The prodigal spy

She knelt down to face him, holding his shoulders. “No. Look, I know all of this seems confusing. But it’s not about you, do you understand? Just-grownups. Your dad’s fine. You don’t want him to have to worry about you too, do you? It’s-it’s a bad time, that’s all.”

A bad time. Nora, for whom Ireland was always just a memory away, called it troubles. “Before your father’s troubles started,” she would say, as if everything that was happening to them was beyond their control, like the weather. But no one would tell him what it actually was.

“ You go,” he said stubbornly.

“It’s different for me. You’re just a child-it has nothing to do with you. It’s not going to, either. I’m not going to let that happen,” she said, holding his shoulders tightly. “Do you understand?”

He didn’t, but he nodded, surprised at the force of her hands.

“You’ll be late,” Nora said, coming into the hall.

His mother looked up, distracted. “Yes, all right. Come on, honeybun, time for school. It’ll be all right. You’ll see.

“This won’t last much longer, I promise. Then we’ll go up to the cabin and forget all about it. Just us. Would you like that?”

Nick nodded. “You mean out of school?”

“Well, in the spring.”

“Don’t forget you’ve got Father Tim coming over later,” Nora said. “You’ll want to be back. Last time he was halfway through the bottle before you were through the door.”

“Nora,” his mother said, pretending to scold but laughing in spite of herself. “Listen to you. He’s not a drinker.”

“No, the poor are drinkers. The rich just don’t mind if they do.”

“He’s not rich anymore. He’s a priest, for heaven’s sake,” she said, putting on her coat.

“The rich don’t change. Someone else’s bottle, that’s what they like. Maybe that’s why they’re rich. Still, it’s your bottle, and if you don’t mind I’m sure I-”

“Nora, stop babbling. I’ll be back. Coast clear?” She nodded her head toward the window. “How about a kiss, then?” She leaned down to let Nick graze her cheek. “Oh, that’s better. I’m ready for anything now.”

At the door she put on her gloves. “You remember what I said, okay? Don’t listen to the other kids if they start saying things. They don’t know what they’re talking about anyway.”

“It wasn’t the other kids. About Dad. It was Miss Smith.”

“Oh.” His mother stopped, flustered, her shoulders sagging. “Oh, honeybun,” she said, and then, as if she had finally run out of answers, she turned and went out the door.

After that, he didn’t go to school. “At least for a while,” his mother said, still pretending that things were normal. Now, after his parents left, the house would grow still, so quiet that he would tiptoe, listening for the sharp whistle of Nora’s kettle in the kitchen, then the rustle of newspaper as she pored over his father’s troubles with one of her cups of tea. He was supposed to be reading Kidnapped. His mother said he was the right age for it, but after the wicked uncle and the broken stairs in the dark it all got confusing-Whigs and Jacobites, and you didn’t know whose side you were supposed to be on. It made no more sense than the papers. His father was a New Dealer but not a Communist, and not a Republican either, according to Nora. Then why was he on trial? Some terrible woman had said he was a spy, but you only had to look at her, all made up the way she was, to know she was lying. And a Catholic too, which made things worse. It was the Jews who loved Russia, not people like his father, even though she’d hate to think how long it had been since he’d seen the inside of a church. Still. And the things they said. But when Nick asked her to see the newspapers himself, she’d refuse. His mother wouldn’t like it.

So he sat in the deep club chair in the living room, pretending to read but listening instead. While Nora had her tea there was no sound but the ticking of the ormolu clock. Soon, however, he’d hear the scraping of a chair in the kitchen, then the heavy steps in the hall as Nora came to peek in before she began her chores. Nick would turn a page, his head bent to the book he wasn’t reading until he felt her slip out of the doorway and head upstairs. After another few minutes, the vacuum would start with a roar and he could go. He would race down the back kitchen stairs, careful not to hit the creaky fourth step, and get the newspaper from behind the bread box, where Nora always hid it. Then, one ear still alert to the vacuum, he would read about the trial. KOTLAR DENIES ALLEGATIONS. COMMITTEE THREATENS CONTEMPT. MUNDT SET TO CALL ACHESON. NEW KOTLAR TESTIMONY. It always gave him an odd sensation to see his name in print. His eye would flash down the column, “Kotlar” leaping out as if it were in boldface, not just another word in a blur of type. But it was Kidnapped all over again. Whigs and Jacobites.