Rumors of Peace (27 page)

S
OON AFTER
, I opened the paper to find that our ragged, hopeless enemy had begun smashing London with a powerful secret weapon, the V-2 rocket.

When I returned to school a few days later, I was three inches taller and many years older. At assembly I observed the usual cast of characters. There was Mother Basketball plonking down the aisle, and over there, Miss Moose, whom I had brought such happiness, and nearby was kindly, wrinkled Mrs. Miller. And there was Coach Thaxter, and Mr. Villendo, and poor Mr. Kerr with his big nostrils, and concluding this band of dreary ex-lovers, Mr. Lewis in his eternal gray suit.

And there was Dumb Donny, green-haired and pulling someone's shirttail as always, but so shockingly tall that I stared. And now Peggy entered with her retinue, all in pink socks, pink skirts, and white blouses; it must be the newest thing, dressing alike first day. She smiled in passing, and I smiled back, but with a touch of pity for all that pink. And then the welcome-back speeches began, the voices droning on as you sank into other things, such as Egon waving from the train. . . .

Now it was all over, except for “On the Road to Mandalay.” Mr. Kerr came onstage, seated himself at the grand piano, and banged out the rousing overture, while majestic Mr. Grandison raised high his arms and flung back his silver head.

The school year had begun.

Our homeroom teacher was new, a puny white-faced young woman called Miss Petain. I disliked her at once because of the name and because she was so awed by us, with big fisheyes that looked paralyzed. A wave of contempt swept through the class, followed by racketing disorder and a swiftly passed note: “Knock your books off 10:10!!!”

I felt excitement building up inside me, a wonderful sense of shared purpose, absolute accord. We all were quiet now, nudging our books to the edges of our desks. It was ten-nine, and Miss Petain was calling roll in a voice as thin and pale as her body. A click of the clock hand, and a tremendous thunderclap as seventeen books struck the floor at once. Miss Petain leaped straight into the air from her chair, a triumph beyond our greatest expectations. Then she collapsed over her desk and burst into hysterical sobs.

We looked worriedly at each other as the sobs grew wilder and more tearing. It was possible that we had destroyed her, and she would be dragged off to a mental institution. We became very frightened and looked for someone to do something. It was Dumb Donny who stood up in all his shocking new tallness. He spoke in a deep, cracking voice.

“Miss Petain, I'm ashamed of this class.”

Eagerly we all agreed, sending up a chorus of disapproval, as if each one of us were an innocent and appalled party. It made no sense, but miraculously, if slowly, it brought Miss Petain's head from her arms. She fumbled her purse from the desk drawer and dragged out a handkerchief, with which, not meeting our eyes, she sadly wiped her tears and blew her very thin nose.

“And I want to tell you,” Dumb Donny went on, “that they'll never do anything like this again. You don't have to worry, Miss Petain.”

We were all pretty sure Dumb Donny himself had started the note, but you couldn't hold his righteousness against him. He had stopped the sobs, and Miss Petain, red-eyed but willing to forgive, took up the roll sheet once more.

Next period I entered the room I had so often dreamed of while turning into a math whiz. Mr. Lewis called roll. His voice was impersonal, his mouth humorless, his gray eyes hard as pebbles. And didn't the man own another suit? I was oppressed by our moonlit past, not only
because it was embarrassing, but because much of life was apparently a waste of time and you never knew it until afterward.

But at least he paused at my name and gave me a brief, interested look for all the Towks to see. That was worth something. And though math was no longer my field, I vowed to maintain my wizardry. With a cool inward smile, I leaned back and crossed my arms.

We met our responsibility toward Miss Petain like a group of doctors given charge of an invalid. Two girls presented her with a pretty lace handkerchief since she was probably in need of many. She never dropped a piece of chalk but the nearest pupils leaped to spare her the effort of bending. We never got out of hand; even when she left the room, we remained orderly, so as not to shock her into a fit when she reentered. Gradually she became less nervous, more social, and now and then she shared some personal tidbit, such as the fact that she came from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where Petain was a fairly common name. I was glad to hear this, and I was glad to see Miss Petain looking very attractive one morning. Her white face glowed with a blush, her big fisheyes were bright, and her thin mouth held a smile. It was exactly at this time that rumors placed her in Mr. Lewis' green coupe, riding down Alhambra Avenue at his side.

Well, I thought, observing him in algebra class, I'm glad if someone sees something in him. If she could find moonlight in those hard pebble eyes, if she wanted that sour mouth stuck to hers, more power to her. Still, it was hard to imagine them together, the big Gestapo agent and the trembling leaf. If she was having a real affair with him, in bed—rumored to be an earthquakian activity—I should think she would be in the hospital now, squashed and broken. But maybe they were only holding hands. I wished them good luck, whatever they were doing.

We started a battle in Holland, at a place called Arnhem. After a few fierce days, Churchill came out and predicted a long battle. He was wrong; it was not very long. And the Germans won. Dad shook his head over the newspaper and said it was our worst blow to date, a bad setback. If we crossed the Rhine this year, he would be surprised.

We had a letter from Peter, written at the beginning of September.
He was somewhere in Belgium. He told about Paris, how it was to rumble through the streets with the whole city running alongside the trucks, crying out and reaching up to hug you, to kiss you and press flowers into your hands, even bottles of wine. It was like something out of a wild dream, he would never in his life forget it. Paris was beautiful, and he told about the green Seine and the chestnut trees, the broad avenues and small, crooked streets, and the buildings—everywhere you looked there was this magnificent architecture, it made your mouth water. Then he said that Dolan, the ex-interior decorater, was back in England with both legs off, and that his other buddy, Zafich, the ex-Detroit butcher, was being sued for divorce by his snazzy wife back home, and what a lousy thing war was, even with the flowers and wine. . . .

I missed stern little Valerie, who was now in high school. Peggy was pleasant, but it was clear that she was not going to be seen with me as long as I was still in dumbbell class and my hair was still green and un-grown-out. As for Eudene, I dropped into the café now and then, but she only wanted to talk about Bobby and the kind of house she and Acie would buy.

My best moments came in Mr. Lewis's class. My satisfaction was great when in his gruff way, with a raised eyebrow or slight nod, he made it known to all that he held my acuteness in esteem. Still, I felt none of the melting ecstasy I had dreamed of last spring, and I thought it probable that all life was arranged so that the right things came at the wrong time.

F
OR INSTANCE
, there was a conference that had just ended in Washington, D.C., called Dumbarton Oaks. I read about it in
Time.
If I had read about it a year ago it would have lifted me high, because it was described as having set up an agency called the United Nations, “to free future generations from the desolation of war.” But now that I knew about history, I could put no faith in it.

I wrote the line down anyway, in my Big Chief notebook, because it was beautiful, like a line of poetry. “To free future generations from the desolation of war.”

We discussed Dumbarton Oaks in Social Studies. It was one of the few interesting subjects ever to be brought up there. The teacher told us about the United Nations, then mentioned the League of Nations and asked if any of us had ever heard of it. I had read about it in the
Time
article. My hand shot up.

“It failed,” I said.

The teacher was so startled to receive a response to a question that she didn't speak for a moment. Then she said, “Very good. But the United Nations will have powers much greater than those of the League of Nations.”

“I don't think that will make any difference. The United Nations will fail too, because there's never been a time in history when peace
wasn't a preparation for war. War always comes. It's human nature to go on doing the same thing over and over.”

The teacher looked interested now. More than interested. “Do we all agree?” she asked like a cheerleader. “Do we have opinions? Is peace impossible?”

“Naw,” said one boy. “Because when we beat 'em, we'll keep 'em beat. For good.”

“They won't twitch, the buggers,” said another, sending a pained expression across the teacher's face, but not daunting her.

“All right, fine! But what about human nature?”

“What is it?” a girl asked.

“It's how people are, basically,” said the teacher.

“Oh. Well, people are basically nice,” the girl informed her.

But another girl disagreed. “People are basically crumbs.”

“That makes you a crumb too,” challenged the first girl.

The second girl didn't answer. She was stuck.

“Nobody wants war,” someone else said. “My parents don't want it anymore. They're fed up.”

“My cousin got his leg shot off in Tarawa, and he says—”

“—or my uncle Alfred in France, my aunt May's fooling around because he's been overseas so long she don't even remember what he looks like—”

“Let's keep to the subject,” interrupted the teacher.

“Well I am, I'm saying it's lasted too long.”

“It oughta end—”

“Everybody wants peace—”

“But they never get it,” I said. “It never lasts.”

“That's what this thing's for, this United Nations.”

“Baloney.”

“Baloney's right,” said Dumb Donny in his cracking new voice. “You've always got overpopulation, so you've always got to have wars to keep it down, and nobody can change that. That's Malthus's theory.”

I looked at him, astonished. There were actually thoughts in that goofy head, which in fact didn't look as goofy as it used to. His face had a lean, graven quality, there was something wolfish about it, perilous, and he had a mind like mine that held lean, perilous thoughts, except
that they didn't seem to bother him, since already he was cagily attaching a long chain of paper clips to the curls of the girl before him.

“All right,” the teacher was asking with enthusiasm, “what do we think of Donald's argument? Do we believe that war is caused by overpopulation?”

“No,” I said, “but it's bad anyway. There're too many poor people in the world. Socialism is the only answer. I believe in Rosa Luxemburg.”

Neither Egon nor Helen Maria had looked startled when I said I was a socialist, but the teacher looked as if I had leaped on my desk and done a dance in the nude. Then she became more enthusiastic than ever. “Have we any opinions on socialism? On a system where the government controls everything? Would you enjoy living in a country without the spirit of free enterprise, in a country where you could never get ahead in life no matter how hard you worked?”

There was a barrage of nos.

“Tell them about capitalism,” I urged.

“Capitalism is the system of free enterprise—”

“Where the rich control everything—” I interrupted.

“—where it is possible for anyone to better himself if he has the desire and the will because he lives in a democracy. I'm not saying anything against our wonderful allies the Russians. They have their system, which they feel is right for them, but do we want a communist government for ourselves?”

Another barrage of nos.

“Yes!” I said, surprising myself.

“She's against America,” a boy pointed out.

“Of course Suse's not against America,” the teacher said. “I think she's just been reading things she hasn't quite understood. She needs to think them out a little more clearly.”

But the boy was right. I was against America. I hadn't been a few minutes before. Strangely enough, I had never brooded over Doris Duke, sailing around in
Life
magazine on her block-long yacht drinking champagne, while on the next page sat a Pennsylvania mining town of grimed shacks and black slag heaps. America had never been included in my thoughts of mush pots and custard bowls. America was America, exceptional, blessed, and it had been that way from the start, with George
Washington and the Bill of Rights and all that dreary but unquestionably fine business. Only when I heard myself say “Yes!” did I realize my opinion had changed. I didn't know how it happened. It seemed the teacher had done it for me.

“Of course I recommend outside reading,” she was telling us. “Nothing is more important than to search for answers. But what must you always keep in mind?”

No one knew.

“To think your ideas through,” she said, lifting a forefinger.

At this point the bell rang, and everyone departed in lively spirits, which were increased by the chain of paper clips borne innocently away like a Chinaman's queue. But I felt removed, staring in my mind at Doris Duke and the coal miners.

We never had another discussion so spirited. We returned to the legislative system, the subject we had disgressed from that day, and though the teacher still tried for enthusiasm, she bored us and we bored her.

I thought dismally of my next four years, the same old blankness at test time, the same old swamp of Ds and D minuses. It had been nice that day of the discussion, having facts and opinions at my fingertips. It was nicer than being bored, which I knew from algebra class. Maybe if I studied all my subjects as I had studied algebra, they would start making sense, too. True, there would be no ultimate sense. There was no golden rose of truth. There were just a lot of parts that would never fit together the way you wanted. But I was feeling something new, a curiosity at least to know what the parts were.