Right off the bat, she says, “Well, looks like you have done it again, Forrest.”
“I reckon,” I says.
“Didn’t you get in enough trouble the last time you went into the army?”
“Yup.”
“So what is it? You think you had to do this for little Forrest?”
“Yup.”
She brushed her hair back an tossed her head, just like she used to do, an I just stood there, twistin my hands.
“Feelin kinda sorry for yourself, huh?”
“Uh huh.”
“Don’t want to go up there to the Congress and tell the truth, do you?”
“Nope.”
“Well, you better, cause this is a serious bidness, sellin arms for hostages—At least those bozos think so.”
“So I’m tole.”
“So what you gonna do?”
“I dunno.”
“My advice is, I’d come clean with the whole thing. And don’t be coverin up for anybody. Okay?”
“Yeah, I guess,” I said, an then another big ole cloud of white mist come waftin in from the river, an Jenny, she just sort of vanished into it, an for a moment I wanted so bad to go runnin after her, maybe to catch her somehow, an bring her back—but even I am not so stupid as that. So I just turned aroun an started back for my crate. Anyhow, I am left on my own again. An as it turned out, it was the last time I did not take Jenny’s advice about tellin the truth.
“Now, tell us, Private Gump, just when was it you first got the idea to swap arms for hostages?”
I be settin at a big ole table facin all the senators an lawyers an other muckity-mucks in the congressional hearin room, an the TV cameras be rollin an lights shinin in my face. A little young-lookin, blond-haired lawyer guy be astin the questions.
“Who says I did?” I ast.
“I am asking the questions here, Private Gump. You just answer em.”
“Well, I don’t know how I can answer that,” I says. “I mean, you don’t even ast me whether I did—You just ast me when...?”
“That’s right, Private Gump, when was it, then?”
I looked over at Colonel North, uniform all full of medals, an he be glarin at me an slowly noddin his head, like I am sposed to answer somethin.
“Well, it was when I first met the President, I reckon.”
“Yes, and did you not tell the President that you had conceived a scheme to swap arms for hostages?”
“No, sir.”
“What did you tell the President then?”
“I tole him the last time I met a president, he wanted to watch To Tell the Truth, on the TV.”
“Issat so! An what did the President say?”
“He says he would rather watch Let’s Make a Deal.”
“Private Gump! I remind you that you are under oath here!”
“Well, actually, he was watchin Concentration, but he said it confuses him.”
“Private Gump! You are evading my question—and you are under oath. Are you tryin to make the United States Senate look ridiculous? We can hold you in contempt!”
“I reckon you already do,” I says.
“Sombitch! You are covering up for all of them—the President, Colonel North, here, Poindexter, and I don’t know who-all else! We are gonna get to the bottom of this if it takes all year!”
“Yessir.”
“So, now, Gump, Colonel North has told us you conceived the whole nefarious plan to swap arms for hostages to the Ayatolja and then divert the money to the Contras in Central America. Isn’t that so?”
“I don’t know nothin about any Contras—I thought the money was goin to some gorillas.”
“Ah—an admission! So you did know about this horrible scheme!”
“I understood the gorillas need the money, yessir. That’s what I was tole.”
“Ha! I think you are lying, Private Gump. I suggest that it was you who devised the entire operation—and with the President’s complicity! Are you trying to play dumb?”
“It ain’t exactly playin, sir.”
“Mr. Chairman!” the lawyer says. “It is obvious that Private Gump, here, the ‘special assistant for covert operations to the President of the United States,’ is a fraud and a faker, and that he is deliberately tryin to make the United States Congress look like fools! He ought to be held in contempt!”
The chairman, he sort of drawed hissef up an look down at me like I was a bug.
“Yes, it does appear that way. Uh, Private Gump, do you understand the penalty for makin the United States Congress look like fools?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, we can thow your ass in jail—not to put too fine a point on it.”
“Oh, yeah,” I says, tryin to imitate Colonel North’s tact an diplomacy strategy, “start thowin then.”
So here I am again, thowed in jail. Headline in The Washington Post next day says: MORON DETAINED IN CONTEMPT OF CONGRESS CASE.
An Alabama man, who sources close to the Post identified as a “certified idiot,” has been charged with contempt of Congress in the Iran-Contra scandal, which this paper has covered from top to bottom.
Forrest Gump, of no fixed address, was sentenced to an indefinite prison term yesterday after he began ridiculing members of the Select Senate Committee appointed to investigate charges that key members of the Reagan administration conspired to swindle the Ayatolja Koumani of Iran out of cash in an arms-for-hostages scam.
Gump, who apparently has been involved in numerous shady activities involving the U.S. Government, including its space program, was described by sources as “a member of the lunatic fringe of American intelligence operations. He’s one of those guys who comes an goes in the night,” the source said.
A senator on the committee, who asked not to be identified, told the Post that Gump “will rot in that jail until he repents for trying to make fools of the U.S. Congress. Only the U.S. Congress itselves, and not some shitheaver from Alabama, is permitted to do that,” said the senator, to quote his own words.
Anyhow, they give me some clothes with black an white prison stripes on em, an stick me in a cell I got to share with a forger, a child molester, a dynamite bomber, an some nut called Hinckley who is always talkin about the actress Jodie Foster. The forger is the nicest one of the bunch.
Anyhow, after reviewin my employment qualifications, they set me to work makin license plates, an life settled down to a dull routine. It was about Christmastime—Christmas Eve, to be exact, an it was snowin—when a guard come up to the cell an say I got a visitor.
I ast him who it was, but he just says, “Listen, Gump, you is lucky to have any kind of visitor, considerin the crime you have committed. People that go around makin a fool of the U.S. Congress are lucky they don’t get thowed in ‘the hole’—so get your big ass out here.”
I gone on down to the visitors room with him. Outside, a group of carolers from the Salvation Army is singin “Away in a Manger,” an I can hear a Santa Claus ringin his bell for donations. When I set down in front of the wire booth, I am absolutely floored to see settin across from me little Forrest.
“Well, merry Christmas, I guess” is all he says.
I don’t know what else to say, so I says, “Thanks.”
We just set lookin at each other for a minute. Actually, little Forrest is mostly starin down at the counter, ashamed, I guess, to see his daddy in the pokey.
“Well, how’d you come to get here?” I ast.
“Grandma sent me. You was in all the papers and on TV, too. She said she thought it might cheer you up if I came.”