Robert Stone - A Flag for Sunrise

“Yes, it’s me.”

“You shouldn’t be here,” the priest said.

Holliwell stood up and brushed the sand from his shirt.

“Want to talk with the boss?” Egan asked. “Come on.”

As he walked with Egan to the mission steps, sentries tracked him with their weapons. On the steps themselves, men in Guardia uniforms emerged from the darkness of the veranda, carrying cardboard boxes. They were unarmed and without helmets; thus dispossessed, they did not seem to be Guardia any longer but only frightened young Indians. They carried their burdens in silence, moving carefully through the cruciform arrangement of lamps to stack the cardboard boxes in the parked trucks.

Holliwell looked up through the lamps’ glare and saw Justin at the top of the steps. Her hands were thrust in the pockets of her white smock; he could not quite see her face. For the first time since he had met her she seemed at ease. After a moment she came down to him.

“What happened?”

“They took me out of the hotel about seven o’clock. To the justicia . They have thousands of troops in Alvarado.” He brushed a loose hand toward the invisible mountains. “They’ve got choppers.”

“I know,” she said. She turned partly away, pivoting on a hip, her hands still in her pockets. He understood that she would not want to face him now and be undone, and have her pride of battle spoiled by intimacy with him, thoughts of the morning. “How did you get away?”

“We were coming … they were coming out to get you. We were ambushed.”

“Campos?” she asked.

“He was there. I think they got him.”

She gave a whispered gasp. There was a roll of automatic fire from the direction of town.

“I tried to get out,” Holliwell said. “Alvarado was closed down by noon. They just took me in.”

“You talked to them.”

“I was under some compulsion. I tried to make a deal with them. They told me you wouldn’t be hurt.”

“You talked to them.” There were men with guns watching them from both sides of the building as they spoke. Justin sighed and put her foot on the bottom step. “Oh, Frank. You betrayed me then, didn’t you?”

“I don’t know,” Holliwell said. “I didn’t think so.”

“But you did,” she said calmly. “Imagine not knowing.”

“If you’d been there you might think better of me. Of course, it hardly matters now.”

“Doesn’t it matter to you?”

“What matters to me isn’t important,” he said.

He was suddenly impatient with her. Watching her stand cool and brave amid her war, he had been awed and moved at the measure of her courage and her delusion. He felt envy and admiration and love for her. He considered the tremor of concern he detected in her voice as she asked after his conscience unworthy of the moment.

“When I decide what happened,” he said, “I’ll decide to live with it.”

Apparently it was his fate to witness popular wars; Vietnam had been a popular war among his radical friends. As a witness to that popular war he had seen people on both sides act bravely and have their moments. Popular wars, thrilling as they might be to radicals, were quite as shitty as everything else but like certain thrilling, unperfected operas — like everything else, in fact — they had their moments. People’s moments did not last long.

“You can’t stay here,” she told him. “We’re pulling out of here when we get the trucks loaded.”

“I can’t go back. I was seen at the justicia by your friends.”

“My friends,” she said, “my friends will be where we’re going.”

“I hope so, May, for your sake. The government’s out in force here and you may not win this round. They claim you’re surrounded.”

She had started up the steps, Holliwell following. As she stooped to pick up one of the hurricane lamps she glanced at him over her shoulder; on her face in the flickering light was the immanence of a smile.

“We were never surrounded. We disarmed the Guardia force that came out.” She raised her chin toward the defanged troopers loading the trucks. “We killed some,” she said when she had turned away.

In the dispensary, the lights were on behind the shutters. Beds had been crowded to one end of the room; against two of the walls sat a dozen or so more men in Guardia fatigues. Across the long room, two black Caribs in sport shirts and Guardia helmets watched the prisoners with Uzi’s across their knees.

The bed in which Holliwell and Justin had made their gesture at love was occupied by a dark, hard-faced young man who was sitting up in it, smoking. His leg was wrapped in clean bandages, there was an anchor tattoo on his left arm. Father Egan, who had followed them up, sat down on the foot of the young man’s bed. Holliwell looked about the room and his gaze fell on two small bottles of the medicinal brandy which were under the bed behind Egan’s feet. Happily and without ceremony, he reached down past the priest’s soiled, sandaled feet to grab them. Father Egan sighed.

He opened one of the brandy bottles and put the second in his trousers pocket. Justin watched him drink. He looked back at her, thinking to see her look away. He remembered now how her eyes had no edge to them, behind them she was naked.

“Well,” he said, when he had finished drinking, “a terrible beauty is born.”

She held his look steadily, then her sober fateful expression broke into a bright young smile, unexpected and unashamed.

“Isn’t it something?” she said.

“Yes, it is.”

“What am I supposed to do with you now?” she asked. “You’re in it.”

“I guess that’s not your problem. I’m not in it with you.”

“You’ll just have to keep talking, won’t you? Explaining yourself.”

“If I had explanations left,” Holliwell said, “I would make all of them to you. If it mattered.”

“And I would believe them, Frank. You could get me to believe them all, if it mattered. But I’m the only one who would.”

“I’m going to lose another war all by myself,” he said. “This is the second.”

Justin looked at the floor while he emptied the brandy bottle. Seconds passed before she spoke.

“You’re a good loser,” she said. “You’re a lucky man. You’ll live longer than you deserve if you help me out.”

“So now we’re tough guys.”

“That’s right,” she said, and smiled a little. Her smiles were like mercy. “We have to be tough guys now. I’m going to give you the mission’s boat. This kid”—she nodded toward the wounded young man—“is named Pablo and he’s American.” Pablo in the bed mumbled something inaudible and tried to smile. “I want you to get him down to the boat and get the two of you out to sea. Get clear of the coast before daylight.”

Holliwell looked at the young man on the bed and back at Justin.

“Would we really have a chance?”

“I think you’d have a very good chance,” she said.

Pablo stirred himself.

“That’s the truth,” he said. “The weather’s nothing but beautiful. I could get a good sound boat mostly to Florida.”

“Inside of a day,” Justin said, “you should run across one of the steamers coming up from the canal. We can see them right off the beach here every day of the week. If you meet rough weather you can turn south and if you still have enough gas you might make Limón in Costa Rica.”

“I don’t have much choice, do I?”

“I don’t think so, Frank. You’re lucky. You’ll make it.”

“Me, too,” Pablo said. “Always been.”

“Christ,” Holliwell said. He glanced at the priest at the foot of Pablo’s bed. “What about you, Father?”

“I’m not as lucky as you two. Anyway I’m staying here.”