by Howard Fast
“No, you never wanted me. Don’t make a world of illusions now. It doesn’t help.”
“You’re a damn fool, Danny.”
“Thank you.”
“Did it ever occur to you to wonder why I wouldn’t give you a divorce all those years?”
“It occurred to me. You told me once that Seldons didn’t divorce.”
“What’s the use?” Jean sighed. “I’m making a fool of myself, and I don’t enjoy that. I came here to talk about Barbara. What shall we do?”
“She’s a grown woman.”
“I thought of going over there and talking to her.”
“That’s not smart. She has to make her own decisions. And Europe’s no place to visit now. Jean,” he said gently, “I think she’ll be back soon. She had to get over what happened to her, and she chose to stay there until she got over it. I think she’s over it now, and I think she’ll come back.”
“Who was the boy? She told you, not me. Do you know how that hurts?”
“A writer. He worked on the newspaper Le Monde.”
“What was he like?”
“She sent us a picture. I thought you’d like to see it.” He took the picture out of his pocket and handed it to her, and he watched her as she stared at the smiling face in the photograph.
“It’s a nice face,” she said wanly. “Poor Barbara, how she must have suffered.”
Dan reached across the table and took her hand. It was a new sensation for him. He had never pitied Jean before.
***
The following day’s edition of the San Francisco Examiner carried the titillating tidbit that Jean Whittier had “flown to Los Angeles for a rendezvous with her ex-husband, Daniel Lavette, where they were seen lunching at the Hotel Biltmore.” It said no more than that, but it was suggestive and sufficiently embarrassing to John Whittier for him to bring it up the first time he saw Jean, which was at dinner that day. Tom was at the table with them.
“I think we should discuss this at another time,” Jean said coolly.
“This is a very appropriate time. At least you’re here. I see little enough of you these days.”
“I prefer our squabbles to be private.”
“If Tom wants to leave, he can leave.”
“I’m having my dinner,” Tom said. “I’ll take it elsewhere if you wish.”
“No, you might as well remain,” Jean said. And then to Whittier, “You want to know how it got into the papers? I can’t tell you that. Someone must have recognized us at the Biltmore. Certainly I had nothing to do with that.”
“This is the second time you’ve seen him—as far as I know.”
“In five years! You’re tiresome.” Jean sighed. “I don’t enjoy this. I see whom I please when I please.”
“Yes, you can do as you damn well please, but don’t involve me in any scandal.”
“Do you ever listen to yourself?” Jean asked gently, and when Whittier stared at her, she added, “You tend to be pompous and quite boring. I saw Dan to discuss my daughter, Barbara. That’s it. We’ll drop the subject.”
Flushed, Whittier rose, his cheeks puffed out, his face red. He swallowed, contained himself, and then said coldly, “I’ll have my dinner elsewhere.” He turned on his heel and left the room.
Jean and Tom sat in silence. The butler entered with the roast and looked at Whittier’s place. “He won’t be dining with us,” Jean said. “He was called away.” Tom remained silent. The butler served them and left.
Tom took a few bites of his food, then bit his lower lip and shook his head. “It gets worse.”
“Yes, my dear,” Jean said. “But it’s my problem, not yours.”
“If you felt this way, why the devil did you marry him?”
“Because, Thomas, I did not feel this way at the time.”
Now in his twenty-seventh year, Thomas Lavette was tall, slender, and still unmarried. His face had fixed into a rather controlled, handsome mask. He had the refined, almost plastic good looks of a film star or a men’s clothes model, light brown hair that he parted on the side and that fell gracefully over his brow, blue eyes, and a wide, slightly petulant mouth. As the years passed, he had retreated behind his face and figure, rarely permitting himself to exhibit either pleasure or disappointment. Women found him attractive, clever within limitations, and coldly closed to any specific designs on their part. He had remained as part of the Whittier household, showing no desire to move out or to establish a place of his own. He had joined Whittier’s city club through the sponsorship of Whittier, he was a member of the San Francisco Golf Club, and he kept a small boat at the wharf, although he rarely sailed. He had moderated his drinking, and he smoked an occasional cigarette. He lit one now and said to his mother. “What do you intend to do?”
“Nothing. Anyway, I don’t see that it concerns you, Tom.”
“It does.”
“Might I ask how?”
“I like John.”
“That’s very nice.”
“Do you intend to divorce him?”
“What is your sudden interest in my intentions?”
“I simply think that another divorce would do you no good. I think it would be a mistake.”
Jean smiled coldly, “So now you advise me on my conduct.”
“Someone has to.”
“You’re insolent and rather nasty. I have no desire to discuss this with you.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be insolent. I just don’t want you to leave John.”
“Why?”
“Can I talk to you, Mother?”
“You’ve been talking to me. Quite outrageously, I think.”
“I apologized for that. Can I talk to you, straight off the cuff?”
“Go ahead.”
“All right. In a few months, your trusteeship will expire. At that time, Barbara and I will have not only the ownership but the voting rights to our Seldon Bank stock, which will amount to about twenty million dollars apiece. John and I have discussed this at some length. I will control the bank. A combination with the Whittier interests would constitute the largest and most powerful financial block on the West Coast. John has been to Washington, and he has it from the best authority there that the arms embargo will be repealed before the year is out. You can see what that would mean to the Whittier shipping interests. I must say that the idea of a combine of interest came from John, and I think it’s very decent of him. He doesn’t need us as much as we need him.”
For a long moment, Jean just stared at her son. “You amaze me,” she said at last.
“Why?”
“Never mind why. That can wait. Tell me, why do we, as you put it, need John Whittier?”
“Because without him we are just a bank, a large bank, but still just a bank. With him—well, damnit, Mother, you must see the power in such a combination.”
“And that’s what you want? The power?”
“Frankly, yes.”
“You’re a strange boy, Tom,” she said, thinking to herself that “stranger” would be a better word, a stranger who was her son and whom she knew so little.
“What else should I want?” he demanded. “Money? I’ve always had enough money. My job at the bank? It’s piddling nonsense. I have my own dreams, Mother. Is that so strange?”
“And if I were to divorce John, it would endanger all this?”
“It would make it very awkward.”
“And what about Barbara? You’ve left her out of your plans. She gets half the stock.”
“I think I can handle Barbara.”
“Do you? That’s interesting.”
“I mean, why shouldn’t she do what’s best for the family?”
“Are you sure you know what’s best for the family? Barbara might have other ideas—or she might decide to do what she feels is best f
or Barbara.”
“I still think I can convince her. The first problem is to get her out of the hands of that Jew lawyer of hers.”
“God help us both,” Jean whispered.
“Just what do you mean by that?”
Jean did not reply, only looked at her son, feeling that she was going to scream, to burst out in rage, yet realizing that she was entitled to neither reaction.
“Don’t tell me you’re shocked, and don’t accuse me of anti-Semitism,” Tom said. “I had dinner last night at the club with Arthur Schwartz, and he’s about as Jewish as you can get. It’s just that Sam Goldberg is Dan’s partner. You know that.”
“I’m sure that some of your best friends are Jewish,” Jean said.
“You’re right.”
“And Dan happens to be your father.”
“He happens to be.”
Jean sighed hopelessly.
“I’m sorry, Mother,” Tom said. “If I offended you in any way, I’m sorry.”
“I don’t deserve sympathy, my dear. I have a son who is enormously rich and has no sense of humor, and I deserve both. It took me half a century to grow up, and it’s too late to weep over that.”
“I think I have as much of a sense of humor as the next person. But damned if I see what’s so funny about all this.”
“No, I don’t suppose you do,” Jean said.
***
In mid-May of 1939, two weeks before Barbara planned to leave Paris for Cherbourg, where she would board the Queen Mary for the journey back to America, Marcel’s old friend Claude Limoget telephoned her and asked whether he and his wife could drop by to see her. Barbara was working on her last “Letter from Paris,” and she hoped that by late afternoon most of it would be out of the way. She was not particularly eager to see Claude and Camille, but they were friends of Marcel, and even didactic company was better than no company at all. And they were didactic. They were well-meaning enough; they had come by half a dozen times in the year since Marcel’s death, and she had been to their home for dinner on two occasions, but one always paid a price of instruction. They lectured her on Spain, on fascism, on Nazism, on the new world that was being wrought in the Soviet Union, on the weakness of Chamberlain, on the wickedness of Deladier, on the spinelessness of the Czechs, on the betrayals—of Spain and Czechoslovakia—by Roosevelt, and on other kindred subjects.
Since Barbara disliked argument and had a deep-seated conviction that little was gained and no one really convinced by it, she was more inclined to listen and swallow her various disagreements than to attempt to prove her point. In her own way, very slowly and thoughtfully over a period of years, she was crystallizing her own point of view. She had possessed an almost instinctive repugnance for suffering inflicted on anyone, for cruelty, for the act of inflicting pain and for the ultimate act of killing. Five years ago, she had left Sarah Lawrence College possessed of a gentle and comprehensive innocence, which, as a very sophisticated student in a very sophisticated college, she would have denied completely. Since then, she had learned a great deal, coped with the situation of a young woman alone in a foreign country, found a job as a correspondent, and proved to herself and others that she could do her work in a professional manner. In a sense, she had formed herself in terms of ideas and beliefs, and she saw no need for inflicting these ideas and beliefs on others.
She had listened to the arguments and persuasions of the Limogets as she had listened to the arguments and persuasions of others. If at times she was bored, boredom was something she had learned to cope with. This time, however, she was not bored.
Claude and Camille Limoget arrived at precisely five o’clock, which they had learned was the proper American cocktail hour. They brought a bottle of wine, downed a glass apiece, munched on Barbara’s crackers and cheese, made the proper inquiries about her health and state of mind, and then came directly to the point.
“We understand,” Claude said, “that you plan to return to America in two weeks.”
“Yes. I’ve overstayed my leave.”
“Of course. Yet Paris has been a happy as well as an unhappy experience.”
“That’s true, Claude. Some of each.”
“Barbara,” he said very seriously, “we are coming to you to ask you to change your plans. We would like you to put off your departure to America and go to Berlin instead.”
She smiled. “You can’t be serious.”
“Very serious. Let me explain the reasons for this request.”
“No,” Barbara said firmly. “Whatever you have in mind, I don’t want to hear about it. I regard what is happening in Germany, in Berlin, with loathing and with horror and disgust. Nothing you have to say could persuade me to go there, now or ever.”
“Will you only listen?”
“No. I am going home. I have been away almost five years. I am totally heartsick for home. You’re French. You ought to understand that.”
“We do understand it,” Camille said. “But isn’t it unreasonable to refuse to listen? You’re not a person of weak character. We’ve spent too many hours trying to convince you of things you absolutely refuse to accept, and I’m sure we haven’t convinced you. But at least you listened.”
Barbara sighed. “Very well, I’ll listen.”
“That’s all we’re asking,” Camille said. “I insisted on that with Claude. We would simply put the facts to you, and then you could say yes or no.”
“You know we’re communists,” Claude said. “We’ve made no secret of that.”
“Indeed you haven’t.” Barbara was forced to smile. There were times when she almost liked the Limogets.
“All right. Now, over the past few years, there have been many discussions in Party circles concerning the question of Nazi Germany. In the beginning, German comrades participated in these discussions—comrades who had escaped from Germany, a few others who moved back and forth. These few became fewer, and finally all our contacts with Germany were broken. At this moment, we don’t even know whether the Party exists in Germany, and the way events are moving, it is desperately necessary that we know, not only for ourselves but for the whole world—”
“Oh, no,” Barbara interrupted. “You can stop right there. I am not a communist. I don’t think I am even a communist sympathizer.”
“You said you’d hear us out,” Camille reminded her.
“All right. Go on.”
“I want to say right here that we have no intention of placing you in a position of danger. Other measures are being undertaken to make contact in Germany. This is a singular case, for which you are ideally suited. No, please wait”—as Barbara began to stop him—“please, listen to me. There is a Professor Wolfgang Schmidt, who teaches philosophy at Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin. He is one of those who espoused the Nazi theories of the master race. He has published two books on the subject, and his writing has been warmly received by the Hitler gang. Nevertheless, we have reason to believe that this man, who was once secretly a Party member, still remains a communist and uses his present role as a cover. If that is the case, he may have contacts, there may be some sort of organization that can be reached and helped.”
Barbara shook her head hopelessly. “You are quite mad.”
“I don’t think we are. Barbara, we are not asking you to try to establish that contact; others will do that. We only ask that you see this Professor Schmidt, that you talk to him as what you are, an American correspondent, that you get a sense of the man and of what his deepest beliefs are. This is something you can do quite legitimately—and if you are able to give us a sound estimate, then the next man we send will not be going to his death. He won’t be walking into a trap.”
“You mean I am to spring the trap for him.”
Camille Limoget’s round, pretty little face took on an expression of pain, as if Barbara’s remark had cut to her soul. Her wide blue e
yes became moist, and Barbara reflected that she was indeed the most unlikely communist.
“We loved Marcel,” she whispered. “We love you. What a thing to say!”
“I’m sorry,” Barbara apologized. “I shouldn’t have said that. But I am not going to Berlin, You know, you and Claude and your friends—you’ve told me a dozen times how you feel about everything that’s happening today. But you never asked me how I feel. Of course, I understand that American women are not supposed to have much sense—”
“That’s not fair,” Camille protested. “We never stopped you from speaking. You were always quiet, listening.”
“True,” she responded, not feeling that this was the best moment to remind Camille that to get a word in during one of their discussions was virtually impossible. “Then it’s my fault. Let me tell you what I feel, in just a few words. I feel that men who fight wars share a common insanity, and that men who kill, for whatever reason, for whatever justification, are also insane. I have listened to the theories and rationalizations and accusations for hours, but I still feel just that way. I loved a man who was like a part of me, and he died senselessly, for no reason and no cause.” She sought for more words, and then felt that what she had said encompassed the whole matter. “That’s the way I feel,” she said.
Camille bit her lower lip and pouted. Claude studied Barbara thoughtfully, and for a little while the three of them sat there in silence.
Finally, Claude said, “Marcel was my friend. I don’t like to parade my emotions, but I sat down and cried when I heard that he was dead.”
Barbara nodded.
“It wasn’t an accident. The Nazis killed him. They have killed thousands, and they will kill thousands more.”
“And Stalin?” Barbara asked tiredly. “He kills no one?”
“It doesn’t change what happened in Spain and what is happening in Germany.”
“And will I change that if I go to Germany? Can anyone change it?”
“I don’t know,” Claude said quietly. “We try. If we don’t try, there’s not much worth living for, is there?”
Again they sat in silence, and at last Claude said, “I don’t blame you if you’re afraid. I’d be afraid.”