The Long November Page 4

  Mother finally asked me to leave. I guess the Pierce-Arrow roadster did it. Mother took one look at its haughty grace and knew I couldn’t possibly have come by a car like that honestly. There was quite a scrap and Betty cried. The room at the General Wolfe Hotel was lonely. I wanted to do something for the folks that might make them ask me to come back. I deposited five grand in their bank account and dropped in to see Mr. Gibson to pay off the mortgage on their home.

  Mr. Gibson had a cold, thin-lipped face that reminded me of a night a door was slammed in mine. It was hard to believe this could be Steffie’s father. He greeted me warmly with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, and took me into his back office. He talked for a long time about how smart I was, and what a bright future there could be for a smart young lad with some money. Maybe even he could use a bright young partner...I bent back and played very hard to get and he finally came out with the gimmick. He showed me the plans for a hotel he was going to build and asked me if I could put up thirty thousand dollars for a “good proposition.” I said I could, but the proposition would have to be awfully damned good. I couldn’t have raised a tenth of it, after evening the score with the folks, but it wouldn’t hurt to let Gibson think anything he wanted about my bankroll.

  You didn’t use your noggin, Gibson; one invitation to dinner, one go-ahead sign on Steffie, and I’d have run the river ten times a night to get any amount you needed...but I was just Joe Mack, a river-runner, whose dough might come in handy, and so you never got it. The dough might have made the difference, Gibson; it might have meant you wouldn’t have had to sit in your garage that night—that lonely night, when your gods had deserted you and you were hurrying back to your mother. And now you’re with her, aren’t you? Lying close by in another “six-by-three.” Across both of you drift the lovely leaves of November with their clean, woody smells. The crinkly leaves scatter, and drift, and catch into piles; then someone burns them...but you won’t smell them, Gibson, and neither will your mother...but I can, Gibson...for me it’s always November.

  In November of ‘32 the States elected a new president and Repeal was on its way. My river-running was ended and I hadn’t piled enough gold. It wouldn’t have mattered, except for Steffie...I’d promised her I’d reach the top. But I’d promised there’d be no more things like running whiskey, and it turned into a cold fear. Oh, sure, I was a smart guy, but what could I work at? I couldn’t sell cars...Bert Hamilton was broke. Right in our own town hundreds of people were out of work. But you’re a smart guy, Joe. Everybody in town says what a smart guy that Joe Mack is. He’ll go to the “top”...that “top” again...yes, I’d go, but how? A lot of things happened in a hell of a hurry. Granny Gibson died. The Toronto experts gave Mr. Gibson the cleaning treatment and he took the carbon monoxide cure for all mortal ills. The Gibsons were through. Yes, he took a run-out, eh, Joe? When he was broke and into trust funds...when the thought of it made the loose flesh across his belly shrivel in cold waves...he didn’t stop to think of a slim, blond girl nor an invalid wife...he thought of his own hide. The big league was too fast for you, eh, Gibson? You didn’t have your mother’s guiding hand...so you got out, and you left Steffie and her mother without a dime.

  Many things happened that year. I told Steffie I’d get a job and “make good,” and I went to Toronto. But the jobs I could get didn’t offer much toward my goal...twelve hours a day pumping gas in a service station for fifteen dollars a week, or selling vacuum cleaners at nothing a week. I had three grand left when Gibson knocked himself off, but I sent two grand of it to Steffie, and learned years later how much the money helped. I thought I’d run my shoestring back up in a poker game at Abe’s, but I tried to fill too many inside straights. Still a very smart guy, eh, Joe? The Toronto boys took you much faster than they took Gibson. What the hell, they only got me for a grand...they got him for a quarter of a million. Still no job, and a mounting hotel bill....I ran into “Bang” Bilton, the old hockey player. “Bang” used to sell me whiskey and he could fix me up.

  “Why, Joe, you shoulda’ come to me....I know all those big guys in Chicago...that’s where the dough is in the distillery game...that’s where you should go. There’s only peanuts around here...I’ll give you a letter to one a’ my old pals.”

  Go to Chicago, Joe...leave your clothes to pledge the hotel bill, they’ll hold ‘em, Joe. Go to Chicago like “Bang” says. Get one of those “big pay” jobs. Get to the “top.” But I haven’t even got carfare to Chicago. Sell your car, Joe, you can’t afford it anyway. Sell my car—my lovely Pierce? The car Steffie sat in and told me she loved me? The car I bought only so she might sit in it...

  The car was only a few months old when I met Steffie in front of the drugstore. We hadn’t talked for over two years, and she’d become just an odd pain in my chest when I thought of her; the chance to talk brought everything flooding back. I jumped out of the car and suddenly I was speaking to Steffie. My breath caught as it always had when I first saw her.

  “Hello...Steffie.”

  “Hello, Joe.”

  “You’re...you’re still the prettiest girl in town, Steffie...”

  “Thank you, Joe, how are you?”

  “Oh, fine...nothing ever goes wrong with me.”

  She looked down then, as though she didn’t want to see me when she said it.

  “I thought you might catch cold in the night air on the upper river...

  It wasn’t a nice crack, but Steffie figured she knew me well enough to pull it.

  “Night air, cold or warm, doesn’t hurt the Scotch people, Steffie...you could ask some of them your grandmother is evicting.”

  “I’m sorry, Joe...I was nasty, I guess. Let’s talk for a minute.”

  We drove through the park and along the riverway. I stopped the car in a quiet place overlooking the rushing water, and we could see the spray from the Cataract mounting in a golden cloud against the setting sun. There were traces of November in the air, and I could notice a faint scent of clover. Steffie leaned back in the corner and looked just as I’d known she would. She looked happy, too, like one night after a high-school dance. She asked about the river-running; Steffie had the notion I was driving the boats myself and I let her keep it...somehow I didn’t seem too proud of just taking the money from them. She looked over the rushing water and shivered a little.

  “It looks so dangerous, Joe...why do you go on with it?”

  “I’m through, Steffie...since they’ve voted Repeal in the States, there’s no money in it any more.”

  “What are you going to do now, Joe?”

  “I haven’t decided exactly...there’re a couple of pretty big things...”

  “I’ll bet Dad could get you started in something honest...I mean something more stable.”

  “I’ve already talked to your Dad, Steffie. He’s looking for investors for his hotel...he isn’t interested in me.” We sat quietly for a while. Steffie seemed to be thinking something out.

  “Joe...if you were with Dad there’d be no objection to...that is, we could...”

  “I know what you mean...I’ve thought of that, too, but I haven’t that much money. I’ll get it though, Steffie...somehow. I’ll fight for it...it’s all a big fight anyway, isn’t it? You fight for what you get or you get nothing, and in a fight you use anything you can get your hands on.”

  “No...no, Joe, that isn’t right. It can’t be...and I don’t like to hear people talk that way.” Her voice was low and steady; Steffie had been thinking too.

  “You mean I’ve got to be with your Dad...you mean, it’s that or else...”

  “I don’t mean that at all, Joe. You said you wanted to marry me once...”

  “I do, Steffie...you know I do. That’s all I’ve ever given a damn about...why do you suppose I. went into river-running?”

  “Oh, Joe...I love you too...no, wait, Joe...but I couldn’t marry you unless you were in some business I could be proud of...”

  I kissed her then. Steffie was bac
k in my arms, kissing me, holding me as if we’d never been apart, and crying softly. There, in my arms, were all my wildest dreams. Only two people were in the world that moment, my darling, two kids who wanted to be together, who wanted only each other. But around them, even if they couldn’t see or feel it, was a world. A world that was slowing down...a world that had almost stopped. Around them were mean forces...things they couldn’t see. Old and dried things that sat around a table and thought up ways to keep these kids apart. But these kids couldn’t see anything, or feel anything, except each other.

  She stopped crying and blew her nose in my handkerchief.

  “You still feel the same way...don’t you, Steffie?”

  I had to know, had to be certain.

  “It won’t ever change, Joe...I’ve always known it wouldn’t ever change...

  She buried her head in my shoulder and told me about it. In a shy, kid-like way she told me of her loneliness, of the months at school, thinking of me and wondering if I still loved her. Of worrying about me on the river. Of seeing me at a distance sometimes and how it made her feel. She told me of her life in the Gibson mansion, and of Granny who never failed to make some nasty little remark about our Joe...remarks which only made her love me more. Then a bewildered note crept in when she spoke of the ceaseless talk of money. Of who was paying his mortgage and who must be dispossessed; of one dispossessed man who called her a vile name on the street. Yes, Granny, you KNEW what was RIGHT and what was WRONG, didn’t you...? It grew cold as we sat there but I just drew the car robe over us and Steffie nestled more deeply in my arms.

  I thought as I held her. I’d been wrong...damned wrong. I’d been trying to show Granny a thing or two, when all the while Steffie had been waiting for me to get back to her. Well, I was back, and it filled me so that I thought my heart would burst.

  “Steffie...Steffie, let’s get married. I haven’t much money but there’ll be enough to keep us for a while and I’ll get a job right away...and it’ll be at something you can be proud of...please, darling. We could get married tonight...we could do it on the American side and we wouldn’t have to wait for a license. Please, Steffie...” She kissed me again...a long, sweet kiss.

  “Oh, Joe...Joe...you can’t guess how much I want to. I would if Granny weren’t so ill...but she’s an old woman and a shock might...Joe, I want to...and I promise I will. But well have to wait for a while.”

  We should have done it that night, Steffie, but we’ve known that for a long time, haven’t we? It was such a wonderful dream...such an improbable dream. Glorious and shining like the dreams kids have. I told you how far I’d climb with you by my side. How I’d bring all the lovely things of the world for you to choose from. Of the grand home we’d have, and the two kids we’d pluck down from a star. A girl and a boy...and they’d both look like you. And I told you no two people who had ever lived would be happier than you and I. It was a solid gold dream, Steffie...but it was still only a dream. It’s later now, my darling...much later. But the dream will still come true.

  If we had married that night, Steffie...it wouldn’t have mattered to your Granny. Nothing would or could ever matter to her again. We’d have faced that year in Toronto together, and it would have worked. I’d never have gone to Chicago...and we wouldn’t have had these lonely years, and maybe, Steffie, I wouldn’t be lying here now...I’d be home with you where I should be. Lots of things had to happen before we could have another chance, Steffie...and maybe lots more will have to happen. But we will have that day, that shining golden day, Steffie...

  The evening deepened until we couldn’t see the bluish haze of the smoke from the burned leaves. But we could smell it, and a faint trace of clover. And then we were kissing too much and holding each other too tightly, and I knew suddenly we had to stop. I found I wasn’t as grown up as I’d thought, and you learned you were more of a woman than you’d known. I hated to stop, darling, I’d rather have done anything else in the world right then. You believed Joe Mack...you believed anything he said or did would be all right. But it couldn’t be...not then and not there...not my slim, blond goddess...not Steffie. I mustn’t use her like a thirty-year-old widow on a back road. It was close, wasn’t it, darling? So close that we were both frightened a little by it. We sat up and talked...we knew we had to.

  “I’ll go away, Steffie. I’ll go to Toronto and get a job. Yes sir, that’s it! You won’t see or hear a thing of me until we can be married.”

  “I’ll wait, Joe...I’ll wait for years. I love you so, Joe...and there couldn’t ever be anyone else...”

  “Steffie...”

  I drove right up the curving drive and stopped by the door. I kissed her in the darkness of the porch for a long time, and an old woman could have seen us if she’d looked out of the window. You couldn’t, could you, Granny? But it wouldn’t have made any difference, because you didn’t frighten us any more. You were just an old woman to feel sorry for, but not too sorry.

  You couldn’t look out of the window, could you, Granny? Or anywhere else, except straight up at the ceiling...you couldn’t see the ceiling, could you, Granny? You’d left this world of seven per cent and gone to your heaven of the same amount. No one knew until morning...no one knew they’d come for you in the night...whoever it was that came. And you were ready for them, weren’t you, Granny? Ready to leave a world that was beginning to make great lies of all your truths. You were ready to go...wherever it was you went. And no one gave very much of a damn. Yes, Granny...that’s the hell of it. Dying isn’t so tough if someone’s going to care...but no one really did care when you died. No one except maybe Steffie...and she didn’t really care, she just felt sorry for you.

  Who else would it be? It wouldn’t be that Joe Mack person, would it, Granny? And you wouldn’t expect the people whose homes you snatched to shed many tears. I don’t think even your son really gave a damn. He was glad you wouldn’t be around to bother him—to check his curious bookkeeping, and ask where all your money was going. He missed you later on, but only when he was in way over his head. So it does level out, eh, Granny? Everything goes back to where it came from, and the only things that are allowed to return are the lovely things...like the leaves, Granny. They are absorbed into the endless chemistry of the Earth just as we are, but the leaves are permitted to return...we want them to return. The green leaves turn into dried and crinkly things, but not bitter things. We can even burn them, Granny, but we can’t stop them from trailing their wonderful bluish smells around the neighborhood. We can’t stop them from climbing clean and woody from the burning piles. It’s as if God wanted us to remember November. And here, Granny—even here—there are leaves. Maybe they are raked with tanks and set afire by artillery, but they still smell like home. Home, Joe? What’s “home”? Home is a slim, blond girl named Steffie...

  CHAPTER 4

  The smell is still in the room, but changed a little; there’s a new sweetness to it. Somewhere the breeze has drifted impersonally over a rotting horse, or maybe a Canadian lad with his belly blown open and his eyes looking a little foolishly at the sky. They always have that silly, surprised look when they die fast. If things are as they smell, death must be awfully sweet because they smell so sweet when they’ve lain in a field or a gutter for a week. Where do you get the “they” stuff, Joe? It’s you you’re smelling, only it hasn’t happened yet. It won’t, by God, it won’t...not yet. Not for thirty years yet, and then it will be in a wide, white bed, accompanied by the faint sobbing of my children and their children and Steffie. Good Christ, Joe...don’t be a chump. Steffie’s probably married to one of our brave boys. Maybe she is, but Betty would have told me, and as long as she isn’t and with this ticket I’ve got in my shoulder, I’ll get home to Steffie. Do you want Italy, Adolf? Or Europe, Adolf? Or the whole goddamned world, Adolf? Take it and welcome. I, Joe Mack, set upon by smells, herewith give it to you; do with it as you will—burn it, bury it, kill it, smear it, but for Christ’s sake stop its smelling so sweet.

>   Which will you be, Mr. Mack, the quick or the dead? Who, me? I’m strictly one of the quick boys, myself. I’ll not be dead and messing up the smell of burning leaves with the smell of rotting Joe. I’ll be a quick laddie with my dark brown smell. Even if I have to pick again at those garbage cans behind the Sherman Hotel in Chicago to find a bun. That was November, too, wasn’t it Joe? Yep, the November of ‘34, and a cold son-of-a-bitch it was. You didn’t seem to mind the smell of the cans, Joe, or the smell of the toilet in the La Salle Street station where you slept. Do you remember how happy you were when you found the veal cutlet with only one bite gone? It was a little soiled with some tea leaves, but it tasted pretty damned good, didn’t it, Joe? You’ve become pretty sensitive about smells, or can’t you remember how Rosie smelled in that filthy rooming house on Clark Street? How she’d work the streets all day and come home to crawl in bed with you after fifteen guys had laid her and she wouldn’t even wash. How she’d wake you up to be kissed and turn her awful body to you, and how you’d retch inwardly, Joe. But you’d stay because it was cold out and you couldn’t face the La Salle Street station again. A half-hour’s sleep and then a cop would say, “Better keep moving, bud.” No, Joe, don’t get all worked up about the smells of war, because peace has some cute ones, too.

  I’d get out in the mornings before Rosie awakened because I’d have to kiss her if I stayed. I’d take the quarter she left for me; just a quarter, because if she left a dollar I could live two days on it and she wouldn’t have me for two days. The coffee and bun would wake me up and I’d head to the YMCA where I could get a shave, and then start the rounds again. The coffee and bun took six cents, and I could get a package of makings and some papers for a dime; nine cents would mean lunch, and my dinner would be in the cans in the alley. The employment agencies were jammed and I’d look the blackboards over. Cook. Spring Green, Wisconsin. Supply own transportation; and for ten bucks the agency would give you the name. Ten bucks—it might as well be ten thousand, and who the hell said you’re a cook? Any work shoveling coal? Anything, anywhere? Don’t you see, mister, I’m not eating...but I didn’t say it. What the hell. I was a big, husky lad of twenty and he was a little guy with a harried look. I guess I should have written to Betty for some piece of the grand I’d loaned Vince when they had to get married. But it was a hard thing to do when she had always figured me a smart guy who could look after himself. I could have, too, if I’d had my clothes. When I went broke in Toronto the hotel just locked the door and every damned thing I owned was there, with six hundred bucks against it. All those swell suits I had Max Fish make because Max was Mr. Gibson’s tailor, and every damned one set me back better than seventy-five bucks. The suit I was wearing was so thin I could feel the wind whip around my legs as if they were bare, and I went without socks for two weeks until I learned about the Sally Ann, or the Happy Sally. You had a lot to learn the hard way, Joe.