by Ward Just
“What’s happened to Mr. Bohn? Why ‘lucky’ Mr. Bohn?”
“He sold off a piece of his bank. It’s a hell of a deal, though of course he can’t run it like the corner grocery anymore. The loans’ve got to be justified—”
“Who bought it?”
“There’re some guys who own four or five banks. They’ve got a pretty good piece of Harry now and they’ll have more before the end of the year. It was one of those”—he shrugged—“either/or deals. I think he should’ve waited. He sold low, considering the potential; I don’t think Harry understands the future. But he needed capital badly and that’s one thing these guys have got. Good thing about it was, Bill Eurich put together the deal. But Harry’s not used to taking orders from anybody and he’s having a tough time right now.”
“That’s terrible, if they’re in control—”
“It could be,” he said. “But isn’t. Eurich will keep them in line. So far, we’ve managed to keep things steady. You need two things for control. You need the newspaper and you need the bank. Lose either one and the game’s lost.”
She smiled. “I thought all you needed was the newspaper.”
“That was what my father thought. And he was wrong.”
She said, “I was appalled at the look of downtown. it’s falling apart.”
“It’s not that bad,” he said defensively. “In recent years the boom has been on the edges, east and west. Business has been stagnant downtown.” He shrugged as if to say, What can you expect?
“Shopping communities,” she said.
“Of course.”
“A shopping center.” She thought, It isn’t a community. It is something else, not a community. “It’s interesting, you made the decision to develop the bog and it changed the town forever. Suddenly opportunity was on the outskirts, the periphery. Money followed and downtown began to decay. Why? Because you and Harry Bohn and the others decided that the future was east.”
He smiled broadly. “Exactly.”
“But the place is dead at the center.”
“Because they didn’t hold on to it.”
Dana leaned forward. “What?”
There was a long silence before her father replied. “Guys are waiting to take it away from you. You’ve got to be smart enough and tough enough to hold on to it, and you’ve got to have a reason to. A damned good reason, something you believe in yourself. The guys downtown didn’t care enough. There are other ways of getting it away from you than buying it. Anything can be taken, anything.” Charles began to move restlessly around the perimeter of the room. “That’s one reason why a newspaper’s got to be profitable. Money is strength. Your grandfather, a great newspaperman, didn’t understand the balance sheet. Didn’t understand because he didn’t have to. It was all different then. The time Capone’s people tried to move in and buy the I, and then failing that considered setting up a rival newspaper. Do you know they couldn’t get a single advertiser to trade with them? Not one. They couldn’t give their advertising away, literally they couldn’t give it away, and believe me they tried. That was the kind of loyalty there was then. Dad didn’t even have to push hard. He just said to a few guys, ‘Do this for me.’ They knew the loyalty was reciprocal and abolute. That was when most every business in this town was owned by a single guy or a single family or two guys who were partners. Every man in this town decided to stick by Amos Rising, no questions asked. There was no need for telephone calls to the home office in New York asking for instructions. Damn shame, in a way.” Charles said, “We had to grow.” His voice was almost pleading now. “There wasn’t any choice in the matter. Bill Eurich was the right man at the right time. Some of them still don’t see that, they don’t understand that Eurich was in the best interests of the town. It was Eurich or stagnation.” He looked away “Most of the old-timers are dead. And their businesses are either marginal or sold to the chains. Old-line families have drifted apart, one or two of the boys killed in the war, like Frank. Others drifted away or didn’t hang on. Some were incompetent. The family tradition isn’t there anymore, so you’ve got to deal with the tradition that is there. Growth. The family business isn’t a way of life now, where the family served the business and was served by it.” He looked at her. “It’s different owning something than managing it.”
She said, “You wouldn’t ever sell.”
Charles said, “I don’t know.” Then, “It’s damned complicated.”
“Because of Frank?”
“Partly,” he said.
“And Grandpa.”
“Grandpa?”
“His memory.”
Charles smiled bleakly. “Actually, I was not thinking of your grandfather’s memory. However, it is true that a tradition is not”—he smiled—“fungible. This is a family business. Like your friend Kennedy. Their business is politics. Ours is newspapers. It’s exactly like that.” He looked down at his daughter. “I was thinking of you, actually.”
She stared back at him. “In what way?”
“All this,” he said. “It was Amos Rising’s. Built from scratch. Now it’s mine. Someday it’ll be yours. That has to mean something, that line. Even to you it has to mean something.” Dana said nothing; there was no answer she felt able to give. He said, “Your children.”
“But Dad—”
“That’s what I’m looking to now, the next generation. Listen to me. If there’s no one to leave it to, why not sell? What’s the point otherwise? I look down the road and I don’t see anything there. I wouldn’t mind spending part of each winter on the golf course in Phoenix, with my friends. I could do that right now, I’m in a financial position to do it. More than do it ... But I can’t leave the newspaper hanging, and it’s all I think about day and night. I mean by that, I don’t want to leave it hanging. There isn’t anyone here besides me who’s capable.”
“What about Jake?”
“No,” he said without elaboration. Then, “He’s tied up with Elliott now. He’s a lawyer and that’s apparently what he wants. Anyway it’s a family business and no one outside the family knows how it’s run. Look,” he said suddenly. “The truth is, it’s my business. And it’s not like other businesses, the board of directors doesn’t matter, the stockholders don’t matter. That’s the way Dad and I set it up. It’s not a—what did Khrushchev call that thing at the UN?”
Dana said, “Troika.”
“It’s not a troika.”
“Well, Tony—”
“Tony,” he said scornfully.
“Or Mitch—”
“—is too old. I don’t understand it, I’ve got half a dozen friends, their sons have all gone into the business. Damn fine boys, doing well, taking the reins. But my son is dead. What happens when I’m gone, is what I want to know?”
“Dad—”
“That goddamned war.”
“Oh Dad,” she began.
“The goddamned politicians and their wars.”
“Dad—”
“I wish you’d come home, Dana. You here, settled, married—” He looked at her. It seemed to him at that moment that all the beauty of the world was within his grasp. His boy was dead but his girl was alive and she had it in her power to revive and refresh him. He had not really objected when she went to New York; he knew that Dement was a small town and not to everyone’s taste. But he hoped in his heart that she would return and the family would again be whole, or nearly whole; the line would be restored. He wanted her home and married and he wanted grandchildren; a son-in-law to advise and a grandson, or two grandsons to take with him to the office on Saturday mornings. “All I’ve done,” he said, “I’ve done for the family.”
She turned away, exasperated. It seemed to her that he wanted her life, She was to turn over her life to him, that was what he wanted. But she was unable to give it. He was right, people wanted to take it away from you. And you had to resist them with your whole heart. She said, “I can’t.” And added, hating herself, “Now.”
“—provided for
you,” he said, “your mother, Mitch, Tony, their families. The employees here, we employ eighty-five people. Known most of them for twenty years, longer. What the hell? Why can’t you?”
She said, “You love the I. It’s your life, you’ve spent your life at it—”
“Is it?”
“Of course, what you’ve just said.”
“That’s what everyone says. It’s what your mother says and she isn’t very often wrong.” He said, “What is there to show for it? You’re in New York living alone. Don’t see you from one year to the next. I bet you don’t even read the I. Bet you don’t even know we’re going to have a new courthouse, we’ll tear down the old one. An eight-million-dollar structure, it’ll revive downtown ...” He was rambling now, the point lost. “Who cares? The town succeeds or it doesn’t succeed. We publish a million lines of advertising or we don’t. Paper’s good or bad. What’s the point if the family’s not together to share it? It’s all a vacuum. If you’re not around. Frank—”
“No,” she said, pleading now.
“—is dead, and I can’t help that.” He began to pace the room again, moving around to the secretary’s desk. He sat heavily in her small swivel chair, staring at the drink in front of him, the change from tycoon to martyr complete. “I’m working my tail off for strangers.”
That wasn’t true either, she thought. Why would he say that? Her father? Her heart went out to him, and she leaned across the secretary’s desk and touched his hand. Blood was the gulf that lay before them and it could not be bridged, perhaps because they were on the same side of it. She said, “You can’t base your life on other people.”
He looked at her. “You can’t?”
“I don’t think so,” she said.
“I always thought you could.” He turned away then. “I don’t think you know anything about it,” he said thickly.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He nodded. “It’s all right.”
She leaned closer to him; her hand was now on his forearm. “You know, I love what I do. I’m very good at it. So they tell me.” He looked at her blankly, not understanding the reference. Good at what? “I’ve got a real career, I like it. I like doing what I do and I’ve got to be in New York to do it. I’m only twenty-three, this book I’m editing now—”
“The one you mentioned.”
“That one. It’s going to be good. The author—”
“Um,” he said.
“It means a lot to me.” She shook his arm a little, waiting for an acknowledgment; a word, any word of approval.
“I don’t know much about books and authors,” he said. “I’m just a poor newspaper publisher.”
She literally had to grit her teeth to prevent an outburst. She said, “It’s all right.”
“I don’t live in New York. Don’t know what goes on there. Always lived here, it’s always been good enough for Risings. Dement, we’ve lived here for four generations.”
Oh, she thought, shit. “Well, you’re missing quite a lot,” she said evenly. She wanted to leave now, to end this conversation.
“You’ve done a swell job, apparently,” he said. “But your place is here. Your mother.” He took a last swallow of his drink and rose. “The trouble began when we sent you away to school.”
“Could be.” She smiled sadly.
“Your mother—” he began.
“She’ll be waiting for us, let’s go home.” She handed him his hat and coat and they moved out the door.
“—her idea.”
She nodded. Yes.
He said, “I was thinking of this. I want you to come on the board of directors of the I.” He held the door for them as they left the building. “You wouldn’t have to do anything. It would be a good thing for the company.” He turned away, opening the passenger’s door of her car. “For me.”
She said, “I’ll drive.”
“Just come back once a year—”
She put the car in gear and accelerated. Was that what this was about? “Of course,” she said.
He smiled hopefully. “It would be a help.”
She heard something new in his voice, something that had not been there before, and she was on her guard. “How would it be a help?”
“This way and that way,” he said carelessly. “Who knows?” Then, “In case I decided to sell the I to Dows. Then I’ll need some backup.” He was silent a moment as the car moved onto the highway, back the way she had come. “Hell,” he said. “I’d just like it, that’s all. You on the board.”
“Well,” she said. “I’m very flattered.”
They were on the strip now. It seemed bright as day. She looked for evidence of the accident but could find none. The memory of it had stuck with her. The damaged cars were gone, and there were no police or medical men. She described the accident to her father, the flashing lights, the confusion, the woman sitting on the pavement, the figure in the other car, the head on the dashboard ... As she talked her hand went inside her raincoat, absently caressing the little owl anchored to her lapel.
“You’re driving too fast,” her father said.
3.
TWO NIGHTS LATER there were friends in for drinks. Her uncles and their wives and Elliott Townsend and the banker, Bohn, and Bill Eurich and her cousin Jake. She loved watching these large and. self-confident men, dominating the room with their booming voices. And the wives: fresh, pink wives; serene as hens. The men were prosperous on the outside, dark suits and gold watches and heavy rings on their fingers. The one who had not changed at all was Elliott Townsend, in his eighties now. Dana took the old lawyer’s arm, leaning against him. He reminded her of old Amos, same cigary smell, same bulk, same flat accent and stubborn mouth. They were talking business, the new courthouse and the two new banks, the possibility of a spur off the proposed Interstate, another shopping center to the west, a park downtown, and an airstrip if federal money could be found. This friend had prospered, that one had gone broke, another one was on the edge—of success or failure, it was hard to tell which. Listening to it she marveled again at how intimate the town was. The businessmen of Dement were linked by commerce, by property bought and sold and services exchanged. They shared the same lawyers and bankers and doctors, and read the same newspaper. They drove Buicks, and took their vacations at the Spa or in northern Wisconsin or in Fort Lauderdale, and. believed in God—without thinking very much about it or needing to go to church to prove it. And she marveled too that the names had not changed. There were Risings and Townsends and Bohns and Haights and Reillys; and of course now there was Enrich. She watched Bill Eurich talk to her mother, telling a joke, laughing; indisputable a man at ease, a quieter man than Mitch or her father or the banker. She turned to Townsend. “How’s Marge Reilly?”
“Poor Marge,” Harry Bohn began.
“—is fine,” Townsend said firmly “A fine woman in all ways. There are those who say the clerk’s office is less efficient than it used to be but of course there’s twice as much work as there used to be. I never have any trouble. I send Jake over there for something and he’s back with the goods in thirty minutes.”
“Some of the newer lawyers complain a little,” Bohn said.
“And last time they tried to run someone against her. But he withdrew so she’s unopposed as usual. There is nothing wrong with Marge Reilly. She’s been clerk now for almost thirty years. Knows where all the bodies are buried.”
“The younger fellas complain a little about that, too,” Harry Born said. They were talking to each other now, and she was surprised that their differences were so close to the surface. There was a pause then and she wanted to ask about her cousin Jake but did not know how to frame the question. However, Townsend guessed what was in her mind and told her that he was doing very well. He seemed to have a flait, though of course it would take time for him to acquire judgment. Judgment came only with experience and hard work. He said that Jake’s father, Tony, was very pleased with his decision to practice law. “Very pleased
indeed,” Townsend said.
“I thought that Tony would want him in the paper,” Dana said. “He worked for the I every summer of his life.”
“Didn’t,” Townsend said.
She said, “,surprising.”
He said, “Not too.”
“Well,” Bohn said. “It’s odd in that here is a flourishing business, a family business, and a boy decides to pass it up. It’s quite unusual. Most of the family businesses in Dement, insurance, law, the larger stores, the sons follow the fathers. That’s the way it’s been done, though I agree there are exceptions.” He named three or four businesses, fathers and sons. “I thought it a bit strange.”
“Jake likes the law?”
“Doing very well,” Elliott Townsend said.
She did not believe that answered the question, so she returned to the other. “And Tony—”
“I think, Dana.” He looked around. Tony and Jake were with the others, clustered around the television set, silent. He lowered his voice. “It could be that Tony felt it would be wiser for Jake to strike out on his own. I don’t believe that Tony has the, ah, commitment to the newspaper that your father has or Mitch has.” He put his hands up, fingers spread. “Don’t misunderstand me. His loyalty and affection are complete. But Tony has always been rather an odd man out, and since Amos died—” He cocked his head. “I believe that he was not eager that Jake follow the same path into the newspaper. Well, it’s only guesswork, of course.”
