Point of No Return

by Gellhorn, Martha;

  And I was only scared of getting hit a third time, Jacob Levy told himself, in terrible judgement.

  Now he walked without plan and found his jeep and started it and drove back through the village, guided by memory. He was making a hiccoughing sound but he did not hear it. He held his arms straight before him, as if he were trying to push the steering wheel against the dashboard. The jeep lurched in and out of a pothole which he had not noticed, and a boy whistled shrilly to a dog who had run barking into the street and now slunk fast away from the left front wheel. The jeep had always belonged to him, he managed it as easily as his body, but he did not seem to feel it anymore or to remember his own old skill. His mouth tasted bitter and dirty and his teeth were clamped together over the words that shouted in his mind. My mother has long black hair, my mother has long black hair. He drove, blind and jolting, down the clean prosperous street where the Germans went about their business in the sun. Two men tipped their hats and stopped to exchange politenesses at a front gate. A woman called to her child who arrived, pig-tails bouncing, and departed again on some errand. Two girls walked along the pavement; they must have been discussing clothes, because the brunette paused and pulled her skirt to one side and held it so draped while the other considered this style. The shorter one carried a loaf of bread and a string sack with vegetables in it. Everyone looked healthy and occupied and cheerful. No one turned to watch the single American soldier driving his jeep in that erratic fashion along their street. No one remarked the set white face of the soldier, and the strange stare of his eyes.

  Two blocks ahead, a group of civilians stood almost in the middle of the street. As Jacob Levy drove closer he saw there was a man holding a bicycle and three other men and two women. He honked his horn. The road was wide. The Germans looked in the direction of the oncoming jeep, but did not move. There was plenty of room to pass them. They were talking together eagerly and they were laughing.

  Jacob Levy saw them as he had seen no one in his life before. They strutted there, proud and strong as if they owned the world. Their bodies boasted how fat they were. The grinning pink faces dared him to bother them. They didn’t have to move for anyone. They’d gotten away with it. Laughing, he thought, laughing out loud in the street to show me.

  The people in the freight cars must have screamed a long time before they died. When the wind was right, the ashes from the chimney must have blown down this way. Not a mile away, not even a mile. They knew, they didn’t care, they laughed. Hate exploded in his brain. He felt himself sliding, slipping. It was hard to breathe. He held his fist on the horn and pressed his foot until the accelerator touched the floor. At sixty miles an hour, Jacob Levy drove his jeep on to the laughing Germans.

  24

  Major Gordon Jarvis slumped even lower in his chair; he was now almost lying on his neck. Fine manners, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought, you can certainly tell these fat cats from Division. Major Jarvis held out a package of Camels and Lieutenant Colonel Smithers shook his head in refusal, because he disapproved of Major Jarvis’ behavior. You would never get the impression from Major Jarvis that this was Lieutenant Colonel Smithers’ office.

  “Of course,” Major Jarvis went on, breathing out smoke, “he mucked himself up pretty thoroughly too. His nose will need plastic surgery to make it look like a nose again. He almost tore off his left cheek and he knocked out a lot of teeth.”

  Major Jarvis talked as if he were going to fall asleep. That voice and that way of talking infuriated Lieutenant Colonel Smithers; it sounded like a Limey to him. Any mustache was foolish but a bushy blond one like that was a plain copy of those Limey officers who carried handkerchiefs in their cuffs. Pretty sure of himself, this lawyer character, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought.

  “And two broken ribs and a broken shoulder and a compound fracture of the left arm and a fractured skull. He was lucky at that,” Major Jarvis finished.

  Lieutenant Colonel Smithers said nothing. Sun poured in the windows, shining on the glass doors of the bookcase and on the gilded cattails.

  “I think he must have taken his hands off the wheel and closed his eyes. I don’t see how he could have bucked that tree, otherwise.”

  There were many things Lieutenant Colonel Smithers wanted to ask, but they would not take shape in his mind. For eight days he had had Division and Regiment on his neck, about Levy. You’d think Levy was a secret weapon, so many people were stewing around in this business. If only I’d got there first, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought, I’d have hushed it up somehow. No one could hush it up now. Even the General knew about it. And Colonel O’Neal and the Chief of Staff and the Judge Advocate and the Provost Marshal and anyone else you wanted to name. He’d had a fine time trying to explain how Levy happened to go off alone in the jeep in the first place. The only person who was not talking was Levy. It seemed that Levy wouldn’t open his mouth; either he didn’t care what became of him or he was too sick to notice. So the Chief of Staff appointed this fancy G-4 type as Levy’s defense counsel, and whenever Levy was well enough to walk they would hold a general court. He couldn’t do anything about it now. The law had moved in.

  “One of the surgeons told Levy that he needn’t worry about his face. He said he’d fix up his nose so that Levy would be delighted with it. Levy said he didn’t see any reason to bother. He expects to hang.”

  The word “hang” produced a knot in Lieutenant Colonel Smithers’ stomach.

  “I wouldn’t have believed any man in my Battalion would be up for manslaughter,” he said. “He might have killed one of the women, just as easy.” This is where I came in, Major Jarvis thought; opening gambit, now repeated by the gallant Colonel. If Jacob Levy had not said, with difficulty through the bandages, “I don’t want to cause the Colonel trouble. The Colonel’s a fine man,” he would not have stayed here more than five minutes.

  “Well, there it is,” Major Jarvis said. “I didn’t have much success, talking to him. I saw him for the first time yesterday and I suppose that cracked skull isn’t helping him to think. I tried to explain that the charge is manslaughter but he believes he committed murder and he sticks to it. He understood I was his defense counsel so he loosened up a little and I made him promise not to discuss his case with anyone else. The point being, if he’ll keep quiet and let me plead not guilty for him, I know I could get him off. He won’t touch it.”

  “What does he say?”

  “He says that he regrets he didn’t have a machine gun instead of a jeep. He also says that he is sorry the war is over because if the war were not over he could volunteer to operate a flame thrower. He said that he only killed one German in the war; being a jeep driver he didn’t have a chance at them. That’s the sort of thing he says.”

  “That’s crazy talk.”

  “He doesn’t sound crazy.”

  “I never knew Levy was like that. You couldn’t have wanted a steadier man in combat. I always used to tell Bill Gaylord, that was my S-2, how solid Levy was. He never showed a thing. We all thought a lot of Levy.”

  Major Jarvis ignored these remarks, which he found both irrelevant and irritating.

  “I haven’t gone into this enough yet, but I understand there was something wrong with the steering gear of the jeep?” Major Jarvis said.

  “The Motor Sergeant said maybe it needed new pins.”

  “It’s broken now, all right. The pins sheared off, the jeep went out of control, Levy ran into a tree because he couldn’t stop. That’s the way it looked to me, straight off, and I know I can make a sound case out of it. No court would imagine a man smashed himself up on purpose. He was going too fast but we’ll think up a reason. With that, and his record, I’d take a bet the court will be only too glad to call it involuntary manslaughter and recommend a suspended sentence. No one’s got any sympathy for the krauts. Dachau was their idea. It’s just that you can’t allow people to wreak private vengeance all over the place. Discipline.”

  “Maybe that’s how it did happen?�
�� Lieutenant Colonel Smithers grasped this possibility, with hope.

  “Not from what Levy says. I’ll need you as a character witness.”

  “I’ll be glad to do anything I can.

  “He has also announced to me, about ten times, that he is a Jew. Which I could have guessed from his name.”

  “But you’d never think Levy was a Jew,” Lieutenant Colonel Smithers interrupted. “I swear I forgot all about it. Ask anyone in the Battalion. They’ll tell you there wasn’t a thing like a Jew about Levy. I don’t know how many times I said to my officers that Levy was a real white man.”

  Major Jarvis looked at Lieutenant Colonel Smithers through his cigarette smoke. His eyes were almost closed.

  “I am not the one who is concerned about Levy’s being a Jew,” he said. “Levy is the one who insists on it.”

  Now what did this slick desk officer mean by that, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers asked himself.

  “He was a little shaken,” Major Jarvis went on, “when I told him that the prisoners in Dachau were not all Jews. In fact, practically none of them are Jews. There were similar places for Jews. They’ve got everything in Dachau.”

  “But if he thought they were Jews that kind of explains it,” Lieutenant Colonel Smithers said. It explained Levy to him. Jews were different, you couldn’t figure them out. Only Levy had never seemed different. “His being a Jew and all. The court would give him a break on that, wouldn’t they?”

  “I’m not going to bring it up. The steering gear is my story. Have you seen Dachau?”

  “I haven’t had time.” And nothing would get him there if he could help it; not after this godawful deal of Levy’s.

  “I saw it two days after the 12th got there.” Major Jarvis settled himself more comfortably in his chair. “People were still making noises inside that death transport. It was fairly cleaned up when Levy arrived. I felt the way he did. You will have to take my word that I am not a Jew,” Major Jarvis said and smiled at Lieutenant Colonel Smithers.

  Lieutenant Colonel Smithers moved restlessly behind his desk.

  “The difference between Levy and me is that I knew I’d get caught. You ought to go over there and see it, Colonel. It makes combat seem a pleasure.”

  Lieutenant Colonel Smithers stiffened. What in hell would Major Jarvis, of Division G-4, know about combat? He wanted to get rid of this smooth-talking citizen, and have a drink.

  “Well, all I can say is, Levy was the best driver I had in the whole war, and he was mighty popular with all of us. He was a damn good man in a fight too. There was enough in this war to make anybody crazy, as far as that goes.”

  Major Jarvis accepted his dismissal. He rose, from the back of his neck, and said, “Thank you, Colonel. I wish you’d talk to Levy. It’s the 113th Evac Hospital. They took over an empty asylum behind the Town Hall. You’ll see the signs. Levy thinks it’s a prison because they’ve got bars at the windows. You might persuade him to keep quiet and let me handle this. He thinks a lot of you.”

  “I’d be happy to.” But he did not want to go, for he did not want to see Levy. He thought he knew Levy; he thought, aside from rank, that Levy was pretty much the same sort of man he was, anyhow someone familiar, someone okay, someone you could count on. But there was a difference and now Levy was a stranger. He would not know how to talk to him. It would be hard to see Levy again.

  “I’m going to do my best to get him off,” Major Jarvis said. His voice sounded awake and serious for the first time. Lieutenant Colonel Smithers looked up, puzzled by this change. “I like him. He’s quite a man.”

  “Levy was always a good straight boy.”

  “I don’t know what he was before,” Major Jarvis said. This wooden-headed Dixie hero thought only of combat, as if combat were all of life. “But he’s something now.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “He’s not asking any favors,” Major Jarvis said, and stopped. Lieutenant Colonel Smithers would never know what he meant; he was not entirely sure himself. He thought of Jacob Levy, in bandages and plaster, lying on a cot in a room like a prison cell, and refusing to escape the consequences of his act. Whatever doubt or fear he might feel, he kept to himself. He was very quiet and very polite and he stood by what he had done, alone. As far as Major Jarvis was concerned, Levy’s bag of three dead Germans mattered not at all. Hadn’t they been patriotically killing Germans for years? Looking at the bombed towns, you could say with reason that they had been killing any Germans, including women and children.

  “Got to be going.” I’m talking too much, Major Jarvis thought, and into a vacuum besides. “Oh, I almost forgot this. A letter Levy gave me. He said you would see it was delivered for him. I haven’t read it. I knew you could do the censoring.”

  Major Jarvis handed over a letter addressed to Miss Dorothy Brock. That’s funny, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought, though he remembered now that Levy had once asked him for Dotty’s A.P.O.

  “I’ll attend to it.” And furthermore this Major did not have to teach him his job and his duties. “You know the way out, don’t you?”

  “Thanks. I’ll keep in touch with you.”

  Lieutenant Colonel Smithers sat at his desk and looked at the letter; it was not sealed. He did not want to read it and he took it out slowly. He felt as if he were prying into the affairs of the dead.

  There was a single sheet of paper: “Dear Miss Brock, I’d appreciate it if you could get this letter to the girl it’s addressed to. Thank you for your trouble. Yours sincerely, Jacob Levy.”

  The enclosed envelope was addressed to Miss Kathe Limpert. So that’s it, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought, he’s nuts for some girl he met in Luxembourg. He pulled out another single sheet and saw that this letter was printed.

  “Cherie petite Kathe; Je ne revenir. No attendez pour moi. Je vous aime tout la vie. JACOB LEVY.” The signature was printed twice as large as the rest.

  The poor bastard, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought, he’s really had it. He sealed both envelopes and put the letter on the corner of his desk. The girl would never guess what had happened to Jacob Levy. He opened a drawer and took out a bottle of gin. He disliked gin but it was all he could get. He swallowed two big mouthfulls of it.

  This war’s gone on too long, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought. First they got killed and now they went crazy and fell into the hands of the law. Had Levy been mulling over that business about Jews, all the time he was there in the jeep, looking and acting like anybody else? I don’t want to think about it, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers decided. He didn’t know what to think; he didn’t know what the answers were. He took another drink of gin. I’ll get over to see Gallagher tonight, he thought, we might fix up a poker game.

  There was a knock at the door and Sergeant Hancock came in, without waiting for permission.

  “Can’t you see I’m busy?” Lieutenant Colonel Smithers said. This whole goddam Battalion was going to hell; they acted any way they felt like.

  “Yes sir,” Sergeant Hancock said. He started to sidle out the door.

  “Now you’re here, you might as well tell me what it is.”

  “The replacements have come, sir.”

  Again, Lieutenant Colonel Smithers thought. What the hell for? Who cares anymore? Or do they expect us to get all spruced up and fight in Japan? Okay, then; if it was going to be Japan it was going to be Japan. But he, John Dawson Smithers, was through with war; he’d go to Japan and he’d command his Battalion, but if anybody thought he meant to take an interest in it, they were wrong. Because he was not interested. He did not give a damn where he went, but he was not interested. He was sick of it, war and peace, he didn’t understand it, nothing made any sense. You couldn’t tell where you stood. You could just damn well get drunk and they could all screw themselves.