Marathon Man

by Goldman, William

  His father he had found, just like he’d told Biesenthal. And in the fifteen years since, whenever he really wanted to ruin himself a little he’d scream, “It’s your fault, your fault, if you’d taken the fucking wool paper in to him he never would have done it, you’d have been there in time, you could have kept him alive!”

  Except, even when he’d told Biesenthal the truth, he wasn’t telling the truth. Because he was ten and he could hear H.V. in his bedroom, staggering around, cursing, sometimes falling down, and he was frightened, afraid that if he went in, his own father would do something to him, hit him for interrupting, cause even more pain, a substance nobody needed any more of just then. Simply put, it came to this: If he had been less of a coward, his father wouldn’t have died.

  Doc had been at classes when the shot came. Doc was always around except for school, where he was a whiz, if you didn’t count chem class, which he hated. That was Doc’s first reaction when he got home and found H.V. dead and Babe hysterical. “It was chem class,” he kept saying. “I was gonna cut the goddamn thing. If I’d just cut the goddamn thing, I could have kept him alive.”

  It was almost, but not quite, funny, Doc railing how H.V.’s death was his fault while all the time Babe knew that was hot air, it was really his; the wool paper proved it. It would have made a terrific argument, once Babe got old enough to give Doc trouble verbally. Nothing was as much fun as a neat argument, two guys going at it, wham-wham, knocking each other’s points to smithereens. God they had had some great times, screaming at each other while Babe was losing in his attempt to cope well with puberty.

  No more arguments now.

  Babe glanced quickly at the sheet the cops had spread over his brother. Someone was definitely under there, but there was no possibility of its being Doc. Babe didn’t think about his own death much, but when he did, it was always going to be Doc who would be there to put him in the ground. Doc was so big and strong and he never got sick, and if there was a flu bug moving through Cincinnati and Babe was in Cleveland, he caught it. No question: When Babe died, Doc would take care of the details, see that it all went right, no goof-ups, all smooth and proper and fine.

  The cops were mumbling again; the head cop was saying it couldn’t have been robbery because there was still a wallet. Motive—Babe thought for a moment. That must be what they’re mumbling about. The head cop went through Doc’s wallet, then hurried to the phone.

  And that, Babe guessed, was when things started getting funny.

  They hadn’t asked him anything, in the first place. Oh, a few things, like about who and when, and Babe did his best to speak sentences, but that was hard, so he just nodded or shrugged; he wasn’t being difficult, he wanted to explain, it was that he wasn’t in any terrific mood for words just then, but he didn’t really have to explain that, they seemed to understand, kept the questions to a minimum, and simple ones at that.

  The head cop was mumbling on the phone. Babe couldn’t make it out exactly. I should really try, he told himself. That’s your brother they’re talking about, pay attention.

  But he couldn’t concentrate on anything until he heard Elsa’s voice from the hall. One of the cops was blocking the entrance, and Babe stood, made his way to them, muttered “Please” to the cop, then went into the hallway with Elsa.

  “You hung up so without warning, I didn’t know what to do. I waited but you didn’t call back. I had to know you were all right, so I came.”

  “Doc’s dead,” Babe said. There—after all these years, he’d given away the secret, said “Doc” without even realizing it. But that was all right. You needed two for a secret. “My brother’s dead, murdered.”

  She wasn’t buying. Not from the way her head shook, side to side and back.

  “It’s true, believe me, okay? I’m awful tired, Elsa.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Babe began to lose control of his voice. “Am I sure what? Am I sure he’s my brother or am I sure he’s dead? Yes and yes, Elsa, I’m sure.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and took a step away. “I was only worried about you. I’ll go now.”

  Babe nodded.

  “How could such a thing happen? Here; what a terrible city. A robbery was it? An accident with a car?”

  “That was my mother,” Babe answered, and the second the words popped out he saw the look of absolute confusion starting across her splendid face, and right there, within half an hour of the death of his beloved, Babe broke out laughing. It was like a woman he’d heard of who’d lost, in the very same hour, in two separate and totally unrelated accidents, in two entirely different states, a father and a child. The father died first and she went to pieces, and when the call about the child came she heard herself laughing. It wasn’t that she didn’t care. It was just sometimes you had to laugh or go wiggy.

  Once he started laughing Elsa looked really confused, and that made it even funnier, and he laughed until it was clear in her face that she thought he might be gone, committable. “I’m fine,” Babe said then.

  Elsa nodded.

  “And I love you. No I don’t—I did a little while ago and I will a little while from now, but right at the moment, I’m fresh out.”

  She came toward him, touched her index finger to her lips, then to his. Then she turned, hurried down the stairs while he went back inside.

  Within five minutes, the first crew cut appeared.

  The head cop went to him, very respectful.

  Babe watched it all from his perch in the corner.

  The crew cut went to Doc, pulled the sheet down until he’d uncovered Doc’s face, glanced at it, nodded. Then he went to the phone, dialed, and started mumbling.

  Pay attention, Babe told himself. Listen. And he tried, but all he got from the crew cut were a few respectful “Yes sirs” and a couple of “Commanders” and not much more. Then the phone call ended. Babe gazed at the crew cut. Thirty, probably, in good shape, muscular but not so you’d look at him twice. Just a guy who took care of himself, no one special, not much going on behind the eyes.

  The second crew cut, when he got there, was a different story. Older, maybe forty, smaller, but not slight, and not flabby either. But quick eyes, quick and blue, and fair-haired—too blond for a crew cut really, it made him sometimes, when the light was behind him, look bald. But except for that, he resembled nothing so much as a man who should have made a fortune doing Wheaties commercials.

  He knelt over Doc, and, unlike the other crew cut, who just glanced at the corpse, this one really did a study. Babe looked away, toward the other corner of his room. There were some terrific cracks in the plaster there, you could get just about any animal you wanted if you worked hard enough, so the next few minutes he only heard.

  “They must have ambushed him, Commander,” the first crew cut said. Babe recognized the voice from when he made the phone call.

  “That or he knew them,” the blond crew cut said. It must have been him talking, though Babe couldn’t swear to it. But he had that tone of authority you just hated, of being right all the goddamn time.

  “What about my men?” This was the head cop.

  “You can go,” the blond crew cut said, obviously the honcho.

  “We’ll just move on then,” the head cop said.

  Babe was about to wonder who could tell the cops what to do like that, but then he found a hippo in the plaster that would be terrific if he could just get it done.

  “Ambulance?” the blond crew cut said then.

  “I made arrangements before I came,” the dark crew cut answered. “It must be waiting outside by now; shall I get them up here?”

  “Right now.”

  Babe glanced over as the first crew cut hurried out. The blond looked briefly at Babe, then went back to his study of Doc. Babe went back to his hippo.

  Three guys took Doc away. The first crew cut and two other guys. He couldn’t tell from their white jackets which hospital they came from, but that didn’t seem to make much difference, w
hen you came right down to it.

  Doc was going now.

  They had him on a stretcher and the stretcher in the air and the white jackets were doing the heavy work, the first crew cut the leading.

  Babe could feel himself losing control.

  No. Later, fine, but don’t you do it now. Not in front of all these bastard strangers.

  Gone.

  “Want me to wait around?” This from the blackhaired crew cut.

  Head shake. This from the blond.

  Babe watched the first one leave, closing the door; then they were alone. Babe went back to his animals. He found a fantastic owl, you could practically hear it going “Hoooooooo.”

  “Maybe we might talk; would you mind terribly?”

  Babe glanced toward the blond crew cut. The guy was bringing the desk chair over close to where Babe was sitting.

  Babe shrugged. He hadn’t wanted to talk to Elsa, so why the hell should he feel like shooting the breeze with this arrogant son of a bitch?

  “I know what an inopportune time this is—”

  “Right!” Babe almost interrupted. “Bingo. Give the genius a box of fucking Mars Bars.” Only it wasn’t worth the effort, so he just shrugged again.

  “I know how close you were to your brother—”

  “You do, huh?—you know that, do you?—how do you know that, for Jesus’ sakes?—how do you know anything about anything?—”

  “I don’t, I’m sorry, I was just trying to ease into things—”

  “What things?—what the hell’s going on?—what the hell are you a commander of?—”

  The crew cut was really in retreat now. “How do you know I’m a commander of anything?” he tried.

  “The flunky with the other crew cut called you that—‘commander,’ he said, I heard him.”

  “Oh, that was nothing, Navy talk. I was a commander in the Navy, it was the top rank I got, and it’s the same as a Senator or a Vice President, when they’re out of office you still call them that, I don’t know, probably out of respect, ‘Senator’ or ‘Good morning, Mr. Vice President.’”

  “Bullshit.”

  There was a long pause. Then the other guy said, “Okay, you’re right, no more bullshit, but look, we’re not hitting it off any too well, I’d say, and it’s important that we do. Forget the Commander stuff. I’ll explain it all. My name’s Peter Janeway.” He held out his hand and made a dazzling smile. “But call me Janey. All my friends do.”

  PART

  III

  PULP

  19

  “I’m not your friend,” Babe said, not even starting to make a move toward taking Janeway’s hand, just letting it hang there, awkwardly, in space.

  “I know that, believe me. But it’s not important now. Only one thing is important and that’s this: You and I have got to talk.” He pulled his hand back, clearly embarrassed.

  I should have shaken with him, Babe thought; it wouldn’t have killed me or anything, a quick shake, what the hell’s that, nothing. But even while his mind was working in that direction, his words were headed elsewhere. “Everything’s important with you, isn’t it? It’s ‘important’ that we hit it off, it’s ‘important’ that we talk. If you’ve got a list of other things that are going to be ‘important,’ I wish you’d tell me now.”

  “And I wish you’d stop being difficult,” Janeway said.

  “I haven’t started being difficult,” Babe replied, kind of liking the sound of his answer even as he spoke it. Bogart might have said something just like that. Not in any of the great ones like African Queen or Casablanca, but it was a decent-enough comeback for most of those crummy B pictures Warners was always sticking him in.

  Janeway sighed. He mimed pouring a drink. “Do you have anything?”

  Babe shrugged, nodded toward the sink area.

  Janeway got up, found a bottle of red Burgundy, opened it quickly. “Want some?” he asked as he poured some wine into the closest remotely clean glass.

  Babe shook his head, no, wondering why he was acting so crummy toward Janeway. He seemed a decent-enough guy, well-spoken, tactful. He reminded Babe of... Babe rooted around a moment before he had it: Gatsby—if Janeway would lose a couple years and let his hair grow, he’d be a ringer for Gatsby, and you love Gatsby, so why take it out on Janeway? It wasn’t Janeway, he realized then; it was the presence of Janeway that was so ruffling.

  Because I need to be alone, Babe thought; I want my chance to mourn.

  His mother he’d been too young to remember, and when it came H.V.’s turn, he and Doc had keened together. “I shoulda gone in sooner, Doc, I shoulda shown him the paper on wool.”

  “Shut up, you don’t know anything, it was me, it was my fault, all of it my fault, that goddamn chem class.” And then they would go silent, because all their bickering wouldn’t make the old man move.

  And now it was Doc done with moving, and Babe would have to be sure the event didn’t pass unnoticed. It didn’t matter so much if he shed tears. But they had laughed a lot together, and those times needed to be remembered.

  Janeway downed the first glass of wine in a gulp, poured another, smaller portion. Then he came back to Babe, sat.

  “Do you think you might try to be helpful?”

  Babe said nothing.

  “Look: I’m not about to get trapped into any wit-matching contest with any semi-genius historian, so if you want to prove you’re smarter than I am, you’ve proved it, that game’s over, I give, you win.”

  “Who told you about me? How’d you know what I was studying?”

  “Later; later I’ll explain everything, but first it’s important that you tell me a couple of things, okay?”

  “No, it isn’t okay, because when you say ‘it’s important that we talk’ you don’t mean ‘it’s important that we talk,’ you mean it’s important that I talk and you listen. Well I’m probably being inconsiderate as hell, but my brother was just murdered and I’m not feeling all that chatty, if you don’t mind.”

  Jane way swirled the wine around in the glass, sniffed it. “Go change,” he said softly. “Shower if you like; then we’ll try again.”

  “Change?” Babe said, all confused. Then he said, “Oh,” because he was still in the same clothes as when Doc died, blue shirt and gray pants, and both were layered with drying blood. He touched the blood with his fingertips. I must always save this shirt, he reminded himself. I’ll fold H.V.’s pistol up in it. The pistol and the extra bullets, all wrapped up together. It was too bad he had nothing of his mother, a piece of tree bark maybe. Babe began to blink. Tree bark? Where was I? Oh yes. Keep the bloody clothes. “You all right?” Janeway asked.

  Babe kept on blinking, lightheaded. “Fine,” he said, louder than he meant to.

  “I’m looking for a motive,” Janeway said then. “Believe me, I’m just as anxious to find whoever did it as you are.”

  “Quit making those stupid overstatements. He was my brother, my father practically, he brought me up, and I never once heard your name, so I’m more anxious, wouldn’t you agree?”

  Janeway hesitated a long time. “Well, of course,” he answered finally.

  But his tone was odd. Babe looked at him, waiting. “We were both in the same business, you see; we knew each other quite well for quite some time.”

  “I don’t believe you’re an oil man.”

  “I don’t care what you believe except this—I want who did it.”

  “It hadda be some nut—this is New York, nuts are slaughtering people every moonrise—some addict tried getting his money and he wasn’t quick enough handing it over and you know the rest.”

  “I don’t think that’s even close,” Janeway said. “I think it was political. At least, that’s the assumption I’m going on till proven otherwise. And I wish you’d do what you could to help me.”

  “Political?” Babe shook his head. “My God, why?”

  “Because it makes some kind of sense. Considering what your brother did. And, of course
, your father.”

  “What about my father?”

  Janeway sipped his wine. “Why are you determined to make this so unnecessarily difficult?”

  “What about my father?”

  “He was H. V. Levy, for Chrissakes.”

  “And he was innocent!”

  “I never said he wasn’t.”

  “You did—you did, goddamn it, you implied it.”

  “Well, he was convicted, wasn’t he? That’s a helluva lot more than implying, that’s fact.”

  “He was not!—he was in no way convicted—” Babe’s voice was out of control. “Do you know that in four years, McCarthy never offered legal support for one single charge—it was all the court of public opinion —did you know he was a Nazi, a fucking Nazi, and he had the country scared pissless. My father was an historian, a great historian, and Acheson asked him down to Washington and he went, like Schlesinger and Galbraith went later, and he was there when McCarthy hit. Two guys suffered worst from it all—Hiss went to jail but at least he’s alive, selling stationery, and my father. He tried defending himself but he didn’t have a chance against that Nazi son of a bitch—it was a Senate hearing and my father was just cut to shit—every time he tried to establish a point McCarthy made it funny. My father talked in long rambling sentences and McCarthy made jokes out of it. It didn’t matter that he had no real facts, McCarthy killed him. He killed his ego, and when you’re like H. V. Levy and kids start laughing at you, it’s over. I was five in fifty-three, that was when they had the hearing, and Dad quit Columbia and began to write a book about the whole thing, to clear his name and get it all together again, but he couldn’t do it —my mother died the next year, and that left just the three of us, and Dad was drinking bad by then. He lasted till fifty-eight. Five years on the bottle, staggering around. Those years I remember, and that’s a shame because he was nothing then, he was garbage then, but what I’d give to have known him before. I read every book he ever wrote and they were great, and I read every speech he ever gave and they were great, but I never met that guy, not so I remember, just this husk is all I have for memories, and you can keep all your goddamn stupid implications about my father, just you wait, wait till I finish, it’s all gonna be down in black and white, right there in my doctorate and—and—”