“I pray for you constantly,” said Tony, and braced himself for ridicule or contempt. But DeWitt was staring at him strangely. “Do you?” he asked, without any intonation. “Do you know I need it? Oh, hell. What is there to pray to? Anyway, it’s some comfort to know that you haven’t forgotten me.”
He twisted his dark little hands together, as if wringing them. “Why did you have to go away? I wouldn’t have wanted you in the road; I hoped all the time you’d never come in. But at least I knew that you—that you. …”
“What?” asked Tony, and he reached out to the wringing hands and quieted them.
DeWitt looked down at the strong white fingers over his own. “That someone cared a damn for me. I don’t know why you ever did, frankly. Never mind; don’t get sentimental and talk of brotherly love. I was a pig of a kid. I suppose I’m a pig of a man. But when you are here, it’s like a peace to me. And that’s very funny, for you were not, and are not, a peaceable kind of fellow. Did you know that Miles is after the road? He won’t get it, of course, for we have our fifty-one per cent. But I feel exposed. I think I always did. Did you know he often went out to see the old man? We never found out what their discussions were. Miles has gone ‘modern.’ He wants to bankrupt the road. Ma laughs, but I have a feeling the directors are with him, all except herself. I, too, have my intuitions. What can he do? Nothing. Did you see him at the funeral? Such a damnable hypocrite. He looked at the old man as if Dad were his own father, and we all know what the Peales thought of us. Do you think the old man gave himhints as to what to do to ruin us?”
“No,” said Tony. The fingers under his hand were tense. “I think it was something else. It might have been about Dad’s Foundation and newspapers. Some of the editorials had a certain ring which was not Dad’s style at all. Measured. Reasonable. The duty of big business to the public. The duty of big business to fight socialism in America in order to preserve not only big business but competition among big business; the survival of small business, and the liberty of all the people. I’ve heard Miles talk many times on these subjects. I’m sure he writes those editorials.”
“I don’t know what he’s after, if he does write those things,” said DeWitt. “Washington would like to see the Foundation smashed, and those newspapers and magazines. We can’t afford to be at loggerheads with Washington these days.”
“You can’t afford not to,” said Tony. He stood up. DeWitt, like a child, caught at his arm. “Are you going?” His thin voice was suddenly desolate. “My God, my God, I tell you I can’t stand this loneliness! Never mind. If you have to leave, I suppose you have to.”
He watched his brother mounting the stone steps to the house again, and his face contorted like the face of a suffering gnome.
50
This is the day, thought Miles Peale, as he stood at his window and looked out at the black river with its banks heaped with snow. The sky was white and still; the voice of the river filled Miles’s bedroom as it struggled with the floes of ice upon it. It would soon be spring. Even though it was February, there was a feeling in the air, a sense of powerful thrust and stir. The old house about Miles creaked a little in all its timbers and walls. He liked Jim Purcell’s house, in spite of the drafty halls and big somber rooms. Some of the family joked with him about it; he was so “modern” yet he did not mind living in a house “built in the dark ages.” He never bothered to explain to them that there was no real cleavage between the past and the present.
He lived sparely. He did not have a valet for himself. But his great old room was comfortable, and he was very neat and fastidious. The three servants in the house were enough. He heard some crackling movement in the corridor outside; one of his wife’s nurses going briskly about her business. He frowned. He liked old Ruth, for she had never troubled him, and he had found her adoration pleasant. He wished she would die; she had been bedridden for years with arthritis, and he knew how she suffered in spite of her constant gentle smiles and absence of complaints. It hurt something in him to see her on her pillows, so wasted, the once-golden hair white and thin, the deep lines of torment on the sweet face. Perhaps that new drug they were prophesying for the future would help her. If not, it would be better for her to die. She was very tired. Miles carefully adjusted his tie. He supposed he had caused her some pain, himself. Everyone thought her without intelligence, a frail shadow who could experience no real emotion, and who never suspected anything. They were wrong. Thinking about her now, he came to the conclusion that not only did he like her but that he had considerable fondness for her. She loved him; he did not believe that anyone else ever had, even his mother, dead these past three months.
A photograph of his mother stood on his dresser and he looked at it closely, the serene and quiet old face, the cloud of white hair, the deep and thoughtful eyes. Poor old girl, he thought. What a life she had. She had slipped away from the living earth like a shadow, and no one remembered her now except himself. He had no photograph or painting of his father, Patrick. He had never wanted one. He smiled at his mother’s image, and said aloud, “This isn’t what you’d want, is it? But, you see, in a way it is justice.”
He went in to see Ruth. Her room was rosy with firelight, and she was supported by pillows. A newspaper lay on her twisted knees, and her distorted hands rested on the sheets. She had always tried to read books and periodicals in order to interest her husband and talk brightly to him. Now, as he entered, her face became radiant, though he guessed that she had spent a sleepless night of agony. When she smiled, as now, she seemed less than her fifty-seven years, in spite of her disease. It was almost the face of a young girl, shy and adoring. Miles bent and kissed her forehead, and the crippled hands raised themselves painfully to touch him.
“How are you, dear?” he asked.
“Quite well. Hardly any pain now, Miles.” She beamed at her nurse. “I slept quite well, didn’t I, Sally?”
“That’s what the report says,” replied the nurse cheerily, with a meaning look for Miles. He was such a handsome man, Mr. Peale, with all those auburn-gray curls and his very blue eyes and his courteous ways. He moved so surely and with such youth, though the nurse guessed that he must be almost forty-eight. He had no paunch like other men his age; his figure might be that of a man of thirty, and his clothing was exquisite. Hardly a line on his face, either, and such a charming smile. Pity, thought the nurse, that he’s so short.
Miles rested his hand on the blue brocade of the bed’s headboard. “I might not be back until late, Ruth,” he said. “I’m going to Philadelphia this morning. Business of the board, you know.”
“Always business,” she replied. She was so proud of him. What did it matter if he had had his women in the past, and even now? It was nothing to her. He was her husband, and she loved him. Humbly, she considered all those faceless women in all those strange beds. What did it matter? She was still grateful to God that Miles had married her; if she had had to pay some price, it was only just. Once she had felt anguish, but when she had finally come to know that he would never leave her for any of the others, she had regained some contentment. It was still a miracle to her that she was Miles’s wife.
“I’ve been reading so many serious things,” she said, feeling his restlessness and wanting to hold him a few moments longer. “This is one of poor Allan’s newspapers. Such sinister matters. Hitler—and something they call a purge because some people tried to kill him last year—1934. This editorial says that Hitler will declare war against the whole world in a few years. But in another part of the paper, Mr. Roosevelt is just amused. He says Hitler wouldn’t dare.”
“Don’t worry yourself,” said Miles. “America has outlived both her domestic and foreign enemies before. Perhaps Roosevelt is just trying to reassure the American people. Presidents do that, you know.”
“They shouldn’t,” said Ruth with gentle vehemence. “We aren’t children. We should know the truth at all times.” She touched the paper again. “Allan’s papers always tell us th
e truth, though some politicians call them sensation-mongers.”
“That’s what they called Jeremiah, too,” smiled Miles. “And I believe there was also something to that effect about Christ.”
She touched his sleeve again, longingly, wistfully, and he kissed her with that old gratitude for her affection. “Ruth, dear,” he said, “you are perhaps going to read, or hear, something about me soon, and it may cause you some anxiety. But you must trust me.”
Now the soft blue eyes widened and became strangely wise. “I always trusted you, Miles,” she said quietly. She smiled. “Even when I had no reason to.”
No, she is no fool, he thought. He waved his hand to her gallantly at the door and went down to his car, which he always drove himself. He drove to Fielding’s house, which had once belonged to Cynthia’s grandfather, Old Brownell. A very handsome Georgian house, of which Miles approved. Fielding was waiting at the door and got into his brother’s car with a dexterous fold of his legs. He let out a gusty breath. “Well,” he said, “this is our day, isn’t it? Think we can manage it?”
“No doubt,” said Miles. Fielding peered at him with his tan-colored eyes and began to hum. “By the way,” said Fielding, with one of his loud laughs, “I’ve just heard a legend about you. It seems there was an old fellow who worked on the road for centuries and who died a long time ago. Old Billie, they called him. The men say that Old Billie insisted that you were ‘Mr. Aaron,’ our great-grandfather, in person. He used to call you that, they said. So I looked it up in that book, The History of American Roads, which was written about us by John Butzer.”
“A foolish, lyrical piece of junk,” said Miles with a rare irritability. “He made our road out to be the benefactor of the human race, or something. Either big business is an all-wise and noble benefactor, operating in behalf of humanity and with no eye for honest profits, or it is ‘a devourer of the labor of honest men and an exploiter of the public.’ I don’t like either version. Why is it right for a workingman to make as much money as he can, and wrong for a big industrial organization to do the dame thing? Socrates mentioned something like that. ‘It has become dangerous for a man to let it be known that he is rich.’ People don’t change. Some might find it comforting; I find it pretty terrible. It’s about time we got out of the trees, in our thinking.”
His small and competent hands smoothly guided the big car over the icy streets. Other cars might slide and churn, but not Miles’s. Fielding studied his china-clear profile with his usual mingling of envy and admiration. “Well, anyway, I sat a long time over old great-grandpappy’s photograph, and damned if I don’t admit that you do look like him, in spite of the goat’s beard he had. Same forehead, hair, nose, and general appearance. You may call that book a ‘piece of junk,’ but did you know that old Aaron had his trouble with organizations very peculiarly like the Socialists these days? That was just after thousands of Germans came here to escape Bismarck’s Socialism, and spies mingled with them, bringing the idea in with them. Just a flurry, though; the free Germans handled them, themselves, with a few clubs and things.”
“It always ends that way,” said Miles. “It always comes back to the people in the end; governments that don’t please the people, no matter how powerfully entrenched they are, usually get kicked out.”
The Pullman they boarded for Philadelphia was, as usual, creaking, obsolete, full of cinders, and chilly. Miles prowled about the car, the trainmen watching him apprehensively. Damned old arks, thought Miles. He talked with some of his fellow travelers, who were strange to him, travelers who had transferred to this train from other points. “What do you think of these rattling boxcars?” he would ask. They were eager to answer him. They spoke of the very few aluminum or stainless-steel trains in which they had journeyed before, belonging to other lines. Warm, full-windows, modern, comfortable. Miles nodded. “But this line thinks only of money,” a man grumbled. “I wouldn’t travel on it if there was any other way. One of these days the airlines will have what we want.”
Miles trusted no one, with the possible exception of his wife, to whom he told nothing of importance. He did not trust even Fielding; avarice made men untrustworthy, even when they were allies, and especially if they were brothers. Fielding had the Brownell money, and he was willing to throw its powerful weight on the side of Miles, as he was about to do today. But still, no one was ever hanged for simply holding his tongue. Let not even your heart be fully aware of what your brain is doing, thought Miles, as he sat beside his brother. He began to smile. Fielding saw that smile and knew that Miles “had something up his sleeve.” It sometimes irked him that Miles never told him “everything,” but he admired Miles too much to be overly annoyed. What a mind he had! And what had he been doing in Washington a week ago? No one but Fielding knew of that visit
Miles was thinking of it. He was thinking of his long years of pretense with the dangerous Norman deWitt, the smiling, shining-eyed, scholarly Norman, the mad, cool-nerved, and ruthless Norman. The man who hated and bowed and talked of nothing in company, but who had his secret places, and his secret comrades in the hidden places of Washington. Jon would have been easier to handle, had he lived, thought Miles, for Jon was not really a madman. But then, one can handle madmen, if one is willing to learn. It was irksome and sometimes boring, and often nauseating, and I frequently wanted to slam his face in, but I was willing to be patient, to lie, to agree, to smile significantly. For something very important; for a part of the world, perhaps. Frankly, if a nation wants slavery, I suppose it is its own business. But I don’t want to be enslaved along with it, in its idiot’s ecstasy of prostration before murderers. So, finally, I must fight for America in the years ahead.
Miles crossed his elegant legs and concentrated on his last visit to Norman deWitt, who held such a powerful position in the Department of Commerce. Norman liked him; there was no unhealthiness in his liking, as there had been in the case of his brother Jon. Miles was “progressive.” He was thoughtful, serious, intellectual; he was charming, and he discussed rather than argued. He had also expressed his amused disdain of Allan Marshall, and had even permitted himself to become slightly heated on the subject, to Norman’s satisfaction.
An egotist, thought Miles, is always under the impression that he is much cleverer than anyone else. The way to manipulate a powerful egotist is to let him believe that. He remembered how, when he had been still only a youth, he had felt the evil current beginning to flow in America. He had set himself out to discover those who had unfurled their sails upon it. Some enormous intuition in himself, even in those days, had informed him that someday it would be very valuable to know about these men. He had not been wrong.
It had not been too hard to gain Norman’s trust. A show of open admiration and serious listening, at first, had been enough. Later had come Miles’s pretendedly reluctant conviction that Norman was right. He had sought Norman’s advice; if it all came to nothing, as Miles intended, Miles expressed his anger and it was Norman who had consoled him with mysterious promises for the future. It was Norman who spoke to the powerful, secret men about him, and convinced them of Miles’s “true” convictions. “He’s been my apt pupil for more years than I like to remember,” Norman had said. “We can’t have too many like him in big business—when the time comes.” They were pleased that they had so many allies in the mighty industries, especially women who had inherited position and fortunes from their more intelligent husbands, idle women who could never get enough publicity in the newspapers for all their wealth.
Miles had gone, a week ago, to Norman’s very modest apartment in Washington. Norman might be a multimillionaire of fantastic assets, but he lived modestly. That was the way with those people, Miles often thought. Until they can strike, they live in a Spartan manner. It is a part of their stage property. Norman did not even have a servant; he ate in obscure restaurants with obscure men who would not be exposed until twenty years later for what they were. His furnishings were old and ramshackle and out of da
te. Miles said to him, as he always did when entering that apartment on the back street, “If nothing else would ever convince me of your absolute integrity and sincerity, this damned old hole would.”
Norman had whisky in quantity for those whose tongues he wished to loosen. But Miles, all these years, had been careful never to drink whisky in Norman’s company. He pretended to like “a light sherry,” of which Norman approved, or a martini which tasted like witch hazel, which Norman preferred even more. Neither of these, taken sparingly, confused Miles in the slightest.
Norman gave Miles sherry tonight. It was a cheap sherry, of course, but Miles sipped it with the air of a connoisseur. Norman, who knew nothing of good wines, was pleased. He poured a glass for himself. He had become thinner with the years, more wiry, but more intent, more aware, more focused. At fifty-five, he seemed almost as young as Miles, his kinsman, for there was no gray in his fine brown hair, which had thinned to partial baldness on the top of his narrow skull. His large brown eyes shone with life and quiet eagerness; his smile was almost as charming as the younger man’s. He had a gracious way with him, a confiding and gentle mannerism, calculated to disarm. “Well, what is on your mind, fella?” he asked of Miles. “You sounded urgent on the phone today.”
Miles became very sober. He twisted the cheap glass in his fingers. He pretended to hesitate. He peeped at Norman apologetically. “Sometimes I wonder if I’m right in telling you so much, Norman, about the road. Oh, I know you should know, of course. But at times I have twinges. …”
Norman’s face became stern and his eyes flashed fanatically. “Miles, I think we’ve gone over this so much in the past. If you have ‘twinges,’ it should be in behalf of the proletariat, not a lot of damned stupid plutocrats in Portersville, Philadelphia, and New York.”
Miles regarded him somberly. He thought: You dog, you dog who believes your own lies. Plutocrat! And who the hell has more money than you, you swine? But it isn’t just money you want. You want the almighty power to judge who shall live and who shall die; who shall starve in concentration camps and who shall crawl around your knees. You, you Torquemada, want what all of you have always wanted, since first Cain raised his club against his brother.
Never Victorious, Never Defeated Page 75
