by Irwin Shaw
They drove through the town. Since the war there had been a lot of new construction, small factories with lawns and flower-beds pretending to be places of recreation and gracious living, shop-fronts redone to look as though they were on eighteenth-century village streets in the English counties, a white clapboard building that had once been the town hall and was now a summer theater. People from New York had begun buying farmhouses in the adjoining countryside and came up for weekends and holidays. Whitby, in the four years that Rudolph had spent there, had grown visibly more prosperous with nine new holes added to the golf course and an optimistic real-estate development called Greenwood Estates, where you had to buy at least two acres of land if you wanted to build a house. There was even a small artists’ colony and when the President of the university attempted to lure staff away from other institutions, he always pointed out that Whitby was situated in an up-and-coming town, improving in quality as well as size, and that it had a cultural atmosphere.
Calderwood’s was a small department store on the best corner of the main shopping street of the town. It had been there since the 1890s, first as a kind of general store serving the needs of a sleepy college village with a back country of solid farms. As the town had grown and changed its character, the store had grown and changed accordingly. Now it was a long, two-story structure, with a considerable variety of goods displayed behind plate-glass windows. Rudolph had started as a stock boy in busy seasons, but had worked so hard and had come up with so many suggestions that Duncan Calderwood, descendant of the original owner, had had to promote him. The store was still small enough so that one man could do many different jobs in it, and by now Rudolph acted as part-time salesman, window dresser, advertising copy writer, adviser on buying, and consultant on the hiring and firing of personnel. When he worked full time in the summer, his salary was fifty dollars a week.
Duncan Calderwood was a spare, laconic Yankee of about fifty, who had married late and had three daughters. Aside from the store, he owned a good deal of real estate in and around the town. Just how much was his own business. He was a closemouthed man who knew the value of a dollar. The day before, he had told Rudolph to drop around after the graduation exercises were over, he might have an interesting proposition to put to him.
Brad stopped the car in front of the entrance to the store.
“I’ll just be a minute,” Rudolph said, getting out.
“Take your time,” Brad said. “I’ve got my whole life ahead of me.” He opened his collar and pulled his tie loose, free at last. The top of the car was down and he lay back and closed his eyes luxuriously in the sunlight.
As Rudolph went into the store, he glanced approvingly at one of the windows, which he had arranged three nights before. The window was deyoted to carpentry tools and Rudolph had set them out so that they made a severe abstract pattern, uncluttered and gleaming. From time to time Rudolph went down to New York and studied the windows of the big stores on Fifth Avenue to pick up ideas for Calderwood’s.
There was a comfortable, female hum of shopping on the main floor and a slight, typical odor of clothes and new leather and women’s scents that Rudolph always enjoyed. The clerks smiled at him and waved hello as he went toward the back of the store, where Calderwood’s private office was located. One or two of the clerks said, “Congratulations,” and he waved at them. He was well liked, especially by the older people. They did not know that he was consulted on hiring and firing.
Calderwood’s door was open, as it always was. He liked to keep an eye on what was happening in the store. He was seated at his desk, writing a letter with a fountain pen. He had a secretary, who had an office beside his, but there were some things about his business he didn’t want even his secretary to know. He wrote four or five letters a day by hand and stamped them and mailed them himself. The door to the secretary’s office was closed.
Rudolph stood in the doorway, waiting. Although he left the door open, Calderwood did not like to be interrupted.
Calderwood finished a sentence, reread it, then looked up. He had a sallow, smooth face with a long blade of a nose and receding black hair. He turned the letter face down on his desk. He had big farmer’s hands and he dealt clumsily with frail things like sheets of paper. Rudolph was proud of his own slender, long-fingered hands, which he felt were aristocratic.
“Come in, Rudy,” Calderwood said. His voice was dry, uninflected.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Calderwood.” Rudolph stepped into the bare room in his good, blue, graduation suit. There was a giveaway Calderwood calendar on the wall, with a colored photograph of the store on it. Aside from the calendar the only other adornment in the room was a photograph of Calderwood’s three daughters, taken when they were little girls, on the desk.
Surprisingly, Calderwood stood up and came around the desk and shook Rudolph’s hand. “How did it go?” he asked.
“No surprises.”
“You glad you did it?”
“You mean go to college?” Rudolph asked.
“Yes. Sit down.” Calderwood went back behind his desk and sat on the straight-backed wooden chair. Rudolph seated himself on another wooden chair on the right side of the desk. In the furniture department on the second floor there were dozens of upholstered leather chairs, but they were for customers only.
“I suppose so,” Rudolph said. “I suppose I’m glad.”
“Most of the men who made the big fortunes in this country, who are making them today,” Calderwood said, “never had any real schooling. Did you know that?”
“Yes,” Rudolph said.
“They hire schooling,” said Calderwood. It was almost a threat. Calderwood himself had not finished high school.
“I’ll try not to let my education interfere with my making a fortune,” Rudolph said.
Calderwood laughed, dry, economical. “I’ll bet you won’t, Rudy,” he said affably. He pulled open a drawer of the desk and took out a jeweler’s box, with the name of the store written in gilt script on the velvet cover. “Here,” he said, putting the box down on the desk. “Here’s something for you.”
Rudolph opened the box. In it was a handsome steel Swiss wristwatch, with a black suede band. “It’s very good of you, sir,” Rudolph said. He tried not to sound surprised.
“You earned it,” Calderwood said. He adjusted his narrow tie in the notch of his starched white collar, embarrassed. Generosity did not come easily to him. “You put in a lot of good work in this store, Rudy. You got a good head on your shoulders, you have a gift for merchandising.”
“Thank you, Mr. Calderwood.” This was the real Commencement address, none of that Washington stuff about the rising military curve and aid to our less fortunate brothers.
“I told you I had a proposition for you, didn’t I?”
“Yes, sir.”
Calderwood hesitated, cleared his throat, stood up, walked toward the calendar on the wall. It was as though before he took a stupendous final plunge, he had to re-check his figures one last time. He was dressed as always in a black suit with vest, and high-topped black shoes. He liked full support for his ankles, he said. “Rudy,” he began, “how would you like to work for Calderwood’s on a full-time basis?”
“That depends,” Rudolph said, carefully. He had expected this and he had decided what terms he would accept.
“Depends on what?” Calderwood asked. He sounded pugnacious.
“Depends on what the job is,” Rudolph said.
“The same as you’ve been doing,” Calderwood said. “Only more so. A little bit of everything. You want a title?”
“That depends on the title.”
“Depends, depends,” Calderwood said. But he laughed. “Who ever made up that idea about the rashness of youth? How about Assistant Manager? Is that a good enough title for you?”
“For openers,” Rudolph said.
“Maybe I ought to kick you out of this office,” Calderwood said. The pale eyes iced up momentarily.
“I don’t
want to sound ungrateful,” Rudolph said, “but I don’t want to get into any dead ends. I have some other offers and …”
“I suppose you want to rush down to New York, like all the other young damn fools,” Calderwood said. “Take over the city in the first month, get yourself invited to all the parties.”
“Not particularly,” Rudolph said. Actually he didn’t feel ready for New York yet. “I like this town.”
“With good reason,” Calderwood said. He sat down behind his desk again, with a sound that was almost a sigh. “Listen, Rudy,” he said, “I’m not getting any younger; the doctor says I’ve got to start taking it easier. Delegate responsibility, is the way he puts it, take holidays, prolong my life. The usual doctor’s sales talk. I have a high cholesterol count. That’s a new gimmick they got to scare you with, cholesterol count. Anyway, it makes sense. I have no sons …” He glared at the photograph of the three girl children at his desk, triply betrayed. “I’ve done the whole thing myself in here since my father died. Somebody’s got to help take over. And I don’t want any of those high-powered young snots from the business schools, changing everything and asking for a share in the shop after the first two weeks.” He lowered his head and looked at Rudolph measuringly from under his thick black eyebrows. “You start at one hundred a week. After a year we’ll see. Is that fair or isn’t it fair?”
“It’s fair,” Rudolph said. He had expected seventy-five.
“You’ll have an office,” Calderwood said. “The old wrapping room on the second floor. Assistant Manager on the door. But I want to see you on the floor during store hours. We shake on it?”
Rudolph put out his hand. Calderwood’s handshake was not that of a man with a high cholesterol count.
“I suppose you’ll want to take some sort of holiday first,” Calderwood said. “I don’t blame you. What do you want—two weeks, a month?”
“I’ll be here at nine o’clock tomorrow morning.” Rudolph stood up.
Calderwood smiled, a flare of unconvincing dentures. “I hope I’m not making a mistake,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”
He was turning over his unfinished letter and picking up his fountain pen with his big, square hand, as Rudolph left the office.
As he went through the store Rudolph walked slowly, looking around at the counters, the clerks, the customers, with a new, appraising, owning eye. At the doorway, he stopped, took off his cheap watch and put on the new one.
Brad was dozing at the wheel in the sunlight. He sat up as Rudolph got into the car. “Anything new?” he asked, as he started the engine.
“The old man gave me a present.” Rudolph held up his hand to display the watch.
“He’s got a soft heart,” Brad said, as they pulled away from the curb.
“One hundred and fifteen dollars,” Rudolph said, “at the watch counter. Fifty dollars wholesale.” He didn’t say anything about reporting to work at nine o’clock in the morning. Calderwood’s was not overflowing country.
Mary Pease Jordache sat at the window looking down at the street, waiting for Rudolph. He had promised he’d come right home after the Commencement exercises to show her his degree. It would have been nice to arrange some sort of party for him, but she didn’t have the energy. Besides, she didn’t know any of his friends. It wasn’t that he wasn’t popular. The phone was always ringing and young voices would say, “This is Charlie,” or, “This is Brad, is Rudy in?” But somehow he never seemed to bring any of them home. Just as well. It wasn’t much of a home. Two dark rooms over a dry-goods store on a treeless, bare side street. She was doomed to live her life out over stores. And there was a Negro family living right smack across the street from them. Black faces at the window staring at her. Pickaninnies and rapists. She had learned all about them at the orphanage.
She lit a cigarette, her hand shaking, and brushed inaccurately at the ashes from former cigarettes on her shawl. It was a warm June day, but she felt better with her shawl.
Well, Rudolph had made it, despite everything. A college graduate, holding his head high, any man’s match. Thank God for Theodore Boylan. She had never met him, but Rudolph had explained what an intelligent, generous man he was. It was no more than Rudolph deserved, though. With his manners and his wit. People liked to help him. Well, he was on his way now. Though when she’d asked him what he was going to do after college, he’d been vague. He had plans, though, she was sure. Rudolph’was never without plans. As long as he didn’t get caught up with some girl and get married. Mary Pease shivered. He was a good boy, you couldn’t ask for a more thoughtful son; if it hadn’t been for him God knows what would have happened to her since that night Axel disappeared. But once a girl came into the picture, boys became like wild animals, even the best of them, sacrificing everything, home, parents, career, for a pair of soft eyes and the promise under the skirt. Mary Pease Jordache had never met his Julie, but she knew she went to Barnard and she knew about Rudolph’s trips to New York on Sundays, all those miles there and back, coming home at all hours, pale and dark under the eyes, restless and short of speech. Still, Julie had lasted over five years and he should be ready for someone else by now. She would have to talk to him, tell him now was the time to enjoy himself, take his time, there would be hundreds of girls who would be more than honored to throw themselves at his head.
She really ought to have done something special for this day. Baked a cake, gone down and bought a bottle of wine. But the effort of descending and climbing the stairs, making herself presentable for the neighbors … Rudolph would understand. Anyway, he was going to New York that afternoon to be with his friends. Let the old lady sit alone at the window, she thought with sudden bitterness. Even the best of them.
She saw the car turn the corner into the street, its tires squealing, going too fast. She saw Rudolph, his black hair blowing, young Prince. She saw well at a distance, better than ever, but close-up was another story. She had given up reading because it was too much of a strain, her eyes kept changing, no glasses seemed to help for more than a few weeks at a time, old eyes. She was under fifty, but her eyes were dying before her. She let the tears overflow.
The car stopped below her and Rudolph leaped out. Grace, grace. In a fine blue suit. He had a figure for clothes, slender, with wide shoulders and long legs. She pulled back from the window. He had never said anything, but she knew he didn’t like her sitting at the window all day peering out.
She stood up, with an effort, dried her eyes with the edge of her shawl, and hobbled over to a chair near the table which they used for eating. She stubbed out her cigarette as she heard him bounding up the steps.
He opened the door and came in. “Well,” he said, “here it is.” He opened the roll of paper and spread it on the table in front of her. “It’s in Latin,” he said.
She could read his name, in Gothic script.
The tears came again. “I wish I knew your father’s address,” she said. “I’d like him to see this, see what you did without any help from him.”
“Ma,” Rudolph said gently, “he’s dead.”
“That’s what he likes people to believe,” she said. “I know him better than anybody. He’s not dead, he escaped.”
“Ma …” Rudolph said again.
“He’s laughing up his sleeve right this minute,” she said. “They never found the body, did they?”
“Have it your own way,” Rudolph said. “I have to pack a bag. I’m staying in town overnight.” He went into his room and started to throw some shaving things and a pair of pajamas and a clean shirt into a bag. “You got everything you need? Supper?”
“I’ll open a can,” she said. “You going to drive down with that boy in the car?”
“Yes,” he said. “Brad.”
“He’s the one from Oklahoma? The Westerner?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t like the way he drives. He’s reckless. I don’t trust Westerners. Why don’t you take the train?”
“What�
��s the sense in spending money for the train?”
“What good will your money do you if you’re killed, trapped under a car?”
“Ma …”
“And you’ll make plenty of money now. A boy like you. With this.” She, smoothed the stiff paper with the Latin lettering. “Do you ever think of what would happen to me if anything happened to you?”
“Nothing will happen to me.” He clipped the bag shut. He was in a hurry. She saw he was in a hurry. Leave her by the window.
“They will throw me on the garbage heap, like a dog,” she said.
“Ma,” he said, “this is a day for celebration. Rejoicing.”
“I’ll have this framed,” she said. “Enjoy yourself. You earned it. Don’t stay up too late. Where’re you staying in New York? Do you have the phone number, in case there’s an emergency?”
“There won’t be any emergency.”
“In case.”
“Gretchen’s,” he said.
“The harlot,” she said. They did not talk about Gretchen, although she knew he saw her.
“Oh, Christ,” he said. She had gone too far, and she knew it, but she had to make her position clear.
He leaned over and kissed her to say goodbye and to make up for the “Oh, Christ.” She held him. She had doused herself with the toilet water he had bought her for her birthday. She was afraid she smelled like an old woman. “You haven’t told me what your plans were,” she said. “Now your life is really beginning. I thought you would spare me a minute and sit down and tell me what to expect. If you want, I’ll make you a cup of tea …”
“Tomorrow, Ma. I’ll tell you everything tomorrow. Don’t worry.” He kissed her again and she released him and he was gone, lightfooted, down the stairs. She got up and hobbled over to the window and sat down in her rocking chair, old lady at the window. Let him see her.
The car drove away. He never looked up.
They all leave. Every one of them. Even the best of them.
The Chevy labored up the hill and through the familiar stone gate. The poplar trees that lined the road leading to the house cast a funereal shade, despite the June sunshine. The house quietly decayed behind its unkempt flower borders.