The Last Mission

by William Kennedy

  Did Mast know he had bought the farm? Probably not. We were all trained to reach out for survival, and he was the best trained among us. Was he thinking of the woman he had killed? I doubt it. I’m sure his last thoughts were for the lives he was determined to save.

  With the clear dirt field only a few yards ahead, his wings caught the branches at the tops of the trees. The nose snapped down as the tail swung up. The fuselage cracked in half like a matchstick. The nose of the B-17, with the colonel still at the controls, hammered into the ground and was crushed like an empty tin can. The severed tail tumbled through the air and skidded across the plowed earth, coming to rest a good fifty yards from the tree line. If Mast knew he was dying, he wouldn’t have known for long, but he would have taken satisfaction that he was the only one dying. He had saved everyone else.

  We’re at altitude, and the steward brings me a huge martini on ice cubes, reason enough for flying an American carrier. I raise it in toast. To you, Colonel Mast. Or I suppose I should say General, since they promoted you after your death. Maybe you did lose it when Mary Brock offered you a taste of what her young American flyers were enjoying. And maybe you sent me home just to cover your tracks. There was a darker side of you that I never knew. But when the choices were clear, when it was your life or the lives of a few Englishmen that you didn’t even know, you didn’t hesitate. You put yourself at risk so there would be no risk to others. That deserves my admiration.

  And here’s to you, Detective Browning. You manipulated, you threatened, and you lied. A dark side that, once again, I never imagined, but you left the case unsolved rather than tarnish a hero’s reputation. When all is said and done, you did the right thing.

  And, of course, to Angela Priest. You lived your whole life with a guilty heart that you certainly didn’t deserve. I wish to God I had come back to see you. I could have told you that it didn’t matter.

  The Scottish coast slips past under the wing. England is behind me. My thoughts switch to Todd and the hearing that is only hours away. I know that Bob Bacon has marshaled a team of dignified dark suits to testify on Todd’s behalf, and maybe that’s the best way to get the sentence reduced. But there’s something terribly wrong about having all these establishment figures—attorneys, clergymen, and an insurance tycoon—pleading the case for someone who couldn’t stomach the establishment.

  There’s an element of condescension in us telling a judge that even though Todd isn’t like us, we can still let him roam about freely. Todd glories in the fact that he isn’t like us. He doesn’t want our forgiveness; he wants us to see our own faults. He once told me that some people come into the world to live in it, and others come into the world to run it. “It’s the idiots who want to run it that are destroying it.” I’m not sure that he’s entirely right, but I’ve learned that he’s not completely wrong, either. Control is an opiate. It distorts our view of reality. We think we are manipulating the future, and we don’t see the trail of destruction that we are leaving behind.

  It’s late in the afternoon by the time I reach Kit’s house. Todd is already there, and Bob Bacon shows up shortly after. We listen as Bob explains the situation.

  Our judge is the Honorable Henry Johnson of the Superior Court that, despite its name, is only a floor higher than the traffic court. Technically, there is no reason for Judge Johnson to review the lower court’s sentence. No point of law is involved, and the sentence is well within the guidelines. It’s actually a light punishment, when weighed against the ten years in prison that Todd could have been given, nor does the judge have any quarrel with the prosecutor who recommended the sentence. That’s his job, and the taxpayers have every right to expect a diligent performance. The truth is that Henry Johnson is involved in this case only because Bob Bacon helped get him the nomination to the bench and campaigned on his behalf As he has made clear, he is not promising to do anything for Todd. He won’t win any points with his colleagues by meddling in their sentencing decisions. He won’t win any votes by appearing to be lax on drug violators. All he’s doing is giving Bacon the courtesy of a hearing.

  “Then you don’t think he’ll set aside the prison time?” I ask.

  Bacon shrugs. “There’s a chance, but even if he doesn’t, it’s still worth bringing the situation to his attention. If he feels he owes us one, he’ll call in some favors from people in the corrections system. That would probably get Todd out in a few months for good behavior.”

  Todd understands, and is genuinely grateful to the attorney.

  Bob Bacon leaves, and Todd and I find ourselves alone. I tell him about England, and pour out the details of the colonel’s crime and the detective’s investigation. I even bring in Angela, which is the first time I have mentioned her name within my family. I don’t give him all the details of our relationship, but enough so he knows she has always been a central character in the affair.

  “You satisfied with the way things worked out?” he asks.

  “Not completely, but I’m getting more patient with the idea that things don’t have to work out. I’ve learned that I’m not in complete charge.”

  He smiles. “No one else is either.”

  He is on his way out the door when I ask him to bring his guitar to the hearing. He looks puzzled. “Isn’t that exactly the wrong image?”

  “Not if that’s the way you performed your community service.”

  The next afternoon, at three o’clock, I am escorted into Judge Johnson’s chambers. Bob Bacon, the pastor, and the bar representative are already there, seated in a ring of chairs around the vacant desk. The attorneys are in three-piece pinstripes, nearly identical to the suit I’m wearing. The pastor is in a softer gray with a crisp white collar.

  “Where’s Todd?” Bob Bacon asks, jumping to his feet.

  “Coming from downtown. He may be in traffic.”

  “Jesus!” Bacon mumbles as he lowers into his chair. His worst nightmare is that Todd won’t be here when the judge is ready to begin.

  Two doors open simultaneously. Judge Johnson enters from his inner office, adding a third three-piece pinstripe to the meeting. Todd pokes his head through the outer door, a dark sports jacket that I didn’t know he owned over a white shirt and bland tie. He carries his guitar case. Behind him comes a young man in his thirties, decked out in the dark-blue-and-red uniform of the Salvation Army. The bars on his shoulders indicate that he’s an officer, and his ruddy complexion, raw from shaving too closely, shows he takes his rank seriously. Bob Bacon’s eyes widen in amazement. He couldn’t be more surprised if Todd were leading in an ostrich. Judge Johnson looks from Todd and his companion to the defense attorney. His eyes narrow. Is this going to take longer than the five minutes he has allowed?

  Bacon introduces the attorney and the clergyman. Judge Johnson isn’t particularly interested. He knows that both of them will heap eloquent praise on Todd, even though neither of them knows him well enough to identify his body. He flips pages in his file folder and allows that he has received a letter from each, testifying to Todd’s fine character, but his eyes keep darting up to the officer.

  Todd handles the introduction, presenting Captain William Guest to the proceedings. Captain Guest, he explains, is in charge of the Grand Street Shelter, which provides clean beds and hot food to the homeless. “He supervised my community service,” he tells the judge.

  Johnson goes back to his papers and then looks up, puzzled. “The prosecutor stipulated that you hadn’t performed your community service requirements,” he says, more to Bob Bacon than to Todd.

  Bacon looks around for help, obviously taken off guard by the introduction of a new player. So I fill in, trying to advance the script that Todd and I discussed.

  “Your honor, I believe that was the prosecutor’s misunderstanding. Mr. Marron has given hundreds of hours to the shelter.”

  “And you are…” the judge asks.

  “James Marron. Todd Marron’s father.”

  He absorbs that and turns his attention
back to our attorney. “Mr. Bacon,” he says with flickering patience. “This is your hearing.”

  Bacon is fast on his feet. He drops his speech about Todd being only an occasional user and takes up the new line. “Your Honor, Mr. Marron’s appeal is that he was sentenced to prison time because the court thought he was refusing to perform community service. The fact is that Mr. Marron met all his past service requirements and volunteered hours well beyond what the courts had ordered. I think Captain Guest can testify to this.”

  “Okay,” Johnson says, dispensing with formal language. “Let’s hear from the captain.”

  Guest is no preacher. He continually clears his throat and speaks in a shy voice, more suitable for the confessional than the courtroom. “Mr. Marron comes into the shelter several times a month. Well, some months not that often. But then again, during holiday seasons he may come in two or three times a week. I remember at Christmas a few years ago…”

  The judge cuts him off. “How many total hours of service has he given the shelter?”

  “Well that would be hard to say, but if I had to guess…”

  “Guess…please!”

  The captain decides that Todd has provided about fifty hours of service a year, over maybe the last ten years. He is about to explain the basis of his calculations.

  “What kind of service?” The judge asks.

  “He sings…and plays his guitar.”

  “Sings?”

  The lawyers are squirming in their pinstripes. They thought they had their appeal in chambers pretty well choreographed. Now the session has been taken over by a uniformed salvation fanatic and a hippie with an old wooden guitar.

  Captain Guest nods. “Yes. He sings. There’s not much for the men to do. We feed them. We have our twelve-step meeting and a reading from the Scripture. But after that, it’s just an empty building. Mr. Marron brings a bit of beauty to the place. We all appreciate it.”

  “Your Honor,” Bob Bacon says, “there are community leaders here who would like to add to the letters they wrote the court.”

  “Any of them ever been to the Grand Street Shelter?” Johnson says.

  Bacon flushes. The attorney from the bar association glances up at the ceiling. The minister tries to look beatific.

  “Your Honor,” I interject, trying to keep the hearing focused on Todd’s work at the shelter.

  “Have you ever been there, Mr. Marron?” the judge asks to cut me off.

  “No, sir.”

  “Then how are we supposed to decide whether Mr. Marron’s singing constitutes community service?”

  There’s an agonizing pause.

  “We might listen to him sing,” I suggest.

  Johnson considers, and then turns to Todd. “Could you give us a sample of what you do at the shelter?”

  Todd snaps open his case, crosses his knees under the guitar, and tunes the strings. Throughout the process, Bob Bacon stares down at his shoes. His stony expression tells me that I have thoroughly humiliated him. He’s probably rehearsing the tongue-lashing he’s going to deliver along with his bill. He has moved mountains to set up this hearing and present my son as an acceptable member of the community. Todd and I are wasting his best efforts.

  A few chords demonstrate that the instrument is ready. “Anything in particular?” Todd asks Captain Guest.

  The Salvation Army officer shrugs. “Maybe some of the those sailing songs,” he decides. Then he tells the judge, “The men are pretty much shut up in a few square blocks. So songs about faraway places…”

  Todd begins a peppy tune, sung by sailors when they hauled in lines. The refrain says, “We’ll know where we are when we get there.” The pastor begins tapping his foot. Bob Bacon covers his eyes in embarrassment. There is no comment, let alone applause, when the song ends, so Todd goes right into another ballad, this one slow and moody, about the loneliness of the sea with men watching their lives drift by, wave after wave. Todd is not a particularly gifted musician, and his voice is hoarse, but there is sincerity in his presentation. You can tell he knows what it’s like to be lonely.

  We all listen until the last chord fades to silence. Then we are all taken by surprise as Judge Johnson claps politely. The two attorneys and the preacher join in.

  “That certainly strikes me as a community service,” the judge announces. Then he tells me, “I agree with you, Mr. Marron. I think the prosecutor was too limited in his definition of community service.” He turns to Bacon. “Let me talk with the trial judge. I think we’ll be able to work something out.”

  Bacon revives, as if his alarm clock has begun to ring. “Thank you, Your Honor. We very much appreciate your time.”

  The pastor is in the process of accosting Todd, in hopes that he will sing at an upcoming church service. The bar association lawyer doesn’t know whom to talk with. He’s not sure what has just happened.

  Judge Johnson pauses at the door to his inner office. “I don’t suppose you know any folk songs about judges?” he asks.

  “Not where they’re the heroes,” Todd answers. “In most songs they’re either the hanging judges or else they work for the landlord.”

  It’s evening at Kit’s house when I close the book on my life in England in a letter to Arthur Lyons.

  “Arthur, as you’ve probably surmised, I arrived back in New York safely after a perfectly uneventful flight, but deeply indebted to you for your kindness. You and Herbert were very helpful to me in pulling together the loose ends of my English life. Your friendship is truly appreciated.

  “My last day was spent in Cambridge in the company of Angela Priest, who is now Mrs. Edward Murray. She is every bit as delightful as I remembered her, and I specifically want to thank Herbert for forcing my hand. You were right. There were no recriminations, and I think she was as pleased as I was to recall fond memories. We have promised to keep in touch.

  “I have very good news concerning my son. His prison term has been suspended and he is continuing community service under supervision of the court. The silver lining to this cloud is that Todd and I seem to have found each other after so many years of living in hostile camps. I don’t know all the answers, but I have learned not to ask questions. That may be the final wisdom of parenthood.”

  I went on to tell Arthur about the rest of my family and my decision to take a small apartment in the town where I grew up. I mentioned a happy visit with my granddaughters, and a trip down to the Grand Street Shelter to do a bit a volunteer work alongside my son. I thanked him again and finished with the usual platitudes about welcoming him, should he ever decide to visit the colonies. I didn’t expect a reply. There was no point of convergence in our parallel lives. Probably we would exchange Christmas cards until one of us decided that there would be no more store-bought sentiments.

  So I’m startled a few days later when I find a bulging business envelope, with royal family stamps, in the morning mail. I open it and find photocopies of news stories from 1943 and 1944. Some of them are journalists’ reports of our work over Germany. The RAF, as I remember, got most of the press, but occasionally a British reporter flew “A dangerous mission with our gallant allies” or “One minute over Berlin in a Flying Fortress.” It’s good reading, but the reporters were either naive or heavily censored. We sound far more skilled than we were, and certainly a lot more courageous.

  Then there are pieces from the social pages, all featuring a young American officer who is addressing a ladies’ club, the farm board, or perhaps the volunteer air-raid wardens. I see faded photos of myself handing over plaques, model planes, or Eighth Air Force shoulder patches. Or I’m accepting a jar of fresh preserves, a china tea service, or a coat of arms. I can’t remember all the occasions. I’m sure that whatever I was saying, I was thinking about bringing it to a conclusion so I could get away with Angela. Everything from that part of my life brings me back to her.

  The last piece is from 1945 and concerns the dedication of a memorial to the American flyers at the Cambridge American C
emetery. Colonel Mast’s story is featured, and there’s a close-up of the determined bronze face that looks very little like him. The sincerity of the writer is evident. He refers to the American flyers “who came here in our time of peril, offered their lives for our defense, and left quietly when the danger was over.” Colonel Mast’s invaders, who never built any castles. Not all of them were able to leave quietly when the danger was over.

  The accompanying letter from Arthur Lyons explains, “I went to the library and plugged your group number and your name into the computer and this is what came out. Would you believe that they keep all this stuff?”

  Of course I believe it. Didn’t Andrew Barnes tell me that a society is nothing more than its records? But I doubt if anyone besides Arthur has looked at them in the past twenty years. We all get on with our lives. The records are for the historians.

  “Happy to hear that your family is well and that your son’s problems were so nicely resolved,” Arthur says. “But I can’t say I enjoy hearing that you’ve taken a little apartment near your granddaughters. Sounds to me like you’re packing it in well before it’s called for. According to Herbert, Angela Priest is alone. And your letter tells me that you’re alone. Haven’t you both spent enough time without each other?”

  Bartenders! Aren’t they always offering advice?

  I bring the clippings down to the living room at Kit’s house, where Todd is joining Kit’s family for dinner. Kit’s husband, Henry, is a charming host, even though he keeps a constant eye on Todd. He doesn’t want to turn his back on a troublemaker, even though Todd seems to be behaving himself for the moment. Todd, with his pop music background, is fascinating to his college-age daughters. Henry doesn’t want his girls to grow fond of an uncle who does drugs.