The Major's Daughter

by J. P. Francis

  Collie rescued her. And George. George swept by and took her elbow and said into her ear that they were wanted in the library. The whole wedding party. People backed away to let them pass, and Estelle smiled at everyone as the new Mrs. Samuels, George’s wife, an upstanding member of Ashtabula society. George was not Cary Grant, that was established, but he was her husband, and she drifted along beside him, Collie bracing her from the other side, the snow drifting past the window like pieces of a plan she once cherished but no longer needed.

  Chapter Twenty

  August swung his backside onto the pan of a coal shovel and pushed off from the top of Haymaker Hill. At first he picked up little speed. A boy from Stark, Jeffrey something or other was his name, whizzed past him. The kids skidded like little demons, August saw, but he knew his weight would work to his advantage as he gained speed. A toboggan team went past, too, the front man shouting a warning, but by then August had started to turn and glide like a metal pot with two long legs for handles. He shouted after the toboggan in English, but the faster device had flown into the darkness, the angle of the hill too acute to see their descent.

  “Heigh-ho!” August yelled, partially to give himself courage—the hill was steep, and the handle of the shovel jutted next to his privates—but also because they had always shouted heigh-ho as boys. A wide grin spread on his face. He saw Gerhard just ahead of him, also twirling slowly. Past Gerhard only the sky remained, the stars blazing as they do in winter. Pinpricks of light in a black felt, August thought.

  Then more speed. The shovel made a rasping sound as it skimmed over the icy patches. How long ago, he wondered, had he experienced a sliding night? It had been years, half a war before, and the memory proved elusive. He shucked it away and concentrated on keeping his feet raised. Now the shovel scooted him down the mountain at top speed and he shouted for people to clear away. He saw the children watching, their faces blurred or covered by scarves, and he could not keep himself from laughing. His destination was a bonfire; someone had built the bonfire, and it was that light that had attracted them to begin with. They had seen the light on their march back from a day of cutting, and the children had offered the shovels and August and Gerhard had taken a turn.

  More speed. He felt his bottom knocking against the shovel pan as he sped over a tiny jump, then two quick bumps in succession. It was nearly Christmas, he realized. Earlier he had heard the villagers singing “Silent Night,” and he had joined them under his breath, pronouncing the lyrics in German, feeling the old holy warmth of the song enter him. It was all madness. Were these the people he had been sent to kill? Were they his enemies? What had it all been about in the final analysis? He closed his eyes and clung to the shovel handle, and he was a boy again, riding his ancient sled down through the Black Forest, and his brother, Frederick, was a mere lad, and his mates shouted and laughed around him. He was no different, he knew, from these boys who ran up and down the hill on this mountain on this night.

  The hill leveled out and he skidded to a stop. A boy with a runny nose asked him if he wanted to ride again. August shook his head. The boy wiped a sleeve across his nose and reclaimed the shovel. Then he ran off.

  “Over here,” Gerhard called from his position in the group of cutters. “We’re cold.”

  Before August could join them a man in a large red mackinaw came closer and invited them to step into the firelight.

  “Come on, come on,” he said, waving his hand as if to wind them closer, “we won’t bite! A hot dog! Have a hot dog. Do you savvy hot dogs?”

  August translated the invitation.

  “What’s all this about?” Liam asked. His color appeared sharp and bright from the sledding.

  “They want us to have a hot dog,” Gerhard said. “A sausage.”

  “Do we have a minute?” August asked his two guards.

  “Go ahead,” said one of the guards, the younger of the two. “But let’s move along afterward.”

  Together the cutting team moved over to the fire. The guards came, too. The heat felt wonderful to August. Ten, maybe fifteen, Americans stood around the fire. The man who invited them busied himself getting hot dogs. A woman on the other end of the fire held them forward, and the man slapped the sausages into rolls.

  “My grandfather was pure German,” the man said, beginning to hand out the hot dogs as the indistinguishable woman across the fire provided them. “Here, try these. This is an all-American food. Sure, there are plenty of Germans in this country. Why, between the Dutch and Germans, and now the Italians, of course . . . the Germans settled Philadelphia, for instance.”

  “Danka,” the men said as they received the hot dogs.

  “You could put just about anything on a hot dog,” the man said, “but most people use mustard. And pickle relish. You savvy pickle relish?”

  August translated and received a hot dog as he did so. He waited for a cue to begin, but the man simply waved his hand in a motion that meant go ahead, so he bit into the hot dog. It was a bland sausage, slightly crispy from being in the flames. August glanced at his team members to see what they thought. He saw they ate mostly out of politeness.

  “There you go,” the man said, “that’s what we eat at baseball games and the like. You savvy baseball?”

  August didn’t recognize the phrase.

  “You know, a lot of people around here were quite concerned when they heard a prisoner-of-war camp was moving in. You can imagine, I’m sure. We’re not a very sophisticated community, but you people have been darn white. You have. No one can speak against it. It makes me proud of my German heritage.”

  August did his best to translate the phrases.

  Then, to his amazement, one of his own party began singing “O Tannenbaum auf Deutsch!” It was a boy named Stephen, and he had a lovely voice. August had heard him sing before, in the showers, and during slow periods of work, but now his voice gathered the others, and they repaid the debt of a hot dog with a carol from their own language. August lifted his voice along with Stephen’s. Tears suddenly came into his eyes and he had to wipe them with his coat sleeve to keep them from freezing. It might have been an absurd moment, August reflected, but Stephen’s voice carried them, and, to his astonishment, a few Americans joined the song. They sang in English, for the most part, but two of the older women in the circle knew the carol in German. A song about a tree, for heaven’s sake. Slowly the faces of the Americans became more visible, the light brighter, and August could not help seeing the hard country where the men and women had suffered. They did not look much different from the people of his own village. Here might have been the cobbler, there the blacksmith. . . . The occupations of his boyhood village could have been transferred easily onto these familiar faces.

  Then Stephen finished the song. The guards called for them to march. The man in the red mackinaw waved them off and the children continued sliding down the hills like dark sprites. Sparks flew up into the black sky, and away from the fire it was very cold.

  • • •

  Henry Heights watched Amos tiptoe carefully along the first row of river logs and knew it did no good to warn him to turn back. The logs lay bobbing next to a boom pier. They had been abandoned there years before, and they rested like white-backed sheep milling slowly in the river pool. Amos carried a pint bottle of rye whiskey in his hand. He drank from it and then lifted it to the side for balance as he stepped onto another log.

  “You’re going to go through,” Henry said. “You won’t like it if you do.”

  “Come out, you chicken. This is how men logged in Daddy’s day.”

  “It’s how men got killed, you foolish jackass.”

  “Come out.”

  It was a bitter night. Henry felt the cold in his bones. He pushed his coat collar closer to his throat, but it did no good. He was not dressed for the frigid temperature. Neither of them were dressed to be out on a bobbing cluster of
logs a few weeks before the New Year. Henry tasted the chemical burn of alcohol on his tongue and mouth. Despite his best intention to refrain from drinking with Amos, he had given in to it once again. They had passed the night in Ernie’s, drinking and shooting pool for a dollar a game against a pair of loggers from Portland, and now this. Henry understood Amos could not be satisfied with the normal course of a night. It was not in his nature to do so. He had to push things; he had nearly talked them into a fight with the Portland loggers, but Henry had negotiated a hasty treaty. Now, not fifty yards from the bar, he had put his life at risk for the holy hell of it.

  “I’m tired and cold,” Henry said, trying to be offhand, which occasionally worked on Amos. “Let’s go home.”

  “Not until you come out and join me.”

  “We have no spikes on our shoes, Amos. And we’ve been drinking. Only an ass would think this is a good idea.”

  Amos laughed and stepped farther out onto the log raft. At the edge of the pod, Henry knew, the logs would be more active. In the center of the mass they could turn at any moment, but at least the other logs pressing on them lent them a modicum of stability. Near the fringe of the pile, the logs bucked and moved on the icy swirls, surging to spin back to the core. Henry knew Amos would work his way out to them.

  “We missed our day,” Amos called over the logs and wind. “We missed the era when logging had romance. You didn’t mind walking on these when you were a boy.”

  “Maybe during the summer. You’re being maudlin, Amos. Come back out of there before you hurt yourself.”

  Amos slipped and went down to a knee, but he stood back up quickly, his whiskey bottle passing to his mouth as he rose. He laughed as soon as he had swallowed his drink.

  “Men used to ride these like horses,” Amos said, deliberately flexing his knees so the log that carried him bobbed slightly. “They walked on water, those jacks.”

  “What are you trying to prove out there?”

  “I’m proving I’m braver than you are, for starters. Proving I don’t give a good goddamn for another thing.”

  “You’re drunk, Amos. Come on back.”

  But he continued working his way out on the logs. Now and then Henry heard the logs hit together and give off a dull thud. Wind carried the sounds away as soon as they were created. The night possessed no moon whatsoever. It was close to the turn of the year, and winter held everything as firmly as it ever would that season.

  “She loves that Kraut, you know,” Amos said over the wind, his face pointed out to the center of the river. “You’re making a fool of yourself over a woman who is in love with a German.”

  “Says who?”

  “It’s common knowledge. Everyone knows it except you.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t I? You think I don’t have friends among the guards? It’s not hard to see if you have eyes to look. She’s playing you for a patsy.”

  Amos turned slowly around. He had reached the outermost edge of the logs. He made a little bow and smiled. Henry half hoped to see him fall from the logs and be spun between the massive boles like a piece of paper on a typewriter platen. Instead, Amos merely grinned and started back toward shore.

  “They trade poetry,” Amos said, working his way across the logs, his hands out at his sides, “and he plays the piano for her. She’s a traitor giving comfort to the enemy. I’m not the only one who says it. She probably gives him a lot of comfort. She probably spreads her legs for his Heine dick. For his Messerschmitt dick.”

  “You’re vile. Don’t talk about Collie like that.”

  “Like what? You think I’m insane? You’re the one lapping after her with your tongue out like a damn dog. She’s in love with a German. You know the one. The princely looking one . . . makes me sick to look at him.”

  Amos slipped again. This time he almost went through the logs, but he caught himself on his belly and worked his way back to his knees. He had spilled a portion of the whiskey, and he tucked the cap back on the top and slid the bottle into his vest pocket. He placed his hand repeatedly on the logs for a third point of balance. Then with great effort, he rose to his feet again. In one motion he rose and took three long steps, jumping two or three logs at a time. With a final surge, he nimbly came back onto shore, but his feet went out from under him and he fell backward, laughing as he went.

  Henry stepped forward and jammed his foot on Amos’s chest. He pushed him down and kept his weight on him.

  “Don’t talk about her like that,” he said.

  “You poor, stupid ass. You like it. You like having the scraps of her, don’t you?”

  “Don’t talk about her that way. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “His German dick.”

  Henry moved his foot up until it pressed on Amos’s neck. He put his weight on his leg and Amos spread out and laughed. Henry kept pressing. The black night saturated him; he felt cold, icy air lifting off the water, and he wondered, absently, if he could crush his brother’s windpipe without a second thought. He listened to his brother choke. Amos did not try to fight. He appeared to surrender, to take death, if death was to be the sentence, from his brother.

  If Amos had struggled, Henry reflected, he might have killed his brother there and then. It was Amos’s acceptance of the death at his brother’s hand that made Henry pull his foot away. Amos coughed and took a large gulp of air. Then he lay back and laughed. He dug his pint out of his pocket and sat up enough to drink from it. He emptied it and threw the bottle back at the water, where it crashed on one of the logs and made a small splash as a portion of it went into the black river.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  “He’s really quite a remarkable fellow when you get right down to it,” Colonel Cook said over the phone. “Been living in New York all this time . . . walked away from the potato farm up in Houlton and managed to make his way to New York. That’s where he proved himself cleverer than most. He didn’t try to get anywhere special, you see? Just decided to make New York his home, and what with all the Germans and Italians and every other kind of creature roosting in that city . . . he blended right in. Actually had tickets for the opera when they found him.”

  “How did he make a living?” Major Brennan asked.

  He spun in his chair and watched the dull late-afternoon sunlight make its way across the parade ground of the prison. The tale Colonel Cook told was familiar in its outline from general accounts, but this was the first time Major Brennan had heard the story in detail. It was fascinating to hear, but he was also aware of the clock. Collie was due back on the six o’clock train.

  “Petty larceny, mostly,” Colonel Cook said. “Stole some items. He got a new suit of clothes first thing, and that was the making of him. Blended in . . . looked downright prosperous, they tell me. He spoke English, too, though I guess with a heavy accent. Of course that won’t raise an eyebrow in New York. He was a college professor back in Germany. Biology or some sort of science. He had lined up a job at Bellevue, but that’s when they caught him.”

  “Ingenious.”

  “Anyway, that’s the scuttlebutt. I guess the lesson is to be aware of the quiet ones. They’re more slippery than the gruff birds. The guy had studied American history in the public libraries so that he would come across as a citizen. Pretty tricky fellow.”

  “Luckily we haven’t had much in the way of escapes up here. Too cold for them.”

  “Most of them don’t have the guts for it. Hell, I wouldn’t if I were in their shoes. Where will they get to when it comes down to it? This fellow in New York City was a shrewd customer, but even he got caught in the end.”

  “Well, it’s an interesting story. Thanks for telling me. Now I’m afraid I have to hurry to pick up my daughter. She’s coming back this evening from Ohio.”

  “What was she doing out there?”

  “A
wedding . . .”

  “Well, one more thing before you go, John. Can you give me one more minute? I’m sorry to keep you.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “Well, it’s about the postwar world, John. Your name has been coming up these last few months in our discussions. You’ve done good work up there and we’re going to need more of that kind of work in Germany in the next few years. This war’s going to end sooner or later and Germany’s going to be the right place for you.”

  “I’m flattered, but in what capacity?”

  “Not sure yet,” Colonel Cook said in his stiff, workaday voice that was decidedly different from the voice he had used to relate the story of the escapee. “We’ll have prisoners. Hell, we have them already. Reconstruction? It will likely come with a significant promotion, John, one you deserve. I guess what I’m asking at this point is whether you would consider reassignment. We could probably get someone else up there to run the camp. Or maybe we’ll just call you up when we need you. So take this as an opening salvo, if you would, John. How does it strike you?”

  “I’m not entirely sure what you’re offering me, Colonel.”

  “Neither am I, John. I’m simply feeling you out about various options. I’m hoping I can count on you as we go forward. We’ll need you, John.”

  “I’m certainly open to anything, Cecil,” John Brennan said, using the Colonel’s Christian name. “I’ve lived overseas before.”

  “That’s one of the reasons you’re in the discussions. Okay, that’s enough for now. Go grab your daughter. I understand she’s been a tremendous help up there.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Thank her for us, then. We’ll be in touch, John. Keep doing the good work we need.”

  “Yes, sir,” John Brennan said, and hung up the phone.

  He sat for a moment looking out the window, not stunned, exactly, but nervously pleased. If he could divine what Cecil had been beating around the bush about, it meant a command in Germany. Perhaps a diplomatic appointment. Cecil Cook was prescient; the war would end and Germany would be in desperate need of management. All of Europe would need reshaping, and it was a place for ambitious men to make a mark. He did not know how he fit into that scheme, and neither did Cecil Cook, apparently, but it was thrilling to be considered for inclusion. As he stood and swung into his coat, he felt a pleasant wave of satisfaction that put him in an excellent mood.