Windchill Summer

by Norris Church Mailer

  “It’s late, and I’m tired. It’s the pictures, isn’t it?”

  The beer slid from his hand. It splashed over the rug and soaked his shoe and his left pant leg. He didn’t bend to pick up the glass, which had rolled under the bed.

  “Yeah. It’s the pictures.”

  “How did you know I had them?”

  Without answering, Tripp got up and went into the bathroom, then came back out with a towel. He wiped his leg and laid the towel over the dark wet spot. He poured himself another beer.

  “Do you know how Jerry died?”

  “Not really. They said it was a booby trap. I know he was real depressed over what happened at that village. It seemed like in his letters he sensed something was going to happen to him.”

  “Maybe he did. I don’t know. A lot of us were pretty strung out about what happened at that village. How much did he tell you?”

  “I’d guess all of it. If there was more, I don’t want to know it. He told me how you saved those little girls, and then how y’all went around putting the nearly dead ones out of their misery. I know you didn’t do any of the real bad stuff.”

  “Carlene, just being there was bad enough. It affected all of us in different ways, but nobody got out of it without being changed.”

  Tripp relaxed a little, as if he felt relieved that she knew and he could talk about it. He took a long drink and continued: “Of all the men there, he was one of the ones it hit the hardest. Jerry was probably the nicest guy I ever met—clean-living, a Christian. Didn’t even cuss, which a lot of saints probably would have done in Vietnam. But he was just not cut out to be a soldier. I don’t think he could live with what happened, and that’s why he let himself get killed.”

  “Let himself?”

  “We were out on patrol in an area we knew for a fact had a lot of booby traps. We’d been slogging along with no real goal, and our morale was bad. After My Lai, none of us even pretended to keep any order or have any pride in our outfit. The brass kept us out in the bush, and our mission was to try to surprise and kill the enemy, but we rarely saw any, even though we knew full well they were all around us. The way we crashed around would have alerted anybody within five miles we were out there. We didn’t care.

  “We never got to go back to base for any downtime. The supplies weren’t steady. Sometimes we didn’t even have enough ammunition. We got in several firefights, and lost five men. Snipers shot at us all the time, and we never saw where they were coming from. They just wore us down to nothing. It seemed like the powers that be were hoping if they left us out there long enough, we’d all be killed and their problem of what to do with us would be solved. We all knew the cover-up of what happened at My Lai would be blown open one day. Too many people knew about it.

  “Jerry kept reliving that day, over and over. He couldn’t get it off his mind—especially one of the little kids. It was like that kid was haunting him. That one bothered me, too, and don’t think I didn’t have my own nightmares, but Jerry got to the point where he was half-insane, I think. The day he got killed, he spent most of the time mumbling to himself, looking up at the sky. Maybe he was talking to God. I don’t know. He wouldn’t eat anything all that day.

  “We had been humping for several hours when the guy in front of me stepped on a mine and got his leg blown off. I dragged the guy off the trail, yelled for the medic. He came and did what he could for the guy and radioed for a dust-off. Jerry was right behind me, and I told him to give me a hand to carry him to the landing zone and put him on the chopper. He had a funny look on his face, and he said to me, ‘There is something I have to take care of first. Stay here and don’t follow me,’ and then he took off running through the bush, without even looking for trip wires or anything, blundering past the trees as fast as he could go. I went after him, but he hadn’t gotten a hundred yards when he hit a mine, and went up in the air like a rag doll. I think it was what he wanted. He went quick. I don’t even know if he knew what hit him.

  “His helmet landed almost at my feet. I picked it up and carried it back to camp with me, and later I found a picture of you and your baby tucked inside it, and the letter you wrote about getting the pictures. I should have put them with the rest of his things they sent to his family, but . . . I didn’t.”

  Carlene took a sip of her Coke. She got up and walked around the little room, then went into the bathroom and closed the door. She gripped the edge of the sink, shook with silent sobs, then splashed cold water on her face. She looked in the mirror and said to herself, “Well—what did you expect?”

  Tripp hadn’t moved from his chair. Carlene sat down again, smoothed her skirt.

  “Thank you for telling me,” she said. “I was afraid it was something like that. It doesn’t make it any easier, but I’m glad to know what happened. What I don’t understand is why you are here now. Why did you wait all this time to come, if you knew I had the pictures?”

  “A few months ago, they finally started a big investigation. A Colonel Wilson is going around tracking down all the guys he can find who were there that day. One of my buddies called and told me he had talked to Wilson and that he probably would be calling me. All of us could be court-martialed and could go to jail for life. Carlene, I don’t know if you have it in your heart to help me or not, but I would appreciate it if you would give me the pictures back. Sooner or later I will have to talk to Colonel Wilson, and I would just as soon not have those mementos floating around.”

  “What if I thought this colonel needed to see them? Jerry wanted me to keep them until he got home, because he thought something ought to be done about what happened.”

  “Carlene, Jerry is dead. Would it do him or his family any good to have his name smeared with this? You know what went down that day. No matter what happens to all of us, those people aren’t coming back, and neither is Jerry. It was war, and there was nothing Jerry or I could have done at the time to stop it. I will have to live with what I did the rest of my life. The real ones who ought to be court-martialed are Johnson and Westmoreland and McNamara, who started this war in the first place, and Nixon, who has kept it going, and you know that is not going to happen.”

  He was speaking in a calm tone of voice that somehow made you want to trust him. Everything he said made sense. Carlene listened as he went on:

  “But as far as the pictures go, you do what you have to do. If you want to hand the pictures over to the army, I’ll abide by that. It is between you and your memory of Jerry.”

  He got up and poured himself another beer.

  “Do you want some more Coke?”

  She chewed on her fingernail. She felt like her mind was in two pieces. Didn’t she owe it to Jerry to try to do something about it? On the other hand, they were already doing something about it with this Colonel Wilson’s investigation. Tripp wasn’t one of the bad guys. He had saved those little girls. She didn’t have the right to hand over the pictures and see him maybe get sent to the pen. Still, it might help convict the ones who were really guilty if she did give them to the army. Her head started to ache. She didn’t want to have to think about it anymore. She had already spent too many sleepless nights thinking about those pictures, and she was sick of the whole mess. It had already killed Jerry. She couldn’t let it kill her, too.

  “They’re out in the truck.”

  “What?”

  “The pictures are out in the truck. You can have them. They’re yours. I’d be happy never to have to look at them again. I’ll go get them.”

  She went outside and brought in an envelope and handed it to Tripp.

  His voice broke as he said, “Thank you.”

  “The negatives are in there, too. I didn’t make any copies. What are you going to do with them? Burn them up?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You might want to give them to this Colonel Wilson, yourself. At least some of them.”

  “Would you, if you were me?”

  “I don’t know. I probably would. It might c
all attention to the fact that this is not the greatest war that has ever been fought.”

  “Has there ever been a great war fought?”

  “There have been ones, like World War Two, that were for more of a reason. I mean, the world couldn’t just sit back and let Hitler drive his tanks in and take over ever single country, could it?”

  “You’re right. But World War Two was necessary, not great. That’s the one trouble with necessary wars. They make you believe that all wars are worth fighting.”

  He took out a cigarette and handed the pack to Carlene. She tapped one out, and he lit it for her.

  “Well, I guess you’ll be heading back to California now that you got what you came after,” she said, blowing out a stream of smoke.

  “Not right away. I’ve decided to stay here awhile. There’s some things in California I need to give a little space. I rented a house here in town today. Jerry used to talk about going to DuVall University, so I might go there and pick up a few more credits toward my degree. It seems like nice country around here.”

  “It’s nice, all right. But let me warn you—if you move full-grown to a small southern town, you’ll never belong.”

  “And if you leave full-grown, they never let you go?”

  “We’ll find out about that. I’m going to California myself, as soon as I can. Hollywood.”

  “You want to try acting?”

  “Yeah. I’d like to give it a try. Who knows? Somebody’s got to make it. Why not me?”

  “You just might, Carlene. Wanting to bad enough is half of it.” He raised his glass in a toast. “Okay then, it’s a deal. We’ll swap. You go to California and I’ll stay in Sweet Valley.”

  They clinked their glasses. Carlene drained the last of the Coke, set her glass down, and picked up her purse.

  “Well, I better get going.”

  Tripp walked her the few steps to the door. “Thank you, Carlene. For everything.”

  “That’s all right. I’m glad it’s out of my hands. You don’t know how glad. Take it easy, Tripp. Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  They stood looking at each other, neither quite knowing how to end it. It all had happened too quick, too easy. They each had a piece of Jerry, and they seemed to sense that when they went their separate ways, something of him would be split and lost forever.

  “Carlene . . . do you think we could get together sometime? I don’t know anybody in town, and if I’m going to stay awhile, it might be good if you could introduce me to some people.”

  “You met anybody at all?”

  “Just my landlord. Nobody my own age.”

  “Sure. We could do that. When would you want to do it?”

  “How about right now? You could give me a night tour of this booming metropolis—if you’re not too tired.”

  “Well . . . why not? I’m getting my second wind. We’ll take a ride in my pickup and hit the hot spots. You will be so dazzled, you’ll thank God every night you moved here.”

  “You think so?”

  “That was a joke, son. But let’s get out of here. This motel room stinks like beer. I need some fresh air.”

  55.Cherry

  It was five-thirty by the time I got out to Baby’s and woke her up. I thought she was going to faint just like I nearly did when she saw the pictures.

  “Oh my Lord, Cherry. I can’t believe it. Do you think Tripp killed all those people? If he did, that means he killed Carlene to keep her from telling on him!”

  “I don’t know what it means, but I can’t believe Tripp could murder that many people. There’s hundreds of them, it looks like. He is a decent, good guy. In spite of how it looks, I know in my heart he is, and I am not going to jump to any conclusions until I talk to him.”

  “Well, you’re not going to talk to him by yourself, that’s for sure. I think we should call Ricky Don and let him arrest Tripp.”

  “No! We’re not calling Ricky Don. I am going to talk to Tripp before I do anything. He has a lot more than these pictures to explain, including one little thing you don’t know: Tripp is married. To somebody named Faye. Ricky Don told me she called the sheriff’s office, trying to track him down. That’s what the Ouija board said, remember? ‘Ask Faye.’ Is that creepy or what?”

  “Carlene tried to tell you. Oh, Cherry, please let’s get somebody to help us!”

  “Baby, cool your jets. We can’t panic and do something stupid. Where do you think Tripp might be? I didn’t hear from him yesterday, and he didn’t come home last night. Do you think Bean might know?”

  “We could call him and see. I think he’s up on the Ridge.”

  We called Bean’s house and his mother, sounding like we had woken her up, said he must have gone out early to tend to his garden. I don’t think she had a clue what it was he grew.

  “Let’s go on up there and talk to Bean, Cherry. We’ll get him to help us.”

  I had only been out to Bean’s one time, and that was when I went with Baby to pick him up after his truck wouldn’t start and he had to get to a gig. We were only there a minute, and I didn’t get out of the car. I didn’t really like going up that far back on the Ridge, and Bean wasn’t in a big hurry to have his friends come out and visit, either. He had moved to an apartment in town when he got back from Nam, but he still went up to the homeplace to work his patch and take care of his business.

  —

  The house was a square wooden box propped up on crooked stacks of rocks at the corners, and looked like it had never come within a mile of a paintbrush. Chickens pecked in the yard, and a rusted-out wringer washer sat on the porch beside a dipper and bucket full of water on a washstand.

  Three or four blue tick hounds went to baying at us when we pulled up in the yard. Bean’s daddy was in his undershirt, lying on a cot in the shade, drinking something out of a flat brown bottle for his breakfast and reading a paperback western. His mother was sitting on the porch in an old armchair with the stuffing coming out the back; she was drinking a cup of coffee. Ramblin’ Rose was parked out beside Bean’s pickup.

  I was scared to get out of the car, with the dogs barking and clawing at the door. Baby rolled down the window, and Mrs. Boggs yelled at the dogs.

  “Get down from there, you dogs! Get on, old Bullet! Little Boy! Come on here! Let these girls out of the car!”

  The dogs slunk back, but watched us out of the corner of their eyes to see if we were going to make a false move.

  “Hi, Mrs. Boggs. Is Bean around?”

  “Naw, I don’t reckon, Baby. He was gone before y’all called this morning, or he may have even spent the night out there. I didn’t hear him come in last night, but his truck’s still here, his and that boy’s that come up here last night. I don’t know why he is so crazy about that old garden. He don’t hardly ever bring us nothing to eat out of it. Maybe a few tomatoes once in a while. It seems like a waste of time to me.”

  “Do you think it would be all right if I left my car here and we went out there to say hi?”

  “Suit yourself. I wouldn’t want to go out through all that old brush and get covered in ticks and chiggers if it was me, but go right on ahead.”

  I wasn’t too keen on going through all that brush and getting ticks and chiggers myself, but we set out across the road on a little trail that you couldn’t see if you didn’t know where to look.

  “Have you been out here a lot, Baby?”

  “Just one time. Bean took me out to show me how high his marijuana plants had grown. I’m not real sure I can find it, but we better holler loud before we get to it. He keeps a gun out there, and I’d hate for him to shoot first and ask questions later.”

  We whacked through trees and underbrush, ripping our panty hose and scratching up our legs and arms for what seemed like an hour, and Baby didn’t recognize anything. I knew we had passed the same old knotty tree three times, but I was so turned around that I didn’t know north from south. I never had a sense of direction, anyhow. Maybe if the sun was setting in a clear s
ky I could tell if it was west, but that was about it. It seemed like Baby didn’t have much of a sense of direction, either. Why was I surprised?

  “Let’s just turn back and go home, Baby, and call Bean later. This is ridiculous, and I’m itching like crazy. I think that might have been a patch of poison oak we went through back there.”

  “I’d do that in a minute if I knew which way was back, Cherry. Do you know?”

  “You mean we’re lost?”

  “Well, not lost, exactly . . .”

  “Well then what, exactly?”

  “We know we’re on the Ridge. How lost can we be, finally? I mean, if we keep walking in one direction, we’re bound to find somebody. It’s not like the desert or anything. People do live up here.”

  “Great. We’ll just wander until we hit a house. Baby, there are not all that many houses up here. Some of them are miles apart. And there are bears and cougars. Don’t you remember when we heard a bear that one time?”

  We came up not all that far from here to do some climbing on the rocks and camp out with the Girl Scouts when we were eleven, and while we were sitting around the fire telling ghost stories and roasting marshmallows, we heard a growl and that coughing sound bears make. It seemed like it was right in the trees outside our camp. We’d all heard stories of how bears went in people’s kitchens and into campers’ tents looking for food, and none of us wanted to get in the tents and go to sleep, even the leader, so we packed up, doused the fire like you’re supposed to, and went home in the middle of the night. We didn’t even get to climb any rocks, which we were looking forward to doing the next day.

  “That might not have been a bear. I think the boys came up here to scare us. It was the boys, I’m pretty sure.”

  “Then why didn’t they ever tell us and get the credit for it? It was a bear, I’m telling you.”

  “Well, stop telling me! It’s bad enough that we’re lost!”

  “I’m going to yell. BEAN! WHERE ARE YOU? BEAN!”

  “BEAN! BEAN!” we both yelled at once. At least maybe it would scare off any bears or cougars, even if he couldn’t hear us.