The Groves of Academe: A Novel (Transaction Large Print Books) by Mary McCarthy Read Free Book Online Page B

fired? A man with a sick wife did not receive carte blanche to abuse the responsibilities of his position, but if a man with a sick wife was unreasonably discharged from his position, then the wife’s health could become a significant factor in arguing for his retention. In short, the more he pondered on it, leaving his own feelings aside, the more clearly he saw that the case was and must be one of academic freedom. In which event, it behooved him to tread warily with Domna, who was capable of subordinating all other issues, dramatically, to the single life-or-death issue, in the manner of Dostoievsky and other Russian sentimentalists who opposed capital punishment and were fond of asserting categorically the absolute sacredness of the individual life. There was no question but that this would alienate from him certain older men on the faculty who, disliking Hoar, would probably be open to conviction on a purely professional argument. On the other hand, there was no doubt that Domna, pleading for another woman’s life, would have behind her many of the women of the faculty who would not dream of enlisting their sympathies in an academic freedom case.
    And the more he envisioned this prospect, the more he was of two minds about it: could Domna be trusted to keep this side of the affair in perspective? “I told Esther,” he answered wearily, “a long time ago, under circumstances I don’t like to remember.” He rested his cheek in his palm. “Before your day, little Domna.” Memories of that epoch disturbed him; he had almost forgotten the time when he and the Hoars had been like a single family, before Maynard unaccountably—yes, even now unaccountably, for all that he now knew of Maynard—showed him the cold shoulder. “Yes?” Domna urged with a little whet of curiosity. Henry suddenly laughed. “Very funny, Domna. Last spring, less than a year ago, when I brought Cathy and the children here, I had Maynard’s word that the appointment was to run for two years, at the minimum. Nothing on paper, of course. A gentlemen’s agreement. ‘Jocelyn doesn’t part with good men, Hen; frankly, between ourselves, she can’t afford to.’” He laughed again, more harshly. Domna frowned. “A pity you didn’t get it on paper,” she murmured.
    This remark moved him to merriment. He laughed once again, but now genuinely, intellectually, till the tears rolled from his eyes. “Precisely,” he cried. “You have it. Proceed to the head of the class. A pity it is, indeed.” But as she commenced to laugh also, his mien immediately sobered. “Domna,” he confessed, “you won’t believe it, but I did try to get it on paper and at that moment my friendship with the Hoars evaporated. Overnight. From that moment, Maynard has hated me without respite.” He spoke with force and impressiveness, bringing his hand down on the chair-arm; yet he thought he saw an inner doubt or reservation shadow the girl’s brow. “Listen, Domna,” he said earnestly. “Forget whatever you may have picked up or whatever Maynard has told you and hear my version first. It does me no credit, I promise you, and you can judge for yourself how it leaves our friend, Maynard.” He began to pace the room. “Last spring, as the campus gossip may have told you, my status here was rather irregular. After the ruckus out West had made all the papers and figured in the Nation and the Witch Hunt book, as well as in a report of the A.A.U.P., several anonymous friends of the college got up a little purse and turned it over to Maynard, to use as he saw fit for victims of the purge in the universities. At that time, there was no vacancy in Literature and he used this grant to appoint me visiting lecturer in humanities—a special creation—with the understanding that I would be fitted into the Literature department at the first opportunity. However, as it happened, no vacancy did occur and I was unwilling to bring Cathy and the children on from her mother’s