A Southern Girl (18 page)

“I didn’t say that.”

“Blame me, not Elizabeth.”

She took an extended sip from her drink. “How much do you know about his time in the Navy?”

“Only what he’s told me, which isn’t much. He mentioned long stretches in the Pacific during the invasion of Japan. He made it sound like a desk job on board ship.”

“That would be his way. But I have his letters, and even the censors couldn’t tone it down but so much. He didn’t want me to worry, but he saw some very grim things out there. Like Iwo Jima. Did you know he landed on the beach there?”

“He never mentioned Iwo Jima.”

She shifted in her chair. “I pulled it out of him. He never understood the Japanese, the way they wanted to die for their emperor, the way they holed up like rats.”

“He wasn’t a Marine.”

“A beach master. He organized all that equipment our boys needed. Your father saw so much death, and he’s never forgiven the Japs.”

“I had no idea. He was in real danger.”

Mother nodded. “Don’t think his reaction to this idea of adoption isn’t wrapped up in Iwo Jima.”

“But who said anything about Japanese?”

She looked annoyed, thrusting her glass at me. “Oh, Coleman, the Orientals just don’t share our values. You must see that. That sneaky attack on Pearl Harbor is the way they live. You can’t trust one as far as you can throw him.”

“This child isn’t Japanese.”

“She’s foreign—it’s all the same. Son, I have a theory on this whole matter if you’d care to hear it. If you would rather my stay out of it, I’ll try, but any child you adopt becomes my grandchild.”

“What theory?”

“Elizabeth is a charming girl. Your father and I love her and we think highly of her as a wife and mother. But we know so little about her; where she came from; who her people are. We met them at the wedding, of
course, and everyone seemed very nice, but that was years ago and she never talks about them. The few times I’ve raised the subject she’s changed it. Are they estranged?”

“Her family isn’t close.”

“But ours is, or at least I’ve told myself that all these years. Whatever communication problems you have with your father–and I’m not blind, I see them, you may be sure–never altered his affection. My theory is that she is jealous of your closeness to us, and that in adopting this child, a child she knows we can’t accept, she is putting you to a choice between us and her.”

“I’ll have to give that some thought, Mother. She has her insecurities, but whether she would go this far to test our relationship is a question I can’t answer. She has said that she doesn’t think you and Dad entirely approved of her.”

Sarah scoffed. “It was never a matter of approval. We didn’t know her.”

“Be honest, Mother. Are you denying your disappointment that I didn’t marry a girl from around here?”

She recoiled momentarily at that, as though this thought had been beamed to her by alien intruders. Then, she recovered. “Well, I suppose there was some small amount—”

“That my wife sensed very early.”

“It’s a cliché, dear, but we only wanted what was best for you.”

“Parents do that. We’re doing the same. But I’m curious as to why you think Elizabeth would want to make me choose between you and her.”

“I’m afraid,” she said, suddenly looking quite wise to me, “that the answer to that question lies in your marriage. Women have certain instincts where those things are concerned, but I can’t help you there.”

“You can’t, or you won’t?”

“I have theories about why a wife might want to reassure herself by putting her husband to a choice, but they’re only theories.” She paused to smile in self-deprecation. “Listen to me, with all my theories. You know her far better than I. But even if I did know, I wouldn’t say. It’s like UFOs; until you see one yourself, you think everyone who claims to have seen one is crazy. I’m tired now. I think I’ll turn in.”

On Wednesday, I met Barron Morris at the Huguenot Club for lunch. The incestuous aromas of garlic, oregano and basil met me at the door. A thin, prissy waiter escorted me to a private table just off the main dining
area, where Barron Morris was already seated, dressed as resplendently as before, but with more color in his tie and a walking cane visible beside his chair. A half-filled Bloody Mary rested on the plate in front of him. He smiled as I approached.

“Circulation’s no better than Sunday,” he said, extending his hand. As soon as I was seated, Morris gave an almost imperceptible nod of his head. Moments later, a Bloody Mary appeared in front of me.

“You like shrimp?” Morris asked, then gave a glottic chortle. “What kind of question is that to ask a Charleston native?” After the waiter brought us steaming plates of shrimp Creole, Barron Morris offered me a job.

“I beg your pardon?” I said, dumbfounded.

“You shouldn’t be so surprised. When a young man begins to get a reputation, people like me take notice. I’ve checked you out with some of my old friends in the Tidewater. You’ve got quite a future in this business.”

“But I just made partner in Mahoney …”

“And you’re wondering why you should pull up stakes and start over here in Charleston.”

I smiled lamely as Morris buttered a roll, broke it in half, and dipped one end in the Creole sauce swimming near the edge of his plate. Light glinted off his cuff link. “I do love the food here. Before me and five others started this club about a million years ago, you just couldn’t find sauce like that without driving thirty minutes. How’s your drink?”

“Fine, sir.”

“Coleman, I have several reasons for making this offer. We need a good trial lawyer. We’ve got two, but they’re older—fiftyish—and we need a young Turk to take over some of this case load. I can promise you twenty-five percent more money in your first year than you’re making at Mahoney, whatever that figure is, plus a complete benefits package, relocation expenses and a full plate of some mighty challenging legal work.”

“Holy Pete.”

Morris laughed. “Your father uses that expression; Holy Pete. You’d better attack that Creole before it gets cold. Then I’d like to take you to the office to meet my partners. They know you’re coming even if you didn’t.”

It was after 4:00 when I emerged onto Broad Street. My reception at Morris & VanCleve had been nothing short of overwhelming. Either
they liked me as much as they seemed to or they liked me as much as Barron Morris wanted them to. And I liked them. Morris had told me to take as much time as I needed to reach a decision. But it had been something else Morris said that accounted for my turning north on Meeting Street toward the Charleston Public Library instead of south, the direction home.

We had been seated in Morris’s commodious office at the corner of the building, with its fine view of Broad Street and the “four corners of law.” Morris had been sounding me out on my reaction to the individuals I had met over the course of the previous two hours. We had almost concluded when Morris paused, looking past me out the window.

“There’s another thing I think you should consider, Coleman. Your roots are here, in Charleston. I’ve known your people for three generations. As I look about Morris & VanCleve today, I see fewer and fewer of the old names. I don’t have but so much time left to practice, but before I retire I’d like to do what I can to insure that fifty, maybe even a hundred years from now, there will still be Carters and Sinklers and Brailsfords and VanCleves and Morrises associated with this firm.”

“It’s odd you mention that,” I said. “For some reason, I feel less a part of New Hampton than I did when I arrived.”

Morris chuckled softly as he withdrew a cigar from his top drawer and clipped the end. “That’s called ‘maturity,’ and it has nothing to do with the people in New Hampton. Some of those fine folks came over on the boat; yours came here and theirs landed a little farther north.” He lit the cigar, then blew a puff of smoke upward. “If you stay there, I’ve no doubt that your grandchildren will feel about New Hampton what I feel for Charleston.”

“I went there to get away from Charleston. I see that now. Are you sure you want someone like that?”

“Absolutely,” said Morris, leaning forward. “I worry about the ones that haven’t been around some. Do you know that one of my earliest memories in this business involved your grandfather?”

“Tell me about it.”

“I had just finished Carolina. Started to work on a Monday. In those days the firm was Jenkins, Rogers & VanCleve. That Thursday, I went to a meeting of the Democratic Party at the Hibernian Hall. Your grandfather, Warren Carter, wasn’t active in city politics but he showed up that night
because of the subject under debate, which was the presidential election of 1932.

“Now bear in mind we were in our third year of the Depression, and folks here were hurting like they were everywhere. The party was split because the details of some of F.D.R.’s cures had begun to leak out, and the conservative folks around these parts were none too wild about the idea of these massive programs.

“Your grandfather found himself in the same boat as a lot of others that night; they couldn’t bring themselves to even contemplate voting for a Republican, the party of Lincoln, but they didn’t think much more of the governor of New York. Tempers flared, and for a time I thought fists were going to fly. In the middle of it, Warren stood up and gave as ripsnorting, fire and brimstone condemnation of F.D.R. as you’ve ever heard. I remember the shock throughout the room because this was a man as prone to public speaking as donkeys are to ballet.

“Next day, the newspaper story about the meeting carried this big picture of your grandfather, standing up in the crowd giving F.D.R. hell. You should look it up some time. It’s part of your history.”

I promised that I would, but left Morris with no real intention of doing so. Once on Broad Street, with time on my hands since Mother, I knew, was being taken to dinner by close friends, I changed my mind.

At the public library, I began my research in the microfilmed records of the
Post and Sentinel
and instantly regretted not having obtained from Morris the exact date of the meeting. I called Morris, but the old gentleman had left for the day. Without the date and with no help from the reference librarian, I had no choice but to begin my search at an arbitrary date in 1932. I chose June 1st. After reading a lead political story for June 2, I realized that F.D.R. had yet to be nominated, so I fast-forwarded to July 2, the day after the convention ended. By closing time, I had plied through September 27. I resolved to return, intrigued and challenged to find the elusive article.

At home, Mother met me at the door. “I was beginning to worry,” she said. I kissed her on the forehead.

“How was your lunch with the girls?”

“It was so sweet of them to invite me, but there was so much food. How was your meeting with Barron?”

“Interesting. We talked lawyer talk. Then I spent some time in the public library.”

“What on earth for?”

“Barron Morris told me a story about grandfather and a political meeting. I thought I’d check it out.”

She took on a pensive pose, as if trying to determine the origin of a noise in the next room. “I don’t know what he might have been alluding to. It must have been before I entered the picture. But I remember him well. He and your father were so alike.”

At the breakfast table the following morning, Saturday, I said, “Mother, I’m flying back tomorrow afternoon. I’m worried about you being here by yourself.”

Mother, dressed in her warmest housecoat, showed the listlessness of a fitful night. “I’ll be fine. It’s been a luxury having you here these past few days, but I need to get on with … things.”

“Why don’t you come spend some time with us in Virginia? A week, a month, as long as you like. Dad’s well cared for. You need to look out for yourself, too.”

“Thank you, dear. As soon as I feel like I’ve come to grips with this, I’ll do just that. Elizabeth won’t mind?”

“She would welcome it, although I can’t promise we won’t stick you with baby-sitting duty from time to time.”

She smiled. “Some time with my grandsons? Throw me in the briar patch.”

I drove slowly down Meeting Street toward the library. The streets were deserted. A morning mist from the river lingered at the height of second floor piazzas, giving the wrought-iron railings and trellises the appearance of black ink filigreed into a dream. I mulled Morris’s offer. Until now, I had thought only in terms of the rush I received from being courted by Charleston’s premier firm.

But as I passed landmarks of my youth, my thoughts moved beyond flattery. I slowed as I passed the house where Marie Donaldson, my first girlfriend, had lived. I idled for a few seconds in front of Cresanto’s, where I had ridden my bicycle when Mother sent me to buy the vegetables she had forgotten at the market and where the awning would soon be rolled out to signal that it was, as it had been for fifty years, the first-to-open
enterprise south of Broad. I drove past Dr. Seigler’s, my pediatrician until I left for college. Why had I left? Why not return?

At just past 11:00, as I scanned the front page for October 22, 1932, I found my article. The text of the story did not mention my grandfather, but the picture Morris had described identified “an irate Warren Carter.” I studied it. In the physiognomy of the man standing above the seated crowd with his arm extended toward an unseen dais, his index finger pointed at an invisible enemy, I saw shadows of my father and of myself. The squareness of the shoulders and the cant of the neck upon them were heirlooms of an unmistakable bequest. But the facial features were lamentably blurred, owing to either the sophistication of archaic photography or the microfilm process, I could not be certain which.

I photocopied the article and picture and noticed how the definition in my grandfather’s face had deteriorated further with the copy. I approached the reference librarian, hoping to find her better informed than the one who attended me the day before.

“I’m sorry, sir,” she said. “The only place I know that keeps the original papers is the
Post and Sentinel.
Collectors might have the edition you need, but it would be hit or miss finding it.”