President's assassin

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

The rain was coming down in heavy sheets as the government sedan took Phyllis and me to Dulles International Airport for the afternoon flight to Oman. She had insisted on accompanying me for some reason. We said very little at first. I think Phyllis was happy to be rid of me, happy to have me out of her hair, and she came along to be sure I climbed on the plane and left.

I must not have been paying attention because when I looked out the window, we had left the GW Parkway and were three-quarters up the exit ramp for Rosslyn. I bent forward toward the driver. "Hey pal, Dulles is back that way."

Phyllis said, "He knows where Dulles is."

"But-"

"Sit back and relax."

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see."

"I want to know now."

"I knew you'd say that."

So I sat back into the seat and watched the gleaming high-rises and people rushing around as we drove through Rosslyn, and off to our left I saw the Iwo Jima monument, where five Marines and a Navy corpsman were straining to stuff the stars and stripes into the pi

She came around the car to meet me with her umbrella, and she took my arm. For the next five minutes we walked without exchanging a word, her guiding, me following, through the entrance into Arlington National Cemetery, and then down a long hill, through the long, neat rows of white stones with crosses and stars, memorials to the dead. The skies were dark, and a few hardy souls were wandering through the markers. Here and there, I saw people placing a wreath on a grave.

Still walking, Phyllis pointed toward a white stone on our left. "Harry Rostow. I dated Harry in high school. A fine boy. The best athlete in the class. He was on his way to Harvard when the war broke out. Poor Harry got it at Anzio, had his legs blown off and died horribly."

She turned and pointed at another marker, about ten crosses in. "Jackson Byler. The best man at my wedding. Jackson was killed at Pork Chop Hill in Korea. Left behind a wife and two babies."

I too had friends buried here, and relatives. In fact, I had last been here the year before burying a dear friend. Like all soldiers, I could not tread this hillside without getting a dullness in my chest and a lump in my throat. Among all the vast fields and prairies that are in America, these few acres are special and unique, a pasture of dead soldiers, the resting place of both heroes and simple men and women who did their best when it was needed. There is a wonderful gentleness to the place, the serenity of the dead, and more than a few haunting memories. I pointed over Phyllis's left shoulder. "My uncle Jerry's over there. Vietnam, class of '68. The Tet offensive. My father was in country at the same time. Missed his own brother's funeral."

"I imagine you've attended lots of funerals here."

"I'll bet not as many as you." After a moment, I asked, "Phyllis, why are we here?"

She ignored my question. "Oblige me."

Anyway, as we continued to walk, my mind wandered back to the day I entered the Army, like all new soldiers filled with optimism and lofty purpose, the noble knight do

We reached the bottom of the hill, and Phyllis went left and led me about ten stones in. We stopped, and I looked at the particular cross Phyllis was gazing at: "Alexander Carney, Major, USMC."

"Your husband?"

"I try to come here every April 17th." She fell silent, watching the cross, sharing some kind of silent reverie with the dead. But also, I thought, at Phyllis's age, she surely was aware that the shadows were lengthening, it wouldn't be long before there would be a cross with her name etched on it, and I wondered if she was reflecting on her own mortality.

Eventually she said, "All these fine people… how much they would give to live another day, another hour, another minute."

Remembering my biblical verses, I whispered, "The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away."

She commented, though I suspect not with relation to anybody on this hillside, "But he taketh away more from some than others."

Indeed he does. I recalled a photograph of Je

The picture was lifted from a yearbook, perhaps, with twenty little boys and girls gathered in two rows, standing and staring brightly into the camera. They were all smiling happily and i

The world can try men's souls, but truly, children should not have to witness and bear its horrors before their time. I think we create our own monsters, and then we wonder in amazement how they failed us, when it was we who failed them.

Phyllis took my arm again, and we began our long walk back up the hill.