Reinhart in Love

by Thomas Berger

  “Thank you,” said Reinhart, fearing the worst, because, as it happened, he agreed with Splendor’s assessment of his character.

  “Now I of course am the diametrical opposite, a person of poor judgment and fundamentally craven. The worst man in a pinch. I am saved from being an absolute failure only by my fecund imagination and my irrepressible audacity, which I am enabled to exercise by reason of a social situation in which no one expects anything of me.”

  “It’s the sewer, isn’t it?” said Reinhart. “My scheme was to work on the men. You went directly to the thing.” He put this as an accusation because he was thinking with reference to Splendor’s other-worldliness.

  Splendor shrugged. “I had no choice, Carlo. I realized that when I witnessed your feeble efforts to overcome Mr. Humbold with the false signatures. And now this hiring of thugs—well, really.”

  “So you got a shovel and pick and started to undermine one of those concrete manholes?”

  Splendor shook his head.

  “Worse than that?”

  “I am afraid so.”

  Reinhart shut his eyes, the only physical movement he could make without pain, and said: “Where?”

  “I think I had better insist at this point, Carlo, that caprice played no part in selecting the place of excavation. Mohawk Street was obvious, being centrally situated in the area to be served and at a lower elevation than the adjacent thoroughfares: indeed, I cannot recall a rain in recent years that hasn’t overflowed the existing system and backed up into our cellars.”

  Keeping his eyes shut, Reinhart mumbled: “Yes, I realize that you live there.”

  “Along with a great population of rats,” Splendor added. “That curious beast who by his mode of life reminds us that man is still filthier. Everywhere we human beings look in Nature, Carlo, we see our moral superiors. It is a crushing burden. Have you ever observed the way an animal voids its wastes? Rather banally, as it were.”

  “That’s quite true,” said Reinhart, opening his eyes and shutting his mouth as if he were stuffed with sawdust and seated on Splendor’s knee.

  “There were efficient sanitary facilities in the palace of Knossos in ancient Crete. On the other hand, as late as the fifteenth century in Paris, the practice was to empty slops out of the window, and on one occasion a student did so on King Louis XI, who was on his way to mass. In Germany at about the same time, the Emperor Frederick was holding a council meeting when the chamber floor suddenly collapsed and half his advisors were drowned in the cesspool underneath…. From one aspect, the history of civilization can be seen as the chronicle of how man has disposed of his filth.”

  “Splendor,” said Reinhart, “so far as I am concerned, you need no philosophical or historical justification for whatever it is you have done while I thought you were harmlessly amusing yourself, safely out of harm’s way, in the county engineer’s office. I’ll admit I was wrong. It is true that experience has made me cynical. And though I started with the idea of helping you achieve self-assertion, in retrospect I see that instead I have persistently blocked you…. Mohawk Street, eh? How far have you gone?”

  “Carlo,” said Splendor, crossing his high-laced boots, “I wish to read you certain expert objections to locating sewers in suburban back yards. This is from a recognized authority.” He unbuttoned the flap of the military pocket over his heart and brought out a memorandum, from which he read: “‘One: manholes get covered and lost. Two: residents object, sometimes violently, to trespassing by maintenance men. Three: dogs are dangerous. Four: shrubbery, trees, and landscaping may be ruined, and their presence adds to the cost of maintenance. Five: there is greater trouble from roots in the sewers. Six: good public relations are jeopardized.’”

  “I won’t fight you there,” Reinhart assured him.

  “The intent,” said Splendor, “was to justify taking to the street itself.”

  “I assume, then, that for convenience’s sake you started to dig very near your own curb?”

  “Carlo,” said Splendor, “I think we may have exploited the subject to the full, insofar as words will take us for the moment. The appropriate move, as I see it, is that we now visit the excavation itself, for good or ill.” He stood up, stepped to his chair and invested himself in the trenchcoat. “Look at it this way: you will have to see it sometime.”

  “True,” answered Reinhart, wincing for effect. “But I tell you today it hurts me to breathe. I can’t understand how I was even able to drive to work. So you dug a hole in the middle of the street. I’ll take your word for it. A sort of moral protest. Fine! Now just wait, can’t you?, till I get into better shape. Say two days. Your hole won’t go anywhere. Meanwhile, be sure to put oilpots around it at dusk, if you haven’t already, and also some sort of barricade during the day, for that matter. My mind hasn’t been impaired, and I shall be thinking intently. But even this early, I am inclined to approve of your impulsiveness. After all, ground had to be broken sooner or later.”

  Splendor ran a finger around the circumference of his left ear, the helix of which took the light like an inlay of rare wood.

  “Oh,” he said deliberately. “Perhaps I could drive the car. You can lie down on the rear seat, which will be quite as restful as your bed or divan at home. And arranging a system of mirrors so as to permit you, without altering your position, to see through the window, would be the work of a moment.”

  “I really don’t care to go over there today,” Reinhart announced firmly but decently. “I really don’t feel capable today of evaluating whatever it is you’ve accomplished beyond the general statement which I have already made: tentatively affirmative, that is, so set your mind at ease. No harm done. After all, a hole is a hole, isn’t it?” He chuckled. “We really should tell Claude about it and let him stew for a while. He may make a deal if he thinks we are ready to go around chopping up the streets, which Cosmo is of course empowered to do without special permit, under the terms of our contract with the town. And you are an officer of the firm. So don’t let him threaten you with charges of destruction of public property.”

  Splendor slowly continued to do up the fastenings of his trench-coat. “How different the arrangements might be,” he said, “were comfort and convenience our chief criteria. But we know they are not, Carlo. And if I say I must insist, you will understand that the circumstances are speaking rather than I personally.”

  “You insist?” asked Reinhart.

  “Afraid I must,” said Splendor.

  “Is it pretty bad?”

  “Do you,” asked Splendor, “wish me to construct that minor arrangement?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” said Reinhart. “I can stand, walk, drive, etcetera, just as if I were alive.” He fetched his own streetwear from the closet—the second-string outfit of covert-cloth topcoat and brown felt hat that he was reduced to now that the chesterfield and homburg were hors de combat—and biting on an imaginary bullet, led Splendor through the outer office, where one of the secretaries tried to press some correspondence upon him, but he motioned her aside and got away with it. He meant to fire both of those girls as soon as he could figure a way to get his and Splendor’s paychecks without them.

  “It might be wise,” he said to his companion when they had seated themselves in the Gigantic, “to check me in before we get there.” In spite of Splendor’s fishy manner, Reinhart intended to stay calm, having been impressed by those check lists run by various popular magazines on what to do in case of emergency: in the great Coconut Grove night-club fire, and other disasters, panic caused more casualties than the flames; on the other hand, reason had prevailed on the Titanic, most of whose passengers drowned serenely—though it is true that a man wearing a dress had tried to enter a lifeboat with the women and children.

  “Oh, I’ll get blamed whichever,” said Splendor in the sullen manner that he could slip into at will, but he dropped it for a moment to wince as Reinhart’s cowboy getaway burned rubber. “Isn’t that childish?”

 
“Certainly,” answered Reinhart, “but tell it to the car.” The Gigantic sounded a Bronx cheer very similar to Claude’s, as if he were under the hood, in fact; and stepped on its own gas. In his current debility, Reinhart dared to comment no further; every so often one heard that such a machine of its own volition leaped the curb and slaughtered innocent pedestrians simply to embarrass its driver.

  When he had recovered his head, which had been whipped back against the top of the seat, Splendor patted the dashboard. “I have a way with engines. The trouble at the excavation occurred when my back was turned. No power shovel would run amok under my direction.”

  The Gigantic settled down to an even purr. Reinhart wished he could say as much for himself.

  “Power shovel,” he repeated idiotically. “Run amok.”

  “Certainly not.” Splendor made a stout gesture. “It was the foolish associate of that scandalous individual who calls himself the Maker. My error consists in permitting him to assume the controls, but I was overwhelmed by his childish enthusiasm. ‘Let me run that big motherfu—’ well, anything to stop his cursing, thought I. You have to consider the populace, Carlo.”

  Reinhart breathed with the sound of dottle being blown from a pipe. But extremity or no, he was first concerned to establish the rights of property.

  “I was wondering, Splendor, where you might have got a power shovel.”

  “You might say I stole it,” Splendor answered as the Gigantic stopped for a traffic light, as it had seldom been wont to do. “Although I suspect that there are clauses in our agreement with the subcontractor that might be interpreted as a sanction: the shovel belongs to Mr. Reo, and is the one which has been ostensibly digging the West Bend but, as we know, was simply parked in the adjacent field. I merely climbed into the cab the other day and drove the monstrous device to my house. The machine that I cannot operate has never been built.”

  “That must have been an interesting spectacle,” said Reinhart. “Did no one see you?” Though he trod the accelerator at the onset of the yellow light, the Gigantic refused to move until the green.

  “Good God, yes,” answered Splendor with puzzled vehemence. “But what’s so odd about a man driving a power shovel?”

  “That’s true,” Reinhart agreed, so relieved over the clearing up of this minor point that for a moment he completely forgot the alleged disaster. What a priceless trick if they could complete the excavation and return the shovel before their enemies were the wiser!

  “Would that I had never left the controls!” Splendor suddenly moaned, casting Reinhart back into fear and trembling. “I fear that what was so hopefully begun is ill finished.” He retracted his hand from the dashboard and the Gigantic’s engine developed a sort of catarrh. “I swear to you, Carlo, that my plans were sound sewer-engineering and my provisions adequate according to standard practice. I had my lumber ready for sheeting and bracing, which are technical terms for the supports one must place in the trench lest its sides collapse. If I mention these, it is to forestall your inevitable accusation that I did not take the proper measures.”

  Reinhart laughed madly. He had no other mode of release, since a middle-aged woman operating a fat sedan had settled down at ten miles an hour ahead of the Gigantic and would, he knew, stay there forever in cahoots with the automobiles coming the other way on the narrow street; one frequently ran into such a conspiracy, the aim of which was to stifle aspiration.

  Oddly enough, Splendor noticed his blockage. “Ah,” he said, no short cut is available. Therefore pull to the curb and wait until the drone is out of sight. Better an outright stop than a deadening crawl; it does not ravage the personality to nearly the same degree.”

  Reinhart tried it, and taking off again after an outright halt of one clocked minute, found no hindrance to his travel for three good blocks. Moreover, when he again approached the woman’s rear bumper, they had both reached the main east-west artery, and he swept round her in a great turn, the Gigantic roaring in exultation.

  “I’ve got to hand it to you, Splendor. You do seem to have worked out a certain style for getting through life,” Reinhart was glad to admit for the nonce, reversing, as he was wont to do, his whole attitude. And though startled, Splendor had the good taste to follow suit.

  “And then I destroy everything with a massive failure of judgment,” he answered. “I realize, Carlo, that your most ferocious criticism of me has been too sympathetic. Any resentment I have shown against you is sheer bravado. You have given me every opportunity to display the—uh—stuff that I am made of and—”

  “Oh for Christ’s sake,” said Reinhart.

  Splendor blushed after his fashion, which was necessarily mystical: a shadow moved across his eyes.

  “Do you or do you not want to hear about the disaster?” he asked with sudden asperity.

  “Then get it over with!” bawled Reinhart, as the Gigantic hurled them around a corner and wallowed for half a block on its soft suspension.

  Splendor sneered faintly and gestured with his thumb like a gas-station attendant indicating the direction of the men’s toilet. “It would be superfluous now. We are there.”

  Reinhart saw they had indeed reached the West Side, the recent corner having been that of the drugstore and the next being, so said the signpost, an ingress into Mohawk Street. He took it to the left, then had to brake sharply to avoid precipitating them into a horde of dark-skinned people that filled the roadway.

  Splendor leaped out of the vehicle before the crowd could surround it. “Make way here for the duly appointed officials,” he pompously proclaimed, becoming grim of aspect, and raised his right arm like a baton.

  Reinhart left the wheel leering hysterically in every direction at once, still in ignorance but determined to reveal neither that nor the peculiar despair which it caused him to suffer. But he moved slowly and a number of Negro children reached the door of the car before he emerged from it. They stared at him with paralytic curiosity. “Excuse me,” he said, for to his mind a child deserved quite as much courtesy as an adult.

  “Tell them,” said Splendor, beyond the hood, “that—Oh, I shall.” He strode back to the children.

  “I will personally,” he addressed that assemblage of round black eyes, “put in jail for twenty years that boy or girl who touches this car; and I will know who does it even though my back is turned, because of a secret electric eye which takes a picture of whoever approaches this automobile and sends it to the police.” Reinhart would have liked to see him wink, and a kid or two jeer, but all played it so straight that there was no telling who hoaxed whom, and Reinhart had no faith that his hubcaps would still be there when he returned.

  “Now, Carlo,” said Splendor with no change of tone, “try to keep control of yourself. What is, is. And what will be, will be.”

  At their approach the crowd broke like water before a boat. Splendor marched on austerely, but Reinhart nodded and smiled at as many individuals as he could pick out. He loathed and feared masses of humanity and always tried to reduce them to their components. Thus he would have plunged into the yawning pit had not his authoritative friend seized him.

  Nevertheless he stayed very calm, and asked: “Isn’t it rather larger than necessary for a sewer trench?” What he saw was an excavation probably fifty feet deep; the street had disappeared altogether from curb to curb and then some: indeed, taking the sidewalk and several houses with it to the east. As to longitude, the gulf extended to the next comer. But he recognized the neighborhood: up ahead on the left lay the Mainwaring house, with now but half a front yard, and beyond it the alley, now debouching into the crevasse. He sensed some alterations closer to the left hand, but cautiously forbore from examining them more thoroughly until Splendor stated his case.

  That person leaned over and looked into the pit, as if he were seeing it for the first time.

  “Yes,” he said, “that would be putting it conservatively.”

  “Now the way I understand it,” said Reinhart, “is that t
his friend of the Maker’s, operating the machine, grew too zealous and before he could be restrained had scooped out all this earth…. By the way, where is all the earth?”

  Splendor moved back from the edge of the hole, which was ever crumbling with little wisps of dust. “There you are,” he said. “We no more than pierced the crust, when suddenly the whole block sank. It must have been undermined by a subterranean creek.”

  “Is that water down there?” Reinhart asked. “So muddy it’s hard to tell.”

  “Yes,” said Splendor, “and it is apparently rising.”

  “The power shovel, I suppose, is beyond recovery. Did the Maker’s friend survive?”

  “That type of individual is nimble as a goat, Carlo. He leaped from the cab as it was in the act of falling. As to the machine itself, you can still see the boom there on the right. I believe it is slowly going under.”

  “Yes, the water has certainly risen just since we’ve been standing here,” Reinhart observed. “I can see it is water now and not simply mud.”

  “Yes, I believe we inadvertently severed a water main.”

  Reinhart put the tip of his little finger in his nose, not picking it but rather feeling for a hair that tickled.

  “No subterranean creek, then?”

  “Well, there could be one, in addition,” said Splendor, taking up another notch in his trenchcoat buckle, the belt now so tight that he appeared to be cut in half. “But I believe that the immediate source of the flow is the main that burst when we used the dynamite.”

  “That could easily happen if you’re not careful,” Reinhart admitted. “Along with the gas mains, too, I should imagine. The latter probably accounts for the strange odor I have smelled since we left the car. You had better warn these people not to light cigarettes near the excavation.” He looked back at the crowd, who were keeping their distance, but seemed not in the least apprehensive; in fact, here and there were broad grins, and almost universal was an air of sanguine anticipation.