A Blind Goddess (2 page)

“Have a seat,” Tree said, pointing to a rough wooden bench set against the whitewashed stone of the Three Crowns Pub. Kaz took the end, hitching up his tailored trousers as he sat. Tree stuffed his hands in his pockets against the chill and leaned forward, elbows at his side. He never liked the cold much. I had a trench coat on over my new Ike jacket, the M-44 service jacket with the short waist, designed by General Eisenhower himself. Nothing but the best for the boys from Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force. Kaz, with his Savile Row bespoke dress uniform, looked like the aristocrat he was as he checked his polished shoes. Tree looked like a kid from Beacon Hill’s North Slope. Tough, and braving the cold in a hand-me-down coat. It was odd seeing him here in an English village, outside of a pub that had probably been there a hundred years before the house was built in Boston. Shops lined the street, whitewashed low buildings with slate roofs and colorful signs. Solid brick homes and stately elm trees lined the road, springtime buds showing on the branches. A picture-book English village.

“Why am I here, Tree?” I said as I settled onto the bench, eyes forward to the road. “Is it because of what those GIs did?”

“No. If I called you every time a white man gave me trouble, I’d have run out of nickels long ago. I didn’t even know about that until ten minutes before you showed up. I feel bad for Horace; he’s a decent guy.”

“Anyone report it?”

“No. The local police wouldn’t be able to question anyone on base, and the army doesn’t want any publicity. My guess is that when word reaches the right officer, guys will show up with a wad of cash for each of the pubs. A lot of guys will be happy to chip in for glasses untouched by Negroes.”

“Yeah,” I said. He was right. It would be taken care of quietly, and the insult would go unanswered. “Which base were they from?”

“Take your pick. There’s an air force base over at Greenham Common. More fighter squadrons coming in every day, plus troop transports. The Hundred-and-First Airborne is spread all across Berkshire. One of their regiments is headquartered at Littlecote House, not far out of town,” Tree said, shrugging at the uselessness of conjecture. “Plus other units I don’t even know about. Could have been any of them.”

“What’s your unit?” I asked, curiosity getting the best of me. “Quartermaster?”

“Hell no, Billy,” Tree said. “We’re the Six-Seventeenth Tank Destroyer Battalion. Combat outfit. Used to be an anti-tank battalion with towed thirty-seven millimeter pieces, but now we’re training on the M-Ten. I command a five-man crew, the best in Baker Company, if not the whole damn battalion.” He sat up a little straighter when he said that, and I knew it meant a lot to Tree. Any Negro soldier who rose to the rank of sergeant and got himself into a combat unit had walked a hard road.

“I knew there were Negro units fighting in Italy,” I said, “but I didn’t know there were any tank outfits in England.”

“They got us loading and unloading every damn thing under the sun,” Tree said. “From Liberty ships to deuce-and-a-half trucks. They got us cooking and cleaning, everything but fighting. I’ve been in the army too long to sit out the shooting war humping supplies.”

“If that’s what you want, Tree, I’m glad for you. But what am I doing here? Are you in trouble?”

“If I was in trouble, I’d think twice about you helping me again, Billy. But I know you mean well, and there is someone who needs help.”

“Who?”

“Abraham Smith, my gunner. They got him locked up in Shepton Mallet.”

“For doing what?” I didn’t know where Shepton Mallet was, but the most important thing was to understand what Tree was asking of me. I had the feeling it wasn’t going to be easy.

“For murder. But he didn’t do it.” I looked askance at Tree, unable to disguise my cop’s suspicious nature. “Really, he didn’t.”

“Okay, who didn’t he murder?”

“A constable.”

“They have him for killing an English cop? Then they must have evidence, Tree. What do you think I can do?”

“You’re the one in the justice business, Billy, you tell me,” Tree said. “How about allowing that he’s innocent until proven guilty? How about trusting that I wouldn’t ask if he wasn’t innocent?”

“You know? For certain?”

“I saw him on base that night. And the next morning. He seemed fine, wasn’t acting like he was upset or anything.”

“When and where was the constable killed?”

“Around midnight, they think, three days ago. It was in a village called Chilton Foliat, a couple of miles north.”

“Where’s your base in relation to that?”

“Just south of here,” Tree said, pointing down the main road. “We’re bivouacked in Hungerford Park, some sort of nature reserve.”

“So your gunner could have left after you saw him, and made it up to Chilton Foliat and back, right?”

“True, we’re camped out in the open. But he didn’t. Angry keeps to himself a lot. He’s never skipped out without a pass.”

“Angry?” I said.

“That’s his nickname. Everyone calls him Angry. He’s got a
reputation for a short fuse. Been in a few fights, nothing serious, though.”

“So you want me to investigate the charges against your gunner, whose nickname is
Angry
, who could have gone up to Chilton Foliat unnoticed to murder a constable, and who happens to have a reputation for using his fists. Anything else while I’m at it?” I stood up and stared down at Tree, arms folded across my chest, hoping for just one more good reason to walk away. I glanced at Kaz, hoping for some support. He studied his fingernails with great care.

“What proof did you have that I didn’t steal that cash?” Tree stretched his arms out and leaned back on the bench, his long legs crossed as if he were lounging out in front of the Boylston Street station where we used to hang out.

“I knew you didn’t,” I said, letting out a sigh and stuffing my hands in my pockets.

“Like I know Angry didn’t murder anyone. I trust him. Like you trusted me.”

“Billy, there’s one thing you should be aware of,” Kaz said. I’d been conscious of him watching us, trying to figure out what was going on. I hadn’t told him much about Tree, except that I wanted company when I went to see him.

“What’s that?” I said.

“Shepton Mallet,” he said. “I saw mention of it in a report from the Judge Advocate General’s office on the legal background to the Visiting Forces Act.”

“Yeah, I must have missed that one. What did it say?”

“Shepton Mallet is an old, disused British prison that has been turned over to the American government as a military prison and place of execution for servicemen convicted of capital offenses. Five soldiers to date have been hanged at Shepton Mallet.”

“Makes sense that there’d be a few bad apples among the thousands of GIs in England,” I said.

“Yes, but I found it odd that of those five, three were Negro. Are there more Negro bad apples than Caucasian bad apples?”

“All depends on who you ask,” Tree said, rising to face me. “I
remember one Boston cop who was sure of it. Heard he came to a bad end, Billy.”

“Basher,” I said, before I could stop myself. “But let’s stick with Angry Smith. Okay, I’ll ask around, see what I can do.”

“That’s it? Ask around?”

“Listen, Tree, I started leave today. I have plans, but I will look into it. The case is only three days old, they’re not going to hang him anytime soon.”

“You’re on leave, that’s perfect. It’ll give you time to talk to folks around here,” he said. For a guy who didn’t like me much, he sure wanted me to stick around. Angry Smith must be one damn good gunner.

“I have to be back in London for tomorrow morning. I’ll talk to people there and see what I can find out. I promise.”

“Got a girl, Billy? A hot date?”

“I’m getting promoted. General Eisenhower is pinning my captain’s bars on me.”

“The general himself!” Tree said. “I heard he’s your uncle. That true?”

“True enough,” I said. I had a girl, too, but I didn’t want to get into that right now.

“Nice,” Tree said. “Always good to have a relation looking out for you.” He looked away, his lips tight in resentment. This was an old argument with us.

“Listen, Tree,” I said, barely keeping my voice steady. “I’ve already been in the shooting war, so don’t think I’m some desk warrior hitting the clubs in London every night. And as far as relations go, you couldn’t even make it to your own father’s funeral, so don’t lecture me on the subject.” We were nose to nose now, fists clenched, years of unresolved rage aching to get out.

“There’s two reasons I wasn’t there,” Tree said, showing more restraint than I had by stepping back and addressing Kaz. “When I got the message my father had died, I was at Fort Polk, Louisiana. The army gave me compassionate leave, and I was on a train in a matter of hours. Only problem was, the Southern Railways route
took me dead across the Deep South. You know what that means, Lieutenant Kazimierz?”

“Yes. The part of the United States that held slaves.”

“Right,” Tree said. “And some down there wish things never changed. I had to change trains in Birmingham, and by the time I got my duffle hoisted aboard and found a seat, I’d misplaced my ticket. In the confusion I must’ve forgotten where I was, because when the conductor came through and I couldn’t find it, I said something like,
hold on buddy, it’s here somewhere
. Big mistake. He pulled a revolver out of his jacket and placed the barrel right between my eyes. Said if I spoke another word, he’d put a bullet in my brain and toss me off the moving train. This was in the colored car, in front of fifty witnesses. You could have heard a pin drop. One white man with a gun in Alabama, that’s all it took. Threw me off the train at the next stop, left me at some two-bit whistle stop where the colored waiting room was behind the outhouse. Not a train going in my direction for ten hours. By the time I made it back, I was a day late.
That’s
why I missed my father’s funeral.” Tree’s eyes were damp, but he locked onto mine. I should have known he hadn’t missed it on purpose. I couldn’t bear his gaze and looked away.

“You mentioned two reasons,” Kaz said.

“The other one is right here,” he said, pointing at me, his finger trembling and his voice choked with anger. “If it weren’t for Billy, I never would have been in the army in the first place.”

“You could have been in jail, Tree,” I said.

“Maybe not. Would have been my choice, though,” he said. I took a lesson from him and stepped away. It was an old argument, no reason to start it up again. I watched the traffic, what there was of it. A couple of horse carts, the occasional truck, and a number of shoppers at a bakery across the street. Hungerford was a lively town, a river cutting through it, spanned by a graceful bridge. Cottages close to the road were well kept, like the shops that dotted the roadway. A constable rode his bicycle across the bridge, his blue uniform bright in the sunny March air, his helmet bobbing along
on the cobblestone street. I wondered if he was a pal of the dead cop as I watched him pass by.

“Sorry I wanted to help,” I said. I knew I sounded like a sarcastic schoolboy, but I couldn’t help myself.

“What you don’t understand, Billy, is that a Negro down South might as well be in jail. Nobody was on our side. Not the army, not the law. They could do anything they wanted to us, and no one backed us up. You know we had to step off the sidewalk in some towns whenever a white passed by? Me, wearing the uniform of the United States Army, with sergeant’s stripes on my sleeve, I had to stand in the gutter for no-account white trash. That’s prison, my friend.”

Somehow we’d come head to head again. Kaz stepped between us.

“It is interesting, you know,” Kaz said, in a casual conversational tone. “The Germans have the same rule in Poland. Poles have to step aside when any German walks by, upon pain of death.”

“Yeah, but there’s one big difference,” Tree said. “I’m going over there to kill those goddamn Nazis who make you step off the sidewalk. But when I go home, white men will still want me in the gutter.”

CHAPTER THREE

W
E HAD TWO hours before the next train to London, so I asked Tree to show us where the constable had been killed.

“But take us from your bivouac,” I said. “I want to get a sense of distance and time.”

“Okay, let’s go,” Tree said. “Jeep’s around the corner.”

“You off duty? I don’t want you to get in trouble with your commanding officer,” I said as we followed him to the vehicle.

“Don’t worry, Billy. The captain doesn’t pay much attention to who’s around, unless it’s a drill or maneuvers. As for my platoon lieutenant, well, in my experience lieutenants are pretty easy to fool. Hope you’re an exception, both of you.” Tree laughed as he pulled away from the curb, and I hung on to my hat.

“Are your officers Negroes?” Kaz asked, raising his voice from the back seat.

“Only one, a lieutenant on the battalion staff. The rest are white. Some hate being in a colored outfit, and pull every string they can to get out. A few are okay. All the non-coms stick together though. We’ll have no trouble getting on or off base, long as we don’t run into any MPs.”

“White MPs?” Kaz asked. We were crossing the arched brickwork span, water flowing languidly beneath us. Tree waved to an older couple walking along the road, and got a cheery greeting. A marker on the bridge said this was the Kennet and Avon Canal.
A pathway graced one bank, and it looked like a pleasant spot for a summer stroll. But this was March in England: bleak, wet, and cold in spite of the clear sky.

“MPs are MPs,” Tree said. “Negro MPs are as glad to crack your skull as the white ones. More so, maybe, since they can only go after other colored troops. White MPs can spread their batons around, know what I mean?”

The jeep rumbled over train tracks and through a more bustling part of town. We passed the town hall with its tall clock tower, and once again Tree waved a greeting to a small knot of men gathered beneath it. He got nods and smiles back.

“Are you running for mayor?” I asked. He turned left after the Three Swans Inn, a two-story white stucco building close to the road. The door was painted a glossy black, and an old gent on a bench out front lifted his pipe in recognition of Tree.