybody else who can make use of the thing you invented?”
“For the same reason that a man shouldn’t get rich by owning firetrap tenements. You’ve always known how I feel about tenements—”
“I never owned any tenements.”
“I didn’t say you did. I said all those things are related: munitions, tenements, they’re all exploitation, and I want no part of any of them. That’s why I can’t accept this.”
The room was hot. Or maybe it was only Hennie’s pounding blood. These two men, both decent, but so different, and yet in their differing ways fond of one another, were now squared off like fighters in a ring. Her brother, red-faced, clutched his hat; Dan, red-faced, hugged the boy who, sucking on a piece of zwieback, was half asleep.
All that wealth! she thought then. It was unreal. And she glanced at Leah, whose round eyes darted in fascination, observing everyone quite as though she were at a play.
“I thank you,” Dan said. “You’ve meant to do something wonderful for me, I understand that, and I appreciate it. But you have to understand, too, that I can’t accept it.” And he reached the check out to Alfie.
“I’m not going to take it back,” Alfie said.
“Then I shall just have to tear it up if you won’t.”
Alfie wiped the perspiration from his forehead. He clasped his knees and leaned forward, as if by coming closer to Dan, he could somehow reach him with reason.
“Dan, it’s done and it can’t be undone. The deal’s made, the stock’s issued in your name, everything’s rolling, and I can’t unroll it even if I want to. Why not take it for Hennie, since you feel this way about it? Just sign it over to Hennie, and that will be that.”
Dan shook his head. “I don’t mean to sound holy, Alfie, but Hennie’s my wife. We’re married. We’re one.” And he laid his hand on hers.
She felt the pressure of his hand. She felt strong and proud.
“I agree with Dan,” she said clearly. “I don’t want to make money out of war. Oh, don’t be angry with us, Alfie! We love you … you have to do what you think is right for you, and we have to do what we think is right for us.”
Alfie stood up. “You’re a fool, Dan. My sister I won’t criticize; after all, she’s a woman, and can’t be expected to know much about the world. But you should know that a day may come when, God forbid, you get sick, and the day surely will come when you’re too old to work. Then you’ll regret this. Here’s wealth being poured into your hands. Freedom from worry.”
“We’ll manage, Alfie. We always have. We don’t need more money.”
Hennie saw her brother’s eyes move around the little kitchen and, through the open door, into the simple parlor. The movement was, no doubt, only an unconscious reflex for him, who must shudder inwardly at the thought of having to live in a cramped and mediocre place like this.
“Twenty thousand dollars, Dan! Doesn’t it stagger you?” Alfie pleaded.
“Have you forgotten that night in the country a couple of years ago, when I told you I’d be glad to give away anything I made if it would make life better on this earth? I don’t want wealth. I wouldn’t even know what to do with it.”
“Think again, Dan. This is only the first payment. Twenty thousand a year, and more, into the foreseeable future. This firm’s going places and they’re very interested in your work—”
“Sorry to interrupt you again,” Dan said. A shadow of exasperation crossed his mouth. “The answer is still no and always will be. Will you take the check?”
It lay on the table, crisp yellow paper with neat black letters. Leah picked it up to examine it and put it back.
“I’m shocked,” Alfie said, looking from one to the other. “Shocked. Nobody who didn’t hear this with his own ears would believe it. For all your knowledge, and I’ve sometimes been in awe of your knowledge, Dan, you’re a fool. Naive. You don’t even know which end is up.”
“Take the check back, Alfie?” Dan spoke gently.
Alfie grabbed it. “Yes, by God, I will! I certainly will!”
“Don’t be angry, Alfie,” Hennie said again as he went to the door.
“Angry? No, just flabbergasted and sorry for the lot of you.” He took one last look around the room. “Okay, then. That’s the way it is. Good night, Hennie.” He kissed his sister and went out.
“I suppose you think I’m crazy, too, don’t you?” Dan asked Leah.
She answered frankly, “Yes, I do. You asked me, so I tell you.”
Dan smiled. “Well, that’s all right. I thought you would think so.”
“I feel sorry for Alfie,” Hennie said. “He looked so crestfallen.”
“I know.” Dan got up. “Take Hank, somebody, he’s asleep. He’s a good sort, Alfie. I can’t help but like him, even though I think sometimes I’d get more understanding from an Eskimo.”
On a brisk April day, the wind tossed the budding cherry blossoms around the tidal basin, while at the Capitol, Woodrow Wilson spoke before the Houses of Congress in joint session.
“Neutrality is no longer feasible, nor desirable, when the peace of the world is involved,” he said. “… It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war … we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts, for democracy … for the rights and liberties of small nations.” And, in solemn tones, he concluded that “the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness.… God helping her, she can do no other.”
On April 6, America entered the war.
All that day, Hennie walked. It seemed to her, as she went through the familiar streets, past the little shops, that they were now threatened by a terrible, great cold. A new ice age loomed, creeping nearer hour by hour to crush them all: the children in the schoolyards, the fat grocer, the old woman carrying a sick cat in a basket, all of them, all of us.
Her mind traveled back through the years to peaceful, hopeful meeting places here in the city and at Lake Mohonk, where the teachers and the Quakers met beneath drowsy summer leafage to speak about a better world, and were so full of confidence. That was past and over.
She came, in her drifting, to the avenue on which Uncle David now spent his days at the home. It had been months since she had paid a visit to him, so busy had she been with the daily affairs that make up a life: the care of the household and the little boy, the now futile effort for peace, and most of all, the heartache, so often buried for Dan’s and Leah’s sakes, over Freddy. Guilt about this neglect, as well as a sudden, unreasoned wish to talk to the old man, a memory of those years when he had been the most trusted person in her life, directed her to the entrance of the dingy building.
“He’s reading in his room,” the attendant told her at the desk. “He spends a lot of time reading.”
A book lay on the table by the chair where Uncle David was sitting. It was unopened; he had not been reading. He had only been staring out of the window, from which there was nothing to be seen except grim gray rooftops.
When, with a gleam of interest, he asked her what was happening in the world, she told him the truth: that we had gone to war.
“Yes, yes, war,” he said with a vague smile. “I was there—with the men in blue, did you know that? Have I ever shown you my picture?”
At the side of his bed stood that ancient brown photograph of himself in uniform, posed in front of an army tent somewhere in Tennessee.
“Have you ever seen it?” The smile was proud.
“Yes, Uncle David, I’ve seen it.”
Foolishly she had hoped for some return of comprehension, so that she might talk to him about Freddy and tell him of her despair over the war; she had hoped to receive from him some of the comfort and strength he had g
iven her long ago. But she was years too late.
“The men in blue.” He began to quaver a few bars of a marching song, then stopped in confusion and closed his eyes.
“You’re tired, Uncle David.”
“Yes, it’s past midnight and you should be home. What are you doing here? Go home.”
So she fled down into the sad, bright afternoon and walked away.
Paul came a few days later to say good-bye.
“I’ve enlisted, got my commission. Conscription’s coming, so there’s no use waiting.”
Hennie wondered how a man really felt, what he might be ashamed to say about the hell he was to enter. And she remembered Freddy, sitting in that same chair, talking of glory and honor and sacrifice, with the glow of faith. Paul’s quiet features, on the other hand, were unreadable.
“Your father, with his connections, could surely get you a job with the War Department in Washington, couldn’t he?” she suggested, and, when Paul’s eyebrows were raised, added quickly, “I know you’re thinking there’s no honor in a thing like that, but is it more honorable to take up a gun and kill?”
“I’m a conformist. I simply do what has to be done. I’ve never used a gun, but I know I will be expected to learn how.” And he said thoughtfully, “God knows I’m not going with any of Freddy’s spirit. I’m just going.… What do you hear from Freddy?”
“Not what we heard in the beginning, I can tell you. He’s seen dead Germans, he says, and ‘they look like us.’ I suppose it hit him hard; they weren’t devils or subhuman, after all. But his latest letters are just forms, postcards, actually, where they cross out what doesn’t apply: I am sick in the hospital, I am wounded, I am well. So he’s in the front lines, and that’s all we know.”
Paul was silent.
“To think the baby’s walking and Freddy hasn’t even seen him!” Hennie cried, for perhaps the hundredth time.
“May I see him?” asked Paul.
“He’s asleep, but he sleeps like a log. We can go in and look.”
The child lay on his stomach with his face turned into a little pillow and his dark hair tumbled. Animals surrounded him in the crib: a teddy bear, a pink rabbit, a white dog, and a lamb with a bow and a bell.