Part 58 (1/2)
Lazarus picked the smaller girl up by her elbows and kissed her cheek, set her down. ”Technically correct, Carol-but 'pretty' suits me just fine if Marie thinks I am. Quite a welcoming committee-do I run along behind?”
”You sit in the tonneau with the girls,” Brian Junior ruled. ”But look at this first!” He pointed. ”A foot foot throttle! Isn't that bully?” throttle! Isn't that bully?”
Lazarus agreed, then took a few moments to inspect the ear-in better shape than he had left it, s.h.i.+ning and clean from spokes to top and with several new items besides the foot accelerator: a dressy radiator cap, rubber nonskids for the pedals, a tire holder on the rear with a patent-leather cover for a spare tire, a robe rail in the rear compartment with a lap robe folded neatly, and-finis.h.i.+ng touch-a cut-gla.s.s bud vase with a single rose. ”Is the engine kept as beautifully as the rest?”
George opened the hood. Lazarus looked and nodded approvingly. ”It could take a white-glove inspection.”
”That's exactly what Grandpa gives it,” Brian declared. ”He says if we don't take care of it, we can't use it.”
”You do take care of it.”
Lazarus arrived in royal splendor, one arm around a big little girl, the other around a small little girl. Gramp was waiting on the front porch, came down the walk to meet him, and Lazarus suddenly revised his mental image: The old soldier was in uniform and seemed a foot taller and ramrod straight-ribbons on his chest, chevrons on his sleeves, puttees most carefully rolled, campaign hat perched high and turned up slightly behind.
As Lazarus turned from handing Carol out, Marie having danced ahead, Gramp paused and threw Lazarus a sweeping Throckmartin salute. ”Welcome home, Sergeant!”
Lazarus returned it as flamboyantly. ”Thank you, Sergeant; I'm glad to be here.” He added, ”Mr. Johnson, you didn't tell me you were a supply sergeant.”
”Somebody has to count the socks. I agreed to take-”
The rest was lost to Woodie's explosive arrival. ”Hey, Uncle Sergeant! You're going to play chess with me!”
”Sure, Sport,” Lazarus agreed, his attention distracted by two other things: Mrs. Smith at the open door, and a service flag in the parlor window. Three stars-Three?
Then Gramp was urging him in with something about this being a drill night so supper would be early. Nancy kissed him, openly and without glancing first for her mother's approval-then d.i.c.kie had to be picked up and kissed, and Baby Ethel (walking!), and at last Maureen gave him her slender hand, drew him to her, and brushed his cheek with her lips. ”Sergeant Theodore . . it is so good good to have you home.” to have you home.”
Supper was a noisy, well-run circus, with Gramp presiding in lieu of his son-in-law, while his daughter ran things with serene dignity from the other end and did not get up once Lazarus placed her chair under her and took his seat of honor on her right. Her three oldest daughters did all that was necessary. Ethel sat in a highchair on her mother's left with George helping her-Lazarus learned that this duty rotated among the five eldest.
It was a lavish meal for wartime, with hot, golden cornbread replacing white bread, this being a wheatless day-and firmest discipline (administered by Nancy and Brian Junior) required that every morsel accepted must be eaten, with admonitions about hungry Belgians. Lazarus did not care what he ate but remembered to compliment the cooks (three), and tried to answer all that was said to him-nearly impossible as Brian and George wanted to tell about their troop's drive to collect walnut sh.e.l.ls and peach pits and how many it took for each gas mask, and Marie had to be allowed to boast that she could knit just as well as George could and she did not either drop st.i.tches!-and how many squares it took to make a blanket, while Gramp wanted to talk shop with Lazarus and had to be stern to get a word in edgewise.
Maureen Smith seemed to find it unnecessary to talk. She smiled and looked happy, but it seemed to Lazarus that there was tension under her self-control-the ages-old strain of Penelope. (For me, darling? No, of course not. I wish I could tell you that Pop will will come back, unharmed. But how could I make you believe that I come back, unharmed. But how could I make you believe that I know know? You're going to have to sweat it out the way Penelope did. I'm sorry, my love.) ”Excuse me, Carol-I missed that.”
”I said it's perfectly horrid horrid that you have to go back so soon! When you're just about to go 'Over There.' ” that you have to go back so soon! When you're just about to go 'Over There.' ”
”But it's quite a lot, Carol, in wartime. It's just that getting here and getting back eats up so much time. I'm not ent.i.tled to special privileges; I don't know that I am about to s.h.i.+p out.”
There was silence around the table, and the older boys exchanged glances.
Ira Johnson broke it by saying gently, ”Sergeant, the children know what a pa.s.s in the middle of the week means. But they don't talk; they are disciplined. My son-in-law decided-wisely, I think-not to keep things from them unnecessarily.”
”But, Grandpa, when Papa has leave, he he doesn't go back next day. It's not fair.” doesn't go back next day. It's not fair.”
”That's because,” Brian Junior said wisely, ”Papa usually rides with Captain Bozell in that big ol' Marmon Six and they burn up the road. Staff Sergeant Uncle Ted, I I could drive you back to camp. Then you wouldn't have to leave till late tomorrow night.” could drive you back to camp. Then you wouldn't have to leave till late tomorrow night.”
”Thank you, Brian-but I don't think we'd better. If I catch the train we call the 'Reveille Special' tomorrow evening, I'm safe even if the train is a bit late, and this is one time I'm not going to risk being over leave.”
”I agree with Sergeant Bronson,” Gramp added, ”and that settles it, Brian. Ted can't risk being late. I see that I had better move along, too. Daughter, if I may be excused?”
”Certainly, Father.”
”Sergeant Johnson, may I drive you to your parade ground? Or wherever it is?”
”To the Armory. No, no, Ted, my captain picks me up and brings me home; he and I go early and stay late. Mrrph. Why don't you take Maureen for a spin? She hasn't been out of the house for a week; she's getting pale.”
”Mrs. Smith? I'd be honored.”
”We'll all go!”
”George,” his grandfather said firmly, ”the idea is to give your mother an hour free of the pressure and noise of children.”
”Sergeant Ted promised to play chess with me!”
”Woodie, I heard what he said. He did not set a time . . and he'll be here tomorrow.”
”And he promised to take me to Electric Park a long, long, long long time ago, and he never did!” time ago, and he never did!”
”Woodie, I'm sorry about that,” Lazarus answered, ”but the war came along before the park opened. We may have to wait until the war is over.”
”But you said-”
”Woodrow,” his mother said firmly, ”stop that. This is Sergeant Theodore's leave, not yours.”
”And get that sulky look off your face,” added his grandfather, ”before we form a regimental square and have you flogged around the flagpole. Nancy? Charge-of-quarters, dear.”
”But-” The oldest girl shut up.
”Father, Nancy's young man is about to reach his birthday and is not going to wait to be drafted, I think I told you. So some of the young people are giving him a surprise party tonight.”
”Oh, yes-slipped my mind. Fine young man, Ted; you would approve of him. Correction, Nancy; you're off duty. Carol?”
”Carol and I can take care of anything,” Brian answered. ”Can't we, Carol? My night to wash, Marie wipes, George's turn to put away. Bedtimes by the schedules, emergency telephone numbers on the blackboard-we know the standing orders.”
”May I be excused, too, then?” said Nancy. ”Staff Sergeant Ted-you will will be here tomorrow. Won't you?” be here tomorrow. Won't you?”
Lazarus went out to the curb to meet Gramp's militia captain. When he came in, Maureen had gone upstairs. He grabbed the chance to freshen up in the bath off the quondam sewing room. Fifteen minutes later he was handing Mrs. Smith into the front seat of the landaulet, himself dizzied by her wonderful fragrance. Had she managed to bathe again in twenty minutes or so? It seemed like it; she had certainly changed clothes. These wartime styles were startling; as he handed her in Lazarus caught a glimpse not only of trim ankle but quite a lot of shapely calf. He was shaken by the thrill it gave him.
How long would this dress cycle last? While he cranked the car, he tried to quiet himself by thinking about it. Corsets disappeared right after this war, and skirts went up and up all during the Torrid Twenties, the ”Jazz Age.” Then women's styles varied all through this century but with a steady trend toward letting men see more and more of ”what they were fighting for.” But social nudity, even in swimming, did not become really common until the end of the century, so he seemed to recall. Then a puritan reaction the following century-a horrid time he had fled from.
What would Maureen think if he tried to tell her any of it?
The engine caught; he got in beside her. ”Where would you like to go, Mrs. Smith?”
”Oh, out south. Somewhere quiet.”
”South it is.” Lazarus glanced at the setting sun, turned on his headlights. He made a U-turn and headed south.
”But my name is not 'Mrs. Smith', Theodore . . when we are alone.”