Dress Gray

by Lucian K. Truscott

  Beatty reached for the phone, dialing, still sputtering. Before he hit the third digit, Slaight reached across the desk and hit the cradle buttons, and the line went dead. He leaned closer to Beatty.

  “This is how it shakes down. You’re calling me a faggot. You wanna call names?” Slaight stood up, reaching for his cap. “Let’s go. Right now. Out that door. Let’s go public, Mr. Beatty. No sense name-calling behind closed doors. Let’s go public. You lay out your garbage, and I’ll lay out mine. The networks and the papers will be up here in battalion force, and we’ll see who comes out on top. You wanna call me a faggot? Okay by me. But you do it out there where people can hear you, because in here, it don’t fuckin’ count.” Slaight was standing by the door, hat in left hand, beckoning with his right. It was a gamble, a dangerous gamble, and a shitstorm waited outside if Beatty moved. But it was all Slaight had. He waited.

  Beatty didn’t move. He sat down, staring at the cluttered desk, picking a cuticle on his left hand with his right forefinger.

  “It’s all over, Mr. Beatty. You know why? I’ve got enough bad shit in my files on the David Hand murder to crack the granite this place sits on. You’ll feel the tremors from West Point all the way down in your office in the Pentagon, Mr. Beatty. You’ll feel the tremors right there in the office of the Secretary of Defense. And if my information is correct, a lot of other big dudes down there will feel the same tremors when the David Hand murder case breaks open. You know the old term ‘knee-level wind,’ Mr. Beatty?”

  Beatty shook his head no.

  “That’s what happens when knees start shaking. Knee-level wind. You better get used to it, Mr. Beatty. You better invest in some paperweights for your desk, because there’s gonna be a goddamn hurricane of knee-level wind when I’m finished, Mr. Beatty. When I unlock that file of mine showing the butt-fucking and cock-sucking that went on, when I’m finished showing how Hand was killed, and why … Well. I leave it to your imagination. Where do you think the chopping will start? With you? Somebody else? One of the generals you wrote letters to concerning Hand? Hedges? Thompson? Where will the ax fall first, Mr. Beatty? You’d better start figuring.”

  Slaight paused, stopped pacing, and glared at William Beatty. He would get no answer. He didn’t need one. The answer to his question was all over Beatty’s face, a soft, doughy confection of every deal he’d ever made, every string he’d ever pulled, every connection he’d ever touched, every bureaucratic ploy he’d ever executed, every career he’d either helped or destroyed. Slaight stared at the man before him.

  “I’ll be going now, Mr. Beatty. I see we’ve got nothing to say to each other at this point. Maybe next week, when the fur begins to fly. Just remember this, Mr. Beatty. Your good friend David Hand … his death came cheap. Just like every other poor SOB who gets fucked in the ass, one way or another, up here at West Point every day. But from this moment on, Mr. Beatty, it’s going to cost you. Hand was a bright, charming, pretty boy, like you said. The way you two got along … he deserves better, don’t you think?”

  Slaight walked out of the Eisenhower Suite, out of the hotel, headed north, toward the barracks.

  William Beatty picked up the telephone and made several telephone calls, three to the Pentagon, and two local: Hedges and Thompson. His conversations were brief. There was no time for elaboration. It was over.

  The deputy Secretary of Defense started packing his bags. He would fly back to Washington that night. The next few days were going to be rough. There were so many pieces to be picked up, so many moves to be made, so many debts to be called in. And now they were maneuvering defensively. They had to move fast.

  Somehow, Hedges had miscalculated. Slaight knew. Beatty didn’t know how, and at this point, it didn’t really matter. Slaight knew.

  37

  Slaight talked to lawyer Bassett, the sergeant major, Dr. Consor, his father. Over the weekend, he talked to Irit, and he made up his mind. Sunday night, Bassett outlined a plan. The next morning, Slaight would make his move.

  On November 11, 1968, at 9:15 A.M., Cadet Slaight reported to the superintendent of the United States Military Academy. He carried a brown metal Sears and Roebuck file box. The supe was “extremely busy,” according to his aide. But when he was informed of the nature of Slaight’s visit, entry was easily gained.

  The superintendent had been stunned earlier to learn that over the weekend, his commandant, General Hedges, and the head of his Social Science Department, Colonel Thompson, had departed West Point on special orders. Thompson had taken a high-level position on the National Security Council, and Hedges was scheduled to work for something called the Office of Emergency Preparedness. No explanations were given for their sudden reassignments to powerful posts in the federal government.

  But a much greater shock awaited the superintendent in a pile of paper work that had appeared mysteriously on his desk sometime over the weekend, when his office was closed. The death of a cadet sometime last May … he barely remembered the name … an accidental drowning as he recalled … but the paper work, Xeroxed and organized into neat categories, alleged that the cadet had been murdered, and that he, the superintendent, had covered up the murder. It was all done in a very gentlemanly fashion. No formal charges. No allegation of criminal acts. Just a request from the Department of the Army for his resignation, undated. Rylander was dumbstruck.

  When Slaight unlocked his metal box and began laying out his files, recounting the events of the past six months with calm, almost icy precision, the superintendent just sat there and listened. It all made sense now—the whole story. That SOB Hedges had been gunning for him all this time, and he’d been too slow, too old, to have seen what was going on behind his back. The story of the cadet’s murder was complex and ugly. The superintendent listened with grim fascination.

  It was the way things were these days, the general concluded. You falsified your body counts, and you awarded yourself medals for imaginary valor in an imaginary war. If you could do that, you could do anything. And this was it. This was the war in Vietnam brought home on the shoulders of the men who fought it. This was Hedges’ personal little war. The superintendent had simply fallen behind, caught in the dust of men like Hdeges, who would weld together from the junk pile of their careers the army of the future. For the sake of the country, the superintendent hoped it would run.

  When Slaight had finished the story of the murder of David Hand and the elaborate cover-up which followed, Rylander stood, motioning for Slaight to follow. They walked through the outer office, into the hall, and climbed a set of stairs growing more and more narrow the higher they climbed. The superintendent pushed open a door, and they were outside, atop a small parapet, the roof of a tower dominating the Academic Building Headquarters.

  “This is where I come to do my thinking,” said the supe. “Like it?”

  Slaight looked around. You could see everything from up there … all the way down the Hudson to the Bear Mountain Bridge, upriver to Cold Spring, the cadet barracks, the Chapel, the Plain—everything.

  “You did the right thing, Slaight,” the superintendent said. “Don’t worry about an Aptitude Board or anything else. I’ll take care of everything before I go.”

  “Before you go, sir? You’re not going to take the fall for Hedges! Not after what I’ve told you!”

  “No. I’m not caving in on this Hedges business. They already have some young buck picked to replace me next month. I’ve known about it for some time. He’s a big Vietnam hero, biggest hero they’ve got right now. Commands something called the American Division. Racked up the biggest body count in the war. They’re bringing him here, so you cadets can see what a real Vietnam hero looks like up close. He’ll be cracked up to look like Christ in a green beret when he arrives for the change-of-command.”

  “I didn’t know anything about that, sir.”

  “Neither did Hedges, apparently, or he wouldn’t have bothered with this damn-fool scheme to pin the cover-up of that murder on me. Hedg
es. He’s one to watch. He’s going places.”

  “You’re not going to nail him, sir? For what he did? He committed at least three felony violations of military law that I know of.”

  “Nail Hedges? With him down there on the staff of the OEP? If I tried that, the White House would get involved, and the whole business would come out. We can’t allow that to happen. Not to the academy.”

  Slaight stood atop the parapet watching the Hudson go by. The supe wouldn’t go down in flames, but he’d go quietly, just so the academy wouldn’t get hurt, so the good name of the academy wouldn’t be dragged through the mud. The academy. Jesus.

  “What are you going to do now, son?” The supe looked at him. The cold November wind ruffled the lapel of his uniform jacket. “This army needs men like you, Slaight. What you did here—it took guts. We need your kind.”

  “What I did had nothing to do with guts, sir.”

  The superintendent looked at the cadet, studied his face. The boy’s eyes were empty pools of hatred and fear. He’d gone too far, too fast. He’d paid for it. He’d seen the look before.

  “What am I going to do, sir? I want out. I’ve had enough. The academy will never be the same for me, sir. Not after this. You can do what you want to protect the good name of West Point, sir, but I’m not so damn sure there’s anything left worth protecting any more.”

  The superintendent stared across the Hudson, his back to the cadet.

  “You’re not going to … go public … with all the information you’ve got? If you give it to the newspapers, they’ll use it against us. They’ll smear us. The army’s got enough trouble with the demonstrators and the war and everybody against us. Don’t give them this.”

  Slaight thought fast. He’d learned his lesson. He’d paid his dues. The time had come for him to be the one making the deal. He held all the cards.

  “I won’t go public with this stuff on Hedges and Beatty and Thompson and David Hand if you get me out of here free and clear, sir. I want to be discharged from the service. I don’t want to graduate from West Point. I don’t want to be an army officer. And I don’t want to go the resignation route. I’d have to serve four years as an enlisted man that way, sir, and they’d get me. You know they would.

  The superintendent studied the cadet. He was right. Even if Slaight graduated and was commissioned a second lieutenant, Hedges and his crew would figure a way to get him. Hell. When you set out to get the superintendent of the United States Military Academy, the life of a second lieutenant is small potatoes indeed.

  “All right. I’ll take care of it. But give me a few days. It’s going to take me awhile to get the paper work through without tipping off Beatty or Hedges, any of their allies.”

  “In the meantime, sir, I want to go on leave. I’m finished with West Point. Finished.”

  “Done. I’ll sign the leave papers myself. Now. About your files …”

  “You can take my file box, sir. It’s yours. But I must tell you I’m keeping copies of everything for my own protection. You’ll have to take my word that I won’t give them to the newspapers.”

  “I’ll accept that.”

  The superintendent and the cadet walked down the stairs from the tower. Slaight picked up his short overcoat and hat, heading back to the barracks. It was almost 10:30. The guys in the company would be back from class.

  They were waiting in his room when he got there, Lugar and Buck and Towne and even Bloomingburg.

  All the guys who knew what was happening. Kip, the company honor representative, walked in. They had their class shirts off. Somebody put a Buck Owens record on. Out in the hallway, plebes could be heard delivering the mail, collecting the laundry. Somebody called one of them a dullard, and there was a resounding crack as the plebe snapped his heels together and hit the wall. Another plebe spouted the menu for lunch: meat loaf, lima beans, mashed potatoes, sir. Things were returning to normal.

  The guys said it was all over the Corps that morning about Hedges and Thompson leaving on special orders. Even Grimshaw and Regimental Commander King were gone, back to the Big Red One in Nam. Their departures were greeted with typical cadet enthusiasm. Having Grimshaw and King out of the way was a “good deal.”

  Slaight told the guys in his room about meeting with the superintendent. He told him how Hedges had tried to pin the cover-up on the supe, how the supe figured Hedges had been out for his job. He told them everything. Then he said he was leaving. No one spoke. Leroy Buck picked up the Times, turning to the financial pages. Lugar pulled his Brown Boy around his shoulders. It was like they expected Slaight to announce he was resigning, and if they waited long enough, the notion would pass—he’d forget it, pick up a book, and they’d all settle back into being firsties again.

  The whole room looked up in unison when First Captain Pete Locke walked in and broke the silence.

  “The supe tells me you’re resigning, Slaight. I’ve just come from his office. He told me everything. Listen, man. You can’t do that. You can’t resign now. Not after everything that’s happened. We need you, Slaight. You’re like a symbol that the … ah … system works. You know?”

  “Yeah,” said Slaight. “I know what you mean.”

  “I’ve got real problems with our classmates over in the Fourth Regiment. I’ve been told you know about them.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well? You gonna stay? Those guys over there look up to you, Slaight. Guys you don’t even know. They’ve been watching you—watching to see what happened to you. And these guys, the guys in your company. Your Mends. This thing is bigger than you, especially now.”

  “Yeah.” It was John Lugar. He was standing, facing Slaight. “If you leave now, it’s like … it’s like saying they beat you, Slaight. It’s like giving up. You won, man. Don’t you see that? You’ve got to stay. What good is everything that happened to you, that happened to us, man, if you take a walk?”

  Slaight was sitting behind his desk, toying with a row of pencils, moving one over the other in hopscotch fashion, avoiding the eyes around him. Leroy Buck put aside the Times, flipping a lock of blond hair out of his eyes. The motion of his head caught Slaight’s attention.

  “Slaight, you fuckstick. Look around this here room.” Buck’s southern accent wanned the air. He pointed soundlessly to the file cabinets and stacks of poop-sheets and magazines and newspapers. The room was truly a headquarters, Slaight its natural commander. The presence of the first captain, Pete Locke, was testimony to that.

  “You just gonna up and leave this shit, Slaight? You lazy, no-good-for-nothin’ dimbo. Dontcha see there’s still shit to do? C’mon, man. You leave now, and ole Hedges won. He said he’d see your ass out of here, and leavin’ like this … goddamn-goddamn … you’re lettin’ him win, Slaight. You can’t do that.”

  Slaight looked around the room. They were all watching him, and they were right. He was copping out. He was a leader, a natural-born leader. The day he decided to get to the bottom of the David Hand case, he had created an issue. It was like he’d held aloft a guidon, and they had followed him. Now that he’d gotten to the bottom of it, he was telling them something else, a secret he’d kept from them and from himself the whole time. Without saying it aloud, he was hinting at his ambivalence about his ability to lead. He was afraid of it at the same time it turned him on. The death of David Hand had caused him to catch a glimpse of his strength, his inbred ability to wield power. For a long time, he had derived an enormous satisfaction from his ability to influence others. He thought he knew most of its components, all of its dimensions. He’d tested himself. But now he knew something about his abilities he hadn’t known before, and he knew he had to tell his friends about it. He didn’t know what to say, where to begin.

  “The thing was never winning or losing, Buck. Not really. The thing was … Jesus … to test the system. Did the fuckin’ system work? It was part of playing the game, Leroy. Thing was, we decided to play the game right to the hilt. We took the system at its word. We
played by their rules. Hell, you play by their rules the day you walk in here and drop your fuckin’ bags when the man tells you to drop ‘em.”

  “What the fuck does dropping your goddamn bags have to do with the price of eggs?” asked Buck angrily.

  “Gimmie a break, man. What I’m sayin’ is, we accepted the terms. So you’ve got to measure the results in their terms. Did the system work? Yeah. Hedges is gone. Thompson is gone. Grimshaw is gone. They’re all fuckin’ gone. They never got me, man. I’m leaving, but I’m leaving on my terms. I made the deal. You understand that? I’m keeping my mouth shut, and the supe is fixing it so I’m discharged from the army. It’s my decision, and my deal. Nobody is forcing me.”

  “So what?” Lugar was on his feet. “You wouldn’t make a deal with Hedges, but now you’re making a deal with the supe. What’s the fuckin’ difference, Slaight? Ends up the same, no matter who makes the deal. The whole thing is hushed up. Nobody’ll ever know what happened. You’re full of shit, Slaight. You just saw a good deal, and you took it.” Lugar was mad as hell, and his face blazed more red than his hair.

  “Hey, fuck you, Lugar. You wanna blow the whistle on Hedges and the rest of them? Go ahead. You guys know everything I know, including you, Locke. You guys could call the New York Times. Any one of you. You don’t need me to put Hedges up against the wall. You got your own minds to make up about that. I’m not going to help you.” No one spoke. Slaight was challenging them, and his voice had a tired, angry edge on it.

  “Okay, Ry. You made your point.” It was Kip, the honor rep. “But what about the point Lugar raised? To me, it makes a difference, who makes the deal, and what the deal is.” Kip’s calm voice eased the tension in the room.