The Rich Are Different

by Susan Howatch

  They all spoke at once, demanding to know which house I had in mind.

  “Dillon, Read,” I said. “We all know what was going on there.”

  “For Christ’s sake! You mean we could tip Pecora off?” I’d even succeeded in shocking Clay Linden.

  “But Cornelius,” said Lewis appalled, “it’s a tradition of the Street that all the Yankee banking houses hang together. We must be loyal to Dillon, Read, just as they would be loyal to us.”

  “Screw tradition,” I said. “It’s their neck or ours.”

  It was theirs. Pecora passed us by, and when we realized we were safe I had Lewis almost crying on my shoulder with gratitude.

  “Thank God Pecora never got the chance to interrogate me about my taxes!” he kept saying. “What an unbelievably lucky escape!”

  “Tell me, Lewis,” I said idly, “what exactly did you do on your tax returns?”

  He told me. He was garrulous in the enormity of his relief. His deviousness related to a source of income other than the income from the partnership and, as I had suspected, was a variation on the scheme which had led Mitchell to his indictment for tax evasion. A fictitious sale of assets had been negotiated to establish a “loss” for income tax purposes. Whether this apparent fraud was tax evasion or merely tax avoidance was something only a court of law could decide, but even if Mitchell won an acquittal there was no doubt his career would still be in ruins.

  “So for God’s sake don’t tell anyone,” added Lewis as an afterthought, still perspiring at his narrow escape.

  “Of course not!” I said soothingly.

  Later Sam said, “Christ, Lewis was a fool!”

  “To lie to the I.R.S.?”

  “No, to tell the truth to you! What are you going to do?”

  “Well, nothing right now,” I said exhausted. “I want to recover from my crucifixion. But it’s nice to know, isn’t it, that we’ve got Lewis exactly where we want him?”

  “Very nice,” said Sam.

  Seven

  I

  AFTER PECORA AND THE Senate subcommittee went into recess for the remainder of the summer, Alicia and I retreated to the cottage I had bought the previous year at Bar Harbor, and soon the children joined us. Vivienne had finally condescended to let Vicky spend each August with me, and as my lawyers had battered a similar concession from Ralph Foxworth, Sebastian and Andrew also arrived with their nurse.

  I had never been more grateful for the opportunity to lead a quiet family life. We took the children for picnics and walks, and for many happy hours I played with the model train set Alicia had bought for Sebastian. F.A.O. Schwarz must have found us good customers that year. I had ransacked their store for presents for Vicky, and although Alicia warned me not to spoil her I took no notice. Vicky was two and a half and could talk to me. We used to have long conversations after I had read her the required bedtime story, and I was continually marveling how advanced she was for her age. Naturally I had enough tact to praise Alicia’s boys as well, but the truth was Sebastian was backward and Andrew was plain and neither of them bore any resemblance to their mother. For the first time in my life I understood the difficulties my own stepfather must have encountered, and as I saw again the pattern of history repeating itself I seemed to feel those mythical mills of God grinding out a belated retribution for my past insensitivity.

  In September the children went away, and without them the house seemed such a morgue that we closed it at once and returned to New York.

  It seemed empty too in the mansion on Fifth Avenue, and upstairs in the east wing the nursery still stood deserted, the furniture swathed in dust sheets, the blinds drawn on every window.

  The mills of God were working overtime that year.

  “Take what you want in life,” says the old Spanish proverb, “and pay for it.” My credit finally ran out on Thursday the seventh of September, 1933.

  The weather was very hot, with the temperature soaring freakishly toward ninety, and the city shimmered in a humid haze. It was a gross distorted repulsive day. I thought it would never end.

  Ironically I had been looking forward to it for some time because Sam was due to return that morning from Europe, where I had sent him to check up on Steve. After Pecora had concluded his summer investigations, Steve had decided to stay on in Europe until December in order to avoid the suspicion which a prompt return would have aroused, but I had at once started to worry in case Dinah Slade was beckoning him again. I still had no desire to go to Europe, but Sam had willingly volunteered to go in my place. It had seemed the ideal opportunity to combine a private mission with a business reconnaissance; I had decided that one of us should acquire at least a rudimentary knowledge of European banking, and Sam, being European-born and bilingual, was obviously better suited than I was to reconnoiter the territory.

  He departed enthusiastically for Cherbourg at the end of July, and after spending two weeks in Paris with Emily and Steve he headed east across the German border into his native land.

  I had one postcard from him. It was a picture of Cologne Cathedral and on the back he had scrawled one word, “Wunderschön!,” before signing his real name, Hans-Dieter.

  “Sam must be enjoying himself,” I said vaguely to Alicia, and I was relieved, for Sam’s feelings for Germany had always been so convoluted that I had feared he might hate the German section of his trip. Jake had given him an introduction to the Reischman office in Hamburg, and it was from Hamburg that he eventually sailed back to the States.

  I went down to West Twenty-first Street to meet his ship, the Manhattan, and as soon as he emerged from the customs hall I sensed he had changed. It was strange that I should have sensed this, for the change was within Him, but I knew him so well and no doubt there were half a dozen hints which my mind subconsciously recorded as significant. He wore a foreign suit and looked much neater than usual. His hair was shorter and styled differently, so that the bones of his face had an altered emphasis. His shoes gleamed, his cuffs were crisp and his skin glowed as if he had been scrubbing it every day with ice water.

  “Hi!” he said in his familiar Maine accent. “Good to see you again! How are you doing?”

  It took me a moment to realize I had expected him to speak in a foreign language. “Just fine!” I said with a smile. We shook hands. “How are you? Good trip? You look as if you’ve just come back from a vacation in the Promised Land!”

  “That’s exactly the way I feel,” he said, and when I looked at him closely I saw he was serious.

  My heart sank. I knew what happened to Americans who fell in love with Europe. They became restless and dissatisfied, torn between two worlds, confused, dislocated and rootless. The pleasures of Europe were like the pleasures of alcohol, acceptable in moderation and ruinous when taken to excess. In despair I tried to discover the extent of his new addiction.

  “So you fell in love with Europe,” I said politely. “That’s nice.”

  “Not Europe,” he said. “Germany.”

  “Oh.” I did not know much about Germany except that I had heard they had finally found someone to put their affairs in order. “Tell me about it,” I said helplessly as my chauffeur drove us to Park Avenue, and my invitation opened the floodgates to a seemingly endless torrent of information.

  I listened and said “uh-huh” at intervals. Later when he had finished unpacking we went downtown, but since it was obvious he was in no mood to listen to the bank’s affairs I resigned myself to the inevitable and offered to take him out to lunch. “Why don’t I ask Jake to join us?” I said inspired. “You can compare notes on Hamburg.”

  “Great idea!” exclaimed Sam, and would have launched into another glowing travelogue if I hadn’t asked him about Emily and Steve.

  “Oh, Emily seemed real happy,” said Sam, “and the new baby’s very cute. Emily was pleased to have a second girl, because now with Steve’s two boys they have even numbers.”

  I asked him more questions about Paris, but he was vague. He had forgott
en France as soon as he had crossed the German border.

  Jake met us at Lüchow’s on Fourteenth Street, and while he and Sam selected German delicacies I ordered an American steak and baked potato.

  “… And I can’t tell you guys how I feel,” Sam was saying. He then proceeded to tell us in detail. “I was so ashamed of being German, you both know that. But once I was there, once I saw what was happening—the economic miracle, the new spirit of optimism, the thrilling spectacle of a nation surging back onto its feet after being ground into the dust—”

  “What’s new about that?” I said. “That’s happening here now! You don’t have to go to Europe to see that.”

  “Ah, but we have Roosevelt,” said Jake ironically, “and Germany has Hitler. There’s a difference.”

  “What does it matter who the leader is so long as he gets the country back on its feet?” cried Sam. “The end justifies the means! God, when I think of all those years of suffering and shame—”

  “Well, I do agree,” said Jake, “that the Allies have only themselves to blame if the Germans now follow anyone who promises to lead them out of the wilderness, but I must say I think a little rabid nationalism goes a very long way.”

  “I disagree,” said Sam heatedly. “Nationalism, even chauvinism, is the key to German revival, and Hitler understands that.”

  “Oh my God, Sam,” drawled Jake, very much the sophisticated New Yorker, “don’t tell me that cheap demagogue’s succeeded in taking you for a ride!”

  “Well, of course you’re just a Jew,” said Sam. “You can’t possibly understand the fundamental necessity of German nationalism.”

  I felt as if someone had walloped me between the shoulder blades. Turning dumbly from one friend to the other, I saw their friendship disintegrate before my eyes.

  “I’m sorry you should say that,” Jake said at last. “I wouldn’t have thought the rising tide of anti-Semitism in Germany could ever have touched you, Sam.” And as he spoke I remembered those days long ago at Bar Harbor when he had reached out to give Sam a helping hand.

  Sam remembered too. He was scarlet, floundering in a mire of guilt and shame. “I’m not anti-Semitic,” he said, his voice a shade too loud. “You’re one of my best friends, as you well know. I was simply pointing out that Jews are by their very situation always on the outside of any nationalist movement taking place in the countries they inhabit, If they were more assimilated anti-Semitism couldn’t exist.”

  “The German Jews are far more assimilated than their French or English counterparts.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “For God’s sake!” I burst out, very upset by this time. “Why the hell can’t you two stop talking as if you’re a couple of Europeans? We’re all good Americans here. Now I know why I’ve always disliked Europe. It turns perfectly normal decent people against one another—and all in the name of race, nationalism and creed!”

  They were silent. I looked from Jake’s light hair and blue eyes to Sam’s dark square familiar face.

  “Racial prejudice is so goddamned ridiculous,” I said violently as our food arrived.

  The subject was changed quickly, but the conversation became stilted and I knew that irreversible damage had been done. At the end of the meal, after Jake had excused himself casually, Sam put his head in his hands in despair and I told him to go home to rest. It was obvious he needed more time to sort himself out.

  “And don’t forget,” I said strongly to give him a sense of direction, “that you’re an American, Sam. You were raised here and you’ve spent all your adult life here. You owe Germany nothing.”

  Without warning he turned on me. “But who are the Americans?” he said. “Have you never asked yourself who you really are?” And when I started to say I had no desire to identify myself with Europe he got up and walked out.

  I returned to the office alone and was still struggling to forget the disastrous lunch when the telephone rang.

  “Your sister is calling from Paris, Mr. Van Zale.”

  I felt winded again, as if I had suffered a second blow between the shoulder blades. Opening the top drawer of my desk, I extracted my medication but did not unscrew the cap. “Put her through.”

  The line clicked. French and American operators called to each other stridently above the atmospheric interference. Finally Emily said in a thin high voice, “Cornelius?”

  “Emily—yes, I’m here. What’s happened?”

  “It’s Steve.”

  I felt the first twinge of emotion, the beginning of a slow burning rage.

  “He’s left me, Cornelius. He’s left me. I don’t know what to do. Should I come home? Should I go after him? Should I wait in case he comes back? I don’t know what to do, Cornelius. Please tell me what I ought to do.”

  “Where is he?” I said, although I already knew. I tried to open my medication bottle, but the cap was stuck. I could hardly see because I was in such a rage.

  “He’s gone to London,” said Emily, and across the three thousand miles which separated us I heard the sad muffled sound of her weeping. “He’s gone to Dinah Slade.”

  II

  I told her to come home. Steve had suggested it in his farewell note and I saw no reason why she should remain in Paris when it was obvious he had no intention of returning to her. I couched this advice in the gentlest possible language and talked to her until she herself said she felt better. Then after promising to call her the following day I said goodbye.

  Numerous emotions chased chaotically through my mind. The anger in all its different shades was easy to recognize, but it took time before I could identify my shame. I had never liked Steve Sullivan; I had always known he would make my sister a bad husband, yet for my own selfish motives I had set her on a course headed inevitably for disaster. It was useless to tell myself that I couldn’t have prevented the marriage. I could easily have done so. If I had made enough noise Steve would have been sufficiently embarrassed to back away. It was useless too to tell myself it was hardly my fault that Steve had chosen to marry Emily. It was. He had thought of her merely as an angel, beautiful, perfect but sexless, and in order to view her realistically he had needed my information that she was capable of passion.

  My sister was suffering, and I was just as responsible as Steve with his fool’s passion for Dinah Slade. I could no longer decide whether my contempt for him was greater than my hatred. To have an affair with Miss Slade when he had thought she was no more than a good-time party girl was bad enough, but it was a mistake many other men might have made and Steve had redeemed the error by cutting himself loose from her. But to have an affair with Miss Slade when he knew she had enough ambition to castrate him had to border on certifiable insanity.

  Yet I did not believe Steve was insane. The hackles rose on the back of my neck. I always knew when I was in danger, and suddenly I saw the pattern of the recent past, my emergence from the shadows of scandal, my unflagging hard work at the bank, my enhanced prestige among my partners, and I knew that it was a pattern Steve could no longer tolerate. He had decided to pursue his European base of power again, and with the knowledge that we no longer had to work harmoniously in New York, Emily had become redundant. He no longer needed someone who would pour oil on troubled waters. He needed someone who would help him beat me to pulp, and so he had turned back inevitably to my natural enemy, Miss Slade.

  One could take the romantic point of view and argue that he was in the grip of a grand passion for Miss Slade, but I could not believe that Steve, who was a hardheaded down-to-earth man, could lapse into a starry-eyed fever of passion over the equally hardheaded and down-to-earth Miss Slade. I thought it more probable that they regarded each other as tough able exciting allies who as a bonus could enjoy a satisfying sexual relationship.

  Meanwhile my sister, wronged and crushed, had been abandoned in Paris, and there was nothing I could do but tell her to come home. I could not call Steve and shout abuse at him; I did not know his address. I could not cable him i
n care of the London office and order him home; as joint senior partner he could legitimately tell me I was getting too big for my boots. I could not go whining to my partners that Steve had treated my sister abominably; they would be sympathetic but they would consider it none of their business, for it was an unwritten rule, as I had discovered myself during my affair with Alicia, that a discussion of unpleasant personal affairs had no place at One Willow Street. Nor could I demand that my partners fire Steve; he was much too valuable to the firm, and if he now chose to build up Van Zale’s in Europe and leave Lewis as sole senior partner in New York, no one except me was going to argue with him.

  Lewis in particular would be thrilled to have the whole of Paul’s office to himself again. I was going to have to do something about Lewis. He really had become very tiresome. …

  My secretary tapped on the door and looked in. “Mr. Van Zale, you haven’t forgotten your doctor’s appointment, have you?”

  I had. I was tempted to cancel it, but I was afraid that might upset Alicia. “I’ll leave right away,” I said, and five minutes later I was traveling uptown to the specialist’s office.

  III

  We had been trying for well over a year to have children. Alicia had gone to her gynecologist after the first four months, but he had merely told her that many couples took longer to conceive a baby, and it was not until she returned to him eight months later that he had taken her case seriously. She had undergone various tests, and when she had emerged with a clean bill of health I had volunteered to undergo an examination myself. I knew it would make her feel better if I made some demonstration of my willingness to solve the problem, but personally I suspected that the difficulty lay in her mounting anxiety. I had once read that conception is unlikely if a woman is too tense, and I had already decided that if there was still no prospect of a baby in December I would take her on another of our Caribbean cruises.