Stranger Than Truth

by Vera Caspary

  The elevator man (a new one since we left) stared suspiciously when I named my floor. When I told him that I was Mr. Barclay’s daughter he consented to take me as far as the foyer and press the bell for me, but he remained on guard until the apartment door was opened by a character who looks like a private detective in butler’s livery. Finally I was inspected and passed on by…But guess! None other, as she would say, than our old friend Eccles. At the sight of me she burst into tears and put on such a show of bathos that I almost lost my expensive breakfast.

  Grace took me upstairs to my rooms. As soon as we were safe behind the locked door, she began a whispering campaign directed against Gloria. “Her lack of faith, Eleanor, is shocking. She employs doctors, conventional medical men who haven’t the slightest concept of the true cause of your poor father’s desperate situation.”

  “When a person’s ill, it’s quite natural to call in medical men. Besides,” I reminded her, “the cause of Father’s stroke is quite obvious. Even though he quit drinking long ago.”

  Grace interrupted with a sigh. “Et tu, Brute. His own daughter. No wonder Caesar has fallen.”

  “What’s your diagnosis, Grace?”

  Her hands traced a pattern in the air. “Far, far beyond the comprehension of those medical artisans who look for causes of physical maladjustment in the body.”

  This was so reminiscent that I almost laughed aloud. “I suppose you believe he could be cured by digging out secrets, cleansing the festering sores, applying the sharp, clean antiseptic of Truth.”

  “If only he could.” She sighed again. “That’s the tragedy and the irony. To think of him, the prophet of Truth-Sharing held prisoner by some guilty secret. What could it be, Eleanor? How could a man who has led an irreproachable life, who has never faltered at confessing his sins, how could he have cause for self-reproach or guilt? Sometimes, Eleanor, I’m tempted to rebel at Fate. It’s all so unfair.”

  There was a knock at the door. I opened it and Gloria’s cool lips were pressed against my cheek. Her words of welcome were honeyed calculation. “Your father’s resting. As soon as he wakes, he’ll want to see you. But come along, dear, I want you to meet someone.” She led me by the hand along the corridor to the sitting room.

  A man rose and bowed, like an old-fashioned courtier, from the waist. I gave him only half an eye, for I was fascinated by a piece of furniture which had been brought into the room. There, displayed boldly in my father’s house, stood a cellarette, its open doors displaying an assortment of bottles and glasses. As I recovered from the shock of this strange sight, I realized that my hand was being pressed in a warm, moist palm.

  “So this is the daughter,” he said with an accent so faint that I could not determine its origin. “No wonder your dear Papa was so eager to have me meet you. But you did not tell me, Gloria, that she was beautiful.”

  I regained possession of my hand and backed away. The man took the tall chair which Father used to like best. He was of medium height but thickset with a look of shagginess about him, unkempt thick hair, leonine eyebrows, tweeds too bulky for a man of his build.

  “A drink?” asked Gloria, nodding toward the cellarette. As though I had demanded explanation, she added hastily, “We have it here for General Podolsky. He does so much of his work here now. Your father likes to keep in touch. Intensive brain work demands moderate stimulation.”

  I laughed. Podolsky’s narrow red-brown eyes measured me coldly. There was a long silence. Presently he got up and started pacing the floor, head bent, brow wrinkled, hairy hands clasped behind his back. The whole thing was a show, every effect predetermined. With his back to me, he asked about you, Johnnie. He said that he had heard you were one of the most brilliant young men Father had ever hired, a natural-born editor. I agreed enthusiastically with all the flattery and was about to add that you have character as well as intelligence when Podolsky whirled around, faced me and suggested that you and I come back to work for Barclay Publications.

  “I am speaking for your father, and I know it is his dearest wish that you and your husband join our staff again.”

  Whether this magnanimity toward us black sheep was ever actually suggested by Father, or whether Podolsky was following the general pattern of Barclay bribery, I could not be sure. But I suspected at once that he knew more than he hinted of Father’s secrets.

  But this man is no Munn, Johnnie. He might have been willing to step into that vacant office and play at being stooge until the time came for Father’s shadow to take over the substance, but there the resemblance ends. Ed Munn was stupid and a fool. I am sure that Father chose Podolsky in preference to his other yes-boys because he did not want to make the same mistake again, and put a dull man in a job that demanded brains. What happened today has made me wonder whether Father would not have been better off to put Henry Roe or Dr. Mason in the Munn vacancy.

  Naturally I turned down his offer. But Podolsky is not easily rejected. He wondered whether I ought not to consult you before making a decision, described the changes in the organization, offered salaries that made my head whirl, mentioned interesting work, the chance to travel and the opportunity to influence public opinion. With the Barclay reputation and distribution outlets, Truth Digest has grown so phenomenally that it now has the second largest circulation of any digest magazine.

  I listened patiently, but always gave the same answer.

  “You’re a stubborn little girl,” he said. “Does your husband allow you to make decisions in this high-handed way?”

  “My husband and I don’t allow each other to do anything. We consider each other capable of making decisions. Moreover,” I said proudly, “my husband expects to sign a contract with a major picture studio.” I kept my fingers crossed while I lied, Johnnie. I had to show off before this upstart.

  “Isn’t that lovely?” cooed Gloria.

  Podolsky raised his eyebrows. And Grace Eccles came in to tell me that Father was awake and waiting for me to come down to him.

  On the staircase she put her arm around me and said, “You must gird yourself, dear. It’ll be hard at first. The fallen eagle.”

  At every step my knees grew weaker and the blood in my veins became more watery. As we entered Father’s study I remembered the last awful evening there, with Father and Ed arguing about the gun that killed Mr. Wilson. The French doors were open now, the sun gilding the white plaster hands that grasped black plush drapes. In that bright light the room had lost its incongruity and horror.

  Father was waiting on the terrace. I did not immediately look at him, but at the white iron furniture, the geranium red awning and cushions, and at the new iron fence. When I last saw the terrace, there had been only a low coping.

  I had expected greater change in Father’s appearance, had heeded Grace’s warning and girded myself for the shock. He is thinner, of course, but the bones of his head stand out in all their powerful modeling and he has the color of vigor, a deep, glowing suntan. He walked toward me and my heart stood still. He drags his right leg and holds his arm in a rigid half-parenthesis.

  I ran toward him, put my arms around him and kissed him. He began to tremble and I was afraid that he would fall. My weight was not enough to brace him and I staggered back. Suddenly, from nowhere, a male nurse appeared and helped him into his chair. I saw then that my father was crying.

  With his left hand he indicated that I was to sit near him and I pulled up one of the red-cushioned chairs and sat there with my hand in his. I talked quickly and breathlessly with no pauses between sentences and ideas. I told him about us, our little apartment, our work, our hopes, about the climate, the canyons and the seashore. After a time I became exhausted and could only wait for his silence. The pressure of his left hand grew heavy. His mouth contorted. He cannot speak at all; he can only utter curious, aborted sounds so deformed that one can barely recognize their kinship with human speech.

  Beyond the iron terrace railing stretched Central Park, all liveliness and sunshine, floweri
ng syringa, baby carriages and roller skates. In the clean light Father’s suntan was no more convincing than a Hollywood make-up. Suddenly the virile left hand jerked me forward, the brown fierce eyes commanded my attention. He tried, with eyes and brows, with the muscles of his cheeks, the tension of his fingers, the crippled voice to communicate with me. I think I knew what he was trying to say. Had I kept Lola’s manuscript? Where was it? Had you read it? Did we plan to use it against him?

  “May we interrupt this happy reunion?” Podolsky’s voice cut like acid through the fatty unction of his words. “Feels good, doesn’t it, Barclay, to talk to one’s child again? Doesn’t Eleanor look lovely?” he asked with jaunty familiarity.

  Father uttered a curious, protesting, animal sound. I followed the direction of his troubled eyes. Podolsky carried a highball. He set the glass on the low coping below the iron rail and stretched his thick legs on the cushions of a chaise-longue.

  Gloria crossed the terrace. She walked with conscious affirmation of her womanly charms, wriggled her hips under the flowing pajamas and thrust out her breasts. The wind played with her chiffons. As she passed his chair, Father extended his good hand. Gloria avoided it and moved toward the rail.

  “A lot of questions you’d like to ask Eleanor, eh, Barclay?” Podolsky lifted the glass and savored the whiskey’s bouquet. “Has she told you anything interesting?”

  Purple blotches like birthmarks stained Father’s artificial suntan. A vein throbbed in his forehead; his useless right arm seemed to quiver and his head wobbled. I could almost feel the throbbing and hammering of his heart, the clotting and stagnation of blood in his brain.

  “Are you worried?” continued Podolsky with such irritating blandness that my own blood pressure rose. “Do you think your own daughter would betray you?” Podolsky had designed his cruelty to fit the pattern of Father’s suffering. He never made a statement, but only asked questions of a man who could not answer. “Hasn’t Eleanor her own interests at heart? Isn’t she to inherit a portion of your estate, Barclay? Wouldn’t it be wise to warn her that her interests and yours are identical?”

  Father was watching Gloria. She turned from the rail to catch a message from Podolsky. It was all very subtle, no more than the twitch of an eyelid, but the flavor of conspiracy was mingled with the scent of Gloria’s cosmetics. I thought of secrets whispered in dark bedrooms, and wondered if Father had ever indulged in indiscreet Truth-Sharing with his beloved wife, and if Gloria, finding the burden of secrecy too great, had whispered, too.

  “I hope you understand, Eleanor, that this visit is to be guarded with utmost secrecy. It would be disillusioning to his millions of followers if they were to discover that Noble Barclay is unable to heal himself through the practice of his theories.” Podolsky laughed and gestured with the hand that held his empty glass. Then he ordered Gloria to fetch him another highball.

  She obeyed at once, floating across the terrace in her flying chiffons, offering temptation to the General, avoiding her husband’s outstretched hand. Poor Father’s face had become bloodless; his lips were pale mauve and the lids closed over his anguished eyes. He sighed, and the sound of it, the only recognizable human sound he had been able to utter, was so painful that I could stand no more of it. I rushed across the terrace, tore blindly through the study and up the stairs.

  I locked the door, threw myself across the bed and tried to cry. But I must have fallen asleep, for the nightmare returned. Although there is a rail on the terrace now, my nightmare rocks had grown sharper, the mountain pass narrower, the cliff steeper. He tossed me into blankness and I died hideously. When I woke I was shivering and sweating ice.

  Has the nightmare stayed with me because I lost my courage at the inquest, Johnnie? But I didn’t actually lie that day. I answered the questions that were asked and it wasn’t my fault that these questions never came within guessing distance of the truth. What else could I have done, Johnnie? He was my father. That, more than any fears for the Barclay name and fortune, kept me silent. It was, I suppose, the old habit of loyalty, the habit that had been bred into my bones. You must remember how I cried in your arms when you hurried to my house after reading Lola’s story, and how I begged you to wait a while before doing anything with the knowledge inherited from my dead friends.

  You told me then that I’d be tormented until I had gained revenge or saw justice done. But I find neither revenge nor justice in the cruel irony of my father’s suffering. He has been hurt enough, it seems to me, and I don’t want to wound him more. His glory, his name and position are still his pride, Johnnie. When I woke up after the nightmare, my room was hot and I opened the window. It looks out on the terrace. There sat my father, motionless in his chair, and beside him, her head bent in happy servitude, the faithful Eccles.

  She was reading to him out of My Life Is Truth.

  I was tempted to call out of the window or rush downstairs and promise to destroy Lola’s manuscript, vowing that I would never betray his confidence, nor reveal his guilt. The thought of you kept me from it. I know how you feel about this and I have decided to make no promises, strike no bargains, show no pity until I hear from you.

  What are we to do, darling? Must we tell? Is revenge necessary? Will justice be done if we destroy the little that is left to this broken man? The murders are forgotten now, the murderer dead. Can’t we let this one truth stay buried?

  Please write to me immediately. I’ll do whatever you say. I trust you more than anyone in the world and I need you desperately. And I hope that someday I can do something big enough to show my gratitude for all that you’ve done for me.

  With all my love,

  Yours,

  Eleanor.

  FROM JOHN TO ELEANOR

  Hollywood, 6/1/46

  My sweet:

  You’re in a bad way, aren’t you? As soon as I’d finished reading your letter I called the airport and asked for an emergency reservation. I even divulged the fact that I am Noble Barclay’s son-in-law which, you must admit, is going pretty far for Ansell. No seats were available and none for tomorrow or the day after.

  In a way I’m glad I couldn’t make it. This is your problem, kid, and the time has come for you to face it, alone and unsupported. This may sound tough, but I believe you’ve grown strong enough now to realize that it isn’t enough to quit being Barclay’s daughter just to become Ansell’s wife.

  Your nightmare comes back, I think, because you still feel guilty about our lack of action after the discovery of the Manfred manuscript. This is not wholly your guilt, darling. I’ve procrastinated, too, refused to push you into a situation which would cause you to suffer. This is a weakness in me. I love you and I want to save you from pain and turmoil. I still can’t forget the way you looked that night you came to my office with the manuscript. Your father certainly succeeded in scaring me when he told about your mother’s suicide and hinted that you had inherited her instability. That was a ruse for scaring me off the Wilson story, and while it never worked out the way he planned, it helped to keep his secret.

  This sounds as if I had little faith in you, but I couldn’t help worrying about the series of shocks and disillusionments that hit you all in one week-end. It was bad enough for you to learn of Lola’s death and to discover that your ex-fiancé had killed her, but the worst blow was the discovery that your father was a fraud. Revenge and justice, I said, because I saw the need in you for hurting your father as he had hurt you, and for vindicating poor Lola’s memory.

  It’s not revenge that we seek, neither you nor I, Eleanor. When I was a pipsqueak editor, forcing issues to assert my authority, I might have sought vindication for my hurt pride. And if revenge were all you wanted, you could easily accept the fact that the gods have contrived a neat form of punishment for your father. But honest men are also stricken with apoplexy. If punishment is involved, the pattern of it is psychological. It may be that your father seeks refuge from Truth-Sharing. The need for confession may have grown so pressing that,
unconsciously, he prefers dumbness. The circle is vicious. Noble Barclay can’t share the truth because he can’t speak or write; and conversely, he can’t recover from his paralysis because he is unable to share the truth.

  I may be wrong about this. I know so little. What I do know is that for you and me, it is not a simple matter of revenge. Or of punishment. You paint a touching picture of the broken eagle in his Fifth Avenue eyrie, but let’s not become too deeply touched or we, too, will be paralyzed.

  The murders matter no longer. Nor the old swindle involving the discovery of Truth-Sharing. But the truth has to be told. Not for the sake of vindicating poor Lola of the charge of having been loved by Munn, not because Homer Peck’s ghost will haunt us until we tell the world how he paid for his sin of creating a religion that had no god, not for abstract justice, either.

  Your father may be helpless and inarticulate, but his influence goes on, the swindles, the lies, the fakes perpetrated in his name. After I read your letter, I wanted to think this out and I took a long walk. Do you know what sight shocked me out of my reverie? A newsstand gaudy with magazines, six of them published by Barclay.

  I bought them. I read them. I used to think them vulgar but comic. Now, after six months away from the pious atmosphere of Barclay conferences, I find evil in the magazines. Time and distance make it clearer to me that these periodicals mislead and misinform good, gullible citizens who believe implicitly in the printed word. In the name of Truth, fact is distorted, rumor spread, crackpots glorified, authority given charlatans and crooks.

  Do you know Podolsky’s history? Your E. E. Munn was a piker by comparison. Munn lost his head and committed a couple of puny murders. There are worse crimes. This may sound like heresy, but after a war and the perfection of the atomic bomb, individual murder loses its criminal dignity.

  Last December at a conference, I reminded your father that Podolsky’s political lies had been exposed by the New York newspapers. It was common knowledge that he had been the best pal of a big Nazi agent and that he made a good living by creating political myths and disseminating international falsehood. As the usurper in your father’s domestic life Podolsky is not nearly so formidable as the occupant of his office.