“Instead of talking about procreation that doesn’t concern us, can we talk instead about how studiously your brother is hiding his reading matter?”
“What’s he reading?”
“Ten Days That Shook the World by John Reed for one.”
“I haven’t noticed. But he can read what he likes, no?”
“Then why does he hide it?”
Alexander started to fuss, so they stopped for a moment while Esther adjusted his blankets and gave him back the rattling teddy bear he had dropped. “You’re a good boy,” she murmured, kissing him on the head. “You’re a very good boy.” She straightened up. Her seventy-three-year-old father, who had been pushing the carriage because keeping both hands on the rails made it easier for him, resumed walking, his pace ever so slow. “Are you asking because you know, Father, or because you’re fishing?”
“Both,” Herman replied. “I’m asking because I know, but I’m fishing to see if you know.”
“I don’t know anything,” said Esther. “I ignore Harry completely when he is in his strange other world, and pay attention to him only when he is engaged in ours.”
“Good,” Herman said. “His lovely and gracious wife may be wise to adopt the same approach.”
“I don’t know why you’re so taken with her,” Esther said, adjusting her hat to protect her face from the sun. “What else is he reading?”
“In the Penal Colony by Kafka.”
Esther smiled. “Harry is so funny.”
“But do you know what he’s pretending to read?”
“What?”
“A Letter to My Father.”
Esther laughed. “He is hilarious. Did you know that Kafka’s father was also named Herman?”
“I didn’t. Laugh now, but what are we going to do in 1922 when his house arrest is over?”
“Let’s not count those chickens yet. Have you seen how scrupulously Janke observes him? It’s almost as if she wants to catch him breaking parole. Do you hear him on Mondays? He’s taken to calling her Inspector Javert.” Esther looked amused. “To her face!”
Herman laughed. “Your brother’s always had a knifelike quality to his sense of humor.”
“My brother, but your son.” She patted her father with deep filial affection as they ambled down a pristine tropical street, gazing inside the window displays of nouveau art and fancy shoes. “You worry too much. He’ll be fine. Look where they’re living. You don’t think Bellagrand will get under his skin like it has got under Salvo’s? And Gina’s?” Esther nudged him. “And even yours a little.”
Pushing Alexander, Herman pulled ahead slightly, away from Esther’s fond teasing. “Yes, sure, it got under my skin,” he said. “Like chiggers.”
“Harry, have you had a chance to read John Reed’s new book?” Herman asked casually after a few days had passed. They had been having a perfectly congenial lunch of shrimp ceviche, fresh bread, and mango with ice cream.
“Why would I, Father?” said Harry. “My prison guard—I mean, my parole officer, the honorable Margaret Javert, prefers I don’t read such things.”
“Perhaps she is right. I, for one, found the book quite harmless. Should I advise her that it’s all right for you to read it, if you wish?”
“Herman, you’ve read Ten Days That Shook the World?” Gina asked with surprise.
“Yes, dear girl, why not?” he said cheerfully. “In your very house. I found a copy in your library, lying around, collecting dust. I’d heard so much about it in the papers, I thought I’d give it a go. I confess, it was curious to find it here. It was published barely a year ago.”
Silence fell over the table. “I don’t understand what’s going on,” a perplexed Gina finally said. “What am I missing?”
“Nothing, Gia,” Harry said, reaching out to take her hand. “Father is just being Father. Doing to me what Salvo was doing to my sister.” He turned to Herman. “Okay, fine. Yes, I read it. It can’t be a surprise that I read my friend John Reed’s book. Did you see, he had it signed to me? I was honored to receive it.”
“Hmm,” Herman said. “I would keep this small detail away from your corrections officer, if I were you. I think that a lack of correspondence between you and CPUSA members is one of the conditions of your current situation.”
“Yes,” Harry said, letting go of Gina’s hand and staring into his bowl of melted ice cream. “Which is why I didn’t tell her.”
“Wise.”
Harry chewed his lip. “So what did you think of the book, Father?”
“I thought it was swell.” Herman shrugged. “Why not? The man is clearly enraptured by guns and rifles and shootings and mass police action, and mobs on the streets. It would have been great as a play without words. Just a lot of movement and noise, no dialogue, very little narrative.”
“I thought there was quite a bit of narrative,” Harry said. “Why do you say there wasn’t?”
“Why? Because his book ably showed me what it was like to live through violence on the streets. It didn’t do so well to explain why there should have been violence in the first place.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“A sixth of the country is trying to brutally oppress and murder the other five-sixths of the country, who do not like whatever this thing Bolshevism is, and want no part of it, or of being murdered. Someone thinks this brute force is a good idea. But no one will tell me why.”
“Do you really need John Reed to tell you why?”
“I wouldn’t have minded at least gleaning what this thing was that was worth slaughtering people on the streets over, so yes.”
“He is writing a new book about that very subject. He’s writing it now.”
“Interesting. I don’t want to know how you know this,” Herman said. “Funny thing though—lots of people keep telling me our current way of living should be overturned. Many governments in Europe, and even our government, live under threat of this overthrow, if you judge by the demonstrations on the streets, of which, of course, you’re no longer part, though I assume you read all about them in the papers. But I, for one, along with a million others, am still waiting for an answer as to why such an overthrow is needed.”
“I don’t see how other people’s failures to inform you of this are John Reed’s fault.”
“Oh, it’s his fault also,” Herman said. “When I read a book on the French Revolution, I want to know the meaning beyond the guillotine. When I read a book on the American Revolution, I want to know something other than Washington crossing the Delaware on Christmas Day. I want to know what he was crossing the river for. Why is that so unreasonable? Why did Caesar cross the Rubicon? Does anyone need to know?”
“Father, you can’t really tell me you don’t know what Bolshevism is!” Exasperated, Harry looked at Gina. But she was studying him puzzled, almost troubled, taken aback at his sudden intensity about a seemingly casual conversation on a languorous afternoon when they all should have been having a nap.
“No,” Herman said, “I don’t know what it is. Mr. Reed refuses to tell me. He writes that the question of what Bolshevism is cannot be answered in the pages of his book. I’ve never read anything stranger. They’re revolting, rebelling, fighting, overthrowing, all of it is glorious, valiant, vehement. Why then am I left in the dark as to why all this valiant glory is taking place? Is that deliberate?”
“Of course not!”
“Well, then, perhaps John Reed himself doesn’t know.” Herman sat back with satisfaction. “For he tells me so many other things in his book, both trivial and profound, I should think that if he knew the answer, he would tell it to me. No?”
“It’s a book about his experience in Petrograd during the Russian Revolution, Father,” Harry said, impatient and defensive. “It’s not an encyclopedia.”
“I should hope not,” Herman said. “It wouldn’t be very comprehensive and educational if it were.” He paused, scraping up and enjoying the last of his mango and ice cream. “Son, let?
??s take your oldest friend Ben as an example of what I’m trying to say.”
Everyone visibly stiffened. Herman’s only reaction to the inexplicable discomfort of the rest of his family was his knitted-together eyebrows. Then, a little more uncertainly, he continued with his point. “Uh—if Ben Shaw were Panama’s John Reed, and he wrote a book about the monumental undertaking that was the building of the canal, in many ways, metaphorical and literal, like a revolution in itself in the way it upended and detonated what was, and then proceeded to build what was to be, do you think that Ben would be able to answer the question of why he endeavored to spend fifteen years of his life building the canal in the first place?”
“I don’t know,” Harry said coldly. “Would that he were here to be asked.”
“We don’t need him to be here,” said Herman. “We know the answer. He’s told us often enough. Hasn’t he, Esther? He expounded his reasons to us at our Sunday dinner table for years. We were sick to death of his reasons. We knew them by heart! And then he went to Panama. His book would definitively answer my question. Because he knows why.”
Esther said nothing. Gina said nothing.
Harry smirked. “The Panama Canal is hardly Bolshevism, Father,” he said, moist with condescension.
“Indeed it’s not. But no matter how small or large your undertaking, shouldn’t you be able to give at least one reason why you’re undertaking it?” Herman pushed away his chair and got up. “Well, thank you for a lovely lunch, ladies, Harry. This lively conversation has exhausted me. I haven’t been so animated in years, and I’m grateful for that, but now, like my bonny grandson, I need a nap. I’m going to go and partake of one.”
Herman said the warm air was easy on his old bones. His rheumatoid arthritis got better. He swam in the ocean, fished in the freshly painted boat that was now called Gia, not Frances. He even went with Gina to buy fresh fruit at the market, to Esther’s great shock, who said she did not realize her father knew what a market was. He stayed for six months, stayed long enough to see Alexander take his first step, say his first word, and see the blue balloons on the boy’s first birthday. He left only when it got unbearably hot.
Four
SIX MONTHS LATER, a few weeks before Christmas 1920, Herman arrived once again, strolling through the tremendous marbled foyer of Bellagrand. His breathing had become more labored, he was thinner, he looked more worn-out. He hugged Gina, firmly shook Harry’s hand, took one fond look at him and frowned. “What’s the matter? Why so grim? Did Emma Goldman get deported again?”
“Oh, it’s not you, Herman,” Gina hastened to say when Harry didn’t reply. “John Reed died recently.”
Herman searched Harry’s face. “I didn’t realize you two were that close.”
“A brilliant man. A visionary,” Harry said. “He was only thirty-two! I can’t believe it. Died of typhus, in Petrograd. Who dies of typhus?”
“Well, John Reed for one.” Herman looked around. “Perhaps if he hadn’t galloped off to Russia he’d be thirty-two and alive. Where’s . . .” He didn’t finish. A boy ran in, dark-haired and brown-eyed, inordinately tall for his age. He was almost nineteen months, but he looked four. He hopped in like he was riding an invisible horse, stopped, stared at the adults, at the smiling Esther, at gleaming Rosa, his gaze stopping on Herman. His face broke into a grin.
“Alexander, do you remember who this is?” Gina asked.
Alexander nodded.
“This is Daddy’s father, your grandfather,” Gina said, keeping her hand on her son’s shoulder, bending down to him. “Grandpa.”
“Mama, let go,” Alexander said, pulling away from his mother. For a few moments he stood, stared, appraised, considered.
“What’s the matter, Alexander?” said Herman, a happy smile on his lined face. “Cat got your tongue?”
“No cat,” Alexander said. “Frogs. Come?” He extended his hand.
“Let’s go,” Herman said, taking the boy’s soft little hand into his giant weathered one. “Will we have to walk far?” The boy slowed down so Herman could keep up with him.
“No.” He pointed. “Water.”
“Water, eh? Well, are you sure they’re frogs, Alexander? How do you know they’re not baby alligators near the water?”
Alexander quickly turned around and glanced at his mother.
“He is joking with you, son,” Gina said. “Like Daddy does. Gators, Grandpa meant. In Florida, we say gators, Herman.”
The boy looked up at his tall, gray, slightly stooped grandfather. “No, no,” he said, pulling on Herman’s hand. “Frogs. No gators. Me show.”
They walked on.
“What’s that?” Alexander pointed to Herman’s cane.
“My walking stick. To help me walk.”
“Oh,” the boy said. “Me want.”
“Maybe we can make you one.”
“Yes. Make now.”
“Later, okay? I can make lots of things.”
“Oh?”
“A table. Chairs. A bench. A shed. A house.”
“House!” Alexander laughed.
“I’m not joking.”
“Me build house,” the boy instantly said.
“Okay. I’ll teach you how. But can we have lunch first?”
Shaking his head, Alexander looked keenly disappointed.
“We’ll need a hammer, you and I,” said Herman, “if we’re going to build a fort for the gators.”
“What’s hammer?”
“Your father hasn’t let you handle a hammer yet? Well, perhaps that’s wise.”
“What’s hammer?”
“I’ll show you,” Herman said, squeezing the boy’s hand. “Oh, your dad used to be very good with a hammer when he was a little guy like you.”
“Me not little. Me big.”
“Yes, you are quite tall. Maybe you and I can go to a store to get some tools.”
“What’s tools?”
“Hammers, pliers, a saw, a wrench.”
Alexander shook his head. “Me get bananas, cookies.”
“Yes, those are called girl stores,” said Herman. “When you grow up, you’ll have to learn to stay far away from those. You and I are going to go to a man store, Alexander. Okay?”
The boy vigorously nodded, not letting go of his grandfather’s hand. “Now. No frogs. Go now.”
“Maybe a little lunch? Your grandpa is starved.”
“No lunch.”
“Please?” Herman said.
They walked outside into the blinding sunshine.
Alexander showed Herman the pond and the frogs under the lilies, the palm trees he and his mother had planted, the lemon trees, the grove of oranges. He showed Herman the dock with the boat and the fishing lines.
“Is that your fishing line?”
Alexander nodded. “Me fish. Daddy fish. Gampa fish?”
“I eat fish. And I like to fish. Your dad and I went out on the boat quite often when I was here last. You were too little. But perhaps this time, all three of us can go?”
“Zio Salvo go too.”
“How could I forget.” He rumpled Alexander’s hair. “Of course Zio Salvo go too.”
Gina called them in for lunch, and both old man and little boy looked reluctant as they trudged up the slope to the lanai.
After lunch, Alexander had a tremendous temper tantrum. “No nap, fish! No nap, fish!” Alexander kept yelling and kicking his legs as he was carried upstairs by Gina. But after the nap that never happened and before dinner, Alexander, Herman, and Harry sat on the dock in the warm December setting sun, legs dangling, and threw their lines in the water. They didn’t succeed in catching a fish that day, but they succeeded the next, and the one after that.
Herman bought Alexander a hammer.
Alexander stopped having naps in the afternoon.
“What are you two looking at?” Gina asked. Herman and Esther’s backs were to her. Since they both paid attention to little else but Alexander and his activities, Gina assume
d her son was being extra special.
“We are trying to figure out what he is doing,” Esther said, moving slightly away from her father’s shoulder, to let Gina take a peek. Alexander was rolling multiedged stones from one end of the grass to the other.
Gina watched him. “Clearly he is building a fort.”
“Alexander, stop that!” That was Harry, from his mosaic table by the dock, where a moment ago he had been engrossed in Sabatini’s Scaramouche, a romance set during the French Revolution. Fiction was the only thing Janke heartily approved of. She deemed fiction “fangless, because it was so far-fetched.”
“Janke’s not wrong there, Harry, about it being far-fetched,” Gina had said. “How else to explain that in Scaramouche, Robespierre plays the part of a romantic action hero?”
“Alexander! What did I say? Stop it.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
“But you’re not stopping!”
“Me no finish!”
“Not, me no finish,” Harry yelled. “You finish.”
“Okay!”
“I think,” said Gina, watching her son, “he is trying to build two forts on opposite sides of the lawn and then have a battle.”
“A battle with what?” Herman asked.
Gina shrugged. “Anything. Everything. Two carrots. Two bananas. The hammer you bought him.”
“I didn’t know he was a fighter,” said Herman with unconcealed pride. “But clearly your son is a builder.”
“And a fighter,” said Esther with unconcealed adoration.
“Alexander! Did you stop?” This time Harry didn’t even look up from Scaramouche.
“Yes, Daddy.”
Gina knew how much Harry was enjoying a book by how much he kept quoting from it. He was born with a . . . sense that the world was mad. And by how little attention he paid to everything else.
Gina called to her oblivious husband. “Harry, tesoro. Can you please look up from Robespierre? Your son is about to take off in the boat.”
Alexander chortling, trying to untie the rope at the dock hook, Harry dropping his book, running down to the dock, Herman, Esther, Gina laughing, Harry scooping up Alexander, swinging him upside down by his feet, pretending to throw him into the water, Alexander laughing, laughing, more, more, Daddy, more, more.