Slap Your Sides

by M. E. Kerr

I’d gone into the diner a few times, and I’d even dropped in on The Teen Canteen, in the basement of St. Peter’s, because a friend from school saw her there one night. There was never any sign of her. Tommy said she was at Sweet Creek High every day, but she disappeared when she saw him coming. She had won a school essay contest about the medal awarded Dean posthumously. An officer in a Marine dress uniform had come to the Daniels’ with it, and at St. Peter’s there’d been a short memorial service during which Mrs. Daniel had been presented with a folded flag.

  For Christmas I’d bought Daria a five-dollar bottle of Evening in Paris perfume. Tommy handed it to her just before school went on vacation. He told her it was from me. He said she’d looked flustered, thanked him, then run off in the other direction.

  I knew that at meeting Lizzie was going to get after the Quakers, and I looked down at my shoes while she did. She quoted A. A. Milne, who had done an about-face and come out with a book called War with Honour.

  Bud said Milne had stunned COs everywhere and put a deep wound in pacifist morale.

  Lizzie had a long red feather on her hat pointed down toward her chin.

  “‘One man’s fanaticism has cancelled rational argument,’” she began, and several Friends glared up at her. She sank one hand into the pocket of her jacket, the new kind called an Eisenhower.

  She continued reading. “‘This is a war for the destruction of all Christian and civilised values. Not a war between nations, but a war between Good and Evil. Hitler is the self-elected, self-confessed anti-Christ! Evil is his God.’”

  While there was strong pacifist sentiment among all Sweet Creek Quakers, Bud was the only one who’d chosen the 4E classification over the 1AO. Some of the congregation’s eligible fathers and sons were already in the service, nearly all as noncombatants.

  Still, no one spoke up. Lizzie had the floor and the last word.

  If the Sweet Creek Friends were probably resigned to the annual tongue-lashing from Lizzie, Dad was not. Just when he seemed to be calmer—we hadn’t had any yellow Ys on our store windows for months—Lizzie’d arrived, dukes up, as usual.

  Dad sliced the ham with a hard frown as Lizzie attacked him for not knowing a certain popular song had been composed by a Jew.

  “Not that you would know anything Jews do, or have done to them” was the next thing to come out of her mouth. I think she was a little tight from the Mumm’s champagne she’d opened for herself before we’d sat down. She was smiling, but her words were harsh. “If you cared at all, why would you be serving ham to me?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be serving it to thee?” Dad’s voice was mocking.

  Mom said, “Lizzie, Tommy chose the menu. You know he always cooks for First Day.”

  “Lizzie,” Tommy said, “I didn’t think you or Mike observed dietary laws of any kind.”

  “Sweetie pie, we don’t. Forget it.” She raised her glass. She was the only one drinking. She said, “Forget it, forget them, already forgotten in Hitler’s concentration camps, soon to go up in smoke—pffft!” A big swallow of champagne.

  Tommy said, “Hey, Lizzie, it’s Christmastime!”

  “Oh, let her continue to run off at the mouth,” said Dad. “She’s been living too long with those who don’t celebrate Christmas.”

  “What do you mean by that, Efram?” Lizzie’s eyes were afire.

  “I have never heard that people of the Jewish persuasion celebrate Christmas.”

  “Dad!” Tommy cried.

  “I don’t celebrate Christmas either, Efram,” Mom said.

  I said, “He didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

  “I’m not eating at the table with you, Efram Shoemaker!” Lizzie got up and flounced into the living room. Next, Dad stood up and walked into the kitchen, then down the cellar stairs.

  Mom started to move, and Tommy put his hand over hers.

  “No,” he said gently. “We’re going to finish dinner. I cooked all last night for you. Let’s not make a molehill into a mountain.”

  Then Lizzie’s head poked around the corner. “Some molehill! Did he go?”

  “He happens to be my husband, Lizzie,” Mom said.

  “Oh, honey, that’s not your fault. Love is blind, Winnie, dear.”

  I felt sorry for Dad. I took him a plate of ham, potatoes, and cabbage, and another filled with animal cookies, springerles, and sandtarts, Pennsylvania Dutch specialties baked by Mom.

  He was sitting in an old rocker with the springs busting from the bottom, not far from the black monster furnace with an appetite for coal second to no other. Around the back of the room were all the vegetables and fruits Mom had canned, and in the center was the workbench with the jigsaw Dad and Bud had used when they’d made venetian blinds for every room in the house.

  “Tommy told me you had a girlfriend, Jubal. Then he told me you didn’t.”

  “I never really did, Dad.”

  “The little Daniel girl?”

  “Daria. But she was never my girlfriend. We were just real close.”

  “And her father didn’t approve, I bet.”

  “No. He didn’t. You know Radio Dan. ‘Slap your sides if you’re off to war.’”

  “I know Dan Daniel Senior. I know that he’s a good man. We’re all good men, Jubal. We’re good, decent, God-fearing men. This war can’t change that.”

  “Wasn’t he one of the ones who snubbed you at Rotary?”

  “Dan is my neighbor, on both the street where I live and the one where I work. We always say hello. We don’t shake hands or have conversations anymore, but we certainly do what would be embarrassing for neighbors not to do.”

  “I don’t think he’s fit to polish Bud’s shoes. That’s how all this started. What did he ever do to make him so high and mighty?”

  “He gave a son. What more can a man do?”

  “You’re mixing him up with God, Dad.”

  “Perhaps…. I wish someone would tell me why your aunt Lizzie feels she’s been appointed to represent everyone on the planet who happens to be of the Jewish persuasion.”

  “I think she just gets enraged because no one in America seems to care what’s happening to the Jews,” I said. “At school we learned this country even refused a ship of Jewish refugees in 1940. We wouldn’t even let Jews come in as temporary visitors.”

  Dad stabbed the ham with his fork. “Don’t say Jews! It isn’t polite,” he said.

  “We wouldn’t let people of the Jewish persuasion even come in as temporary visitors. I read up on it, Dad. Lizzie’s right about a lot of stuff!”

  Dad wasn’t going to argue.

  He chewed his dinner for a while, then said, “I remember the summer you went to Cub Scout camp and Dean Daniel went home because he was afraid of spiders.”

  “I thought of the same thing, Dad.”

  “Well, he ran into something a lot more fear-inspiring than arachnids. Those filthy Japs got him! Filthy slant eyes got him!”

  I’d never heard that kind of talk from my father. At SCFS we were taught to avoid name-calling, that war was no excuse to make the enemy seem different from us. We had to realize if we chose to go to war, we chose to kill people just like us.

  “I remember that night at the Trenton station,” Dad said.

  “How did you feel that night, Dad?”

  “Ashamed and embarrassed for myself, and for Bud.” Dad shrugged his shoulders and sighed. “I couldn’t help it.”

  “I think we all felt funny. Some Quakers.”

  “I’m nobody’s Quaker. I just went along with your mother.”

  “I wish you’d be with her more now,” I said. I’d never said anything of the kind to him before, and I regretted it immediately. He gave me a look. Then he put his plate on the table beside him, got up, and went across to get the coal bucket and the shovel.

  “Chilly in here,” he said. “Go up and tell your mother that Hope called while you were at meeting. She’s calling again tonight, between nine and ten.”

  “
What a thrill!” I said, but Dad wasn’t in a mood to kid around about Hope, as we used to. He wasn’t buying any more intimacy. When I tried to take the coal shovel from his hand, he said, “Do as I told you, Jubal.”

  NINETEEN

  Christmas night Lizzie and Mom planned to play Monopoly. Dad said he wanted to see exactly how much he’d lost compared to last year. He’d wanted to feature gala markdown sales, but what Quaker belief he had left kept him from making something commercial out of a celebration of the Lord’s birth. All the other merchants held holiday sales, and all seemed to have had a banner year. But Dad’s problem luring customers into Shoemaker’s had nothing to do with sales. He knew it, and we knew it too. Still, no one was saying out loud how badly Bud was hurting us.

  Tommy was out with Rose Garten. He said whatever it was Hope wanted, he could hear about it the next day. We always felt like postponing news from Hope, fearing that our luck wouldn’t last, that someday she would be calling to announce she’d landed Bud. That was how we thought of it, that she’d reel him in like a big fish, ignoring the fact Bud was mad about her.

  Christmas night The Teen Canteen was not only open but showing Yankee Doodle Dandy. I remembered Daria telling me how she’d loved that movie. It began at six and it would be over in plenty of time for me to get back home and find out Hope’s news.

  Tommy hadn’t worn his new Christmas tie. A tie would only be in the way of Fast Tom that evening. It was this sharp dark-blue-and-white-striped number I decided to wear myself, with Bud’s old blue blazer and his gray flannel pants. The pants were so old they had cuffs, a taboo since the war. I shined my loafers and polished the gold tie clip that was also Tommy’s. I borrowed some of his Vitalis for my hair.

  The Teen Canteen had been the Catholic church’s answer to gas rationing and the seasonal closing of Chester Park. It gave kids a place to go their parents would okay. Older kids and servicemen went to the Side Door Canteen at City Hall.

  But everyone was invited to the Teen Canteen movies, and Sweet Creek was full of people at loose ends that Christmas night, including a Marine and half a dozen sailors.

  I sat on one of the folding chairs in the last row. That way I could see Daria if she came in. There were so many there for the show, they had to throw in some extra chairs.

  The only thing I knew about the picture was that it was the life of George M. Cohan. I knew he was a song-writer and a dancer. I didn’t know what songs he’d written.

  No one from Sweet Creek Friends seemed to be there. Marty Allen had said he might show up, and I’d said if he did and Daria didn’t, I’d hang around with him.

  After the film got going, I wasn’t surprised that I was probably the only Quaker present. It was all about good old war!

  Daria hadn’t come, of course. I knew that was just wishful thinking. What I didn’t know was how to get out of there without climbing over people’s knees. Even if I did manage that, how would I find my overcoat on the rack in back, in the dark?

  So I sat there right to the last scene, a major tear-jerker. It took place outside the White House. Marching soldiers all singing “Over There.” The people on the sidewalk were cheering and singing along with the soldiers: “…the Yanks are coming, the drums rum-tumming everywhere—” Suddenly across the White House lawn George M. Cohan came, played by Jimmy Cagney. All he could do was stand and look amazed, because he was so touched by them singing a song he’d written. A passing soldier stopped long enough to ask George what was the matter (“old-timer”)—didn’t he remember the song?

  George nodded and said it seemed he did remember it.

  Then George joined in the singing with the soldiers. He marched in step with them as the words grew louder. “AND WE WON’T COME BACK ’ TIL IT’S OVER OVER THERE!”

  “What’s the matter, Shoemaker?” a voice asked. “What’s your hurry?”

  I had just found my overcoat when Luke Casper spoke to me.

  “Nothing’s the matter,” I said.

  “Great movie, hmmm?”

  “Yeah.”

  “People tell me I look like him.”

  We were walking toward the exit. My heart was beating fast. It surprised me, still, when I reacted sentimentally to stuff about the war. It was hard not to react when there was music, marching, and American flags waving. I’d have a lump in my throat and an argument against it in my head.

  Luke asked, “Do you think I look like James Cagney?”

  “No,” I said. But he did. His face did, a lot, although he was taller and huskier. I wasn’t in the mood to flatter him.

  “So what’d you really think of the movie?” he said.

  “I liked the music.”

  “I didn’t think you would,” he said. “I thought it would be too patriotic for you.”

  “You know so much about me.”

  “I know you lost your girl.”

  I didn’t answer that.

  “She hasn’t been by the stable in a long time,” he said.

  “Her brother died. Didn’t you hear?”

  “Oh, I heard. I wondered if you heard. I wondered how you felt when you heard. I wondered how your brother felt when he heard.” Why hadn’t I just admitted that he looked like James Cagney?

  “Shut up, Luke.”

  “You shut up.”

  “Both of you shut up!” a sailor said. “You’re in a church!”

  “That’s right!” from others.

  I could see a priest hurrying toward us through the crowd. Another one was feeding slugs into the jukebox, while the Catholic Boys’ Club stacked the chairs to clear the floor for dancing.

  I pushed through the door, and Luke was right behind me.

  “Hey, don’t you want a ride home?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “Shall I give her your love when I see her, Jubal?”

  I kept on going.

  “Because I’m going to see her!” Luke shouted. “No kidding!”

  He liked to see if he could get me mad enough to fight. He’d say, “Jubal, I know you want to sock me in the kisser. What’ll it take to make you try?”

  On the walk home my heart felt like it would punch its way out of my chest. All I needed, on top of World War I, was Luke Casper. Luke Casper talking about seeing Daria. My mind spun back to the last afternoon Daria and I were together, when she’d told him he was a sweetheart and told me he looked like Cagney. Maybe he wasn’t baiting me. What made me think she wouldn’t go out with someone who looked like Jimmy Cagney?

  When I got home, Mom, Lizzie, and Dad were in the living room. There was just one lamp lit, plus the light from the large Stromberg-Carlson radio/record player that had been sent from a local Sears, courtesy of Lizzie. The house was cold. Mahatma came slinking across the room with his head down, tail wagging between his legs, the way he looked sometimes when he’d done something wrong, or someone else had.

  “We’ve been waiting for you. Is Tommy with you?” Mom asked.

  “No. What’s going on?” What I really meant was, What happened to bring Dad up from the cellar? What happened to make Dad put on a suit and tie at this hour of night?

  “Hope called,” Mom said. “Bud is in the hospital. He was very badly beaten up by an Indian patient.”

  “Sky Hawk,” I said. You should see the size of him!

  “He’s in bad shape,” Dad said.

  “How bad?”

  “Bad!” Lizzie said. “We’re all going down there. Tonight!”

  “I want to drive,” said Dad, as though they’d been arguing the point. “We’ll take our car.”

  Lizzie said, “My car if we’re using my gas rationing tickets.”

  “Oh, Lizzie, you always have extra,” Mom said.

  “Don’t ask where she gets them,” said Dad.

  “We save them, Efram, so I can spend time with my sister! Don’t you dare insinuate we get them any other way!”

  “We’re taking the Buick,” Dad said, “and we better get going.”

  Lizzie
said, “We’ll take the Lincoln. I’ll drive.”

  “I want to go too!” I said.

  “No,” Mom said. “You and Tommy stay here.”

  “Please, Mom.”

  “You have to open the store,” Dad said, never one to forget that.

  They took the Buick, too.

  TWENTY

  Dear Jubal,

  I am very sorry to learn about Bud, and I hope he will be all right. It is often the dogooders that bad things happen to because you cannot change what is just by wishing it would change. I remember you telling me about that Indian.

  Jubal, I want to turn over a new leaf in the new year, and this is another reason I am writing this letter. This letter needs no response, and I would appreciate it if you did not answer it.

  I have to tell you something I did and I was wrong about it, though it was done with the best intentions. Like Bud, I misjudged the situation. Also I think I was a little crazy, you know, with both my brothers gone. I got the idea I could protest the CO thing marking your store windows. You thought I stopped after you found me out, but I didn’t. I put the yellow Ys there. I even thought (this is how crazy I really was) that I had to do it because of seeing so much of you. I believed if I didn’t, something would happen to Danny or Dean.

  Jubal, this sounds nuts, I know, but I also talked Mom into getting rid of that casserole. I began to think anything connected with you was a jinx…that next Daniel could go.

  It’s funny that I really never thought it would be Dean, because he never described bad things. His letters kept coming after we knew he was dead, and he had written things like “In a broadcast today Tokyo Rose said we American soldiers were ‘like summer insects that have dropped into the fire themselves.’ Nice of her to wax poetic, don’t you agree?”

  Danny says he is not all that sure your brother is that off the mark, because try to name a war that wasn’t caused by an earlier one and won’t cause a future one. I’m not sure I agree with that or even understand it, but Danny says your family is probably guilty enough without me acting as judge and prosecutor.