The Winston Affair

by Howard Fast

  “It doesn’t go far,” the sergeant explained, pointing to the shadowy bulk of a warehouse about a hundred yards away, “but one can’t trundle it through this rain. Are you looking for anyone, Captain?”

  “Your CO. I’m afraid I don’t know his name.”

  “No CO here, Captain. I’m in command at the station, for the time being. We only have eleven personnel here now. The only commissioned officer is Major Kensington, but he’s not attached. He’s medical officer for eight stations on the narrow gauge and for the airstrip as well. It just happens that he’s here today because Thursday’s our day for clinic.”

  “Where can I find him, Sergeant?”

  “He’s at the medic shack. Why don’t you hop into the back of the lorry, Captain, and I’ll drop you there. I’d ask you to ride in the cab, but that means at least ten steps through this rain.”

  “I’ll ride in back.” Adams grinned. “Thank you, Sergeant.”

  In front of a small bungalow, the sergeant stopped and leaned on his horn. Adams made the veranda in three long steps, and faced a short, gray-haired man with an enormous mustache and quizzical blue eyes.

  “Major Kensington?”

  “You have the advantage of me, sir.”

  “Barney Adams,” he said, trying to dry his face with a handkerchief.

  “Welcome to Bachree. I’ll bring you a towel, and then we’ll go inside.” He was back in a moment. Drying his face and hands, Adams followed Kensington into a tiny cubicle that was office and consulting room.

  As he sat down, Kensington said, “Don’t mind your clothes on the chair. Anything around here that water can harm has already been harmed. Tea or gin, Captain?”

  “Tea, if you don’t mind. And I’ll take a rain check on the gin.”

  “Good. Rain check. I like that, Adams.” Kensington went to the door and shouted to someone to bring tea and buns and jam. Then he offered Adams a cigarette and thoughtfully lit it for him.

  “The few comforts of Bachree. There are, unquestionably, more wretched places on earth—for whatever consolation that holds. May I ask what brings you to Bachree, Adams?”

  “I’ve been appointed defense counsel for Charles Winston.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yesterday, as a matter of fact. I have a limited amount of time to prepare my case.”

  “It’s a thankless task you chose for yourself, if I may say so.”

  “I didn’t choose it.”

  “No—no, of course not. We don’t exercise much choice about anything these days. But what can I do for you?”

  “I’m not sure. But since you were the officer who sent Winston down to the NP Ward in the General Hospital, I thought I would talk to you. I understand that I’m fortunate to find you here.”

  “I hope it’s worth the trip and the wetting. I don’t know what I can tell you that isn’t already in the record.”

  The tea was brought in, thick and dark. Adams had his plain, but Kensington loaded his with condensed milk from an open can, explaining, “I think it’s the rain gives me such a sweet tooth. I’ll leave half my teeth here for sure. Have a bun.” He was already digging into the jam pot.

  “About the murder itself,” Adams began. “Are there any possible doubts? Is it conceivable that Winston is innocent?”

  “No. You can rule that out completely, Adams. Not only were there witnesses, but Winston was found with the gun in his hand. From the moment he was found, he made no attempt to deny the crime.”

  “You weren’t here when it happened?”

  “No—not when it happened. I was at Sutta, about twelve miles up the line. They rang me there, and I ran down by jeep. It took me about forty-five minutes because the road is very bad.”

  “About what happened that night, as much as you know. Would you mind telling me? I know you’ve gone through this before, but I would appreciate it.”

  “Don’t mind a bit,” Kensington said. “I was set for a bleak and ugly day here. Fresh company’s an unexpected treat. Take the two men to begin with—Winston, the murderer; Quinn, his victim. I won’t say I got to know them; to me, they were not men one would particularly want to know or be intimate with. But I did get to observe them.

  “You know—a more unlikely pair of pals would be hard to find. Quinn’s background was the Liverpool docks. He was tough and brutal, and he looked the part. Young man in his twenties. Weighed better than fourteen stone. When Sergeant Quinn spoke, the enlisted men around here stepped lively. Not a bright fellow. I don’t mean background. I’ve seen some damned fine minds out of the same background. Not Quinn.”

  “You say they were friends—he and Winston?”

  “Call it that. They were together a great deal, and they seemed to get something out of each other—” He paused to stuff a short black pipe and light it. “Damn it, Captain, I’m no psychiatrist. Not even Harley Street. I’m a general practitioner who left an excellent if trying practice in Soho because I had certain notions about this war. But if you want my opinion for whatever it’s worth, their relationship was homosexual.”

  “Do you mean—” Adams began.

  “No, no—not at all. We really have the most primitive notions of what constitutes homosexuality. I don’t think there was anything physical about this. I don’t believe either of them could have coped with the thought or even understood their motivations. Don’t forget that Winston was twice Quinn’s age. Tall, skinny, depressed type. Overbearing one moment, cringing the next. Mistrustful, suspicious, and not overly bright.”

  “You don’t paint a pretty picture,” Adams said.

  “No indeed. Murder is ugly and terrible, Adams. Murderers are not pleasant or attractive people. Winston was not attractive, not at all. For one thing, he drank too much—and drunk, he was even less winning. He managed to have plenty of liquor on hand. It seems you American chaps leave such loose ends alone. And he used the liquor to get Quinn. They drank together a good deal. Heaven knows, I don’t blame them for that. Evenings in Bachree are hardly inspiring. Winston was a sallow type—this climate is the very devil for the liver—and I warned him about jaundice. But such types don’t worry about physical disability. They exist in a foggy haze of immortality.”

  “Do you mean that literally, Major?”

  “Well—again, I am not the man for a proper diagnosis. I believe Winston is insane. I believe he’s paranoid. But that is only what I think—” He lit his pipe, which had gone out.

  “Were they drinking the night it happened?”

  “Oh, yes. Whoever is CO here at Bachree uses a little office over the goods depot—the warehouse, which is the only reason for any personnel being here at all. They were drinking there for about two hours, and as I managed to piece it together from what little Winston could explain, Quinn was ragging him on his manliness. You know, taunts about impotence and that sort of thing—I can imagine how Quinn enjoyed seeing the poor devil whine and twist. Quinn cast doubts about the parentage of Winston’s children, and that would strike home.”

  “Could you say when they started to drink and when they finished?”

  “Only what I heard later—you understand, Adams? I was not here at the time. But it seems they began to drink shortly before ten. At about midnight, Quinn staggered into his barracks. He woke Sergeant Johnson, the man who met you at the station. Johnson shared a cubicle with Quinn, and the two of them were separated from the other men by a semipartition. The barracks has a door at each end. You can go directly into Quinn’s section or into the other section. When Quinn awakened Johnson, Johnson noticed the time. He helped Quinn, who was quite drunk, to get his shoes off. Then they both went to sleep.

  “An hour or so later, Johnson was awakened by the sound of a man swearing hysterically.”

  “Swearing?”

  “Cursing. Screaming the curses.” That’s how Johnson described it. Johnson switched on the light by his bed, and there was Winston standing over Quinn, holding his revolver at Quinn’s head, and cursing him. Before Joh
nson could gather his wits, Winston began to shoot. His first bullet killed Quinn—took him directly in the face. Three other bullets entered his body. Winston emptied his revolver—two bullets went wild. Before he finished shooting, there were men in the doorway to the main part of the barracks. So you see there were sufficient witnesses.”

  “Did they take Winston then?”

  “No, he held the gun on them and backed out into the night. Men waked out of sleep don’t count shots. They didn’t know the gun was empty. Johnson sent one of the men to telephone me. Then they dressed and went to look for Winston. Just before I arrived, they found him in the goods depot, but they waited outside until I had examined Quinn. Of course, there was nothing I could do for him. I went over to the depot then. All of the men were outside waiting for me—your men and ours. It’s to their credit that they worked very well together.”

  “There was no antagonism?” Adams asked curiously.

  “Oh, no. There had been friction. Saints would snap at each other, holed up in a place like this. But this night, they all worked together and took their orders from Sergeant Johnson. They seemed to share a sense of tragedy—tragedy beyond the fact that two wretched men had destroyed each other.”

  “Did Winston resist?”

  “No. No, he didn’t. I went into the goods depot alone—not because I’m a brave man. I assure you, I am not. But a physician carries a shaky kind of immunity with him, and I was also quite certain that I was in no danger. I felt that I knew what had happened—and that Winston’s play of violence was over. I was right. Winston was sitting on a box. The gun had fallen to the floor. His hands hung by his sides, and his eyes were open and staring blankly at nothing at all.”

  “Did he recognize you, Major?”

  “Not at first. But after I spoke to him several times, he began to answer.”

  “What did he say?”

  “At first—only, Hello, Major Kensington.”

  “Did you ask him what had happened?”

  “I tried and kept trying. I got only fragments—the bits about the drinking session.”

  “Did he know that he had killed Quinn?”

  “No. He didn’t remember that.”

  “You’re certain?”

  “Quite certain.” Now the major turned his head and looked out of the window. “Rain’s over,” he said. “Are you sure you won’t have a bit of gin, Adams? A man can’t drink alone at this hour of the day, and I want a drink.”

  “I think I do, too,” Adams said.

  Kensington took a bottle and two shot glasses out of the desk. They swallowed the gin neat. Outside, the ground steamed in murky yellow sunlight. Kensington looked at Adams thoughtfully.

  “It’s none of my business, I suppose, but what made you come out here to Bachree?”

  “I thought I made that clear.”

  “Did you?”

  “I thought so.”

  “I don’t know. There’s nothing here or anywhere else that could change the fact.”

  “What fact? That Winston is a murderer?”

  “No. That he must die,” Kensington said.

  “He is going to be tried.”

  “Oh, my eye, Adams. You’re no fool, and I’m not the worst judge of men. You are by no means the tintype you make yourself out to be.”

  “Thank you, Major.”

  “Now don’t go and take all kinds of umbrage over that. I bore with you very patiently. I’m isolated here, Adams, but not so isolated that I don’t know what a cause célèbre this Winston business has become. I read a few things, and the jungle is no barrier to gossip. As a matter of fact, I get the Times. A bit late, but I get it. Whitehall and Washington have both washed their hands of Winston. He’ll be hanged as a symbol of unity.”

  “And then all will be well, Major?”

  “All is never well.”

  “No, I suppose not. Why are you so certain that Winston is insane? Because he murdered Quinn? Couldn’t he have had more good and sane reasons to murder Quinn than you and I would have to shoot down a Jap if he should walk out into that clearing?”

  “That’s an old philosophical approach, Adams—old and well-worn.”

  “I am not trying to be original or clever. I am trying to understand something that is very difficult for me to understand.”

  “Why? You still haven’t told me what brings you here.”

  “Wouldn’t it be easier for you to tell me how you know Winston is insane?”

  “All right,” Kensington agreed. “I’ll play the game your way, Captain Adams. I suspected Winston for a paranoiac before the murder happened. Twice he cornered me and talked to me at great length. You see, he knew why he had been sent here.”

  “He knew?”

  “I talk of his own subjectivity. He believed that there was a great international plot, and that he was the nexus of it. He believed that his own talent was such that he should have held a general rank—and that, holding such, he could end the war within weeks through a solution of every logistical problem. He had a theory that logistics was the key to the victory. But the plot woven around him had degraded him to a permanent rank of second lieutenant.”

  “He believed that? He actually believed it?”

  “Why are you so surprised, Adams? We all have our pet areas of unreason. He made it sound quite logical.”

  “And who did he think was in this plot?”

  “According to Winston, a great many were in it in one way or another. But at the center of it—international Jewry, the Elders of Zion, the whole kit and kaboodle of Nazi filth.”

  “That makes no sense at all,” Adams said hopelessly.

  “No. Of course not. The man is insane.”

  “But he couldn’t have put it that way. He must have realized that you would not sympathize with his delusions.”

  “Adams, your paranoiac shapes the outside world to fit his own purpose. He didn’t put it to me that way. Of course not. His wheedling and whining was to help him get out of Bachree—so that he could go about winning the war. He let drop this and that, and I put it together.”

  “And yet you took no action?”

  “For heaven’s sake, Adams, what action was there to take? I’m a British medic. I can’t go interfering with you fellows, and even if I were so minded, how do you go about accusing someone of insanity? Do we live in a world that enshrines sanity? I have my hands full maintaining my own sanity in this place.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “If you are thinking that I could have prevented Quinn’s death, you’re wrong.”

  “I wasn’t thinking that. You couldn’t have prevented it.”

  “You won’t join me in another glass of gin?”

  “Thank you, no.”

  Kensington poured himself a drink. Adams sat and stated through the window. Now that the rain had stopped, the temperature in the room was rising. He wiped his brow and noticed a mist of perspiration on Kensington’s face.

  “The rain has a cooling effect. When the sun comes out, it feels hotter than it is. The contrast, you know.”

  Adams nodded.

  “Not a very nice picture of your client—”

  “No.”

  “Well, take it with a grain of salt. I just didn’t like the man. What are your own impressions?”

  “I haven’t seen him yet,” Adams said.

  “Oh?”

  “I wanted to know him a little before I met him.”

  “I see. You take this quite seriously, don’t you?”

  “As seriously as I would take the life or death of any human being put into my hands.”

  “But his life or death isn’t in your hands at all, Adams. He is going to hang. There is nothing on earth that you can do to stop that or to change it. In this case, the decision has already been made—and by very powerful people, if I may say so. Why can’t you accept that and go through the formality of a defense?”

  “Would you, sir?”

  Kensington hesitated before he answer
ed. “I deserve that. A physician is apt to forget about personal reservations. I’m a good deal older than you, Adams. It’s easier for me to indulge a formality.”

  “That’s an evasion.”

  “How the devil do I know what I would do in your place, Adams? Is this world so well ordered? Look around you at this happy land. It stinks of death! We’re at war. Every day thousands of young men die—strong, alert young men, full of hope and love and vitality. Do you want me to weep and wax philosophical over one twisted, distorted and wretched human being? A confessed murderer. A mind warped with hatred and fear. A personality diseased and damaged beyond hope of repair. Do you doubt for a moment that Winston deserves to die?”

  “I don’t know who deserves to die,” Adams answered slowly.

  “Now look, Adams,” Kensington said, marking his words with his pipe. “I am not a soldier. I am a physician, and for the big brass I have neither love nor admiration. But this war must be won. Even out here in this stinking backwash of jungle, that remains the central focus of my life. I console myself with the wee bit I contribute, and with the thought that this theater is a sort of pivot. In this pivot, my people and your people do not get along well. There is bad feeling. The Winston affair has brought that feeling to a head. If Winston’s death can shorten this war even by moments, it becomes the only positive fact of his life.”

  “How do you know?” Adams asked sadly.

  “Know? Know what?”

  “That his death would be the only positive fact of his life?”

  Kensington stared at him, angrily at first—then uneasily. Then the major rose and stalked over to a window.

  “You’ll want some lunch before your train,” Kensington said. “I suppose you’ll want to look about for a bit.” He didn’t turn around.

  “I want something else, sir.”

  “What else?”

  “I want you to testify at the court-martial.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I feel that your testimony is pertinent.”

  “I don’t feel that it is pertinent or of any importance.”

  “You will have to let me decide that, Major.”

  “You have Winston’s confession. Sergeant Johnson has been called by the prosecution.”