High Hunt

4

THE following Saturday I got out of the Army. Naturally, they had to have a little ceremony. Institutions always feel they have to have a little ceremony. I’ve never been able to figure out why really. I’m sure nobody really give a rat’s ass about all that nonsense. In this case, we walked in a line through a room; and a little warrant officer, who must have screwed up horribly somewhere to get stuck with the detail, handed each of us a little brown envelope with the piece of paper in it. Then he shook hands with us. I took the envelope, briefly fondled his sweaty hand, walked out, and it was all over.

“You sure you got my address, Alders?” Benson asked as we fished around in the pile for our duffle bags.

“Yeah, kid, I got it,” I told him.

“Les-ter,” a woman’s voice yodeled from the parking lot.

“That’s my mom,” Benson said. “I gotta go now.”

“Take care, kid,” I told him, shaking his hand.

“Be sure and write me, huh? I mean it. Let’s keep in touch.”

“Les-ter! Over here.”

“I gotta run. So long, Dan.” It was the only time in two years he’d ever used my first name.

“Bye, Les,” I said.

He took off, weighted way off-balance by his duffle bag. I watched him go.

I stood looking at the parking lot until I located Jack’s Plymouth. I slung the duffle bag by the strap from my left shoulder and headed toward my brother’s car. It’s funny, but I almost felt a little sad. I even saluted a passing captain, just to see if it felt any different. It did.

Jack was leaning against the side of his car. “Hey, man, you sure throw a sharp highball.” He grinned as I came up. “Why didn’t you just thumb your nose at the bastard?”

I shrugged. “He’s still in and I’m out. Why should I bug him?”

“You all ready? I mean have you got any more bullshit to go through?”

“All finished,” I said. “I just done been civilianized. I got my divorce papers right here.” I waved the envelope at him.

“Let’s cut out, then. I’ve got your civvies in the back seat.”

I looked around once. The early afternoon sun blasted down on the parking lot, and the yellow barracks shimmered in the heat. It looked strange already. “Let’s go,” I said and climbed into the back seat.

There was a guy sitting in the front seat. I didn’t know him.

“Oh,” Jack said, “this is Lou McKlearey, a buddy of mine. Works for Sloane.”

McKlearey was lean and sort of blond. I’d have guessed him at about thirty. His eyes were a very cold blue and had a funny look to them. He stuck out his hand, and when we shook hands, he seemed to be trying to squeeze the juice out of my fingers.

“Hi, Dogface,” he said in a raspy voice. He gave me a funny feeling—almost like being in the vicinity of a fused bomb. Some guys are like that.

“Ignore him,” Jack said. “Lou’s an ex-Marine gunnery sergeant. He just ain’t had time to get civilized yet.”

“Let’s get out of here, huh?” Suddenly I couldn’t stand being on Army ground anymore.

Jack fired up the car and wheeled out of the lot. We barreled on down to the gate and eased out into the real world.

“Man,” I said “it’s like getting out of jail.”

“Anyhow, Jackie,” McKlearey said, apparently continuing what he’d been talking about before I got to the car, “we unloaded that crippled Caddy on a Nigger sergeant from McChord Field for a flat grand. You know them fuckin’ Niggers; you can paint ‘Cadillac’ on a baby buggy, and they’ll buy it.”

“Couldn’t he tell that the block was cracked?” Jack asked him.

“Shit! That dumb spade barely knew where the gas pedal was. So we upped the price on the Buick to four hundred over book, backed the speedometer to forty-seven thousand, put in new floor mats, and dumped it on a red-neck corporal from Georgia. He traded us a ’57 Chevy stick that was all gutted out. We gave him two hundred trade-in. Found out later that the crooked son of a bitch had packed sawdust in the transmission—oldest stunt in the book. You just can’t trust a reb. They’re so goddamn stupid that they’ll try stuff you think nobody’s dumb enough to try anymore, so you don’t even bother to check it out.

“Well, we flushed out the fuckin’ sawdust and packed the box with heavy grease and then sold that pig for two and a quarter to some smart-ass high school kid who thought he knew all about cars. Shit! I could sell a three-wheel ’57 Chevy to the smartest fuckin’ kid in the world. They’re all hung up on that dog—Niggers and Caddies; kids and ’57 Chevies—it’s all the same.

“So, by the end of the week, we’d moved around eight cars, made a flat fifteen hundred clear profit, and didn’t have a damn thing left on the lot that hadn’t been there on Monday morning.”

“Christ”—Jack laughed—“no wonder Sloane throws money around like a drunken sailor.”

“That lot of his is a fuckin’ gold mine,” McKlearey said. “It’s like havin’ a license to steal. Of course, the fact that he’s so crooked he has to screw himself out of bed in the morning doesn’t hurt either.”

“Man, that’s the goddamn truth,” Jack agreed. “How you doin’ back there, Dan?”

“I’m still with you,” I said.

“Here,” he said. He fumbled under the seat and came out with a brown-bagged bottle. He poked it back at me. “Celebrate your newfound freedom.”

“Amen, old buddy,” I said fervently. I unscrewed the top and took a long pull at the bottle, fumbling with my necktie at the same time.

“You want me to haul into a gas station so you can change?” he asked me.

“I can manage back here, I think,” I told him. “Two hundred guys got out this morning. Every gas station for thirty miles has got a line outside the men’s room by now.”

“You’re probably right,” Jack agreed. “Just don’t get us arrested for indecent exposure.”

It took me a mile or two to change clothes. I desperately wanted to get out of that uniform. After I changed though, I rolled my GI clothes very carefully and tucked them away in my duffle bag. I didn’t ever want to wear them again—or even look at them—but I didn’t want them wrinkled up.

“Well,” I said when I’d finished. “I may not be too neat, but I’m a civilian again. Have a drink.” I passed the bottle on up to the front seat.

Jack took a belt and handed the jug to McKlearey. He took a drink and passed the bottle back to me. “Have another rip,” he said.

“Let’s stop and have a couple beers,” I suggested. I suddenly wanted to go into a bar—a place where there were other people. I think I wanted to see if I would fit in. I wasn’t a GI anymore. I wanted to really see if I was a civilian.

“Mama Cat’s got some chow waitin’,” Jack said, “but I guess we’ve got time for a couple.”

“Any place’ll do,” I said.

“I know just how he feels, Jackie,” Lou said. “After a hitch, a man needs to unwind a bit. When I got out the last time in Dago, I hit this joint right outside the gate and didn’t leave for a week. Haul in at the Patio—it’s just up the street.”

“Yeah,” Jack agreed, “seems to me I got all juiced up when I got out of the Navy, too. Hey, ain’t that funny? Army, Navy, Marines—all of us in here at once.” It was the kind of dung Jack would notice.

“Maybe we can find a fly-boy someplace and have a summit conference,” I said.

Jack turned off into the dusty, graveled parking lot of a somewhat overly modern beer joint.

“I’m buying,” I said.

“OK, little brother,” Jack said. “Let’s go suck up some suds.” We piled out of the car and walked in the bright sunlight toward the tavern.

“This is a new one, isn’t it?” I asked.

“Not really,” Jack told me, “it’s been here for about a year now.”

We went inside. It was cool and dim, and the lighted beer signs behind the bar ran to the type thet sprinkled the walls with endlessly varying patterns of different colored lights. Tasteful beer signs, for Chrissake! I laid a twenty on the polished bar and ordered three beers.

The beer was good and cold, and it felt fine just to sit and hold the chilled glass. Jack started telling the bartender that I’d just got out, and that I was his brother. Somehow, whenever Jack told anybody anything, it was always in relation to himself. If he’d been telling someone about a flood, it would be in terms of how wet he’d gotten. I guess I hadn’t remembered that about him.

Lou sat with us for a while and then bought a roll of nickels and went over to the pinball machine. Like every jarhead I’ve ever known, he walked at a stiff brace, shoulders pulled way back and his gut sucked in. Marine basic must be a real bitch-kitty. He started feeding nickels into the machine, still standing at attention. I emptied my beer and ordered another round.

“Easy man,” Jack said. “You’ve got a helluva lot of drinkin’ to do before the day’s over, and I’d hate to see you get all kicked out of shape about halfway through. We’ve got a party on for tonight, and you’re the guest of honor.”

“You shouldn’t have done that, Jack,” I said. What I’d really meant to say was that I wished to hell he hadn’t.

“Look,” he said, “my brother doesn’t get out of the Army every day, and it’s worth a blowout.” I knew there was no point arguing with him.

“Is Marg really waiting?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. “She’s got steak and all the trimmings on. I’m supposed to call her and let her know we’re on the way.”

“Well,” I said, “we shouldn’t keep her waiting. Hey, Jack, who’s this McKlearey guy anyway?” I thumbed over my shoulder at Lou.

“He works at Sloane’s used car lot. I knew him when I was in the Navy. We met in Yokosuka one time and pitched a liberty together. He’s got ten years in the Corps—went in at seventeen, you know the type—washed out on a medical—malaria, I think. Probably picked it up in Nam.”

“Bad scene,” I said. “He seems a little—tight—keyed-up or something.”

“Oh, Lou’s OK, but kind of watch him. He’s a ruthless son of a bitch. And for God’s sake don’t lend him any money—you’ll never see it again. And don’t cross him if you can help it—I mean really cross him. He’s a real combat Marine—you know, natural-born killer and all that shit. He was a guard in a Navy brig one time, and some poor bastard made a break for the fence. McKlearey waited until the guy was up against the wire so he couldn’t fall down and then blasted him seven times between the shoulder blades with a .45. I knew a guy who was in there, and he said that McKlearey unloaded so fast it sounded like a machine gun. Walked ’em right up the middle of the guy’s back.”

“Kill him?”

“Blew him all to pieces. They had to pick him up in a sack.”

“Little extreme,” I said.

“That’s a Gyrene for you. Sometimes they get kill-happy.”

I finished my beer. “Well,” I said, “if you’re done with that beer, I think I’m ready to face the world again. Besides, I’m coming down with a bad case of the hungries.”

“Right,” he said, draining his glass. “Hey, Lou, let’s go.”

“Sure thing,” McKlearey said, concentrating on the machine. “Just a minute—goddamn it!” The machine lit TILT, and all the other lights went out. “I just barely touched the bastard,” he complained.

“We got to go, anyway,” Jack said. “You guys go on ahead, and I’ll give Marg a quick buzz.”

Lou and I went back on out in the sunlight to Jack’s Plymouth and had another belt from the bottle.

“I’d just hit the rollover,” Lou said, “and I had a real good chance at two in the blue.” His eyes had the unfocused look of a man who’s just been in the presence of the object of his obsession.

“That pay pretty good?” I asked.

“Hundred and sixty games,” he said. “Eight bucks. Goddamn machines get real touchy when you’ve got half a chance to win something.”

“I prefer slots,” I said. “There was this one over in Germany I could hit three times out of four. It was all in how you pulled the handle.”

He grunted. Slots weren’t his thing. He wasn’t interested.

“She’s puttin’ the steaks on right now,” Jack said as he came across the parking lot. He climbed in behind the wheel. “They’ll be almost ready by the time we get there.” He spun us out of the nearly empty lot and pointed the nose of the car back down the highway.

We pulled in beside his trailer about ten minutes later and went on in. Margaret came over and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek. She seemed a little self-conscious about it. I got the feeling that the “cousinly” kiss or whatever wasn’t just exactly natural to her. “Hi, Civilian,” she said.

“That’s the nicest thing anybody ever said to me,” I told her, trying to keep my eyes off the front of her blouse.

We all had another drink—whiskey and water this time—while Marg finished fixing dinner. Then we sat down to the steaks. I was hungry and the food was good. Once in a while I’d catch myself looking at McKlearey. I still didn’t have him figured out, and I wasn’t really sure I liked him. To me, he looked like a whole pile of bad trouble, just looking for someplace to happen. Some guys are like that. Anyway, just being around him made me feel uncomfortable. Jack and Margaret seemed to like him though, so I thought maybe I was just having a touch of the “first day out of the Army squirrelies.”

After dinner Marg got the kids up from their naps, and I played with them a little. They were both pretty young, and most of the playing consisted of tickling and giggles, but it was kind of fun. Maybe it was the booze, but I don’t think so. The kids weren’t really talking yet, and you don’t have to put anything on with a kid that age. All they care about is if you like them and pay attention to them. That hour or so straightened me out more than anything that happened the rest of the day. We flopped around on the floor, grabbing at each other and laughing.

“Hey, Civilian,” Jack said. “Let’s dump your gear over at your trailer. I want you to see how we got it fixed up.”

“Sure,” I said. “Uncle Dan’s gotta go now, kids,” I told the girls. Marlene, the oldest—about two—gave me a big, wet kiss, and Patsy, the baby, pouted and began to cry. I held her until she quit and then handed her to Marg. I went to the door where Jack was waiting.

“You guys go ahead,” Lou said. “I got my shoes off. Besides, I want to watch the ballgame.”

I glanced at the flickering TV set. A smeary-looking baseball game was going on, but I’d swear he hadn’t been watching it. I caught a quick glance between him and Margaret, but I didn’t pay much attention.

“You guys going to be down there long?” Margaret asked.

“We ought to unpack him and all,” Jack said. “Why?”

“Why don’t you put the girls out in the play yard then—so I can get the place cleaned up?”

“Sure,” Jack said. “Dust McKlearey, too—since he’s a permanent part of that couch now.”

Lou laughed and settled in a little deeper.

“We’ll take the jug,” Jack said.

“Sure,” Lou answered. “I want to rest up for tonight anyway.”

Jack and I put the little girls out in the little fenced-in yard and drove his Plymouth down the street to the trailer I’d rented. We hauled my duffle bag out of the back seat and went in.

It was hot and stuffy inside, and we opened all the windows. The trailer was small and dingy, with big waterstains on the wood paneling and cracked linoleum on the floor. Jack had been able to scrounge up a nearly new couch and a good bed, as well as a few other odds and ends of furniture, a small TV set, dishes, and bedding. It was kind of a trap, but like he said, it was a place to flop. What the hell?

“Pretty good, huh?” he said proudly. “A real bachelor pad.” He showed me around with a proprietary attitude.

“It’s great,” I said as convincingly as I could. “I sure do appreciate all you’ve done in here, Jack.”

“Oh, hell, it’s nothing,” he said, but I could see that he was pleased.

“No, I mean it—cleaning up the place and all.”

“Margaret did that,” he said. “All I did was put the arm on Clem for the furniture and stuff.”

“Let’s have a drink,” I said. “Christen the place.”

“Right.” He poured some whiskey in the bottom of two mismatched glasses and we drank. My ears were getting a little hot, and I knew I’d have to ease up a bit or I’d be smashed before the sun went down. It had been a real strange day. It had started at six that morning in a mothball-smelling barracks, and now I’d left all of that for good. Soon I’d be going back to the musty book-smell and the interminable discussions of art and reality and the meaning of truth. This was a kind of never-never land in between. Maybe it was a necessary transition, something real between two unrealities—always assuming, of course, that this was real.

We hauled my duffle bag and my civvies back to the tiny little bedroom and began hanging things up in the little two-by-four closet and stashing them in the battered dresser.

“You gonna buy a set of wheels?” he asked.

“I guess I’d better. Nothing fancy, just good and dependable.”

“Let’s see what we can finagle out of Sloane tonight.”

“Look, Jack,” I said, “I don’t want to cash in on—”

“He can afford it,” Jack interrupted. “You go to one of these two-by-four lots on the Avenue, and they’ll screw you right into the wall. Me and Lou and Sloane will put you into something dependable for under two hundred. It may not look too pure, but it’ll go. I’ll see to it that they don’t fuck over you.”

I shrugged. Why fight a guy when he’s trying to do you a favor? “OK,” I said, “but for a straight deal—I want to pay for what I get.”

“Don’t worry,” Jack said.

“Where’s the big blowout tonight?” I asked him.

“Over at Sloane’s place. Man, wait’ll you see his house. It’s a goddamn mansion.”

“McKlearey going to be there?”

“Oh, sure. Lou’ll show up anywhere there’s free booze.”

“He’s an odd one.”

“Lou’s OK. You just gotta get used to him is all.”

“Well,” I said, depositing my folded duffle bag in the bottom of the closet, “I think that’s about got it.”

“Pretty good little pad, huh?” he said again.

“It’ll work out just fine,” I said. “Hey, you want to run me to a store for a minute? I’d better pick up some supplies. I guess I can’t just run down to the friendly neighborhood mess hall anymore.”

“Not hardly.” He laughed. “But, hell, you could eat over at my place tomorrow.”

“Oh, no. I’m not fit to live with until about noon. Marg and I get along fairly well, and I sure don’t want to mildew the sheets right off the bat.”

“What all you gonna need?”

“Just staples—coffee, beer, aspirin—you know.”

“Get-well stuff.” He laughed again.

We went out and climbed into his car.

“Hadn’t you better let Marg know where we’re going?” I asked him as he backed out into the street.

“Man, it’s sure easy to see you’ve never been married. That’s the first and worst mistake a guy usually makes. You start checkin’ in with the wife, and pretty soon she starts expectin’ you to check in every five minutes. Man, you just go when you want to. It doesn’t take her long to get the point. Then she starts expectin’ you when she sees you.”

The grocery store was large and crowded. It took me quite a while to get everything. I wasn’t familiar with the layout, and it was kind of nice just to mingle with the crowd. Actually, I wound up getting a lot more than I’d intended to. Jack kept coming across things he thought I really ought to have on hand.

“Now you’ll be able to survive for a few days,” he told me as we piled the sacks in the back seat of his car.

We drove back to my trailer, unloaded the groceries, and put the stuff that needed to be kept cold in the noisy little refrig beside the stove. Jack picked up the whiskey bottle, and we drove his car back up to his trailer. We got out and went up to the door. The screen was latched.

“Hey,” Jack yelled, rattling the door, “open the gate.”

Lou got up from the couch, looking a little drowsy and mussed. “Keep your pants on,” he said, unlocking the door.

“Why in hell’d you lock it?” Jack asked him.

“I didn’t lock it,” Lou answered. “I dropped off to sleep.”

“Where’s Marg?”

“I think I just heard her in the can.”

“Marg,” Jack yelled, “what the hell’d you lock the front door for?”

“Was it locked?” Her voice was muffled.

“No, hell, it wasn’t locked. I’m just askin’ because I like the sound of my own voice.”

“I don’t know,” her voice came back. “Maybe it’s getting loose and slipped down by itself.”

He snapped the latch up and down several times. It seemed quite stiff. “It couldn’t have,” he yelled back at her, “it’s tighter’n hell.”

“Well, I don’t know. Maybe I latched it myself from force of habit.” The toilet flushed, and she came out. “So why don’t you beat me?”

“I just wanted to know why the door was latched, that’s all.”

“Lou and I were having a mad, passionate affair,” she snapped, “and we didn’t want to be interrupted. Satisfied?”

“Oh,” Jack said, “that’s different. How was it, Lou?”

“Just dandy,” Lou said, laughing uneasily.

“Let’s see now,” Jack said, “am I supposed to shoot you, or her, or both of you?”

“Why not shoot yourself?” Margaret suggested. “That would be the best bet—you have got your insurance all paid up, haven’t you?”

Jack laughed and Margaret seemed to relax.

“Where’d you guys take off to in the car?” she asked me.

“We made a grocery run,” Jack said. “Had to lay in a few essentials for him—you know, beer, aspirin, Alka-Seltzer—staples.”

“We saw you take off,” she said. “We kinda wondered what you were up to.”

“Hey, Alders,” Lou said, “what time are we supposed to be at Sloane’s?”

“Jesus,” Jack said, “you’re right. We better get cranked up. We’ve got to pick up Carter.”

“Who’s he?” I asked.

“Another guy. Works for the city. You’ll like him.”

“We’ll have to stop by a liquor store, too, won’t we?” I said.

“What for? Sloane’s buying.”

“Sloane always buys,” McKlearey said, putting on his shoes. “He’d be insulted if anybody showed up at one of his parties with their own liquor.”

“Sure, Dan,” Jack said. “It’s one of the ways he gets his kicks. When you got as much money as old Calvin’s got, you’ve already bought everything you want for yourself so about the only kick you get out of it is spendin’ it where other guys can watch you.”

“Conspicuous consumption,” I said.

“Sloane’s conspicuous enough, all right,” Jack agreed.

“And he can consume about twice as much as any three other guys in town.” Lou laughed.

“We’ll probably be late,” Jack told Margaret.

“No kidding,” she said dryly.

“Come on, you guys,” Jack said, ignoring her. We went out of the trailer into the slanting late-afternoon sun.

“I’ll take my own car,” McKlearey said. “Why don’t you guys pick up Carter? I’ve got to swing by the car lot for a minute.”

“OK, Lou,” Jack said. “See you at Sloane’s place.” He and I piled into his Plymouth and followed McKlearey on out to the street. I knew that my brother wasn’t stupid. He had to know what was going on with Margaret. Maybe he just didn’t care. I began not to like the feel of the whole situation. I began to wish I’d stayed the hell out of that damned poker game.

5

MIKE Carter and Betty, his wife, lived in a development out by Spanaway Lake, and it took Jack and me about three-quarters of an hour to get there.

We pulled into the driveway of one of those square, boxy houses that looked like every other one on the block. A heavyset guy with black, curly hair came out into the little square block of concrete that served as a front porch.

“Where in hell have you bastards been?” he called as Jack cut the motor.

“Don’t get all worked up,” Jack yelled back as we got out of the car. “This is my brother, Dan.” He turned his face toward me. “That lard-ass up there is Carter—Tacoma’s answer to King Kong.”

Mike glanced around quickly to make sure no one was watching and then gave Jack the finger, “Wie geht’s?” he said to me grinning.