If you added up the columns and looked at the figures, there could be no doubt as to the outcome. And still, Duchinsky was hedging.
“Your wife,” Joseph said suddenly—“do you expect her back, soon, from her visit to her English family?”
“Yes, I do.”
“We must get together socially, sometime. But that’s not why I mentioned her....”
He stopped. Duchinsky had stiffened. Maybe the General resented the social note. Duchinsky was a snob and a fool, or perhaps too much of a gentleman to catch the inference. Well—it was low and somehow unclean to ring in a man’s family; but whose family was not affected by this struggle?
The General’s throat was working above the tight collar of his greenish-gray shirt. “Why did you mention Madame Duchinsky?”
Duchinsky had caught on.
“Look here, General, said Joseph, “you’ve known me as a soldier, as a patriotic man, as a person of democratic convictions. And what happened to me: First they took away my factory. So the Government appointed me National Administrator. I did my job as conscientiously as I knew how, as conscientiously as I fought in the war, as conscientiously as you do yours. And now I’m being forced to resign.”
“About my wife!” demanded the General.
“I’ve got a wife, too. She isn’t a titled lady; she’s got a little business. And very likely, they’ll take away that, too.”
“Do you mean to imply, Benda, that someone would want to kick me out of my command because I married a woman I loved?”
“My Minister seemed to think so....” Joseph cursed Dolezhal who had wished this on him. He was no conspirator. And he was sorry for Duchinsky.
He talked fast. “Our Party would like to keep you out of harm. But it’s the others who will get hold of the whip if things continue the way they are drifting....You say you are a soldier and nothing but a soldier Will they believe it? They will say: Ah, Duchinsky, hasn’t he got a British wife? A relation of Lady Chittenden, English aristocracy, the rich, that’s what he’s married into! How can we trust him?...They won’t ask any questions of you, they don’t want any answers. They don’t care if you can pin-point an objective and destroy it with minimum expense and the minimum loss of life. They will take away your command as they took away my factory, they’ll pension you off at a few crowns unless they trump up some charges and put you away somewhere. My God, you know how that’s done; there are enough men on your staff to whom it happened under the Nazis!”
Nervously, Duchinsky patted his crew haircut. He was a well-knit kind of man with a strength that had carried him without sleep through days of the most harrowing operations in England. But now, this strength appeared sapped.
“I know,” he said darkly, “I know how it is. I’ve known it for a long time and feared it.”
“And are you going to sit there and wait till they enter this door, and throw you out and put in your place one of their creatures who can recite Marx backwards but who’s never seen the inside of a plane?”
“I don’t understand people anymore,” said Duchinsky. “A man does his duty—isn’t that enough for them?”
Joseph appreciated the question. “Who knows!...There’s no end to what they want once we let them get started. You could make application to join their Party and hope they believe you mean it. You could divorce your wife and hope they accept you and forgive your bourgeois past—”
“I’m a soldier!” said Duchinsky.
“I thought so. Can we rely on you?”
The General looked down at his uniform, at the buttons with the crossed swords, at his trim, firm stomach, the fine crease of his pants.
“You’re not planning anything crazy? I’m a soldier, I’ve got a commander in chief—the President....” His harried voice ended in a whisper.
Joseph laughed tightly. “You needn’t be troubled about that. All will be done according to parliamentary rules and regulations...” and he finished the quote from Dolezhal with a certain relish... “we’re experts in that, you see!”
“That’s better,” said Duchinsky, visibly eased, “much better. Nothing illegal! I couldn’t go along with that!”
“Nothing illegal,” promised Joseph, because he wanted nothing of the sort either. “But you are going along?”
The General uneasily led his finger along the edge of a shell fragment which served as a paperweight. “I know your heart’s in the right spot, Benda, and your aims are good—”
“Please, don’t misunderstand us, General. We are not pressuring you. We are not asking you to do anything. All we want is that you do nothing at all, when the time comes.”
“I can’t say Yes or No, like that. Let me think about it. Let me listen around what the others are thinking. Come back next week....”
“Next week, fine,” said Joseph. Duchinsky was a weak sister. He had liked the General, even admired him, back in the old days in England. But then, perhaps, the decisions of war were easier than those which had to be made now. In any case, tentative as the commitment was, it was better than none at all; and once committed, Duchinsky wouldn’t be able to backtrack on his own steps.
The General was again displaying his bluff smile. “Next week,” he said, “I may have some information for you.” He was thinking, too, behind his smile. I haven’t said anything definite, pledged no action. Maybe things aren’t as critical as this Benda wants me to believe. After all, a man who only does his duty is fairly immune....“And don’t worry, Benda, I’ll keep everything under my hat.”
“I am not worried,” said Joseph, “and I’ll be back.”
But as he left the General and came out onto the street, he felt a drawing in his breast as if his ribs were about to cave in. If Dolezhal should complain that it took too long to bring Duchinsky in line—so what! He wasn’t afraid of Dolezhal. What bothered him was something else. If the most logical men for the plan were that weak, that hesitant—what, then, did numbers mean?
On his way back to Parliament, he stopped at the main post office to send off a cable to Elinor Simpson, begging her to come over, and indicating that a big story was going to break. Perhaps she knew already and was on her way; she had her stringers and informants in Prague. It was important that she be here and cover whatever might happen. She had her limitations; but she had a heart for poor little Czechoslovakia, and maybe a lot of sympathy would be needed from the United States.
Joseph shoved the cable across the counter to the official. It wasn’t sympathy for poor little Czechoslovakia he wanted from her, really, but an insurance policy just in case. With her connections to the American Embassy, she could get a visa for himself, and Lida, and Petra overnight, as she had done for Thomas and Kitty. He frowned. There was no earthly reason for opening a rear exit with not even a ghost knocking at the front door of his house!
He stretched out his hand as if to ask the official for the return of the blank; but when the man had counted the words and stated the cost, he paid.
The bell had long since sounded two o’clock. Instead of hurrying home, as they did on other days, the men of the morning shift hung around in the yard of the Benda Works, braving the wet, miserable cold, talking in subdued voices, clapping their arms, and glancing more and more frequently toward the door of the office building.
Over Sunday, a rumor had sprung up and quickly made the rounds from one glass worker’s home to the other—that a meeting of the Works Council had been called for Monday morning, and that Joseph Benda was going to resign as National Administrator.
There were those who refused to believe it and said, “He’d rather kill himself than give up the Works.” Others argued that after the fire at Hammer nothing else could be expected, and that it was high time for Joseph Benda to see that he was through, as far as the men in the Rodnik glass industry were concerned. Some workers to whom the old days, in retrospect, appeared pleasant, remembered the close relationship they had had with the Benda family and were thoughtful. “It won’t be the same without him,�
�� they said, and one of the younger men agreed, “It certainly won’t, thank God.”
“He won’t starve!” said Viteslav Czerny. “He’s got his nest egg socked away, you can be sure of that. And we gave him a fine job in the National Assembly, pays him plenty—I wish I made mine as easy as he makes his. And look at Vesely’s! A gold mine!”
“Strikes me he won’t agree to a thing unless he gets more out of it than he puts in. I wonder what the deal is this time!” said another man, and Blatnik added, “That Works Council of ours had better take a close look at the books!”
He kicked a broken beechwood form and let the pieces sail over the partially frozen ground. Some voices were raised against him, and a man muttered that Blatnik, of all people, should keep his mouth shut. “Always picking up a scandal! Always making trouble!”
At that moment, the door to the office building opened. But it was only Dr. Karel Benda with his little bag, leaving the infirmary.
“Hey, Doctor, what’s going on in there?”
Karel shrugged.
“That’s an awfully long meeting!”
“Don’t you talk to your brother? Don’t you know what’s up?”
Karel wished he did know. The rumors, which seemed to have some basis in fact, had surprised him as much as the others—or more. It remained to be seen, of course, whether Joseph actually would resign. But if he did, what had happened to drum sense into his skull?
Karel gripped his bag more firmly and started out across the yard, making his way between the groups of waiting men, and taking care not to set his cracked shoes on the thin ice covering the puddles. But before he reached the big main gate of the Works, the yard sprang into action. It made him stop and turn.
On top of the step that led to the door of the office building stood Joseph, his fur-lined coat open, his soft gray felt shoved back from his forehead; he was smiling at a somber Kravat standing alongside him.
The men moved up closer. The restless babble of voices was stilled by Kravat’s hand.
“My friends!” said Joseph.
Despite the length of the conference and the difficult decisions which he must have had to make, Joseph appeared in a remarkably even temper. He’s always had a considerable ability to bounce back, thought Karel—and who knows what goes on behind that thick forehead of his?
“There comes a time in life,” Joseph began, “when a man must make up his mind as to what he wants. I am speaking that personally, because most of you know me quite well and must have a hunch about how I’ve felt these last months—these last years....”
Karel saw him gaze over the yard, mop his face, and press his fingers against his forehead. It was harder on Joseph than he let on.
“This neither-nor business is not good for anybody, not for you and not for me. I’ve tried it long enough, haven’t I?”
His hand swept in a large circle.
“All of this used to be mine, and I loved it, and loved to work for it. Times change, people change; who mourns for the stubbles on last year’s fields?”
The men were very quiet. From the grinding room, in which the afternoon shift was at work, came the wailing sound of the glass as its rims were being smoothed down by the eternally revolving horizontal sandstone wheels. This sound, and the tone of Joseph’s voice, made Karel sad, and sorry for his brother, and they submerged the question: Why is Joseph doing it? Why now? Why did he refuse, to me? Why did he tell me he couldn’t resign even if he wanted to?
“I could work here,” said Joseph, “and do a good job and help you, under two conditions: If I’d never owned it, or if I owned it again.”
His face smoothed out as if he were enjoying a sublime vision, and Karel wondered, through all his sympathy, whether a memory of the great past alone could create so beatific an expression.
Then Joseph’s heavy lids opened, his face became sober, and he said, “But as things are, the strain has become too great—you understand, I’m sure. And a man must be capable of making a radical break. That’s what I’m doing. Maybe it is better for you people, too. Be on your own, completely, and see how it works out and see how you like it.”
Joseph pulled down his hat and buttoned his coat.
“So your Works Council has agreed to accept my resignation as National Administrator, subject to approval by the District National Committee in Limberk, and to have your old fellow worker, Mr. Frantishek Kravat, take over in my place. Franta,” he turned and reached for Kravat’s hand, “good luck!...And good luck to you all!”
He bent down and picked up something which he had placed against the door post. Karel recognized it, even at this distance. It was the portrait of Peter Benda that had hung on the wall of Joseph’s office. Holding the large picture carefully, Joseph came down the steps and walked through the men, who willingly and respectfully made an aisle for him. They were silent; the eyes of some were moist; and some started to come to him and grasp his hand, but stopped, feeling that it would be wrong to intrude on him at this moment. Some wanted to cheer, for Joseph, or for Kravat, or for themselves who were finally and unalterably free of even the shadow of their former boss. But somehow, no cheer materialized.
Joseph nodded to Karel and strode out through the main gate without looking back. Then he waited for Karel to catch up with him.
“Here,” he said, “it’s a big thing, help me carry it.”
Karel took one end of the frame of his father’s picture, and, holding the portrait horizontally between them, so that it joined as well as separated them, the two brothers went across the stone bridge over the little Suska River and uphill again toward the town.
“Are you satisfied, now?” said Joseph.
“You did the best thing.” Karel’s voice carried some of what he felt for his brother at this moment. “It was hard, wasn’t it?”
“Hard?” Joseph asked back. “I’ll tell you something. You’re a sentimental fool, you’ve always been one. And if you don’t watch out, you’ll get hurt one of these days.”
When he came home, Lida was there. The dining room was a mess—all the drawers of the credenza were pulled out, the silverware was heaped on the table, and Lida was shining it.
“For Heaven’s sake, what are you doing here?” he asked. “Why aren’t you at your office? Why isn’t the maid cleaning this stuff?”
Lida was pale, but her red-rimmed eyes and the inflamed wings of her nose told him that she had been crying.
“Can’t trust the maid,” she said.
“She’s never stolen anything!”
“Who talks of stealing? I can’t pack the silver dirty, can I? And I can’t let her know that I’m packing—her, and your Miss Rehan!”
“Why—pack?”
She came up to him. Her pinafore was awry, her hands roughened from the chemical she had been using. She stroked his cheeks, “I’ve been poor, once. I’ve had nothing, before. This time, we’ll take along what we’ve got left, all of it!”
“Take it along where? What are you talking about?”
“Poor darling,” she said softly. “You don’t know how it is. But I do. I’ve lived away from home, in one small room. I’ve brought up your child, and starved, in one small room. It’s fine silver, it’s worth a lot, it may bring a good price....”
She picked up a soup spoon and a wad of grayish, sticky cotton and began to rub.
“You’ve given up the Works,” she said. “You’ve given up everything. That’s the end.”
He stared at her, at the lines that circled her neck, at her flat, straight nose that now reminded him of the hollow in a death’s-head.
“You’re out of your mind, Lida!”
Then he gathered her into his arms and buried her face at his shoulder. She permitted the embrace for a moment, then freed herself and returned to her silver. “We must buy a lot of things,” she said, “and quickly, and so that no one notices. Perhaps I should go to Prague and attend to it; it’s easier there. Things of lasting value. Gold and pieces of jewelry.”
>
He sat down. His hands were trembling.
“Where did you get the idea that we are leaving?”
His sober tone seemed to recall her to a sensible consideration of matters. “What is Vesely’s without Benda?” she asked. “Like a tree without roots. What do you want me to do—stand in line for a handout of raw glass from Kravat?”
He felt better. He leaned back and laughed. “No, of course not!”
“Can’t you see them gang up on us—all the other refiners whom we’ve been cutting out and converting into little branch factories of our own?”
Again he laughed. “It will be taken care of.”
“When?”
“Shortly.”
“How?”
He hesitated. Then, seeing her tragic face, he pulled himself up and announced, “We will take back Benda. We will take back Hammer. Not just through some phony setup—but as ours, really ours.”
“Now who’s out of his mind?” she asked cuttingly. “And the millennium is around the corner, too?”
Joseph grew annoyed. A woman might lose her nerve, hysteria was well and good, but everything in its place and at the right time and with moderation. His own fears were dammed up; she didn’t have to burrow at the dam and try to tear down what he had built.
“Listen, Lida, I can’t tell you much. The fewer the people who know and the less they know, the better. There will be changes, terrific, wonderful changes, and it’ll be soon. These changes have to be prepared. And part of this preparation was what I did this morning.”
She nodded abstractedly. Her eyes swerved back to the silver piled on the table. “I understand,” she said. “You threw away the Works to those thieves just so as to take them back?”
Stefan Heym Page 40
