Glory Boys

by Harry Bingham

  ‘Yes, Father. I see.’

  ‘I had intended for you to enjoy your vacation. Geddes made sure you had everything you wanted, I suppose? Car, driver, arrangements made, that kind of thing.’

  ‘Oh yes, it wasn’t that.’

  ‘Good.’

  There was a short pause. Willard felt the heat of Rockwell’s gaze on the back of his neck. He felt the pressure of his father’s presence looming from the telephone. He felt squeezed between the two men.

  ‘I am sending Roeder to you now. That was the reason I phoned.’

  ‘Roeder?’

  ‘Rockwell is still at large. He managed to escape. Roeder thinks you may be able to assist.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Roeder’s coming here?’

  ‘Yes… Are you drunk, Willard?’

  ‘No, Father.’

  ‘He’ll be with you in twenty minutes. And well done. I wanted to say well done.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The two men hung up. Willard swivelled to face Abe, who nodded an enquiry at the phone.

  ‘Your father?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Powell Lambert.’ Abe pronounced the two words as though he’d never heard either of them before. ‘You know, my colleague – my late colleague – Haggerty McBride found Mr Powell easily enough. He never found Mr Lambert.’

  ‘That was him, my father.’

  Abe smiled, as if he had found something to smile at. ‘It makes sense. I couldn’t see you mixed up with mobsters. I thought there was something I wasn’t seeing, else I’d got you figured wrong. Well, your Mr Lambert makes sense of it. I had you right, after all.’

  Willard began to say, ‘We aren’t mobsters. We only sell the stuff wholesale. We’re not mixed up with all the rackets on the street.’ But he didn’t. He didn’t get any further than the first two words. Because of course it was true. Roeder and Mason and all the others. They were mobsters. Just because Willard worked on Wall Street and wore a fancy suit didn’t make him any less of a mobster. Instead, he said something that surprised him.

  ‘You thought I couldn’t be mixed up in it? Because of who I was?’

  ‘I knew you weren’t perfect, Will, far from it. But I couldn’t see you mixed up in that. Not you.’

  Willard scowled at the floor, pleased at what Abe had just said, but scowling because he was about to say something he knew he shouldn’t.

  ‘McBride and Bosse are dead – but you knew that?’

  Abe nodded.

  ‘The judge is still free, but they have his family…’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘The other folks mostly got away, it seems. As for the evidence you folks collected. It seems like the fire service has most of it. We think … that is, my father thinks…’ Willard tailed off, not wanting to tell his old commander that his final mission had comprehensively failed.

  But Abe nodded. ‘You’ll send a few friendly cops down to the fire station to collect it up. The fire guys will hand it over, thinking they’re doing the right thing. Yes, I thought that might happen. We gave it our best shot.’

  There was another pause.

  ‘They’re on their way here now,’ said Willard.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Roeder.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry, Willard. I came by here to dig you out of trouble. I think maybe I just created some.’

  ‘To dig me out of trouble?’

  All through their conversation, Abe’s hat had lain beside him on a little side-table. He moved the hat to reveal a black cloth-bound ledger.

  ‘We took four ledgers from the bank. Your name didn’t figure in three of them. It figured a whole lot in this one. I wanted you to have it. To destroy it, or do whatever. If we had won out down there at the warehouse, I wanted you to make yourself safe. But as it is, I guess your man Roeder noticed the missing book. I reckon that’s why he thinks it’s worth a trip over here.’

  Willard took the book uncertainly. To be found with it now would be catastrophic. God only knew what his father would think if Willard were found with gifts from the enemy. He shoved the book under the sofa, wondering if Roeder would attempt to search the place. His mouth went dry.

  Abe said, ‘Sorry. I was trying to do you a good turn.’

  ‘I appreciate it.’

  ‘Do you have any friends in the hotel?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘I don’t think the couch is the best place to put that. The hotel will have an incinerator in the basement. Perhaps you know someone who could take it there.’

  Willard nodded, still dry-mouthed. ‘Good idea.’ He went to the phone, called down to the lobby, asked for the bellhop he knew. The bellhop was there and promised to come up right away. Willard paced the room impatiently until he arrived, then gave the kid the book and a twenty-dollar note. The boy promised to have the thing destroyed immediately.

  ‘Be sure you do,’ said Abe.

  ‘Yeah, OK mister, sure.’

  The boy left. Willard watched the door close with relief. ‘Gosh, I hope it’s OK to trust him. Maybe I oughta go and watch. These kids, you never know –’

  ‘He’s fine. You can trust him.’

  ‘Really? It’s just that –’

  ‘Will, you don’t want to be running up from the incinerator when Roeder comes knocking.’

  ‘Jeez, no.’ Willard looked at Abe for a moment, before his belly gave a sudden lurch. ‘But, jeez, Captain, you need to get going.’

  Abe nodded.

  ‘But I mean now.’

  Abe nodded again. He indicated the open window. ‘I can always step out there, if necessary. Don’t worry. I won’t let them find me with you.’

  Willard looked, jaw dropped, at the window. Just as he had done when Abe arrived in the room, Willard had the eerie sense that Abe could just step in and out of the sky at will. ‘The window? We’re fourteen floors up here.’

  ‘There’s a ledge. It runs along to the elevator lobby. If I have to use it, I will. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Gosh.’

  The pause returned. Then Willard remembered something. He scrambled for his jacket and produced the envelope he’d been carrying around with him. He thrust it into Abe’s hands.

  ‘Look, I’d got this to give to you if we ever met up. Then everything got so complicated, I couldn’t figure out a way to find you. It’s cash, a passport, and a liner ticket to Sydney, Australia. I figured you’d be safe there.’

  Abe didn’t open the envelope. He didn’t even toy with it. He just held Willard’s gaze.

  ‘That’s big of you, Will. I hadn’t expected it.’

  ‘You need to leave. Now. Nobody knows about the boat, I swear it. You’ll be safe there. I thought Australia would suit you. Plenty of sky.’

  ‘Yes, plenty of sky.’

  Willard stood up. ‘So long, then.’

  Abe shook his head very gently and tossed the envelope back to Willard.

  ‘I can’t take this, Will.’

  ‘What? Why not? Don’t worry. It wasn’t much. If you really want, you can pay me back some time. Only you needn’t worry about it. Honestly.’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking about the money.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘I’m not leaving. I mean, I won’t be in here when your guy Roeder arrives. But I’m not leaving America. I started a job, you know.’

  ‘You’re not giving up?’

  Abe shook his head.

  ‘Christ, Captain, we’ve got everything. We’ve got McBride. We’ve got Bosse. Quite soon we’ll have the papers and the judge as well. We’ve got everything. We’ve got half of Washington.’

  Abe smiled. ‘I know. That’s why I can’t quit. You understand.’

  There was a pause. Willard looked at his watch.

  ‘How long?’ asked Abe.

  ‘About fifteen minutes.’

  ‘OK. I’ll be gone in ten.’

  Willard nodded. Abe turned away and rummaged amongst the breakfast thin
gs for more coffee and some cold toast.

  ‘May I?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course.’

  Abe munched on the toast. Willard remembered this about his old commander. In one way, Abe was naturally spartan. He had never used his rank or his fame or even his army salary to buy himself any extra comforts, not even an extra blanket for his bed or a picture to hang on his bare office walls. But in another way, Abe always managed to make himself comfortable. Here he was, with danger advancing by the minute, lolling on a chair, munching toast. Abe looked up.

  ‘Remembering old times?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘D’you miss it? The squadron, I mean.’

  ‘Yes. I do, I guess I do.’

  ‘Despite everything? Despite the fear?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘D’you remember early on, those speeches of President Wilson’s?’

  ‘Jeez, those speeches!’

  In the first months following America’s entry into the war, the American airmen had been called on to drop propaganda speeches over enemy lines. The propaganda was of a strange sort. No flimsy leaflets, but instead long, wordy speeches by the then President, Woodrow Wilson. The speeches were idealistic, innocent. They exhorted the German troops to cease fighting. The speeches painted a picture of a world in harmony, working together for peace. The message was utterly well-intentioned, utterly useless.

  And dangerous.

  Not to the Germans below, but to the American airmen above. The speeches were big, heavy things. The aircraft dropping them were designed as pursuit planes or perhaps observation planes, but certainly not bombers. The unlucky airmen assigned to delivering the manuscripts had to fly low over enemy lines, chucking ungainly chunks of paper, handful by handful, from the cockpit. Sometimes the speeches wrapped around the airplane’s tail fin and rudder, or snuck into the control wires running along the fuselage. As the airmen wrestled with their planes, the Germans below amused themselves by turning every gun upwards hoping for a lucky hit. After months of near-accident, high command was eventually persuaded to drop the venture.

  ‘We sure took some ribbing from the Frenchies, huh?’

  Willard nodded. He remembered.

  ‘But, Will, let me ask you something. What did you think, what went through your head, when you had to drop those speeches.’

  ‘I thought our President knew damn all about aviation.’

  ‘Sure. What else?’

  ‘I thought our President knew damn all about the German fighting man.’

  ‘Sure. What else?’

  ‘I thought… Shit, I was scared doing it. And what was the point anyhow?’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was a pause. Abe was driving at something, but Willard didn’t know what. Abe tried again.

  ‘You remember how some of the Frenchies were given those same speeches to drop? They didn’t want to, so they just put their allocation on a truck and drove it around to our aerodrome.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Willard laughed. ‘“C’est votre Président.” I could see their point of view.’

  ‘Right. And what did you think then? When you took those speeches off the Frenchies, knowing it would be your job to drop them?’

  ‘Heck, I thought… D’you know what, Captain? I felt proud, actually. I felt proud of my country and proud of my President.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I mean, the speeches were useless. We all knew that. But they said something. They said something about America. About how it was our destiny to be different. To make peace, not war. To bring freedom. You know what? I felt honoured to drop those speeches. Dangerous or not, stupid or not, I wanted to drop them. To say to the Germans and the French and the Brits and everyone else, look at me, I’m an American and proud of it, Goddamn it.’

  ‘Yes.’ Abe’s look was unusually direct, unusually intense. ‘Yes. So you do understand.’

  ‘I’m sorry. Understand what?’

  ‘Will, how come you miss being a part of the squadron? It was dangerous, frightening, relentless. But you miss it. I do too. Everyone who was a part of it does. How come? I’ll tell you. Because you fought for something you believed in. Fought for something that was bigger than you. And what’s become of that, Will?’

  ‘I’m not getting you.’

  ‘What’s happened to our country? Freedom and democracy, we invented them, Will, or at least we put our stamp on ’em. And what’s happened? What the hell have we let happen? We’ve let bootleggers buy the country. We’ve got enforcement officers who take bribes. We’ve got cops who are crooked. We’ve got entire cities owned by the mob. Even Congress isn’t straight, Will, even Congress.’

  Willard thought about the Powell Lambert bar, operated in the heart of the Senate. Abe was right and he didn’t even know the half of it.

  Just then, there was a quiet commotion at the door. Not the door to the corridor outside, but the bedroom door. Annie was there, dressed only in nightgown and bathrobe, hair messed up, sleep still in her eyes. She saw Willard, saw Abe, blinked in surprise. Abe was getting ready to go, hat in hand. He nodded to the newcomer.

  ‘I guess you must be Rosalind. I’m Abe, an old friend of –’

  Her face told him he had goofed. Annie looked at Willard for help. Willard gave it.

  ‘Annie, actually. A friend of mine. Rosalind and I – she isn’t – she didn’t want –’ Willard pulled himself up. Abe wasn’t his father. He didn’t have to be tongue-tied with Abe. ‘Rosalind broke off her engagement. Annie is just a friend who dropped in unexpectedly.’

  Abe smiled and nodded. ‘Nice to meet you, Annie. I’m sorry but I need to get going.’ He looked quickly between the two of them again, reading that even if there hadn’t yet been sex, there was certainly more than friendship. He spoke again to Annie. ‘He’s a good man, you got there. You be sure to hold on to him.’ He turned to Willard. ‘So long, Will. Take care.’

  ‘So long, Captain.’

  ‘Captain?’ It was Annie who spoke.

  Willard looked at Abe, who answered her.

  ‘Captain Rockwell, ma’am, only you might want to keep that quiet for now. Willard can tell you why later.’

  ‘Captain Rockwell? Will’s old commander?’

  Abe grinned. ‘Not that old.’

  The sleep still caught in Annie’s eyes made her face wider, softer, more innocent than usual.

  ‘You saved his life. You kept him safe. Thank you.’

  ‘He told you that?’

  ‘He doesn’t talk about anyone the way he talks about you.’

  Abe put his hat on. He opened the door to the corridor, looked quickly out. There was no one there.

  ‘He saved my life too, Annie. He ever tell you that?’

  And then he was gone.

  Through the door, down the corridor, away from the elevators, heading towards the concrete service stairs which would lead down to the hotel basement and safety. And Annie was staring at Willard, Willard at Annie.

  Because, no, Willard hadn’t told her that. Hadn’t ever told anyone.

  136

  France, Somme sector, October 1918.

  A dogfight. Two American planes – a Spad and a Nieuport – fighting four Germans, three Fokkers and a clumsy two-seater Albatross. Willard had been one of the American pilots. Captain Abraham Rockwell had been the other.

  The dogfight proceeded with the usual terrifying swiftness. Willard couldn’t remember the detail, only the broad outline. Rockwell, somehow, was pursuing the Albatross, but using his pursuit as a ruse to close on the Fokker that protected it. Willard was having a fierce encounter of his own, with neither pilot able to gain a decisive edge. But then the last German plane saw an opportunity to dive at Rockwell, who was now fighting three.

  Twist as he might, Rockwell couldn’t avoid placing his aircraft in danger from one gun or another. The first Fokker found his tail, began to close range. Willard, still fighting, was unable to help.

  Except that he did.

  On a
n impulse, he turned his plane. He flew towards the Fokker that endangered Rockwell, but at the same time let his own tail appear huge and steady in the sights of his own attacker. For three, four, five, ten seconds he flew, expecting the sudden flare and shock of bullets, the roar of flame, the hot red touch of death.

  It never came. Nothing happened. The Fokker closing on Rockwell saw its own position worsen and pulled away. Willard turned to face his own pursuer, whose gun, he now saw, was badly jammed. With the German gun jammed, the odds had shifted: two Americans against the three Germans and one of the Germans an unwieldy two-seater. The conflict sputtered on for a minute or two, before the two sides chose to pull away.

  And that was it. Willard’s one moment of perfect heroism. He had saved Rockwell’s life at the risk of his own. Back at the aerodrome, Captain Rockwell had put his hand on Willard’s shoulder and said, ‘Thank you. That was a noble thing you did.’

  And that was all. Rockwell had never spoken of it again. And in all his years of boasting, Willard had never mentioned it to a soul.

  137

  Annie smiled a proper hello to Willard.

  What was she, a friend, a girl to have a fling with, or a life partner? He didn’t know, but he did know he liked her better than any of his other girls. More than Evie Moroney. More than Rosalind. More than anyone. He walked to the windows and pulled back the curtains. Light flooded the room.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Annie, ‘did I interrupt something? I didn’t know you were –’

  The phone went. Willard picked it up. It was the hotel reception, telling him a Mr Roeder was here to see him.

  ‘Don’t send him up. I’ve a guest staying. I’ll be down in two minutes.’

  Willard looked at Annie. He felt light-headed, but joyous. Joy poured through him, as though it were an emotion he’d never experienced before.

  ‘How fast can you get dressed?’ he asked.

  ‘Already?’ Her voice sounded upset, as though she thought he was sending her away.

  He kissed her softly on the lips. ‘I’m coming too.’

  They went into the bedroom and began to dress quickly. Annie wanted to go into the bathroom to look after her make-up, but Willard told her not to bother.

  ‘Annie, listen to me, I have a question to ask. I want to do something rather dangerous, but worth doing. There may be a little danger in it for you too, though I hope not. I expect I shall need to go to prison for a little while. Will you … will you still be there for me when I come out?’