Establishment

by Howard Fast

  “Yes, if you need it.”

  “My turn. Why? Why the devil should you offer me money?”

  “Because I like you,” he said. “Because you’re a wonderful woman. Because you’re Joe’s wife,” he finished lamely.

  “You did it!” she snapped.

  They walked on in silence. She was annoyed, and he had no idea why. Finally she said, “Why don’t you give the money to the clinic?”

  “I gave them some. I gave them five thousand dollars. I didn’t want to mention it.”

  “Of course not,” she said sourly. “That’s the fifth rule of sainthood. Don’t mention your damned good works.”

  ***

  Even before Dan came out of the hospital, Jean decided that her dream of creating a viable museum of modern art in San Francisco was a dream and no more; she also decided that she wanted the house on Russian Hill to be solely a home for herself and Dan. She would soon be fifty-nine years old. She reminded Eloise of this when she told her that she was closing the gallery for good and refurnishing the house. “I want it ready when Dan leaves the hospital. I don’t know how long he will have, but I want a few good, ordinary years.”

  “I understand but I’m miserable,” Eloise said. “It meant so much to me—not just the gallery, but the whole world of art. And you gave it to me, Jean. All I’ve learned, all the courses I’ve taken. I know it’s silly, but I always pretended to myself that someday there would be a great, splendid modern art museum here, and you would be the curator and I’d be your assistant, or one of your assistants. I was sure you’d have at least half a dozen.”

  They were sitting upstairs in Jean’s breakfast room in the house on Russian Hill. Already, decorators and painters were at work downstairs. Jean’s decisions were always followed by immediate action, and now she was intent upon refurbishing the house before Dan saw it again.

  “At least half a dozen,” Jean agreed, laughing. “No, no, dear. Rich, pampered ladies do not become curators—indeed, they never become much of anything. We are cursed with dilettantism, as much a disease of the rich as gout was in old England. But there are good loose ends, aren’t there? You’ve learned so much. I doubt that there are five people in this city who know as much about the moderns as you do.”

  “Even if I do, I don’t know how to use it. I feel so lost, and worst of all, I’ll no longer have an excuse to come into the city. I love the valley, but coming here—Jean, you’re the dearest person in the world.”

  It was accolade enough for Jean. She had heard through the years so many descriptions of herself—cold, icy, arrogant, aristocratic, snobbish, incapable of a human reaction—so much and so often that Eloise’s simple statement almost brought her to tears. How very fond she was of this gentle, timid woman who had been so loyal to the gallery since the beginning!

  “My dear,” she said, “I want you to have your pick of the paintings, any one of them, as a gift from me to you.”

  “Oh, no, you can’t do that, Jean. They’re priceless, every one of them.”

  “Nothing is priceless.”

  “But I can’t.”

  “Then I’ll be very hurt, and I’m sure you don’t want to hurt me.”

  “Jean, I couldn’t, I wouldn’t dare.”

  “Well, I would, and I shall do it for you. Come downstairs.”

  Eloise followed Jean downstairs to where the paintings were stacked in the old kitchen, now an office, soon to be a kitchen again. Jean selected a splendid twenty-four-by-thirty-six-inch Mondrian. “This is something that doesn’t have to be understood, just the most direct and charming arrangement of color and space that man can devise, and I think Adam will like it better than a Klee or a Kandinski or any of the others that require a philosophical headstand before they can be really seen.”

  Eloise shook her head hopelessly. “Jean, it’s the only one. There is no other Mondrian in San Francisco—or in California, for that matter. I won’t take it. It’s worth thousands of dollars.”

  “Then we’ll have a frightful argument, and we’ll end up not talking to each other. Do you want that to happen?”

  “No,” Eloise said weakly.

  “Then no more words. Take it.”

  ***

  By the time Dan was released from the hospital, much of the decorating had been done. The stark plaster white of the gallery rooms had been replaced by wallpaper and molding, and Jean led Dan with slow steps into a house not too unlike the one they had lived in thirty years before. Dan stood in the living room, still only half-furnished, looking around him with the odd feeling that time had indeed reversed itself. The room was lit by soft lamplight, and Jean, a few paces away and facing him, her face half-shadowed, might just be mistaken for the young woman he had fallen so hopelessly in love with an eternity before. He had never been very good with words, and now there was nothing he could think of saying. Jean waited. Then, almost foolishly, Dan pointed to the couch and said, “It’s the same one. It’s the same damn sofa.” As if she had done a marvelous trick of magic.

  “Danny, no. I had it made. It’s the same style, a Lawson, but I will say this. If you go through that door into the room that used to be your study—no, come. I want you to see it.” She led him into the study. She had furnished it in comfortable, overstuffed, leather pieces, and over the mantel was the rather primitive painting of his first ship, the Oregon Queen.

  “I’ll be damned,” Dan said softly. “Where did you find it?”

  “Sarah Levy had it, and when she heard what I was doing, she insisted that you have it.”

  “Wait a minute. Hold on,” Dan said. “This is your house. I don’t live here.”

  “I know. It’s very proper. You have your own apartment in Oakland, and you only use this as a sort of private cathouse.”

  “You are learning the language. That’s a hell of a way for an old lady to talk.”

  “Oh, I have a few good years left, Danny. How would you like to move in?”

  “What do you mean, move in? Is that why you gussied the place up, to tempt me?”

  “Sort of. I’d like you to marry me.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. I’m making a formal proposal of marriage. I’ll admit I’m past the childbearing age, and I suppose that with all your money you could find a young filly if you want one; but on the other hand, I’ve still got a pretty good figure, and you’ve been sleeping with me on and off for almost forty years, and we’ve put the worst of it behind us, and I think I love you, sort of—”

  “Hold on,” he said, dropping into a chair. “Just give me a moment to think.”

  “All right. You want a drink?”

  “I do. Scotch and water. You didn’t happen to include a box of cigars with the furnishings?”

  “Cigars are out, Danny, forever, according to Dr. Kellman. He says you’re as good as new, providing you stay away from cigars and a few other things.”

  “Does he? We’ll see about that.”

  Jean left the room to get his drink, and Dan sat there, staring at the picture of the Oregon Queen. In a few minutes she returned with his drink.

  “You’re not having one?”

  “No. I want a clear head. What is it, Danny? Ghosts or too much past?”

  “Some of each.”

  “Man is given three score and ten.”

  “If he’s lucky.”

  “We’ve used up the three score.”

  “The hell with that! Maybe we can work the next ten. Maybe. I’ve had a heart attack. I’m half a man. You’re sure you want to marry me?”

  “The half is better than anything else I’ve seen along the way. Yes. I’ve thought about it long enough. I would have liked the proposal to come from you, but I’m tired of waiting.”

  “What kind of wedding?”

  “City Hall.”

  “Joe’s too da
mn busy to come up here for a wedding, and Tom would only be a pain in the ass,” Dan said. “We’ll have Barbara for a witness.”

  It was then that the telephone rang, and Barbara, her words coming slowly, her voice low and controlled, told them that Bernie was dead.

  Two months later, at City Hall, with Barbara as the only witness, Jean and Dan were married for the second time, and Jean Seldon Whittier once again became Jean Seldon Lavette.

  ***

  Thomas Lavette and Lucy Sommers were married a month later, on the last Saturday of June in 1948. Both Tom and Lucy had an active ten days before the wedding, but since they planned to leave for a honeymoon of two weeks in Europe, they felt it was vital to clear the decks and depart with the assurance of a place for everything and everything in its place. John Whittier was first on the agenda.

  He greeted Tom petulantly when Tom came into his office, pointing out that he had barely passed the time of day with him for the past two weeks. “Decisions without me, meetings without me, and that Milton ship contract. That’s a ten-million-dollar contract, and I wasn’t even shown the final specifications. First thing I know of it is a letter from Leonard Milton, thanking me for the contract. What the devil has come over you, Tom? I’m still the president of Great Cal. It’s still a Whittier company. I’m not dead yet.”

  “No.”

  “Well, that’s one point of agreement.”

  “No, you don’t understand me, John. It’s not a Whittier company. It’s a Lavette company.”

  “What the devil are you talking about?”

  “I’m voting Alvin Sommers’ twelve thousand shares of stock. He sold the stock to Lucy and me, as joint tenants. This gives me a clear voting majority.” Tom’s voice was pleasant, but there was no mistaking his meaning and intent.

  Whittier stared at him and said nothing.

  “John, John,” Tom said, “this had to come. You knew that. You’re tired and you haven’t been well. A rest will be the best thing in the world for you.”

  “I thought you were going to run for Congress,” Whittier said slowly.

  “That was a silly notion. I am not political.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want you to resign.”

  “And you take over?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are a malignant bastard!” he exclaimed. “You and all the other Lavettes!”

  “That wasn’t called for.”

  “I think it was.”

  “I thought we could discuss this like gentlemen and old friends,” Tom said.

  “I don’t consider you a gentleman or a friend.”

  Tom rose. “Very well, John. If that’s the way it is…” He shrugged. At the door, he turned and said, “I called a meeting of the board for this afternoon. Come or not, as you wish. In any case, I want you out of here by tomorrow.”

  “Go to hell!” Whittier snarled.

  Tom closed the door behind him.

  At the meeting that afternoon, Tom became president of the company and Lucy was voted a seat on the board of directors.

  The name of the company was changed—at Lucy’s instigation—to GCS. Lucy wanted a simple, effective colophon. She felt that the name Great Cal Shipping was both limited in its definition, since its interests went far beyond shipping, and somewhat gauche; after thinking about it, Tom tended to agree with her.

  Before they moved on to the second piece of business on the premarital agenda, Lucy had a talk with Tom about his family.

  “I’m very pleased that you repaired the break with your father. That was an intelligent move,” Lucy said. “On the other hand, I don’t think we should get involved with them.”

  “You’re thinking of Barbara.”

  “More or less. You have a half brother, Joseph Lavette, the one who runs the clinic in Los Angeles. But mainly Barbara. Barbara is in trouble. She will always be in trouble.”

  “Good God, Lucy, you don’t believe she’s a communist?”

  “I don’t know what she is. I am not asking you to foment some kind of open break, but I think it ought to be hands off—totally hands off. For the record.”

  “I don’t think I’ve spoken to Barbara three times in the past year. Anyway, we don’t talk the same language.”

  “You know that her husband was mixed up in some gunrunning scheme for the State of Israel?”

  “I’ve heard.”

  “Barbara is making her own bed. She has to sleep in it, Tom.”

  He nodded.

  “You do understand what I’m driving at?”

  “You don’t have to convince me. That stupid display in Washington caused me enough grief.”

  “That is only the beginning, believe me. These are very interesting times we live in. I don’t think there’s ever been anything like this before in these United States. But they’re not bad times for us.”

  Norman Drake was next on the agenda. Tom’s secretary called him in Washington, and upon learning that he was due back in Berkeley the following day, wondered whether he might be inclined to come to San Francisco and join Mr. Lavette for dinner. When she told Tom about that, he smiled and shook his head.

  “Don’t go on. He said that I could damn well come to Berkeley if I desired to see him.”

  “Yes,” Janet replied. “How did you know?”

  “That little bastard is cock of the walk right now. You told him I’d come?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Suppose we say day after tomorrow for dinner. Call him back and tell him, and be very sweet. And make reservations for three, or four if he wants to bring his wife.”

  “In Berkeley? Where?”

  “At Frederick’s. Where else in Berkeley? Mention his name when you make the reservation and tell them we want a good table.”

  Lucy had some second thoughts about Drake. “I don’t trust him, and his involvement with Barbara makes it tacky.”

  “We’re not exactly searching for an honest man,” Tom said.

  “He’s depressing. Just to look at him is depressing.”

  “The point is that he plays the game. Everyone who knows him agrees on that score. He plays the game.”

  Tom and Lucy were first at the restaurant. Tom handed the head waiter twenty dollars, impressing him with the charge that Mr. Drake was to be treated as visiting royalty. Lucy’s knowledge of Berkeley was hazy. She had never been to Frederick’s before, and she smiled dubiously as Tom explained to her that their table, near the front of the restaurant, was one of the three or four most desirable.

  “I suppose so,” Lucy agreed, “as such things go. It’s a deplorable place.”

  The head waiter brought Drake over. He was in his middle thirties, slender and plump at the same time, with a small round paunch and round puffy cheeks. He seated himself dubiously. He had come alone, ignoring the invitation to bring his wife. He was wary; his handshake was without enthusiasm.

  “My fiancée,” Tom said, introducing Lucy. Congressman Drake’s expression questioned her presence at what was certainly intended as a business meeting. “She is also my associate,” Tom explained. He successfully covered the contempt he felt for this small, foxlike man. Lucy was right about politics. This man, who had a seat in the House of Representatives, was shabby, shabby in his manner and shabby in his pretenses. He had no idea of the relationship between Tom and his sister, and with an ounce of pride or integrity, he would have avoided the meeting. Tom wondered what he was expecting. A payoff? What would it take to buy Barbara out? Or was it too late? Lucy felt it was too late since Congress had already voted the contempt. What then? Respect for money? That certainly was a part of it. He knew the wealth and the power Tom represented, and Tom realized that he himself was only beginning to understand the extent and potency of that wealth and power. Lucy understood it much better.

  He f
elt a surge of possessive pride that Lucy was sitting next to him. To hell with those who didn’t think she was attractive! He did. She was a strong woman, and to his way of thinking, a very handsome woman. They had never been to bed, never made physical gestures toward each other; but the thought of such gestures excited him, and no other woman had excited him in a long time.

  All this went through his mind as Lucy engaged in chitchat with the congressman. Tom ordered drinks, Scotch and water all around.

  “Now let’s understand this,” Drake said, flatly and unexpectedly. “There’s nothing I can do for your sister now. It’s too late. I just want you to know that when the committee subpoenaed her, I didn’t know she was your sister. The name was Barbara Cohen. Then I found out who she was. She was insolent and hostile, but that’s not to the point. The point is that she can vacate the contempt citation any time she pleases to. All she has to do is to answer the question and name the names we asked for.”

  Tom stared at Drake thoughtfully for a long moment before replying. Lucy observed him with interest, wondering just how Tom intended to proceed. Finally he said, “That’s up to my sister, isn’t it?”

  Drake was taken aback. He simply nodded.

  “I’m not terribly fond of my sister,” Tom went on, his voice cool and without emotion. “She’s a grown woman, and she has never consulted me about any action of hers. I was going to wait until we knew each other a little better, congressman, which two or three drinks might accomplish, but since you have plunged in, I’ll swim with you. I didn’t ask for this meeting to plead my sister’s case. I wish to talk to you about the Lavettes, because it seems to me that when you took this step of subpoenaing my sister, you knew very little about us.”

  On the defensive now, Drake again stressed that he had not known Barbara’s identity.

  “Of course,” Tom said. “That’s water under the bridge. But let me make this plain. I am the president and I control the majority stock of the fifth largest corporation in this state. I am not speaking only of the Seldon Bank, but of a conglomerate of interests that reach into every corner of California and a few corners outside it. I don’t think I have to say much more than that. You come up for reelection in the fall. I have also heard it bruited about that you’d like to be governor. I doubt that the Republican party could elect a governor in California without our help.”