Missing (5 page)

But on this day, a man, a stranger, was standing beside the grave. The man stared down at the cross and checked a piece of paper in his hand. He pulled a pen from his pocket and
wrote something on the paper. When Luc came closer, he saw that the paper in the man’s hand was some kind of list.

“Are you someone from this man’s family?” Luc asked the stranger. “Did you know Jack Green? He was a Canadian pilot who died March 4, 1917.”

The man looked up, surprised to see Luc. He was even more surprised that Luc knew the date of the pilot’s death. The two men shook hands.

“I’m from the War Graves office in England,” said the man. “I’m looking for the grave of a pilot named Jack Greenwood. But the name on this grave is Jack Green.”

“That is the name the Germans printed on the cross in 1917,” said Luc. “I was a boy at the time, and I remember every detail. I attended the pilot’s funeral. Jack Green is the only pilot buried in this graveyard. The other graves belong to village people.”

“How do you know the pilot was Canadian?” asked the man.

“I heard the German soldiers say the word
Canadian
,” said Luc. “The soldiers must have been able to tell, but I don’t know how.”

“Are you sure about the date?” asked the man.

“I’m absolutely sure,” said Luc. “I will never forget March 4, 1917. I saw the plane flip upside down, and I watched the pilot fall to the ground. I was very much upset, especially because I was the only person who saw him fall to his death. Three planes were fighting in the sky that Sunday morning, and I happened to be walking directly below. I was only a boy, and I was trying to spy on the Germans who had invaded our village. The other people who live here were inside their houses and didn’t see what happened. Jack Green, who is buried here, was flying a British plane. He tried to fight two German planes at the same time. The fight was over quickly.”

“The Germans gave us their burial lists at the end of the war,” said the stranger. “That is why I’m here. The War Graves office in England saw from the lists that one soldier was buried in this village. But no one knew the soldier was a pilot. If you look at the German list I have here, you’ll see the name,
Jack Green
. But neither the list nor the cross has any date. If you are certain about the date, then this has to be the grave I’m
looking for. Jack Greenwood was a Canadian pilot who went missing on that very day, March 4, 1917.”

“Maybe the Germans copied Jack Green’s name from the torn card,” said Luc.

“What torn card?”

“A torn card was lying on the ground near the pieces of the airplane,” said Luc. “I was at the crash site before the soldiers got there, but when they saw me they chased me away. I had already hidden three things inside my jacket. When I picked up the piece of card, I saw a name, but the edge of the card was torn. I tried to keep that, too, but a German soldier grabbed it out of my hand.”

“So part of the name was torn off in the crash,” said the man. “That might be why the grave was not identified sooner. The names
Jack Green
and
Jack Greenwood
are almost the same, it’s true. But millions of soldiers have no graves, and our lists are very long. There were many soldiers named Green and many named Greenwood.”

“You are the first person to come here to identify the grave,” said Luc. “I am sure of that.”

“The date you have given me, March 4, 1917, is the exact date Jack Greenwood went missing,” said the man.

“If it’s a pilot you are looking for, then this has to be the same man,” said Luc.

“I’d like to hear the whole story before our office confirms the identity,” said the man. “I would like to send word to the Greenwood family in Canada. They have been waiting many years for news. They will be glad to know if we have finally found their son’s grave.”

“Please come to my home,” said Luc. “I, too, have waited many years. And now I would like to tell my story.”

1928

Northern France

Luc brought the stranger to his home. As they walked, he thought about what he would say. He wanted to tell the man about the peaceful look on the pilot’s face after he’d crashed to the ice on the pond. About how he had cried when he knew he could do nothing to help. About how he had kept the details of that day in his memory.

He also wanted to tell the man about the German soldiers. How they brought a team of horses and a cart to the pond. How they
used hooks to pull the body to shore. How they loaded the pilot’s body onto the cart and took it to the church. And Luc wanted to tell about hiding in the bushes under the church window. About watching the priest clear the long table where the body would lie. And about the funeral, too. How a German military band played music, and how a German general attended. And how the villagers had never seen such an event before.

Most of all, Luc wanted to show the man what was in the bundle on the shelf. The bundle he had kept for eleven years.

Luc invited the man to sit at the table in the kitchen. The room smelled of newly baked bread. Luc’s wife had been up since early morning. She welcomed the stranger and served tea and slices of fresh bread with butter and jam. The baby was asleep in a special cradle in a corner near the kitchen fireplace.

“What did you hide in your jacket?” the man asked, after he’d had his tea. “I’d really like to see what you found at the crash site.”

“I’m happy to show you,” said Luc. “I’ve kept my souvenirs ever since the day of the crash. The
soldiers had no idea that I had taken anything. When they shouted at me to get away from the crash site, I ran home. I put my treasures into a canvas bag, and I hid the bag under my bed. Of course, I wasn’t supposed to do that, and I was afraid. So I kept them hidden until the end of the war. But because I saw the pilot fall to his death, I felt connected to him. I wanted to have something to show his family. All these years, I have wanted to tell them what a brave death this man had.”

“Maybe we should start at the beginning,” said the man from the War Graves office. He took out his pen, opened his notebook, and began to write while Luc told the story.

Luc tried to remember every detail. Then he went to the shelf, carried the bundle to the kitchen table, and unwrapped the cloth. There lay the two canvas strips. There lay the splinter of wood from the propeller.

The stranger was surprised to see what Luc had kept all these years. He turned the items over in his hands. He rubbed the dirt on the canvas strips between his fingers. He studied the name and the date Luc had printed on one
of the strips. Finally, he handed everything back to Luc.

“This is what I have been searching for,” said the man. “What you printed on the canvas is only half the name, but the man you saw was Jack Greenwood. He was the only Canadian pilot who went missing that day. The mystery of his grave has now been solved. I have to thank you for inviting me here and telling your story.”

“You said that you would write to the pilot’s family in Canada,” Luc said. “But after you let them know about the grave, I would like to write to them, too. Will you send me their address?”

“I’ll be more than happy to do that,” said the man. “You’ll receive it in about two weeks. Do you want our office to send the objects from the plane crash to the family? I can take them with me today and have them sent from England.”

Luc thought about this for a moment. “Yes,” he said. “It’s time for me to part with the souvenirs that have meant so much to me. These belong to the family of the pilot. In a few weeks, I will write to them myself. I’ll tell them the story of what happened during the last moments of their son’s life.”

1928

Nova Scotia

One Monday morning in June, Peggy and Will Greenwood sat in the kitchen looking out at the rows of apple trees. Peggy had walked through the orchard early that morning. She’d come back into the house and baked bread, and now she made a pot of tea. Will was taking a break from his outdoor work. The brass ringer suddenly twisted in the front door, making its usual loud noise.

Will answered the door. There stood the postman, who handed over a parcel with a letter attached. Will brought these into the kitchen.

“Here we go again,” he said. “Another letter from the War Graves office. But look, Peggy, they’ve sent a parcel this time. They’ve never done that before. Which one shall we open first?”

Peggy reached for the letter. “We might as well start with this one,” she said.

They sat at the table and Peggy read aloud.

London, England

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Greenwood,

I am finally able to send news. We have found a war grave with the name
Jack Green
printed by hand on a cross over it. This cross had been made from two pieces of propeller from your son’s plane. The graveyard is beside a church in a small village in northern France. I have written its name and location at the end of this letter.

An officer from our War Graves office travelled to France to visit the village grave site. He found proof that your son, Jack
Greenwood, is buried there. We did not know this sooner because only half of your son’s name is on the cross. German soldiers had copied the name from a torn card they found at the crash site in 1917. We are certain that this “Jack Green” is your son.

We are sorry we have taken so many years to identify your son’s grave. But there is more to tell. While our officer was in the village in France, he happened to meet a young man named Luc Caron. He soon learned that Mr. Caron was the only witness to the aerial fight in which your son was killed.

Mr. Caron was much affected by the tragedy that took your son’s life. He was only a boy at the time, but he attended the church service and the burial of your son. He also saved three souvenirs from the crash site. These souvenirs have been sent to you from this office, and you will receive them along with this letter.

Mr. Caron asked if he might write to you directly. He wants so much to share the details of the event he witnessed so long ago.
We have given him your address. You can expect his personal letter in a few weeks.

Sincerely,

T. S. Harvey

Secretary

Jack’s parents opened the parcel. They cried when they saw the strips of canvas and the splinter from the propeller. They cried, but they were glad to have real proof of what had happened to their son.

Will went to the bookshelf and carried the atlas to the table. He opened it to a map of northern France, and he and Peggy found the name of the village on the map. Now they knew that their beloved son had a grave. Now they knew the name of the place where his body was lying.

Two weeks later, the first letter from Luc Caron arrived. In the years to follow, there would be many more letters. But the first was the one Will and Peggy had been waiting for.
It told them what they wanted and needed to know: the story of their son’s last moments of life.

This is how that first letter from Luc Caron began.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Greenwood,

With deep feeling, I write this letter, having found you at last. By now you will have received the souvenirs I guarded for many years on behalf of your son. You have seen that clumps of dirt are still stuck to the canvas from the wings of your son’s plane. The strips of canvas are exactly as I found them when I tore them from the ground. The splinter of propeller, I hid inside my jacket.

I part with these souvenirs sadly, because they have been so dear to me. But of course they are more dear to you, and it is to you that they now belong.

I am also sorry to open in your hearts, again, the sorrow of losing your son. I have been told by the War Graves office
in England that you will want to hear my story. And so, with respect, I now start at the beginning.

In 1917, I was a small boy, only twelve years old. On March 4, a Sunday, I was on my way home from church. Just after eleven o’clock in the morning, I heard machine-gun fire in the sky above me. Two German planes were fighting a British plane. I looked up to watch this fight in the sky...