A hospital. Not a MASH Unit. All white and chrome. The unmistakable odor of antiseptic. It had a taste, a smell, acrid and threatening. From the minds eye he examined his body, cautiously, an inch at a time. A dull ache in the shoulder and arm, lesser aches and soreness down the length of his body.
I took one, he thought, in the shoulder. He felt hunger as something good, valuable, basic, but before he could explore being alive, a dark wave of fear filled his mind and nearly overwhelmed him. Panic, raw and violent. He couldn’t see the source. He felt hollow, nauseous.
First the violin case, then the violin began to form in the darkness of his mind, becoming clearer and clearer.
“Where?”
He tried to sit up and couldn’t. He tried to speak out, to shout, but no sound came, just a hoarse gasp.
A nurse came into the private room, saw his face distorted with effort and rushed to his side. His hand shot out and grabbed hers.
“Where is it?” It came out as a whisper.
She had been a nurse for five years, and knew the wounded the way a good sergeant knows his squad. She patiently asked him what he wanted.
“Where is my knapsack, my gear?”
When she understood, she gently disengaged his hand and went to the closet. She knew about him. A communiqué from SCAP Headquarters - Supreme Command Allied Pacific - preceded him. He was the lone survivor of a battle for another godforsaken hill, and no less than General Alton Taylor had recommended him for the Medal of Honor. Usually private rooms were reserved for Majors and above.
She brought his knapsack and rifle from the closet. She stood the rifle against the wall near the bed. The knapsack, she put in a chair next to the bed. She went back to the closet and dragged his duffel over to the bed.
He whispered hoarsely. “Please, ma’am, in the bottom of the duffel, there’s a black case.”
She’d handled a thousand strange requests from patients and knew they had to be taken seriously. It took more than cutting and stitching to heal a man.
She removed an odd assortment of gear, personal mementos, worn clothing, then the case. She placed it on the bed along side his body where he could feel it.
“Shall I raise the bed so you can sit up?”
“Please, ma’am.” His voice was getting stronger.
She cranked the handle on the bed until he was upright. He pulled the case onto his lap and picked at the clasps. His free hand was numb, weak. It didn’t work right. He frowned, not understanding. She came to his side and reached down to the case.
“May I do that, Sergeant Cole? I’ll be very careful.”
He nodded. She popped the clasps and lifted the top.
It was there! Luther felt a visceral charge of relief. He stared at the violin, put his fingers on the slack strings, reassured himself it was real.
“That’s a beautiful instrument, Sergeant.” She looked closer. “My brother plays the violin with the San Diego Symphony.”
She peered down through the top, then stood up with a gasp. She quickly bent down for a closer look. Scarcely changed since the day it came from the hands of the Maestro of Cremona.
“ANTONIUS STRADIVARIUS CREMONENSIS.”
“Jesus and Saints preserve, it’s a Stradivari! No wonder you were worried.”
What’s she talking about, it’s just a fiddle. It’s made real fine, that’s a fact. He had saved it. That mattered.
He closed lid and the snaps himself.
“Does that closet lock, ma’am?” he whispered.
“Yes, it does. I’ll put it away if you like.”
“Please.”
She put his things back in the closet and locked it. Then she came back to the bed.
“I’m going to check you over before the Doctor comes.” She proceeded to check his temperature and pulse.
“Uh, ma’am, that stuff in the closet is private.”
She looked at him, nodded, and smiled.
“My name is Janice Pell, or just Nurse Pell if you like. You’re going to be here awhile, so we might as well be friendly. Don’t worry, I won’t mention that,” she pointed toward the closet.
“Thank you, Miz Pell.” He fell asleep, one part of the terrible storehouse of his mind at peace.
Chapter 4
The dreams began in the hospital. They terrified him. During the day he hid the terror from everyone except nurse Pell. He feared he might be mad. Luther answered the doctor’s questions, even talked with a psychiatrist, though afterward he had no idea what the man said, or what he answered.
He tried to be what he thought other people would think sane. He wasn’t sure if he succeeded. The anxiety ate at him constantly.
How could anyone look at him and not know? he wondered
He struggled not to dream. It was another war, and he wasn’t strong enough for it. Luther confided in nurse Pell his fear of the shrinks. He hated them more than he hated any battle-maddened North Korean soldier.
When he was a boy, his auntie Rebecca had been forcibly committed to the state mental facility for the insane. Her husband, a cruel, many times born again Baptist, insisted she’d been possessed of the devil.
The poor woman talked to people she couldn’t see. No one in the family minded. She never harmed anyone. Folks would just agree with her and treat her gentle.
In the first year they gave her the electricity so many times she couldn’t remember her own name. He went with his father to visit and she asked his Daddy who is the nice little boy. He never forgot.
Whole days disappeared. He wondered if he was dying. Nurse Pell explained that he had done and seen more than he could deal with; that there were automatic mechanisms in the mind trying to help him cope with the hurt done to his spirit. She suggested he find a quiet place when he got back to West Virginia and rest.
Luther believed her. Whenever the army shrinks wanted to interview him, she scheduled it for the early morning. He felt better in the morning.
Luther started life with a strong, resilient body. Once begun, the healing went rapidly. A week before he left Japan for the states, Major Welter arrived from Korea.
Luther started to snap to attention and the Major waved him back to his chair. A worn bible sat on a table next to the bed.
Welter looked around the room and raised his eyebrows. He smiled. “Nice billet, Sergeant Major Cole.” He handed him the three-up and three-down cloth patch signifying his new rank.
Luther held the patch, but felt no real pleasure in it.
“Ah thank you, Major. I ain’t, I have not earned these stripes, but I’ll take ‘em seein’s you’re givin’ ‘em.”
Major Welter nodded. “I know, I do know.” He sat down in a chair across from Luther.
“It doesn’t seem right, does it? You are alive and your men gone.” The Major looked out the window for a long time. Luther’s hands writhed in his lap, knuckles white. “I’m still working on that one Sergeant Major. Maybe someday we’ll get the answer.” He looked at the Bible on the table. “I read the book too,” he nodded toward Luther’s Bible. “I look forward to one day, just one, when my soul is at peace, when I am at peace.”
Major