The Lehman Trilogy, page 27
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
A deep animal sound
generated from deep inside
for he is racked not just by pain
but the sounds in his mouth are frozen by the ice
even before they emerge,
and all that comes out is an “Aiiuuughaaah!”
Agonizing.
But what’s the point?
It’s useless to complain:
it has snowed all night
and it’s Jeff’s task
to clear the school entrance.
It will take him two hours at least
so long as his lungs hold out.
So he takes a deep breath
and carries on:
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
Between one “Aiiuuughaaah!” and another
he hasn’t even noticed
that a boy standing
on the other side of the avenue
for at least an hour
is admiring his immense effort.
Standing still and watching him
he morally endorses
each “Aiiuuughaaah!”
making it in some way his own
and he would even go to help him
if it were not that at present
he is untutored in the practical sphere.
So that
he limits himself to moral support.
From a distance.
Hands in his coat pockets.
Scarf tight around his neck.
An expression that is supportive
as well as clear-sighted and pitying
for the old shovelman’s toil
reveals a problem that, in his view, lies deep down
and the question becomes political:
“What am I witnessing?
What is this man deep down
if not a monument to social injustice?”
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
“Why are people like him
who break their backs shoveling snow
always those worst off
and those who ought to be protected?
He represents a paradigm.”
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
“The rich can look after themselves, buy drugs,
get treatment from a good physician
and warm themselves in front of a fire.
And yet, who are the ones
most at risk of falling sick?
Not the rich but this little old man.”
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
“Later tonight he’ll die of pneumonia
because his house has broken windows,
yet society sticks him out in the snow.
Wealth generates imbalances:
this man believes he is shoveling snow,
in reality he is shoveling our inequalities.”
“Aiiuuughaaah!”
“That’s how it is. No doubt about it.”
Herbert nods.
He takes a notebook from his pocket.
Jots it down
under the heading “Winter rights for workers.”
After which
still shaken
he heads along the approach road
to Williams College, Massachusetts.
The reason why
this twenty-year-old from New York
is so feared by the teachers
isn’t due to the surname he carries.
Not at all: Herbert would never use it
to instill fear.
If anything he hides it.
The truth is that the boy is a tough nut.
He’s not a brilliant student.
He works enough to get by.
And yet to give him low marks
is really not a good idea
for anyone with a minimum of caution:
those who do
find themselves caught unwittingly
up a blind alley
of endless discourses
in which everything is a problem that lies deep down,
the question becomes political
and a schoolroom
suddenly becomes Congress:
“If I take the floor in this hall to speak, Professor Maxwell,
it is to defend not my own particular interests
but a general principle.
I will not detain you
over the fact that you have given me a ‘C’:
I basically accept it, though with reservations.
What I find wholly questionable
—indeed unworthy of this institution—
is the method with which you give out grades:
why, before a class of thirty students
is the teacher obliged by Law
to give out
ten low grades
ten intermediate grades
five satisfactory
three good
and only two commendations?
It is the basic assumption that is wrong,
without taking account of the message it expresses!
Should I be afraid of speaking out in this hall
about an idea of social equality?
I haven’t finished, excuse me:
in a truly egalitarian college
the teacher ought to be free of constraints.
Or do we really want to believe that
out of thirty American citizens
one-third are hopeless at their studies?
I haven’t yet finished, excuse me:
don’t you find that
such a rule
which you are obliged to follow
is—to say the least—antidemocratic?
The implied consequence
however
is that only one-fifteenth of pupils
can aspire to top grades,
and what is this
if not a blatant denial of the principle
that every citizen has a right
—and I say ‘right,’ Professor Maxwell—
to be treated equally?
I haven’t yet finished, excuse me:
let us suppose for one moment
that due to an error
the best thirty students in the college
end up in a single class:
what folly would it be for you to punish twenty
branding them with the marks of blockheads?
I’ve still not finished, excuse me:
And if in one class
all of them
started whooping about
and burning books,
in what name
would we still be obliged
to honor at least two
with the laurels of State?
And then . . .”
“That’s enough, Lehman: for pity’s sake!
You’ve convinced me! I’ll speak to the college council
and to Mr. Rutherford, the principal!
We will change the system, if you wish.
And now, can I continue with the lesson?”
“Only after one last observation:
you have given me a ‘C’
for my class composition on the subject
“THE LEGACY OF PRESIDENT THOMAS JEFFERSON.”
If you now claim that my discourse has convinced you
—and since I have spoken about rights—
don’t you think that the facts belie the grade?
I honestly believe I have shown you
how much I embody in every respect
President Jefferson’s legacy to posterity.
If then however . . .”
“Fine! Agreed! Lehman, you’ve won!
Is top grade enough for you?”
“I would consider it fair.
And not for me but for everyone.”
There.
What makes
the heir of Thomas Jefferson
unique
is his incapacity to consider something for itself:
everything in him
is immediately projected
onto a social scale
reflecting quite different values.
A serious complication.
There are those who suggest
it is the natural result
of a childhood tormented by questions
and that having risked
trying to confiscate his brother’s bed
for this very reason
Herbert Lehman
has radically converted
to an extreme vision of philanthropy.
That’s a possibility.
It’s certainly true
that this sensitivity
makes it quite difficult
to talk to the boy
about even the smallest matters:
How can you ask for a glass of water
when he regards that glass
as symbolizing
the Western system of water provision?
How can you complain about the rain
to someone who immediately tells you about the homeless?
How can you start laughing at a childish joke
with someone who has a fixation
about infant mortality?
And above all
how is it possible
that the blood of a banker
—albeit filtered through a vegetable—
runs in the veins
of someone who doesn’t believe
in financial models?
Herbert Lehman
has gone as far
as calling the Wall Street Stock Exchange
a snake pit.
And in front of witnesses.
In short
while seeming disinclined
toward a financial career
it can only be hoped
that his path in life
takes him far away
from 119 Liberty Street.
And this thought is shared
by the whole family
including his father, Mayer,
and his brother Sigmund
who, when asked about it,
replied with No. 70
of his rules.
Only Philip seems
strangely unconcerned.
And not because he is moved
by any particular affection.
The point is that dear Philip
believes firmly
in family ties,
including those of relations
acquired through marriage.
And besides,
of all the verbs
we use
in these cases,
doesn’t the verb acquire
say a great deal
about the commercial implications
that a marriage entails?
Exactly.
Let us say that
in the cost-benefit calculation
of his cousin Herbert’s marriage
Philip Lehman
felt
extremely satisfied with the acquisition
and that was enough to endear him
to his thoroughly Democrat cousin.
How this marriage came about
was quite a story in itself
which no one
—including Philip Lehman—
would ever fully discover.
It just so happens, in fact,
that the union between the Lehmans and the Altschuls
proved immediately
deep down
to be a serious problem
becoming a political question.
But in short:
these are facts
of which no one is aware.
Recently graduated
Herbert was drawn
without realizing it
into the most advanced and dangerous of political terrains
namely
that form of exasperated defense of rights
that leads a human being
to go beyond his own bounds
invading the intimacy of others
so that some idea of justice might prevail.
Well.
As often happens
among twenty-year-olds
Herbert Lehman found himself
almost by chance
through friends
intercepting the existential path
of a certain daughter of the Altschuls
by the name of Eve
whose biblical name, to Herby,
seemed not disproportionate to her beauty.
Indeed: he found it entirely consistent.
Playing therefore
the enthusiastic part
of a latter-day Adam
he stepped into Paradise on Earth,
taking it for granted that
they would soon be
plundering forbidden apples.
But it wasn’t to be.
For Eden had evidently
already been violated.
The serpent in question
—for this was Satan—
was soon identified
predictably
as one of those wild reptilian characters at the Stock Exchange.
To be precise it was
none other
than the eldest son of the Morgenthaus
true pythons
one of the most prominent families
and a direct rival of Lehman Brothers.
This was a harsh blow to Adam:
his body quivered
with rage
at just the thought
of that fair model of womanhood
being destined to gratify a Wall Street cobra.
Without reckoning on the fact
that Eve had been fashioned by HaShem
to be his companion, as Genesis says,
and not to marry the serpent
who plays a mere secondary role
of evil counselor.
So far so good,
being after all the eternal story
of human jealousy.
The problem was that Herbert went much further.
The fact that Eve Altschul
—of such rare beauty—
should be snatched from general admiration
to become the property of a single person
soon struck him
as a social inequality.
On top of this, Morgenthau was a powerful man
who extended the concept of inequality
to that of abuse.
And it was a very short step
from abuse to oppression:
that engagement
was an insult to the American people
and it was time
to put up the barricades (his, he failed to add).
Then
since every legend
has its contradictions
Herbert overlooked
the fact that the victim of Evil
was not exactly a timid virgin,
but an heiress to the Altschul fortunes,
mainstay of the American economy
better known in close circles as the “mastiffs”
confirmation of a not altogether upstanding fame.
In other words
a romantic feud was about to erupt
between the Lehmans, Altschuls, and Morgenthaus
three giants of New York finance
who had more reason to join forces
than to go to war.
Yet this is politics:
the need for conflict.
And Herbert, while not knowing all that was going on,
had certainly already guessed. Deep down.
There it is.
To fight blatant injustice
Herbert embarked
on the first real political struggle
of his fortunate career.
Theodore Roosevelt was an amateur in comparison.
Abraham Lincoln a schoolboy.
George Washington would have asked for private tutoring.
In the first place
a ruthless anticapitalistic campaign
was launched against the Morgenthaus
carried out undercover of course
and keeping the Lehman name well hidden
so that
for many decades to come
socialist mythology
celebrated an unknown popular hero
without knowing
he was a scion of finance.
Meanwhile
as in every war
he triggered a relentless underground campaign
to incite revolt
among those subjugated by the tyrant;
in this case, since
in his view
Eve was a victim of dominant power
(it never occurring to him that she might be happy about it),
Herbert set about pursuing her
every day
and bombarding her
with passionate letters
gifts of flowers
and whatever other political expedient
to stir in her
the urge to rebel.
In this he was helped
by the victim’s younger sister
a certain Edith, a kindly girl
more like a young poodle
than an Altschul mastiff
perhaps because she had spent all these years
as an eternal lady-in-waiting
overshadowed by a biblical diva.
In Edith Altschul
democratic propaganda
found an unexpected voice:
the girl was devoted to the cause
stirred by a keen political zeal
and fought with all her might
for the noble moral objective
of wrecking her sister’s marriage
in pursuit of a war against finance (and therefore against her father).
Commendable, Edith:
between Party and Family
she chose the former.
Hadn’t women, after all,
now won the right to vote?
Her enthusiasm for politics was only natural:
it is always such with new experiences.
And since American politics
rarely abandons its goals,
the pact between Herbert and his deputy Edith
succeeded
after much effort
in producing its first fruits.
It happened one dull summer afternoon.
Months and months had been spent
on electoral campaigning
so that
the results were now expected.
At the umpteenth request
for a brief personal encounter
so far promptly rejected
Eva Altschul at last replied with a glimmer of hope:
she would agree to an interview
so that she could look him in the face
and tell him how much embarrassment
he was causing her.
This was obviously a ruse.
And Edith thought so too:
examining the subtext
is the first talent of a good secretary.
The time was fixed: at seven o’clock sharp.
The place was fixed: the Altschuls’ flower garden
as if to say that Eden was welcoming its children back
