The Adventurers (58 page)

In a moment his younger brother Thomas came up. Jeremy introduced him and ordered him a drink. "What about the boat?"

"The captain says he'll have everything ready. We can take her up to Antibes in the morning."

"Dad will be pleased. You go on up with the yacht, I'll drive."

"Is that the new yacht I saw in the basin?" Von Kuppen asked.

Jeremy nodded.

"I admired it from a distance. She's a beauty."

"You're going up to the Riviera anyway; why don't you both join my brother for the trip? It will really give you a chance to look her over."

"I'd love to, but—" Von Kuppen looked hesitantly at Marlene.

"I'm afraid I'm a big disappointment to my husband. Boats are his second love, and I always get seasick."

"I could drive you up if you'd like," he'd suggested. "We'd be there by evening."

She shook her head. "No, thank you, Mr. Hadley. It would be too much of an imposition."

But unexpectedly Von Kuppen had spoken up. "I think it's an excellent suggestion, liebchen. I'd love a day on the water." He turned to Jeremy. "Thank you very much, Mr. Hadley. We'd be delighted to accept your offer."

When they had gone Tommy had grinned. "You got some-thin' going with that girl?"

Jeremy had laughed. "I only met her ten minutes before you got here."

Tommy shook his head. "Some guys have all the luck."

Jeremy rumpled his brother's hair affectionately. "Stop bitching, Tommy. You didn't do so bad those last few weeks in Switzerland."

"I didn't come up with anything like that," Tommy complained. "How come you always wind up with the cream?"

"Make the most of it, younger brother," Jeremy said, suddenly serious. "I have a feeling playtime will soon be over."

"What do you mean?"

"Jim and Dad should be back by the weekend. And you know why they flew back to Boston."

"Do you think they'll let Jim go for Congress? Really, I mean?"

"If they don't, it won't matter. Dad will convince them. He usually does."

"Well, what the hell, that shouldn't bug us too much. There's still more than a year until election."

"You're kidding yourself and you know it. If Dad's made up his mind, the campaign has already begun. And we're all going to be in it. The way Dad looks at it it isn't only Jim who will be running, it will be the whole family."

The yacht was tied up at the private dock and Tommy and Von Kuppen were out on the porch when they pulled up in front of the villa.

"Have a nice drive up?" Von Kuppen called as they got out of the car.

"It was lovely," Marlene said, "but we ran out of gas."

"Bloody damned careless of me," Jeremy added. "I should have filled up before we left."

"Those things happen," Von Kuppen answered casually. He got to his feet. "You must be exhausted, darling. Come, I'll show you to our room."

"That would be lovely." Marlene turned to Jeremy. "Thank you for the ride up."

"You're welcome."

After they had gone into the house, Tommy came down the steps and got into the car beside his brother. He let out a sigh of relief as Jeremy drove the car around in the back to park it. "Man, I'm glad you showed when you did. Things were getting a little bit sticky."

Jeremy looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"Von Kuppen didn't like it at all. And yet I had the feeling it was just what he expected. Maybe even what he wanted. Very sick."

"Yeah," Jeremy said thoughtfully. Probably he had been right in his appraisal. The marriage could be a cover. It was not uncommon. He pulled the car into the parking lot and turned off the motor.

"The hell with him. It's his problem." He was suddenly annoyed at himself for being caught in the middle of something he hadn't anticipated. "Let's go get a drink."

Marlene did not come down for dinner, and the three of them ate in a curiously polite silence. It would be another day before any of the others arrived. His sisters and mother from Paris, where they had been shopping; his sister-in-law, Jim's wife, and their two children from New York; and Jim and their father from Boston. At the end of dinner, Tommy looked across the table at him. "Are you using the car tonight?"

Jeremy shook his head.

"I'd like to run over to Juan-l'es-Pins and see what's goin' on."

"Go ahead, I'm turning in early."

Von Kuppen turned to Tommy. "If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to come along."

"I'd be glad to have you."

"Thank you." Von Kuppen got to his feet, "I'll be back in a moment. I'll just tell Marlene so she won't wait up for me."

The two of them looked at each other when he left the dining room. "What do you make of that?" Tommy asked. "I was willing to bet he wouldn't leave the two of you alone again."

"We're not exactly alone." Jeremy nodded at a maid and the butler, who were busy clearing the table.

"You know what I mean."

"I'm not going to worry about it, I'm just going up to bed."

Jeremy came out of his bathroom rubbing himself vigorously with a huge bath sheet. He tied the towel around his waist, and took a cigarette from the dresser and lit it. He looked at himself in the mirror with a feeling of satisfaction.

He was in pretty good condition considering his age. His belly was still flat and hard, his weight the same as it had been when he went into the army in 1941. That was eight years ago. Sometimes it seemed almost like yesterday. He had been twenty then.

"Go in now," his father had urged. "We'll be in it before the year is over. I want you boys to be ready for it."

Jim had gone into the air force, he into the infantry. By March of 1942 they were both overseas. Later that same month he had looked up into the sky from where he clung precariously to a sheltering rock and seen the insignia of his brother's squadron on the underwings of the planes that were flying over him. Suddenly, somehow the stupidity of the token raid on Dieppe no longer mattered, the danger from the murderous crossfire in which the Germans had entrapped them was no longer so frightening. His brother was up there watching over him.

Jeremy came back from that raid a first lieutenant, earned his captaincy on the beach at Anzio, and attained his majority in the fields of Normandy, together with the silver star and the purple heart.

That had been the real end of the war for him. After he came out of the hospital he'd been transferred to General Staff and he hadn't complained. He'd had enough. But Jim kept on flying the big bombers right up until VE Day, and came out a full chicken colonel.

Two days later, by a prearranged agreement between them, they had met here at the villa on the Cap d'Antibes, which had belonged to their father for so many years and where they had spent many fun-filled summers.

Old Francois, the caretaker, and his wife had come out to greet them. "Look, messieurs," the old man said proudly, "we kept the pig Boche out."

They had nodded, smiling, and murmured their approval despite the knowledge that the Germans for one reason or another hadn't been interested in that area. Still, there was something very sad about seeing the condition of the grounds, the shutters nailed to the windows, the covered furniture.

When they were alone, the two brothers had looked at each other. Jim was older by only four years but already there was gray in his hair and deep lines in his face. The strain of the more than a thousand hours in war-torn skies had left their mark. By contrast Jeremy seemed almost unchanged, untouched. Perhaps it was due more to the prolonged rest in the hospital than to the comparative ease of headquarters duty.

"How is it?" Jim asked about the wound.

"Just a scratch. Nothing. How is it with you?"

Jim held up his hands in a mock punchy fighter's pose. "Look, Maw, they never touched me." But there was no humor in his voice.

"They touched you all right. I was lucky. You didn't get off that easy."

"You were lucky," Jim said, a sudden bitterness in his voice. "At least all you fought were soldiers. They were trying to kill you, and you were trying to kill them. That made you even. But when I dumped one of those big ones I never knew whom they might kill. You should have seen Cologne after we got through with it. And Berlin. Each time we came back it was easier. You didn't need eyes, you just followed the aroma of burning houses reaching three miles up in the sky."

"Wait a minute, Jim. You're not feeling sorry for the Germans?"

His brother stared at him. "You're damn right I am. They weren't all soldiers, all Nazis. How many women and children do you think I killed? The soldiers were safe at the front."

"We didn't make the rules for this war," he said harshly, "they did. In Holland, Poland, France, England. They didn't care where their bombs fell or whom they killed. They didn't give a shit because whoever was left they planned to take care of at Dachau and Auschwitz."

"Did that make it right for us?"

"No, nothing makes war right. But when war comes you have no choice. You either fight back or you get killed. And in our time the rules of warfare are made by the aggressor." He pulled out a cigarette. "Any time you doubt that take a walk around Coventry."

Jim looked at his younger brother, a sudden respect growing in his eyes. "Maybe you're right. I'm just tired. I guess I've had it."

"We've all had it, but it's over now. At least for us."

"I hope so," Jim said wearily.

Just then old Francois had stuck his head into the room and announced dinner. He was dressed in his old butler's uniform, which had been pressed carefully. Silently they followed him into the dining room.

From somewhere Frangois had got fresh flowers for a centerpiece, and candles were burning at either end of the table. The silver was sparkling, the linen soft and creamy white. And Francois's wife was standing in the doorway to the pantry, her blue eyes shining behind her glasses. "Welcome home, messieurs."

Jeremy had laughed, and run around the table to kiss her on both cheeks. "Merci."

She retired to the kitchen in confusion, and they sat down. Francois had barely finished pouring the wine for their first course when they heard the sound of an automobile on the gravel driveway outside. For a moment they stared at each other, for no one was expected. Then as one they got up and went to the front door.

They were just in time to see their father get out of the old Citroen taxi that had brought him from the station. When he turned and waved to them, they could scarcely believe their eyes.

"I knew exactly where to find you guys," their father called happily.

Then they were all crying at once, and there were a thousand questions. All through dinner they kept looking at each other and at the snapshots of the rest of the family that their father had brought. After a little while it was almost as if the war had never happened.

That year had been the first since the war that the villa was in full use. Not much time had been necessary to restore it, but other concerns kept some of them away. Jim had been married one month after his return home in June of 1945, and now there were two children, both boys. The senior Hadley took Jim into the office and bit by bit let him take over the general operations of his complex businesses.

Jim had almost completed his takeover by the time Jeremy picked up his diploma from Harvard. He had gone back for the one year he had missed, but once he was out he was still uncertain of his future. As usual his father had known exactly what was necessary.

When he accepted an appointment to the reparations commission he had taken Jeremy along as his assistant, and for two years Jeremy had walked in and out of government offices in every major country of Europe. His tall good looks and easygoing manner made him a favorite everywhere he went. The fact that he was American and very rich hadn't hurt either.

He enjoyed both his position and his social life to the hilt. European women were far more sophisticated than their American counterparts. If he had a slight tendency to become over involved with any particular one, his job took care of that. He rarely stayed in one place long enough to develop problems.

At the end of the job he came back to the States and spent a year in Washington working on a report dealing with the work of the commission. In April that job was finished, and he returned to Boston with an offer from the State Department.

Again his father was quite definite. "Don't take it, take a year off. Go back to Europe and enjoy yourself."

"I have to decide where I'm going with my life, Dad."

"There's no hurry, you'll know when the time comes. Besides, it's time Tommy spent a little time there too. He'll need someone to show him the ropes. He's never had the chances you had."

Jeremy smiled at the way his father put it. Tommy had just graduated from Harvard, and since he was only twenty-two he had missed the war. But if what he had heard from Jim was correct, Tommy had missed very little else. Half the mothers in Boston locked up their daughters whenever he came around.

In a way he had enjoyed showing his young brother the Europe he had come to know. It was like seeing himself as he used to be before the war. And yet there was a sophistication about his younger brother that he and Jim had never had. It was almost as if the six years between them made Tommy of another generation. It was purely and simply the war; the naivety and innocence had gone never to return. There was a bomb and it had made death a constant companion to everyone who walked the earth.

Thoughtfully Jeremy came away from the mirror and, taking his pajamas from his suitcase, slipped into them. Thinking of his brother going down to Juan with Von Kuppen to catch the action, he smiled. They were all in too much of a hurry.

For the first time he thought he understood what his father meant when he had said there was no hurry. He was still young. He was only twenty-eight.

He stretched out on the bed and turned out the light. Lying on his side, he watched the shadows move across the curtained window. His eyes were just beginning to close when he suddenly became aware that one shadow was all wrong. It didn't move with all the others.