Winkie

by Clifford Chase

  Why should Ruth get her wish, and never Marie?

  Even so, the bear couldn’t help but see how extraordinary it was—a violin for Ruth. The bear felt a sharp pain behind the eyes. How could she begrudge the miracle? Against the odds, Ruth had known what she wanted, she had persevered, and she had gotten it.

  “I may?” said Ruth meekly. She didn’t leap up or hug her father, knowing he didn’t like that sort of thing. She only looked up at him with not too much excitement.

  Marie marveled at this timid little girl’s canny resilience. Marie had to admit it served Ruth well. This house was like a maze, and somehow the girl kept finding her way through it.

  Papa spoke of when they would buy the violin, how they would find Ruth a teacher. Already he was backing out of the room, as if he’d overstayed his allotted time. On his way out he warned that supper was nearly ready.

  “I’ll just finish reading one more verse,” Ruth said.

  She and Marie were left alone. The rain of goodness had subsided. Ruth didn’t seem to know what to do. She picked Marie up and hugged her tightly; Marie was scarcely less angry but she squeaked anyway, she couldn’t help it, and Ruth, in her happiness, mimicked her: “Eehkth.”

  In Ruth’s arms Marie was neither yielding nor resisting. Nor was Winkie, in the arms of memory. Though Ruth’s childhood would continue for some time, that evening his own had come to an end. For Marie had realized then that she hadn’t pitched from Ruth’s lap on her own power. She remained only what she was. Would she always? She felt Ruth’s tears soak through her blouse. Soon she would acquire new illusions, but for now she was free of them. She wasn’t such a bad bear as to forsake her duties—to listen, to comfort, to cuddle. As Ruth squeezed her tighter, Marie squeaked once more. Over the girl’s shoulder, in the narrow window, she could see the summer evening light between the leaves. It was her first look at such light, yellow gold behind a lattice of green. So many summers to come, and each would bring back this first one, of sloping ceiling and narrow window, of having and losing at the same time, of eyes wide-open in a hug.

  Prisoner Winkie

  The plain sedan screeched short in front of a large, windowless building with a square white roof like the lid of a shoebox. “OK, miss, let’s go now, c’mon, c’mon, let’s go, let’s go, miss, come on,” said the two agents, though Winkie offered no resistance as they threw open the back door, yanked him out of the car, and pulled him forward so quickly that his two legs dangled above the ground.

  Weee, thought the bear angrily.

  Inside, it reeked of disinfectant. The agents exchanged gruff hellos with two jailers sitting at a desk behind a thick window—“Al.” “Joe.” “Mike.” “Mary Sue.” Everyone seemed to know one another. They spoke in fragments and finished one another’s sentences. “The two two seven?” “Yep.” “Area—?” “B. Sure.” “You need the—?” “Yeah. Thanks.” Above their heads a big plain round clock read exactly 4:00, seeming to define this particular world—as if the jail and the jailers could only exist at this precise moment in the middle of the night.

  The little bear was dragged swiftly down numerous concrete-block hallways and buzzed through numerous gates and doors, arriving finally at a large white room where a row of greenish video monitors displayed still more concrete hallways lined with barred cells or solid doors. The same terse hellos had been exchanged along the way, and now again with the two hefty jailers standing at a large console full of buttons and more screens as if they were piloting a spaceship. “Bill.” “Cindy.” “Mike.” “Mary Sue.” Winkie had thus deduced the useless information that Mike and Mary Sue were the names of his two agents. “Two two sev—” “Yep.” “B?” “Thanks.”

  A button was pushed, there was the same sharp buzzing sound, and Agent Mary Sue shoved Winkie into a small side room. Before he could even turn to see her go, the door shut behind him with a loud click, and the bear was alone. He turned to the good-sized window expecting to look out at the monitors and guards in the central chamber, but instead beheld only himself in a dim mirror, handcuffed and bewildered, still in his hospital gown. He watched himself sigh.

  At 9 A.M. the next morning, in a federal courthouse nearby, the judge, a large, round man in black robes, was handed a list of attorneys available to serve as counsel to the indigent defendant Miss Winkie. He began to read:

  Bane

  Chafe

  Choke

  Fear

  Fink

  Flamer

  Guilloton

  Lies

  Monstrosky …

  The judge stroked his chin. “Hm. Curious …” He looked up at the small, neat clerk who had brought him the list, but she said nothing. She was definitely prettier than any of his own assistants. He asked, “You’re new here, aren’t you?”

  The clerk shrugged. The judge continued reading:

  Murk

  Rattle

  Roach

  Sleeper

  Slutsky

  Smagula

  Snakey …

  He turned the paper over but there was nothing on the other side. “These aren’t exactly the county’s most successful attorneys,” he said musingly. “Murk, for instance—I don’t believe he’s practiced in several years now.”

  The clerk rolled her eyes. “Sir, these are the names.”

  Her pert, blond ponytail twitched with every word, and the judge felt suddenly very, very tired. He sighed. Three deputy attorneys general had called that morning to remind him that this was the kind of high-profile case that could end a judicial career. He was tired of his career. He said to himself now, as lately he had taken to saying to himself many times a day, to soothe himself, Sometimes ya just can’t win. And his weary eyes settled on a name near the bottom of the list.

  “Unwin?” he said, tentatively.

  The clerk nodded. “That would be Charles Unwin the Fourth, Esquire,” she said, snatching the list out of his hand. “Of Unwin, Grimble, and Slyz. I’ll contact him immediately.”

  The white concrete walls were nearly soundproof, but sometimes Winkie could hear snickering or swearing on the other side of the door.

  “… disgusting …,” he thought he heard someone say, maybe Agent Mary Sue.

  Despite the haste with which they had brought him here, the authorities now left him in the small room for hours at a time. The little bear began to worry about Françoise—where they had taken her, whether she, too, was in jail simply for her kindness to him. He doubted any of his captors would tell him, even if he had the chance to ask. Sometimes it sounded like someone was about to come in, but then nothing happened. Winkie fell into a fitful doze. He dreamed of Ruth and of her five children, each of whom was a playing card in the bear’s hand. Ruth sat across from him, intent on her own cards. Half waking, knowing he’d spoil the game by doing so, Winkie placed each one faceup on the felt table—Carol, Helen, Paul, Ken, and Cliff. It was the end of the game now; there were no more chances to be drawn or played. “That was Ruth’s family,” he murmured sadly, waking a little more. It was as if he had summed up every finality both before and since, including and especially the hopes and losses of the forest, which hadn’t even figured in the dream.

  The door of the cell clicked open and a plump female jailer entered, complaining to Agent Mike that the jail had no clothing on hand that would fit a traitor and murderer as puny as this one, and that something had to be specially ordered, which took most of the goddamn day and which the little piece of shit didn’t deserve. “Put it on!” she shouted, throwing a set of gray baby clothes at the bear. The outfit fell from his grasp to the floor. “Pick it up!” she shouted now.

  It seemed to take an excruciatingly long time for him to remove his hospital gown and pull on the little T-shirt and pants, and indeed Agent Mike grumbled, “Christ—finally,” when Winkie was done. Glancing down at the baby outfit, the bear didn’t think he could be any more humiliated than this. A row of figures was stenciled on the front.

  “That’
s yer number,” said the jailer, enunciating angrily as if the suspect might not understand, or might pretend not to understand, these simple words. “From now on. Don’t forgit it.”

  Then she and Agent Mike dragged the bear down yet another long hallway to be photographed and fingerprinted. Shoved up against the white wall marked with heights, waiting for the camera to be ready, Winkie cleared his throat, getting up the courage to ask about Françoise—

  “Shut up and smile!” Mike yelled, and then came the flash.

  The spots in Winkie’s eyes must have looked like dapples of sunlight, because as he stood there blinking, he was suddenly overtaken by a forest memory, one as complete and unbidden as a dream. Together, he and his cub descended into a shady bowl of ferns, between which a stream swished and gurgled. The little one let out a sigh of pleasure at the prospect of a drink. “Ye-e-s,” Winkie crooned, as he did every day; for they came here every day, and every day she sighed halfway down the hill, first as he carried her and now as they walked side by side between the new, bright green fronds. “And after?” Winkie asked next, like always, meaning after their drink, and the toddler answered, like always, “Violins,” her playful name for fiddleheads, because Winkie had once carefully explained to her that a fiddle was a violin. Then the two of them chuckled, as they did each day at her jest, because of course the little cub had never seen either a fiddle or a violin, and probably never would see one, not here, deep in the woods—

  “Hey!” Mike hollered, tugging Winkie’s chain. “Move your fuzzy fuckass back to the holding area.”

  * * *

  The slight man in a baggy gray suit was very nervous and spoke so quickly that the bear could scarcely understand him. “Hello, Miss Winkie, it’s very late, we don’t have much time, my name is Charles Unwin, I will be your court-appointed attorney, since I understand you are unable to afford one, nice to meet you, too, and let me tell you, I had a devil of a time getting in to see you today, oh, they had all kinds of excuses, first one and then another, and the assistant DAs were all laughing at me behind my back, I know they were, they always do, why would they stop now—but anyway, ahem, that’s all in the past now, and I’m sure you and I will get along fine.” Abruptly he sat down, opened a file folder, and became absorbed for several minutes in its many pieces of paper full of typewritten words, nodding to himself and grunting. After a few minutes Winkie cleared his throat once again to ask about Françoise, but the lawyer held up his hand, frowning severely and shutting his eyes as if being interrupted were the most painful thing to him in the world. He continued reading for several more minutes. Then, without even looking up, he began again just as quickly as before: “It took some doing, and really I don’t know how I did it, ha-ha, but I managed to get the FBI to declassify at least some of the charges against you—as you can see”—he lifted the stack of papers and set them down again—“though my request for bail has been denied, so that’s definitely out—but of course you already know that, otherwise we wouldn’t be sitting here right now at the county jail, we’d be in my office, or a coffee shop or something, wouldn’t we?” Unwin’s cheeks turned a blotchy pink and he began rapidly shuffling first one and then another piece of paper to the front of the file folder. “I finally did also manage—again, I don’t know how, but I did, though it took all day, and that’s why we have so little time, which is unfortunate—but in any case I did finally manage to get in here to see you today, oh yes, I already said that, and anyway of course you can see me sitting right here in front of you now, so you know that I succeeded in getting in to see you, ha-ha, so, um, so, uh, so …” His face now bloomed a heated raspberry shade to the tips of his ears, his watery eyes darted from one corner of the little room to another, and his voice seemed about to give out. “As I was saying, ahem, the crimes you’re accused of, as I’m sure you know, um, as I’m sure you’re aware, are very grave—very grave indeed”—though the redness in his face began to die down, Unwin’s eyes continued darting here and there, so that the bear didn’t know where to look—“and indeed there are so many charges, they go on and on, page after page after page, that honestly I can scarcely make heads or tails of them—I mean, of course I can make sense of them, I mean, that’s my job—so, so, so, so, so—oh yes—so, at this time I must tell you, Miss Winkie—now, defendants never want to hear this, and I’m never any good at telling them—oh well, what can you do?—at this juncture I must prepare you—now, don’t shoot the messenger, and don’t take this personally—I take everything personally, but you shouldn’t—again, it’s not that I’m saying you necessarily will get the death penalty, it’s only one of many possible outcomes, but you must consider that, especially given public opinion at this time—and let me tell you, right now the name Winkie is about synonymous with ‘radioactive dog shit floating in toxic—’”

  Just then something on one of the closely typed papers caught Unwin’s skittering eye and he started reading again, paging forward, then back, and as Winkie watched, all trace of distress departed as if by magic from the man’s otherwise haggard face so that he appeared almost boyish, his straight graying hair falling in front of his eyes. “Now this … Now this …,” Unwin muttered, shaking his index finger in an imaginary courtroom. Then he was silent again, shuffling the papers quickly and reading with the greatest speed and absorption, so that Winkie breathed easier and after several minutes began to stumble into another busy, dreamfilled sleep …

  “So there’s always hope, right?” said Unwin suddenly, quickly gathering his things. “That’s what you have to tell yourself, over and over, don’t worry, don’t worry, don’t worry, don’t worry, just tell yourself that, and yes, by God, one way or another, I don’t know how, I never know how, but some way, somehow, I will get you out of this!”

  Winkie was glad that Mr. Unwin was feeling better, but he still needed to ask his one question. “Where …?” he attempted to say and found his voice unwilling. He cleared his throat and tried again, but still nothing. The lawyer was about to leave. Grasping his ballpoint, Winkie scrawled across the Formica table: “WHERE IS FRANÇOISE?”

  “Mr. Winkie, what are you doing, you’re defacing public property, please give that back—”

  The bear began pointing vigorously at the name of his friend.

  “Françoise? Who’s Françoise?” said Unwin. “I don’t know anything about a Françoise.” He waved one hand in the air.

  “THE HOSPITAL,” the bear wrote now.

  Unwin remained puzzled for a moment but suddenly brightened. “Oh, you mean your accomplice.”

  Winkie didn’t bother to correct this but simply handed back the ballpoint.

  “Miss, Miss, Miss—let’s see—yes, yes, yes, Miss Fouad, Miss Françoise Fouad,” the lawyer muttered, paging through a thick folder. “Or Faoud. They have it both ways.” He squinted at one of the papers, then flipped back to another. “Aiding and abetting … Accessory after the fact … Yes, it appears she remains in custody as well. OK?”

  Unwin was more than ready to go now, but Winkie looked stricken.

  “Don’t worry!” said Unwin, hastily patting the bear’s shoulder and heading toward the door. Winkie didn’t know what to think or feel. “OK, well—” He knocked three times, the door opened, and Unwin disappeared down the hall, calling back over his shoulder, “Now, I mean it!”

  In another grim room, on another floor, Françoise sat before the chief detective. She had been questioned several times over the past two days, to no avail, so the chief had decided to interrogate her personally.

  Chief detective: The thread that was used to sew up Miss Winkie’s wounds is the same as the thread in your sewing kit. An exact match. Indisputable. There’s no use denying it.

  Françoise Fouad: As I have already said again and again, yes, I mended him. And I want a lawyer.

  “Him”? Who do you mean? You “mended” another terrorist as well? Where and when was that?

  No, I mended only the little bear. He is a boy, and I already to
ld you that, too.

  (Laughs condescendingly) OK, have it your way, so who told you to “mend” “him”?

  No one. I heard him moaning, and I wanted to—

  Who trained you in the use of a needle and thread to treat battlefield wounds?

  (Sighing) He is a stuffed animal.

  So that’s your story. That’s still your story.

  It isn’t a story. He is a teddy bear!

  Some teddy bear. Who told you to say that?

  No one.

  So that’s your story.

  (Sighing again) My story is that it is not a story.

  Don’t get smart. OK. Sure. And this “stuffed bear” can walk, and talk, and blow things up?

  I do not believe he blows things up, but yes, he can walk and talk.

  And how do you explain that?

  I cannot explain that.

  How many other stuffed bears can walk and talk?

  (Pause) Mother Nature is mysterious.

  We’ll get to your extremist beliefs in a moment. You’re a lesbian?

  Yes.

  It’s OK, you can admit it.

  I have already said several times that I am queer.

  (Yells) Queer enough to have sex with a twelve-inch terrorist?

  What?

  We know for a fact that the two of you had sex, that Miss Winkie seduced you, and that’s how you were drawn into this conspiracy. That’s how she drew everyone in. It wasn’t your fault. If only you would tell us the truth, we could help you.

  I told you he is a boy, and I like girls, and besides, he is a stuffed animal.

  To each his own.

  (Silence.)

  Doesn’t Islam forbid such things?

  Forbid what?

  Sex with one-foot-tall freaks!

  (Sighs) Sir, I am an agnostic and a feminist, and though I do still believe in many of the precepts of Islam, I do not believe in restrictions on sex between men, women, or, as you say, freaks.

  That’s convenient. So lesbian sex with terrorists is OK for agnostics?

  I am telling you that we did not have sex, and he is not a terrorist. He is a good bear, and he is my friend. Not that having sex is bad—