I've known for three days that the voice screaming down the hall belonged to my friendly enemy, Joseph Morning, but the momentum of the confession, once confided to paper, carried me on, leaving me in the rather absurd position of confessing to a murder that didn't take place, yet. Art deceives as well as History; Life imitates Art as often as Art does Life; History seems to have little connection to either one. I can't apologize for lying, for only an accident of timing kept my confession from being as true as I knew. Should I confess just intent, or should I admit only life-like confusion? Art, History, Life: traitorous knaves. Don't blame me; I'm just their foolish pawn chained to my machine.

That infinite number of monkeys somewhere out there pounding at their machines for an infinite time surely will re-create Shakespeare, Tolstoy, and me, but God knows if they'll ever finish writing the truth.

Please don't despair because it's not over at all.

11. Abigail Light

I must admit that I was glad to see the bastard again. He lay, pale after the long still months in a Saigon hospital, immobilized like a huge turtle by a large cast from toes to chest, thinner, and somehow older, in his hospital bed.

"Off your ass, soldier," I said as I rolled into his room.

"Krummel?" he asked, his head unable to turn to see me.

"Joe, Joe, how are you?"

"Bad, man," he said. "Really bad. Crippled. Can't walk, can't get a hard-on, can't do anything." Tears seeped out of the corner of his eye, the one I could see.

"They'll fix you. Uncle Sam owes you that," I said, trying to joke. I'd rather see him dead than crippled, I thought.

"No, man. All the king's whores and all the king's men can't put old Joe Morning back together again." He forced a chuckle.

"Cut it out," I said. "This guy Gallard is a magician, man. Hell, he tied my leg back on, didn't he? He's all right. He'll fix it up for you."

"There's just nothing left to fix, Krummel. Nothing."

Nothing to say either, so I shut up for a while. Morning talked, but said nothing, and I wouldn't have heard it if he had.

"Well, guess I'll take off, kid. Got a heavy date," I said, but he didn't seem to hear me.

"Krummel," he said. "I need you to help me. You'll help me, won't you? Won't you?"

"Sure. You know I will."

"Get me… some sleeping pills or something like that," he mumbled.

"Why?"

"Why do you think? I can't stand this… crippled… bad scene, man… not for me… please…" he choked.

"Ah, Christ," I said. "To hell with you, Morning, just to hell with you. You're the most melodramatic mother in the world." I rolled away from the bed. "Please help me, Krummel, please," I mocked. "I'm tempted, by God, I'm tempted, if only because you're such a pain in the ass. You want to die, just rot then. To hell with you." I turned the chair, knocked a pitcher off the nightstand, then moved out the door. "To hell with you."

I met Abigail in the hall outside.

"Where have you been?" she asked. "I thought we had a date." In a brown, red, and gold tweed skirt and soft brown sweater with the sleeves pushed back around her elbows and loafers, she was as lovely as a fall coed in autumn. "What's the matter?"

"Wasting my time," I said. "I knocked a pitcher off the table in Pfc Morning's room. Would you pick it up for me?"

"What were you doing in there? You know him?"

"Old friends," I said.

She walked into Morning's room, stayed longer than necessary, and when she came back, her sweet face was wrinkled in concern. Tiny white teeth chewed at her pale lips, and her hands held each other as if no one else had ever reached out for her.

"He's crying," she said, walking behind my chair but not pushing it yet. "He wouldn't answer me. He's just crying. What did you do?"

"I shot him," I said, but she wasn't listening.

"Why is he crying?"

"To hell with him," I said. "He enjoys crying. He's crazy about it. Leave him alone. He's bad medicine. Stay away from him." Once again she didn't listen, but she did push the chair down the hall. "You're lovely today, maiden."

"Huh?"

I grabbed the spokes and turned the chair out of her hands. "Listen to me," I said. "Is all of you going outside, or are you going to leave half of you in here?"

She took the hand I gestured with, held it with both of hers. "I'm sorry," she said. "But he looked so damned sad. Like a little boy whose dog was just run over. I felt so sorry for him."

"Yeah," I grunted.

"Yeah what?"

"Yeah nothing." I turned, pushed myself on toward the door.

"All right, Billy Goat Gruff," she whispered when she caught me. "Don't bite the milk of human kindness." She pushed me on out the door.

We rolled downhill through the golf course, uphill around the Nineteenth Hole Clubhouse, along the bluff past the Main Club. I took off the blue convalescent pajama top, lay my head back, and let the sun work on me. I kept my eyes closed until we were past the Main Club and into a stand of timber going uphill again on a graveled footpath.

"Where are we going, nurse? Physical therapy in your apartment?"

"Just shut up and help me push."

As we topped the small ridge, we came out on a clearing, a bowl-like depression circled by the ridge. In the center a miniature Greek theater had been built by some bored but imaginative airman, but the rocks were rough-hewn and it recalled something more pagan, Stonehenge maybe. Terraces stepped up the sides of the amphitheater, alternating stone and flower beds, rough stone, exotic flowers, sensual pinks, lush purples, velvet reds and blues, and pure whites. Abigail pushed me down one of the walkways to the bottom of the bowl and stopped next to the stage.

"You're pretty heavy, fellow. I'm not sure I can get you out of here," she said, wiping sweat from her forehead with a bare brown arm.

"You mean we're stranded here?"

"You're stranded here," she said. "I'm not." Then she laughed and ran away, circling the small stage once, then she flopped on the grass, then rolled on her back and stretched. "Isn't it lovely."

"Gaudy as a goddamned Christmas tree," I said.

"Don't be cute," she said. "Admit you're dizzy with beauty, you're stunned with color, knocked out by the air, enchanted with the sky, and madly in love with me."

"It's all right, I guess," I said, smiling.

"Quit that," she said. "I mean it." She sat up, propped her arms behind her, slipped her loafers off, and crossed her ankles. "You never admit anything," she said, not smiling. "Just say it's lovely. Just admit that much."

"It's okay; if you like that sort of shit."

"It's lovely. Admit that."

"Okay, so it's lovely," I said. "So what the hell. Gushing doesn't make it any more lovely."

"I didn't say gush," she said, tilting her head back. (I would have cut my leg off just to kiss her neck just then.) "I just said be honest and not cute and not cynical and admit what is."

"Come off it, lady."

She looked up at me, pouting playfully. "Please."

"No."

She looked down and away, trying to hide a really pouting mouth, and in a small quiet voice asked again, "Please."

"You don't give an inch," I said.

"Neither do you." She rose, pulled the blanket from behind my back and, in a very methodical medical manner, spread the blanket. With a nurse's hands, neutral, efficient, she helped me out of the chair and onto the blanket; then she sat in the chair, held her hands as a child does when she prays, and said, "What are you afraid of?"

"Jesus Christ," I said, nearly shouting. "This is the most beautiful place I've ever been. I'm stunned and enchanted and dizzy, assaulted by beauty, the beast in me is soothed by sky and sun, appeased by flowers, beset by madness, etc."