The Evidence Against Her

by Robb Forman Dew

  Warren’s mother, Lillian, would turn her face away; she would concentrate on carefully smoothing the seams of the fingers of her gloves, or she would move away altogether and speak to a friend, bending toward some other churchgoer with a soft gesture of inclusion and interest. “Mrs. Rydell,” she would murmur, as though the conversation among her family had long ago been dealt with by her, “I’m awfully glad to see you out this morning. You must be feeling a good deal better.” She could not betray embarrassment or anger because in the face of her husband’s good-natured teasing she would appear either foolishly sensitive or would seem to be carping. And besides, John would do exactly as he wanted in any case.

  He would cock his head at Warren with a wink, and Warren would be thrilled at being singled out. “Lillian, I’ll leave this boy in your hands until he’s twelve years old,” he would say, and Warren’s mother would turn toward him with a beatific smile, as if she were delighted to participate in this little joke. She would place her hand on the arm of whomever she had been speaking to, indicating that she intended to return to their conversation in only a moment. “Oh, yes, John. Yes, yes. Well, I’ll do my best, you know,” she’d say airily, as if it were of little consequence, and then she would direct her attention elsewhere while her husband carried on.

  “And you, too, Leo. Exert whatever persuasion you like, but after that he can decide for himself. He can decide whether Dan Butler is offering superstition or salvation. Warren here can decide it for himself soon enough. But I’ll be down at the Company, ensuring the stability of our earthly kingdom.”

  Warren was delighted to be treated so seriously by his father, but he was also unnerved by the anxiety the whole thing caused his mother, who sometimes spoke to him with soft intensity as they walked home from church, the two of them some distance from the others, or when she came up to tell him good night. “Warren, I don’t think it would be bearable to . . . well, to live life without knowing that God watches over you. I don’t think I could ever be happy for a second of my life if I didn’t know there was heaven where there’s eternal peace. I’m certain you understand that. No one could be happy without believing that. You know your father believes the same thing. Why, Warren, I know he does.”

  On those Sunday mornings, too, Warren was dismayed by the detached but stern look of disapproval leveled in his father’s direction by his uncle Leo as his father engaged once more in this customary banter. Uncle Leo didn’t bother even to respond, and Warren worried over this, because so very young he had transferred the majority of his familial loyalty from his mother and even his aunt Audra to that brisk world of the two elder Scofield brothers. Any disagreement between them threw Warren into a dilemma of allegiance.

  Each Sunday the playing out of this little production was unsettling until he was old enough to anticipate the repetition of the scene from week to week. But when he was very young—even in the face of his deep belief that Uncle Leo was in every respect beyond reproach—Warren always experienced a brief stab of triumphant pride as John Scofield, tall and curiously loose-limbed and graceful, hat at a slight tilt, moved briskly away from the group of Scofields as they crossed the street and made their way up the steps of Park Street Methodist.

  When Warren was only nine or ten years old and repeated to his father what his mother had said—that no one could be happy who didn’t believe that God watched over him—his father’s face had taken on a rare expression of serious consideration. He had looked solemnly at Warren for some little while, and finally he had said, with no hint of any other meaning under the surface, “Your mother is a good person. She’s certainly a finer person than I am. She’s a Marshal, and her family are strong believers. But she’s not given to questioning much of anything, Warren. She’s one of those women who believe whatever’s easiest. She was a beautiful girl . . . . She’s a very handsome woman who’s never had to think for herself, you see. That happens to pretty women, you know. She’s a fine person. She’s a very fine woman, but, I think, Warren, that she has little more than a very ordinary mind.”

  Whenever Warren remembered that conversation he winced with a pang of disloyalty, because he hadn’t disagreed with his father; he hadn’t even thought to protest on behalf of his mother. When his father declared that his wife was a finer person than he, Warren had thought his father believed it himself, and therefore Warren had been certain that just the opposite was true. What a fine person it must be who could declare his own inferiority! John Scofield had been the romantic ideal of his son’s childhood, while Leo had served as a safe harbor.

  But there was little work for John Scofield to do at the Company with the war on, since the rail crisis had made delivery of parts and small engines virtually impossible to guarantee for the Company’s commercial customers. In fact, though, Warren knew that his father had been disgruntled by Leo and George’s decision, as far back as 1914, to delay conversion from steam engines to the sole production of steam turbine and gas engines. John Scofield thought—and said—that the reciprocating steam engines would, and should, in his opinion, soon be obsolete, and when Leo disagreed, John was furious. He thought he wasn’t being taken seriously.

  His resentment had begun to show itself even then, and the relations between the two older Scofield brothers became strained on both sides. One spring day in 1914, shortly after the decision had been made to continue production of those reciprocating engines, Leo Scofield had caught sight of John making his way briskly down the hallway past Leo’s always open door. John had his briefcase in hand, his hat at a reckless tilt, and for some reason his general air of gladness hit Leo wrong, struck a nerve somehow.

  Leo was feeling the weight of the responsibility for making a decision that he knew might well be wrong—George’s opinion was uninformed and no comfort at all, and the workforce had been unenthusiastic when they got wind of the direction the company would continue to take. It irritated Leo to see John swinging along the hallway, apparently carefree and full of enthusiasm.

  “Say, John!” he called to his brother, amiably enough. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

  John had turned back and stepped just inside the door, grinning that rapturous grin that when he was a child had always given away his deep enthusiasms, his secret thoughts and plans. “I’ve got a good line on a prospect in Pittsburgh, Leo! And for one of your big steam engines!”

  Leo looked steadily back at his brother without making any remark for a moment, and then he swiveled his chair to look out the window of his office across a weedy patch of grass at the building across the way, and slowly shook his head. “We have enough business, John,” he said, tilting backward and still gazing out the window. John didn’t reply, wasn’t really paying attention, was eager to get going, and he shifted his stance restlessly. Leo turned to size him up once more. “Unpack your case, John. There’s no point in it. We don’t need the business. No point at all in your traipsing off to Pittsburgh.”

  John Scofield retreated down the hall to his own office, where he borrowed a ball of sturdy twine from his secretary, tied two lines to his heavy briefcase, and successfully lowered it out the window, sailing his hat out afterward, where a group of workmen sitting outside to eat their lunch watched it land within three feet of the briefcase. When John next passed Leo’s doorway, hatless, his hands deep in his pockets and proceeding at an aimless ramble, Leo only glanced his way.

  Down the stairs John went, outside and around the corner, where he snatched up his bag, adjusted his hat on his head, and gave an exaggerated salute of farewell to the laughing workmen. “Somebody’s got to sell these behemoths,” he called across to them happily, “if that’s what we’re determined to build, by God!”

  And he was off, and the story became a legend—in no more than an hour and a half—that cast John Scofield as the champion of the workers of Scofields & Company. A man who cared nothing for himself, they said, nothing for his salary. Why, he didn’t even know what it was he earned. No, John Scofield only cared ab
out getting business for the men out in that plant so they wouldn’t find themselves without jobs to do.

  Generally, though, as the story was repeated around a dinner table, or at Harvey’s Tavern, or at the Beer Garden at Kroner’s Lake, someone would remember all the tales of John Scofield’s long nights of card playing, or would remember seeing him making his way home just before dawn, and whoever it was would say something along the lines of Mr. Leo Scofield certainly being a good man, having a sober head for business. Nevertheless, John Scofield remained their hero.

  When the United States declared war on Germany in 1917, Leo placed the Company entirely at the disposal of the government and rushed into production of high-capacity presses to forge large guns and shells. It was all necessary, and John would wander through the plant to observe the frantic pace of the work, but mostly it bored him. He was a salesman, but there was no persuasion needed these days on any front.

  John easily finished up in no time whatever paperwork Leo gave him to do, although sometimes he sat regarding it and was so overcome with anger and despair that he had to get out of his office. He came to take a wicked delight in throwing a monkey wrench into the deliberate workings of the Company’s daily operations. He would range along the corridors, wander through the shop floors, hunch down in a chair in the corner of Tut Zeller’s office and pepper him with questions and suggestions. But Tut liked John Scofield and generally enjoyed the diversion of the long conversations about the merits of some innovation or other.

  The laborers loved John Scofield as much as they respected Leo, because John would turn up at one or another of the taverns where the men often gathered after work. He would have a few drinks with them and listen with great attention to stories of the adventures of their lives. There was no one else in the world who would listen to the tale of a man’s woes—or of his triumphs—with the avid attention that John Scofield brought to bear.

  But toward the middle of March 1918, a little while after John and Leo and Warren Scofield had returned from Washington, having seen the rest of the family off on their trip south, John Scofield had begun to fall out of the trappings of civility. As soon as he had spent any time at all in his own house at Scofields without his wife at home, he began to fall to pieces. He and Leo had traveled with Lillian and Audra and Lily to Washington to meet Warren—who was already in the Capital for a series of conferences. The family spent a week visiting old friends, and during those few days, John had been in fine spirits. But when he and Leo and Warren boarded a train home after seeing the ladies off at Union Station, John became subdued.

  After a few days at home in the absence of his gentle, sweet-natured wife, it became clear that John Scofield was in a bad state. He began to leave work early, saddle his big bay, and ride back and forth down River Road, which bisected the layout of Scofields & Company. The offices were across the road from the buildings that housed the works, which were scattered out along the river and the railroad tracks. John would get up an impromptu horse race—or insist that some hapless soul match his automobile against Soldier—or simply amuse himself riding up and down calling out to the men who were loading the boxes and boxes being shipped overland to the eastern ports and then on to Europe.

  No one said aloud to Warren or Leo or even to George, who drifted around town rather aimlessly himself, but with less disruption, that early in the day John Scofield was already feeling no pain and by evening was generally drunk as a skunk. It enraged and embarrassed Leo, and it truly grieved Warren, who would look out the window and take note of his father’s suddenly fragile-seeming lankiness as he sat his great, powerful mahogany-colored horse.

  Leo had finally approached Warren on the first Saturday in April, the moment Warren came into the office after a quick three-day trip to Grove City, Pennsylvania. Warren hadn’t even gone home to change clothes; he had come straight from the station. “Your father’s been causing no end of fuss, Warren,” Leo said, standing in Warren’s office doorway before Warren had even sat down at his desk. “It was so bad last night they put him in a back room at the Eola Arms Hotel to sleep it off and sent a man to bring him home this morning. Art Copeland’s boy, it was, who came by to tell me, so it’ll be all over town. It’s time you did something about your father.”

  “Uncle Leo, I don’t know what I can do. I’m wondering if I should try to get my mother home.”

  But Leo had bristled with disapproval. “You won’t involve any of the Marshal family in this business! They never did think those two girls should have anything to do with your father or me. Certainly didn’t want them to have anything to do with two fellows who ran a foundry!” Leo Scofield was sixty-seven years old, and there were no more Marshals in Washburn. Warren’s grandparents on both sides of his family were dead, and although there were a few Marshal cousins here and there in central Ohio, none of them was likely to have any objection to being connected to the most successful industry in that part of the state. Warren didn’t point that out to his uncle, however, who was stiff and unkind with reproach.

  “I’ve never said this to you before, Warren, but I tell you it’s been true since you were a boy! You’re the spitting image of your father!” Leo had, in fact, said exactly that many times, only it had been a fond observation. It was rare for Leo Scofield to show his anger, and Warren was taken aback. “That’s just what John would do. He’d rely on your mother. But she shouldn’t be here now. It’s no time to have her see your father. There’s John running around with all sorts. Well! You won’t do it! You won’t even write to your mother or your aunt Audra—not even Lily—about any of this business. I can hardly stand to see that it’s true. I’ve about given up, Warren. I’ve just about given up on him.” And then he sounded no more than wrung out, and without the animation of indignation his voice went flat. “I can’t tell you how surprised I am to find out that your father has a weak character. He has no sense of propriety. No willpower! I don’t believe I’ve ever been as disappointed in anyone in all my life.”

  So on Sunday morning of that week in early April 1918, Warren had been awake since he had heard his father come in at just past four A.M., and Warren had finally gotten up and dressed and gone out to walk off his dark brooding. For the first time in his life he had had the urge to disagree with his uncle. For the first time in his life he had understood just exactly how onerous Leo’s insistence on maintaining the family’s impeccable reputation must be to his own brother John, who was never so bitterly amused by anything as he was by sentimentality or any hint of pretentiousness. Warren had walked along High Street, past the Eola Arms Hotel and down School Street, where he took note of the gradual lightening of the sky, so that the branches showed up black and encouragingly flexible above the silhouettes of houses. The air was cool but springlike.

  Finally he came full circle but couldn’t summon up the energy to go back inside his own house. He settled on a park bench across the street, in Monument Square, throwing an arm over the slatted back, which was slightly damp with dew, and cocked his head to gaze at the Union soldier atop his column amid the budding trees. It was a handsome statue, but it was such a fixture in the square that Warren had forgotten to pay any attention to it. It was just barely light, and the inscription was hard to read, so Warren stepped with care through the masses of early daffodils planted around the statue’s base to read the inscription again.

  OUR COUNTRY!

  BY THAT DREAD NAME . . .

  Warren was truly startled, and he traced the letters with his fingers to be certain he wasn’t misreading it in the dim light. But the word was dread, not dear, which is what he had thought it said for all the time he had been aware of its existence—for all of his remembered life. And every Fourth of July, at any political speech, at every bond rally, some politician standing on the bandstand would recite what he assumed was the inscription in order to stir up a greater inclination among the people in the audience to part with a vote, or a little bit of money, in the name of patriotism.

  W
arren stepped away from the statue and beyond the fragile circle of daffodils to contemplate the actual inscription. What could it mean? Why would anyone have chosen such a peculiar sentiment to inscribe on a war memorial? He sat down again on the bench and finally was mightily amused in spite of himself. He thought of how gleeful his father would be to discover this incontrovertible bit of evidence of the endless, sentimental foolishness of his own friends and neighbors. He thought of how delighted his father would be to point out this vinegary, bitter inscription to Leo, who had taken on the price of the upkeep of the statue some years ago when it had fallen into disrepair. And then he thought of Robert Butler, who was indeed dear to him, and from whom no letters had arrived for some time. Lily hadn’t heard from Robert, nor had his mother and father.

  Warren knew that Reverend and Mrs. Butler were doing their best not to imagine anything at all, and one day when he went along with Lily to collect the mail, and as they stood in the post office while she shuffled through the envelopes a second time to be sure there was no word from Robert, she had let her guard drop for just a moment. She had lost her crisp composure and drooped despondently, staring down at the clutch of envelopes, none of which offered her any consolation.

  “There’s no one I can think of more likely to be all right than Robert,” Warren said to her. “He’s levelheaded. He’ll be careful. He wouldn’t ever take a foolish chance . . . .”

  “That won’t do him a bit of good . . . . It’s not a chess game, Warren! It won’t matter . . . . I can’t let myself think about it! I can’t be upset! I can’t be worried! You know it would be . . . Oh, it could be a curse. It would bring him bad luck if I even imagine it. I can’t ever, ever let myself imagine the worst or it might come true. You remember that? You remember my father always said that!” And Warren did remember it, but Uncle Leo had said that when they were about five years old and learning to swim. In the echoing marble lobby, though, Lily’s voice was high and thin, and she seemed as alarmed as she had been when—as an unusually nonbuoyant child—she had stood on the dock out at the lake working up the courage to dive in.