Heaven and Hell (100 page)

"Fine," George said. "Please go on."

"My friend the professor believes, as I do, that America and France are sisters in freedom. General Lafayette helped win your independence.

Now America stands as an important beacon of liberty and human rights at a time when--" Levie squinted along the terrace like a conspirator--

"France is grievously troubled."

At last George had a political orientation. His visitor was a liberal,
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and probably not a partisan of Emperor Napoleon III.

Levie rushed on. "What my friend proposes, and our group seconds, is a symbolic gift to your country. A monument or statue of some kind, representing mutual friendship and faith in freedom."

"Ah," George said. "Who would finance such a gift?"

"The French people. Through a public subscription, perhaps. The details are hazy as yet. But our goal is clear. We want to complete and present the monument in time for your country's one hundredth anniversary.

Several years away, I grant you, but a project of this magnitude will not be brought to completion quickly."

"Are you talking about some kind of statue for a park, Monsieur Levie?"

"Oh, grander, much grander. On the night the idea was conceived, a young sculptor was present for another purpose entirely. An Alsatian. Bartholdi. Talented fellow. The conception of the monument will be his."

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"Then what do you want from me?"

"The same things we request from any important American we hear of and contact on the Continent. An endorsement of the idea. A pledge of future support."

George was in such a fine mood because of the direction the new day had taken that he said, "I should think I could give you that without qualification."

"Splendid! That would be a noteworthy coup for us. What we are also trying to gauge, less successfully, is whether such a gift would be welcomed by the American government and the American people."

George lit a cigar and strolled to the balustrade. "You're very shrewd to ask the question, Monsieur Levie. Right off, you would expect that it would be welcome, but Americans can be a contrary lot. I receive newspapers from home regularly. What I glean from them is this. All that's foreign is suspect." He rolled the cigar between his fingers, thoughtful. "That would be especially true of a gift proposed by a country torn by strife between the right and the left, and ready to plunge into war with Prussia." He took a puff. "Such is my guess, anyway."

Downcast, the journalist said, "It confirms what Edouard has been
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told by members of the Philadelphia Union League."

George pointed with the cigar. "That's where I've heard his name.

He's on our roster."

"That is so, although he has never been privileged to visit your country."

They discussed the European political climate for a while. Levie was vituperative about the Prussian premier, Otto von Bismarck, and his chief of the general staff, Moltke. "They are clearly bent on exacerbating tensions to the point of war. Bismarck dreams of reunification of the Germanic states--a new empire, if you will. Unfortunately our own so-called emperor is lulled by his conceits. He thinks he has built, an invincible army. He has not. Further, Moltke has powerful breech loading field guns, a superb spy system, and Bismarck to goad him. It will come out badly for France. I hope it will not come out badly for our scheme too."

"I'm familiar with General von Moltke," George said. "Two of his staff officers called here last month. They want to negotiate with my company for certain ordnance castings. Back in Pennsylvania, my general manager is working up figures. I've reached no decision on it yet."

Levie became less friendly. "You are saying the possibility exists that you might work for France on the one hand and against her on the other?"

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"Unfortunately that's the iron trade, Monsieur Levie. Men in my profession are inevitably represented on both sides of battles."

Levie's hostility moderated. He squinted at his host. "You are forthright, anyway."

"And I'll say just as forthrightly that I'll do everything I can to support and promote your scheme if it develops along the lines you suggest. You can consider me one of your group, if you wish."

It was said before he quite knew he was going to. A gull swooped by and dove down toward the lake. A steamer whistle hooted. The sensations delighted his eye and heart. Everything was different.

After a moment, the journalist said, "Most certainly. You can be an important conduit for estimates of American reaction and opinion.

Professor Laboulaye will be overjoyed."

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He didn't say he was overjoyed, but they shook hands nonetheless.

That evening, over a light supper at home of veal medallions and new beans--no pastries or heavy wines at night; his weight was becoming a visible problem, especially at the waist--George realized he had a new cause. Something not connected with the past, but instead, something that looked forward to the great celebration planned for 1876.

He finished his meal quickly, called his staff together and announced that he was going home.

George sent a message to Jupiter Smith by the transatlantic cable and sailed from Liverpool on the Cunarder Persia. She was larger and more lavish than Mr. Cunard's earlier oceangoing vessels, whose austere cabins had earned the scorn of Charles Dickens. Persia advertised

"Oriental luxury" and promised a quick ten-day crossing by means of her great forty-foot side paddles, assisted by sails when necessary.

The first night out, George drank too much champagne, waltzed with a young Polish countess and surprised himself by spending the night with her. She was a charming, ardent companion, interested in the moment, not the future. He was pleased to discover his manhood had not atrophied. Yet the very detachment with which the young woman welcomed him to her stateroom and her bed only renewed his sense of love for Constance, and the attendant loss.

His mood was imperiled even more on the third day, when the huge steamship encountered heavy weather and began to roll and pitch like a toy. Though warned by the purser's men to stay off the decks, George wouldn't. He was drawn to the vistas of impenetrable gray murk with great fans of white water rising up to smash the funnels and sway the lifeboats and swirl around his feet as he gripped the teak rail. It was noon, and nearly as dark as night. Images of Constance, Orry, Bent nickered in his thoughts. The past ten years seemed to trail across his Crossing Jordan 639

memory like a ribbon of mourning crepe. He lost the feeling of renewal from Lausanne and plunged backward again.

Something in him rebelled, and he sought to escape the bleakness by discovering its cause, by answering, if he could, certain questions that haunted him. Why was there so much pain? Where did it come from? The answers always eluded him.

In the storm's murk, he glimpsed Constance again. He saw his best friend Orry. A set of conclusions came neatly out of the box of his mind.

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The pain comes from more than the facts of circumstance, or the deeds of others. It comes from within. From understanding what we've lost.

It comes from knowing how foolish we were--vain, arrogant children--when we thought ourselves happy.

It comes from knowing how fragile and doomed the old ways were, just when we thought them, and ourselves, secure.

The pain comes from knowing we have never been safe, and therefore will never be safe again. It comes from knowing we can never be so ignorant again. It comes from knowing we can never be children again.

Losing innocence. Remembering heaven.

That was the essence of hell.

The liner's whistle bellowed. Members of the deck staff rushed in every direction. George felt the engines reverse. A white-coated steward told him two small children of an Italian olive oil millionaire had been washed into the sea from the stern. A search was conducted until dark, with great difficulty; two of the ship's boats capsized. The children were not found. Sometime during the night, curiously awake and tense beside the sleeping countess, George heard the engines throbbing differently. Persia was resuming her journey because there was nothing else to do.

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On Saturday, at his home in Lehigh Station, Jupiter Smith received Charles's telegraph message. He told his wife to keep supper warm and walked rapidly down the hill to the depot. The operator was just lowering the shutter behind the wicket. "Send this before you go, Hiram," Smith said as he reached for a blank. He penciled quickly, in block letters.

MR HAZARD EN ROUTE HOME ON CUNARD LINE.

IMPOSSIBLE TO REACH HIM BUT AM CERTAIN

HE WILL GLADLY WELCOME

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MRS MAIN FOR AN INDEFINITE STAY.

REGRET CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH MAKE THIS NECESSARY.

J. SMITH ESQ.

Charles's message had conveyed the essence of the situation at Mont Royal. How Madeline Main's sister-in-law could be so harsh on a relative escaped Jupe Smith. He'd never met Ashton Main, though Constance had mentioned her several times, never in a complimentary way.

Hiram's key began to click. Smith stood silent in the dusty waiting room, feeling a familiar keen disappointment in the behavior of a majority of human beings. Just no explaining it--

As he opened the door to leave the depot, it occurred to him that perhaps someone else in the family should be informed of the appeal, in case help and encouragement of a more personal sort were needed.

Self-centered Stanley couldn't be counted on to speak compassionately 640

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for the family, but another member could, now that she was reconciled with her brother, and considerably softened.

"Hiram, before you quit, send one more, will you? This one's going to Washington."

On Sunday, in the quiet of early morning, Sam Stout unlocked his Senate office. It was a lovely summer day; the office was already warm.

At his desk Stout arranged a small stack of foolscap sheets and began to answer correspondence from his constituents, most of them dull-witted farm people he held in contempt. A couple from his old House district in Muncie had sent eight Spencerian pages describing their son's qualifications for a Military Academy appointment. Stout knew nothing about the status of appointments from his home state, but he wrote "None available" and tossed the reply in a wire basket for his clerk to expand and send.

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He started to read another letter but gave up almost at once. He threw his pen on the blotter and surrendered to the misery he'd been fighting through a long, wakeful night. When he'd divorced Emily to marry Jeannie, he and the young woman had agreed Sam was too old, and too busy with his career, to start a new family. Fine. He'd trusted the little bitch to keep the bargain. Last night, after a champagne supper, she'd announced that she would deliver a child seven months from now. Stout went to a separate bedroom for the night.

Not merely his personal life, but everything seemed to be failing.

While giving speeches during his last swing into Indiana, he had sensed that his audiences were sick of him and Republicans like him who waved the bloody shirt. Though it was just four years since Appomattox, the public was tired of divisive politics, tired of radical social programs.

There were even some indications of disenchantment with the Grant administration, which had just taken office. Grant was a popular man but pitifully innocent. Stout's more cynical acquaintances said it wouldn't be long before the President's cronies were thieving and pillaging right under his nose.

It worried Stout. He'd backed Grant, though out of expediency, not principle. Now he feared he'd bet on a losing horse.

His own shallow convictions reminded him of Virgilia Hazard's stronger and more honest ones. That in turn reminded him of the physical side of their relationship. Virgilia seemed more alluring now that his wife had revealed her deceit. Perhaps he'd been wrong to toss Virgilia aside so hastily.

He snatched a sheet of foolscap and began to write. If he could pull this off, he sensed that everything else would right itself in due course. He poured passion into the phrases, and loneliness--even a 642 HEAVEN AND HELL

difficult admission of his mistakes in the course of their relationship.

He felt as cheerful as a twenty-year-old bachelor when he posted the letter early in the afternoon.

On Monday, Virgilia pulled her gray glove over the diamond ring on her left hand and picked up her portmanteau. A hack waited outside the Thirteenth Street cottage to take her to the railway station. She glanced around to be sure everything was in order. On the writing desk she noticed the insulting letter from Sam Stout. She'd forgotten it in the excitement of receiving Smith's message and her preparations to respond to it.

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Virgilia's mouth set. She put the portmanteau on a chair and worked quickly with a match and wax to reseal Stout's letter. She inked lines through her own address and wrote his above it. Then she turned the envelope over and on the blank side printed NO.

She mailed it before she caught the night express for Richmond and Charleston.

On Tuesday, Willa again offered to help with the packing. Madeline had thus far put it off, as if anticipating some miracle. There would be no miracles.

"All right, we'll pack," she said, defeated. "There isn't a lot worth taking, but if we don't move it out, she'll destroy it."

She was wrapping some of her china in pages of the Courier when a carriage arrived. It was Theo and his wife. The young Northerner pressed Madeline's hand in his and said he was sorry. Marie-Louise, pink-faced and healthy in her third month of pregnancy, gave freer rein to her emotions. She cried in Madeline's arms, and uttered sobbing condemnations of her father. Madeline patted her. It seemed she was always taking care of someone. She wished someone would take care of her.

Charles came in with a wooden packing box he'd hammered together.