Comfort to the Enemy and Other Carl Webster Stories

by Elmore Leonard

  I'm Gunnery Sergeant Louly Webster. Yeah, Carl's my husband, Louly said and touched her cheek. You've got some mayonaisse right here. Shemane raised her napkin. Louly said, The other cheek, and sat down with her.

  I've been reading about you and your love nest. I've got a lawyer suing the paper.

  You didn't entertain Jurgen at your house? When you were working at Teddy's, Shemane said, did you ever strip?

  Louly shook her head. Or take guys upstairs or meet them at hotels.

  Any my home wasn't a love nest, Shemane said. I live there with my mom.

  Carl thinks you drove Jurgen and Otto to Ft. Smith.

  He does, huh.

  And bought them a car.

  Is this Carl's idea, get us to talk girl to girl?

  I teach aerial gunnery and Carl goes after fugitive felons. He doesn't put me up to doing any spying for him. I did meet Jurgen once, at the camp. We talked through the wire fence. I liked him right away. He has a good attitude and seems to maintain pretty well. The only thing Carl told me about you and Jurgen, you said you cook for him once in a while and you don't even know how to cook. Louly smiled. He told me because it's funny, what you said. Carl has told FBI agents he believes Jurgen visited your home every time he escaped. Have your lawyer noodle that one. Or you never dreamed he was a German prisoner of war. I can't see you going to jail for being in love with a guy like Jurgen, even if he is a Kraut.

  She watched Shemane raise the cup to sip her tea, but there was no teapot on the table and the slight face Shemane made told Louly it was whiskey. Shemane touched her napkin to her mouth and looked at the trace of lipstick.

  What does Carl think will happen?

  Carl lives by the marshal's motto- 'Let no guilty man escape'u-once he's convinced the man he wants is guilty. Carl has his own sense of right and wrong- and I'm starting to think the way he does, see the situation as a gray area where you can justify what you're doing or not doing, and tell yourself if it's okay. Louly paused. Is that booze in your cup? I ask it as a m arine who's been looking forward to a refreshment all afternoon.

  Let me fix you up, Shemane said. She caught the waitress's eye, raised her cup and nodded to include Louly.

  Louly was thinking about Carl. She said, I'm never sure what Carl's gonna do, and I've been married to him seven years. I have a feeling he'd like to go after Jurgen, bring him back to testify at the trial. I'm talking about those six Nazis they're holding.

  I read about them, Sheamne said. Charged with murdering one of their own guys.

  The federal prosecutor, Louly said, will need Jurgen and Otto's testimony to convict them, so there's a nationwide manhunt going on right now. What'll be interesting, if they ask Carl to get on their trail. He thinks they'll go to Detroit, at least at first. I said, 'But if you know he'll go there, then he won't.' Carl said Detroit's way bigger than Tulsa, two million people in a working-man's town. We know they turn out military vehicles, trucks, tanks, bombers, even boats, landing craft. Carl said he'd like to see all that activity in one place.

  He wants to go after Jurgen, Shemane said.

  He wants Jurgen and Otto to tell on the super Nazis, get them sent to Leavenworth to be hung by the neck. Carl said he'd vow to keep Jurgen safe till the war's over. Then you all can decide what you want to do.

  He said that? Really?

  'Cause he thought I was jealous of you. He wanted to show he wasn't interested in you in that way. But he meant it, what he'd do.

  Were you jealous?

  Maybe a little. He seemed so protective of you and I got the wrong idea. The thing is, Louly said, I came home on leave and in a week we had two good days together, beauties, but that's all, two days... Though it wasn't bad at his dad's house this time, for once.

  Boy, you two have something really good, don't you?

  We like to argue, but we can turn it off when we want. I guess 'cause we're dyin' of love for each other. Sehamne said, Wow.

  *

  Carl walked in the coffee shop.

  He saw Louly with Shemane, the redhead and the blond looking like a couple of movie stars, talking, raising their teacups to have a sip, mmmmm, putting the cups down, talking again, Louly reaching over to pat Shemane's hand...

  *

  By the time Carl saw Louly off and arrived at his dad's house it was coming on dark. They sat at the table by the windows across the back part of the kitchen, the chairs comfortable, with arms and pads o n t he seats; they could sniff Narcissa's cooking while they talked and sipped whiskey.

  Carl said poor Louly'd be on the train all night and most of tomorrow, the Frisco to Memphis and the Southern line to Nashville, Chatanooga, down to Atlanta and over to the Marine Air Base at Cherry Point. Day after tomorrow the sweet girl's back to showing jarheads how to shoot down Zekes.

  Virgil said, Well, you seem contented for a change, watching his boy sip on his bourbon. Remember putting off marrying that girl and I said you were crazy?

  Narcissa turned from the range. You said you'd be after Louly yourself if I didn't look so much like Dolores Del Rio. And you bet Dolores Del don't even know how to cook. The nicest thing your dad ever said to me.

  Before she left, Virgil said, Louly get over that snit she was in? I don't see she had a reason to be jealous of Shemane, Louly's better looking any day of the week.

  Those newspaper pictures, Narcissa said, don't do a thing for Shemane.

  Carl said, We're driving to the station, Louly says she's starting to understand how I think. How I can talk to a man escaped from prison, still has 20 years to serve, wish him luck with his cotton and walk away. Louly says, 'Shemane's a traitor to our country 'cause she happened to fall for Jurgen?'

  He was a hard worker, Virgil said. All those Huns, they put their backs to it. They'd swat more pecans, fill more bags'n any people I ever hired. He said, Tell me what happens to Shemane now.

  I doubt she'll be convicted of giving comfort to Jurgen. She's got a good lawyer.

  You have to testify if she's tried?

  I'll tell what I know about the situation. Shemane understands, she knows I've already told the Feds about it. But I'm pretty sure she'll walk.

  Now Teddy Ritz, Virgil said, who came to town with sub-machine guns. You know why?

  Tell me, Carl said.

  'Cause you invited him.

  Carl frowned at his dad. When'd I do that?

  I'll tell you in a minute, Virgil said. First, I want to hear what Teddy was doing with the machine guns.

  *

  Teddy said to me, 'You haven't figured it out? The Tedescos wanted to drive by the camp, sweep the yard with the tommy guns and kill as many Krauts as they could.' He says it was strictly their idea. He brought them as bodyguards since he planned to visit a Nazi camp.

  Teddy being Jewish, Virgil said.

  That's what he meant. But he says it was the Tedescos' idea to kill Germans.

  What would they have against the Huns?

  Teddy says they're Jews on their mother's side, from a Jewish mob in Detroit, the Purple Gang. Teddy says he happened to tell them, before they left Kansas City, what the Nazis were doing to the Jews in Poland and it must've worked them up and they brought the Thompsons, which Teddy says he didn't know anything about. All he wanted to do was talk to a Nazi, ask him why they hate Jews. I said, 'But when they drove by the camp there wasn't anybody to shoot at. You know why?' Teddy says he wasn't there. I told him the P. O. W. S were confined to barracks for screwing up the roll call the night before, to throw off the count. This was after the two guys escaped. I said, 'You didn't know why the yard was empty?' He said, 'How could I? I told you, I wasn't there.'

  When did you talk to him?

  This afternoon. I told him to expect the Feds before he checked out. Teddy puts on his innocent look -'Why? What did I do?' They'll throw the Tedescos at him till he's groggy. He'll start to defend the idea saying, 'What's wrong with shooting Krauts? Isn't that what we're doing in the war?' Carl said to his dad, But you're
saying I invited him.

  You got him pumped up. He should tell Shemane what the Huns are doing in Poland.

  I meant call her on the phone.

  But there's a whole camp of Huns right here. It must've got him thinking, uh?

  Carl said, He wants somebody put away's messing with him, he sends a guy with a gun. He wants a yard full of Germans put away, he brings Tutti and Frankie to do it, couple of mutts. One of them killed the colored kid and threw him in the river. They go to Shemane's, Gary opens the door... I'll have to talk to Gary, I see him, find out what he was thinking.

  Virgil said, You left out their breaking in, the first time they came to the house.

  I'm gonna leave it out as much as I can.

  His dad took a moment, sipped his bourbon and said, It was Gary busted the pane.

  It surprised Carl. He looked at Narcissa. Narcissa said, He's taking the Dale Carnegie course. Learn how to act like a grownup.

  Virgil said to his boy, You tend to make friends and influence people, Jurgen, Shemane, and get things going.

  Carl said, You're saying I started all this? By bringing Teddy here?

  And you aren't through yet, are you? You going after Jurgen?

  If they want me to. The first thing I'd do is find out what kind of car Shemane bought him.

  You're stuck on that idea, Virgil said. But if you work it, you'll come up with the car, won't you? You remember -you were 21 years old, you came home from shooting Emmett Long the bank robber through the heart. You remember what I told you?

  Do I remember, Carl said, I almost had it tattooed on my other arm. 'God help us show-offs.'

  The End