by Ray Clift
‘So I’m told you’ll be an undercover agent when we tour, correct? Actually, we need a player so I suppose I’m offering you a job as well.’ Suzie sat back with a smile, waiting for his response.
‘A good point. Bears thinking about. I may as well tell you a few titbits about my family of good old boys. Never had slaves but they were all Johnny Rebs. Great great grandfather Jess MacRae fought with General Jo Shelby, who never surrendered. And never signed the oath of allegiance to the USA. They shot through to Mexico and helped the Mex rebs under Juarez in their fight against the French. They came back and he married. One son named William died in 1935. He’d fought with Teddy Roosevelt in his charge up the San Juan Hill. My father Ben went missing when I was two years old. He was an army man, never wounded but broken in spirit. Another chapter there. So the good old boy is in my blood without the hatred of blacks, ‘cos one saved my life in ’68 in ’Nam. I’m a godfather to his son. Mum never got over her missing mate but she remained an immaculate woman all of her life. But that’s another story. You raised an eyebrow about my father and I can see you’re a good listener. One day when we get a moment I’ll show you some interesting material about my dad. It’s yet another chapter on its own. While I think of it, can I ask you to sign this CD – your latest, I think.’
She cocked her eyebrow and grinned once more when he handed her a pen. She signed the CD.
Martin walked to the gates with her. She turned back and waved with his last words still ringing. ‘We’ll be back in twenty-four hours.’
She walked to the small Catholic church a few blocks away and lit a candle for her mother Joan and chatted to her about the coming pivotal moment.
The file marked ‘Top Secret’ was closed but not before Martin added a comment:
Suzie Smith is a highly intelligent woman with impeccable credentials who has a keen ear and highly developed observation skills regarding body language. She is able to extract information before the subject knows how much he has told her, which is a great skill. I know this first hand because she trapped me into revealing many of my family memories. Her appointment as a part-time staffer/intell gatherer is recommended.
2
Da Nang, Vietnam
February 1968
The operation order was distributed to the officers of the 27th Marines just before the formal briefing. The time had passed for the comfort of the dug-out, with food, earphones and some illegal weed being smoked to lessen the rising fear of death, or, worse, being blinded, having legs blown off. Time to stand up and be counted, to move off with their buddies alongside and the medics following with their needles. ‘Up, up’ was spoken quietly. No banshee charge, just a silent collection of grim-faced men with camouflage paint smeared on shiny spots, gear secured, their useless vests in place and a last smoke.
PFC Victor Bryon Marshall, a southern boy from Arkansas, was expected by his family to do well just like his father, a marine ‘gunny’, who survived all the South Pacific landings without a physical scratch, did in World War II. However, his family knew better about the other side of their father. They knew about the brooding man and his rages with the permanent twisted sneer which flooded his face. The sneer was the legacy of a knife wound to the lips in an off-duty knife fight. The bottles of moonshine hidden within an old dank cellar on the run-down farm didn’t help his mood when he emerged into the cold from the cellar looking for trouble with his two giant dogs who had taken on their master’s habits, nipping and biting the kids if they didn’t instantly obey his barked orders.
The children soon learned how to disappear fast into little hiding spots, happy to be away from the large marine leather belt with the buckle inscribed ‘Semper fidelis’. But the giant dogs always found them, barking with anticipation of the bone they would get from their master. The beltings came and Victor got the worst of it.
Victor knew he would give those dogs a reward one day, one day when he was older and stronger. It would be a quick trip to a dog’s heaven. He learned a form of self-protection which expanded over time into an indifference about death, which was an everyday occurrence on the old farm. Best not to get too attached to an animal or a sister who might betray you, best not to care about death or cold. His indifference was extended to most people he knew, though he had a certain amount of affection for his younger brother Mark, who adored him. The only other exception to his rule was himself.
He feared death and the demons which would follow. Death had a smell which he quickly found out and when it came he would cover his head with an old grey greatcoat which belonged to an ancient uncle who had fought under the tigerish General Nathan Bedford Forrest, who also rallied the Ku Klux Klan in 1866.
One hundred and two years later, he sat paralysed with an old coat over his head, away from the smell of nicotine which reminded him of the yellow-stained fingers and breath of his father. Victor had signed up and Parish Island boot camp loomed. Among his last few acts before he left for the marines was the drowning of the two dogs in the dam after he’d lured them there like the Pied Piper. His father suffered the same fate with a quick push of the boot from his son. There was no coroner’s inquest. Just a quick burial and peace for the family. Only a few old vets recalled what a good marine he had been.
*
The bullets whizzed around outside the trenches and there were dull thuds and metallic whistling sounds which sent fear among the men that mortars might pick up the scent of the humans. ‘Just like the dogs,’ he murmured. But the stupid officers were blowing whistles and yelling, ‘Out, out.’ The artillery barrage had started.
It was different from the training. This was real. He wanted away from it all. Away from the nicotine. A plan came in an instant. The troops lumbered up. He pushed away the old coat and stood with his M16 held out pointing to his head. He pulled the trigger and the sear on his right temple caused him pain, not deep yet enough to cause blood to flow and blackness to follow.
The general walked around the MASH tent shaking hands with the wounded men, taking care if some of them had no arms. He bent down and pinned a Purple Heart on Victor’s pyjama coat. He shook his hand and moved on.
Victor smiled to himself in the night at the thought of how clever he was.
However, his foxhole partner PFC Martin MacRae didn’t smile when he came to visit when the choppers loaded them all for a flight back home. Victor knew he had not fooled Martin and from that moment a seed of hatred was formed in his mind. Like dogs, nicotine and drugs: they would all be obliterated from his presence, given time.
The less wounded marines were flown to Sydney for R&R leave. Victor met a nineteen-year-old girl in a bar who was dazzled by his uniform and the small purple ribbon. They went to a hotel nearby and had sex. He wrote his name – Martin MacRae – on a piece of paper and laughed as he walked out, soon to be back in the USA.
Yvonne Streeter was sad about the loss of her virginity but treasured the note with his name scrawled on it: she kept it in her small musical jewel box with the ballet dancers circling around. She loved ballet.
Victor never knew that Martin forgot about the minor injury because of the mounting casualties of the battle scattered about the Da Nang airbase. Martin was not a judgemental person. He was a happy man who entertained his buddies with a harmonica.
Martin stayed happy despite being severely wounded two days later. He lost one testicle and a portion of the other. He maintained a positive disposition though the loss caused him some quiet inner trauma. When the dark thoughts came, he would pick up the harmonica and play it endlessly till the emotion went away. The Silver Star which was awarded to him as a result of his actions in the battle remained sitting quietly beside the hospital bed. Every now and then a high-ranking officer who was visiting asked if he could see the medal. After all, it was the second on the scale of honours given by a grateful government.
Martin was recruited into the Secret Service in 1991 at the age of forty-one after twenty-three years of continuous service in which he rose to the highest N
CO rank of sergeant major of marines. At his retirement show, an indelicate marine fuelled with gallons of beer shouted out, ‘He’s a Russian, you know. Ivor Knackeroff,’ which caused a silence to descend on the hall.
*
Victor wormed his way into the Washington city police and became supposedly intent on destroying the drug trade. He worked close to Martin’s workplace but they never met.
4
USA
2006
Martin pondered for some time how to tell Suzie about his war injury. They had at that time not made love, though the prospect was circling in the air and a decision to speak out soon was appropriate. After all, she’s young enough to have children and I’m no use in that area, he thought.
‘We’re getting along fine, mate,’ (he called her mate on many occasions) ‘but we have to be careful. The rules.’
And she would always reply with the same words, ‘Yeah, no fraternising. It’s laughable, really, when I think of all the shagging going on in the halls of power, right under the noses of the bosses who made the rules.’
Martin recognised how forthright she was and admired her for it – something to do with the Aussie spirit and he had a fondness for Australians. He looked down deep in thought.
Suzie studied his face when he was thoughtful and knew that words were sometimes stuck. He licked his lips before speaking.
Maybe it’s a moisture thing, she mused. ‘Spit it out, Martin. You’re a hawk, boy, not a chicken.’
He laughed at her imitation of a favourite cartoon. He produced an old dog-eared medical photo in which she saw a twenty-year-old Martin on a hospital bed with a bandage around his groin.
‘Mate, I lost a testicle and part of the other at Da Nang. Can’t have kids. Haven’t tried to make love for years but it wasn’t a problem once.’
‘So what are you trying to tell me, Martin? Maybe that you’re not a complete man? Please don’t hand me that crap.’
Martin persisted. He did not wish for her to be under any illusion. ‘But kids. You’re young enough, you know.’
She jumped straight in with a matter-of-fact answer. ‘Listen to me, Martin. They’re not on my radar. Kids are out with me. So what’s your next line?’
His last words on the subject, which he had feared to raise for a long time, poured out in a rush. ‘I’m able to get it up. Viagra will help later, so the smart quacks say.’
Suzie finished his worries with the great big radiant toothy smile which surged all over her features. ‘So it’s Viagra. So what?’ She patted him on the shoulder and stared into his face but without speaking for the moment, sensing that Martin wanted to have the last word, which he did.
‘Hell, I am glad I met you. I love you but I was too scared to tell you. It’s been a struggle.’
‘Me too. I love you heaps but let’s not rush it for the moment, Martin. Is that OK with you?’
Martin started to giggle and knew then he ought to tell her something else. ‘Someone gave me a blow-up job which fits over in cases of emergency. It has a blow-up tube on the side which the partner can pump up.’
Suzie started to giggle and it was still in her voice when she asked another question. ‘What if I pump it and it keeps going up?’
‘I guess I’ll have to scrape you off the ceiling.’
She started to laugh and Martin hushed her. ‘Watch out. Someone’s coming. They’re good at body language too, you know.’
5
Suzie
2008
I looked many times at the old photo of Martin’s family in his flat, not far from where I live. It was either laid flat or stood up, depending on the mood he was in. His sister Jane, who beat him to Vietnam in 1966, was a MASH nurse in Saigon and later married a surgeon. She lives in Baltimore and still works. There has been sadness in her life – she lost her only child with meningitis at the age of eleven and nobody speaks about it.
I was staring at the separate photo of Jane, Martin and their mum Bea when I heard Martin walking towards me. He looked at the photo.
‘She looks sad in this shot, Martin. I guess it was after the loss.’
‘Yes. It was an unhappy time. She and Bill nearly parted but they’re OK now. They ought to be after all of those years together.’
‘It’s another reason why I don’t ever want to have a child The loss of a child would be the greatest nightmare.’
We watched a re-run of the West Wing, which is a prerequisite for White House staffers.
Later there was a quiet moment until I spoke. ‘Would you like to talk about Bea? I know she died in 1990. I’ll get us a drink.’
‘It might be a bit long-winded, you know.’ He tapped his knee, concentrating on how he would start, and the easy drawl came out. ‘Mum went into dementia rapidly. It was a hit and miss affair with lapses of memory and haunting expressions. Words didn’t connect, which was sad for her because her grammar and sentence construction were very good. Shoes frozen to useless were found in the fridge and she’d gaze for hours at her wedding album. She lost her lifetime job as a waitress when she tipped a bowl of spaghetti over a grumpy customer. He sat looking like a sheepdog caught in the rain, his eyes bolting like a meerkat which had swallowed a golf ball. The staff were sad to see her go. She made an eloquent speech spliced with humour which had them rolling in the aisles.
‘Jane watched her closely from then on. She loved dancing and always trotted around to Fred and Ginger – without clothes when the rot set in but we didn’t know that until she opened the door to the mailman and signed for the mail, with him standing there dumbstruck. She wished him goodbye and closed the door. We were in fits when he told us about it.
‘Jane caught her pushing a turd around the bath and talking to it at the same time so she found a respite home for her. She had a good nurse named Angela. She was only fifty-nine, which was too young.
‘Jane said she used to have a lot of fun when Dad was still with us. He’d get on his high horse about something and jump about restlessly. Bea would watch and call out, “Left turn, Ben, now right turn, Ben, about turn, Ben,” and he would stop, realising how stupid he looked.
‘Anyway, Jane and Mum and I got on with our lives as best we could, with me back in the marines for a few more years, until the police contacted Jane saying they had found some old remains in the mountains. There was a tape in the rotten clothes and it was Dad signing off in his last moments. He’d been crushed by a giant boulder. We identified the remains and were sad at how Dad had come unglued before he left and after.
‘We made a choice to let Mum listen to the tape so we took it to Angela. Mum’s ears pricked up. Our mum of old returned for a brief time. She recalled her feelings before the separation, feelings which had been stuck in the archives of her mind. She remembered how she had focused on the care and protection of her family. Memories of her wedding and anniversaries came back to her.
‘She accepted that her health was failing but she revelled in the words on the tape, which brought her some long sought-after closure and peace. She vowed to make the best of the years she had left. And no one could ever prise the tape off her after that. It became her teddy bear and sat alongside her in her sleep. Angela’s a medium and she was sure a male voice came through the teddy bear at times in the night. The tape went with her into her grave.’ Martin paused.
I had held my breath right through the sad yet wonderful story. His eyes were glistening and I wondered whether it would be appropriate to ask a few questions.
‘When did she die, love?’
‘1990. She and Ben were buried in the same grave.’
‘Did you make a copy of the tape?’
Martin nodded.
‘Can I hear it now?’
The phone interrupted us. It was the White House. Some paperwork had to be fixed.
‘Some other time, mate. I don’t feel up to it. Gotta rush out.’
We’re no different to any other people on the planet and spoken words are easily forgotten. We shou
ld write them down or record them like Ben’s tape. In his last moments he was obviously able to get the message out to his loved ones.
6
Suzie
2009
One of my better choices with regard to the band was to recruit a gifted keyboard player. She was Joan Oliver, my flatmate. Apart from her skills, which she also taught me, she shared my mother’s name. She looked a bit like her too, with curls around her oval face. And best of all she sang like Joan Baez, one of my favourite folk singers. She wasn’t liked in parts of the South ’cos she went on the marches and the freedom rides with Martin Luther King. I was aware of that on my tours in the early days and always careful with my speeches on stage.
However, Joan was unlucky in love because of the choices she made in men. Most of them were snorting cocaine every chance they got and spending Joan’s money – she was wealthy thanks to her interest in real estate and accountancy. In time the gamblers got the flick.
She also hated smoking, because the smell of nicotine made her sick. It was that which eventually attracted her to another good old boy and former marine named Victor Marshall, who apparently had been wounded in ’Nam. He hated smoking. He was a Washington police detective around her age. Never married, no kids and quite wealthy, a bit of a surprise for a cop. And from Arkansas. I wondered whether Martin knew him but let it go. The less talk about us two the better.
I have an instinct about some people. I either like or dislike them; there are no in-betweens. In Victor’s case I disliked him intensely. He was fond of bragging about the Purple Heart he had been awarded in battle. Martin, my dad and my Uncle Adam rarely ever speak about their medals.
My affinity with some groups extends to cops. My cousin Rosemary was an Australian federal cop until she was wounded in Afghanistan. She came out a hero after saving a child’s life on a dusty road. She almost lost a leg in the explosion. She’s now invalided out and married to Westie, a war correspondent who was at the scene of her bravery and wrote about her. I have a copy of her letter with the newspaper cutting about the action she was in. She was given a medal and now illustrates children’s books where she lives in Canberra. And then of course there’s my brother Shane, who is a Victoria drug squad detective.