Way the Crow Flies (16 page)

“And those are just the flights we know about,” says Jack.

Hal Woodley joins them. They make room for him, imperceptibly straightening up.

“Think what else they got up their sleeve,” says Vic.

“Nowadays,” says Jack, “the real battles get fought in the press and in front of the TV cameras.”

“So that’s what happened to Nixon,” says Woodley, and they all laugh.

Jack opens another beer, offers it to Hal. “Cheers, sir.”

“Prost
. Call me Hal, Jack.” The others raise their glasses but, with the exception of Henry, avoid calling Hal Woodley anything at all, “sir” seeming overly formal for the setting, and “Hal” being inappropriate unless expressly invited.

“Think of the disappointment, eh?” says Jack with a grin. “You’re a great Russian hero, a cosmonaut. You orbit the earth like a god, the whole world down below is your oyster, and where do they take you when you parachute down? Back to some godforsaken desert in the middle of Kazakhstan!”

“I’d take six orbits over a hundred any day if it meant I could spend a week or two in Florida,” says Steve. “The waitresses alone are bound to be easier on the eyes.”

“Not to mention the food!” says Vic.

Froelich waits until they have stopped laughing. “By landing on the moon”—he speaks with the precision, the slight annoyance, of an expert—“the successful party demonstrates the ability to achieve instant liftoff which is necessary for the moon which is a moving target. When one is adding to this the superior Soviet guidance and control, there is the prospect also of ICBMs that launch to orbit where they cannot be shot down, then re-enter earth’s atmosphere to strike a target—” As Jack listens he speculates; Froelich with his PhD could be teaching at a university, patches on his elbows. Maybe he’s an eccentric, getting away from it all out here in the boondocks. Yet he clearly loves his subject. Why would he want to get away from it? “Sputnik made the West very afraid,” Froelich is saying. “But what is Sputnik?”

“Fellow Traveller, I think is the translation,” says Jack.

Froelich ignores the comment and continues. “A small transmitter on the head of a rocket. And also the last resting place of a dog who did not ask to be a cosmonaut.” The others chuckle, but Froelich does not smile. “Sputnik was not an intercontinental ballistic missile, it had to hit no target, just it had to … go up.” And he points. “They did not have the ICBM, we have this—America has this—before Russia, but ordinary people in the West become afraid and this fear becomes useful to….” He pauses, knits his brow, in search of the words. The other men wait respectfully for him to pick up the thread. Froelich is the picture of the absent-minded professor.

Hal Woodley supplies the missing phrase: “The powers that be.”

“
Ja
, thank you,” says Froelich. “By landing on the moon, the successful party demonstrates also the ability to rendezvous between two spacecrafts in orbit, and this is vital to making a military installation.”

There is a moment of silence. He seems to have finished.

Jack says, “You’re right, Henry, putting a man on the moon’ll give us a nice warm fuzzy feeling, but the bottom line is security. The Yanks ought to pour their dollars into the air force space program.”

“It’s all politics,” says Hal. “Look what happened with the Arrow.”

A moment of silence for the Avro Arrow, the most advanced jet fighter in the world. Created by Canadians, test-flown by Canadian pilots, scrapped by Canadian politicians.

“And what did we buy instead?” says Steve with disgust. “Bomarcs.”

“American hand-me-downs,” snorts Vic.

“I don’t know why McNamara is stalling,” says Jack. “USAF’s got all kinds of good stuff in the works like their, uh—they’re working on those Midas satellites that tell you every time the enemy launches a missile, they’ve got a manned space glider in the works, what do they call it—?”

“The Dyno-Soar,” says Vic.

“Yeah,
Time
had a whole spread. NASA’s got Apollo but there’s plenty of work to go around. Kennedy ought to throw USAF a bone.”

Vic says, “Uncle Sam don’t want to look like the Soviets, rattling the sabre in space.”

Henry says, “You think space is not military now?”

“NASA is a civilian agency,” argues Jack. “In fact, half the movers and shakers down in Houston are your countrymen, Henry.”

“That’s right,” says Hal. “Look at von Braun and that other fellow—”

“Arthur Rudolph,” says Jack. “Guy’s a managerial genius.”

Froelich shrugs. “They worked for Nazis.”

“Really?” says Steve.

Jack winces. “Technically yes, but they were civilians. Scientists and dreamers.”

Vic lifts his glass to Henry. “You got to hand it to the Germans, eh, when it comes to technology.”

But Henry is still hunched, arms crossed, glass in hand. “Scientists and dreamers also caused the first atomic bomb to detonate at Los Alamos. They hold—held it together with masking tape. Very idealistic. It would stop Hitler. It kills instead millions of civilians.”

There’s a pause. Then Jack says, “It ended the war, though, didn’t it?”

Hal says, “Although I wonder if you could’ve found a single general who’d’ve made that particular call.”

Another pause. Vic sighs. “The Yanks always get stuck with the dirty work.”

Jack nods. “Yup.” Then smiles. “You know, Peter Sellers had the right idea. We ought to declare war on the Americans. They’ll come in and hammer us, then give us a whole bunch of aid and we’ll be better off than ever.” Henry shrugs again, sips. Jack continues. “We’re just lucky the nuclear types didn’t get together with the rocket types over in Germany during the war—they’d’ve had nuclear missiles.”

Vic says, “I wonder why they didn’t.”

Henry replies, “Because it is Jewish science.”

The others look at him, but Henry does not continue.

“What’s that?” asks Jack.

“Atomic science.”

Hal asks, “What do you mean, ‘Jewish’?”

“Einstein is a Jew,” says Henry.

Jack flinches at the word—it sounds abrupt, rude:
Jew
. It sounds … anti-Semitic. Jack knows that isn’t fair—just because Froelich is German doesn’t make him an anti-Semite.

“Hitler rejects Jewish science”—Henry sounds more Teutonic than ever to Jack, clipped tones, confident to the point of arrogance—“also Hitler does not have the imagination to marry the rocket with the atomic warhead.”

“Boy,” says Steve. “So in a strange way … Hitler’s anti-Semitism may have saved us from the big one.”

Jack gives a low whistle. Henry says nothing.

Elaine calls, “What are you boys talking about?”

Jack smiles over at her. “Aw, fun ’n’ games, Elaine, fun ’n’ games.”

“They’re talking politics,” says Mimi, carrying a TV table over with four plates of pineapple upside-down cake, “solving the world’s problems.” She sets the table down and winks at her husband.

Vic protests, “That’s the third dessert tonight!”

“I don’t know where you found the time, Mimi,” calls Betty.

Jack notices Karen sitting a little apart, both babies asleep in her lap. Yet she doesn’t look maternal so much as … what? He tries to put his finger on it. She looks as though she’s on safari … like that woman who rescues animals … monkeys … lion cubs? What’s the name of that book?

“Well stop being so boring,” Elaine calls to the men from her chaise, “and come talk to us.”

“Let them get it out of their system, love,” says Betty, pouring tea, although Elaine is still working on a cocktail.

Froelich takes a bite of cake. “Thank you Mrs. McCarthy—
entschuldigen Sie mich, bitte
—Mimi. Delicious cake.” He inclines his head in a formal old-world bow, and resumes energetically: “My point being, why go to the moon when we can so very well annihilate ourselves from here?”

The other men look at him. “I’m talking about avoiding annihilation,” says Jack.

“Then why don’t we get rid of the weapons?”

“Are you a ban-the-bomb type, Henry?”

“Sure, why not?”

“So am I,” says Vic. “I’d like the Soviets to ban it first, though.”

“The military are the biggest peaceniks of all,” says Jack. “Unlike a lot of politicians, military types know what war is like.”

Henry Froelich says, “And some civilians too. They know.”

Hal looks Henry in the eye. “That’s for sure, Henry. Lest we forget, eh?” He raises his glass.

“To friendship,” Jack says.

“To friendship,” the others join in.

Over by the barbecue, the kids are roasting marshmallows. Mike has made a torch of his, claiming to prefer it well done,
à point
. Madeleine approaches Elizabeth. “Would you like a roasted marshmallow?”

Elizabeth nods and sighs. Madeleine blows on the marshmallow, then holds the skewer out to her. Lisa and Auriel join her and watch as Elizabeth slowly savours the toasty white, her eyes half closed, a creamy moustache forming on her lip.

“Is it good?” Auriel asks.

“Yahhh.” Elizabeth’s head rests almost on one shoulder, then moves slowly in a half-circle and tilts back. Madeleine follows with the marshmallow. Elizabeth makes it look delicious.

Lisa says, “Know what, Elizabeth? If you take a marshmallow and squish it, it shrinks and you get ghost gum. Want to try it?”

“Yahhh.”

Betty Boucher settles into a lawn chair and cuddles one of the Froelich babies. “With luck we’ll get a family moving into that little green bungalow down the street, with a daughter over twelve.”

“Wouldn’t that be grand,” says Elaine Ridelle. Most children in the PMQs are no older than Mike, hence babysitters are at a premium. Vimy’s daughter Marsha is not able to babysit for the Bouchers Saturday night; the Woodleys are going away for the weekend.

Karen Froelich says, “Ricky can babysit.” Perhaps she misinterprets the awkward silence that follows her offer as confusion because she adds, “My son.”

Vimy turns to Mimi. “Ricky is a good friend of my daughter’s, he’s a lovely boy.”

“He’s a doll,” adds Elaine.

Karen nods vaguely. The other women smile and change the subject.

Mimi has not yet met Ricky Froelich. She has no way of knowing what Betty and Elaine will tell her later: that Ricky is a good-looking youngster of fifteen, so responsible and well adjusted that many women in the PMQs wonder how he could possibly be a product of the Froelich household—not that the Froelichs aren’t good people, they are just … far from average. But the fact that Ricky is a fine boy is not the point. The point is, boys do not babysit. What kind of mother would volunteer her son for a girl’s job?

Vic crosses the lawn, heading for the street, and says over his shoulder to the women, “I’m not sure but I think he’s just got the two dependents.”

Betty asks, “Who?”

Vic stops and turns. “The American moving into the bungalow. They’ve just got the one child.”

“Vic, you never tell me anything!”

“You never ask!”

“He’s the new exchange officer,” says Hal, joining the women. “A flying instructor.”

“We’ll have to have them over, Jack,” says Mimi. “They’ll be a long way from home.”

“Aren’t we all,” adds Betty Boucher.

Vic was on his way home to fetch his accordion, but Mimi stops him: “Stay right where you are!” She turns to her daughter and orders,
“Madeleine, va chercher ton accordéon.”
Her daughter groans but Mimi overrides her.
“C’est pour monsieur Boucher, va vite, va vite.”

Madeleine returns with her big red, white and black beast. Vic seats himself in a lawn chair, settles it onto his broad lap, undoes the snaps to let it inhale, then proceeds to bounce and hug the music out of it, elbows working the bellows, stocky fingers flying up and down the keys. Before long he has the children singing with him, then the women join in and so does Steve Ridelle. The young couple next door come out and join the crowd with their infant.

Madeleine sings
“Alouette”
with the others, and wonders where Colleen Froelich is. Did she do something bad and have to stay home? Is she spying on us right now?

Vic strikes up a jig, and Mimi sings, “‘
Swing la bottine dans l’fond d’la bôite à bois.’”
Mike dashes behind the house and returns with the baseball bat. He holds it end to end and jumps over it back and forth in double time to the music, like a wild boy, throwing it up, catching it, step-dancing. Mimi whoops, everyone claps time. Madeleine is painfully proud. She watched her boy cousins and one of her big huge uncles do the same dance this summer while Tante Yvonne played accordion—except in Acadie they used an axe handle, not a bat.

Across the lawn, Jack and Henry join in the applause. Then Henry fills his pipe, tamps it down, tops it up, tamps it down. Jack takes out a pack of White Owl cigars and lights up. “You know, Henry, there is nothing I’d like better than to get rid of these things altogether. All the nukes. Hell of a thing to leave our kids. But we can’t stick our heads in the sand. What about the missile gap?”

“If you believe in this gap.” Froelich finally strikes a match, stroking the open bowl of his pipe with the flame, puffing it to life.

“Can we afford not to believe it?”

“Even their Secretary of Defense does not believe it.”

“Yeah, McNamara backtracked pretty quick on that one, eh? Still, you never know what they’ve got in the pipeline.” Jack spits out a speck of tobacco. “What’s that you’re smoking, Hank? Smells familiar.” More acrid than Amphora, a Continental edge to it—dark, as opposed to milk, chocolate.

“Von Eicken. Deutsch tobacco.”

“That explains it.”

“Eisenhower warned his country it could be very dangerous to make a war economy during peacetime.”

“Are we living in peacetime?” asks Jack, aiming a stream of smoke up into the deepening blue of twilight.

“Right here? Right now? Oh yes.”

Jack nods a little, in time with the music—
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands, if you’re happy and you know it clap your hands, if you’re happy and you know it and you really want to show it…
.

“Friede,”
says Froelich.

Jack looks at him sharply, then recalls. Of course.
Peace
. “You know, Henry, we can ban the bomb and do all that good stuff but we can’t stop mankind exploring.”