The Patriot

by Evan S. Connell

  He had been in the barracks only a few minutes and was standing at the window thoughtfully folding and unfolding his garrison cap when Pat Cole sauntered into the room and mentioned that he had just returned from the main station, where he had watched the weekly graduation ceremony. Melvin nodded somewhat absently and remarked that in another four weeks their turn would come.

  “Three weeks,” said Cole with a quizzical smile. “As long as I’ve been acquainted with you I have yet to see you keep accurate track of the time. Invariably you’re behind.”

  “I was thinking about something else. A very strange thing happened to me a little while ago. I was bringing in a formation, so I called the tower for instructions the way we’re supposed to. And I got the instructions, and everything worked out right. Do you know what I mean?”

  “No, I don’t,” said Cole.

  Melvin went on with difficulty. “Well, it was as though I wasn’t a cadet. It was as though I was a naval aviator.”

  “That’s what you are,” said Cole.

  “Yes. But it’s very strange, don’t you think?”

  And then Cole said, “Someday when you’re not busy I’d like to have a talk with you.”

  “What about?”

  “Oh, the war. Our situation. I may have the answers you’re searching for.”

  Just then Horne strode into the room cursing the laundry which had pressed his shirts until the buttons cracked; and Cole, after helping himself to a peppermint, sauntered away.

  “Liberty’s been reduced to one night a week,” Horne said. He crumpled the freshly laundered shirt and hurled it to the floor. “How do you like that! We might as well be back at pre-flight! One night a week! It’s posted on the bulletin board.”

  “Did they give any reason?”

  “They didn’t post the reason, but the reason is the clap. Same old story. Sick bay full of guys with the crud they picked up in Mobile or Pensy and the skipper’s disgusted. I suppose he figures if we can’t get off the base we can’t catch the clap.”

  “Well, he’s right, of course.”

  Horne was furious. “You put fifty naval aviation cadets in a zeppelin and they’d come down with the clap! This is the stupidest stunt yet! This takes the cake! There used to be four liberty nights a week at this base. It was three when we first got here. Then two! Now we’re down to one! The Navy’s going to have a lot of fairy aviators if it doesn’t change that policy.”

  “Maybe if they increased the Shore Patrol, that might help. I don’t know how, though, the more I think about it.”

  “I don’t know and I don’t care!” Horne snarled, and gave his shirt a vicious kick. “I’m certainly glad we’re almost through this dim-witted program.”

  A few days later, during which time Cole had made no further reference to whatever it was he wanted to talk about, an admiral visited the base. Just before noon a transport plane landed and the admiral was driven across the station in a black limousine with a four-starred flag fluttering from a mast on the fender. Melvin happened to be on the street when the limousine rolled by; he stooped a little and peered in. He saw, quite alone in the back seat, a shaggy, burly old man who resembled a gnome, with tangled yellow eyebrows and a penetrating but not unfriendly gaze. The admiral looked out just as Melvin looked in and Melvin straightened up quickly.

  A familiar voice said, “How do, buddy?” and he turned around, and there was the gate guard from Barin Field.

  “Hello, Gorman,” Melvin said with a grin. “What are you doing here?”

  “They done transferred me.”

  “The weather’s a little better than last time we met. I was pretty soggy.”

  “You was a mite damp.” An uncomfortable smile appeared on the seaman’s face; he screwed up his eyes, blinked, spat tobacco juice into the grass, and finally remarked with an air of deep concentration, “Got me a old lady.”

  “You got married? Congratulations. Some girl from Monroe?”

  “Naw!” He was amused. “Got me a little bitch I seen jitter-bugging one night in the Yardarm.”

  “Where’s the Yardarm? I never heard of it.”

  Gorman pointed in the direction of Mobile, and there was approval in his knowing eyes. “Get you some real stuff there.” He worked the tobacco around in his mouth, frowned, shuffled his feet, and said with reluctance, “Been doing me some powerful thinking, buddy. Been thinking about that liquor.” He looked swiftly to see if Melvin remembered. An officer approached. They both came to attention and saluted.

  “Didn’t really figure to run into you no more,” he continued when the officer had gone by. “That liquor, buddy, I drank her spang up,” he added with a sparse grin. “Damn my everlasting soul if I didn’t.”

  “Well, it’d have been a shame to waste it. To break it, or whatever you were supposed to do.”

  “Done cost you something, I figure.”

  Melvin realized with astonishment that the guard was intending to pay for the bottle. He had pulled up the bottom of his jumper to get at his wallet, which was folded over the waistband of his trousers.

  “There at that gate all day long they lied to me. I know it. They know I knowed it. Then along come you, and you didn’t lie to me.”

  “I tell you what,” Melvin said. “You’ve been thinking about the whisky, I’ve been thinking about that tobacco. I’ve never tried chewing tobacco. Have you got any left? A good chew ought to square us for that bourbon.”

  The guard spun around, positive that someone had crept up to overhear the conversation, but there was nobody near them. “Generally that don’t make sense,” he countered, probing. Officers were his enemies, of this he had no doubt, he had never had any cause to doubt this, and a cadet would one day be an officer; at the same time he had heard that cadets, like enlisted men, were badly used. “You lying to me now, buddy?”

  “You’ll have to decide that for yourself,” said Melvin.

  Gorman squinted, pretending to look at something in the sky; then he bowed very briefly, the round white cap lay upside down in his hands, and in the cap, bent into an arch to fit snugly over his skull, was the plug. Melvin unwrapped it and put a corner between his teeth; he was not certain, when he felt something give, whether his teeth were still in his mouth, but he wrapped the tobacco and dropped it in the cap, Gorman bowed again and came up wearing the cap and a remote, mindless gaze.

  “Reckon she’s chow time,” he murmured.

  Melvin nodded, unable to speak because of the juice spreading through his mouth. He thought he had a tongue full of pins, or sparks. Gorman, after studying him kindly, lifted a hand in a vague manner, in what could have been an incipient salute, did an about face, and was soon lost among a group of men near the recreation hall.

  At the barracks Horne was lying on the bunk meditatively turning the pages of a thick, cloth-bound book. Without looking up from the book he said, “Lieutenant Caravaggio was here and just now left. Did you see him?”

  Melvin walked to the basin and rinsed his mouth for several minutes before attempting to speak. Horne watched him curiously.

  “Who?” Melvin said, wiping his lips on the back of his hand.

  “What’s the matter with you?” said Horne.

  “Nothing’s the matter with me. What does shellac taste like?”

  “Shellac!” Horne echoed. “How should I know?”

  “I was just wondering. Who did you say was here?”

  “Lieutenant Caravaggio. Are you drunk?”

  “I’m not drunk. Who’s Lieutenant Caravaggio? I never heard of him.”

  Horne sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bunk, closing his book on one finger so as not to lose the place.

  “Well, you act like you’re drunk.”

  Melvin ignored him. He began to scrape his teeth with a fingernail. Presently Horne stood up and approached.

  “What’s the matter, baby? Are you sick?”

  “Why should I be sick?” Melvin retorted. He glared at the book, which had n
o title. “What are you reading?”

  Horne returned to his own bunk and sat down complacently, saying, “You wouldn’t be interested. You’re too young.”

  “Too young for what?” Melvin demanded.

  Horne rolled over so that he faced the wall. In this position he turned the pages. Melvin angrily ran across the room to see what he was looking at, but Horne shut the book.

  “Oh,” said Melvin, “we’re smart, aren’t we!” He grabbed for the book and Horne slapped his hand away

  “Go see the lieutenant.”

  “What lieutenant?”

  Horne made a clucking noise and peeped into the book.

  “Who cares what it is!” Melvin said in disgust, returning to his side of the room. He could still taste the tobacco. Horne’s book annoyed him because it did not look exactly the way a book should look. He tried to peer across Horne’s shoulder and believed he saw a female figure and sprang across the room to have a better look, and this time Horne did not hide the book, although he would not let go of it.

  “How many are there?” Melvin whispered, watching greedily as he turned up one after another.

  “I don’t know exactly, but I think there’s about six hundred and fifty.”

  “Did you get it at Ship’s Service?”

  Horne stared up at him and after a moment said, “Sometimes I don’t know about you. What would a book like this be doing in Ship’s Service?”

  “Let me have it.”

  “No,” said Horne. “Let go, it’s mine. Will you kindly let go? Please! Holy cow, what’s the matter with you?”

  “What are you going to do with them?” asked Melvin, trying to twist the book out of his hands.

  “I thought about pasting them on the wall or in the closet,” said Horne. “Let go! You’re ruining it!” He doubled up so he could use his feet to shove Melvin away, but Melvin slipped around and managed to get a knee on his chest.

  “Where did you get them?” he demanded, leaning forward victoriously.

  All at once Horne escaped and caught him in a hammer lock. “Drop my book,” he ordered.

  Melvin shook his head.

  “Drop it, I say. I’m not fooling. I’ll break your arm.”

  Melvin shook his head again and made a pretense of looking through the book although the pain was blinding him.

  “Why don’t you let go?” Horne asked. He was puzzled.

  On his knees, with his forehead pressed to the floor, Melvin gasped in anguish and resumed struggling.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Horne muttered, letting him go. “I can’t understand you. I ordered it from a place in New Hampshire, if that makes any difference. Now will you please let me have it? You can look at it all you want to after I get through.”

  “I want to look at it now,” Melvin said.

  “Well, I do too,” Horne exclaimed, jumping from the bunk and catching him by the throat. They staggered across the room, hissing and snarling, and stumbled against the desk. The gooseneck lamp crashed into the wastebasket.

  “Let go of my pants!” Horne shouted. “My other pants are in the laundry! These are the only ones I got!”

  Melvin let go and at that moment his feet were kicked from under him and he came down flat on the linoleum with a blow that pumped the wind from his lungs.

  “I just can’t figure you out,” muttered Horne. He picked up the book and discovered that one of the pages was torn. “Look what you did!” he cried pettishly. “I liked that one. That was one of my favorites. You simple clown!”

  Melvin was lying supine on the floor with his arms outflung as though he had been crucified. He was not able to speak; he thought his vocal chords had been crushed. His lip was swollen and one of his teeth felt loose. The ceiling of the room had tilted and was continually sliding aside. He could hear everything plainly, but there was a singing and roaring in his ears. He was not able to feel his neck; it was as though his neck were made out of rubber and he thought it had probably turned black. He swallowed and made a gurgling noise.

  “What’s the matter?” Horne asked. He was trying to press the torn picture back into place.

  Melvin feebly sat up, gazed at the torn page, and whispered, “Why don’t you fix it with Scotch Tape?”

  “There isn’t any,” said Horne, frowning.

  “Desk drawer,” Melvin said hoarsely. “Bought some last week.”

  “I used it all up yesterday,” said Horne.

  “You what! You used my Scotch Tape? Did I say you could?”

  “You weren’t around when I needed it.”

  “A man leaves his own room,” Melvin said, “for about five or ten minutes, and some greedy slob not only uses his Scotch Tape, he uses it all up.”

  “By God!” Horne exclaimed, and jumped to his feet. “I’m sorry!” He slammed the book shut and strode out of the room.

  Melvin lay on the floor tenderly feeling his lip and his throat, but after a few minutes, becoming somewhat lonesome, he got up and staggered along the corridor looking for Horne. He was at the door to McCampbell’s room, squatting on his haunches and peeping through the keyhole. Melvin squatted beside him and listened. The noises were muffled—the chink of silver coins and every so often the patter of dice like the claws of a rodent scampering desperately across the linoleum.

  Horne took hold of the door knob. Finding that it would turn he flung open the door; the gamblers, who knelt in a semi-circle against the wall, looked around in dismay. Cole was asleep on his bunk, dressed only in the polka-dot shorts he consistently wore in defiance of Navy regulations; his long, arched feet extended over the end of the bunk. Above him McCampbell sat cross-legged with a pillow behind his back and an aerology manual in his lap. The opposite bunks, which belonged to Roska and to a lean, agate-eyed Southerner named Dixon Kerdolph, were empty. Roska, Kerdolph, and five other cadets were gambling.

  “You people are on report,” said Horne. “Go down and sign the pap sheet.”

  “Shut up your mouth and close that door. And fix that blanket how we had it,” Kerdolph said.

  “I’ll fix more than the blanket,” said Horne.

  “You ain’t going to fix nobody, Mister. You want in this game, you’re welcome. You don’t, that’s all right too. Make up your mind.”

  Horne stepped forward with his fists clenched and Melvin shouted at him, “Oh, for Christ’s sake!” Horne was astonished by this; he looked at Melvin doubtfully, and then dropped to his knees to stuff the blanket against the door.

  Some time later McCampbell, who had been studying quietly, said, “Do any of you remember Peter Tajitos at Barin?”

  Melvin said he did, and added, “Why? What’s his problem? One of the WAVEs overdue?”

  “A friend of mine who’s still at Barin telephoned this morning to tell me Tajitos hit the water tank last night.”

  “Was he killed?”

  “Was he killed?” Horne echoed. “Of course he was killed! Roll the dice.”

  “I didn’t know him too well,” Melvin said. He felt dismayed and shocked by the news. They had been in the same company, although in different platoons, at the pre-flight school in Georgia, but Tajitos had caught pneumonia on the survival hike and had been left behind when the company was ordered to Memphis. Melvin straightened up and slowly shook his head and discovered, then, to his amazement, that he was not in McCampbell’s room; he was in the lounge. How he had gotten there he had no idea. He was leaning against the cigarette machine with a packet of matches in one hand as though he had been about to smoke. It was dark outdoors. He vaguely remembered getting up from his knees and saying something to everybody who was looking at him, but that was all he could recall.

  Thoughtfully he walked along the corridor and sat on the edge of his bunk. In a little while Horne came striding into the room and stopped, somewhat startled.

  “What the hell are you sitting in the dark for?” he demanded cheerfully and switched on the lamp. He peeled a five-dollar bill from a thick roll in his hand and tucked it in
to Melvin’s cap. Then he seated himself at the desk, licked his thumb importantly, and began to count the money.

  Melvin took the bill from his cap and said with no interest, “I guess I must have won.”

  “No, you lost the same as usual. You were going great, but you lost.”

  “Then what’s this five dollars for?”

  “Go buy us some Scotch Tape. We’re always running out. I don’t know what we do with it all.” Horne counted the money again, his chapped lips moving laboriously. His expression darkened. He counted it a third time with extreme care. After he finished he clasped his hands behind his head and said with no emotion, “Can you feature that? Can you imagine a thing like that?”

  “What’s the trouble?”

  “Some friends!” said Horne. “Some friends! I’m telling you!”

  “Who in particular?”

  Horne went on as though he had not heard. “In all fairness, I ask you, did you ever in your entire life hear of anything like this? I ask you. Just what type of person do we associate with? It makes me sick. These are the people we fly with. We entrust our lives every day to this sort of person.”

  “What happened?”

  “What happened?” said Horne. “I’ve been short-changed, that’s all. Just simply swindled.”

  Melvin could not help feeling rather pleased. “Who did it?”

  “Who would it be? Cole, naturally. He woke up after you left and wanted in the game.”

  “It’s your own fault. You know you’ve got to watch him.”

  “I cashed a check for him, see? I mean I had already cleaned him out of all the cash he had, and did that make me happy! Well, so he wanted a receipt for his check. I don’t know why, but being a nice fellow I said all right. So I was writing out this receipt, see, when he asked if I would take the twenty back and give him two tens—or, no, he said two fives and—well, anyway, I said sure. So then he said—”

  “I get the idea. The point is, you were had.”

  “I can’t understand it. Both of us counted the money. Well, by God, I’ll fix his wagon. I’ll get even and more.”