A taxi pulled up behind their car at that moment. “Here I am,” Harry called out hurriedly as he got out of the cab.
17
Now that the war was on, everything was changing. More than ever women were taking over jobs that men used to do. Here, at the counter, Uncle Harry hired young Puerto Rican girls instead of the boys he used to hire. Buddy said that Harry got the better of the bargain. Not only did he pay the girls less than the boys, he was always able to talk one or two of them into giving him a fuck. They didn’t complain. They needed the job. The only other opportunity they would have was to work as cleaning women. That paid even less than Harry paid, and they could only work a day or two a week. At least this was steady work.
Graduation day for me was on the twentieth of January. When I woke up that morning, Aunt Lila had a big special breakfast prepared for me. I had made a 3.0 grade average. It wasn’t great, but it was better than flunking out.
Aunt Lila and Kitty were coming to the school for the graduation exercises. Harry had to keep the store open; as he said, without him “nothing would work.”
Aunt Lila gave me a nice Arrow shirt and Kitty gave me a bulky sweater. She said that would keep me warm, since it was cold at the counter at night now when the windows were open.
After I got my diploma, Aunt Lila dropped Kitty and me back at the apartment house. She told us that she was going to go by and pick Harry up a little early and surprise him. She said she had gotten Harry an Arrow shirt, too, and she wanted to give it to him.
I looked at Kitty and she looked at me. We both had the same thought. I ran into the apartment and called the counter. Fat Rita answered at the register.
“Where’s Harry?” I asked.
“Upstairs,” she said. I could hear her gum clicking against her teeth. “He’s got one of the spick girls with him.”
“Get upstairs and tell him that Aunt Lila’s on her way down there,” I said.
“I can’t do that,” she said fearfully. “He’d kill me if I went up there.”
“It’ll be worse if you don’t call him,” I said. “There goes your job.”
“I don’t care,” she said, starting to cry. “I’m afraid. You know his temper.”
“You call him,” I said firmly. “He won’t be angry. He’ll thank you for it. Believe me.”
She hesitated a moment. “Stay on the phone,” she said. “Don’t hang up. I’ll go up and knock on the door.”
I held on for almost two minutes. She came back on the phone. “Everything’s okay,” she said.
“Thanks, Rita,” I said, and hung up the phone.
I turned to Kitty. “She got him.”
“Good,” she said, and pulled an envelope out of her purse and held it in her hand. “This came for you this morning in the mail just before I went to your graduation.”
I looked down at it. An official draft board envelope. I opened it and took out the note. They didn’t lose any time. I was ordered to take the draft card and go directly to Grand Central and take my physical.
I handed the letter to Kitty. She glanced at it quickly and then looked up at me. “You were expecting it.”
“Yeah,” I said. “But not so soon. I haven’t even had enough time to decide what I want to do.”
“If you’re one-A,” she said, “you have no choice, anyway. They just send you to the army or navy. But if you’re lucky and get four-F, then you stay here and get yourself a real job, not a crummy one like at Harry’s.”
“What kind of job?” I asked. “They don’t train you for anything at high school.”
“There’s a lot of jobs,” she said. “Just read the classifieds in the newspaper. All the good jobs are for the men that are left here. Maybe you don’t realize it, but men are a real property—in demand.”
“Maybe I can get a job fucking some rich society dame,” I said kiddingly.
“You can’t even handle what you’ve got,” she said laughing, going along with the fun. She reached for my fly. “You have just enough to keep me satisfied.”
We got out of our clothes and rolled onto the bed. I really liked Kitty; she made everything fun. I hoped I made her happy, too. Now that I had graduated we’d have a lot of time to do things together. That’s what I thought, but we never had a chance. By the middle of March I was in the army.
BOOK TWO
PART ONE
ONE FRANC A LITER
1
France—1914
Jean Pierre heard his father and grandfather screaming at each other from behind the heavy, ornate library doors. He pressed his ear closer to the door, but then Armand, the heavy butler, pulled him abruptly away from the door by the collar and dragged him upstairs to his bedroom. He pushed him inside the room and slapped him twice on the face. “You never eavesdrop when your eiders are speaking!” he snapped.
“But they were talking about a war!” Jean Pierre said. “I love wars.”
“You’re still young. You don’t know anything about wars,” Armand said. “Now you wait up here until you are called downstairs.”
Jean Pierre watched as the butler closed the door behind him. He muttered at the butler under his breath. “Son of a bitch! I know why he has a job in this house. He sucks my grandfather’s cock and lets my father fuck him in the ass.” Still muttering under his breath, he walked to the window that overlooked the beautiful flower garden in the front of the villa. He continued wondering what they were talking about.
* * *
“Papa!” Jacques said. “Why are you so afraid? If we do have a war it will be over quickly. A matter of months.”
Maurice looked at his son sadly. “Jacques, you’re stupid. There is never a war that is over in just a few months. I remember when the French were fighting the Prussians when I was only twelve years old. Your grandfather took me and ten men with four wagons in the middle of the night to bring water into Paris because the Prussians had cut off the water supply. The French are never prepared, even then, as well as now.”
“So what?” Jacques replied. “That’s how we became rich and started a whole new business.”
“You don’t understand, Jacques,” his father said. “Those were different days. Now Briand, our premier, is an egoist. I have to believe that he had Jaurès, the pacifist, murdered so that he could get us into the war. Don’t deceive yourself, Jacques, the Prussians will beat the whole of Europe. We can’t beat shit. Even our football teams can’t win a game.”
“But Briand is not in charge of the government; Poincaré is the president,” Jacques answered.
“You must learn, Jacques, to read between the lines. He will become president within two years. Then all Europe will have to beg America to save us,” Maurice stated.
Jacques looked at his father. “Perhaps we should ask his mother to let him live with her in Switzerland until this is over.”
“You know the agreement we have made with her. Besides, I do not want my grandson in the company of that whore.” He shook his head. “No, she would never agree to Jean Pierre living with her. She only agreed to bear the child, not to raise the child.”
“The Rothschilds still have family in England. Maybe we should ask them to take Jean Pierre,” Jacques suggested.
Maurice shook his head. “The only thing the Rothschilds are interested in is money.”
“We have money, too,” Jacques answered arrogantly. “Don’t forget we own all the bottling plants for our water. That’s more valuable than all of the Rothschilds’ assets!”
“And don’t forget that the Rothschilds are Jews,” his father said.
Jacques also remembered that his father’s name was Maurice, and he always felt uncomfortable because he thought it looked too Jewish. Maurice had tried to have his name changed to François, but his father, Jacques’s grandfather, refused. He would not allow it because Maurice’s wife’s father was named François. He was a lowly drayman, who worked for Plescassier driving a wagon. The only reason there had been a marriage was because M
aurice needed a strong lower-class girl who could breed a healthy son for him. The marriage was made because of the inheritance laws. Plescassier must always remain in the family. When Jacques married, he too married for the same reasons. His wife had given him two sons, Jean Pierre and Raymond. Jacques gave her and her family twenty thousand louis for a divorce. They parted amicably. His wife was not unhappy; at the time she married Jacques she knew he was homosexual, as his father and grandfather had been. She also knew that she could never be satisfied until she found a real man.
She agreed to relocate in Switzerland with twenty thousand louis for herself and five thousand louis for her family. She soon found many companions and opened a bar and café.
“No, not the Rothchilds,” Maurice boomed, his voice echoing in the high ceilings of the room. “We will send him to Quebec, where I have distant cousins,” Maurice said. “With a little money, they will care for him.”
“But what about Raymond?” Jacques asked. “The boy is only three years old.”
“There is no problem with Raymond,” Maurice said coldly. “The boy is physically and mentally retarded. You know what Dr. Meyer said. The best thing we could do for him is to place him in a nursing facility that cares for children of his kind.”
“But, Papa,” Jacques pleaded. “He is our family. We can’t desert him like that.”
“Again you don’t remember what Dr. Meyer and all the other specialists said. He will not live more than nine or ten years at the most. The kindest thing we can do is give him the best care available.”
Jacques sat quietly. He felt small in the big chair. Tears filled his eyes. “He’s still just a baby,” he said. “Only God can know his future. A miracle could happen and he could be healed.”
“There’s always hope, Jacques. If a miracle occurs, the nurses can help and he can come home to us,” Maurice said. “The child is a problem for us. We cannot show him in society—they would insult us behind our backs. Our business would slowly go down. I know these bastards. They can be cruel.”
“But Jean Pierre loves his little brother,” Jacques said.
“Jean Pierre will be going to Canada until the end of the war. He will be told that Raymond is too small to send away. By the time Jean Pierre comes home he will have completely forgotten about him.”
Jacques looked up at his father. “Vous êtes vraiment dur, Papa,” he said.
2
It was not the Queen Mary or the Normandie, but it was a large and comfortable ship, even if it was Irish. Its name was the Molly Machree out of Dublin. Jean Pierre sighed and looked up at Armand as he leaned on the railing. “Why didn’t Papa book us on one of the big French boats?”
“The war,” Armand said. “The Germans and the French are at war. But Germany is not at war with the Irish Republic. So our ship is safe to cross the Atlantic.”
“But we’re going to Quebec,” Jean Pierre said. “That’s part of France, isn’t it?”
“Not anymore,” Armand said as he shook his head. “It’s British now.”
“But they all speak French!”
“History. It’s a never-ending story,” Armand said. “Come, let’s go to the cabin and get washed up. Soon we will have dinner and after dinner we will be able to see the Rock of Gibraltar as we sail into the Atlantic.”
It was ten o’clock when they passed the Rock of Gibraltar, and then Armand put him to bed. They had two small adjoining rooms. He didn’t know what time it was when the clanging ship alarm awakened him. He ran to the door to Armand’s room. He banged on the door. There was no answer. “Armand! Armand!” he shouted. Still, no answer. Quickly, he pulled his trousers and shirt on. He could hear people running through the corridors. He ran out of his room, but he could not understand what they were saying because everyone was speaking English. He ran toward the barroom. One of the sailors picked him up and took him into the dining room. Another sailor quickly slipped a life jacket over his head. The sailor gestured with his hand. “Stay here!”
Jean Pierre looked around the room. There were many people waiting in the dining room, all wearing life jackets, some seated, some standing, waiting for instructions from the staff. They were told only that everyone should stay in the dining room. There was nothing to fear; they should not forget that this was an Irish vessel and Ireland was not at war with anyone.
Jean Pierre was not afraid. He was still looking around for Armand. Not seeing him anywhere, he slipped out by one of the small doors leading to the deck. He had come out underneath a staircase. He was hidden in the shadows. Looking out, he saw two large searchlights covering the whole side of the Molly Machree. He turned and saw where the searchlights were coming from: a small German warship.
He stayed under the staircase and watched a motorboat bring a number of German sailors over to the Molly Machree. The Irish captain saluted them as they came aboard and the officer saluted the captain. They then shook hands. They were all speaking in German, so Jean Pierre didn’t understand what had been said. The Irish captain nodded and made an order to his men. Then those men and the German sailors went off together. Once they had gone the Irish captain and the German officer went to the bar and had a few drinks.
Jean Pierre sat under the staircase. He was able to understand that the Irish and the Germans must have an agreement. But he was still angry about Armand. When his father learned about Armand’s behavior, that would be the end of Armand. His father would destroy him. He heard some noise from the deck. The Germans were back carrying cases of things. Wine, whiskey, food. Jean Pierre couldn’t see exactly what they were taking, but it seemed to keep them happy.
An hour passed before the Germans had transported their goods and had disappeared into the darkness of the Atlantic Ocean. Then slowly Jean Pierre stretched and listened to the engines of the Molly Machree begin softly. Jean Pierre stayed under the staircase another hour as the other passengers returned to their cabins. Then he stood up and went back to the barroom.
The barman was the only one left. He stared down at Jean Pierre. “What the hell are you still doing here?” Then he realized that the child didn’t understand him. But he was a proficient barman. He spoke a few languages, one of them French. He repeated his question in French.
Jean Pierre was happy to find someone who could speak his language. He began to tell him what had happened from the time that he heard the alarm.
The barman then called the purser, who also spoke French. The purser said he would take Jean Pierre to his cabin and try to locate Armand.
The purser opened the door to Jean Pierre’s quarters. He then put the key in the door to Armand’s room. He tried to open it. The door moved slightly, but not easily. The purser then threw his weight against the door. This time it opened enough to turn the light on in the room before it shut again.
But it was Jean Pierre, whose eyes were younger and faster, who could see what had happened. Armand was lying on his stomach on the floor with a knife stuck through his heart from the back. The blood was still seeping onto the rug.
3
The telegram came to Jacques at Plescassier’s sales office in Paris. It was from the executive vice president of the Irish Atlantic Shipping Lines.
The message was simple:
DEAR MR. JACQUES MARTIN: We are sorry to inform you that the tutor of your son, Mr. Armand LeBosc, has had an accident and perished. We are also pleased to let you know that your son, M. Jean Pierre Martin, is well and not very distressed by this sad affair. We have placed your son into the care of the purser, Mr. Benjamin O’Doul, who speaks French fluently and is the father of three sons of his own. I would like to ask that you please give me the information concerning your son’s care once we land in Quebec. Mr. O’Doul will be informing you about any news pertaining to your son.
With all respect, sir,
Thomas T. Watts
Executive Vice President
Waving the telegram, Jacques walked into his father’s office. He dropped the telegram on the desk in fron
t of his father. He waited but one minute to complain to the old man. “Armand, the crazy asshole! You were the one that wanted him to take care of Jean Pierre!”
Maurice looked up from his desk. “What are you complaining about now?” he said calmly. “He’s dead! There is no longer a problem.”
“We don’t know what he may have taken with him when he got on the ship. He was always a crook and a thief,” Jacques said.
Maurice waved his hand in annoyance. “Nothing,” he said. “Armand was not that crazy. He knew there would be a large bonus when he delivered Jean Pierre to Canada.”
Jacques was silent.
Maurice looked up at him. “Now give the information to the vice president concerning the location of the school in Montreal that we have arranged for him. The boy seems to be in very good care. We don’t have time to dwell on this. When you finish come back in here and we will find the money to buy the Cabernet farms and the winery that Prudhomme has offered to us this morning.”
“Wine isn’t like water,” Jacques said. “We don’t have to grow the grapes.”
“But wine brings more money than water,” Maurice said. “Water is only a franc a bottle. Good Cabernet can bring you ten francs a bottle.”
4
“It won’t matter whether the British bring their entire army into France. They are all stupid. Hindenburg has been put in charge of the German army in the east of France. That means they will wipe out the entire French and British armies in France. The son of a bitch is a genius like Bismarck. What will we do when he occupies Paris?” Jacques was angry as he spoke to his father.
Maurice smiled. “We’ll open more cabarets so the Boche can see the cancan. Then we will open more brothels and let them all get venereal diseases. Last but not least, we will give them all the sweet boys they love. They will not last long in Paris.”
“Papa, you’re old-fashioned. The new German is not like that!” Jacques answered.
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