Sins of the Fathers

by Susan Howatch

  “Yes, sir,” said the waiter at my elbow.

  “Give me a martini,” I said, “straight up.”

  “Give me the same,” said Sam, finishing his gimlet. I gave the waiter one second to turn his back and then wiped the good-natured expression off my face as I slammed into the attack. “Now, look, Sam—”

  “Believe me,” he interrupted, outshouting me yet still managing to sound soothing as he picked up the nice-guy expression I had discarded, “I want to be reasonable about this. You three are the grandparents, and you have certain rights, and I want to be humane. But I’ve got to put Vicky first. You’d agree with that, Neil, wouldn’t you? That’s what you’ve just said, isn’t it? Vicky’s got to come first.”

  I knew I was being steered into some blind alley to be beaten up. I back-pedaled rapidly, nodding my head in agreement and saying in my meekest, most reasonable voice, “Sure. Right. But it strikes me Vicky’s being just a bit neurotic about this, I mean, like a schoolgirl, you know, sort of hysterical. Couldn’t you be a bit firmer with her, take a tougher line? Couldn’t you say—?”

  “Neil,” he said, “are you trying to tell me how to run my marriage?”

  “Hell, no!” I said. “Of course not!” I looked around for my drink, but the bartender was still shaking the cocktail pitcher. “Just a minute,” I said. “I’ve got to go to the men’s room. Excuse me.”

  I went to the men’s room again, looked at my white face in the mirror, used the urinal, washed my hands, and looked again at my white face. My mind was as blank as a wiped slate.

  Returning to the martini, I drank half of it in two gulps and set down my glass.

  “Look, Neil,” said Sam kindly, as if he were thinking: Poor old Neil, no sons of his own, I mustn’t get too rough, “this is not an uncommon problem. It happens all the time in small towns across America. Daughter gets married and lives on her parents’ doorstep. Husband eventually has to take her away to preserve her sanity.”

  Rage burst through me, but I never altered my expression. Any display of temper would only make him sorrier for me, and I was determined not to lose control of the interview. Every word now counted, and every sentence was a weapon.

  “You want to leave New York,” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “Where do you want to go?”

  “That depends on you, Neil!” Sam was smiling again, paying out the rope which had snapped taut between us, so that we had additional room to maneuver. “Naturally, I don’t want to leave Van Zale’s, and it occurred to me that this might well be the ideal moment to open a European office. With the postwar European economies showing signs of gathering strength at last …”

  “Whereabouts in Europe?”

  “Germany.”

  I felt the prick of the knife between my shoulder blades, but I didn’t stop to examine the knife, take its measurements, or marvel at its efficiency. My first priority was to take defensive action.

  “That’s a wonderful idea, Sam!” I said enthusiastically, manipulating the slack on the rope into the best noose I could manage. “A European Van Zale’s again to cash in on the postwar boom! But I’m afraid I see no point in opening an office unless it’s in the financial center of Europe, and besides, the German political situation is still unstable, thanks to the Russians. We’ll base the office in London.”

  “But my German contacts, my bilingualism …”

  “Stick to speaking English, Sam. I’ve had enough trouble with your pro-German sympathies.”

  “But I’ve no affinity with England!”

  “Get one. Or quit.”

  The rope strained between us as I watched him pick over his options. He could quit without fear of me crucifying him later, because he knew I would do nothing to upset Vicky. Yet he had a big stake in Van Zale’s, bigger than he would ever get anywhere else, and if I dropped dead, he could scoop the bank into his hip pocket. He disliked England, but he’d survive. He would use his charm to insist that he was one hundred percent American, and most of the time it would never occur to the British that Keller was a German name. And even if they did get around to wondering how German he was, they would probably assume that with his dark complexion and his adopted first name he was not only German but Jewish too.

  I smiled at the irony. Umpteenth round to me.

  “Okay!” he said, looking generous to give the impression he had conceded victory voluntarily on this point, although we both knew I had wrung the concession from him. “England, here I come!”

  We smiled at each other. I felt ready to collapse with relief. I’d won. I still had the whip hand. He hadn’t dared push me too hard. I had saved my grandson from being raised as a German, and I was still indisputably the boss despite this unprecedented attack on my authority.

  “We’ll make it a two-year assignment in London,” I said genially, “and then you can hand over to someone else and bring Vicky back.” I now had time to examine the knife at my back, but before I could complete the job of disarming him, Sam took a deep breath and stabbed me all the way up to the hilt.

  “Gee, Neil,” he said, “I can see I haven’t made myself clear. We won’t be coming back to New York.”

  I didn’t say anything. It was impossible for me to say anything. It was barely possible for me to breathe.

  “I’m willing to compromise with you by starting in London,” said Sam reasonably, “because I can see that from a business point of view this would be best. But as soon as the London base is operating smoothly, I’m going to start an office in Germany. This is what I’ve wanted for a long time, and this is what Vicky wants too, Neil, make no mistake about that. Vicky wants what I want, and she wants to be where I want to be, and you wouldn’t want to upset Vicky, would you, Neil? You love Vicky and you wouldn’t want to distress her by being less … shall we say flexible? … than you should be.”

  There was another terrible silence, and as we stared at each other I saw at last the way things really were: not Vicky’s husband and father focusing single-mindedly on her welfare, but two men whose friendship had been irrevocably dislocated, two predators stalking one another in a nasty brutish world dense with jealousy and revenge. I saw too that the truth was neither black nor white but a murky mixture of the two. Sam did love Vicky. He did want the best for her. But over and above all else he was using Vicky to get what he wanted, and what he wanted was not only an independent life in Germany away from my long doppelgänger’s shadow but repayment with interest for that night when he had found me in Kevin’s attic with Teresa. He was going to take my daughter and my grandson away from me as absolutely as I had taken Teresa away from him, and there was nothing I could do to stop him. If I fired him, he would still go to Europe to work; if I tried to keep him in New York, he would resign and still put the Atlantic between us. He might prefer to stay with Van Zale’s, but if the chips were down, he’d quit and walk into another top job somewhere else. His ambition and his revenge meant more to him than the sentimental ties of a twenty-six-year-old partnership.

  I looked on the shattered fragments of our friendship and heard my voice say painfully, “Sam … what happened to those two kids who danced to ‘Alexander’s Ragtime Band’?”

  He had discarded the mask of his charm. As his face hardened, he said brutally, “The record wore out and we found other games to play.” He finished his martini and stood up. “I’d better be getting back to Vicky or she’ll be wondering what’s happened to me. And I don’t want to miss Eric’s bedtime.”

  He had won the final round. I remained seated in front of my empty glass.

  “So long, Neil. Glad we’ve got this straightened out.”

  I waited until I was sure he had gone, and then I ordered another martini and tried to figure out how I could stop Alicia pitying me as soon as she heard the appalling news.

  III

  “I feel so exhausted,” said Vicky, “and I think it’s because I’m trying to be too many things at once—the perfect wife, the perfect mother, th
e perfect daughter, the perfect stepdaughter. So I’ve got to cut down on all these roles and settle for the ones that are most important.”

  “So you’ve chosen to be the perfect wife and mother? Well, that’s fine, sweetheart, that’s all I’ve ever wanted for you anyway, but—”

  “It’s not that I don’t love you, Daddy. It’s just that I’ve got to get right away from being a daughter. I’m not a little girl anymore, and I want to grow up, but somehow when I see you and Mother fighting over Eric, it puts me right back in the past again—”

  “Yes.” I turned away.

  “—and I want to make a clean break with all that. Sam understands. I just want to be with Sam.”

  We were in the living room of the Kellers’ house on East Sixty-fourth Street the morning after my meeting with Sam. Most of the furniture had come from Sam’s Park Avenue penthouse and had that impersonal look of luxury which only furniture in the most expensive hotels achieves. The Braque I had once given Sam hung above a small walnut desk and was a bad companion for the early Picasso which I had donated as a wedding present. Outside it was raining. I wandered over to the window and looked into the patio, where Sam’s plants, transferred from his penthouse terrace, exhibited their unlikely enthusiasm for city life. On the table near the window was a book entitled Heute Abend, and when I opened the cover I found it was a German textbook.

  “Don’t be angry, Daddy.”

  “I’m not angry. All I want’s your happiness, you know that. It’s just that I don’t quite see …” I closed the cover of the book and turned to face her again. “Why Germany?” I said. “Why Europe? Wouldn’t you be happier in America?”

  “I know you hate Europe. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  “I don’t hate it. It’s just that it has no message for me, like a canvas by Rubens. Vicky, if I thought you’d be happier in America, I could have Sam open a branch office in Boston or Chicago …”

  “No. I want to go to Europe. I want what Sam wants. I just want to be with Sam.”

  Sam seemed to have turned himself into some kind of Svengali. “Look, Vicky, you’ve got to be honest with me. Is Sam forcing you to go to Europe against your wishes?”

  She looked at me as if I’d taken leave of my senses. “Of course not! Oh, Daddy, don’t be so silly! Sam wouldn’t force me to do anything! He’s sweet to me!”

  “You’re truly happy with him?”

  “Of course! What a question! Daddy, do please stop worrying about me! Sam looks after me just as well as you ever did.”

  “I see,” I said. I thought about that. Then I said, “And you think going to Europe will make you feel more grown-up?”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  “Then you must go.” I saw with great clarity that if Vicky wanted to be more grown-up, I should be the last person to stop her quest for maturity. Mature women with minds of their own were far more likely than girls utterly dependent on their Svengali-type husbands to form their own ideas about where they wanted to live and what kind of life they wanted for their children.

  A glimmer of hope flickered dimly on the horizon. The odds were that time was on my side. At the moment, the balance of power was weighted in Sam’s favor, but if I hung on, kept the peace, and played the part of the saintly, resigned, long-suffering boss who would accept any indignity for his daughter’s sake, the day might eventually dawn when Vicky would tire of Europe, and then the balance of power would tilt in my favor again. My main task now was obviously to stage a reconciliation with Sam, because it would never do if he resigned in a fit of pique and went straight to Germany. So long as I was his boss, I would in theory retain my power to drag him back across the Atlantic, and one day I might be in a position to dispense with theory and put that power into practice.

  I detested waiting games. I detested the thought of letting Sam walk all over me while I smiled and did nothing. And I detested the prospect of Vicky and Eric disappearing into Europe. But I was a survivor. Heaving a sigh, I scraped together all the cunning, the patience, and the iron determination which I had acquired over the years, and said in my meekest, mildest voice, “Don’t you worry about anything, sweetheart! I understand the situation much better now, so you go to Europe with Sam, just as you want, and don’t you feel guilty about it for one minute. I’m sure it’ll all be for the best in the end.”

  IV

  I played my part to perfection until the Kellers left for Europe, but as the Queen Mary steamed off down the Hudson, I felt more depressed than I had ever felt in my life. I felt I had to be alone, yet paradoxically I couldn’t bear the thought of solitude.

  “Would you like to go out to dinner, Cornelius?” said Alicia, trying to be nice to me.

  “No, thanks.” I knew she was feeling sorry for me, and I couldn’t bear it. Making some excuse, I retired upstairs and later slipped out of the house to see Teresa, but I got no farther than the lobby of the Dakota. I was so depressed that I had no sexual desire, and there seemed no point in seeing Teresa unless we went to bed. I couldn’t have discussed the situation with her; any explanation involving Sam’s motives would inevitably have led us back to the one subject which mutual embarrassment always forbade us from discussing: the night at Kevin’s house, my irresistible offer, the seamy start of an affair which should never have started at all. Anyway, I didn’t want Teresa to know that Sam had got the better of me. It was important that she should believe there were no chinks in my armor, and I didn’t want to betray that I could be vulnerable.

  “Yes, sir?” said my chauffeur as I returned from the Dakota seconds after leaving the car.

  I thought quickly. I had to talk to someone, but whom could I possibly confide in without losing face? I was back with the old problem that there were so few people I could trust. This time I couldn’t even talk to Scott or Jake; I couldn’t let anyone who worked on Wall Street know that Sam had wiped the floor with me. Perhaps Kevin … Kevin might cheer me up, although of course I couldn’t have a serious conversation with a homosexual. But at least he knew the circumstances surrounding my acquisition of Teresa, so I wouldn’t have to embark on long explanations of Sam’s behavior.

  The thought of no explanations was immensely appealing.

  I set off for Greenwich Village.

  V

  Kevin’s kitchen was warm and cozy, reminding me of the farm where I had been born. I could just recall sitting on my Negro nurse’s lap in front of the kitchen range while Emily played with her dolls, and my mother, her needlework forgotten, browsed through a huge book which I later assumed was the Bible and later still found out was a novel in French by Balzac. I always felt very secure in kitchens, and was pleased when Kevin invited me to drink, not in his formal living room, but at the kitchen table.

  “It’s the ultimate compliment I pay my guests!” he said, laughing as he uncapped the Wild Turkey bourbon. “Drinks in the kitchen is the Kevin Daly equivalent of Louis XIV giving audiences on the john!”

  Kevin was a tall slim, dark man who looked as normal as those guys Sears Roebuck pick to model denims for their catalogs. When he wasn’t smiling, he could look both obstinate and tough, the sort of person who might start a fight in a bar after a few drinks, although in fact Kevin abhorred violence and as a conscientious objector had spent the war years working for the Red Cross. He drank too much, but then, he was an artist, so I made allowances for him. His plays were getting more obscure, but then, he would insist on writing that blank verse, which I privately thought was an intellectual affectation. You don’t go to the theater to hear poetry—unless the play’s by Shakespeare, and any impresario can tell you that Shakespeare’s bad box office. However, the critics thought highly of Kevin, and since the critics can make or break a play in this town, his plays usually did well. A couple of the early ones, written before he had developed the unfortunate taste for blank verse, had been filmed successfully, and certainly I had always done everything I could to support his work, even now when it was becoming less commercial.<
br />
  “… and imagine Sam screwing you like that!” he was saying, sounding sympathetic but not one bit surprised. “No wonder you look exhausted! Have another drink.”

  “Thanks.” I was feeling better. It made all the difference to be able to talk frankly to someone. “The worst part,” I added in a fresh burst of confidence, “is not that I’ll be cut off from Vicky and Eric. There’ll be regular visits, and I think that if I’m smart, I’ll get them back in the end. The worst part is that I’ve lost Sam for good. It’s probably hard for you to understand how much my three Bar Harbor friends mean to me, but …”

  “It must be a question of relaxation.”

  “Right, Sam was the only person I could relax with at the office. I didn’t have to play the role of big tycoon with Sam, but that’s all finished now. It’s going to be lonely at Willow and Wall in future, and I’m going to feel very … isolated. Yeah, that’s the word. Isolated. Hell, I feel isolated already! I feel so cut off from people.”

  “Your position at the bank must surely make a certain amount of isolation inevitable. But what about your private life? You’ve still got your wife to talk to. And your mistress.”

  I thought of myself retreating from Alicia that evening. I thought of myself being unable to face Teresa. The silence lengthened. I looked at Kevin, but he was gazing at the picture of the wild turkey oh the bottle of bourbon. A lump of anguish hardened in my throat, and suddenly my depression seemed no longer diffuse but concentrated, a despair which demanded immediate verbal expression. “Kevin …”

  “Uh-huh?”

  But I didn’t know what to say.

  “Things are okay with Teresa, aren’t they?” said Kevin carelessly, as the silence lengthened again. “Or are you getting tired of her?”

  “Hell, no! It’s just … I don’t know. Nothing. At least …”

  “Christ, communication’s hard sometimes, isn’t it?” said Kevin. “It’s like being in a pit and shouting for help but finding you’ve lost your voice. Or it’s like getting lost and asking the way and finding no one speaks your language. Or it’s like climbing into a suit of armor to protect yourself and then finding you can’t get out.”