by Maria Riva
“In a way I agree,” John sighed. “If the Black Hand takes control of the illegal liquor business before Prohibition becomes law in the rest of the country, there’ll be trouble—big trouble—”
“Well, for sure the micks won’t like the wops getting too power hungry—sorry, John.”
John laughed, “I love it, Ebbely—only you can get so downright American!”
Summer brought its accustomed activities, this year adding special occasions for jubilant news—the celebration of battles won, stretches of scarred land regained—marred only by the swelling lists of those sacrificed to do so. Death achieved in righteous battle was still a man’s domain. Women as wives, mothers and sweethearts were certainly expected to mourn the result—but being politically educated enough to have an opinion and voice this progression to their grief was as unexpected as it was socially condemned. As the war progressed, women who had been assured by recruiting slogans that their loved ones would return better men began to think that a live return might be preferable.
It was rumored that Henry Ford would run for the Senate—that President Wilson had personally encouraged him to do so. Stating every farmer in America would vote for him, many thought that if Ford wanted to, he could run for the presidency and get elected. Those whom the Boss recognized, even called by name on the factory floors, were proud to be singled out, cheered whenever he appeared. Although he did not campaign, posters reading wilson needs henry ford began to appear. In June, making good on his promise, the first Ford-built Eagle Boat was launched.
The day Rudy left to become a soldier in the sky—as Hannah described it—the Ford men gathered to bid him good-bye.
“You know you’re crazy, boy.” Carl hiding his emotion punched Rudy’s shoulder while Fritz stuffed a pouch of his best tobacco into his coat pocket. Zoltan blew his nose.
“Good luck, Rudy—and let’s hear from you.”
“Yes—don’t forget—write and tell us all about it.” John hugged his friend. Michael, aware something was changing, clung to Rudy’s trouser leg. Jane pulled him gently to her side. Hannah stood silent.
“Well-I-I-guess-I better get going …” The suspended hesitancy that always surfaces when good-byes could become eternal hung in midsentence. “Hannah?” Like a son leaving home, Rudy took a step towards her.
“You got de sandwiches?”
He nodded.
“And de clean underwear? De key to dis house in case you come one day back home and nobody here to let you in?” Again Rudy nodded.
“Well, den—so go already! But you just remember one ting—if you get yourself killed I’ll never talk to you again!” And Rudy pulled Hannah into his arms and laughed. When he was gone—then, she cried.
Fritz’s friend Mr. Horowitz took his Missus, said good-bye to their neighbors, left Ford and Highland Park, to journey to Massachusetts to be near their only son, Bruno, one of the forty thousand conscripts training at the hutted cantonment known as Camp Devens, before he was shipped out.
By the Fourth of July what once had seemed an impossible task had been achieved—an army of a million men fully equipped, trained and ready had arrived in France.
When at a fitting for a new summer dress, Serafina boasted that Detroit now had more speakeasies than any other city in the state, Jane just had to ask what that was.
“That’s a place that sells hooch.”
“Oh, Serafina, now what is that?”
“No wonder John calls you Ninnie! Hooch is booze is hard liquor—and a speakeasy is a place that sells it.”
“But isn’t that against the law now?”
“Of course—that’s why there’s so much money in it—and you know what … it’s fun!” Serafina admired herself in the mirror. “You have done excellent work on this dress. When I brought you the material I thought it might be too delicate to stitch but this is very, very acceptable. Can you have it ready by Friday? Stan will be back then and we are going dancing.”
“Friday? Yes, of course.”
Without care, Serafina pulled the half-finished dress off over her head.
“Want to know how to spot a place that sells gin?”
Retrieving her delicate handiwork off the floor, Jane murmured, “Not particularly.”
“Well, you just have to look if there is a potted fern in the window.” At Jane’s startled expression, Serafina chuckled, “That’s the sign—they sell liquor. Once a week I deliver them to all our customers—our ferns are free but our booze … that’s quite another matter.” This last sally seemed to amuse her further. Putting on her latest acquisition, a splendid boater of lacquered straw, Serafina, gazing in the mirror squinted, her eyes drawn to Jane’s accompanying reflection behind her.
“Why do I see you … as though duplicated? I wonder … oh, by the way, Morgana is expecting—so now all we have to do is wait for her to miscarry! I’m off—don’t forget—Friday before the afternoon. Arrivederci!”
Frowning, Jane secured the pins in the hem of the delicate batiste.
Duplicated? She said duplicated! Really, that witch! Hannah was right—a real witch! She had a good mind not to finish by Friday. Still, Serafina paid well and Jane having seen a most splendid collar of real seal fit for her precious winter coat was determined to acquire it as well as a new pair of boots for Michael, who was growing so fast it would soon be time to make him another pair of knee pants. Sewing diligently, Jane wondered if her nest egg could reach to include a new invention—buttonhole scissors offered by Mr. Sears and Mr. Roebuck for the staggering sum of forty cents … a real luxury that she coveted even more than a fancy collar of real seal.
Both having been refused glory in combat—one because of a deaf ear, the other for being too old to pull a caisson into firing position—Mr. Kennec the iceman and his Molly came plodding along the streets of Highland Park trailing their usual gaggle of thirsty children as though this August was no different from any other. The first day of the ice wagon’s arrival, Michael gave up his special privilege and allowed Gloria to feed Molly her expected carrot. In doing so, he felt very cavalier—especially when he saw how much the little girl enjoyed it.
As the first death lists began to appear, the hatred of all things German intensified. Aided and abetted by the propaganda needed to rally a nation beginning to go sluggish by its very distance to actual combat—by many means the enemy was brought into focus to invade the consciousness of the country if not its actual terrain.
As always, rumor was an effective tool for accelerating hatred. It was whispered that those of German origin were putting ground glass into food, poison onto Red Cross bandages, explosives into every conceivable aperture for the sole purpose of killing as many innocent American women and children as possible. The evil of the Hun was graphically illustrated in a moving picture entitled The Kaiser, the Beast of Berlin. The teaching of German was banned as was the music of Beethoven. Regardless of citizenship all of German origin were suspect. Some were forced by riotous mobs to kneel, salute, kiss the American flag. Many were beaten, in Kentucky one was lynched. It was even rumored that the black radicalism that was beginning to surface was solely due to German agents.
Hannah believing herself tainted by her origin, and therefore rife for other’s punishment of her—rarely left her house. Especially nervous when visited—she cautioned those who came, to be careful if seen, perhaps not come at all for it could mean they too might become suspect of terrible deeds to destroy the glorious freedom of America. Fritz at a loss of what to do with her, yet equally apprehensive when going out amongst the people taking his tram to and from work—tried his best to assume the air of normalcy that had been, believing that as soon as the war was won, it would be again.
Jane now needed to knock on Hannah’s door to gain admittance. And even then she was usually made to identify herself before the door was opened. She had the feeling that if she had been other than
a safe Italian—despite their long and binding friendship, Hannah might not have let her in. When together their speaking in German was strictly forbidden. Even if rationing and the inflationary prices had permitted it—Jane somehow knew neither jelly doughnuts nor gingerbread houses would ever emerge from Hannah’s kitchen again. If Ebbely hadn’t been in residence those who loved Hannah would not have known what to do. But he was and despite it all he made her smile, even laugh at times, played jaunty tunes upon her lovely Christmas present filling the house with jazz—even suspect Mendelssohn—recalling happy times and joy-filled days when all her immediate worries were kitchen bound, easily solvable by a pinch of salt, the addition of a bit of spice. To feed the ones one loves is such an all-embracing sanctuary that after so many years of having it, now that it was allowed her but rarely, Hannah felt its desertion at a time an exterior danger was threatening to strip her of herself. As a Jewess she knew hatred. As a German who was about to become a citizen of the country she adored—it tore her to pieces.
Often, when Hannah voiced her need to be left alone, by saying, “A little time in my kitchen for just peeling whatever mit nobody—okay, Ninnie?” Jane would use the luxury of time gained to seek out Ebbely, draw from him what had become important to her to analyze from. His ever-generous availability gave her that gift so unusual, the respect of her right to intelligence. Sometimes not to interrupt, she would simply sit and listen while he played—at other times pick up a thought that might not have been concluded to her satisfaction days before.
“Why are people judged before they are known?”
“In what way?” Ebbely fingered the keys at random.
“I’m sorry, am I disturbing you?”
“No, continue—you usually have a purpose.” Knowing how he liked to tease, Jane acknowledged this with a smile.
“Well … now that Russia has surrendered, suddenly all Russians are bad—where before when they were fighting with us they were good. What if Italy has to surrender—will that make all Italians into enemies?”
“Mob thinking needs to generalize to make a mob.”
“What is a mob?”
“An accumulation of humans who generally have forsaken their humanity.”
“Why would they do that?” Jane sounded like a child at school.
“Mostly it is done to them not by them.”
“Remember that day when John and Hannah were talking of war and freedom? Will we win the war?”
“The we being?”
“America, of course!” Jane sounded surprised.
“I think we must at least try.” Ebbely ran the scale of E-flat. “Soon Europe will have lost a whole generation to this terrible war.”
“I think freedom is more important than death.”
“Even if death is freedom?”
“We don’t know that.”
“But what if it is?” asked Ebbely, leaving “The ‘Jelly Roll’ Blues” for another day.
“Then I suppose all of us would court death and be done with living.”
“Sometimes, my child, you startle me, and I pride myself on not being startled easily.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize—after strumming a banjo for the entertainment of pimpled youth about to be brave cannon fodder on some foreign field, I welcome theological dissertation, especially with you.” Ebbely patted the footstool by his chair. “Sit, Tall Lady—sit. We sages hate looking up at our interlocutor—kinks the neck muscles.”
Settling herself, Jane wondered where their talk would lead. From above her head the question came.
“Do you believe in God?”
“No,” she whispered—half-afraid for having voiced it.
Bending down, Rumpelstiltskin placed his small hand beneath her chin, lifted her face to look at him. “Aren’t you terribly lonely then?”
And the sobs came. As if contained too long of a childhood warped—loving denied—yearning ridiculed by too strict reality, all was there … yet nothing salvageable to build upon, give ballast to a spirit made vulnerable by too much need.
Enfolding the child he knew her to be, Ebbely wished he were tall and handsome.
“Dear friends, those within the delightful proximity of me, even those long gone and sadly too, too far away” is how Ebbely began the announcement of his planned departure during a rare Sunday supper. “No, no, do not stop partaking of this magical concoction—only Hannah can make a soup out of nothing and triumph. Herbert Hoover should have hired her long ago. Now … where was I? Ah, yes—before the leaves fall, carpet their russet beauty upon newly glacial ground, I and my trusty T must once again sally forth to cheer the fuzz-cheeked youth of this my promised land.”
Zoltan twitched. “Where to this time?”
“I’ve been trying to make up my mind. The camps are mostly all alike, just row upon row of endless makeshift huts, their perimeter clustered by the usual whorehouses and booze joints.”
“I heard that army doctors have been so overwhelmed by the rampant rate of syphilis that the government has given orders to burn the houses down. So at least those will be gone.”
Ebbely smiled, “You want to make a bet on that, John?”
“No—not really.”
“Well, at least here in Michigan all the saloons are gone,” Zoltan observed.
John laughed. “Ebbely will probably want to bet you on that, too!”
“You know the clap and all its happy handmaidens is not, as the traveling salesman said to the farmer’s daughter …”
Seeing Hannah enter the room ready to serve her perfected vegetable stew, Fritz barked, “Ebberhardt, not this talk. Hannah is here now.”
“Sorry, dear Lady.” Noting Jane had followed her in, Ebbely amended it to “Ladies.”
The women served—the men ate in silence. Despite Fritz’s possible objection, John reopened the subject knowing his friend had more to say.
“Ebbely, tell me, regardless of such commodities that have existed since the days of the Caesars as part of any military installation, what are these military cantonment camps really like?”
“Besides the obvious deplorable conditions? The mounds of garbage no one has figured, nor possibly can figure out what to do with? The absence of proper sanitation and often nonexistent viable disposal of the human waste of more than twenty thousand men? The astounding illiteracy of our backcountry recruits? The cruelties of those who are in charge as well as those who receive, who then turn on their own kind in impotent revenge? The indiscriminate use of the Chihuahua Weed supposedly smoked by Mexicans of the lower classes that the army claims produces insanity and homicidal mania. So especially convenient for war, might one agree? Sometimes when the handlers infiltrate the camps—I have seen men line up just as they do for vaccinations … for injections of morphine.”
“For God’s sake, why, Ebbely? Why is it allowed?” If Zoltan hadn’t asked—Jane nearly would have.
“Why, my friend? You may well ask. Lonely? Desperate? Far from home? Uneducated? Scared? Lost or just plain dumb? Youngsters being taught to kill having not the slightest notion what that will entail. The natural euphoria of the young for war needing a reinforcement to keep the excitement of it going until it becomes real? Take your pick. General Pershing has asked for four million men and he will get them. How many of them will be men in our sense of the word, or how many will return alive and sane after their baptism by fire turns them into so-called men—that’s up to whatever god suits you.”
The women stood waiting in the shadows. The men ate their supper in silence. To lighten the mood, Ebbely ventured, “By the way, in Kansas and Missouri so many conscripts go into Kansas City that its notorious Twelfth Avenue has been renamed Woodrow Wilson Avenue, a piece at any price!”
Fritz barked, “Enough! Hannah, Jane—now please leave this room.” John covered a smile behind his
napkin.
“Really, Ebberhardt,” Fritz spluttered, “such talk in front of respectable wives!”
“I agree and I am terribly sorry—I don’t know what got into me.” Noticing John’s expression, Ebbely added, “And I was about to tell you of the posters hung everywhere that proclaim in overly large letters …”
“What?”
“Well, if Fritz will allow, now the course is clear … I’ll quote, ‘A German bullet is cleaner than a whore,’ and one I particularly found enchanting, ‘You wouldn’t use another man’s toothbrush. Why use his whore?’”
Putting down his napkin, John looked at his friend. “You are in one of your naughty moods tonight, Ebbely—any special reason why?”
Caught off guard and startled that this should so discomfort him, Ebbely changed the subject. “As to my imminent departure, in all the years you’ve known me I bet none of you have figured out how I find my way around this land.”
Zoltan rose to the bait. “Well now that the first maps of real roads are being printed to be sold I assume your bloodhound senses will no longer be necessary.”
“Regardless, I venture to assume that you dyed-in-the-wool Detroiters don’t even know that the Lincoln Highway—that excellent example of navigational surface—carries the identification of its amazing lengths by painted colors of red, white and blue. Aha! Just as I thought! And for those roads less auspicious, ‘Follow the telephone poles’ is now the motto of the open road. For these and only these will lead you into the heart of civilization, or what passes as such. John, my boy, when will you acquire a T of your own? You of all people—without one—seems practically blasphemous.”
“Soon.”
“Well, don’t tell me your miracle car suddenly can’t maneuver your favorite riverbank. After all the years we have had to listen to you expound on the dependability of your unstoppable heartthrob, I should think you’d be ashamed to have your Lizzie at times see you use a real horse. Shocking, John—really shocking!”