Harold and Maude

by Colin Higgins

  They walked along the reservoir and sat on a small hill beneath a tree. No one was about, and the general began telling Harold some of his wartime experiences.

  “They came at me from all sides. Hundreds of ’em. We kept firing. Zat-tat-tat-tat! ‘Throw the grenades,’ I shouted. ‘Mac, throw the grenades!’ ‘He’s dead,’ Joe said, and kept right on feeding me the bullets. Zat-tattat-tat! They kept falling, but they kept coming. Bullets whizzing all around me. Zot! Joe falls back with a neat red hole in his head. I thought I was done for. But I kept firing. Zat-tat-tat-tat! Only one thought kept me going. Kill! Kill! For Joe and Mac and the rest of the guys. Kill!—a blinding flash. I wake up on a stretcher. ‘Did we hold?’ I asked the medic. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said, and I slipped into unconsciousness.”

  “Gee! That’s a great story, sir.”

  “Well, you’ll soon have stories like that to tell of your own.”

  “You think so, sir?”

  “Sure. You’ll be able to tell your children. Something for them to look up to. Be proud of.”

  “I hope so, sir. Golly, I never knew it could be so exciting.”

  “It’s the greatest excitement in the world.”

  Harold sat up and mulled it over. “To pit your own life against another,” he said pensively.

  “That’s right.”

  “To kill.”

  “Yes, indeed.”

  “The taste of blood in your mouth.”

  “The moment of truth.”

  Harold took hold of an imaginary rifle and aimed it at an imaginary enemy. “Another man’s life in your sights.”

  “Yes.”

  He pulled the trigger. “Zap!”

  Uncle Victor laughed.

  “Will they really teach me to shoot?” Harold demanded.

  “Oh, sure,” said Uncle Victor. “A variety of weapons.”

  “And to use the bayonet? AHHHHHH!”

  “Oh, sure.”

  “How about hand-to-hand combat?”

  “You’ll have plenty of that.”

  Harold grappled with an imaginary victim and began to kill him. “To strangle someone. Choke him. Slowly. Squeeze out his life between your hands.”

  Uncle Victor looked at Harold and became slightly perturbed.

  “Eh?” he said.

  “How about to slit his throat?”

  “Well, I don’t …”

  “I’d like that. You could see the blood squirt out.”

  “Harold. I think you’re getting carried away here.”

  “Sir, how about souvenirs?”

  “Souvenirs?”

  Harold sprang to his knees. “Of your kill. You know—ears, nose, scalp. Privates.”

  “Harold!”

  “What’s the chances of getting one of these?” he asked, and pulled out a shrunken head. “Wow! To think maybe I could make my own.”

  “Harold!” cried Uncle Victor. “That’s disgusting!”

  “It certainly is!” said Maude.

  Harold and the general stopped talking and looked up. Maude stood over them, her goose-head umbrella in one hand and a large peace sign in the other.

  “Who are you?” asked Uncle Victor, standing up.

  “I am petitioning for peace, and I came over here—”

  “Parasite!” shouted Harold, jumping up and thrusting his fist in Maude’s face. “Parasite!”

  “Harold, control yourself,” said Uncle Victor.

  “Commie bastard!” cried Harold. “Get out of here!”

  “Don’t you talk to me like that, you little foulmouth degenerate,” said Maude. “Really, General, I thought you at least—”

  “Traitor!” shouted Harold. “Benedict Arnold! Remember Nathan Hale, right, sir?”

  “Don’t you advance on me!” Maude shouted.

  “We’ll nail every last one of you! You’re all going to end up like this!” And he held up the shrunken head.

  “Filth! Filth!” cried Maude.

  “Lady, please,” said Uncle Victor. “Harold—”

  “Just like this,” said Harold, shaking the shrunken head in Maude’s face.

  “Give me that!” she cried, and grabbed it out of his hand. “I’m going to throw this in the sewer where it belongs.” She turned and ran off toward the reservoir.

  “She took my head,” said Harold, dumbfounded.

  “Stay where you are,” ordered the general.

  “She took my head!” screamed Harold. He picked up Maude’s fallen peace sign and ran after her. “I’ll kill her!” he screamed.

  “Harold, come back! Harold, that’s an order.” The general followed him in hot pursuit.

  Maude ran past the sign saying “Danger—No Trespassing!” and under the fence that led to the dam. Harold followed her, wielding the peace sign like a club. The general, totally unnerved, ran after them.

  Scampering out along the edge of the dam, Maude stopped in the middle and held the shrunken head out over the rushing water below.

  “Don’t you dare!” cried Harold, catching up with her and grabbing her arm. Maude clobbered him with her umbrella, and when the general arrived she clobbered him too.

  “Lady, please,” cried Uncle Victor, trying to restrain Harold with his one arm. “Give him back the head.”

  “I’ll kill her,” shouted Harold. “I’ll kill her!”

  “Keep away from me, you twisted little pervert!” screamed Maude.

  The general wrenched the peace sign from Harold and threw it over the dam. They paused for a moment to see it disappear in the treacherous water below. Maude stood on the general’s right, holding the shrunken head. With a quick move, Harold pulled the general’s lanyard which activated his mechanical salute. The sleeve sprung out and clipped Maude under the chin, knocking her over the dam and into the churning waters. The general, horrified, watched her go under. He waited anxiously, but she did not come up.

  Still with his sleeve held at salute, he looked up. He couldn’t believe what he’d seen. He turned to Harold for some reason for this calamity—some motive, some explanation.

  “I lost my head,” said Harold sadly, and watched the water flow rapidly downstream.

  BACK AT HEADQUARTERS General Ball sat at his desk. “You can get rid of the Chasen file,” he said to his adjutant. “My nephew is not going in the Army.”

  “Shall I put it back in Top Secret, sir?”

  “No need to, Rodgers. Send it back through regular channels and have it certified medically unfit for active duty.”

  “Anything specific, sir?”

  “Use your own judgment, lieutenant. But, confidentially—the boy is an idiot. A homicidal maniac. He belongs in a mental institution.”

  “Yes, sir. Here’s the latest body count, sir.”

  “I shudder to think, Rodgers, what would happen to the Army if we allow it to become a refuge for killers.”

  TWO SKELETONS, hung on two doors, jingled their bones and laughed uproariously. The doors burst open and Harold and Maude went scuttling by in a small cart that drew up by a sign marked “Exit.” An attendant helped them out of the cart, and they walked down the steps to the promenade.

  “Well, so much for the Haunted House,” said Harold. “It wasn’t very scary.”

  “No,” said Maude. “It had nothing on this afternoon.”

  “Oh, you weren’t scared.”

  “Scared? Swimming underwater with that oxygen device of yours? I was petrified.”

  “Go on, you loved it.”

  “Well, of course, it was a new experience.”

  They both laughed. Harold bought tickets for the Ferris wheel, and they were helped to their seat and locked in.

  “Off we go!” said Maude, as they sailed above the carnival lights and up into the night sky. “Isn’t this fun? I used to ride the Prater wheel all the time.”

  “Too bad you lost your umbrella in the reservoir,” said Harold.

  “Oh, well,” said Maude. “It served its purpose. That’s all you can ask of any
thing—or anybody.”

  “Your plan certainly served its purpose. If you could have seen my uncle’s face.” Harold laughed. “The Army won’t want me now.”

  Maude laughed too. “Well, the Army was all right in its day,” she said. “Like the Church. Together they protected us from the bad guys on the one hand and the devil on the other. But—as everything will—the foe has changed. We have met the enemy and he is us. So we’ll just have to sit down now and reason out some better solutions than defenses with weapons and dogmas.”

  “Do you think we’ll succeed?”

  “Oh, certainly. Keep the faith! The way I see it we’re now in the cocoon. The day of the caterpillar is over. The time of the butterfly is at hand.”

  “Oh, we’ve stopped,” said Harold.

  “And right at the top. What fun!”

  “Look at the people down on the pier. They seem so small. Maude! Wait! What are you doing?”

  “Just rocking the boat,” cried Maude, wildly swinging the seat.

  Harold was very relieved when they stepped off the Ferris wheel and went into the penny arcade.

  They played the pinball machines and tested their grips. But it was the hand-operated soccer game that gave them the most fun.

  Maude right away got into the football spirit. She cheered her team on enthusiastically and manipulated her men to kick goal after goal.

  Fifteen minutes later a crowd had gathered around her. A short Italian man played with her against a couple wearing matching Hawaiian shirts. The crowd cheered on every play and slapped each other on the back whenever a goal was scored.

  Harold stole away and put a penny in a machine that stamped out letters on a metal disk. As he marked the letters and pulled the lever, he listened to the cheering and smiled.

  “You sure have a way with people,” he said as they left the amusement park and walked along the pier.

  “Well,” said Maude, “they’re my species.”

  Harold bought two candy apples, and they sat out on the end of the pier to eat them.

  “Look!” said Harold, pointing. “A shooting star!”

  “I saw it,” said Maude. “My, my. There’s always an oddball, even in the firmament.”

  Harold looked up at the stars. “They’re beautiful, aren’t they?”

  “Yes. They’re old friends. I used to watch them in Bavaria. They can be very … comforting.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Well, for example, I used to look up and think that light traveling from a distant star would take over a million years to reach us. In a million years Nature evolved the wing of a bird. So, maybe by the time that light reaches us, mankind will have learned to deal with evil. Maybe he will have phased it out altogether, and we’ll all be flying around … like angels.”

  Harold smiled. “You should have been a poet.”

  “Oh, no!” cried Maude. “But I should have liked to be an astronaut. A private astronaut, able to just go out and explore the unknown. Like the men who sailed with Magellan. I want to see if we really can fall off the edge of the world.”

  She laughed. “What a joke it will be,” she said, making a large circle with her candy apple, “if, like them, I end up where I began.”

  “Maude,” said Harold.

  “Yes.”

  “I have a present for you.” And he handed her the metal disk.

  “Oh, Harold! How nice.” She read the inscription out loud. “‘Harold loves Maude.’”

  Harold, somewhat embarrassed, turned and looked out to sea. Maude touched his arm, and he turned around.

  “And Maude loves Harold,” she said softly.

  He smiled, and Maude gave a happy laugh.

  “Oh, my!” she said. “This is the nicest present I’ve received in years.” She kissed it and tossed it into the ocean. Harold watched it go in disbelief.

  “But …” he said.

  “Now,” explained Maude, “I’ll always know where it is.”

  Harold swallowed. “Okay,” he said, and smiled.

  “Come on,” said Maude. “Let’s try the roller coaster.”

  And hand in hand they walked back along the pier to the dazzle of the carnival on the boardwalk.

  BACK AT HER PLACE, Harold lit a fire while Maude prepared her chrysanthemum cordial in the kitchen (a pound of chrysanthemums, water, sugar, lemon peel, nutmeg, and a pint of quality brandy).

  “It’s delicious,” said Harold.

  “Oh, I love cooking with flowers,” said Maude. “It’s so Shakespearean.”

  She turned on the radio in the bookcase. “I think there’s a Chopin concert on FM tonight. Yes. There we are.”

  The delicate sounds of a nocturne flowed out into the room.

  “Do you like Chopin, Harold?”

  “Very much.”

  Maude sat on the piano stool and sipped her cordial. “So do I,” she said. “So do I.”

  Harold walked over to her and leaned on the piano. He looked at the empty frames.

  “Why are there no photographs in these frames?” he asked.

  “I took them out.”

  “Why did you do that?”

  “They mocked me. They were representations of people I dearly loved, yet they knew these people were gradually fading from me and that, in time, all I would have left would be vague feelings—but sharp photographs. So I tossed them out. My memory fades, I know. But I prefer pictures made by me, with feeling, and not by Kodak with silver nitrate.”

  Harold smiled. “I’ll never forget you, Maude,” he said. “But I would like a photograph of you.”

  Maude laughed. “Well, let me see.”

  She put down her glass and went into the bedroom. By the closet with the musical instruments stood an old sea chest.

  “Bring over the candelabra,” said Maude, kneeling down, “and we’ll get some light on this. How’s the banjo coming?”

  “Just fine,” said Harold, taking the branched candlestick from the bedside and bringing it over to Maude. “I’m going to surprise you tomorrow night.”

  “My, my.” She chuckled, opening the chest. “It’s going to be quite a birthday celebration. I’m certainly looking forward to it.”

  She shuffled through old papers, bundles of letters, and well-worn manila envelopes. “It’s in here somewhere,” she said.

  “These candles smell nice,” said Harold, standing over her. “What is that incense? Sandalwood?”

  “Yak musk,” said Maude. “But I don’t think they call it that commercially. It’s ‘Fragrance of the Himalayas,’ or something. ‘The Dalai Lama’s Delight.’ I suppose that’s nicer.”

  “It’s more romantic.”

  “Pay dirt!” cried Maude, holding up a large envelope and closing the trunk. “I think it’s in here.”

  She got up and sat on the canopied bed. Harold put down the candelabra and sat beside her. She opened the envelope. “Yes. Here it is,” she said. “My American visa.”

  She peeled the photograph off the document and handed it to Harold. “On short notice, this is the best I can do.”

  “Thank you.” He held it up. “Very pretty. It looks just like you.”

  Maude smiled. “Harold, that picture is almost twenty-five years old.”

  “You haven’t changed a bit. I’ll keep it in my wallet.”

  He opened his wallet and out fell a picture of a sunflower, clipped from a dealer’s catalogue. He quickly retrieved it and turned away from Maude.

  “You’re not supposed to see that,” he said, putting it back in his wallet. “It’s another part of tomorrow night’s surprise.”

  He closed his wallet and turned back to Maude.

  “Maude,” he said. “You’re crying.”

  Maude held the visa in her hand. “I was remembering how much this meant to me,” she said slowly. “It was after the war—I had nothing—except my life. How different I was then. And yet how much the same.”

  Harold was perplexed. “But … you’ve never cried befor
e. I never thought you would. I thought you could always be happy.”

  “Oh, Harold.” She sighed, stroking his hair. “You are so young. What have they taught you?” She brushed away the tears that fell down her cheeks. “Yes. I cry. I cry for you. I cry for this. I cry at beauty—a sunset or a seagull. I cry when a man tortures his brother … when he repents and begs forgiveness … when forgiveness is refused … and when it is granted. One laughs. One cries. Two uniquely human traits. And the main thing in life, my dear Harold, is not to be afraid to be human.”

  Harold blinked away the tears in his eyes. He had a lump in his throat. He swallowed. Reaching out, he took her hand in his. Then, gently touching her cheeks, he brushed away her tears.

  She smiled slightly, and he leaned forward and kissed her on the lips.

  Parting, they looked at each other in the candlelight. They heard the Chopin playing softly in the next room. Leaning forward, Harold took her face in his hands and kissed her again. Her arms embraced him tenderly. As effortlessly as two raindrops merge, they fell back together on the canopied bed.

  HAROLD AWOKE the next morning to the crowing of a rooster—“Cock-a-doodle-doo!”

  He rubbed his eyes and yawned. He heard it again. Taking care not to wake Maude, he sat up in bed and looked out the window.

  Madame Arouet was feeding her chickens, and her rooster, perched on a fence post, was greeting the new day.

  As Harold watched, the line of a song ran through his head:

  “A rooster crows to bravissimos,

  But the cuck-cuck-cuckoo …”

  He smiled and scratched his chest. He felt great. He stretched. He thought he’d like a cigarette. He looked back down at Maude.

  The morning sun shone on her white hair and threw a soft golden glow about her face. She slept like a child, he thought, serene and secure. He had never seen anything more beautiful.

  He snuggled down beside her and pulled up the covers. He laid his head in front of hers and waited for her to wake up.

  She opened her eyes. They were as clear and sparkling as a mountain stream.

  She smiled.

  “Good morning,” she said.

  “Happy birthday,” he said, and kissed her on the nose.

  MRS. CHASEN SAT in her bedroom, eating her breakfast and talking on the phone.