Four Freedoms

by John Crowley

  “It wasn’t my fault,” Larry said. “I had no choice.”

  “Don’t give me that,” Prosper said. “We’re quite aware.”

  “Get the hell out of here,” Larry said. “That was business and I did

  what I had to do.”

  Later Prosper would try to think whether he’d actually had Larry’s

  own advice in his mind as the next moments unfolded. A little crowd

  had gathered. “Somebody ought to punch your nose,” Prosper said.

  “Nobody’s punching anybody,” Larry said.

  “We’ll see,” Prosper said, with all the implacable menace he could

  muster. “Come on.” He whirled and started toward the door, Larry

  following him.

  “Cut it out,” he called to Prosper. “Don’t be a dope.”

  “What are you, a coward? Scared of something?” Prosper said this

  in fury straight in front of him as he reached the door of the games

  room, grabbed the knob, and pushed it open. Larry was just exiting

  behind him when Prosper flung the door shut hard and hit Larry smack

  in the face. Then as Larry, dazed, pushed it open again to come after

  him, Prosper swung around on his heels and with one lifted crutch

  caught Larry a blow on the cheek that made the onlookers now crowd-

  ing the exit gasp in horror or amazement.

  That was all Prosper was holding in the way of an attack, and set-

  ting himself then as firmly as he could, he waited for Larry to fall upon

  him. His heart felt like it would tear him apart. Larry, red-faced and

  with teeth bared, seemed ready now to do terrible things, but after a

  pause he throttled down with awesome effort and backed away; threw

  his hand into the air, Aw beat it, and turned back into the Community

  Center, pushing through the crowd. Sal came squirming out almost

  under his arm, went to Prosper and stood beside him as though to shel-

  ter him with her own unassailability. “Bully!” she yelled back.

  Ironic cheers for the two of them followed them out into the day.

  “You’re going to go?” Sal said. It was she who’d rescued Pancho’s

  letter in the donnybrook.

  “Of course I am.” His heart still pounding.

  “I’ll go too,” she said.

  “No, Sal. You don’t need to say that.”

  F O U R F R E E D O M S / 371

  “Listen, mister. He was my friend too.”

  That was true: for all her mocking tone, Sal had sat as quietly as

  anyone could have been expected to as Pancho expatiated, and Prosper

  thought that was about what Pancho’d mean by a friend. “Well,” he

  said. “What about your shift?”

  “I’m quitting,” Sal said, “if you want to know. I’m blowing.”

  “You are? What about Al?”

  “Al and I,” Sal said in that record-played-too-fast voice of hers, “are

  quits.”

  Prosper slowed down. Sal was about the only Associate around who

  had to skip to keep up with him. “What? That’s hard to believe.”

  “I know,” said Sal. “People look at the two of us and it’s like the

  little man and woman on the wedding cake. How could they be apart?

  Well lemme tell you.”

  “I figured it was a love match. I admit.”

  “To tell you the truth,” Sal said, “it was a kind of marriage of con-

  venience. And it ain’t convenient anymore.”

  “What’s he done?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it. When do we leave?”

  Sal and Prosper parted at the Assembly Building, Sal to go hand in her

  resignation (as she put it) and Prosper to go back to Z Street and pre-

  pare for a journey, a train journey with no aid but what Sal, who came

  up just past his waist, could provide. He was headed that way when he

  felt the presence of someone large coming up behind.

  “Listen,” Larry said, without other preface. “What are you going to

  do, are you going to do what he asked, go collect him and that?”

  “Yes,” Prosper said, looking ahead with dignity, and some fear.

  “Alone?”

  “Sal Mass just said she’d come too.”

  “Oh for Christ’s sake. The two of you? That’s ridiculous. You’ll

  pull into town like some carny show. Nobody’ll take you seriously.

  There’s legal matters there to resolve.”

  Prosper kept on, following his nose.

  “Look,” Larry said. “I’ve got no responsibility for this. None. But I

  can help. I’ll come along. You can’t do it, you and her.”

  372 / J O H N C R O W L E Y

  Prosper let that sink in for a few steps. “You can get the time off?”

  Larry stopped suddenly, and Prosper did too. Larry fetched breath

  and looked to heaven. “Well,” he said, “actually, I’m quitting.”

  The doors of the Assembly Building were rolling open, the little

  tractors arriving to do their duty. The nose of another completed Pax

  was revealed, then its wide wings.

  “Well this is quite a day,” Prosper said.

  All that Prosper would ever learn about what had caused Larry to turn

  in his badge and resign his stewardship wasn’t enough to make a story,

  and Prosper wasn’t about to delve deeply. There was a woman, a

  woman at the plant, and an angry husband: Larry seemed visibly to

  break out in a sweat, like a comic strip worrier, when he let even that

  much slip. Prosper’d been tempted to say a lot then, maybe tell Larry

  Pancho’s theories about war and the sex urge: but no.

  “Well anyway,” Prosper said. They were all three on the local train

  from Ponca to this city over the state line where Pancho lay dead. Sal in

  the opposite seat was asleep, her small feet not reaching the floor. “I’m

  sorry I whacked you with the stick there. I’ve been meaning to say.”

  Larry touched the side of his face. “Didn’t hurt.”

  “Good. Anyway thanks for not punching my lights out.”

  “What?” Larry tugged at his collar. He was wearing a fawn-col-

  ored suit, a bit too tight, and his suitcase was in the overhead rack: he

  was headed farther, somewhere.

  “Oh. You know.” Prosper punched the air.

  Larry was watching him with an odd look, a look Prosper had seen

  in the faces of women more than men: that look toward themselves as

  much as at you, waiting to hear their own permission to say some-

  thing, maybe something they’ve never said before.

  “Well,” he said. “Look. There’s a lot of stories about me. That aren’t

  all what you’d call true.”

  “Oh?” The stories that Prosper had heard about Larry were all Lar-

  ry’s telling. Prosper removed all suggestion of an opinion from his face,

  but Larry seemed to strangle on the effort of saying whatever it was

  that might come next, and instead removed his hat and furiously wiped

  the sweatband with a large handkerchief.

  F O U R F R E E D O M S / 373

  Midday the train they’d taken toddled into the central station,

  which had no platforms, only a little wedding-cake building beside the

  tracks. Sal went out the door and down, leaping from the last step as

  the conductor looked on. Then Larry. Then Prosper, who stood at the

  door looking at the steep declivity. Easy enough maybe to go down the

  first two steps, handy rails to hol
d: but the last drop to the ground was

  going to take some thought. The conductor, ready to wave the engineer

  on, gazed up at him in a kind of disinterested impatience. Finally Larry,

  perceiving him stuck, stepped up.

  “Come on!” he said. “I’ll getcha!”

  All the things that Larry standing there arms open was capable of

  doing or not doing passed as in a shiver over Prosper, but he didn’t

  seem to have a choice. He dropped himself down the first step and then

  bent forward as far as he could so that Larry could take him under the

  armpits. Then he gave himself over to him. Strong as he was, Larry

  staggered for a second under the weight and Prosper knew they were

  going to go over, but Larry held and Prosper got his crutches set and

  propped himself, removing his weight from Larry. Larry blew in impa-

  tience or embarrassment, twisted his hat right on his head, and walked

  away; neither man ever mentioned the moment.

  The hotel was across a wide bare street from the station, a wooden

  structure with a long front porch where a row of rockers sat. The words

  grand hotel painted across the facade were worn somewhat; they

  were supplemented by the same words in neon above the porch. Not the

  kind of place important oil millionaires would be found, in Prosper’s

  view, not that he knew anything about it. Beyond this place and rising

  above, the newer buildings, like Ponca City’s, plain or fancy. Even as

  they crossed the street to reach it, they could see what they should not

  have been able to see, and they could do and say nothing until they were

  entirely sure it was what it certainly seemed to be: Pancho Notzing,

  seated in a rocking chair, feeding bits of something to a little dog.

  “Now what,” Larry said, striding forward. “Now what in hell.”

  When all three of them stood before the porch Pancho said, “Hello,

  friends.”

  “You’re supposed to be at the morgue,” Sal said. “I came a long way

  to see that. If you just got out to come and greet us I suggest you beat it

  back there.”

  374 / J O H N C R O W L E Y

  “What in hell,” Larry said again.

  “Hello, Pancho,” Prosper said. “I’m glad to see you.”

  Pancho nodded solemnly but without seeming to feel that a quick

  explanation was in order. The little dog put a paw on his leg to remind

  him of what he’d been up to as the others arrived. For the first time it

  occurred to Prosper that Pancho, who spent his life and time and

  energy planning for the true deep happiness of men and women, every

  one of them different and precious, didn’t really perceive the existence

  of actual other people. “Well as you see,” he said at last, “I did not in

  the end take the step I wrote you about. I was on the point of sending

  you a telegram to say so, but approaching the dark door and then

  retreating took such an effort that I could do nothing further.”

  “It’s all right,” Prosper said.

  “All those common questions and tasks that I said had flown away

  came right back again—in prospect anyway—and it was a bit appall-

  ing. Stops you cold.”

  “It’s all right.”

  “Life,” said Pancho. He took a bit of something from a plate in his

  lap and gave it to the dog, who snapped it up and looked for more.

  “Who’s the dog?” Sal asked, unable to frame a different question.

  “A stray, belongs to no one,” Pancho said. “As far as I can tell.”

  “So you mean to say,” Larry said, “that we came all this way, ready

  for a funeral, wearing the suit and tie, and there was never a reason for

  it?”

  “Larry,” said Pancho. “I can’t imagine why you’ve come, and I’m

  sorry to have disappointed you, but I am honored. I am deeply hon-

  ored.”

  “Aw hell,” said Larry, and he snatched the hat from his head, seem-

  ing to be on the point of throwing it to the dusty ground and stamping

  on it; instead he jammed it back on his head and turned away, looking

  down the empty street, hands in his pockets.

  “Question is,” said Sal, “if we can’t bury you, what are we going to

  do with you?”

  “And yourself?” Pancho asked.

  “Well that too,” Sal said. She’d taken a seat on the edge of the porch,

  her feet on the step below, looking more than usual like a child, and

  petted the little black dog, who seemed to take to her.

  F O U R F R E E D O M S / 375

  “We’re all out of a job,” Prosper said. “One way or another.”

  Pancho stared at Larry’s back, and Larry’s pose softened, though he

  didn’t turn.

  “Him too,” said Prosper.

  There seemed to be nothing for it except to go into the dining room of

  the hotel, where overhead fans spooned the air around and wicker

  chairs were set at the tables, and treat the dead man to a lunch; all his

  money was in the check he’d sent to Prosper. What should they do

  now? Some ideas more or less reasonable were put forward. For his

  part, Prosper knew he could go back to Bea and May’s house, they’d

  take him in, and certainly there’d be something he could do somewhere

  in the art line, after all his experience. So long as he could get into the

  building and into a chair in front of a desk. It was the safest thing, and

  it was hard for somebody like him not to think Safety First. Safety was

  rare and welcome. He’d had some close calls; in fact it sometimes

  seemed that, for him, every call was close.

  “I suppose you might not have heard,” Larry said, tucking a napkin

  into his collar, “that while you were busy here, we won the war. Against

  Hitler anyway. He’s done.”

  “I did hear that, Larry,” Pancho said. “On that day I was reminded

  of a passage in a book I often carry with me. For consolation, though

  it hasn’t worked so well that way lately.”

  He fished in his coat pockets, but found no book there, and then

  bowed his head, clasped his hands, and began to speak, as though he

  asked a blessing before their meal. “ ‘This is the day,’ ” he said, gravely

  and simply, “ ‘which down the void abysm, at the Earth-born’s spell

  yawns for Heaven’s despotism. And Conquest is dragged captive

  through the deep.’ ”

  He lifted his eyes. “Shelley,” he said. “Prometheus. The Earth-born.

  Friend to man. Unbound and triumphant.”

  The rest of them looked at one another, but got no help. Prosper

  wondered if this strange gentle certitude with which Pancho spoke had

  been acquired somehow in his trip toward the other side, as May

  always called it, and back again.

  “ ‘And if with infirm hand,’ ” Pancho went on, and lifted his own,

  376 / J O H N C R O W L E Y

  “ ‘Eternity, Mother of many acts and hours, should free the serpent

  that would clasp her with his length’ ”—here Pancho seized the air dra-

  matically—“ ‘these are the spells by which to reassume an empire o’er

  the disentangled doom.’ ”

  He seemed to arise slightly from his chair, enumerating them, the

  spells, on his fingers: “ ‘To suffer woes which
Hope thinks infinite. To

  forgive wrongs darker than death or night.’ ”

  Sal and Prosper looked at Larry.

  “ ‘To defy Power, which seems omnipotent. To love, and bear. To

  hope till Hope creates from its own wreck the thing it contemplates.’ ”

  Full hand open high above them: “ ‘Neither to change, nor falter, nor

  repent.’ ”

  “Hey I have an idea,” said Sal.

  “ ‘This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be good, great and glorious, beau-

  tiful and free! This is alone Life! Joy! Empire! And Victory!’ ”

  He was done, sank, put his hands on the table; lifted his head and

  smiled at them, as though awaking and glad to find them there.

  “ ’Scuse me, but you know what?” Sal got up and knelt on the chair

  seat to address them. “Right this minute, in San Francisco, California,

  the United Nations are meeting. You’ve read about it. All the ones on

  our side in the war, and all the others too, that’s the idea. They’re there

  talking about peace in the world and how to do it. How to make it last

  this time. About the rights everybody should have, all of us, how to

  keep them from being taken away.”

  “Four freedoms,” said Prosper. “Yes.”

  “So, Mr. Notzing. Why don’t you go there? Bring your plans and

  your proposals, your writings. That’s the bunch that needs to hear

  them. Am I right?”

  She looked around at the others, who had no idea if she was or

  wasn’t.

  “Oh,” said Pancho. “Oh, well, I don’t know, no, I.”

  She scrambled down from her chair and came to his side. “Oh come

  on!” she said.

  “Mrs. Roosevelt will be there,” Larry said, lifting his eyes as though

  he saw her, just overhead.

  “We’ll all go,” Sal cried. “You’ve got a car, haven’t you? We’re all

  flush. Let’s do it.”

  F O U R F R E E D O M S / 377

  “Will you all?” Pancho asked with something like humility. Nobody

  said no. “Very well,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Sal.

  “We’ll just take French leave. When we choose, we’ll return for

  what we’ve left behind—if we think there’s any reason to.”

  “It’ll all be there when we get back.”

  “The things and the people.”

  “Yes.”

  “If you don’t mind,” Larry said, and picked up his fork and knife,

  “I’d like to have my lunch before we go. Maybe you people can live on