“Then I’ll say good-bye to you here.” Karsh smiled, not the rictus — this time — and took the cigarette lighter from his pocket. “I saw you looking at this. A driver in our motor pool makes them up for us. Would you care to have one as a souvenir of the hearings?”
“Thanks, but why not give it to Sergeant Corey? I noticed that she smokes.”
Karsh nodded. “All right. I’ll do that tonight. With the lieutenant’s compliments.”
They had stopped under the tall arch of the double doors. Docker turned and looked back into the ballroom, where the light from the windows and chandeliers caught sparks in the golden ceiling and fell softly across the old carpets and empty tables and chairs.
He stepped back a pace, gave Karsh a salute and went down to the lobby and out into the snow blowing through the streets.
Chapter Thirty-Two
February 15, 1945. Hotel Leopold, Liège, Belgium. Thursday, 2200 Hours.
Buell Docker packed his gear that night after initialing a revised transcript of the board of inquiry hearings and an amendment to his original statement to Captain Grant. When he finally signed both documents under Lieutenant Weiffel’s careful eye, he had assisted in the transformation of Private Jackson Baird from a frightened recruit into a certified hero, the statement and transcript now only stressing Baird’s disregard for his personal safety, his bravery under enemy fire, and the fact that his death in the line of duty had been in the highest traditions of the service and reflected credit on his family, his country and the United States Army. Baird’s defection from his unit and subsequent attachment to Gun Section Eight was explained, defended and praised in a single sentence which. Docker thought, mostly demonstrated the major’s virtuoso forensic techniques:
“In the confusion and disruption created by the massive German counterattack in the Ardennes, Private Jackson Baird became separated from his unit, but displayed courage and resourcefulness in finding and attaching himself to a 40-millimeter gun section which had been battered by the first waves of the enemy attack and was retreating to regroup at a defendable position.”
Well, Docker had thought as he signed the last of the papers, who was to say it wasn’t at least “a defendable position”?...
Docker told the clerk at the desk to send someone to wake him at four in the morning. He put out clean linen and shaving gear and was mentally flipping a coin to decide whether or not to go out for a good-night bottle of beer when there was a knock on the door. He opened it and smiled when he saw Trankic’s wide bulk in the doorway.
“Come the hell in. But if you want a drink, we’ll have to go out.”
“Then what’re we hanging around here for?”
“There’s a bar down the block with pretty good brandy. Let me get a coat.”
They went down the stairs to the lobby and walked through heavy snow along a blacked-out street.
“What are you doing over here?”
“I brought some news for you. Bull.”
“Anything wrong?”
“No, nothing’s wrong.”
“Who did you leave in charge of your section?”
“Well, Solvis and Farrel are looking after things, showing the new guys how everything works.”
They pushed through the doors of a bar crowded with soldiers. The air was heavy and noisy with cigarette smoke and accordion music and bursts of talk and laughter. At a table in the rear, as far from the music as they could get, they ordered brandies and water.
Trankic wore a fatigue uniform and the rim of his helmet shaded his broad, weather-rough cheeks and worried eyes.
“So what is it?” Docker said.
“Blame that ginney Linari and that flannel-mouth Kohler if you want to blame anybody.” Trankic took a worn and soiled envelope from his pocket and placed it on the table in front of Docker. “Dumb fuckers, they told Dormund he’d get his ass in a sling for not giving it to you after Baird got racked up.”
Docker glanced at the envelope, which was addressed to him in block capitals.
“This is from Baird?”
Trankic nodded and sipped his brandy. “He wrote it the night before that tank hit us. Gave it to Dormund to give to you if anything happened to him. So naturally, Dormund forgot about it. I should have made him a new fucking head out of that tin can after all. Linari and Kohler found out he had it and got riding him about it. Told him he’d do time in Leavenworth, shit like that. He got so scared, he hid it in his duffel bag. Shorty finally told me about it and that’s how I got hold of it. Just last night.”
The waiter put two brandies on the table and stood watching them until Trankic gave him a hundred francs.
Docker opened the envelope and removed two sheets of ruled notebook paper, the kind Solvis used for his diaries. The overhead light was dim and obscured by the heavy layers of smoke. Docker turned the sheets of paper toward the bare bulb to make out Baird’s cramped handwriting.
He drank the brandy, following it with a sip of water, but the liquor didn’t reach the coldness in his stomach that had been gathering there since he had first glanced at the envelope with his name on it. Jackson Baird’s letter read:
“Dear Sergeant Docker:
I’m writing this without much light, the fire’s about out. So if you have trouble reading it, you’ll know why. I’ll give it to Dormund when I’m through and if he gives it to you in the next few days, well — that’s that.
I guess you knew from the beginning I was lying to you. I think Corporal Trankic did too. So it was a relief to talk to you tonight and finally tell you what happened. But I’d also like you to understand a little about why I lied. Maybe you can forgive me for that.
When I first saw German troops and heard artillery fire, it was like a nightmare. It was that kind of feeling, like something was coming for me and I couldn’t move a hand or foot, couldn’t even scream for help. Then I threw my rifle away and ran. The other guys in my company stayed at their posts. I’ve thought about them a lot, sergeant. In those first few days I thought I was the only soldier alive who was a coward. It was the loneliest feeling I ever had. The worst thing about it was that I felt it was so final, that there was nothing I could ever do to change it. And then you and the other men in the section helped me to settle down, to get hold of myself And I began to pray to God I’d get another chance. I realized a person just can V be ashamed of being afraid, you’ve got to get over it. Farrel and Sonny Laurel talked with me about it, and I didn’t feel so alone then. Kohler even told me to call him Shorty after a while.
But there was no room for weakness — no, that’s not the right word. When I was growing up, there was no interest in weakness. To be afraid of things — that was for other people, not the Bairds. And there was no interest either in losing or coming in second. If I won something, that was fine. But it was only at times like that — for instance, I was pretty good with horses and I always got top grades — that I felt like I was part of things. If my mother had lived, it might have been different. Maybe for my father, too. But if anything happens to me, sergeant, the only way my life will have any meaning is if he knows about me and can accept it. The guys who didn’t run deserve that. My father has got to live with what happened to me that first day, because I have. Then he should know I tried to get over it, tried to be a good soldier. That’s why I’m writing this to you. I didn’t know I could ever feel so sad. Maybe I’ll never see him again. It seems to me I wanted very little in my life. I still don’t think I asked for too much. I’m going to sign this now but I’m hoping you’ll never read it. If everything works out tonight, I think I’ll be able to speak for myself. But if it doesn’t, I’d like to ask one last favor, sergeant. Please, and this means something to me that you may not understand, I want you to make sure my father sees this letter. In some way, it could help him too, when he thinks about me.”