“Happy Years, Waiting There for Me”
In those days, I did not skip. I wasn't interested in skipping, or running, or scrambling. I was a slowpoke. I liked being a slowpoke. I ate so slowly that my mother used to say I could always finish my plate at the next meal. Nobody ever cautioned, “Eat your string beans,” or “Drink up that milk!” For one thing, there were no string beans to eat nor had I ever seen a glass of milk. But even if such delicacies had graced my place, no one would have stayed around long enough to see me polish them off.
There were theories, of course-- that this was my form of rebellion, a holding back, an undoing in the face of high-achievers. Or maybe only a phase to live through. There was a possibility of brain damage since I had been this way since infancy. If only I didn't stare so or maybe if I said something. These theories occupied only a few mealtime moments and then the conversation would turn to the really important events of the day, so I never bothered to explain myself. I sat patiently, languid, waiting ever quietly. In amidst the really important news of the day were clues as to whether Jonesy would be coming for breakfast or Clifford and Berg would be by for tea. Either for me was a treat, not rare but always a treat.
Jonesy was from Cincinnati, Ohio. Berg, I think was from Philadelphia. Although, as my mother commented in our recent reminiscence, there were generally about eighty people in our house at all hours. “Probably,” she said, “For you, Jonesy, Berg, and Clifford were the big influences.”
I liked Jonesy. He came every morning with his violin and taught me how to play, “Going Home” on the piano using only the black keys. He said that when the fine ladies came in for the morning chamber concert to be sure to call it, “The Theme from the New World Symphony.” Otherwise and whenever he came early, I'd play, “Going Home.”
And I liked Berg. How could I help it? He was a schemer, a plotter, a mover of men and he had a plan for me. He was devising a way to get me to Jerusalem, which was my last hope for finding a doctor who could remove a tumor that was growing on my vocal chords.
Out of all that mass of company, though, despite Jonesy and Berg, for me there was only one person. Clifford. For Clifford, I didn't have to know anything. He was slower than I was and inclined to daydreaming so I didn't have to say anything. He and Berg worked in the Army supply section at Lagens Airfield in Angra do Heroismo. Every day there was a troop plane that stopped over with a load of wounded on the way back to the States. Clifford would go on the plane with my older brother to cheer up the boys and then, late in the afternoon, they'd come to our house.
We lived on a windy, foggy, isolated hill that overlooked a lovely bay and town, which was said to have been settled before Columbus. The house was only partially built when we arrived but the Seabees promptly began working on it, putting in a fireplace and a bathroom. I was under the impression we were the only American civilians on the island. My mother was pretty and charming; suddenly we were our own USO. My mother convinced the local Portuguese girls to come in the evening and dance despite the fact that every girl was either married or “engaged.” In the afternoons, they would tear up rags for bandages. We became also our own Red Cross. However, I never noticed all this activity.
Apart from helping with the rolling of the bandages, I spent my days in the steep canyons behind the house or wandering down to the village to look at the stiff organdy handkerchiefs in the windows, the delicate bracelets and miniature fishing boats. I would get back in time for tea and Clifford's standard greeting, “What's cookin' good lookin'.” I was five years old and my ears burned at the fretful way everyone talked bout me. My dad said all this Portuguese fuss over my plainness was a lot of nonsense; someday, I was going to be very, very smart. Someday. My brother was crazy for Shakespeare and I spent many an hour playing the part of a dying princess in a dark dungeon. I was always, according to him, “Magnifico!” In a dark dungeon. But Clifford came to the door banging loudly and shouting, “What's cookin' good lookin'?” How could I help but love Clifford? He also brought me paper dolls. Where he got paper dolls, I'll never figure out. He had a set for himself and when I went out to the base, I was to tell him what mine were doing at home. He would tell me what his were up to.
I got wind of the Portuguese girls all being “engaged” and told Clifford I wanted to be engaged. “I thought you'd never ask,” he replied and told me
if I ever had any trouble with any sailors to tell them I was engaged. I asked him about my operation, if it would help to be engaged. “As long as you're engaged, everything's going to be wonderful. Don't forget now.”
About a week before I was to leave for Jerusalem, I came to the base in a heavy rain; Clifford and Berg, m brothyer and me were to see a movie. I had brought Clara, one of my paper dolls because she had never seen a movie, either.
“Where's her raincoat?” Clifford gasped. His paper doll had her raincoat on. She was up on the wall shelf alongside of his photos of the Indiana farm he had grown up on. Clifford happened to have a room to himself in back of the supply house because quarters were cramped and make-shift. He had paneled one side and built a high shelf which held his photos, David Copperfield in a leather edition and a worn-out paperback of The Odyssey, which he often read to me. I liked the parts about the wine-dark sea and the rosy-fingered dawn.
We went to get Berg, all the while Clifford explaining to me that Clara couldn't do things for herself, and it was my responsibility to think of her welfare at all times; it was a sacred, constant duty. Berg's quarters were roomy and comfortable with an over-stuffed chair from a Lisbon hotel and pictures on the wall of Betty Grable. On his desk were identical pictures and some enlarged aerial views he had taken of the island.
At the movies, my brother and I shared flatcakes and plums which Berg had gotten in the village. In the middle of the movie, Clifford left to go meet the afternoon plane; Berg dozed off; my brother was involved with watching, so I sneaked out to follow Clifford. There was such confusion that I went unnoticed on to the plane. I told myself that I would be the first American child the troops had seen for a long time and that I could cheer up the boys with my tap dance to Pack Up Your Troubles in an Old Kit Bag.
I remember first the sound. The plane was like an enormous dying animal; there was a groaning sound, full of wind, unlike a human sound but with words. As I started down the aisle, I saw my first customer for cheering up. He was tugging at a bandage that seemed to cover all of him, a stiff living second skin. He was writhing and pulling at this new skin of his. I started to help him gather the gauze as he said, “My neck, my neck, the ones on my his neck.” I peeled at the cloth around his neck. It came off in one dry hunk, like breaking off the crust of week-old black bread. Underneath there was such a large hole I couldn't figure how I was going to hold his head together with the rest of his body. Dried blood and pus like melted cheese radiated clear around to encircle his slender neck. I became frantic. I couldn't do my tap dance if I had to hold his neck together with the rest of his body and the smell of the rotted cheese mixed with the plums I had eaten at the movie. I felt sick. Finally, I whispered to him, “May I please be excused? I have to be sick.” He told me not to leave, never leave, to use his cap. He held out his cap unsteadily. I threw up in his cap. As I saw his silver bars, so shiny and distinguished smearing up, I fainted. When I came to, nurses were gingerly removing my pinafore and speaking soothingly. Clifford was screaming, “Who let her get on? How could you let her get on? How did she get on?”
He took me home and swore all the way, pushing the jeep into a terrifying dodging of oxen and carts and deep puddles. He told my mother to put me to bed and to heat up some Coca-Cola. He also told her that he had his orders.
The next day, my mother said we were going to have a big fiesta. Clifford was going to be leaving for Italy. She said I should go up the mountain and get a bunch of really pretty flowers.
As I went up the mountain slowly, it seemed as though the island was a picture of Berg's, so far down it was and gray. I thought of all the planes Clifford had met and afterwards his coming in with his glad greeting. “What;s cookin' good lookin'.” I sat down at the top. It had taken me about three hours. I heard the slight sound of seagulls calling and a scratching little tune close by me. I started picking flowers and playing a game with the tune. Am I close?...Closer now? Until I found its source—a crevice in the rock had been covered partly by a small slide. I tugged away the rocks and in the opening lay a seagull apparently stunned by a tremor. It was a dark gray, smooth and full, almost squat seagull; for a moment I thought it might be some other variety of bird. Carefully, I arranged the feathers. I gently put it in the crevice, closing the way with flowers and an arch of rocks. I raced back down to tell Clifford. He would be at the house by now. It was so noisy that I had to yell “Where's Clifford? Got something for Clifford.” No one seemed to know. I found my mother. “What took you so long?” she shouted. “Where are the flowers?” She brought me over to the fireplace. “Clifford couldn't come. He sent you a present and a note.” I opened the envelope carefully. Inside was a soft lace handkerchief, Berg's aerial pictures of the island, and a typed message.
“To Christine
Always be true to the Army.
Your fiance,
Claude Clifford “
I showed my mother, “Look what Clifford gave me!” She called, “How nice.” I slipped out and up the mountain.
The next two days I kept care of the seagull and considered telling somebody about it. My dad, my brother, Berg? They didn't seem to fit. If I couldn't tell Clifford it didn't seem important to tell anyone. So I hoarded my seagull. When it was time to leave for Jerusalem I let it go into the fog. I put the handkerchief into the crevice. I painstakingly wrote a note with the words I had pestered my brother over. “Goodbye, my old friend. Maybe if you look for the rosy-fingered dawn, you won't look so gray. Don't forget now.”
My mother gave only a passing thought to my quick recovery from the plane encounter. She was glad that I was ready to face the adventure ahead with hope.
I didn't mention Clifford again until a week or so ago and then I asked my mother what he was like.
“He was a nice boy. They were all nice boys. But really, Walter was everybody's favorite.”
“Who's Walter,” I asked.
She brought out an album and showed me some pictures. Walter was in most of them.
“Where's a picture of Clifford?”
She hunted but couldn't find any. I asked her what he looked like.
“He was a farm boy, feet like a farm boy, always turned out to keep out of the way of the plough. Now Walter was everybody's favorite.
“Well, Berg came to see us in Virginia in'48. Clifford was going to have a coffee shop in Indiana. Berg was going to try his luck on a taxi service between Pittsburgh and New York.”
I felt relieved. I had something to tell that I'd been keeping a long time.
I asked my mom if she knew any way after all these years to find out where he was through the Army records.
“You mean Clifford?” I nodded.
“What on earth would you want to do that for?”
“I want to know if I'm still engaged, “ I said, as I very, very slowly closed the album.
She looked at my father and sighed. Then she cleared the coffee cups, all save mine and they began to to talk of the really important events of the day.
