Heart of War (62 page)

There is one other factor beside time which is vital: Sea Communications … We do not know, we do not wish to know, how many ships are being sunk each week by submarines. We know that the number and proportion is most serious and is still increasing. Here then is the fatal crux. Let the whole energies of Britain be directed upon this point … Let every resource and invention be applied. Let the antisubmarine war claim priority and dominance over every other form of British effort. Let us make sure we can bring the American Armies to Europe as soon as they are fit to come.

Meanwhile what should be our policy on land? Is it not obvious, from the primary factors which have been described, that we ought not to squander the remaining Armies of France and Britain in precipitate offensives before the American power begins to be felt on the battlefields? …
Let the House implore the Prime Minister to use the authority which he wields, and all his personal weight, to prevent the French and British High Commands from dragging each other into fresh, bloody, and disastrous adventures. Bring over the American millions, and meanwhile maintain an active defensive on the Western Front, so as to economize French and British lives, and so as to train and perfect our Armies and our methods for a decisive effort in a later year.

(Various members then intervened in the debate.)

The Right Honourable Member for Caernarvon, Mr David Lloyd George (Lib.) … I accept in principle my Right Honourable friend's statement of the main factors affecting our policy. I must, however, decline to commit this government, or myself personally, against a renewed offensive on the Western Front during the current year.

(The Prime Minister then surveyed the war situation on all fronts, and at home. On resuming his seat, he was loudly cheered by nearly all sections.)

Stella had had lunch with her aunt by marriage, Fiona Rowland, and was now feeling a little muzzy from the wine Fiona had given her at the meal, and the sherries beforehand. Fiona, she noticed, had taken no sherry, or wine, but two small glasses of whisky, neat. But of course Aunt Fiona was Scottish, and had probably been given whisky as soon as she was old enough to sit at the grown-ups' table for dinner.

Mrs Orr, the cook, came in and said, ‘I'll be going out shopping now, m'm. The new saucepans, m'm.'

Fiona said, ‘I remember. Thank you.' The cook bustled out, closing the drawing room door quietly behind her. Fiona leaned back in her chair, crossed her legs at the ankles, and said, ‘So you're pregnant. Are you happy about it?'

Stella said, ‘Of course, Aunt Fiona! I only wish Johnny could be with me.'

Fiona said, ‘But the baby's not going to be Johnny's … is it?'

Stella stared, entranced, at the other woman. Fiona seemed to be moving, swaying. There were two Fionas, over-lapping. Stella said at last, ‘How do you know?'

Fiona said, ‘I have the sight, child.'

She's mad, Stella thought. But Aunt Fiona had always
been strange, given to prophetic utterances which often turned out to be correct.

Stella felt herself crying, the tears rolling silently down her cheeks. She stammered, ‘I was … s-so lonely … I …'

Fiona said, ‘Don't tell me … I wish I could have had a child by
my
lover. God knows I wanted one, and begged him to give me one … but mostly he used those rubber things, and even when he didn't, nothing happened.'

Stella's tears slowly dried as she stared in mounting astonishment at her aunt, Guy and Virginia's mother, Uncle Quentin's wife. She said, ‘You had a … a lover?'

Fiona rose abruptly from her chair and stood by the window looking out at the bright yellow blossoms of a laburnum and the pink candles of a horse chestnut, glowing like fire in the light spring rain. She said, ‘For ten years – until he joined the Army, last Christmas. Why did he do that? He could have been excused. If he had tried … or become an official war artist. But he joined up, and now he's in the same battalion as Quentin. He's Quentin's adjutant, his personal staff officer!'

Stella said wonderingly, ‘Does he … do they … know?'

Fiona said, ‘Quentin doesn't.' She was silent a moment, then said abruptly, ‘Do you love him?'

Stella said slowly, ‘I don't know, Auntie. I don't think so. But when I'm with him, I think I do.'

‘That's true with all men who show interest in you, isn't it?'

Stella said, ‘Not every man … It's when they're exciting. They make me feel bolder than I really am … I love Johnny so much, but …' She shrugged; she was becoming irritated and unhappy and her mouth was dry. Aunt Fiona could not understand, and she could not explain. She'd leave as soon as she decently could, go home and have a little sherry and a little sniff. What to talk about for the next ten minutes?

She looked round. The walls of the room were hung with small water colours, some oils, and a few pen and ink drawings, all of wartime scenes in France. On a sudden intuition she said, ‘Are those pictures by … him?'

Fiona said, ‘Yes. Some, Archie gave to Quentin, others I am to keep to the end of the war, when we'll give them back to Archie.' She laughed bitterly – ‘There'll be no end of the war for one of them … perhaps neither. Have a look at them – a good look.'

Stella rose and circled the walls examining the paintings. She didn't know much about art, but the Manor was full of good classic English oils, family portraits, country scenes; and her father used to take them all to the Royal Academy summer exhibitions … These were very good, very strong. The condition of the war over there was apparent in every line … Here was a soldier, stretched out beside a road, weariness in every line of his face, in the exhausted fall of his hand across his rifle beside him … Here was a soldier talking to a girl, in a bar – what did they call it?
estaminet
– just the two heads, the girl obviously flirting, the soldier's face yearning, trying not to show it – she knew that look in men, too well – bottles and glasses sketched in, all seen through a bluish haze of tobacco smoke … And here was Uncle Quentin, as she had known him all her life … a little thinner than he used to be, his mouth set, his popping blue eyes more wrinkled at the corners, staring past the painter, binoculars in his hands, held high, ready … She licked her lips, and stifled a yawn.

‘They're awfully good, Auntie,' she said, ‘and now I'm afraid …'

‘They're the best things he's ever done,' Fiona said angrily, ‘and do you know why?'

‘No, I can't think.'

‘Because Quentin's perverted him, so that he feels more for those men, the soldiers, than he does for anything or anybody else. He's painted me a dozen times, clothed, nude, head and shoulders. None was half as good as these. He knew … But now he sees the soldiers as Quentin always has, as a lover should, as a mother would … he
was
my lover, but
I
could not arouse that insight.' She laughed again, high and bitter – ‘He used to make love to his models … I was never jealous. He didn't love them, he loved me. I would never lose him to any of them. Now I
have
lost him … to my husband! What do you think of that?'

Stella waited a minute before saying, ‘I really think I must be going now, Aunt Fiona.'

El Paso, Texas

The ancient Hupmobile taxi wheezed to a stop outside the open iron gate with the big white-painted arch over it proclaiming HEADQUARTERS 16th U.S. INFANTRY.
‘Not allowed to pass here 'less I'm carrying an officer' the driver said in a Tex-Mex singsong. Johnny scrambled out, pulling his heavy suitcase after him, and stood a moment, stretching in the sun. The buildings of the barracks shimmered in the heat, white waves of sun glared off the gravelly dust of the parade ground. A company of soldiers in faded khaki, their campaign hats ringed with the blue cord of the infantry, marched and counter-marched, the dust swirling round their leggings, rifles steady on the right shoulders. Johnny listened to the barked commands of the sergeants – ‘Left face! … Left shoulder – arms! … About – face!' … sergeants calling the cadence, bawling imprecations and oaths … silence again, but for the tramp tramp of the boots.

From behind him the driver called, ‘Hey meester, pay opp so's I can go. I seen more of these sonsabeetches than I want to awreddy.'

Johnny turned and gave the man his fare, passed under the arch and trudged up the dusty road, lined with whitewashed stones, that led to a building set between two white flagpoles, one flying the flag of the United States, the other the crested blue flag of the 16th U.S. Infantry. After a while he paused to rest, lowering his suitcase, finding a handkerchief in the breast pocket of his Brooks Brothers seersucker suit, and mopping his forehead. Another man passed him, this one carrying nothing, a squat young man about five foot seven inches tall, and almost as wide, his face dark brown and square as the body, on his head a tall black cowboy hat, domed, an eagle's feather in the beaded band, from under which hung down on both sides shiny locks of straight black hair. He was wearing a pair of old torn khaki drill trousers and a cotton shirt of the same colour; and on his feet deerskin moccasins tied with a thin strip of leather – an obvious Indian. Johnny picked up his suitcase and trudged on, the Indian now a few paces in front of him.

As they neared the building with the flags, Johnny saw a sentry standing at parade rest outside the door, under a thatched awning. The Indian had stopped, staring from side to side. Johnny stepped in front of the sentry, and said, ‘I want to enlist. Where do I go?'

The sentry jerked his head over his shoulder – ‘In there, second door on the right.'

The Indian had listened, but not spoken. Now, as Johnny picked up his suitcase, and entered the building, the Indian followed. They turned down a narrow passage, hot and airless. Johnny knocked at the second door on the right. No answer. They waited. Johnny knocked again. A deep voice from behind the door roared, ‘Come in!' Johnny opened the door. The room contained a table covered with papers, and behind it a chair, occupied by a huge man in his forties, in uniform, three chevrons on each sleeve. He must be six foot two or three, Johnny thought, and over two hundred and thirty pounds. This terrifying apparition bawled, ‘This is the Army, you dumb hayseeds, not a ladies' piss house. What do you want?'

‘I want to enlist, sir,' Johnny said.

‘Don't call me “sir,” 'the sergeant snapped. ‘I'm Sergeant Leary and I'm the poor son of a bitch who has to train recruits.' He turned to the Indian – ‘You want to enlist, too, Chief?'

The Indian nodded. The sergeant said to Johnny, ‘What do
you
want to enlist for?'

‘We're at war, for democracy,' Johnny said. ‘I think it's every able-bodied man's duty to …' He said no more; whatever it was, it would sound pompous. The sergeant turned to the Indian – ‘You, why do you want to enlist? You a patriot, too? You're a Navajo, aren't you?'

The Indian said nothing and the sergeant shouted, ‘Don't you speak English? I got enough troubles without trying to teach poor bastards who don't understand what I'm telling 'em!'

The Indian said, ‘No food. Four days.'

The sergeant, whose Irish accent was becoming more marked as time passed, said, ‘You walked in from the reservation? In four days?'

‘Gallup, in wagon,' the young Indian said. ‘Rode Santa Fe freight, Belen … two days, freight to here … No food at home.'

Johnny listened in horror. If he'd known, if the man had told him, he could have stood him a meal, at least. There was a taco stand right outside the gate … It was too late now; the sergeant was pulling a sheaf of papers toward him. ‘O.K.,' he said, looking up at Johny. ‘Name?'

‘John de Lisle Merritt … River House, Nyack, New York
… and in case of injury you'd better notify my wife, Mrs John Merritt, The Cottage, Beighton, Kent, England.'

‘By special cable? Any more addresses? What about your club? … All right then. Grade school?'

‘Eh?'

‘Did you get through grade school, dummy?'

‘B.A. Harvard, 1914, sir – sergeant.'

‘Christ!' the sergeant said, ‘and you're married. You must have murdered someone to be enlisting.' He turned to the Indian – ‘Name?'

‘Chee Shush Benally.'

The sergeant laid down his pen – ‘Mother of God, spell it – slowly.'

The Indian said nothing, and Johnny cut in – ‘Perhaps he doesn't know how it's spelled, if he can't write.'

‘When I want your help, rookie, I'll ask for it … Say that again, Chief.'

‘Chee … Shush … Benally.'

The sergeant wrote painstakingly, muttering, ‘I suppose that means Rain-on-the-Mountains or Two-Dogs-Fucking.'

The Indian spoke unexpectedly, ‘Red Bear's Grandson.'

‘Eh? O.K., there's half a dozen other Indians in the outfit and three of them are Navajo, I know. You won't be seeing anything of them till you're fit to wear our uniform off the post here … Raise your right hands … Swear after me … Sign here … Make a mark, Chief, an X – like this, see … All right, now you're sojers in the United States Army. You're recruits in the best goddamned regiment in the Army, which means in the world. And the latrine rumour is that we'll be heading for France soon, because Black Jack Pershing knows us and he knows we're the best, so he has asked for us.'

‘That's true,' Johnny said.

The sergeant glared at him – ‘Did I ask you to open your big mouth, rookie? … How do you know?'

‘The Secretary of War, Mr Baker, told me. That's why I wanted to enlist in this regiment, particularly.'

‘Oh, is it?' Sergeant Leary said. ‘Well, next time you write, give Mr Baker Sergeant Leary's compliments and tell him his little friend's starting his very first K.P. this very evening … Now, listen to what I'm going to tell you, and you'll be O.K. There are three ways of doing anything – the right way,
the wrong way, and the Army way. You do it the Army way, always! … Johnson!'