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Back The Fall of Valor Save as PDF
Chapters (51)
  1. Introduction by Michael Bronski
  2. BEGINNING
  3. II
  4. III
  5. IV
  6. V
  7. VI
  8. VII
  9. VIII
  10. IX
  11. X
  12. XI
  13. XII
  14. XIII
  15. MIDDLE
  16. II
  17. III
  18. IV
  19. V
  20. VI
  21. VII
  22. VIII
  23. IX
  24. X
  25. XI
  26. XII
  27. XIII
  28. XIV
  29. XV
  30. XVI
  31. XVII
  32. XVIII
  33. XIX
  34. XX
  35. END
  36. II
  37. III
  38. IV
  39. V
  40. VI
  41. VII
  42. VIII
  43. IX
  44. X
  45. XI
  46. XII
  47. XIII
  48. XIV
  49. XV
  50. XVI
  51. About the Author

“Now honey,” he said, and he smiled charmingly at Ethel. “Billie doesn’t mean it, ma’am, but just to tease me she says I think more of the Marine Corps than I do of her. She doesn’t seem to realize—well, that—”

“That what,” Billie challenged. “You see? He can’t explain it himself.”

“Well gee, what can a fellow do?” He touched Grandin’s sleeve. “That’s a nice jacket, sir, if you don’t mind my saying so. My daddy would look nice in that. Wouldn’t he, Billie?” He fingered the tweed. “My daddy loves nice jackets.”

“Do you know something, Mrs. Grandin? All the time Cliff was in San Diego in the hospital, he never once let me go out there to see him. And he was there since last December.”

“Billie could never get it through her head, ma’am, why I didn’t want her hanging around San Diego. What would she do out there, with no friends, and me in the hospital? San Diego is no place for a young girl.” The childish mouth broke into a winning smile. “Anyhow, I came home to you, didn’t I—Mrs. Hauman?”

Billie turned away with a blush. “Did you know there’s going to be a full moon, Mrs. Grandin? I looked it up.”

“Yes, we heard.”

“In fact that’s why we chose this time for our honeymoon, isn’t it Cliff? On account of the full moon. . . .”

X

X

The steamer moved slowly away from the pier at Oak Bluffs; the deck began to throb again as it started the last lap of the sail to Nantucket.

Though most of the passengers had moved to the rail or gone below, John and Ethel Grandin still kept to their chairs against the wall of the closed saloon. When the engines died down, indicating the boat was approaching Martha’s Vineyard, the Haumans had risen to their feet. “We’re going to look,” Billie said, holding her hat with both hands, and Hauman had called back over his shoulder, “We’ll be right back, sir,” as though he thought the Grandins might miss them or even worry. Grandin wanted to go with them; he wanted to see what the island looked like and watch the passengers getting off. But Ethel had made no move. Under the circumstances, he thought it best to stay with her.

After a while he said, “It’s a long time since I’ve seen anyone so polite. I must say I like it.” Then he added, “Isn’t it odd the way he speaks of ‘my daddy’?”

“Yes.”

Taking this for encouragement, he went on. “Not dad or pop, like our kids. And always my daddy.”

But that was all. In a moment he tried again. “Curious that I had forgotten her. But I don’t believe I ever heard the sound of her voice till today. She never recited.”