The Rebellion of Yale Marratt (85 page)

 

 

"Our little private world is crumbling, isn't it, Yale? Starting tomorrow
we stop living for the three of us, and devote our lives to the great
public who will hate us for being happy, and spit on us for trying to
tell them how to be happy. Doesn't it frighten you, Yale?" Cynthia brushed
the tears from her eyes. She looked at Anne who was listening to her.
"Neither of you seems to realize it. Maybe because you don't know what
it is to be one of the 'minority.' We will be hated for the same reason
that Jews are hated . . . because we have set ourselves apart." Cynthia
smiled sadly. "Whether you realize it or not, Yale, the First Commandment
of Challenge that states that Man is God, denies the need for Christ,
and puts us in a position equivalent to the Jews. We are going to be in
trouble, Yale . . . I just know it. We are providing people with just the
kind of whipping boy they need. People like conflict. It's an antidote
to boredom. I've been through it with Mat. Being horrified with us and
what we are doing will help them keep their minds off their own boring
lives. People don't want to be challenged. Socrates proved that. It's
too demanding for them."

 

 

"What about the people who are buying the book? I don't expect to reach
everyone." Yale rubbed his eyes in weariness. "A few hundred thousand
seems like a pretty good start to me."

 

 

"Maybe it's just a fad . . maybe they are not buying the book because they
agree with us but because it is something to talk about." Anne looked at
Yale in thought. "Maybe we shouldn't push it so hard, Yale. I don't think
that either Cynthia or I realized that you were going to stir up such a
commotion with this Latham business. I think one thing at a time is all
that we can handle." Anne wanted to say "handle emotionally," but Yale
looked so dejected that she rumpled his hair. "We're with you, honey.
It just may be good judgment to go a little slower."

 

 

Yale smiled at them. "Just in case I forget to tell you . . . I love you
both very much." He told them that until the Latham Yards was in good shape
he wouldn't attempt any further speculations. He assured them that there
was nothing to worry about in the Latham situation. Within a few days he
expected that John Norwell would accept the presidency. It was natural
that Alfred Latham would start all kinds of rumors going. "What I'm not
completely able to adjust to," Yale said, "is that I have, inadvertently,
created a witches' brew of hatreds. . . ."

 

 

"Did you expect that Alfred and Jim Latham would love you?" Cynthia asked.
She wondered sometimes at Yale's essential naïveté. "Did you think that
your father would approve of our ménage à trois . . . that he would love
the book?"

 

 

Agatha Latham walked into the living room, followed by Sam and Clara.
She heard Cynthia's remarks. She smiled sardonically at the girls.
"You young ladies have had the questionable fortune of becoming associated
with a young man who quite evidently thinks he is a modern Jesus." Agatha
sat down. "You'll be lucky, young man, if you don't reap Jesus's reward."

 

 

Agatha told the girls that for the next few days they were going to have
to run Challenge by themselves. Yale and she would be very busy trying to
patch together an executive organization at the Latham Shipyards.
She smiled at Yale and asked him whether he thought that he had at last
bitten off more than he could chew.

 

 

"What Aunt Agatha is really asking is, have I got cold feet?" Yale,
who was sitting between Cynthia and Anne, grabbed them around the waists
and pulled them to him. "Listen to me, all of you. Some people in this
world must make a stand. I'm being reviled because I'm saying that
every individual is fundamentally good and loving. People will say,
if you believe this why couldn't you say it quietly? Why couldn't you
just lead an exemplary life and prove it in a humble way? Why do you
want to make enemies? Why do you shout from the high heavens that all
men are brothers? People will say, we know these things. You don't have
to spend a million dollars to prove them." Yale's voice had risen in
volume as he spoke. He released Anne and Cynthia and stood up.

 

 

"I love you two girls deeply and intensely. I never want to lose you.
But some one has to try to stem the tide of hatred and stupidity in
the world. How I got myself elected to do the job, I'll never quite
know. Maybe because I fell in love with Cynthia Carnell. Maybe because
I met Mat Chilling. Maybe because I went to India and married Anne
Wilson. What does it matter now? What does matter is that the loudest
voice in our western culture is the voice that has money in back of
it. It's time that the message that the three of us dared to formulate
as Commandments was backed by money and lots of it." Yale plopped on the
sofa and grinned at them. "Okay, I'm ranting again. But no matter.
I'm not afraid."

 

 

Agatha chuckled. "Cynthia Marratt, Anne Marratt, I hope you appreciate
this man. Most young women wouldn't. You have to live a long time to
know a real man." She squeezed Yale's arm affectionately, and then told
them that she was going to bed. As she left the living room she dropped
an envelope in Yale's lap. "Here's something to help make the voice a
little louder."

 

 

"I think Cynthia and I are going to be jealous of her if she doesn't
cut it out," Anne said, grinning at Yale when Agatha had gone.

 

 

"What's the old hell-cat given you?" Sam asked curiously. He looked at
the envelope that Yale was holding unopened.

 

 

Yale opened the envelope slowly. "Well, what do you know?" he asked
excitedly. He held up a sheaf of green stock certificates. "It's Agatha's
shares of Latham stock all transferred to Challenge. Do you know what
that means, kids?"

 

 

Cynthia and Anne weren't quite sure, but they were impressed by
Sam's astonishment. Sam asked Yale how he had managed to hypnotize
Agatha. "That's equivalent to giving the foundation four million
dollars," he explained. "It's even better than that because up to now
Yale didn't know where in hell he stood. If Agatha had dropped dead,
and her shares got into Alfred Latham's hands the stock Challenge held
in Latham Shipyards, in fact, the whole damned foundation, would be on
pretty thin ice."

 

 

They discussed the implications of what Agatha had done. Sam suggested
that Agatha might very well leave her entire estate to Challenge. "She's
worth close to a hundred million dollars," Sam said. He looked at Yale
wonderingly. "If she does, she's going to give Challenge a pretty loud
voice."

 

 

Yale shook his head. "I don't want any of you to get the impression
that I'm after Agatha's money. I like Agatha, and she likes me. It's
as simple as that. While I think that Challenge is a worthy cause,
I don't want it so fat that it becomes complacent. This is a people's
cause. After I have made most people aware of what we are trying to do,
they will either support it spontaneously or it will die."

 

 

Clara assured him that she and Sam were going to be ardent supporters.
Sam told Yale that they were going back to New York in the morning.
"Agatha has answered the problem I was going to bring up. Now that Latham
Shipyards are in the bag, Higgins, Incorporated would like to be repaid."

 

 

"Are you afraid the ship is going to sink, Sam?"

 

 

"Who knows?" Sam had come to enjoy Yale too much to want to shake his
confidence. "Let's say that the elder Higgins talked with me yesterday.
He admitted that we had done a good job. But Higgins isn't interested in
owning a shipyard." Sam didn't tell Yale that the elder Higgins had
suggested that the entire affair in Midhaven was assuming emotional
overtones that weren't conducive to good investments. Their nearly
three million dollar loan to Yale, backed by collateral in Latham stock,
could go very sour if the Yards didn't get organized with several good
contracts, government or otherwise.

 

 

On the way upstairs Sam told Yale that he would keep in close touch with
him. He chuckled. "I don't know what it is you've got, Yale . . . but I
heard a word for it once -- 'Serendipity' . . . I'm not sure, but I think
it means that if you fell into a pile of horse-shit you'd come out of it
sweet and clean smelling. Take Clara and me . . . we are all straightened
out . . . providing I stay home nights. . . ." Sam shrugged. "I haven't got
what it takes to convince her that a man needs two women."

 

 

Later, lying in bed with Cynthia and Yale, Anne asked Yale if he thought
he needed two women. "Cynthia and I have wondered if you met Cynthia and
married her without ever having been married to me . . . and then met me
later . . . if you would have tried to talk us into living together?"

 

 

Yale looked at Cynthia. He noticed that she was waiting expectantly for
his answer. Both girls leaned on their pillows and looked at him. Lying
on his back between them, he looked at Cynthia's heart-shaped face and
big brown eyes, and then at Anne's face, impish; her blue-black eyes
sparkling. He pulled them down beside him, flopped on his stomach and
nuzzled in their necks.

 

 

"You know something?" he whispered, enjoying the warm feminine fragrance
of them, "only a woman would ask a question like that. If I say yes then
you'll both be convinced that what you heard Sam say is right . . . that
a man needs two women; on the other hand, if I say no then Anne who asked
the question will be convinced that I don't really love her." Yale could
feel them both snuggling against him under the sheet. "Let's not try
to analyze it. Let's say by some kind of magic we were all able to love
each other. Let's say that it isn't impossible in this world of hatred
to love one another . . . if you really want to."

 

 

 

 

Within a few days Anne, Cynthia, Yale, and Agatha had established
a temporary routine. Yale spent most of each day with Agatha at the
Latham Shipyards. Agatha took over Alfred's vacated office. Together
they studied the Yards departmentally, interviewing superintendents
and foremen and planning for the future. Senator Williams, yielding to
Agatha's long-distance telephone prodding, assured them he was working for
a Navy contract for the Yards. He told them that he hoped the situation at
the Yards was settling down. There were some doubts in high places whether
the recent changes in ownership might make it unwise politically to seek a
contract for Latham's. He wanted to know what connection Challenge Inc.,
which was creating quite a fuss, had with Latham's. Agatha told him to
stop being an old biddy and concentrate on getting Latharn a contract.

 

 

Each day as Ralph Weeks drove them to work they passed the Marratt
Corporation factory. The place looked strangely deserted. It was the
third week of the strike. A handful of pickets walked up and down in
front, and looked sourly at their car as they passed.

 

 

While Yale and Agatha were trying to re-organize the Yards, Anne and
Cynthia worked desperately to develop a clerical staff to handle the flood
of mail that had descended on Challenge. Barbara Marratt, having nothing
better to do, and feeling ill at ease at home, had temporarily moved in
with them. The three of them alternated at being nursemaid for the two
children. While one of them watched the babies the others tried to train
a staff of some twenty girls into a system for handling the thousands
of membership cards that were being received from the sale of the book.

 

 

The morning that Liz Marratt drove up and parked her car near the
Challenge barn, Barbara was minding both babies. Cynthia and Anne,
appalled at the accumulation of mail, had been interviewing older women
who they hoped might be indoctrinated with the Challenge ideas. As Yale
had pointed out to them, the correspondence which was rapidly piling
up, and ranged all the way from violent, vituperative crank letters to
letters sincerely seeking advice on every conceivable problem, would
require a staff of trained and sympathetic people to handle it. Yale
had insisted that all the letters be answered. Cynthia, Anne, and he
had tried valiantly each night to wade through the accumulating mail,
but it had quickly become obvious that their main job in the future was
going to be to teach a competent staff to carry out their instructions.

 

 

Liz walked into the busy office and joined the line of women whom
Cynthia and Anne were interviewing. For nearly fifteen minutes she waited
while her astonishment and anger grew apace. She had read
Spoken in My
Manner
, and been shocked. Nothing in her own background had prepared her
for such a casual linking of sex and religion. It seemed wrong to her
somehow, and yet she was strangely attracted by the idea. She wondered
what influence these girls had had on Yale. Why did he insist on living
with both of them? It was dirty, somehow . . . while the idea of a nice
sexual relationship, that maybe encompassed God, was possible with one
person . . . Liz had known it a little with Pat, and once quite deeply
with Frank Middleton . . . Liz couldn't understand how a woman could
accept a man who had been with another woman. Ugh, she thought.

 

 

The line of women she was in had moved up in front of Cynthia. Liz looked
at her and thought, the girl is really quite beautiful, and so is that
other one . . . Anne -- was that her name? She knew it must be Anne who
was quietly talking to some woman just ahead of her in line.

 

 

Cynthia smiled at Liz, and then recognized her. "You are Yale's mother,
aren't you?" she gasped, thinking it had been ten years since she had
seen Mrs. Marratt. Yale's mother still impressed her as being supremely
self-confident.