Authors: Alan Glenn
And so it went. Sam crossed his feet and glared at the rear of the chair before him, stenciled with the A.L. #6 logo. He let his mind drift as Teddy went on, running the meeting as expertly as the Kingfish ran the Louisiana Legislature and then the Congress. Motions were made, seconded, and passed within seconds. He remembered reading somewhere
—Time
magazine, maybe?—that the record for bill passing was forty-four in just over twenty
minutes, down in Baton Rouge, while Huey Long was senator and still running the state, before the assassination of FDR, the disastrous single term of Vice President Garner, and the triumphant election of Long in ’36 and his reelection in ’40.
He shifted in his seat. A cynical thought but a true one: Democracy might be dying, replaced by whatever was going on here and around the globe, but at least its death made for quick meetings. Teddy droned on, then said, “All right, only three more things left on our agenda tonight. First of all, we’re lookin’ for your help for some information.”
There was a stir in the room. “There are index cards being passed out now, okay? We’ve all been asked to write down on those cards three names of people you think need to be looked at. Okay? Neighbors, coworkers, people down the street, we’re lookin’ for anybody who talks out of turn, insults the President and his people, or anybody else that needs to be looked at because of subversive activities or words. Okay?”
Some murmurs, but nobody protested. Sam felt queasy, as though the chicken stew from earlier had spoiled. Sean whispered something about how stoolies were the only growth industry in this administration, but Sam ignored him. He was thinking about his own status as a stoolie, being pressed by both his boss and father-in-law to be a rat. And he thought suddenly about that terrified writer he had put into the hands of the Interior Department last night.
When a card was passed to him, he took out his fountain pen, scribbled down three names—
Huey Long, Charles Lindbergh, Father Coughlin
—and then passed
the card forward. There. Up front somebody laughed—“At last my idiot cousin will get what’s coming to him”—and then Teddy collected the cards, breathing a bit hard, and passed them to one of the Long Legionnaires.
“Okay, item number two, some remarks from President Huey Long that we’re gonna play right now. Hank? Got the Victrola ready?”
There was a smattering of applause. Sam sat still, thinking about the other names on those cards. Sixty or seventy city residents were going about their business tonight, not realizing or imagining that they’d just been put on a list, a list that would eventually destroy them. Just like that firefighter O’Halloran, carving toys from scrap wood, peddling them on the street. Something cold seemed to catch in Sam’s throat. Maybe his own name was on that list.
He folded his arms tight as the man named Hank fiddled around with a Victrola set up in the corner, and from two speakers set up on chairs, there was a crackle of static and then the familiar Southern drawl of the thirty-third president of the United States:
“But my friends, unless we do share our wealth, unless we limit the size of the big man so as to give something to the little man, we can never have a happy or free people. God said so! He ordered it
.
“We have everything our people need. Too much of food, clothes, and houses—why not let all have their fill and lie down in the ease and comfort God has given us? Why not? Because a few own everything—the masses own nothing
.
“I wonder if any of you people who are listening to me were ever at a barbecue! We used to go there—sometimes one thousand people or more. If there were one thousand
people, we would put enough meat and bread and everything else on the table for one thousand people. Then everybody would be called and everyone would eat all they wanted. But suppose at one of these barbecues for one thousand people that one man took ninety percent of the food and ran off with it and ate until he got sick and let the balance rot. Then nine hundred ninety-nine people would have only enough for one hundred to eat, and there would be many to starve because of the greed of just one person for something he couldn’t eat himself
.
“Well, ladies and gentlemen, America, all the people of America, have been invited to a barbecue. God invited us all to come and eat and drink all we wanted. He smiled on our land, we grew crops of plenty to eat and wear. He showed us in the earth the iron and other things to make everything we wanted. He unfolded to us the secrets of science so that our work might be easy. God called: ‘Come to my feast.’
“Then what happened? Rockefeller, Morgan, and their crowd stepped up and took enough for one hundred twenty million people and left only enough for five million, for all the other one hundred twenty-five million to eat. And so many million must go hungry and without these good things God gave us unless we call on them to put some of it back …”
* * *
Sam kept his hands fisted in his pockets as the record ended and most of the men in the room applauded. Not moving his hands was a small protest, but it was the best
he could do. Sean sat next to him, head nodding forward, and Sam jabbed him with an elbow.
“Huh?”
“Speech over,” Sam said. “Look suitably enthusiastic.”
Sean covered a yawn. “Sorry. Dozed off. Must’ve listened to that same speech a half dozen times, starting ten years ago. Rockefellers and Morgans too rich. Everybody else too poor. A new Homestead Act. No man a slave, every man a king.” He looked about at the mostly smiling faces. “The same blah-blah-blah. If the Kingfish wants to get elected next year to a third term, he’s gonna have to do better than reusing the same old speech.”
“If it works, it works.”
Teddy, the Party leader, came back to the lectern and took another folded sheet of paper from his coat. “All right, all right, all right. Last item on tonight’s agenda. I gotta list here of some names. When I read out the names, you can leave the hall. For you, the meetin’ is over. We’ll see you next month. Okay, here we go: Abbott, Alan, Courtney, Delroy …”
It was as if the temperature in the hall had abruptly dropped. Sam saw that the others near him felt the same way, moving in their seats, looking around. No matter what Teddy said, this was unusual, this wasn’t right. Sean whispered gleefully, “That’s how it happens in the occupied lands. You get separated out. One group lives, the others get shot. Wonder what group we’re in.”
“Sean, nobody’s going to get shot.”
“Maybe so. But you got your revolver with you?”
“Why?”
“If there’s shooting, I want to be next to you. I get the feeling you wouldn’t go without a fight.”
Sam kept his mouth shut. He knew where his revolver was. Safe back at home. Teddy droned on, “Williams, Young, and Zimmerman. Okay, get a move on, get a move on.”
The sound of chairs being scraped and men walking away and the doors swinging open quieted down, and Sam saw that about a fourth of the room had filed out. Now the place was so quiet, he could hear a steam whistle blowing from the shipyard.
Teddy cleared his throat. “Okay. Now. The rest of you fellas, get ready for somethin’ important, okay?”
Sam looked at the rear door. It was unmanned, no sergeant at arms standing by. He could bail out right now and hit the street and—
Teddy carefully unfolded another sheet of paper. “Okay, these orders come straight from Party headquarters in Concord and Washington. Understand? Good. It’s been decided that the National Guard has to be expanded for future challenges. All the men that left, they’re already members of the Guard. You fellas aren’t. So you’re gonna volunteer this evening to join the New Hampshire National Guard. Understood?”
A voice came from the back. “Hey, Teddy! The hell with you! I got a bum knee! I ain’t gonna join the Guard, march around, and sleep on the ground. The hell with that!”
Teddy nodded, fat lips pursed. “That’s your right, then. And you know what happens next. We take note of who gets in and who doesn’t, right? Right. And then things happen. Maybe your uncle gets kicked off relief. Maybe your kid doesn’t get a summer job from the city. And maybe your boss, maybe he gets word that you’re not cooperative, that you’re not part of the team.”
The silence fell across the room like a cold, wet blanket. Teddy was right: Everyone knew what the threat meant. Not being part of the team, not being cooperative, meant you could get fired. Just like that. Whatever thin thread you were living by could be cut in an instant. No job, no government relief, no charity, and in a manner of weeks, you and your desperate family would be scratching out a living in the hobo camp out by Maplewood Avenue. Or selling cheap toys on the sidewalk.
Teddy looked about the hushed room. “Good. That’s more like it. I don’t want the word to get out that the Portsmouth district didn’t get one hundred percent enlistment. Good. Now. All you guys, stand up, raise up your right hand.”
There was the barest hesitation among the men, and Sam felt like here and now maybe somebody would make a stand, maybe somebody would push back. But nobody did. The room was still, and then one man got up, looking at his feet. He was joined by the man sitting next to him. A third man stood up, and another, and then the rest of the room joined in. Sam stood up with the rest, thinking,
Not right, this is not right
, and he realized with a sour taste in his mouth that it was just another step in that long descent into whatever was now passing for civil society, where you were conscripted and it was called volunteering, when the poor and homeless were called bums, and when you lied over the radio and it was called a frank talk with the American people.
So Sam raised his hand, his voice low and quiet, as he joined his fellow men in the American Legion hall in swearing to uphold and defend the constitutions of the state of New Hampshire and the United States, and to
defend both the state and the country against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Teddy folded the paper. “Okay. Word is, a couple of weeks, you’ll report to the armory to get a medical exam and get issued gear. More training will happen down the road. For you guys with bum knees or whatever, don’t fret, there’ll be something for you to do. We all pull together and we’ll do just fine.” He went through the quick and formal phase of dismissing the meeting, and by then Sam was out of his chair, joining everyone else to crowd out the rear door.
It seemed there was one more bit of business left undone. Two Long’s Legionnaires were blocking the door, holding up their hands.
“Jus’ hold on a second there, fellas,” the one on the left said. “We got somethin’ special for y’all.”
The other Legionnaire reached under his leather jacket. There was a slight gasp from someone, wondering what was going on as the man’s hand slipped in, and Sam watched, the hand came out, holding a—
A paper sack.
The tall young man jiggled the paper sack, held it out. “As you leave, boys, take one, okay? Gonna be a nice way to find out who our friends are up here.”
The first man up put a hand into the paper sack, came out with a flash of metal. Sean whispered, “Oh, crap, look at that,” and Sam saw “that” was a Confederate-flag pin. The two Legionnaires grinned.
“Welcome aboard,” the one on the left said.
* * *
With the flag pin in his hand, Sam rushed out of the meeting hall, his stomach sick, his head aching. He stood on the sidewalk, sucking in the cool air.
“Can you believe this?” Sean demanded, holding the pin up. “Just like Russia, just like Germany. Show your loyalty to nation and party by wearing a bloody pin.” He dropped his pin in an open drain grate. Sam, without even hesitating, did the same thing. It felt good, hearing the clink as the pin fell into the shadows.
“And another thing,” Sean raged. “Did you hear the oath we just took? It’s not the foreign enemies I’m worried about. It’s the other half. The
domestic
. Pretty big fucking blank check, if you know what I mean. That’s one of the reasons why our fair President got to keep control in Louisiana when he started out. He had the Guard in his pocket. Now we’re part of his shock troops. We do his dirty work wherever he wants us.”
Sam knew exactly what Sean meant. The National Guard was a trained reserve to help out the army overseas during a war, but more and more, it was used for other things. Breaking strikes in the big industrial cities in Pennsylvania and Illinois and Michigan. Burning down hobo encampments when they got too large outside of New York and Los Angeles and Chicago. Shooting at mobs when the relief money ran out in Seattle and Miami and Detroit. And now he and the others in that smoky hall were part of it.
“Christ, Sam.” Sean’s voice was harsh with anger. “What’s going to happen to us?”
“Damned if I know,” Sam said, moving away, wanting to get away from the hall, to get away from Teddy, to get away from the Party and everything else.
Just to get away.
But when he got to his Packard, he was brought back to ground very quickly.
As he opened the door, the overhead dome lit the front seat, and there, lined up in a row, lay three bound grass stalks. He froze. He started to crumple them but then gently placed the stalks back in the car, got in, started up the big engine, and motored home.
Sarah and Toby were both asleep, Sarah with the radio on low, Toby snoring, cuddled tight against his pillow. Out there was the Party, out there were the hoboes, out there armies and air forces and navies were grappling in the dark, men and women and children blown up, shot, drowned, burned …
Here it was peace. Inside this little frame house in this old port city, here was peace. A peace built on illusions, based on him doing his job, keeping his head down, not getting involved, and so far, the illusions were working.
But for how long?
He walked into the living room to the small bookcase. Among the books was a well-worn thick paperback with a faded green cover.
The Boy Scout Handbook
. His very own, and one that Toby liked to look through even though the boy was only old enough to be in the Cub Scouts. He
opened the flyleaf, saw the little scrawl.
Sam Miller. Troop 170. Portsmouth, N.H
. Nearly twenty years ago.