When Lionel came home to dine with her, she said to him, as she nestled in his arms, “That horrible, contemptible woman! I wish to God, Lionel, there was some way we could take Sebastian away. I’m afraid for him there.”
“So am I,” said Lionel with a rare sincerity. “So am I.”
25
In November Woodrow Wilson was elected president of the United States. Mr. Roosevelt had effectively divided the Republican party and showed no regret. Some of his friends muttered that “Teddy seems to be interested in Greater Things.” He had a look of avid anticipation.
In 1913 Mr. Wilson signed into law the Federal Reserve System and the Internal Revenue Act.
Lenin, in Russia, wrote to friends: “We have the world! Taxes and wars and the power to control the currency of the American nation will result in universal Communism. America will fall into our hands like a ripe plum. We will smash her face with an armored fist!”
Dr. David Starr Johnson, director of the World Peace Foundation, said, “What shall we say of the impending war in Europe? We believe that it will never come. Humanly speaking, it is impossible.” A newspaper in the state of Maine published an editorial to the effect that “the outlook for universal brotherhood of man was never brighter than today, not since Christ was born in the manger!”
Only in Washington did some quiet men know the prospect for peace was dim. While the rest of the country was lulled into false security, many American bankers and financiers made many discreet journeys to consult the great munitions makers in several countries, including Germany.
Occasionally there were small ominous items in the newspapers, but the vast majority of the American people did not read them. They were more fascinated by the articles about one Sigmund Freud, and read those with libidinous eagerness, for he “proved” that there was no genuine human love anywhere. A boy, even in infancy, “lusted for his mother.” A girl hated her mother and longed to have intercourse with her father. An adult, embracing a child, even his or her own, was “an unspeakable scandal.” A worshiper of Christ was accused of adoring a phallic symbol and was prompted only by “a lust of the flesh.”
The spiritual corruption of America and in most of the European world had begun. Only in Russia were Freud’s teachings not permitted. The czar found them “disgusting.” Lenin agreed. It was not his plan to permit this perversion to enter his country. But it would be used sedulously to destroy the soul of other peoples.
At the same time, the German kaiser was warned by his generals not to act hastily in any crisis. He was incredulous. Who would attack Germany? And why? He loved military displays and invited his cousin, King George of England, to be his guest for the “presentation.” He invited Mr. Roosevelt for the same purpose. There was something dangerously innocent about his pride. But when whispers reached him of “The War,” he thought it absurd.
In the meantime, the German people were as industrious as ever. The English raced to build their navy, and the French, cynical and sophisticated, detected something sinister in the world.
Only two nations suspected nothing at all: Russia and America. This was no accident.
Jason Garrity detested receiving letters from his brother, victorious letters now. The old pastor in John’s parish had died, and he had been elevated to monsignor. He never forgave Jason for not attending the ceremony. But Jason was obsessed by his growing troubles. He was not in any mood to be “proud” of his brother. He had written John of Nicholas’ affliction, and John had mentioned it, almost impatiently, as “God’s will.” He was far less interested in his brother’s children than in the sin in his own community. It sounded, Jason thought morosely, like Sodom and Gomorrah. John monitored his communicants like a top sergeant, and Jason sourly remarked to Lionel that he was certain that John never slept but patrolled the streets and searched for heresy.
Jason had sent a handsome check to his brother on the occasion of his sacred honor, and John wrote with his usual tone of admonishment: “I thank you most sincerely for your check and trust it has caused you no financial embarrassment.” A sneer? thought Jason. “The ladies of the parish have formed a society, with my approval, for the Protection of the Souls of Our Children. They intend to hold discussions on the Lack of Morality in Modern Life, and the perils of moving pictures and other secular entertainment. I have warned them not to be too intrusively zealous.” You did? thought Jason. “But I praise their dedication to Youth. Accordingly, I have donated a portion of your check to this worthy endeavor.” Oh, God, thought Jason. “I am certain you will be pleased at this charity.” Guess again, thought Jason. “I will preside.” I’m sure, thought Jason. With a pitchfork. “We are particularly incensed by one Mary Pickford, an actress in the moving pictures.” What! thought Jason. Did she kiss somebody?
“As for the rest of your money, I have given it to the Rosary and Altar Society.” Well, it will produce some flowers at any rate, thought Jason. “A contingent of men signed the Pledge this week, and we are hoping for absolute sobriety.” What an Irishman! remarked Jason.
John continued: “I trust you and Patricia have resigned yourselves to God’s will in the matter of Nicholas’ affliction. All things work together for the best. But you were always one to ‘kick against fate.’ I hope, in this sorrow, that you have attained some small humility as well as resignation. God does not afflict his children without reason.” John had scratched out “cause,” but scrutiny revealed the original word.
“I am enclosing a Miraculous Medal for Sebastian. Joan seems troubled concerning her nephew, and Joan is usually correct in any situation. She has tremendous Family Feeling, and particularly loves the boy, though I have warned her of the dangers of too much personal involvement in any human affairs. One, only, deserves out love.” You? thought Jason. “I am glad to hear that Lionel is prospering, and you also. Give thanks where it is due.”
Jason could read only portions of his brother’s letters at one time. What a comforter! he would think. At least Job wasn’t afflicted by one like you. Otherwise he would really have “cursed God and died,” and you’d have thought he deserved it.
Frequently, on receiving one of John’s letters, Jason would vengefully visit St. John the Baptist Church to grimly stare at the high altar. He no longer conducted a savage confrontation with the Lord. He merely stared like an antagonist. Then, newly embittered, he would go for a long walk, seeking some solace, some peace, which he could not find. He never attended Mass, never went to confession. The adversary loomed larger and larger in his mind, the afflictor of the innocent. What had little Nicholas done to merit this horror? What had his parents done, his brother and his sister? To “submit” with meekness was not worthy of a man. There could be only defiance in manhood if one believed, and indifference if one did not.
Today, a radiant Sunday in May 1914, Jason had returned from one of many visits with Nicholas’ doctors in Philadelphia and New York. Patricia continued to insist on additional opinions. She was “certain” that somewhere there existed “a little doctor that no one knows much about,” a physician who has the “right” pill to cure the child. So over and over again, to soothe and calm her, Jason would go on the futile search, encountering many charlatans who talked of electric currents, diets, exercises, and even amulets and esoteric prayers. Even Patrick, her doting father, became impatient, but Jason, heavy with guilt, would do anything to pacify her. If he so much as hinted at protest, she would become hysterical and accuse him “of not wanting our child to get better.”
The twins were now five years old, Sebastian six. Nicholas was almost as tall as Sebastian. He was in appearance healthy and vigorous. Only Nicole and Mr. Doherty could control him with any success. The first year Patricia had hardly spoken to the boy out of grief and fear; now she was excessively affectionate, even maudlin. This excited him; he would burst into loud tears, complain like a baby, and for an hour or so after her visits would be completely out of control, running, screaming, and flailing his arms. Patricia intended t
o take him to Lourdes in late August or September—“just my child and I, alone, and there will be a miracle.” She still refused to accept the immutability of nature’s failure.
The last medical visit seemed only to confirm her vehement belief that one day Nicholas would be “cured.” In some fashion she felt that Nicholas’ condition reflected on herself as a mother, and it needed only resolution of will to correct the tragedy. She had almost always gained her own way throughout her life, and she saw no reason why her usual tactics should not succeed again.
“You can’t blame her for wanting to try anything,” Jason said to Patrick. The older man shook his head. “Lourdes, next,” he said, and Jason could not help smiling, though he was not amused. “Well,” he said, “there have been some authentic cures, you know.” But Patrick, the pragmatic Irishman, did not believe in miracles. In this he was much like Bernard.
“We shouldn’t waste money just now,” Patrick said. “Curse it. The new hotel is not even half-finished. And the money’s going out hand over fist; the prices keep getting higher. Only last week the contractor demanded another increase before he will deliver the new wood. It will be another six months or more before we can begin to send out our brochures. What the hell is the matter with the country?” He cursed again. “And now Patricia wants to go abroad, and I know my girl! It won’t just be Lourdes. It will be Paris for a couple of months, then Rome, then England, and maybe Germany ‘for the baths.’” He shook his head and turned back to the subject of their hotel. “Schofield seems confident he’ll take over that land we own next to his.”
“No, he won’t,” said Jason. “That is, you aren’t selling it, are you, Mr. Mulligan?”
Patrick gave him a look which was suddenly dour for so rosy and amiable a man, and Jason, as often before when he mentioned the land, saw that Patrick’s glance held some furtive resentment.
“No,” he said shortly, and turned away. His manner toward Jason was no longer so paternal and kind. Jason felt heavily depressed. There were so many mysterious things wrong with his life now, and he could not fathom them. Business affairs had a slippery way of evading him; his wife detested him; his child was mentally different, his father-in-law oddly withdrawn, his friend Lionel watchful and curiously wary. Jason had the sensation that he was under a secret surveillance. He no longer even had the pleasure of seeing Molly.
In the past two years he had visited her and Daniel Dugan’s house infrequently. He did not know how that came about, but he was at first relieved. Then there had come Nicholas’ affliction. Patricia, who had always disliked Molly, had irrationally come to despise and avoid her. Jason had the suspicion that Patricia envied the other young woman for not having any children. Molly had a far more expensive house than even Lionel and Joan. Daniel was also very rich. Molly, in the past two years, had “gone off” several times to Europe, indulged extravagantly by Daniel, and had remained abroad for months at a time. This added to Patricia’s vindictiveness. Even when Molly was in Belleville, Patricia tried to avoid her, and visits between the two couples had dwindled to no more than once a month. Even then there was a puzzling uneasiness in the atmosphere. Daniel made some efforts to ease the strain, but by himself could not do much. Jason had little light talk. The two women were silent antagonists, and when Molly tried to be agreeable to Patricia, the latter would become snappish and contemptuous.
It appeared to Jason that Daniel did not particularly enjoy his company, though he was urbane as always. Molly avoided Jason’s eyes, though he noticed that when she thought she was undetected, she would gaze at him intently. But if he faced her quickly, she turned her regard away and resumed talking to Patricia.
Molly no longer seemed as fond of Jason’s children. Until two years ago she had been exceptionally interested in Sebastian, then had incomprehensibly changed. She was kind to Nicholas; if she had a favorite, it was Nicole. But she never asked about Sebastian.
Jason had decided, especially since Nicholas’ infirmity had been discovered, that it would be too selfish to indulge his love and longing for Molly. He had felt more and more guilt because of Patricia. She was his wife; she was the mother of his afflicted son; he owed her first duty, as he termed it. To desert her now, even if only in his thoughts, was a kind of abandonment, a cruelty she did not deserve. He had been guilty enough of loving Molly.
This morning he decided to take a walk to be alone with his thoughts. Often these days he would take his elder son. Sebastian was still a comfort. He was generally silent but gave Jason the sensation that he was “there,” an understanding, stalwart companion. Two years ago Patrick and Jason had taken him hunting, which he did not like, though he became expert with the rifle. “We’ll only hunt what we can eat,” Jason told him. “Mama likes partridge and rabbit.” Patrick had been much pleased with him until he had gotten sick when Patrick shot a deer. “Dammit!” Patrick said, “you’ve got to keep the numbers down or they’ll starve during the winter! D’you think, Bastie, it’s kinder to let them die of hunger than to kill them?” “No,” said Sebastian. Then he had added, “Why’s there so much pain?” Patrick did not understand, but Jason did.
Jason reflected on the boy’s words when he took his walk. Yes, why? Was it a childish question? It presupposed that there was a sentient force which delighted in pain, both of man and beast. As God was the creator of all things, was he not the creator of torment? Jason did not want Sebastian to revolt against God, for he wished that his children would be happy. If only I were an atheist, Jason would think, I would explain that death and suffering were accidents of nature, and there would be no question of “why.” There would be only acceptance of the natural condition.
Jason knew the religious answer: that man had brought sorrow and pain and death into the world, and it was none of God’s doing. It was the sin of disobedience. He could not reconcile this with the premise of God’s omniscience. Jason had once read a Jesuitical explanation: that it was what transpired in the soul of a man—free will—over which God had no control, and not his mere actions.
Jason had struggled most of his life to not believe in God. He knew it would make his existence less burdensome.
Still—and he considered it a perversity—he wanted his children to believe in God. He could not understand why. At least, he would think, it can make life endurable and give some easy answers to the human condition. And what would I be if I couldn’t blame God for everything? he would say with bitter humor. Still, he would be more content, less anguished, if he did not believe.
He thought: I would be free. No regrets, no matter what I did. I would be the hunter—and not the hunted, the way most men are. No consciousness of “sin,” no prohibitions. I would be happy, knowing there was no responsibility, no command to be more than a man. Or would I?
He would consider, almost with hatred, his brother, John, the priest, who believed he knew all the answers, and never doubted, as Father Sweeney did. In a way, he is the perfect atheist, Jason would say to himself. Even Christ, in his agony on the cross, questioned. To question is to be a man. Unthinking faith is not faith at all. Job, he recalled, had been full of questions and lamentations. He was a man, which was more than you could say for the “faithful.” They preferred not to meditate, not to exercise their divine gift of thought. If there is sin, Jason would reflect, that is the sin. I’ll bet Satan gets his best harvest from the pious.
Saul Weitzman had told him of the yetzer hara, the spirit of evil. “God,” said Saul, “doesn’t want weak slaves. He wants us to fight against wickedness. That’s why he created Satan.”
Jason was thinking of all these things when Dennis Farrell interrupted him at breakfast. One glance, and Jason knew that here entered the spirit of tragedy, and sorrow.
“What is it, Dennie?” asked Jason. He took his visitor’s arm and led him to a chair. “Coffee? No?” Jason sat down and braced himself, as he had done all his life, in anticipation of bad news.
“It’s me lads,” said Dennie. His sturdy worki
ngman’s shoulders dropped. He averted his face. “The police in Indianapolis wrote me. They saw your ad in the papers asking for information. The lads were killed two years ago—railroad accident.” Dennis huddled in his chair. “They … they were robbing a freight car—fell under the wheels when it moved. They were buried in paupers’ graves. Then some policeman remembered your ad, and sent me photographs of my lads—dead. And some trinkets they had with them. For identification. They were my lads; there was a jackknife I had given Mike, with his initials. No doubt.”
He looked at Jason, heartbroken. “The worst—the very worst—that my lads were thieves, and they old and strong enough to work honestly. My dada used to say a man who’ll steal is a man who will kill.”
“My God,” said Jason. “Dennie, you shouldn’t have come here. You should have called; I’d have come to your house. Your wife—”
Dennis lifted a quick hand. “No. You see, she blames you for what happened to the lads. She said they was scared of you, and so ran away, and they became thieves because they couldn’t find work. Work! Any man who wants to work can find it, even in bad times! And you didn’t have anything to do with them running away. They went off a couple of times before, when I thrashed them for doing wrong. So, my woman’s hysterical. She has to blame somebody.”
He drew a deep breath. “She doesn’t want to blame herself for coddling and pampering them and defending them, as she says, from the nuns. And me. And all we wanted them to do was grow up to be good and sober and hardworking Christians! That’s our crime. I don’t want to say anything to her; she’s suffering enough. I don’t want to tell her she’s responsible …” He wrung his hands, and his haggard face turned from side to side. “She knows she’s guilty.”
“There’s a new attitude in the country,” said Jason, hoping to relieve his pain. “Your wife’s probably been reading about it in the newspapers. Children mustn’t be ‘hurt’ or disciplined. They must just be ‘loved.’ That’s why we have so many young criminals now. I read a little poem once; don’t know who wrote it:
Answer as a Man Page 44
