Part 12 (1/2)

There was a tap on the door, the bell was not rung, so I knew who it was. The tapping used to happen once a week, but in the past few weeks it came every other day. I shut my eyes, said a prayer, and opened the door.

Bill Westerleigh was there, looking at me, tears streaming down his cheeks.

”Is this my my house or house or yours yours?” he said.

It was an old joke now. Several times a year he wandered off, an eighty-nine-year-old man, to get lost within a few blocks. He had quit driving years ago because he had wound up thirty miles out of Los Angeles instead of at the center where we were. His best journey nowadays was from next door, where he lived with his wondrously warm and understanding wife, to here, where he tapped, entered, and wept. ”Is this your house or mine?” he said, reversing the order.

”Mi casa es su casa.” I quoted the old Spanish saying. I quoted the old Spanish saying.

”And thank G.o.d for that!”

I led the way to the sherry bottle and gla.s.ses in the parlor and poured two gla.s.ses while Bill settled in an easy chair across from me. He wiped his eyes and blew his nose on a handkerchief which he then folded neatly and put back in his breast pocket.

”Here's to you, buster.” He waved his sherry gla.s.s. ”The sky is full of 'em. I hope you come back. If not, well drop a black wreath where we think your crate fell.”

I drank and was warmed by the drink and then looked a long while at Bill.

”The Escadrille been buzzing you again?” I asked.

”Every night, right after midnight Every morning now. And, the last week, noons. I try not to come over. I tried for three days.”

”I know. I missed you.”

”Kind of you to say, son. You have a good heart. But I know I'm a pest, when I have my clear moments. Right now I'm clear and I drink your hospitable health.”

He emptied his gla.s.s and I refilled it.

”You want to talk about it?”

”You sound just like a psychiatrist friend of mine. Not that I ever went to one, he was just a friend. Great thing about coming over here is it's free, and sherry to boot.” He eyed his drink pensively. ”It's a terrible thing to be haunted by ghosts.”

”We all have them. That's where Shakespeare was so bright. He taught himself, taught us, taught psychiatrists. Don't do bad, he said, or your ghosts will get you. The old remembrance, the conscience which doth make cowards and scare midnight men, will rise up and cry, Hamlet, remember me, Macbeth, you're marked, Lady Macbeth, you, tool Richard the Third, beware, we walk the dawn camp at your shoulder and our shrouds are stiff with blood.”

”G.o.d, you talk purty.” Bill shook his head. ”Nice living next door to a writer. When I need a dose of poetry, here you are.”

”I tend to lecture. It bores my friends.”

”Not me, dear buster, not me. But you're right. I mean, what we were talking about. Ghosts.” He put his sherry down and then held to the arms of his easy chair, as if it were the edges of a c.o.c.kpit.

”I fly all the time now. It's nineteen eighteen more than it's nineteen eighty-seven. It's France more than it's the U.S. of A. I'm up there with the old Lafayette. I'm on the ground near Paris with Rickenbacker. And there, just as the sun goes down, is the Bed Baron. I've had quite a life, haven't I, Sam?”

It was his affectionate mode to call me by six or seven a.s.sorted names. I loved them all. I nodded.

”I'm going to do your story someday,” I said. ”It's not every writer whose neighbor was part of the Escadrille and flew and fought against von b.i.+.c.hthofen.”

”You couldn't write it, dear Ralph, you wouldn't know what to say.”

”I might surprise you.”

”You might, by G.o.d, you might. Did I ever show you the picture of myself and the whole Lafayette Escadrille team lined up by our junky biplane the summer of 'eighteen?”

”No,” I lied, 'let me see.”

He pulled a small photo from his wallet and tossed it across to me. I had seen it a hundred times but it was a wonder and a delight.

”That's me, in the middle left, the short guy with the dumb smile next to Bickenbacker.” Bill reached to point.

I looked at all the dead men, for most were long dead now, and there was Bill, twenty years old and lark-happy, and all the other young, young, oh, dear G.o.d, young men lined up, arms around each other, or one arm down holding helmets and goggles, and behind them a French 7-1 biplane, and beyond, the flat airfield somewhere near the Western front. Sounds of flying came out of the d.a.m.ned picture. They always did, when I held it. And sounds of wind and birds. It was like a miniature TV screen. At any moment I expected the Lafayette Escadrille to burst into action, spin, run, and take off into that absolutely clear and endless sky. At that very moment in time, in the photo, the Red Baron still lived in the clouds; he would be there forever now and never land, which was right and good, for we wanted him to stay there always, that's how boys and men feel.

”G.o.d, I love showing you things.” Bill broke the spell. ”You're so d.a.m.ned appreciative. I wish I had had you around when I was making films at MGM.”

That was the other part of William (Bill) Westerleigh.

From fighting and photographing the Western front half a mile up, he had moved on, when he got back to the States. From the Eastman labs in New York, he had drifted to some flimsy film studios in Chicago, where Gloria Swanson had once starred, to Hollywood and MGM. From MGM he had s.h.i.+pped to Africa to camera-shoot lions and the Watusi for King Solomon's Mines King Solomon's Mines. Around the world's studios, there was no one he didn't know or who didn't know him. He had been princ.i.p.al cameraman on some two hundred films, and there were two bright gold Academy Oscars on his mantel next door.

”I'm sorry I grew up so long after you,” I said. ”Where's that photo of you and Rickenbacker alone? And the one signed by von Richthofen.”

”You don't want to see them them, buster.”

”Lake h.e.l.l I don't!”

He unfolded his wallet and gently held out the picture of the two of them, himself and Captain Eddie, and the single snap of von Richthofen in full uniform, and signed in ink below.

”All gone,” said Bill. ”Most of'em. Just one or two, and me left. And it won't be long”-he paused-”before there's not even me.”

And suddenly again, the tears began to come out of his eyes and roll down and off his nose.

I refilled his gla.s.s.

He drank it and said: ”The thing is, I'm not afraid of dying dying. I'm just afraid of dying and going to h.e.l.l h.e.l.l!”

”You're not going there, Bill,” I said. ”Yes, I am!” he cried out, almost indignantly, eyes blazing, tears streaming around his gulping mouth. ”For what I did, what I can never never be forgiven for!” be forgiven for!”

I waited a moment. ”What was that, Bill?” I asked quietly. ”All those young boys I killed, all those young men I destroyed, all those beautiful people I murdered.”

”You never did that, Bill,” I said.

”Yes! I did! In the sky, dammit, in the air over France, over Germany, so long ago, but Jesus, there they are every night now, alive again, flying, waving, yelling, laughing like boys, until I fire my guns between the propellers and their wings catch fire and spin down. Sometimes they wave to me, okay! as they fell. Sometimes they curse. But, Jesus, every night, every morning now, the last month, they never leave. Oh, those beautiful boys, those lovely young men, those fine faces, the great s.h.i.+ning and loving eyes, and down they go. And I did it And I'll burn in h.e.l.l for it!”

”You will not, I repeat not not, burn in h.e.l.l,” I said.

”Give me another drink and shut up,” said Bill. ”What do you know about who burns and who doesn't? Are you Catholic? No. Are you Baptist? Baptists burn more slowly. There. Thanks.”

I had filled his gla.s.s. He gave it a sip, the drink for his mouth meeting the stuff from his eyes. ”William,” I sat back and filled my own gla.s.s. ”No one burns in h.e.l.l for war. War's that way.”

”We'll all all burn,” said Bill. burn,” said Bill.