Matters of Honor

by Louis Begley

  As though to fill the breach that had been opened in our calendar, Henry announced that his parents were arriving the following weekend to celebrate his birthday. It would be their first view of the college and, for that matter, Cambridge and Boston. The travel agent who had booked their reservations for the trip to Maine the previous summer recommended a hotel that was a short walk from the Yard across the Common. He had also given them the names of museums to visit with Henry. The open question was where and how they should entertain Henry’s roommates, which they were determined to do. They also wanted to invite George, in order to return his parents’ hospitality. Henry did not mention Margot. I guessed that he hadn’t told them enough, if anything, about her to arouse their curiosity or to make them think they had a duty to acknowledge her existence. Since they were to leave Brooklyn by car on Friday morning, Henry expected them at the hotel in the late afternoon on Friday. They would start for home on Sunday, after breakfast. But Margot, although she didn’t figure in his parents’ questions and instructions, rapidly became Henry’s biggest worry. When he told her about the impending visit—a big mistake he later thought—she expressed the categorical wish to meet them. If Henry had misgivings about exhibiting his parents to Archie and me, and, even more likely, to George, he kept them to himself but made no attempt to hide some of them from us in the case of Margot. As he considered the available solutions, one he thought he dreaded most was the prospect of a family dinner with Margot as the only guest. At the same time, the way things stood between her and George, inviting her to dinner with him there was out of the question. There was also the more fundamental issue: Should his parents meet Margot under any circumstances? On one hand, he had become very proud of Margot, or anyway of their odd friendship, and would have liked nothing more than to show her off. On the other, there was the risk that they—to be specific, his mother—would afterward make unpleasant comments about her, for instance singling out Margot’s brash curtness or, if his mother guessed that he was in love with her, about her not being Jewish. The mere idea that his mother might refer to Margot as that Gentile girlfriend was intolerable. We did not discuss the effect Mr. and Mrs. White would have on Margot, and how that entered into his calculations. However, he did explain that Margot’s being half Jewish might weigh against her. That surprised me.

  It’s simple, he said. Even if Margot can’t be a real Jew because of her Gentile mother, she is Jewish enough to give my mother a reason to apply with full force the code of Krakow to her, the way she dresses, and her demeanor, and anything else you care to name. There were no bigger snobs than prewar Jewish bourgeoisie in Galicia. Forget the Berkshires and your cousins. They’ve no standards at all. The only person I met there who would pass muster in Krakow is George’s mother. She’s dressed just right and has the right combination of sweetness and venom. If Margot were just another shiksa, my mother might say that how she behaves is her own business. But a girl who might be mistaken for a Jewess, one that happens to be the object of the attention of my mother’s only son—everything about her is my mother’s business and subject to the severest censure.

  Archie examined the underlying logistical problems and came up with a solution. Three of us—George, he, and I—would have dinner with Henry and his mother and father the evening of their arrival at the hotel, since they were likely to be tired from the drive. Because of their fatigue, the meal wouldn’t drag on, and that would be all to the good. On Saturday afternoon, following a museum trip or some other cultural expedition Henry might devise, there would be drinks in our suite. Sherry, he specified. Margot and three or four of our dormitory neighbors should be invited, as well as perhaps Jerry, our proctor. That number of guests should make it possible to have Margot in the same room with George.

  I overheard Henry announce this program by telephone, first to his mother and then again to his father. Henry was speaking English. The language he used in addressing them varied with circumstances. It seemed to me that he used Polish when he didn’t want Archie or me to understand, and also when the subject matter didn’t require a vocabulary that he hadn’t learned before leaving Poland. I had no doubt, however, that his Polish was equal to communicating about dinner and drinks. From Henry’s long silences and the way he repeated certain sentences, it became clear that Archie’s proposals weren’t being received with complete enthusiasm. There came a moment when I felt particularly embarrassed (since by that time I was eavesdropping, and not merely happening to hear, as was most often the case) when he gave his estimate of the cost of dinner for five at the hotel, and of the gathering at our room on Saturday. I could imagine that Mr. and Mrs. White’s experience with buying sherry and pretzels or peanuts for an undergraduate cocktail party was limited, but surely they had paid for meals in a restaurant. Never mind, I heard him saying, never mind. None of this is necessary at all. Let’s just skip it. Having heard more than one discussion about money between Henry and his parents, I was surprised that he didn’t reassure them right away, as was his custom, that the expense they were facing was small, and I began to wonder whether he hadn’t decided that it would be just as well if his parents canceled the entertainments. It was a possible outcome that would spare him a good deal of anguish. He would, of course, have to announce the cancellation to Archie and me, and I supposed to Margot as well, but that awkwardness would be as nothing to the one he dreaded. In fact, all he had to say was that his overly possessive parents had decided that they would prefer to savor the company of their only son on this birthday weekend in strict family intimacy and without any dilution. Or something more or less like that. The ground for that sort of thing was prepared; he had bad-mouthed his parents so relentlessly.

  As it turned out, the parents didn’t veto either the dinner or the party, but the party became unnecessary, and Margot was invited to dinner along with Archie and me. George said that he had to be away, at Mount Snow, with his parents, sisters, and the sisters’ husbands, on the Standishes’ annual ski weekend. Another change, for which Margot was responsible, was that the dinner would take place on Saturday, at the Henri IV. She explained to Henry that hotel food and hotel restaurants were fatally triste; she couldn’t abide them. Besides, she added, won’t your parents be thrilled to celebrate your birthday in a restaurant named for you?

  HAVE YOU EVER HEARD of such a thing? You, his roommate and best friend: Can you imagine what kind of son I have? Mrs. White asked as soon as we reached the table Archie had reserved. Margot and Archie had been waiting for us. She put me on her right and Archie on her left. In accordance with her instructions, Mr. White was next to me and Margot between him and Henry. Archie’s standing at the Henri IV was lofty; that was why we had been directed to the corner table, and had been spared, even though it was a Saturday evening, the wait at the bar upstairs.

  When we arrived at the hotel yesterday, Mrs. White continued without releasing her hold on my arm, we found your roommate spread out in an armchair in the lobby—asleep with his mouth open. Thank God, he wasn’t snoring! I spoke to him, and nothing. Then his father called him by his name. Still nothing. Finally, when I kissed him, he decided to wake up. I said, So this is how you greet your parents: you get drunk. And do you know what? Right away, he got so mad I thought he would kill me. Look at him. He had to be drunk. Only drunks and eighty-year-old men can’t stay awake in the afternoon. And he isn’t even ashamed.

  This was the second time I was hearing this anecdote. She had told it to me on the way to the restaurant, so that I could only guess that she was repeating it not for my benefit but for the edification of the rest of the party. Since Margot had offered to bring Archie in a taxi, I had gone with Henry to get his parents at the hotel. I had supposed that we too would take a taxi to the restaurant, but Mr. and Mrs. White said they preferred to walk. We split into two pairs. I accompanied Mrs. White, who took my arm before I remembered to offer it. Mr. White and Henry followed.

  Rysiek is a very lucky boy, she said. He doesn’t know how lucky he is.


  Who is that? I asked.

  Who is Rysiek? she replied. Rysiek is Rysiek.

  Then, having realized how obtuse I was, she laughed, gave my arm a squeeze, and told me she was referring to Henry by his little name. What was the English word for such a little name? Diminutive, I suggested. She repeated diminutive after me, and cast about for the Latin root, which she found.

  Henry is Henryk in Polish, she explained, like Henryk Sienkiewicz, the author of Quo Vadis. From Henryk you get Henrysiek, and you shorten Henrysiek to Rysiek. That’s the way it is in Polish. We use diminutives. For example, my father’s name was Jacob, but his family and friends called him Kuba.

  I was going to ask her about Mr. White’s name and her own, but she cut me off to express the hope that my parents were well. I assured her that they were, whereupon she inquired whether they came to see me often. Not waiting for my answer, she said once again that Rysiek was a very lucky boy, but why did he have to drink so much? Neither his father nor she drank alcohol, except perhaps a glass of wine with dinner, if they went out or had guests at home. I said that I didn’t think that Henry drank, but she insisted I was wrong. That is when she first related the scene of coming upon his comatose body in the lobby. Had she been in his place, she would have been worried sick about her parents’ being late and asking herself whether the car had broken down or, the way his father drives, whether they had had an accident.

  The idea that Henry had conked out in the hotel lobby struck me as no less strange than Mrs. White’s suspicion that he was drunk at that hour of the afternoon until I remembered that he had not slept at all the preceding night, writing a paper on Pericles’ funeral oration and swallowing one Nodoz pill after another until, as he told me that morning, he found himself at dawn unable to stop chewing the pages he had pulled from his typewriter, crumpled, and thrown on the floor. I proffered the explanation of a deadline to be met, without any mention of the pills.

  Why should he be writing a paper at night instead of sleeping? she countered. Normal people work during the day and sleep at night.

  Again, I came to Henry’s defense. He was working very hard, I said, harder than anybody I knew, what with difficult Latin and Greek courses and intensive French. Although I knew that she was aware of the grade he received on every quiz, exam, and paper, I added that he was a remarkably good student.

  And you, Mr. Roommate, she said, are you also at college to learn Latin and Greek?

  I replied that I was convinced I had learned all the Latin I wanted to know at school. I was going to major in English.

  English. She laughed. And here I thought that you already spoke the language perfectly.

  I laughed with her.

  The subject of my intellectual development having been for the moment exhausted, she returned to what I could see was her bête noire. Why does Rysiek think he should study classics? she asked. She went on to speak about how they had lost everything in Poland, how hard she and her husband were working to give Henry a good home and a good education, and how he should be thinking about his future instead of throwing away his opportunities.

  Not having a ready answer, I remained silent and concentrated on her. She was good-looking—no, in reality she was beautiful and sexy. It was odd to have that impression of the mother of my roommate, but I certainly did. She made me think of a Lana Turner with jet-black hair. Henry’s flaming top had come from his father. I had observed her wool suit of a lighter brown than the voluptuously ample beaver coat with which Mr. White helped her as we were leaving the hotel. May Standish might well have worn such a suit and such a fur, but, on a night as cold as this, with patches of ice on the sidewalk, she would have had her feet in some sort of booties. Mrs. White wore burgundy pumps with high heels. I thought of my own mother, who was no less good-looking or well turned out if the occasion called for it. There was a big difference. In my mother’s case, it always seemed as though she had thrown on her clothes at the last minute, improvising the entire effect to include just a hint of slatternliness. Mrs. White exercised her charms differently. Mr. White’s grooming also left nothing to chance. I liked his gray herringbone tweed jacket, crisp Oxford gray flannels, beautifully shined black wingtips, white-on-white shirt, blue necktie of heavy silk with a darker blue stripe, black overcoat, and black fedora with a little red feather in the hatband. A white handkerchief, neatly folded to make two triangles, peeked out from the breast pocket of his jacket. Black calfskin leather gloves, looking new and expensive, completed the picture. Once I had examined Mr. White, the secret of the garments Mrs. White had bought for Henry so that he would be appropriately equipped for college was revealed. She had quite simply gotten him the clothes she was in the habit of choosing for Mr. White, only larger, because Henry, though small boned, was taller, and needed room to grow. How could she know that those of Henry’s classmates he had chosen to emulate affected quite a different style?

  To return to the Henri IV, Mrs. White’s opening salvo had put the king’s namesake in a state of mute rage she must have foreseen. I began to wonder whether the quarrel between son and mother would explode right then and there, and I believe that it would have if Archie had not headed it off. It wasn’t likely that Henry had told his parents what he knew of Archie’s accident. To do so would have heightened the suspicion with which they were inclined to regard both Archie and me. Perhaps the parents didn’t even know how badly he had been banged up. Normally, he made light of his injuries, but this time he made use of them. His crutches were leaning against the wall behind his chair where Henry had put them. Therefore, I was well placed to see him perform the maneuver that sent them crashing to the floor. Once the clatter had stopped the conversation, Archie slowly recounted the story of the car accident omitting none of the details other than the drinking at the officers’ club that had preceded it. The Whites listened to him as though mesmerized, presumably calculating the risks to which Henry’s friendship with this strange and charming young man exposed him.

  There is a silver lining, Archie added. I am getting my own set of wheels. I mean a car.

  At that, Mrs. White drew a deep breath and said she had never heard anything like it. She felt very sorry for his parents, especially his mother.

  Archie shook his head.

  Actually, he replied, Mother is tough, tougher than my father even though he is the soldier.

  Then he told us that the colonel thought a Chinese attack across the Yalu River was imminent, in which case Russia would get involved as well as China, so that the U.S. would have to use tactical nuclear weapons.

  Absolutely, said Mr. White.

  As he talked about the designs of the Russians and the Chinese on the rest of the world it occurred to me that the one person I knew who would agree with him all the way down the line was old Gummy, at our country club. Except that Gummy also thought that we should have limited our involvement in World War II to the defeat of Japan, and let the Germans and the Russians finish off each other, a notion that Mr. White, if he thought of his family’s likely fate in such an event, would not have approved.

  It fell to me to take Archie back to the dormitory that evening. While we waited for the taxi the owner of the restaurant had called, I told him that I had rather liked Mr. and Mrs. White.

  They’re not half bad, he replied, but they’ll get in Henry’s way.

  XI

  IN THE END, there was to be no dinner at all with Mrs. Palmer. She told Archie that the coffee shop at the Commodore where she was staying—across the street from the hotel the Whites had chosen—was perfect for her needs. A bite there alone was all the evening entertainment she needed in Cambridge. Archie laughed about it and said we weren’t missing much, and Mater was having a blast pinching pennies. She did, however, consent to come to our rooms for a drink. This time there was no talk of sherry; Mrs. Palmer favored S.S. Pierce bourbon, which had managed to make its way to the far-flung officers’ clubs she and the colonel had frequented. Having studied her photograph on
the dresser in Archie’s room, where she appeared at the side of a young officer resplendent in dress blues, I was disappointed. Instead of the more mature version of Hedy Lamarr I had expected, the little old lady I was introduced to evoked a missionary nun or the housekeeper of a bedridden old codger living in a house too large for him at the end of a hillside village in a black-and-white French film. Either the photograph had been heavily touched up or time had been particularly cruel to her. As I might have surmised, Mrs. Palmer’s dress—black crepe-soled shoes, black stockings, a dark gray skirt of harsh flannel, and a black cardigan worn over a gray shirt with a small round collar—had a purpose. The point was to be comfortable on the Greyhound from Houston to Cambridge and back. In fact, Mrs. Palmer liked travel by bus and discoursed cheerfully on the courtesy of her fellow passengers and the cleanliness of toilets wherever Greyhound made them available. But most of our conversation was about the many virtues of the Nash, which Archie had taken us to inspect after his mother and he returned from the inaugural ride on Route 128 earlier that day. I thought that the most striking of them—the reclining front seats that turned the car into a double bed—would not be mentioned, being the stuff of so many off-color jokes. I was wrong. Mrs. Palmer brought up the savings Archie could realize forgoing motels, if only he learned to travel with a sleeping bag. She seemed even more pleased by the power of the engine—or perhaps it was some ratio to the weight of the body. They had taken her up to ninety-five, miles I mean, Archie said, and he thought there was still some muscle to be flexed before the car reached its limit. And she’s solid, Mrs. Palmer added with a smile. If you’d been driving her in Panama, you wouldn’t have wound up on crutches, with a face like a scarecrow.