Thai Horse

by William Diehl

  ‘Everybody clear out but Hatcher,’ he snapped and the room emptied. Hatcher stood as erect as a statue in his new uniform, his chin tucked against his clavicle. Cody stood very near him but did not look t him; he stared out the window at the courtyard as he spoke. ‘My name’s Murphy Cody. You call me Mister Cody.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I hear you’re a Street kid. Is that right, maggot?’

  “Well, sir, I . .

  ‘Yes or no!’

  ‘Yes, sir!’

  ‘I hear you were a Golden Gloves champion in Boston. That correct?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Cody looked him over. ‘Middleweight?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘You don’t look like you could break wind, maggot,’ Cody said and walked out of the room.

  Thanksgiving, 1963. A cold, harsh-wind day. ‘Hit the wall, maggot,’ Snyder bellowed as Hatcher was leaving the mess hail and the underclassman assumed the position.

  A dozen frogs had already fallen before the relentless hazing of Snyder, Cody and other midshipmen. Yet Hatcher felt that in a funny way Cody was watching out for him. Hatcher had surprised them all. While other freshmen broke under the rigorous schedule and hazing, Hatcher seemed to get stronger as the months went by. By winter he knew he would get by that crucial first year if Snyder didn’t force a confrontation.

  Snyder had other plans.

  ‘Hatcher’s mine,’ Snyder bragged openly. ‘I’ll break him. He’ll be gone before Christmas.’

  He braced Hatcher constantly, in the lower classman’s shower, in the yard, in the halls, his comments always insulting and humiliating. Eventually it started to get to Hatcher.

  Now he was at it again.

  ‘The academy is for men, maggot,’ Snyder snarled. ‘You’re not a man, you’re what we used to call a J.D. back where I come from. You know what a J.D. is, maggot?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I’m going to make it my business to run you off. You’re history. You don’t deserve to be an officer in this man’s Navy.’

  Hatcher didn’t say anything.

  ‘You want to be an officer, maggot?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Well, that’s a joke. You don’t even have a mother and a father, isn’t that a fact?’

  Hatcher didn’t answer. He could feel the blood rising to his face.

  ‘I asked you a question, maggot.’

  Still no answer.

  Snyder moved so close his breath was hot against Hatcher’s face.

  ‘You know what they call someone who doesn’t have a mother and a father, maggot?’

  Hatcher stared straight ahead. He fought to keep himself from trembling with rage.

  ‘Say the word,’ Snyder demanded.

  ‘Maybe he doesn’t know the word, Snyder,’ Cody’s voice said. Hatcher was staring straight ahead; and Snyder moved out of the way and suddenly Cody was staring at him.

  ‘Maybe he never got that far in school,’ Cody said. ‘Is that right, maggot?’ Snyder snapped.

  ‘Well, maggot, is that right?’ Cody repeated.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Hatcher said.

  Snyder leaned over to Cody and said softly, ‘He’s mine, Cody. He’ll be Boston dog meat by Christmas.’ He chuckled and moved on.

  ‘You almost lost it there, maggot,’ Cody said sharply. ‘I was watching you. Now, you listen up. Everybody figured you’d be history by now, but you fooled us all. So don’t lose it now. Snyder’s trying to provoke you, and if he does, you’re gone. You took it this long, just keep taking it. Couple more months and you’re a second-year man and nobody can mess with you anymore.’

  ‘What’s he got against me, sir?’

  ‘He’s an elitist. He doesn’t think you fit the profile.’

  ‘Do you, sir?’

  ‘It doesn’t make any damn difference what anybody thinks, it’s what you think. And we never had this talk,’ Cody snapped and walked away.

  ‘You and Murph Cody were pretty close for a time, weren’t you?’

  Hatcher was drawn back to the present by Sloan’s question. He stared at him for several seconds and then said, ‘Yes . . . we were at Annapolis together. I didn’t see much of him after we graduated. He went in the air service and I went into intelligence. Why? Why the interest in Cody?’

  ‘You know how it is. The general never has gotten over his death. I guess he just wants to put it all in perspective.’

  Hatcher’s eyes narrowed. Sloan was lying to him and he knew it. But it wasn’t Sloan’s tone of voice or expression that gave him away.

  ‘Don’t bullshit me, Harry. You didn’t track me down and then come all the way here to chat about Murph Cody. You think I got stupid since I saw you last?’

  Sloan held up his hands in a gesture of apology. The smile got broader when he was in trouble. ‘Hey. Please. Stick with me for a couple of minutes more, okay?’

  Hatcher relaxed. He was curious and had nothing to lose by going along with the game, whatever the game was.

  ‘Well, that’s a long time ago,’ Hatcher went on. ‘Annapolis was — 1963 to ‘67. I was in his wedding. That was...’

  “Sixty-nine,’ Sloan said. He pointed to the records. ‘It’s in the file.’

  ‘Then I didn’t see him again after I joined the brigade.’

  ‘Why?’

  Hatcher paused for a moment. ‘We had a falling-out,’ he said. ‘Anyway, Cody was tough at first. Big on hazing. It was — like paying dues to him. Cody was very big on paying dues. Maybe it had something to do with being Buffalo Bill’s son.’

  ‘How so?’ Sloan pressed on.

  ‘Well, you know, Polo had to measure up. As I remember, the general wouldn’t put up with any slack in the line.’

  ‘He played polo?’

  ‘Did I call him Polo?’ Hatcher replied, surprised. ‘Jesus. I didn’t even think about it just came out. Polo’s a nickname, short for Polaroid. Cody had a photographic memory, could remember anything — faces, names, math formulas, you name it. Everybody from the old gang at the academy called him that.’

  He paused again as new images came back. ‘Look, he was a good guy, very loyal, liked to raise a little hell—’

  Hatcher looked back down at the family Christmas photograph. Somehow the man in the Christmas picture seemed smaller and sadder than the Cody he remembered. And then Hatcher remembered the Christmas holidays that first year.

  ‘— and loved the ladies.’

  Christmas, 1963. There was a light snow, just enough to call it a White Christmas and make being away from the Cirillos for the first time a painful experience. Hatcher was huddled against the wind, walking across the yard with his head down. Broke and with n place to go, he was spending the Christmas holidays at the academy along with perhaps a dozen other midshipmen. As he was crossing the chilly yard he heard yelling and what sounded like furniture being overturned.

  My God, Hatcher thought, two of the guys are going at it. He ran into the sophomore dorm and up to the second floor. The furor was coming from Cody’s room.

  The room was a shambles. Books, papers and clothes were strewn all over the floor. Cody was in a rage, stumbling around the room, yelling obscenities, tears in his eyes. He picked up his desk chair and, turning to the window, swung it back with both hands. Hatcher leaped into the room and grabbed the chair. Cody turned on him, his face red with drunken fury. ‘Wha’ the hell’re you doin’, maggot!’

  ‘Shit, sir, you’re going to be in a lot of trouble. The OD’s bound to hear you.’

  ‘Up the OD’s dick, maggot.’

  Hatcher looked out the window. The OD was charging across the yard through the snow toward the dormitory.

  ‘Oh shit!’ Hatcher said.

  He put the chair back and rushed around the room, straightening it up, stacking up papers and arranging them on the corner of the desk. He threw the clothes in the closet and closed the door.

  ‘What d’you think you’re doin’, maggot?’ Cod
y demanded.

  ‘The OD’s on his way over here,’ Hatcher said. ‘If he catches you drunk in your room, you’re gone, sir.’

  ‘S’be it,’ Cody replied drunkenly. ‘Teach ‘em all.’

  ‘All who, sir?’

  ‘Mm’ your own business.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Hatcher heard the front door of the dorm open and close.

  ‘He’s on his way up here,’ Hatcher said in a panic.

  ‘Who’re we talkin ‘bout?’

  ‘The fucking OD, sir.’

  ‘Up the OD’s —‘ Hatcher grabbed Cody and steered him toward the bathroom. ‘What the hell’re --‘

  Hatcher shoved him in the bathroom and turned on the shower. He went back in the room and pulled the door shut. Then he went to Cody’s closet and got out a pair of shoes and a shoeshine kit. He could hear the officer of the day approaching the room. He started frantically shining the shoes as the OD pounded on the door.

  ‘Mr. Cody?’

  Hatcher opened the door.

  ‘What’re you doing in here, maggot?’ the OD demanded, staring at Hatcher.

  Hatcher held up a shoe and a rag.

  ‘Doing Mr Cody’s shoes, sir.’

  ‘Where’s Cody?’ the OD demanded, brushing past Hatcher and entering the room. From behind him, Hatcher looked down at the foot of the bed. A. capped bottle of vodka was sitting on the floor. Hatcher moved as cautiously as he could to the foot of the bed and dropped the shoe, waiting until it hit the floor and at the same moment kicking the bottle under the bed.

  The OD whirled and Hatcher popped to attention. ‘Sorry, sir,’ he stammered. ‘I dropped the shoe.’

  At that moment the door opened and Cody’s dripping head peered around its edge. He had a towel wrapped around his shoulders.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he asked sternly.

  ‘Sounded like a riot in here, Cody,’ the OD answered.

  ‘The radio,’ Cody said. ‘I turned it off. Get back on those shoes, maggot.’ He slammed the bathroom door shut.

  ‘Yes, sir!’

  The OD stalked out of the room. ‘Just keep it down,’ he said as he left.

  Cody came out of the bathroom. The towel was still wrapped around his shoulders and his hair was dripping wet. Water had splashed on his tunic. He walked into the room and looked around, got down on his hands and knees and reached under the bed to get the bottle of vodka. He sat on the floor, leaning on the bed, uncapped the bottle and started to laugh.

  ‘That was very quick thinkin’, maggot, very resourceful, indeed. Have a drink.’

  ‘I don’t think—’

  ‘S’down and have a damn drink, maggot,’ Cody said with a flourish and held the bottle toward him. Hatcher sat beside him on the floor, took a swig, and shuddered.

  ‘You’re a real case, maggot,’ Cody said, almost sneering. ‘I been watching you. You got a funny kinda attitude. What d’you call that, street ethics?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘You suppose so, what?’

  ‘Sir.’

  ‘Right.’ He took another swig and handed the bottle back to Hatcher. ‘M’old man’s a soldier’s soldier, maggot. E’body loves Buff’lo Bill Cody.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Well, shit,’ Cody said with a vague wave of his arm. He stared down at the vodka bottle. ‘Think I’ll ever make adm’ral, maggot?’

  Hatcher took another swallow of vodka and handed it back to Cody. ‘Is that what you want to be, sir?’

  ‘Isn’t that what this’s all about? This is the U.S. Naval Academy, maggot. We’re all suppos’ t’be admirals before we retire, didn’t y’know that. Isn’t that why you’re here? You jus’ tryin’ to get recest — respect — respectable?’ He chuckled at the tongue twister and passed back the bottle.

  Hatcher took another swig of the vodka. The room was beginning to tilt a little.

  ‘I like the ocean,’ he said finally, handing the bottle back to Cody.

  ‘I like the ocean,’ Cody repeated with a snicker. ‘Jesus, he came to Annapolis because he likes the friggin’ ocean. Well, maggot, which ocean d’you like best?’

  Hatcher chuckled. ‘I like ‘em all, long’s they’re wet.’

  Cody laughed. ‘Tha’s very funny. But ‘s indiscriminant. You’re indiscriminant, maggot. Got t’be discriminating‘s part of what we’re doing here, becoming elit — elit-isss.’

  ‘Elit-isss, yessir.’

  Their laughter progressed toward a laughing jag.

  ‘Elit-isss-t,’ Cody said through his laughter.

  ‘Elit-isss-t,’ Hatcher replied.

  ‘Why’d you do this for me, maggot. I been giving you an awful lot of shit. Was it because I gave you that advice ‘bout Snyder?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘F’r the record, I wasn’t doing you any favors, Hatcher, I’m an opportunis’, prob’ly the wors’ snob of the bunch. Next year I’m capt’n of the boxing team and right now Snyder’s our only middle-weight and Snyder’s got a glass jaw. A good, hard shot and ‘s ass is planted. I want a winning team, maggot, and I need a good middleweight for that, so I gotta keep you around until spring tryouts, see what kinda stuff you got.’

  ‘Well,’ Hatcher said with a shrug, “s good a reason as any.’ And then after a pause he added, ‘But it’d take more than you and Snyder to get rid of me.’

  Cody looked at him with surprise, and then, leaning back against the bed with the bottle perched on his knee, he nodded. ‘Y’know somp’n, I think you’re right,’ he said and passed the bottle back. ‘What the hell’re you doin’ here, maggot? Why aren’t you back in Boston?’

  ‘I couldn’t afford it. Besides, the only people I really want to see are out West skiing.’

  ‘No kidd’n. Me too, maggot, got n’place to go. M’ old man’s in the Far East somewhere and Mrs Cody’s on a Caribbean cruise. Wha’ the hell’s the diff’rence, anyway. Just ‘nother day, right?’

  He took a deep swig and handed the bottle to Hatcher.

  ‘Mostly, though, it’s because m’ lady fair — sweet, adorable Cassie — decided to marry a lawyer. Can you believe that, she’s marrying one of those fuckin’ blood suckers. She decided she didn’ wanna be a sailor’s wife.’

  ‘Well, you can’t really blame her for that.’

  ‘Maybe you’re right,’ he said. ‘Also she didn’ wanna wait three more years to legalize her favorite sport.’ Cody giggled and held the vodka bottle up in a toast. ‘To past sport with Cassie.’

  He took a swig and handed it back to Hatcher.

  ‘I know how it is,’ said Hatcher. ‘‘1y girl dropped me for a wrestler. Talk about humiliating. No neck and solid muscle from the balls of his feet to the top of his head.’ He held up the bottle. ‘Here’s to stupidity.’

  ‘What’re you gonna do New Year’s Eve, maggot?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Ever seen Times Square on New Year’s Eve?’

  ‘Mr. Cody, I don’t have the price of a bus ticket to the showers.’

  ‘Well, money is not one of my problems. It’s on me, jus’ don’t ever tell anybody that Cody and the maggot Hatcher spent the weekend together.’ He winked and laughed and took a swig. ‘We’ll stay in a fancy hotel, order up room service, maybe even fin’ a coupla friendly ladies. And at midnight, we’ll go down ‘mong the heathen hordes.’ Cody held up the bottle. ‘To the heathen hordes.’

  And so Midshipman Murph Cody and maggot Christian Hatcher went off to New York for New Year’s.

  From the moment they got on the bus it was Murph and Hatch, and finding lonely ladies was not a problem — selection was the problem. The bars were crowded, there were parties in the rooms that overflowed into the halls and parties in the streets. There was an epidemic of brotherly love. And occasionally when opportunity presented itself in the form of two lonely ladies, Hatcher and Cody would vote, holding the fingers of one hand behind their backs and then flashing them. If the total number of fingers for each was mo
re than seven, they would make a move. They scored before dark.

  The girls were roommates. Helen, who was with Murph, was an assistant photo editor for a news magazine. Hatcher’s date, Linda, was an usher at one of the Broadway theaters. Both were eights. And both slept in the same room, so there was the added sense of excitement that came with trying not to be too demonstrative with another couple a few feet away.

  Two in the morning and the sharp, intrusive ring of the telephone. Helen took the call. ‘Hi Mom, Happy New — What?. . . Oh, no! When?. . . Oh God, Momma, I’ll be there as soon as I can. Yes, yes . .‘ She cradled the phone and sat on the edge of the bed, shaking and crying, and Cody sat up and put a blanket around her shoulders.

  ‘What happened?’ he asked.

  ‘My brother . . . was in an automobile . . . automobile . . . wreck. I’ve got to go straight to the hospital. They don’t think. . . don’t think . .

  ‘C’mon, get dressed. I’ll take you.’

  ‘It’s way out in Queens.’

  ‘Hey, get dressed. I don’t care where it is, you can’t go alone.’

  Cody was a true gentleman. His macho bravado had vanished when they met the girls, replaced by a tenderness that astounded Hatcher. Now Cody organized the trek to the hospital quickly, and when they were gone Hatcher and Linda lay side by side in the bed, the news of the wreck somehow making sex — even touching — seem self-indulgent and frivolous. They lay there for a long time, Hatcher dozing off, then ‘waking, then dozing off again. The sky was turning gray when the doorbell rang.

  Linda sat bolt upright in bed.

  ‘My God, who could that be?’ she whispered. Hatcher scrambled to the door and peered through the peephole.

  ‘It’s Murph,’ he said and opened the door.

  Cody stood there with his hat under his arm.

  ‘Just thought you’d like to know that Fred — that’s Helen’s brother — is gonna make it.’

  ‘Hey, that’s great,’ Hatcher said.

  ‘I didn’t know the phone number, that’s why I didn’t call.’

  ‘Hey, right, we’re glad to get the news.’

  ‘Uh.. .‘

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘I don’t feel like going back to the hotel alone,’ he said quietly.