CHAPTER THIRTEEN
There was a way the wind had of blowing through the jungle that chilled the blood. A low, querulous moan that rattled the leaves like so many bones. A voice, deep, plaintive and haunted, like the remnant of a lost soul forced to wander this living hell for all eternity. The wind echoed the misery of the captives, cowering wretchedly in the lockup hootch. It mocked Lieutenant Calavicci, segregated yet again for his belligerence and immured in the tiger cage. He crouched, neither sitting nor standing, his legs numb from the waist, his contorted back aching, his blistered hands throbbing, the warm softness of a baby-doll-clad bosom against his cheek...
Al opened his eyes to find himself in the strange Sears catalogue room, Sharon fast asleep next to him. There was no jungle. There was no Vietnam. It was all gone, over and done with, part of a past that he didn't have to remember. A past he could forget. A tiny nip of whiskey, he knew, would quell the dreams and let him sleep--but his whiskey was at home in Wickenburg.
He sat up, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands. This was ridiculous. He could still hear the wind, still feel it. He hugged his pajama shirt to his body and shivered convulsively. There was a feel to it. The cut or the fabric sparked a memory of rough black garments, nondescript, filthy--when he was even allowed to wear them. Carefully, lest he should wake Sharon, Al got to his feet and began, catfooted, to pace the room. The shag carpet beneath his bare feet woke some semblance of reality in his mind.
But he could still hear the wind. It gnawed at his reason, compromising his attempts to recover his sense of time and place. He needed help, but realized that there was no help to be had. He couldn't wake Sharon: after their impassioned quickie in the 'Vette she had made it quite clear that such antics were strictly taboo in the house. Chester, always an antidote for the horrors, was asleep in the Penjas' trailer back home. Al was alone, as alone as he had been in that cage on the other side of the world.
Rich had to have something stronger than beer in the house, he thought abruptly. The mournful lowing of the wind would drive him out of his mind if he couldn't stop it soon. Shaking a little, he slipped out of the guest room.
The house was dark, but Al had night vision that most men would envy: the product of long years lived without electricity. He moved carefully, avoiding the dim shadows of the furnishings. The first step onto the tiles of the kitchen floor almost startled a gasp of terror from his throat. His unstable psyche equated this sensation of cold ceramic on bare feet to that first winter of imprisonment; his last month at the Hanoi Hilton. Day after day, numb toes and tingling heels on the icy floor. Tropical country, sure.
Al opened the fridge, and its light blinded him momentarily. Then his vision equilibrated and he started to open cupboards, peering behind Corelware and crystal, boxes of cereal, jars of spices, a stovetop popcorn maker. He opened the last door to find shelves of table linen. He slumped, defeated. The shaking grew worse. The conflicting stimuli--the cold floor, the pajamas, the smooth grain of the cupboard door and the sound of the wind, yowling like horns in the distance--were overpowering. It was as if he was in three places at once, and not one of them was where he wanted to be.
Unable to bear the moaning wind any longer, Al fell to his knees, clamping his hands over his ears and screwing his eyes tightly closed. When was this going to end? He'd been repatriated in 'seventy-three, for God's sake. When would he be allowed to come home?
Home. Though a fraction of a second ago, the word had meant the United States, the free world, that relatively painless definition quickly fled. Home. Lost in the intrusion, Al couldn't stop the image from surging up to assail him. A beautiful little bungalow. Blue. A handsome veranda. A majestic elm on the corner of the lot. Calla lilies in the flowerbeds. And in the window, a face. The most beautiful face on Earth...
The wind began to crescendo in time to his agony, and Al crumpled, burying his face in his lap.
"Stop," he begged, not realizing that he was speaking aloud. "Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop."
Like the mantra of name, rank, serial number and birthdate that had served as a touchstone through his tenure in Hell, this simple repetition gave him focus and intent. With each utterance of the small word his mind pulled further within itself, able, somehow, to hide from the pain. From the wind. "Stop," Al repeated. "Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. St--"
"Okay, okay. It stopped."
Al gasped sitting up defensively. Leaning against the door of the still-open refrigerator was Luke, still fully dressed, his tattered garments creating a very strange silhouette. Al stared, too numb with confusion and embarrassment to do anything more.
"Music hater, huh?" the boy said scornfully.
Al's brows furrowed. "Music?"
Luke thumped his breastbone with two fingers. "Ouch, man. You got me right here with that one. Music, Mister Square. You ever heard of jazz?"
"Kid, jazz and me grew up together," Al said. "I was younger than your sister when I saw Louis Armstrong play live in Chi."
The transformation was amazing, even in the dim light. All pretense of disinterest dissolved into an expression of wonder and disbelief.
"You saw Louis Armstrong? Live?" Luke cried, clapping his hand over his mouth when he realized how loudly he had spoken.
"Sure. Not the kind of thing you forget," Al said, recovering something of his customary self-assurance... or at least a reasonable outward facsimile of it. "I'll tell you about it some day."
"How 'bout now?" Luke whispered, pointing over his shoulder. "I was just hangin' downstairs, if you wanna join me."
What the hell? It wasn't like he was going to get any sleeping done, anyway. "Sure, kid. What the hell?" Al grunted, getting to his feet and trying to forget that the boy had found him groveling in the midst of a panic attack.
He followed Luke to the back stairs, and so down into the basement rec room. There was a television in one corner, surrounded by a sofa and several beanbag chairs. Another corner sported a rack of sequined dance costumes, no surprises there, and a blue gymnastics mat. Luke scorned these and turned the corner from whence the dim incandescent light was filtering.
In a corner under the stairs was an old recliner and the remains of an ottoman. Set on the latter was a glistening saxophone. The walls were plastered with posters, including one of Charlie Chaplain sitting on a grubby-looking stoop. Al eyed that one, impressed at this new insight into the kid's personality.
"Sit down," Luke said, indicating the battered armchair. "Nobody can hear us upstairs."
Al sat gingerly, half afraid that the structure would give out under his weight. Luke picked up the instrument and settled on the ottoman.
"Don't you ever sleep?" Al asked.
"Napped this afternoon," Luke told him, shrugging. "So who cares?"
"Not me," Al said. "What time is it, anyway?"
Luke shrugged still more enormously. "Time is the worn convention of the pedantic architects of our Age of Banality."
"I see," Al intoned mildly, not sure where else to take the conversation. Silence ensued briefly, before Luke spoke again.
"So spill it," he said. "Tell me all about how you got to see Louis Armstrong."
Al couldn't help but grin at the boy's eagerness, but the fact was that part of him was still in Vietnam, and he was having trouble adjusting to the change of environment. He felt like running, or hiding, or...
He shivered. Luke frowned.
"Hey, you cold?" he asked. He got to his feet, setting down the saxophone, and slipped behind the chair, creeping into the ever-shrinking crawlspace beneath the stairs. " 'Cause I got something that'll warm you up."
There was considerable rummaging and a strange squeak, and then Luke came crawling back, somewhat dustier for his efforts. "You like tequila?" he asked, holding up a bottle.
Al's eyes widened. "Yeah, I--" Then he stopped and frowned. "How did you get that?" he asked, something of the responsible adult he knew he ought to be but actually wasn't filtering through his words.
Luke shrugged. "Got a buddy who pulls for me," he said. "Laws are the worn convention--"
"--of the pedantic architects of our Age of Banality," Al finished. "Yeah, I know. Let's try some of that."
Luke smiled, a broad, genuine smile. "No glasses. You care?"
As a matter of fact, Al did care. He felt very strongly about the luxury of dishes, especially the clean, smooth, well-crafted sort. On the other hand, he knew that the drink would help him finish his transition from the anguished past to the merely annoying present, and that was a state greatly to be desired.
"Naw. I don't backwash," he said.
"Neither do I," Luke promised, uncapping the bottle and offering Al the first quaff. He took it gratefully and felt the alcohol sublime its way down his esophagus. The calming effect was almost instantaneous, an anticipation of the relief that he knew would ensue rather than a reaction any chemical process. That would come later, and then he really would be able to sleep.
Al handed the bottle to Luke, who took a more moderate swallow. "So we've got the refreshments. Where's the entertainment?" he demanded. "Sachmo in Chi!"
"Oh, yeah," Al said, helping himself to another mouthful of tequila. "Well, I was eleven, and I was on the lam with the greatest pool player in the world. You ever heard of Charlie 'Black Magic' Walters?"
Luke shook his head. Al sighed.
"Yeah, I shoulda figured. Well, anyway, Magic and me, we were in Chi, and he was shooting pool in this club, when all of a sudden in walks Louis Armstrong!" Al relished the wonder on the youth's face. "I didn't know who he was, of course, but everybody there sure did. This was 1945, too, when he was already a celebrity, but he was in town playing some big concert hall, and after the show he figured he'd stop by his old haunts and say hello to some of the guys he used to know back in the 'Twenties before he hit it big. So there he was!"
"Hey, hang on, you were eleven?" Luke said, frowning. "So how come you were at this club in the middle of the night? You should've been in bed or something."
Al grinned. "Hey, who just said that bit about time and afternoon naps?" he challenged. "I was there, okay? And Louis gets up with the band and he starts jamming, right there on the dinky little stage in this club. They musta played two, three hours, and Magic let me sit on the pool table to watch. When they were all done and Louis came down to the bar for a drink, Magic took me over with him, and he said, 'That was some mighty fine playing, Mister Armstrong. Mighty fine.' "
Al paused to avail himself once more of the liquor, which was now taking the edge off of his distress. Vietnam was fading fast, back into Hell where it should be, and it was being replaced with the memory of some of the happiest days of his less-than-idyllic childhood. Thank God for Luke and his contrary habits!
The boy was staring at Al, wide-eyed with amazement. "What happened then?" he asked breathlessly.
Al's smile broadened, now entirely sincere and untainted by any recollection of the camps. "Louis said, 'Why, it's Black Magic! Sir, it is an honor to meet you, an honor! Saw you play once down in New Orleans. Best game I ever watched!' Then he bought Magic a drink, and they sat down together at the bar."
"What about you?" Luke asked.
It was the most treasured moment of an immensely precious memory. "He asked me my name, and I told him. Then he said he was pleased to meet me, and shook my hand. Then he bought me a soda."
He fell silent, lost in a reverie of nostalgia. Luke stared at him, and finally managed a reverent whisper.
"Louis Armstrong bought you a soda," he breathed. "Louis Armstrong bought my Uncle Al a soda."
The almost worshipful tone the boy was taking made Al uncomfortable. "Yeah, well, I couldn't finish it," he said wryly. Ready to change the subject, he pointed at the saxophone. "You play?"
"Soloist in the school jazz band," Luke said proudly.
"Isn't school a worn convention?" Al asked snarkily.
Luke shrugged. "Gets me away from Mom," he said.
"So play for me," Al said.
Luke seemed to flush a little. "Okay," he said. "Whaddaya want to hear?"
"Play me some jazz," suggested Al.
"Well..." Luke licked his reed and flexed his fingers. "This is something I've been kind of tooling around with. Just a little... something."
He put the instrument to his lips and began to play. The sound was low and full, beautifully crafted by strong lungs and an exquisitely controlled diaphragm. The instrument wept softly, mourning the woes of the world as it swung with the beat of sweet, slow jazz. It had an almost verbal quality to it, eloquent and yet ineffable. Like the weeping of a broken heart.
Like the wind in the jungles of Vietnam.