The Grey Ladies keep up their work but is it enough? There’s talk of a man from New Bedford, rescued after thirty days on a raft. He arrived battered and damaged, in body and in mind, and at half the weight as when he left. And his story is a happy one. I think of the others who would trade their souls to be found at sea in any kind of state.
I’ll tell you this much, I don’t have the urge to hand this stranger a blanket or some woolen socks. I want to tend his wounds. I want to do more.
Best regards,
Mary Young
37
RUBY
Summer 1942
June 4, 1942
Hi-de-ho, my darling Rubes!
Thanks for the jingle-jangle of the other night. It was a kick to hear your voice. Golly, I miss Sconset. I’ll try to get out this summer, by hook or by crook. It’s the loveliest place around. The rose-covered homes and dawdling summer days in Sconset are exactly why we’re fighting this war.
As for me, I’m still in Sag Harbor batting off suitors. Don’t get the wrong idea—these courters are of the corporate type. My stint at Mademoiselle has come to an end. It was buckets of fun but you can only brood over fashion and frippery for so long before you go bonkers. The wrong colors, the right patterns, and all the hell they’ve given me for wearing slacks and not wearing a hat. I don’t quite get this “style” racket. If the getup isn’t your brainchild, then you can’t count yourself as having panache. And that’s the truth as I know it.
Now it’s off to tackle more serious endeavors. Journalistic reporting in general, foreign corresponding to be specific. A modern-day Margaret Fuller, or so I dream! Perhaps I shall pursue something more akin to Dorothy Thompson. I can’t imagine an achievement bearing greater thrill than to get booted out of Germany by Hitler for being a pest. Of course I have to nab the gig first—all in due time.
I’ll keep you posted, from the front lines here in Sag Harbor, which is itself more a sideline than anything.
Love and kisses,
HR
* * *
Fridays at the Yacht Club were a lot less fun with the boys gone.
It took some mettle for Ruby to get herself all gussied and glammed. If you were togged to the bricks and no one was around to see, then what? She didn’t even have Hattie around, offering her review. All that and her duds didn’t fit exactly as they should. Ruby was “in the club,” as they said. In other words, she was pregnant.
Not that she was complaining. Ruby was thrilled to be officially on stork watch, despite the strained buttons on the blouse and the stretched fabric across her backside. At least she wasn’t in E-Z-On maternity frocks just yet. But Lord did Ruby find herself constantly beat, and how. Beat and green-gilled and forever itching to take a snoozer under the buffet table. Plus, her hooves were awfully swollen for someone still able to (somewhat) squeeze into her same clothes. All that and gin tasted weird—less ginny somehow. It took most of Ruby’s gumption to polish off a single glass. But she had to. How else was she to sleep?
Pregnant. Three months gone. All Ruby ever wanted was to be a mother. But a day late and all that, at least regarding the draft board. She’d been hoping for class 3-B: men with dependents engaged in war work, and therefore exempt from service. With Daddy’s gas mask production Sam had the work box ticked, but their love bug was not a dependent quite yet. And so Sam joined the service.
At that very moment Sam was still Stateside, training for whatever calamitous situation Uncle Sam would throw him into. After a month or two—the timing was aggravatingly vague—Ruby’s dear husband would step aboard a ship bound for a strange land and with God knows what munitions strapped to his body and stashed in his trunk. He was the kindest, most generous man to grace the mortal world and Ruby could not square with the fact that he was training to stare another human dead in the eyes and shoot.
“I’m learning to work a boat,” he swore. “That’s all.”
It was a very Sam Packard type of lie, gentleman that he was.
And Topper, well, Topper had to top them all. He’d taken up as a nose gunner in the AAF, flying B-24 Liberators—which were built for tall pilots, he did not fail to add. The boy had always been proud of his stature. Ruby was surprised he didn’t claim Liberator pilots had to likewise be certified as officially debonair. Ruby pictured the commotion he must’ve made with the ladies when he visited the local canteen in his uniform and sheepskin jacket.
Like Sam, Topper was neck-deep in training, which sounded preferable to war, except when her baby brother got too frank with the details. Things like unreliable fuel gauges and engines that fell plumb away. And the Krauts weren’t even shooting at them yet.
“Don’t worry, Ruby Red,” he wrote. “The planes have four engines.”
Yes, four engines. Until they had three. It was the first time Ruby realized a soldier could die before he began to fight. Thank God Sam was on a ship, which seemed safer somehow, Pearl Harbor notwithstanding. He wouldn’t last two minutes with plane parts dropping off.
“Madame,” said one of the Yacht Club waiters, and set a plate before Ruby. It had on it a thin slice of cake, or a facsimile of cake anyway. “Your dessert.”
“Thanks,” Ruby said, though she didn’t have the stomach for it.
As the waitstaff bustled about, Ruby poked and clicked at her plate, scoping the room and its guests. They weren’t all women. There were plenty of old fellows and at least a dozen servicemen now that the Yacht Club was open to all in uniform. Or as Mary griped the night before: “It’s become a real mixed bag.”
But although the dining room was chockablock with Nantucketers and off-islanders alike, there wasn’t a one Ruby cared to kibitz with. She was awfully lonely in such a crowded room.
“Hello there,” called a voice.
As if summoned for duty, Mary scissored up, looking ever more gray and haggard. Rationing had begun on their gilded shores, and Mary herself was like a rationed version of a normal dame. No sugar, lard, or gas with that one. The woman’s new, war-friendly, rubberless girdle didn’t help.
“Not that an old stick rule like Mary has anything to suck in,” Ruby could very nearly hear Hattie say.
Sakes alive, Ruby missed her friend. She missed their bull sessions, likewise their tennis matches and rounds of golf. To speak nothing of all the parties and tea dances they double-starred on their calendars, all summer long. Once again, Hattie’s voice clattered through Ruby’s ears.
“What’s with all the waltzing?” she said. “If we’re going to dance, we should dance. How about the rumba? I could teach ya. I learned it myself during one sen-saysh summer in Cuba.”
With Hattie gone, who would rumba then? It was rubber girdles and waltzes for the duration.
“How are you doing?” Mary asked, and lowered herself onto the chair beside Ruby.
“I’m okay,” Ruby said, still pushing her cake around the plate. “A tad fagged out.”
“What’s the matter? Don’t like the dessert?”
Ruby made a face and shrugged.
“Papier-mâché is best left for homecoming floats,” she said.
“Well, sugar is under ration. Even our tongues must make sacrifices!”
Mary seemed almost giddy at the prospect of suffering all the way down to her taste buds. The woman was born to ration. Someone needed to clue her in that conserving personality and spunk wasn’t going to help the war effort.
“Talk about dim-out rules,” Hattie might’ve said.
A smirk found Ruby’s lips and she covered her mouth with a napkin.
“Something funny?” Mary asked in a slight huff.
“No, not at all.” Ruby cleared her throat and set her napkin back in her lap. “The rationing doesn’t bother me that much.”
“Then why are you sitting in a corner by yourself when there’s a party going on?”
“Some party,” Ruby mumbled. “Listen, Mare, it’s hard to explain. It’s nothing and everything at once. I’m just ‘off’ I suppose. G
ood grief, I really need to stop the bellyaching. Mother would have my head.”
Not that Sarah Young was a ball of sparkle herself lately. In fact, these days Sarah Young took the sourpuss prize, hands down.
“It must be hard,” Mary said, to Ruby’s vast surprise. “To face this pregnancy with Sam away, when it’s your first child and Mother Young…”
Mary wavered, plainly debating whether to release a potshot sitting at the tip of her tongue. Commiseration was dandy but you couldn’t go around biting the hand that fed you.
“She’s been a real crab lately, hasn’t she?” Ruby said with a laugh, knowing exactly where her sister-in-law was headed.
Mary studied her before finally relenting with a resigned nod. Ruby squeezed her sister-in-law’s arm, her heart at once softening to the old gal. Mary would give her left eye, or her new girdle, for the chance to produce the first Young offspring. And here was the scamp Ruby beating her to the punch. Not that Ruby’s tot would be a Young in name. So Mary still had that at her hip.
“I suppose Mother’s earned the right to grump,” Ruby said. “With Daddy so sick and fighting her every step of the way. She turns her back and he’s out the door, headed toward the office.”
Ruby shook her head, feeling a little pluck of happy at the thought of Daddy acting like his normal self.
“He’s a handful,” Mary agreed.
“Isn’t it unusual sometimes?” Ruby asked. “I know they’re trying with the dances and parties and same old rigmarole, but it makes everything bleaker. Like a bad paint job on an old clunker. Why try to impersonate last summer? Or the summer before? This cake…”
She mashed her fork into it.
“Let’s stop pretending we can have dessert,” Ruby said.
Mary made a sound. Was she crying? Choking? Fighting off a seizure? Ruby went to slug her on the back, but realized it was only Mary, suffering from amusement. A chuckle, almost.
“Have you ever met such a spoiled brat?” Ruby said. “A war overseas and I’m complaining about parties that aren’t up to snuff!”
“Actually, I was thinking that I quite agree. Enough with the pretending. What’s that expression Topper uses? ‘You said it’?”
Ruby smiled.
“The phrase you’re looking for is ‘You shred it, wheat.’”
“That’s the one.”
Ruby sighed deeply. She set her fork on the table.
“I shouldn’t grouse,” she said. “The boys are off saving the world, putting themselves in danger, and I’m meowing about dessert.”
“But it’s not about the cake, really,” Mary said, astonishing Ruby with her insight. “It’s the change. And you miss your friend, too. The Rutter girl.”
“I do,” Ruby said, one eye on Mary, who was suddenly the most changed of all. “I miss Hattie something fierce. I know you didn’t much care for her—”
“Oh, she’s fine,” Mary lied.
“But Hattie just had a way of making everything seem gayer. She swears she’ll come out soon but she’s hunkered down in Sag Harbor, entertaining an offer or twenty.”
“Twenty offers!” Mary yelped, grabbing at her throat.
Ruby could see it all over her face: I knew that girl was fast …
“Offers of the career variety,” Ruby clarified as Mary managed to look relieved and disappointed all at once.
Thank God it was Ruby who stumbled upon Hattie and Topper in the pantry. Mary likely would’ve called the fuzz. Or expired on the spot.
“What would Hattie need with a man?” Ruby said. “She’s going places. I guess that’s half the problem. Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud as peaches, but sometimes it’s hard to be the one left behind.”
Left by Hattie, and Sam, and Topper, too, as it happened. And though Ruby tried not to think about it, soon Daddy would be added to the group. He’d already outlived doctors’ estimations by a good six months.
“It can be hard to be left behind,” Mary said, once again displaying uncharacteristic human understanding. “But, rest assured, when a woman claims to be ‘going places’ it is usually in the wrong direction.”
Ruby let out a cackle. So she was the same Mary, by and by. Swell to know that not everything was thrown to the four winds.
“Oh, Mary,” Ruby said, still chuckling. “You do hold a curious place in my heart. And I think Hattie will do all right. She’ll score some primo gig at the Post, then jet-set all over the world, hobnobbing with dignitaries and irritating fascist dictators left and right. What a life!”
“Yes. But you have a life as well. Two times over.”
Mary gestured to Ruby’s stomach, and Ruby smiled in return. Yes, a baby. Her parting gift from Sam, the lug. If nothing else, she had that—motherhood. Nothing important, mind you. Only what she’d dreamt of her whole dang life.
“Fancy a smoke, Mare-bear?” Ruby asked. “Because right about now I could use a cig and some fresh air like a rat needs his cheese.”
“A rat and his cheese,” Mary said, grumbling and rising to her feet. “No one would doubt you were raised with a pack of wild brothers.”
“Nah. Mostly I was raised away at school.”
Ruby put a ciggie to her lips and bummed a light from the chap two tables over. Folger-something-or-other. He was in uniform, another body for the cause. If Hattie were there, she’d give the man a farewell look-see of her leg, raising her hemline to midthigh to tide him over. Ruby would never do such a thing. She didn’t have Hattie’s gams, for one.
“Let’s go outside,” Ruby said, taking a puff. “The night’s clear. Not a bank of fog for miles. A damned miracle.”
“I’ll join you but, Ruby, I have to say, when I was in Boston last I was talking with your father. And, well, he believes cigarette smoke is unhealthy. A carcinogen. He read it in some scientific journal. It made me quit cold turkey!”
“Don’t listen to old Dad,” Ruby said with a snort. “He also thinks they’ll discover a cure for polio.”
“Be that as it may, the smoking thing seems to have legs. Notably bad are the Turkish ones you prefer. You should at least switch to ivory-tipped.”
“My cigarettes are French.”
“Same thing.” Mary slapped at the air. “Foreign, you know. I’m only suggesting you lay off on account of the babe.”
She pointed to Ruby’s not-quite-a-belly.
“Aw, Mare,” she said. “Don’t be such a nervous Nell. Smoking is a stress reliever, everyone knows. Plus, the doctor says I can only gain fifteen pounds. How else am I supposed to keep my weight down?”
“Ruby Packard, you look fantastic. I’d never know you were pregnant if you hadn’t told me.”
“Thanks, kid. So, whaddya think?” Ruby said, the cig hanging out the side of her mouth like a Hollywood gangster’s. “Should we check out what’s happening on the harbor?”
She linked her arm through Mary’s. Mary gave a little jolt as though she’d been stung by a bee. But after thinking about it, she settled into the gesture.
“Sure,” Mary said. “The harbor.”
“All those boats,” Ruby said, leading her along. “I hear there’s a soirée on every one. With no gas and no go they might as well put the clippers to some use. At least these parties aren’t pretending to be something they’re not.”
July 10, 1942
Dear Ruby,
Shoot! Shoot and a half!
I’m sorry I haven’t made it out Nantucket way. Things have been dizzy-busy and I hardly have time to sit down for a meal. I hate that I missed the Independence Day festivities. And I could stab myself for not getting the telegram out to you in time. My apologies! Kiss, kiss!
I truly hope you didn’t hold a place at the table for me. But you better not have gotten yourself a new doubles partner! Those Coffin girls must’ve been tripping over themselves when they saw you were on the tennis market. My advice: Stay away from them both. The chubby one hits forehands like she’s tossing grenades that miss their mark. Listen Rubes, that is
our trophy to win. Next year. Promise.
Now, on to off-island things. You might’ve noticed the postmark. I’m back in New York! I know you weren’t too jazzed about me nosing around the front lines. Not to worry. Turns out nailing down a foreign correspondent post is no cinch. Even worse that I’m of the female persuasion.
“If we’re gonna send a gal,” one editor told me, “it has to be a woman who looks a little rough.”
I haven’t given up, though! If I have to ugly it up, then by jove, I’ll do it. In the meantime, any of these diddies ring a bell?
“The Yanks shot to victory thanks to a 3-run homer by Joe DiMaggio. The Yankee Clipper walloped it far left in the top of the sixth. The swell fielding during the game helped shore up the win.”
“Ted Williams was fined $250 for loafing and generally acting screwy.”
“McCarthy’s boys may have lost, but so did the Sox. The Boston bozos are still lagging at four games back.”
Yessiree! That’s right! You’re pals with the latest sports reporter for the Daily Mirror! I happened to walk into the editor’s office approximately one hour after a reporter died of apoplexy while covering a game. Poor so-and-so. But good for me, as they sent me straight out on the beat! My first game was the New York Black Yankees versus the New York Cubans. Me, a real sports fiend. Can you stand it?
Enough about my professional pursuits. What’s happening at Cliff House? Do you hear from Sam or your brothers often? Are they allowed to write? I still can’t believe P.J. enlisted … and that they’d let him in! The boy is class 5-F all the way. Physically unfit to serve due to being spineless and scarce of pulse.
Ack! Look at me. Crude and crass. I’ve spent too much time with ballplayers already. I realize he’s your brother and Mary, you claim, is not so bad this summer. (!!!!) But them’s the cards, Rubes. And don’t pretend that comment didn’t earn me a bit of the tee-hee, some Ruby-style cheer. The best kind there is.
Alrighty joe, off I go to cover the Yankees versus the St. Louis Browns. I’ll tell you what, the world champions are on a roll and quite the gas to watch. I know your family favors the Sox, but perhaps you can come for ladies’ day at the ballpark later this month?
The Book of Summer Page 20