February 1950
He was not allowed to attend the hearing. There was his age, for one thing, but he knew it was really the reporters. From his bedroom window he could see them every morning when his father left the house. Mr Benjamin, his father’s lawyer, would come for him-it was somehow unthinkable that he should make the short walk down 2nd Street to the Capitol alone-and the minute they were down the steps Nick would see the clusters of hats swooping toward them like birds. There was even a kind of ritual about it now. No one stood in front of the house. Usually they were across the street, or on the corner, drinking coffee from paper cups, exhaling little puffs of steam in the cold February air. Then the front door would open and they would stamp out their cigarettes, suddenly on duty, and surround his father, falling into step with him and Mr Benjamin as if they were joining them for a stroll.
In the beginning there had been photographers, their hats pushed back on their heads as they popped flashbulbs, but now there were just the reporters. No one yelled or pushed. The ritual had turned polite. He could see his father in his long herringbone coat drawing the pack with him as he moved down the street, Mr Benjamin, terrier-like, hurrying to keep up. His father never ignored the reporters. Nick could see him talking-but what did he say? — and nodding his head. Once Nick saw one of them laugh. His father had said the whole thing was a goddam circus, but from up here in the window, watching the hats, it seemed friendly, a gang of boys heading for school. It wasn’t, though. At night, alone in the study, smoking in the light of the desk lamp, his father looked worried.
His mother always left separately. She would busy herself with Nora, arranging the day, then stand in front of the hall mirror, touching her hair, smoothing out her wool skirt, while a cigarette burned in the ashtray on the table where they put the mail. When Nick came downstairs she would look surprised, as if she had forgotten he was in the house, then nervously pick up her lipstick to get ready. Her new dress, with its tight cinched waist and fitted top, seemed designed to hold her upright, every piece of her in place.
“Have they gone?” she said, putting on the lipstick.
“Uh-huh. Dad made one of them laugh.”
Her hand stopped for a minute, then the red tube continued along her lip. “Did he,” she said, blotting her lips, but it wasn’t a question. “Well, I’ll give them another five minutes.”
“They never wait for you, you know,” Nick said. It was one of the things that puzzled him. His mother walked to the hearings alone every day, not even a single straggler from the pack of hats waiting behind to catch her. How did they think she got there?
“They will one day,” she said, picking up her hat. “Right now all they can think about is your father. And his jokes.” She caught the edge in her voice and glanced at him, embarrassed, then went back to the hat.
“There was only one,” Nick said.
“I know,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean- Check the window again, would you? And shouldn’t you be getting ready for school?”
“I am ready,” he said, going over to the window. “I don’t see why I can’t go to the trial.”
“Not again, Nicky, please. And it’s not a trial. For the hundredth time. It’s a hearing. That’s all. A congressional hearing.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Your father’s not a criminal, that’s the difference. He’s not on trial for anything.”
“Everybody acts like he is.”
“What do you mean? Has anyone said anything to you at school?”
Nick shrugged.
“Have they?”
“They said he’s on trial for being a Communist.”
His mother stopped fixing the hat and lowered her hands. “Well, he’s not on trial and he’s not a Communist. So much for what they know. Just don’t listen, okay? It only makes it worse. They’re looking for Communists, so they have to talk to a lot of people in the government, that’s all.”
Nick came back to the mirror, studying them both, as if the world reflected would be his mother’s cheerful dream of before, when all they had to worry about was school gossip.
“They want to hear what he has to say. That’s why it’s called a hearing. There,” she said, pressing the hat like a protective shell. “How do I look?”
Nick smiled. “Beautiful.”
“Oh, you always say that,” she said lightly, glancing at the mirror again and leaning forward. Nick loved to watch her dress, disappearing to the edge of her careful absorption. It was the harmless vanity of a pretty girl who’d been taught that how you looked mattered, that appearance could somehow determine events. She blotted her lips one last time, then noticed his expression. “Honeybun, what’s wrong?”
“Why can’t I hear him too? I’m not a little kid anymore.”
“No,” she said softly, touching the side of his head. “Maybe just to me. But ten isn’t very old either, is it? You don’t want to grow up too fast.”
“Is he going to go to jail?”
She knelt down to face him, holding his shoulders. “No. Look, I know all of this seems confusing. But it’s not about you, do you understand? Just-grownups. Your dad’s fine. You don’t want him to have to worry about you too, do you? It’s-it’s a bad time, that’s all.”
A bad time. Nora, for whom Ireland was always just a memory away, called it troubles. “Before your father’s troubles started,” she would say, as if everything that was happening to them was beyond their control, like the weather. But no one would tell him what it actually was.
“ You go,” he said stubbornly.
“It’s different for me. You’re just a child-it has nothing to do with you. It’s not going to, either. I’m not going to let that happen,” she said, holding his shoulders tightly. “Do you understand?”
He didn’t, but he nodded, surprised at the force of her hands.
“You’ll be late,” Nora said, coming into the hall.
His mother looked up, distracted. “Yes, all right. Come on, honeybun, time for school. It’ll be all right. You’ll see.
“This won’t last much longer, I promise. Then we’ll go up to the cabin and forget all about it. Just us. Would you like that?”
Nick nodded. “You mean out of school?”
“Well, in the spring.”
“Don’t forget you’ve got Father Tim coming over later,” Nora said. “You’ll want to be back. Last time he was halfway through the bottle before you were through the door.”
“Nora,” his mother said, pretending to scold but laughing in spite of herself. “Listen to you. He’s not a drinker.”
“No, the poor are drinkers. The rich just don’t mind if they do.”
“He’s not rich anymore. He’s a priest, for heaven’s sake,” she said, putting on her coat.
“The rich don’t change. Someone else’s bottle, that’s what they like. Maybe that’s why they’re rich. Still, it’s your bottle, and if you don’t mind I’m sure I-”
“Nora, stop babbling. I’ll be back. Coast clear?” She nodded her head toward the window. “How about a kiss, then?” She leaned down to let Nick graze her cheek. “Oh, that’s better. I’m ready for anything now.”
At the door she put on her gloves. “You remember what I said, okay? Don’t listen to the other kids if they start saying things. They don’t know what they’re talking about anyway.”
“It wasn’t the other kids. About Dad. It was Miss Smith.”
“Oh.” His mother stopped, flustered, her shoulders sagging. “Oh, honeybun,” she said, and then, as if she had finally run out of answers, she turned and went out the door.
After that, he didn’t go to school. “At least for a while,” his mother said, still pretending that things were normal. Now, after his parents left, the house would grow still, so quiet that he would tiptoe, listening for the sharp whistle of Nora’s kettle in the kitchen, then the rustle of newspaper as she pored over his father’s troubles with one of her cups of tea. He was supposed to be reading Kidnapped. His mother said he was the right age for it, but after the wicked uncle and the broken stairs in the dark it all got confusing-Whigs and Jacobites, and you didn’t know whose side you were supposed to be on. It made no more sense than the papers. His father was a New Dealer but not a Communist, and not a Republican either, according to Nora. Then why was he on trial? Some terrible woman had said he was a spy, but you only had to look at her, all made up the way she was, to know she was lying. And a Catholic too, which made things worse. It was the Jews who loved Russia, not people like his father, even though she’d hate to think how long it had been since he’d seen the inside of a church. Still. And the things they said. But when Nick asked her to see the newspapers himself, she’d refuse. His mother wouldn’t like it.
So he sat in the deep club chair in the living room, pretending to read but listening instead. While Nora had her tea there was no sound but the ticking of the ormolu clock. Soon, however, he’d hear the scraping of a chair in the kitchen, then the heavy steps in the hall as Nora came to peek in before she began her chores. Nick would turn a page, his head bent to the book he wasn’t reading until he felt her slip out of the doorway and head upstairs. After another few minutes, the vacuum would start with a roar and he could go. He would race down the back kitchen stairs, careful not to hit the creaky fourth step, and get the newspaper from behind the bread box, where Nora always hid it. Then, one ear still alert to the vacuum, he would read about the trial. KOTLAR DENIES ALLEGATIONS. COMMITTEE THREATENS CONTEMPT. MUNDT SET TO CALL ACHESON. NEW KOTLAR TESTIMONY. It always gave him an odd sensation to see his name in print. His eye would flash down the column, “Kotlar” leaping out as if it were in boldface, not just another word in a blur of type. But it was Kidnapped all over again. Whigs and Jacobites.
The newspapers became part of the spy game. The point at first was to see how many rooms he could visit without Nora’s knowing-from the kitchen up to his father’s study, then past the bedroom where she was working (this was the best part) to his mother’s dressing room, then back down the stairs (carefully now, the vacuum having gone silent) and into the club chair with the open book before she appeared again. Not that she would have cared if he’d left the room-it was just the game. Stuck in the house, cocooned against the cold outside that kept promising snow, he learned its secrets, the noisy parts, the bad floorboards, as if they were bits of Braille. He could even spy on Nora, watching through the crack in the door, crouching halfway down the stairs, until he felt he could roam the house at will, invisible. His father, he knew, could never have done this. You always knew where he was, clunking down the hall to the bathroom at night, all his weight on his heels. His mother said you could feel him a block away. It was Nick who knew how to spy. He could stand absolutely still, like one of those movie submarines with the motors off, on sonar silence, waiting to hear something.
Then one day, by accident, he finally saw his father at the hearing. Nora had taken him downtown to the movies, a My Friend Irma picture with Martin and Lewis. She crossed herself when the newsreel began with the Holy Year in Rome, long lines of pilgrims forming at the churches, some from Germany, some even from as far away as America. A crowded open-air mass. A year of new hope for a century half old. Fireworks exploded over St Peter’s. Then, abruptly, the newsreel shifted to Washington, and the announcer’s voice turned grim.
“A different kind of fireworks on Capitol Hill, as the House Committee on Un-American Activities and combative congressman Kenneth Welles continued the probe into Communist subversion in our State Department. In the box again, Undersecretary Walter Kotlar, named by Soviet spy Rosemary Cochrane as one of the members of an alleged Washington ring.”
He felt Nora move beside him and covered her hand to keep her still as the screen filled with his father walking down a corridor to the hearing room, wearing the familiar hat and herringbone coat. The reporters were more animated now, battering him with questions, as if they had finally thawed out from their morning vigil in the cold. Then he was seated at a polished table, several microphones in front of him, facing a long dais filled with men in suits who kept turning to whisper to aides who sat behind them like shadows, away from the lights.
The man at the center, surprisingly young, was taller than the others, with a thick football player’s neck bursting out of a suit that stretched across his wide shoulders like a padded uniform.
“Mr Kotlar, in 1945 you were a member of the American delegation that attended the Yalta Conference, were you not?”
“Yes.”
“In that capacity did you offer views on the political future of the countries of Eastern Europe?”
“No. My views were not solicited.”
“But you are Czechoslovakian, are you not?”
“No, sir, I am an American.”
“Well, Mr Kotlar, that’s fine. I meant by origin. Would you tell the committee where you were born?”
“I was born in what was then Bohemia and is now part of Czechoslovakia,” Nick’s father said, but the carefulness of his answer had the odd effect of making him seem evasive. “I came to this country when I was four years old.”
“But you speak Czechoslovakian?”
Nick’s father allowed the trace of a smile. “Czech? No.” But this wasn’t true. Nick remembered his grandmother talking in her kitchen, his father nodding his head at the incomprehensible words. “I know a few words,” his father continued. “Certainly not enough to use the language in any official capacity. I know a little French, too.”
This seemed to annoy the Congressman. “This committee isn’t interested in your knowledge of French, Mr Kotlar. Is it not true that as a member of the Yalta delegation, you had access to information the Russians considered very valuable?”
“No. I was there strictly as an adviser on Lend-Lease and postwar aid programs. My information wasn’t classified-it was available to everyone.”
Welles looked the way Miss Smith did when someone in class was being fresh. “That remains to be seen, Mr Kotlar,” he said. “That remains to be seen.” He paused, pretending to consult a paper but really, Nick knew, just allowing his words to hang in the air. “Lend-Lease. We’ve all heard about your generosity during the war. But after the war, you went right on being generous, didn’t you? Isn’t it true you wanted to give Marshall Plan aid to Czechoslovakia?”
“The United States Government offered the Marshall Plan to all European countries.”
“Maybe it would be more accurate to say that certain officials of the United States Government offered that aid. Officials like yourself. Or maybe you disagreed. Did you feel that such an offer was in the best interests of the United States?”
“It must have been. They turned us down.”
This time there was real laughter, and Congressman Welles, leaning into the microphone, was forced to talk over it, so that when it stopped he seemed to be shouting. “May I remind our visitors that this is a congressional hearing?” There were a few flashbulbs. “Mr Kotlar, you may consider this a laughing matter. I assure you, the American people do not. Now, this aid you were so eager to hand out. A little money for the old country-even if it was now a vassal state of the Soviet empire.”
“I think you have your chronology slightly confused, Congressman. At the time of the offer, Czechoslovakia was a democracy, and President Benes was eager to participate. Subsequently, of course, they declined.”
Nick lost his father halfway through-it was Whigs and Jacobites again, too mixed up to sort out-and he could tell the audience wasn’t really following either. They could hear only the rhythm of Welles’s interrogation, the slow build and rising pitch that seemed to hammer his father into his chair. The momentum of it, not the words, became the accusation. The Congressman was so sure-he must know. It didn’t really matter what he said, so long as the voice rushed along, gathering speed.
“Round two,” the voice-over said, introducing another film clip. “And this time nobody was pulling any punches.”
“Mr Kotlar, I’m sure we’ve all been grateful for the history lessons. Unfortunately, anyone who changes positions as often as you do is bound to make things a little confusing for the rest of us. So let’s see if we can find out what you really think. I’d like to talk again about your background, if I may?” Welles swiveled his head to the other men at the long table, who nodded automatically, absorbed in the drama of where he might be going. “You are, I believe, a graduate of the Harvard Law School?”
For a minute Nick’s father didn’t respond, as if the question were so unexpected it must be a trick. “That’s correct.”
“And can you tell us what you did next? Did you join a firm or hang out your own shingle or what?”
“I came to Washington to work for the Government.”
“That would be, let’s see-1934. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“Of course, jobs were tight then, so I guess government work was pretty popular,” Welles said, suddenly folksy and reminiscent. “Kinda the patriotic thing to do in 1934. Yes, sir, they used to say the Harvard Law School ran a regular bus service down here right after graduation.” This play to the gallery had the expected effect, and Welles, smiling slyly, waited for the laughter to subside. Then he looked back at Nick’s father. “But you didn’t come right away, did you?”
Nick’s father looked at him blankly, saying nothing.
“Mr Kotlar, is it not a fact that after Harvard Law School you offered your services to the United Mine Workers union during their illegal strike?”
“It was not an illegal strike.”
“Just answer the question,” Welles shot back. “Did you work for the UMW?”
“Yes.”
“And how much were you paid for this work?”
“It was unpaid.”
“Unpaid. Free, you mean. Well now, I’m just a country lawyer-I didn’t go to the Harvard Law School. They usually work for free up there? Or just the labor agitators?”
He rushed on, not waiting for Nick’s father to reply. “The Party often ask you to do union work, Mr Kotlar?”
“No,” his father said quietly.
“No.” Welles paused. “They had other plans for you. Washington plans. Seems a shame, considering. The strike went pretty well from their point of view, wouldn’t you say?”
“I wouldn’t know. I wasn’t working for the Communist Party.”
“No. Just the miners. Out of the goodness of your heart. What made them so special, I wonder. To work free of charge.”
Nick’s father waited, drawing the room to his side of the table, then let his lips form the hint of a smile. “My father was a coal miner. He asked me to help. I didn’t think I could refuse.”
There was a slight pause and then the room buzzed. Welles, visibly surprised and annoyed, covered the microphone with his hand and turned to an aide. The other members of the committee began to talk too, as if by looking away Welles had given them all a brief recess. When he turned back to the mike, the room grew still, expectant.
“I’m sure the members of the committee all appreciate a son’s devotion, Mr Kotlar,” he said, reaching again for sarcasm. But the momentum had gone. Nick wasn’t sure what had happened, but his father was sitting up straighter, no longer letting his shoulders hunch in self-protection. “Perhaps they’d also appreciate hearing that you didn’t confine yourself to legal services in that strike. It says here that the picket line at the Trousdale Colliery got pretty violent. You were arrested, were you not?”
“No. There was a scuffle with the company guards, that’s all. No arrests.”
“Mr Kotlar, we’re not talking about a speeding ticket here. Do you deny there was a violent incident in which you took part?”
“I don’t deny there was a fight. I deny I took part in it.”
“Oh? What were you doing?”
“I was trying to stay out of the way.”
Now there was real laughter, a wave that passed through the room, gathering force until it spilled onto Welles’s table, breaking as it hit his angry face.
“Mr Kotlar,” he said loudly, “I think I’ve had enough. I’ve had enough impertinence. This committee is charged with the serious business-the very serious business — of investigating Communist activities in this country. I’ve had enough of your Harvard Law School evasions. And I think the American people have had enough of high-handed boys who use their tax dollars while they sell this country down the river. You go ahead and laugh. But that was no scuffle, and you are no loyal American. When I look at your testimony start to finish, I see nothing less than an attempt to deceive this committee and this great country. Well, we’re not going to be deceived. This committee is here to look at un-American activities. In your case, I think the people of this country are going to be grateful we did.”
“Congressman,” Nick’s father said, his voice tight with scorn, “the only un-American activity I’ve seen is taking place right here in this committee room. I hope the people see that too.”
Another clip, the announcer’s voice more excited now. “But the sparring match drew to a close as Congressman Welles zeroed in on the sensational Cochrane testimony.” The clip must have been from another day, because his father was wearing a different suit, the gray double-breasted one Nick’s mother said made him look heavier.
“Mr Kotlar, Rosemary Cochrane testified that on several occasions she received government documents from you in her role as a courier for a Russian undercover operation.” The Congressman paused. “Do you recall that testimony?”
“Vividly.”
“And you denied these charges. In fact, you denied ever having met her, is that correct?”
“To the best of my knowledge, I have never met her.”
“To the best of your knowledge?”
“I am trying to be precise. I may have encountered her without my knowing it. Certainly I have no memory of having done so.”
“Is that your way of saying no?” Welles said. “Do I have to remind you that you’re under oath?”
Nick’s father managed a wry smile. “No, you don’t have to remind me.”
“Mr Kotlar, have you ever shopped at Garfinkel’s department store?”
For a moment Nick’s father looked blank. “I’m sorry. What?”
“Have you ever shopped at Garfinkel’s department store? The big store down on 14th Street. You’re familiar with Garfinkel’s?”
“Yes. I suppose so.”
“Shirts? Ever buy shirts there?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You don’t remember. Now how could that be?”
“My wife usually does the shopping.”
The camera moved to take in Nick’s mother, sitting rigidly at the edge of the row behind, her eyes blinking in the unfamiliar light.
Nick felt Nora squirm beside him. “That’s it,” she whispered urgently. “We’re going.”
“No, when it’s over,” Nick said firmly, not moving his head. “I want to see.”
Congressman Welles was talking again. “But I suppose once in a while you find time in your busy schedule to shop for yourself?”
“Yes.”
“And you never bought shirts from Miss Cochrane?”
“Was she the salesgirl? I don’t remember.”
“She remembers you, Mr Kotlar. She remembers receiving envelopes from you during these little shopping trips. Does that refresh your memory?”
“She is mistaken.”
“She even remembers your size. Fifteen and a half, thirty-three. Can you at least remember that for the committee? That your size?”
His father smiled. “I prefer a thirty-five,” he said. “A longer sleeve.”
“A longer sleeve,” Welles repeated sarcastically. “Maybe you’re still growing. You’d better watch your nose then. They say it gets longer every time you tell a lie.”
“I’m watching yours too, Congressman.”
More laughter, and this time Nick got the joke. He remembered Pinocchio, the sick feeling in his stomach when the boy went to Donkey Island and couldn’t get back. He felt it now again, that dread, being scared while everyone around him was having a good time. But his father didn’t look scared. His smooth, lean face was calm, as if he knew it was all just a movie.
“And so this week’s round ends in a draw,” the announcer was saying, “as both sides retire to their corners to come back to fight another day.”
But it wasn’t a boxing match, it was a trial, and Welles was the only fighter who came back in the last clip, surrounded by hand-held microphones on the windy Capitol steps.
“I don’t think there can be a doubt in anyone’s mind that this country is under attack,” he said, his face grave, looking straight at the camera. “These people are using lies and tricks the same way their comrades overseas are using tanks and machine guns to undermine the free world. We saw it in the Hiss case and we’re seeing it again here. Walter Kotlar is a Communist and he’s going to lose his shirt-no matter what size he says it is.”
Then all at once the screen brightened, flooded with Florida sun as the newsreel switched to water-skiing formations in Cypress Gardens. Nick blinked in the light. A man and woman in bathing suits were receiving crowns. After a rooster crowed to end the newsreel, the screen went dark. Nick watched the curtain close, then open again to start the feature, but he was no longer paying attention to any of it. Nora laughed at some of the movie, but Nick was thinking about the newsreel and missed the point of the jokes and then had to pretend to laugh when everyone else did. He could still see Welles’s wide linebacker’s face, eyes peering out as if he thought he could make you squirm just by looking hard enough. He was like one of those guys who kept poking you in the chest until you had to fight. But every time Nick’s father hit back, he’d get madder. He’d never stop now. The newsreel must be a few days old. Nick wondered what had happened since.
After the movie, on the street, Nora was uneasy. “Don’t tell your mother. She wouldn’t like it.”
“I won’t.”
“He’s a wicked man, the Senator.”
“He’s not a senator.”
“Well, whatever he is.” She sighed, then brightened. “Still, I’ll say this for your father. He gave as good as he got.”
Nick looked up at her. “No, he didn’t,” he said.
Nick could see the Capitol dome from his window if he craned his head to the left, but when he lay in the bed, facing straight ahead, everything disappeared except the tree branches, thin and brittle now in the cold. In the faint light from the street they quivered when the wind shook them, too stiff to bend. Downstairs the dinner party was still going on. Nick could hear the voices rising up through the floorboards, his mother’s occasional laugh. Earlier she had been nervous, her red fingernails brushing over ashtrays as she rearranged things on tables, moving the flower vase twice before it seemed right. Then the doorbell, Nick helping with the coats in the hall, the cocktails and the clink of ice cubes, his polite farewells as they finally went in to dinner, his mother’s promise to be up later as she touched his cheek goodnight, the air around her warm with smoke and perfume. He had listened on the stairs for a while, straining to make out words in the familiar hum, then come up to bed, lying here watching the branches and waiting. She always looked in while the coffee was being served. But it was his father who came. Nick saw the shadow first against the window, then turned to see him standing in the doorway, taller than he’d been in the newsreel.
“Nicku, you still up?”
“Uh-huh. Where’s Mom?”
His father came over and sat on the edge of the bed, moving the covers up under Nick’s chin. Nick caught the faint whiff of aftershave. “She and Father Tim are going over old times again. You know what that’s like.”
Nick smiled. “They’re not even old.”
“Well, they used to be younger. Anyway, your mother enjoys it. Father Tim’s good for her that way.”
“Does he hear her confession?”
“Tim?” His father laughed. “I don’t think Tim has time for church business. He’s what we call a dinner priest-here’s a story and pass the port.”
“Nora says you don’t like priests. She says you’re anticlerical,” Nick said, trying out the word.
“She’d better watch out or I’ll get anti-Nora.”
“So why does he come here, if you’re-”
“Well, he doesn’t come for me. He and your mother go back a long way. Since they were your age. To tell you the truth, I think he was sweet on her.”
“Dad. He’s a priest.”
“Lucky for us, huh?” his father said, gently brushing the hair off Nick’s forehead. “How about some sleep?”
“When Grandma talks to you sometimes, what language is that?”
“Czech. You know that.”
“Like when you say Nicku?”
“Uh-huh. If you put a u on the end of a name, it’s a way of showing affection. Sort of a Nick-name.”
“Dad.”
“Why do you ask?”
“You told the man you didn’t speak Czech.”
“What man?” he said, his hand stopping on Nick’s forehead.
“The man at the hearing. I saw you in a newsreel today.”
“You did, huh?” But Nick could tell his father was stalling, not sure what to say. “What did you think?”
“ Do you speak it?”
Nick’s father sat up. “Not in the way he meant. A few words. Half the time I don’t know what Grandma’s saying. Why? Did you think I wasn’t telling the truth?”
Nick shrugged. “No.” He paused. “Why did he want to know that, anyway?”
“He wanted to make people think I was foreign. Some people don’t like foreigners. They’re afraid, I guess. But let’s not worry about it, okay? It’s just politics. It’s his way of running for office, that’s all.”
“I hope he loses.”
His father smiled. “So do I, Nick. Maybe we’ll get Father Tim to send up a few prayers, what do you say? If we can get him out the door. Now, how about some sleep?” But he stayed on the bed, looking at Nick. “Does it bother you, all this business?”
“Why did that woman say she knew you if she didn’t?”
“I don’t know, Nick,” his father said, slumping a little so the light caught the shiny waves of his hair. “I don’t know. Maybe she thought she did. Maybe she met me someplace and decided she didn’t like me for some reason. Maybe she’s crazy-you know, the way people make things up? Like when you’re afraid of the dark-you think there’s someone there even when there isn’t. Well, everybody’s afraid of the dark now. So they keep seeing things.”
“Grownups aren’t afraid of the dark.”
“It’s an expression. I mean afraid in general. They’re afraid of all kinds of things, so they keep seeing bogeymen everywhere. I know it doesn’t make a lot of sense, Nick. Maybe you can’t explain a bogeyman-he’s just there.”
“Communists, you mean.”
His father nodded. “That’s who it is now. Maybe next week it’ll be something else.”
Nick said nothing, thinking.
“Not much help, is it?” his father said. “I don’t have an explanation, Nick.”
“Are they going to stop?”
“They can’t-not yet.” His voice had begun to drift, away from Nick to some private conversation. “Sometimes I think it was the war. We got into the habit of having enemies. That’s a hard habit to break. After a while, you don’t know any other way to think. And one day it’s over and they turn on all the lights again and expect things to go back to the way they were, but nobody knows how to stop. They’re used to it. They have to get new enemies. It’s the way things make sense to them.”
“For always?” Nick said.
His question brought his father back. “No,” he said, “things change. That’s why we need people like you,” he added, his voice lighter now. He pulled up the covers again. “Who weren’t there. Who don’t even remember it. It’ll be different for you. What’s going on now-” His voice lifted, like a verbal wave of the hand. “You’ll forget that too. It’ll just be history.” He paused. “Just a bad dream.”
“It’s not a dream now,” Nick said quietly. “I saw it.”
His father looked at him, stalling again. “No,” he said, “not now.” Then he tapped Nick’s forehead with his finger. “You’re a pragmatist, Nick. That’s what you are.”
“What’s that?”
“Oh, someone who keeps his eye on the ball. Feet on the ground. You know. Not like someone else we know, huh?” he said, pointing to himself.
“Mom says I’m like you. Aren’t you a pragmatist?” Nick said, getting it right.
“Sure. Not as good as you, though. You’ll have to help me out, okay? Keep me on my toes.”
Nick nodded, but he knew, with the same dread he’d felt in the movies, there was nothing he could do to help. His father was just trying to make him feel better-a different land of lie, like pretending he wasn’t worried, pretending it was all going to go away.
“That’s the thing about history anyway,” his father said. “You still have to live through it. Before you know how it’s going to come out. So you keep me on my toes. Of course, to do that you have to grow, and to do that — ”
“I know. Sleep. But Dad-”
“Ssh. No more. We’ll talk tomorrow. It’s supposed to snow, you know. I’ll bet it’s already snowing up at the cabin. Wind blowing it all over the place. Swoosh.” His father leaned over and made a wind sound in his ear, tickling him and making him burrow deeper under the covers. It was their old game, from when he was little. “Here it comes, down the chimney.” He made another wind sound. “But we don’t care, do we? We’ll just stay warm and cozy.” His father always said that.
“Snug as a bug in a rug,” Nick said, as he always did.
“That’s right,” his father said softly. “Snug as a bug in a rug.”
“Dad? If it snows, will you have to go to the hearing?”
His father smiled. “I think Mr Welles would insist. No snow days for him.”
“Don’t go,” Nick said, his voice suddenly urgent. “He’s trying to get you. I saw him.”
“Ssh. Don’t worry, he won’t. He’s only a bogeyman, and they never get anybody. We make them up, remember?” he said playfully. Then, seeing Nick’s solemn face, he nodded. “I know. I’ll be careful. This one’s really there.” He stood up, smoothing the covers. “He made himself up, I guess. Some world, isn’t it? All he used to be was a dumb cluck from Oklahoma.”
“Walter?” his mother said from the doorway. “Larry’s here. Nick, are you still up?”
“We’ve been going over my defense strategy,” Nick’s father said. “We’re hoping for a snow day.”
“Walter,” his mother said, shooting him a glance.
“Uncle Larry’s here?” Nick said, starting to get up. “Where?”
“Not tonight, kiddo,” his father said. “It’s late.”
Larry wasn’t really his uncle. His father had met him in college — over the serving line in the dining hall, according to the family story, when Nick’s father was dishing out food to work his way through Penn and Larry, nursing a hangover, tipped a tray onto his father’s white jacket without knowing it. His father used to joke that they never changed-he kept working behind the line and Larry kept getting things handed to him on a platter, indifferent to spills. In Washington it had been the dining hall all over again. His father worked long hours in the agencies; Larry moved his tray all the way to the White House, where, his father said, he was one of the fair-haired policy boys. His hair in fact was fair, a bright ginger that reminded Nick of Van Johnson, and he had the same open face and easy smile. When he took Nick and his mother to see the White House one day-even upstairs, since the President was away-he moved through the rooms as if they were his, kidding with the secretaries, who waited for his grin, an effortless seduction. It’s easy to be charming, his father said, when your family owns half of Philadelphia, but in fact he couldn’t resist it either. He was different with Larry-easy and comfortable, the way people were when their jokes are too old for anyone else to remember. But Larry hadn’t been to the house for weeks, and it was late to call. Nick wondered what was wrong.
“He’s in the study,” his mother said. “Go ahead. I’ll take care of the others. The Kittredges look as if they’re settling in for the night.” Nick heard the laugh in her voice, the way she used to be at parties. So maybe it was all right. “Night, Nick,” she said, blowing him a kiss. She pulled the door behind her but left it half open, so that Nick could see them starting down the stairs, their heads together.
He didn’t wait. When he heard the click of her heels on the landing, he slid out of bed and darted into the hall. He peered over the banister, watching his mother’s skirt swish down the next flight of stairs, then tiptoed down to the second floor. He waited until his father’s back disappeared into the study before he crept along the wall, angling himself at the open door to see through the crack. Uncle Larry was still wearing his topcoat, as if he didn’t mean to stay.
“Long time no see, Larry.”
“Sorry. I couldn’t get away,” Larry said quickly. “We’re redoing the speech.”
“I didn’t mean the dinner. It’s been a while,” his father said, moving out of Nick’s line of vision. “Want a drink?”
“No. I can’t stay.”
“Don’t worry. Nobody saw you. The reporters don’t show up until morning.”
“For Christ’s sake, Walter.” Larry looked over toward his father, then dropped his hat on the leather couch. “All right. Maybe a short one,” he said, taking off his coat.
Nick heard his father pour the drink at the sideboard. “Good. I thought maybe I’d reached the leper stage. Have I?”
Larry glanced up sharply. “No. But you’re not making any friends in there either, Walter. You’ve got to stop fighting with him.”
“I can’t help it,” his father said, coming back into view and handing Larry a glass. “He’s a moron.”
“He’s a moron who’s getting headlines. He’s got nothing going for him but a district full of dust farms and a bunch of Indians who don’t vote, and you’re making him a national figure. How smart is that? Come on, Walter, you know how it works. You’re not exactly new in town.”
“The town’s changed.”
“The town never changes,” Larry said evenly. “Never. You just got on the wrong side of it.”
“That the view from the East Lawn these days?” his father said. “Okay. Withdrawn. Cheers.” He took a sip of his drink, then paused. “You don’t know what it’s like,” he said quietly.
“I’m sorry I missed the party,” Larry said. “How’s Livia?”
“I need your help, Larry,” his father said, ignoring the question.
For a minute neither of them said anything.
“I can’t get involved with the case, Walter. You know that. We don’t go near the Hill these days. Christ, we don’t even cross the street. Everybody’s too busy ducking under the table.”
His father nodded with a small smile. “So I heard. They’re starting to get lonely over at State.”
“State’s like sick bay-everybody’s afraid they’ll catch something. Anyway, you’ve already got Benjamin. He’s the best lawyer in town for this.”
“Devoted as he is to lost causes,” his father said, taking a drink.
“You’re not going to lose. Just stop fighting with Welles. He’s on a fishing expedition and you keep biting. He hasn’t got anything, so he’s trying to nail you for contempt.”
“How do you know he hasn’t got anything?”
Larry looked at him. “Because he never does,” he said, tossing back his drink. “Because I know you. The Mine Workers, for Christ’s sake. What’s next, the fucking Red Cross? He hasn’t got a thing, Walter.” He paused. “If he did we’d have heard about it.” He turned and started walking, a courtroom pace. “One witness who doesn’t even look stable. You see the way she twists her handkerchief? If this were a real trial, Benjamin would discredit her in two minutes. Two minutes.”
“Then I guess I don’t have a thing to worry about,” his father said easily. He leaned against the edge of the desk, looking down at his glass. “Nick wonders why she’s saying these things. I’ll bet he’s not the only one.”
Nick started at the sound of his name, as if they’d caught him and were drawing him into the room.
“Who knows?” Larry said. “Maybe Welles is screwing her. She wouldn’t be the first. Maybe she’s doing it for love. She looks the type. The point is, it doesn’t matter. All she’s got is some cockamamie story about shirts. Shirts. Christ, where do they get this stuff? Anyway, forget her. This is about Welles, not her. Welles doesn’t know what to do with her either. Just keep your eye on him.”
His father smiled, still looking down. “That’s what Nick said too.”
Larry stopped, disconcerted, then walked over to the sideboard to put his glass down. “Well, do it then. All you’ve got to do is keep your head, Walter. It’s her word against yours, and yours still counts for something in this town.”
“Let’s not kid ourselves, Larry,” his father said slowly. “I’m finished in this town. That’s why I need your help.”
In the quiet Nick could hear the sounds from downstairs, the indistinct voices and clinks of coffee spoons.
“Walter, I-”
“Don’t worry, it won’t cost you anything. I don’t want a lawyer. Just some advice. Advice used to be cheap.” He got up and walked over to the window, out of Nick’s sight.
“You’re a behind-the-scenes guy. It’s your specialty, isn’t it? I need someone like that now.”
“To do what?”
“To make a deal with the committee.”
“You don’t want to do that,” Larry said carefully.
“I have to. It’s going to get worse.”
The room was quiet again.
“What do you mean?” Larry finally said. “Look, Walter, if you’re trying to tell me something, don’t. I’m not your lawyer. Anything we say-it’s not privileged. You know that.”
His father came back into view, his face slightly surprised. “You don’t have to tell me that, Larry,” he said gently. “What’s the matter? Do you think I’m a Communist? You too?”
“It doesn’t matter. I don’t want to know. I mean it. Not any of it. I don’t want to know what you joined or who your pals were.”
“Larry-”
Larry held up his hand. “No. Listen to me. I don’t care if you organized the whole goddam dining hall or had a drink with Uncle Joe at Yalta. Things were different then. Was it innocent? There is no such thing now. They can twist anything. I can’t know. What if they call me too? They could. I’m an old friend. I don’t want to be used against you.”
“No,” his father said after a minute, nodding to himself. “Not to mention tarred with the same brush.”
“That’s right,” Larry said quickly, embarrassed. “Not to mention. This isn’t just happening to you.”
His father looked up. “You don’t have to tell me that either, Larry. You don’t have a wife who wonders why nobody calls her anymore or a kid who can’t go to school without hearing his father’s a criminal. I know it’s happening to all of us. But I’m the one getting beaten up every day. This isn’t a trial-I’m already guilty. I’m a Communist whether I am or not. What’s the point of going on with it? How do I win?”
“You don’t win. You just don’t lose it.”
“No, they lose. Everybody who comes near me. Just by being around. Even old friends,” he said, with a wave of his hand. “It’s enough. I don’t want to go on being a punching bag just to get Welles elected.”
“You don’t have a choice, Walter,” Larry said slowly. “And if you handle this right, he won’t get elected. He thinks he’s Nixon, but he’s not that good. He’s still looking for a pumpkin, and he’s not going to find one. All you have to do is let it play itself out.”
“Forget the politics for a minute, will you? This isn’t about politics.”
“Yes it is,” Larry said calmly.
“My God, how you love all this,” his father said, then turned away.
Larry looked up to answer, then seemed to change his mind and took out a cigarette. “Nobody loves this. Not this. It’s getting in the way.”
“Of what? Business as usual?” Nick’s father said, still sarcastic, handing Larry a lighter.
Larry nodded. “Nothing moves now. We’re paralyzed until we get him to run out of steam. Maybe it stops with you, Walter. Who knows?”
“Well, that would be nice. Meanwhile, I’m the one being run out of town.” A roar of laughter came up from the first floor, a party sound, and his father smiled involuntarily. “All evidence to the contrary aside.”
Larry smiled back and raised his glass appreciatively. His father, seeming agitated, started pacing across the room. “Look, do you think I like asking for help? I’m drowning. That’s what it feels like. Sometimes I think we’re all going to go under if it doesn’t stop.” He paused. “I’m not asking you to lie for me. Or tell the truth, for that matter. I don’t want you to testify. I just want you to run a little interference, that’s all.”
“We don’t make deals with the committee, Walter.”
“That’s right, I forgot. Everyone’s ducking under the table.”
Larry shrugged. “Anyway, what have you got to trade? Twenty names at State? That’s about the going price these days, if you had them. Which you don’t.”
“Marked down from twenty pieces of silver,” his father said.
Larry said nothing.
“I’m going to resign. That’s what Welles wants-let’s give it to him. He can take credit for hounding another Red out of the State Department. Cleaning out the stables. Without having to go to the bother of proving anything. Since he can’t, that should put him ahead. I’ll deny it, but it won’t matter. Even the people who don’t believe it believe it a little. We finish out the hearing in closed session-no more cameras. I don’t want my kid seeing me in the movies again, ever. Not a bad cover for the committee either. People will think they really had something. The republic’ll be safe and I’ll be out of this. End of the drama.”
Outside the door, Nick stood still in disbelief. His father always told him never to give up. Why would he walk away from a fight? He wanted to push the door wide open, tell him that he didn’t mind the newsreel or what people said, any of it. Instead, there was only the prickling feeling of dread again. Where would they go?
For a minute Larry was quiet. “You’re out of your mind,” he said finally.
“No, I’m not. It’s the way it makes sense.”
“Do you think Welles gives a rat’s ass whether you’re a Communist or not? The only Red he’s ever seen had feathers coming out of his head. No cameras. That’s what he’s doing this for. Once they turn the lights off, he’s gone. And right now, all he’s got is you. No one else to call. The girl didn’t give them any names. How they tricked her into naming you, I don’t know, but it won’t work again. You’ve seen her up there-she never expected any of this to happen. She’s not the Bentley type. You’re the end of the road as far as Welles is concerned. He’s not going to trade you for some musical chairs over at State. You’re all he’s got.”
“Do you know this?”
Larry shrugged. “Nobody keeps a secret in this town. Believe me, his in-box is empty. She’s not giving him anything. She can’t even prove what she said about herself. At this point, he’d be lucky to make the charges stick against her.”
“She confessed.”
“If you believe her. Maybe she did Judge Crater too. People confess to anything-they like the spotlight. That doesn’t make it true. Even Welles is nervous about her. The louder he gets, the less he has to say.”
“Then he ought to jump at this.”
“He won’t. Listen to me, Walter. There is no deal here. Welles is too dumb to make one and you’re too smart. You don’t have to give him anything-you just have to stop fighting with him. If he can’t cite you for contempt, he’ll walk away with nothing.”
Nick heard his father sigh. “What’s the difference, Larry? I’m going to have to resign anyway. I keep waiting for the phone call. No, it’ll be a meeting, I suppose. Acheson’s office. Just the two of us. Nothing personal. Better under the circumstances-Christ, I’ve already been through it. Why not get something for it? A little peace of mind at least.”
“If you do that now, it’s as good as an admission, Walter. We can’t have that.”
Nick’s father raised his eyebrows in surprise. “We?”
“You’d be a political liability.”
For a moment they stared at each other, a silent conversation, then Nick’s father leaned against the desk again. “I don’t care, Larry. I’m going to resign.”
“No, it’s not going to happen that way,” Larry said, his voice low and steady, as if he were explaining something to a child. “He’s going to shout and you’re going to be polite. Nothing will happen. You’ll be the loyal American you always were-maybe a little foolish and idealistic, but nothing worse. One of the good guys. She-let’s say she was confused, maybe a nut case, anyway confused.”
Larry moved toward the desk, as if he were adjusting the sights of his words, taking aim. “In the spring, two, three months from now, you resign quietly. All that time in the limelight-well, it would make anyone shy. You want the quiet life. The administration regrets. It’s a pity reckless accusations are driving talented men out of public life. Or maybe nothing has to be said-no one notices. They’ve moved on. By the time the elections roll around in the fall, you’re not even a memory and Welles is out on the stump with a different fight on his hands. Nobody’s soft on Communism. Nobody’s been embarrassed.”
Again, an awful stillness in the room.
“It’s been decided, then,” Nick’s father said softly.
“It’s been discussed.”
And then Nick saw, without knowing why, that it was over, like a tennis game.
“They don’t pay you enough, Larry,” his father said finally, now slumped against the desk.
Larry looked at him, and let it pass. “This one’s for free, Walter. I’m on your side, believe me.”
“I do, Larry. That’s the funny part. Well,” he said, standing up and straightening, the way he did when he walked over to the net to shake hands, a good sport, “so I get to make a deal after all. What’s in this one for me?”
“You’ve got to think about your future, Walter. What are you going to do after?”
“With my land of resume, you mean.”
“It never hurts to have friends,” Larry said quietly.
Nick’s father nodded. “Thanks for explaining everything so clearly.”
“Don’t, Walter. I’m not the bad guy. I’m trying to help. It’s a lousy time.”
“I know,” his father said, his voice suddenly deflated. “I know.” He stood for a minute lost in thought. “Maybe there aren’t any bad guys anymore.”
“Yes, there are. They’re in that committee room.” He walked over to the couch and picked up his coat. “Look, I’ve got to go. You all right?” Nick’s father nodded. “Play it smart, Walter, okay?”
His father looked at him, then broke the stare and went over and put a hand on Larry’s shoulder. “Come say hello to Livia.”
“I can’t. I’m late. Give her my love, will you?”
“Late for what?” his father said lightly. “You seeing somebody these days?”
“I’m seeing everybody.”
“Nothing changes, does it?”
Larry shrugged. “It doesn’t mean anything. You got the only one worth having.”
His father dropped his hand. “Luck.”
“You’re still lucky,” Larry said, putting on his coat. He stopped and looked at him. “Just play it smart.”
Larry turned toward the door and Nick took a step down the hall, out of sight.
“I’ll see myself out,” Larry said. “You’d better go break up the party before the neighbors start complaining.”
“Don’t be a stranger,” Nick heard his father say.
Larry’s voice was cheerful again, Van Johnson. “Not me,” he said.
He opened the door suddenly, before Nick could race up the stairs, and stood for a second with his hand on the knob, looking at Nick with surprise. Then he winked and pulled the door shut behind him. He put a finger to his lips and motioned with his head for Nick to follow him to the stairs, as if they were hiding together. At the landing he knelt down.
“Hi, sport,” he whispered. “You okay?”
Nick nodded.
“You know what happens to guys who listen at keyholes, don’t you?” he said, smiling.
“What?” Nick whispered back, playing along.
“You’ll end up working for Drew Pearson, that’s what.”
“A legman,” Nick said, his father’s expression.
Larry looked surprised again, then grinned. “Yeah, a legman. Hear anything worth hearing?”
Nick shook his head.
“Well, neither do they, mostly,” he said, still whispering. “Come on, up you go before they catch us both.”
Nick turned to go, then looked back at Larry. “Dad asked you to help him,” he said, a question.
Larry stood up. “I can’t, Nick. Not the way he wants.” Then he smiled and ruffled Nick’s hair. “He’ll be all right. Don’t worry. We’ll all help him.”
They heard the sound of the door opening and Larry made a face of mock alarm, shooing Nick with his hand up the stairs and turning away to start down the other flight. Nick darted up, out of his father’s line of sight, and watched Larry’s red hair bob down the stairs. In a minute his father followed. Over the banister Nick could see him stop at the foot of the stairs, waiting until he heard the front door click shut. Then he turned, straightened his shoulders, and went in to join the party.
No one was going to help. All the rest of it, the confusing jumble of elections and deals and witnesses, still came down to that. No one. Not even Uncle Larry, who had just been trying to make him feel better on the stairs. He’d heard them. His father felt like he was drowning. Nick wondered what that was really like, everything closing around you, choking for air, reaching up for any hand at all. No one. It wasn’t smart anymore. Not even for his father to help himself.
The draft in the hall seeped through his thin pajamas, making him shiver. He felt like leaping into bed, pulling the covers over his head, and curling his body into a ball, as warm as the cabin fire. Instead he went down the hall to his parents’ room. The bedside lamps were on, surrounded by piles of books and Kleenex and alarm clocks. He walked over to his father’s dressing area, a mirror and a tall row of built-in drawers that pulled out on smooth, quiet runners, not like Nick’s, which always stuck. All the shirts were white, stacked in two neat piles. He took one out. Garfinkel’s, all right. But the tag under the laundry mark was 15?-35. Just as he’d said. Nick almost grinned in relief. The next one was the same, and suddenly he caught sight of his pajamas in the mirror and felt ashamed. This wasn’t playing the spy game with Nora; it was wrong, like being a burglar. What if his father noticed?
Nick put back the shirts and evened out the edge of the pile. But he’d already started-why not know for sure? Carefully he flipped through the collars of the shirts, looking for the size tags. Some weren’t even Garfinkel’s. Then, halfway down, he found it. A Garfinkel label, 15?-33. He stared at it, not moving, his finger barely touching the tag. Why had he kept it? Maybe it was a mistake, a present from Nick’s mother. But that wouldn’t matter. Uncle Larry said nothing was innocent now. They’d find it, just as Nick had. There was a laundry mark, too-he’d worn it. Nick tried to think what that meant. No fingerprints. That woman, any trace of her, had been washed away. And all the shirts looked alike. But what if they had other ways? As long as it was here-
He heard the front door slam, voices downstairs saying goodbye, and without thinking snatched the shirt, closed the drawer quietly, and ran back to his room. He looked around for a hiding place, but then the voices seemed to be coming up the stairs so he shoved it under his pillow and got into bed, breathing fast. Outside the snow had finally begun, blowing almost horizontally across the light from the street lamp. When his mother peeked in through the door, he shut his eyes, pretending to be asleep. He kept them closed as she crossed the room to tuck him in. For a second he was afraid she would fluff his pillow, but she only kissed his forehead and drifted away again in a faint trail of perfume.
Tomorrow he would find someplace to get rid of it-a trash can, not too near the house-and then his father would be safe again. Then he thought of the laundry mark. He’d have to cut that out. No trace. He turned on his side and put one hand under the pillow, anchoring the shirt. He tried to imagine himself at the cabin again, snug, but the room stayed cold and awake, as if someone had left a window open. His grandmother once told him that people in Europe thought the night air was poison, so they sealed everything tight. But now it came in anyway, blowing through the cracks, making his thoughts dart like flurries, poisoning shelter.
His father was wrong about one thing: Welles did have to delay the hearing. The next day, a Friday, snow covered Washington in a white silence, trapping congressmen in Chevy Chase, swirling around Capitol Hill until the dome looked like an igloo poking through the drifts. In the streets nothing moved but the plows and a few impatient cars, their heavy snow chains clanking like Marley’s ghost. By midmorning everyone on Nick’s block began digging out, a holiday party of scraping shovels and the grind of cars spinning wheels in deepening ruts. Nick’s father helped the other men spread ashes around the tires, then push from behind until the cars lurched into the street, shuddering with exhaust. At the curbs, snow was piled into mounds, perfect for jumping. Even Mrs Bryant next door came out, tramping up and down the street in her galoshes and mink coat, dispensing cups of chocolate, mistress to the field hands. Afterward Nick and his father knocked the heavy snow off the magnolias with brooms to save the branches, and it fell on their heads, seeping under their collars until they were finally forced inside to dry out. They had soup beside the fire, the way they did at the cabin, and Nick hoped the snow would never stop. The shirt, stuffed now behind a row of books, could wait.
“They’ll cancel the dance,” his mother said, glancing out the window. “Poor old Miriam. Her first year as chairwoman, too.” She giggled. “What do they do with the flowers, do you think? God, she’ll be furious.”
“It’ll be gone by tomorrow night,” his father said. “Anyway, a little snow won’t stop her. She can fly in on her broom.” This to Nick, who laughed.
“Walter.”
“It snowed last year too, remember?”
“Yes, and half the people didn’t show. Poor Miriam.”
Nick leaned back against the club chair hassock, warm from the fire, and watched his parents. It was the sort of easy conversation they used to have, before the troubles. Her new dress. Where the United Charities money went anyway. Whether the President would come this year. When the phone rang it jolted him, as if he’d been half asleep.
His father had barely said ‘Hello’ before his expression changed. He glanced up at Nick’s mother, then, seeing Nick, retreated to a series of noncommittal ‘Yes’ and ’I see’s. When the call was finished, he went up to the study without saying a word. Nick could hear him dialing, then the low tones of another conversation. His mother, nervous again, followed him, standing outside the study door with her hand against the frame, braced for bad news. Then she went in, closing the door behind her so their voices were no louder than the muffled sounds in the street.
Nick knew they were not going to tell him, whatever it was, and he wondered in a kind of quiet panic whether he’d waited too long to get rid of the shirt. The storm had lulled him into thinking there was time, but now it was starting again. He got up from the floor and headed out into the hall, grabbing his winter jacket from the closet before racing up to his room. The shirt was still there, folded behind the books, and he stuffed it under his sweater, then put on the jacket, buckling the belt to keep the shirt from falling out. His boots were in the back mud room, drying out, so he’d have to go that way, through the kitchen.
“And where might you be going?” Nora said when she saw him.
But he was prepared. “The hill. With the sled. Mom said I could.”
“And your boots still wet.”
“I don’t care. Everybody’ll be there,” he said, pulling them on in a rush.
“Who’s everybody?”
But Nick was already opening the back door. “Everybody.”
And then he was free, crossing the back alley courtyard, where all the garages were. The snow was deep here-no one had bothered to shovel in back yet-and it took him a minute or two to reach the garage and find the sled, crammed in a corner with rakes and shovels. Any moment now his mother might appear at the window, calling him back. But she didn’t, and after he turned the corner into the alley, he knew it was going to be all right.
The problem was where to dump it. The snow had covered the trash cans along with everything else. He couldn’t just bury it in the snow. They’d find it after the melt, like a body. A mailbox would be ideal, but his father had told him it was illegal to put things there. Somebody would report it. Pulling the sled behind him, he walked as far as Massachusetts Avenue, where the plows had been. But it was crowded here, store owners shoveling sidewalks, people carrying paper bags of groceries, so he turned onto A Street, back toward the Capitol.
He had gone two more blocks before he saw it-a storm drain at the curb that hadn’t been blocked by snow. He looked around, then knelt down, fishing the shirt out from under his jacket. The label. He took off his gloves and ripped off the black tag, his fingers surprised by the cold, then stuffed the shirt into the space behind the grate, pushing it with his bare hands until it fell with a quiet thud into the drain. He stood up and looked around to see if anyone had noticed, but the street was still empty. He remembered then that he hadn’t cut out the laundry mark, but it was too late. And maybe it wouldn’t matter. The sun would melt the snow and the drains would run, carrying the shirt along their underground tunnels until they emptied into the Potomac, or wherever they went, miles from the committee room. When he reached the Capitol a few blocks later, making a circle, he felt happier than he’d been in days. Somebody had finally helped.
There were more phone calls in the afternoon and Mr Benjamin, the lawyer, came to dinner, so Nick ate in the kitchen, catching only bits of the talk in the dining room. No one had to tell him, however. It was there in Nora’s afternoon paper. WELLES TO RE-CALL COCHRANE. NEW COCHRANE TESTIMONY MONDAY. He’d overheard Mr Benjamin say that it was a typical Welles tactic to tie up the weekend papers in speculation. By the time Monday rolled around, people would think she’d already testified and it would hardly matter what she actually said. But it mattered to Nick. He hoped it would be about the shirt, floating away. When he went to bed that night, his mother told him not to worry about anything and he nodded, as if they’d both forgotten to pretend he didn’t know a thing.
The reporters were out in front again the next morning, even though it was Saturday. Nick’s father went out to tell them he had nothing to say, but they lingered anyway, drinking coffee and looking up at the house, waiting for clues. No one came. Nick’s father was shut in the study on the phone while Nora and his mother fitted her dress for the United Charities that night, because now his mother said they had to go, so Nick was invisible again. It was easy to disappear. When his father came out of the study, his face pale and distracted, he looked right past him, not seeing anything. The phone rang, and like a sleepwalker he turned back into the room. Nick had the odd feeling of not having been there at all. His mother told him to go outside-they were building a snow fort across the street-but he wanted to stay close to his father, ready to help. He knew he couldn’t leave him now, alone despite the phone calls. Someone had to be there.
He was sitting listlessly in the club chair after lunch when he heard his father in the hall, putting on his boots. Where was he going? He looked out the front window, checking the street, then went back down the hall to the kitchen, obviously heading for the back door. Nick didn’t hesitate. He grabbed his jacket in the mud room and pulled on his boots without bothering to close the buckles. When he stepped out into the snowy courtyard, he could see his father already turning the alley corner.
He followed about a block behind, not even worrying if his father turned around, trusting his invisibility. His father walked past the Senate Office Building, then turned down the hill, toward Union Station. He wasn’t going out for milk or the afternoon papers. No errand took you to the station. Nick watched the herringbone coat cross D Street, not stopping for the light, then weaving through the moats of clear sidewalks between the banks of snow. Nick picked up his own pace. There were always crowds at the station, and he might lose him.
He darted past the line of taxis and into the great hall, a roar of loudspeaker announcements and newsboys and shoes clicking on marble. Nick moved to the side of the room-a kid alone might be suspicious-and walked quickly past the waiting benches crammed with delayed passengers. His father stopped and looked around, but Nick was lucky, hidden by a swarm of people heading for the track gates. Besides, you never saw what you didn’t expect to see. Then his father went over to the row of telephone booths and, taking off his hat, sat down and closed the folding door. Nick waited by the newsstand, trying to make sense of it. Why come to Union Station to make a phone call when that was all he’d been doing at home? But he hadn’t bought a ticket, that was the main thing. He wasn’t going anywhere. Nick stared blankly at the magazines, warm with relief.
The trip home, up the hill, was longer, and Nick kept his distance, letting the coat stay several blocks ahead. He could probably spin off now, avoiding any risk of being seen, but he wanted to be sure. It was only when his father turned into the alley, back home, that he felt safe again. The sky was darkening for another snowfall, but he couldn’t go in yet. Not so soon. Instead he went around the block to the front and pretended to roll snow with the other kids for the big fort. When they started throwing snow, he was the first to get hit, because he hadn’t seen it coming. He was looking over the reporters’ hats toward the house, protective as a guard dog.
He ate dinner alone again, then went upstairs to watch his parents dress for the ball, his father in a tuxedo with jet cufflinks and shiny shoes, his mother in a tight shoulderless top and a long skirt that swooped out with stiff petticoats. The day was almost over and nothing had happened. Nick kept glancing at his father, wondering if he knew he’d been followed, but he seemed unaware, smoking and fixing his bow tie with some of his old spirit. His mother was wearing her good necklace, the one with the garnet pendant, and she was smiling in the mirror, so that Nick thought maybe their good luck had come back again. It had been like this a hundred times before, the warm busyness before a party, the air rich with powder and aftershave.
The telephone rang.
“Now what?” his mother said, annoyed. “We’ll be late.”
His father answered the phone and listened for a minute without saying a word. Then he put the receiver back gently, as if he were afraid of waking someone, and looked up at them, pale.
“I have to talk to your mother, Nick,” he said simply, and Nick knew that it had come, whatever it was. He glanced at his mother, but her eyes, anxious now, were fixed on his father.
“I’ll be there in a minute, honeybun,” his mother said absently, and Nick, dismissed, went out and closed the door. At first he could hear nothing, then a quiet undertone of voices, a moan. He had to know. He crept back to his room, then through the door of the connecting bathroom, the way he did to fool Nora, watching her vacuum. But now the spy game was real. The door to his parents’ bedroom was open just a crack, and at first he heard only conspiratorial whispers. Then their voices rose, his mother’s a kind of wail.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I couldn’t,” his father said. “I couldn’t.”
“ Now?” his mother said, inexplicably.
“I didn’t know it would be tonight. I’m sorry.”
“No, I don’t believe any of it,” his mother said, and Nick could hear a cry beginning in her voice. “What about us? What about us, Walter?”
“I’m sorry,” his father said quietly. Then, more audibly, “Come with me.”
“Are you crazy?” his mother said. “You must be crazy. Everything-” She broke off, sobbing.
“Livia, please,” his father said.
“Don’t touch me!” she shouted, and Nick froze.
For a moment he heard nothing, but he didn’t dare push the door open. Then his father was talking, so quietly that Nick missed the next exchange.
He heard his mother take a quick few steps. “No, you can’t,” she said. “It’s all-Walter, this is crazy. You can’t-”
“Livia, I have to,” he said calmly. “Come with me.”
“Go to hell,” she said, almost spitting the words.
“Livia, please,” his father said.
Nick heard a new sound, then realized she was hitting his father’s chest. “Go,” she said. “Go.”
“Believe me, I never thought-”
“Never thought,” she said, her voice unfamiliar with scorn.
“Never. I love you.”
Now his mother was crying.
“I’ll call tomorrow. The way I said.”
“I don’t care,” his mother said faintly.
“Don’t say that.” Nick heard his father move toward the door, then stop. “You are so beautiful,” he said softly.
For a moment there was absolute silence. Then, “I hope you die,” his mother said.
Nick heard the door close. He rushed into the room and saw his mother sink onto the bed, her head drooping, as if the crying had made her limp. His stomach heaved. Once he had seen a man lying on the sidewalk downtown, people surrounding him and calling for an ambulance, and he’d felt this same fear, of life stopping before he could run away. Then he heard his father below, and he bolted from the room, clumping down the stairs and racing along the hall until, breathless, he caught him at the back door, his coat already on.
“Nick,” his father said, turning, dismayed.
“Where are you going?”
“I have to go away, Nick,” he said, bending down to face him. “Im sorry.”
“I got rid of the shirt,” Nick said.
“You did?” he said, not understanding.
“Fifteen and a half, thirty-three. Like the lady said. I got rid of it. They’ll never find it. You don’t have to go.”
“Nicku,” his father said, holding him by the shoulders. Nick watched his father’s eyes fill with tears. “My God. I never meant any of this to happen to you. Not you. Do you believe me?”
“You don’t have to go.”
“I can’t explain. Not now. I wouldn’t know how.” His father got on one knee, his face level with Nick’s. “I’ll never leave you. Not really.” He paused. “Would you do something for me? Make sure your mother’s all right?”
Nick nodded, but what he heard was that his father was really going. Nothing would stop him now.
“Don’t go,” Nick said quietly.
“Could I have a hug? Would you do that?”
Nick put his arms around his father’s neck, smelling the smoke and aftershave.
“No, a real one,” his father said, clutching him, drawing him tighter and tighter, until Nick felt that he was suspended, without air, holding on for dear life. They stayed that way until Nick felt his father’s arms drop. When he finally let go, he looked at Nick and said, “Okay,” like the handshake of a deal.
He got up and went to the door.
“You need your rubbers,” Nick said, pointing to the shiny formal shoes.
His father gave him a weak half-smile. “It’s all right. It doesn’t matter.” Then he opened the door and started down the stairs, leaving Nick to close it behind him.
Nick watched through the pane of the mud room door. His father didn’t go to the garage but headed across the courtyard to the alley. His shoes made holes in the snow, and even after he was out of sight, pausing only once at the corner to look back, Nick stared at the footprints, waiting for them to fill with new snow until finally every trace was gone.
Upstairs his mother was still crying, slumped over on the bed in her pretty dress like a stuffed doll. When she saw Nick, she opened her arms wordlessly and held him.
“Where did he go?” Nick said, but his mother didn’t answer, just sat rocking him back and forth, the way she did when he was hurt. Finally she wiped her eyes, reached back to undo the clasp of the garnet necklace, and let it fall slowly into her hand. She sat looking at it for a moment, then closed her hand over the bright red stone and got up to put it away with the rest of her things.