neat, with one cube of ice.” And to Millicent, “What will you have, my dear?”
“Amaretto on the rocks,” she answered, her voice a startling blend of softness and strength. She reached over and held Bannon’s hand. It was a gentle move, one that subtly proclaimed her affection for him. Her eyes said the rest.
When the army had sent Bannon to the hospital in San Diego, Millicent had insisted on coming to see him. He had resisted at first. He wanted to get through rehab, get himself back to together, be whole again. Get rid of the demons that follow all men home from the battlefield: guilt because he had survived when others around him had died; fear that is so real it tastes like acid in the throat.
But she had come anyway, driving down to the hospital every weekend, nursing him back with love and caring, cheering him up when he got the blues, chasing away the nightmares. The war had added a few years to Bannon’s handsome features, but he seemed fit and looked well.
“The place hasn’t changed,” he said, making conversation as he looked around the lobby.
“No,” Merrill answered. “It’s reached that traditional stage. I have a feeling it will change, though. Times have changed. The old place will have to catch up.”
“That’s too bad,” Millicent said. “There’s something to be said for tradition, don’t you think?”
“I do indeed,” Merrill answered.
“Sorry it took so long for us to get up here,” Bannon said. “That last card from Brodie was in a stack of mail that was forwarded to me from the hospital. I guess it had been bouncing around APOs for a month or two. Hope he wasn’t pissed that I didn’t answer sooner.”
“Brodie? Never,” Merrill said.
“How’s it going with him?”
“Still alive,” Merrill said with a smile. “You know Brodie. He defies the odds.” There was a catch in his voice when he said it.
“Hell, I didn’t really know him at all,” said Bannon.
“Yes, you did. In some ways, maybe more than any of us. You got in his skin, and you know a lot about a person when that happens. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
He swallowed a couple of times and went on. “He had a heart attack last November. Actually, the day after Thanksgiving. We had breakfast together at Wendy’s and we were walking up the courthouse steps. He was glad- handing everybody, as usual. All of a sudden he stopped and sat down on the steps and said, ‘I think I’m having a heart attack. I feel like my chest is gonna explode.’ He was right. Massive coronary. He almost didn’t come back from that one. Doc Fleming gave him a week. Then two weeks, then two months. Two months later, he gave him six more weeks, and two months after that Brodie was holding court every day out in the garden. Smoking, having a couple of drinks, everything he wasn’t supposed to do. But he was going downhill fast. You could see a change every day. Yesterday, when I asked how it was going, Fleming said, ‘He’s sicker than most dead people I know.’ ”
Neither of them said much for a minute or two.
“You’re right about Brodie, Brett,” Bannon said. “I knew him for what? Two weeks? But he stayed with me. I thought a lot about him through the years.”
“That’s the way it is with the Captain.”
“It’s that damned army mail system,” Bannon said angrily. “The card should’ve been here weeks ago.”
“He understands that. When he read Pennington’s story about you getting the DSC and the Purple Heart, he did an Irish jig around the apartment. ‘And shot in the leg, just like me, wouldn’t you know it!’ he said. He was very proud of you. It doesn’t take two weeks to measure the strength of a man.”
“How true,” Millicent Bannon said, and looked at Bannon adoringly.
A lucky man, Merrill thought. And aloud, “Had a rough time of it, didn’t you?”
“Not really,” he answered. “Most of the time I was a glorified traffic cop, moving tanks, jeeps, half-tracks, quarter-tons through bottlenecks, getting them up to the front. We were near the German border and a German Tiger tank broke through the lines. We were caught in the middle of a firefight. I drove over a mine. Next thing I remember, I was under the damn jeep, with a fifty-caliber shooting at everything that moved. We slowed the bastard down just long enough for our artillery to get its range. It didn’t help win the war. Just another hour in the life of World War Two.”
“That isn’t exactly the way I heard it,” said Merrill.
“That’s exactly the way it happened,” Bannon said.
Merrill looked past him, smiled, and stood up.
“Here’s Del,” he said.
Delilah hadn’t changed a bit. Not a wrinkle, not a smile line, not a gray hair. Maybe Grand View was sitting on top of the fountain of youth, thought Bannon.
“Hi, hero,” she said, giving him a peck on the cheek and immediately turning her attention to his wife.
“You must be Millicent,” she said, offering her hand. Bannon watched her quick appraisal, saw the glint in her eye. All class, that’s what she’s thinking.
“How are things at Grand View?” Bannon asked.
“Nothing’s changed,” her dusky voice answered. “Things seemed to freeze in time during the war. You’re looking fit as a fiddle, Zeke.” She looked back at Millicent with a smile. “Must be the company you keep. Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Millicent answered. She was a bit ill at ease, like meeting in-laws for the first time, and Delilah sensed it. Then Millicent said, “I feel as if I know you all. Zee has told me a lot about you. Actually, I met him the day before he came to San Pietro for the first time.”
“We saw the announcement in the Times that you two tied the knot.”
“We sneaked up to Monterey and got married. Neither of us wanted a big wedding. It upset my family but they’ll get over it.”
“I didn’t get the card until two days ago. It’s the damned army mail system…” Bannon started to repeat the excuse.
“That’s exactly what Brodie said.”
There was a moment of awkward silence and then Delilah said, “He’s out in the garden. Bring your drinks, we’ll freshen them outside.”
“I have to beg off,” Merrill said. “Today’s our anniversary. I’m taking Susan up to San Francisco for a week. We’re going to hole up at the St. Francis, have room service, and make believe we’re twenty again.”
“Congratulations,” said Millicent. “I’m sure you’ll have a grand time.”
They said their goodbyes and Merrill strode out of the hotel.
“Prepare yourself,” Delilah said, leading them across the sprawling lobby and out the French doors. “He’s taken a licking.”
It was a dazzling day, cloudless with a hint of wind, and the garden nestled between two wings of the hotel was a spotless oasis of emerald green grass bordered with flowers. Beyond it, the Pacific was as serene as a fish pond.
Brodie Culhane was sitting under a striped umbrella at a secluded table surrounded by acacia trees. His frame was spare. His failing heart had stripped away most of his weight and hollowed his cheeks. His skin was stretched tight over thick bones and had an almost translucent quality. His thinning hair was white as a swan.
There was a blanket over his shoulders even though it was a warm day. But though his body had betrayed him, his indomitable spirit had refused to surrender. He sat in a wheelchair, straight as a billiard cue, and his blue eyes were as alert as ever. As they approached the table, the Captain’s crooked, arrogant grin brightened his withered features.
“Well, it’s about damned time,” he said. His voice had lost some of its timbre but the rascally quality was still there. He turned his attention immediately to Millicent. He reached out, took her hand, and held it for a long time.
“Saw your picture in the society pages when you got married,” he said gruffly. “Beautiful, but pictures don’t do you justice. No wonder it took him so long to bring you up here. Probably afraid I’d steal your heart and we’d run off together.”
“We might still,” Mil said with mischief in her smile as well.
“She dragged my sorry carcass back to the living,” Bannon said. “She wouldn’t let me feel sorry for
