The Truth is Dead (7 page)

Afterwards the priest stayed by himself to meditate for a few moments on these three latest losses.

Gefreiter Samuel Goldstein.

Unteroffizier Heinz Schneider.

And Lance Corporal Leo.

Of course, his name was not really Leo, but the priest thought it suited him, with his slow-burning fierceness.

It was so heartbreakingly sad, the priest thought, to see the youth and strength of Europe sacrificed to the vast indifference of war. All the talents and potential of these young men, their futures, their children: thrown away, lost. He couldn’t put faces to the other names, but to this last one he could. He recalled the brightness and passion of those blue eyes, the penetrating gaze. He’d seen pride there, single-mindedness, and driving ambition.

Standing by the graveside, head bent, he wondered what this man’s destiny would have been had fate not dealt him such an early death. Who could tell how much had been lost? Who could guess what he might have achieved, in ten, or thirty, or fifty years’ time, this Leo, this – to give him his real name – Adolf Hitler? He might have become a great artist; the whole world might have recognized his genius.

The workings of God, the priest reminded himself, cannot be known to mankind. We cannot begin to understand; we can only have faith.

As he walked away, he looked back at the three stark crosses, and rain started to fall.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Lance Corporal Adolf Hitler was treated for an injury in the crypt of Messines Church, Belgium, in the winter of 1914. Shortly after this he was awarded the Iron Cross for bravery, for rescuing an officer under heavy fire. Hitler is known to have produced many drawings and paintings during his time as a soldier, one of which shows the ruined cloisters at Messines.

ECLIPSED

Matt Whyman

The nuclear stand-off between the United States of America and the Soviet Union, part of what was known as the cold war, dominated global politics for more than four decades after the end of World War Two. By the 1980s, people lived with the very real fear of a nuclear Armageddon…

I missed the moment that the moon exploded. Like so many people, I was fast asleep when it happened. According to my friend Maisie, whose neighbour works a night shift, it looked just like a mothball fragmenting into the void.

The morning after, I discovered my father staring out of the kitchen window. He was barely blinking. On the radio a news report claimed that America was demanding some explanation from the Soviets. At a time when the world lived in fear of a nuclear strike from one side or the other, it seemed like an act of madness for Russia to launch a lunar attack. My father didn’t appear to be listening, however, and at first I didn’t realize the enormity of what was being broadcast. It was only when I sneezed on account of my hay fever that he noticed me.

“Sleep well, cupcake?” he asked.

“Sure,” I told him, looking around. “Where’s Mum?”

As he pressed his lips into a smile, I noticed his eyes shine over. “She’ll be back later,” he said after a moment. “I promised her I’d tell you that.”

At school I found everyone talking about the same thing. At first I thought I was the victim of a grand hoax. How could the moon just cease to exist? I had only been alive for fourteen years. Considering a lifetime without it seemed unthinkable. I remember that first day was clear and bright. The sky, as blue as a lagoon, had not a cloud in sight. During a special assembly, our headmistress explained that with the loss of the moon we faced a time of great uncertainty. Nobody knew for sure what effect its disappearance would have on everything, from the ebb and flow of the oceans’ tides to the rate at which the earth revolved. Still, she assured us that nature would adapt and survive, as would mankind.

Throughout each lesson that followed, we kept turning our attention to the window. Even the teachers couldn’t resist looking, despite the fact that there was nothing unusual to see.

Come dusk, as we made our way to our homes, stars began to prick the twilight. I kept looking up and around. I wasn’t sure what I was hoping to spot. The moon might have sailed through every night sky for billions of years, but sometimes clouds, tall buildings or trees conspired to cover it up. Everything just looked so normal up there, so peaceful and serene. I saw no smouldering remains or hole torn out of the heavens. Had I spent the day in my own company, without news or gossip, it would not have struck me that anything was different. Still, as an urgent breeze picked up all the litter in the streets, I couldn’t help feeling that perhaps we had taken things for granted.

“Come and sit with us, cupcake. There’s something we need to discuss.”

I had found my parents facing one another at the kitchen table. Like everyone, they appeared a little shell-shocked and bewildered. They looked up when I came into the room. As soon as my father invited me to join them, I realized I had just killed a conversation.

“What’s the latest on the moon?” I asked, noting the television switched on in the corner. The sound was muted, but the footage of the rockets climbing into the sky looked ominous.

“The moon?” My father paused and gazed at me. It left me feeling like I hadn’t returned home in years. “I’m not sure,” he said, and cleared his throat. “What did they tell you at school?”

I drew a chair from the table and sat with them. “The Russians are claiming a test firing went badly wrong. That’s what our form teacher told us before the bell rang. They’re suggesting the target coordinates were changed as an act of sabotage by the United States.”

Mum clasped her mug with both hands. Not once did she take her eyes off it. “The last time I looked at the moon,” she said, “it was on the wane.”

I glanced at Dad, confused by her comment. “Mum,” I said, “it isn’t coming back.”

Outside, the wind had strengthened so much that it began to moan and whistle. Only then did I notice that the curtains had been closed against the night sky. I looked at my dad, and found his focus upon me once again.

“This isn’t about the moon,” he said. “It’s about us.”

Until they told me Mum was moving out, I really hadn’t known that my parents had been having problems. As it turned out, I don’t think my dad had either. Sure, Mum would sometimes say that he loved his work more than he loved us, but we’d never taken her seriously. Looking back, I suppose this was her way of quietly convincing herself that the changes in her heart were for the best. I didn’t cry when Mum revealed that she’d met someone else. I just nodded when she promised me that everything would be OK, and stared at the table when Dad began to weep.

“I should go,” my mother said. “I would ask you to come with me, Lottie, but space is an issue and this is only for the very short term. Your father and I have a lot of sorting out to do, but we’ve agreed that you come first. Once we sell this house, we’ll have enough money to provide you with two places you can call home.”

“But I don’t want to move,” I said. “And I don’t want you to go.”

My mother rose from the table. She circled behind my father, touched his shoulder for a moment and then headed for the door. When she opened it, the howling I could hear out there sounded like another world entirely.

The first few nights were the worst. I suppose we had to get used to the loss and what it meant for us all. The winds struck at sunset and only calmed as dawn broke. In the darkest hours gusts would rampage across town and country with such violence that I couldn’t sleep. The experts explained how this was due to the absence of a gravitational pull. As I looked at the impact around me, it seemed more like the loss of a calming influence.

On the television Dad and I watched endless news footage of tidal surges and oceanic whirlpools. It looked to me like God had got fed up with us all and decided to pull the plug. All my favourite programmes were replaced by reports about emerging changes to our planet. Birds flocked in unusual directions, clouds formed strange new shapes, and dogs howled after midnight as if plagued by a frequency beyond our hearing.

Even people behaved differently. Many panicked, with riots taking place as far afield as Reykjavik, Moscow and Rio de Janeiro. I also heard from Maisie that her neighbour had switched to a day shift on account of all the late night looting. As for me, I found my hay fever disappeared completely.

At home our cat reacted badly to the situation. It didn’t help that Mum was the one who had always taken care of him. After she left he went hungry for several days because Dad and I completely forgot to feed him. Worse still, the high winds really spooked the poor thing. Instead of spending his nights out on the prowl, he chose to stay indoors. Even with the calm that came at daybreak, he would pop out only for a very short time. Then he’d crash back through the cat flap as if chased in by a snarling dog.

“What’s frightening him?” I asked on one occasion.

My father considered this for a moment, watching the fur on the cat’s back settle. “Change,” he said finally. “It’s an unsettling time for us all.”

Throughout this period, while most governments appealed for calm, the two superpowers continued to raise the temperature. In an address to the world President Reagan not only denied all involvement in the moon strike, but even went so far as to suggest that the Russians had been attempting a surprise attack on American defence satellites. One which had ended in a cosmic disaster for us all. As each side had primed their nuclear arsenal to take flight, I asked if we should prepare a fallout shelter. In response, Dad turned to me as if emerging from a dream, and said it was too late for that.

I was at school when Mum first returned to pick up some things. I knew she had been here as soon as I walked in. Her perfume hung in the air and the cat was at his bowl, finishing a treat of canned tuna.

Then, late last night, she came back again. I was in bed when I heard the key in the lock. Normally at that hour I’d have been asleep but, what with the high winds, I was wide awake.

I heard her close the door against the gale, and then her voice calling softly for my father. I wanted to get up and see her. I really did. I was just worried that by padding downstairs, somehow I would scare her away. A moment later, my parents were speaking in the kitchen.

It struck me then that Dad hadn’t shown any anger about the situation. He wasn’t like the president, whose emotions were quite clear each time he made a broadcast. Reagan didn’t shout or beat the desk with his fist, but you could see it in his face. From a tension in his jawline to the way his eyes pinched when he outlined the American position. My dad didn’t carry that kind of fire within him. Once he had stopped weeping, there was nothing left.

As I listened to them from my bed, it sounded as if my mother was doing all the talking. At one point I even heard some words.

“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I’m just sorry.”

The storm that night was more ferocious than anything we had experienced. It raged so hard against my window that I was too scared to climb out and peek through the curtains. I just pulled my duvet over my head, and prayed the house would not be blown to bits.

Now, as sunrise sees the winds subside, I look out and catch my breath. Trees have come down everywhere, bringing power lines with them, while somewhere in the distance I can hear a voice droning through a megaphone. Weirdly, though, the street is deserted. I switch on my radio, if only for some company, and that’s when I hear about the emergency measures.

“Dad!”

Grabbing my dressing-gown, I rush across the landing to the main bedroom. If the government really have ordered troops onto the street, there’ll be no school today for sure. I don’t pause to knock. I throw open the door and then stop in my tracks.

I’m surprised to find the cat curled up at the foot of the bed. My father is sound asleep, but what leaves me reeling is the sight of the woman in his arms. Her head is resting upon his shoulder, with her palm flat on his chest. She opens her eyes and looks at me. At first, we just gaze at one another.

“We’ve been ordered to stay inside,” I say eventually, blinking back tears. “It’s chaos out there.”

Just then, from somewhere over the hills, we hear the crack of gunfire. The sound takes a moment to decay, as if refusing to fall silent.

“Things will never be the same again,” says Mum in barely a whisper. “All we can do is hope that we’re over the worst.”

ONE GIANT LEAP

Philip Ardagh

In July 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the Moon…

There are countless monuments to the memory of US astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, with hundreds in the United States alone. The best known must be the Apollo 11 Memorial in Washington DC, and the Armstrong–Aldrin statue at the Kennedy Space Center. There are, of course, no graves in Arlington National Cemetery, where one would have expected such all-American heroes to be laid to rest. There were no grand funerals. No coffins draped with star-spangled banners or soldiers with heads bowed.

The silver-haired man had visited many of these monuments over the years, but it was to the one in Wapakoneta, Ohio, that he always returned. It is an enormous statue of an astronaut, at least double life-size but looking even larger up on its high plinth. It’s of Wapakoneta’s most famous son, Neil Armstrong: one of only two people ever to have walked on the surface of the Moon. The lifeless Armstrong stands proudly in his spacesuit, his goldfish-bowl-like helmet tucked under his arm, looking up with sightless stone eyes to the stars, where he sought adventure and remains for ever. This is the people of Wapakoneta claiming their own.

In July 2009, on the fortieth anniversary of the Moon landing, the man took yet another pilgrimage to Wapakoneta, quietly and anonymously, away from the bigger crowds of officials and dignitaries gathered in Washington and Houston, Texas. He stood in front of the Armstrong statue. Armstrong had not grown old as he had. The commander stays thirty-eight years old for eternity. He, on the other hand, was now seventy-eight. His military bearing was still evident, but his back no longer as rod straight as he’d have liked. Age has a nasty way of sneaking up on one like that. He looked at his shoes and saw that the leather was scuffed at the toes. He wished he’d thought to bring a newer pair – not that anyone would give him or his shoes a second glance.