Winston Groom - Gump & Company

“Well, I don’t know how I can answer that,” I says. “I mean, you don’t even ast me whether I did—You just ast me when... ?”

“That’s right, Private Gump, when was it, then?”

I looked over at Colonel North, uniform all full of medals, an he be glarin at me an slowly noddin his head, like I am sposed to answer somethin.

“Well, it was when I first met the President, I reckon.”

“Yes, and did you not tell the President that you had conceived a scheme to swap arms for hostages?”

“No, sir.”

“What did you tell the President then?”

“I tole him the last time I met a president, he wanted to watch To Tell the Truth, on the TV.”

“Issat so! An what did the President say?”

“He says he would rather watch Let’s Make a Deal. ”

“Private Gump! I remind you that you are under oath here!”

“Well, actually, he was watchin Concentration, but he said it confuses him.”

“Private Gump! You are evading my question—and you are under oath. Are you tryin to make the United States Senate look ridiculous? We can hold you in contempt!”

“I reckon you already do,” I says.

“Sombitch! You are covering up for all of them—the President, Colonel North, here, Poindexter, and I don’t know who-all else! We are gonna get to the bottom of this if it takes all year!”

“Yessir.”

“So, now, Gump, Colonel North has told us you conceived the whole nefarious plan to swap arms for hostages to the Ayatolja and then divert the money to the Contras in Central America. Isn’t that so?”

“I don’t know nothin about any Contras—I thought the money was goin to some gorillas.”

“Ah—an admission! So you did know about this horrible scheme!”

“I understood the gorillas need the money, yessir. That’s what I was tole.”

“Ha! I think you are lying, Private Gump. I suggest that it was you who devised the entire operation—and with the President’s complicity! Are you trying to play dumb?”

“It ain’t exactly playin, sir.”

“Mr. Chairman!” the lawyer says. “It is obvious that Private Gump, here, the ‘special assistant for covert operations to the President of the United States,’ is a fraud and a faker, and that he is deliberately tryin to make the United States Congress look like fools! He ought to be held in contempt!”

The chairman, he sort of drawed hissef up an look down at me like I was a bug.

“Yes, it does appear that way. Uh, Private Gump, do you understand the penalty for makin the United States Congress look like fools?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, we can thow your ass in jail—not to put too fine a point on it.”

“Oh, yeah,” I says, tryin to imitate Colonel North’s tact an diplomacy strategy, “start thowin then.”

So here I am again, thowed in jail. Headline in The Washington Post next day says: MORON DETAINED IN CONTEMPT OF CONGRESS CASE.

An Alabama man, who sources close to the Post identified as a “certified idiot,” has been charged with contempt of Congress in the Iran-Contra scandal, which this paper has covered from top to bottom.

Forrest Gump, of no fixed address, was sentenced to an indefinite prison term yesterday after he began ridiculing members of the Select Senate Committee appointed to investigate charges that key members of the Reagan administration conspired to swindle the Ayatolja Koumani of Iran out of cash in an arms-for-hostages scam.

Gump, who apparently has been involved in numerous shady activities involving the U.S. Government, including its space program, was described by sources as “a member of the lunatic fringe of American intelligence operations. He’s one of those guys who comes an goes in the night,” the source said.

A senator on the committee, who asked not to be identified, told the Post that Gump “will rot in that jail until he repents for trying to make fools of the U.S. Congress. Only the U.S. Congress itselves, and not some shitheaver from Alabama, is permitted to do that,” said the senator, to quote his own words.

Anyhow, they give me some clothes with black an white prison stripes on em, an stick me in a cell I got to share with a forger, a child molester, a dynamite bomber, an some nut called Hinckley who is always talkin about the actress Jodie Foster. The forger is the nicest one of the bunch.

Anyhow, after reviewin my employment qualifications, they set me to work makin license plates, an life settled down to a dull routine. It was about Christmastime—Christmas Eve, to be exact, an it was snowin—when a guard come up to the cell an say I got a visitor.

I ast him who it was, but he just says, “Listen, Gump, you is lucky to have any kind of visitor, considerin the crime you have committed. People that go around makin a fool of the U.S. Congress are lucky they don’t get thowed in ‘the hole’—so get your big ass out here.”

I gone on down to the visitors room with him. Outside, a group of carolers from the Salvation Army is singin “Away in a Manger,” an I can hear a Santa Claus ringin his bell for donations. When I set down in front of the wire booth, I am absolutely floored to see settin across from me little Forrest.

“Well, merry Christmas, I guess” is all he says.

I don’t know what else to say, so I says, “Thanks.”

We just set lookin at each other for a minute. Actually, little Forrest is mostly starin down at the counter, ashamed, I guess, to see his daddy in the pokey.

“Well, how’d you come to get here?” I ast.

“Grandma sent me. You was in all the papers and on TV, too. She said she thought it might cheer you up if I came.”

“Yeah, well it does. I really appreciate it.”

“It wadn’t my idea,” he said, a comment which I thought was unnecessary.

“Look, I know I’ve screwed up, an right now I ain’t exactly somebody you can be proud of. But I been tryin.”

“Tryin to do what?”

“Tryin not to screw up.”

He just kep starin at the counter, an after a minute or so, he says, “I went out to the zoo to see Wanda today.”

“She okay?”

“Took me two hours to find her. Seemed like she was cold. I tried to put my jacket in there for her, but some big ole zoo guard come up an start hollerin at me.”

“He didn’t mess with you, did he?”

“Nah, I tole him it was my pig, an he says somethin like, ‘Yeah, that’s what some other crackpot tole me, too,’ an then he just walked off.”

“So how’s school?”

“It’s okay, I guess. The other kids been givin me a hard time on account of you bein thowed in the slammer.”

“Well, don’t let that bother you, now. It ain’t your fault.”

“I don’t know about that... If I’d just kept remindin you to check those valves and gauges at the pig farm, maybe none of this would have happened.”

“You can’t look back,” I says. “Whatever is, is what is meant to be, I reckon.” That was about the only face I had left to put on it.

“What you doin for Christmas?”

“Oh, they probably got a big ole party for us here,” I lied, “probably have a Santa Claus an presents an a big turkey an everthin. You know how prisons are, they like to see the inmates enjoyin themsefs. What you gonna do?”

“Catch the bus back home, I guess. I reckon I seen all the sights. After I got back from the zoo, I walked by the White House an up to Capitol Hill an then down to the Lincoln Memorial.”

“Yeah, how was that?”

“It was kinda funny, you know. It had started snowin, an was all misty, an... an...”