The Troubled Air

by Irwin Shaw

  “The big moment,” Herres said. “The moment of decision. When you finally took the drink and stared everybody down. Caesar watching the gladiators in the arena on a slow afternoon. You came through, Professor. I was testing you all day, and you came through like a lion. You’re solid, Professor, rock-solid, and I admire you.”

  He’s too perceptive, Archer thought, he knows too much for a boy his age. But mixed with this was a feeling of warm accomplishment and pleasure in Herres’ praise. Herres was not free with his approval and this was the first time he had ever explicitly given it to Archer for anything. As they walked, more swiftly, toward home, Archer thought, I’m going to miss him when he graduates in June. This place is going to seem awfully empty next year.

  A gust of wind made the shade rattle under the curtains at the window and Archer blinked and almost sat up in bed at the sudden noise. Kitty was sleeping without moving, the sound of her even breathing almost a snore in the dark room. The luminous dial of their bedside clock showed that it was after three o’clock. Archer shook his head, thinking, I’ll be in great shape in the morning.

  He got out of bed quietly and padded barefooted over to the window. He parted the curtains and looked out over the neat backyards. The moon was out and made the thin trees look as though they were made of bare silver.

  He dropped the curtains and looked at Kitty. He shook his head, trying to make the dark room and his sleeping wife more real than the lost autumn evening in Ohio. He felt melancholy, and the two figures disappearing down the streets of reverie seemed wonderfully young and hopeful to him, as though they were better at that moment than they would ever be again. The cleaner time, when you could prove yourself to your friend merely by lifting a silver flask to your lips even though the Dean of Men was only two rows away.

  He stood silently in the space between the beds, looking down at Kitty. He leaned over and kissed her gently on the forehead. She stirred a little in her sleep, moving her head slowly on the pillow.

  Archer got into bed and closed his eyes.

  When I wake up, he thought, I’m going to call Vic.

  The phone was ringing on the table next to him and Archer kept his eyes closed, hoping someone else would answer it. The phone kept ringing. He opened one eye and squinted at the instrument. The clock on the table said ten-thirty. Automatically he calculated, three to ten-thirty. Seven and a half hours. I am not tired. He opened both eyes and saw that Kitty was not in her bed. The phone kept ringing. Archer reached over and took the instrument off its rest and put the receiver against his ear on the pillow.

  “Hello,” he said.

  “Clement,” O’Neill’s voice said crisply over the wire. He always sounded very much like an executive on the telephone, as though he had taken a course somewhere in sounding forceful at a distance and had never forgotten the rules. “Are you up?”

  “Just,” Archer said. “Is anything wrong?”

  “Have you got a cold?” O’Neill asked,

  “No,” Archer said, puzzled. “Why do you ask?”

  “You sound funny. Very deep.”

  “I’m lying down,” Archer said. “I sound sexy.”

  But O’Neill didn’t laugh and Archer knew it was serious. “I thought you had a cold,” O’Neill said. “Listen, Clement, I’m sorry I have to reneg, but I had a talk this morning with Hutt and he’s blazing.”

  “Now, Emmet,” Archer began, “you said. …”

  “I know what I said. Let me finish, please, Clement. It isn’t as bad as you think.”

  “Oh.” Archer waited.

  “Hutt hit the ceiling, but he came down. Most of the way. He’ll give you the two weeks because I promised.”

  “Well,” Archer said, “that’s all I asked for.”

  “He’ll give you the two weeks on everyone,” O’Neill said, “except Pokorny.”

  There was a silence on the wire while O’Neill waited for Archer to respond to this. But Archer said nothing.

  “I argued with him until I was blue in the face,” O’Neill said, “but he won’t budge about the musician. He’s ready to fire everybody tomorrow, Clement,” O’Neill said harshly, “including you and me, if we insist about Pokorny.”

  “How about next week’s show?” Archer said. “The music’s already in.”

  “He’ll take that,” O’Neill said. “Then farewell.”

  Archer looked up at the ceiling, allowing the phone to fall away from his ear a few inches. The ceiling was beginning to flake near the window. It will need a new coat by October, Archer thought.

  “Clement,” O’Neill’s voice seemed small and forlorn in the distant receiver on the pillow. “Clement! Are you still there?”

  “I’m here,” Archer said.

  “Well?”

  “I’ll call Pokorny,” Archer said slowly, “and tell him for the next week or two we won’t need him. Temporarily.”

  “Good.” O’Neill sounded relieved. “I think that’s the sensible thing to do.”

  “Yes,” Archer said. “Very sensible.”

  “After all,” O’Neill said, “Hutt’s being decent about the others.”

  “Thank Mr. Hutt in my name,” Archer said.

  “He wants to see you,” O’Neill said. “Today at four o’clock.”

  “I’ll be there,” Archer said.

  “Clement …” O’Neill was hesitant, and didn’t sound like an executive now. “I did what I could.”

  “I know,” said Archer. “I’m sure of it, Emmet.”

  “Well,” O’Neill said uneasily, “till four.”

  Archer hung up. He stared at the ceiling again. Question—is it better to talk to Pokorny before or after getting out of bed? Which is healthier at the beginning of the day? Is pleasure to be found in action or delay? Do you start or end breakfast with dismissal? How much easier it would be to call O’Neill back instead and tell him he was resigning, as of that moment. Except that then four other people would be lost without a fight. Resignation, Archer told himself, would be irresponsible. Pokorny, he thought, reaching for the phone, you are temporarily expendable. You are the rear guard covering the main body’s strategic withdrawal and we hope to redeem you later when prisoners are exchanged. Be brave among the trumpets.

  “Hello,” Pokorny’s voice was saying. “Who calls? Who calls?” He sounded shrill and worried, as though the telephone invariably damaged him.

  “Manfred, this is Clement Archer.”

  “Oh, Mr. Archer, I am happy you called,” Pokorny said in a rush. “I have been wishing to apologize. Last night, I went beyond the boundaries of my position, if you understand me. About the conductor. I was excited. I used language that was extreme. It is a bad habit of mine, my wife is constantly pointing it out to me. …”

  “That’s OK, Manfred,” Archer said. “You were perfectly right.”

  “Oh, thank you, Mr. Archer. I couldn’t sleep, I was so. …”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Archer said. “I called about something else.” He paused, wondering how to say it. “Look, Manfred,” he said, “we’re making some changes on the show. Experimenting. …”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” Pokorny hurried on, wishing to agree with everything in advance, “that is always necessary in such fields of …”

  “For the next week or two, Manfred, we’re going to try something different in the way of music.”

  “Anything. Anything you say,” Pokorny said shrilly.

  “I mean we’re going to try someone else,” Archer said. “Another composer.” There was a breath on the other end of the phone. “Temporarily.”

  “Yes,” Pokorny said flatly. “Yes, of course.”

  There was the sudden clicking of the phone being put down at the other end, then the ghosts and murmurs of the wires. Archer hung up. It was easier than I figured, he thought, and got out of bed and began to dress.

  4

  “I AM NOT GOING TO BE ANGRY,” HUTT WAS WHISPERING. “IT IS NOT MY intention to be arbitrary. I believe O’
Neill exceeded his authority in telling you you could have two weeks, but it has always been my policy to allow my account executives to make their own decisions. If, finally, I do not approve of those decisions, I do not reverse them. I fire the executive.”

  Hutt smiled bleakly. He had a face like a wedge, sharp, pale and formidable, and had a tendency to talk in sonorous and legal-sounding paragraphs. He always whispered. Whether it was because he mistrusted his larynx or whether he had discovered that it made people pay more attention to him, Archer didn’t know. But you always had to sit on the edge of your chair and strain forward when you had any dealings with Hutt. He was a man of about fifty, slender and short, in an expensive suit. His graying hair was always brushed tightly around his head and looked, in some lights, like a clipped fur cap. He had been an important figure in the Office of War Information during the war, and he had many contacts high in the Government and in the Army, whom he was always mysteriously calling, in whispers, on long distance. He got drunk on week-ends, but always appeared on Monday mornings clear-eyed and straight-backed, carrying himself like a divisional commander. He was a man who clearly had confidence in himself and his own opinions and who gave orders naturally and was accustomed to being obeyed. Archer saw him only on rare occasions and always felt uncomfortable with him, although Hutt’s manners were correct and friendly and he sometimes took Archer to lunch. His office was cold and unadorned and reminded Archer of surgery.

  Just now, O’Neill was sitting glumly in a corner in a leather chair, almost lost in the blunt shadows of the winter afternoon. Archer sat on a padded chair close to Hutt’s desk, listening silently.

  “Only on the question of Pokorny,” Hutt went on, “I must beg your indulgence and depart from my usual routine. I must insist that he go immediately. That isn’t really too bad, is it? One out of five?” He smiled frostily. “You couldn’t call me overbearing and meddlesome for that, could you, O’Neill?”

  “No, sir,” O’Neill said from the shadows.

  “I have very good information,” Hutt said, “that Pokorny perjured himself when he applied for entry into this country in 1939 and that the Government is certain to deport him. Also, some rather important people in the music world vouched for him at that time and their names will give the story notoriety in the newspapers, so that there would be no possibility of its being done quietly.”

  “What if Pokorny proves he didn’t perjure himself?” Archer asked. “At his trial or hearing or whatever he’s going to have? What do we do then?”

  “Then, of course,” Hutt smiled gently at Archer, “I would be delighted to take him back.”

  “Then why can’t we wait until the Government decides?” Archer asked. “Why do we have to deport him in advance?”

  “I’m going to say something ugly,” Hutt whispered; smiling again, the wedge momentarily splintering, “and I hope you don’t hold it against me. We can’t afford it. Radio, as you two gentlemen know, is not at the moment in a strong position. In fact, it is not putting it too vigorously to say that the medium is fighting for its life. A new form of entertainment, television, is gaining enormous momentum, capturing our clients and our audience; the economic situation of the country is uncertain and advertisers are retrenching everywhere—the old days when we could do anything and get away with everything are gone, perhaps forever. We are teetering on the edge of the cliff, gentlemen—and it might take only the slightest push to send us off into space. Mr. Pokorny and his particular problem might prove to be just that push. He is not a citizen and I think it will be proved shortly that he violated the laws of the country to get in here. He is not famous enough to be forgiven his lapses by the public—and perhaps in these days no one is—and, personally, he is not a completely attractive figure at best …” Hutt smiled apologetically. In the wan light, his face looked as though it were planed out of bleached wood. “I’m afraid, as far as Mr. Pokorny is concerned, the decision, is, as of this time, final.”

  Hutt fell silent for a moment. Archer watched him light a cigarette. He used a long black holder that had been given to him by an admiring lieutenant-general during the war. He looked fragile, aristocratic and dangerous behind his bare desk. Poor Pokorny, Archer thought, matched out of his class this winter.

  “As for the others,” Hutt went on, in his low, soft voice, speaking through the smoke of his cigarette, “I will, as I told you, respect O’Neill’s promise to you. I will not hide the fact that I, myself, would have made no such promise. Also, practically, I don’t really see what you hope to gain by delay …”

  “I told O’Neill,” Archer began.

  “I know,” said Hutt. “O’Neill has explained it to me. I hope you won’t take offense, Archer, but I think you’re being naive.”

  Why don’t I just stand up and get out of here? Archer thought.

  “I’m afraid,” Hutt was saying, his voice even and hard to follow across the desk, “that you haven’t really looked into the background of this affair, Archer. As you know, I’m acquainted with quite a few people in Washington …”

  “I know,” Archer said.

  “And,” Hutt said, measuring Archer’s voice for irony, “as a man who deals in the molding of public opinion, I have been called in from time to time to make suggestions and also—and this is important—to receive suggestions. Democracy,” he said, allowing more volume into his voice for the first time, “is not completely a one-way arrangement.”

  Ah, thought Archer, his training in the OWI is paying off—he can now generalize on Democracy.

  “It is not enough,” Hutt said, “merely to pass on instructions to our political leaders. We must from time to time expect our leaders to pass on instructions to us. Does that sound reasonable?”

  “Yes,” Archer said, grudgingly. “That’s reasonable enough.”

  “Also, if I’m not mistaken,” Hutt continued, “you voted for the Administration. Or, at least,” he nodded pleasantly, “during the elections you voiced your approval, quite strongly, of Mr. Truman.”

  “Yes,” Archer said, puzzled, wondering what Hutt was driving at and whether it would mean a trap, and also how Hutt knew what his sympathies had been. “What has that got to do with us now?”

  “So, in effect, the Administration is partly your doing and represents you quite accurately. Am I fair in saying that?”

  “Roughly, yes.”

  “Now, if I were to tell you that quite recently, last week, to be exact, it was hinted to me by someone high in the Government that the time had come to clear out Communists and Communist sympathizers from all fields of communication and public opinion, it would not be too far-fetched to say that that particular hint was actually an expression of your will.”

  “I am with you,” Archer said sourly, feeling clumsy and unprepared. “Part of the way.”

  “I, myself,” Hutt said, smiling, “happened to vote Republican. So, actually, it is you who are telling me what to do in this matter, rather than the other way around.”

  “I don’t think it’s necessary to go into the freakishness of representative government,” Archer said, knowing he was coming off badly. “Just now.”

  “Quite the opposite,” Hutt said, waving his cigarette gaily. He was clearly enjoying himself. “This is just the time. We have a problem. We are opposed. We are co-workers and we are necessary to each other. We are both, I hope, reasonable men. Even O’Neill,” he said with a fatherly chuckle, “may be supposed, for the purpose of discussion, to be a reasonable man.”

  “I’m nothing,” O’Neill said from the corner. “Leave me out of this. I’m a primitive idiot. I’m going into the business of handmade arrowheads.”

  “As reasonable men we try to reach some ground for agreement. To do that we have to advance our arguments, listen to each other, weigh, as honestly as we can, the other man’s position. And we must see the whole matter in the round.” This was one of Hutt’s pet phrases. He was always talking about seeing matters in the round, even when it was just a qu
estion of launching a campaign for a new washing machine.

  “In the round, what is the situation?” Hutt asked, Socratically. “If we get away from our particular small sphere of activities, from our little problem of four or five unimportant artists, what do we find? We find a divided world. We find that this country is threatened by an enormous and expanding power—Russia. Are you with me up to now?”

  This, too, was another pet punctuation of Hutt’s speech. It made him sound gracious and reasonable and he used it as a kind of packaging device for certain portions of his argument, wrapping up one section in his listener’s approval and going on neatly to the next. The only trouble was that Archer, for one, had never heard anyone tell Hutt, when asked, that he was not with him up to now.

  “I am with you,” Archer said, “up to now.”

  “We are engaged in what the newspapers have turned into a cliché,” Hutt said, “the cold war. That doesn’t make it less dangerous. It is possible to be destroyed by a cliché, even if it bores us. And I assure you, Archer, I am bored by the whole matter. But that doesn’t relieve me or you, for that matter, or any citizen of this country, from responsibility to the agencies in the Government who are fighting this particular phase of the war, just as the fact that we might have been bored in 1942 and 43 and 44 did not relieve any one of us from responsibility to the Army in its war against the Germans and the Japanese. I hope I make myself clear.”

  “I am with you,” Archer said. “Up to now.”

  Hutt stared at him coldly, fractionally. Then he went on, without emotion. “The Russians,” he said, “are using a variety of means to defeat us. Military action in China, strikes in Italy and France, speeches in the United Nations, subversive activities in our own country by deluded or treasonable Americans. As the military analysts used to say during the war, they are trying to impose their will upon the enemy. And the enemy is us, although until now they have not fired a shot at us. So far, this is a fair estimate of the situation, isn’t it?”