by Jeff High
John nodded. “So, I guess it’s safe to say that Luther’s not putting a selfie of you two on his Facebook page?”
“Strong insight as always, Professor.”
Again, we sat in silence. I thumped the pencil rhythmically. “Connie told me that Luther was highly decorated for combat valor in Vietnam.”
“Didn’t know that.”
“Apparently few people do. He’s kept it a secret. Speaking of which, John, what about you? You were around during the last of Vietnam. Did you serve in the military?”
“My draft number was three hundred fifty-eight. The Viet Cong would have to have taken Iowa before I got called up.”
“Well, I’m pretty sure Luther will use this incident today to add more fodder to his anti-Mennonite rhetoric.”
“Don’t know what to tell you, sport. Luther usually reports a pretty clean accounting of the facts, but he does seem to have it in for the boys in black.”
“Doesn’t make it right.”
“Doesn’t make it a big deal either. Look, people get stirred up for a little while, but it passes.”
“That may be so, but I wish I knew what’s behind Luther’s bitterness. It’s got something to do with Moon Lake and something from his past.”
“Why don’t you ask him?”
“I did the other night. He didn’t exactly say the words ‘Go to hell,’ but that’s a pretty close approximation.”
John grunted a short laugh. “Give it time. I’m sure you’ll figure it out. Meanwhile, anything else troubling you while you still have my undivided attention?”
“Everything seems out of kilter lately. The new vet, Karen Davidson, had her open house today. Nobody showed up. She was crushed. It’s just been one of those days.”
John stood, signaling his departure. “Take a drive. Clear your head. Or, on the other hand, you could go slap Luther around to your way of thinking. That might make you feel better.”
“A thoughtful recommendation. Thanks.”
“Take care, sawbones.”
He left and I sat brooding. Then I decided to take John’s advice. Maybe I just needed to rethink my approach. After locking the clinic door, I made my way toward High Street.
CHAPTER 24
A Hidden Eloquence
Unlike my last visit to Luther’s house, this one was not haunted by feelings of uncertainty or trepidation. I climbed the porch steps and pounded on his front door. After a short minute, it opened. Luther stood before me, wearing a face of shrewd curiosity and holding a glass of water.
“Bradford, you keep dropping by like this, people are going to think we’re an item.”
“I need a word with you, Luther.”
My hard, clipped words told him I wouldn’t back down. Still, he let a few awkward seconds pass before giving a slight nod and stepping aside.
The main hallway of the grand Victorian home was wide and stately. A large cased opening to the right led to a formal parlor with a pale marble fireplace, dark paneled walls, and towering windows. Luther motioned me in that direction. There was the musky odor of gathered time: air made stale from the smells of old rugs, aged leather books, and fireplace ash. Heavy window drapes had been pulled closed, leaving the room dimly lit. Only a few brilliant shafts of light shone through the slim openings along the edges. The ancient furniture was bulky and heavy, stiff, and inhospitable. Decades’ worth of old black-and-white photographs were neatly framed and stood in tight clusters atop every surface. A layer of dust rested upon everything.
Nevertheless, the room spoke of earlier money, of staid wealth from the past. I suspected Luther was still a man of considerable fortune but had grown miserly in his later years. He looked much the same as the room. In spite of his weathered frame, he was clean-shaven and wore a crisply starched open-collared shirt tucked into neatly pressed slacks. He carried himself in a loose, almost regal manner. He was surprisingly relaxed and sober. I sat in one of the large chairs as he took the couch opposite me.
“Luther, you’re looking rather stately and composed this afternoon,” I said. “I don’t think I’ve seen this version of you.”
He took a sip of water and answered casually, “Must be the Pilates.”
“No, really. You seem dressed for some special occasion and . . . drinking water, I notice.”
Luther set his glass on the coffee table. He crossed his legs at the knee and tugged on the crease of his slacks, pulling it straight. He spoke calmly, plainly. “Today was my mother’s birthday, Bradford. She abhorred drinking. So, in respect to her, I abstain for this one day.” He regarded me disdainfully. “You may giggle now.”
I lifted my hand in a gesture of accommodation. “Nope, nope, not at all. As good a reason as any. Sounds like you have fond memories of her.”
He paused. “This day holds many memories for me. July fifth was the day I shipped off to Fort Polk.” He let this thought sink in for a moment. “What’s on your mind, Doctor?”
“Luther, I was wondering if you could tell me what Vietnam was like.”
I expected some vile riposte from his acidic verbal arsenal, but instead he asked almost politely, “Why do you want to know?”
“I’m cochair of the fund-raiser to build the memorial statue for Watervalley’s soldiers killed in action. I’ve never served in the military, I’ve never been shot at in a hostile conflict, and I’ve never aimed a gun at someone and pulled the trigger. So I guess I’m trying to get a better appreciation of what that experience is like.” It was a thin excuse, but I was hoping it would be enough to get him to talk.
Luther drew in a long breath, his gaze studied, apprehensive, searching.
When he finally did speak, it was with surprising elegance and a careful choice of words. “I was born a child of the midcentury, a child of the victory years. So I grew up with the romance of stories about brave soldiers, and grand parades, and glorious purpose. My generation was consumed with the mystery of war. With the moral purity of childhood, we imagined ourselves heroes with our stick guns, fighting it out on the pretend battlefields of Bastogne, Monte Cassino, Iwo Jima. . . .”
He paused a moment. “At least, some of us did. Our fathers’ reluctance to talk about the war only heightened our fascination. The footlocker in the attic, with its uniforms and medals, was practically a secret shrine to my friends and me. We were intoxicated with naïve ideas about country and service. North Vietnam was never a threat to us as a nation. We knew that. But war in the abstract can cast a strong allure. Yet all that grand intent, that sense of righteous mission, turned out to be vaporous. Our disillusionment was inevitable. Surely, Bradford, you don’t need me to explain that.”
“I heard that you received a number of medals for valor in combat. Is that true?”
“There may be some truth to that. But it’s not a subject worth discussing.”
I nodded and changed direction. “What was the day-to-day like?”
Luther sipped his water and reflected before speaking. “Early on, a lot of guys threw themselves recklessly into the fight, and they were pretty quickly massacred. And those first few times you see a man half-blown apart and lying in those awkward positions of death, it sobers you, teaches you to be cautious, careful. Your days are spent in the stretch and sag of nerves, riding the crest and fall of frayed emotions. Oftentimes, due to fatigue and lack of sleep, our thoughts bordered on madness. Death sat beside us constantly. In the dark at night, we talked about food and women, the things we missed. But it seemed that most of the time was spent in fear and waiting, always waiting.”
Luther’s words flowed seamlessly, creating what felt like a grandly surreal moment. It occurred to me that his normally acidic tongue had cruelly overshadowed his incredible gift of expression. I prompted him further. “What were you waiting for?”
“To come home, of course. To return to things the way they were. To
summer evenings and people talking on their porches, to the sound of church bells on Sunday, to the faces we’d left behind. We thought about these things constantly, and we waited.”
“How many tours of duty did you serve?”
“Three.”
“So . . . you re-upped a couple of times?”
“That’s right.”
“Then I guess I’m confused. If you wanted to come home so badly, why did you keep going back?”
I did my best to pose the question innocently and could only hope he was not second-guessing me. He set his glass down again on the coffee table and rubbed his face. The game was up. I was about to catch the brunt of his venomous tongue. But instead, it seemed that memories, long ago relegated to the dark corners of his mind, began to slip through the cracks. He cocked his head to one side and spoke reflectively.
“Things change, Bradford. People change. The life I had before the war was never going to be the life I would have after the war. That life had died. The war changed everything. Lost youth and lost dreams—there was a whole generation of us from the sixties who were forever stained by the experience. So yeah, I stayed on till it finished. I met Claire in California, and after being gone for eight years, I finally decided it was time to come home.”
There was a pause in the conversation, and I felt uncomfortably conspicuous, as if my naked intent in asking these questions were becoming all too obvious. Fortunately, Luther broke the silence.
“After returning here, Claire and I were happy for a short period. I had sealed up the past, blotted out the old voices, the old life. But they still haunted me. I couldn’t sleep, and I began to take long walks at night. And slowly the old memories of my childhood simmered.”
“Luther, if you don’t mind my asking, what memories?”
He looked at me drily and snorted. “Actually, I do mind.”
I nodded and held up a hand of dismissal, communicating that it was none of my business. This seemed to satisfy something in Luther, and in that moment an odd understanding came between us. Luther twisted his mouth to the side in a gesture of resignation.
“Oh, what the hell, Bradford. There were other influences, other ideas in my childhood that defined me.”
“You mean living near the Mennonites?”
“Yes, living near the Mennonites.”
“How so?”
“We were all just children out in the country, several of the Mennonite kids and me. We were young, innocent, foolish. . . . We played together every day.”
“You’re talking about Eli Yoder?”
“Yeah. Eli and I are the same age. We were best friends when we were very young. We were in a world of our own, playing in the fields, swimming in the lake, hiding in the woods. My parents knew, but I’m not sure his did. It doesn’t matter now. All that ended.”
“What happened?”
“My father sold the farm and we moved to town. We became teenagers and saw each other less and less. I got drafted. Things happened.”
“I learned from Eli’s son, Jacob, that Eli did government service during the war. Is that what you were talking about the other night?”
A sly grin spread across Luther’s face. “So, Bradford, you did do your homework.” He looked down and again pulled at the crease in his slacks. “Yeah, he served at a government agricultural research facility working in their dairy, I believe.”
I thought for a moment about all that Jacob had told me. “So, I guess you knew his twin sister, Ellie?”
Luther looked at me sharply. He seemed to choose his words carefully. “Yes, we were all friends.”
“I understand she died of pneumonia?”
“Yes, she did,” Luther responded. “It was senseless. He didn’t get her to a hospital, and she died needlessly.”
“Yeah, I don’t understand that either. It would seem the situation just fell apart.”
Luther spoke with tired resignation. “Her death was quite tragic. It was a long time ago.”
He ran his finger around the rim of the water glass, lost in reflection. Eventually, he spoke without looking up. “Like I said, we were all friends.” Amusement spread across his face. “Ellie spent her entire time keeping Eli and me in line, declaring that she would need to spend half of her waking hours praying for us. She was the unblemished warden of all morality, as good and virtuous a person as I’ve ever known. That was why her death was so appalling.”
“So why did you and Eli have a falling-out?” It was the linchpin question, the one that I hoped would explain Luther’s bitterness.
“Because we finally realized we were different, Bradford. We saw things differently. The war. Everything.”
I nodded. “And Moon Lake was a casualty of all that?”
Luther let a long silence fill the room, after which he spoke in a dispirited, reflective voice. “Moon Lake belonged to my childhood. It belonged to another time.”
I wanted to probe deeper, but I knew that I had pushed Luther as far as I could. I changed subjects.
“So I guess you heard about the mishap this morning with Clayton Ross?”
“I did. What of it?”
“I’m wondering what you plan to do with the story.”
He shrugged. “Two men had a misunderstanding. One of them got slugged. Ultimately, no charges were filed. So what?”
“And you’re willing to let it go at that?”
“I leave something out?”
I was certain that Luther already knew the answer to this question. Despite Clayton’s ability to mask it, he had been intoxicated. But Clayton was a veteran of two tours in Afghanistan, and Warren was giving him a pass . . . this time. Luther seemed fine with that. And I guess, ultimately, I had to agree it was the right thing to do. It occurred to me that Clayton Ross had made sacrifices that I had not, had seen and done things that I had not. Perhaps he deserved some leeway.
“No, Luther. I don’t think you did.”
There was a tightening in his eyes that communicated our unspoken understanding. “So how bad was the Mennonite fellow hurt?”
“A few stitches and a black eye.”
Luther nodded thoughtfully. “‘The meek shall inherit the earth,’ Doctor.”
“Yeah . . . It doesn’t exactly say when, though, does it?”
He stiffened, slightly amused. “Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you just stole one of my lines.”
“Your sparkling personality is contagious, Luther.”
“By the way, Bradford. I found out some skinny on our new veterinarian.”
“What do you mean?”
“She did a little time in an army mental hospital a few years back, Beaumont Medical Center, Fort Bliss, Texas.”
“Luther, that’s private patient information. How did you come across it?”
“Relax. I still have a few old friends in the military, and I made some inquiries. We both know it’s not for publication. Just thought you might want to know.”
Karen’s past was neither Luther’s business nor mine, but admittedly, it was an interesting revelation. I didn’t pursue the matter further.
Luther rubbed his hands together and stood. “So I’m guessing we’re finished here. I assume you got what you came for?”
There were layers of subtlety in Luther’s remark. I couldn’t be sure if he was referring to Clayton Ross or if he had known all along that I wanted to pry into his past.
“Actually, Luther . . . no, I haven’t.”
He regarded me with a discerning curiosity. “So, what do you want?”
“A check. Your donation to the statue fund.”
A buried wit emerged and he nodded. “Well played, Bradford. Sit tight. I’ll get my checkbook.”
He disappeared down the central hallway. I stood and walked around the room, examining decades’ worth
of old black-and-white photographs. There were a few candid shots taken of fishing trips and mountain vacations, but most were formal in nature, including weddings, black-tie social events, and military portraits.
One photo in particular caught my eye. It was of a young woman, a teenager dressed in an evening gown. The style of the dress and the patina of the photograph gave me the impression that it was well over a half-century old, possibly from the forties. The girl in the picture had a compelling beauty, and I had the fleeting notion I had seen her before. I had just picked up the frame to study the photo closely, when Luther’s voice broke the silence just behind me.
“That was my mother, Evangeline, at her debutante ball.”
Somewhat startled and embarrassed, I set the frame down quickly, endeavoring to be careful to leave it standing properly. “She was an attractive woman.”
“She was eighteen, I believe. She married my father shortly after that. I was born in 1950.” Luther handed me the check. I put it in my pocket and thanked him, and he showed me to the door. Before exiting, I turned to him and extended my hand.
He looked at me and then at my outstretched arm. Then slowly, he extended his and we shook, exchanging solemn nods. I turned away, and he shut the door behind me.
The meeting with Luther had not been the confrontation I had expected. And while the conversation had shed some light on the origins of his dark nature, there remained unanswered questions as to what had soured his life. I understood how certain experiences could not be shared any more than they could be forgotten. But more than ever I was convinced that something in Luther’s past had poisoned him.
From what Connie had told me, Luther’s battle injuries had left him unable to have children of his own, and apparently adoption was never considered an option. The disillusionment of the war, the loss of one childhood friend, and the untimely death of another had been difficult chapters in his life. But collectively, these events seemed to fall short of explaining a lifetime of bitterness.
Although it wasn’t outwardly visible, Luther had a disfigured spirit. Something dark in his past had left him unable to see any possibility of a happy ending. Somewhere in the rice paddies of Vietnam Luther’s soul had died, leaving him consumed with some terrible regret.
