A Jeweler’s Eye View

“Jake!”  Sam yelled, jumping up, but he ignored him and kept moving away.

With a huff, Sam reached down into his knapsack, and pulled out a pistol.  He quickly chambered a round and pointed it at the sky, pulling the trigger three times in rapid succession. 

Jake immediately spun around; his eyes wide with surprise.

“Go ahead, Jake!  Go ahead and Kill!  Kill!  KILL!”  Sam roared, his eyes welling up with emotion.

“Whoa, Sam,” Jake said, looking at the weapon.  “Take it easy…”

“What...you want it?” Sam asked, looking at the weapon in his hand.  “Go ahead…take it!” He yelled, flinging it across the ground to Jake’s feet.  “Go ahead; do what your ‘deeper law’ tells you to do!” Sam said, his lip twisted with irony.  “Feel free to use mine!!!”

“Sam…” Jake stammered, shaking his head with shock.  “What the hell?!?”  He looked down at the weapon.  It was an old luger, circa 1940’s.  Jake had never seen such a violent demonstration from Sam, and he stood staring at the pistol, then back at Sam.

“You’re not the only one who’s fought in a war, Jake,” Sam whispered, with tears now trickling down his cheeks.  “Don’t kid yourself.”

Jake reached down and picked up the luger and examined it.  It had the worn emblem of a circled swastika held in the talons of the Third Reich Wehrmacht Heer Eagle etched into its ancient nickel-plating.  He looked from the weapon back up to Sam with surprise.  He took a tentative step towards him. 

“Wh…What the hell is this?” He asked.

“What the hell do you think it is?”  Sam shot back.

“But…What are you doing with it?”

“What the hell do you think I’m doing with it???”  Sam roared.

They locked eyes.

“What—you think the idea of killing hasn’t crossed my mind?” Sam cried.  “Is that what you think?  You think you’re the only one who knows about your ‘unwritten law,’ Jake?  Hunh???  I’ve got bloodlust boiling over in me right now like you can’t even imagine!” He said, glaring at him.  “You have no idea how much in love with your mother I was, do you?!?”

Jake was stunned into silence. 

“You have no idea how the cries of Annie from the back of that damned church van has haunted every waking moment of my life since I heard them!” He was shaking his head and swallowing a lump in his throat.  “It has ripped me in two!!!”  He yelled, violently slamming his fists against his chest. 

His grief suddenly became raw, and he dropped to his knees and openly wept.  Jake stared at him, dumbfounded, then took another tentative step towards him, but was stopped when Sam snarled and waved him back. 

“You think I don’t know how to take care of this situation?!?”  He growled, glaring up at him.  “Hell, I can make a phone call right now, and have three carloads of professionals down from New York who will take care of these bastards for almost nothing; but my first hesitation to do that is that it would deprive me the pleasure of doing...it…myself!” 

The cold venom in his eyes caught Jake by surprise.

“Right now, I’m experiencing your ‘deeper law’ like I haven’t experienced it since the war,” Sam said darkly.  “You think I want to go after that bastard with a ‘by-the-book’ investigation, Jake?  What the hell’s the end result of that?  You think I’m stupid?!?  At best, years from now, he’s strapped down in a gas chamber at Jackson State Prison ready to receive a lethal dose.  At worst, he gets away with murder!  Neither option is acceptable to me.  Even the idea of having a front row seat at his execution disgusts me.  Dying at the hands of the State is too good for him!”

“Then why are you...?”

“Because of your mother!!!”  Sam yelled, looking up at him.  He then again dropped his face into his hands and wept; his grief raw.  “For me to pick up a weapon and kill someone out of vengeance for her would be a betrayal of her!” 

“Betrayal of my mother?” Jake asked.

“Aw, come on, Jake,” Sam said, wiping his eyes and finding his feet.  “Please tell me you knew your mother well enough to know that about her!  She lived and breathed love as the answer.  This wasn’t just nice sentiment to her, she lived it.  Her life was devoted to truth that love is the greatest force in the universe; a force far greater than violence.  Her convictions regarding this in all that she did.  It was her life! I would be disloyal to her memory if I took matters into my own hands the way I want to.  Whatever else I achieved through violence would be a mockery of her very life!  Once I go there, it can never be undone.  Drawing blood on her account would negate her raison d'être; her very being.  And for me to do that would kill me!”

With a huff, he turned away and walked down to the water’s edge.

Jake reeled at Sam’s revelation.  When it came to his mother, he knew Sam was right.  As he looked at him, he saw the depth of feeling he had for his mother, and he swallowed hard.  Seeing the deep lines of grief etched into the older man’s features moved him to step toward him with compassion.  

“Sam,” he said more gently.  “Please; I didn’t mean to…”

“Fifty-seven men, Jake!”  Sam roared with unexpected passion, turning to face him.   “Fifty-seven men I watched die by my own hand—by these…very…hands!!!”  He shook his open palms at Jake with fresh tears streaming down his cheeks.  “That was my great accomplishment during the war!  And if that particular talent is resurrected in me,” he said, patting his chest.  “The gates of Hell will be flung open, and everyone will pay!!!”