Dan Wakefield - Under the Apple Tree - A Novel

“Of course I still care. I wish him well, wherever he is, but that isn’t it , what bothers me so.”

“What is, then?”

“That I was so weak, so carried away, that I—that we did it. While Roy was at War. It’s like a dark cloud, over all this happiness.”

“But he’ll never know, will he? Roy?”

“If he ever did, it would be the end.”

“But he loves you.”

“He’d never forgive me.”

“How do you know?”

“I know. He’s a man.”

“You mean men can’t forgive, ever?”

“Not that.”

“How come? How come you’re so sure?”

Shirley stopped walking and put her mittened hand on Artie’s arm, as if to physically convey the truth of what she told him.

“Artie. It’s the way men are.”

He nodded, Shirley took her hand away, and they walked on to her house in silence, weighed down by the burden of nature’s stern law.

When Artie got home a car he’d never seen before was parked outside, and he hoped it wasn’t some reporter come snooping around. This one old guy had come over from the paper in Moline the second day Roy was home and asked a lot of questions about “what it was like” on Guadalcanal and Roy’s answers got shorter and his face got tighter till. Artie was afraid he’d explode and finally he said he was sorry but he couldn’t really say any more and the guy got ticked off and asked how the people on the Home Front were supposed to know what was going on if their own boys returning home wouldn’t talk? Then Roy’s tan had turned the color of a bruise and he handed the reporter his hat and said, “Tell ’em to read Ernie Pyle.”

If any reporter was snooping around, Artie would give him the bum’s rush and say, “Tell ’em to read Ernie Pyle.”

It wasn’t a reporter, though; it was Bo Bannerman, Roy’s old teammate and pal who had gone with him and Wings Watson to see Bubbles LaMode the day of Pearl Harbor. Bo had been “rotated” back to the States after flying twenty-five missions over Germany as a ball-turret gunner on a B-17, and was stationed at Scott Field, right over in Rantoul, Illinois. When his folks wrote him Roy was coming home after being wounded, Bo had got a pass and come back to see his old pal. The two buddies were sprawled on the living room floor, drinking beer and whooping it up just like in the old days, while Shirley’s record of “Besame Mucho,” the Latin love song, was playing on the Victrola.

Artie took off his coat and went back to the kitchen, not knowing if he ought to intrude on the talk of the two heroes, who probably had stuff to say to each other that regular people weren’t supposed to hear. Mom was whipping up a batch of Toll House cookies and she asked if Artie wanted to help, or would rather go listen to “the boys.”

“They might not want me sticking my nose in,” Artie said.

“I’m sure they won’t be shy about telling you to scram if that’s how they feel.”

She reached up in one of the cabinets and pulled down a bag of potato chips.

“Here. Feed these to the lions.”

She smiled, and twitched Artie’s ear.’

“Hey, thanks, Mom.”

Artie ripped the bag open and went in to offer it to the guys.

“Grab some grub!” Roy said, reaching in for a huge handful.

“Don’t mind if I do,” Bo said, rummaging in the sack.

“Hey, Artie, you remember Bad Bo here,” Roy said.

“Sure. How they hangin’, Bo?”

“Loose as a goose, little buddy. Hey, the kid’s hep, huh, Roy?”

“Whattya expect from my own brother?”

Artie, full of pride, took that as kind of an invitation to join them, so he sat on the floor and tried to sprawl out the way Bo and Roy were, like he was one of them.

Bo demolished the potato chips he had taken and reached for another fistful.

“Hey, Bo,” Roy said, “don’t they got potato chips over in England?”

“They got what they call ‘chips,’ but they’re really french fries, not actual potato chips.”

“And warm beer, I heard tell.”

“You ain’t heard nothin’ about what England’s got, Keemosabee .”

“You tryin’ to tell me somethin’?”

Bo tipped his beer can and guzzled down what was left.

“Chug-a-lug,” he said. “You wanna hear some ‘war stories’?”

“ Hear some? I got some to tell .”

Roy slugged down some more beer, and Bo took his empty can and bent it double with his bare hand.

“There more where this come from?” he asked.”

Roy crushed his own empty can and winked.

“You better believe it, pardner. This is the Home Front.”

“I’ll get ’em!” Artie volunteered eagerly, and scrambled up from his sprawl. He started to run to the kitchen but Bo waved him back.

“Uh, Roy,” Bo said in a low, secret voice. “Before we crack any more, is there someplace we can swap war stories without burning the ears off your Mom out there in the kitchen?”

“We’ll beat a hasty retreat to my old room. Artie, how ’bout bringing us up that whole six-pack from the icebox?”

Artie snapped a salute and said, “Roger!”

“And Artie,” Roy said, “bring up a church key with it, okay?”

“ Church key?”

“You know—the opener. So we don’t have to chew the lids off the cans.”

So that was what you called the little metal gizmo that cut the neat little triangles in the top of the beer can. It wasn’t an ordinary “can opener”—it was a church key! Elated at feeling even more a part of the manly world of the servicemen, Artie bounded off to the kitchen while Roy and Bo went upstairs singing raucously: “Off we go, into the wild blue yonder—”

When Artie brought up the beers he hesitated, then asked, “Is it okay if I stay?”

Roy took a can of beer and knotted his brows as he looked at Bo.

“Whattya think, Sarge? Is the kid ready?”

“If he’s old enough to button his fly, and button his lip.”

“I’ll never tell, Scout’s Honor!” Artie said.

“Okay, close the door,” Roy said.

A thrilling tingle went through Artie’s whole being. He felt he had been allowed entry into an inner sanctum of manhood such as he had never dreamed of knowing as a mere almost-thirteen-year-old kid. He was with a couple of veterans of the War, one from the European Front, one from the Pacific, about to exchange war stories ! These were things that the brave fighting men didn’t deign to disclose to inquiring reporters, the real stuff of battle too personal to spill to civilians, too gory and terrifying to reveal to girl friends and wives, parents and loved ones. He squatted on the floor, Indian fashion, concentrating totally, wanting to remember for the rest of his life the wrenching details of what it meant to face death and deal death to others.

As if all this weren’t enough, Roy opened not two but three cans of beer, and handed one to Artie.

“You going to hear war stories, you might as well have a little foam.”

“Hey, thanks!”

“Just button your lip about that , too,” Roy said.

“Damn right!” Artie said, feeling grown-up enough to cuss out loud.

He took a swallow of the beer, and almost choked.

It tasted like soapsuds.

Artie smacked his lips, like he really loved it. He’d have gladly drunk horse pee if that’s what the guys were having.

“Whoo-ee!” Bo exclaimed. “Let’s tell a few tales.”

Roy waved his beer can and stamped his feet.

“Roll me o-ver, in the clo-ver!” he sang out, croaking.

Artie was a little surprised, since he thought the sacred nature of the subject would make the guys somber, sad in a courageous kind of way, and something like reverent. But he realized that was dumb. Roy and Bo were carrying on just like a couple of death-defying RAF officers in those movies where they banged on the piano and got pie-eyed before going up on a mission to shoot down whole squadrons of Messerschmitts. You treated war and death lightheartedly, that was the style!