Prudence (6 page)

T
hey took the path behind the Pines and cut up the trail till they hit the logging road and took it west, parallel to the lake. It was the same trail and the same woods in which Billy and Frankie had played and later used as a kind of refuge from the Pines itself, when they were teenagers. But it felt different to Billy now. The heat hung heavy among the basswood and maple. Funny, but there weren’t really any pines behind the Pines except for the few planted as a windbreak between the property and the woods. The woods themselves were hardwoods and poplar. The horseflies droned in the air, and Billy’s shirt stuck to his arms underneath his brown wool jacket. He hadn’t thought to take it off. Frankie had been too excited, too eager to search for the German, and Billy had been too eager to be with Frankie, and so he was sweating heavily. The air had the feel of rain—a heavy, waiting feel—but the sky was clear and the stationmaster at the depot said that it was supposed to remain that way. Even so, the air . . . it was as though a man could swim in it.

Felix was in the lead, followed by Frankie—who had insisted on carrying the Winchester—and Billy, Ernie, and David were behind. Frankie peppered Felix with questions and Felix mumbled in reply. Billy suggested Ernie head north while Felix and David cut down by the slough to the south. Frankie finally caught on.

“Yeah, Felix. Good idea. We’ll take the tote road here and meet
you on the other side of the slough. I’ll have a better field of fire with the Winchester on the road.”

“Field of fire?” asked Ernie.

“Well,” said Frankie, and he shrugged.

“Okay,” said Felix. “Okay.”

Ernie walked up to Billy and peered at him with bloodshot eyes, as though Billy had said something or offered some kind of challenge.

“One for the road,” said Ernie, and he reached inside Billy’s coat, removed one of the pints, and, without saying anything else, turned and stalked off into the brush, the branches flapping closed behind him.

Felix motioned to David and the two them turned and walked away through the trees to the south.

Frankie raised his eyebrows as if to say, “Well?” Billy smiled.

They slowed down. The deerflies hummed heavily around them. Billy wasn’t sure if the humming sound came from the bugs or the blood in his ears. He could hear his own heart. They followed the tote road for a distance without saying anything. Frankie scanned the woods, the Winchester pointing up and to the left.

Frankie looked across at Billy. “Port arms,” he said. Billy smiled again.

They continued down the road and then Billy steered them off into a small clearing.

“I don’t think he’s out here, Frankie.”

“He could be anywhere.”

“He’s not here. Just slow down. Okay? Just slow down, Jesus. You’re really worked up.”

“I’ve been doing exercises,” said Frankie, blushing.

“Yeah?”

“You know, to get ready for the Air Force.”

“Oh?”

“Push-ups. Toe touches. Cherry pickers. Like that.”

“I suppose you’re stronger now,” ventured Billy. His heart beat fast.

“Yeah. I think so. Running, too. When we went to Key West after graduation I ran on the beach every day.”

“Let me feel.”

Frankie turned to face him and Billy reached out and squeezed his arm.

“Geez.”

“Stop it.”

“No. Really. Pretty good.”

Frankie looked straight into Billy’s eyes.

“I missed you, Billy. I missed you an awful lot.”

As he said it, he reached up and picked a twig from Billy’s hair and leaned in, his eyes closed in expectation. Billy closed his eyes and let himself be kissed. How long had it been? A year? A full cycle of seasons and chores and school and all that work peeling pulp, and the letters, and the books, and his own pitiful letters back, smudged and probably misspelled. Billy kissed him back and savored the slight, ever so slight feel of Frankie’s stubble on his lips. His blood rushed in his ears.

But then a sound crept through the blood. He heard something behind him and he turned to see Felix and David step out of the brush. And then Ernie came from the other direction.

Ernie said something, but Billy’s head was buzzing and he couldn’t hear what it was. Maybe they hadn’t seen. It was possible. Maybe they saw but didn’t know what they were seeing. Frankie was stammering and talking, and he had turned from Billy and was walking away.

“Come on, Billy. I said, come on.”

Billy followed, stumbling.

“Goddamn Indians,” said Frankie. “Come on.”

Frankie forced his way through the brush, the branches slapping his face. Billy followed. They walked this way for a few minutes, maybe a minute.

“Hold on, Frankie. Just wait up. They didn’t see anything. I don’t think they saw anything.”

“Saw what?”

“Would you stop? Just stop for a minute.”

Frankie stopped but he wouldn’t look at Billy.

“No one’s going to say anything.”

“Just drop it.”

Billy had wanted to touch Frankie’s arm again. He wanted to step close and hold him by both arms till he calmed down. But he didn’t dare. He wanted to tell him he didn’t care about push-ups or cherry pickers. He wanted to say that he liked Frankie’s arms—yes, his thin arms, his thin arms unencumbered, free of dull muscle. He wanted to say he liked his wrists, his dusty eyelashes. But he didn’t dare. He wanted to say, remember. Remember? Remember when they would steal time in the cabins. And how much he liked that Frankie let himself be held, let Billy curl his body around Frankie’s smaller one. Remember? To let yourself be held takes a lot more courage than to do the holding. But he didn’t dare. More than that. He wanted more: he wanted to retake the search for the German, back up the canoe, drive back to the station, and wait again—but he wanted to wait for Frankie, and only Frankie, to step off the train. And he wanted the train to be different. And the depot. It would be some other depot in some town neither of them knew or were known in. Some bland place no one would think of visiting. And Frankie would say, “Nice jacket, Billy!” and, “I like your style, kid.”

But Billy said only, “Everyone’s going to forget about it.”

“I’ll be gone in two weeks. In two weeks I’ll be in Montgomery.”

“I know.”

“What are you going to do when you turn eighteen? What are you going to do, for your part?”

“I’ll do something. I’ll figure it out. Let’s go back. We can take the long way around the slough and meet the rest at the big house. There will be a lot of people around.”

“Shh.”

“Frankie. Please, let’s—”

“Quiet.”

Frankie turned toward the thicker brush. There was movement deep in the middle of it, under a blowdown.

“Hear that?”

Billy couldn’t see anything, but he heard the rustle of
leaves.

J
onathan lay on his bed. The Pines was finally quiet. A man could actually hear the goddamn pines now. And though it was late afternoon (could it be five already?) the heat had not broken. The grass and each and every leaf seemed to ooze moisture, to drip with heat. And for that and the quiet that let him breathe, he was glad he hadn’t gone with the others after the German. He’d almost caved when Emma asked him, and again after Frankie had arrived with Ernest, Billy, and that other boy whose name he could never remember. He almost gave in just so he wouldn’t have to endure any more of Emma’s nervous wing-beating. And Frankie’s excitement was a little contagious. But, by God, he’d met enough Germans during the last war. They were decent enough, and he’d been sorry so many died. He’d even saved a few who had been pulled back to the trenches with their own and he had been glad to save them. It made him feel noble. The Japanese were a different matter. And as he lay on the bed and searched for a breeze by turning his head one direction and then the other, he wondered if he’d save one of those if he were still in the Army. Probably not. After what they’d done it was hard to imagine helping them, or lifting a finger if one lay bleeding below him. Let him bleed. He’d seen men stretched out on the ground many times, and it was surprising how seldom they themselves knew they were going to die. They’d turn their heads
as though searching for something, something they could not find. And they’d say
please, oh, please, please
but he wasn’t sure what it was they were looking for or asking for, and neither were they, and then they died.

Jonathan wished that the Pines were wired for electricity, because then he could bring one of the electric fans they had in Chicago, and have a breeze whenever he wanted. You’d think this was the tropics, not the north. That’s how heavy the heat was. He turned his head again but did not lift his arms or move his body. He had not been wounded in the war. Not much more than scratches and a little trench foot, which came late and he was able to cure it by putting bandages in his boots and drying them over the Bunsen burner at the aid station. It must be a strange feeling to be shot. He turned his head quickly from side to side. “Please, oh, please, please,” he said, remembering the pleas of the soldiers under his care. He even went so far as to make the small gurgling sound in his throat that the wounded often made, as though they were thirsty, or as though swallowing air might somehow ease the pain.

“Please, oh, please, please.”

He felt himself stir. After a moment he reached down into his trousers. Well, why not? He shucked his pants and lay on the bed in his boxers and undershirt. He worked his penis out of his boxers. It lay long and limp on the sterile fabric, poking out of the fly as though draped and ready to be operated on. He liked it better this way. He liked not to see the angry cloud of his pubic hair and his penis rising out of it like some trunk out of the jungle canopy. It was better this way, with his underwear on. That way his penis was less like an extension of himself, with its taproot (as he knew from medical school) running deep down near his anus. With his underwear on, it was as though his penis had no origin, no ancestral soil; it emerged clean, without history, from the white cotton of his shorts.

This would have to suffice until he got back to Chicago.

“Please, oh, please, please.”

He would have to wait weeks—weeks!—until he would hear those words spoken from any lips other than his own. There, after a long day with patients, he could close and lock his office door and spend some time with one of the nurses. Some of them, at least, were willing. They knew the score. Until then . . . well, he was a competent surgeon. He could operate on himself.

Emma would be of no help. She was a good woman. A good mother and a good wife. But passion was something he was sure she never felt. There was no changing that. Worry was as close as she came to passion, and the worry was nonstop. Worry about which wildflowers to stand in which vases at which tables, or whether or not to put parsley on the finger potatoes. She had the annoying habit of standing and murmuring to herself, arranging the flowers, stepping back, taking them out, putting them back in, and giving the vase another quarter turn. And then she would stand in front of the bookcase to the side of the fireplace and tap her chin and ask herself which books the various guests might appreciate finding, as though on accident, in their cabins. Usually Emma solved these crises on her own, but if he was within earshot she could not stop herself from asking him, even though she knew he found it annoying.

“Do you think Mrs. Norton would like
The Ambassadors
? It’s funny when you read it from the right angle,” she would say.

“Give her D. H. Lawrence, dear.”

“Oh, be serious, Jonathan.”

“Then ask Felix. I’m sure he has a recommendation.”

“Jonathan, please.”

Please, indeed.

Please, oh, please, please.

Jonathan worked more diligently with his right hand, and he snuck his left under the elastic of his boxers and skirted the forest of pubic hair on the way to worry his balls.

The phrase “ask Felix” had become a bit of a joke between them. At first it had annoyed him how she would go on and on about what Felix had done and what he had fixed and how fast. Every story or bit of news about the Pines involved what Felix had done. They weren’t even safe in the winter. Felix lived in the boathouse throughout the winter doing God knows what—drinking, no doubt—and he sent regular letters, then telegrams, through Harris at the Wigwam. Harris probably composed them anyway, hewn from the raw materials of Felix’s few words—
The Pines in good shape
or
Storm came through
a few trees down
structures fine
. Harris was a finder of things (he’d found Jonathan his scotch and gin, even during the dry years when Jonathan couldn’t get what he wanted in Chicago).

Jonathan turned his head to one side and then the other and moved his left hand up to the base of his shaft to keep the blood from escaping, trickling back down into the lake of his usual calm. He tried to think of the kitchen girls again, but he had already left that station. He cast his mind back to Chicago, to his consulting room and the nurse he met there these days (except not of course
these
days, the days he wasted at the Pines).

Please, oh, please, please.

There were many new nurses now. Of course some were attached to the armed forces and would be sent overseas. But there was a need for nurses on the home front, too. He had many applicants and hired more than he really needed, or could afford. They weren’t rich, after all. But he hadn’t had much during the Crash and so hadn’t lost much, and with a lot of hard work they were comfortable. The last nurse he had hired was one of those special ones, entrepreneurial. It having become impossible to find stockings, she had drawn a perfectly straight black line from her heel to her buttocks with an eyeliner pencil.

Jonathan had noticed the line and the absence of stockings when
she’d sat down. But it was the girl, Madeline, who had drawn attention to it during the interview.

“I believe in helping others, Dr. Washburn. One of the ways we can help is by going without, even if it means being creative.”

He’d asked her what she meant.

“For instance,” she’d had her hands folded primly on her lap. “For instance, since we cannot buy stockings, but, you know, society demands we have some class even with a war on, you have to pretend.”

“You’re creative and helpful because you don’t wear stockings?”

“Not just that, of course. I made sure it seemed as though I was wearing stockings.”

“Pretense.”

“Exactly.”

“How far would you say that the pretense needs to go?”

“As far as is necessary, Doctor.” And she stood and turned and showed him how she had drawn a black line down the back of her thighs and calves all the way to her ankles.

How easy it had been! And when they were finished, he had, in a fit of boyish gallantry, laid her on the desk and, with his surgeon’s hand, drawn the line back in where it had been rubbed off.

Please, oh, please, please.

The house was quiet now. The girls were done with their kitchen work and were in the pump house working on the ironing and the laundry. The boys and Felix were still out looking for the German. Where was Emma? The shrill cheer of the reunion, the discomfort that lurked beneath it, continued to ring in his ears. It had been no different when they were being transported to the lines during the previous war. The same stiff joking and sing-alongs. “Tipperary” and “Be Kind to Your Web-footed Friends,” which had made them laugh and laugh and laugh. And most of them had died. The only time
during the war Jonathan had felt like himself was when he found time and enough money to see one of the prostitutes down behind the cook tents, where they had set up business. With French whores one could say anything, could do anything. And he had. He could move their bodies any way he pleased and they cooperated, whereas the dead and dying bodies at the front were awkward, stiff, smelly, and broken. And with the whores he could say what he pleased.
Let me fuck your mouth
.
Turn over
. And he closed his eyes, and with them shut he could see the girl under him, thin, with dark hair, and dark hair marking her legs and her armpits, and small breasts with tiny, very tiny pink nipples accentuated by two or three long dark hairs on each. And with his eyes closed he could picture this and not imagine and not have to see the wound that was her pussy, filled and filled again by so many men.

Please, oh, please. God, oh, please.

That was blessedly enough, as he lay on the iron frame bed in his room at the Pines, as the afternoon limped toward evening and everything lay still—the lake, the house, the pines themselves, and finally, thank God, finally, his own penis, spent and ragged, gasping itself smaller and smaller, retreating, eel-like, into its hiding place, having fed on his hand and his spit and his thoughts. Jonathan tucked it back in his boxers and lay on the bed for a long time. It was a long time gone before he remembered how much he hated it at the Pines and how angry Emma made him and how Frankie was his son but didn’t feel like his son. And just when he remembered this, he was roused by the voices of the search party, which had returned amid much shouting and yelling.

Could it be? Could they really have done it, found the German? He stood and looked out the window that faced the forest and saw them. Ernie and David came stumbling out of the woods. They were calling his name.
Dr. Washburn, Dr. Washburn.
As they approached
out of the gloom he could see the alarm on their faces. The look of boys who had seen something profound and terrible. He knew it. He knew that look and had all but forgotten it.

Dr. Washburn! Dr. Washburn!

Jonathan opened the window to call down and then, as they drew closer, he saw blood on Ernie’s shirt. But where were Felix and Billy? And where was Frankie?

“Mr. Washburn! Please! Mr. Washburn!”

Oh, God, please. Please, God.

Jonathan ran down the stairs and through the kitchen. He was halfway past the garden when he realized he was wearing only his undershirt and underwear. He felt the semen drying on the fabric of his boxers.

Please, oh, please. Please!

Jonathan rounded the garden just as Felix emerged from the woods with Billy in his shadow. He sensed Emma coming up around the front of the house and turned. She held a cutting of dahlias and hollyhocks in her arms.

Felix held a body in his arms, the arms and legs dangling, the face hidden against Felix’s shoulder.

Please, oh, please. Please!

He sprinted toward Felix. So slow, so slowly, slowgoing. It wasn’t until Felix stood next to him that Jonathan registered that the body was not Frankie’s, nor was it the German’s. Felix held a girl in his arms, a girl who stirred and moaned and then whimpered. An Indian girl. A teenager, from the look of it, but not a girl he knew. She wore a white blouse, which was soiled and covered in blood, and a gray jumper and black shoes—as if she had been dressed for school or church.

Jonathan looked up at Felix and Billy, confused.

“What the hell? Felix? Where’s—”

Frankie emerged from the woods at last. He, too, was covered in blood. He did not look at the girl or at Jonathan. His hands were shoved deep in his pockets.

Jonathan looked back at Felix.

“Take her,” Felix said.

Jonathan did as he was told. He held out his arms to receive her.

“She’s okay,” said Felix. “She’ll be okay.”

When the girl was in Jonathan’s arms, he was shocked at how light, how thin she was. Her hair was matted and tangled and studded with burrs and bark chips. Her face was dirty. But her legs and torso, where his hands clasped her, were strong and smooth. It took nothing at all to hold her. Nothing.

Felix put his hand on her head and said something to her in Indian, something low and smooth and quick. Then he turned and brushed past Frankie, heading back out into the woods. Billy stepped closer to Frankie and Felix, his eyes on the ground, his Adam’s apple jumping up and down as he swallowed hard.

“Where are you going?” asked Jonathan. “Where do you think you are going?” He was surprised at the desperation in his voice, the dependence.

“To get the other one,” said Felix. He stopped and turned to face Jonathan.

“Is she okay? The other one? Is she like this?”

“No.”

Jonathan tried to search Frankie’s eyes, but Frankie wouldn’t look at him.

“Frank. Frank! What the hell happened? What happened to the other one?” He turned in despair to Felix. “Felix. What happened? Felix! Answer me.”

Felix looked at Jonathan coolly.

Billy stepped forward, his eyes on the ground.

“I shot her,” he said.

Jonathan looked at Billy and then at his son. “Frankie?”

“I said I shot her, Dr. Washburn,” said Billy again.

Frankie looked up at his father and then to the girl in Jonathan’s arms.