The Rebellion of Yale Marratt (14 page)

 

 

"Listen, my little cocky friend, you'll do what I want you to do. You're
not of age yet, and if you think I'm going to let you marry that Jewish
girl friend of yours, you are sadly mistaken." Pat turned to Doctor Tangle
who was listening to the conversation with a half smile on his face.
"Amos, I am counting on you to set the ball rolling. Since Yale's marks
are now excellent there should be no trouble. Now, you can prove to me
that Midhaven College rates well enough to have a student accepted at
Harvard."

 

 

"Midhaven College rates well enough, you can be sure of that. There may
be other considerations. . . ."

 

 

Yale interrupted him. "Just because you and my father are friends doesn't
mean that you can decide my future." Yale tried to hold back tears of
anger. "You're not running my life anymore, Pat. If you keep it up I'll
quit Midhaven and never graduate." He picked up his golf bag. "I'm sick
of this needling," he shouted. "You take care of your love life and I'll
take care of mine." He snarled the last words and strode furiously across
the fairway toward the clubhouse.

 

 

He heard Bert Walsh say, "Let him go, Pat. Remember, he's just nineteen.
That girl is his first love. . . ."

 

 

To hell with you, Bert Walsh, Yale thought. You wise, brown-nosing
Master in Business Administration. Pat Marratt will try to own you too
before he's through, and he'll succeed because you're after the almighty
dollars. Pat will buy you with them! But not me . . . not me.

 

 

He realized suddenly that he was cornered. His own car was in the garage
at home. Liz might have come out to the club in her car by this time.
If he ran into her there would be endless explanations. The key to Pat's
Packard was probably in Pat's business suit at the club. It would serve
him right to finish playing and find his car gone. Yale grinned as he
imagined Pat's consternation. Walking quietly up to the pro-shop, he
deposited his clubs with Dick Cannon. "Has my mother been around?"

 

 

"Not yet," Dick said, looking at him curiously. "Thought you were playing
the course with your old man?"

 

 

"Got to go on an emergency errand for him," Yale said. He hurried away.
The keys were in Pat's suit coat. Yale changed his clothes quickly and
ran out to the parking lot.

 

 

It was crazy, he thought, a kid trick to take Pat's car. There would
be hell to pay later, but he couldn't stand the embarrassment of seeing
Doctor Tangle, and having Bert Walsh try to commiserate with him. What
an operator Walsh was, buttering Pat on the one hand and trying to be
an understanding older brother to Yale. It was sickening.

 

 

Yale turned on the ignition, ground the gears into third. He pushed
firmly on the gas pedal before the car got into full momentum.

 

 

The motor snorted, coughed and then the car jumped forward going
forty miles an hour, along the narrow road leading from the club.
He drove into Midhaven at a reckless speed -- not knowing where he was
going. Over and over in his mind he reviewed the quarrel and he cursed
himself for simply not ignoring Pat as he usually did. If he worked on
Liz he would have no trouble. She would cool Pat down. One thing was
sure, he was not going to Harvard Business School. Just the thought of
being separated from Cynthia for two years after their graduation and a
feeling of loneliness and utter dejection swept over him. "Oh, Cindar,
Cindar . . . Love me because I need you. . . ."

 

 

 

 

 

 

7

 

 

As he drove his anger abated. Without being conscious of direction he
found that he was driving toward Helltown. Helltown is actually part of
Midhaven and under the jurisdiction of the city governing body. Fifty
years earlier it had been a peninsular shaped island jutting into the
Atlantic Ocean. An enterprising citizen of earlier times had suggested
joining it to the mainland with a bridge and Helltown came into being. As
its name suggested it was a place where no respecting citizen of Midhaven
would live. If cities could have skeletons in their closets, Helltown was
the skeleton in Midhaven's. Periodically, irate citizens had proposed a
general clean-up of the section -- or a redevelopment plan. A current
idea in City Hall was that some Works Progress Administration money
might be suborned to this purpose. The very Republicans who cursed the
W.P.A. and its concepts were highly in favor of this; perhaps feeling
that the inhabitants of the area might somehow raise themselves by
their bootstraps. Had the peninsula remained untouched until later years
it might have become a popular real estate development. Surrounded by
water and beaches, it was somewhat rocky on all sides. A more prescient
real estate promoter might have foreseen the possibility for ranch house
living at the edge of the ocean. But cities, being all things to all men,
must provide for their poor. And Helltown with its tawdry shacks and
run down beach cottages, many without inside toilets and running water,
at least gave a roof over the heads of some five thousand Negroes, Jews,
Catholics and Protestants who provided Midhaven with its submarginal
untrained labor requirements.

 

 

Driving across the Helltown bridge Yale noticed the usual group of
hopeful fishermen leaning against the railing anxiously watching their
drop lines for a nibble. Standing a little distance away from the rest was
the lean figure of Mat Chilling. He was idly looking at the water swirling
beneath the bridge. Yale stopped his car and yelled "Hi." Turning, Mat
looked at Yale, puzzled for a moment, then his face broke into a smile.

 

 

"I guess I was daydreaming. I haven't seen you for so long I didn't
recognize you."

 

 

Yale got out of his car. "Don't tell me you are fishing, too? You'll
never get anything from here except maybe a flounder."

 

 

"Some people have to fish to eat," Mat said. He looked down at his line.
Yale watched him, uncomfortably noticing that Mat's clothes seemed very
old. His trousers were almost three inches above his shoes. They were
the same trousers he had worn last March when he took over the class in
religion for a day. Probably the only trousers he owned.

 

 

Mat sensed his discomfort. "I like flounder. Not to mention that fish
is supposed to be good for you. Even though you have all the money,
you can't always buy fish fresh from the sea. Besides, fishing is a
comfortable act. It doesn't interfere with meditation."

 

 

"What do you mediate about? God?" Yale asked. He wondered just how one
accomplished such an intangible state.

 

 

Mat laughed. "Do I look so holy? As a matter of fact, I was wondering if
perhaps the ministry was the best thing for me. You know what my real
name is? Cotton Mather Chilling. See, like you, I have had a certain
amount of pre-conditioning! Your father probably hopes you'll be a
businessman. Before he died my father was a minister, and such is man's
nature he figured by naming me properly I might become the Evangelical
leader of the century. Unfortunately, at the present moment I do not
believe in salvation by atoning for Christ but lean more to salvation
as a hymn to living."

 

 

"I've read a few of Cotton Mather's sermons. I think he was more
interested in sex than Christ," Yale said. "Frustrated libido."

 

 

"Oh, that's perfect!" Mat said, a smirk on his face. "You are now a true
college student. For the remainder of your educated life you will deftly
attribute all actions to Freudian complexes, I suppose."

 

 

Yale smarted under the attack. "Listen, I read Freud when I was in Buxton
Academy. I've also read a good bit of Jung and Adler. I can think in terms
other than Freud but, I repeat, I can't remember at the moment whether
it was Cotton or Increase Mather, but in one of their essays they refer
to Gynecandrical dancing. You won't find the word in any dictionary
that I know of but it is obvious what was worrying him. If you worry
as much about sex as the Mathers did in their sermons, it is obvious to
me without benefit of Freud that you wished you had it yourself. Ergo:
Frustrated libido."

 

 

"You astound me," Mat said. "I've never bothered to read anything by
either of the Mathers. So you win! . . . temporarily at least, until
I rectify my oversight. What does your father think of your erudite
knowledge of religion?"

 

 

"He doesn't suspect, thank God." Yale suddenly remembered the golf game
he had left so abruptly. "I'd like to warn you, that you may be in serious
trouble."

 

 

Mat looked at him questioningly. Yale paused. Was it wise to repeat
Doctor Tangle's warning to Pat? If it ever got back to Doctor Tangle
that he had forewarned Mat Chilling he would be in hot water. Maybe
it was better to let Mat squirm in his own juice. "Oh, I don't know,"
Yale said. "I'll tell you later. Do you know Professor Leonard?"

 

 

"Sure," Mat said, wondering what Yale was concealing. "About thirty minutes
ago he was standing just about where you are. He was on his way to see
Harry Cohen."

 

 

"No kidding!" Yale looked worried. "Boy, he should stay far away from
Cohen."

 

 

Mat reeled in his line. "I guess I have some other fishing to do. Okay,
Yale, what's it all about?"

 

 

"Look," Yale parried, "I'd like to talk with Leonard. Do you know where
Cohen lives?" Mat admitted he did.

 

 

Driving slowly through the hot, tired streets of Helltown, Mat explained
that Sarah Cohen had often invited him to eat with them. "Harry came
from New York about three years ago. A very nice guy. A little too
Communistic for my thinking but then Communism has some good points
. . . You turn here."

 

 

Yale swung onto an unpaved road and came to a bumping halt in front of
a weather-beaten house. It stood in ugly gingerbread detail against a
background of marsh grass.

 

 

The front porch had several broken planks that slanted tipsily away from
the foundation.

 

 

"The tide comes right into their back yard," Mat said. "A good storm
here is an experience." He pounded on the front door. A voice yelled,
"Come on in. We're in back." They walked through the house. Yale had
a surprising glimpse of an immaculately clean front room, decorated
with water color paintings. A grand piano was piled high with musical
scores. Friendly piles of books littered the tables and chairs and
spilled over onto the floor.

 

 

A man in bathing trunks greeted them in the kitchen. He turned and yelled
into the yard. "It's okay, Sarah. It's only Mat." He recognized Yale and
looked startled. "And young Mr. Marratt," he added. "What brings us this
pleasure on a hot Saturday afternoon?"

 

 

Yale was about to answer him when the door opened and a woman about
thirty-five, plump, with a friendly, rosy-cheeked face, walked into the
kitchen. She was absolutely naked. Yale had a confused impression of
large sturdy breasts, a quite round stomach and black pubic hairs. He
blushed and turned away. He could see Mat grinning.

 

 

"My wife comes from a part of Sweden where they dress casually," Harry
Cohen said. "She is gradually making summertime nudists out of all our
friends." He introduced her to Yale. Yale took her outstretched hand,
trying not to see her large comfortable looking breasts.

 

 

"I am sorry if I embarrass you, Mr. Marratt. Come out in the yard. It is
quite private. Only the sea, grass and sea gulls. We have some cold beer."

 

 

They followed her into the rocky beach that was the back yard for the house.
Two boys about eight and nine years old, as naked as their mother, ran up
to Mat Chilling and tugged at him joyously. "Mat, Mat, tell us a story,"
they screamed.

 

 

Lying beneath a crude sun shelter built of wood and canvas Yale could see
a girl about fifteen or sixteen, naked, leaning on her elbow talking to
Professor Leonard, who was also naked.

 

 

Jack Leonard waved to Yale without embarrassment. The girl, who was
obviously Sarah Cohen's daughter, gave Yale a cold look.

 

 

"Daddy," she said angrily, "you aren't being very smart today."

 

 

"I guess you are right, honey. Mr. Marratt probably wouldn't understand.
You better put on your bathing suit. You, too, Sarah."

 

 

Yale smiled. "Don't get dressed for me. It's too hot. Besides, I'm not
embarrassed, just a little startled. I didn't know there was anyone in
the world besides me who liked to walk around naked."

 

 

"Why don't you take off your clothes and relax with us, Mr. Marratt?"
Sarah asked. "We are going to cook some frankfurts and you can break
bread with us."

 

 

Yale looked at Mat. Mat laughed. "When in Rome . . ." He quickly peeled
off his shirt, pants and underwear. Yale was shocked to see that Mat was
so thin. Like a huge animal that had gradually starved in captivity.
While the skeleton structure remained strong and massive, Mat's flesh
had tightened until all the bones were visible.

 

 

"You see the way Yale looks at me, Sarah? As I have told you before,
the male animal is probably better disguised with clothes."

 

 

"Mr. Marratt looks at you with the eyes of a man. God made women's eyes
differently. I see the body of a man and peering through it the child
who needs a woman. I see Mat Chilling, naked, jumping from his stone
tub, shouting 'Eureka' to the astounded Greeks, and because his deep,
thinking mind frightens me and leaves me a little awe stricken I am
pleased to know as a woman, it depends for its very existence on the
frailty of the body beneath it. You need a woman, Mat, and a year of
good Kishke and flanken dinners to fill you out."