A Midnight Clear: A Novel

by William Wharton

  “Listen, Hunt. I could kill you now; you know it. With these witnesses, I’d get off with ten years at most. I’d miss the war.”

  Mother’s humped himself down so he can talk into Hunt’s ear. Five seconds go by, five blank seconds.

  “Hunt, you don’t deserve to live; you’re the scum of this earth. I can’t think of anything to stop me.”

  It seems forever with just the hard breathing; Hunt tries to struggle once more but Mother puts pressure on and he stops.

  “Do you want to live, Hunt? If you do, kick your left foot on the floor.”

  We watch. The foot lifts, kicks the floor.

  “To live you need to do just three things. First, apologize about my wife; next, leave me alone from now on.”

  We wait. Mother pauses for breath.

  “And now, you go to the orderly room. In half an hour I’ll be there for my pass. You understand?”

  Mother’s been putting on more pressure as he talks. Hunt’s face is purple again, his eyes watering, his fingers digging into Mother’s arm. A thin line of blood is oozing from his nose. His foot lifts and kicks hard against the floor three, four times.

  Mother lets go and stands up. Hunt doesn’t move. Nobody goes to help him. Mother stands over him shaking, the buttons torn from his shirtfront, his whole uniform soaked through with sweat. He stares down at Hunt several seconds, then turns away and lies out on his bunk.

  Finally, Hunt sits up. He wipes his nose with the back of his hand and looks at the blood. Then he turns over on his hands and knees; he vomits. He struggles slowly to his feet, bent forward, his arms splattered with the vomit. He looks around. His voice is a harsh whisper.

  “He jumped me from the back, you guys saw it.”

  Nobody says anything. The smell of vomit is beginning to spread. It’s early May and warm. It could go any way from here.

  “Listen, you bastards, I apologize for what I said about Wilkins’s wife.”

  Still nobody says anything. Hunt staggers toward the door. Corrollo opens it and Hunt walks down the stairs out of the barracks.

  We’re all in a state of shock. Mother sits up on his bunk, removes his sweaty clothes. He goes down and showers. When he comes back, he dresses slowly and takes out his sewing kit. He sews back the buttons that got torn off, then hangs his sweat-soaked suntans on a hanger. We’re half expecting a troop of MPs to come charging into the barracks but Wilkins doesn’t seem excited at all. His face is still red and his glass frames are slightly bent so they sit on his face wrong, crooked; one side half an inch higher than the other.

  Without saying anything to anybody, he picks up his overnight bag from the bunk where it’s been all this time and goes down the stairs.

  He never would tell what happened in the orderly room but that was it. Until we shipped out, Hunt never bothered him, and Wilkins had his weekend passes right to the end.

  A week after the Olsheim crossroads, Mother got the letter from his wife about the baby. We didn’t even know she was pregnant. Mother told Father Mundy the baby was born dead, but he still hasn’t said anything to the rest of us.

  After that, Mother’s seemed to lose the delusion of his immortality. I think that’s what it is, anyway. Without it, nobody could do the things we all do.

  It must be fifteen minutes later when the phone rings again. It’s Shutzer.

  “Won’t, what’s the chance of there being wolves around here?”

  “I don’t know, Stan, could be. These are real forests, the kind Little Red Riding Hood walked through.”

  “Mundy thinks they’re owls. Can you hear them down there?”

  “Haven’t heard a thing; I’ve been half asleep and not listening.”

  “Hot pistols! There they go again! Did you hear them that time?”

  “Nothing here. Where they coming from?”

  “Sounds like up on the hill behind us and then across the hills on the other side. It’s hard to tell, like echoes or they’re talking to each other.”

  “Let me call Gordon.”

  Soon as I put the phone down, it rings.

  “Suckin’ ants, Wont! We’ve got Indians or something down here. Mother thinks it’s Germans signaling back and forth. I can’t figure it!”

  “Hold on, Mel, I’ll be right down!”

  I hang up, shake Miller.

  “Bud, there’s something funny going on out there: voices or animal noises. I’m going down to the bridge; you sit on the phone. Call Shutzer and tell him what’s up. Then call Gordon and Wilkins, remind them not to shoot me.”

  “OK. Probably only some animal; must be all kinds of night hunting going on in a forest like this.”

  “I hope so.”

  I pick up grenades and bandoliers. I take two extra grenades from the box. It’s too dark for much shooting. I edge down along the side of the road where I ran our wire; they challenge me at about ten yards. I hurry and lean against the wall with them. They’re tense; we whisper.

  “Hear anything more?”

  “Not since the last one.”

  We wait there in the dark; maybe five minutes. Then it comes. It does sound like an Indian, a bad imitation of an Indian imitating a wolf. But it’s human all right; I begin to get scared. Wilkins looks at me.

  “Closer that time!”

  We wait in the dark some more. I’m trying to decide if it’s better for Wilkins, Gordon and me to stay together, or spread out. I decide we’ll stick it here. This is not so much a decision as what I want to do anyway. I pick up the phone and call Miller.

  “Bud, you stay there on the phone.”

  “Sure, what’s up?”

  “I think we’ve got a German patrol sneaking around us!”

  “Jesus! OK, I’ll ring Shutzer and Mundy again. Anything else?”

  “Yeah, tell them to be careful, but keep us covered and make sure nobody sneaks up behind them.”

  “Right.”

  “And, Bud, if anybody comes charging into the chateau, give up, surrender. Got it?”

  “Sure, yes, sir, just end the ever-lovin’ war.”

  “That’s it. No nonsense, no blue-eyed Aryan poetic hero stuff.”

  I don’t hang up. There’s only more quiet. I take off my helmet to hear better. We wait, silent, tense, another five minutes; then there’s some caterwauling up on the hill. It’s almost like laughing, a hyena laugh, or the mad mechanical laugh from the fun house at a carnival. Then, not a minute later, we hear a voice close on the other side of the road.

  “Heh, ami!”

  We freeze. I look out the corners of my eyes but can’t see anything. Next, there’s another voice about thirty yards to the right.

  “Heh, ami! Schnapps? Zig-zig?”

  There’s the distinct sound of hard laughing. We wait. I take off a grenade, pull the pin and hold down the handle. I expect every minute something’s going to come in on us, most likely one of those masher grenades. They’ve got to know just about where we are; we should’ve spread out.

  There’s nothing I can think to do. I switch the lock off the M1 with my left thumb; Gordon and Wilkins unlock, too; makes an awful racket in the quiet. The phone is still off the hook, exhaling into the night. But if I hang up, Miller is liable to ring us, so I leave it. My legs have started their own private dance and my whole body’s vibrating.

  “Ami! Schlaf gut, ja!”

  This comes from the same place; then I think I hear movement but still can’t see anything. We wait some more in the dark; there’s the crashing of brush going uphill and away. Miller’s whistling over the phone trying to get us. I pick it up and stoop close.

  “Miller?!”

  “Hey, what’s going on? I’ve been trying to get you!”

  “Anything happening up top?”

  “Nothing.”

  “They’ve been talking to us down here.”

  “Holy bells!”

  “I’ll call in ten minutes. Don’t call here.”

  “Right.”

  I ease the phone
back on its hook. I’ve been holding the grenade in my right hand with the pin and ring on a finger of my left. I work the pin back through its handle and let up lightly till it catches. It holds fine. I’m shivering so I could easily just have dropped the damned thing. We squat there, crouched, waiting, ready to run, ready to shoot, not ready to die. After another five-minute year, I motion Gordon close.

  “Mel, you go left and I’ll go right. We’ll close in on the other side of the road. I’m fairly sure they took off but we’d better make sure. Wilkins, you cover us. Whatever we do, let’s not shoot each other.”

  Gordon edges along our wall to the other side of the bridge; I slink along to where it curves. I wait till Gordon starts across the road, then we sprint over at the same time. Nothing happens. We slowly, noisily, close in through the trees till we see each other; no grenade traps, nothing. We wave, then both dash back across the road and jump down the bank beside Wilkins. We’re out of breath, more from fear than anything. Mother looks at me.

  “Nothing out there now, Vance, and I’m not exactly complaining.”

  “Yeah, I watched you both all the way; nothing moved, I could see.”

  I pick up the phone and crank.

  “Bud, everything OK here; think they took off. How’re things on the hill?”

  “Mundy says somebody up behind them was laughing and they could hear what Shutzer claims is Kraut talk, but that’s all.”

  “It’s enough. But they’re OK?”

  “Sure, I just talked to them.”

  “It’s quarter to ten; tell those guys you’ll be up there in about ten minutes. I think we’ve had our show for the night.”

  “You mean I don’t get to end the war?”

  “Not this time.”

  I hang up. We look at each other. Somehow, now it seems halfway funny; at least we’re smiling.

  “Mel, I’m going inside to get warm again and I’ll be right back. If anything else happens, call. Keep me covered on the way up that hill.”

  There’re flakes of snow coming down as I start trudging up to the chateau. I was so busy being scared I didn’t notice the beginnings. The ground’s hard and the snow isn’t melting when it lands. When I come in, Miller’s heating water in both our canteen cups. He’s also heating some for Gordon and Mundy. We break in a couple Nescafe packets and sugar, then sit on the beds watching our fire. The damned fire’s eating wood like mad. The phone rings and my heart jumps. It’s Shutzer from the upper hole.

  “Hey, Won’t, what the hell’s been going on down there?”

  “Stan, I think maybe the German Army is cracking up. There’s some good news for you.”

  “Miller says they were talking to you. What’d they actually say?”

  “First it was ‘Hey, ami,’ and ‘schnapps and zig-zig’; everything prisoners say except ‘Kamerad.’ Then it sounded as if they were threatening us; something like ‘slap good.’ That’s what they said just before they left.”

  “Say that again!?”

  “Maybe it was ‘slaf good,’ didn’t make sense.”

  “Hey, Won’t. That’s Yiddish! My grandmother always said it when we went to bed. It’s ‘Schlaf gut,’ means ‘Sleep well.’”

  “Wait a minute, Shutzer. Are you telling me all this creeping around in the cold, scared, with snow coming down, was only some crazy sauerkraut slurpers making a bed check? I’ll tell you, Stan, if that’s it, they’ve been in this cockeyed war too long.”

  “I’ll bet that’s what it was, though, Won’t. I’ll bet pickles to bagels that’s just what it was. Lousy, hot shit Nazis laughing at us, softening us up for the kill.”

  At five before ten, I slide down to the bridge and Miller goes up the hill. The snow’s getting thick. They challenge me just where I told them to. Gordon starts up trying not to slip on the snow-covered pine needles. We’re all slightly punch drunk.

  Wilkins and I sit quietly watching the snow fall. There’s something relaxing about the constancy of snow coming down. Could be all the good memories of sledding and ice-skating when I was a kid. God, somewhere inside, I’m still a kid; what happened? One day I was seventeen and in high school, then suddenly I’m nineteen and here.

  “What do you think this is all about, Wont? It sounded as if there were more of them than there are of us. What if they make some kind of charge? We wouldn’t have a chance.”

  “I don’t think anybody’s going to charge anybody, Mother. They were probably only trying to find out if we’re here and how many of us there are. They saw our smoke and checked us out, that’s all.”

  To keep Mother’s mind off what’s going on, I ask him to help make up some new bridge hands. Here we are, two hands down by the bridge making bridge hands. We’ll need to stock up for the fanatics. When they’re nervous or bored, they play more than usual. They’ll probably even start with PANTRANT again; that’s Shutzer’s screwball game of “dictionary,” only without a dictionary. The scoring on that one’s gotten so complicated you need a mathematical wizard or a Monroe calculator to know who’s winning.

  I pull my sets of once played bridge deals from my pocket. There are seven. The most aged, the vintage deal, is only five days old. I might be able to slip that one in on them but I need new hands. I keep the bidding, contract and results from the first play; also, who was North-South, East-West. They sign and date the card they’ve played. It’s a regular four-dimensional merry-go-round. I’m half squad leader, half bookkeeper.

  So Mother and I stand in the snow leaning against the wall, writing in the dark on my little bits from tab edges of K ration boxes. Shutzer once traded off a German bayonet to one of the typists in personnel for some three-by-five cards but they were mostly used up before we lost the decks on Morrie. Shutzer even got a pack of rubber bands in the trade. I use those to keep each deal separate; I also use them to keep my drawings together. Shutzer’s our best squad trader and negotiator as well as squad “Why We Fight” cheerleader. Maybe I can get him to work up a trade for the P38 pistol I took from an SS officer at Metz; maybe a pack of typing paper. I can work tears up thinking of crisp white bond paper.

  Mother is absolutely diabolical when he concocts hands. He says it’s like writing a mystery story; you start with what you know is the right ending, knowing who’s the murderer and who the victims are, then work backwards, throwing in as many false leads and confusing directions as possible. Mother’s idea for the consummate deal is for both sides to feel cocksure of a cold slam but with in-built boobytraps guaranteeing failure either way.

  I keep peeking around as he figures out his complicated maneuvers. I’m mostly only writing down what Wilkins tells me. I can assure Mel I’m not thinking; my mind is a blank. I’m not much at bridge but I know enough to recognize these deals Mother’s coming up with could turn any serious bridge player into a staggering paranoid. Who’d believe holding all forty points with four-four fit and going down fourteen hundred points? There’ve been times when I’ve been convinced Miller, Shutzer or Gordon was going to murder Wilkins. Father never gets that excited about things. I think all he wants to do is get through the games without making any serious mistakes. The only comment I’ve ever heard him make was one time he said that if the devil could play God for a while, it would be like Wilkins making up bridge hands.

  Shutzer spends hours trying to teach Mundy the subtle art of bidding. Gordon and Miller are convinced Shutzer’s training Mundy in inflected bidding and is desecrating our only holy one by turning him into a bridge cheater, a dastardly type, destined for the lowest level of the inferno.

  Wilkins doesn’t want to play because he says he can’t forget a hand once it’s played, no matter how many days or games are stuck between. At first, everybody laughed, but now they’re convinced. They like having Wilkins play because he’s so good, but he and his partner, even if it’s Mundy or me, will always win the second time around. Mother claims he can’t help himself; he tries to forget but can’t. For him a bridge hand is like a face, something you reme
mber as a sort of gestalt, without any real effort to memorize cards or plays. Bud is sure Mother’s an idiot savant of some kind. Idiot he isn’t by any count, savant yes.

  I call in regularly as the first two hours pass. Wilkins comes up with four deals to ruin their lives. We’re liable to roll out of this château with true idiots, blithering idiots, slobbering at the mouth, muttering “Chinese finesse” or “Yarborough.” It could happen; you can only push the human mind so far.

  Toward the end, Mother is deeply cold. He’s so thin, as well as tall, that despite all the bits of cut-up blanket he has wrapped around his chest or pinned to the inside of his pants, or wrapped around his head and neck under his helmet, he gets miserable. I hate to think what’ll happen when the winter really comes on; after all, it isn’t even Christmas yet.

  We still don’t talk about what happened on the hill two days ago. I’m not going to mention it unless he wants to.

  A quarter hour before Wilkins’s time is up, Father Mundy comes clumping down the hill. He tramps along as if he’s walking across a golf course following a tee shot. He has his head tucked in and doesn’t look up; he forgets to stop and give the password. But he’s there and he’s there early; there’s nothing you can say against Mundy. Mother looks at Mundy’s watch.

  “Come on, Paul, I still have almost fifteen minutes.”

  “I got tired listening to Gordon snore. He makes more noise than a screaming meemie! Maybe we should aim him at the Germans and destroy them by sound waves. He could be the squad’s private secret weapon. Go on up and you’ll hear what I mean, Vance. But put your fingers in your ears as you go through the door or you’ll wind up with broken eardrums.”

  Wilkins stamps his feet and shakes off some of the snow. I tuck away the cards we’ve been working on.

  “You’re sure it’s OK? You’ll take over now?”

  “Sure, just plug your ears. I’m fine.”

  “Thanks. I’m about frozen.”