by James R Benn
At the end of the hall, kids were dragging barracks bags into rooms on the left side. Walking towards them, Jake passed a room where old women knelt over buckets, scrubbing shirts with brushes and dunking them into the sudsy water, pulling them out to view their handiwork. In the next room, four old women sat around a table, stitching up holes in the cleaned shirts. Jake was reminded of an assembly line, a great factory of death, reusing worn out parts, wringing every last drop out of them, cleaning and sewing until they looked like new, unless you noticed the mended hole you wore over your heart.
“First group in here,” a G.I. said, motioning his hand into a small room. A cross hung above the door. As Jake followed Big Ned inside, he could see that one wall had been painted with a portrait of the Madonna. The walls were all whitewashed clean, except for that outer wall, where Mary held up her hand in blessing, next to a leaded window on hinges, open to reveal a view of the building across the alleyway. The room was small, empty, and cold.
“What kinda joint is this?” asked Tuck.
“Monastery, I bet,” said Clay. “This was probably a monk’s cell, looks like a whole row of them along the hall.” Dropping his pile of clothes on the floor he began to open his barracks bag, first removing his dogtag and putting it back on the chain around his neck.
Jake looked at Mary, her graceful hand extended, her head slightly tilted, as if she were inviting him in. Her eyes were set to look at whoever entered the room, and Jake realized the painter did that on purpose, to make whoever passed through that door think of God and heaven.
“Hey, Jake, move aside, huh?” Miller edged around him and began working open his barracks bag. Jake felt like he were dreaming, and was surprised that he was actually in anybody’s way. He moved slowly, working his way through the tight room to his bag, set with the others along the wall. Behind him, he heard others in the crowded hallway, G.I.s in towels, kids pulling heavy bags of clothes, soldiers giving directions, laughing, joking, life flowing through the old building like blood pumping through veins.
“Goddammit,” Miller said, pulling at something in his barracks bag. “Something’s stuck.” He gave a hard tug, trying to disentangle whatever was knotted up in the opening of his bag. Jake looked, and saw it a fraction of a second too late. A grenade. Maybe left in a jacket pocket, it didn’t really matter, because the wire run through the grommets of the barracks bag had become wound around the pin, and as Miller gave a last powerful pull, the clump of clothing pulled free, and with it the grenade, free of its pin, rolled onto the floor, the safety level flipped off, its four second timer counting down under the serene gaze of Mary, mother of Jesus.
One-thousand one.
“GRENADE” yelled Clay, and all eyes riveted on the grenade, slowly spinning on the wooden floorboards. Noises from the hallway flooded in as the warning was heard.
One-thousand two.
“Ohmigod, ohmigod,” Miller repeated, diving for the grenade, knocking it toward the wall before getting his hands on it. A young kid, speaking French a mile a minute, came into the room, maybe drawn by the excitement, or to ask a question. Clay dove on top of the boy.
“Throw it, throw it!” Big Ned pointed to the window, stepping to the side, making room for Miller to toss it outside.
One-thousand three.
Miller took two steps to the window. It was small, and he didn’t want to chance throwing it. He’d drop it out, it was the only way to go. Big Ned stood to the side of the window, and saw them the same split second Miller did. The whole scene instantly filling his vision. The nun and the children, walking down the narrow alley below them, the nun holding a length of rope, each of the seven toddlers grasping onto it with one tiny hand. Miller gasped at the sight, and clenched his hand tight around the fragmentation grenade, thrusting it out the window, holding the grenade against the outside wall, his cheek planted on the inside wall, next to the Madonna’s hand. He felt the grit of the surface on his cheek, the rough cold stone against his knuckles…
One-thousand four.
The explosion threw Miller back into the room, into Big Ned’s arms. Screams filled the hall, cries rose up from the alley, and everyone in the room cried for a medic at the top of their lungs.
Big Ned was on the floor, cradling Miller from behind, wrapping one big arm around both his shoulders, wiping the blood from his face with the other. He held the stump of Miller’s arm in a vise grip, clamping it to hold down the blood flow and keeping Miller from trying to lift it up.
“There, there, buddy, you’re going to be okay,” Big Ned murmured in his ear as he cleared the blood from Miller’s eyes with the other hand. “Hold on, I’ve got you, I’ve got you.”
Miller was shaking, his whole body convulsing. Big Ned could hardly hold on, the blood so slippery against bare skin.
“MEDIC!”
Jake went to the window, saw the nun with the children gathered around her, her arms and habit enveloping them as they cried.
“They’re okay,” he said to Miller, kneeling down and looking straight into his eyes. “Hear me? You saved them, you saved us all.”
Miller blinked, his face twitching. “The kids…”
“Yeah, the kids,” Jake said. “You saved them, saved us.”
Clay moved beside Jake with a belt and tied it around Miller’s bicep, pulling it tight. Someone thrust clean tee shirts at them and they wrapped the stump below his elbow, gently padding the broken ends of bone and torn muscle.
“Big Ned?” Miller said, his voice a choked whisper.
“Yeah, I’m right here, kid, I got you, the medics are coming.”
“Did I do okay?”
“You did swell, Miller, just fine.” Big Ned dipped his head down and rubbed the top of Miller’s head with his cheek. “Just fine.”
“I had to do it,” Miller said, a sudden clarity lighting up his eyes, as if he had to explain himself to all of them. “It was the only thing to do. I had no choice, you understand?”
“Yeah,” said Jake, “we understand.” He wondered what it would be like to be presented with such an obvious, terrible choice, and if he’d act with Miller’s certainty.
“I had to do it, no question in my mind,” Miller said, twisting his head to look up at Big Ned.
“That was the bravest fucking thing I ever saw,” said Big Ned, as he started to rock slightly, gently, just a few inches back and forth, his bare arm across Miller’s chest. Clay placed Miller’s wrapped arm on Big Ned’s chest. They were all naked now, towels dropped in the tumult, clean bodies dappled in pink sprays of blood, like newborns ripped from the womb.
“Medics are on the way, ambulance will be here in a minute,” the sergeant said from the doorway, twisting the unlit cigar in his mouth. Glancing between the Madonna and Miller on the floor, he crossed himself.
“Hold his arm in place,” Big Ned said to Jake, as he rose from the floor, in one fluid motion, lifting Miller in his arms. “You’re going home, buddy, you’re going home,” he said, over and over again as he carried Miller out of the room, down the long hallway, past G.I.s in towels and uniforms, Belgian kids and old ladies. They all made room, clearing a path for the naked giant who whispered gentle comfort into the ear of the boy who knew when to do the right thing.
Chapter Seventeen
1964
Clay couldn’t help glancing at the floorboards in the back room of the Tavern as he and Chris walked in. The Colt .45 was underneath, oiled and cleaned, a round in the chamber, safety on. Ready for action. Clay had killed before, but it had never been personal. All those Germans were just shooting at the uniform he happened to be in. It had nothing to do with him. Al was a man who wanted to use him, had used his son to get to him, a man who wanted to own him. It ought to be easy. But his palms were wet, his stomach churning, and he’d been up since five this morning, praying for another way out. No answers came, and he was left with the only choice that could set him free and keep Al away from his family. An old automatic, bequeathed to him by gh
osts.
“Get started in the kitchen,” Clay said. “Get everything up off the counters and clean ’em down good, the cutting board too. I’ll mop in there when you’re done.” He glanced at his watch. Ten o’clock.
“Want me to make the signs first, Dad?”
“Yeah, sure. Use the backs of those posters, and tape ‘em in the windows.” Clay pointed to thick cardboard promotional posters from Carling Black Label, picturing a smiling waitress carrying a tray of beers. Hey Mabel – Black Label!
“They’re kinda big, Dad.” The posters were about two by four feet, thick enough to stand up leaned against a wall.
“Well, then, they’ll be easy to see. One in each window. Closed for cleaning, open at six.”
“Oookay,” said Chris, in his best tone of teenage disbelief, tossing a stack of books on Clay’s desk. Taking two of the posters and a thick marker, he headed up front to work on them. As he opened the door from the back room into the Tavern, jarring noises from the street flooded in. The work crew had their compressor set up next-door, up on the sidewalk. Two jackhammers were working off it, the air-driven metallic sounds driving through the glass and echoing around inside the room.
“I see what you mean,” said Chris, raising his voice and turning his head back towards his father. “No one’s going to hang around here with that racket.”
Clay nodded. It made sense. Folks could walk in, or park up on Pratt Street, but no one in their right mind would sit in here for more than five minutes. So he’d called Brick and Cheryl, gave them the afternoon off, and took Chris along to help him give the place a scrub down. The big signs would keep people from rattling the locked door, he hoped. And obscure the view from the road.
Clay lifted the mop bucket into the sink, poured in soap and ran the water, watching the suds grow, white bubbles climbing to the top of the metal rim. Get through today, he told himself, make sure everything goes as planned, and things will work out. He figured his chances were fifty-fifty. Addy was on the verge of walking out, taking Chris and staying with her parents in Cranston, over in Rhode Island. Clay had stalled her for now, convincing her that moving to another state wouldn’t look good when Chris went to trial. He knew she was fed up, nearly done with him, and that Chris’ troubles were nothing more than a thin thread holding them together, but likely to break under the strain. Or, the excuse she needed to leave him, removing her son from temptation and herself from her husband. This was his last chance, his chance to salvage everything he held dear.
Wheeling the mop bucket into the bar, he watched Chris fashioning large block letters, filling them in with the dark marker. He looked young, bent over the cardboard, focused on letters, like a child hovering over a coloring book. Even though he was growing, turning tall and lean, Clay could still see the child in him, the smoothness of skin, traces of chubbiness in his cheeks, his tongue licking his lips as he worked to keep the letters even. He had to smile, even with this grim task facing him, thinking of coming home from his cigarette run in the afternoon, finding Addy and Chris coloring, or sitting and pouring over picture books, or in the kitchen surrounded by bowls and the smell of warm cookies fresh from the oven. Chris running to him and jumping into his arms, a look of total contentment and joy on Addy’s face as she watched. Everything she didn’t have growing up was lavished on Chris, from books and paints to cakes and cookies. Her ultimatum was part of the plan she had envisioned so long ago, a plan that had no place in it for gamblers and gangsters.
This is worth it, he decided. This is worth fighting for, worth taking a life for. Clay could burn in hell, but Chris could never know about any of his transgressions.
He glanced at his watch. Ten twenty.
“Got an appointment, Pop?” Chris smiled, using the term he always did when he kidded with his father. Clay realized it had been a while since he’d heard it.
“No, just checking. I want to make sure you have enough time to finish up here and get to the library.” One thing Addy and Clay had agreed upon was that Chris’ schedule was now firmly under their control. After breakfast this morning, she’d found Clay transplanting a white azalea from the back border of the house to the front of the garage. She’d said he should’ve given the job to Chris, that it would do him some good to keep busy, and why didn’t he take him to help clean the Tavern? With no reason to argue, he agreed, adding that Chris could head up at noon to the Curtis Memorial Library on East Main, a few blocks away, to do his homework. Chris had wanted to stay with his father and do the homework in the back room, but Clay was firm, saying it would do Chris good to get to know the inside of a library.
“Okay,” said Chris, returning to his labors. Clay marveled at how agreeable and pliant Chris had become after he got in trouble. Maybe being punished gave him permission to give up the sullen teen scowl he always wore. A sense of protectiveness overwhelmed him. He wanted to cradle Chris in his arms the way he used to, tell him stories, tell him the world was a safe place. Now, they both knew that was a lie.
He turned away from his son, unwilling to draw attention to himself, fearing his thoughts would be revealed on his face. Things had to look completely normal, logical, everyday. Clay walked into the storeroom and reached for an old can of paint on the shelf, caked with white and rust along the top. He shook it, and pried the top off with a screwdriver. About an inch left on the bottom, plenty for what he needed. Taking a brush and a paint-stained canvas tarp, he brought it all to the kitchen entrance, spread out the tarp on the floor, and began to paint the trim.
“Shouldn’t you clean that first?” Chris asked. The molding was marked with grease, stains and even a few phone numbers. His father had always been a stickler for cleaning surfaces before painting, sanding down old glossy paint so the new coats would stick. Chris was surprised to see him breaking his own rules.
“Yeah, but I’m giving this a quick coat so it’ll have time to dry. Next time, maybe we’ll strip it down to the bare wood and stain it.”
“Sure, Dad.” Stripping old paint was another of his father’s pet projects, and Chris wanted no part of that. Clay knew there’d be no more questions. He finished one coat on the molding, set the paint can down on the tarp, and wiped his hands on an old bar rag.
He watched Chris tape the posters up in the twin windows on either side of the front door, Mabel sideways on the back, ready with her Black Label. They filled up the center of the big windows, blocking out the view of the street. Chris went to work in the kitchen, and Clay moved slowly up front, glancing at his watch. Ten forty-five.
Next Clay moved tables up to the windows, stacking chairs on top of them. The compressor was running not five yards away, the gas engine rumbling. Rolling the mop bucket next to the bar, he dunked the mop head into the sudsy water and slopped it onto the floor, pushing down on the handle, rubbing the floor hard, feeling the muscles in his forearm tense as he moved the mop in circles, wringing it out and moving it over the floorboards, the white suds absorbed into the old, dry wood. Grit and dirt from thousands of shoes caked together between the boards, worn to a gray shine by the scuffing of decades. When had he last mopped the floors? He couldn’t remember. A good sweep at night and then another before opening was clean enough, but today was special. Cleaning day.
“Dad? Want me to put the tarp away?” Chris hollered above the sounds of the jackhammers out in the street.
“No. No, leave it, I might do another coat.”
Clay rolled the bucket back into the storeroom, dumped out the dirty water and filled it with clean water for the rinse. He opened a full container of bleach and poured some in. He started at the storeroom door, working his way forward.
Eleven-fifteen.
He liked how the floor looked after the wet mop. The diluted bleach gave it a clean, fresh woody smell as the dry floorboards soaked it up. It’d been years since they were this clean. Years too since he’d killed. He remembered the last man he had killed, as if it happened yesterday.
Working the mop, he felt
the tightness still gripping his stomach. It was intent, eating at him. He’d been satisfied with the thought that Al was ruining his life, and his family. That was justification enough. But now intent worried him. All the others dead at his hands—well, most anyway—knew what they were in for. Kill or be killed. A few were accidents, terrible, horrible, haunting. But no intent at all. Al was different. Clay had the intent to kill him. Murder. If things went well, Al would walk in alive, unsuspecting, and leave unsuspecting and dead. It was kill or be killed. But Al’s type of killing was a lot slower, it might take a life time, destroying a family, a marriage, a man. Okay. The hell with intent.
He was at the windows. The noise was constant, a backdrop to everything he did and thought. Between the stacked chairs and the posters, it was hard to see outside. He walked backwards to the storeroom, swabbing his steps away. Eleven-thirty.
“How’s it going, Chris?” Clay stepped on the tarp and looked in the kitchen, avoiding the wet paint. Chris was scrubbing down the refrigerator, wiping off grimy fingerprints.
“Using the ol’ elbow grease, Pop,” said Chris. “How’s it look?”
“Not bad,” said Clay, nodding. He’d never seen the frig look whiter. “You getting hungry?”
“Yeah, sure. You want me to cook us some burgers?”
“No sense messing up your clean kitchen. You finish that and I’ll give you a buck for lunch at the Liberty Diner. Then straight to the library.”
“Okay, thanks. You want me to get you something?”
“No. No listen, Chris. I want you to promise you’ll do exactly as you’re told. Lunch, then the library. Stay put until I come get you. Understood?”
“Sure.”