The Troubled Air

by Irwin Shaw

  “That’s Vic,” Nancy was saying, her voice betraying nothing. “Number 22. He’s throwing passes now, but he doesn’t do much of that in the game.”

  “He looks so large,” Kitty said. “It doesn’t seem fair, letting such a large boy play with some of those poor little undernourished ones.”

  They had all laughed and Kitty’s eyes had been dancing and lively. Kitty loved parties, dances, events of all kinds. Watching her out of the corner of his eye, Archer felt a little guilty, because he kept her so close to home all the time. He himself disliked noise and group hilarity, and stayed at home whenever he could and Kitty, although she sighed from time to time when he made her refuse an invitation, loyally smothered all complaints.

  He looked for number 22. He had brought a pair of binoculars and he put them to his eyes. Vic Herres emerged from the circular blur of the glasses. He did look enormous, with the shoulder pads and helmet, as he took the pass from center and ran back easily and threw with a jumping, flipping motion. He seemed bored but relaxed, in contrast to the tense excitement of the other boys around him. His hips seemed very narrow, sloping in from the spread of the shoulder pads and his legs, tight in the silk pants, were thick and long. When he moved, Archer realized what sports writers meant when they talked about the way an athlete handled himself.

  “Mr. Archer,” Nancy said in a low voice and Archer put down the glasses, “I have something here for the cold.”

  Archer looked down and saw that Nancy was holding a silver flask, keeping it low on her lap, and partially covered under a plaid blanket. He must have looked a little surprised, because Nancy said hastily, “It’s Vic’s. It’s his whiskey, too. He said not to press it on you, but to be quick with it if you showed unmistakable signs of exposure.” She smiled and Archer decided that he liked her very much.

  “Kitty,” he said, turning to his wife, “we’re being tempted with spirits by the younger generation. Look.”

  Kitty bent over and saw the flask. She looked at him doubtfully. “Here?” she whispered, with a quick flick of her eyes for the students and faculty members and alumni and parents crowded below them.

  “Vic said that’s why he got you tickets in the last row,” Nancy said. “There’s nobody around you and everybody’s looking the other way.”

  “Victor Herres is probably the most thoughtful man playing collegiate football this year,” Archer said. “He has my vote for All-American right now.” He took the flask and offered it to Kitty.

  Kitty giggled as she took the flask. “Gilded youth,” she said. “I feel illegal and dissolute. As though Prohibition were still on.” She unscrewed the top, which had a little silver chain, and drank. She looked mischievous and boyish, with her head tilted back from the collar of her old fur coat and Archer thought vaguely and pleasantly of the time when he first met her. She took a long drink, and made a little satisfied pursing sound with her lips as she passed the flask back to Archer. “Some day,” she said, “I’m going to investigate whiskey more completely. Scandal on the campus. Faculty member’s wife found looping in chapel-tower every Saturday evening.”

  Archer smiled at her, pleased that she was having such a good time. Then he turned and offered the flask to Nancy.

  Nancy shook her head soberly. “Vic gave me explicit instructions not to,” she said.

  “I won’t tell the man,” Archer said. “Mum as the grave.”

  “No,” Nancy said. “He says I get silly on one drink and he’s right.”

  “Does Vic drink much?” Archer asked curiously.

  “Yes,” Nancy said, without criticism. “I’ve had to carry him into his fraternity house twice so far. He weighs a ton, too, and he’s dangerous when he’s drunk. He’ll do anything. The last time, he walked across the water pipe over the gully near the lake. In the middle of the night. Somebody dared him. It’s a twenty-foot drop and he wouldn’t listen to any of us when we tried to stop him. He knocked out Sully, that’s number 17, the center, because Sully stood in his way. And Sully’s his best friend.”

  The history student, Archer thought dryly, does other things with his time, too, I see. And there’s more to little Nancy MacDonald than you can see with the naked eye across six rows of chairs in a classroom, too.

  He lifted the flask and drank. It was Bourbon, very smooth and strong. Another thing about the quarterback, Archer thought appreciatively, he does not serve inferior spirits to his elders.

  The game was about to begin and Samson, the coach, was hanging onto Herres’ arm and talking earnestly into his ear. Herres kept nodding again and again impatiently and trying to walk away from Samson, as though he had heard everything that the coach had to say and was bored by it. Archer watched through the binoculars as the players gathered into a pre-game huddle, exhorting each other, shaking hands and clapping one another on the back, their faces strained and tense. Archer noticed that Herres stood quietly on the edge of the group, his hands on his hips, taking no part in the fervent little ceremony, looking on almost tolerantly, like a grownup watching children playing. When a man whacked him encouragingly across the shoulders, Herres shrugged, as if he were annoyed. And when, just as the knot of players broke up, number 17, Sully, kneeled swiftly and crossed himself, Herres’ face, calm and soldierly looking under the golden helmet, showed amused disdain.

  “He shouldn’t do that to Sully,” Nancy said. “Vic always makes fun of him when he crosses himself and he knows it hurts him. He keeps telling Sully that’s taking God too cheaply, pulling Him in on athletic events. He says if God spends His Saturdays watching football games, He must be neglecting more important work somewhere else.”

  “Oh, that’s unfriendly,” Kitty said. Kitty came from a religious family and treated anyone’s observance of ritual with worried respect. “I should think it would make Mr. Sully hate him.”

  “Oh, no,” Nancy said, seriously. “Sully loves Vic. He goes to Mass and prays for Vic’s safety every Saturday morning. It makes Vic furious.”

  Watching Herres trot out onto the field to line up for the kickoff, Archer had the feeling that there was no necessity for praying for the boy’s safety at any time. He moved with calm assurance and didn’t jitter around the way the other boys did and his long powerful body seemed to be under easy control at every moment. Yet, when the game got under way, Archer was surprised. Herres played with cold recklessness, backing up the line on defense and throwing himself at charging blockers with insane disregard for what Archer, who was a sedentary man, would have felt were the most rudimentary rules of self-preservation. Archer used his glasses almost all the time and found himself following Herres rather than the game. Herres hurt people when he hit them, brushing through blockers with his hands swinging cruelly and tackling savagely, even when a ball carrier was stopped by other men or herded against the sidelines so that a mere push would have sufficed to throw him out of bounds. And when his team had the ball he blocked the same way, with that ferocious, cold tenacity, knifing into tacklers’ legs with long, lunging dives or driving them with his shoulders, his helmet bobbing up into their chins, hitting, it seemed, harder and harder as the game wore on. And when he carried the ball, he barely deigned to twist or dodge, but plunged disdainfully and with furious power into tacklers, knocking them over, trampling on them, carrying them on his back as he plowed on. Without knowing much about the game, Archer understood that Herres was an unpleasant and discouraging man to play against.

  There was something curious about the way he played, different from the rest of the boys on the field. He seemed to do everything impersonally. When the others would congratulate a man after a play or cheer each other on, he remained out of it. Between plays he stood by himself, his hands on his hips, not seeming to listen to the other players or notice them. And in the time outs he walked off by himself and got down on one knee to stare placidly at the crowd.

  “He shouldn’t do that,” Archer heard Nancy say during one time out, when Herres as usual, went off toward the sideline, and
with his back half-turned from the men on his team grouped around the waterboy, knelt and played with a blade of grass at his feet.

  “Shouldn’t do what?” Archer asked.

  “Go off by himself like that all the time,” Nancy said. “The other boys don’t like it. They think he’s stuck-up.”

  Archer smiled at the childish phrase.

  “It’s not so funny,” Nancy said. “Sully’s come to me to ask him to change. They don’t like him, really. They think he’s making fun of them all the time. They won’t elect him captain for next year, Sully says, even though he’s the best player on the team.”

  “Did you tell him?”

  “No,” said Nancy.

  “Why not?”

  “Because nobody can tell him anything,” Nancy said soberly. “Especially not his girl. That’s the wonderful thing about him. Do you want another drink?”

  Archer looked at her gravely. There was a lot more here than just two children holding hands on the way to a history class. Archer had the feeling that if he asked if she were Herres’ mistress she would answer, surprised at the question, “Of course. Didn’t you know?”

  “Yes,” Archer said, “I’d love a drink.”

  “Don’t leave me out,” Kitty said, from the other side, her cheeks bright from the cold and the chrysanthemum shedding its petals in a yellow shower over her coat. “I’m numb.” She drank from the flask. “Oh, glory,” she said, “I’m going to become a sportswoman. You’re so lucky, Nancy, to have a man who gets you out into the open air every week.”

  I’m not so sure, Archer thought as he took the flask, I’m not sure at all how lucky she is.

  Just before the end of the game a fight broke out on the field. The visiting’ team was behind by three touchdowns and felt punished and humiliated. Their tempers were touchy and when one of the defending backs was knocked down after the play was over he got up swinging. In ten seconds there was a melee around the two players, with fists flailing among the helmets. Almost all the players, including the substitutes on both benches, rushed to the scene and joined in. Only Herres, who had not been in on the play, remained aloof. He stood twenty yards away, smiling amusedly and shaking his head. When a substitute from the opposing bench ran past him, Herres mockingly put his hands in the position of prizefighters in oldtime prints. The substitute stopped running and looked at Herres puzzledly, and the crowd laughed. Oh, no, thought Archer, you will not be elected captain this year, young man.

  The officials broke up the fight quickly and the game continued. It was over two minutes later and the crowd wound onto the field, darkening spots of color on the dark green grass in the autumn dusk.

  “I have to go now,” Nancy said. “I have to wait for Vic outside the field house and he’s always the first one out. He never hangs around after the game.” She put the flask to her ear and shook it to see if there was any left. She smiled as she saw Archer and Kitty watching her. “Vic likes a good long slug after a game.”

  “Does the coach know about this?” Archer asked.

  “I’m sure he does,” Nancy said. She shook hands with Kitty. “Good-bye,” she said. “This has been so nice.”

  “Tell Mr. Herres,” Kitty said, “that he had an ardent admirer in the top row. Under the influence of liquor all through the second half.”

  “I certainly shall. I know he’ll be glad to hear it.”

  “Do you think he’ll get drunk tonight?” Archer asked, although he knew he shouldn’t.

  “I suppose so,” Nancy said lightly. She folded the blanket she had brought with an intense and suddenly childish look of concentration on her face.

  “Well,” said Archer, “have a good time tonight.”

  “I’m sure we will, Mr. Archer,” the girl said, and went carefully down the creaking wooden aisle, with her blanket and her flask and the long slug of Bourbon for the boy who was now taking off his sweaty jersey in the field house. She walked away, happy, her hair shining in the dull evening light, young and not innocent. As he watched her, Archer had the feeling that the generations were filling in behind him.

  He walked home slowly through the dusty-smelling trees, holding Kitty by the arm. He kissed her when they got to the shadow of the porch, without knowing exactly why he did it. Kitty’s face was cool from the wind and her skin smelled of the chrysanthemum, autumnlike and healthy when he kissed her. “I feel nineteen,” she said as he held her. “I really feel only nineteen years old.”

  Archer thought that he knew why Kitty felt that way. But he knew he didn’t feel nineteen that afternoon.

  When they went into the house and Kitty started calling for Jane, to give her supper, he went into his study and put on the light. He sat down at his desk and picked up the act and a half of the play about Napoleon III. He read it through. It seemed empty and dead, deprived of all the life he had thought it had as recently as eleven o’clock that morning.

  He sat in the limited light of the desk lamp, thinking how pleasant it would be to get drunk that night.

  After that, Archer went to see all the games, allowing Napoleon III time off on Saturday afternoons. Herres always played the same way, remotely, savagely, and with amusement. He was involved in a small scandal when he refused to attend the rally on the eve of the last game with the season’s traditional rival, and Nancy told Archer that there was a great deal of resentment on the part of the other boys on the team, especially when Herres told them he had just gone to a movie that evening. And as Sully had predicted, he was not elected captain for the next year.

  But the real scandal came the following season, when Herres was a senior. By that time, he and Archer were friends and both Herres and Nancy were dropping into the house casually, playing with Jane, who had given herself to Herres on sight, and helping Kitty with the dishes when they had dinner together. At Kitty’s request, Herres dragged Archer off to ice skate during the winter and play tennis when the weather got warm. Kitty was afraid Archer was getting too fat and was always after him to exercise, but until Herres came along to root him out with imperious good nature, Archer had placidly sat in the easy chair in his study, allowing his wife’s scolding to flow unremarked over his head. Herres was a good tennis player, too, hitting the ball hard and volleying deftly, and Archer, who was physically a clumsy and untrained man, was no match for him. But Herres didn’t seem to mind, good-naturedly playing with him three or four hours a week, coaching him mockingly, putting the ball from one corner of the court to the other, for Kitty’s sake, as he said, to make Archer run the fat off.

  Then Herres joined the Dramatic Society and got the leading part in the spring play.

  “Now what did you do that for?” Archer asked him one night. It was a surprising thing for Herres to do. Aside from the football team, he paid no attention to the extra-curricular life of the campus. And he had no friends besides Sully and the Archers and steered away from all group activity. Even in his fraternity he lived alone, more like a guest at a hotel than anything else. “I didn’t know you thought you had any talent.”

  “I probably haven’t.” Herres grinned at him. “But I want to keep an eye on Nancy.” Nancy was the star of the Dramatic Society and was talking about going to New York and trying to get on the stage. “I don’t like her walking home at one o’clock in the morning with the leading man, after rehearsing love scenes all night. So now I’m the leading man and she’s trapped.”

  It had started as frivolously as that. But just before the play was to go on, Herres had come to him with tickets and had said, very seriously, “Now, listen, Clement, I want you to watch me carefully. Don’t drink too much before you go and watch me as though you weren’t my friend. As though you were a critic on a tough newspaper and you didn’t give a damn for anything.”

  Archer had watched conscientiously. The play was The Hairy Ape, and while Herres, with his close blond hair and aristocratic face had seemed somewhat too polite for the part of the tortured, gorilla-like stoker, there still was evident enough of
the competence and self-assurance with which Herres always conducted himself to keep it from being hopeless. Later that night, Archer had told him this, Herres listening intently, nodding and agreeing when Archer had pointed out crudities and amateurishness, and shaking his hand with unaccustomed emotion when he left and saying, “Thank you. It’s just what I needed to hear. Thanks for being so honest.”

  In bed, with the lights out, Archer said to Kitty, “That Vic is a queer one. Acting now. The last thing in the world you’d expect from a boy like that. And really concerned about it.”

  “Don’t you worry about Vic Herres,” Kitty said. “All he has to do is lie down under the tree and the fruit falls into his mouth.”

  That summer, Herres and Nancy got a job in a summer theatre in the East, working fourteen hours a day, playing small parts, attending classes and painting flats just for their keep. That was the summer Archer finished the play about Napoleon III and threw it away.

  The scandal came after the second game of the football season and Archer never got over the feeling that he was partly responsible for it. Herres showed up one evening after practice, played for awhile with Jane, then asked if he could have a minute alone with Archer. In the study he had seemed uncharacteristically ill at ease and Archer had fiddled elaborately at cleaning and filling his pipe to allow Herres time to gather his forces.

  “I want to ask you a favor,” Herres had begun.

  Oh, thought Archer, he’s in trouble with Nancy and he’s come to an older man for the name of an abortionist.

  “I’m in the new play,” Herres went on, gravely. “They gave me the lead. And we’ve been rehearsing two weeks. And I want you to come to the run-through tonight and watch me. And then I want you to be as honest as you were last spring. I’ve worked hard all summer, but I’m still not sure. I want you to tell me whether you think there’s any hope for me as an actor. You’re the only one I know I can trust. And it’s very serious. After you tell me, I’ll explain why.”