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diff --git a/old/67652-h/67652-h.htm b/old/67652-h/67652-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index ba55aac..0000000 --- a/old/67652-h/67652-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9608 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Bring The Jubilee , by Ward Moore. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -h1 -{ - margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; - text-align: center; - font-size: x-large; - font-weight: normal; - line-height: 1.6; -} - - h2,h3{ - text-align: center; - clear: both; - } - -.half-title { - margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; - text-align: center; - font-size: x-large; - font-weight: normal; - line-height: 1.6; - } - -div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} -h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} - -/* Paragraphs */ - -p {text-indent: 1em; - margin-top: .75em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .75em; - } -.nind {text-indent: 0em;} -.spaced {margin-top: 3em; margin-bottom: 3em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - - -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -hr.small {width: 25%; margin-left: 37.5%; margin-right: 37.5%;} -@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - } - -.standard { font-size: .9em; border-collapse: collapse; } -td {padding-left: 5px;} - -.tdl {text-align: left;} -.tdr {text-align: right;} - -.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ - /* visibility: hidden; */ - position: absolute; - left: 92%; - font-size: smaller; - text-align: right; -} /* page numbers */ - - -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} -.allsmcap { text-transform:lowercase; } - -.small {font-size: small;} -.large {font-size: large;} - - -/* Poetry */ -.poetry-container {text-align: center;} -.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} -/* uncomment the next line for centered poetry in browsers */ - .poetry {display: inline-block;} -.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} -.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} -/* large inline blocks don't split well on paged devices */ -@media print { .poetry {display: block;} } -.x-ebookmaker .poetry {display: block;} -.poetry .indent2 {text-indent: -2em;} -.poetry .indent10 {text-indent: 2em;} - - -/* Transcriber's notes */ - -.transnote { - background-color: #E6E6FA; - color: black; - font-size:smaller; - padding:0.5em; - margin-bottom:5em; - font-family:sans-serif, serif; - } - -/* Poetry indents */ -.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} - - - </style> - </head> -<body> -<p style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Bring the Jubilee, by Ward Moore</p> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Bring the Jubilee</p> -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Ward Moore</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: March 18, 2022 [eBook #67652]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Tim Lindell, Les Galloway and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BRING THE JUBILEE ***</div> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="transnote"> -<h3> Transcriber’s Notes</h3> - -<p>Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations -in hyphenation been standardised but all other spelling and punctuation -remains unchanged. Note in particular that the apostrophe is very -rarely used to indicate abbreviation.</p> - -<p>The cover was prepared by the transcriber and is placed in the public -domain.</p> - -</div> - - -<p class="half-title">Bring<br /> -the<br /> -Jubilee</p> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p class="half-title">By Ward Moore</p> -</div> - - -<p class="center">_<i>Breathe the Air Again</i><br /> -<i>Greener Than You Think</i><br /> -<i>Bring the Jubilee</i></p> - -<p class="spaced"><small>This is an original novel—not a reprint—published by FARRAR, STRAUS & -YOUNG, INC. The low price of $2.00 is made possible by large printings -of combined editions</small>.</p> - - -<div class="chap"></div> - -<table class="standard" summary=""> -<tr> -<td class= "tdl_br"> </td> -<td class="tdl"><h1>Bring<br />the<br />Jubilee</h1> -</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class= "tdl_br"><span class="large">WARD<br />MOORE</span></td> -<td> </td> -</tr> -</table> - - - -<p class="spaced nind"><span style="margin-left: 1em;">FARRAR, STRAUS and YOUNG, Inc.</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">NEW YORK</span></p> - - - - -<p class="center small">Copyright 1952 Fantasy House, Inc.<br /> -Copyright 1953 Ward Moore<br /> -All rights reserved. Manufactured in the U. S. A.<br /> -Library of Congress catalog card number: 53-10417</p> - -<p class="center small">BACK COVER MAP: BETTMANN ARCHIVE</p> - - - - -<p class="center spaced"><i>For<br /> -TONY BOUCHER and MICK McCOMAS<br /> -who liked this story</i></p> - - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse indent2"><small>What he will he does, and does so much</small></div> -<div class="verse indent2"><small>That proof is call’d impossibility</small></div> -<div class="verse indent10">—<small><i>Troilus and Cressida</i></small></div> -</div></div></div> - - <hr class="small" /> - -<p><small>It is always the puzzle of the nature of time that brings our thoughts -to a standstill. And if time is so fundamental that an understanding -of its true nature is for ever beyond our reach, then so also in -all probability is a decision in the age-long controversy between -determination and free will.</small></p> -<p class="right">—<small><i>The Mysterious Universe</i> by James Jeans</small></p> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="Contents">Contents</h2> -</div> - - -<table class="standard" summary=""> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C1">I</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Life in the Twenty-Six States</i></td> -<td class="tdl">1</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C2">II</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Of Decisions, Minibiles, and Tinugraphs</i></td> -<td class="tdl">12</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C3">III</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>A Member of the Grand Army</i></td> -<td class="tdl">22</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C4">IV</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Tyss</i></td> -<td class="tdl">32</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C5">V</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Of Whigs and Populists</i></td> -<td class="tdl">42</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C6">VI</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Enfandin</i></td> -<td class="tdl">50</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C7">VII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Of Confederate Agents in 1942</i></td> -<td class="tdl">61</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C8">VIII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>In Violent Times</i></td> -<td class="tdl">71</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C9">IX</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Barbara</i></td> -<td class="tdl">76</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C10">X</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>The Holdup</i></td> -<td class="tdl">86</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C11">XI</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Of Haggershaven</i></td> -<td class="tdl">95</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C12">XII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>More of Haggershaven</i></td> -<td class="tdl">106</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C13">XIII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Time</i></td> -<td class="tdl">116</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C14">XIV</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Midbin’s Experiment</i></td> -<td class="tdl">124</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C15">XV</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Good Years</i></td> -<td class="tdl">132</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C16">XVI</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Of Varied Subjects</i></td> -<td class="tdl">142</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C17">XVII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>HX-1</i></td> -<td class="tdl">156</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C18">XVIII</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>The Woman Tempted Me</i></td> -<td class="tdl">166</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C19">XIX</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Gettysburg</i></td> -<td class="tdl">175</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C20">XX</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>Bring the Jubilee</i></td> -<td class="tdl">181</td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#C21">XXI</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><i>For the Time Being</i></td> -<td class="tdl">191</td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C1"><i>1. LIFE IN THE TWENTY-SIX STATES</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>Although I am writing this in the year 1877, -I was not born until 1921. Neither the dates nor the tenses -are error—let me explain:</p> - -<p>I was born, as I say, in 1921, but it was not until the -early 1930’s, when I was about ten, that I began to understand -what a peculiarly frustrate and disinherited world -was about me. Perhaps my approach to realization was -through the crayon portrait of Granpa Hodgins which -hung, very solemnly, over the mantel.</p> - -<p>Granpa Hodgins after whom I was named, perhaps a -little grandiloquently, Hodgins McCormick Backmaker, -had been a veteran of the War of Southron Independence. -Like so many young men he had put on a shapeless blue -uniform in response to the call of the ill-advised and headstrong—or -martyred—Mr Lincoln. Depending on which -of my lives’ viewpoints you take.</p> - -<p>Granpa lost an arm on the Great Retreat to Philadelphia -after the fall of Washington to General Lee’s victorious -Army of Northern Virginia, so his war ended some six -months before the capitulation at Reading and the acknowledgment -of the independence of the Confederate -States on July 4, 1864. One-armed and embittered, Granpa -came home to Wappinger Falls and, like his fellow -veterans, tried to remake his life in a different and increasingly -hopeless world.</p> - -<p>On its face the Peace of Richmond was a just and even -generous disposition of a defeated foe by the victor. (Both -sides—for different reasons—remembered the mutiny of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</span> -the Unreconstructed Federals in the Armies of the Cumberland -and the Tennessee who, despite defeat at Chattanooga, -could not forget Vicksburg or Port Hudson and -fought bloodily against the order to surrender.) The South -could easily have carved the country up to suit its most -fiery patriots, even to the point of detaching the West and -making a protectorate of it. Instead the chivalrous Southrons -contented themselves with drawing the new boundary -along traditional lines. The Mason-Dixon gave them Delaware -and Maryland, but they generously returned the panhandle -of western Virginia jutting above it. Missouri was -naturally included in the Confederacy, but of the disputed -territory Colorado and Deseret were conceded to the old -Union; only Kansas and California as well as—for obvious -defensive reasons—Nevada’s tip went to the South.</p> - -<p>But the Peace of Richmond had also laid the cost of -the war on the beaten North and this was what crippled -Granpa Hodgins more than the loss of his arm. The postwar -inflation entered the galloping stage during the Vallandigham -Administration, became dizzying in the time -of President Seymour and precipitated the food riots of -1873 and ’74. It was only after the election of President -Butler by the Whigs in 1876 and the reorganization and -drastic deflation following that money and property became -stable, but by this time all normal values were destroyed. -Meanwhile the indemnities had to be paid regularly -in gold. Granpa and hundreds of thousands like him -just never seemed to get back on their feet.</p> - -<p>How well I remember, as a small boy in the 1920’s and -’30s, my mother and father talking bitterly of how the War -had ruined everything. They were not speaking of the then -fairly recent Emperors’ War of 1914-16, but of the War -of Southron Independence which still, nearly seventy years -later, blighted what was left of the United States.</p> - -<p>Nor were they unique or peculiar in this. Men who -slouched in the smithy while Father shod their horses, or -gathered every month around the postoffice waiting for the -notice of the winning lottery numbers to be put up, as often -cursed the Confederates or discussed what might have -been if Meade had been a better general or Lee a worse<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</span> -one, as they did the new-type bicycles with clockwork -auxiliaries to make pedaling uphill easier, or the latest -scandal about the French Emperor, Napoleon VI.</p> - -<p>I tried to imagine what it must have been like in Granpa -Hodgins’ day, to visualize the lost past—that strange bright -era when, if it could be believed, folk like ourselves and -our neighbors had owned their farms outright and didnt -pay rent to the bank or give half the crop to a landlord. I -searched the wiggling crayon lines that composed Granpa -Hodgins’ face for some sign that set him apart from his -descendants.</p> - -<p>“But what did he <i>do</i> to lose the farm?” I used to ask my -mother.</p> - -<p>“Do? Didnt do anything. Couldnt help himself. Go -along now and do your chores; Ive a terrible batch of work -to get out.”</p> - -<p>How could Granpa’s not doing anything result so disastrously? -I could not understand this any more than I could -the bygone time when a man could nearly always get a job -for wages which would support himself and a family, before -the system of indenture became so common that practically -the only alternative to pauperism was to sell oneself -to a company.</p> - -<p>Indenting I understood all right, for there was a mill in -Wappinger Falls which wove a shoddy cloth very different -from the goods my mother produced on her handloom. -Mother, even in her late forties, could have indented there -for a good price, and she admitted that the work would -be easier than weaving homespun to compete with their -product. But, as she used to say with an obstinate shake -of her head, “Free I was born and free I’ll die.”</p> - -<p>In Granpa Hodgins’ day, if one could believe the folktales -or family legends, men and women married young -and had large families; there might have been five generations -between him and me instead of two. And many -uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers and sisters. Now late marriages -and only children were the rule.</p> - -<p>If it hadnt been for the War—This was the basic theme -stated with variations suited to the particular circumstance. -If it hadnt been for the War the most energetic young men<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</span> -and women would not turn to emigration; visiting foreigners -would not come as to a slum; and the great powers -would think twice before sending troops to restore order -every time one of their citizens was molested. If it hadnt -been for the War the detestable buyer from Boston—detestable -to my mother, but rather fascinating to me with -his brightly colored vest and smell of soap and hair tonic—would -not have come regularly to offer her a miserable price -for her weaving.</p> - -<p>“Foreigner!” she would always exclaim after he left; -“sending good cloth out of the country.”</p> - -<p>Once my father ventured, “He’s only doing what he’s -paid for.”</p> - -<p>“Trust a Backmaker to stand up for foreigners. Like -father, like son; suppose you’d let the whole thieving crew -in if you had your way.”</p> - -<p>So was first hinted the scandal of Grandfather Backmaker. -No enlarged portrait of him hung anywhere, much -less over the mantel. I got the impression my father’s father -had been not only a foreigner by birth, but a shady character -in his own right, a man who kept on believing in the -things for which Granpa Hodgins fought after they were -proved wrong. I don’t know how I learned that Grandfather -Backmaker had made speeches advocating equal -rights for Negroes or protesting the mass lynchings so popular -in the North, in contrast to the humane treatment accorded -these non-citizens in the Confederacy. Nor do I -remember where I heard he had been run out of several -places before finally settling in Wappinger Falls or that -all his life people had muttered darkly at his back, “Dirty -Abolitionist!”—a very deep imprecation indeed. I only -know that as a consequence of this taint my father, a meek, -hardworking, worried little man, was completely dominated -by my mother who never let him forget that a -Hodgins or a McCormick was worth dozens of Backmakers.</p> - -<p>I must have been a sore trial to her for I showed no -sign of proper Hodgins gumption, such as she displayed -herself and which surely kept us all—though precariously—free. -For one thing I was remarkably unhandy and awk<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</span>ward, -of little use in the hundred necessary chores around -our dilapidated house. I could not pick up a hammer at -her command to do something about fixing the loose -weatherboards on the east side without mashing my thumb -or splitting the aged, unpainted wood. I could not hoe the -kitchen garden without damaging precious vegetables and -leaving weeds intact. I could shovel snow in the winter at -a tremendous rate for I was strong and had endurance, but -work requiring manual dexterity baffled me. I fumbled in -harnessing Bessie, our mare, or hitching her to the cart -for my father’s trips to Poughkeepsie, and as for helping -him on the farm or in his smithy I’m afraid my efforts -drove that mild man nearest to a temper he ever came. He -would lay the reins on the plowhorse’s back or his hammer -down on the anvil and say mournfully:</p> - -<p>“Better see if you can help your mother, Hodge. Youre -only in my way here.”</p> - -<p>On only one score did I come near pleasing Mother: I -learned to read and write early, and exhibited some proficiency. -But even here there was a flaw; she looked upon -literacy as something which distinguished Hodginses and -McCormicks from the ruck who had to make their mark, -as an accomplishment which might somehow and unspecifiedly -lead away from poverty. I found reading an end in -itself, which probably reminded her of my father’s laxity -or Grandfather Backmaker’s subversion.</p> - -<p>“Make something of yourself, Hodge,” she admonished -me often. “You can’t change the world”—an obvious allusion -to Grandfather Backmaker—“but you can do something -with it as it is if you try hard enough. There’s always -some way out.”</p> - -<p>Yet she did not approve of the postoffice lottery, on -which so many pinned their hopes of escape from poverty -or indenture. In this she and my father were agreed; both -believed in hard work rather than chance.</p> - -<p>Still, chance could help even the steadiest toiler. I remember -the time a minibile—one of the small, trackless -locomotives—broke down not a quarter of a mile from -Father’s smithy. This was a golden, unparalleled, unbelievable -opportunity. Minibiles, like any other luxury, were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</span> -rare in the United States though they were common -enough in prosperous countries like the German Union -or the Confederacy. We had to rely for our transportation -on the never-failing horse or on the railroads, wornout and -broken down as they were. For decades the great issue in -Congress was the never completed Pacific transcontinental -line, though British America had one and the Confederate -States seven. (Sailing balloons, economical and fairly common, -were still looked upon with some suspicion.) Only -a rare millionaire with connections in Frankfurt, Washington-Baltimore -or Leesburg could afford to indulge in a -costly and complicated minibile requiring a trained driver -to bounce it over the rutted and chuckholed roads. Only an -extraordinarily adventurous spirit would leave the tar-surfaced -streets of New York or its sister city of Brooklyn, -where the minibiles’ solid rubber tires could at worst find -traction on the horse or cable-car rails, for the morasses -or washboard roads which were the only highways north -of the Harlem River.</p> - -<p>When one did, the jolting, jouncing and shaking inevitably -broke or disconnected one of the delicate parts in its -complex mechanism. Then the only recourse—apart from -telegraphing back to the city if the traveler broke down -near an instrument—was to the closest blacksmith. Smiths -rarely knew much of the principles of the minibiles, but -with the broken part before them they could fabricate a -passable duplicate and, unless the machine had suffered -severe damage, put it back in place. It was customary for -such a craftsman to compensate himself for the time taken -away from horseshoeing or spring-fitting—or just absently -chewing on an oatstraw—by demanding exorbitant remuneration, -amounting to perhaps twenty-five or thirty -cents an hour, thus avenging his rural poverty and self-sufficiency -upon the effete wealth and helplessness of the -urban excursionist.</p> - -<p>Such a golden opportunity befell my father, as I said, -during the fall of 1933, when I was twelve. The driver had -made his way to the smithy, leaving the owner of the minibile -marooned and fuming in the enclosed passenger seat. -A hasty visit convinced Father, who could repair a clock<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</span> -or broken rake with equal dexterity, that his only course -was to bring the machine to the forge where he could heat -and straighten a part not easy to disassemble. (The driver, -the owner, and Father all repeated the name of the part -often enough, but so inept have I been with “practical” -things all my life that I couldnt recall it ten minutes, much -less thirty years later.)</p> - -<p>“Hodge, run and get the mare and ride over to -Jones’s. Don’t try to saddle her—go bareback. Ask Mr -Jones to kindly lend me his team.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll give the boy a quarter dollar for himself if he’s back -with the team in twenty minutes,” added the owner of the -minibile, sticking his head out of the window.</p> - -<p>I won’t say I was off like the wind, for my life’s work has -given me a distaste for exaggeration or hyperbole, but I -moved faster than I ever had before. A quarter, a whole -shining silver quarter, a day’s full wage for the boy who -could find odd jobs, half the day’s pay of a grown man -who wasnt indented or worked extra hours—all for myself, -to spend as I wished!</p> - -<p>I ran all the way back to the barn, led Bessie out by her -halter and jumped on her broad back, my enthralling daydream -growing and deepening each moment. With my -quarter safely got I could perhaps persuade my father to -take me along on his next trip to Poughkeepsie; in the -shops there I could find some yards of figured cotton for -Mother, or a box of cigars to which Father was partial but -rarely bought for himself, or an unimagined something for -Mary McCutcheon, some three years older than I, with -whom it had so recently become disturbing as well as imperative -to wrestle—in secret of course so as not to show -oneself unmanly in sporting with a weak girl instead of -another boy.</p> - -<p>It never even occurred to me, as it would have to most, -to invest in an eighth of a lottery ticket. Not only were my -parents sternly against this popular gamble, but I myself -felt a strangely puritanical aversion to meddling with my -fortune.</p> - -<p>Or I could take the entire quarter into Newman’s Book -and Clock Store. Here I could not afford one of the latest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</span> -English or Confederate books—even the novels I disdained -cost fifty cents in their original and thirty in the pirated -United States’ edition—but what treasures there were in -the twelve-and-a-half cent reprints and the dime classics!</p> - -<p>With Bessie’s legs moving steadily beneath me I pored -over in my imagination Mr Newman’s entire stock, which -I knew by heart from examinations lulled by the steady -ticking of his other, and no doubt more salable, merchandise. -My quarter would buy two reprints, but I would read -them in as many evenings and be no better off than before -until their memory faded and I could read them again. -Better to invest in paperbacked adventure stories giving -sharp, breathless pictures of life in the West or rekindling -the glories of the War. True, they were written almost entirely -by Confederate authors and I was, perhaps thanks -to Granpa Hodgins and my mother, a devout partisan of -the lost cause of Sheridan and Sherman and Thomas. But -patriotism couldnt steel me against the excitement of the -Confederate paperbacks; literature simply ignored the -boundary stretching to the Pacific.</p> - -<p>I had finally determined to invest all my twenty-five -cents, not in five paperbound volumes but in ten of the -same in secondhand or shopworn condition, when I suddenly -realized that I had been riding Bessie for some considerable -time. I looked around, rather dazed by the abrupt -translation from the dark and slightly musty interior of -Newman’s store to the bright countryside, to find with dismay -that Bessie hadnt taken me to the Jones farm after -all but on some private tour of her own in the opposite -direction.</p> - -<p>I’m afraid this little anecdote is pointless—it was momentarily -pointed enough for me that evening, for in addition -to the loss of the promised quarter I received a thorough -whacking with a willow switch from my mother after -my father had, as usual, dolefully refused his parental -duty—except perhaps that it shows how in pursuing the -dream I could lose the reality.</p> - -<p>My feeling that books were a part of life, and the most -important part, was no passing phase. Other boys in their -early teens dreamed of going to the wilds of Dakotah,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</span> -Montana or Wyoming, indenting to a company run by a -young and beautiful woman—this was also a favorite paperback -theme—discovering the loot hidden by a gang, or -emigrating to Australia or the South African Republic. Or -else they faced the reality of indenture, carrying on the -family farm, or petty trade. I only wanted to be allowed -to read.</p> - -<p>I knew this ambition, if that is the proper word, to be -outrageous and unheard of. It was also practically impossible. -The school at Wappinger Falls, a survival from the -days of compulsory attendance and an object of doubt in -the eyes of the taxpayers, taught as little as possible as -quickly as possible. Parents needed the help of their children -to survive or to build up a small reserve in the illusory -hope of buying free of indenture. Both my mother and my -teachers looked askance at my longing to persist past an -age when my contemporaries were making themselves -economically useful.</p> - -<p>Nor, even supposing I had the fees, could the shabby, -fusty Academy at Poughkeepsie—originally designed for -the education of the well-to-do—provide what I wanted. -Not that I was clear at all as to just what this was; I -only knew that commercial arithmetic, surveying, or any -of the other subjects taught there, were not the answer -to my desires.</p> - -<p>There was certainly no money for any college. Our position -had grown slowly worse; my father talked of selling -the smithy and indenting. My dreams of Harvard or Yale -were as idle as Father’s of making a good crop and getting -out of debt. Nor did I know then, as I was to find out -later, that the colleges were increasingly provincialized and -decayed, contrasting painfully with the flourishing universities -of the Confederacy and Europe. The average man -asked what the United States needed colleges for anyway; -those who attended them only learned discontent and to -question time-honored institutions. Constant scrutiny of -the faculties, summary firing of all instructors suspected -of abnormal ideas, did not seem to improve the situation -or raise the standards of teaching.</p> - -<p>My mother, now that I was getting beyond the switching<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</span> -age, lectured me firmly and at length on idleness and self-indulgence. -“It’s a hard world, Hodge, and no one’s going -to give you anything you don’t earn. Your father’s an easy-going -man; too easy-going for his own good, but he always -knows where his duty lies.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, maam,” I responded politely, not quite seeing -what she was driving at.</p> - -<p>“Hard, honest work—that’s the only thing. Not hoping -or wishing or thinking miracles will happen to you. Work -hard and keep yourself free. Don’t depend on circumstances -or other people, and don’t blame them for your -own shortcomings. Be your own man. That’s the only way -you’ll ever be where you want to.” -She spoke of responsibility and duty as though they -were measurable quantities, but the gentler parts of such -equations, the factors of affection and pity, were never -mentioned. I don’t want to give the impression that ours -was a particularly puritanical family; I know our neighbors -had of necessity much the same grim outlook. But I felt -guiltily vulnerable, not merely on the score of wanting -more schooling, but because of something else which -would have shocked my mother beyond forgiveness.</p> - -<p>My early tussles with Mary McCutcheon had the natural -consequences, but she had found me a too-youthful partner -and had taken her interests elsewhere. For my part I -now turned to Agnes Jones, a suddenly alluring young -woman grown from the skinny kid I’d always brushed -away. Agnes sympathized with my aspirations and encouraged -me most pleasantly. However her specific plans for -my future were limited to marrying her and helping her -father on his farm, which seemed no great advance over -what I could look forward to at home.</p> - -<p>And there I was certainly no asset; I ate three hearty -meals a day and occupied a bed. I was conscious of the -looks and smiles which followed me. A great lout of seventeen, -too lazy to do a stroke of work, always wandering -around with his head in the clouds or lying with his nose -stuck in a book. Too bad; and the Backmakers such industrious -folks too. I could feel what the shock of my be<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</span>havior -with Agnes added to my idleness would be to my -mother.</p> - -<p>Yet I was neither depraved nor very different from the -other youths of Wappinger Falls, who not only took their -pleasures where they found them, but often more forcibly -than persuasively. I did not analyze it fully or clearly, but -I was at least to some extent aware of the essentially loveless -atmosphere around me. The rigid convention of late -marriages bred an exaggerated respect for chastity which -had two sides: sisters’ and daughters’ honor was sternly -avenged with no protest from society, and undiscovered -seduction produced that much more gratification. But both -retribution and venery were somewhat mechanical; they -were the expected rather than the inescapable passions. -Revivalists—and we country people had a vast fondness -for those itinerants who came periodically to castigate us -for our sins—denounced our laxity and pointed to the -virtues of our grandparents and greatgrandparents. We -accepted their advice with such modifications as suited us, -which was not at all what they intended.</p> - -<p>And this was how I took my mother’s admonition to be -my own man. What debts I owed her and my father -seemed best discharged by relieving them of the burden of -my keep, since I was clearly not fitting myself to reverse -the balance. The notion that there was an emotional obligation -on either side hardly occurred to me; I doubt if it -did to them. Toward Agnes Jones I felt no debt at all.</p> - -<p>A few months after my seventeenth birthday I packed -my three most cherished books in my good white cotton -shirt, and having bade a most romantic goodbye to Agnes, -one which would certainly have consummated her hopes -had her father come upon us, I left Wappinger Falls and -set out for New York.</p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C2"><i>2.</i> <i>OF DECISIONS, MINIBILES, -AND TINUGRAPHS</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>I thought I could do the walk of some eighty miles -in four days, allowing time to swap work for food, supposing -I found farmers or housewives agreeable to the -exchange. June made it no hardship to sleep outdoors, and -the old post road ran close enough to the Hudson for any -bathing I might want to do.</p> - -<p>The dangers of the trip were part of the pattern of life -in the United States in 1938. I didnt particularly fear being -robbed by a roving gang for I was sure organized predators -would disdain so obviously unprofitable a prey, and individual -thieves I felt I could take care of, but I was not -anxious to be picked up as a vagrant by any of the three -police forces, national, state, or local. As a freeman I was -more exposed to this chance than an indent would be, with -a work-card on his person and a company behind him. A -freeman was fair game for the constables, state troopers, -or revenuers to recruit, after a perfunctory trial, into one -of the chain gangs upon whom the roads, canals and other -public works were dependent.</p> - -<p>Some wondered why the roads were so bad in spite of -all this apparent surplus of labor and were dubious of the -explanation that surfacing was expensive and it was impossible -to maintain unsurfaced highways in good condition. -Only the hint that prisoners had been seen working -around the estates of the great Whig families or had been -lent to some enterprise operated by foreign capital brought -knowing nods.</p> - -<p>At seventeen possible disasters are not brooded over.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</span> -I resolved to be wary, and then dismissed thoughts of police, -gangs and all unpleasantness. The future was mine to -make as my mother had insisted, and I was taking the first -steps in shaping it.</p> - -<p>I started off briskly, passing at first through villages long -familiar; then, getting beyond the territory I had known -all my life, I slowed down often enough to gaze at something -new and strange, or to wander into wood or pasture -for wild strawberries or early blueberries. I covered less -ground than I had intended by the time I found a farmhouse, -after inquiring at several others, where the woman -was willing to give me supper and even let me sleep in the -barn in return for splitting a sizable stack of logs into -kindling and milking two cows.</p> - -<p>Exercise and hot food must have counteracted the excitement -of the day, for I fell asleep immediately and didnt -waken till quite a while after sunup. It was another warm, -fine morning; soon the post road led, not between shabby -villages and towns or struggling farms, but past the stone -or brick walls of opulent estates. Now and then I caught -a glimpse between old, well-tended trees of magnificent -houses either a century old or built to resemble those dating -from that prosperous time. I could not but share the -general dislike for the wealthy Whigs who owned these -places, their riches contrasting with the common poverty -and deriving from exploitation of the United States as a -colony, but I could not help enjoying the beauty of their -surroundings.</p> - -<p>The highway was better traveled here also; I passed -other walkers, quite a few wagons, a carriage or two, several -peddlers and a number of ladies and gentlemen on -horseback. This was the first time I’d seen women riding -astride, a practice shocking to the sensitivities of Wappinger -Falls which also condemned the fashion, imported -from the Chinese Empire by way of England, of feminine -trousers. Having learned that women were bipedal, both -customs seemed sensible to me.</p> - -<p>I had the post road to myself for some miles between -turns when I heard a commotion beyond the stone wall to -my left. This was followed by an angry shout and shrill<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</span> -words impossible to distinguish. My progress halted, I instinctively -shifted my bundle to my left hand as though to -leave my right free for defence, but against what I had no -idea.</p> - -<p>The shouts came closer; a boy of about my own age -scrambled frantically over the wall, dislodging some of -the smaller lichen-covered rocks on top and sending them -rolling into the ditch. He looked at me, startled, then -paused for a long instant at the road’s edge, undecided -which way to run.</p> - -<p>He was barefoot and wore a jute sack as a shirt, with -holes cut for his arms, and ragged cotton pants. His face -was little browner than my own had often been at the end -of a summer’s work under a burning sun.</p> - -<p>He came to the end of indecision and started across the -highway, legs pumping high, head turned watchfully. A -splendid tawny stallion cleared the wall in a soaring jump, -his rider bellowing, “There you are, you damned black -coon!”</p> - -<p>He rode straight for the fugitive, quirt upraised, lips -thickened and eyes rolling in rage. The victim dodged and -turned; in no more doubt than I that the horseman meant -to ride him down. He darted by me, so close I heard the -labored rasp of breathing.</p> - -<p>The rider swerved, and he too twisted around me as -though I were the post at the far turn of a racecourse. Reflexively -I put out my hand to grab at the reins and stop -the assault. Indeed, my fingers actually touched the leather -and grasped it for a fraction of a second before they fell -away.</p> - -<p>Then I was alone in the road again as both pursued and -pursuer vaulted back over the fence. The whole scene of -anger and terror could not have lasted two minutes; I -strained my ears to hear the shouts coming from farther -and farther away. Quiet fell again; a squirrel flirted his -tail and sped down one tree trunk and up another. The -episode might never have happened.</p> - -<p>I shifted my bundle back and began walking again—less -briskly now. My legs felt heavy and there was an involuntary -twitch in the muscles of my arm.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</span></p> - -<p>Why hadnt I held on to the rein and delayed the hunter, -at least long enough to give his quarry a fair start? What -had made me draw back? It had not been fear, at least in -the usual sense, for I knew I wasnt timorous of the horseman. -I was sure I could have dragged him down if he had -taken his quirt to me.</p> - -<p>Yet I had been afraid. Afraid of interfering, of meddling -in affairs which were no concern of mine, of risking action -on quick judgment. I had been immobilized by the fear of -asserting my sympathies, my presumptions, against events.</p> - -<p>Walking slowly down the road I experienced deep -shame. I might, I could have saved someone from hurt; I -had perhaps had the power for a brief instant to change -the course of a whole life. I had been guilty of a cowardice -far worse than mere fear for my skin. I could have wept -with mortification—done anything, in fact, but turn back -and try to rectify my failure.</p> - -<p>The rest of the day was gloomy as I alternately taunted -and feebly excused myself. The fugitive might have been -a trespasser or a servant; his fault might have been slowness, -rudeness, theft or attempted murder. Whatever it -was, any retaliation the white man chose could be inflicted -with impunity. He would not be punished or even tried -for it. Popular opinion was unanimous for Negro emigration -to Africa, voluntary or forced; those who went westward -to join the unconquered Sioux or Nez Perce were -looked upon as depraved. Any Negro who didnt embark -for Liberia or Sierra Leone, regardless of whether he had -the fare or not, deserved anything that happened to him in -the United States.</p> - -<p>It was because I held, somewhat vaguely, a stubborn refusal -to accept this conventional view, a refusal never precisely -reasoned and little more, perhaps, than romantic -rebellion against my mother in favor of my disreputable -Grandfather Backmaker, that I suffered. I couldnt excuse -my failure on the grounds that action would have been -considered outrageous. It would not have been considered -outrageous by me.</p> - -<p>I pushed self-contempt at my passivity aside as best I -could and strove to recapture the mood of yesterday, suc<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</span>ceeding -to some extent as the memory of the scene came -back less insistently. I even tried pretending the episode -had perhaps not been quite as serious as it seemed, or that -the pursued had somehow in the end evaded the pursuer. -I could not make what had happened not happen; the best -I could do was minimize my culpability.</p> - -<p>That night I slept a little way from the road and in -the morning started off at dawn. Although I was now little -more than twenty miles from the metropolis the character -of the country had hardly changed. Perhaps the farms were -smaller and closer together, their juxtaposition to the estates -more incongruous. But traffic was continual now, -with no empty stretches on the roads, and the small towns -had horse-drawn cars running on iron tracks embedded in -the cobbles.</p> - -<p>It was late afternoon when I crossed Spuyten Duyvil -Creek to Manhattan. Between me and the city now lay a -wilderness of squatters’ shacks made of old boards, barrel-staves -and other discarded rubbish. Lean goats and mangy -cats nosed through rubble heaps of broken glass and earthenware -demijohns. Mounds of garbage lay beside aimless -creeks struggling blindly for the rivers. As clearly as though -it had been proclaimed on signposts this was an area of -outcasts and fugitives, of men and women ignored and -tolerated by the law so long as they kept within the confines -of their horrible slum.</p> - -<p>Strange and repugnant as the place was, I hesitated to -keep on going and arrive in the city at nightfall, but it -seemed unlikely there was a place to sleep among the -shacks. Once away from the order and sobriety of the post -road one could be lost in the squalid maze; undefined -threats of vaguely dreadful fates seemed to rise from it -like vapors.</p> - -<p>Then the fading light revealed the anomaly of a venerable -mansion set far back from the highway, with grounds as -yet unusurped by the encroaching stews. The house was -in ruins; the surrounding gardens lost in brush and weeds. -Evidently a watchman or caretaker guarded its forlorn -dignity or had very recently abandoned it; I could not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</span> -imagine its remaining long without being entirely overrun -otherwise.</p> - -<p>It was almost fully dark as I made my way cautiously -toward the remains of an old summerhouse. Its roof was -fallen in and it was densely enclosed by ancient rosebushes -whose thorns, I thought, when they pricked my -fingers as I struggled through them, ought to give warning -of any intruder. For weatherworthiness this shelter had -little advantage over the hovels, yet somehow the fact that -it had survived seemed to make it a more secure retreat.</p> - -<p>I stretched out on the dank boards and slept fitfully, disturbed -by dreams that the old mansion was filled with -people from a past time who begged me to save them -from the slumdwellers and their house from being further -ravaged. Brokenly I protested I was helpless—in true -dream manner I then became helpless, unable to move—that -I could not interfere with what had to happen; they -moaned and wrung their hands and faded away. Still, I -slept, and in the morning the cramps in my muscles and -the aches in my bones disappeared in the excitement of the -remaining miles to the city.</p> - -<p>And how suddenly it grew up around me, not as though -it was a fixed collection of buildings which I approached, -but as if I stood still while the wood and stone, iron and -brick, sprang into being all about.</p> - -<p>New York, in 1938, had a population of nearly a million, -having grown very slowly since the close of the War -of Southron Independence. Together with the half million -in the city of Brooklyn this represented by far the largest -concentration of people in the United States, though of -course it could not compare with the great Confederate -centers of Washington, now including Baltimore and Alexandria, -St Louis, or Leesburg (once Mexico City).</p> - -<p>The change from the country and the dreadful slums -through which I had passed was startling. Cable-cars -whizzed northward as far as Fifty-ninth Street on the west -side and all the way to Eighty-seventh on the east, while -horse-cars furnished convenient crosstown transportation -every few blocks. Express steam trains ran through bridged<span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</span> -cuts on Madison Avenue, an engineering achievement of -which New Yorkers were vastly proud.</p> - -<p>Bicycles, rare around Wappinger Falls, were thick as -flies, darting ahead and alongside drayhorses pulling wallowing -vans, carts or wagons. Prancing trotters drew -private carriages, buggies, broughams, victorias, hansoms, -dogcarts or sulkies; neither the cyclists, coachmen nor -horses seemed overawed or discommoded by occasional -minibiles chuffing their way swiftly and implacably over -cobblestones or asphalt.</p> - -<p>Incredibly intricate traceries of telegraph wires swarmed -overhead, crossing and recrossing at all angles, slanting -upward into offices and flats or downward to stores, a reminder -that no urban family with pretensions to gentility -would be without the clacking instrument in the parlor, -that every child learned the Morse code before he could -read. Thousands of sparrows considered the wires properly -their own; they perched and swung, quarreled and scolded -on them, leaving only to satisfy their voracity upon the -steaming mounds of horsedung below.</p> - -<p>The country boy who had never seen anything more -metropolitan than Poughkeepsie was tremendously impressed. -Buildings of eight or ten storeys were common, -and there were many of fourteen or fifteen, serviced by -pneumatic English lifts, that same marvelous invention -which permitted the erection of veritable skyscrapers in -Washington and Leesburg.</p> - -<p>Above them balloons moved gracefully through the air, -guided and controlled as skillfully as old-time sailing vessels. -These were not entirely novel to me; I had seen -more of them than I had minibiles, but never so many as -here. In a single hour, gawking upward, I counted seven, -admiring how nicely calculated their courses were, for they -seldom came so low as to endanger lives beneath by having -to throw out sandbags in order to rise. That they could -so maneuver over buildings of greatly uneven height -showed this to be the air age indeed.</p> - -<p>Most exciting of all was the great number of people who -walked, rode, or merely stood around on the streets. It -seemed hardly believable so many humans could crowd<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</span> -themselves so closely. Beggars pleaded, touts wheedled, -peddlers hawked, newsboys shouted, bootblacks chanted. -Messengers pushed their way, loafers yawned, ladies -shopped, drunks staggered. For long moments I paused, -standing stock still, not thinking of going on, merely watching -the spectacle.</p> - -<p>How far I walked, how many different parts of the city -I explored that day, I have no idea. I felt I had hardly -begun to fondle the sharp edge of wonder when it was -twilight and the gas lamps, lit simultaneously by telegraph -sparks, gleamed and shone on nearly every corner. Whatever -had been drab and dingy in daylight—and even my -eyes had not been blind to the dirt and decay—became in -an instant magically enchanting, softened and shadowed -into mysterious beauty. I breathed the dusty air with a -relish I had never known in the country and felt I was inhaling -some elixir for the spirit.</p> - -<p>But spiritual sustenance is not quite enough for a seventeen-year-old, -especially one who is beginning to be hungry -and tired. I was desperately anxious to hoard the three -precious dollars in my pocket, for I had little idea how to -go about replacing them, once they were spent. I could not -do without eating, however, so I stopped in at the first -gaslit bakery, buying, after some consideration, a penny -loaf, and walked on through the entrancing streets, munching -at it and feeling like an historical character.</p> - -<p>Now the fronts of the tinugraph lyceums were lit up by -porters with long tapers, so that they glowed yellow and inviting, -each heralded with a boldly lettered broadside or -dashingly drawn cartoon advertising the amusement to be -found within. I was tempted to see for myself this magical -entertainment of pictures taken so close together they gave -the illusion of motion, but the lowest admission price was -five cents. Some of the more garish theaters, which specialized -in the incredible phonotos—tinugraphs ingeniously -combined with a sound-producing machine operated by -compressed air, so that the pictures seemed not only to -move but to talk—actually charged ten or even fifteen -cents for an hour’s spectacle.</p> - -<p>By this time I ached with tiredness; the insignificant<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</span> -bundle of shirt and books had become a burden. I was -pressed by the question of where to sleep and began thinking -more kindly than I would have believed possible of -last night’s slum. I didnt connect my need with the glass -transparencies behind which gaslight shone through the -unpainted letters of BEDS, ROOMS, or HOTEL, for my -mind was hazily fixed on some urban version of the inn -at Wappinger Falls or the Poughkeepsie Commercial -House.</p> - -<p>I became more and more confused as fatigue blurred -impressions of still newer marvels, so that I am not entirely -sure whether it was one or a succession of girls who -offered delights for a quarter. I know I was solicited by -crimps for the Confederate Legion who operated openly -in defiance of United States law, and an incredible number -of beggars accosted me.</p> - -<p>At last I thought of asking directions. But without realizing -it I had wandered from the thronged wooden or -granite sidewalks of the brightly lit avenues into an unpeopled, -darkened area where the buildings were low and -frowning, where the flicker of a candle or the yellow of a -kerosene lamp in windows far apart were uncontested by -any streetlights.</p> - -<p>All day my ears had been pressed by the clop of hooves, -the rattling of iron tires or the puffing of minibiles; now the -empty street was unnaturally still. The suddenly looming -figure of another walker seemed the luckiest of chances.</p> - -<p>“Excuse me, friend,” I said. “Can you tell me where’s -the nearest inn, or anywhere I can get a bed for the night -cheap?”</p> - -<p>I felt him peering at me. “Rube, huh? Much money -you got?”</p> - -<p>“Th—Not very much. That’s why I want to find cheap -lodging.” -“OK, Reuben. Come along.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, don’t trouble to show me. Just give me an idea -how to get there.”</p> - -<p>He grunted. “No trouble, Reuben. No trouble at all.”</p> - -<p>Taking my arm just above the elbow in a firm grip be -steered me along. For the first time I began to feel alarm.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</span> -However, before I could attempt to shrug free he had -shoved me into the mouth of an alley, discernible only -because its absolute blackness contrasted with the relative -darkness of the street.</p> - -<p>“Wait—” I began.</p> - -<p>“In here, Reuben. Soundest night’s sleep youve had in -a long time. And cheap—it’s free.” -I started to break loose and was surprised to find he no -longer held me. Before I could even begin to think, a -terrific blow fell on the right side of my head and I traded -the blackness of the alley for the blackness of insensibility.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C3"><i>3.</i> <i>A MEMBER OF THE GRAND ARMY</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>I was recalled to consciousness by a smell. -More accurately a cacophony of smells. I opened my eyes -and shut them against the unbearable pain of light; I -groaned at the equally unbearable pain in my skullbones. -Feverishly and against my will I tried to identify the walloping -odors around me.</p> - -<p>The stink of death and rottenness was thick. I knew -there was an outhouse—many outhouses—nearby. The -ground I lay on, where it was not stony, was damp with -the water of endless dishwashings and launderings. The -noisomeness of offal suggested that the garbage of many -families had never been buried, but left to rot in the alley -or near it. In addition there was the smell of death, not -the sweetish effluvium of blood, such as any country boy -who has helped butcher a bull-calf or hog knows, but the -unmistakable stench of corrupt, maggotty flesh. Besides -all this there was the spoor of humanity.</p> - -<p>A new discomfort at last forced my eyes open for the -second time. A hard surface was pressing painful knobs -into my exposed skin. I looked and felt around me.</p> - -<p>The knobs were the scattered cobbles of a fetid alley; -not a foot away was the cadaver of a dog, thoroughly putrescent; -beyond him a drunk retched and groaned. A -trickle of liquid swill wound its way delicately over the -moldy earth between the stones. My coat, shirt, and shoes -were gone, so was the bundle with my books. There was -no use searching my pocket for the three dollars. I knew I -was lucky the robber had left me my pants and my life.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</span></p> - -<p>A middleaged man, at least he looked middleaged to -my youthful eye, regarded me speculatively over the head -of the drunk. A pale, elliptical scar interrupted the wrinkles -on his forehead, its upper point making a permanent part -in his thin hair. Tiny red veins marked his nose; his eyes -were bloodshot.</p> - -<p>“Pretty well cleaned yuh out, huh boy?”</p> - -<p>I nodded—and then was sorry for the motion.</p> - -<p>“Reward of virtue. Assuming you was virtuous, which -I assume. Come to the same end as me, stinking drunk. -Only I still got my shirt. Couldnt hock it no matter how -thirsty I got.”</p> - -<p>I groaned.</p> - -<p>“Where yuh from boy? What rural—see, sober now—precincts -miss you?” -“Wappinger Falls, near Poughkeepsie. My name’s -Hodge Backmaker.”</p> - -<p>“Well now, that’s friendly of you, Hodge. I’m George -Pondible. Periodic. Just tapering off.”</p> - -<p>I hadnt an idea what Pondible was talking about. Trying -to understand made my head worse.</p> - -<p>“Took everything, I suppose? Havent a nickel left to -help a hangover?”</p> - -<p>“My head,” I mumbled, quite superfluously.</p> - -<p>He staggered to his feet. I slowly sat up, tenderly touching -the lump over my ear with my fingertips.</p> - -<p>“Best thing—souse it in the river. Take more to fix -mine.” -“But ... can I go through the streets like this?”</p> - -<p>“Right,” he said. “Quite right.”</p> - -<p>He stooped down and put one hand beneath the drunk, -who murmured unintelligibly. With the other he removed -the jacket, a maneuver betraying practice, for it elicited -no protest from the victim. He then performed the still -more delicate operation of depriving him of his shirt and -shoes, tossing them all to me. They were a loathsome collection -of rags not fit to clean a manurespreader. The -jacket was torn and greasy, the pockets hanging like the -ears of a dog; the shirt was a filthy tatter, the shoes shapeless -fragments of leather with great gapes in the soles.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</span></p> - -<p>“It’s stealing,” I protested.</p> - -<p>“Right. Put them on and let’s get out of here.”</p> - -<p>The short walk to the river was through streets lacking -the glamour of those of the day before. The tenements -were smokestreaked, with steps between the parting bricks -where mortar had fallen out; great hunks of wall were kept -in place only by the support of equally crazy ones abutting. -The wretched things I wore were better suited than Pondible’s -to this neighborhood, though his would have marked -him tramp and vagrant in Wappinger Falls.</p> - -<p>The Hudson too was soiled, with an oily scum and -debris, so that I hesitated to dip even the purloined shirt, -much less my aching head. But urged on by Pondible I -climbed down the slimy stones between two docks and -pushing the flotsam aside, ducked myself in the unappetizing -water.</p> - -<p>“Fixes your head,” said Pondible with more assurance -than accuracy. “Now for mine.”</p> - -<p>The sun was hot and the shirt dried on my back as we -walked away from the river, the jacket over my arm. Now -that my mind was clearing my despair grew rapidly; for a -moment I wished I had waded farther into the Hudson -and drowned.</p> - -<p>Admitting any plans I’d had were nebulous and impractical, -they had yet been plans of a kind, something -in which I could put, or force, my hopes. My appearance -had been presentable, I had the means to keep myself fed -and sheltered for a few weeks at least. Now everything -was changed, any future was gone, literally knocked out -of existence and I had nothing to look forward to, nothing -on which to exert my energies and dreams. To go back to -Wappinger Falls was out of the question, not simply to -dodge the bitterness of admitting defeat so quickly, but -because I knew how relieved my mother and father must -have been to be freed of my uselessness. Yet I had nothing -to expect in the city except starvation or a life of petty -crime.</p> - -<p>Pondible guided me into a saloon, a dark, secretive -place, gaslit even this early, with a steam piano tinkling -the popular, mournful tune, <i>Mormon Girl</i>:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">There’s a girl in the state of Deseret</div> - <div class="verse indent0">I love and I’m trying to for-get.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Forget her for my tired feet’s sake</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Don’t wanna walk to the Great Salt Lake.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">They ever build that railroad toooo the ocean</div> - <div class="verse indent0">I’d return my Mormon girl’s devotion.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">But the tracks stop short in Ioway....</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>I couldnt remember the next line. Something about Injuns -say.</p> - -<p>“Shot,” Pondible ordered the bartender, “and buttermilk -for my chum here.”</p> - -<p>The bartender kept on polishing the wood in front of -him with a wet, dirty rag. “Got any jack?”</p> - -<p>“Pay you tomorrow, friend.”</p> - -<p>The bartender’s uninterrupted industry said clearly, -then drink tomorrow.</p> - -<p>“Listen,” argued Pondible; “I’m tapering off. You know -me. Ive spent plenty of money here.”</p> - -<p>The bartender shrugged. “I don’t own the place; anything -goes over the bar has to be rung up on the cash -register.”</p> - -<p>“Youre lucky to have a job that pays wages.”</p> - -<p>“Times I’m not so sure. Why don’t you indent?”</p> - -<p>Pondible looked shocked. “At my age? What would a -company pay for a wornout old carcass? A hundred dollars -at the top. Then a release in a couple of years with a -med holdback so I’d have to report every week somewhere. -No, friend, Ive come through this long a free man—in a -manner of speaking—and I’ll stick it out. Let’s have that -shot; you can see for yourself I’m tapering off. Youll get -your jack tomorrow.” -I could see the bartender was weakening; each refusal -was less surly and at last, to my astonishment, he set out a -glass and bottle for Pondible and an earthenware mug of -buttermilk for me. To my astonishment, I say, for credit -was rarely extended on any scale, large or small. The inflation, -though sixty years in the past, had left indelible -impressions; people paid cash or did without. Debt was -not only disgraceful, it was dangerous; the notion things<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</span> -could be paid for while, or even after, they were being -used was as unthinkable as was the idea of circulating -paper money instead of silver or gold.</p> - -<p>I drank my buttermilk slowly, gratefully aware Pondible -had ordered the most filling and sustaining liquid in the -saloon. For all his unprepossessing appearance and peculiar -moral notions, my new acquaintance seemed to -have a rude wisdom as well as a rude kindliness.</p> - -<p>He swallowed his whiskey and called for a quart pot of -light beer which he sipped slowly. “That’s the trick of it, -Hodge. Avoid the second shot. If you can.” He sipped -again. “Now what?”</p> - -<p>“What?” I repeated.</p> - -<p>“Now what are you going to do? What’s your aim in -life anyway?”</p> - -<p>“None—now. I ... wanted to learn. To study.” -He frowned. “Out of books?”</p> - -<p>“How else?”</p> - -<p>“Books is mostly written and printed in foreign countries.”</p> - -<p>“There might be more written here if more people had -time to learn.”</p> - -<p>Pondible wiped specks of froth from his beard with the -back of his hand. “Might and mightnt. Oh, some of my -best friends are book-readers, don’t get me wrong, boy.”</p> - -<p>“I’d thought,” I burst out, “I’d thought to try Columbia -College. To offer—to beg to be allowed to do any kind of -work for tuition.” -“Hmm. I doubt it would have worked.”</p> - -<p>“Anyway I can’t go now, looking like this.”</p> - -<p>“Might be as well. We need fighters, not readers.”</p> - -<p>“‘We?’”</p> - -<p>He did not explain. “Well, you could always take the -advice our friend here gave me and indent. A young -healthy lad like you could get yourself a thousand or -twelve hundred dollars—” -“Sure. And be a slave for the rest of my life.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, indenting aint slavery. It’s better. And worse. For -one thing the company buys you won’t hold you after you -arent worth your keep. Not that long, on account of book<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</span>keeping; -they lose when they break even. So they cancel -your indenture without a cent payment. Course theyll -take a med holdback so as to get a dollar or two for your -corpse, but that’s a long time away for you.”</p> - -<p>An inconceivably long time. The medical holdback was -the least of my distaste, though it had played a large part -in the discussions at home. My mother had heard that -cadavers for dissection were shipped to foreign medical -schools like so much cargo. She was shocked not so much -at the thought of the scientific use of her dead body as at -its disposal outside the United States.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” I said. “A long time away. So I wouldnt be a -slave for life; just thirty or forty years. Till I wasnt any -good to anyone, including myself.”</p> - -<p>He seemed to be enjoying himself as he drank his beer. -“Youre a gloomy gus, Hodge. Taint’s bad’s that. Indenting’s -pretty strictly regulated. That’s the idea anyway. I -aint saying the big companies don’t get away with a lot. -You can’t be made to work over sixty hours a week. Ten -hours a day. With twelve hundred dollars you could get -all the education you want in your spare time and then -turn your learning to account by making enough to buy -yourself free.”</p> - -<p>I tried to think about it dispassionately, though goodness -knows I’d been over the ground often enough. It was -true the amount, a not improbable one, would see me -through college. But Pondible’s notion of turning my -“learning to account” I knew to be a fantasy. Perhaps in -the Confederate States or the German Union knowledge -was rewarded with wealth, or at least a comfortable living, -but any study I pursued—I knew my own “impracticality” -well enough by now—was bound to yield few material -benefits in the backward United States, which existed as -a nation at all only on the sufferance and unresolved rivalries -of the great powers. I’d be lucky to struggle through -school and eke out some kind of living as a freeman; I -could hardly hope to earn enough to buy back an indenture -on what was left of my time after subtracting sixty hours -a week.</p> - -<p>“It wouldnt work,” I said despondently.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</span></p> - -<p>Pondible nodded, as though this were the conclusion -he had expected me to come to. “Well then,” he said, -“there’s the gangs.”</p> - -<p>I looked my horror.</p> - -<p>He laughed. “Forget your country rearing. What’s -right? What the strongest country or the strongest man -says it is. The government says gangs are wrong, but the -government aint strong enough to stop them. And maybe -they don’t do as much killing as people think. Only when -somebody works against them—just like the government. -Sure they have to be paid off, but it’s just like taxes. If you -leave the parsons’ sermons out of it there’s no difference -joining the gangs than the army—if we had one—or the -Confederate Legion—” -“They tried to recruit me yesterday. Are they always -so....”</p> - -<p>“Bold?” For the first time Pondible looked angry and I -thought the scar on his forehead turned whiter. “Yes, -damn them. The Legion must be half United States citizens. -When they have to put down a disturbance or run -some little cockroach country they send off the Confederate -Legion—made up of men who ought to be the backbone -of an army of our own.” -“But the police—don’t they ever try to stop them?” -“What’d I tell you about right being what the strongest -country says it is? Sure we got laws against recruiting into -a foreign army. So we squawk. And what have we got to -back it up with? So the Confederate Legion goes right on -recruiting the men who have to beg for a square meal in -their own country. Well, the government is pretty near as -bad off when it comes to the gangs. Best it can do is pick -off some of the little ones and forget about the big ones. -Most of the gangsters never even get shot at. They all live -high, high as anybody in the twenty-six states, and every -so often there’s a dividend—more than a workman makes -in a lifetime.” -I began to be sure my benefactor was a gangster. And -yet ... if this were so why had he wheedled credit from -the barkeep? Was it simply an elaborate blind? It seemed -hardly worth it.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</span></p> - -<p>“A dividend,” I said, “or a rope.”</p> - -<p>“Most gangsters die of old age. Or competition. Aint -one been hung I can think of the last five-six years. But I -see youve no stomach for it. Tell me, Hodge—you Whig -or Populist?” -The sudden change of subject bewildered me. “Why -... Populist, I guess.”</p> - -<p>“Why?”</p> - -<p>“Oh ... I don’t know....” I thought of some of -the discussions that used to go on among the men around -the smithy. “The Whigs’ ‘Property, Protection, Permanent -Population’ —what does it mean to me?” -“Tell you, boy, means this: Property for the Confederates -who own factories here and don’t want to pay taxes. -Protection for foreign capital to come in and buy or hire. -Permanent Population—cheap native labor. Build up a -prosperous employing class.” -“Yes, I know. I can’t see how it helps. Ive heard Whigs -at home say the money’s bound to seep down from above, -but it seems awfully roundabout. And not very efficient.”</p> - -<p>He reached over and clapped me lightly on the shoulder. -“That’s my boy,” he said. “They can’t fool you.”</p> - -<p>I wasnt entirely pleased by his commendation. “And -protection means paying more for things than theyre -worth.”</p> - -<p>“Taint only that, Hodge, it’s a damn lie as well. Whigs -never even tried protection when they was in. Didnt dast. -Knew the other countries wouldnt let them.”</p> - -<p>“As for ‘permanent population’ ... well, those who -can’t make a living are going to go on emigrating to prosperous -countries. Permanent population means dwindling -population if it means anything.”</p> - -<p>“Ah,” he said. “You got a head on your shoulders, -Hodge. Youre all right; books won’t hurt you. But what -about emigrating? Yourself, I mean?”</p> - -<p>I shook my head.</p> - -<p>He nodded, chewing on a soggy corner of his mustache. -“Don’t want to leave the old ship, huh?”</p> - -<p>I don’t suppose I would have put it exactly that way, or -even fully formulated the thought. I was willing to ex<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</span>change -the familiar for the unknown—up to a certain -point. The thought of giving up the country in which I’d -been born was repugnant. Call it loyalty, or a sense of -having ties with the past, or just stubbornness. “Something -like that,” I said.</p> - -<p>“Well now, let’s see what weve got.” He stuck up a dirty -and slightly tremulous hand, turning down a finger as he -stated each point. “One, patriot; two, Populist; three, don’t -like indenting; four, prosperity’s got to come from the poor -upward, not the rich down.” He hesitated, holding his -thumb. “You heard of the Grand Army?”</p> - -<p>“Who hasnt? Not much difference between them and -the regular gangs.”</p> - -<p>“Now what makes you say that?”</p> - -<p>“Why ... everybody knows it”</p> - -<p>“Do, huh? Maybe they know it all wrong. Look here -now—and remember about the Confederate Legion riding -over the laws of the United States—what would you -think ought to be done about foreigners from the strong -countries who come here and walk all over us? Or the -Whigs who do their dirty work for them?” -“I don’t know,” I said. “Not murder, certainly.”</p> - -<p>“Murder,” he repeated. “That’s a word, Hodge. Means -what you want it to mean. Wasnt murder back during the -War when Union soldiers was trying to keep the country -from being split up. Taint murder today when somebody’s -hung for rape or counterfeiting. Anyhow the Grand Army -don’t go in for murder.”</p> - -<p>I said nothing.</p> - -<p>“Oh, accidents happen; wouldnt deny it. Maybe they -get a little rougher than they intend with Whig traitors or -Confederate agents, but you can’t make bacon out of a -live hog. Point is the Grand Army’s the only thing in the -country that even tries to restore it to what it once was. -What was fought for in the War.”</p> - -<p>I don’t know whether it was the thought of Grandfather -Backmaker or the unassuaged guilt for the miserable -figure I had cut only three days back that made me ask, -“And do they want to give the Negroes equality?”</p> - -<p>He drew back sharply, shock showing clearly on his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</span> -face. “Touch of the tarbrush in you, boy? By—” He bent -forward, looking at me searchingly. “No, I can see you -aint. Just some notions youll outgrow. You just don’t understand. -We might have won that war if it hadnt been for -the Abolitionists.”</p> - -<p>Would we? I’d heard it said often enough; it would -have been presumptuous to doubt it.</p> - -<p>“The darkies are better off among their own,” he said; -“they never should have been here in the first place; black -and white can’t mix. Leave ideas like that alone, Hodge; -there’s plenty and enough to be done. Chase the foreigners -out, teach their flunkies a lesson, build the country up -again.”</p> - -<p>“Are you trying to get me to join the Grand Army?”</p> - -<p>Pondible finished his beer. “Won’t answer that one, boy. -Let’s say I just want to get you somewheres to sleep, three -meals a day, and some of that education youre so fired up -about. Come along.”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C4"><i>4.</i> <i>TYSS</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>He took me to a bookseller’s and stationery store -on Astor Place with a printshop in the basement and the -man to whom he introduced me was the owner, Roger -Tyss. I spent almost six years there, and when I left neither -the store nor its contents nor Tyss himself seemed to have -changed or aged.</p> - -<p>I know books were sold and others bought to take their -places on the shelves or to be piled towerwise on the floor. -I helped cart in many rolls of sulphide paper and bottles of -printers’ ink, and delivered many bundles of damp pamphlets, -broadsides, letterheads and envelopes. Inked ribbons -for typewriting machines, penpoints, ledgers and -daybooks, rulers, paperclips, legal forms and cubes of -indiarubber came and went. Yet the identical, invincible -disorder, the synonymous dogeared volumes, the indistinguishable -stock, the unaltered cases of type seemed fixed -for six years, all covered by the same film of dust which -responded to vigorous sweeping only by rising into the -air and immediately settling back on precisely the same -spots.</p> - -<p>Roger Tyss grew six years older and I can only charge -it to the heedless eye of youth that I saw no signs of that -aging. Like Pondible and, as I learned, so many members -of the Grand Army, he wore a beard. His was closely -trimmed, wiry and grizzled. Above the beard and across -his forehead were many fine lines which always held some -of the grime of the store or printing press. You did not -dwell long on either beard or wrinkles however; what held -you were his eyes: large, dark, fierce and compassionate. -You might have dismissed him at first glance as simply<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</span> -an undersized, stoopshouldered, slovenly printer, had it not -been for those eyes which seemed in perpetual conflict -with his other features.</p> - -<p>“Robbed and bludgeoned, ay?” he said with a curious -disrespect for sequence after Pondible had explained me -to him. “Dog eats dog, and the survivors survive. Backmaker, -ay? Is that an American name?”</p> - -<p>So far as I knew, I said, it was.</p> - -<p>“Well, well; let’s not pry too deeply. So you want to -learn. Why?”</p> - -<p>“Why?” The question was too big for an answer, yet an -answer of some kind was expected. “I guess because -there’s nothing else so important.”</p> - -<p>“Wrong,” he said triumphantly, “wrong and illusory. -Since nothing is ultimately important there can be no -degrees involved. Books are the waste-product of the human -mind.”</p> - -<p>“Yet you deal in them,” I ventured.</p> - -<p>“I’m alive and I shall die too; this doesnt mean I approve -of either life or death. Well, if you are going to learn -you are going to learn; there’s nothing I can do about it -As well here as another place.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you, sir.”</p> - -<p>“Gratitude, Hodgins”—he never then nor later condescended -to the familiar “Hodge” nor did I ever address or -even think of him except as Mr Tyss—“Gratitude, Hodgins, -is an emotion disagreeable both to the giver and to -the receiver. We do what we must; gratitude, pity, love, -hate, all that cant, is superfluous.”</p> - -<p>I considered this statement reflectively.</p> - -<p>“Look you,” he went on, “I’ll feed you and lodge you, -teach you to set type and give you the run of the books. -I’ll pay you no money; you can steal from me if you must -You can learn as much here in four months as in a college -in four years—if you persist in thinking it’s learning you -want—or you can learn nothing. I’ll expect you to do the -work I think needs doing; any time you don’t like it youre -free to go.” -And so our agreement, if so simple and unilateral a -statement can be called an agreement, was made within<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</span> -ten minutes after he met me for the first time. For six -years the store was home and school, and Roger Tyss was -employer, teacher and father to me. He was never my -friend. Rather he was my adversary. I respected him and -the longer I knew him the deeper became my respect, but -it was an ambivalent feeling and attached only to those -qualities which he himself would have scorned. I detested -his ideas, his philosophy and many of his actions, and this -detestation grew until I was no longer able to live near -him. But I am getting ahead of my story.</p> - -<p>Tyss knew books, not merely as a bookman knows them—binding, -size, edition, value—but as a scholar. He -seemed to have read enormously and on every conceivable -subject, many of them quite useless in practical application. -(I remember a long discourse on heraldry, filled with -terms like “paley-bendy” or, “fusils conjoined in fess, -gules” and “sable demi-lions.” He regarded such erudition, -indeed any erudition, contemptuously. When I asked -why he had bothered to pick it up, his retort was, “Why -have you bothered to pick up calluses, Hodgins?”)</p> - -<p>As a printer he followed the same pattern; he was not -concerned solely with setting up a neat page; he sometimes -spent hours laying out some trivia, which could have -interested only its author, until he struck a proof which -satisfied him. He wrote much on his own account: poetry, -essays, manifestoes, composing directly from the font, running -off a single proof which he read—always expressionlessly—and -immediately destroyed before pieing the type.</p> - -<p>I slept on a mattress kept under one of the counters -during the day; Tyss had a couch hardly more luxurious, -downstairs by the flatbed press. Each morning before it -was time to open he sent me across town on the horse-cars -to the Washington Market to buy six pounds of beef—twelve -on Saturdays, for the market, unlike the bookstore, -was closed Sundays. It was always the same cut, heart of -ox or cow, dressed by the butcher in thin strips. After I -had been with him long enough to tire of the fare, but not -long enough to realize the obstinacy of his nature, I begged -him to let me substitute pork or mutton, or at least some -other part of the beef, like brains or tripe which were even<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</span> -cheaper. He always answered, “The heart, Hodgins. Purchase -the heart; it is the vital food.”</p> - -<p>While I was on my errand he would buy three loaves of -yesterday’s bread, still tolerably fresh; when I returned he -took a long two-pronged fork, our only utensil, for the -establishment was innocent of either cutlery or dishes, and -spearing a strip of heart held it over the gas flame of a -light standard until it was sooted and toasted rather than -broiled. We tore the loaves with our fingers and with a -hunk of bread in one hand and a strip of heart in the other -we each ate a pound of meat and half a loaf of bread for -breakfast, dinner, and supper.</p> - -<p>“Man is uniquely a savage eater of carrion,” he informed -me, chewing vigorously. “What lion or tiger would -relish another’s ancient, putrefying kill? What vulture or -hyena displays human ferocity? Too, we are cannibals at -heart. We eat our gods; we have always eaten our gods.”</p> - -<p>“Isnt that figurative, or poetic, Mr Tyss? I mean, doesnt -it refer to the grain of wheat which is ‘killed’ by the harvester -and buried by the sower?”</p> - -<p>“You think the gods were modelled on John Barleycorn -and not John Barleycorn on them—to conceal their fate? -I fear you have a higher opinion of mankind than is warranted, -Hodgins.” -“I’m not sure I know what you mean by gods.”</p> - -<p>“Embodiments or personifications of human aspirations. -The good, the true, the beautiful—with winged feet -or bull’s body.” -“How about ... oh, Chronos? Or Satan?”</p> - -<p>He licked his fingers of the meat juices, obviously -pleased. “Satan. An excellent example. Epitome of man’s -futile longing to upset and defy the divine plan—I use the -word ‘divine’ derisively, Hodgins—; who does not admire -and reverence Lucifer in his heart? Well, having made a -god out of the devil we eat him daily in a two-fold sense: -by swallowing the myth of his enmity (a truer friend there -never was), and by digesting his great precepts of pride -and curiosity and strength. And you see for yourself how -he finds interesting thoughts for idle minds to speculate -on. Let’s get to work.”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</span> -He expected me to work, but he was far from a hard or -inconsiderate master. In 1938-44, when the country was -being ground deeper into colonialism, there were few employers -so lenient. I read much, generally when I pleased, -and despite his jeers at learning in the abstract he encouraged -me, even going to the length, if a particular book was -not to be found in his considerable stock, of letting me get -it from one of his competitors, to be written up against -his account.</p> - -<p>Nor was he scrupulous about the time I took on his -errands. I continued to ramble and sight-see the city much -as though I had nothing else to do. And if, from time to -time, I discovered there were girls in New York who didnt -look too unkindly on a tall youth even though he still carried -some of the rustic air of Wappinger Falls, he never -questioned why the walk of half a mile took me a couple -of hours.</p> - -<p>True, he kept to his original promise never to pay me -wages, but he often handed me coins for pocketmoney, -evidently satisfied I wasnt stealing, and he replaced my -makeshift wardrobe with worn but decent clothing.</p> - -<p>He had not exaggerated the possibilities of the books -surrounding me. His brief warning, “—you can learn -nothing,” was lost on me. I suppose a different temperament -might have become surfeited with paper and print; I -can only say I wasnt. I nibbled, tasted, gobbled books. -After the store was shut I hooked a student lamp to the -nearest gasjet by means of a long tube, and lying on my -pallet with a dozen volumes handy, I read till I was no -longer able to keep my eyes open or understand the words. -Often I woke in the morning to find the light still burning -and my fingers holding the pages open.</p> - -<p>I think one of the first books to influence me strongly -was the monumental <i>Causes of American Decline and -Decay</i> by the always popular expatriate historian, Henry -Adams. I was particularly impressed by the famous passage -in which he reproves the “stay-at-home” Bostonian essayists, -William and Henry James, for their quixotic sacrifice -and espousal of a long-lost cause. History, said Sir Henry, -who had renounced his United States citizenship and been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</span> -knighted by William V, history is never directed or diverted -by well-intentioned individuals; it is the product of -forces with geographical, not moral roots.</p> - -<p>Possibly the learned expatriate was right, but my instinctive -sympathies lay with the Jameses, in spite of the -fact that I had not found their books enjoyable. This was -due at least partly to the fact that the small editions were -badly printed and marred, at least so foreign critics -claimed, by an excessive use of Yankee colloquialisms, -consciously employed to demonstrate patriotism and disdain -of imported elegance. For some reason, obscure to -me then, I did not mention Adams to Tyss, though I usually -turned to him with each of my fresh discoveries. When -he came upon me with an open book he would glance at -the running title over my shoulder and begin talking, either -of the particular work or of its topic. What he had to say -gave me an insight I might otherwise have missed, and -turned me to other writers, other aspects. He respected no -authority simply because it was acclaimed or established; -he prodded me to examine every statement, every hypothesis -no matter how commonly accepted.</p> - -<p>Early in my employment I was attracted to a large -framed parchment he kept hanging, slightly askew and -highly attractive to dust, over his typecase. It was simply -but beautifully printed in 16 point Baskerville; I knew -without being told that he had set it himself:</p> - -<p> -<i>The Body of<br /> -Benjamin Franklin<br /> -Printer<br /> -Like the Cover of an Old Book<br /> -Stripped of Its Lettering and Gilding<br /> -Lies Here<br /> -Food for Worms.<br /> -But the Work Shall Not Be Lost<br /> -For it will, As he Believed,<br /> -Come Forth Again<br /> -In a new and Better Edition<br /> -Revised & Corrected<br /> -By<br /> -The Author.</i><br /> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</span></p> - -<p>When he caught me admiring it Tyss laughed. “Felicitous, -isnt it, Hodgins? But a lie, a perverse and probably -hypocritical lie. There is no Author; the book of life is -simply a mess of pied type, a tale told by an idiot, full of -sound and fury, signifying nothing. There is no plan, no -synopsis to be filled in with pious hopes or sanctimonious -actions. There is nothing but a vast emptiness in the -universe.”</p> - -<p>“The other day you told me we admired the devil for -rebelling against a plan.”</p> - -<p>He grinned. “So you expect consistency instead of truth -from me, Hodgins. There is no plan, authored by a Mind; -it is this no-plan against which Lucifer fought. But there -is a plan too, a mindless plan, which accounts for all our -acts.”</p> - -<p>I had been reading an obscure Irish theologian, a Protestant -curate of some forsaken parish, so ill-esteemed he -had been forced to publish his sermons himself, named -George B Shaw, and I had been impressed by his forceful -style. I quoted him to Tyss, perhaps as much to preen myself -as to counter his argument.</p> - -<p>“Nonsense. Ive seen the good parson’s book with its -eighteenth-century logic and its quaint rationalism, and -know it for a waste of ink and paper. Man does not think; -he only thinks he thinks. An automaton, he responds to -external stimuli; he cannot order his thought.”</p> - -<p>“You mean that there’s no free will? Not even a marginal -minimum of choice?”</p> - -<p>“Exactly. The whole thing is an illusion. We do what -we do because someone else has done what he did; he did -it because still another someone did what he did. Every -action is the rigid result of another action.”</p> - -<p>“But there must have been a beginning,” I objected. -“And if there was a beginning, choice existed if only for -that split second. And if choice exists once it can exist -again.”</p> - -<p>“You have the makings of a metaphysician, Hodgins,” -he said witheringly, for metaphysics was one of the most -despised words in his vocabulary. “The reasoning is infantile. -Answering you and the Reverend Shaw on your<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</span> -own level, I could say that time is a convention and that -all events occur simultaneously. Or if I grant its dimension -I can ask, What makes you think time is a simple straight -line running flatly through eternity? Why do you assume -that time isnt curved? Can you conceive of its end? Can -you really imagine its beginning? Of course not; then why -arent both the same? The serpent with its tail in its mouth?”</p> - -<p>“You mean we not only play a prepared script but repeat -the identical lines over and over and over for infinity? -There’s no heaven in your cosmos, only an unimaginable, -never-ending hell.”</p> - -<p>He shrugged his shoulders. “That you should spout -emotional apologetics at me is part of what you call the -script, Hodgins. You didnt select the words nor speak them -voluntarily. They were called into existence by what I -said, which in turn was mere response to what went before.”</p> - -<p>Weakly I was forced back to a more elementary attack. -“You don’t act in accordance with your own conviction.”</p> - -<p>He snorted. “A thoughtless remark, excusable only because -automatic. How could I act differently? Like you, I -am a prisoner of stimuli.”</p> - -<p>“How pointless to risk ruin and imprisonment as a member -of the Grand Army when no one can change what’s -predestined.”</p> - -<p>“Pointless or not, emotions and reflections are responses -just as much as actions. I can no more help engaging -myself in the underground than I can help breathing, -or my heart beating, or dying when the time comes. Nothing, -they say, is certain but death and taxes; actually everything -is certain. Everything,” he repeated firmly.</p> - -<p>I went back to sorting some pamphlets which were to be -sold for wastepaper, shaking my head. His theory was unassailable; -every attack was discounted by the very nature -of the thesis. That it was false I didnt doubt; its impregnability -made its falseness still more terrifying.</p> - -<p>There were fully as many imaginary discussions with -Tyss as real ones. Yet even in these disembodied arguments -I could gain no advantage. Why do you look back -on the War of Southron Independence with regret for what<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</span> -might have been, if no might-have-been is possible? I asked -him mentally, knowing his answer, I cannot help myself, -was no answer at all.</p> - -<p>The logical illogic of it was only one of the multitude of -contradictions in him. The Grand Army to which he was -devoted was a violent organization of violent men. He himself -was an advocate and implement of violence—one -illegal paper, the <i>True American</i>, came from his press and -I often saw crumpled proofs of large type warnings to “Get -Out of Town you Conf. TRAITOR or the GA will HANG -YOU!” Yet cruelty, other than intellectually, was repugnant -to him; his vindictiveness toward the Whigs and Confederates -rose from commiseration for the condition into -which they had plunged the country.</p> - -<p>Pondible and the others who bore an indefinable resemblance -to each other, bearded or not, came to the store on -Grand Army business, and I was sure many of the errands -I was sent on advanced or were supposed to advance the -Grand Army’s cause. Those who signed receipts with an -X—and in the beginning at least Tyss was strict about -assurance of delivery—seemed unlikely customers for the -sort of merchandise we handled.</p> - -<p>I was relieved, but puzzled and perhaps a little piqued, -that aside from the very first conversation with Pondible, -no attempt was made to persuade me into the organization. -Tyss must have perceived this, for he explained -obliquely.</p> - -<p>“There’s the formative type, Hodgins, and the spectator -type. One acts, and the other is acted upon. One changes -events, the other observes them. Of course,” he went on -hastily, “I’m not talking metaphysical rubbish. When I say -the formative type changes events I merely mean he reacts -to a given stimulus in a positive way while the spectator -reacts to the same circumstances negatively, both reactions -being inevitable and inescapable. Naturally, events are -never changed.”</p> - -<p>“Why can’t one be one type sometimes and the other at -other times? Ive certainly heard of men of action who have -sat down to write their memoirs.”</p> - -<p>“You are confusing the after-effect of action with non<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</span>action, -the dying ripples on a pond into which a stone has -been tossed with the still surface of one which has never -been disturbed. No, Hodgins, the two types are completely -distinct and unchangeable. The Swiss police chief, Carl -Jung, has refined and improved the classifications of Lombroso, -showing how the formative type can always be detected.”</p> - -<p>I felt he was talking pure nonsense, even though I had -never read Lombroso or heard of Chief Jung.</p> - -<p>“To the formative type the spectator seems useless, to -the spectator the man of action is faintly absurd. A born -observer would find the earnest efforts of the Grand Army—the -formation of skeleton companies, the appointment -of officers, the secret drills, the serious attempt to become -a real army—lacking in humor and repellent.” -“You think I’m the spectator type, Mr Tyss?”</p> - -<p>“No doubt about it, Hodgins. Certain features might be -deceptive at first sight: the wide-spaced eyes, the restrained -fleshiness of the mouth, the elevation of the nostril; but -they subordinate to more subtle indicators. No question -but that Chief Jung would put you down as an observer.”</p> - -<p>If his fantastic reasoning and curious manner of classifying -personalities as though they were zoological specimens -could relieve me of having to refuse pointblank to join -the Grand Army I was content. While this hardly alleviated -my disturbance at being, no matter how remotely, -accessory to mayhem, kidnaping and murder I compromised -with my conscience by trying to believe I might after -all be mistaken in thinking I was being used. There were -times when I felt I ought boldly to declare myself and -leave the store but when I faced the prospect of having to -find a way to eat and sleep, even if I put aside the imperative -necessity of books, I lacked the courage.</p> - -<p>Spectator? Why not? Spectators had no difficult decisions -to make.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C5"><i>5.</i> <i>OF WHIGS AND POPULISTS</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>A country defeated in a bitter war and -divested of half its territory loses its drive and spirit and -suffers a shock which is communicated to all its people. For -generations its citizens brood over what has happened, preoccupied -with the past and dreaming of a miraculous -change, until time brings apathy or a reversal of history. -The Grand Army, with its crude and brutal philosophy -and methods, was pride’s answer to defeat.</p> - -<p>It was not the only answer; the two major political -parties had others. The realistic Whigs wanted to fit the -country and its economy into actual world conditions, to -subordinate it wholly and openly to the great manufacturing -nations and accept with gratitude foreign capital and -foreign protection. The immediate result would be more -prosperity for the propertied classes; they contended this -would mean a gradual raising of the standard of living -since employers could hire more hands, and indenture, -faced by competition with wages, would dwindle away.</p> - -<p>This the Populists denied. The government, they insisted -when they were out of office, should create industries, forbid -indenting, buy up the indentures of skilled workers and -offer high enough pay to create new markets, and defy the -world by building a new army and navy. That they never -put their program into effect they laid to the wily tricks of -the Whigs.</p> - -<p>The presidential election of 1940 was as violent as if the -office were really a prize to be sought rather than a practically -empty title, with all real power now held by the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</span> -Majority Leader of the House and his cabinet of Committee -Chairmen. As early as May one of the leading contenders -for the Populist nomination was shot and badly crippled; -the Cleveland hall where the Whig convention was -being held was fired by an arsonist.</p> - -<p>I would not be old enough to vote for two years, yet I -too had campaign fever. Jennings Lewis, the Populist, was -perhaps the ugliest candidate ever offered, with a hairless, -skeletonlike face; Dewey, the Whig nominee, had a certain -handsomeness, which might have been an asset if the persistent -advocates of woman suffrage had ever gotten their -way.</p> - -<p>Traditionally, candidates never ventured west of Chicago, -concentrating their appearances in New York and -New England and leaving the campaign in the sparsely -settled trans-Mississippi to local politicians. This year both -office-seekers used every device to reach the greatest number -of voters. Dewey made a grand tour in his balloon-train; -Lewis was featured in a series of short phonotos -which were shown free. Dewey spoke several times daily -to small groups; Lewis specialized in enormous weekly -rallies followed by torchlight parades.</p> - -<p>One of these Populist rallies was held in Union Square -early in September; outgoing President George Norris -spoke, and ex-President Norman Thomas, the only Populist -to serve two terms since the beloved Bryan. Tyss indulgently -gave me permission to leave the store a couple of -hours before the meeting was to commence so I might get -a place from which to see and hear all that was going on. -Though he characterized all elections as meaningless exercises -devised to befuddle, he had been active in this one in -some mysterious and secretive way.</p> - -<p>The square was already well filled when I arrived, with -the more acrobatic members of the audience perched on -the statues of LaFayette and Washington. Calliopes played -patriotic airs, and a compressed air machine shot up puffs -of smoke which momentarily spelled out the candidate’s -name. Resigned to pantomime glimpses of what was going -on, I moved around the outside edge of the crowd, thinking -I might just as well leave altogether.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</span></p> - -<p>“Please don’t step on my foot so firmly. Or is that part -of the Populist tradition?”</p> - -<p>“Excuse me, Miss; I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”</p> - -<p>We were close enough to a light standard for me to see -she was young and well-dressed, hardly the sort of girl to -be found at a political meeting, few of which ever counted -much of a feminine audience.</p> - -<p>She rubbed her instep briefly. “It’s all right,” she conceded -grudgingly. “Serves me right for being curious about -the mob.”</p> - -<p>She was plump and pretty, with a small, discontented -mouth and pale hair worn long over her shoulders. “There’s -not much to see from here,” I said; “unless youre enthusiastic -enough to be satisfied with a bare look at the important -people, perhaps you’d let me help you to the streetcar. -For my clumsiness.”</p> - -<p>She looked at me thoughtfully. “I can manage by myself. -But if you feel you owe me something for trampling me, -maybe you’ll explain why anyone comes to these ridiculous -gatherings.”</p> - -<p>“Why ... to hear the speakers.”</p> - -<p>“Hardly any of them can. Only those close up.”</p> - -<p>“Well then, to show their support of the party, I guess.”</p> - -<p>“That’s what I thought. It’s a custom or rite or something -like that. A stupid amusement.”</p> - -<p>“But cheap,” I said. “And those who vote for Populists -usually havent much money.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe that’s why,” she answered. “If they found more -useful things to do they’d earn money; then they wouldnt -vote for Populists.”</p> - -<p>“A virtuous circle. If everyone voted Whig we’d all be -rich as Whigs.”</p> - -<p>She shrugged her shoulders, a gesture I found pleasing. -“It’s easy enough to be envious of those who are better off; -it’s a lot harder to become better off yourself.”</p> - -<p>“I can’t argue with you on that, Miss ... um ...?”</p> - -<p>“Why Mister Populist, do ladies always tell you their -names when you step on their feet?”</p> - -<p>“I’m not usually lucky enough to find feet to step on that -have lovely ladies attached,” I answered boldly. “I won’t<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</span> -deny Populist leanings, but my name is really Hodge Backmaker.”</p> - -<p>Hers was Tirzah Vame, and she was indentured to a -family of wealthy Whigs who owned a handsome modern -castiron and concrete house near the Reservoir at Forty-second -Street and Fifth Avenue. She had used the apt word -“curious” in characterizing herself but it was, as I soon -found out, a cold and inflexible curiosity which explored -only what she thought might be useful or which impressed -her as foolish. She was interested in the nature of anything -fashionable or popular or much talked of, the idea of being -concerned with anything even vaguely abstract struck her -as preposterous.</p> - -<p>She had indented, not out of stark economic necessity, -but calculatedly, believing she could achieve economic security -through indenture. This seemed paradoxical to me, -even when I contrasted my “free” condition with her bound -one. Certainly she seemed to have minimum restriction on -her time; soon after our introduction at the rally she was -meeting me almost every evening in Reservoir Square -where we sat for hours talking on a bench or walking -briskly when the autumn weather chilled our blood.</p> - -<p>I did not long flatter myself that her interest—perhaps -tolerance would be a better word—was due to any strong -attraction exerted by me. If anything she was, I think, -slightly repelled by my physical presence, which carried to -her some connotation of ordinary surroundings and contrasted -with the well-fed smooth surfaces of her employers -and their friends. The first time I kissed her she shuddered -slightly; then, closing her eyes, she allowed me to kiss her -again.</p> - -<p>She did not resist me when I pressed my lovemaking; she -led me quietly to her room in the big house on my transparent -plea that the outdoors was now too cold even for -conversation. I was no accomplished seducer, but even in -my awkward eagerness I could see she had made up her -mind I was to succeed.</p> - -<p>That her complaisance was not the result of passion was -soon obvious; there was not so much a failure on my part -to arouse her as a refusal on hers to be aroused beyond an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</span> -inescapable degree. Even as she permitted our intimacy -she remained as virginal, aloof and critical as before.</p> - -<p>“It seems hardly worth the trouble. Imagine people talking -and writing and thinking about nothing else.”</p> - -<p>“Tirzah dear—” -“And the liberties that seem to go with it. I don’t think -of you as any more dear than I did an hour ago. If people -must indulge in this sort of thing, and I suppose they must -since it’s been going on for a long time, I think it could be -conducted with more dignity.”</p> - -<p>As my infatuation increased her coolness did not lessen; -curiosity alone seemed to move her. She was amused at my -pathetic search for knowledge. “What good is your learning -ever going to do you? It’ll never get you a penny.”</p> - -<p>I smoothed the long, pale hair and kissed her ear. “Suppose -it doesnt?” I argued lazily; “There are other things -besides money.”</p> - -<p>She drew away. “That’s what those who can’t get it always -say.”</p> - -<p>“And what do people who can get it say?”</p> - -<p>“That it’s the most important thing of all,” she answered -earnestly. “That it will buy all the other things.”</p> - -<p>“It will buy you free of your indenture,” I admitted, -“but you have to get it first.”</p> - -<p>“Get it first? I never let it go. I still have the contract -payment.”</p> - -<p>“Then what was the point of indenting at all?”</p> - -<p>She looked at me wonderingly. “Havent you ever -thought about serious things? Only books and politics and -all that? How could I get opportunities without indenting? -I doubt if the Vames are much of a cut above the Backmakers; -well, youre a general drudge and I’m a governess -and tutor and even in a way a sort of distant friend to -Mrs Smythe.”</p> - -<p>“That sounds suspiciously like snobbery to me.”</p> - -<p>“Does it? Well, I’m a snob; Ive never denied it. I want -to live like a lady, to have a good house with servants and -carriages and minibiles, to travel to civilized countries, -with a place in Paris or Rome or Vienna. You can love the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</span> -poor and cheer for the Populists; I love the rich and the -Whigs.”</p> - -<p>“That’s all very well,” I objected, “but even though you -have your indenting money and can buy back your freedom -any moment you want it, how does this help you get -rich?”</p> - -<p>“Do you think I keep my money in my pocket? It’s invested, -every cent. People who come to this house give me -tips; not just money, though there’s enough of that to add -a bit to my original capital, but tips on what to buy and -sell. By the time I’m thirty I should be well off. Of course -I may marry a rich man sooner.”</p> - -<p>“That’s an awfully cold-blooded way of looking at marriage,” -I remonstrated.</p> - -<p>“Is it?” she asked indifferently. “Well, youve been telling -me I’m cold-blooded anyway. I may as well be cold-blooded -profitably.”</p> - -<p>“If that’s the way you feel I don’t understand what -we’re doing here at this moment. I’d have thought you’d -have picked a more profitable lover.”</p> - -<p>She was unruffled. “You didnt think about it at all. If -you had, you would have seen I could hardly encourage -any of the men from the class into which I intend to marry. -Great ladies can laugh at gossip, but the faintest whisper -about someone like me would be damaging. Scandal would -be unavoidable if I appeared to be anything in this house -but a chilly prude.”</p> - -<p>An appearance not too deceitful, I considered, sickly -jealous at the thought of men who might have been in my -place if they had been as anonymous, as inconsequential -as I. But this writhing jealousy was little more painful than -my frustration at having been made a convenience, a trial -experiment. Almost anyone of equal unimportance, anyone -who was not a fellow-servant or a familiar in the house -would have done as well as I, anyone unlikely ever to come -face to face with Mrs Smythe, much less talk to her.</p> - -<p>Looking back, trying to recapture for a moment that -vanished past, I have a sad, quizzical welling of pity for the -girl Tirzah and the boy Hodge. How gravely we took our -moral and political differences; how lightly the flying<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</span> -moments of union. We said and did all the wrong things, all -the things which fostered the antagonism between us and -none of the things which might have softened our youthful -self-assurance. We wrangled and argued: Dewey and -Lewis, Whig versus Populist, materialist against idealist, -reality opposing principle. It all seems so futile now; it all -appeared so vital then.</p> - -<p>Added to the almost unanimous distrust and hatred of all -foreigners in the United States, we regarded the Confederates -in particular as the cause of all our misfortunes. -We not only blamed and feared them, but looked upon -them as sinister, so Populist orators had a ready-made response -every time they referred to the Whigs as Southron -tools.</p> - -<p>Contrary to the accepted view in the United States, I -was sure the victors in the War of Southron Independence -had been men of the highest probity, and the noblest among -them was their second president. Yet I also knew that immediately -after the Peace of Richmond less dedicated individuals -became increasingly powerful in the new nation. -As Sir John Dahlberg remarked, “Power tends to corrupt.”</p> - -<p>From his first election in 1865 until his death ten years -later, President Lee had been the prisoner of an increasingly -strong and imperialistic congress. He had opposed -the invasion and conquest of Mexico by the Confederacy, -undertaken on the pretext of restoring order during the -conflict between the republicans and the emperor. However -he had too profound a respect for the constitutional processes -to continue this opposition in the face of joint resolutions -by the Confederate House and Senate.</p> - -<p>Lee remained a symbol, but as the generation which had -fought for independence died, the ideals he symbolized -faded. Negro emancipation, enacted largely because of -pressure from men like Lee, soon revealed itself as a device -for obtaining the benefits of slavery without its obligations. -The freedmen on both sides of the new border were without -franchise, and for all practical purposes without civil -rights. Yet while the old Union first restricted and then -abolished immigration, the Confederacy encouraged it, -making the newcomers subjects like the Latin-Americans<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</span> -who made up so much of the Southron population after -the Confederacy expanded southward, limiting full citizenship -to posterity of enfranchised residents in the Confederate -States on July Fourth 1864.</p> - -<p>The Populists claimed the Whigs were Confederate -agents; the Whigs retorted that the Populists were visionaries -and demagogues who tolerated if they did not actually -encourage the activities of the Grand Army. The Populists -replied by pointing to their platform which denounced -illegal organizations and lawless methods. I was not too -impressed by this, knowing how busy Tyss, Pondible and -their associates had been ever since the campaign started.</p> - -<p>On election night Tyss closed the store and we walked -the few blocks to Wanamaker & Stewarts drygoods store -where a big screen showed the returns between tinugraphs -puffing the firm’s merchandise. From the first it was apparent -the unpredictable electorate preferred Dewey to -Lewis. State after state, hitherto staunchly Populist, turned -to the Whigs for the first time since William Hale Thompson -defeated President Thomas R Marshall back in 1920 -and again Alfred E Smith in 1924, before Smith gained the -great popularity which gave him the presidency four years -later. Only Massachusetts, Connecticut, Dakotah and Oregon -went for Lewis; his own Minnesota along with twenty-one -other states plumped for Dewey.</p> - -<p>Disappointed as I was, I could not but note Tyss’s cheerful -air. When I asked him what satisfaction he could find -in so overwhelming a defeat he smiled and said, “What -defeat, Hodgins? Did you think we wanted the Populists to -win? To elect Jennings Lewis with his program of world -peace conferences? Really Hodgins, I’m afraid you learn -nothing day by day.”</p> - -<p>“You mean the Grand Army wanted Dewey all along?”</p> - -<p>“Dewey or another; we prefer a Whig administration -which presents a fixed target to a Populist one wavering all -over the place.”</p> - -<p>Of course it should have occurred to me that Tyss and -Tirzah would wind up on the same side. It was a measure -of my innocence that it never had.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C6"><i>6.</i> <i>ENFANDIN</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>Tirzah’s question, “What good is your learning -ever going to do you?” bothered me from time to time. Not -that I was burdened by any vast amount of knowledge, but -presumably I would get more—and then what? It was true -I expected no rewards from reading except the pleasure it -gave me, but the future, to use a topheavy word, could not -be entirely disregarded. I could not see myself spending a -lifetime in the bookstore. I was grateful to Tyss, despite his -disdain of this emotion, for the opportunities he had given -me, but not grateful enough to reconcile myself to becoming -another Tyss, especially one without his vitalizing involvement -with the Grand Army.</p> - -<p>Other courses were neither numerous nor inviting. To -follow Tirzah’s own example might have seemed feasible -if one ignored the vast differences of situation and character, -to say nothing of those between a hulking youth and -a pretty girl. I could hardly hope to find a wealthy family -who would buy my services, put me to congenial tasks, and -look with tolerance on my efforts to advance myself right -out of their employment. Even if such a chance existed I -could not have utilized it as she did; I should undoubtedly -confuse one stock with another or neglect to buy what I -was told until too late, winding up with lottery tickets and -losing the stubs.</p> - -<p>My helpless uncertainty only added to my disadvantage -with her. I had no hope her coolness would change to -either ardor or affection. At any moment she might decide -her curiosity was satisfied and find the awkwardness,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</span> -inconveniences, and what must have been to her the sordidness -of the affair too great.</p> - -<p>We were a strange pair of young lovers. When we talked -we argued opposing views or spoke sedately of things not -near our hearts. When we walked together in the streets -or fled the gaslit pavements for the moon over Reservoir -Square we neither held hands nor kissed impulsively. Because -prudence forbade the slightest physical contact save -in utmost privacy there were no innocent touchings or -accidental brushing of hands against hips or arms against -arms, and our secret embraces were guilty simply because -they were secret.</p> - -<p>Often I dreamed of a miraculous change, either in circumstances -or in her attitude, to dissolve the walls between -us; beneath the hope was only expectation of an abrupt -and final break. Yet when it came at last, after more than -a year, it was not the result, as I had agonizedly anticipated, -of some successful speculation or an offer of marriage, but -of natural and normal actions of my own.</p> - -<p>Among the customers to whom I frequently delivered -parcels of books was a Monsieur René Enfandin who lived -on Eighth Street, not far from Fifth Avenue. M Enfandin -was Consul for the Republic of Haiti; the house he occupied -was distinguished from otherwise equally drab neighbors -by a large red and blue escutcheon over the doorway. -He did not use the entire dwelling himself, reserving only -the parlor floor for the office of the consulate and living -quarters; the rest was let to other tenants.</p> - -<p>Tyss’s anti-foreign bias caused him to jeer at Enfandin -behind his back and embark on discourses which proved -by anthropometry and frequent references to Lombroso -and Chief Jung that Negroes were incapable of self-government. -I noticed however that he treated the consul no -differently, either in politeness or honesty, from his other -patrons, and by this time I knew Tyss well enough to attribute -this courtesy not to the self-interest of a tradesman -but to that compassion which he suppressed so sternly -under the contradictions of his nature.</p> - -<p>For a long time I paid little attention to Enfandin, beyond -noting the wide range of interests revealed by the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</span> -books he bought. I sensed that, like myself, he was inclined -to shyness. He had an arrangement whereby he turned -back most of his purchases for credit on others. I saw that -if he hadnt, his library would have soon dispossessed him; -as it was, books covered all the space not taken by the paraphernalia -of his office and bedroom with the exception of -a bit of bare wall on which hung a large crucifix. He seemed -always to have a volume in his large, dark brown hand, -politely closed over his thumb or open for eager sampling.</p> - -<p>Enfandin was tall and strong-featured, notable in any -company. In the United States where a black man was, -more than anything else, a reminder of the disastrous war -and Mr Lincoln’s proclamation, he was the permanent target -of rowdy boys and adult hoodlums. Even the diplomatic -immunity of his post was poor protection, for it was -believed, not without justification, that Haiti, the only -American republic south of the Mason-Dixon line to preserve -its independence, was disrupting the official if sporadically -executed policy of deporting Negroes to Africa -by encouraging their emigration to its own shores or, what -was even more annoying, assisting them to flee to the unconquered -Indians of Idaho or Montana.</p> - -<p>Beyond a “Good morning” or “Thank you” I doubt if -we exchanged a hundred words until the time I saw a copy -of Randolph Bourne’s <i>Fragment</i> among his selections. -“That’s not what you think it is,” I exclaimed brashly; “it’s -a novel.”</p> - -<p>He looked at me gravely. “You also admire Bourne?”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes.” I felt a trifle foolish, not only for having thrust -my advice upon him, but for the inadequacy of my comment -on a writer who had so many pertinent things to say -and had been persecuted for saying them. I was conscious -too of Tyss’s opinion: How could a cripple like Bourne -speak to whole and healthy men?</p> - -<p>“But you do not approve of fiction, is that so?” Enfandin -had no discernible accent but often his English was uncolloquial -and sometimes it was overly careful and stiff.</p> - -<p>I thought of the adventure tales I had once swallowed -so breathlessly. “Well ... it does seem to be a sort of a -waste of time.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</span></p> - -<p>He nodded. “Time, yes.... We waste it or save it or -use it—one would almost think we mastered it instead of -the other way around. Yet are all novels really a waste of -the precious dimension? Perhaps you underestimate the -value of invention.” -“No,” I said; “but what value has the invention of happenings -that never happened, or characters who never -existed?”</p> - -<p>“Who is to say what never happened? It is a matter of -definition.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” I said; “suppose the characters exist in the -author’s mind, like the events; where does the value of the -invention come in?”</p> - -<p>“Where the value of any invention comes in,” he answered. -“In its purpose or use. A wheel spinning aimlessly -is worth nothing; the same wheel on a cart or a pulley -changes destiny.”</p> - -<p>“You can’t learn anything from fairy tales,” I persisted -stubbornly.</p> - -<p>He smiled. “Maybe you havent read the right fairy -tales.”</p> - -<p>I soon discovered in him a quick and penetrating sympathy -which was at times almost telepathic. He listened to -my callow opinions patiently, offering observations of his -own without diffidence and without didacticism. The understanding -and encouragement I did not expect or want -from Tyss he gave me generously. To him, as I never could -to Tirzah, I talked of my hopes and dreams; he listened -patiently and did not seem to think them foolish or impossible -of accomplishment. I do not minimize what Tyss -did for me by saying that without Enfandin I would have -taken much less profit from the books my employer gave -me access to.</p> - -<p>I was drawn to him more and more; I’m not sure why -he interested himself in me, unless there was a reason in -the remark he made once: “Ay, we are alike, you and I. -The books, always the books. And for themselves, not to -become rich or famous like sensible people. Are we not -foolish? But it is a pleasant folly and a sometimes blameless -vice.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</span></p> - -<p>I wanted anxiously to speak of Tirzah, not only because -it is an urgent necessity for lovers to mention the name at -least of their beloved a hundred times a day or more, but -in the nebulous hope he could somehow give me an answer -to her as well as to her question. I approached the topic in -a number of different ways; each time our conversation -moved on without my having told him about her.</p> - -<p>Often, after I had delivered an armful of books to the -consulate and we had talked of a wide range of things—for, -unlike me, he had no self-consciousness about what interested -him, whether others might consider it trivial or -not—he would walk back to the bookstore with me, leaving -a note on his door. The promise that he would be “Back -in 10 minutes” was, I’m afraid, seldom fulfilled, for he -became so deeply engrossed that he was unaware of time.</p> - -<p>The occasion which was to be so important to me sprang -from a discussion of non-resistance to evil, a subject on -which he had much to say. We were just passing Wanamaker -& Stewarts and he had just triumphantly reviewed -the amazing decision of the Japanese Shogun to abolish all -police forces, when I became conscious that someone was -staring fixedly at me.</p> - -<p>A minibile, highslung and obviously custom-built, moved -slowly down the street. Its brass brightwork, bumpers like -two enormous tackheads, hub rims like delicate eyelets in -the center of the great spokes, rococo lamps, rain gutters -and door handles, was dazzling. In the jump-seat, facing a -lady of majestic demeanor, was Tirzah. Her head was -turned ostentatiously away from us.</p> - -<p>Enfandin halted as I did. “Ah,” he murmured; “you -know the ladies?”</p> - -<p>“The girl. The lady is her employer.”</p> - -<p>“I caught only a glimpse of the face, but it is a pretty -one.”</p> - -<p>“Yes. Oh yes....” I wanted desperately to say more, to -thank him as though Tirzah’s looks were somehow to my -credit, to praise her and at the same time call her cruel and -hardhearted. “Oh yes....”</p> - -<p>“She is perhaps a particular friend?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</span></p> - -<p>I nodded. “Very particular.” We walked on in silence.</p> - -<p>“That is nice. But she is perhaps a little unhappy over -your prospects?”</p> - -<p>“How did you know?”</p> - -<p>“It was not too hard to infer. You have been concealed -from the mistress; the young lady is impressed by wealth; -you are the idealistic one who is not.”</p> - -<p>At last I was able to talk. I explained her indenture, her -ambitious plans, and how I expected her to end everything -between us at any moment. “And there’s nothing I can do -about it,” I finished bitterly.</p> - -<p>“That is right, Hodge. There is nothing you can do -about it because—You will forgive me if I speak plainly, -brutally even?” -“Go ahead. Tirzah—” what a joy it was just to say the -name “—Tirzah has told me often enough how unrealistic -I am.” -“That was not what I meant. I would say there is nothing -you can do about it because there is nothing you wish -to do about it.”</p> - -<p>“What do you mean? I’d do anything I could....”</p> - -<p>“Would you? Give up books, for instance?”</p> - -<p>“Why should I? What good would that do?”</p> - -<p>“I do not say you should or that it would do good. I -only try to show that the young lady, charming and important -as she is, is not the most magnetic or important -thing in your life. Romantic love is a curious byproduct of -west European feudalism that Africans and Asiatics can -only criticize gingerly. You shake your head with obstinacy; -you do not believe me. Good, then I have not hurt you.”</p> - -<p>“I can’t see that youve helped me much, either.”</p> - -<p>“Ay! What did you expect from the black man of Haiti? -Miracles?”</p> - -<p>“Nothing less will do any good I’m afraid. Now I suppose -youll tell me I’ll get over it in time; that it’s just an -adolescent languishing anyway.”</p> - -<p>He looked at me reproachfully. “No, Hodge. I hope I -should never be the one to think suffering is tied to age -or time. As for getting over it, why, we all get over every<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</span>thing -in the end, but no matter how desirable absolute -peace is, few of us are willing to give up experience prematurely.”</p> - -<p>Later, I compared what Enfandin told me with what -Tyss might have said. Did the responsibility of holding -Tirzah lie with me and not with both of us, or with fate -or chance? Or were events so circumscribed by inevitabilities -that even to think of struggling with them was foolish?</p> - -<p>I also asked myself if I had been too proud, too hypersensitive. -I had tried to make her see my viewpoint by -arguing, by fighting hers; might it not be possible, without -giving up essentials, to approach her more gently? To divert -her, not from her ambitions, but from her contempt for -mine?</p> - -<p>Full of resolves, I left the store after eight; eager walking -brought me to our meeting place in Reservoir Square -early, but the nearby churchbells had hardly sounded the -quarter hour when she said, “Hodge.”</p> - -<p>Her unusual promptness was a good omen; I was filled -with warm optimism. “Tirzah, I saw you this afternoon—” -“Did you? I thought you were so busy with Sambo you -would never look up.”</p> - -<p>“Why do you call him that? Do you think—” -“Oh for Heavens sake, don’t start making speeches at -me. I call him Sambo because it sounds nicer than Rastus.”</p> - -<p>All my resolutions about trying to see her point of view! -“I call him M’sieu Enfandin because that’s his name.”</p> - -<p>“Have you no pride? No, I suppose you havent. Just some -strange manners. Well, I can put up with your eccentricities, -but other people wouldnt understand. What do you -think Mrs Smythe would say?”</p> - -<p>“Never having met the lady, I havent the faintest idea.”</p> - -<p>“I have, and I agree with her. Would you like me to be -chummy with a naked cannibal with a ring in his nose?”</p> - -<p>“But Enfandin doesnt wear a ring in his nose, and you -must have seen he was fully dressed. Maybe he eats missionaries -in secret, but that couldnt offend Mrs Smythe -since appearances would be saved.”</p> - -<p>“I’m serious, Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“So am I. Enfandin is my only friend.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</span></p> - -<p>“You may be above appearances and considerations of -decency but I’m not. If you ever appear in public with him -again you can stop coming here. Because I won’t have -anything more to do with you.”</p> - -<p>“But Tirzah ...” I began helplessly, overwhelmed by -the impossibility of coping with the irrelevancies and inconsistencies -of her stand. “But Tirzah....”</p> - -<p>“No,” she said firmly; “you’ll simply have to grow up, -Hodge, and stop such childish exhibitions. Only friend indeed! -Why I suppose if he appeared here right this minute, -you’d talk to him.”</p> - -<p>“Well naturally. You’d hardly expect me to—” -“But I do. That’s exactly what I’d expect. You to act -like a civilized man.”</p> - -<p>I wasnt angry. I couldnt be angry with her. “If that’s -civilization then I guess I don’t want to be civilized.”</p> - -<p>I detected astonishment in her voice. “You mean, actually -mean, you intend to keep on acting this way?”</p> - -<p>Grandfather Backmaker must have been a stubborn -man; I had my mother’s word I possessed no Hodgins -traits. “Tirzah, what would you think of me if I turned on -my only friend, the only thoroughly kind and understanding -friend Ive ever had, just because Mrs Smythe has -different notions of propriety than I have?”</p> - -<p>“I’d think you were beginning to understand things at -last.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry, Tirzah.”</p> - -<p>“I mean it, Hodge, you know. I’ll never see you again.”</p> - -<p>“If you’d only listen to my side—” -“You mean if I would only become a crank like you. -But I don’t want to be a crank or a martyr. I don’t want -to change the world. I’m normal.”</p> - -<p>“Tirzah—” -“Goodbye, Hodge.”</p> - -<p>She walked away. I had the irrational feeling that if I -called after her she might come back. Or at least stand -still and wait to hear what I had to say. I kept my mouth -obstinately closed; Enfandin had been right, the responsibility -was mine. There were things I would not give up.</p> - -<p>My heroic mood must have lasted fully fifteen minutes.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</span> -Then I hurried through the little park and across the -street to the Smythe house. There were lights in the upper -floors, but the basement, as always, was dark. I dared not -knock or ring the bell; her admonitions were too firmly -impressed on my mind. Instead, in a turmoil of emotions, -I paced the flagged sidewalk until the suspicious eye of a -patrolman was attracted; then I fled cravenly.</p> - -<p>I couldnt wait for the next day to write a long, chaotic -letter begging her to let me talk to her, just to talk to her, -for an hour, ten minutes, a minute. I offered to indent, to -emigrate, to make a fortune by some inspired means if only -she would hear me. I recalled moments together, I told her -I loved her, said I would die without her. Having covered -several pages with these sentiments I began all over and -repeated them. It was dawn when I posted the letter in the -pneumatic mail.</p> - -<p>Sleepless and tormented, I was of little use to Tyss next -day. Would she telegraph? If she answered by pneumatic -post her letter might be delivered in the afternoon. Or -would she come to the bookstore?</p> - -<p>The second day I sent off two more letters and went up -to Reservoir Square on the chance she might appear. I -watched the house as though my concentration would force -her to emerge. On the third day my letters came back, -unopened.</p> - -<p>There is some catchphrase or other about the elasticity -of youth. It is true it was only weeks before my misery -abated, and weeks more before I was heart-whole again. -But those weeks were long.</p> - -<p>The subject of Tirzah did not come up again between -Enfandi and me. He must have sensed I had lost her, perhaps -he even guessed his connection with the break, but -he was too tactful to mention it and I was too sore.</p> - -<p>I don’t know if the episode precipitated some maturity -in me, or if, as a result of grief and anger I tried to turn -my mind away from the easy emotions and shield myself -against further hurt. At any rate, whether there was a logical -connection or not, it is from this period that I date my -resolve to center my reading on history. Somewhat diffidently -I spoke of this to him.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</span></p> - -<p>“History? But certainly, Hodge. It is a noble study. But -what is history? How is it written? How is it read? Is it a -dispassionate chronicle of events scientifically determined -and set down in the precise measure of their importance? -Is this ever possible? Or is it the transmutation of the ordinary -into the celebrated? Or the cunning distortion which -gives a clearer picture than accurate blueprints?”</p> - -<p>“It seems to me facts are primary and interpretations -come after,” I answered. “If we can find out the facts we -can form our individual opinions on them.”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps. Perhaps. But take what is for me the central -fact of all history.” He pointed to the crucifix. “As a -Catholic the facts are plain to me; I believe what is written -in the Gospels to be literally true: that the Son of Man -died for me on that cross. But what were the facts for a -contemporary Roman statesman? That an obscure local -agitator threatened the stability of an uneasy province and -was promptly executed in the approved Roman fashion as -a warning to others. And for a contemporary fellow-countryman? -That no such person existed. You think these facts -are mutually exclusive? Yet you know no two people see -exactly the same thing; too many honest witnesses have -contradicted each other. Even the Gospels must be reconciled.”</p> - -<p>“You are saying that truth is relative.”</p> - -<p>“Am I? Then I shall have my tongue examined, or my -head. Because I mean to say no such thing. Truth is absolute -and for all time. But one man cannot envisage all of -truth; the best he can do is see a single aspect of it whole. -That is why I say to you, be a skeptic, Hodge. Always be -the skeptic.”</p> - -<p>“Ay?” I was finding the admonition a little difficult to -harmonize with his previous confession of faith.</p> - -<p>“For the believer skepticism is essential. How else is he -to know false gods from true except by doubting both? One -of the most pernicious of folk-sayings is, ‘I could scarcely -believe my eyes?’ Why should you believe your eyes? You -were given eyes to see with, not to believe with. Believe -your mind, your intuition, your reason, your feelings if you -like—but not your eyes unaided by any of these inter<span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</span>preters. -Your eyes can see the mirage, the hallucination, -as easily as the actual scenery. Your eyes will tell you -nothing exists but matter—” -“Not my eyes only, but my boss.”</p> - -<p>“Ay? What are you saying?” For all his amiability Enfandin -enjoyed interruption in mid-discourse no more -than any other teacher. But in a moment his irritation -vanished and he listened to my description of Tyss’s mechanistic -creed.</p> - -<p>“God have mercy on his soul,” he muttered at last. “Poor -creature. He has liberated himself from the superstitions -of religion in order to fall into superstition so abject no -Christian can conceive it. Imagine to yourself—” he began -to pace the floor “—time is circular, man is automaton, we -are doomed to repeat the same gestures over and over, forever. -Oh I say to you, Hodge, this is monstrous. The poor -man. The poor man.” -I nodded. “Yes. But what is the answer? Limitless space? -Limitless time? They are almost as horrifying, because they -are inconceivable and awful.”</p> - -<p>“And why should the inconceivable and awful be horrifying? -Is our small human understanding the ultimate -measuring stick and guide? But of course this is not the -answer. The answer is that all—time, space, matter—all -is illusion. All but the good God Himself. Nothing is real -but Him. We are creatures of His fancy, figments of His -imagination....” -“Then where does free will come in?”</p> - -<p>“As a gift, naturally. Or supernaturally. How else? The -greatest gift and the greatest responsibility.”</p> - -<p>I can’t say I was entirely satisfied with his exposition, -though it was certainly more to my taste than Tyss’s. I returned -to the conversation at intervals, both in my thoughts -and when I saw him, but in the end I suppose all I really -accepted was his admonition to be skeptical, which I doubt -I always applied the way he meant me to.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C7"><i>7.</i> <i>OF CONFEDERATE AGENTS -IN 1942</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>To anyone but the mooncalf I still was in the year -of my majority it would have long since occurred with considerable -force that Enfandin ought to be told of Tyss’s -connection with the Negro-hating, anti-foreign Grand -Army. And the thought once entertained, no matter how -belatedly, would have been immediately translated into -warning. For me it became a dilemma.</p> - -<p>If I exposed Tyss to Enfandin I would certainly be basely -ungrateful to the man who had saved me from destitution -and given me the opportunity I wanted so much. Membership -in the Grand Army was a crime, even though the laws -were laxly enforced, and I could hardly expect an official -receiving the hospitality of the United States to conceal -knowledge of a felony against his host, especially when the -Grand Army was what it was. Yet if I kept silent I would -be less than a friend.</p> - -<p>If I spoke I would be an informer; if I didnt, a hypocrite -and worse. The fact that neither man, for totally different -reasons, would condemn me whichever course I took increased -rather than diminished my perplexity. I procrastinated, -which meant I was actually protecting Tyss, and -that this was against my sympathies increased my feeling -of guilt.</p> - -<p>At this juncture a series of events involved me still -deeper with the Grand Army and further complicated my -relationship to both Tyss and Enfandin. It began the day -a customer called himself to my attention with a selfconscious -clearing of his throat.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</span></p> - -<p>“Yes sir. Can I help you?”</p> - -<p>He was a fat little man with palpably false teeth, and -hair hanging down behind over his collar. However the -sum of his appearance was in no way ludicrous; rather he -gave the impression of ease and authority, and an assurance -so strong there was no necessity to buttress it.</p> - -<p>“Why, I was looking for—” he began, and then scrutinized -me sharply. “Say, aint you the young fella I saw -walking with a Nigra? Big black buck?”</p> - -<p>Seemingly everyone had been fascinated by the spectacle -of two people of slightly different shades of color in company -with each other. I felt myself reddening. “There’s no -law against it, is there?”</p> - -<p>He made a gargling noise which I judged was laughter. -“Wouldnt know about your damyankee laws, boy. For myself -I’d say there’s no harm in it, no harm in it at all. Always -did like to be around Nigras myself. But then I was rared -among em. Most damyankees seem to think Nigras aint -fitten company. Only goes to show how narrerminded and -bigoted you folks can be. Present company excepted.”</p> - -<p>“M’sieu Enfandin is consul of the Republic of Haiti,” I -said; “he’s a scholar and a gentleman.” As soon as the -words were out I was bitterly sorry for their condescension -and patronage. I felt ashamed, as if I had betrayed him by -offering credentials to justify my friendship and implying -it took special qualities to overcome the handicap of his -color.</p> - -<p>“A mussoo, huh? Furrin and educated Nigra? Well, -guess theyre all right.” His tone, still hearty, was slightly -dubious. “Ben working here long?”</p> - -<p>“Nearly four years.”</p> - -<p>“Kind of dull, aint it?”</p> - -<p>“Oh no—I like to read, and there are plenty of books -around here.” -He frowned. “Should think a hefty young fella’d find -more interesting things. Youre indented, of course? No? -Well then youre a mighty lucky fella. In a way, in a way. -Naturally youll be short on cash, ay? Unless you draw a -lucky number in the lottery.”</p> - -<p>I told him I’d never bought a lottery ticket.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</span></p> - -<p>He slapped his leg as though I’d just repeated a very -good joke. “Aint that the pattrun,” he exclaimed; “aint that -the pattrun! Necessity makes em have a lottery; Puritanism -keeps em from buying tickets. Aint that the pattrun!” He -gargled the humor of it for some time, while his eyes moved -restlessly around the dim interior of the store. “And what -do you read, ay? Sermons? Books on witches?”</p> - -<p>I admitted I’d dipped into both, and then, perhaps trying -to impress him, explained my ambitions.</p> - -<p>“Going to be a professional historian, hey? Little out of -my line, but I don’t suppose they’s many of em up North -here.”</p> - -<p>“Not unless you count a handful of college instructors -who dabble in it”</p> - -<p>He shook his head. “Young fella with your aims could -do better down South, I’d think.”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes; some of the most interesting research is going -on right now in Leesburg, Washington-Baltimore and the -University of Lima. You are a Confederate yourself, sir?”</p> - -<p>“Southron, yes sir, I am that and mighty proud of it. -Now look a-here, boy: I’ll lay all my cards on the table, -face up. Youre a free man and you aint getting any pay -here. Now how’d you like to do a little job for me? They’s -good money in it; and I imagine I’d be able to fix up one -of those deals—what do they call em? scholarships—at the -University of Leesburg, after.” -A scholarship at Leesburg. Where the Department of -History was engaged on a monumental project—nothing -less than a compilation of all known source material on -the War of Southron Independence! It was only with the -strongest effort that I refrained from agreeing blindly.</p> - -<p>“It sounds fine, Mr—?” -“Colonel Tolliburr. Jest call me cunnel.”</p> - -<p>There wasnt anything remotely military in his bearing. -“It sounds good to me, Colonel. What is the job?”</p> - -<p>He clicked his too regular teeth thoughtfully. “Hardly -anything at all, m’boy, hardly anything at all. Just want you -to keep a list for me.”</p> - -<p>He seemed to think this a complete explanation. “What -kind of list, Colonel?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</span></p> - -<p>“Why, list of the people that come in here steady. Especially -the ones don’t seem to buy anything, just talk to your -boss. Names if you know em, but that aint real important, -and a sort of rough description. Like five foot nine, blue -eyes, dark hair, busted nose, scar on right eyebrow. And -so on. Nothing real detailed. And a list of deliveries.”</p> - -<p>Was I tempted? I don’t really know. “I’m sorry, Colonel. -I’m afraid I can’t help you.”</p> - -<p>“Not even for that scholarship and say, a hundred dollars -in real money?”</p> - -<p>I shook my head.</p> - -<p>“They’s no harm in it, boy. Likely nothing’ll come of it.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry.”</p> - -<p>“Two hundred? I’m not talking about yankee slugs, but -good CSA bills, each with a picture of President Jimmy -right slapdash on the middle of it.”</p> - -<p>“It’s not a matter of money, Colonel Tolliburr.”</p> - -<p>He looked at me shrewdly. “Think it over, boy. No use -being hasty.” He handed me a card. “Any time you change -your mind come and see me or send me a telegram.”</p> - -<p>I watched him out of the store. The Grand Army must -be annoying the mighty Confederacy. Tyss ought to know -about the agent’s interest. And I knew I would be unable -to tell him.</p> - -<p>“Suppose,” I asked Enfandin the next day, “suppose -one were placed in the position of being an involuntary -assistant in a—to a....” -I was at a loss for words to describe the situation without -being incriminatingly specific. I could not tell him about -Tolliburr and my clear duty to let Tyss know of the -colonel’s espionage without revealing Tyss’s connection -with the Grand Army and thus uncovering my deceit in not -warning Enfandin earlier. Whatever I said or failed to say, -I was somehow culpable.</p> - -<p>He waited patiently while I groped, trying to formulate -a question which was no longer a question. “You can’t do -evil that good may come of it,” I burst out at last.</p> - -<p>“Quite so. And then?”</p> - -<p>“Well.... That might mean eventually giving up all<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</span> -action entirely, since we can never be sure even the most -innocent act may not have bad consequences.”</p> - -<p>He nodded. “It might. The Manichaeans thought it did; -they believed good and evil balanced and man was created -in the image of Satan. But certainly there is a vast difference -between this inhuman dogma and refusing to do consciously -wicked deeds.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe,” I said dubiously.</p> - -<p>He looked at me speculatively. “A man is drowning in -the river. I have a rope. If I throw him the rope he may not -only climb to safety but take it from me and use it to garrote -some honest citizen. Shall I therefore let him drown -because I must not do good lest evil come of it?”</p> - -<p>“But sometimes they are so mixed up it is impossible to -disentangle them.”</p> - -<p>“Impossible? Or very difficult?”</p> - -<p>“Um.... I don’t know.”</p> - -<p>“Are you not perhaps putting the problem too abstractly? -Is not perhaps your situation—your hypothetical situation—one -of being accessory to wrong rather than facing -an alternative which means personal unhappiness?” -Again I struggled for noncommittal words. He had formulated -my dilemma about the Grand Army so far as it -connected with giving up my place in the bookstore or telling -him of Tyss’s bias. Yet not entirely. And why could I -not let Tyss know of Colonel Tolliburr’s visit, which it -was certainly my duty to do? Was this overscrupulousness -only a means of avoiding any unpleasantness?</p> - -<p>“Yes,” I muttered at last.</p> - -<p>“It would be very nice if there were no drawbacks ever -attached to the virtuous choice. Then the only ones who -would elect to do wrong would be those of twisted minds, -the perverse, the insane. Who would prefer the devious -course if the straight one were just as easy? No, no, my -dear Hodge; one cannot escape the responsibility for his -choice simply because the other way means inconvenience -or hardships or tribulation.”</p> - -<p>“Must we always act, whether we are sure of the outcome -of our action or not?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</span></p> - -<p>“Not acting is also action; can we always be sure of the -outcome of refusing to act?”</p> - -<p>Was it pettiness that made me contrast his position as an -official of a small yet fairly secure power, well enough paid -to live comfortably, with mine where a break with Tyss -meant beggary and no further chance of fulfilling the ambition -every day more important to me? <i>Did</i> circumstances -alter cases, and was it easy for Enfandin to talk as he did, -unconfronted with harsh alternatives?</p> - -<p>“You know, Hodge,” he said as though changing the -subject, “I am what they call a career man, meaning I have -no money except my salary. This might seem much to you, -but it is really little, particularly since protocol says I must -spend more than necessary. For the honor of my country. -At home I have an establishment to keep up where my -wife and children live—” -I had wondered about his apparent bachelorhood.</p> - -<p>“—because to be rudely frank, I do not think they would -be happy or safe in the United States on account of their -color. Besides these expenses I make personal contributions -for the assistance of black men who are—how shall we say -it?—unhappily circumstanced in your country, for I have -found the official allotment is never enough. Now I have -been indiscreet; you know state secrets. Why do I tell you -this? Because, my friend, I should like to help. Alas, I cannot -offer money. But this I can do, if it will not offend -your pride: I suggest you live here—it will be no more -uncomfortable than the arrangements you have described -in the store—and attend one of the colleges of the city. A -medal or an order from the Haitian government judiciously -conferred on an eminent educator—decorations cut so -nicely across color-lines, perhaps because they don’t show -their origin to the uninitiated—should take care of tuition -fees. What do you say?” -What could I say? That I did not deserve his generosity? -The statement would be meaningless, a catchphrase, unless -I explained that I’d not been open with him, and now even -less than before was I able to do this. Or could I say that -bare minutes earlier I had thought enviously and spitefully -of him? Wretched and happy, I mumbled incoherent<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</span> -thanks, began a number of sentences and left them unfinished, -lapsed into dazed silence.</p> - -<p>But the newly opened prospect cut through my introspection -and scattered my self-reproaches. The future was -too exciting to dwell in any other time; in a moment we -were both sketching rapid plans and supplementing each -other’s designs with revisions of our own. Words tumbled -out; ideas were caught in mid-expression. We decided, we -reconsidered, we returned to the first decisions.</p> - -<p>I was to give Tyss two weeks’ notice despite the original -agreement making such nicety superfluous; Enfandin was -to discuss matriculation with a professor he knew. My employer -raised a quizzical eyebrow at my information.</p> - -<p>“Ah, Hodgins, you see how neatly the script works out. -Nothing left to chance or choice. If you hadnt been relieved -of your trifling capital by a man of enterprise whose methods -were more successful than subtle you might have -fumbled at the edge of the academic world for four years -and then, having substituted a wad of unrelated facts for -common sense and whatever ability to think you may have -possessed, fumbled for the rest of your life at the edge of -the economic world. You wouldnt have met George Pondible -or gotten here where you could discover your own -mind without adjustment to a professorial iron maiden.”</p> - -<p>“I thought it was all arbitrary.”</p> - -<p>He gave me a reproachful look. “Arbitrary and predetermined -are not synonymous, Hodgins, nor does either -rule out artistry. Mindless artistry of course, like that of -the snowflake or crystal. And how artistic this development -is! You will go on to become a professor yourself and construct -iron maidens for promising students who might become -your competitors. You will write learned histories, -for you are—havent I said this before?—the spectator type. -The part written for you does not call for you to be a participant, -an instrument for—apparently—influencing -events. Hence it is proper that you report them so future -generations may get the illusion they arent puppets.” -He grinned at me. At another time I would have been -delighted to pounce on the assortment of inconsistencies -he had just offered; at the moment I could think of nothing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</span> -but my failure to mention the Confederate agent’s visit. It -almost seemed his mechanist notions were valid and I was -destined always to be the ungrateful recipient of kindness.</p> - -<p>“All right,” he said, swallowing the last of his bread and -half-raw meat; “so long as your sentimentality impels you -to respect obligations I can find work for you. Those boxes -over there go upstairs. Pondible’s bringing a van around for -them this afternoon.”</p> - -<p>Ive heard the assumption that working in a bookstore -must be light and pleasant. Many times during the years -with Roger Tyss I had reason to be thankful for my strength -and farm training. The boxes were deceptively small but -so heavy they could only have been solidly packed with -paper. Even with Tyss carrying box for box with me I was -vastly relieved when I had to quit to run an errand.</p> - -<p>When I got back he went out to make an offer on someone’s -library. “There are only four left. The last two are -paper-wrapped; didnt have enough boxes.”</p> - -<p>It was characteristic of him to leave the lighter packages -for me. I ran up the stairs with one of the two remaining -wooden containers. Returning, I tripped on the lowest step -and sprawled forward. Reflexively I threw out my hands -and landed on one of the paper parcels. The tight-stretched -covering cracked and split under the impact; the contents—neatly -tied rectangular bundles—spilled out.</p> - -<p>I had learned enough of the printing trade to recognize -the brightly colored oblongs as lithographs, and I wondered -as I stooped over to gather them up why such a job should -have been given Tyss rather than a shop specializing in this -work. Even under the gaslight the colors were hard and -vigorous.</p> - -<p>Then I really looked at the bundle I was holding. ESPAÑA -was enscrolled across the top; below it was the picture -of a man with long nose and jutting underlip, flanked -by two ornate figure fives, and beneath them the legend, -CINCO PESETAS. Spanish Empire banknotes. Bundles -and bundles of them.</p> - -<p>I needed neither expert knowledge nor minute scrutiny -to tell me there was a fortune here in counterfeit money. -The purpose in forging Spanish currency I could not see;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</span> -that it was no private undertaking of Tyss’s but an activity -of the Grand Army I was certain. Puzzled and worried, I -rewrapped the bundles of notes into as neat an imitation of -the original package as I could contrive.</p> - -<p>The rest of the day I spent casting uneasy glances at the -mound of boxes and watching with apprehension the movement -of anyone toward them. Death was the penalty for -counterfeiting United States coins; I had no idea of the -punishment for doing the same with foreign paper but I -was sure even so minor an accessory as myself would be -in a sad way if some officious customer should stumble -against one of the packages.</p> - -<p>Tyss in no way acted like a guilty man, or even one with -an important secret. He seemed unaware of any peril; -doubtless he was daily in similar situations, only chance -and my own lack of observation had prevented my discovering -this earlier.</p> - -<p>Nor did he show anxiety when Pondible failed to arrive. -Darkness came and the gaslamps went on in the streets. -The heavy press of traffic outside dwindled, but the incriminating -boxes remained undisturbed near the door. At -last there was the sound of uncertain wheels slowing up -outside and Pondible’s voice admonishing, “Wh-whoa!”</p> - -<p>I rushed out just as he was dismounting with slow dignity. -“Who goes?” he asked; “Vance and give a countersign.”</p> - -<p>“It’s Hodge,” I said. “Let me help you.”</p> - -<p>“Hodge! Old friend; not seen long time!” (He had been -in the store only the day before.) “Terrible sfortune, Hodge. -Dri-driving wagon. Fell off. Fell off wagon I mean. See?”</p> - -<p>“Sure, I see. Let me hitch the horse for you. Mr Tyss -is waiting.”</p> - -<p>“Avoidable,” he muttered, “nuvoidable, voidable. Fell -off.”</p> - -<p>Tyss took him by the arm. “You come with me and rest -awhile. Hodgins, you better start loading up; youll have -to do the delivering now.”</p> - -<p>Rebellious refusal formed in my mind. Why should I be -still further involved? He had no right to demand it of me; -in self-protection I was bound to refuse. “Mr Tyss....”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</span></p> - -<p>“Yes?”</p> - -<p>Two weeks would see me free of him, but nothing could -wipe out the debt I owed him. “Nothing. Nothing,” I murmured -and picked up one of the boxes.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C8"><i>8.</i> <i>IN VIOLENT TIMES</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>He gave me an address on Twenty-Sixth Street. -“Sprovis is the name.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” I said as stolidly as I could.</p> - -<p>“Let them do the unloading. I see there’s a full feedbag -in the van; that’ll be a good time to give it to the horse.”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>“They’ll load up another consignment and drive with you -to the destination. Take the van back to the livery stable. -Here’s money for your supper and carfare back here.”</p> - -<p>He thinks of everything, I reflected bitterly. Except that -I don’t want to have anything to do with this.</p> - -<p>Driving slackly through the almost empty streets my resentment -continued to rise, drowning, at least partly, my -fear of being for some unfathomable reason stopped by a -police officer and apprehended. Why should I be stopped? -Why should the Grand Army counterfeit pesetas?</p> - -<p>The address, which I had trouble finding on the poorly -lit thoroughfare, was one of those four-storey stuccos at -least a century old, showing few signs of recent repair. Mr -Sprovis, who occupied the basement, had one ear distinctly -larger than the other, an anomaly I could not help attributing -to a trick of constantly pulling on the lobe. He, like -the others who came out with him to unload the van, wore -the Grand Army beard.</p> - -<p>“I had to come instead of Pon—” -“No names,” he growled. “Hear? No names.”</p> - -<p>“All right. I was told you’d unload and load up again.”</p> - -<p>“Yeah, yeah.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</span></p> - -<p>I slipped the strap of the feedbag over the horse’s ear -and started toward Eighth Avenue.</p> - -<p>“Hey! Where you going?”</p> - -<p>“To get something to eat. Anything wrong with that?”</p> - -<p>I felt him peering suspiciously at me. “Guess not. But -don’t keep us waiting, see? We’ll be ready to go in twenty -minutes.”</p> - -<p>I did not like Mr Sprovis. In the automatic lunchroom -where the dishes were delivered by a clever clockwork device -as coins were deposited in the right slots, I gorged on -fish and potatoes, but my pleasure at getting away for once -from the unvarying bread and heart was spoiled by the -thought of him. And I was at best no more than half -through with the night’s adventure. What freight Sprovis -and his companions were now loading in the van I had -no idea. Except that it was nothing innocent.</p> - -<p>When I turned the corner into Twenty-Sixth Street -again, the shadowy mass of the horse and van was gone -from its place by the curb. Alarmed, I broke into a run and -discovered it turning in the middle of the block. I jumped -and caught hold of the dash, pulling myself aboard. “What’s -the idea?”</p> - -<p>A fist caught me in the shoulder, almost knocking me -back into the street. Zigzags of shock ran down my arm, -terminating in numbing pain. Desperately I clung to the -dash.</p> - -<p>“Hold it,” someone rumbled; “it’s the punk who came -with. Let him in.”</p> - -<p>Another voice, evidently belonging to the man who’d -hit me, admonished, “Want to watch yourself, chum. Not -go jumping like that without warning. I might of stuck a -shiv in your ribs instead of my hand.”</p> - -<p>I could only repeat, “What’s the idea of trying to run -off with the van? I’m responsible for it.”</p> - -<p>“He’s responsible, see,” mocked another voice from the -body of the van. “Aint polite not to wait on him.”</p> - -<p>I was wedged between the driver and my assailant; my -shoulder ached and I was beginning to be really frightened -now my first anger had passed. These were “action” members -of the Grand Army; men who regularly committed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</span> -battery, mayhem, arson, robbery and murder. I had been -both foolhardy and lucky; realizing this it seemed diplomatic -not to try for possession of the reins.</p> - -<p>I could hear the breathing and mumbling of others in -back, but it didnt need this to tell me the van was over-loaded. -We turned north on Sixth Avenue; the street lights -showed Sprovis driving. “Gidap, gidap,” he urged, “get -going!”</p> - -<p>“That’s a horse,” I protested; “not a locomotive.”</p> - -<p>“What do you know?” came from behind; “And we -thought we was on the Erie.”</p> - -<p>“He’s tired,” I persisted, “and he’s pulling too much -weight.”</p> - -<p>“Shut up,” ordered Sprovis quietly. “Shut up.” The -quietness was not deceptive; it was ominous. I shut up.</p> - -<p>Speed was stupid on several counts. For one thing it -called attention to the van at a time when most commercial -vehicles had been stabled for the night and the traffic was -almost entirely carriages, buggies, hacks and minibiles. I -visualized the suspicious crowd which would gather immediately -if our horse dropped from exhaustion. There was -no hope that consciousness of an innocuous cargo made -Sprovis bold; whatever we carried was bound to be as incriminating -as the counterfeit bills.</p> - -<p>Disconnected scraps of conversation drifted from -Sprovis’ companions. “I says, ‘Look here, youre making -a nice profit from selling abroad. Either you....’”</p> - -<p>“And of course he put it all on a twenty-dollar ticket -even though....”</p> - -<p>“‘ ... my taxes,’ he says. ‘You worry about your taxes,’ -I says; ‘I’m worried about your contributions.’”</p> - -<p>A monotonous chuffing close behind us forced itself into -my consciousness; when we turned eastward in the Forties -I exclaimed, “There’s a minibile following us!”</p> - -<p>Even as I spoke the trackless engine pulled alongside -and then darted ahead to pocket us by nosing diagonally -toward the curb. The horse must have been too weak to -shy; he simply stopped short and I heard the curses of the -felled passengers behind me.</p> - -<p>“Not the cops anyway!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</span></p> - -<p>“Cons for a nickel!”</p> - -<p>“Only half a block from—” -“Quick, break out the guns—” -“Not those guns; one bang and we’re through. Air pistols, -if anybody’s got one. Hands or knives. Get them all!”</p> - -<p>They piled out swiftly past me; I remained alone on the -seat, an audience of one, properly ensconced. A few blocks -away was the small park where Tirzah used to meet me. -It was not believable that this was happening in one of -New York’s quietest residential districts in the year 1942.</p> - -<p>An uneven, distorting light emphasized the abnormal -speed of the incident that followed, making the action seem -jumpy, as though the participants were caught at static -moments, changing their attitudes between flashes of visibility. -The tempo was so swift any possible spectators in -the bordering windows or on the sidewalks wouldnt have -had time to realize what was going on before it was all -over.</p> - -<p>Four men from the minibile were met by five from the -van. The odds were not too unequal, for the attackers had -a discipline which Sprovis’ force lacked. Their leader attempted -to parley during one of those seconds of apparent -inaction. “Hay you men—we got nothing against you. -They’s a thousand dollars apiece in it for you—” -A fist smacked into his mouth. The light caught his face -as he was jolted back, but I hardly needed its revelation to -confirm my recognition of Colonel Tolliburr’s voice.</p> - -<p>The Confederate agents had brass knuckles and black-jacks, -Colonel Tolliburr had a sword-cane which he unsheathed -with a glinting flourish. The Grand Army men -flashed knives; no one seemed to be using air pistols or -spring-powered guns.</p> - -<p>Both sides were intent on keeping the clash as quiet and -inconspicuous as possible; no one shouted with anger or -screamed in pain. This muffled intensity made the struggle -more gruesome; the contenders fought their natural impulses -as well as each other. I heard the impact of blows, -the grunts of effort, the choked-back cries, the scraping of -shoes on pavement and the thud of falls. One of the defenders -fell, and two of the attackers, before the two re<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</span>maining -Southrons gave up the battle and attempted -escape.</p> - -<p>With united impulse they started for the minibile, evidently -realized they wouldnt have time to get up power, -and began running down the street. Their moment of indecision -did for them. As the four Grand Army men closed in -I saw the Confederates raise their arms in the traditional -gesture of surrender. Then they were struck down.</p> - -<p>I crept noiselessly down on the off-side of the van and -hastened quietly away in the protection of the shadows.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C9"><i>9.</i> <i>BARBARA</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>For the next few days reading was pure pretense. -I used the opened book to mask my privacy while I -trembled not so much with fear as with horror. I had been -brought up in a harsh enough world and murder was no -novelty in New York; I had seen slain men before, but this -was the first time I had been confronted with naked, merciless -savagery. Though I believed Sprovis would have had -no qualms about despatching an inconvenient witness if I -had stayed on the van, I had no particular fear for my -own safety, for my knowledge of what had happened became -less dangerous daily. The terror of the deed itself -however remained constant.</p> - -<p>I was not concerned solely with revulsion. Inquisitiveness -looked out under loathing to make me wonder what -lay behind the night’s events. What had really happened, -and what did it all mean?</p> - -<p>From scraps of conversation accidentally heard or deliberately -eavesdropped, from the newspapers, from deduction -and remembered fragments, I reconstructed the picture -which made the background. Its borders reached a -long way from Astor Place.</p> - -<p>For years the world had been waiting, half in dread, -half in resignation, for war to break out between the world’s -two Great Powers, the German Union and the Confederate -States. Some expected the point of explosion would be the -Confederacy’s ally, the British Empire; most anticipated at -least part of the war would be fought in the United States.</p> - -<p>The scheme of the Grand Army, or of that part of it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</span> -which included Tyss, was apparently a farfetched and fantastic -attempt to circumvent the probable course of history. -The counterfeiting was an aspect of this attempt which was -nothing less than trying to force the war to start, not -through the Confederacy’s ally, but through the German -Union’s—the Spanish Empire. With enormous amounts -of the spurious currency circulated by emissaries posing as -Confederate agents, the Grand Army hoped to embroil the -Confederacy with Spain and possibly preserve the neutrality -of the United States. It was an ingenuous idea evolved, -I see now, by men without knowledge of the actual mechanics -of world politics.</p> - -<p>If I ever had any sentimental notions about the Army -they vanished now. Tyss’s mechanism may not have been -purposefully designed to palliate, but it made it easy to -justify actions like Sprovis’. I had no such convenient way -of numbing my conscience. But even as I brooded over the -weakness and cowardice which made me an accomplice, I -looked forward to my release. I had not seen Enfandin -since his offer; in a week I would leave the bookstore for -his sanctuary, and I resolved my first act should be to tell -him everything. And then that dream was exploded just -as it was about to be realized.</p> - -<p>I do not know who it was broke into the consulate or -for what reason, and was surprised in the act, shooting and -wounding Enfandin so seriously he was unable to speak -for the weeks before he was finally returned to Haiti to recuperate -or die. He could not have gotten in touch with -me and I was not permitted to see him; the police guard -was doubly zealous to keep him from all contact since he -was both an accredited diplomat and a black man.</p> - -<p>I did not know who shot him. It was most unlikely to be -anyone connected with the Grand Army, but I did not -know. I could not know. He <i>might</i> have been shot by -Sprovis or George Pondible. Since the ultimate chain could -have led back to me, it did lead back to me. If this were -the Manichaeism of which Enfandin had spoken, I could -not help it</p> - -<p>The loss of my chance to escape from the bookstore was -the least of my despair. It seemed to me I was caught by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</span> -the inexorable, choiceless circumstance in which Tyss so -firmly believed and Enfandin denied. I could escape neither -my guilt nor the surroundings conducive to further guilt. -I could not change destiny.</p> - -<p>Was all this merely the self-torture of any introverted -young man? Possibly. I only know that for a long time, long -as one in his early twenties measures time, I lost all interest -in life, even dallying with thoughts of suicide. I put books -aside distastefully or, which was worse, indifferently.</p> - -<p>I must have done my work around the store; certainly I -recall no comments from Tyss about it. Neither can I remember -anything to distinguish the succession of days. -Obviously I ate and slept; there were undoubtedly long -hours free from utter hopelessness. The details of those -months have simply vanished.</p> - -<p>Nor can I say precisely when it was my despair began -to lift. I know that one day—it was cold and the snow was -deep on the ground, deep enough to keep the minibiles off -the streets and cause the horse-cars trouble—I saw a girl -walking briskly, red-cheeked, breathing in quick visible -puffs, and my glance was not apathetic. When I returned to -the bookstore I picked up Field Marshal Liddell-Hart’s -<i>Life of General Pickett</i> and opened it to the place where -I had abandoned it. In a moment I was fully absorbed.</p> - -<p>Paradoxically, once I was myself again I was no longer -the same Hodge Backmaker. For the first time I was determined -to do what I wanted instead of waiting and hoping -events would somehow turn out right for me. Somehow I -was going to free myself from the bookstore and all its -frustrations and evils.</p> - -<p>This resolution was reinforced by the discovery that I -was exhausting the volumes around me. The books I -sought now were rare and ever more difficult to find. Innocent -of knowledge about academic life I imagined them -ready to hand in any college library.</p> - -<p>Nor was I any longer satisfied with the printed word -alone. My friendship with Enfandin had shown me how -fruitful a personal, face-to-face relationship between -teacher and student could be, and it seemed to me such<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</span> -ties could develop into ones between fellow scholars, a mutual, -uncompetitive pursuit of knowledge.</p> - -<p>Additionally I wanted to search the real, the original -sources: unpublished manuscripts of participants or onlookers, -old diaries and letters, wills or accountbooks, -which might shade a meaning or subtly change the interpretation -of old, forgotten actions.</p> - -<p>My problems could be solved ideally by an instructorship -at some college, but how was this to be achieved without -the patronage of a Tolliburr or an Enfandin? I had no -credentials worth a second’s consideration. Though the -immigration bars kept out graduates of foreign universities, -no college in the United States would accept a -self-taught young man who had not only little Latin and -less Greek, but no mathematics, languages, or sciences at -all. For a long time I considered possible ways and means, -both drab and dramatic; at last, more in a spirit of whimsical -absurdity than sober hope, I wrote out a letter of -application, setting forth the qualifications I imagined myself -to possess, assaying the extent of my learning with a -generosity only ingenuousness could palliate, and outlining -the work I projected for my future. With much care and -many revisions I set this composition in type. It was undoubtedly -a foolish gesture, but not having access to so -costly a machine as a typewriter, and not wanting to reveal -this by penning the letters by hand, I resorted to this transparent -device.</p> - -<p>Tyss picked up one of the copies I struck off and glanced -over it. His expression was critical. “Is it too bad?” I asked -despondently.</p> - -<p>“You should have used more leading. And lined it up -and justified the lines and eliminated hyphens. Setting type -can never be done mechanically or half-heartedly—that’s -why no one yet has been able to invent a practical typesetting -machine. I’m afraid you’ll never make a passable -printer, Hodgins.” -He was concerned only with typesetting, uninterested -in the outcome. Or satisfied, since it was predetermined, -that comment was superfluous.</p> - -<p>Government mails, never efficient and always expensive,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</span> -being one of the favorite victims of holdup men, and pneumatic -post limited to local areas, I dispatched the letters -by Wells, Fargo to a comprehensive list of colleges. I can’t -say I then waited for the replies to flow in, for though I -knew the company’s system of heavily armed guards would -insure delivery of my applications, I had little anticipation -of any answers. As a matter of fact I put it pretty well out -of my mind, dredging it up at rarer intervals, always a trifle -more embarrassed by my presumption.</p> - -<p>It was several months later, toward the end of September, -that the telegram came signed Thomas K Haggerwells. -It read, <span class="allsmcap">ACCEPT NO OFFER TILL OUR REPRESENTATIVE -EXPLAINS HAGGERSHAVEN</span>.</p> - -<p>I hadnt sent a copy of my letter to York, Pennsylvania, -where the telegram had originated, or anywhere near it. I -knew of no colleges in that vicinity. And I had never heard -of Mr (or Doctor or Professor) Haggerwells. I might have -thought the message a mean joke, except that Tyss’s nature -didnt run to such humor and no one else knew of the letters -except those to whom they were addressed.</p> - -<p>I found no reference to Haggershaven in any of the directories -I consulted, which wasnt too surprising considering -the slovenly way these were put together. I decided that -if such a place existed I could only wait patiently until the -“representative,” if there really was one, arrived.</p> - -<p>Tyss having left for the day, I swept a little, dusted some, -straightened a few of the books—any serious attempt to -arrange the stock would have been futile—and took up a -recent emendation of Creasy’s <i>Fifteen Decisive Battles</i> by -one Captain Eisenhower.</p> - -<p>I was so deep in the good captain’s analysis (he might -have made a respectable strategist himself, given an opportunity) -that I heard no customer enter, sensed no impatient -presence. I was only recalled from my book by a rather -sharp, “Is the proprietor in?”</p> - -<p>“No maam,” I answered, reluctantly abandoning the -page. “He’s out for the moment. Can I help you?”</p> - -<p>My eyes, accustomed to the store’s poor light, had the -advantage over hers, still adjusting from the sunlit street. -Secure in my audacity, I measured her vital femininity, a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</span> -quality which seemed, if such a thing is possible, impersonal. -There was nothing overtly bold or provocative about -her, though I’m sure my mother would have thinned her -lips at the black silk trousers and the jacket which emphasized -the contour of her breasts. At a time when women -used every device to call attention to their helplessness and -consequently their desirability and the implied need for -men to protect them, she carried an air which seemed to -say, Why yes, I am a woman: not furtively or brazenly or -incidentally but primarily; what are you going to do about -it?</p> - -<p>I recognized a sturdy sensuality as I recognized the fact -that she was bareheaded, almost as tall as I, and rather -large-boned; certainly there was nothing related to me -about it. Nor was it connected with surface attributes; she -was not beautiful and still further from being pretty, though -she might have been called handsome in a way. Her hair, -ginger-colored and clubbed low on her neck, waved crisply; -her eyes appeared slate gray. (Later I learned they could -vary from pale gray to blue-green.) The fleshly greediness -was betrayed, if at all, only by the width and set of her -lips, and that insolent expression.</p> - -<p>She smiled, and I decided I had been quite wrong in -thinking her tone peremptory. “I’m Barbara Haggerwells. -I’m looking for a Mr Backmaker”—she glanced at a slip -of paper—“a Hodgins M Backmaker who evidently uses -this as an accommodation address.”</p> - -<p>“I’m Hodge Backmaker,” I muttered in despair. “I—I -work here.” I was conscious of not having shaved that -morning, that my pants and jacket did not match, that my -shirt was not clean.</p> - -<p>I suppose I expected her to say nastily, So I see! or the -usual, It must be fascinating! Instead she said, “I wonder -if youve run across <i>The Properties of X</i> by Whitehead? Ive -been trying to get a copy for a long time.”</p> - -<p>“Uh—I.... Is it a mystery story?” -“I’m afraid not. It’s a book on mathematics by a mathematician -very much out of favor. It’s hard to find, I suppose -because the author is bolder than he is tactful.”</p> - -<p>So naturally and easily she led me away from my em<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</span>barrassment -and into talking of books, relieving me of self-consciousness -and some of the mortification in being exposed -at my humble job by the “representative” of the telegram. -I admitted deficient knowledge of mathematics and -ignorance of Mr Whitehead though I maintained, accurately, -that the book was not in stock, while she assured me -that only a specialist would have heard of so obscure a -theoretician. This made me ask, with the awe one feels for -an expert in an alien field, if she were a mathematician, to -which she replied, “Heavens, no. I’m a physicist. But -mathematics is my tool.”</p> - -<p>I looked at her with respect. Anyone, I thought, can read -a few books and set himself up as an historian; to be a -physicist means genuine learning. And I doubted she was -much older than I.</p> - -<p>She said abruptly, “My father is interested in knowing -something about you.”</p> - -<p>I acknowledged this with something between a nod and -a bow. She had been examining and gauging me for the -past half hour. “Your father is Thomas Haggerwells?”</p> - -<p>“Haggerwells of Haggershaven,” she confirmed, as -though explaining everything. There was pride in her voice -and a hint of superciliousness.</p> - -<p>“I’m dreadfully sorry, Miss Haggerwells, but I’m afraid -I’m as ignorant of Haggershaven as of mathematics.”</p> - -<p>“I thought you said you’d been reading history. Odd -youve come upon no reference to the Haven in the records -of the past seventy-five years.”</p> - -<p>I shook my head helplessly. “I suppose my reading has -been scattered.” Her look indicated agreement but not -absolution. “Haggershaven is a college?”</p> - -<p>“No. Haggershaven is ... Haggershaven.” She resumed -her equanimity, her air of smiling tolerance. “It’s hardly a -college since it has no student body nor faculty. Rather, -both are one at the haven. Anyone admitted is a scholar -or potential scholar anxious to devote himself to learning. -I mean for its own sake. Not many are acceptable.”</p> - -<p>She need hardly have added this; it seemed obvious I -could not be one of the elect, even if I hadnt offended her -by never having heard of Haggershaven. I knew I couldnt<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</span> -pass the most lenient of entrance examinations to ordinary -colleges, much less to the dedicated place she represented.</p> - -<p>“There arent any formal requirements for fellowship,” -she went on, “beyond the undertaking to work to full capacity, -to pool all knowledge and hold back none from -scholars anywhere, to contribute economically to the Haven -in accordance with decisions of the majority of fellows, and -to vote on questions without consideration of personal gain. -There! That certainly sounds like the stuffiest manifesto -delivered this year.”</p> - -<p>“It sounds too good to be true.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, it’s true enough.” She moved close and I caught the -scent of her hair and skin. “But there’s another side. The -haven is neither wealthy nor endowed. We have to earn -our living. The fellows draw no stipend; they have food, -clothes, shelter, whatever books and materials they need—no -unessentials. We often have to leave our own individual -work to do manual labor to bring in food or money -for all.” -“Ive read of such communities,” I said enthusiastically. -“I thought they’d all disappeared fifty or sixty years ago.”</p> - -<p>“Have you and did you?” she asked contemptuously. -“Youll be surprised to learn that Haggershaven is neither -Owenite nor Fourierist. We are not fanatics nor saviors. -We don’t live in phalansteries, practice group marriage or -vegetarianism. Our organization is expedient, subject to -revision, not doctrinaire. Contribution to the common stock -is voluntary and we are not concerned with each other’s -private lives.”</p> - -<p>“I beg your pardon, Miss Haggerwells. I didnt mean to -annoy you.”</p> - -<p>“It’s all right. Perhaps I’m touchy; all my life Ive seen -the squinty suspiciousness of the farmers all around, sure -we were up to something immoral, or at least illegal. Youve -no idea what a prickly armor you build around yourself -when you know that every yokel is cackling, ‘There goes -one of them; I bet they ...’ whatever unconventional practice -their imaginations can conceive at the moment. And -the parallel distrust of the respectable schools. Detachedly, -the haven may indeed be a refuge for misfits, but is it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</span> -necessarily wrong not to fit into the civilization around us?”</p> - -<p>“I’m prejudiced. I certainly havent fitted in myself.”</p> - -<p>She didnt answer and I felt I had gone too far in daring -an impulsive identification. Awkwardness made me blurt -out further, “Do you ... do you think there’s any chance -Haggershaven would accept me?” Whatever reserve I’d -tried to maintain deserted me; my voice expressed only -childish longing.</p> - -<p>“I couldnt say,” she answered primly. “Acceptance or -rejection depends entirely on the vote of the whole fellowship. -All I’m here to offer is train fare. Neither you nor -the haven is bound.”</p> - -<p>“I’m perfectly willing to be bound,” I said fervently.</p> - -<p>“You may not be so rash after a few weeks.”</p> - -<p>I was about to reply when Little Aggie—so called to -distinguish her from Fat Aggie who was in much the same -trade, but more successful—came in. Little Aggie supplemented -her nocturnal earnings around Astor Place by begging -in the same neighborhood during the day.</p> - -<p>“Sorry, Aggie,” I said; “Mr Tyss didnt leave anything -for you.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe the lady would help a poor working girl down -on her luck,” she suggested, coming close. “My, that’s a -pretty outfit you have. Looks like real silk, too.”</p> - -<p>Barbara Haggerwells drew away with anger and loathing -on her face. “No,” she refused sharply. “No, nothing!” -She turned to me. “I must be going. I’ll leave you to entertain -your friend.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, I’ll go,” said Little Aggie cheerfully, “no need to -get in an uproar. Bye-bye.”</p> - -<p>I was frankly puzzled; the puritanical reaction didnt -seem consistent. I would have expected condescending -amusement, disdainful tolerance or even haughty annoyance, -but not this furious aversion. “I’m sorry Little Aggie -bothered you. She’s really not a wicked character and she -does have a hard time getting along.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sure you must enjoy her company immensely. I’m -sorry we can’t offer similar attractions at the haven.”</p> - -<p>Apparently she thought my relations with Aggie were -professional. Even so her attitude was odd. I could hardly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</span> -flatter myself she was interested in me as a man, yet her -flare-up seemed to indicate jealousy, a strange kind of jealousy, -perhaps like the sensuality I attributed to her, as -though the mere presence of another woman was an -affront.</p> - -<p>“Please don’t go yet. For one thing—” I cast around for -something to hold her till I could restore a more favorable -impression. “—for one thing you havent told me how -Haggershaven happened to get my application.” -She gave me a cold, angry look. “Even though we’re supposed -to be cranks, orthodox educators often turn such -letters over to us. After all, they may want to apply themselves -someday.”</p> - -<p>The picture this suddenly presented, of a serene academic -life which was not so serene and secure after all, but -prepared for a way to escape if necessary, was startling -to me. I had taken it for granted that our colleges, even -though they were far inferior to those of other countries, -were stable and sheltered.</p> - -<p>When I expressed something of this, she laughed. “Hardly. -The colleges have not only decayed, they have decayed -faster than other institutions. They are mere hollow shells, -ruined ornaments of the past. Instructors spy on each other -to curry favor with the trustees and assure themselves of -reappointment when the faculty is out periodically. Loyalty -is the touchstone, but no one knows any more what the -object of loyalty is supposed to be. Certainly it is no longer -toward learning, for that is the least of their concerns.”</p> - -<p>She slowly allowed herself to be coaxed back into her -previous mood, and again we talked of books. And now -I thought there was a new warmth in her voice and glance, -as though she had won some kind of victory, but how or -over whom there was no indication.</p> - -<p>When she left I hoped she was not too prejudiced against -me. For myself I readily admitted it would be easy enough -to want her—if one were not afraid of the humiliations it -was in her nature to inflict.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C10"><i>10.</i> <i>THE HOLDUP</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>This time I didnt offer Tyss two weeks’ notice. -“Well Hodgins, I made all the appropriate valedictory remarks -on a previous occasion, so I’ll not repeat them, except -to say the precision of the script is extraordinary.”</p> - -<p>It seemed to me he was saying in a roundabout way that -everything was for the best. For the first time I saw Tyss -as slightly pathetic rather than sinister; extreme pessimism -and vulgar optimism evidently met, like his circular time. -I smiled indulgently and thanked him sincerely for all his -kindness.</p> - -<p>In 1944 almost a hundred years had passed since New -York and eastern Pennsylvania were first linked in a railroad -network, yet I don’t suppose my journey differed -much in speed or comfort from one which might have been -taken by Granpa Hodgins’ father. The steam ferry carried -me across the Hudson to Jersey. I had heard there were -only financial, not technical obstacles to a bridge or tunnel. -If the English and French could burrow under the Channel, -as they had early in the century, and the Japanese -complete their great tube beneath the Korea Strait, it was -hard to see why a lesser work here was dismissed as the -impractical suggestion of dreamers who believed the cost -would be saved in a few years by running trains directly -to Manhattan.</p> - -<p>Nor was the ferry the only antique survival on the trip. -The cars were all ancient, obvious discards from Confederate -or British American lines. Flat wheels were common; -the wornout locomotives dragged them protestingly over<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</span> -the wobbly rails and uneven roadbed. First class passengers -sat on napless plush or grease-glazed straw seats; second -class passengers stood in the aisles or on the platforms; -third class rode the roofs—safe enough at the low speed -except for sudden jerks or jolts.</p> - -<p>There were so many different lines, each jealous of exclusive -rights of way, that the traveler hardly got used to -his particular car before he had to snatch up his baggage -and hustle for the connecting train, which might be on -the same track or at the same sooty depot, but was more -likely to be a mile away. Even the adjective “connecting” -was often ironical for it was not unusual to find time-tables -arranged so a departure preceded an arrival by minutes, -necessitating a stopover of anywhere from one hour -to twelve.</p> - -<p>If anything could have quieted my excitement on the -trip it was the view through the dirt-sprayed windows. -“Fruitless” and “unfulfilled” were the words coming oftenest -to my mind. I had forgotten during the past six years -just how desolate villages and towns could look when their -jerrybuilt structures were sunk in apathetic age without -even the false rejuvenation of newer jerrybuilding. I had -forgotten the mildewed appearance of tenant farmhouses, -the unconvincing attempt to appear businesslike of false-fronted -stores with clutters of hopeless merchandise in their -dim windows, or the inadequate bluff of factories too small -for any satisfactory production.</p> - -<p>Once away from New York it was clear how atypical -the city was in its air of activity and usefulness. The countryside -through which the tracks ran, between fields and -pastures or down the center of main streets, should have -been the industrial heart of a country bustling and vigorous. -Instead one saw potentialities denied, projects withered, -poverty and dilapidation.</p> - -<p>We crossed the Susquehanna on an old, old stone bridge -that made one think of Meade’s valiant men, bloodily -bandaged many of them, somnambulistically marching -northward, helpless and hopeless after the Confederate triumph -at Gettysburg, their only thought to escape Jeb Stuart’s -pursuing cavalry. Indeed, every square mile now<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</span> -carried on its surface an almost visible weight of historical -memories.</p> - -<p>York seemed old, gray and crabbed in the afternoon, but -when I got off the train there I was too agitated with the -prospect of being soon at Haggershaven to take any strong -impression of the town. I inquired the way, and the surly -response confirmed Barbara Haggerwells’ statement of -local animosity. The distance, if my informant was accurate, -was a matter of some ten miles.</p> - -<p>I started off down the highway, building and demolishing -daydreams, thinking of Tyss and Tirzah, Enfandin and -Miss Haggerwells, trying to picture her father and the -fellows of the haven and for the thousandth time marshaling -arguments for my acceptance in the face of scornful -scrutiny. The early October sun was setting on the rich -red and yellow leaves of the maples and oaks; I knew the -air would become chilly before long, but exertion kept me -warm. I counted on arriving at the haven in plenty of time -to introduce myself before bedtime.</p> - -<p>Less than a mile out of town the highway assumed the -familiar aspect of the roads around Wappinger Falls and -Poughkeepsie: rutted, wavering, with deep, unexpected -holes. The stone or rail fences on either side enclosed -harvested cornfields, the broken stalks a dull brass with -copper-colored pumpkins scattered through them. But the -fences were in poor repair and the oft-mended wooden -covered bridges over the creeks all had signs, DANGEROUS, -Travel At Your Own Risk.</p> - -<p>There were few to share the highway with me: a farmer -with an empty wagon, urging his team on and giving me a -churlish glance instead of an invitation to ride; a horseman -on an elegant chestnut picking his course carefully -among the chuckholes, and a few tramps, each bent on his -solitary way, at once defensive and aggressive. The condition -of the bridges accounted for the absence of minibiles. -However, just about twilight a closed carriage, complete -with coachman and footman on the box, rolled haughtily -by, stood for a moment outlined atop the slope up which I -was trudging and then disappeared down the other side.</p> - -<p>I paid little attention except—remembering my boyhood<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</span> -and my father’s smithy—to visualize automatically the -coachman pulling back on the reins and the footman thrusting -forward with the brake as they eased the horses downward. -So when I heard first a shout and then feminine -screams my instant conclusion was that the carriage had -overturned on the treacherous downgrade, broken an axle, -or otherwise suffered calamity.</p> - -<p>My responsive burst of speed had almost carried me to -the top when I heard the shots. First one, like the barking -of an uncertain dog, followed by a volley, as though the -pack were unleashed.</p> - -<p>I ran to the side of the road, close to the field, where I -could see with less chance of being seen. Already the dusk -was playing tricks, distorting the shape of some objects -and momentarily hiding others. It could not however falsify -the scene in the gully below. Four men on horseback covered -the carriage with drawn revolvers; a fifth, pistol also -in hand, had dismounted. His horse, reins hanging down, -was peacefully investigating the roadside weeds.</p> - -<p>None of them attempted to stop the terrified rearing of -the carriage team. Only their position, strung across the -road, prevented a runaway. I could not see the footman, -but the coachman, one hand still clutching the reins, was -sprawled backward with his foot caught against the dashboard -and his head hanging down over the wheel.</p> - -<p>The door on the far side was swung open. I thought for -a moment the passengers had managed to escape. However -as the unmounted highwayman advanced, waving his -pistol, the other door opened and a man and two women -descended into the roadway. Slowly edging forward I -could now plainly hear the gang’s obscene whistles at sight -of the women.</p> - -<p>“Well boys, here’s something to warm up a cold night. -Hang on to them while I see what the mister has in his -pockets.”</p> - -<p>The gentleman stepped in front, and with a slight accent -said, “Take the girl by all means. She is but a peasant, a -servant, and may afford you amusement. But the lady is -my wife; I will pay you a good ransom for her and myself.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</span> -I am Don Jaime Escobar y Gallegos, attached to the Spanish -legation.”</p> - -<p>One of the men on horseback said, “Well now, that’s real -kind of you, Don High-me. We might have taken you up -on that, was you an American. But we can’t afford no company -of Spanish Marines coming looking for us, so I guess -we’ll have to pass up the ransom and settle for whatever -youve got handy. And Missus Don and the hired girl. Don’t -worry about her being a peasant; we’ll treat her and the -madam exactly the same.”</p> - -<p>“Madre de Dios,” screamed the lady. “Mercy!”</p> - -<p>“It will be a good ransom,” said the Spaniard, “and I -give you my word my government will not bother you.”</p> - -<p>“Sorry, chum,” returned the gangster. “You foreigners -have a nasty habit of interfering with our domestic institutions -and hanging men who make a living this way. Just -can’t trust you.”</p> - -<p>The man on foot took a step forward. The nearest rider -swung the maid up before him and another horseman -reached for her mistress. Again she screamed; her husband -brushed the hand aside and put his wife behind him. -At that the gangster raised his pistol and shot twice. The -man and woman dropped to the ground. The maid shrieked -till her captor covered her mouth.</p> - -<p>“Now what did you want to do that for? Cutting our -woman supply in half that way?”</p> - -<p>“Sorry. Mighty damn sorry. These things always happen -to me.”</p> - -<p>Meanwhile another of the gang slid off his horse and -the two went through the dead, stripping them of jewelry -and whatever articles of clothing caught their fancy before -searching the luggage and the coach itself for valuables. -By the time they had finished it was fully dark and -I had crept to within a few feet of them, crouching reasonably -secure and practically invisible while they debated -what to do with the horses. One faction was in favor of -taking them along for spare mounts; the other, arguing -that they were too easily identifiable, for cutting them out -and turning them loose. The second group prevailing, they -at last galloped away.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</span></p> - -<p>A sudden thrashing in the cornstalks just beyond the -fence startled me into rigidity. Something which might be -human stumbled and crawled toward the carriage, snuffling -and moaning, to throw itself down by the prostrate bodies, -its anguished noises growing more high-pitched and chilling.</p> - -<p>I was certain this must be a passenger who had jumped -from the off-side of the carriage at the start of the holdup, -but whether man or woman it was impossible to tell. I -moved forward gingerly, but somehow I must have betrayed -my presence, for the creature, with a terrified groan, -slumped inertly.</p> - -<p>My hands told me it was a woman I raised from the -ground and the smell of her was the smell of a young girl. -“Don’t be afraid, Miss,” I tried to reassure her; “I’m a -friend.”</p> - -<p>I could hardly leave the girl lying in the road, nor did -I feel equal to carrying her to Haggershaven which I reckoned -must be about six miles further. I tried shaking her, -rubbing her hands, murmuring encouragement, all the -while wishing the moon would come up, feeling somehow it -would be easier to revive her in the moonlight.</p> - -<p>“Miss,” I urged, “get up. You can’t stay here—they may -come back.” -Had I reached her? She stirred, whimpering with strange, -muffled sounds. I dragged her to her knees and managed -to get her arm over my shoulder. “Get up,” I repeated. -“Get on your feet.”</p> - -<p>She moaned. I pulled her upright and adjusted my hold. -Supporting her around the waist and impeded by my valise, -I began an ungraceful, shuffling march. I could only -guess at how much time had been taken up by the holdup -and how slow our progress would be. It didnt seem likely -we could get to Haggershaven before midnight, an awkward -hour to explain the company of a strange girl. The -possibility of leaving her at a hospitable farmhouse was -remote; no isolated rural family in times like these would -open their door with anything but deep suspicion or a -shotgun blast.</p> - -<p>We had made perhaps a mile, a slow and arduous one,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</span> -when the moon rose at last. It was full and bright, and -showed my companion to be even younger than I had -thought. The light fell on masses of curling hair, wildly -disarrayed about a face unnaturally pale and lifeless yet -extraordinarily beautiful. Her eyes were closed in a sort of -troubled sleep, and she continued to moan, though at less -frequent intervals.</p> - -<p>I had just decided to stop for a moment’s rest when we -came upon one of the horses. The clumsily cut traces -trailing behind him had caught on the stump of a broken -sapling. Though still trembling he was over the worst of his -fright; after patting and soothing him I got us onto his -back and we proceeded in more comfortable if still not -too dignified fashion.</p> - -<p>It wasnt hard to find Haggershaven; the sideroad to it -was well kept and far smoother than the highway. We -passed between what looked to be freshly plowed fields -and came to a fair sized group of buildings, in some of -which I was pleased to see lighted windows. The girl had -still not spoken; her eyes remained closed and she moaned -occasionally.</p> - -<p>Dogs warned of our approach. From a dark doorway a -figure came forward with a rifle under his arm. “Who is it?”</p> - -<p>“Hodge Backmaker. Ive got a girl here who was in a -holdup. She’s had a bad shock.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” he said, “let me hitch the horse. Then I’ll -help you with the girl. My name’s Dorn. Asa Dorn.”</p> - -<p>I slid off and lifted the girl down. “I couldnt leave her -in the road,” I offered in inane apology.</p> - -<p>“I’ll water and feed the horse after. Let’s go into the -main kitchen; it’s warm there. Here,” he addressed the girl, -“take my arm.”</p> - -<p>She made no response and I half carried her, with Dorn -trying helpfully to share her weight. The building through -which we led her was obviously an old farmhouse, enlarged -and remodelled a number of times. Gaslights of a -strange pattern, brighter than any I’d ever seen, revealed -Asa Dorn as perhaps thirty with very broad shoulders and -very long arms, and a dark, rather melancholy face. -“There’s a gang been operating around here,” he informed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</span> -me; “tried to shake the haven down for a contribution. -That’s why I was on guard with the gun. Must be the -same bunch.”</p> - -<p>We bustled our charge into a chair before a big fieldstone -fireplace which gave the large room its look of welcome, -though the even heat came from sets of steampipes under -the windows. “Should we give her some soup? Or tea? Or -shall I get Barbara or one of the other women?”</p> - -<p>His fluttering brushed the outside of my mind. Here in -the light I instinctively expected to see some faint color in -the girl’s cheeks or hands, but there was none. She looked -no more than sixteen, perhaps because she was severely -dressed in some school uniform. Her hair, which had -merely been a disordered frame for her face in the moonlight, -now showed itself as deeply black, hanging in thick, -soft curls around her shoulders. Her features, which seemed -made to reflect emotions—full, mobile lips, faintly slanted -eyes, high nostrils—were instead impassive, devoid of vitality, -and this unnatural quiescence was heightened by the -dark eyes, now wide open and expressionless. Her mouth -moved slowly, as though to form words, but nothing came -forth except the faintest of guttural sounds.</p> - -<p>“She’s trying to say something.” I leaned forward as -though by sympathetic magic to help the muscles which -seemed to respond with such difficulty.</p> - -<p>“Why,” exclaimed Dorn, “she’s ... dumb!”</p> - -<p>She looked agonizedly toward him. I patted her arm -helplessly.</p> - -<p>“I’ll go get—” he began.</p> - -<p>A door opened and Barbara Haggerwells blinked at us. -“I thought I heard someone ride up, Ace. Do you suppose....” -Then she caught sight of the girl. Her face set in -those lines of strange anger I had seen in the bookstore.</p> - -<p>“Miss Haggerwells—” -“Barbara—” -Dorn and I spoke together. Either she did not hear us -or we made no impression. She faced me in offended outrage. -“Really, Mr Backmaker, I thought I’d explained there -were no facilities here for this sort of thing.”</p> - -<p>“You misunderstand,” I said, “I happened—”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</span> -Dorn broke in. “Barbara, she’s been in a holdup. She’s -dumb....”</p> - -<p>Fury made her ugly. “Is that an additional attraction?”</p> - -<p>“Miss Haggerwells,” I tried again, “you don’t understand—” -“I think I understand very well. Dumb or not, get the -slut out of here! Get her out right now, I say!”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, youre not listening—” -She continued to face me, her back to him. “I should -have remembered you were a ladies’ man, Mr Self-taught -Backmaker. No doubt you imagined Haggershaven to be -some obscene liberty hall. Well, it isnt! You’d be wasting -any further time you spent here. Get out!”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C11"><i>11.</i> <i>OF HAGGERSHAVEN</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>I suppose—recalling the inexplicable scene with -Little Aggie—I was less astonished by her frenzy than I -might have been. Besides, her rage and misunderstanding -were anticlimactic after the succession of excitements I had -been through that day. Instead of amazement I felt only -uneasiness and tired annoyance.</p> - -<p>Dorn steered Barbara out of the room with a combination -of persuasion and gentle force disguised as solicitous -soothing, leaving the girl and me alone. “Well,” I said, -“well....”</p> - -<p>The large eyes regarded me helplessly.</p> - -<p>“Well, youve certainly caused me a lot of trouble....”</p> - -<p>Dorn returned with two women, one middleaged, the -other slightly younger, who flowed around the girl like -soapy water, effectually sealing her away from all further -masculine blunders, uttering little bubbly clucks and sudsy -comfortings.</p> - -<p>“Overwork, Backmaker,” Dorn mumbled. “Barbara’s -been overworking terribly. You mustnt think—” -“I don’t,” I said. “I’m just sorry she couldnt be made to -realize what actually happened.”</p> - -<p>“Hypersensitive; things that wouldnt ordinarily ... -it’s overwork. Youve no idea. She wears herself out. Practically -no nerves left.”</p> - -<p>His face, pleading for understanding, looked even more -melancholy than before. I felt sorry for him and slightly -superior; at the moment at least I didnt have to apologize -for any female unpredictability. “OK, OK; there doesnt<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</span> -seem to be any great harm done. And the girl appears to -be in good hands now.”</p> - -<p>“Oh she is,” he answered with evident relief at dropping -the subject of Barbara’s behavior. “I don’t think there’s -anything more we can do for her now; in fact I’d say we’re -only in the way. How about meeting Mr Haggerwells now?”</p> - -<p>“Why not?” The last episode had doubtless finished me -for good so far as Barbara was concerned; whatever neutral -report she might have given her father originally could -now be counted on for a damning revision. I might as well -put a nonchalant face on matters before returning to the -world outside Haggershaven.</p> - -<p>Thomas Haggerwells, large-boned like his daughter, -with the ginger hair faded, and a florid, handsome complexion, -made me welcome. “Historian ay, Backmaker? -Delighted. Combination of art and science; Clio, most -enigmatic of the muses. The ever-changing past, ay?”</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid I’m no historian yet, Mr Haggerwells. I’d -like to be one. If Haggershaven will let me be part of it.”</p> - -<p>He patted me on the shoulder. “The fellows will do what -they can, Backmaker; you can trust them.”</p> - -<p>“That’s right,” said Dorn cheerfully; “you look strong -as an ox and historians can be kept happy with books and -a few old papers.”</p> - -<p>“Ace is our cynic,” explained Mr Haggerwells; “very -useful antidote to some of our soaring spirits.” He looked -absently around and then said abruptly, “Ace, Barbara -is quite upset.”</p> - -<p>I thought this extreme understatement, but Dorn merely -nodded. “Misunderstanding, Mr H.”</p> - -<p>“So I gathered.” He gave a short, selfconscious laugh. -“In fact that’s all I did gather. She said something about a -woman....”</p> - -<p>“Girl, Mr H, just a girl.” He gave a quick outline of -what had happened, glossing over Barbara’s hysterical -welcome.</p> - -<p>“I see. Quite an adventure in the best tradition, ay Backmaker? -And the victims killed in cold blood; makes you -wonder about civilization. Savagery all around us.” He -began pacing the flowered carpet. “Naturally we must help<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</span> -the poor creature. Shocking, quite shocking. But how can -I explain to Barbara? She ... she came to me,” he said -half proudly, half apprehensively. “I wouldnt want to fail -her; I hardly know....” He pulled himself together. “Excuse -me, Backmaker. My daughter is high-strung. I fear -I’m allowing concern to interfere with our conversation.”</p> - -<p>“Not at all, sir,” I said. “I’m very tired; if you’ll excuse -me....”</p> - -<p>“Of course, of course,” he answered gratefully. “Ace -will show you your room. Sleep well—we’ll talk more tomorrow. -And Ace—come back here afterward, will you?” -Barbara Haggerwells had both Dorn and her father well -cowed, I thought as I lay awake. Clearly she could brook -not even the suspicion of rivalry, even when it was entirely -imaginary. It would be rather frightening to be her father, -or—as I suspected Ace might be—her lover, and subject -to her tyrannical dominance.</p> - -<p>But it was neither Barbara nor overstimulation from the -full day which caused my insomnia. A torment, successfully -suppressed for hours, invaded me. Connecting the -trip of the Escobars—“attached to the Spanish legation”—with -the counterfeit pesetas was pure fantasy. But what is -logic? I could not argue myself into reasonableness. I could -not quench my feeling of responsibility with ridicule nor -convincingly charge myself with perverse conceit in magnifying -my trivial errands into accountability for all that -flowed from the Grand Army—for much which might have -flowed from the Grand Army. Guilty men cannot sleep because -they feel guilty. It is the feeling, not the abstract guilt -which keeps them awake.</p> - -<p>Nor could I pride myself on my chivalry in rescuing distressed -maidens. I had only done what was unavoidable, -grudgingly, without warmth or charity. There was no point -in being aggrieved by Barbara’s misinterpretation with its -disastrous consequences to my ambitions. I had not freely -chosen to help; I had no right to resent a catastrophe which -should properly have followed a righteous choice.</p> - -<p>At last I slept, only to dream Barbara Haggerwells was -a great fish pursuing me over endless roads on which my -feet bogged in clinging, tenacious mud. Opening my mouth<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</span> -to shout for help was useless; nothing came forth but a -croak which sounded faintly like my mother’s favorite -“Gumption!”</p> - -<p>In the clear autumn morning my notions of the night -dwindled, even if they failed to disappear entirely. By the -time I was dressed Ace Dorn showed up; we went to the -kitchen where Ace introduced me to a middleaged man, -Hiro Agati, whose close-cut stiff black hair stood perfectly -and symmetrically erect all over his head.</p> - -<p>“Dr Agati’s a chemist,” remarked Ace, “condemned to -be head chef for a while on account of being too good a -cook.”</p> - -<p>“Believe that,” said Agati, “and you’ll believe anything. -Truth is they always pick on chemists for hard work. -Physicists like Ace never soil their hands. Well, so long as -you can’t eat with the common folk, what’ll you have, eggs -or eggs?”</p> - -<p>Agati was the first Oriental I’d ever seen. The great anti-Chinese -massacres of the 1890’s, which generously included -Japanese and indeed all with any sign of the epicanthic -eyefold, had left few Asians to have descendants in -the United States. I’m afraid I stared at him more than was -polite, but he was evidently used to such rudeness for he -paid no attention.</p> - -<p>“They finally got the girl to sleep,” Ace informed me. -“Had to give her opium. No report yet this morning.”</p> - -<p>“Oh,” I said lamely, conscious I should have asked after -her without waiting for him to volunteer the news. “Oh. -Do you suppose we’ll find out who she is?”</p> - -<p>“Mr H telegraphed the sheriff first thing. It’ll all depend -how interested he is, and that’s not likely to be very. -What’s to drink, Hiro?”</p> - -<p>“Imitation tea, made from dried weeds; imitation coffee -made from burnt barley. Which’ll you have?”</p> - -<p>I didnt see why he stressed the imitation; genuine tea -and coffee were drunk only by the very rich. Most people -preferred “tea” because it was less obnoxious than the -counterfeit coffee. Perversely, I said, “Coffee please.”</p> - -<p>He set a large cup of brown liquid before me which had -a tantalizing fragrance quite different from that given off<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</span> -by the beverage I was used to. I added milk and tasted, -aware he was watching my reaction.</p> - -<p>“Why,” I exclaimed, “this is different. I never had anything -like it in my life. It’s wonderful.”</p> - -<p>“C eight H ten O two,” said Agati with an elaborate air -of indifference. “Synthetic. Specialty of the house.”</p> - -<p>“So chemists are good for something after all,” remarked -Ace.</p> - -<p>“Give us a chance,” said Agati; “we could make beef -out of wood and silk out of sand.”</p> - -<p>“Youre a physicist like B—like Miss Haggerwells?” I -asked Ace.</p> - -<p>“I’m a physicist, but not like Barbara. No one is. She’s -a genius. A great creative genius.”</p> - -<p>“Chemists create,” said Agati sourly; “physicists sit -and think about the universe.”</p> - -<p>“Like Archimedes,” said Ace.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>How shall I write of Haggershaven as my eyes first saw -it twenty-two years ago? Of the rolling acres of rich plowed -land, interrupted here and there by stone outcroppings -worn smooth and round by time, and trees in woodlots or -standing alone strong and unperturbed? Of the main building, -grown by fits and starts from the original farmhouse -into a great, rambling eccentricity stopping short of monstrosity -only by its complete innocence of pretense? Shall -I describe the two dormitories, severely functional, escaping -harshness because they had not been built by carpenters -and though sturdy enough, betrayed the amateur touch -in every line? Or the cottages and apartments, two, four, at -most six rooms, for the married fellows and their families? -These were scattered all over, some so avid for privacy -that one could pass unknowing within feet of the concealing -trees or shrubbery, others bold in the sunshine on -knolls or in hollows.</p> - -<p>I could tell of the small shops, the miniature laboratories, -the inadequate observatory, the heterogeneous assortment -of books which was both less and more than a library, the -dozens of outbuildings. But these things were not the -haven. They were merely the least of its possessions. For<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</span> -Haggershaven was not a material place at all, but a spiritual -freedom. Its limits were only the limits of what its fellows -could do or think or inquire. It was circumscribed only by -the outside world, not by internal rules and taboos, competition -or curriculum.</p> - -<p>Most of this I could see for myself, much of it was explained -by Ace. “But how can you afford the time to take -me all around this way?” I asked; “I must be interfering -with your own work.”</p> - -<p>He grinned. “This is my period to be guide, counselor -and friend to those whove strayed in here, wittingly or un. -Don’t worry, after youre a fellow youll get told off for all -the jobs, from shoveling manure to gilding weathercocks.”</p> - -<p>I sighed. “The chances of my getting to be a fellow are -minus nothing. Especially after last night.”</p> - -<p>He didnt pretend to misunderstand. “Barbara’ll come -out of it. She’s not always that way. As her father says, -she’s high-strung, and she’s been working madly. And to -tell the truth,” he went on in a burst of frankness, “she -really doesnt get on too well with other women. She has a -masculine mind.”</p> - -<p>I have often noticed that men not strikingly brilliant -themselves attribute masculine minds to intelligent women -on the consoling assumption that feminine minds are normally -inferior. Ace however was manifestly innocent of -any attempt to patronize.</p> - -<p>“Anyway,” he concluded, “she has only one vote.”</p> - -<p>I didnt know whether to take this as a pledge of support -or mere politeness. “Isnt it wasteful, assigning a chemist -like Dr Agati to kitchen work? Or isnt he a good chemist?”</p> - -<p>“Just about the best there is. His artificial tea and coffee -would bring a fortune to the haven if there were a profitable -market; even as it is it’ll bring a good piece of change. -Wasteful? What would you have us do, hire cooks and -servants?”</p> - -<p>“Theyre cheap enough.”</p> - -<p>“Or frightfully expensive. Specialization, the division of -labor, is certainly not cheap in anything but dollars and -cents, and not always then. And it’s unquestionably waste<span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</span>ful -in terms of equality. And I don’t think there’s anyone -at the haven who isn’t an egalitarian.”</p> - -<p>“But you do specialize and divide labor. Don’t tell me -you swap your physics for Agati’s chemistry.”</p> - -<p>“In a way we do. Of course I don’t set up as an experimenter, -any more than he does as a speculator. But there -have been plenty of times Ive worked under his direction -when he needed an assistant who didnt know anything but -had a strong back.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” I said; “but I still don’t see why you can’t -hire a cook and some dishwashers.”</p> - -<p>“Where would our equality be then? What would happen -to our fellowship?”</p> - -<p>Haggershaven’s history, which I got little by little, was -more than a link with the past; it was a possible hint of -what might have been if the War of Southron Independence -had not interrupted the American pattern. Barbara’s -great-great-grandfather, Herbert Haggerwells, had been a -Confederate major from North Carolina who, as conquerors -sometimes do, had fallen in love with the then fat Pennsylvania -countryside. After the war he had put everything—not -much by Southron standards, but a fortune in depreciated, -soon to be repudiated, United States greenbacks—into -the farm which later formed the nucleus of -Haggershaven. Then he married a local girl and transformed -himself into a Northerner.</p> - -<p>Until I became too accustomed to notice it anymore I -used to stare at his portrait in the library, picturing in idle -fancy a possible meeting on the battlefield between this -aristocratic gentleman with his curling mustache and daggerlike -imperial and my own plebian Granpa Hodgins. -But the chance of their ever having come face to face was -much more than doubtful; I, who had studied both their -likenesses, was the only link between them.</p> - -<p>“Hard looking character, ay?” commented Ace. “This -was painted when he was mellow; imagine him twenty -years earlier. Pistols cocked and Juvenal or Horace or -Seneca in the saddlebags.”</p> - -<p>“He was a cavalry officer, then?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know. Don’t think so as a matter of fact. Saddle<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</span>bags -was just my artistic touch. They say he was a holy -terror; discipline and all that—it sort of goes with a man -on horseback. And the old Roman boys are pure deduction; -he was that type. Patronized several writers and -artists; you know: ‘Drop down to my estate and stay a -while’ and they stayed five or ten years.” -But it was Major Haggerwells’ son who, seeing the deterioration -of Northern colleges, had invited a few restive -scholars to make their home with him. They were free to -pursue their studies under an elastic arrangement which -permitted them to be selfsupporting through work on the -farm.</p> - -<p>Thomas Haggerwells’ father had organized the scheme -further, attracting a larger number of schoolmen who contributed -greatly to the material progress of the haven. They -patented inventions, marketless at home, which brought -regular royalties from more industrialized countries. Agronomists -improved the haven’s crops and took in a steady -income from seed. Chemists found ways of utilizing otherwise -wasted byproducts; proceeds from scholarly works—and -one more popular than scholarly—added to the funds. -In his will, Volney Haggerwells left the properties to the -fellowship.</p> - -<p>I suppose I expected there would be some uniformity, -some basic type characterizing the fellows. Not that Barbara, -or Ace, or Hiro Agati resembled a stereotype at any -point, any more than I did myself, but then I was not one -of the elect nor likely to be. Even after I had met more than -half of them the notion persisted that there must be some -stamp on them proclaiming what they were.</p> - -<p>Yet as I wandered about the haven, alone or with Ace, -the people I met were quite diverse, more so by far than -in the everyday world. There were the ebullient and the -glum, the talkative and the laconic, the bustling and the -slow-moving. Some were part of a family, others lived -ascetically, withdrawn from the pleasures of the flesh.</p> - -<p>In the end I realized there was, if not a similarity, a -strong bond. The fellows, conventional or eccentric, passionate -or reserved, were all earnest, purposeful and, despite -individual variations, tenacious. They were, though<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</span> -I hesitate to use so emotional a word, dedicated. The cruel -struggle and suspicion, the frantic endeavor to improve -one’s own financial, social, or political standing by maiming -or destroying someone else intent on the same endeavor -was either unknown or so subdued as to be imperceptible -at the haven. Disagreements and jealousies existed, but -they were different in kind rather than in degree from those -to which I had been accustomed all my life. The pervasive -fears which fostered the latter, the same fears which made -lotteries and indenture frantic gambles to escape the wretchedness -of life, could not circulate in the security of the -haven.</p> - -<p>After the scene at my arrival, I didnt see Barbara again -for some ten days. Even then it was but a glimpse, caught -as she hurried in one direction and I sauntered in another. -She threw me a single frigid glance and went on. Later, I -was talking with Mr Haggerwells, who had proved to be -not quite an amateur of history but more than a dabbler, -when, without knocking, she burst into the room.</p> - -<p>“Father, I—” Then she caught sight of me. “Sorry. I -didnt know you were entertaining.”</p> - -<p>His tone was that of one found in a guilty act. “Come in, -come in, Barbara. Backmaker is after all something of a -protégé of yours. Urania, you know—if one may stretch -the ascription a bit—encouraging Clio.” -“Really, Father!” She was regal. Wounded, scornful, but -majestic. “I’m sure I don’t know enough about self-taught -pundits to sponsor them. It seems too bad they have to -waste your time—” -He flushed. “Please, Barbara. You must, you really -must control....”</p> - -<p>Her disapproval became open anger. “Must I? Must I? -And stand by while every pretentious swindler usurps your -attention? Oh, I don’t ask for any special favors as your -daughter; I know too well I have none coming. But I -should think at least the consideration due a fellow of the -haven would prompt ordinary courtesy even where no -natural affection exists!”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, please.... Oh, my dear girl, how can -you ...?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</span></p> - -<p>But she was gone, leaving him distressed and me puzzled. -Not at her lack of restraint but at her accusation that -he lacked a father’s love for her. Nothing was clearer than -his pride in her or his protective, baffled tenderness. It did -not seem possible so willful a misunderstanding could be -maintained.</p> - -<p>“You can’t judge Barbara by ordinary standards,” insisted -Ace uncomfortably, when I told him what had happened.</p> - -<p>“I’m not judging her by any standards or at all,” I said; -“I just don’t see how anyone could get things so wrong.”</p> - -<p>“She.... Her nature needs sympathy. Lots of it. She’s -never had the understanding and encouragement she ought -to have.”</p> - -<p>“It looks the other way around to me.”</p> - -<p>“That’s because you don’t know the background. She’s -always been lonely. From childhood. Her mother was impatient -of children and never found time for her.”</p> - -<p>“How do you know?” I asked.</p> - -<p>“Why ... she told me, of course.”</p> - -<p>“And you believed her. Without corroborative evidence. -Is that what’s called the scientific attitude?”</p> - -<p>He stopped stock-still. “Look here, Backmaker—” a -moment before I had been Hodge to him—“Look here, -Backmaker, I’m damned tired of all the things people say -about Barbara; the jeers and sneers and gossip by people -who just aren’t good enough to breathe the same air with -her, much less have the faintest notion of her mind and -spirit—” -“Come off it, Ace,” I interrupted. “I havent got anything -against Barbara. The shoe is on the other foot. Tell -her I’m all right, will you? Don’t waste time trying to convince -me; I’m just trying to get along.”</p> - -<p>It was clear, not only from the slips which evaded Ace’s -guard, but from less restrained remarks by other fellows, -that Barbara’s tortured jealousy was a fixture of her character. -She had created feuds, slandered and reviled fellows -who had been guilty of nothing except trying to interest her -father in some project in which she herself was not concerned. -I learned much more also, much Ace had no desire<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</span> -to convey. But he was a poor hand at concealing anything, -and it was clear he was helplessly subject to her, but without -the usual kindly anesthetic of illusion. I guessed he had -enjoyed her favors, but she evidently didnt bother to hide -the fact that the privilege was not exclusive; perhaps indeed -she insisted on his knowing. I gathered she was a fiercely -moral polyandrist, demanding absolute fidelity without -offering the slightest hope of reciprocal singlemindedness.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C12"><i>12.</i> <i>MORE OF HAGGERSHAVEN</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>Among the fellows was an Oliver Midbin, a -student of what he chose to call the new and revolutionary -science of Emotional Pathology. Tall and thin, with an incongruous -little potbelly like an enlarged and far-slipped -adamsapple, he pounced on me as a ready-made and captive -audience for his theories.</p> - -<p>“Now this case of pseudo-aphonia—” -“He means the dumb girl,” explained Ace, aside.</p> - -<p>“Nonsense. Dumbness is not even the statement of a -symptom, but a very imperfect description. Pseudo-aphonia. -Purely of an emotional nature. Of course if you -take her to some medical quack he’ll convince himself -and you and certainly her that there’s an impairment, or -degeneration, or atrophy of the vocal cords—” -“I’m not the girl’s guardian, Mr Midbin—” -“Doctor. Philosophiae, Göttingen. Trivial matter.”</p> - -<p>“Excuse me, Dr Midbin. Anyway, I’m not her guardian -so I’m not taking her anywhere. But, just as a theoretical -question, suppose examination did reveal physical damage?”</p> - -<p>He appeared delighted, and rubbed his hands together. -“Oh, it would. I assure you it would. These fellows always -find what theyre looking for. If your disposition is sour -theyll find warts on your duodenum. In a postmortem. In a -postmortem. Whereas Emotional Pathology deals with the -sour disposition and lets the warts, if any, take care of -themselves. Matter is a function of the mind. People are -dumb or blind or deaf for a purpose. Now what purpose -can the girl have for muteness?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</span></p> - -<p>“No conversation?” I suggested. I didnt doubt Midbin -was an authority, but his manner made flippancy almost -irresistible.</p> - -<p>“I shall find out,” he said firmly. “This is bound to be a -simpler maladjustment than Barbara’s—” -“Aw, come on,” protested Ace.</p> - -<p>“Nonsense, Dorn; obscurantic nonsense. Reticence is a -necessary ingredient of those medical ethics by which the -quacks conceal incompetence. Mumbo jumbo to keep the -layman from asking annoying questions. Priestly, not scientific -approach. Art and mystery of phlebotomy. Don’t -hold back knowledge; publish it to the world.”</p> - -<p>“I think Barbara wouldnt want her private thoughts -published to the world. You have to draw the line somewhere.”</p> - -<p>Midbin put his head on one side and looked at Ace as -though he were difficult to see. “Now that’s interesting, -Dorn,” he said; “I wonder what turns a seeker after knowledge -into a censor.”</p> - -<p>“Are you going to start exploring my emotional pathology -now?”</p> - -<p>“Not interesting enough; not nearly interesting enough. -Diagnosis while you wait; treatment in a few easy instalments. -Barbara now—there’s a really beautiful case. Beautiful -case; years of treatment and little sign of improvement. -Of course she wouldnt want her thoughts known. -Why? Because she’s happy with her hatred for her dead -mother. Shocking to Mrs Grundy; doubly ditto to Mister. -Exaggerated possessiveness toward her father makes her -miserable. Thoughts known, misery ventilated: shame, -condemnation, fie, fie. Her fantasy—” -“Midbin!”</p> - -<p>“Her fantasy of going back to childhood (fascinating; -adult employs infantile time-sequence, infantile magic, infantile -hatreds) in order to injure her mother is a sick -notion she cherishes the way a dog licks a wound. But -without analogous therapy. Ventilate it. Ventilate it. Now -this girl’s case is bound to be simpler. Younger if nothing -else. And nice, overt symptoms. Bring her around tomorrow -and we’ll begin.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</span></p> - -<p>“Me?” I asked.</p> - -<p>“Who else? Youre the only one she doesnt seem to -distrust.”</p> - -<p>It was annoying to have the girl’s puppylike devotion -observed and commented on. I realized she saw me as the -only connection, however tenuous, with a normal past; I -had assumed she would turn naturally after a few days to -the women who took such open pleasure in fussing over her -affliction. However she merely suffered their attentions; no -matter how I tried to avoid her she sought me out, running -to me with muted cries which should have been touching -but were only painful.</p> - -<p>Mr Haggerwells’ telegram to the sheriff’s office at York -had brought the reply that a deputy sheriff would visit the -haven “when time permitted.” He had also telegraphed the -Spanish legation who answered they knew no other Escobars -than Don Jaime and his wife. The girl might be a -servant or a stranger; it was no concern of His Most -Catholic Majesty.</p> - -<p>The school uniform made it unlikely she was a servant -but beyond this, little was deducible. She did not respond -to questions in either Spanish or English, and it was impossible -to tell if she understood their meaning, for her -blank expression remained unchanged. When offered pencil -and paper she handled them curiously, then let them -slide to the floor.</p> - -<p>I wondered briefly if perhaps her intelligence was slightly -subnormal, but this was met by a firm, even belligerent -denial from Midbin, whose conclusion was confirmed, at -least in my opinion, by her apparently excellent coordination, -her personal neatness and fastidiousness which were -far more delicate than any I’d been accustomed to.</p> - -<p>Midbin’s method of treatment smacked of the mystical. -His subjects were supposed to relax on a couch and say -whatever came into their minds. At least this was the clearest -part of the explanation he gave when I rebelliously -escorted the girl to his “office,” a large, bare room decorated -only by some old European calendars by the popular -academician, Picasso. The couch was a cot which Midbin -himself used more conventionally at night.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</span></p> - -<p>“All right,” I said; “just how are you going to manage?”</p> - -<p>“Convince her everything’s all right and I’m not going -to hurt her.”</p> - -<p>“Sure,” I agreed. “Sure. Only: how?”</p> - -<p>He gave me one of his head-on-shoulder looks and -turned to the girl who waited apathetically, with downcast -eyes. “You lie down,” he suggested.</p> - -<p>“Me? I’m not dumb.”</p> - -<p>“Pretend you are. Lie down, close your eyes, say the -first thing on your tongue. Without stopping to think about -it.”</p> - -<p>“How can I say anything if I’m pretending to be dumb?” -Grudgingly I complied, fancying a faint look of curiosity -passing over the too-placid face. “‘No man bathes twice -in the same stream,’” I muttered.</p> - -<p>He made me repeat the performance several times, then -by pantomime urged her to imitate me. It was doubtful if -she understood; in the end we nudged her gently into the -required position. There was no question of relaxation; -she lay there warily, tense and stiff even with her eyes -closed.</p> - -<p>The whole business was so manifestly useless and absurd, -to say nothing of being undignified, that I was tempted -to walk out on it. Only ignoble calculation on Midbin’s -voting for my acceptance in the haven kept me there.</p> - -<p>Looking at the form stretched out so rigidly, I could not -but admit again that the girl was beautiful. But the admission -was dispassionate; the beauty was abstract and neutral, -the lovely young lines evoked no lust. I felt only vexation -because her plight kept me from the wonders of Haggershaven.</p> - -<p>“What good can this possibly do?” I burst out after ten -fruitless minutes. “Youre trying to find out why she can’t -talk and she can’t talk to tell you why she can’t talk.”</p> - -<p>“Science explores all methods of approach,” Midbin -answered loftily; “I’m searching for a technique which will -reach her. Bring her back tomorrow.”</p> - -<p>I swallowed my annoyance and started out. The girl -jumped up and pressed close to my side. Outdoors the air -was crisp; I felt her suppress a slight shiver. “Now I sup<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</span>pose -I’ll have to take you where it’s warm or find a wrap -for you,” I scolded irritably. “I don’t know why I have to -be your nursemaid.”</p> - -<p>She whimpered very softly and I was remorseful. None -erf this was her fault; my callousness was inexcusable. But -if she could only attach herself to some other protector -and leave me alone....</p> - -<p>As one about to be banished I tried to cram everything -into short days. I realized that these autumn weeks, spent -in casual conversation or joining the familiar preparations -for rural winter, were a period of thorough and critical -probation. There was little I could do to sway the decision -beyond the exhibition of an honest willingness to turn to -whatever work needed doing, and to repeat, whenever the -opportunity offered, that Haggershaven was literally a revelation -to me, an island of civilization in the midst of a -chaotic and savage sea. My dream was to make a landfall -there.</p> - -<p>Certainly my meager background and scraps of reading -would not persuade the men and women of the haven; I -could only hope they might divine some promise in me. -Against this hope I put Barbara’s enmity, a hostility now -exacerbated by rage at Oliver Midbin for daring to devote -to another, particularly another woman, the attention which -had been her due, and the very technique used for her. I -knew her persistence and I could not doubt she would -move enough of the fellows to insure my rejection.</p> - -<p>The gang which had been operating in the vicinity, presumably -the same one I had encountered, moved on. At -least no further crimes were attributed to it. Once they -were gone, Deputy Sheriff Beasley finally found time to -visit Haggershaven in response to the telegram. He had -evidently been there before without attaining much respect -on either side. I got the distinct impression he would have -preferred a more formal examination than the one which -took place in Mr Haggerwells’ study, with fellows drifting -in and out, interrupting the proceedings with comments of -their own.</p> - -<p>I think he doubted the girl’s dumbness. He barked his -questions so loudly and brusquely they would have terri<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</span>fied -a far more securely poised individual. She promptly -went into dry hysterics, whereupon he turned his attention -to me.</p> - -<p>I was apprehensive lest his questions explore my life -with Tyss and my connection with the Grand Army, but -apparently mere presence at Haggershaven indicated an -innocence not unrelated to idiocy, at least so far as the -more popular crimes were concerned. My passage of the -York road and all the events leading up to it were outside -his interest; he wanted only a succinct story of the holdup, -reminding me of the late Colonel Tolliburr in his assumption -that the lay eye ought normally to be photographic of -the minutest detail.</p> - -<p>He was clearly dissatisfied with my account and left -grumbling that it would be more to the point if bookworms -learned to identify a man properly, instead of logarithms -or trigonometry. I didn’t see exactly how this applied to me, -since I was laudably ignorant of both subjects.</p> - -<p>If Officer Beasley was disappointed, Midbin was enchanted. -Of course he had heard my narrative before, but -this was the first time he’d savored its possible impact on -the girl.</p> - -<p>“You see, her pseudo-aphonia is neither congenital nor -of long standing. All logic leads to the conclusion that it’s -the result of her terror during the experience. She must -have wanted to scream, it must have been almost impossible -for her not to scream, but for her very life she dared -not. The instinctive, automatic reaction was the one she -could not allow herself. She had to remain mute while she -watched the murders.”</p> - -<p>For the first time it seemed possible there was more to -Midbin than his garrulity.</p> - -<p>“She crushed back that natural, overwhelming impulse,” -he went on. “She had to; her life depended on it. It was an -enormous effort and the effect on her was in proportion; -she achieved her object too well; when it was safe for her -to speak again she couldnt.”</p> - -<p>It all sounded so plausible it was some time before I -thought to ask him why she didnt appear to understand<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</span> -what we said, or why she didnt write anything when she -was handed pencil and paper.</p> - -<p>“Communication,” he answered. “She had to cut off -communication, and once cut off it’s not easy to restore. -At least that’s one aspect. Another is more tricky. The -holdup happened more than a month ago, but do you suppose -the affected mind reckons so precisely? Is a precise -reckoning possible? Duration may, for all we know, be an -entirely subjective thing. Yesterday for you may be today -for me. We recognize this to some extent when we speak of -hours passing slowly or quickly. The girl may still be undergoing -the agony of repressing her screams; the holdup, -the murders, are not in the past for her, but the present. -They are taking place in a long drawn out instant of time -which may never end during her life. And if this is so, is it -any wonder she is unable to relax, to let down her guard -long enough to realize that the present is present and the -crisis is past?”</p> - -<p>He pressed his middle thoughtfully. “Now, if it is possible -to recreate in her mind by stimulus from without -rather than by evocation from within the conditions leading -up to and through the climacteric, she would have a -chance to vent the emotions she was forced to swallow. -She might, I don’t say she would, she might speak again.”</p> - -<p>I understood such a process would necessarily be lengthy, -but as time passed I saw no indication he was reaching her -at all, much less that he was getting any results. One of -the Spanish-speaking fellows, a botanist who came and -went from the haven at erratic intervals, translated my -account of our meeting and read parts of it to the recumbent -girl, following Midbin’s excited stage directions and -interpolations. Nothing happened.</p> - -<p>Outside the futile duty of coaxing the girl to participate -in Midbin’s sessions I had no obligations except those I -took upon myself or could persuade others to delegate to -me. Hiro Agati declared me hopelessly incompetent to help -him in the kiln he had set up to make “hard glass,” a thick -substance he hoped might take the place of cast iron in -such things as woodstoves, or clay tile in flues. He conceded -I was not entirely useless in the small garden surrounding<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</span> -their cottage where he, Mrs Agati—an architect, much -younger than her husband and extremely diminutive—and -their three children spent their spare time transplanting, -rearranging, or preparing for the following season.</p> - -<p>Dr Agati was not only the first American Japanese I -had ever met; his was the first family I had known who -broke the unwritten rule of having only one child. Both he -and Kimi Agati seemed unaware of the stern injunctions -by Whigs and Populists alike that disaster would follow -if the population of the country increased too fast. Fumio -and Eiko didnt care, while Yoshio, at two, was just not -interested.</p> - -<p>The Agatis represented for me one more pang at the -thought of banishment from the haven. Since I knew -neither chemistry nor architecture, our conversation had -limits, but this was no drawback to the pleasure I took in -their company. Often, after I was assured I was welcome -there, I sat reading or simply silent while Hiro worked, -the children ran in and out, and Kimi, who was conservative -and didnt care for chairs, sat comfortably on the floor -and sketched or calculated stresses.</p> - -<p>Gradually I progressed from the stage where I wanted -decision on my application postponed as long as possible -to one where I was impatient to have it over and done with. -“Why?” asked Hiro. “Suspense is the condition we live in -all our lives.”</p> - -<p>“Well, but there are degrees. You know about what you -will be doing next year.”</p> - -<p>“Do I? What guarantees have I? The future is happily -veiled. When I was your age I despaired because no one -would accept the indentures of a Japanese. (We are still -called Japanese even though our ancestors migrated at the -time of the abortive attempt to overthrow the Shogunate -and restore the Mikado in 1868.) Suspense instead of certainty -would have been a pleasure.”</p> - -<p>“Anyway,” said Kimi practically, “it may be months -before the next meeting.”</p> - -<p>“What do you mean? Isnt there a set time for such -business?” Sure there must be, I had never dared ask the -exact date.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</span></p> - -<p>Hiro shook his head. “Why should there be? The next -time the fellows pass on an appropriation or a project, -we’ll decide whether there’s room for an historian.”</p> - -<p>“But ... as Kimi says, it might not be for months.”</p> - -<p>“Or it might be tomorrow,” replied Hiro.</p> - -<p>“Don’t worry, Hodge,” said Fumio, “Papa will vote for -you, and Mother too.”</p> - -<p>Hiro grunted.</p> - -<p>When it did come it was anticlimactic. Hiro, Midbin, -and several others with whom I’d scarcely exchanged a -word recommended me, and Barbara simply ignored my -existence. I was a full fellow of Haggershaven, with all the -duties and privileges appertaining. I was also securely at -home for the first time since I left Wappinger Falls more -than six years before. I knew that in all its history few had -ever cut themselves off from the haven, still fewer had ever -been asked to resign.</p> - -<p>At a modest celebration in the big kitchen that night, -the haven revealed more of the talents it harbored. Hiro -produced a gallon of liquor he had distilled from sawdust -and called cellusaki. Mr Haggerwells pronounced it -fit for a cultivated palate, following with an impromptu -discourse on drinking through the ages. Midbin sampled -enough of it to imitate Mr. Haggerwells’ lecture and then, -as an inspired afterthought, to demonstrate how Mr Haggerwells -might mimic Midbin’s parody. Ace and three -others sang ballads; even the dumb girl, persuaded to sip a -little of the cellusaki under the disapproving eyes of her -self-appointed guardians, seemed to become faintly animated. -If anyone noted the absence of Barbara Haggerwells, -no one commented on it.</p> - -<p>Fall became winter. Surplus timber was hauled in from -the woodlots and the lignin extracted by compressed air, a -method perfected by one of the fellows. Lignin was the fuel -used in our hot water furnaces and provided the gas for -the reflecting jets which magnified a tiny flame into strong -illumination. All of us took part in this work, but just as I -had not been able to help Hiro to his satisfaction in the -laboratory, so here too my ineptness with things mechani<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</span>cal -soon caused me to be set to more congenial tasks in -the stables.</p> - -<p>I did not repine at this, for though I was delighted with -the society of the others, I found it pleasurable to be -alone, to sort out my thoughts, to slow down to the rhythm -of the heavy percherons or enjoy the antics of the two -young foals. The world and time were somewhere shut -outside; I felt contentment so strong as to be beyond satisfaction -or any active emotion.</p> - -<p>I was currying a dappled mare one afternoon and reflecting -how the steam-plow used on the great wheat -ranches of British America deprived the farmers not merely -of fertilizer but also of companionship, when Barbara, her -breath still cloudy from the cold outside, came in and stood -behind me. I made an artificial cowlick on the mare’s flank, -then brushed it glossy smooth again.</p> - -<p>“Hello,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Uh ... hello, Miss Haggerwells.”</p> - -<p>“Must you, Hodge?”</p> - -<p>I roughed up the mare’s flank once more. “Must I what? -I’m afraid I don’t understand.”</p> - -<p>She came close, as close as she had in the bookstore, and -I felt my breath quicken. “I think you do. Why do you -avoid me? And call me ‘Miss Haggerwells’ in that prim -tone? Do I look so old and ugly and forbidding?”</p> - -<p>This, I thought, is going to hurt Ace. Poor Ace, befuddled -by a Jezebel; why can’t he attach himself to a nice -quiet girl who won’t tear him in pieces every time she follows -her inclinations?</p> - -<p>I smoothed the mare’s side for the last time and put -down the currycomb.</p> - -<p>“I think you are the most exciting woman Ive ever met, -Barbara,” I said.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C13"><i>13.</i> <i>TIME</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>“Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“Barbara?”</p> - -<p>“Is it really true youve never written your mother since -you left home?”</p> - -<p>“Why should I write her? What could I say? Perhaps if -my first plans had come to something, I might have. But -to tell her I worked for six years for nothing would only -confirm her opinion of my lack of gumption.”</p> - -<p>“I wonder if your ambitions in the end don’t amount to -a wish to prove her wrong.”</p> - -<p>“Now you sound like Midbin,” I said, but I wasnt annoyed. -I much preferred her present questions to those I’d -heard from her in the past weeks: Do you love me? Are -you sure? Really love, I mean; more than any other -woman? Why?</p> - -<p>“Oliver has had accidental flashes of insight.”</p> - -<p>“Arent you substituting your own for what you think -might be my motives?”</p> - -<p>“My mother hated me,” she stated flatly.</p> - -<p>“Well, it isnt a world where love is abundant; substitutes -are cheap and available. But hate—that’s a strong word. -How do you know?” -“I know. What does it matter how? I’m not unfeeling, -like you.”</p> - -<p>“Me? Now what have I done?”</p> - -<p>“You don’t care about anyone. Not me or anyone else. -You don’t want me; just any woman would do.”</p> - -<p>I considered this. “I don’t think so, Barbara—”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</span> -“See! You don’t think so. Youre not sure, and anyway -you wouldnt hurt my feelings needlessly. Why don’t you -be honest and tell the truth. You’d just as soon it was that -streetwalker in New York. Maybe you’d rather. You miss -her, don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, Ive told you a dozen times I never—” -“And Ive told you a dozen times youre a liar! I don’t -care. I really don’t care.”</p> - -<p>“All right.”</p> - -<p>“How can you be so phlegmatic? So unfeeling? Nothing -means anything to you. Youre a real, stolid peasant. And -you smell like one too, always reeking of the stable.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry,” I said mildly; “I’ll try to bathe more often.”</p> - -<p>Her taunts and jealous fits, her insistent demands did -not ruffle me. I was too pleased with the wonders of life to -be disturbed. All I’d dreamed Haggershaven could mean -when I was sure I would never be part of it was fulfilled -and more than fulfilled. Haggershaven and Barbara; Eden -and Lilith.</p> - -<p>At first it seemed the bookstore years were wasted, but -I soon realized the value of that catholic and serendipitous -reading as a preparation for this time. I was momentarily -disappointed that there was no one at the haven to whom -I could turn for that personal, face-to-face, student-teacher -relationship on which I’d set so great a store, but if there -was no historical scholar among the fellows to tutor me, I -was surrounded by those who had learned the discipline -of study. There was none to discuss the details of the industrial -revolution or the failure of the Ultramontane -Movement in Catholicism and the policies of Popes Adrian -VII, VIII and IX, but all could show me scheme and -method. I began to understand what thorough exploration -of a subject meant as opposed to sciolism, and I threw myself -into my chosen work with furious zest.</p> - -<p>I also began to understand the central mystery of historical -theory. When and what and how and where, but the -when is the least. Not chronology but relationship is ultimately -what the historian deals in. The element of time, -so vital at first glance, assumes a constantly more subordinate -character. That the past is past becomes ever less<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</span> -important. Except for perspective it might as well be the -present or the future or, if one can conceive it, a parallel -time. I was not investigating a petrification but a fluid. -Were it possible to know fully the what and how and where -one might learn the why, and assuredly if one grasped the -why he could place the when at will.</p> - -<p>During that winter I read philosophy, psychology, archaeology, -anthropology. My energy and appetite were prodigious, -as they needed to be. I saw the field of knowledge, -not knowledge in the abstract, but things I wanted to know, -things I had to know, expanding in front of me with dizzying -speed while I crawled and crept and stumbled over -ground I should have covered years before.</p> - -<p>Yet if I had studied more conventionally I would never -have had the Haven or Barbara. Novelists speak lightly of -gusts of passion, but it was nothing less than irresistible -force which drove me to her, day after day. Looking back -on what I had felt for Tirzah Vame with the condescension -twenty-four has toward twenty, I saw my younger self only -as callow, boyish and slightly obtuse. I was embarrassed -by the torments I had suffered.</p> - -<p>With Barbara I lived only in the present, shutting out -past and future. This was only partly due to the intensity, -the fierceness of our desire; much came from Barbara’s -own troubled spirit. She herself was so avid, so demanding, -that yesterday and tomorrow were irrelevant to the -insistent moment. The only thing saving me from enslavement -like poor Ace was the belief, correct or incorrect I -am to this day not certain, that to yield the last vestige of -detachment and objectivity would make me helpless, not -just before her, but to accomplish my ever more urgent -ambitions.</p> - -<p>Still I know much of my reserve was unnecessary, a -product of fear, not prudence. I denied much I could have -given freely and without harm; my guard protected what -was essentially empty. My fancied advantage over Ace, -based on my having always had an easy, perhaps too easy -way with women, was no advantage at all. I foolishly -thought myself master of the situation because her infidelities, -if such a word can be used where faithfulness is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</span> -explicitly ruled out, did not bother me. I believed I had -grown immensely wise since the time when the prospect of -Tirzah’s rejection had made me miserable. I was wrong; -my sophistication was a lack, not an achievement</p> - -<p>Do I need to say that Barbara was no wanton, moved -by light and fickle voluptuousness? The puritanism of our -time, expressing itself in condemnations and denials, -molded her as it molded our civilization. She was driven -by urges deeper and darker than sensuality; her mad jealousies -were provoked by an unappeasable need for constant -reassurance. She had to be dominant, she had to be -courted by more than one man; she had to be told constantly -what she could never truly believe: that she was -uniquely desired.</p> - -<p>I wondered that she did not burn herself out, not only -with conflicting passions, but with her fury of work. Sleep -was a weakness she despised, yet she craved far more of it -than she allowed herself; she rationed her hours of unconsciousness -and drove herself relentlessly. Ace’s panegyrics -on her importance as a physicist I discounted, but older -and more objective colleagues spoke of her mathematical -concepts, not merely with respect, but with awe.</p> - -<p>She did not discuss her work with me; our intimacy -stopped short of such exchanges. I got the impression she -was seeking the principles of heavier-than-air flight, a -chimera which had long intrigued inventors. It seemed a -pointless pursuit, for it was manifest such levitation could -no more replace our safe, comfortable guided balloons -than minibiles could replace the horse.</p> - -<p>Spring made all of us single-minded farmers until the -fields were plowed and sown. No one grudged these days, -for the Haven’s economic life was based first of all on its -land, and we were happy in the work itself. Not until the -most feverish competition with time began to slacken could -we return to our regular activities.</p> - -<p>I say “all of us,” but I must except the dumb girl. She -greeted the spring with the nearest approach to cheerfulness -she had displayed; there was a distinct lifting of her -apathy. Unexpectedly she revealed a talent which had survived -the shock to her personality or had been resurrected<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</span> -like the pussywillows and crocuses by the warm sun. She -was a craftsman with needle and thread. Timidly at first, -but gradually growing bolder, she contrived dresses of -gayer and gayer colors in place of the drab school uniform; -always, on the completion of a new creation, running to -me as though to solicit my approval.</p> - -<p>This innocent if embarrassing custom could hardly escape -Barbara’s notice, but her anger was directed at me, -not the girl. My “devotion” was not only absurd, she told -me, it was also conspicuous and degrading. My taste was -inexplicable, running as it did to immature, deranged -cripples.</p> - -<p>Naturally when the girl took up the habit of coming to -the edge of the field where I was plowing, waiting gravely -motionless for me to drive the furrow toward her, I anticipated -still further punishment from Barbara’s tongue. The -girl was not to be swayed from her practice; at least I did -not have the heart to speak roughly to her, and so she daily -continued to stand through the long hours watching me -plow, bringing me a lunch at noon and docilely sharing a -small portion of it.</p> - -<p>The planting done, Midbin began the use of a new technique, -showing her drawings of successive stages of the -holdup, again nagging and pumping me for details to -sharpen their accuracy. Her reactions pleased him immensely, -for she responded to the first ones with nods and -the throaty sounds we recognized as understanding or -agreement. The scenes of the assault itself, of the shooting -of the coachman, the flight of the footman, and her own -concealment in the cornfield evoked whimpers, while the -brutal depiction of the Escobars’ murder made her cower -and cover her eyes.</p> - -<p>I suppose I am not particularly tactful; still I had been -careful not to mention any of this to Barbara. Midbin, however, -after a very gratifying reaction to one of the drawings, -said casually, “Barbara hasnt been here for a long time. I -wish she would come back.”</p> - -<p>When I repeated this she stormed at me. “How dare -you discuss me with that ridiculous fool?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</span></p> - -<p>“Youve got it all wrong. There wasnt any discussion. -Midbin only said—” -“I know what Oliver said. I know his whole silly vocabulary.”</p> - -<p>“He only wants to help you.”</p> - -<p>“Help me? Help <i>me</i>? What’s wrong with me?”</p> - -<p>“Nothing, Barbara. Nothing.”</p> - -<p>“Am I dumb or blind or stupid?”</p> - -<p>“Please, Barbara.”</p> - -<p>“Just unattractive. I know. Ive seen you with that creature. -How you must hate me to flaunt her before everyone!”</p> - -<p>“You know I only go with her to Midbin’s because he -insists.”</p> - -<p>“What about your little lovers’ meetings in the woodlot -when you were supposed to be plowing? Do you think I -didnt know about them?”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, I assure you they were perfectly harmless. -She—” -“Youre a liar. More than that, youre a sneak and a -hypocrite. Yes, and a mean, crawling sycophant as well. I -know you must detest me, but it suits you to suffer me -because of the haven. I’m not blind; youve used me, deliberately -and calculatedly for your own selfish ends.”</p> - -<p>Midbin could explain and excuse her outbursts by his -“emotional pathology.” Ace accepted and suffered them -as inescapable, so did her father, but I saw no necessity of -being always subject to her tantrums. I told her so, adding, -not too heatedly I think, “Maybe we shouldn’t see each -other alone after this.”</p> - -<p>She stood perfectly immobile and silent, as if I were still -speaking. “All right,” she said at last. “All right; yes ... -yes. Don’t.”</p> - -<p>Her apparent calm deceived me completely; I smiled -with relief.</p> - -<p>“That’s right, laugh. Why shouldnt you? You have no -feelings, no more than you have an intelligence. You are -an oaf, a clod, a real bumpkin. Standing there with a silly -grin on your face. Oh I hate you! How I hate you!”</p> - -<p>She wept, she shrilled, she rushed at me and then turned<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</span> -away, crying she hadnt meant it, not a word of it. She cajoled, -begging forgiveness for all she’d said, tearfully promising -to control herself after this, moaning that she needed -me, and finally, when I didnt repulse her, exclaiming it -was her love for me which tormented her so and drove her -to such scenes. It was a wretched, degrading moment, and -not the least of its wretchedness and degradation was that -I recognized the erotic value of her abjection. Detachedly -I might pity, fear or be repelled; at the same time I had to -admit her sudden humility was exciting.</p> - -<p>Perhaps this storm changed our relationship for the -better, or at least eased the constraint between us. At any -rate it was after this she began speaking to me of her work, -putting us on a friendlier, less furious plane. I learned now -how completely garbled was my notion of what she was -doing.</p> - -<p>“Heavier-than-air flying-machines!” she cried. “How -utterly absurd!”</p> - -<p>“All right. I didnt know.”</p> - -<p>“My work is theoretical. I’m not a vulgar mechanic.”</p> - -<p>“All right, all right.”</p> - -<p>“I’m going to show that time and space are aspects of -the same entity.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” I said, thinking of something else.</p> - -<p>“What is time?”</p> - -<p>“Uh?... Dear Barbara, since I don’t know anything -I can slide gracefully out of that one. I couldnt even begin -to define time.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, you could probably define it all right—in terms of -itself. I’m not dealing with definitions but concepts.” -“All right, conceive.”</p> - -<p>“Hodge, like all stuffy people your levity is ponderous.”</p> - -<p>“Excuse me. Go ahead.”</p> - -<p>“Time is an aspect.”</p> - -<p>“So you mentioned. I once knew a man who said it was -an illusion. And another who said it was a serpent with its -tail in its mouth.”</p> - -<p>“Mysticism.” The contempt with which she spoke the -word brought a sudden image of Roger Tyss saying “metaphysics” -with much the same inflection. “Time, matter,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</span> -space and energy are all aspects of the cosmic entity. Interchangeable -aspects. Theoretically it should be possible to -translate matter into terms of energy and space into terms -of time; matter-energy into space-time.”</p> - -<p>“It sounds so simple I’m ashamed of myself.”</p> - -<p>“To put it so crudely the explanation is misleading: suppose -matter is resolved into its component....”</p> - -<p>“Atoms?” I suggested, since she seemed at loss for a -word.</p> - -<p>“No, atoms are already too individualized, too separate. -Something more fundamental than atoms. We have no -word because we can’t quite grasp the concept yet. Essence, -perhaps, or the theological ‘spirit.’ If matter....”</p> - -<p>“A man?”</p> - -<p>“Man, turnip or chemical compound,” she answered impatiently; -“if resolved into its essence it can presumably -be reassembled, another wrong word, at another point of -the time-space fabric.”</p> - -<p>“You mean ... like yesterday?”</p> - -<p>“No—and yes. What is ‘yesterday’? A thing? An aspect? -An idea? Or a relationship? Oh, words are useless things; -even with mathematical symbols you can hardly.... But -someday I’ll establish it. Or lay the groundwork for my -successors. Or the successors of my successors.” -I nodded. Midbin was at least half right; Barbara was -emotionally sick. For what was this “theory” of hers but -the rationalization of a daydream, the daydream of discovering -a process for reaching back through time to injure -her dead mother and so steal all of her father’s affections?</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C14"><i>14.</i> <i>MIDBIN’S EXPERIMENT</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>At the next meeting of the fellows Midbin asked -an appropriation for experimental work and the help of -haven members in the project. Since the extent of both -requests was modest, their granting would ordinarily have -been a formality. But Barbara asked politely if Dr Midbin -wouldnt like to elaborate a little on the purposes of his -experiment.</p> - -<p>I knew her manner was a danger signal. Nevertheless -Midbin merely answered goodhumoredly that he proposed -to test a theory of whether an emotionally induced physical -handicap could be cured by recreating in the subject’s mind -the shock which had caused—to use a loose, inaccurate -term—the impediment.</p> - -<p>“I thought so. He wants to waste the haven’s money -and time on a little tart he’s having an affair with while -important work is held up for lack of funds.”</p> - -<p>One of the women called out, “Oh, Barbara, no,” and -there were exclamations of disapproval. I saw Kimi Agati -look steadfastly down in embarrassment. Mr Haggerwells, -after trying unsuccessfully to hold Barbara’s eye, said, “I -must apologize for my daughter—” -“It’s all right,” interrupted Midbin. “I understand Barbara’s -notions. I’m sure no one here really thinks there is -anything improper between the girl and me. Outside of -this, Barbara’s original question seems quite in order. Quite -in order. Briefly, as most of you know, I’ve been trying to -restore speech to a subject who lost it—again I use an inaccurate -term for convenience—during an afflicting expe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</span>rience. -Preliminary explorations indicate good probability -of satisfactory response to my proposed method, which is -simply to employ a kinematic camera like those making -entertainment photinugraphs—” -“He wants to turn the haven into a tinugraph mill with -the fellows as mummers!”</p> - -<p>“Only this once, Barbara, only this once. Not regularly; -not as routine.”</p> - -<p>At this point her father insisted the request be voted on -without any more discussion. I was tempted to vote with -Barbara, the only dissident, for I foresaw Midbin’s tinugraph -would undoubtedly rely heavily on cooperation from -me, but I didnt have the courage. Instead I merely abstained, -like Midbin himself and Ace.</p> - -<p>The first effect of Midbin’s program was to free me from -obligation, for he decided there was no point continuing -the sessions with the dumb girl as before. All his time was -taken up anyway with photography—no one at the haven -had specialized in it—kinematic theory, the art of pantomime, -and the relative merit of different makes of cameras, -all manufactured abroad.</p> - -<p>The girl, who had never lost her tenseness and apprehension -during the interviews, nevertheless clung to the habit -of being escorted to Midbin’s workroom. Since it was impossible -to convey to her that the sessions were temporarily -suspended, she appeared regularly, always in a dress with -which she had taken manifest pains, and there was little I -could do but walk her to Midbin’s and back. I was acutely -conscious of the ridiculousness of these parades and expectant -of retribution from Barbara afterward, so I was -to some extent relieved when Midbin finally made his decision -and procured camera and film.</p> - -<p>Now I had to set the exact scene where the holdup had -taken place, not an easy thing to do, for one rise looks much -like another at twilight and all look differently in daylight. -Then I had to approximate the original conditions as nearly -as possible. Here Midbin was partially foiled by the limitations -of his medium, being forced to use the camera in -full sunlight instead of at dusk.</p> - -<p>I dressed and instructed the actors in their parts, rehears<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</span>ing -and directing them throughout. The only immunity I -got was Midbin’s concession that I neednt play the role of -myself, since in my early part of spectator I would be hidden -anyway, and the succor was omitted as irrelevant to -the therapeutic purpose. Midbin himself did nothing but -tend the camera.</p> - -<p>Any tinugraph mill would have snorted at our final product -and certainly no tinugraph lyceum would have condescended -to show it. After some hesitation Midbin had decided -not to make a phonoto, feeling the use of sound -would add no value and considerable expense, so the film -didnt even have this feature to recommend it. Fortunately -for whatever involuntary professional pride was involved, -no one was present at the first showing but the girl and me, -Ace to work the magic-lantern, and Midbin.</p> - -<p>In the darkened room the pictures on the screen gave—after -the first minutes—such an astonishing illusion that -when one of the horsemen rode toward the camera we all -reflexively shrank back. Despite its amateurishness the tinugraph -seemed an artistic success to us, but it was no triumph -in justifying its existence. The girl reacted no differently -than she had toward the drawings; if anything her -response was less satisfactory. The inarticulate noises ran -the same scale from dismay to terror; nothing new was -added. Nevertheless Midbin, his adamsapple working joyously -up and down, slapped Ace and me on the back, predicting -he’d have her talking like a politician before the -year was out.</p> - -<p>I suppose the process was imperceptible; certainly there -was no discernible difference between one showing and the -next. The boring routine continued day after day and so -absolute was Midbin’s confidence that we were not too -astonished after some weeks when, at the moment “Don -Jaime” folded in simulated death, she fainted and remained -unconscious for some time.</p> - -<p>After this we expected—at least Ace and I did, Midbin -only rubbed his palms together—that the constraint on her -tongue would be suddenly and entirely lifted. It wasnt, but -a few showings later, at the same crucial point, she<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</span> -screamed. It was a genuine scream, clear and piercing, -bearing small resemblance to the strangling noises we were -accustomed to. Midbin had been vindicated; no mute could -have voiced that full, shrill cry.</p> - -<p>Pursuing another of his theories, he soon gave up the -idea of helping her express the words in her mind in Spanish. -Instead he concentrated on teaching her English. His -method was primitive, consisting of pointing solemnly to -objects and repeating their names in an artificial monotone.</p> - -<p>“She’ll have an odd way of speaking,” remarked Ace; -“all nouns, singular nouns at that, said with a mouthful of -pebbles. I can just imagine the happy day: ‘Man chair wall -girl floor;’ and you bubbling back, ‘Carpet ceiling earth -grass.’”</p> - -<p>“I’ll supply the verbs as needed,” said Midbin; “first -things first.”</p> - -<p>She must have been paying at least as much attention to -our conversation as to his instruction for, unexpectedly, -one day she pointed to me and said quite clearly, “Hodge -... Hodge ...”</p> - -<p>I was discomposed, but not with the same vexation I -had felt at her habit of seeking me out and following me -around. There was a faint, bashful pleasure, and a feeling -of gratitude for such steadfastness.</p> - -<p>She must have had some grounding in English, for while -she utilized the nouns Midbin had supplied, she soon added, -tentatively and questioningly, a verb or adjective here and -there. “I ... walk ...?” Ace’s fear of her acquiring Midbin’s -dead inflection was groundless; her voice was low and -charmingly modulated; we were enchanted listening to her -elementary groping among words.</p> - -<p>Conversation or questioning was as yet impossible. Midbin’s, -“What is your name?” brought forth no response -save a puzzled look and a momentary sinking back into -dullness. But several weeks later she touched her breast -and said shyly, “Catalina.”</p> - -<p>Her memory then, was not impaired, at least not totally. -There was no way of telling yet what she remembered and -what self-protection had forced her to forget, for direct -questions seldom brought satisfactory answers at this stage.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</span> -Facts concerning herself she gave out sporadically and -without relation to our curiosity.</p> - -<p>Her name was Catalina García; she was the much -younger sister of Doña Maria Escobar, with whom she -lived. So far as she knew she had no other relatives. She -did not want to go back to school; they had taught her to -sew, they had been kind, but she had not been happy there. -Please—we would not send her away from Haggershaven, -would we?</p> - -<p>Midbin acted now like a fond parent who was both -proud of his child’s accomplishments and fearful lest she be -not quite ready to leave his solicitous care. He was far from -satisfied at restoring her speech; he probed and searched, -seeking to know what she had thought and felt during the -long months of muteness.</p> - -<p>“I do not know, truly I do not know,” she protested toward -the end of one of these examinations. “I would say, -yes; sometimes I knew you were talking to me, or Hodge.” -Here she looked at me steadily for an instant, to make me -feel both remorseful and proud. “But it was like someone -talking a long way off, so I never quite understood, nor was -even sure it was I who was being spoken to. Often—at -least it seemed often, perhaps it was not—often, I tried to -speak, to beg you to tell me if you were real people talking -to me, or just part of a dream. That was very bad, because -when no words came I was more afraid than ever, and when -I was afraid the dream became darker and darker.” -Afterward, looking cool and fresh and strangely assured, -she came upon me while I was cultivating young corn. A -few weeks earlier I would have known she had sought me -out; now it might be an accident.</p> - -<p>“But I knew more surely when it was you who spoke, -Hodge,” she said abruptly. “In my dream you were the -most real.” Then she walked tranquilly away.</p> - -<p>Barbara, who had studiedly said nothing further about -what Midbin was doing, commented one day, apparently -without rancor, “So Oliver appears to have proved a -theory. How nice for you.”</p> - -<p>“What do you mean?” I inquired guardedly; “How is it -nice for me?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</span></p> - -<p>“Why, you won’t have to chaperone the silly girl all over -any more. She can ask her way around now.”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes; that’s right,” I mumbled.</p> - -<p>“And we won’t have to quarrel over her any more,” she -concluded.</p> - -<p>“Sure,” I said. “That’s right.”</p> - -<p>Mr Haggerwells again communicated with the Spanish -diplomats, recalling his original telegram and mentioning -the aloof reply. He was answered in person by an official -who acted as though he himself had composed the disclaiming -response. Perhaps he had, for he made it quite clear -that only devotion to duty made it possible to deal at all -with such savages as inhabited the United States.</p> - -<p>He confirmed the existence of one Catalina García and -consulted a photograph, carefully shielded in his hand, -comparing it with the features of our Catalina, at last satisfying -himself they were the same. This formality finished, -he spoke rapidly to Catalina in Spanish. She shook her -head and looked confused. “Tell him I can hardly understand, -Hodge; ask him to speak in English, please.”</p> - -<p>The diplomat looked furious. Midbin explained hastily -that the shock which had caused her muteness had not entirely -worn off. Unquestionably she would recover her full -memory in time, but for the present there were still areas -of forgetfulness. Her native language was part of the past, -he went on, happy with a new audience, and the past was -something to be pushed away since it contained the terrible -moment. English on the other hand—” -“I understand,” said the diplomat stiffly, resolutely addressing -none of us. “It is clear. Very well then. The Señorita -García is heir—heiress to an estate. Not a very big one, -I regret to say. A moderate estate.” -“You mean land and houses?” I asked curiously.</p> - -<p>“A moderate estate,” he repeated, looking attentively at -his gloved hand. “Some shares of stock, some bonds, some -cash. The details will be available to the señorita.”</p> - -<p>“It doesnt matter,” said Catalina timidly.</p> - -<p>Having put us all, and particularly me, in our place as -rude and nosey barbarians, he went on more pleasantly, -“According to the records of the embassy, the señorita is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</span> -not yet eighteen. As an orphan living in foreign lands she -is a ward of the Spanish Crown. The señorita will return -with me to Philadelphia where she will be suitably accommodated -until repatriation can be arranged. I feel certain -that in the proper surroundings, hearing her natural tongue, -she will soon regain its use. The—ah—institution may submit -a bill for board and lodging during her stay.” -“Does he mean—take me away from here? For always?” Catalina, who had seemed so mature a moment before, -suddenly acted like a frightened child.</p> - -<p>“He only wants to make you comfortable and take you -among your own people,” said Mr Haggerwells. “Perhaps -it is a bit sudden....”</p> - -<p>“I can’t. Do not let him take me away. Hodge, Hodge—do -not let him take me away.” -“Señorita, you do not understand—” -“No, no. I won’t. Hodge, Mr Haggerwells, do not let -him!”</p> - -<p>“But my dear—” -It was Midbin who cut Mr Haggerwells off. “I cannot -guarantee against a relapse, even a reversion to the pseudo-aphonia -if this emotional tension is maintained. I must -insist that Catalina is not to continue the conversation -now.”</p> - -<p>“No one’s going to take you away by force,” I assured -her, finally finding my courage once Midbin had asserted -himself.</p> - -<p>The official shrugged, managing to intimate in the gesture -his opinion that the haven was of a very shady character -indeed and had quite possibly engineered the holdup -itself.</p> - -<p>“If the señorita genuinely wishes to remain for the present—” a lifted eyebrow loaded the “genuinely” with meaning -“—I have no authority at the moment to inquire into -influences that have persuaded her. No, none at all. Nor -can I remove her by—ah—I will not insist. No. Not at all.” -“That is very understanding of you, sir,” said Mr Haggerwells. -“I’m sure everything will be all right eventually.”</p> - -<p>The diplomat bowed stiffly. “Of course the—ah—insti<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</span>tution -understands it can hope for no further compensation—” -“None has been given or asked for. None will be,” said -Mr Haggerwells in what was, for him, a sharp tone.</p> - -<p>The gentleman from the legation bowed. “The señorita -will naturally be visited from time to time by an official. -Without note—notification. She may be removed whenever -His Most Catholic Majesty sees fit. And of course none of -her estate will be released before the eighteenth birthday. -The whole affair is entirely irregular.” -After he left I reproached myself for not asking what -Don Jaime’s mission had been that fateful evening, or at -least for not trying to find out what his function with the -Spanish legation was. Probably he could in no way be connected -with the counterfeiting of the pesetas. By making no -attempt to learn any facts which might have lessened the -old feeling of guilty responsibility I kept it uneasily alive.</p> - -<p>These reproaches were pushed aside when Catalina put -her head against my collarbone, sobbing with relief. “There, -there,” I said, “there, there.”</p> - -<p>“Uncouth,” reflected Mr Haggerwells. “Compensation -indeed!”</p> - -<p>“Dealing with natives,” said Midbin. “Probably courteous -enough to Frenchmen or Afrikanders.”</p> - -<p>I patted Catalina’s quivering shoulders. Child or not, -now she was able to talk I had to admit I no longer found -her devotion so tiresome. Though I was definitely uneasy -lest Barbara discover us in this attitude.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C15"><i>15.</i> <i>GOOD YEARS</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>And now I come to the period of my life which -stands in such sharp contrast to what had gone before. Was -it really eight years I spent at Haggershaven? The arithmetic -is indisputable: I arrived in 1944 at the age of twenty-three; -I left in 1952 at the age of thirty-one. Indisputable, -but not quite believable; as with the happy countries -which are supposed to have no history I find it hard to go -over those eight years and divide them by remarkable -events. They blended too smoothly, too contentedly into -one another.</p> - -<p>Crops were harvested, stored or marketed; the fields -were plowed in the fall and again in the spring and sown -anew. Three of the older fellows died, another became -bedridden. Five new fellows were accepted; two biologists, -a chemist, a poet, a philologist. It was to the last I played -the same part Ace had to me, introducing him to the sanctuary -of the haven, seeing its security and refuge afresh -and deeply thankful for the fortune that had brought me -to it.</p> - -<p>There was no question about success in my chosen profession, -not even the expected alternation of achievement -and disappointment. Once started on the road I kept on -going at an even, steady pace. For what would have been -my doctoral thesis I wrote a paper on <i>The Timing of General -Stuart’s Maneuvers During August 1863 in Pennsylvania</i>. -This received flattering comment from scholars as -far away as the Universities of Lima and Cambridge; be<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</span>cause -of it I was offered instructorships at highly respectable -schools.</p> - -<p>I could not think of leaving the haven. The world into -which I had been born had never been fully revealed for -what it was until I had escaped from it. Secrecy and ugliness; -greed, fear and callousness; meanness, avarice, cunning, -deceit and self-worship were as close around as the -nearest farmhouses. The idea of returning to that world -and of entering into daily competition with other underpaid, -overdriven drudges striving fruitlessly to apply a -dilute coating of culture to the unresponsive surface of unwilling -students had little attraction.</p> - -<p>In those eight years, as I broadened my knowledge I -narrowed my field. Undoubtedly it was presumptuous to -take the War of Southron Independence as my specialty -when there were already so many comprehensive works on -the subject and so many celebrated historians engaged with -this special event. However, my choice was made not out -of self-importance but fascination, and undoubtedly it was -the proximity of the scene which influenced the selection -of my goal, the last thirteen months of the war, from -General Lee’s invasion of Pennsylvania to the capitulation -at Reading. I saw the whole vast design: Gettysburg, Lancaster, -the siege of Philadelphia, the disastrous Union -counter-thrust in Tennessee, the evacuation of Washington, -and finally the desperate effort to break out of Lee’s trap -which ended at Reading. I could spend profitable years -filling in the details.</p> - -<p>My monographs were published in learned Confederate -and British journals—there were none in the United States—and -I rejoiced when they brought attention, not so much -to me as to Haggershaven. I could contribute only this -notice and my physical labor; on the other hand I asked -little beyond food, clothing and shelter—just books. My -field trips I took on foot, often earning my keep by casual -labor for farmers, paying for access to private collections -of letters or documents by indexing and arranging them.</p> - -<p>The time devoted to scholarship did not alone distinguish -those eight years, nor even the security of the haven. I -have spoken of the simple, easy manner in which the Agatis<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</span> -admitted me to their friendship, but they were not the only -ones with whom there grew ties of affection and understanding. -With very few exceptions the fellows of Haggershaven -quickly learned to shed the suspicion and aloofness, -so necessary a protection elsewhere, and substitute acceptance. -The result was a tranquillity I had never experienced -before, so that I think of those years as set apart, a -golden period, a time of perpetual warm sunshine.</p> - -<p>Between Barbara and me the turbulent, ambivalent passion -swept back and forth, the periods of estrangement -seemingly only a generating force to bring us together -again. Hate and love, admiration and distaste, impatience -and pity were present on both sides. Only on hers there was -jealousy as well; perhaps if I had not been indifferent -whenever she chose to respond to some other man she -might not have felt the errant desire so strongly. Perhaps -not; there was a moral urge behind her behavior. She -sneered at women who yielded to such temptations. To her -they were not temptations but just rewards; she did not -yield, she took them as her due.</p> - -<p>Sometimes I wondered if her neurosis did not verge on -insanity; I’m sure for her part she must often have stood -off and appraised me as a mistake. I know there were -many times when I wished there would be no more reconciliation -between us.</p> - -<p>Yet no amount of thinking could cancel the swift hunger -I felt in her presence or the deep mutual satisfaction of -physical union. Frequently we were lovers for as long as -a month before the inevitable quarrel, followed by varying -periods of coolness. During the weeks of distance I remembered -how she could be tender and gracious as well as -ardent, just as during our intimacy I remembered her -ruthlessness and dominance.</p> - -<p>It was not only her temperamental outbursts nor even -her unappeasable craving for love and affection which -thrust us apart. Impediments which, in the beginning, had -appeared inconsequential assumed more importance all the -time. It was increasingly hard for her to leave her work -behind even for moments. She was never allowed to forget, -either by her own insatiable drive or by outside acknowl<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</span>edgment -that she was already one of the foremost physicists -in the world. She had been granted so many honorary -degrees she no longer traveled to receive them; offers from -foreign governments of well-paid jobs connected with their -munitions industries were common. Articles were written -about her equation of matter, energy, space and time, acclaiming -her as a revolutionary thinker; though she dismissed -them as evaluation of elementary work, they nevertheless -added to her isolation and curtailed her freedom.</p> - -<p>Midbin was, in his way, as much under her spell as Ace -or myself. His triumph over Catalina’s dumbness he took -lightly now it was accomplished; stabilizing Barbara’s emotions -was the victory he wanted. She, on her side, had lost -whatever respect she must have had for him in the days -when she had submitted to his treatment. On the very rare -occasions when the whim moved her to listen to his entreaties—usually -relayed through Ace or me—and grant -him time, it seemed to be only for the opportunity of making -fun of his efforts. Patiently he tried new techniques of -exploration and expression.</p> - -<p>“But it’s not much use,” he said once, dolefully; “she -doesnt <i>want</i> to be helped.”</p> - -<p>“Wanting seemed to have little to do with making Catty -talk,” I pointed out. “Couldnt you....”</p> - -<p>“Make a tinugraph of Barbara’s traumatic shock? If I -had the materials there would be no necessity.”</p> - -<p>Perhaps there was less malice in her mockery now Catty -was no longer the focus of his theories about emotional -pathology; perhaps she forgave him for her temporary displacement, -but she did not withhold her contempt. “Oliver, -you should have been a woman,” she told him; “you would -have been impossible as a mother, but what a grandmother -you would have made!”</p> - -<p>That Catty herself had in her own way as strong a will -as Barbara was demonstrated in her determination to become -part of Haggershaven. Her reaction to the visit of the -Spanish official was translated into an unyielding program. -She had gone resolutely to Thomas Haggerwells, telling him -she knew quite well she had neither the aptitudes nor qualifications -for admission to fellowship, nor did she ask it. All<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</span> -she wanted was to live in what she regarded as her only -home. She would gladly do any work from washing dishes -to making clothes—anything she was asked. When she -came of age she would turn over whatever money she inherited -to the haven without conditions.</p> - -<p>He had patiently pointed out that a Spanish subject was -a citizen of a far wealthier and more powerful nation than -the United States; as an heiress she could enjoy the luxuries -and distractions of Madrid or Havana and eventually make -a suitable marriage. How silly it would be to give up all -these advantages to become an unnoticed, penniless drudge -for a group of cranks near York, Pennsylvania.</p> - -<p>“He was quite right you know, Catty,” I said when she -told me about the interview.</p> - -<p>She shook her head vigorously, so the loose black curls -swirled back and forth. “You think so, Hodge, because you -are a hard, prudent Yankee.”</p> - -<p>I opened my eyes rather wide; this was certainly not -the description I would have applied to myself.</p> - -<p>“And also because you have Anglo-Saxon chivalry, always -rescuing maidens in distress and thinking they must -sit on a cushion after that and sew a fine seam. Well, I can -sew a fine seam, but sitting on cushions would bore me. -Women are not as delicate as you think, Hodge. Nor as -terrifying.”</p> - -<p>Was this last directed toward Barbara? Perhaps Catty -had claws. “There’s a difference,” I said, “between cushion-sitting -and living where books and pictures and music are -not regarded with suspicion.”</p> - -<p>“That’s right,” she agreed; “Haggershaven.”</p> - -<p>“No, Haggershaven is an anomaly in the United States -and in spite of everything it cannot help but be infected by -the rest of the country. I meant the great, successful nations -who can afford the breathing-spaces for culture.”</p> - -<p>“But you do not go to them.”</p> - -<p>“No. This is my country.”</p> - -<p>“And it will be mine too. After all it was made in the -first place by people willing to give up luxuries. Besides -you are contradicting yourself: if Haggershaven cannot -avoid being infected by what is outside it, neither can<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</span> -any other spot. Part of the world cannot be civilized if another -part is backward.”</p> - -<p>There was no doubt her demure expression hid stern -resolution. Whatever else it hid was not so certain. Evidently -Mr Haggerwells realized the quality of her determination -for eventually he proposed to the fellows that she -be allowed to stay and the offer of her money be rejected. -The motion was carried, with only Barbara, who spoke long -and bitterly against it, voting “no.”</p> - -<p>In accepting Catty out of charity, the fellows unexpectedly -made an advantageous bargain. Not merely because -she was always eager to help, but for her specific contribution -to the haven’s economy. Before this, clothing the -haven had been a haphazard affair; suits or dresses were -bought with money which would otherwise have been contributed -to the general fund, or if the fellow had no outside -income, by a grant from the same fund. Catty’s artistry with -the needle made a revolution. Not only did she patch and -mend and alter; she designed and made clothes, conveying -some of her enthusiasm to the other women. The haven -was better and more handsomely clad and a great deal of -money was saved. Only Barbara refused to have her silk -trousers and jackets made at home.</p> - -<p>It was not entirely easy to adjust to the new Catty, the -busy, efficient, selfreliant creature. Her expressive voice -could be enchanting even when she was speaking nonsense—and -Catty rarely spoke nonsense. I don’t mean she was -priggish or solemn, quite the contrary; her spontaneous -laughter was quick and frequent. But she was essentially -not frivolous; she felt deeply, her loyalties were strong and -enduring.</p> - -<p>I missed her former all too open devotion to me. It had -caused embarrassment, impatience, annoyance; now it was -withdrawn I felt deprived and even pettish at its lack. Not -that I had anything to offer in return or considered that any -emotion was called for from me. Though I didnt express it -to myself so openly at the time, what I regretted was the -sensually valuable docility of a beautiful woman. Of course -there was a confusion here: I was regretting what had never -been, for Catty and the nameless dumb girl were different<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</span> -individuals. Even her always undeniable beauty was -changed and heightened; what I really wanted was for -the Catty of now to act like the Catty of then. And without -any reciprocal gesture from me.</p> - -<p>The new Catty no more than the old was disingenuous -or coquettish. She was simply mature, dignified, selfcontained -and just a trifle amusedly aloof. Also she was very -busy. She did not pretend to any interest in other men; at -the same time she had clearly outgrown her childish dependence -on me. She refused any competition with Barbara. -When I sought her out she was there, but she made -no attempt to call me to her.</p> - -<p>I was not so unversed that I didnt occasionally suspect -this might be a calculated tactic. But when I recalled the -utter innocence of her look I reflected I would have to have -a very nice conceit of myself indeed to believe the two most -attractive women at Haggershaven were contending for me.</p> - -<p>I don’t know precisely when I began to see Catty with a -predatory male eye. Doubtless it was during one of those -times when Barbara and I had quarrelled, and when she -had called attention to Catty by accusing me of dallying -with her. I was essentially as polygamous as Barbara was -polyandrous or Catty monogamous; once the idea had -formed I made no attempt to reject it.</p> - -<p>Nor, for a very long time, did I accept it in any way except -academically. There are sensual values also in tantalizing, -and if these values are perverse I can only say I was -still immature in many ways. Additionally there must have -been an element of fear of Catty, the same fear which maintained -a reserve against Barbara. For the time being at -least it seemed much pleasanter to talk lightly and inconsequentially -with her; to laugh and boast of my progress, to -discuss Haggershaven and the world, than to face our elementary -relationship.</p> - -<p>My fourth winter at the haven had been an unusually -mild one; spring was early and wet. Kimi Agati who, with -her children, annually gathered quantities of mushrooms -from the woodlots and pastures, claimed this year’s supply -was so large that she needed help, and conscripted Catty -and me. Catty protested she didnt know a mushroom from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</span> -a toadstool; Kimi immediately gave her a brief but thorough -course in thallophytology. “And Hodge will help you; -he’s a country boy.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” I said. “I make no guarantees though; I -havent been a country boy for a long time.”</p> - -<p>“I’m not so sure,” said Kimi thoughtfully. “You two take -the small southeast woodlot; Fumio can have the big pasture, -Eiko the small one; Yosh and I will pick in the west -woodlot.”</p> - -<p>We carried a picnic lunch and nests of large baskets -which were to be put by the edge of the woodlots when -full; late in the afternoon a cart would pick them up and -bring them in for drying. The air was warm even under -the leafless branches; the damp ground steamed cosily.</p> - -<p>“Kimi was certainly right,” I commented. “Theyre thick -as can be.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t see....” She stooped gracefully; “Oh, is this -one?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” I said, “And there, and there. Not that white -thing over there though.”</p> - -<p>We filled our first baskets without moving more than a -few yards. “At this rate we’ll have them all full by noon.”</p> - -<p>“And go back for more?”</p> - -<p>“I suppose. Or just wander around.”</p> - -<p>“Oh.... Look, Hodge—what’s this?” -“What?”</p> - -<p>“This.” She showed me the puffball in her hands, looking -inquiringly up.</p> - -<p>I looked down casually; suddenly there was nothing -casual between us any more, nor ever would be again. I -looked down at a woman I wanted desperately, feverishly, -immediately. The shock of desire was a weight on my chest, -expelling the air from my lungs.</p> - -<p>“Goodness—is it some rare specimen or something?” -“Puffball,” I managed to say. “No good.”</p> - -<p>I hardly spoke, I could hardly speak, as we filled our -second baskets. I was sure the pounding of my heart must -show through my shirt, and several times I thought I saw -her looking curiously at me. “Let’s eat now,” I suggested -hoarsely.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</span></p> - -<p>I found a pine with low-hanging boughs and tore down -enough to make a dry, soft place to sit while Catty unpacked -our picnic. “Here’s an egg,” she said; “I’m starved.”</p> - -<p>We ate; that is, she ate and I pretended to. I was half -dazed, half terrified. I watched her swift motions, the turn -of her head, the clean, sharp way she bit into the food, -and averted my eyes every time her glance crossed mine.</p> - -<p>“Well,” she murmured at last; “I suppose we mustnt sit -idle any longer. Come on, lazy; back to work.”</p> - -<p>“Catty,” I whispered. “Catty.”</p> - -<p>“What is it, Hodge?”</p> - -<p>“Wait.”</p> - -<p>Obediently she paused. I reached over and took her in -my arms. She looked at me, not startled, but questioning. -Just as my mouth reached hers she moved slightly so that -I kissed her cheek instead of her lips. She did not struggle -but lay passively, with the same questioning expression.</p> - -<p>I held her, pressing her against the pine boughs, and -found her mouth. I kissed her eyes and throat and mouth -again. Her eyes stayed open and she did not respond. I undid -the top of her dress and pressed my face between her -breasts.</p> - -<p>“Hodge.”</p> - -<p>I paid no attention.</p> - -<p>“Hodge, wait. Listen to me. If this is what you want -you know I will not try to stop you. But Hodge, be sure. Be -very sure.”</p> - -<p>“I want you, Catty.”</p> - -<p>“Do you? Really want <i>me</i>, I mean.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know what you mean. I want you.”</p> - -<p>But it was already too late; I had made the fatal error -of pausing to listen. Angrily I moved away, picked up my -basket and sullenly began to search for mushrooms again. -My hands still trembled and there was a quiver in my legs. -To complement my mood a cloud drifted across the sun -and the warm woods became chilly.</p> - -<p>“Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“Yes?”</p> - -<p>“Please don’t be angry. Or ashamed. If you are I shall -be sorry.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t understand.”</p> - -<p>She laughed. “Oh my dear Hodge. Isnt that what men -always say to women? And isnt it always true?”</p> - -<p>Suddenly the day was no longer spoiled. The tension -melted and we went on picking mushrooms with a new -and fresh innocence.</p> - -<p>After this I could no longer keep all thoughts of Catty -out of the intimacy with Barbara; now for the first time -her jealousy had grounds. I felt guilty toward both, not because -I desired both, but because I didnt totally desire -either.</p> - -<p>Now, years later, I condemn myself for the lost rapturous -moments; at the time I procrastinated and hesitated as -though I had eternity in which to make decisions. I was, -as Tyss had said, the spectator type, waiting to be acted -upon, waiting for events to push me where they would.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C16"><i>16.</i> <i>OF VARIED SUBJECTS</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>“I can’t think of anything more futile,” said Kimi, -“than to be an architect at this time in the United States.”</p> - -<p>Her husband grinned. “You forgot to add, ‘of Oriental -extraction.’”</p> - -<p>Catty said, “Ive never understood. Of course I don’t remember -too well, but it seems to me Spanish people don’t -have the same racial fanaticism. Certainly the Portuguese, -French and Dutch don’t. Even the English are not quite so -certain of Anglo-Saxon superiority. Only the Americans, in -the United States and the Confederate States too, judge -everything by color.”</p> - -<p>“The case of the Confederacy is reasonably simple,” I -said. “There are about fifty million Confederate citizens -and two hundred and fifty million subjects. If white supremacy -wasnt the cornerstone of Southron policy a visitor -couldnt tell the ruling class at a glance. Even as it is he -sometimes has a hard time, what with sunburn. It’s more -complicated here. Remember, we lost a war, the most important -war in our history, which was not unconnected with -skin color.”</p> - -<p>“In Japan,” said Hiro, “the lighter colored people, the -Ainu, used to be looked down on. Just as the Christians -were once driven underground at exactly the same time -they themselves drove the Jews underground in Spain and -Portugal.”</p> - -<p>“The Jews,” murmured Catty vaguely; “are there still -Jews?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</span></p> - -<p>“Oh yes,” I said. “Several millions in Uganda-Eretz -which the British made a self-governing dominion back in -1933 under the first Labour cabinet. And numbers most -everywhere else, except in the German Union since the -massacres of 1905-1913.”</p> - -<p>“Which were much more thorough than the anti-Oriental -massacres in the United States,” supplied Hiro.</p> - -<p>“Much more thorough,” I agreed. “After all, scattered -handfuls of Asians were left alive here.”</p> - -<p>“My parents and Kimi’s grandparents among them. How -lucky they were to be American Japanese instead of European -Jews.”</p> - -<p>“There are Jews in the United States,” announced Kimi. -“I met one once. She was a theosophist and told me I -ought to learn the wisdom of the East.”</p> - -<p>“Very few of them. There were about two hundred thousand -at the close of the War of Southron Independence on -both sides of the border. After the election of 1872, General -Grant’s Order Number Ten, expelling all Jews from -the Department of the Missouri, which had been rescinded -immediately by President Lincoln, was retroactively re-enacted -by President Butler, in spite of the fact that the -United States no longer controlled that territory. Henceforth -Jews were treated like all other colored peoples, Negroes, -Orientals, Indians and South Sea Islanders: as undesirables -to be bribed to leave or to be driven out of the -country.”</p> - -<p>“This is very dull stuff,” said Hiro. “Let me tell you -about a hydrogen reaction—” -“No, please,” begged Catty. “Let me listen to Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“Good heavens,” exclaimed Kimi, “when do you ever -do anything else? I’d think you’d be tired by now.”</p> - -<p>“She will marry him one of these days,” predicted Hiro; -“then the poor fellow will never be allowed to disguise a -lecture as a conversation again.”</p> - -<p>Catty blushed, a deep red blush. I laughed to cover some -constraint. Kimi said, “Go-betweens are out of fashion; -youre a century behind times, Hiro. I suppose you think -a woman ought to walk two paces respectfully behind her<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</span> -husband. Actually, it’s only in the United States women -can’t vote or serve on juries.”</p> - -<p>“Except in the state of Deseret,” I reminded her.</p> - -<p>“That’s just bait; the Mormons gave us equality because -they were running short of women.”</p> - -<p>“Not the way I heard it. The Latter Day Saints have -been the nearest thing to a prosperous group in the country. -Women have been moving there for years, it’s so easy to -get married. All the grumbling about polygamy has come -from men who can’t stand the competition.”</p> - -<p>Catty glanced at me, then looked away.</p> - -<p>Had she, I wondered afterward, been thinking how Barbara -would have rejected my observation furiously? Or -about that day in the spring? Or about Hiro’s earlier comment? -I thought about it, briefly, myself.</p> - -<p>I also thought of how easily Catty fitted in with the -Agatis and contrasted it with the tension everyone would -have felt if Barbara had been there. One could love Barbara, -or hate her or dislike her or even, I supposed, be -indifferent to her; the one thing impossible was to be comfortable -with her.</p> - -<p>The final choice (was it final? I don’t know. I shall never -know now) hardened when I had been nearly six years at -Haggershaven. It had been “on” between Barbara and me -for the longest stretch I could recall and I had even begun -to wonder if some paradoxical equilibrium had not been -established which would allow me to be her lover without -vexation and at the same time innocently enjoy a bond with -Catty.</p> - -<p>As always when the hostility between us slackened, Barbara -spoke of her work. In spite of such occasional confidences -it was still not her habit to talk of it with me. That -intimacy was obviously reserved for Ace, and I didnt begrudge -him it, for after all he understood what it was all -about and I didnt. This time she was so full of the subject -she could not hold back, even from one who could hardly -distinguish between thermodynamics and kinesthetics.</p> - -<p>“Hodge,” she said, gray eyes greenish with excitement, -“I’m not going to write a book.”</p> - -<p>“That’s nice,” I answered idly. “New, too. Saves time,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</span> -paper, ink. Sets a different standard; from now on scholars -will be known as ‘Jones, who didnt write <i>The Theory of -Tidal Waves’</i>,‘Smith, unauthor of <i>Gas and Its Properties</i>,’ -or ‘Backmaker, non-recorder of <i>Gettysburg And After</i>.’”</p> - -<p>“Silly. I only meant it’s become customary to spend a -lifetime formulating principles; then someone else comes -along and puts your principles into practice. It seems more -sensible for me to demonstrate my own conclusions instead -of writing about them.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, sure. Youre going to demonstrate ... uh ...?”</p> - -<p>“Cosmic entity, of course. What do you think Ive been -talking about?”</p> - -<p>I tried to remember what she had said about cosmic entity. -“You mean youre going to try to turn matter into -space or something like that?”</p> - -<p>“Something like that. I intend to translate matter-energy -into terms of space-time.”</p> - -<p>“Oh,” I said, “equations and symbols and all that.”</p> - -<p>“I just said I wasnt going to write a book.”</p> - -<p>“But how—” I started up as the impact struck me. -“Youre going to ...” I groped for words. “Youre going -to build a ... an engine which will move through time?”</p> - -<p>“Putting it crudely. But close enough for a layman.”</p> - -<p>“You once told me your work was theoretical. That you -were no vulgar mechanic.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll become one.”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, youre crazy! As a philosophical abstraction -this theory of yours is interesting—” -“Thank you. It’s always nice to know one has amused -the yokelry.”</p> - -<p>“Barbara, listen to me. Midbin—” -“I havent the faintest interest in Oliver’s stodgy fantasies.”</p> - -<p>“He has in yours though, and so have I. Don’t you see, -this determination of yours is based on the fantasy of going -back through time to—uh—injure your mother—” -“Oliver Midbin is a coarse, stupid, insensate lout. He -has taught the dumb to speak, but he’s too much of a fool -to understand anyone of normal intelligence. He has a set<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</span> -of idiotic theories about diseased emotions and he fits all -facts into them even if it means chopping them up to do it -or inventing new ones to piece them out. Injure my mother -indeed! I have no more interest in her than she ever had -in me.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, Barbara—” -“‘Ah Barbara,’” she mimicked. “Run along to your -pompous windbag of a Midbin or your oh-so-willing cow-eyed -Spanish doxy—” -“Barbara, I’m talking as a friend. Leave Midbin and -Catty and personalities out of it and just look at it this -way. Don’t you see the difference between promulgating a -theory and trying a practical demonstration which will certainly -appear to the world as going over the borderline into -charlatanism? Like a spiritualist medium or—” -“That’s enough! ‘Charlatan’! You unspeakable guttersnipe. -What do you know of anything beyond the seduction -of cretins? Go back to your trade, you errand boy!”</p> - -<p>I seemed to remember that once before an incident had -ended precisely this way. “Barbara—” -Her hand caught me across my mouth. Then she strode -away.</p> - -<p>The fellows of Haggershaven were not enthusiastic for -her project. Even as she outlined it to them in more sober -language than she had to me it still sounded outlandish, like -the recurrent idea of a telegraph without wires or a rocket -to the moon. Besides, 1950 was a bad year. The war was -coming closer; at the least, what was left of the independence -of the United States was likely to be extinguished. Our -energies had to be directed toward survival rather than new -and expensive ventures. Still, Barbara Haggerwells was a -famous figure commanding great respect, and she had cost -them little so far, beyond paper and pencils. Reluctantly -the fellows voted an appropriation.</p> - -<p>An old barn, not utilized for years, but still sound, was -turned over to Barbara, and Kimi was delighted to plan, -design and supervise the necessary changes. Ace and a -group of the fellows attacked the job vigorously, sawing -and hammering, bolting iron beams together, piping in gas<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</span> -for reflecting lights to enable them to work at night as well.</p> - -<p>I believe I took no more interest than was inescapable -as a fellow of Haggershaven. I had no doubt that the money -and labor were being wasted, and I foresaw a terrible disappointment -for Barbara when she realized the impossibility -of her project. For myself I did not think she would -play any further part of importance in my life.</p> - -<p>We had not spoken since the quarrel, nor was there inclination -on either side toward coming together again. I -could not guess at Barbara’s feelings; mine were those of -relief, unmixed with regret. I would not have erased all -there had been between us, but I was satisfied to have it -in the past. The raging desire vanished, gradually replaced -by an affection of sorts; I wanted no more of that tempestuous -passion, instead I felt aloofly protective and understanding.</p> - -<p>For at last I was absorbed with Catty. The raw hunger -of the moment when I first realized I wanted her came back -with renewed force, but now other, more diffused feelings -were equally part of my emotion. I knew she could make -me jealous as Barbara could not; at the same time I could -see tranquillity beyond turbulent wanting, a tranquillity -never possible with Barbara.</p> - -<p>But my belated realization of what Catty meant to me -was no reaction to Barbara or connected with the breaking -of that tie. The need for Catty was engendered by Catty -alone, and for Catty apart from anything I had ever felt -for another. It was in some ways an entirely new hunger, -as the man’s need transcends the youth’s. I understood now -what her question in the woodlot meant and at last I -could truthfully answer.</p> - -<p>She kissed me back, freely and strongly. “I love you, -Hodge,” she said; “I have loved you even through the bad -dream of not being able to speak.”</p> - -<p>“When I was so unfeeling.”</p> - -<p>“I loved you even when you were impatient; I tried to -make myself prettier for you. You know you have never -said I was pretty.”</p> - -<p>“You arent, Catty. Youre extraordinarily beautiful.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</span></p> - -<p>“I think I would rather be pretty. Beauty sounds forbidding. -Oh, Hodge, if I did not love you so much I would not -have stopped you that day.”</p> - -<p>“I’m not sure I understand that.”</p> - -<p>“No? Well, it is not necessary now. Sometimes I wondered -if I had been right after all, or if you would think -it was because of Barbara.”</p> - -<p>“Wasnt it?”</p> - -<p>“No. I was never jealous of her. We Garcías are supposed -to have Morisco blood; perhaps I have the harem -outlook of my dark Muslim ancestors. Would you like me -to be your black concubine?”</p> - -<p>“No,” I said. “I’d like you to be my wife. In any colors -you have.”</p> - -<p>“Spoken with real gallantry; you will be a courtier yet, -Hodge. But that was a proposal, wasnt it?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” I answered grimly; “if you will consider one from -me. I can’t think of any good reason why you should.”</p> - -<p>She put her hands on my shoulders and looked into my -eyes. “I don’t know what reason has to do with it. It is -what I always intended; that was why I blushed so when -Hiro Agati blurted out what everyone could see.”</p> - -<p>Later I said, “Catty, can you ever forgive me for the -wasted years? You say you werent jealous of Barbara, but -surely if she and I—that is ... anyway, forgive me.” -“Dear Hodge, there’s nothing to forgive. Love is not a -business transaction, nor a case at law in which justice is -sought, nor a reward for having good qualities. I understand -you, Hodge, better I think than you understand -yourself. You are not satisfied with what is readily obtained, -otherwise you would have been content back in—what is -the name?—Wappinger Falls. I have known this for a long -time and I could, I think—you must excuse my vanity—have -interested you at any moment by pretending fickleness. -Just as I could have held you if I had given in that -day. Besides, I think you will make a better husband for -realizing you could not deal with Barbara.” -I can’t say I entirely enjoyed this speech. I felt, in fact, -rather humiliated, or at least healthily humbled. Which was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</span> -no doubt what she intended, and as it should be. I never -had the idea she was frail or insipid.</p> - -<p>Nor did Catty’s explanation of a harem outlook satisfactorily -account for the sudden friendliness of the two -women after the engagement was announced. That Barbara -should soften so toward a successful rival was incomprehensible -and also disturbing.</p> - -<p>Because both were fully occupied they actually spent little -time together, but Catty visited the workshop, as they -called the converted barn, whenever she had the chance -and her real admiration for Barbara grew so that I heard -too often of her genius, courage and imagination. I could -hardly ask Catty to forego society I had so recently found -enchanting nor establish a taboo against mention of a name -I had lately whispered with ardor; still I felt a little foolish, -and not quite as important as I might otherwise have -thought myself.</p> - -<p>Not that Catty didnt have proper respect and enthusiasm -for my fortunes. I had completed my notes for <i>Chancellorsville -to the End</i>—that is, I had a mass of clues, guideposts, -keys, ideas, and emphases which would serve as skeleton -for a work which might take years to write—and Catty -was the audience to whom I explained and expounded and -used as a prototype of the reader I might reach. Volume -one was roughly drafted, and we were to be married as -soon as it was finished, shortly after my thirtieth and Catty’s -twenty-fourth birthday. There was little doubt the book -would bring an offer from one of the great Confederate -universities, but Catty was firm for a cottage like the -Agatis’, and I could not conceive of being foolish enough -to leave Haggershaven.</p> - -<p>From Catty’s talk I knew Barbara was running into increasing -difficulties now the workshop was complete and -actual construction begun of what was referred to, with -unnecessary crypticism I thought, as HX-1. The impending -war created scarcities, particularly of such materials as -steel and copper, of which latter metal HX-1 seemed inordinately -greedy. I was not surprised when the fellows -apologetically refused Barbara a new appropriation.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</span></p> - -<p>Next day Catty said, “Hodge, you know the haven -wouldnt take my money.”</p> - -<p>“And quite right too. Let the rest of us put in what we -get; we owe it to the haven anyway. But the debt is the -other way round in your case and you should keep your -independence.”</p> - -<p>“Hodge, I’m going to give it all to Barbara for her -HX-1.”</p> - -<p>“What? Oh, nonsense!”</p> - -<p>“Is it any more nonsensical for me to put in money I -didnt do anything to get than for her and Ace to put in -time and knowledge and labor?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, because she’s got a crazy idea and Ace has never -been quite sane where she’s concerned. If you go ahead and -do this you’ll be as crazy as they are.”</p> - -<p>When Catty laughed I remembered with a pang the long -months when that lovely sound had been strangled by terror -inside her. I also thought with shame of my own -failure; had I appreciated her when her need was greatest -I might have eased the long, painful ordeal of restoring -her voice.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps I am crazy. Do you think the haven would -make me a fellow on that basis? Anyway, I believe in -Barbara even if the rest of you don’t. Not that I’m criticizing; -you were right to be cautious. You have more to consider -than demonstration of the truth of a theory which -can’t conceivably have a material value; I don’t have to -take any such long view. Anyway I believe in her. Or perhaps -I feel I owe her something. With my money she can -finish her project. I only tell you this because you may -not want to marry me under the circumstances.”</p> - -<p>“You think I’m marrying you for your money?”</p> - -<p>She smiled. “Dear Hodge. You are in some ways so -young; I hear the wounded dignity in your voice. No, I -know very well you arent marrying me for money, that it -never occurred to you it might be a good idea. That would -be too practical, too grown up, too un-Hodgelike. I think -you might not want to marry a woman who’d give all her -money away. Especially to Barbara Haggerwells.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</span></p> - -<p>“Catty, are you doing this absurd thing to get rid of me? -Or to test me?”</p> - -<p>This time she again laughed loud. “Now I’m sure you -will marry me after all and turn out to be a puzzled but -amenable husband. You are my true Hodge, who studies -a war because he can’t understand anything simpler or -subtler.”</p> - -<p>She wasnt to be dissuaded from the quixotic gesture. I -might not understand subtleties but I was sure I understood -Barbara well enough. Foreseeing her request for more -funds would be turned down, she must have cultivated -Catty deliberately in order to use her. Now she’d gotten -what she wanted I confidently expected her to drop Catty -or revert to her accustomed virulence.</p> - -<p>She did neither. If anything the amity grew. Catty’s vocabulary -added words like “magnet,” “coil,” “induction,” -“particle,” “light-year,” “continuum” and many others -either incomprehensible or uninteresting to me. Breathlessly -she described the strange, asymmetric structure taking -shape in the workshop, while my mind was busy with -Ewell’s Corps and parrott guns and the weather chart of -southern Pennsylvania for July, 1863.</p> - -<p>The great publishing firm of Ticknor, Harcourt & Knopf -contracted for my book—there was no publisher in the -United States equipped to handle it—and sent me a sizable -advance in Confederate dollars which became even more -sizable converted into our money. I read the proofs of -volume one in a state of semiconsciousness, sent the inevitable -telegram changing a footnote on page 99, and -waited for the infuriating mails to bring me my complimentary -copies. The day after they arrived (with a horrifying -typographical error right in the middle of page 12), -Catty and I were married.</p> - -<p>Dear Catty. Dear, dear Catty.</p> - -<p>With the approval of the fellows we used part of the -publisher’s advance for a honeymoon. We spent it—that -part of it in which we had time for anything except being -alone together—going over nearby battlefields of the last -year of the War of Southron Independence.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</span></p> - -<p>It was Catty’s first excursion away from Haggershaven -since the night I brought her there. Looking at the world -outside through her perceptions, at once insulated and -made hypersensitive by her new status, I was shocked -afresh at the harsh indifference, the dull poverty, the fear, -brutality, frenzy and cynicism highlighting the strange resignation -to impending fate which characterized our civilization. -It was not a case of eat, drink, be merry, for tomorrow -we die; rather it was, let us live meanly and trust -to luck—tomorrow’s luck is bound to be worse.</p> - -<p>We settled down in the autumn of 1951 in a cottage -designed by Kimi and built by the fellows during our absence. -It gave on the Agatis’ cherished garden and we were -both moved by this evidence of love, particularly after -what we had seen and heard on our trip. Mr Haggerwells -made a speech, filled with classical allusions, welcoming -us back as though we had been gone for years; Midbin -looked anxiously into Catty’s face as though to assure himself -I had not, in my new role as husband, treated her so ill -as to bring on a new emotional upset; and the other fellows -made appropriate gestures. Even Barbara stopped by -long enough to comment that the house was ridiculously -small, but she supposed Kimi’s movable partitions helped.</p> - -<p>I immediately began working on volume two and Catty -took up her sewing again. She also resumed her visits to -Barbara’s workshop; again I heard detailed accounts of -my former sweetheart’s progress. HX-1 was to be completed -in the late spring, or early summer. I was not surprised -at Barbara’s faith surviving actual construction of -the thing, but that such otherwise level-headed people as -Ace and Catty could envisage breathlessly the miracles -about to happen was beyond me. Ace, even after all these -years, was still bemused—but Catty ...?</p> - -<p>Just before the turn of the year I got the following letter:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</span></p> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p> -LEE & WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY<br /> -Department of History<br /> -</p> - -<p> -Leesburg, District of Calhounia, CSA.<br /> -December 19, 1951<br /> -<br /> -Mr. Hodgins M. Backmaker<br /> -“Haggershaven”<br /> -York,<br /> -Pennsylvania, USA.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Sir</i>:<br /> -</p> - -<p><i>On page 407 of</i> Chancellorsville to the End, <i>volume -I</i>, Turning Tides, <i>you write, “Chronology and topography—timing -and the use of space—were to be the -decisive factors, rather than population and industry. -Stuart’s detachment, which might have proved disastrous, -turned out extraordinarily fortunate for Lee, as -we shall see in the next volume. Of course the absence -of cavalry might have been decisive if the Round Tops -had not been occupied by the Southrons on July 1....”</i></p> - -<p><i>Now, sir, evidently in your forthcoming analysis of -Gettysburg you hold (as I presume most Yankees do) -to the theory of fortuitousness. We Southrons naturally -ascribe the victory to the supreme genius of -General Lee, regarding the factors of time and space -not as forces in themselves but as opportunities for the -display of his talents.</i></p> - -<p><i>Needless to say, I hardly expect you to change your -opinions, rooted as they must be in national pride. I -only ask that before you commit them, and the conclusions -shaped by them, to print, you satisfy yourself -as an historian, of their validity in this particular case. -In other words, sir, as one of your readers (and may -I add, one who has enjoyed your work), I should like<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</span> -to be assured that you have studied this classic battle -as carefully as you have the engagements described in -volume I.</i></p> - -<p> -<i>With earnest wishes for your success,<br /> -I remain, sir<br /> -Cordially yours,<br /> -Jefferson Davis Polk</i><br /> -</p> -</div> - -<p>This letter from Dr Polk, the foremost historian of our -day, author of the monumental biography, <i>The Great Lee</i>, -produced a crisis in my life. Had the Confederate professor -pointed out flaws in my work, or even reproached me -for undertaking it at all without adequate equipment I -would, I trust, have acknowledged the reproof and continued -to the best of my ability. But this letter was an accolade. -Without condescension Dr Polk admitted me to the -ranks of serious historians, only asking me to consider the -depth of my evaluation.</p> - -<p>Truth is, I was not without increasing doubts of my own. -Doubts I had not allowed to rise to the surface of my mind -and disturb my plans. Polk’s letter brought them into the -open.</p> - -<p>I had read everything available. I had been over the -ground between the Maryland line, South Mountain, Carlisle -and the haven until I could draw a detail map from -memory. I had turned up diaries, letters and accounts -which had not only never been published, but which were -not known to exist until I hunted them down. I had so -steeped myself in the period I was writing about that sometimes -the two worlds seemed interchangeable and I could -live partly in one, partly in the other.</p> - -<p>Yet with all this, I was not sure I had the whole story, -even in the sense of wholeness that historians, knowing -they can never collect every detail, accept. I was not sure -I had the grand scene in perfectly proper perspective. I admitted -to myself the possibility that I had perhaps been -too rash, too precipitate, in undertaking <i>Chancellorsville to -the End</i> so soon. I knew the shadowy sign, the one which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</span> -says in effect, <i>You are ready</i>, had not been given. My -confidence was shaken.</p> - -<p>Was the fault in me, in my temperament and character, -rather than in my preparation and use of materials? Was -I drawing back from committing myself, from acting, from -doing? That I had written the first volume was no positive -answer, for it was but the fraction of a whole deed; if I -withdrew now I could still preserve my standing as an -onlooker.</p> - -<p>But not to act was itself an action and answered neither -Dr Polk nor myself. Besides, what could I do? The entire -work was contracted for. The second volume was promised -for delivery some eighteen months hence. My notes for it -were complete; this was no question of revising, but of -wholly re-examining, revaluing and probably discarding -them for an entirely new start. It was a job so much bigger -than the original, one so discouraging, I felt I couldnt -face it. It would be corrupt to produce a work lacking absolute -conviction and cowardly to produce none.</p> - -<p>Catty responded to my awkward recapitulation in a -way at once heartening and strange. “Hodge,” she said, -“youre changing and developing, and for the better, even -though I love you as you were. Don’t be afraid to put the -book aside for a year—ten years if you have to. You must -do it so it will satisfy yourself; never mind what the publishers -or the public say. But Hodge, you mustnt, in your -anxiety, or your foolish fear of passiveness, you mustnt try -any shortcuts. Promise me that.” -“I don’t know what youre talking about, Catty dear. -There are no shortcuts in writing history.”</p> - -<p>She looked at me thoughtfully. “Remember that, Hodge. -Oh, remember it.”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C17"><i>17.</i> <i>HX-1</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>I could not bring myself to follow the promptings -of my conscience and Catty’s advice, nor could I use my -notes as though Dr Polk’s letter had never come to shatter -my complacency. As a consequence—without deliberately -committing myself to abandon the book—I worked not at -all, thus adding to my feelings of guilt and unworthiness. -The tasks assigned by the fellows for the general welfare -of the haven were not designed to take a major part of my -time, and though I produced all sorts of revolutions in the -stables and barns, I still managed to wander about, fretful -and irritable, keeping Catty from her work, interrupting -the Agatis and Midbin—I could not bring myself to discuss -my problems with him—and generally making myself a -nuisance. Inevitably I found my way into Barbara’s workshop.</p> - -<p>She and Ace had done a thorough job on the old barn. -I thought I recognized Kimi’s touch in the structural -changes of the walls, the strong beams and rows of slanted-in -windows which admitted light and shut out glare, but -the rest must have been shaped by Barbara’s needs.</p> - -<p>Iron beams held up a catwalk running in a circle about -ten feet overhead. On the catwalk there were at intervals -what appeared to be batteries of telescopes, all pointed -inward and downward at the center of the floor. Just inside -the columns was a continuous ring of clear glass, perhaps -four inches in diameter, fastened to the beams with -glass hooks. Closer inspection proved the ring not to be in -one piece but in sections, ingeniously held together with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</span> -glass couplings. Back from this circle, around the walls, -were various engines, all enclosed except for dial faces and -regulators and all dwarfed by a mammoth one towering in -one corner. From the roof was suspended a large, polished -reflector.</p> - -<p>There was no one in the barn and I wandered about, -cautiously avoiding the mysterious apparatus. For a moment -I meditated, basely perhaps, that all this had been -paid for with my wife’s money. Then I berated myself, for -Catty owed all to the haven, as I did. The money might -have been put to better use, but there was no guarantee -it would have been more productive allotted to astronomy -or zoology. During eight years I’d seen many promising -schemes come to nothing.</p> - -<p>“Like it, Hodge?”</p> - -<p>Barbara had come up, unheard, behind me. This was the -first time we had been alone together since our break, two -years before.</p> - -<p>“It looks like a tremendous amount of work,” I evaded.</p> - -<p>“It was a tremendous amount of work.” For the first -time I noticed that her cheeks were flushed. She had lost -weight and there were deep hollows beneath her eyes. “This -construction has been the least of it. Now it’s done. Or has -begun. Depending how you look at it.”</p> - -<p>“All done?”</p> - -<p>She nodded, triumph accenting the strained look on her -face. “First test today.”</p> - -<p>“Oh well ... in that case—” -“Don’t go, Hodge. Please. I meant to ask you and Catty -to the more formal trial, but now youre here for the preliminary -I’m glad. Ace and Father and Oliver will be along -in a minute.”</p> - -<p>“Midbin?”</p> - -<p>The familiar arrogance showed briefly. “I insisted. It’ll -be nice to show him the mind can produce something besides -fantasies and hysterical hallucinations.”</p> - -<p>I started to speak, then swallowed my words. The dig -at Catty was insignificant compared with the supreme -confidence, the abnormal assurance prompting invitations -to witness a test which could only reveal the impossibility<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</span> -of applying her cherished theories. I felt an overwhelming -pity. “Surely,” I said at last, seeking to make some preparation -for the disillusionment certain to come, “surely you -don’t expect it to work the first time?”</p> - -<p>“Why not? There are sure to be adjustments to be -made, allowances for erratic chronology caused by phenomena -like the pull of comets and so forth. There might -even have to be major alterations, though I doubt it. It -may be some time before Ace can set me down at the exact -year, month, day, hour and minute agreed upon. But the -fact of space-time-energy-matter correspondence can just -as well be established this afternoon as next year.”</p> - -<p>She was unbelievably at ease for someone whose lifework -was about to be weighed. I have shown more nervousness -discussing a disputed date with the honorary secretary -of a local historical society.</p> - -<p>“Sit down,” she invited; “there’s nothing to do or see till -Ace comes. Ive missed you, Hodge.”</p> - -<p>I felt this was a dangerous remark, and wished I’d stayed -far away from the workshop. I hooked my leg over a stool—there -were no chairs—and coughed to hide the fact I -was afraid to answer, Ive missed you too; and afraid not to.</p> - -<p>“Tell me about your own work, Hodge. Catty says youre -having difficulties.”</p> - -<p>I was faintly annoyed with Catty, but whether for confiding -in Barbara at all or specifically for revealing something -unheroic, I didnt stop to consider. At any rate this -annoyance diluted my feeling of disloyalty for conversing -with Barbara at all. Or it may be the old, long-established -bond—I almost wrote, of sympathy, but it was so much -more complex than the word indicates—was reawakened -by proximity and put me in the mood to tell my troubles. -It is even possible I had the altruistic purpose of fortifying -Barbara against inevitable disappointment on a misery-loves-company -basis. Be that as it may, I found myself -pouring out the whole story.</p> - -<p>She jumped up and took my hands in hers. Her eyes -were gray and warm. “Hodge! It’s wonderful—don’t you -see?” -“Oh....” I was completely confused. “I ... uh....”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</span></p> - -<p>“The solution. The answer. The means. Look: now you -can go back, back to the past in your own person. You can -see everything with your own eyes instead of relying on -accounts of what other people said happened.”</p> - -<p>“But ... but—” -“You can verify every fact, study every move, every -actor. You can write history as no one ever did before, -for youll be writing as a witness, yet with the perspective -of a different period. Youll be taking the mind of the present, -with its judgment and its knowledge of the patterns, -back to receive the impressions of the past. It almost seems -HX-1 was devised especially for this.”</p> - -<p>There was no doubt she believed, that she was really and -unselfishly glad her work could aid mine. I was overcome -by pity, helpless to soften the disillusionment so soon to -come and filled with an irrational hatred of the thing she -had built and which was about to destroy her.</p> - -<p>I was saved from having to mask my emotions by the -arrival of her father, Ace, and Midbin. Thomas Haggerwells -began tensely, “Barbara, Ace tells me you intend to -try out this—this machine on yourself. I can’t believe you -would be so foolhardy.” -Midbin didnt wait for her to reply. I thought with something -of a shock, Midbin has gotten old; I never noticed it. -“Listen to me. There’s no point now in saying part of your -mind realizes the impossibility of this demonstration and -that it’s willing for you to annihilate yourself in the attempt -and so escape from conflicts which have no resolution. Although -it’s something you must be at least partly aware of. -But consider objectively the danger involved in meddling -with unknown natural laws—” -Ace Dorn, who looked as strained as they in contrast to -Barbara’s ease, growled, “Let’s go.”</p> - -<p>She smiled reassuringly at us. “Please, Father, don’t -worry; there’s no danger. And Oliver....”</p> - -<p>Her smile was almost mischievous and very unlike the -Barbara I had known. “Oliver, HX-1 owes more to you -than you will ever know.”</p> - -<p>She ducked under the transparent ring and walked to -the center of the floor, glancing up at the reflector, moving<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</span> -an inch or two to stand directly beneath it. “The controls -are already adjusted to minus fifty-two years and a hundred -and fifty-three days,” she informed us conversationally. -“Purely arbitrary. One date is good as another, but -January 1, 1900 is an almost automatic choice. I’ll be gone -sixty seconds. Ready, Ace?”</p> - -<p>“Ready.” He had been slowly circling the engines, checking -the dials. He took his place before the largest, the -monster in the corner, holding a watch in his hand. “Three -forty-three and ten,” he announced.</p> - -<p>Barbara was consulting her own watch. “Three forty-three -and ten,” she confirmed. “Make it at three forty-three -and twenty.”</p> - -<p>“OK. Good luck.”</p> - -<p>“You might at least try it on an animal first,” burst out -Midbin, as Ace twirled the valve under his hand. The -transparent ring glowed, the metal reflector threw back a -dazzling light. I blinked. When I opened my eyes the light -was gone and the center of the workshop was empty.</p> - -<p>No one moved. Ace frowned over his watch. I stared at -the spot where Barbara had stood. I don’t think my mind -was working; I had the feeling my lungs and heart certainly -were not. I was a true spectator, with all faculties save sight -and hearing suspended.</p> - -<p>“ ... on an animal first.” Midbin’s voice was querulous.</p> - -<p>“Oh, God ...” muttered Thomas Haggerwells.</p> - -<p>Ace said casually—too casually, “The return is automatic. -Set beforehand for duration. Thirty more seconds.”</p> - -<p>Midbin said, “She is ... this is....” He sat down on a -stool and bent his head almost to his knees.</p> - -<p>Mr Haggerwells groaned, “Ace, Ace—you should have -stopped her.” -“Ten seconds,” said Ace firmly.</p> - -<p>Still I couldnt think with any clarity. She had stood -there; then she was gone. What ...? Midbin was right: we -had let her go to destruction. Certainly more than a minute -had passed by now.</p> - -<p>The ring glowed and the brilliant light was reflected. “It -did, oh, it did!” Barbara cried. “It did!”</p> - -<p>She stood perfectly still, overwhelmed. Then she came<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</span> -out of the circle and kissed Ace, who patted her gently -on the back. I suddenly noticed the pain of holding my -breath and released a tremendous sigh. Barbara kissed her -father and Midbin—who was still shaking his head—and, -after the faintest hesitation, me. Her lips were ice-cold.</p> - -<p>The shock of triumph made her voluble. Striding up -and down, she spoke with extraordinary rapidity, without -pause, almost a little drunkenly. In her excitement her -words cluttered her tongue; from time to time she had to -go back and repeat a phrase or sentence to make it intelligible.</p> - -<p>When the light flashed, she too involuntarily closed her -eyes. She had felt a strange, terrifying weightlessness, an -awful disembodiment, for which she had been unprepared. -She thought she had not actually been unconscious, even -for an instant, though she had an impression of ceasing to -exist as a unique collection of memories, and of being somehow -dissolved. Then she had opened her eyes.</p> - -<p>At first she was shocked to find the barn as it had been -all her life, abandoned and dusty. Then she realized she -had indeed moved through time; the disappearance of the -engines and reflector showed she had gone back to the unremodelled -workshop.</p> - -<p>Now she saw the barn was not quite as she had known -it, even in her childhood, for while it was unquestionably -abandoned, it had evidently not long been so. The thick -dust was not so thick as she remembered, the sagging cobwebs -not so dense. Straw was still scattered on the floor; -it had not yet been entirely carried away by mice or inquisitive -birds. Alongside the door hung bits of harness beyond -repair, some broken bridles, and a faded calendar on which -the ink of the numerals 1897 was still bright.</p> - -<p>The minute she had allotted this first voyage seemed fantastically -short and incredibly long. All the paradoxes she -had brushed aside as of no immediate concern now confronted -her. Since she had gone back to a time before she -was born, she must have existed as a visitor prior to her -own conception; she could presumably be present during -her own childhood and growth, and by making a second -and third visit, multiply herself as though in facing mirrors,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</span> -so that an infinite number of Barbara Haggerwells could -occupy a single segment of time.</p> - -<p>A hundred other parallel speculations raced through her -mind without interfering with her rapid and insatiable survey -of the commonplace features of the barn, features -which could never really be commonplace to her since they -proved all her speculations so victoriously right.</p> - -<p>Suddenly she shivered with the bitter cold and burst into -teeth-chattering laughter. She had made such careful plans -to visit on the First of January—and had never thought -to take along a warm coat.</p> - -<p>She looked at her watch; only twenty seconds had -passed. The temptation to defy her agreement with Ace not -to step outside the tiny circle of HX-1’s operating field on -the initial experiment was almost irresistible. She longed -to touch the fabric of the past, to feel the worn boards of -the barn, to handle as well as look. Again her thoughts -whirled with speculation; again the petty moment stretched -and contracted. She spent eternity and instantaneity at -once.</p> - -<p>Suppose.... But she had a thousand suppositions and -questions. Was she really herself in the flesh, or in some -mental projection? A pinch would do no good; that might -be projection also. Would she be visible to the people of -the time, or was she a ghost from the future? Oh, there -was so much to learn, so much to encounter!</p> - -<p>When the moment of return came, she again experienced -the feeling of dissolution, followed immediately by the -light. When she opened her eyes she was back.</p> - -<p>Midbin rubbed his belly and then his thinning hair. -“Hallucination,” he propounded at last; “a logical, consistent -hallucination. Answer to an overriding wish.”</p> - -<p>“You mean Barbara was never gone?” asked Ace. “Was -she visible to you—or Mr H or Hodge—during that minute?” -“Illusion,” said Midbin; “group illusion brought on by -suggestion and anxiety.”</p> - -<p>“Nonsense,” exclaimed Barbara. “Unless youre accusing -Ace and me of faking youll have to account for what you -just called the logical consistency of it. Your group illusion<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</span> -and my individual hallucination fitting so neatly together.”</p> - -<p>Midbin recovered some of his poise. “The two phenomena -are separate, connected only by some sort of emotional -hypnosis. Certainly your daydream of having been back in -1900 is an emotionally induced aberration.”</p> - -<p>“And your daydream that I wasn’t here for a minute?”</p> - -<p>“The eyes are quickly affected by the feelings. Note -tears, ‘seeing red’ and so forth.”</p> - -<p>“Very well, Oliver. The only thing to do is to let you -try HX-1 yourself.”</p> - -<p>“Hay, my turn’s supposed to be next,” protested Ace.</p> - -<p>“Of course. But no one is going to use it again today. -Tomorrow morning. Bring Catty, Hodge, if she wants to -come, but please don’t say anything to anyone else till -weve made further demonstrations, otherwise we’ll be besieged -by fellows wanting to take short jaunts into popular -years.”</p> - -<p>I had little inclination to discuss what had happened -with anyone, even Catty. Not that I shared Midbin’s theory -of nothing material having taken place; I knew I’d not seen -Barbara for sixty seconds and I was convinced her account -of them was accurate. What confused me was the shock to -my preconceptions involved in her proof. If time and space, -matter and energy were the same, as fog and ice and water -are the same, then I—the physical I at least—and Catty, -the world and the universe must be, as Enfandin had insisted, -mere illusion. In that sense Midbin had been right.</p> - -<p>I went furtively to the workshop next day without telling -Catty, as though we were all engaged in some dark -necromancy, some sacrilegious rite. Apparently I was the -only one who had spent an anxious night; Mr Haggerwells -looked proud, Barbara looked satisfied, Ace cocky, and -even Midbin, for no understandable reason, benign.</p> - -<p>“All here?” inquired Ace. “I’m eager as a fox in a hen-house. -Three minutes in 1885. Why 1885? I don’t know; a -year when nothing much happened, I suppose. Ready, -Barbara?”</p> - -<p>He returned to report he had found the barn well occupied -by both cattle and fowl, and been scared stiff of discovery -when the dogs set up a furious barking.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</span></p> - -<p>“That pretty well settles the question of corporeal -presence,” I remarked.</p> - -<p>“Not at all,” said Mr Haggerwells unexpectedly. “Dogs -are notoriously psychic.”</p> - -<p>“Ah,” cried Ace, bringing his hands from behind his -back; “look at this. I could hardly have picked it up with -psychic feelers.”</p> - -<p>“This” was a newlaid egg, sixty-seven years old. Or was -it? Trips in time are confusing that way.</p> - -<p>Barbara was upset, more than I thought warranted. “Oh, -Ace, how could you be so foolish? We darent be anything -but spectators, as unseen as possible.”</p> - -<p>“Why? Ive a notion to court my grandmother and wind -up as my own grandfather.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t be stupid. The faintest indication of our presence, -the slightest impingement on the past, may change -the whole course of events. We have no way of knowing -what actions have no consequences—if there can be any. -Goodness knows what your idiocy with the egg has done. -It’s absolutely essential not to betray ourselves in any way. -Please remember this in future.” -“You mean, ‘Remember this in past,’ don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“Ace, this isnt a joke.”</p> - -<p>“It isn’t a wake either. I can’t see the harm in bringing -back tangible proof. Loss of one egg isnt going to send the -prices up for 1885 and cause retroactive inflation. Youre -making a mountain out of a molehill—or an omelette out -of a single egg.” -She shrugged helplessly. “Oliver, I hope you won’t be -so foolish.”</p> - -<p>“Since I don’t expect to arrive in, say, 1820, I can safely -promise neither to steal eggs nor court Ace’s female ancestors.”</p> - -<p>He was gone for five minutes. The barn had apparently -not yet been built in 1820 and he found himself on a slight -rise in a field of wild hay. The faint snick of scythes, and -voices not too far off, indicated mowers. He dropped to the -ground. His view of the past was restricted to tall grass -and some persistent ants who explored his face and hands<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</span> -until the time was up and he returned with broken spears -of ripe hay clinging to his clothes.</p> - -<p>“At least that’s what I imagined I saw,” he concluded.</p> - -<p>“Did you imagine these?” asked Ace, pointing to the -straws.</p> - -<p>“Probably. It’s at least as likely as time-travel.”</p> - -<p>“But what about corroboration? Your experience, and -Barbara’s and Ace’s confirm each other. Doesnt that mean -anything?”</p> - -<p>“Certainly. Only I’m not prepared to say what. The -mind can do anything; anything at all. Create boils and -cancers. Why not ants and grass? I don’t know. I don’t -know....”</p> - -<p>After more fruitless argument, he and I left the workshop. -I was again reminded of Enfandin—Why should I -believe my eyes? I felt though that Midbin was carrying -skepticism beyond rational limits; Barbara’s case was -proved.</p> - -<p>“Yes, yes,” he answered when I said this. “Why not?”</p> - -<p>I puzzled over his reply. Then he added abruptly, “No -one can help her now.”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C18"><i>18.</i> <i>THE WOMAN TEMPTED ME</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>Gently, Catty said, “Ive never understood why you -cut yourself off from the past the way you have, Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“Ay? What do you mean?”</p> - -<p>“Well, youve not communicated with your father or -mother since you left home, fourteen years ago. You say -you had a dear friend in the man from Haiti, yet youve -never tried to find out whether he lived or died.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, that way. I thought you meant ... something -different.” By not taking advantage of Barbara’s offer I -certainly was cutting myself off from the past.</p> - -<p>“Yes?”</p> - -<p>“Well, I guess more or less everyone at the haven has -done the same thing. Let outside ties grow weak, I mean. -You for one—” -“But I have no parents, no friends anywhere else. All -my life is here.”</p> - -<p>“Well, so is mine.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, dear Hodge; it is unlike you to be so indifferent.”</p> - -<p>“Catty darling, you were brought up comfortably in an -atmosphere knowing nothing of indenting or sharecropping, -of realizing the only escape from wretchedness was -in a miracle—usually translated as a winning number in -the lottery. I can’t convey to you the meaning of utterly -loveless surroundings, I can only say that affection was a -luxury my mother and father couldnt afford.” -“Perhaps not; but you can afford it. Now. And nothing -of what you have said applies to Enfandin.”</p> - -<p>I squirmed shamefacedly. My ingratitude and callous<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</span>ness -must be apparent to everyone; even Barbara, I remembered, -had once asked me much the same questions -Catty asked now. How could I explain, even to my own -satisfaction, how procrastination and guilt made it impossible -for me to take the simple steps to discover what had -happened to my friend? By a tremendous effort I might -have broken through the inertia years ago, just after Enfandin -had been wounded, but each day and month between -confirmed the impossibility more strongly. “Let the -past take care of itself,” I muttered.</p> - -<p>“Oh Hodge! What a thing for an historian to say.”</p> - -<p>“Catty, I can’t.”</p> - -<p>The conversation made me nervous and fidgetty. It also -made me remember much I preferred to let fade: the -Grand Army, Sprovis, the counterfeit pesetas.... All the -evil I had unwillingly abetted. If a man did nothing, literally -nothing, all his life, then he might be free of culpability. -Manichaeism, said Enfandin. No absolution.</p> - -<p>My idleness, I knew very well, heightened all these feelings -of degradation. Were I able to continue in the happy, -cocksure way I had gone about my note-gathering and the -writing of volume one, I would have neither the time nor -susceptibility to be plagued by this disquiet. As it was I -seemed to be able to do nothing but act as audience for -what was going on in the workshop.</p> - -<p>With childish eagerness Barbara and Ace explored -HX-1’s possibilities for the next two months. They quickly -learned that its range was limited to little more than a century, -though this limit was subject to slight variations. -When they tried to operate beyond this range the translation -simply didnt take place, though the same feeling of -dissolution occurred. When the light faded they were still -in the present. Midbin’s venture into the hayfield had been -a freak, possibly due to peculiar weather conditions at both -ends of the journey. They set 1850 as a safe limit, with an -undefined marginal zone further back which was not to be -hazarded lest conditions change during the journey and -the traveler be lost.</p> - -<p>Why this limit existed at all was a matter of dispute between -them, a dispute of which I must admit I understood<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</span> -little. Barbara spoke of subjective factors which seemed to -mean that HX-1 worked slightly differently in the case of -each person it transported; Ace of magnetic fields and -power relays, which didnt mean anything to me at all. The -only thing they agreed on was that the barrier was not immutable; -HX-2 or 3 or 20, if they were ever built, would -undoubtedly overcome it.</p> - -<p>Nor would HX-1 work in reverse; the future remained -closed, probably for similar reasons, whatever they were. -Here again they disputed, Ace holding an HX could be -built for this purpose, Barbara insisting that new equations -would have to be worked out.</p> - -<p>They confirmed their tentative theory that time spent in -the past consumed an equal amount of time in the present; -they could not return to a point a minute after departure -when they had been gone for an hour. As near as I could -understand, this was because duration was set in the present. -In order to come back to a time-point not in correspondence -with the period actually spent, another HX, -or at least another set of controls, would have to be taken -into the past. And then they would not work since HX-1 -could not penetrate the future.</p> - -<p>The most inconvenient circumscription was the inability -of one person to visit the same past moment twice. When -the attempt was made the feeling of dissolution did not -occur, the light went on and off with no effect upon the -would-be traveler standing beneath it. Here Barbara’s -“subjective factor” was triumphant, but why, or how it -worked, they did not know. Nor did they know what would -happen to a traveler who attempted to overlap by being -already on the spot prior to a previous visit; it was too -dangerous to try.</p> - -<p>Within these limits they roamed almost at will. Ace -spent a full week in October 1896, walking as far as Philadelphia, -enjoying the enthusiasm and fury of the presidential -campaign. Knowing President Bryan was not only going -to be elected, but would serve three terms, he found it -hard indeed to obey Barbara’s stricture and not cover confident -Whig bets on Major McKinley.</p> - -<p>Though both sampled the war years they brought back<span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</span> -nothing useful to me, no information or viewpoint I -couldnt have got from any of a score of books. Lacking -historians’ interests or training, their tidbits were those of -curious onlookers, not probing chroniclers. It was tantalizing -to know that Barbara had seen Secretary Stanton at -the York depot or that Ace had overheard a farmer say -casually that Southron scouts had stopped at his place the -day before and they had thought neither incident worth -investigating further.</p> - -<p>I grew increasingly fretful. I held long colloquies with -myself which always ended inconclusively. <i>Why not?</i> I -asked. <i>Surely this is the unique opportunity. Never before -has it been possible for an historian to check back at will, -to select a particular moment for personal scrutiny, to -write of the past with the detachment of the present and -the accuracy of an eyewitness knowing specifically what to -look for. Why don’t you take advantage of HX-1 and see -for yourself?</i></p> - -<p>Against this I objected—what? Fear? Uneasiness? The -“subjective factor” in HX-1? The superstitious notion that -I might be tampering with a taboo, with matters forbidden -to human shortcomings? <i>You mustnt try any shortcuts. -Promise me that, Hodge.</i> Well, Catty was a darling. She was -my beloved wife, but she was neither scholar nor oracle. -On what grounds did she protest? Woman’s intuition? A -respectable phrase, but what did it mean? And didnt Barbara, -who first suggested my using HX-1, have womanly -intuition also?</p> - -<p>A half-dozen times I tried to steer our talk in the direction -of my thoughts; each time I allowed the words to drift -to another topic. What was the use of upsetting her? -<i>Promise me that, Hodge.</i> But I had not promised. This was -something I had to settle for myself.</p> - -<p>What was I afraid of? Because I’d never grasped anything -to do with the physical sciences did I attribute some -anthropomorphism to their manifestations and like a savage -fear the spirit imprisoned in what I didnt understand? (But -HX-1 <i>did</i> have subjective factors.) I had never thought of -myself as hidebound, but I was acting like a ninety-year<span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</span>old -professor asked to use a typewriter instead of a goose -quill.</p> - -<p>I recalled Tyss’s, “You are the spectator type, Hodgins.” -And once I had called him out of my memory I couldnt -escape his familiar, sardonic, interminable argument. <i>Why -are you fussing yourself, Hodgins? What is the point of all -this introspective debate? Don’t you know your choice has -already been made? And that you have acted according to -it an infinite number of times and will do so an infinite -number of times again? Relax, Hodgins; you have nothing -to worry about. Free will is an illusion; you cannot alter -what you are about to decide under the impression that you -have decided.</i></p> - -<p>My reaction to this imagined interjection was frenzied, -unreasonable. I cursed Tyss and his damnable philosophy. -I cursed the insidiousness of his reasoning which had -planted seed in my brain to sprout at a moment like this.</p> - -<p>Yet in spite of the violence of my rejection of the words -I attributed to Tyss, I accepted one of them. I relaxed. The -decision had been made. Not by mechanistic forces, nor by -blind response to stimulus, but by my own desire.</p> - -<p>And now to my aid came the image of Tyss’s antithesis, -René Enfandin. <i>Be a skeptic, Hodge; be always the skeptic. -Prove all things; hold fast to that which is true. Joking -Pilate, asking,</i> What is truth? <i>was blind. But you can see -more aspects of the absolute truth than any man has had a -chance to see before. Can you use the chance well, Hodge? -That is the only question.</i></p> - -<p>Once I could answer it with a vigorous affirmative, and -so buttress the determination to go, I was faced with the -problem of telling Catty. I could not shut her out of so important -a move. I told myself I could not bear the thought -of her anxiety; that she would worry despite the fact others -had frequently used HX-1, for my object could not be -accomplished in a matter of minutes or hours. I was sure -she would be sick with apprehension during the days I -would be gone. No doubt this was all true, but I also remembered, -<i>Promise me, Hodge</i>....</p> - -<p>I finally took the weak, the ineffective course. I said I’d -decided the only way to face my problem was to go to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</span> -Gettysburg and spend three or four days going over the -actual field. Here, I explained unconvincingly, I thought I -might at last come to the conclusion whether to scrap all -my work and start afresh, or not.</p> - -<p>Her faintly oblique eyes were inscrutable. She pretended -to believe me and begged me to take her along. After all, -we had spent our honeymoon on battlefields.</p> - -<p>Would it be possible? Two people had never stood under -the reflector together, but surely it would work? I was -tempted, but I could not subject Catty to the risk, however -slight. Besides, how could I explain?</p> - -<p>“But Catty, with you there I’d be thinking of you instead -of the problem.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, Hodge, have we already been married so long you -must get away from me to think?”</p> - -<p>“No matter how long, that time will never come. Perhaps -I’m wrong, Catty. It’s just a feeling I have.”</p> - -<p>Her look was tragic with understanding. “You must do -as you think right. Don’t ... don’t be gone too long, -my dear.”</p> - -<p>I dressed in clothes I often used for walking trips, clothes -which bore no mark of any fashion and might pass as current -wear among the poorer classes in any era of the past -hundred years. I put a packet of dried beef in my pocket -and started for the workshop.</p> - -<p>As soon as I left the cottage I laughed at my hypersensitivity, -at all the to-do I’d made over lying to Catty. This -was but the first excursion; I planned others for the months -after Gettysburg. There was no reason why she shouldnt -accompany me on them. I grew lighthearted as my conscience -eased and I even congratulated myself on my skill -in not having told a single technical falsehood to Catty. I -began to whistle, never a habit of mine, as I made my way -along the path to the workshop.</p> - -<p>Barbara was alone. Her ginger hair gleamed in the light -of a gas globe; her eyes were green as they always were -when she was exultant. “Well, Hodge?”</p> - -<p>“Well, Barbara, I....”</p> - -<p>“Have you told Catty?”</p> - -<p>“Not exactly. How did you know?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</span></p> - -<p>“I knew before you did, Hodge. After all, we’re not -strangers. All right. How long do you want to stay?”</p> - -<p>“Four days.”</p> - -<p>“That’s long for a first trip. Don’t you think you’d better -try a few sample minutes?”</p> - -<p>“Why? Ive seen you and Ace go often enough and heard -your accounts. I’ll take care of myself. Have you got it -down fine enough yet so you can invariably pick the hour -of arrival?”</p> - -<p>“Hour and minute,” she answered confidently. “What’ll -it be?”</p> - -<p>“About midnight of June 30, 1863,” I answered. “I want -to come back on the night of July Fourth.”</p> - -<p>“Youll have to be more exact than that. For the return, -I mean. The dials are set on seconds.”</p> - -<p>“All right, make it midnight going and coming then.”</p> - -<p>“Have you a watch that keeps perfect time?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know about perfect—” -“Take this one. It’s synchronized with the master control -clock.” She handed me a large, rather awkward timepiece -which had two independent faces side by side. “We had a -couple made like this; the duplicate dials were useful before -we were able to control HX-1 so exactly. One shows 1952 -Haggershaven time.”</p> - -<p>“Ten thirty-three and fourteen seconds,” I said.</p> - -<p>“Yes. The other will show 1863 time. You won’t be -able to reset the first dial—but for goodness sake remember -to keep it wound—and set the second for ... 11:54, -zero. That means in six minutes youll leave, to arrive at -midnight. Remember to keep that one wound too, for youll -go by that regardless of variations in local clocks. Whatever -else happens, be in the center of the barn at midnight—allow -yourself some leeway—by midnight, July Fourth. -I don’t want to have to go wandering around 1863 looking -for you.” -“You won’t. I’ll be here.”</p> - -<p>“Five minutes. Now then, food.”</p> - -<p>“I have some,” I answered, slapping my pocket.</p> - -<p>“Not enough. Take this concentrated chocolate along. I -suppose it won’t hurt to drink the water if youre not ob<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</span>served, -but avoid their food. One never knows what chain -might be started by the casual theft—or purchase, if you -had enough old coins—of a loaf of bread. The possibilities -are limitless and frightening. Listen: how can I impress on -you the importance of doing nothing that could possibly -change the future—our present? I’m sure to this day Ace -doesnt understand, and I tremble every moment he spends -in the past. The most trivial action may begin a series of -disastrous consequences. Don’t be seen, don’t be heard. -Make your trip as a ghost.” -“Barbara, I promise I’ll neither assassinate General Lee -nor give the North the idea of a modern six-barreled cannon.”</p> - -<p>“Four minutes. It’s not a joke, Hodge.”</p> - -<p>“Believe me,” I said, “I understand.”</p> - -<p>She looked at me searchingly. Then she shook her head -and began making her round of the engines, adjusting the -dials. I slid under the glass ring as I’d so often seen her do -and stood casually under the reflector. I was not in the -least nervous. I don’t think I was even particularly excited.</p> - -<p>“Three minutes,” said Barbara.</p> - -<p>I patted my breast pocket. Notebook, pencils. I nodded.</p> - -<p>She ducked under the ring and came toward me. -“Hodge....”</p> - -<p>“Yes?”</p> - -<p>She put her arms on my shoulders, leaning forward. I -kissed her, a little absently. “Clod!”</p> - -<p>I looked at her closely, but there were none of the familiar -signs of anger. “A minute to go, it says here,” I -told her.</p> - -<p>She drew away and went back. “All set. Ready?”</p> - -<p>“Ready,” I answered cheerfully. “See you midnight, -July Fourth, 1863.”</p> - -<p>“Right. Goodbye, Hodge. Glad you didnt tell Catty.”</p> - -<p>The expression on her face was the strangest I’d ever -seen her wear. I could not, then or now, quite interpret it. -Doubt, malice, suffering, vindictiveness, entreaty, love, -were all there as her hand moved the switch. I began to -answer something—perhaps to bid her wait—then the -light made me blink and I too experienced the shattering<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</span> -feeling of transition. My bones seemed to fly from each -other; every cell in my body exploded to the ends of space.</p> - -<p>The instant of translation was so brief it is hard to believe -all the multitude of impressions occurred simultaneously. -I was sure my veins were drained of blood, my -brain and eyeballs dropped into a bottomless void, my -thoughts pressed to the finest powder and blown a universe -away. Most of all, I knew the awful sensation of being, for -that tiny fragment of time, not Hodgins McCormick Backmaker, -but part of an <i>I</i> in which the I that was me merged -all identity.</p> - -<p>Then I opened my eyes. I was emotionally shaken; my -knees and wrists were watery points of helplessness, but I -was alive and functioning, with my individuality unimpaired. -The light had vanished. I was in darkness save for -faint moonlight coming through the cracks in the barn. -The sweetish smell of cattle was in my nostrils, and the -slow, ponderous stamp of hooves in my ears. I had gone -back through time.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C19"><i>19.</i> <i>GETTYSBURG</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>The barking of the dogs was frenzied, filled with -the hoarse note indicating they had been raising the alarm -for a long time without being heeded. I knew they must -have been baying at the alien smells of soldiers for the -past day, so I was not apprehensive that their scent of me -would bring investigation. How Barbara and Ace had escaped -detection on journeys which didnt coincide with -abnormal events was beyond me; with such an unnerving -racket in prospect I would either have given up the trips -or moved the apparatus.</p> - -<p>Strange, I reflected, that the cows and horses were undisturbed. -That no hysterical chicken leaped from the roost -in panic. Only the dogs scented my unnatural presence. -Dogs who, as Mr Haggerwells remarked, are supposed to -sense things beyond the perceptions of man.</p> - -<p>Warily I picked my way past the livestock and out of -the barn, fervently hoping the dogs were tied, for I had no -mind to start my adventure by being bitten. Barbara’s -warnings seemed inadequate indeed; one would think she -or Ace might have devised some method of neutralizing -the infernal barking. But of course they could hardly do -so without violating her rule of non-interference.</p> - -<p>Once out on the familiar Hanover road every petty feeling -of doubt or disquiet fell away and all the latent excitement -took hold of me. I was gloriously in 1863, half a day -and some thirty miles from the battle of Gettysburg. If -there is a paradise for historians I had achieved it without -the annoyance of dying first. I swung along at a good pace,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</span> -thankful I had trained myself for long tramps, so that thirty -miles in less than ten hours was no monstrous feat. The -noise of the dogs died away behind me and I breathed the -night air joyfully.</p> - -<p>I had already decided I dared not attempt to steal a ride -on the railroad, even supposing the cars were going -through. As I turned off the Hanover road and took the -direct one to Gettysburg, I knew I would not be able to -keep on it for any length of time. Part of Early’s Confederate -division was moving along it from recently occupied -York; Stuart’s cavalry was all around; trifling skirmishes -were being fought on or near it; Union troops, regulars as -well as the militia called out by Governor Curtin for the -emergency, were behind and ahead of me, marching for -the Monocacy and Cemetery Ridge.</p> - -<p>Leaving the highway would hardly slow me down, for -I knew every sideroad, lane, path or shortcut, not only as -they existed in my day, but as they had been in the time -where I was now. I was going to need this knowledge even -more on my return, for on the Fourth of July this road, -like every other, would be glutted with beaten Northern -troops, supplies and wounded left behind, frantically trying -to reorganize as they were harassed by Stuart’s cavalry -and pressed by the victorious men of Hill, Longstreet, and -Ewell. It was with this in mind I had allowed disproportionately -longer for coming back.</p> - -<p>I saw my first soldier a few miles further on, a jagged -shadow sitting by the roadside with his boots off, massaging -his feet. I guessed him Northern from his kepi, but this -was not conclusive, for many Southron regiments wore -kepis also. I struck off quietly into the field and skirted -around him. He never looked up.</p> - -<p>At dawn I estimated I was halfway, and except for the -sight of that single soldier I might have been taking a nocturnal -stroll through a countryside at peace. I was tired -but certainly not worn out, and I knew I could count on -nervous energy and happy excitement to keep me going -long after my muscles began to protest. Progress would be -slower from now on—Confederate infantry must be just -ahead—even so, I should be at Gettysburg by six or seven.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</span></p> - -<p>The sudden drumming of hooves brushed me off the -dusty pike and petrified me into rigidity as a troop dressed -in gray and dirty tan galloped by screaming, “Eeeeee-yeeee” -exultantly. The gritty cloud they stirred up settled -slowly; I felt the particles sting my face and eyes. It would -be the sideroads from now on, I determined.</p> - -<p>Others had the same impulse; the sideroads were well -populated. Although I knew the movement of every division -and of many regiments, and even had some considerable -idea of the civilian dislocation, the picture around -me was jumbled and turbulent. Farmers, merchants, workers -in overalls rode or tramped eastward; others, identical -in dress and obvious intensity of effort, pushed westward. -I passed carriages and carts with women and children traveling -at various speeds both ways. Squads and companies -of blue-clad troops marched along the roads or through -the fields, trampling the crops, a confused sound of singing, -swearing, or aimless talk hanging above them like a -fog. Spaced by pacific intervals, men in gray or butternut, -otherwise indistinguishable, marched in the same direction. -I decided I could pass unnoticed in the milling crowds.</p> - -<p>It is not easy for the historian, ten, fifty or five hundred -years away from an event, to put aside for a moment the -large concepts of currents and forces, or the mechanical -aids of statistics, charts, maps, neat plans and diagrams in -which the migration of men, women and children is indicated -by an arrow, or a brigade of half-terrified, half-heroic -men becomes a neat little rectangle. It is not easy to see -behind source material, to visualize state papers, reports, -letters, diaries as written by men who spent most of their -lives sleeping, eating, yawning, eliminating, squeezing -blackheads, lusting, looking out of windows, or talking -about nothing in general with no one in particular. We are -too impressed with the pattern revealed to us—or which -we think has been revealed to us—to remember that for -the participants history is a haphazard affair, apparently -aimless, produced by human beings whose concern is essentially -with the trivial and irrelevant. The historian is -always conscious of destiny. The participants rarely—or -mistakenly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</span></p> - -<p>So to be set down in the midst of crisis, to be at once -involved and apart, is to experience a constant series of -shocks against which there is no anesthetic. The soldiers, -the stragglers, the refugees, the farm boys shouting at -horses, the tophatted gentlemen cursing the teamsters, the -teamsters cursing back; the looters, pimps, gamblers, -whores, nurses and newspapermen were indisputably what -they appeared: vitally important to themselves, of little interest -to anyone else. Yet at the same time they were a -paragraph, a page, a chapter, a whole series of volumes.</p> - -<p>I’m sure I was faithful to the spirit if not the letter of -Barbara’s warnings, and that none of the hundreds whom -I passed or who passed me noted my presence, except cursorily. -I, on the other hand, had to repress the constant -temptation to peer into every face for signs which could -not tell me what fortune or misfortune the decision of the -next three days would bring to it.</p> - -<p>A few miles from town the crowded disorder became -even worse, for the scouts from Ewell’s Corps, guarding -the Confederate left flank on the York Road, acted like a -cork in a bottle. Because I, unlike the other travelers, knew -this, I cut sharply south to get back on the circuitous Hanover -road I had left shortly after midnight, and crossing -the bridge over Rock Creek, stumbled into Gettysburg.</p> - -<p>The two and a half storey brick houses with their purplish -slate roofs were placid and charming in the hot July -sun. A valiant rooster pecked at horsedung in the middle -of the street heedless of the swarming soldiers, any of -whom might take a notion for roast chicken. Privates in -the black hats of the Army of the Potomac, cavalrymen -with wide yellow stripes and cannoneers with red ones -on the seams of their pants, swaggered importantly. Lieutenants -with hands resting gracefully on sword hilts, captains -with arms thrust in unbuttoned tunics, colonels smoking -cigars, all moved back and forth across the street, out -of and into houses and stores, each clearly intent on some -business which would affect the course of the war. Now -and then a general rode his horse through the crowd, -slowly and thoughtfully, oppressed by the cares of rank. -Soldiers spat, leered at an occasional woman, sat dolefully<span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</span> -on handy stoops, or marched smartly toward an unknown -destination. On the courthouse staff the flag hung doubtfully -in the limp summer air. Every so often there was a -noise like poorly organized thunder.</p> - -<p>Imitating the adaptable infantrymen, I found an unoccupied -stoop and sat down after a curious glance at the -house, wondering whether it contained someone whose -letters or diaries I had read. Drawing out my packet of -dried beef, I munched away without taking any of my -attention from the sights and sounds and smells around -me. Only I knew how desperately these soldiers would -fight this afternoon and all day tomorrow. I alone knew -how they would be caught in the inescapable trap on July -Third and finally routed, to begin the last act of the war. -That major, I thought, so proud of his new-won golden -oak leaves, may have an arm or leg shot off vainly defending -Culp’s Hill; that sergeant over there may lie faceless -under an apple tree before nightfall.</p> - -<p>Soon these men would be swept away from the illusory -shelter of the houses and out onto the ridges where they -would be pounded into defeat and disaster. There was -nothing for me now in Gettysburg itself, though I could -have spent days absorbing the color and feeling. Already -I had tempted fate by my casual appearance in the heart of -town. At any moment someone might speak to me, to ask -for a light or a direction; an ill-considered word or action -of mine might change, with ever-widening consequences, -the course of the future. I had been foolish enough long -enough; it was time for me to go to the vantage point I had -decided upon and observe without peril of being observed.</p> - -<p>I rose and stretched, my bones protesting. But a couple -of miles more would see me clear of all danger of chance -encounter with a too friendly or inquisitive soldier or civilian. -I gave a last look, trying to impress every detail on my -memory, and turned south on the Emmitsburg Road.</p> - -<p>This was no haphazard choice. I knew where and when -the crucial, the decisive move upon which all the other -moves depended would take place. While thousands of -men were struggling and dying on other parts of the battleground, -a Confederate advance force, unnoticed, disre<span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</span>garded, -would occupy the position which would eventually -dominate the scene and win the battle—and the war—for -the South. Heavy with knowledge no one else possessed I -made my way toward a farm on which there was a wheatfield -and a peach orchard.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C20"><i>20.</i> <i>BRING THE JUBILEE</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>A great battle in its first stages is as tentative, -uncertain, and indefinite as a courtship just begun. At the -beginning the ground was there for either side to take without -protest; the other felt no surge of possessive jealousy. I -walked unscathed along the Emmitsburg Road; on my left -I knew there were Union forces concealed, on my right the -Southrons maneuvered. In a few hours, to walk between -the lines would mean instant death, but now the declaration -had not been made, the vows had not been finally -exchanged. It was still possible for either party to withdraw; -no furious heat bound the two indissolubly together. -I heard the periodic shell and the whine of a minie bullet; -mere flirtatious gestures so far.</p> - -<p>Despite the hot sun the grass was cool and lush. The -shade in the orchard was velvety. From a low branch I -picked a near ripe peach and sucked the wry juice. I -sprawled on the earth and waited. For miles around, men -from Maine and Wisconsin, from Georgia and North Carolina, -assumed the same attitude. But I knew for what I was -waiting; they could only guess.</p> - -<p>Some acoustical freak dimmed the noises in the air to -little more than amplification of the normal summer -sounds. Did the ground really tremble faintly, or was I -translating my mental picture of the marching armies, the -great wagon trains, the heavy cannon, the iron-shod horses -into an imagined physical effect? I don’t think I dozed, but -certainly my attention withdrew from the rows of trees -with their scarred and runneled bark, curving branches and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</span> -graceful leaves, so that I was taken unaware by the unmistakable -clump and creak of mounted men.</p> - -<p>The blue-uniformed cavalry rode slowly through the -peach orchard. They seemed like a group of aimless hunters -returning from the futile pursuit of a fox; they chatted, -shouted at each other, walked their horses abstractedly. -One or two had their sabres out; they rose in their saddles -and cut at the branches overhead in pure, pointless mischief.</p> - -<p>Behind them came the infantrymen, sweating and swearing, -more serious. Some few had wounds, others were without -their muskets. Their dark blue tunics were carelessly -unbuttoned, their lighter pants were stained with mud and -dust and grass. They trampled and thrashed around like -men long weary. Quarrels rose among them swiftly and -swiftly petered out. No one could mistake them for anything -but troops in retreat</p> - -<p>After they had passed, the orchard was still again, but -the stillness had a different quality from what had gone -before. The leaves did not rustle, no birds chirped, there -were no faint betrayals of the presence of chipmunks or -squirrels. Only if one listened very closely was the dry -noise of insects perceptible. But I heard the guns now. -Clearly and louder. And more continuously—much more -continuously. It was not yet the full roar of battle, but -death was authentic in its low rumble.</p> - -<p>Then the Confederates came. Cautiously, but not so cautiously -that one could fail to recognize they represented a -victorious, invading army. Shabby they certainly were, as -they pushed into the orchard, but alert and confident. Only -a minority had uniforms which resembled those prescribed -by regulation and these were torn, grimy and scuffed. -Many of the others wore the semiofficial butternut—crudely -dyed homespun, streaked and muddy brown. Some -had ordinary clothes with military hats and buttons; a few -were dressed in federal blue trousers with gray or butternut -jackets.</p> - -<p>Nor were their weapons uniform. There were long rifles, -short carbines, muskets of varying age, and I noticed one -bearded soldier with a ponderous shotgun. But whatever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</span> -their dress or arms, their bearing was the bearing of conquerors. -If I alone on the field that day knew for sure the -outcome of the battle, these Confederate soldiers were -close behind in sensing the future.</p> - -<p>The straggling Northerners had passed me by with the -clouded perception of the retreating. These Southrons, -however, were steadfastly attentive to every sight and -sound. Too late I realized the difficulty of remaining unnoticed -by such sharp, experienced eyes. Even as I berated -myself for my stupidity, a great, whiskery fellow in -what must once have been a stylish bottle-green coat -pointed his gun at me.</p> - -<p>“Yank here boys!” Then to me, “What you doing here, -fella?”</p> - -<p>Three or four came up and surrounded me curiously. -“Funniest lookin damyank I ever did see. Looks like he -just fell out of a bathtub.”</p> - -<p>Since I had walked all night on dusty roads I could only -think their standards of cleanliness were not high. And -indeed this was confirmed by the smell coming from them: -the stink of sweat, of clothes long slept in, of unwashed -feet and stale tobacco.</p> - -<p>“I’m a noncombatant,” I said foolishly.</p> - -<p>“Whazzat?” asked the beard. “Some kind of Baptist?”</p> - -<p>“Naw,” corrected one of the others. “It’s a law-word. -Means not all right in the head.”</p> - -<p>“Looks all right in the foot though. Let’s see your boots, -Yank. Mine’s sure wore out.”</p> - -<p>What terrified me now was not the thought of my boots -being stolen, or of being treated as a prisoner, or even the -remote chance of being shot as a spy. A greater, more indefinite -catastrophe was threatened by my exposure. These -men were the advance company of a regiment due to sweep -through the orchard and the wheatfield, explore that bit of -wild ground known as the Devil’s Den and climb up Little -Round Top closely followed by an entire Confederate brigade. -This was the brigade which held the Round Top for -several hours until artillery was brought up, artillery which -dominated the entire field and gave the South victory at -Gettysburg.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</span></p> - -<p>There was no allowance for a pause, no matter how -trifling, in the peach orchard, in any of the accounts I’d -read or heard of. The hazard Barbara had warned so insistently -against had happened. I had been discovered, and -the mere discovery had altered the course of history.</p> - -<p>I tried to shrug it off. Delay of a few minutes could -hardly make a significant difference. All historians agreed -that the capture of the Round Tops was an inevitability; -the Confederates would have been foolish to overlook -them—in fact it was hardly possible they could, prominent -as they were both on maps and in physical reality—and -they had occupied them hours before the Federals made a -belated attempt to take them. I had been unbelievably -stupid to expose myself, but I had created no repercussions -likely to spread beyond the next few minutes.</p> - -<p>“Said let’s see them boots. Aint got all day to wait.”</p> - -<p>A tall officer with a pointed imperial and a sandy, faintly -reddish mustache whose curling ends shone waxily came -up, revolver in hand. “What’s going on here?”</p> - -<p>“Just a Yank, Capn. Making a little change of footgear.” -The tone was surly, almost insolent.</p> - -<p>The galloons on the officer’s sleeve told me the title was -not honorary. “I’m a civilian, Captain,” I protested. “I -realize I have no business here.”</p> - -<p>The captain looked at me coldly, with an expression of -disdainful contempt. “Local man?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Not exactly. I’m from York.”</p> - -<p>“Too bad. Thought you could tell me about the Yanks -up ahead. Jenks, leave the civilian gentleman in full possession -of his boots.”</p> - -<p>There was rage behind that sneer, a hateful anger apparently -directed at me for being a civilian, at his men for their -obvious lack of respect, at the battle, the world. I suddenly -realized his face was intimately familiar. Irritatingly, because -I could connect it with no name, place or circumstance.</p> - -<p>“How long have you been in this orchard, Mister Civilian-From-York?”</p> - -<p>The effort to identify him nagged me, working in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</span> -depths of my mind, obtruding even into that top layer -which was concerned with what was going on.</p> - -<p>What was going on? <i>Too bad. Thought you could tell -me about the Yanks up ahead. How long have you been in -this orchard?</i></p> - -<p>Yanks up ahead? There werent any. There wouldnt be, -for hours.</p> - -<p>“I said, ‘How long you been in this orchard?’”</p> - -<p>Probably an officer later promoted to rank prominent -enough to have his picture in one of the minor narratives. -Yet I was certain his face was no likeness I’d seen once in a -steel engraving and dismissed. These were features often -encountered....</p> - -<p>“Sure like to have them boots. If we aint fightin for -Yankee boots, what the hell we fightin for?”</p> - -<p>What could I say? That I’d been in the orchard for half -an hour? The next question was bound to be, Had I seen -Federal troops? Whichever way I answered I would be -betraying my role of spectator.</p> - -<p>“Hey Capn—this fella knows something. Lookit the -silly grin!” -Was I smiling? In what? Terror? Perplexity? In the -mere effort of keeping silent, so as to be involved no -further?</p> - -<p>“Tell yah—he’s laughin cuz he knows somethin!” -Let them hang me, let them strip me of my boots; from -here on I was dumb as dear Catty had been once.</p> - -<p>“Out with it man—youre in a tight spot. Are there Yanks -up ahead?” -The confusion in my mind approached chaos. If I knew -the captain’s eventual rank I could place him. Colonel -Soandso. Brigadier-General Blank. What had happened? -Why had I let myself be discovered? Why had I spoken at -all and made silence so hard now?</p> - -<p>“Yanks up ahead—they’s Yanks up ahead!” -“Quiet you! I asked him—he didnt say there were Yanks -ahead.” -“Hay! Damyanks up above. Goin to mow us down!”</p> - -<p>“Fella says the bluebellies are layin fur us!”</p> - -<p>Had the lie been in my mind, to be telepathically plucked<span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</span> -by the excited soldiers? Was even silence no refuge from -participation?</p> - -<p>“Man here spotted the whole Fed artillery up above, -trained on us!”</p> - -<p>“Pull back, boys! Pull back!”</p> - -<p>I’d read often enough of the epidemic quality of a perfectly -unreasonable notion. A misunderstood word, a baseless -rumor, an impossible report, was often enough to set -a group of armed men—squad or army—into senseless -mob action. Sometimes the infection made for feats of -heroism, sometimes for panic. This was certainly less than -panic, but my nervous, meaningless smile conveyed a message -I had never sent.</p> - -<p>“It’s a trap. Pull back boys—let’s get away from these -trees and out where we can see the Yanks!” -The captain whirled on his men. “Here, damn you,” he -shouted furiously, “you all gone crazy? The man said nothing. -There’s no trap!”</p> - -<p>The men moved slowly, sullenly away. “I heard him,” -one of them muttered, looking accusingly toward me.</p> - -<p>The captain’s shout became a yell. “Come back here! -Back here, I say!”</p> - -<p>His raging stride overtook the still irresolute men. He -grabbed the one called Jenks by the shoulder and whirled -him about. Jenks tried to jerk free. There was fear on his -face, and hate. “Leave me go, damn you,” he screamed, -“Leave me go!”</p> - -<p>The captain yelled at his men again. Jenks snatched at -the pistol with his left hand; the officer pulled the gun -away. Jenks brought his musket upright against the captain’s -body, the muzzle just under his chin, and pushed—as -though the firearm somehow gave him leverage. They -wrestled briefly, then the musket went off.</p> - -<p>The captain’s hat flew upward, and for an instant he -stood, bareheaded, in the private’s embrace. Then he fell. -Jenks wrenched his musket free and disappeared.</p> - -<p>When I came out of my shock I walked over to the body. -The face had been blown off. Shreds of human meat dribbled -bloodily on the gray collar and soiled the fashionably -long hair. I had killed a man. Through my interference<span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</span> -with the past I had killed a man who had been destined to -longer life and even some measure of fame. I was the -guilty sorcerer’s apprentice.</p> - -<p>I stooped down to put my hands inside his coat for -papers which would tell me who he was and satisfy the -curiosity which still basely persisted. It was not shame -which stopped me. Just nausea, and remorse.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>I saw the Battle of Gettysburg. I saw it with all the -unique advantages of a professional historian thoroughly -conversant with the patterns, the movements, the details, -who knows where to look for the coming dramatic moment, -the recorded decisive stroke. I fulfilled the chroniclers’ -dream.</p> - -<p>It was a nightmare.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>To begin with, I slept. I slept not far from the captain’s -body in the peach orchard. This was not callousness, but -physical and emotional exhaustion. When I went to sleep -the guns were thundering; when I woke they were thundering -louder. It was late afternoon. I thought immediately, -this is the time for the futile Union charge against the -Round Tops.</p> - -<p>But the guns were not sounding from there. All the roar -was northward, from the town. I knew how the battle went; -I had studied it for years. Only now it wasn’t happening the -way it was written down in the books.</p> - -<p>True, the first day was a Confederate victory. But it was -not the victory we knew. It was just a little different, just a -little short of the triumph recorded. And on the second -day, instead of the Confederates getting astride the Taneytown -Road and into the position from which they tore -Meade’s army to bits from three sides, I witnessed a terrible -encounter in the peach orchard and the wheatfield—places -known to be safely behind the Southron lines.</p> - -<p>All my life I’d heard of Pickett’s charge on the third day. -Of how the disorganized Federals were given the final killing -blow in their vitals. Well, I saw Pickett’s charge on the -third day and it was not the same charge in the historic -place. It was a futile attempt to storm superior positions<span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</span> -(positions, by established fact, in Lee’s hands since July -First) ending in slaughter and defeat.</p> - -<p>Defeat for the South, not the North. Meade’s army was -not broken; the Confederates could not scatter and pursue -them now. The Capitulation, if it ever took place, would -come under different circumstances. The independence of -the Confederate States might not be acknowledged for -years. If at all.</p> - -<p>All because the North held the Round Tops.</p> - -<p>Years more of killing, and possibly further years of -guerrilla warfare. Thousands and thousands of dead, their -blood on my hands. A poisoned continent, an inheritance -of hate. Because of me.</p> - -<p>I cannot tell you how I got back to York. If I walked, -it was somnambulistically. Possibly I rode the railroad or -in a farmer’s cart. Part of my mind, a tiny part that kept -coming back to pierce me no matter how often I crushed it -out, remembered those who died, those who would have -lived, but for me. Another part was concerned only with -the longing to get back to my own time, to the haven, to -Catty. A much larger part was simply blank, except for the -awesome, incredible knowledge that the past could be -changed—that the past <i>had</i> been changed.</p> - -<p>I must have wound my watch—Barbara’s watch—for it -was ten oclock on the night of July Fourth when I got to -the barn. Ten oclock by 1863 time; the other dial showed -it to be 8:40, that would be twenty of nine in the morning, -1952 time. In two hours I would be home, safe from the -nightmare of happenings that never happened, of guilt for -the deaths of men not supposed to die, of the awful responsibility -of playing destiny. If I could not persuade Barbara -to smash her damnable contrivance I would do so myself.</p> - -<p>The dogs barked madly, but I was sure no one heeded. -It was the Fourth of July, and a day of victory and rejoicing -for all Pennsylvanians. I stole into the barn and settled -myself in the exact center, even daring the use of a match, -my last one, to be sure I’d be directly under the reflector -when it materialized.</p> - -<p>I could not sleep, though I longed to blot out the horror -and wake in my own time. Detail by detail I went over<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</span> -what I had seen, superimposing it like a palimpsest upon -the history I’d always known. Sleep would have kept me -from this wretched compulsion and from questioning my -sanity, but I could not sleep.</p> - -<p>I have heard that in moments of overwhelming shock -some irrelevancy, some inconsequential matter persistently -forces itself on the attention. The criminal facing execution -thinks, not of his imminent fate or of his crime, but of -the cigarette stub he left burning in his cell. The bereaved -widow dwells, not on her lost husband, but on tomorrow’s -laundry. So it was with me. Behind that part of my mind -re-living the past three days, a more elementary part -gnawed at the identification of the slain captain.</p> - -<p>I knew that face. Particularly did I know that face set in -a sneer, distorted with anger. But I could not remember it -in Confederate uniform. I could not remember it with -sandy mustaches. And yet the sandy, reddish hair, revealed -in that terrible moment when his hat flew off, was as familiar -as part of the face. Oh, I thought, if I could only -place it once and for all and free my mind at least of this -trivial thing.</p> - -<p>I wished there were some way I could have seen the -watch, to concentrate on the creeping progress of the -hands and distract myself from the wave after wave of -wretched meditations which flowed over me. But the moonlight -was not strong enough to make the face distinguishable, -much less the figures on the dials. There was no -narcotic.</p> - -<p>As one always is at such times I was convinced the appointed -moment had passed unnoticed. Something had -gone wrong. Over and over I had to tell myself that minutes -seem hours in the waiting dark; it might feel like two -or three in the morning to me; it was probably barely -eleven. No use. A minute—or an hour or a second—later -I was again positive midnight had passed.</p> - -<p>Finally I began to suffer a monstrous illusion. I began -to think it was getting lighter. That dawn was coming. Of -course I knew it could not be; what I fancied lifting darkness -was only a sick condition of swollen, overtired eyes. -Dawn does not come to Pennsylvania at midnight, and it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</span> -was not yet midnight. At midnight I would be back at -Haggershaven, in 1952.</p> - -<p>Even when the barn was fully lighted by the rising sun -and I could see the cattle peaceful in their stalls I refused -to believe what I saw. I took out my watch only to find -something had disturbed the works; the hands registered -five oclock. Even when the farmer, milk pails over arm, -started in surprise, exclaiming, “Hay, what you doing -here?”—even then, I did not believe.</p> - -<p>Only when, as I opened my mouth to explain to my -involuntary host, did something happen. The puzzle which -had pursued me for three days suddenly solved itself. I -knew why the face of the Southron captain had been so -familiar. Familiar beyond any of the better known warriors -on either side. I had indeed known that face intimately; -seen those features enraged or sneering. The nose, -the mouth, the eyes, the expression were Barbara Haggerwells’. -The man dead in the peach orchard was the man -whose portrait hung in the library of Haggershaven, its -founder, Herbert Haggerwells. Captain Haggerwells—never -to become a major now, or buy this farm. Never to -marry a local girl or beget Barbara’s great grandfather. -Haggershaven had ceased to exist in the future.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="C21"><i>21.</i> <i>FOR THE TIME BEING</i></h2> -</div> - - -<p>I am writing this, as I said, in 1877. I am a healthy -man of forty-five, no doubt with many years ahead of me. -I might live to be a hundred, except for an illogical feeling -that I must die before 1921. However, eighty-nine should -be enough for anyone. So I have ample time to put my -story down. Still, better to have it down and done with; -should anything happen to me tomorrow it will be on -paper.</p> - -<p>For what? As confession and apology? As an inverted -substitute for the merciful amnesia which ought to have -erased my memory as well as my biography? (I have written -to Wappinger Falls; there are no records of any Hodgins -family, or of Backmakers. Does this mean the forces I -set in motion destroyed Private Hodgins as well as Captain -Haggerwells? Or only that the Hodginses and Backmakers -settled elsewhere? In either case I am like Adam—in -this world—a special, parentless creation.) There is no -one close enough to care, or intimate enough to accept my -word in the face of all reason. I have not married in this -time, nor shall I. I write only as old men talk to themselves.</p> - -<p>The rest of my personal story is simple. The name of the -farmer who found me in his barn was Thammis; they had -need of a hired hand and I stayed on. I had no desire to go -elsewhere; in fact I could not bear to leave what was—and -will never be—Haggershaven.</p> - -<p>In the beginning I used to go to the location of the -Agati’s garden and look across at the spot where I left our<span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</span> -cottage and Catty. It was an empty pilgrimage. Now I content -myself with the work which needs doing. I shall stay -here till I die.</p> - -<p>Catty. Haggershaven. Are they really gone, irrevocably -lost, in a future which never existed, which couldnt exist, -once the chain of causation was broken? Or do they exist -after all, in a universe in which the South won the battle of -Gettysburg and Major Haggerwells founded Haggershaven? -Could another Barbara devise a means to reach -that universe? I would give so much to believe this, but I -cannot. I simply cannot.</p> - -<p>Children know about such things. They close their eyes -and pray, “Please God, make it didnt happen.” Often they -open their eyes to find it happened anyway, but this does -not shake their faith that many times the prayer is granted. -Adults smile, but can any of them be sure the memories -they cherish were the same yesterday? Do they <i>know</i> that -a past cannot be expunged? Children know it can.</p> - -<p>And once lost, that particular past can never be regained. -Another and another perhaps, but never the same -one. There are no parallel universes—though this one may -be sinuous and inconstant.</p> - -<p>That this world is a better place than the one into which -I was born, and promises to grow still better, seems true. -What idealism lay behind the Southron cause triumphed in -the reconciliation of men like Lee; what was brutal never -got the upper hand as it did in my world. The Negro is free; -black legislatures pass advanced laws in South Carolina; -black congressmen comport themselves with dignity in -Washington. The Pacific railroad is built, immigrants pour -in to a welcoming country to make it strong and wealthy; -no one suggests they should be shut out or hindered.</p> - -<p>There are rumors of a deal between northern Republicans -and southern Democrats, betraying the victory of the -Civil War—how strange it is still, after fourteen years, to -use this term instead of the familiar War of Southron Independence—in -return for the presidency. If this is true, my -brave new world is not so brave.</p> - -<p>It may not be so new either. Prussia has beaten France -and proclaimed a German Empire; is this the start in a dif<span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</span>ferent -way of the German Union? Will 1914 see an Emperors’ -War—there is none in France now—leaving Germany -facing ... whom?</p> - -<p>Any one of the inventions of my own time would make -me a rich man if I could reproduce them, or cared for -money. With mounting steel production and the tremendous -jump in population, what a success the minible would -be. Or the tinugraph. Or controllable balloons.</p> - -<p>The typewriter I have seen. It has developed along different -and clumsier lines; inevitably, I suppose, given initial -divergence. It may mean greater advances; more likely not. -The universal use of gaslight must be far in the future if it -is to come at all; certainly its advent is delayed by all this -talk of inventing electric illumination. If we couldnt put -electricity to work it’s unlikely my new contemporaries will -be able to. Why, they havent even made the telegraph -cheap and convenient.</p> - -<p>And something like HX-1? It is inconceivable. Could it -be that in destroying the future in which Haggershaven -existed I have also destroyed the only dimension in which -time travel was possible?</p> - -<p>So strangely easily I can write the words, “I destroyed.”</p> - -<p>Catty.</p> - -<p>But what of Tyss’s philosophy? Is it possible I shall be -condemned to repeat the destruction throughout eternity? -Have I written these lines an infinite number of times before? -Or is the mercy envisaged by Enfandin a reality? -And what of Barbara’s expression as she bade me goodbye? -Could she possibly</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Editorial note by Frederick Winter Thammis: Quite recently, -in the summer of 1953 to be exact, I commissioned -the remodelling of my family home near York, Pennsylvania. -Among the bundles of old books and papers stored -in the attic was a box of personal effects, labelled “H M -Backmaker.” In it was the manuscript concluding with an -unfinished sentence, reproduced above.</p> - -<p>My father used to tell me that when he was a boy there -was an old man living on the farm, nominally as a hired -hand, but actually as a pensioner, since he was beyond the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</span> -age of useful labor. My father said the children considered -him not quite right in his mind, but very entertaining, for -he often repeated long, disjointed narratives of an impossible -world and an impossible society which they found as -fascinating as the Oz books. On looking back, he said, Old -Hodge talked like an educated man, but this might simply -be the impression of young, uncultivated minds.</p> - -<p>Clearly it was in some attempt to give form and unity to -his tales that the old man wrote his fable down, and then -was too shy to submit it for publication. This is the only -reasonable way to account for its existence. Of course he -says he wrote it in 1877, when he was far from old, and -disconcertingly, analysis of the paper shows it might have -been written then.</p> - -<p>Two other items should be noted. In the box of Backmaker’s -belongings there was a watch of unknown manufacture -and unique design. Housed in a cheap nickel case, -the jeweled movement is of extraordinary precision and -delicacy. The face has two dials, independently set and -wound.</p> - -<p>The second is a quotation. It can be matched by similar -quotations in any of half a hundred volumes on the Civil -War. I pick this only because it is handy. From W. E. -Woodward’s <i>Years of Madness</i>, p. 202:</p> - -<p>“ ... Union troops that night and next morning took a -position on Cemetery Hill and Round Top.... The Confederates -could have occupied this position but they failed -to do so. It was an error with momentous consequences.”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="About_Ward_Moore">About Ward Moore</h2> -</div> - - -<p>On the battlefield at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, there is a -small hill called Little Round Top. One morning in July, -1863, the Confederate Army made the tactical error of not -occupying this hill. It was a mistake that cost them victory -in a battle which—in the view of many historians—was -the turning point of the Civil War. In the ninety years since -Gettysburg one question has never been far from the minds -of most Southerners—and a good many Yankees, too: What -if the battle had gone the other way, what if the South had -won the war? Ward Moore—a Northerner himself—has -settled the matter at last in a book that might be called -imaginative historical fiction, an excursion into the world of -might-have-been so filled with exact and convincing detail -that, for a few hours, it seems true.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The author of <i>Bring the Jubilee</i> was born in Madison, New -Jersey, in 1903. “From the age of five,” he writes, “books -have been for me the essential narcotic; as a natural consequence -I detested school. When this detestation did not -bring on psychosomatic illnesses to save me from the hated -classrooms, I was not above malingering or playing hooky—now -a lost art, but one practiced in my generation. Three -weeks short of graduation I quit high school and have not -been inside a school house since, except to vote.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>“My first short story was written at the age of eleven and -was followed by a flood of juvenilia, some little of which was -unfortunately published. Happily, markets and industry died -simultaneously; I wrote only desultorily until my first novel -<i>Breathe the Air Again</i> was published in 1942. This was -acclaimed by Max Eastman in the American Mercury, who -predicted that I would fall heir to ‘the cloak of Upton Sinclair.’ -Something went wrong with the tailoring arrangements; -my next novel was <i>Greener Than You Think</i> (Sloane, -1947), a satirical fantasy.”</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>In addition to these two novels, Mr. Moore has published a -number of short stories in such disparate media as Amazing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</span> -Stories and Harper’s Bazaar, Fantasy and Science Fiction -and The Reporter, Science Fiction Quarterly and Tomorrow.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He concludes: “I have been intensely interested in the history -of the Civil War ever since—at the age of six—I came across -a book with nice black woodcuts showing the firing on Fort -Sumter and the burning of Richmond. As an amateur I’ve -read hundreds of dull volumes and a score of fascinating -ones on the Irrepressible Conflict. A novel based on the concept -‘what would have happened if the South had won at -Gettysburg,’ was practically inevitable. <i>Bring the Jubilee</i> is it.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</span></p> - - - -<p class="center"><i>The Idea Behind</i><br /> - -DUAL EDITIONS</p> - - -<p>An agreement unusual in American publishing has been -made between <span class="smcap">Farrar, Straus</span> and <span class="smcap">Young, Inc.</span>, and <span class="smcap">Ballantine -Books, Inc.</span> We believe that through simultaneous publication -of new titles in paperbound and trade editions it is -possible to secure broader distribution of good books at a considerable -saving to the reader and with substantially greater -royalty income for the author. At a time when costs are consistently -rising, large printings of combined editions make -possible a lower price for the trade editions, while nation-wide -distribution of the paperbound edition makes immediately -available to a great new audience the best in current fiction -and non-fiction.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The convenient-sized, permanent, hard-cover editions may -be obtained through any bookstore at a saving of approximately -60% of the cost of similar books published in the -regular way. 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