Rillma Ryan, home for the holidays, sang with the Baltimore Street crowd—causing a sensation among the men just by breathing.
As Juts drank in the whole cocktail of happiness it was hard to believe that someone in this group or in one of those cozy houses had burned out Noe Mojo’s business. She put the incident out of her mind, but it would pop back again like a headache. She decided she never would understand people. This chased away the headache.
Other reminders of the war would creep into her consciousness. She wondered, How were they celebrating the holiday in Paris? Or London? And what of Berlin—did they go about their Christmas festivities believing they were in the right? After all, they started the damned war. Why march into Poland or Czechoslovakia? Did Hitler really think the Western nations wouldn’t fight?
Were the German people told the truth? Maybe they didn’t know over there.
A chill shot up her spine. Maybe we don’t know, either. Are we told the truth?
If Popeye Huffstetler is an example of the free press, God help us, she thought to herself.
Then she thought of the huge poster in the post office. It showed people gossiping in an armaments factory while, behind them, a ship hit by torpedoes was sinking. “Loose Lips Sink Ships,” read the warning.
The carolers had started on “It Came upon a Midnight Clear,” Juts’s favorite carol.
Even Mother Smith, on the other side of the tree, seemed to enjoy herself.
Maizie asked Cora if she thought people were singing carols in Germany.
“I expect.” Cora handed her a red-sugared doughnut made specially by the Yosts for this occasion.
“I don’t get it.” Maizie blinked.
“What, sweetheart?” Cora watched Tubby’s baton.
“They’re like us, then.”
“More or less.” Cora readied for “Good King Wenceslas.”
Maizie sang along with her grandmother. Adults made life complicated. If she ran the world there wouldn’t be any wars, Maizie was sure of that.
After the caroling, people exchanged favors, kisses, hugs, food and drink. Bitter cold was fended off with inner fire. For one evening, domestic squabbles were set aside, financial troubles forgotten, cracked romances ignored, and old enmities muffled. Christmas Eve in Runnymede was about as close to heaven as a body could get.
Juts floated home on a cloud until she opened the door to her house and beheld her decorations shredded, the presents under the tree clawed to pieces, and the balls, as high as Yoyo could reach, smashed in glittering colored pieces on the floor.
This proved conclusively that cats do not have Christmas spirit. They might not even be Christians.
36
Christmas supper at Cora’s, everyone ate like pigs.
Juts held up her glass. “Here’s to 1942, Louise. We’ll have paid off Flavius by May.”
“Free and clear.” Chessy clinked his glass to his wife’s.
“Here’s to an end to this war before—well, you know.” Mary raised her glass.
Everyone drank and chattered, exchanging gifts. Juts oohed and aahed at the beautiful gold bracelet Chester gave her. She assumed the earrings she’d liked had gone to his mother, the bitch. They’d look better on her.
Trudy had given Chester a gentleman’s walking stick. He unwrapped it while at the store. Chester had given the gold shell earrings to Trudy. He wasn’t sure it was proper to give her earrings—maybe he should have given her perfume—but the earrings looked like her.
Pearlie stood up. “I’m going to pick up Patience Horney.”
“You are?” Louise smelled the wonderful fragrance of cherry wood in the fireplace.
“All her people are dead now and she’s alone. I just this minute thought of it.”
“Really? Did Rollie Englehard die this year?” Juts was losing track of time. “Was it this year?”
Rollie was Patience’s last surviving cousin.
“I think he did,” Cora replied.
“Be right back.” Pearlie grabbed his hat and coat. Chessy followed him.
Twenty minutes later they returned with Patience, so happy she babbled. It made the others teary, not just because they were glad to make her happy, but because Patience’s situation could be any one of theirs someday. Nobody ever knew what might happen. And it happens so damned fast.
37
Mary Miles Mundis declared she had second sight, a nifty concept since most people don’t even have first sight: People see what they want to see.
Chester, not a man seeking arguments in order to display his intelligence, casually let such ideas go in one ear and out the other. He was one of those men who drive their wives to ask constantly, “Did you hear a word I said?” Not that Chessy pondered second sight, but if he’d paid a bit more attention to himself and others he would have known what was hurtling around the corner like a trolley car out of control. Maybe he could have ducked.
He left the hardware store at five to see his mother. Josephine, rolling pie dough, shook her rolling pin at him. “You’re late.”
Black-eyed peas bubbled in a pot on the stove because New Year’s, commencing the following night at 12:01, she had to eat black-eyed peas for luck. Mother Smith first boiled them, then let them simmer on low, low heat, every now and then adding more water and molasses.
He didn’t reply, but went down into the cellar to check the furnace. The coal-delivery man had left the doors to the coal chute open, so the frigid air was pouring in. He shut the doors and then shoveled coal into the furnace. He dusted himself off as he walked up the wooden stairs, which reverberated with each step. “Tommy left the doors open.”
“That boy.” She shook her head. “He’ll never be able to take over his father’s business.”
“He’s enlisted. Maybe when he comes home he’ll be ready.”
“Tom West enlisted?”
“Army. Ted Baeckle told me he scored so high on the entry tests that he’ll be going to officers’ training school after boot camp.”
“That’s a surprise.”
“I don’t know, Mother, maybe Tommy West is a square peg in a round hole. Someone else can run West and Co.”
“That’s ridiculous. Where do you get these ideas? Juts?” She squinted.
“You know, Mother, I’ve been thinking a lot lately. I surprise myself.” His tone of voice was crisp. “I realize that I can’t make you happy and make Juts happy. If I do something for you, she’s upset. If I do something for her or agree with her, you’re upset. I’ve decided I’m going to please myself. At least one person will be happy.” He walked out the door.
It was snowing again so Chessy drove slowly to the dance studio and parked, as always, in the alleyway. He took the stairs two at a time and threw open the door. Trudy was wearing the lovely gold seashell earrings.
“Let’s dance.” He laughed, swept her in his arms, and kissed her. She returned the kiss with passion. It was a sure bet that Chester Smith’s 1942 was going to be different from 1941.
38
Yoyo snuggled on the afghan drawn around Juts’s legs as she flopped onto the sofa in front of the roaring fire. Buster, head on paws, stretched out on the floor in front of Juts because Yoyo wouldn’t let him on the sofa.
“I told you to wear a hat when we went caroling.”
Louise’s admonition at this moment was not appreciated. “You say that every day there’s a drop of moisture in the air, Louise. Don’t take credit for being right one time out of thousands.”
“You’re not a good sick person.” Louise handed her a hot tea. “Come on, Juts, drink a little of it.”
“New Year’s Eve, one of my favorite nights in the whole year, and I’m home sick. This is as bad as the time I got measles at Christmas.”
“That was 1909!”
“So?” Juts squiggled farther down in the afghan, kicking the newspaper on the floor.
The headline of the Clarion read “Dusseldorf Bombed.”
Wheezie picked up the pap
er and properly folded it. “Guess the Germans are getting back some of their own.”
“You’d think they’d have the sense to realize if they’re going to bomb London then the English will fly over the Channel and bomb them.” She sat up a little straighter and reached for the tea. “Can you imagine, Wheezie, being high up in the air with people shooting at you from the ground and other planes coming at you to blow you out of the sky? I can’t imagine it, really, and the cold air when those bomb doors open.” She shivered.
“I could be on the ground but I couldn’t be a pilot or a sailor.” Louise folded her arms across her chest. “I want the ground under my feet at all times. Hey, where’s Chessy?”
“Civil Air Patrol, emergency meeting. He’s learning Morse code and semaphore.”
“If the Japs bombed Pearl Harbor off aircraft carriers, why can’t the Germans do the same thing?” Louise asked.
“Do the Germans have aircraft carriers?”
“I don’t know, but they have submarines.” Louise stared into the fire.
“Guess I should let him go to the party with you and Pearlie, huh?”
“Well, he can’t dance. He’ll just sit around and watch the rest of us.”
“He can drink and throw confetti with the best of them.” Juts’s laugh turned into a cough.
Buster barked, hearing the car turn down the block before the human ears could pick up the tread sound. Within a minute Juts and Louise heard the car and saw the lights, which were soon switched off.
Chessy pushed open the back door, his arms full of groceries.“Hey.”
“Hi, Chess.” Louise walked into the kitchen to help him with the bags. “The patient is”—she lowered her voice—“crabby.”
“You’re talking about me,” Juts yelled from the living room. “I know you are.”
Chester tiptoed into the living room, face solemn. “We were talking about you.” He shook his head. “Tuberculosis. Won’t be long.”
Louise sang a hymn from the kitchen, where she was putting away groceries.
“You wouldn’t think it was funny if you were sick on New Year’s Eve,” Juts pouted.
Louise brought in orange juice and a bottle of gin as well as little party hats and streamers. “Whoopie!”
Juts smiled. “Chester, did you think of this by yourself?”
“Yep.”
“I’m going to make mild orange blossoms because you’re sick. You’ll get drunk as a skunk if you aren’t careful.” Louise measured out the gin, pouring it into a tall glass tumbler, then she added the orange juice and gently mixed the concoction. Finally she poured the bright liquid into martini glasses, which Chester brought out for the occasion.
“Does this mean I’m going to get drunk and you’re going to leave me?” Juts imploringly asked her husband.
“No, it means we’ll have our own party.” He put on a hat.
Louise put one on, then bent down to fix up Buster, who shook his head and tried to work it off. He finally did. Yoyo eyed Louise with suspicion. Louise didn’t try to put a hat on her.
Juts picked out a purple hat with a little tassel on it, bright green. “Junior McGrail’s colors,” she joked. She held up her glass. “Cheers.”
“Cheers and a happy, healthy New Year.” Louise lifted her glass, which she didn’t drink from because she was sticking to her story of not drinking alcohol. Occasionally, she’d forget but tonight was one of her virtuous nights.
“Louise—” Juts motioned for her to drink.
“No, I think I’ll pour a glass of orange juice.”
“You won’t be needing this, then.” Chester knocked back her drink.
A honk outside sent Louise to her feet. “All right, Sister, you have a happy New Year, get better.”
“I’ll be good enough to work on Friday, don’t worry.”
“Okay.”
“Happy New Year, Chester.” Louise kissed him on the cheek, bent over and kissed Juts, then zipped out the door.
“You aren’t going?”
Chester shook his head no, then added, “Wouldn’t be any fun without you.”
“Really?”
“Really.” He turned on the old radio. They sang along, whipped around their noisemakers, which made Buster bark. Yoyo ignored the whole undignified procedure. Chester didn’t feel like an unfaithful husband. It was curious, but somehow he loved Juts more than he had before.
At midnight he walked out with a big pot and ladle to bang in the New Year. She hollered “Happy New Year,” and then promptly fell asleep.
39
Except for Pearl Harbor, the war still seemed far away, but each time Juts scrambled across the slippery walks in the square, or hunched her shoulders to ward off the cold as she bought more doughnuts from the Yosts, she saw fewer and fewer young men.
Albert Barnhart, Lillian Yost’s younger brother, was the last to enlist. He joined the Coast Guard. He kidded the sisters Hunsenmeir by saying he did it so he could get a free haircut and Lillian could get her nails done.
Not wishing to seem less patriotic than that fat load on the other side of the square, Juts and Louise had run a big, expensive ad in the Clarion and one in the Trumpet, too, announcing free haircuts for servicemen and manicures at half price for the wives, mothers, sisters, and girlfriends of same. The place was mobbed.
Celeste, under heavy pressure from both mayors, agreed to head up the Red Cross, which meant endless fund-raising. Chessy, in response, assumed more duties for the Civil Air Patrol. His Tuesday-night dance lessons continued. He occasionally walked Buster to Trudy’s little apartment but he couldn’t make a habit of that.
The Civil Air Patrol attracted Louise, Fannie Jump Creighton, Lillian Yost, Agnes Frost, and the entire BonBon family over the age of eighteen. Digby and Zeb Vance and O.B. Huffstetler were the only men. Chessy had to train Runnymede’s X two sheriffs as well. Celeste pressured her connections in Washington for the latest in training films.
Training proved more rigorous than the volunteers had anticipated. Juts and Louise easily mastered Morse code but Lillian Yost had a hell of a time with it.
Turned out in their Army-surplus uniforms from the 1914 war, they drilled with wooden rifles until blistered. Fannie Jump bitched that drilling was absurd. Their job was to identify aircraft and lead civilians to safety in the event of bombing. In a fit, she threw down her wooden rifle. Chester, in his deepest baritone, told her to pick it up. She did and marched some more. Seeing Chester bark out that order to Fannie impressed everyone.
The patrol members concentrated fiercely during the film sessions. They watched German, Japanese, and Italian planes. The films showed each side of the machines, the underside and the topside.
Posters of silhouettes of planes as seen from the ground were tacked onto the walls of their small office in the Lutheran church. Chessy gave pop quizzes on what they learned, including enemy insignia, the black cross with white lines for the German aircraft and the red sun on the Japanese aircraft.
Each night two people pulled duty. Day duty was much easier because one could see the aircraft. Chessy, overrun with women wanting to contribute, discovered he was respected by people. They wanted to work with him. He was surprised and pleased.
Despite all their training, identifying a plane in the night sky by shape alone was difficult.
Chester found a big antiaircraft gun and an antiaircraft light in a salvage yard outside of Philadelphia. From the Great War, they still worked. The arrival of the antiaircraft equipment was a triumphant moment for Chessy and his CAP’s. A heated argument flourished in the basement of Christ Lutheran’s, where the meeting took place, over whether to place it by the fire tower or set it up in Runnymede Square. Louise wanted the antiaircraft and light gun in the square because it was easier for her to walk there, although she declared it would be a reminder to everyone that a war was on.
Caesura and Agnes wanted it by the fire tower, closer to their homes.
Finally, Digby stood up, lifted
his band baton, and asked for silence. He suggested using a crane and lifting the antiaircraft light into the fire tower; that way the two CAP’s would be together, which would help if the worst happened. He felt certain that an enemy plane would zoom down on the light, trying to knock it out, so the gun had to be there also. If the operator was injured the other CAP could take over.
Louise argued her program was better. If an airplane went after the tower, both CAP’s would get it. If the troops were divided, maybe one person would survive. She also pointed out that the fire tower had a roof, which would shut off part of the light beam.
Chester finally quieted the group by telling them that if a plane flew over, it would most likely be a reconnaissance plane. Their task was to report it immediately to Col. Frank Froling at the armory in Hagerstown.
Louise hollered out that it might be more than reconnaissance—after all, look what had just happened in Hawaii. And what was the CAP doing in the armory?
Patiently, Chester explained that special phone lines in the armory were connected to Baltimore and to Washington. Given the jolt the country had just endured, the Civil Air Patrol was well organized, even if HQ was in an armory.
Louise still wanted the big light in the square. The feuding rolled into the night. Digby Vance, tired and disgusted, suggested they let Colonel Froling make the decision.
Chester said no because then the colonel would lose confidence in them. They had to settle this themselves. At one in the morning they reached a compromise: They would build a new tower with no roof in the vacant lot behind St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. While that was being built, the light and gun would be placed in the center of the square, straddling the Mason-Dixon line. The big air-raid siren stayed in the fire tower while the new tower was being built. Chester prayed the new tower would be quickly completed and fortunately it was. Everything was then put in the tower.
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