The Rebellion of Yale Marratt Read online

  A year after Liz and he were married, Amos Tangle had taken over the duties of full-time minister of the Midhaven Congregational Church. His flock, composed of prosperous businessmen and their wives, and particularly Alfred Latham of Latham Shipyards, found his sermons inspiring. "It's the kind of down to earth religion I think you'll like, Pat," Liz's father had said. "This Tangle is only five or six years older than you and Liz, but he's got a head on him. Besides, the Lathams attend church regularly. . . . They are good people to know."

  Tangle's appeal to the businessmen of Midhaven was a neat interpretation of the Bible based on a religious philosophy that made the pursuit of the dollar a fundamental part of militant Christianity. "Christ told you to cast your bread upon waters. For you who are forging the future of this great country, your bread is your boundless energy which comes back to you, and the people of this nation twofold . . . in profits for you and higher standards of living for those you employ."

  In the early twenties Doctor Tangle's advice was a pleasant balm to his congregation. While Pat couldn't particularly stomach Tangle's pompous manner, he had to admit that what Doctor Tangle said was sound enough.

  Liz's father told Amos Tangle about Pat's plans to start a food packing plant and when Reverend Tangle cornered Liz after church one Sunday, she had first apologized for the fact that her husband seldom went to church and then invited Doctor Tangle to supper. It was the first time that Pat had spoken to him since the wedding, six months before. Tangle's buoyant manner, and his cheery inquiries about newly-wedded bliss brought blushes to Liz's face, but Pat was surly. He couldn't believe that Tangle's enthusiasm and good fellowship were sincere. Pat had continued to feel that way through his long years of association with Doctor Tangle but he had never been able to catch him in open hypocrisy. Pat finally came to the conclusion that Amos Tangle actually believed everything he said. This made Pat even more wary. An unreserved belief in every word you uttered was a form of egotism beyond even Pat's ebullient self-confidence.

  Before the evening was over Amos had warmed Pat up so thoroughly on the subject of the future Marratt Corporation, that Pat revealed not only his immediate plans, but his dreams of a brand line of canned vegetables, fruits, jams, jellies and products packed under a label which would become synonymous with top quality throughout the country. Pat was starting out with five thousand dollars borrowed from the Midhaven National Bank and three thousand of his own savings. Amos revealed that he had two thousand dollars inherited some years before from his father's estate. He convinced Pat that the extra two thousand dollar capital would iron out the rough spots for the new company. With no more time than it took to withdraw the money from the savings bank, and inveigle Pat into a few conferences with his lawyers, Amos Tangle became a twenty per cent stockholder in the newly launched Marratt Corporation.

  During the next eighteen years, while Doctor Tangle contributed little in the way of actual management, and certainly nothing to the genius that brought the Marratt Corporation to the position of one of the top companies in the food industry, he managed to maintain an uncanny knowledge of the financial workings of the company, as well as an abundance of ideas about everything from production through sales.

  It was an act of desperation, Pat thought, but there was no alternative. He finally decided to telephone Doctor Tangle and ask his help. Labor Day was next Monday. The fall terms at the New England colleges would start soon . . . something had to be done. Yale would have to be enrolled somewhere and quickly.

  After telling Doctor Tangle's secretary his name, Pat was greeted with a booming "Hello, it's nice to hear your voice, Pat." Pat could picture Doctor Tangle sitting behind his ornate mahogany desk covered with mementos sent to him by missionaries from all parts of the world. He could visualize Doctor Tangle's size eight and one-half, bald head gleaming like an oval-shaped lamp of knowledge.

  Pat explained briefly the problem and how he was determined to have Yale admitted to one of the Ivy League colleges. He didn't bother to tell Doctor Tangle that Yale evinced little interest, nor did he tell him that Yale didn't seem to care whether he went to college or not. Pat suggested that Dean Tracy of Buxton was probably sabotaging his efforts. He finally suggested that in view of their long relationship as stockholders in Marratt Corporation and as personal friends, he was throwing the problem in Doctor Tangle's lap. Certainly Doctor Tangle could prevail upon his confreres in some New England college to take Yale in as a freshman. "I'll look into it immediately, Pat. The Lord has a solution to everything," Doctor Tangle said confidently.

  As emissary for the Lord, Doctor Tangle arrived in Pat's office the next morning. "I know that you and Liz would prefer to have your son go to Harvard. In your financial position and all, it's the proper place -- but you'll have to face the facts, Pat. I have gone over Yale's records. A strange boy -- not like you, eh!" Doctor Tangle chuckled with a heh-heh sound that Pat found peculiarly irritating. "Yale is surprisingly well read -- way beyond his age group. Dean Tracy mentioned to me that he had few friends at Buxton. Didn't take part in athletics. A little bit of a crusader. I read some of his themes. Excellent! Excellent! But his marks outside of literature." Doctor Tangle shook his head. "Geometry, French, Chemistry . . . barely passing. Well, all is not lost. Who knows? The boy might have the makings of a minister."

  Pat frowned. "Are you suggesting Midhaven College? Christ . . . no! I won't buy it."

  Doctor Tangle froze in his chair. Slowly and pompously he placed his black Homburg hat on his shining head. "For a man who is the president of a pretty big business, you are remarkably dense," he said ironically. "Money does not make a college. If you would study the various college standings the way you study a profit and loss statement, you would find that Midhaven College rates academically as high as any college in New England. If Yale is accepted to Midhaven it will be on a trial basis motivated simply by our long friendship. College starts in three weeks. If you wish to register Yale with us, it will have to be done no later than next Friday."

  His inability to have Yale accepted by the Ivy League colleges became a thorn in Pat's side. Al Latham's son was going to Harvard. Tom Ames, the Midhaven Buick dealer, told Pat while they were having a drink at the club, that his son was accepted at M.I.T. Even Ed Barnes who ran a cut-rate jewelry store in Midhaven had a son going to Princeton.

  While Pat had let Doctor Tangle leave his office without a decision, it was apparent that there was no alternative. Liz Marratt blamed her husband, accusing him of not having spent enough time with Yale. She ignored Pat's remark that between her activities as Midhaven's most active hostess and wintering in Florida, she would have difficulty accounting for the time she spent with her son. "I might remind you," she told Pat, "that our daughter Barbara is in her second year at Bryn Mawr. I can't remember that it was a desperate decision on her part. She could have gone to Wellesley or Smith."

  Having placed the blame where she felt it belonged, Liz took the idea of Yale's going to Midhaven College philosophically. "While he will live at the college, he will be near home. Besides, despite your own lack of interest in religion, I feel that Doctor Tangle will work miracles with him."

  Pat's look was sour. He had been a deacon of the Midhaven Congregational Church for nearly ten years. Prodded by Doctor Tangle and Liz, he had contributed several thousand dollars annually to God-knew-what religious causes, but he rarely went to hear Doctor Tangle preach. Privately, he figured that his contribution to the church absolved him from seeing Doctor Tangle more often than necessary.

  So the son of Patrick Marratt, Yale Marratt, who owned a red Ford convertible which he rarely drove; who usually had twenty or thirty dollars in his pocket, which, if he spent at all, he spent on books; Yale Marratt, eighteen last April, son of the next to wealthiest man in the city of Midhaven; Yale Marratt who had kissed one girl in his life, and under pressure from his sister and mother, had dates with two others (and found them dull); Yale Marratt, a bewilderment to his parents, was enrolled in M
idhaven College.

  2

  Yale met Cynthia Carnell at the George Kramer picnic. Doctor Tangle had personally checked to make sure that Yale was among the mixed group of about two hundred boys and girls who gathered on the lawn in front of Doctor Tangle's home. It was the first Saturday after their arrival at college.

  Doctor Tangle pumped Yale's hand heartily. "Even though you have lived in Midhaven all your life, boy, you're going to find a new world in the next four years. Years from now you'll look back on this picnic with a real nostalgia for Midhaven College."

  Yale was skeptical . . . and bored. He never could remember the names of those he met for the first time. He was so conscious of his own embarrassment that all he retained was the blurred memory of a smile. Later, when he became better acquainted on the campus, he was surprised to number among his friends those who claimed they had first met him at the Kramer picnic.

  Accompanying Dr. Amos Tangle and George Kramer on the hike to the picnic grounds were Dean Amelia Wiswell, in charge of women, and Harry Shaw, Dean of Men. Several of the upper classmen who had suffered through the picnic as freshmen came along to direct the cooking of hot dogs.

  Dean Wiswell trotted along with the freshmen girls. Dressed in a tweed skirt, she darted from one group to another, showing her large teeth in an insincere smile as she attempted to mix the groups and spread the shyer girls among the more homely men. "Mr. Yale Marratt, meet Miss Beardsley. Mr. Marratt, meet Mr. Williams. Yale lives in Midhaven, you know. He can tell you all about the city. Mr. Marratt, meet Miss Cynthia Carnell."

  Yale looked at the girl smiling at him. He retained a flashing image of sweet, heart-shaped face and wide-apart brown eyes. As he was mumbling hello, she disappeared in the crowd. He felt a momentary disappointment. Her swift glance had given him an elusive feeling of intimacy.

  A get acquainted party for the freshman class, the George Kramer picnic had been an annual function for fifteen years. The picnic, in the words of Doctor Tangle, was now a "college institution."

  Doctor Tangle wearing knickers, argyle socks and a tweed jacket, along with George Kramer, professor of Zoology, who was second-in-command on the hike, led the straggling procession. The rear guard was composed of several worldly sophomores and Dean Shaw who urged along the less enthusiastic male hikers. Yale found himself somewhere in the middle of the procession listening to the denunciations of his new roommate Sonny Thompson, "What a crackpot way to spend a Saturday. How far do we have to walk?"

  Yale told him that the picnic grounds were about five miles from the college. "Oh brother," Sonny groaned. "Five miles on a hot day like this. I hate this jerk stuff. . . ."

  They exchanged the usual comments about the co-eds. Yale gathered that Sonny was enrolled in Midhaven College for much the same reason as he. Sonny had been a big man in a small suburban high school just outside of Boston. Unfortunately, he had become so involved in being assistant manager of the high school football, track and baseball teams, that his marks had suffered. To the dismay of his father, who had arduously saved the money from his earnings as an insurance salesman, it was discovered that, academically, Sonny was not prepared to go to Princeton. "I'll transfer next year," Sonny said. "Even if no one ever heard of it, Midhaven College has a good reputation."

  Yale grinned. He wondered how many were in the freshman class at Midhaven College who actually planned to stay the four years.

  When they arrived at the picnic grounds Doctor Tangle, waving his arms ostentatiously, formed the class in a half circle. He then proceeded to make an interminably long speech about the traditions of Midhaven College and the wonderful opportunities that lay before these eager freshmen.

  Standing near the portly Doctor Tangle, George Kramer listened with an expression of interest that belied the fact that he had heard this speech practically word-for-word for the past fifteen years. When his turn finally came, the class was treated to a further long discussion. In a surprisingly deep voice, Professor Kramer expounded on the value of this land as a future bird sanctuary. It was suggested that this glorious new class, like its predecessors, would be anxious to contribute in the form of a class gift to the growing Sanctuary fund. Usually by graduation, some member of the class would remember with nostalgia the George Kramer picnic, and old Goosey Kramer's bird sanctuary would get a few hundred dollar donations.

  That's the way things were done at Midhaven College. Compared with some of its more venerable New England companions, Midhaven was a young college, only seventy-five years old. Few alumni with sufficient money to endow it heavily had been graduated. The courses with a strong emphasis on training teachers and ministers inevitably developed alumni who were embarrassingly deficient in funds. What the college lacked in money, however, was compensated for by the enthusiastic energy of its president and former missionary to China, Dr. Amos Tangle.

  After eating a hot dog and drinking a glass of warm cider, Yale managed to extricate himself from the crowd of freshmen who were being coached in the Midhaven College songs. He wandered along the river by himself. This country was familiar to him; the Marratt farm was located only a few miles farther up the river. Many times he had followed the winding course of the river directly into the city of Midhaven.

  Yale amused himself scaling flat stones across the water to the opposite bank. It occurred to him that he had never been on the other side at this point. He was plagued with curiosity as to what was over there. Looking across he could see that it was heavily wooded. He knew that once on the other side, if he walked in a straight line for about a half mile, he would come to Route 6. It would then be possible to hitchhike the several miles to his home. He could skip out and not bother to go back to college this afternoon. Yale had scarcely adjusted to living in the small dormitory with a stranger called Sonny Thompson; a boy from Boston who said words like car and park with such a peculiar "ah" sound that Yale shivered every time the combination of "a" and "r" came together in a word.

  No one would miss him at the picnic. By tying his pants and shoes around his neck, he could partly walk and partly swim to the other side and still emerge fairly dry. He was about to take off his shoes when he heard a feminine voice. He turned and recognized one of the girls he had been introduced to earlier. She was sitting on a flat ledge, partially obscured by a heavy growth of white birches. She held a pint of whiskey which she waved in Yale's direction.

  "Have a shot, freshman," she said. "Larry won't mind. By the way, meet Larry McQuail." She giggled. "Met you once but I've forgotten your name. Mine's Cynthia. Cynthia Carnell."

  Yale tried to conceal his surprise. Students at Midhaven College didn't drink. Dr. Amos Tangle had recently issued a statement to the nation's press: "There is no drinking problem at Midhaven. No matter what occurs at other colleges, Midhaven, with its long religious tradition, has successfully overcome the problem of drinking. We attribute this to close supervision and strict admission requirements that have eliminated such deplorable practices."

  Yale took the bottle. He had consumed quite a lot of beer in the past year, more or less encouraged by his father. But Pat had never given him any encouragement with whiskey. Yale had experimented several times with Pat's Scotch, but had given it up in despair. He disliked the hot, searing effect as it went down. He knew he would make a face with the whiskey and tried to conceal it. Who did this Carnell dame think she was, he wondered? Just because she was drinking a sophomore's whiskey didn't raise her from her green freshman's ranks.

  Yale took a long swallow. "Rotgut." His voice was hoarse. "Why don't you drink good whiskey?" These were lines he had heard his father speak but he mouthed them effectively. "This stuff will kill you."

  Any doubts in their minds about Yale vanished with his words. They passed the bottle around several times. They weren't much more experienced drinkers than he, although Larry McQuail seemed the more confident of the three. In the distance they could hear the freshmen singing Midhaven, our alma mater . . . .

  Larry burped and s
aid, "In the real song it goes like this: Midhaven, our alma mater . . . . He sang in a reedy voice. ". . . a fart for a starter . . . there is no fairer shithouse in the land . . . ." Larry finished a version of the song that was well known on the campus, probably to all except Doctor Tangle.

  Yale retaliated by singing a stanza from a lurid version of Little Red Wing that the Meyerberger boys (who worked in one of the packing departments at the Marratt plant) had taught him. He blushed as he sang, and was surprised to hear Cynthia and Larry pick up the chorus and finish a dozen or more verses to the conclusion. Yale looked at Cynthia unbelievingly. Everything she said came from her throat in a rich, exciting, alto-pitched voice without the artificiality and the affected manner of the few girls he had known. If Cynthia weren't so completely feminine with long brown hair tumbling on her shoulders and rounded breasts beneath the white shantung dress, he would have felt as at ease with her as with any boy he had ever known.

  "Here's one you never heard, I bet," Cynthia said. She sang to a cowboy tune,

  "I lined a hundred men up against a wall and bet two bucks I could screw 'em all. I screwed just ninety-eight and thought my blooming back would break. ...

  Cynthia stopped singing. "Why, Mr. Marratt, you look shocked!"

  Yale was shocked but denied it. Larry simply said, "Wow!" and then he apologized for having to leave them. He went back to the picnic to give an orientation talk to the trembling freshmen. He left the bottle. Cynthia and Yale took several more gulps and eyed each other uneasily. As Yale watched her drink, he was amazed that Cynthia's only reaction to the hot tasting stuff was a slight wrinkle between her eyebrows.

  "You think I'm awful, don't you?" she demanded, her eyes teasing him. Yale shook his head. "Not awful," he said, "just simple. Do you know what he'll do?" Yale jerked his thumb in the direction that Larry McQuail had gone. "He'll tell every guy in the college about a hot babe named Cynthia Carnell. Tomorrow your dormitory phone will ring all day. The bets will be on who makes you first."