My father, who was there then, said: “Jean, it happened all at once. Even if you had been sitting there you couldn’t have saved him. Look at poor Pete.” I began to curse the man from Washington who had called us away. I cursed the weeds and the “scorpions” and I cursed God. Never had I been so engulfed in hatred and pain.
I did not notice that no snow came, that the heat did not slacken, and that death marched unrelentingly over the countryside. I did what work there was to do, and I became as quiet as Edward. The foul creatures in the weeds did not disappear. My only pleasure—vindictive, almost rapturous—was in killing them, in hunting them out for hours at a time.
It was February now, and the weeds were as high as our hips, and there was no rain, no sign of spring, no sweetness in the air. One night I said to my father: “We might as well give up. We are going to die sooner or later, and it might as well be sooner.”
For the first time we had to go to the Grange in Arbourville and get our rations. Most of our fowl and our cows, and all but three of our pigs, had died.
Then the cities, in their witless terror, erupted into murderous panic.
CHAPTER TWELVE
As we lived in an inland community we had no access to any body of water larger than our little Lake Wilde, which had never been abundantly stocked with fish. Our other sources of water were the brooks and narrow streams, now almost dry, and few fish ever had traversed them except during the spring floods. When the fish had disappeared last summer it had not caused much comment except among those who had time for fishing, and our family was not among them.
Of course, the newspapers and other sources of public information did not let us know that in communities blessed with huge bodies of water the fish had gone entirely. Worst of all, we found out later that the sea had refused to give up her creatures to the nets and the trawlers. The oysters vanished, and the shrimp and the clams and the lobsters, and though fishing boats went dangerously far out into the oceans to cast their nets they pulled in few if any edible fish.
We know now that the countries who subsist largely on fish were the most desperately stricken of all of us. Millions died of starvation in Scandinavia alone, and millions died in Britain too, long before the rest of the world was seriously afflicted. The inland countries were still eating meat then. It is to the credit of Scandinavia and Britain that their people did not riot first. But American people rioted in full mass while there were still some canned vegetables and meat in the markets, and some flour and corn and potatoes. And it is to our shame that the news of our rioting spread to other afflicted countries and set them off.
To people accustomed to unlimited meat and milk and fruits and butter, to exotic canned goods, to green vegetables and orange juice and “balanced diets,” the situation had become outrageous and maddening. “Mothers’ movements” sprang up overnight, led by fierce-eyed strangers, little women who were not mothers at all, and had no prospects of becoming mothers. Banners, lettered in red, appeared suddenly and copiously from nowhere, screaming: “Our children want milk! Our children demand fresh fruits and vegetables! Our children must have meat! We demand action! The Government must act!”
“Workers’ Movements” roared into being, led by the male counterparts of the hectic little women. The appeared, as if at a signal, haranguing the men as they came out of the factories of the mills or the shops. The Government warehouses were “bulging,” they shouted. They were cracking at the seams with hoarded butter and meat and wheat and corn, bought from “selfish, greedy, special interests,” and kept from “the people” for higher prices. Capitalism was the culprit. Under a fair system of government food would be plentiful for “the masses, the exploited worker.” A planned economy must be put into operation at once.
We heard later that mobs composed of tens of thousands of men and women, led by the strangers, stormed the city warehouses, killed or trampled the guards, and poured in demented hordes through the empty buildings. The emptiness brought them momentarily to a standstill. They stared about them in the hollow silence of the warehouses. But the leaders had a quick explanation. The Government had secretly restored the goods to the “fat farmers” in order to keep them from the cities until higher prices were permitted. The land, cried the strangers, was not producing for use. It was producing for profits.
The governors of the states called out the National Guard, and then appealed desperately to the President for the Army. For two weeks the soldiers were able to prevent the populace of the cities from flowing out into the countryside like a devouring forest fire. They set up huge guns on the outskirts and made it clear that the guns would be used if necessary.
In the meantime, news of our rioting cities reached Europe. London went mad; Paris mobs streamed through the streets by day and by night, looting, burning, destroying. There was not a city which did not lose its mind, anywhere in the world, including Russia.
Congress was called into emergency session. The President addressed it. He pleaded with all members to go back to their constituents and reason with them. But the members of Congress looked back at the President with haunted eyes, and did not obey. They were afraid, now, of their own people, and of questions they could not answer.
The cities, taking breath for the last fatal onslaught, panted behind their barriers of steel. Soldiers did not dare to appear alone on the streets, or even in couples. The police had disappeared. Martial law was declared. Curfews were announced. But it was impossible, and it would have been unpardonable, to shoot down the thousands of paraders who defied the military, even led as they were by the strangers. The Army tried shutting off electricity at night, and so keeping the streets black. The people were amazingly, and promptly, armed with torches. They eddied and flowed and streamed through the streets, the torchlight reflecting redly from the sides of buildings. Millions paraded and screamed and threatened with raised, clenched fists.
The small towns and the villages did not riot, for they were too close to the country, and there the people knew the truth.
Frustrated in their urge to inundate the countryside, the mobs turned their rage on their own means of existence, the factories and the mills. Countless millions of dollars’ worth of property was destroyed in twenty-four hours, before the Army could intervene.
The clergy attempted pacification, but as they had been warned not to tell the real truth, their attempts failed. They talked sternly or soothingly of the “need to maintain order.” They talked of God, not as an affronted and angry God, but as a source of infinite mercy in whom the people could put their hope. They left their churches and talked on the streets, in the scarlet shadow of torchlight or under the day’s yellow skies. The people did not listen. They howled their derision at priest and minister and rabbi, and drowned out their voices. In many instances these innocent and pleading men were trampled by the mobs or were beaten to death.
All the mills and the factories were closed. The banks closed, one by one. And then the churches closed. There were no people who wished to go to church, anyway. It happened all over the civilized world.
The markets were empty, everywhere. What little had remained in them had been seized by the insane mobs. There was, now, nothing for the people to eat, except the small stores they had on their own shelves, and these were dwindling fast.
It is to the credit of humanity, everywhere, that the men who maintained the utilities remained on their jobs, though they were starving. Otherwise millions would have died of thirst.
The United Nations met in extraordinary session during the last days of February. By this time the cities had found arms.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Lester Hartwick, our Grange president, called my father. He was asking all local farmers to come to the Grange hall for consultation and information that night. We went there, greeted our gaunt friends, and waited. An air of doom and despondency hovered in the hall.
Lester said: “We’ve had some confidential news about the cities. They’re rioting. Martial law�
�s been declared; the Army is out.” He was so weak that he paused between sentences, and kept running his hand dazedly over his face. “Now, Grovetown is only one hundred miles from here—eight hundred thousand people. They can get around to this community in less than three hours, for the highways are still open. They’re already talking about it; we’re the richest farming community in this part of the state. The city people know all about the Grange stocks of food for the farmers.”
He stopped again, and looked at us with haggard eyes. “Boys, we’ve got our seed corn and wheat piled up here, waiting for when we can plant it again. I want you all to take it away; it’s the only chance for food for the future for all of us. Turn the weeds over with your tractors, far from your houses; bury the seed deep, mark the place. The weeds will grow over it in a few hours. Make sure you line the hole with wood or concrete; I don’t know how much time we have now.
“And then, divide what we have here on hand among yourselves, all the food and meat. Take it home; hide it away. I don’t think you’ll have to worry much; they’ll attack the Granges first. But arm yourselves. Boys, this is war, not to kill people but to save them, the poor damn fools.
“The mayor of Arbourville is here tonight. He wants to offer us the big factory which used to be the silk mills, until the owners moved south. Start bringing your cattle and hogs and other stock here tomorrow, at dawn. Get them here as soon as you can. The factory’s at the edge of town, and nobody goes there any more. Here in Arbourville we’ll take the hay and the corn to the factory, for the stock.
“Grange presidents all over the country have made these plans. Now, go home, and come back tomorrow with your trucks and tractors. There’s no time to be lost.”
We spent four hours portioning out the food for ourselves. Those who had children and pregnant wives were given the largest shares. We worked in the steaming heat, with the strength born of fear and dread. We loaded our seed corn and wheat in bags; it was good to look at the seed again, hard and yellow and dry in our hands, the fruit of life, the promise of life. We worked, not only for ourselves, but for all men.
My father and I reached home in the saffron dawn, ate hastily, and then took our tractor out. We tore at the weeds, ripping them up, our tractor grinding and crushing. The murky sun was hot on our backs by the time we had made a large enough hole. We lined it with thick wood and tossed our bags into it, and sealed it. It would keep for several months, we hoped. Within a few hours the weeds had grown back over the place; we set a marker on the spot, unobtrusive to any eyes but our own.
It was not until the next dawn that we could load our remaining two cows, the bull, and the three pigs, into our truck. When we reached the abandoned mills in Arbourville we found them already teeming with bellowing, frightened stock. The citizens of the town had been working without sleep; hay and corn filled improvised bins, and barrels of water were placed at intervals. It was a lonely place; the factory had broken windows, but the doors were strong and several of the townsmen offered to stand guard inside. It would not be safe for them to be seen outdoors.
We hid our food in our empty barns, under hastily ripped-up floors, under eaves, under beds, in blind attics reached by ladders. We had to live, if any other men were to live.
My father was contained and steadfast during all this, but my disgust and hatred for mankind was growing. In my exhausted and grief-stricken mind the men of the cities, men everywhere, were responsible for my child’s death. I made a solemn vow that if my family were spared I would never again lift a hand to help others, no matter how needy or hopeless. In that way, I told myself, I would escape future agony.
After we had completed our almost superhuman work we sat down to wait. My father was full of assurance, as always. We had not been talking to each other much these days, and when I sat down in the sitting room I picked up a book. I knew he was watching me, as he smoked. Then he said: “Pete, I have an idea what’s bothering you, and giving you that bitter expression. It’s Porgie. You’ve worked with all of us, and buried the seed corn and wheat, and taken only your just share of the food. But you always looked as if you were doing it unwillingly. I think you’ve been cursing your fellow-men, deep inside you.”
I did not answer him. I heard him sigh. “Pete, I hate to say this, but you aren’t any better than your neighbor. You’re no worse, perhaps, but you’re no better. A man doesn’t stand alone, even when he is the most lonely and keeps his doors shut tight. He is only a part of mankind; he couldn’t live without it.”
“I’m not interested any longer in my neighbor,” I said, curtly. “I feel he is guilty of Porgie’s death.” I dropped the book and stared at my father, and my heart began to beat with sudden violence. Then I stood up.
“You’ve remembered something,” said my father.
I was unbearably excited. “I have!” Then I stopped. What idiocy! “Lord, have mercy upon me, a sinner.” Those were the words of the prayer I had forgotten. I remembered them now, but the passion I had felt when uttering them so long ago was gone. The sick weight of resentment and hate was too strong in me. The patch of grass had been a strange accident.
My father was standing up; he was approaching me almost on tiptoe, for fear that I would forget again. He whispered: “Pete, Pete. The prayer!”
I told him, and I blushed self-disgust at my sentimentality. “It couldn’t have been that,” I said.
But my father was already running to the telephone, and he was calling young Mr. Herricks. I began to swear, more and more embarrassed. I went upstairs to see Jean. She seemed better, and smiled wanly at me, and kissed me. She was sitting in a chair, and as I stood beside her she held my hand, tightly. She was so pale and thin, so listless.
“Darling, you look so grim these days that you frighten me,” she said. Her voice broke. “I know you think about Porgie. But we’re going to have another baby—”
I had forgotten the sudden hideous danger which threatened my wife, and Lucy, who were carrying whatever future there would be within their bodies. Now I thought of the insane city mobs pouring out into the country. They would have no mercy on these girls; the least they would do would be to deprive them of our last store of food. I went to my chest of drawers and took out my gun. I went into the clothes closet and got my rifle. I gathered all my ammunition together. If we were injured, if our food was menaced, then I would shoot to kill. I fingered the triggers of the weapons and I almost hoped I would have an opportunity to use them.
“Peter,” said Jean, faintly, raising herself a little in her chair. “What is it? Pete, you look so—awful. As if you want to kill.”
“I do,” I said, before I could stop myself.
She sank back into her chair and looked at me with eyes that were prominent in her thin white face. She began to speak softly, watching me every moment: “I think I have some idea, Pete. But haven’t you forgotten something? The cross on Christmas Eve.”
“The cross!” I laughed shortly. “I imagined it. Just a magnetic disturbance—that’s what they said, wasn’t it?”
“But you saw it, Pete!”
I was silent. I could see, again, the infinite and brilliant cross against the black night. I had seen it, myself. I put away the gun and the rifle, and suddenly I was overcome with weakness. I knelt down beside Jean and put my head into her lap. She touched me with tender hands. “Poor Pete, poor darling,” she murmured.
Much of my grief and all of my hatred and contempt left me.
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,” whispered Jean, and she held my head against her breast.
The yellow light at the windows began to fade as the evening came. I remained with Jean, too exhausted to speak or move. She slept in her chair and I thought that some color was returning to her face. I still could not look without anguish at the empty crib between the ruffled curtains at the windows. What was to become of all of us? How much longer had we to live? Two children would be born again in this house; how were they to s
urvive? But still, a dull peace had come to me.
Mr. Herricks came that night, brought to us by a neighbor’s belching tractor. We had not seen him for some time, and I was aghast at the change in him. He seemed weary and broken and very sad. Yet, as he shook my hand he smiled at me, and his youthful eyes became radiant. He had brought his own food with him, and my mother and Lucy prepared it and we all sat down together for our sparse meal. He told us that very few people, if any, came to church now. Either they were dead or dying, sick or desolate, unable to travel even a little distance, or nursing their children or their parents. He visited them in their homes, giving them what comfort he could. He looked at me directly, now. “The gospel of repentance,” he said. “How can I say to them: ‘Pray for forgiveness’? Wouldn’t it be cruel? But that is the only prayer which will save the world now. True repentance, true penance. It has seemed strange to many people that when Christ cured the blind and the lame He usually told them that their sins had been forgiven them. What had affliction to do with sin? Besides, there was evidence all about us that the wicked appeared to be especially blest; their affairs prospered, their children were happy, they were honored among men, they died with at least as much serenity as good men. The charitable and the just, on the other hand, seemed to be the most unlucky of people.”
He still gazed at me, but I was confused. “It is not new that men confuse material prosperity with blessedness, and fail to value spiritual prosperity.”
These were strange and humble words from our “educated parson,” who had once given us fine and scholarly lectures on ethics and psychiatry and world politics and the origins of various philosophies.
Your Sins and Mine: The Terrifying Fable of a World Without Faith Page 10
