Keeping Secrets

by Suzanne Morris

  I caught his hand, and held it against my neck. “How would you know, as much as you stay gone?”

  He pulled his hand away. “I’m busy. You know how much I’m involved in. If you wanted a husband who worked from seven till six and came home for lunch, you ought to have thought twice before you took up with me.”

  “Emory, let’s go away together for a little while. Maybe to Corpus Christi for a few days. Wouldn’t it be nice to get away, just the two of us?”

  “Yes, yes, we will when I have some time. Right now I’m too busy. And I’ll be late tonight. I have a meeting.”

  “With Aegina?”

  “No, damn it, with somebody else,” he said, and strutted up the stairs.

  Oh God, I hate this, I thought; who does he think he is fooling?

  Later as I lay in bed I thought once again of leaving Emory. I was quite objective about it all for a few minutes, until I thought of the afternoon he tapped on my door at the Menger and gave me the chance for something better than I’d ever had before. Surely if he’d wanted only a replacement for Aegina as his bride, he wouldn’t have reached back twenty years to find her.

  After that I just lay there and let tears stream down my face. I didn’t beat the pillow in frustration, or even cry hard. I just let the sadness come warm and soft across my cheeks, and thought how much easier it would have been had we both come into this marriage with nothing behind us.

  19

  Many times I found myself in agreement with Emory about his views that we were all being duped, led along by the nose, and being robbed of our freedom little by little. German U-boat warfare continued right into 1916, though it was dealt with through reams of paper memoranda between our government and theirs that often dwelled more on legal terms than on human rights. The German Government was unwilling to accept an agreement for settlement, terming the Lusitania incident of so many months ago “illegal,” so we batted back through the embassies a substitute word: “unintentional.” I don’t suppose one word or another made much difference to the families of all the people who lost their lives when the steamer was torpedoed.

  At the same time, the British arrogantly continued to confiscate the cargo of our merchant ships and had begun the further assault of our mails: opening and inspecting them as they saw fit. One mention of this sent Woody into outrage. To be sure, Wilson was caught squarely in the middle … at this point, both sides seemed to be doing their utmost to alienate our friendship and force us down a neutral course in Europe.

  To make matters worse, he still could not extricate us from troubles to the south. Border raids continued to erupt like infected sores in Mexico, while Carranza pranced around the peaceful part of the country bragging about his reforms in progress. Yet it struck me as ironic that as Wilson himself toured the United States speaking on the importance of national preparedness, the need for a League of Nations that would ensure freedom of the seas for world powers and sovereignty of small nations (costing a few more tax dollars), the President seemed to forget these high ideals momentarily when Pancho Villa raided Columbus, New Mexico. He immediately requested permission of Congress to send a battery of our troops down into the Mexican interior to pursue the troublesome “outlaw.” This would be, Wilson promised, a “punitive” expedition, which must have been a handy word to substitute for the much-hated term “intervention.” When Carranza demanded to know how far we proposed to come into his country with our guns and troops, and how long we intended to stay, and whether he’d have reciprocal rights to cross our border if need be, I couldn’t help noticing that the First Chief added he was bound to protect the “sovereignty” of Mexico, using Wilson’s own words to slap him in the face.

  When in the spring of the year we learned Pershing would take nineteen thousand troops south of the border, Emory remarked, “Hell, that’s nearly the whole army. We’d be in a hell of a fix if we got into the war in Europe.”

  Nathan, seated at the dinner table, turned pale. “Oh, you don’t think—”

  Then Emory leaned back and eyed him, puffing on his cigar. “They might have to increase the forces, pass a conscription bill in Congress, just to be on the safe side.”

  “But they’d federalize the state militia instead of that, didn’t they say so?” Nathan asked anxiously.

  “Yes, but in all-out war, there wouldn’t be enough. Young … single men … would go first,” he added, drawing out the words cruelly.

  Nathan started to raise his fork, then put it down and took his napkin from his lap. “I’m not very hungry. I think I’ll go to my room.”

  When he was gone I told Emory, “It’s too bad Nathan isn’t smaller. Then you could capture him in a jar and stick pins in him.”

  “What goes on between Nathan and me is none of your business,” he said, then left the table and went out the back door.

  I felt sorry for Nathan, and felt I ought to apologize for Emory’s vicious behavior. While a lot of young men were talking earnestly about joining to go down with Pershing’s forces, Nathan clearly wanted no part of it, at least at this early point, and I saw no reason he should be shamed for his feelings. It wasn’t as though we were being threatened with a massive attack on our country.

  I knocked on his door. “Can I come in for a moment?”

  “If you want to.”

  He sat at his rolltop desk piled high with papers, trying, I am sure, to look much busier than he was. Without looking up he said, “It’s those new income tax laws, new rules coming out all the time. You can spend all your time filling out forms.”

  “Nathan, I’m sure Emory didn’t mean to sound quite so cruel just then—”

  “Oh yes, he did,” he quickly answered, then paused. “Of course, when it came down to it Cabot would try to figure out a way to keep me from going into the service because I know too much … about his business affairs. I mean, no one could walk in and take my place, and he knows that.”

  “Well Emory has a lot on his mind lately … things are getting so complicated in Mexico. There is still so much fighting down there that Carranza might use it as an excuse to bend the rules and put off regular elections. If that happens, Barrista might be forced into an all-out revolt, with more guns and smoke and blood.”

  “Good. Then Cabot will have his fight.”

  “Oh no, you’re wrong. Emory just wants to protect his property, and he thinks Mexico can be made into a country as good as ours with Barrista leading it.”

  He smirked. “If not Barrista, Cabot would have found someone else to help him stir up trouble,” he said, and the look on his face told me what I had long suspected: Nathan’s loyalty to Emory was based on something other than sincere devotion or even some sort of twisted gratitude because Emory taught him a trade. My husband’s despise of him was more than equally returned.

  Shaken, I rose from my chair and said, “Emory could get killed down in Mexico. While it may not matter to you, it is a source of great concern to me.”

  “Oh no, seeing Cabot dead is the last thing I want,” he said quickly, then beneath his hostile eyes a smile curled up like a burning piece of paper.

  Through the spring I was feeling glum and everyone else seemed to be in the same frame of mind. Even if people insisted on saying the only effects of the war in Europe were the highly suspicious rise in food prices and the welcome boom to that intangible term “our economy” as we sold more goods to the warring countries, we all felt uneasy about the fact it continued to drag on and on and force us closer to a position on one side or the other.

  Lyla was no doubt unaware of most of this, but typically was bothered if anyone was moping around, in which case she felt they became boring. She suggested Emory and I throw a big party to celebrate our anniversary. “But we’re a month too late,” I protested. She insisted that didn’t matter, and even Emory seemed in favor of her idea so we set on an April date.

  “You must hang Japanese lanterns all the way from the house to the summerhouse, wired with electric lights, and you
can set up a punch bowl in there. Little tables and chairs should be put around outside in case the house gets stuffy.”

  “That’s an awful lot of work.”

  “Yes, but it’s the way people entertain around here,” she said. “You don’t have a third floor like some people, where you can serve a midnight supper, so you have to make the most of what you do have.

  “Really, I’ll never understand why you don’t hire any help. At least one maid certainly—”

  “I still like doing things myself.”

  “That’s absurd. No one does that. If you ever had a couple of bawling kids to contend with, it would change your mind.”

  “Well I don’t, and so that’s an end to it. I know what—I’ll see if I can get that young girl from Adolph Tetzel’s bank to come. She helped out at his party.”

  “Oh, yes—that dizzy redhead—I’m all for doling out the dirty work.”

  “I have noticed that.”

  Emory would probably have squawked at the suggestion of inviting Woody to the party, and I didn’t believe he would be interested in coming to our evening get-together anyhow, although he had readily accompanied me to the Philharmonic concerts all the way to the end of the season. Just the same, I went by one afternoon to ask him. He was happier than I had seen him in months, and proudly displayed a photo of his grandson Johnny in uniform. Light-haired and bright-eyed, the boy looked very dashing in his military getup. Woody’s chest swelled as I mentioned these obvious facts. “It isn’t so frightening after all, when you see him this way, is it? Makes you realize he’s among a group of able men who are going to do their best to win,” I told him, thinking guiltily of Emory’s copper bound for Germany.

  “Right, it does. He’ll come home with a chest full of medals, watch and see. Maybe when all this is over, he’ll take a leave and come over here before going back to school.”

  “Oh, I hope so. It would be so nice to meet him.”

  “Perhaps he might even enroll and finish school over here, at Harvard or Yale. Ah, how I miss him! I keep this photo beside my bed.”

  I had guessed correctly—Woody declined the invitation to our party—but everyone else accepted and we ended up with better than thirty people at our house. From the mood of gaiety that prevailed until around two in the morning, I had to admit Lyla’s timing was good.

  Camille Devera eagerly accepted the job of helping out, and proved even more of an advantage than I’d imagined. Although she kept a close watch on Nathan, who seemed bent on avoiding her, she stood duty in the kitchen and at the serving table, and freshened drinks—she seemed to have a talent for being several places at once. I liked her very much for her spunk and plain-spoken ways. She wasn’t frivolous or coy, like some of the young girls around; rather, she was quick-witted and candid, and obviously knew just how to look after herself and what direction she was taking. I asked her how long she’d been on her own.

  “Seems forever,” she said. “My mother travels all the time with the National Suffrage Movement. My father’s been dead for several years.”

  “Have you lived here all your life?”

  “No. My father was stationed at Fort Sam Houston when I was born and for three years after, then we were sent to first one place then another.”

  “What brought you back here?”

  “We lived here another two times before my father’s death—he was quite a bit older than my mother—and since it was the only place we’d lived more than once in my lifetime, San Antonio seemed like home. When Mother started traveling so much, I decided to roost here. That was a little over a year ago.”

  “Does she visit you often?”

  “Yes. She’s up in Oklahoma helping establish a branch of the Congressional Union right now, but she’s coming down to Texas for the state democratic convention in May, hoping to get a pro-suffrage plank into the platform.”

  “Do you think they’ll—we’ll—win?”

  “It’s as sure as prohibition,” she said, then smiled. “Pardon me while I take out these cocktails.”

  I watched her as she walked toward the parlor, looking very energetic in her starched uniform, and realized she had a quality that made me feel good just being around her. If there were a lot of seriously negative events taking place in the world right now, Camille’s unusual common sense and self-confidence certainly were a positive sign a few things were going right … and her mother’s work, in which she was obviously well versed, was without doubt a ray of hope that good things were to come.

  I felt very cheerful through the party all evening long, and could not remember when last I had felt so carefree. After it was all over, Camille stayed to help until everything was cleared and put away, while Nathan mysteriously disappeared and Emory went to bed.

  I thought little of Nathan’s behavior at the time, even though he usually put forth a lot of effort for me. He had spent the greater part of the day working on the Japanese lanterns Lyla had insisted upon, although from all appearances they were wasted because the punch bowl brought in from the summerhouse was still full at the end of the party, and the evening had turned too cool for people to spend time at the little tables clustered around it. I explained all this to Camille as I washed and she dried dishes, and she suggested Nathan was probably worn out, then suddenly sliced her finger on a knife edge. “Oh, fudge! How stupid,” she said. In looking after the small wound, we both forgot about discussing the subject further.

  Around two in the morning I finally went to bed, exhausted but still too keyed up to fall asleep. I thought I heard a sound—the cracking of a dry limb maybe, from the back yard—so I walked to the window to investigate. Under the light of the full moon, Nathan paced back and forth along the riverbank, his hands pushed deep into his pockets. I started to go back to bed and leave him to himself, but then my curiosity got the best of me. I pulled on a robe and went down.

  He was quite engrossed in his own thoughts, and seeing me gave him a start. “Oh, it’s you,” he said, and turned to face the glistening water.

  “Having a time getting to sleep?”

  “Yes … I …” He dropped his gaze to the ground.

  “Something troubling you? Can I help?”

  He shook his head. “You know, if a fellow doesn’t behave in certain ways, everyone thinks he’s crazy or, you know … not manly.”

  I knew then it was Camille. Either because of Emory’s occasional fun-poking, or her continued interest in him, he was beginning to feel as though there must be something wrong with him for not returning her affections. I asked him if that was it, and he looked wide-eyed and said, “Did you see, tonight?”

  “I noticed she kept her eyes on you, and you seemed eager to avoid her.”

  “Oh, that … yes,” he replied, then appeared to relax somewhat.

  “Well don’t worry. You’re young yet, still have time to find the love of your life. I have to admit I can’t understand how you can pass up someone as cute and sweet as Camille, but when you don’t like someone, there’s no help for it.”

  “There was someone … a long time ago. Her name was Cynthia. She was very pretty, with brown hair and green eyes, and a nice smile. But no one approved of her.”

  “Oh, here in San Antonio?”

  “No, much further back. I was fifteen at the time, still in Mill Springs. It was the year my mother died.”

  “I see. Why didn’t people approve of her?”

  “They called her ‘easy,’ ‘common.’ She was just eighteen, and went to work for the mill, as cashier in the commissary.

  “I was having a bad time around then, and she’d talk to me. There were deep, thick woods between the big ponds, and we’d go for long walks through them on Sunday afternoons. Sometimes I’d walk the logs in the log pond while she watched.… I was fair at that, with a good leveling stick. Once in a while we’d walk across the long railroad trestle; she liked that, flirting with danger. Often we’d just lean against the big iron pump at pond number three, and talk about things.


  “It was pitiful because she was so kind, and the men in town always talked about her. I used to listen to them, while shining shoes. What did they know? Still, they said ugly things about her—all speculation about what she’d done before she came to Mill Springs. The more they talked, the more I liked her. I guess it wasn’t right, but that was how I felt.”

  “What did your mother think about it?”

  “For a long time she didn’t know … but then one day, after … well, she found out somehow, and got furious with me, told me she knew what was going on and I shouldn’t be fooling around with trash like Cynthia.… My mother got kind of … mixed up … near the end. She’d just lash out over the least—”

  “I think I know what you mean,” I told him gently.

  “After that my mother and Sam got into a big argument. Mother wanted him to have Cynthia fired, said it was the least he could do for her. He argued she was the first cashier they’d been able to find who knew how to count change and send it back through the chutes to the right department.

  “But Mother won. Lord knows, it was the only thing Sam ever did for her. I guess he felt obliged. I never saw Cynthia again, and Mother died three months later.”

  I couldn’t see Nathan’s face, and could only sense how painful the memory was for him. In a moment he looked at me, though, and his eyes were moist. “I was so ashamed,” he said. “Can you understand?”

  As in many of our talks, I was left to figure out Nathan’s message from what he did not say. I was certain that young girl had seduced him into an illicit relationship, undoubtedly his first; and his mother, with the queer, highly developed instinct reserved for people at the brink of death, guessed and reprimanded him for it. Knowing she’d soon be powerless to shape his morals probably intensified her reaction, as well. She may not have realized she was dabbling with the fledgling manhood of her young son. I felt very sorry for Nathan, and determined this was his reason for steering away from women in the following years. He held his mother in such high esteem, what a blow it must have been for him to have disappointed her so near the time she died.