Manhasset

Manhasset is the location of the Keith family home, a substantial property that anchors two turning points in Willie Keith’s early wartime life: his departure for Navy training and his return to a homecoming celebration. Its domestic comfort provides a measure of the sheltered background from which he enters naval service.

The Keith Home

The house in Manhasset is a twelve-room Dutch colonial set on a knoll amid two acres of lawns, mature beech, maple, and oak trees, flower beds, and a high hedge. Heavy white pillars and a steep, black-shingled roof give it a commanding presence. Mrs. Keith’s family had given her the property, and income from her Rhode Island bank securities paid for its upkeep. Willie regards these surroundings as normal, a small but telling indication of how accustomed he is to the security and abundance of his upbringing.

Departure for Navy Training

When Willie enters the Navy’s midshipmen school, Mrs. Keith has driven him from their home in Manhasset despite his preference to take the train. He wants the departure to feel more like leaving for war and dislikes being escorted to the Navy’s gates by his mother; she prevails, as she usually does. The episode places his first step toward wartime service within the familiar orbit of home and family, rather than the independent departure he imagines.

Homecoming and Significance

After his service, Willie returns to the Manhasset house to a prepared welcome. Mrs. Keith embraces him, while relatives and neighbors greet him as a war hero. The best china and silver are laid out, and the meal includes the foods she knows he loves. Yet Willie eats without much enthusiasm, disappointing his mother’s expectation that he will arrive ravenous. The contrast between the grand welcome and his subdued response gives the homecoming a quiet complexity: Manhasset offers the comfort and recognition of his former life, but his experience of war has made a simple return to it less straightforward.