Collected Fiction

by Irwin Shaw

  The rumble of the ocean oppressed him, the waves rolling in implacably, eroding beaches, undermining foundations, menacing, changing the contours of the land with each new season. Old harbors silted over, once thriving seaports lay deserted, the cries of gulls over the shifting waters plaintive, melancholy, complaining harshly of hunger and flight and the wreckage of time.

  An unlucky house. Tomorrow he would tell Leslie and Caroline to pack, the holiday which had been no holiday was over, it was time to leave.

  He tried to read, but the words on the page made no sense to him. He went into the library and tried to choose another book, but none of the titles on the shelves appealed to him. He sat down in front of the television set and turned it on. He pushed button after button at random. As the screen brightened he saw Russell Hazen’s image on the tube and heard a voice saying, “We regret that Senator Blackstone, who was to be on this panel tonight, was unable to leave Washington. We have been fortunate in finding Mr. Russell Hazen, the distinguished lawyer, well known for his expertise on tonight’s subject, international law, who has graciously agreed to take the senator’s place on our program.”

  Hazen, impeccably dressed and imperially grave, bowed his head slightly in the direction of the camera. Then the camera switched to a full shot of the table, with three other middle-aged, professorial-looking men and the gray-haired moderator seated in a circle.

  Strand wondered if Hazen’s story about having to go to New York to see his wife had been a lie and if the call he had answered in the library had actually been from the broadcasting studio. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to let Strand know that he was abandoning his guests for what Strand might think was a frivolous reason.

  Strand listened without interest as the other three participants gave their intelligent, well modulated, reasonable views on foreign affairs and international law. There was nothing in what they said that Strand hadn’t heard a hundred times before. If he hadn’t been waiting to hear what Hazen was going to say he would have gone back into the living room and tried his book again.

  But Hazen’s first words made him listen very carefully. “Gentlemen,” Hazen said, his voice strong and confident, “I’m afraid we’re confusing two entirely separate things—foreign affairs and international law. True, whether we like it or not, we do have foreign affairs. But international law has become a fiction. We have international piracy, international assassination, international terrorism, international bribery and bartering, international drama, international anarchy. Our national law perhaps is not quite fiction, but the most generous description of it that we can accept is that it is at best semi-fiction. With our legal codes, under our adversary system, in any important matter, he who can afford to hire the most expensive counsel is the one who walks out of the courtroom with the decision. Of course, there are occasional exceptions which only go to prove the rule.

  “When I first went into the practice of law I believed that at least generally, justice was served. Unhappily, after many years of service, I can no longer cling to this belief…”

  Good Lord, Strand thought, what does he think he’s doing?

  “The corruption of the judiciary, the regional and racial prejudices of the men who sit on the bench have too often been exposed on the front pages of our newspapers to warrant further comment here; the buying of posts through political contributions is a time-honored custom; the suborning of testimony, the coaching of witnesses, the concealment of evidence has even reached into the highest office in the land; the venality of the police has entered our folklore and legal evasion by men in my own profession who have sworn to act as officers of the law is taught in all our universities.”

  The moderator of the program, who had been shifting uncomfortably in his chair, tried to break in. “Mr. Hazen…” he said, “I don’t think that…”

  Hazen stopped him with a magisterial wave of the hand and went on. “To get back to the international conception of law…on certain small matters, like fishing rights and overflights by airlines, agreements can be reached and observed. But on crucial concerns, such as human rights, the inviolability of the frontiers of sovereign states, the safeguarding or destruction of nations, we have progressed no farther than in the period of warring and nomadic tribes. We have instituted theft and calumny in the United Nations, where on the territory of the United States, in a forum supported in great part by our own taxes, a cabal of all but a few of our so-called and infinitely fickle friends daily mocks and insults us and with impunity does all it can to damage us. I am a so-called expert on international law, but I tell you, gentlemen, there is no such thing and the sooner we realize that and remove ourselves from that parliament of enemies on the bank of the East River, the healthier it will be for us in years to come. Thank you for listening to me and forgive me for not being able to stay for the end of this interesting discussion. I have an appointment elsewhere.”

  Hazen nodded, almost genially, to the other men at the table, who were sitting there woodenly, and stood up and left.

  Strand reached over and turned the set off. He sat, staring at the blank screen, feeling dazed, as though he had just witnessed a grotesque accident.

  Then he stood up and went over to the little desk in front of the window. He had not brought along the copy book in which he made the occasional entries in his journal and so he took some notepaper out of the drawer and began to write.

  I am alone downstairs in the East Hampton house and I have just seen a man destroy himself on television. The man is Russell Hazen. In what can only have been a valedictory speech, he was saying good-bye to his career. What his reasons were I do not know, but he has denounced himself, his profession, the rules we all live by and which have enriched him and brought him honor. I can only consider it an aberration, but an aberration for which he will not be forgiven. Since I met him I knew there was a dark side to his character, an all-pervading cynicism about men’s motives and behavior, a melancholy streak that was present even in his lightest moments, but I never suspected that he was tormented enough by it to allow himself to be overwhelmed by it. Where he will go from here it is impossible to foresee…

  Suddenly he felt terribly tired and even the effort of writing was too much for him. He put his arm across the sheet of paper and leaned over, his head resting on his wrist, and fell instantly asleep.

  He awoke with a start. He had no idea of how long he had slept. There was the sound of a key in a lock and a door opening, then closing. He stood up and went into the living room just as Hazen came in.

  Strand stared at him wordlessly as Hazen smiled at him and stamped his feet vigorously to shake the snow off his shoes. He looked the same as always, calm, robust. The expression on Strand’s face made Hazen scowl.

  “You look peculiar, Allen,” he said. “Is anything wrong?”

  “I saw the television program.”

  “Oh, that,” Hazen said lightly. “I thought those dreary men needed a little excitement. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. And I got a few things off my chest that I’ve been thinking for a long time.”

  “Do you know what you’ve done to yourself tonight, Russell?”

  “Don’t worry about me. Nobody takes television seriously, anyway. Let’s not talk about it, please. The whole thing bores me.” He came over to Strand and put an arm around him and gave him a brief hug. “I was hoping you’d still be up. I wanted to talk to someone who was not a lawyer.” He took off his coat and threw it, with his hat, over a chair. “What a miserable night. The drive out in this snow was grim.”

  Strand shook his head as if to clear it. He felt confused, uncertain of himself. If Hazen was so debonair about the evening, perhaps he had overreacted to the television program. He watched television so rarely that it was possible he misjudged its capacity to make or break a man. Maybe, he thought, he had been wrong in despairing for his friend. If Hazen had no fears of the consequences of his speech, he wouldn’t disturb him by voicing his own. “You drove yourself?” he asked.

&n
bsp; Hazen nodded. “I let the chauffeur go for the night. His fiancée came into town and I did my share for young love. Where’re the ladies?”

  “They’re up in their rooms. They’re making an early night of it.”

  Hazen looked at him keenly. “They’re all right, aren’t they?”

  “Fine,” Strand said.

  “Leslie told me about Eleanor’s going back to Georgia. That’s quite a mess down there, isn’t it?”

  “Ugly,” Strand said. “Gianelli’s acting like a fool.”

  “He’s got guts. I admire that.”

  “I admire it a little less than you do,” Strand said dryly.

  “I called the police chief down there and told him he had to put a man on to guard their house. I made it plain to him that if anything happened to those kids I’d have his hide.”

  “I hope it helps.”

  “It better,” Hazen said grimly. “Now, what I need is a drink. How about you?”

  “I’ll join you.” Strand went over to the bar and watched while Hazen poured them two large Scotch and sodas. They carried their drinks back to the fireplace and sat facing each other in the big leather wing-back chairs. Hazen took a long gulp of his drink and sighed contentedly. “Man, I needed this,” he said.

  “The last time we had a drink like this,” Strand said, “the telephone rang and you were gone like a streak. I hope you’ll at least be able to finish your drink before you have to go again.”

  Hazen laughed, a pleasant low rumble. “I’m not going to answer the telephone for a week. I don’t care who’s calling, the Pope, the President of the United States, any one of a dozen assorted lawyers, they’ll have to struggle along without me.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. How’re things going?”

  “So-so.” Hazen stared into his glass. “Nobody’s declared war—yet.”

  “Leslie told me about your wife’s threatening to name her as correspondent.”

  “She’s threatening every woman I’ve said hello to for the last thirty years. She’s digging up graves from Boston to Marseilles. I felt I had to tell Leslie that there was a possibility it would leak. But I told her I didn’t want you to know about it.”

  “We’re on a new policy here,” Strand said. “Full disclosure.”

  “A dangerous experiment.” Hazen peered intently at him. “You don’t believe for one instant…?”

  “Not for one instant,” Strand said. Looking at the powerful, fleshily handsome man in his immaculate clothing Strand could understand why any woman, even his wife, would be attracted to him. Nixon’s Secretary of State Kissinger, in one of his less diplomatic messages, had said when asked about his success with women that power was an aphrodisiac. By any standards Hazen was powerful and certainly by comparison with an ailing, obscure, disabused schoolteacher he must be overwhelming. Love finally could withstand only so much temptation. He wondered just what Hazen had said or done or looked that had made Leslie understand that Hazen had wanted her. Better not to know, he thought.

  “I’ve kept my wife at bay, at least for the moment. The sticking point is this house,” Hazen said. “I’ve agreed to let her strip me of just about everything else, but I have other plans for the house. We’ll see.” Hazen drank thirstily, emptying his glass. He got up and went to the bar and poured himself a second drink, “Oh, by the way,” he said as he came back, “our man in Paris happened to call and I spoke to him about you. He says he thinks it can be easily arranged for next September, when the new school term starts. They have a big turnover in the faculty, people drifting in and out, like the wandering teachers of the Middle Ages. He’ll be getting in touch with you. Do you think you can stand Dunberry for another five months?”

  “I can. I’m not sure Leslie can.”

  “Ummm.” Hazen frowned. “I suppose she could go alone. It would just be a few months.”

  “That’s a possibility. Don’t worry about it. We’ll work something out.”

  “Allen, there’s only one thing wrong, as far as I’m concerned, with you and Leslie,” Hazen said. His tone was earnest and Strand feared what he was going to say.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “When I look at you two, it makes me realize what I’ve missed in my life.” Hazen spoke reflectively, sorrowfully. “The love, spoken, unspoken, intimated, that passes between you. The dependence upon each other, the unwavering support of one for the other. I’ve known many women in my life and I’ve enjoyed most of them and maybe they’ve enjoyed me. I’ve had money, success, a kind of fame, even that very rare thing—occasional gratitude. But I’ve never had anything like that. It’s like a big hole in me that the wind goes howling through—endlessly. If you’re lucky, you’ll both die the same minute. Oh, hell…” He rattled the ice in his glass angrily. “What’s come over me tonight? Talking about dying. It’s the weather. Snow on a seacoast. Maybe people are wise to close down their houses, put the shutters up, when the leaves begin to turn.” He finished his drink, put his glass down deliberately, with a gesture of finality. “I’m tired.” He ran his big hand over his eyes, stood up. “I’m going to treat myself to a long, long sleep. Don’t bother to put out the lights. I don’t want the house to be dark tonight.” He looked around him. “This room could stand a new coat of paint. A lighter color. Well, good night, friend. Sleep well.”

  “Good night, Russell. You, too.” Strand watched him walk heavily out of the room. He stumbled a little as he crossed the threshold and Strand thought, He must have had a lot to drink in New York before he started out, it’s lucky a cop didn’t stop him on the road or he’d have spent the night in jail instead of in his big warm bed. Then he climbed the stairs to the room where Leslie was sleeping, breathing gently, her bright hair spread out on the pillow, shining in the light of the bedside lamp. He undressed silently, put out the lamp and slipped into bed beside his wife.

  Sometime during the night he awoke because in his sleep there had been a noise of an automobile engine starting up, then dwindling in the distance. He wasn’t sure whether he had heard it or if he had been dreaming. He turned over, put his arm around his wife’s bare shoulders, heard her sigh contentedly. Then he slept.

  He awoke early, just as the dawn started to show through the windows. It was still snowing. Leslie slept on. He got out of bed, dressed quickly and started out of the room. He stopped at the door. An envelope was lying on the floor, half under the door. He opened the door silently, picked up the envelope. It was too dark in the hallway to read something that was scrawled on the envelope. He closed the door softly and went downstairs quickly to the living room where the lights still burned and the last ashes were glowing on the hearth. The envelope was a long, fat one and on it was written one word—Allen. He tore it open. Dear Allen, he read in Hazen’s bold, steady script.

  By the time you read this I will be dead. I came here last night to say good-bye to you and wish you happiness. Everything has piled up on me—my wife, the investigation in Washington, Conroy threatening me with blackmail. I’ve been subpoenaed to appear before the Committee on January second. I can’t appear without committing perjury or implicating, criminally, old friends and associates of mine. One way or another I would have no shred of reputation left at the end of it. I’ve figured this out carefully and I am taking the only possible way out. When my will is read it will be discovered that I have left the beach house to Caroline. For good and sufficient reason. To pay for its upkeep, she can sell off several acres of the property. There’s plenty of it—forty acres—and it’s very valuable. All my liquid assets I’ve left to my wife, with the proviso that if she contests any clause in the will she will be completely cut off. My daughters have substantial trust funds my father set up for them when they were born and there’s nothing they can do to break the will. I’m a good lawyer and the will is ironclad. All my pictures have long since been donated to museums with the understanding that they were to remain in my possession during my lifetime. The tax laws make death something of
a morbid game, a game at which I was expert. As I look back at it now I knew how to play too many games—legal, corporate, legislative, philanthropic—the sleazy, profitable American gamut. One of the things that endeared you and Leslie to me most was that you were not entrants in the competition. It wasn’t that you were above it all. It was as though you didn’t realize its existence. It undoubtedly made you a worse historian, but a better man.

  Thoughtlessly and without malice, I involved you and your family in my world. Lonely and bereft of family myself, I believed I could insert myself into a happy family. What I thought was generosity turned out to be disaster. Jimmy learned all too quickly how to succeed. Caroline is on the competitive American merry-go-round, whether she likes it or not. Eleanor and her husband have learned failure and live in fear. I hate to say this, dear Allen, but Leslie’s new career can only push you further apart and uproot you once again. Opportunity is a two-edged weapon. It might have turned out well, but it didn’t. The same might be said in the case of Romero.

  The Renoir drawing in your bedroom was bought after I made the arrangement with the government, and I am happy to be able to leave it to you in the will which is now in my partner’s safe.

  Strand stopped reading for a moment. The enormity of the document in his hand left him numb and the fact that it had been written so carefully, so neatly, by a man preparing to take his life by his own hand made him marvel at the almost inhuman rigor of his friend’s self-control. Along with reading law, Strand thought, Hazen must have read Plato on the death of Socrates. “Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius: will you remember to pay the debt?” A cock for Asclepius. A Renoir for Strand. An antique grace in dying. Famous last words.

  Dry-eyed, Strand continued reading.

  In the smaller envelope, which is enclosed with this letter, there is ten thousand dollars in five hundred dollar bills to help make the Paris adventure more pleasant for you and Leslie. I suggest you do not mention this to anyone.