Returning Home

by Mary Carmen

  After each year of Eliza’s studies at St. Paul’s, Len sent a generous donation for further work on the gymnasium. In 2095 Len sent a letter asking St. Paul’s to admit Morris, including with his letter Morris’s timings from various swimming contests on Octula. Of course swimming is easier on Octula, and the numbers were very impressive.

  The new gymnasium at St. Paul’s included a universal-sized pool, just a few feet shorter than the pool Len had built. In those days St. Paul’s was noted for success at swim meets, and two St. Paul’s students were included on the RSA’s 2096 Olympic swimming team.

  When Miss Ruth Worrell and Morris reached Earth in April of 2097, they immediately went to the Vermont house for a week of acclimation. After that Miss Martha Worrell took Morris to the testing company in Montpelier so he could take the Private School Aptitude Test. His scores were delivered to St. Paul’s the next day.

  While they waited to learn of St. Paul’s decision, Miss Martha Worrell left for their home in England. She would never return to Octula, staying with her aging father in Oxford until his death.

  Mr. Edward Worrell Comes to Octula

  Of course the departure of Miss Ruth Worrell from Octula left Mattie without a governess. By the time Morris reached Vermont, the Worrell brother, Edward, was available to travel to a new assignment. Having heard for years about the life on Octula and realizing Mattie was only three years from entering high school, he agreed to come as the new tutor. He boarded a spacecraft on August 17, 2097 and arrived on Octula on October 29, 2097.

  Harrison Arrives

  As 2097 arrived I thought Anna’s childbearing years were over. She was forty years old that year, and she had borne eight children.

  However, Anna and I were again happy to learn another child was on the way.

  For this child, the doctor was even stricter due to Anna’s age. Anna was moved to the doctor’s clinic just after the third month of the pregnancy, and she remained there until after the delivery.

  Mattie and I went to visit at the clinic every evening, playing bridge with Len or Louella or the doctor herself. Anna complained there was no respite from the hours in bed, but the doctor was very firm about what Anna must to do deliver the child safely at her age.

  On September 29, 2097, the doctor took Harrison. He remained in critical condition for two weeks but, in a two-day period, he went from critical to normal. After four weeks we knew he would be able to go home with us. After over ten years with no infant in the house, he brought smiles to even Miss Gasnes’s dour face.

  Len Builds a Music Room

  Before Harrison came home, Len and his architect had completed the plans for a modification to the theater to allow it to be used as a music room.

  Originally, the back of the stage area of the theater faced the yard. The swimming pool building was to one side of the theater’s lobby, and the observatory was above it.

  The new plans called for a revolving stage at the back of the theater. On one third of the stage would be two grand pianos, facing each other for duets. One piano could be pushed aside and folded for concerts where only one piano was required.

  On another third of the stage would be a large pipe organ. The pipe organ’s console and its 1,168 pipes were designed to be facing the audience.

  The final third of the stage would be empty, allowing a curtain of gold threads to be pulled across the proscenium.

  Again I was amazed at the complexity of the design. It looked to me like a ten-year project, but Len was ready to begin. He had already found a 1920s pipe organ in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that was ready to be rebuilt, and he had put his name on the waiting list for two nine-foot grand pianos from Vienna.

  General Hsapv Moves Toward New Philadelphia

  After his success in Djavvapooha, General Hsapv was promoted to Commander of the Assemblage Armies. It was clear to us at the Commerce Department he was very much in favor with Mr. Mipdomp, and he seemed to make a success of every battle he commanded.

  But, we always chuckled when we saw him at meetings with Mr. Mipdomp. What a sloppy dresser he was, and how unkempt his hair! Unlike Mr. Mipdomp’s somber look in public, General Hsapv sometimes looked gay, even drunk.

  Nevertheless, he was promoted, and he worked with us on supplies in a very professional manner. He knew where his divisions were located and where they were moving.

  By February of 2098 General Hsapv had moved to a wilderness area just south of the border and very near New Philadelphia. There his troops met General Mee’s forces and fought a terrible three-day battle. The result was inconclusive, but General Mee was unable to replace those soldiers he lost. General Hsapv, on the other hand, had replacements moving in every day and ended the battle with more troops than he had started with.

  Eliza Completes High School

  In June of 2098 Eliza finished her work at St. Paul’s School. She ranked third in her class of seventy-five, and Anna and I were so very proud of her.

  Miss Ruth Worrell, Sam, Franklin, and Morris were there to see her graduation ceremonies. They sent a complete film of the two services, and we gathered in the theater to watch it over and over. Eliza looked so mature and so confident that Anna gasped.

  “She’s all grown, and we scarcely know her,” she cried.

  “She’ll be back home in a couple of years, darling,” I said, although I really was not at all confident of her return.

  Eliza had picked Oberlin College in Ohio about two years earlier and applied only to that school. It was just large enough and distinguished enough for a shy, intelligent woman. Furthermore, it was fairly close to Franklin’s college in Columbus, Ohio, and we knew the children would be able to visit each other.

  Sam took this opportunity to turn over his duties in the Vermont house to Jonathan. Sam returned to his commuter job, traveling back and forth from Earth to Octula, working for Len.

  Miss Ruth Worrell stayed in Vermont with Morris, and she awaited Mattie’s arrival, scheduled for early 2099.

  General Tjesnap’s Conquest

  In August of 2098 General Tjesnap and his three divisions left the area around Djavvapooha, where he had been camped since General Hsavp won his decisive victory there.

  General Tjesnap was not a favorite in our office. He never knew how many soldiers he had in any location, and he was brusque when he had to talk directly to our people about supplies and arms. We were not sure he was much of a leader, but we knew he certainly was a powerful personality.

  In addition, he was known for killing the enemy without reason, including people in the Alliance who were not involved with the war. Mr. Mipdomp was very anxious to keep on good terms with the civilians in the Alliance because he believed they would soon be among his electorate. General Tjesnap was the worst offender, we believed, because he unnecessarily murdered women, children, and old people.

  But the war dragged on, and even Mr. Mipdomp realized aggressive action was required. He spoke with sadness about the costs of the war, but he did nothing to control the activities of General Tjesnap.

  Before the start of the war, the largest and most beautiful city in the Alliance was Avmapva. This was, of course, an agricultural center and a place of culture. The agricultural workers came to Avmapva to sell their harvests, to see plays, and to attend dances. The bankers lived in Avmapva and managed the trades of stocks and futures.

  General Tjesnap was determined to conquer Avmapva. He talked of nothing else, and Mr. Mipdomp finally agreed the war could not be won without its fall.

  The three divisions moved the short distance from their encampment at Djavvapooha toward Avmapva, meeting the Alliance’s General Koteqj Kojptvop almost as soon as they departed.

  General Kojptvop was very skillful in his handling of his ragtag troops, and he was able to hold off General Tjesnap’s divisions. The people in our office believed if General Kojptvop had been allowed to continue in his command, General Tjesnap never would have reached Avmapva. This was not to be. Instead, the Alliance replaced Gene
ral Kojptvop with the less experienced General Kojp Cemm Joof. General Tjesnap soon overtook General Joof’s troops and General Joof surrendered Avmapva.

  The next day General Tjesnap entered Avmapva with his three divisions and remained there for several months.

  Back in New Philadelphia the news of the conquest of Avmapva was met with elation. Mr. Mipdomp, once again, declared the victory within reach, and the newspapers and other media had nothing but praise for General Tjesnap.

  Mattie Goes to High School

  In March of 2099 Mattie and Sam took a spacecraft to Earth so Mattie could attend high school.

  This was the worst day of all for Anna and Len, I believe. For Anna, Mattie was the only person who could lift her spirits when Franklin and Eliza left. For Len, his favorite of our children was no longer to be his playmate.

  Harrison was the only child left at home, and Anna and Len would not allow him to want for anything after that day.

  Miss Ruth Worrell took charge of Mattie in Vermont, making sure she was prepared for her freshman year at Franklin’s high school.

  General Tjesnap Moves to the Sea

  While Mattie was in the spacecraft headed toward her life on Earth, General Tjesnap was stirring. He had rested with his three divisions in Avmapva long enough.

  We had sent a great quantity of supplies to Avmapva, certainly enough for eight months. General Tjesnap’s troops raided all the grain and rice silos and loaded his armored personnel carriers to the top. With all this food and plenty of ammunition, General Tjesnap believed he was in a good position to cripple the industries around Avmapva.

  No Alliance military units were in the vicinity, but the district was one of the richest of the Alliance’s farming regions. General Tjesnap’s plan was to destroy all the support services for this district to bring about its surrender.

  He put all his soldiers in with the grain and the rice and drove in a caravan toward the sea, some three hundred miles away. After the troops had been on the road for twenty miles, they divided into ten separate caravans. Then, the ten caravans spread out so that there was about six miles between each line.

  Everything they came upon they destroyed. Houses containing only women and children were burned to the ground. Factories were shelled and leveled. Bridges were crossed and then blown up. Railroads were uprooted so no car could stay on the tracks. Public buildings were flooded with the plentiful water.

  Few people died during the three-hundred-mile trip. General Tjesnap lost only four soldiers.

  After a month of caravanning, the troops reached the outskirts of the lovely old city of Tawappa. Here they were met by a delegation of the city’s elders. The elders asked what they could do to save their city, and General Tjesnap listed the supplies he needed. The elders gathered the required supplies and prepared a paper of surrender. General Tjesnap and his troops bivouacked outside Tawappa and never entered it.

  Len Works on the Music Room

  The spacecraft that took Mattie to Earth came back in August of 2099 with one of the two Viennese pianos Len had ordered. In addition the organ refurbishers sent about five hundred pipes on that craft.

  Len had spent the prior year getting the preliminary work done on the revolving stage that replaced the theater’s screening area. Workers were, as always, at the house day and night, and Len frequently came into the library to ask me to walk down the hall to look at the progress. By August of 2099 the heavy table that allowed the stage to revolve was in place and the mechanics that worked it were built and installed.

  Each portion of the stage was to be of a different wood, and Len had selected American and English walnuts for the piano stage. In 2099 these woods were very scarce on Earth, but walnut trees had found an agreeable climate on a planet in the constellation of Pisces. They thrived there. Len was able to order all the wood he needed from that planet, and about half had been delivered by August of 2099.

  The workers completed the floor of the piano stage in November of 2099. The walls that would separate the three sections were not finished, and I could see from one stage through to the fronts of the other stages. The domed enclosure that protected the stages from the weather was complete, and Len put the new piano in its place and installed the automatic tuner. For the hour it worked adjusting the strings, Len and I sat in the theater and listened to the tones and the hammering of the strings and the tightening and loosening of the hardware.

  Len was no accomplished pianist, but he was able to pick out a couple of tunes he had learned in his childhood. As he started to play, all the workers and the people of the household filed into the small auditorium.

  “Mr. Worrell, you take a turn,” Len finally said.

  Mr. Worrell, a willowy young man of about thirty, carried Harrison to the stage and put the little fellow beside him on the bench. He played two hymns from memory and announced he was going back to his house to fetch some sheet music.

  Len sat on the bench with Harrison on his knee and showed him the parts of the piano. Then, Harrison, with one finger, picked out the melodies of Mr. Worrell’s two hymns, hesitatingly at first but soon satisfied with when he heard.

  “Another Mozart!” Len cried and ran to hug Anna.

  The Alliance Falls but Does Not Surrender

  By July of 2099 General Tjesnap’s rampage and the continual blockades of most of the Alliance’s ports caused shortages of nearly everything necessary for life in the seceded districts. Finding food for everyone was the worst problem, but other supplies were also scarce. Ammunition was essentially gone.

  Even the Alliance’s soldiers were hungry, and many deserted their units to return home to their former lives of plenty. Many deserters never reached home, and those who did found terrible conditions. Farm buildings had been burned and crops had been destroyed.

  Anna and I thought this was the moment for the surrender of the Alliance, but no surrender came.

  To take further advantage of this low point, General Tjesnap and his divisions again moved, using the ten-caravan plan. This time they moved north through two additional districts and several large cities. Again, they burned or destroyed everything in their path.

  Morris Tries Out for the RSA Olympic Team

  In the summer of 2099 Morris, Mattie, and Jonathan traveled to Denver so Morris could enter the time trials for the country’s swimming team for the 2100 Olympic Games.

  Morris had just finished his junior year at St. Paul’s School, and he had distinguished himself by appearing for the school in a number of interscholastic swim meets. He was the school’s best swimmer, and he frequently won the gold medal at these meets.

  Len followed the news about the meets closely, reading the school’s publication for parents as soon as it was available for interplanetary transmission. He knew Morris’s times for each event, and he kept a large chart with the times of all the competitors. Each year Len could see Morris climb in rank, and Len was very certain Morris would compete well in Denver.

  The drive to Denver was the longest land trip the children had ever taken. Morris, always a better message writer than Mattie, communicated with us about once every two days, describing the tour of the Great Lake, the baseball game in Cincinnati (the Reds lost to the Las Vegas Dodgers), the grain fields of Iowa, and the beautiful Pike’s Peak.

  Morris entered every swimming category except diving. He was selected for a relay team and as an alternate for two other competitions. Most of the men selected were over twenty, and Morris told himself he would be better able to compete in four years.

  Len was optimistic. “It’s the attempt that counts, not actually winning,” he told us. “He’s probably too tall for a world-class swimmer, but he’s just right for a world-class competitor. Plenty of heart.”

  Mattie found a new boyfriend among Morris’s teammates, and they agreed to exchange messages during the next year. This was Nathaniel Redding, and we would hear more about him several years later.

  Len Completes the Piano Room

  In
early 2100 the piano room was complete. The last load of walnut had been delivered and installed, and the second piano had arrived from Vienna. The other two sections of the revolving stage were incomplete, but Len decided to have a party to show off the pianos.

  He asked Mr. Worrell to prepare two pieces for presentation, and he contacted some Octulian musicians who advertised that they performed on the piano. The Octulains were used to a lighter touch on their electronic pianos, but they gamely auditioned for Len and expressed great interest in performing.