The Immigrants

by Howard Fast

  Two days later, the funeral services for Mary Seldon were held in the Founders’ Crypt of the still-unfinished Grace Cathedral, within sight of the Seldon residence. In spite of the fact that the crypt was inadequate for the numbers who would have come to the proceedings, Thomas Seldon specified to Dan that he desired it to be there and no other place. A small piece of property which his wife had owned on Nob Hill had been willed to the cathedral. In this decision, Seldon was following his wife’s wishes; and during the two days after his wife’s death, he talked to Dan at length about this and other matters. Dan realized with some surprise that Seldon was clinging to him desperately, that one of the three or four richest and most powerful men in San Francisco was to all effects utterly alone in the world with no one else he felt he could turn to. Dan took care of all the arrangements. Bishop Nichols gave the funeral oration, commending Mary Seldon as a woman whose graciousness and beauty would long be remembered and whose generosity had contributed so unselfishly to the great Episcopal cathedral that would someday rise over this crypt.

  A few days later, Dan and Jean and Thomas Seldon gathered in the library of the Seldon mansion for the reading of Mary Seldon’s will. There were a few bequests to various charities. The bulk of her estate, ten thousand shares of stock in the Seldon Bank, various other stocks and bonds as well as some fifty thousand dollars in cash, went to her daughter, Jean.

  Training recruits to crawl on their bellies, their heads down, their guns sliding in front of them, Lieutenant Jacob Levy was informed that he was wanted at the post headquarters. There, Colonel Albert Broderick said to him, “I’m sorry, Jake, but the honeymoon’s over. It’s open season on lieutenants. Jones is cutting your orders. You go up to the front tomorrow morning. I wish to hell we had some other replacements. You had your lumps.”

  “Maybe I’ll be lucky,” Jake said.

  “I hope so.”

  But he had no faith in his luck; he had used it up. He had made friends, good friends, dear friends, the kind of friends who clutch you and look at death through your eyes, and they were all dead. Even Steve Cassala had been torn open, ripped apart, and he thought of Steve now as his command car lurched and swayed over a rutted, muddy road through the Argonne Forest. A misty rain had been falling; then the sun broke through to reveal the tortured, blackened sticks that had once been trees in this demented landscape.

  When he reached his unit, there was no welcome. Lieutenants were in the nature of condemned men, and the men who were only half condemned looked at him with blank, tired, bearded faces, their eyes dead already. His captain nodded at him, took his papers, told him to keep his head down, and led him to his dugout.

  “Get some sleep,” the captain said. “It’s been too quiet. Tomorrow, the shit hits the fan.”

  But it was quiet all that night. Jake didn’t sleep. He lay there, thinking. He let the pictures flow through his mind, pictures of things he was convinced he would not see again, the sun on the water of Richardson Bay, the catboat slipping past San Pedro Point on that long, long sail he had taken with Clair through the narrows to Petaluma Creek, the stillness while they drifted for hours, becalmed and content, the old Spanish house at Sausalito, his mother and his father. He pictured them all, and lay awake in his pool of melancholy. Perhaps he dozed. The voice of his captain came out of the blob of daylight that marked the entrance to the dugout–without rancor, strangely gentle: “Levy, you lucky sonofabitch.”

  He sat up, pulled on his shoes, and stared at the captain.

  “Listen.”

  It was quiet. There were voices outside, but otherwise it was quiet.

  “I think it’s over,” the captain said uncertainly.

  Jake went outside into the trench. The men were leaning high on the parapet, staring out over the ruptured, wire-strewn earth that separated them from the enemy. No gun fired and no shell exploded. The stillness was unearthly, incredible, not broken by cheers or tears or any sound except the low voices of the men, speaking to each other almost in whispers.

  That afternoon, word came through that Kaiser William had abdicated and that Prince Maximilian of Baden, the Chancellor of Germany, had resigned.

  The war was over.

  In San Francisco, Mark stood at the window in his office over the department store, staring out at the wild celebration below, people in a vast parade, twisting, dancing, embracing strangers, hundreds of them wearing gauze masks to protect them from that silent death of influenza that had slid out of the trenches and across the whole world. When Dan entered the office, Mark didn’t move.

  “This calls for a drink,” Dan said.

  “Get out, Danny.”

  “What?”

  “Get out and leave me alone.”

  “Jesus, Mark, it’s over. Over!”

  Mark turned to face him, blinking his eyes to keep back the tears.

  “What’s over? Is Jake alive or dead? Tell me what’s over. I was on the phone with Sarah for an hour. Tell her it’s over.”

  “Jake’s all right.”

  “How the hell do you know?” Mark demanded.

  Dan walked over and put his arm around him. “Come on, old buddy. How many times you told me the kid’s a survivor? He’s all right. You know what, we’ll have a few drinks and then we’ll find Jim Rolph and put him on the telephone. There are ways to find out what’s with Jake. And Sunny Jim owes us. Mark, bad news comes home and damn quick. All we got now is good news, so let’s find a bar and put down a few.”

  Stephan Cassala had been a quiet, studious boy, very gentle, very unaggressive. If anything, these qualities were accentuated in the man. He returned to work at the bank. He was only twenty-three years old, but he had the lined, thin face of a much older man. He was tall, slender, good-looking. His father adored him, and thanked God every day for his recovery; and more and more, he came to lean on him and to turn to him. While the Bank of Sonoma was still a small institution, it was nevertheless substantial and in the process of growth. When Anthony Cassala wanted to buy a piece of property on California Street–since they were bursting through their seams in the small space on Montgomery Street–it was Stephan who persuaded his father to remain where they were and to erect a nine-story superstructure over their heads while they continued to do business. Montgomery Street was the place to be, regardless of the cost.

  In such matters, Stephan could be decisive. In other ways, he appeared to have no will of his own. Dolores Vincente was a countrywoman to Maria, and she had a daughter of seventeen years whose name was Joanna. The Vincentes lived in the city, where Ralph Vincente owned a grocery store. Joanna Vincente was a quiet, placid, rather pretty girl, with large, dark eyes and a mass of fine black hair. For years, Maria Cassala and Dolores Vincente had been plotting a match between son and daughter, and now Joanna became a guest at the Cassala home in San Mateo. Her shyness and gentleness appealed to Stephan; he was not in love with her, but indeed he had never been in love with any woman; there was no force within him that impelled him toward marrying her, but then again there was no force that impelled him away from such an action.

  Certainly, she was a comfortable person, unassuming and making no demands whatsoever. Both Rosa and Maria loved her, and she fell into the life of the big house at San Mateo, causing scarcely a ripple. Weekends, the house would fill with guests, and they were all exorbitant in their praise of Joanna. Maria saw her as the perfect daughter-in-law, and Anthony as well indicated to Stephan that it was time he married and settled down.

  In all truth, it simply happened and Stephan let it happen. The wedding ceremony took place in St. Matthew’s Catholic Church on Notre Dame Avenue, where Maria’s tears had wet the altar rail so many times, and afterward there was a reception at the Cassala home. Cassala had erected three enormous striped pavilions, one with a dance floor, the other two crowded with tables, chairs, and great mounds of food. More than two hundred guests were invited. Jean Lavette begged off with the understandable excuse that it was too close to her mother’s dea
th, and on a public occasion of this sort, May Ling could hardly be present. But Dan came and Mark and Sarah Levy, bringing with them Clair Harvey and Martha Levy. Just turned fourteen, Martha was budding into full womanhood. She was an impetuous, bubbling, effervescent young lady, so filled with life and energy and excitement that people who caught sight of her found themselves seeking her out again and again as the party continued.

  Stephan danced with her, and then he found that he kept looking for her, trying to find her in the crowd. When he glimpsed her, he would feel a pang, a kind of forlorn excitement.

  She said to him at one point, “Oh, Stephan, your bride is lovely! She’s like a Madonna!”

  And in reaction to that, he experienced a sense of loss, of awful, poignant loss.

  Alan Brocker had been one of the people present at Mary Seldon’s funeral, but he had not spoken to Jean on that occasion. He waited for a number of weeks after that, expecting to hear from her, and, when he did not, he telephoned her and made a luncheon date. She was neither warm nor cool, but simply matter-of-fact, and she suggested lunch at the Fairmont. “The easiest way to hide a relationship, Alan,” she explained, “is not to attempt to hide it.”

  When they were seated at their table, Alan looked at her thoughtfully and observed that she had changed since her mother’s death.

  “Have I? How?”

  “I don’t know yet. Did you have a rough time?”

  “I loved my mother. It’s not easy.”

  “And now?”

  “Quite capable of facing the world.”

  “Am I permitted to say that you’re more beautiful than ever?”

  “Thank you. What is the champagne for?” An iced bottle had arrived.

  “I use every opportunity. We are going to have Prohibition, my dear. This will all be a dreamy memory.” The waiter filled their glasses, and Alan raised his. “To the living. I don’t want to sound callous, my dear, but I have an aunt and three friends who died of the flu. Welcome back.”

  “Don’t be so damned sure of yourself. Just once, show some trace of humility.”

  “I do, Jean dear. I run errands. You appear to forget.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “Pinkertons. The report on your errant husband.” He took a folded sheaf of papers out of his pocket. “Six hundred dollars’ worth. Don’t mind that. It’s a gift, but not a paltry gift.”

  “I had forgotten all about it. I’ll pay for it. Don’t worry.”

  “I told you it’s a gift.”

  She opened it and glanced at it. “Did you read it?”

  “I could lie and tell you that honor triumphed and that I did not.”

  “I don’t blame you,” she said. She wanted to put it away unread in her purse, but she could not resist. Her eyes picked it up in the middle of the page: “From September 16th to September 28th, the subject made seven visits to the house on Willow Street. On September 16th, he arrived at 1:00 P.M. He was observed to embrace the Oriental woman who opened the door for him. On said day, he departed the premises at 2:45 P.M. On September 18th, he arrived at said premises on Willow Street at 7:20 P.M. Surveillance was maintained as per contract until midnight, at which time the subject had not departed. Surveillance began the following day outside subject’s Russian Hill residence, from which residence he was observed to depart at 8:12 A.M.–” She broke off reading and stared at Alan Brocker.

  “You can go on reading if you wish. I don’t mind.”

  “You’re so generous.”

  “I could have ordered twenty-four-hour surveillance. That would have doubled the price, and I don’t think you would have known any more.”

  “Thank you.” Unable to control herself, she was leafing through the pages.

  “I don’t know whether to commiserate or not,” he said. “It depends on how you look at it.”

  “I don’t need sympathy,” she snapped.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake, Jean, cool down. What did you expect? You haven’t been sleeping with the man. He’s evidently not a eunuch.”

  “Can’t you be quiet.”

  “As you wish. Shall I order lunch for both of us?”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “I’ll order anyway.” He called the waiter and gave the order for both of them. “Chops and salad,” he told her. “Very simple.”

  She folded the report and stuffed it into her purse. “About the child,” she said slowly. “Do you suppose it’s his?”

  “Possibly. There are ways to find out if you desperately have to know. Do you know who this Chinese lady might be?”

  “I can guess.”

  “You’re furious, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not exactly delighted.”

  “On the other hand, you are in possession of what might be called an invaluable weapon.”

  “I am aware of that.”

  “Do you intend to face him with this?”

  “That is none of your business.”

  “Still, as a friend of the family, I am curious.”

  She observed him shrewdly. “My dear Alan,” she said. “I will satisfy your curiosity. At some time, which I alone will decide, I shall discuss these matters with my husband. That time is in the future. Do you understand? The future. Meanwhile, you are not to imagine for one moment that you too have a weapon. If one word of this gets out–one word, mind you–I shall tell Dan that you are the originating source. And do you know what he might well do?”

  “Latins are quite temperamental.”

  “Yes, he might kill you. And not pleasantly either.”

  “I should think you could trust me.”

  “I like you, dear man,” she said, smiling. “I like the way you look and the way you make love. So we’ll remain friends and not discuss trust. Agreed?”

  “Agreed.” The waiter brought the food now. “Do eat your lunch,” Alan said. “One always feels better afterwards.”

  She began to eat with excellent appetite. Brocker watched her in silence for a while; then he said, “Dear lady, only one thing. Why won’t you divorce him?”

  “Do you know any divorced ladies you don’t feel sorry for, Alan? I don’t. And no one is to feel sorry for me. May I tell you something else? One day, Dan Lavette will be the richest and the most powerful man in this state. He’ll own California. But, dear man, I shall own Dan Lavette. Think about that.”

  The opening of the new L&L Department Store, the largest, the most splendid, and the most stylish store west of Chicago, was, in Mark Levy’s words, “a historic occasion for this queen of all American cities.” It is true that the planned principal beneficiary of Mark’s labors was still with the American Expeditionary Forces in occupied Germany, but since he was alive and well, his absence did not in any way interfere with the gaiety of the occasion. The two enormous and malignant forces of death, the World War and the influenza epidemic, were both in the past, and while an unpredictable thing called Prohibition was settling down on the nation, this was still the beginning of a new era of light and hope, a time when the reborn nations of the earth would embrace in a mighty league to end war forever and to institute the community of man. Of course, there were certain disturbing factors, such as the emergence of a man called Lenin leading a Bolshevik Revolution in Russia–but that was only a temporary phenomenon. The Hun had been driven into his lair, and the war to end all wars was over.

  As the main speaker at the reception, held in the street floor of L&L, Mayor Sunny Jim Rolph emphasized all of the above points, and then he joined in the singing of “Smiles,” not only his own theme song but in a sense one of the theme songs of the AEF. “There are smiles that make you happy, there are smiles that make you gay,” his fine baritone boomed out above all others.

  Mark Levy, gray at the temples and almost bald now in his fortieth year, had labored long and carefully over his own small speech. “A store such as this,” he said, “is not simply an emporium where things are sold to the public; it is a hallmark, a symbol of the civil
ization which we have built here on the shores of the mighty Pacific Ocean. Our fathers and our grandfathers came here with only their bare hands and the clothes on their backs. All of us were immigrants together. We worked and saved and built. And on the counters of this great store will be the products of this great and industrious nation. No store like this one ever existed in the great State of California, and every inhabitant of the Bay Area should take pride in its present existence.”

  Dan was careful and patient in his approach to his father-in-law. He was not in any hurry. By the war’s end, the price per ton for the building of first-class passenger tonnage had gone above five hundred dollars, raising the cost of a ship such as he envisaged to over fifteen million dollars. But no one was building passenger ships. Every dockyard in the nation was frantically creating cargo vessels–and then the war ended. Meanwhile, Dan waited. He no longer had one ship in mind, but two–the beginnings of a mighty fleet. He hired Alton Jones, the best naval architect on the coast, to begin work on the plans. With the sale of the cargo ships, he had plenty of time on his hands but no desire to be involved or to interfere with the operation of the new department store. He left that entirely to Mark and Feng Wo. He invested in some tracts of land in Daly City and purchased some property near Lincoln Park. He pored over each new set of drawings for the ships, and he studied the plans of such great liners as the old White Star Oceanic, the Cunard Mauretania, and the North German Lloyd’s Crownprince Cecilie.

  Much of this he did at May Ling’s house, and those days there were the happiest he had ever known. He would sometimes arrive there in the morning, spread out his blueprints on the floor, and then pore over them while his son, Joseph, did his best to crumple and tear them; and then the two of them would roll over on the floor, Dan growling and woofing like a huge bear and Joseph shrinking away in mock terror.

  “Do you ever play like that with Tom and Barbara?” May Ling asked him one day.