Colonel Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [324]
Flat on his back that same day, he heard that Lieutenant Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., had gone AWOL from military convalescence and reassumed command of the Twenty-sixth Infantry Regiment, just in time to participate in Pershing’s final offensive. Kermit had gotten to the Front too, and fought in the same division. Quentin was avenged. Family honor was satisfied.
AROUND THREE O’CLOCK the following morning, floodlights illuminated the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. Newspaper presses throughout the city thumped out an announcement by the State Department: “The Armistice has been signed.” At 6 A.M., local time, hostilities would cease on the Western Front.
Steam whistles began to blow long before dawn, in a continuous wail punctuated by motor horns and church chimes. By seven all Manhattan was throbbing, as fire crackers, cap pistols, brass bands, air-raid sirens, and even cow bells added to the cacophony. Impromptu parades joined together and marched up Fifth Avenue. Soldiers and sailors grabbed girls off the sidewalks and kissed them with a promiscuity unimaginable in prewar days. Airplanes roared overhead at dangerously low altitudes. There was a crescendo of noise through the day, approaching its climax in the late afternoon, just as Roosevelt was driven into town and returned to the hospital room he had occupied in February. It had windows facing toward Broadway, only one block distant. For as long as he remained awake, he could hear roaring and music in Columbus Circle.
Dr. John H. Richards announced overnight that the Colonel was back in Roosevelt Hospital because he needed to be “near his physician.” His ailment, diagnosed as “lumbago,” was not considered serious. “His blood pressure and heart action are those of a man of forty years.”
Subsequent bulletins, issued every few days by Richards and others, were equally positive, but vague enough to confuse reporters as to what, exactly, was wrong with Roosevelt. If he was in no danger, why had his wife moved into an adjoining room? And why was his treatment taking so long? On 21 November, a rumor that he was facing an operation impelled his old literary friend Hamlin Garland to come and see him.
“I found him in bed propped up against a mound of pillows,” Garland wrote in a diary entry. “He looked heavier than was natural to him and his mustache was almost white. There was something ominous in the immobility of his body.”
After some chat about their youthful experiences out West, Garland said that he and a few friends would like permission to buy the field in France where Quentin was buried and turn it into a memorial park, “so that when you and Mrs. Roosevelt go there next summer, you will find it cared for and secure.”
Roosevelt’s eyes misted over. “That’s perfectly lovely of you, Garland.” But he needed to consult Edith before coming to a decision.
Corinne Roosevelt came in with a cake, and Garland rose to go. The Colonel would not let him. “Sit down!”
For half an hour the three of them talked about books and poetry. Roosevelt mentioned politics only once. “I wanted to see this war put through and I wanted to beat Wilson. Wilson is beaten and the war is ended. I can now say Nunc dimittis, without regret.”
Garland came back four days later to ask again about the memorial. Roosevelt seemed stronger: his operation had been merely a dental procedure, to remove two formerly abscessed teeth. Yet he emanated sadness, and his voice had a moribund sound. The stillness of his body, mummified in thick blankets, again struck Garland. It contrasted strangely with the movement of his arm as he reached out to shake hands. He was evidently in worse condition than the hospital would admit.
Edith, Roosevelt said, was opposed to the idea of a park around Quentin’s grave. She felt that her son had been “only an ordinary