Una and Mary took us to Saint Petersburg, Florida, for a week on March break in 1970. We stayed in a luxurious villa with its own private pool. I remember building a huge sand-castle with Una and Sally on the beach, just the three of us all alone in the sun. Though I was very content, it added to a sense of the unreal which had affected every level of my being, all the more so because of my run of successes.
Month after month, my life took on a marvelous quality. I enjoyed the cottage better than the Magical Kingdom. Not so many things got in the way. But really, I enjoyed them both enormously.
About this time, Sally became sometimes annoying to our friends and to Una. In grade five, she began thinking that we should be allowed anything because we were Tappets, and I must say in fairness to myself, it was Sally’s idea from the beginning.
Often times, I didn’t fight this degenerate tendency, as Una calls it, as much as I should have, even though I knew it to be wrong. Often times, I’d find myself at odds with Una because Sally wanted something which Una had refused her.
At one point, Una even took back our credit cards.
“Don’t you see?” I complained to Sally one day, “Una wins every time. Why do you keep on testing?”
“Una won’t be around forever.”
I’d eavesdropped on enough of Mary and Una’s private conversations, to know this wasn’t true, and that Sally was being petulant, and that Mary had one time recently said to Una, “If that child of mine were to ever be spoilt, I’d never forgive myself.”
“Everything’s in hand,” Una had replied, “as long as we’re on the same page.”
I began to actively coach Sally on reducing her testy behavior and watching carefully for her mood changes. However, though I didn’t concede to material temptations because I was a Tappet, I did yield to being treated differently outside the mansion.
This turned out to be worse than any sin committed by Sally.
On Sunday September 23, 1970, I turned ten years old and Mary, Una, Sally, and Stan, escorted me to a restaurant near the Empire State Building, The von Covvossan, where I was surprised to see it was closed to the public for the night and only available to Tappet employees and other invited guests.
Stan sat at a table at the front with John Admen who ran Factory Bright and Ken Roxton, the president of Modal Oil. John had flown with Stan in the Korean Conflict, but Ken wasn’t even a pilot, yet they were all war buddies. I wouldn’t find out the story behind that until much later. They were with their wives, but I didn’t see any of their kids. Una had spoken to me many times about John and Ken. I knew she particularly held Ken in high esteem, the one who had helped Lloyd.
Mary referred to the original founders, of whom there were six, as Stanroids, Stan’s co-founders, war-buddies, allies, and long-time friends. Often up in her office in the mansion, she’d complained to Una about them. How they undermined her authority or voted against her on this or that issue, unless Stan intervened at her request. A number of times, she’d become furious.
Una and she would talk at length about the company and its many ins and outs which I couldn’t even begin to understand. Mary would complain that this executive had too much power, or that too much protection because Stan liked him. Most of the time this part bored me and I left or tuned out. When supper began, I sat beside Una. Sally was on the other side of her.
“Point out the six Stanroids to me tonight,” I whispered conspiratorially.
She wiped her forehead off with a napkin and her big brown eyes were delighted that I was interested. “What do you know about the Tappets’ politics?” she asked, pretending to be surprised. I shrugged and she gently rubbed my head. “I think you spy at the door too much and know far more than you should,” she added. “Do you see the big man at the table across from Stan’s? He’s dressed in the black suit and sits beside the blond-curly-haired woman? I nodded. “That’s Gordon Whitley. He runs the mining companies, Tay Mines and Tappet Holdings. He made the most money of the lot this last year.”
“Even more than Ken Roxton and John Admen?” I asked surprised. She nodded. “Even more than Mom and Dad?” I asked further surprised.
She nodded again. “The man beside Gordon is Graham Roberts, the president of Constant Batteries. When I first met him in 1960, he was a slim handsome man. Success has gone to his stomach.” She giggled. “However,” she quickly added, “not like with Una in a nice way, but in a rather swollen way.”
What she said was absolutely true. When you saw Una, you didn’t think uncomfortable, you thought, smooth-skin and happiness, but when you saw Graham, you thought bloated. His clothes were to the point of bursting. I laughed and squeezed her hand. I instantly disliked the man. In my terms of how I’d learned to judge men from the streets of Jersey City with lightning speed, his face, especially his eyes, were mean and untrustworthy. How true this assessment would turn out to be.
“The one beside her, is that his wife?” I asked.
“No, that’s Cheryl Garland, the president of Nexus. She’s one of Mary’s allies inside Tappets. Last year her husband and two children were killed in a car accident. Mary has spent a lot of time with her lately, but there’s only so much you can do. She’s still working though and I think it’s getting better for her. The financial-comptroller of Tappets is Jack Denison, sitting on the other side of her with the grey thinning hair. The one dressed in the blue suit and the old-fashioned bow-tie. He’s also the International Spokesperson for Tappet’s interest worldwide. He is referred to as a Stanroid as well, although he doesn’t run any of the divisions.”
“Who is the sixth one?”
“Hiroyuki Nakamura, the President of Poss Fast-Discs. He’s the man sitting beside Mary right now.”
The tall and debonair Asian man with hard features looked over at me as though he knew we were discussing him. It was spooky, but his hard features were softened by his kind eyes and he sent a warm smile in our direction.
“He looks very rich.”
“He should for what Tappets pay him.”
“How much is that?”
She grunted. “You’ll get your nose clipped.” Una always said that if I became too curious, especially about things I was too young to understand. “He’s also Senior Vice President of Tappet Electronics,” she added. “Mary admires him more than any of the other Stanroids, and he often votes with her against your father. His power inside of Tappet Industries has become as great as anyone’s.”
“Was he one of the men at the hospital the first time I saw you?”
“Those two men were John Admen’s people from Japan who were meeting with Mary that day.”
“How is it that Mr. Nakamura is a war buddy?”
“He’s not. But they did meet during the Korean conflict.”
I didn’t see how he could be a Stanroid if he wasn’t a war-buddy. This was another thing that bugged me about life. Nothing was obvious, even the simplest things were complicated. What could be more simple than six war-time buddies becoming co-founders of Tappets and being referred to as Stanroids. But no. There had to be an exception. “Why would Mom and Dad be voting against each other?”
“Good question, my full-grown child.” For a few minutes, our conversation was interrupted because dinner was served, but when Una had made sure Sally was well on the way to a good meal, her attention returned to me.
“If you’re piloting a plane,” she whispered, “the pilot and the captain are one and the same. You can’t have a vote on how to take off or land or even how fast you should be flying. You’re the captain, your authority must be unfettered. When you are running a complex financial institution, such as Tappets, there’s room for compromise and negotiations to keep the original partners on board. Mary is a pay as you go girl, and doesn’t want to finance things until they’ve proved themselves in the market place, like appliances, metals, tools, and so forth. But, to her, the team is the biggest asset of Tappets, and she’ll make compromises to keep the original people on board. She greatly admires loyalt
y. Stan likes to spend money on ideas, gadgets, and inventions, but much of them will never make any money. He had real problems with Thorp Tools when he was the Executive Operating Officer and Mary replaced him and put him in charge of research. So, by this compromise, they try to get the best of both worlds.”
“Who has the final say?”
“Who do you think?”
“Mary.”
“Usually it is Mary, but she occasionally loses, and when she does, look out.”
After I had finished my supper, I saw Lloyd walking toward us and rose to meet him. His blond hair was even longer than before, and it had softened his eyes further and made him appear more gentle. I remember thinking though that maybe it wasn’t his long hair alone. With the job he had at Tappets and his improved living arrangements with Ken Roxton, perhaps the cruelness in his eyes had been taken away a little. The only thing which contradicted this judgment was that his body was as lean as ever, as though he was caught in the middle of a long war and couldn’t find enough food to eat.
“Happy Birthday,” he said and gave me a quick hug.
We went out of the eye of the crowd, back behind the tables. He passed me a small gift of which I guessed immediately was a book and I unwrapped it. “The Last of the Wine,” I said, “by Mary Renault.”
“You’ll like it. It’s about the Greek philosophers and their friends and warriors during the hostilities between Athens and Sparta in ancient time.”
“Thanks. How is it at the Roxton family?”
“They bought me a mountain bike.”
“What kind is that?”
“One with thick tires for riding anywhere you want even over curbs. Hi, Sally.”
Sally had stepped up behind me. “Hello,” she said. “Christian doesn’t get the rest of his gifts until he gets home.”
“Guess what I saw last night?” Lloyd asked. I never understood why people ask questions that way. If you ever guessed correctly they’d be disappointed. It’s stupid. We both shrugged. “Saturday Night Fever,” he said. “Ken took Mike and me. The dancing in it is so real. Have you ever been to a disco?”
I’d begun to collect Rolling Stone records and I had decided that I should hate disco. I knew nothing about it, but I had picked up my cues from Kurt. He had told me that disco was for fairies and Europeans. I shook my head.
“I’d love to go,” Sally said, “but our prison-keepers would never consent.”
“Prison-keepers? ” I said with a laugh. “They give us everything we want.”
She half-frowned. “I was just joking.”
Everyone was asked to sit and Mary rose to the podium at the front of the hall. She was flanked on two sides by enormous arrangements of blooms and orchids of which I hadn’t really taken note of before.
“Our annual fiscal year statement in mid September,” she said, her voice loud and clear, “was our fifth straight year in a row of significantly increased sales. We’ll be having a party in Hoboken in early December to celebrate. Last week Tappets published the MRP merit plan which every year around this time is completed. All the winner’s were invited tonight and bonuses will be handed out in the next few weeks by Mr. Nakamura’s office under Mr. Denison’s direction.”
She paused and looked out over the gathering. “Before we bring out the birthday cake and other goodies, to salute Christian’s birthday, I want to comment on an issue which took place in our new London England office this last month with Spectrum Sound. You may have heard some rumors about it. Some executives bought a prestigious castle to set up our offices. I interdicted and made them relocate to a more modest place, but that fiasco cost Tappets Industry plenty. We are is here to serve the public and we don’t show our wage-earning might nor tolerate open displays of wealth by any of the divisions. We’ve achieved this success by a deliberate strategy of relying on the choice for better value by consumers, not on advertisement and duplicity of image over quality. All of our divisions are what they are: Trusted products. They produce guaranteed goods and take a slight profit. We don’t boast of our success, even though we could. Let’s make sure this doesn’t happen again. You’ve great freedom inside the Tappet structure to create and produce, but not to spend on frivolous matters.”
For the first time, I saw that in public, Mary was intense. Una had told me once that she was a visionary. I didn’t know what that meant, but I was gaining some idea. Stan and Una came to the front hall and Mary stepped down from the podium. They sang ‘Happy Birthday’ and everyone joined in. Sally held my hand and kissed me when they were done. I was very flush and nearly choked up.
Afterward, we had cake, ice-cream and such. It being a school night, we soon left for home. I knew Sally had only been partly kidding before about Una, Mary, and Stan, being our prison-keepers. Someone was putting these stupid ideas into her head and I wanted to know who or what. She’d said it was a joke, and oddly enough, it turned out to be funny and strange all at once. The last thing I wanted to do was to go to a disco and I found myself on the way home asking Mary, Stan, and Una, if Sally and I could go.
“Who would take you?” Stan asked.
“I leaned over into Sally’s ear. “See? It’s a yes already,” I whispered. “They’re just concern about who would look after us?”
Defiance jumped to her eyes. “Why can’t we go alone,” she said aloud.
Mary looked at her in shock. “If you don’t want your mouth slapped, you’ll leave that attitude for your spoilt friends or you’ll never see the inside of a disco. Believe me, it’s totally unimportant whether you ever go to one.”
I could see Mary wasn’t really angry, but only being hard. “Lloyd could come with us,” I said, now desperate to make the point to Sally that she had it wrong about Una, Mary, and Stan.
“Larry could drop you off at eight o’clock,” Stan offered, “and you could be out in front at eleven.”
“Eleven?” Sally complained.
Una slapped her hands together and laughed. “My sweet thing, listen to yourself. You aren’t past ten-years-old yet and you’d be manipulatin` everyone of us who love and care for you.”
When we got home I opened my birthday gifts. Stan and Mary had bought me a video cassette recorder for my television-set. I was floored.
“Tappet Tapes are making these to compete with Sony Betamax,” Mary said. “Stan will show you tomorrow how to work it.”
From Una I got a copy of the VHS movie, True Grit with Robert Duvall and John Wayne, and from Sally another one, Yellow Submarine, a cartoon movie inspired by the Beatles with the songs, Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, Nowhere Man, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and others.
The gifts from them were excessive, and I couldn’t have dreamed of the cost. A video cassette recorder in 1970 was probably well over a thousand dollars. The bugger of it was, though, it led a short time later, two days, to a direct humiliation of the Tappets, a shameful event for me and Sally, and one of the days that I thought at the time would be the worst of my life. How mistaken I’d be in that conclusion; it can always get worse. When you’re a kid, you don’t know that.
The next morning Una drove Sally, Kurt, Andy, and myself to school. “Make you’re way directly home after school,” she said, “there is no one to pick you up, today or tomorrow.”
I’d heard Mary and Una talking. Mary had asked Una to come to the Hoboken Head Office with her to work against a plan of Tappets to buy a car company that was in trouble. The Stanroids were determined to purchase it.
“Mary doesn’t like the American automobile business,” Una had told me, “she thinks the employees are belligerent unionists.”
I’d no idea what that meant and Una didn’t offer anything further. Monday was much the same as any other day and the four of us had good weather for our walk home after school. The next day, Larry dropped me off for basketball practice at seven o’clock in the morning. Almost every Tuesday, Principal Adam joined Coach Kray and his son Terry for practice.
I had re
cently started shooting better, especially from outside the circle, and was often getting the ball. Kurt and I played well together, having practiced extra in his driveway with Andy. Bert had set up a hoop above the garage door. That morning I actually did better than satisfactory, receiving more points in scrimmage than anyone else, even Terry, the coach’s son. I remember being elated that day. I received perfect on a mathematics quiz, too, and in a story I’d wrote about Snowball, I received an A.
This pretty much sums up the way calamity falls to people. You could be having one of the best days, or maybe somehow, because you’re having that kind of great day, The First Law of Life for orphans or other people unlucky by birth seeks you out like a bloodhound of disaster.
“I saw Gimme Shelter for sale at Magnavox Electronics,” Kurt said.
This is the comment I made which started the incident. “How much?”
“Twenty dollars.”
“I don’t have that much cash,” I said.
“What about your credit card?” Kurt asked.
I looked over at Sally with an expression of self-righteousness. “Una took them away from us. We took out cash on it and it wasn’t an emergency.”
“I was hoping we could watch it today,” Kurt complained. “They say someone is really killed in it.”
“How?” Sally asked.
“Stabbed to death by a member of the Hells Angels. Right during the concert. You’re supposed to be able to pick it out.”
“I don’t believe that,” Andy said.
“I could just take the tape,” I offered.
“You mean steal it?” Sally said, shocked.
I shook my head. “No, it isn’t stealing. They have insurance and everything. They want you to do it. It makes jobs.” Kurt laughed nervously. “I’ve done it plenty of times,” I added, “it’s easy.” Kurt and Andy were scared, but we decided to go to the mall and consider it. They wanted to see for themselves if it was as easy as I claimed. The store was small and had row after row of products like radios, televisions, music, and related items. “Do you have the new Rolling Stones’ video?” I asked a tall middle-aged store-clerk; a nice-looking man.
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