The Enemy at Home

“Oh, I blame the war for this juvenile delinquency problem,” Marge declared. With her elbow on the cafeteria table, she puffed on a cigarette.

Marge Chaffy was Nora’s bucker this morning. They kept changing work partners on Nora every day. Apparently, it was something the plant did with trainees. She and Marge were having their coffee break together.

“Mind you,” Marge went on, “it was no picnic dealing with my oldest, Mary, when she was a teenager. The same goes for Leo. But my sixteen-year-old, Ralphie, used to be an absolute angel. Didn’t give me a speck of trouble. Then the war came along, and now, thanks to the gang of hoods he runs around with, I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up on the Ten Most Wanted list.”

After three hours of working with her, Nora was just now learning that the robust, fiftyish woman with the blue bandana was a widow with three kids: a married daughter, the difficult teenage son, and a middle child, Leo, who was twenty and in the army—stationed in North Africa. Nora had promised Marge that, when she wrote to Pete tonight, she’d ask if by any chance he knew Leo. “The odds are pretty slim,” Nora had said. “But wouldn’t that be a kick if they’d actually met?”

Nora was also discovering that Marge was a bit of a chatterbox when not working a bucking bar. Nora had merely mentioned that she’d had a hard time falling asleep last night because she’d been worried about her teenage son.

This prompted Marge to tell her all about her three kids—while puffing her cigarette and slurping coffee. Nora barely got a word in edgewise. But she liked Marge, and it was nice to have someone confiding in her. Plus, she felt reassured knowing that Chris wasn’t the only teenager out there getting into mischief lately.

She wanted to believe that Chris had told her the whole story about the police questioning him outside the drugstore on Wednesday. Certainly, if he was an actual suspect in a break-in, the authorities would have detained him and notified her.

“I swear, Ralphie and his pals on the football team act like a bunch of hooligans,” Marge went on, stubbing out her cigarette. “They’re always breaking training, always whooping it up. Thank God Ralph’s got a sweet girlfriend—not just pretty, but smart and nice. I hope he doesn’t mess that up and lose her, because she’s a peach.” Marge took off her shoes and rubbed her feet. “How about your son? Does he have a steady girl?”

“No,” Nora answered—with a wan smile and a little shake of the head. How could she explain to her about Chris’s “almost girlfriend” who had committed suicide? And her son wasn’t on the football team. He had no friends at all—except a loudmouthed bully who treated him like crap. Next to Chris, Marge’s son sounded so normal and adjusted. Nora didn’t want to open up to her about Chris’s problems. The woman might not have understood.

Nora watched Marge slip her shoes back on and noticed for the first time that she was wearing brown, open-toed pumps. They were hardly regulation footwear for their job. Nora had read Boeing’s list of recommended clothes, shoes and safety gear. Last week, she’d gone out and purchased a pair of lace-up “Military Walkers” for $2.99. They weren’t exactly flattering, but they were on the list of acceptable footwear. Nora had felt lucky to find them, since shoes had become so scarce lately.

Marge caught Nora looking at her shoes. She wiggled her toe, visible in the small opening, and then she cracked a smile. “I know, I know, I’m pushing my luck wearing these.”

Amused, Nora shrugged. “Well, they’re pretty.”

“But impractical,” Marge said, holding her leg straight out to show off the shoe. “And to tell you the truth, by the end of the day, they’re not the most comfortable things around. But they make us hide our hair and wear men’s pants or coveralls. I have to hold on to one little bit of femininity. My lead man keeps saying I’ll get into trouble one of these days if some higher-up checking the line notices what I’ve got on my feet. Fortunately, no one ever really looks at a woman’s shoes except other women. Still, I know I’m living on borrowed time.” She glanced at her wristwatch. “Goodness, speaking of time, our break’s almost over. We need to get back . . .”

Returning to their station, they slid right back into a comfortable groove, working together on the tail assembly of a B-17. From the other side of the tail, Marge would give a little nod every time she had the bucking bar ready for a new rivet. Because of all the noise, they had to communicate with signals and gestures.

Nora wondered if she’d ever see Marge again after today. Or would she disappear like all the previous buckers who had come and gone? Nora decided to ask Marge to join Connie, Fran and her at lunch today. She figured they’d like Marge, too.

Nora still hadn’t gotten used to what it was like to have a job—and coworkers. Fran had told her in confidence that she never saw Connie outside of the plant. Maybe it was because Connie was about twenty years younger. But before Nora had joined them, they’d been eating their lunches together for several months. Nora couldn’t understand how work friends could be so detached once off the clock. Then again, they had their own lives and their own sets of friends outside of work.

Nora wondered if it was too early or too pushy to invite Connie, Fran and Marge over for dinner on Sunday. The only times she had entertained at home had been for Pete’s friends and their wives. It would be nice to throw a party for her own friends for a change.

“HEY!” someone shouted over all the racket.

Nora took her finger off the trigger of the riveting gun and glanced over her shoulder.

Larry hovered behind her. He pushed his work goggles up to his forehead and nodded at Marge, whose attention he had now, too. “The foreman wants you up in his office—now,” he said, loudly. Then he turned to Nora. “You stay put. I have to scrounge up someone to work with you. It might take a while. Don’t move. Don’t do anything. Just wait.”

Marge gave her a bewildered look. All Nora could think was that someone—maybe Larry—had complained about Marge’s nonregulation footwear.

“C’mon,” Larry said to Marge. “They’re waiting for you up in the crow’s nest.”

Marge moved her work goggles up to the edge of her blue bandana. She gave Nora a nervous smile. “Well, it’s been nice knowing ya . . .”

“Good luck,” Nora said with uncertainty.

But Marge had already turned away to follow Larry down the scaffolding steps.

The “crow’s nest” was the head foreman’s office—up near the rafters. Along one wall, about three stories above the plant floor, a row of offices with windows looked out over the assembly line. Some of the blinds were shut, some were open. One office, smack dab in the middle, jutted out from all the others—with windows on all three sides. That was the office of the head foreman, Mr. Susco. He was like God; he could look down from his “nest” and see everything that was going on in the plant.

Standing beside the tail of the B-17, Nora watched Marge follow Larry into the cage-like elevator. Larry shut the accordion-style door.

Glancing up at Mr. Susco’s office, Nora spotted him pacing around in there while two other men stood and watched him. It was too far away for Nora to read his expression. But one of the men was in an olive uniform. For a moment, Nora thought the uniformed man was one of the security guards, there to escort Marge off the premises. Were they really going to raise such a stink over a pair of nonregulation shoes? But then Nora realized the man wasn’t a guard. His olive-green suit was an army “dress” uniform. The third man had stood with his back to Mr. Susco’s window. But now, as he turned around, Nora saw he was an older man. She also saw the priest’s collar around his neck.

Nora’s heart sunk. She felt sick.

“Oh, no,” she whispered, watching the elevator stop at the office level. The door opened. Then Marge and Larry stepped out and disappeared down the corridor.

All Nora could think was that Marge had no idea what was waiting for her. She wondered if it was too much to hope that Marge’s son, Leo, had merely been wounded in North Africa. But if that were the case, they wouldn’t have called for a priest to console her.

Larry must have left Marge at Susco’s door, because, from what Nora could see, Marge stepped into the office by herself. And once Marge realized who was waiting there for her, she had to know what had happened.

It was painful to watch, but Nora couldn’t tear her eyes away.

Marge stood there with her hand over her heart.

The uniformed army man—his posture suddenly ramrod-straight—started reading something to her from a piece of paper. The priest gingerly put his hand on Marge’s arm. But she staggered away from him. Doubled over as if in pain, Marge collapsed into a chair.

Nora watched Mr. Susco move to the window and lower the blinds.

Still staring up at the “crow’s nest,” Nora imagined the sobbing and wailing inside the office. She could almost hear it—past the deafening noise of the assembly line. Dazed, she glanced around at all the other workers at their stations, going about their jobs.

She couldn’t help thinking that Pete was in North Africa, too. The Allies seemed to be sealing a victory there. Had the Nazis made a last-ditch effort to regain a foothold in Tunisia? She wondered if Marge’s son, Leo, had been one among hundreds or thousands of Allied casualties. Maybe he’d been killed in an aerial attack or some other kind of indiscriminate bombing.

Nora imagined a man in an olive uniform knocking on her front door tonight.

She had no idea how long she’d stood there at her station, waiting for Marge’s replacement.

Nora had been told to stay put. But she was so shaken up, she just wanted to go home—or at the very least, run to the restroom, duck into a stall and cry.

“HEY!”

She swiveled around to see Larry standing behind her again—this time with an older, stocky black man with a kindly smile and gray flecks in his hair. His goggles were pushed up to his lined forehead.

“You’re going to be working with this boy for the rest of your shift,” Larry announced, shouting over the noise.

Nora nodded cordially to the other man and then turned to Larry. “Is Marge going to be okay? Was it her son in North Africa?”

“That’s none of my beeswax, and none of yours either,” Larry replied. “This is Willie. Try not to inflict any bodily harm on him. Now, you’ve just had the last twenty minutes to rest up and do nothing while the company paid you. So, shake a leg and try to make up for lost time, okay?”

He patted the man’s shoulder and walked away.

After what had happened to Marge, the last thing Nora wanted to do was go back to riveting like everything was status quo. But she managed to smile at the man. “Hi, Willie. I’m Nora.”

He nodded and adjusted his goggles over his eyes. “Nice to meet you, ma’am.”

“The woman I was working with, Marge Chaffy,” Nora said over the din. “Did anyone mention what happened to her? Was her son killed?”

Willie shook his head and gave a sad shrug. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t know anything about that. I was just told I’d be bucking at this station.” He walked around to the other side of the B-17’s tail and pointed to the first hole in the rivet line pattern along the tail’s edge. “Is this where you left off?” he asked, setting the bucking bar in place.

They didn’t waste any time getting to work. Nora tried to focus on riveting, but she kept thinking of poor Marge—and wondering if Pete was okay. Willie was a good partner, working in sync with her, and every once in a while, nodding and smiling at her reassuringly. Past the resounding blast from her gun, she somehow caught him humming to himself. It took her a while to figure out the tune. She paused before putting in a rivet. “Glenn Miller, ‘Moonlight Serenade,’ right?” she asked over the racket.

He chuckled. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you could hear me.”

“Well, it was a very good rendition.” With a nod, she set the rivet gun in place, pulled the trigger, and they were back to work again.

Pretty soon, she heard him humming another familiar song. It was The Ink Spots’ “I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire.” Nora didn’t miss a beat of riveting work as she called the song title out to him.

Laughing, Willie nodded. He kept pace with her and started humming another tune. It took two guesses before she finally got it right with Duke Ellington’s “Take the ‘A’ Train.” The little game went on for a while—and made the time fly by. It also made Nora forget her troubles for a while—and she almost felt guilty about it.

She started humming tunes for Willie to guess. She almost stumped him with “Tangerine,” but he got “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” after only a few notes.

“That one was simply way too easy, ma’am,” Willie chuckled.

Smiling, Nora paused for a moment while she loaded a rivet into the gun. “Okay, I’m going to get tough on you for the next one, Willie. And please, call me Nora. I feel like . . .”

She trailed off, once she realized Larry stood a few feet away, scowling at her.

Nora quickly got back to work—and so did Willie. She sensed Larry approaching, but she didn’t look away from her riveting.

“Save the chitchat for your coffee break!” he yelled.

Not looking at him, Nora just nodded and kept focused on the rivets. Willie nodded contritely as well.

It didn’t seem fair. Nora had seen other work partners chatting at their stations while they went about their duties. No one ever reprimanded them. Was Larry completely dedicated to making her miserable?

But he wasn’t the only one. Once he walked away, Nora stole a glance around and noticed a few others on the line giving her and Willie dirty looks. She suddenly realized that no one liked seeing her get along so well with a colored man. It made her angry—and sad.

She and Willie didn’t say anything. Nor did they look at each other or smile for the next hour. Nora hoped she hadn’t gotten him into any kind of serious trouble. The people scowling at them probably blamed Willie for getting too familiar with a white woman. She might get the cold shoulder from a few people, but they’d be a lot harsher on Willie.

When the lunch bell rang, Nora didn’t know what to say to him. She didn’t even know if he was coming back. Maybe Larry would find another bucker for her.

“Thank you,” she called to Willie over all the racket. She wanted to tell him that she enjoyed working with him and hoped she hadn’t gotten him into trouble. But she realized people were staring.

“Thank you, ma’am,” Willie said, backing away from her. Then he turned and retreated down the scaffolding steps.

Two men at the neighboring workstation stared at him with unveiled contempt. Larry wandered over to them. He threw her a look and said something to the two other men that made them laugh.

Nora figured she was the topic of a filthy joke. She waited until they headed down the scaffolding before she removed her gloves and pulled off her goggles. Then she started down the scaffolding’s grated steps.

She found Ned waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs. She was grateful for the older man’s kind, fatherly smile. “Hi ya, Nora,” he said.

She knew her face was flushed, but she worked up a smile for him. “Hello, Ned. Ever have one of those days when . . .” She trailed off, because he was nodding like he already understood.

“Larry’s gone just a little too far this time,” he said. “I can’t believe he paired you up with a coon. What was he thinking? I’m going to say something to the lead man. Willie’s an okay sort, but they should stick him with one of his own people.”

Bewildered, Nora just stared at him for a moment. She finally shook her head. “Th-that’s okay, Ned. He’s really very nice. I-I’m fine . . .”

But she wasn’t fine. Nora was so utterly disappointed in this man she’d thought was sweet and caring, she had a hard time concealing it. She could tell he was disappointed in her, too.

Biting her lip, Nora turned and hurried toward the cafeteria.

* * *

“Anyway, I think you’re right about Marge’s son,” Fran said, setting her cold, homemade meatball sandwich on the crinkled wax paper in front of her. She sat with Nora at one of the four-top tables near the cafeteria’s annex. Connie had left her half-eaten lunch on the table while she’d gone to talk to someone. She’d said her friend in the cafeteria line might know what had happened with Marge.

“They wouldn’t have had a priest there if he’d just been wounded,” Fran continued. She wiped her hands with a napkin. “When it happened to me, there was no priest and no grim reaper military messenger. They called me into the personnel office, and this nervous-looking clerk with sweat on his upper lip told me that someone from the navy was trying to track me down because Marty had been wounded. Of course, I went into shock. All the clerk could tell me was that Marty was in stable condition and being transferred to a hospital stateside. I was supposed to wait for the navy to send me a telegram at home that night—with more details. Once I calmed down, I decided to go right back to work. I knew if I went home, I’d just fall apart or climb the walls. So . . . get this, come lunchtime, I’m sitting here with my egg salad sandwich, trying to keep myself together, and this woman comes and sits next to me. Her name’s Bunny Something, one of the secretaries. She’s around my age—maybe a little older. I used to think she was pretty nice. Well, Bunny says she heard that my son got wounded and oh, what a shame and all that. Then she asks if I’d heard of the National League of American Mothers. I’m thinking it’s some kind of organization for the mothers of servicemen—or wounded servicemen. But no. Bunny cleared that up for me really quick. Turns out she’s with some crazy isolationist group. She started telling me that it’s the Jews and President Franklin D. Rosenvelt’s fault that my son was overseas fighting a war we have no business being in. Can you imagine—a Jew-hating Nazi sympathizer working and recruiting here?”

Setting down her peanut butter and jelly sandwich, Nora shook her head.

“I told her—first off—that my son was in the Pacific, not over in Europe or North Africa. And second, I said, ‘Just because he’s fighting for your right to spout your stupid fascist bullshit, Bunny, it doesn’t mean I have to listen, thank you very much.”

“Good for you!” Nora said.

“Anyway, my point is—it takes all kinds, and just about every one of them is working here. So don’t be surprised if some people you think are swell end up disappointing you. The funny thing about this Ned fella is I’m sure he doesn’t consider himself a bigot at all.” She picked up her messy sandwich again. “And don’t worry about your friend, Willie. I don’t think anyone’s going to lynch him or anything—”

“Oh, Fran, don’t even say that!” Nora winced.

“I’m sorry, me and my big mouth. But it struck me that’s what you were afraid might happen. The sad truth is, you were rattled by the way people were reacting, but I’ll bet he has to put up with that kind of thing five times a day. Not that it makes it any easier to put up with. Anyway, it’s not your fault how people react.” She glanced past Nora’s shoulder. “Is that Connie? She’s certainly been gone long enough . . .”

Nora turned and spotted Connie in the crowded cafeteria. Her pink and black bandana was a giveaway. Weaving through the tables and the people, she headed toward them.

“I got the story from my friend Kaye,” Connie announced glumly. She plopped down in her chair and put a napkin in her lap. “You’re right, Nora, her son was killed. But it wasn’t in some battle or attack. He was driving a jeep and ran over an old mine.”

“Oh, how awful,” Nora murmured. “No wonder they called a priest for her. Good Lord . . .”

Nora took a deep breath and told herself that at least she could rest easy about Pete for a while. There was no last-ditch Nazi offensive in North Africa. Then again, in all likelihood, the army would soon relocate Pete to wherever the Allies made their next major offensive, and he’d be in the thick of all the fighting again—even if he wasn’t exactly on the front line.

“I hope you appreciate this scoop, sad as it is,” Connie said over her glass of iced tea. “It cost me a dollar.”

“Your friend charged you for the information?” Fran asked, incredulous.

“No, Kaye hit me up for a donation. Marge’s friends are all chipping in for flowers. I barely even know her, and I contributed. We better start winning this damn war. That’s the third time I’ve gotten hit up this week.”

Fran shook her head and turned to Nora. “She always complains about donating to these things.”

“I have a right to complain. I just paid for the privilege.” Connie took a bite out of her tuna fish sandwich.

“That reminds me,” Fran said. “One of those donations this week was for that poor Loretta girl who was strangled. Have you heard from any of your sources if the police have a lead on the killer?”

Connie had her mouth full. But she gave them both a somber look and slowly shook her head.

Fran burst out laughing.

“What in the world is so funny?” Nora asked.

“Her!” Fran replied, pointing across the table at Connie. “With her mouth full and that serious pout on her face!”

“You’re horrible,” Nora said, but she started to laugh, too. So did Connie. “You’re both horrible! And to think, I was about to invite you two monsters to dinner on Sunday night . . .”

“Yes!” Fran said. “A doctor’s house in the rich section of Capitol Hill? Count me in. I’m dying to see how the other half lives.”

Nora turned to Connie. “Can you make it—Sunday night?”

She had her mouth full again, and nodded—with an exaggerated serious look.

The three of them started giggling again.

After everything that had happened that morning, Nora felt guilty for laughing. She automatically glanced around to see if they’d attracted any attention. No one seemed to notice them—except for one person.

Larry sat alone a few tables away. He stared at them as he ate his sandwich. Nora couldn’t read his expression. It wasn’t his usual smirk—or the contemptuous look she’d gotten from him earlier that morning. He seemed to be studying the three of them.

He didn’t look away when Nora caught him staring.

He just kept eating his sandwich and assessing them with that cold, detached gaze.

* * *

After her lunch break, when Nora returned to her station, she found a tall, stocky man waiting for her. He wore a face shield that cast a heavy reflection, so Nora couldn’t really tell what he looked like or how old he was. “My name’s Warner Nash,” he said behind the shield. “I’m your bucker, and I’m not one for small talk. So let’s get started, okay?”

“Fine,” Nora replied. Then they started to work.

And neither one of them said a word for the rest of the afternoon.