Death Sentence (11 page)

Velma grew more despondent as Ronnie’s enlistment date neared, and she was even more unhappy in her marriage. Jennings was no less miserable. On Friday, March 19, he drove to a son’s house and called a lawyer to talk about divorce. He made an appointment for Monday morning.

On Sunday night, Velma called Ronnie at her parents’ house. She was at Cape Fear Valley Hospital again, but this time she was not the patient. Jennings had gotten very sick, she said, and she’d had to bring him to the hospital.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “Do you need me to come?”

“No, I’ll be all right,” she said.

Ronnie heard no more that night and assumed everything was okay. But the next day his mother called him at the gas station just before noon. She was crying. Jennings had died an hour earlier, she told him. His weakened heart had just given out. Ronnie, who ran the gas station alone, told her that he would be there as soon as he could arrange to get away.

How could one person have such an incredible run of misfortune? he asked himself. Why his mother? How much more could she be expected to endure?

6

Disgust with the war in Vietnam was mounting early in 1971 as Lieutenant William Calley was tried for the massacre of civilians at My Lai three years earlier. In May, thousands of antiwar demonstrators would be arrested as they attempted to bring traffic and government activities to a halt in Washington. But in deeply patriotic Robeson County, with its close connections to Fort Bragg, the disgust was with the antiwar protestors and with an army that would make a scapegoat of a lowly lieutenant while exonerating his superior officers.

Ronnie was as patriotic as anybody in Robeson County and felt a deep obligation to serve his country, even if it meant going to war. But presented with a choice between his country and his mother, as he would be soon after Jennings Barfield’s death, he had little doubt about which he would choose.

His mother was not handling Jennings’ death well. She had been almost too drugged to attend the funeral, and afterward Ronnie helped her move back into her parents’ home, where he and Pam still were living. Ronnie was scheduled to leave for basic training in only twelve days, but his mother took to bed with her medicines, pleading with him not to go. She needed him now more than ever, she said, and she didn’t know how she could make it without him.

Ronnie didn’t know what to do. He’d signed a contract. But he didn’t want to leave his mother in this condition. Perhaps he could get a delay. He talked with his recruiter but got little encouragement. His enlistment had already been deferred. Still, Ronnie decided to try to get out of his contract. He got teachers, doctors and others to write letters to the Army explaining all the illness, loss and heartbreak his mother had undergone, asking that his obligation be dismissed. He even lined up a job at a furniture plant in Tabor City that would pay him $100 a week. His prospective boss also petitioned the Army on his behalf.

The Army was not swayed, and on April 7, nine days after Lieutenant Calley’s conviction, Ronnie was sent to Fort Jackson, South Carolina, near Columbia. Velma was distraught when he left. How could the government be so cruel? How could the Army need Ronnie more than she did?

Jennings had bought Velma a car, a year-old Maverick, and three different times while Ronnie was in basic training, she drove to Fort Jackson to see him on the weekends that he was allowed visitors. No other recruit in his company had such visits from his mother.

When Pam’s graduation from Parkton School came, Ronnie was in the last stages of his training and couldn’t attend. He had to settle for calling to congratulate her. In mid-June, Velma and her brother John drove to Fort Jackson for Ronnie’s graduation, and he returned home for two weeks of leave before reporting to the Army Security Agency School at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, in July.

By this time, Velma and Pam had moved back into the twice-burned house that Thomas had built for them. Velma’s condition seemed improved while Ronnie was at home, but after he began training at Fort Devens to become a code interceptor, the situation quickly worsened.

Velma got one of her doctors, Roscoe McMillan of Red Springs, to write to the Army on her behalf.

“This certifies that Mrs. Velma Barfield is suffering from a complete nervous breakdown due partly to the sudden death of her husband and the induction into the Army of her son, Ronald,” he wrote. “The purpose of this letter is to inform you of the above circumstances and if possible to work some solution out in which Private Burke can be discharged to support his mother and sister.”

Ronnie’s support was needed because Velma’s drug swings had been interfering with her work. At Jennings’ request, Velma had quit her job during their marriage, but now she was back at Belk’s. Frequently, though, she was unable to go in because she took too many pills. And her doctor and drug bills continued to grow. In late July, she borrowed $800 from a Fayetteville bank to pay some of them.

In August Velma called the Robeson County Sheriff’s Department to report a break-in at her house. Alf Parnell investigated. He found the screen cut on the window of Ronnie’s bedroom, the window open, a pane broken. Ronnie’s room was in disarray. Velma told Parnell that five $100 bills—part of the money she had borrowed—had been stolen from beneath the mattress in Ronnie’s room. Some of Ronnie’s clothing and shoes also were missing, she said. No charges would ever come from the report, but Velma filed for homeowner’s insurance.

Ronnie heard about this by telephone, as he was hearing of all of his mother’s problems, but it would be many years before he realized that she likely was staging such events not only to get money but to bring him back to her. This time she was even more insistent that he try to get out of the Army and return home. Ronnie thought his chances of getting a hardship discharge unlikely but promised to try again.

By fall, Velma’s performance at work had grown so bad that her boss, D. N. Geddie, removed her from contact with customers, with whom she frequently was testy and argumentative. But Geddie was sympathetic to Velma, and instead of firing her, he reassigned her to the stockroom, marking prices.

Pam, meanwhile, had been unable to find a job since graduation. On Thursday, October 14, Velma planned to take her to put in applications at several businesses before going to work. Velma lingered inside after Pam had gone to the car, but Pam thought nothing about it at the time.

When they returned a couple of hours later, they found fire trucks at the house and firefighters cleaning up inside. Pam could not believe it. A third fire in just two and a half years. Surely, this house was cursed. Velma went to pieces, Pam would later recall, and neither she nor anybody else could console her.

Later, when Velma called Ronnie to tell him what happened, she begged, “Can’t you come home? My nerves are just completely tore up.”

Ronnie applied for emergency leave, and two days later he arrived to his mother’s welcome embrace. Velma and Pam had once again moved in with Murphy and Lillie, but things were not well there either.

During the summer Murphy had come down with laryngitis that wouldn’t go away. He had reluctantly gone to a doctor, who had given him antibiotics and throat spray. Still, he had been slow to recover, and even after the laryngitis passed, he had trouble swallowing and developed breathing problems and pains in his chest and right side. Doctors were uncertain about his problem, but for most of his adult life Murphy had smoked unfiltered cigarettes. He checked into a hospital for tests that fall and was told that his problems were due to angina. While Ronnie was at home, though, Murphy rallied. Velma was not rebounding, however, despite Ronnie’s presence and his promise to press for a hardship discharge. While he was home, he began collecting the necessary paperwork for the discharge: letters from his mother, his grandparents, her doctors; death certificates for his father and stepfather.

His efforts became even more urgent after D. N. Geddie called to tell him that he was going to have to let Velma go. She was out of work too often, sometimes unable to function when she was there. She was even having prescriptions delivered to the store. He was sorry, he said. He’d given her every chance to work out her problems, but the situation appeared hopeless. Ronnie understood—he was beginning to feel the same way himself.

Ronnie did not want to leave his mother in this situation. It was not only her drug use, her poor health, the loss of her job, that concerned him. The latest fire and the break-in before it made him wonder if his mother hadn’t been targeted by somebody. But by whom? And for what reason? He questioned her, but she had no answers.

“I just can’t understand why all these things are going on,” she said.

Ironically, Velma’s ploys to bring Ronnie back only led him further from her. On a Friday night while he was home he went to a high school football game between Rowland and Red Springs. One of his cousins played for Red Springs. At the game another cousin introduced him to a friend, Joanna McCollum.*

Joanna was a senior in high school. She had a thin, pretty face, straight brown hair to her waist, an artist’s temperament and a dark sense of humor. Ronnie was taken with her immediately. He had dated in high school, usually double-dating with Pam, but he had never had a serious girlfriend. He asked Joanna out, and she accepted. When he had to return to Fort Devens, she told him she would write. He went back to his Army duties with another hopeful reason for seeking a discharge.

As soon as he got back, Ronnie arranged for an allotment from his pay to be sent monthly to his mother and informed his superiors that he would be seeking a hardship discharge.

At the beginning of November, Pam moved to Lancaster to live with Velma’s brother Jimmy. He owned a Tom’s franchise, selling peanuts, candies, crackers and other snacks, and offered her a job tending a vending machine route. She, too, would be able to send money back to her mother. With the income from her children and unemployment benefits, Velma could get by temporarily.

Before Ronnie could complete all the necessary paperwork to apply for his discharge, he got more bad news. His training was soon to be complete, and in mid-November he got orders for Vietnam. He was to report at the end of January. Although the United States was cutting troop strength in Vietnam, the long-promised end to the war was still not in sight.

Ronnie put off calling his mother. He knew this had been her greatest fear. Her best friend, Nellie Wallace, had lost a son in Vietnam, a helicopter pilot. He wasn’t sure that his mother could take the news, but she had to know sooner or later, and after a few days he gathered his nerve and called home.

“Well, the thing we’ve been worried about has happened,” he said. “I’ve got my orders. I’m going to Vietnam.”

“Oh, no!” Velma cried. “No! I knew this was going to happen. I knew it.” She burst into tears. “If you go over there, you’re going to be killed!”

“You don’t know that, Mama,” Ronnie said. “You’ve got to have some faith. I’m in the Army and I’ve got to do what they tell me to do.”

“You can’t go!” she insisted. “I can’t let them do that to you.”

What about the hardship discharge? she wanted to know.

It hadn’t gone anywhere yet, Ronnie told her. They still wanted more paperwork.

“You’ve got to get that.”

On November 29, Ronnie completed the discharge application. His commanding officer approved it, noting that Ronnie was a fine soldier with excellent ratings in conduct and efficiency, and sent it up the chain of command. Now the anxious waiting began, and, the Army being the Army, nobody could predict how long it would last.

At Christmas, Ronnie went home again on leave and found the conditions of both his mother and grandfather greatly deteriorated. His grandfather looked terrible. He was wasting away, and the doctors were unable to explain why. He had been forced to quit work a month earlier, but he didn’t want to file for medical disability. He was not a man to accept “handouts,” as he called it. Besides, he fully intended to return to work just as soon as he could get over whatever was dragging him down.

Murphy’s illness and Ronnie’s imminent departure for war threw a pall over Christmas. Velma’s anxiety was causing her to take even more pills. At least Ronnie got to see Joanna a couple of times before returning to Fort Devens after New Year’s, the only bright moments of his holidays.

After Ronnie’s departure, Velma fell into even deeper depression. Her drug taking and despondency grew by the day.

Lillie, who had more than she could handle just trying to take care of Murphy, didn’t know what to do. After Velma had been three days in bed, unable to get up, Lillie called the rescue squad. Velma was taken to the emergency room at Cape Fear Valley Hospital in Fayetteville on January 19, then transferred by ambulance to the mental health unit at Southeastern Hospital in Lumberton, where the county would help to pay for her treatment. There she told a psychiatrist that she had taken an overdose to commit suicide because she couldn’t face seeing her son killed in Vietnam. After fifteen days she was released.

Ronnie’s orders were put on hold until a decision could be reached on his discharge. Not until March 1 did he get a ruling. He called his mother to tell her that he had good news and bad. The bad news was that his discharge had been denied. His voice brightened as he told her the good news: He had been granted a compassionate reassignment to Fort Bragg. He would be there for her, after all! Hadn’t he promised that he always would be?