The German (13 page)

Two weeks after David had been killed, Mr. Weigle moved to Fredericksburg to live with his daughter and her family. Also in those two weeks, a young man from a German family was run down by a car out on the farm road. No one knew who ran the boy down, and the papers called it an accident. The boy died the next morning. Fist fights became common occurrences at the Longhorn Tavern, Mitch’s Roadhouse and the Mueller Beer Hall. No such disrespect was shown at the Ranger’s Lodge, because it had not yet reopened for business since the afternoon Mort Grant had found David Williams hanging from a rafter.

~ ~ ~

On an overcast Saturday afternoon late in July, when the air felt like steam and the eclipsed sun still managed to cook the city, Bum and I walked into town. Ma had given me a quarter to see a movie at the Paramount, but Bum’s daddy wouldn’t give him a cent so we used the quarter to buy sodas at Delrubio’s. Instead of taking stools at the counter, watching Clete Browning’s tongue wag through his chipped and missing teeth, we sat at a table beneath a ceiling fan that whipped around like a propeller. Bum stabbed his soda with a straw while I set on mine as if I’d been wandering a desert for days.

After we’d finished our drinks we lingered at the shop, postponing the walk back home through the day’s heat as long as we could. We browsed through the magazines and comic books for thirty minutes, and Bum picked up a copy of
Weird Tales
, the cover of which showed a cloaked figure at the mouth of a cave or a tunnel, pointing threateningly at a young couple huddled by candlelight. I read the names on the cover, Lovecraft, Bloch, and Bedford-Jones but they didn’t mean a thing to me. My preference was for comics with bigger-than-life characters like Superman, The Human Torch, Captain Marvel and The Flash. Besides, comics only cost a dime, whereas the magazine Bum held cost fifteen cents.

“This looks good,” he said, his nose about an inch from the page he was reading. “They don’t have these at the library.”

“Another fine reason to avoid the place,” I said, reaching for a comic book to peruse while Bum scanned the magazine. I had fifteen cents left in my pocket, but couldn’t commit the limited amount to any single issue.

Eventually, Mr. Browning chased us out, told us to go to the library if we wanted to read, and Bum thought that was a pretty good idea, but I nixed it quick. I wanted to go back home and maybe swim for a while to get the sweat off and see what Ma had left for supper. Soon the stores in town would be closing and the walk home would be fogged by clouds of dust kicked up by car tires. The drought had lasted all spring and summer and you couldn’t walk three steps without a fog of grit rising from your heels.

We were well away from downtown, only a couple of blocks from my house when we noticed Hugo Jones and his buddies had taken some shade beneath an old oak sprouting from Mrs. Parmer’s yard.

They stood halfway between Crosby and Dodd on Bennington, leaning against the Parmers’ split-rail fence. Hugo smoked a cigarette. Ben Livingston and Austin Chitwood were at his sides, and the three seemed deep in conversation, until Hugo looked up and asked Bum and me to come over for a chat.

There didn’t seem to be any reason not to do as he asked.

Hugo wasn’t a typical bully, not like Bobby Lawrence or Tucker Manetti, who would target kids and chase them down, hurling insults before shoving their victims around a while. Hugo took a more sinister approach. He’d start a conversation – it could be as innocent as talking about the weather – and somewhere along the line, his eyes would go dark and a switch in his head would click and the punches would soon follow.

I knew this about Hugo, but Bum and I were much younger than his usual victims, and he’d never given us so much as a go to hell up to that point, so while we feared him the way we were meant to, we didn’t actually figure him a threat.

“You’re the Randall kid,” he said, as if he’d heard about me before. He looked at Bum, whose older brother Mudbug had been friends with Hugo before getting sent off to fight. “Bum,” Hugo said with a nod.

“Good day for it. Just make sure you’re out before sunset. Place is swarming with mosquitoes and moccasins once it starts to get dark.”

“We will,” Bum said nervously. “There’s a curfew.”

And Hugo asked us about where we’d been and how we’d spent the afternoon. He joked with us, and his buddies, Ben and Austin, laughed a lot, and it never occurred to me that the conversation was leading anywhere. In fact, it felt good to have a talk with an older boy, made me feel mature.

Then Hugo said, “You know we patrol out here at night, keeping an eye out for that Cowboy?”

And I made the mistake of admitting I’d seen them on the night the sheriff had found Harold Ashton’s body. It had struck me as a way to confirm what Hugo had said, while making it sound like I was in the know. It was also a big mistake.

“You live on Dodd Street?” Hugo asked casually around the cigarette in his mouth.

“Yeah, like I said, by the lake.”

“Well we have a problem, Tim Randall,” Hugo said, and I saw the darkness like inky water running into his eyes. “We don’t patrol Dodd Street.”

I explained that I hadn’t seen them from my living-room window or front porch. I told them I saw them at the corner of Worth. Bum confirmed my claim by explaining that I’d gone out on my own that night.

This intrigued Hugo, who nodded his head. He dropped his cigarette on the sidewalk and stepped on it, raising a small disturbance in the dust. Ben rapped Austin’s shoulder with the back of his hand as if saying,
Get a load of this.

Then Hugo lunged at me. He grabbed me by the front of the shirt and hauled me forward. Bum yelped and immediately started begging Hugo to let me go, but both Ben and Austin were moving forward, intercepting Bum, who wouldn’t have presented much of a threat anyway.

Hugo’s dark eyes were only inches from mine. I could feel the heat coming off of his acne-ruined face, and when he spoke again, his breath washed into my nostrils like sewer water passing downstream from a fire.

He didn’t know that for sure, but it dawned on me that he was genuinely concerned I’d heard something I shouldn’t have. I said no about fifty times. I told him I didn’t hear a thing, I just saw them, but he had already reached a violent place.

The rest is a blur. He punched me in the gut, and then in the mouth, and I dropped to the sidewalk as more blows struck the side of my head and shoulder. I remember he dragged me along the sidewalk, shouting words my terrified mind overpowered with screams of its own. Tears scalded my eyes, though not from any specific pain. Fear made me cry, because I didn’t know how to stop what was happening, or even understand why it had happened.

A crisp drone, like the beating of a hummingbird’s wings, came up in my ears, and through it came a calm, deep voice that I didn’t immediately recognize. Hugo Jones shouted, “Goddamn Kraut,” and at first I was confused, because I wasn’t German and neither was Bum, so his pejorative made no sense.

“If you three want a fight, you come see me,” Mr. Lang said, his voice so even he might have been inviting the boys over for a snack or some sweet tea. “Go home, now.
Go.
” He barked the last word, and Hugo upped his insult to “Fucking Kraut,” but I could hear his boots stomping the pavement as he said it.

The hum receded, making way for the pain. At first it was a general anguish that seemed to surround me as if I lay in a pool of it, but as my heartbeat slowed and my mind cleared, individual agonies presented themselves. My split lip burned. A knot on my forehead ached. A scrape on my knee stung. My stomach felt bruised and cramped. A stitch of embarrassment joined the physical pain; I hated that my best friend and neighbor were seeing me cry. I couldn’t stop it, though. Sobs broke loose in my chest and fled through my mouth and nose, and more than anything I wanted the shameful display to end.

Mr. Lang helped me to my feet and looked me over with concern. His scarred face appeared particularly flat to me just then but his eyes were warm.

“Yes, good,” he said. “If you can stand up, you’ll live.”

Bum rushed to us and grabbed my arm. He put it around his neck to help support my weight. “Thank you, Mr. Lang,” he said, rapidly. “We’ll be okay now.”

“Nuh,” said my neighbor. “Your friend should have his cuts cleaned. You bring him to my house.”

“No, that’s okay. I’ll just take him home.”

From the anxiety in my friend’s voice, I knew he was thinking about his father’s warning to keep well away from the Germans in town.

“But his mother is not there,” Mr. Lang countered. “Do you know how to dress wounds? Nuh, I didn’t think so. You boys come to my house, and Ernst will take care of your friend.”

Bum made to protest again, but I interrupted with “Thanks, Mr. Lang, I’d appreciate that.”

Leaning on Bum, we walked to the end of the block. Once inside my neighbor’s house, he instructed Bum to help me onto the small green sofa and then walked into his kitchen. He returned a moment later with a bottle of Coca-Cola, which he gave to Bum.

“Maybe you are right,” the German said, though Bum’s claim clearly amused the man. He stood in front of the sofa, looking down at us. His gaze drifted from Bum to me, and he said, “The next time, you kick him here.” Mr. Lang reached down and formed a cup with his fingers that covered his crotch.

“Pa said that’s below the belt,” Bum argued. “He says it’s unfair.”

“All fights are unfair,” my neighbor said. “One man will always be bigger or faster or smarter. That boy was older and stronger and more experienced. Do you think he cared about fighting fair? Nuh, he cared about winning. That’s why he won.”

He left us on the sofa and walked into the hall. Wiping the tears from my eyes, I winced. The skin at my brow was tender, and I felt a knot pushing through. My lips were also swelling, puffing up like a bee had stung them. Ma was going to throw a fit when she saw me – face bruised, pants torn, shirt stained. I felt worse then, because the last thing I wanted was to give her something else to worry about. Mr. Lang returned to the room with a small tin box. He knelt on the floor before me, putting the container in the space between my feet.

“What did you do to this boy?” he asked as he withdrew a small amber bottle from the tin.

“Nothing.” The word leapt from my throat like a denial of guilt. “I didn’t do anything to him. He’s just a bully. I don’t know why he hit me.”

My neighbor seemed to cough, but a moment later, I realized it was a blunt chuckle. “He hit you because he is human, yes?”

“He’s just a creep,” Bum said.

Mr. Lang shook his head. He retrieved a small cloth from the tin and upended the mouth of the bottle against it. “You call him a creep. Good. Yes. He is a creep, but that is in your mind. In his mind, he is a hero.”

He pressed the dampened cloth to my split lip. Iodine. I should have seen it coming, but I was too distracted by the German’s words. The fluid entered my wound and mixed with the blood, sending a hot sheet of pain across the lower half of my face. I tried to lean back on the sofa, but Mr. Lang shot out an arm, wrapping his hand around the back of my head, holding me in place.

“It hurts, yes? But it’s helping you. Sometimes pain isn’t the enemy.”

His nose was close to mine then as he held my head between his palm and the cloth. I looked at his scarred face, the deep lines, nearly matching on each of his cheeks the shallow valley at the ridge of his nose. Despite the force he was employing and the agony his cloth delivered, his eyes were soft and kind.

“You think it is mean to hurt someone, yes? I hurt you now, but I am not being mean. Do you see? Nuh, you don’t.” He pulled away. Again he upended the bottle against the cloth. “Your father is far away from here, and he is hurting people, and he is right to do it because they will hurt him if he doesn’t. He is hurting people, but he is not a bad man.” Mr. Lang screwed the cap back on the bottle and replaced it in the tin. He straightened his back and puffed out his chest. “He is a soldier. A hero.” He made a fist and thumped his chest. The performance made me smile, which ripped open the cut on my lip. In a flash, Mr. Lang had the cloth against my cheek and another blossom of pain erupted on my face. “The men he is fighting don’t think him a hero. They think he is a monster. That’s how they can fight him.”

“They’re just filthy Krauts,” I said.

Mr. Lang produced another of those coughing laughs. “Yes,” he said brightly, genuinely amused by the statement. “Filthy Japs and Krauts and Jerries and Nips.” He seemed very pleased with the words. He pulled the cloth from my face and dropped it into the tin. Securing the lid, he grasped the box and stood.

He crossed the room and again entered the hall, leaving me to wonder if I had hurt his feelings or angered him, though he seemed nothing but happy. When he returned he stood on the far side of the living room, back straight, eyes sharp. He put his hands on his hips, appraising us like a sergeant inspecting his squad.

“You need ice for your head,” he announced. He spun on his heels and marched into the hall again.

Bum nudged my shoulder and pointed rapidly at the front door. He clearly didn’t want to spend another minute in Mr. Lang’s house. I shook my head and put a finger to my swollen lips so he didn’t say anything that might get us in trouble.