Joseph Kanon: The Prodigal Spy

February 1950

He was not allowed to attend the hearing. There was his age, for one thing, but he knew it was really the reporters. From his bedroom window he could see them every morning when his father left the house. Mr Benjamin, his father’s lawyer, would come for him-it was somehow unthinkable that he should make the short walk down 2nd Street to the Capitol alone-and the minute they were down the steps Nick would see the clusters of hats swooping toward them like birds. There was even a kind of ritual about it now. No one stood in front of the house. Usually they were across the street, or on the corner, drinking coffee from paper cups, exhaling little puffs of steam in the cold February air. Then the front door would open and they would stamp out their cigarettes, suddenly on duty, and surround his father, falling into step with him and Mr Benjamin as if they were joining them for a stroll.

In the beginning there had been photographers, their hats pushed back on their heads as they popped flashbulbs, but now there were just the reporters. No one yelled or pushed. The ritual had turned polite. He could see his father in his long herringbone coat drawing the pack with him as he moved down the street, Mr Benjamin, terrier-like, hurrying to keep up. His father never ignored the reporters. Nick could see him talking-but what did he say? — and nodding his head. Once Nick saw one of them laugh. His father had said the whole thing was a goddam circus, but from up here in the window, watching the hats, it seemed friendly, a gang of boys heading for school. It wasn’t, though. At night, alone in the study, smoking in the light of the desk lamp, his father looked worried.

His mother always left separately. She would busy herself with Nora, arranging the day, then stand in front of the hall mirror, touching her hair, smoothing out her wool skirt, while a cigarette burned in the ashtray on the table where they put the mail. When Nick came downstairs she would look surprised, as if she had forgotten he was in the house, then nervously pick up her lipstick to get ready. Her new dress, with its tight cinched waist and fitted top, seemed designed to hold her upright, every piece of her in place.

“Have they gone?” she said, putting on the lipstick.

“Uh-huh. Dad made one of them laugh.”

Her hand stopped for a minute, then the red tube continued along her lip. “Did he,” she said, blotting her lips, but it wasn’t a question. “Well, I’ll give them another five minutes.”

“They never wait for you, you know,” Nick said. It was one of the things that puzzled him. His mother walked to the hearings alone every day, not even a single straggler from the pack of hats waiting behind to catch her. How did they think she got there?

“They will one day,” she said, picking up her hat. “Right now all they can think about is your father. And his jokes.” She caught the edge in her voice and glanced at him, embarrassed, then went back to the hat.

“There was only one,” Nick said.

“I know,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean- Check the window again, would you? And shouldn’t you be getting ready for school?”

“I am ready,” he said, going over to the window. “I don’t see why I can’t go to the trial.”

“Not again, Nicky, please. And it’s not a trial. For the hundredth time. It’s a hearing. That’s all. A congressional hearing.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Your father’s not a criminal, that’s the difference. He’s not on trial for anything.”

“Everybody acts like he is.”

“What do you mean? Has anyone said anything to you at school?”

Nick shrugged.

“Have they?”

“They said he’s on trial for being a Communist.”

His mother stopped fixing the hat and lowered her hands. “Well, he’s not on trial and he’s not a Communist. So much for what they know. Just don’t listen, okay? It only makes it worse. They’re looking for Communists, so they have to talk to a lot of people in the government, that’s all.”

Nick came back to the mirror, studying them both, as if the world reflected would be his mother’s cheerful dream of before, when all they had to worry about was school gossip.

“They want to hear what he has to say. That’s why it’s called a hearing. There,” she said, pressing the hat like a protective shell. “How do I look?”

Nick smiled. “Beautiful.”

“Oh, you always say that,” she said lightly, glancing at the mirror again and leaning forward. Nick loved to watch her dress, disappearing to the edge of her careful absorption. It was the harmless vanity of a pretty girl who’d been taught that how you looked mattered, that appearance could somehow determine events. She blotted her lips one last time, then noticed his expression. “Honeybun, what’s wrong?”

“Why can’t I hear him too? I’m not a little kid anymore.”

“No,” she said softly, touching the side of his head. “Maybe just to me. But ten isn’t very old either, is it? You don’t want to grow up too fast.”

“Is he going to go to jail?”

She knelt down to face him, holding his shoulders. “No. Look, I know all of this seems confusing. But it’s not about you, do you understand? Just-grownups. Your dad’s fine. You don’t want him to have to worry about you too, do you? It’s-it’s a bad time, that’s all.”

A bad time. Nora, for whom Ireland was always just a memory away, called it troubles. “Before your father’s troubles started,” she would say, as if everything that was happening to them was beyond their control, like the weather. But no one would tell him what it actually was.

“ You go,” he said stubbornly.

“It’s different for me. You’re just a child-it has nothing to do with you. It’s not going to, either. I’m not going to let that happen,” she said, holding his shoulders tightly. “Do you understand?”

He didn’t, but he nodded, surprised at the force of her hands.

“You’ll be late,” Nora said, coming into the hall.

His mother looked up, distracted. “Yes, all right. Come on, honeybun, time for school. It’ll be all right. You’ll see.

“This won’t last much longer, I promise. Then we’ll go up to the cabin and forget all about it. Just us. Would you like that?”

Nick nodded. “You mean out of school?”

“Well, in the spring.”

“Don’t forget you’ve got Father Tim coming over later,” Nora said. “You’ll want to be back. Last time he was halfway through the bottle before you were through the door.”

“Nora,” his mother said, pretending to scold but laughing in spite of herself. “Listen to you. He’s not a drinker.”

“No, the poor are drinkers. The rich just don’t mind if they do.”

“He’s not rich anymore. He’s a priest, for heaven’s sake,” she said, putting on her coat.

“The rich don’t change. Someone else’s bottle, that’s what they like. Maybe that’s why they’re rich. Still, it’s your bottle, and if you don’t mind I’m sure I-”

“Nora, stop babbling. I’ll be back. Coast clear?” She nodded her head toward the window. “How about a kiss, then?” She leaned down to let Nick graze her cheek. “Oh, that’s better. I’m ready for anything now.”

At the door she put on her gloves. “You remember what I said, okay? Don’t listen to the other kids if they start saying things. They don’t know what they’re talking about anyway.”

“It wasn’t the other kids. About Dad. It was Miss Smith.”

“Oh.” His mother stopped, flustered, her shoulders sagging. “Oh, honeybun,” she said, and then, as if she had finally run out of answers, she turned and went out the door.