In a Field of Blue

by Liviero, Gemma

  “He is a man with thoughts buried deep,” said Jerome as he lit the sweet-smelling tobacco in his pipe and nodded. “We must give him space. He will be here for two weeks. He has been given longer to recuperate. He wears things inside that he does not wish to share, so we must make his stay here as welcoming and comforting as possible.”

  Jerome squeezed my shoulder as he stood up as if the message was more for me than anyone else.

  For the next two days, the situation was the same. Edgar would come in for meals and then leave again to his room. One day, he asked if he could ride one of the horses, and Jerome suggested that Helene ride with him. But Helene declined, her shyness taking over. Jerome then asked me, and I agreed of course. It was an opportunity to have him all to myself.

  We rode through the fields behind the orchard and stopped to rest under the shade of a tree. He seemed more relaxed on the horse, not so formal, and was always talking to and stroking Hester, which I had given him to ride. He praised my horse-riding skills. Several times he looked northeast toward the fighting, pondering over something, and I thought then how fearful it must be for him that he must soon take his gun again to fight. We let the horses graze while we sat and ate some dates that Lenore had sent us for Christmas, and I had also packed us a bottle of milk.

  “Where do you and your sister come from?” he asked in perfect French.

  “Pardon me?”

  “Your sister and you . . . Did Jerome adopt you?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  He nodded. How he knew, I don’t know, but I guessed he’d heard from someone in the town. I told him how we were abandoned and about some of our journey.

  “Did your sister attend school?”

  “Yes, and I did, too.” Though I didn’t tell him I didn’t complete it like Helene had done.

  “She is very clever, your sister,” he said, more to himself than anyone else. And I wondered how he knew this and remembered that she would add up the receipts and count them and write up bills for payment of goods.

  “Do you think you could get her to come riding with me also?”

  “Oh, but she is not as accomplished on a horse,” I said, to which he laughed. I failed to understand at the time that he had seen right through my attempted diversion.

  He was talkative that night at dinner, and he tested our English conversations and taught us more phrases. He told us about his brothers and mother. What he liked to do for leisure, his horses, and about his marvelous house in a quiet place that sounded like paradise compared to the turmoil we had grown used to. That night when I went to bed, I fantasized about going home with Edgar and being introduced to his family as his wife. In England I imagined we would ride together and have dinner in the dining room that he described.

  Helene whispered in the dark because she saw I was tossing and turning and sighing a lot.

  “Aren’t you sleeping?”

  “No, can’t you?” I replied.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  There was a silence.

  “Are you still thinking about the men on the battlefield?” I asked.

  “Just one at the moment,” she said. And I knew then that Helene, like I had been, was fantasizing about Edgar, and I had an ominous feeling that my own dreams might be over. I did not think at the time that she was also aware he was falling for her. What I did realize was that sometimes, when someone likes you, you just know. I wondered then if something had happened, some connection across the dinner table, some words spoken when I was not in earshot, something else that I had missed.

  Even though I loved Helene, it did not stop me from feeling envious and competing with her. The next day I wore my Paris dress, and Edgar looked me up and down and told me I looked pretty, but his eyes rested mostly on Helene.

  One day, after I returned from a ride, Mira and the cart were gone and Jerome was in the kitchen.

  “Edgar and Helene have left with the deliveries. You have the morning off. You can go riding if you wish.”

  But I didn’t want the morning off.

  “She never wants to do the deliveries!” I said.

  Jerome was shocked at my vexation, his mouth open, speechless, and I turned and slammed the back door as I left and ran out into the fields to sit and think and watch the road from the hills for their return.

  Later, from behind the fruit trees, I watched them sit together on the cart, idling the horse along the track, not in any hurry to return. Edgar appeared talkative and expressive, and he looked at her often while she looked bashfully down. He seemed far more carefree than he had on previous days. Helene was smiling and laughing. It was such a rare thing to see that I was mesmerized by it. I went in through the back door and waited for them. I could hear them talking outside.

  “I will see you at dinner then?” said Edgar.

  “Where else would I be?”

  There was silence, and I imagined Helene looking down shyly.

  “Thank you for your company,” he said.

  There was a pause as Helene tried to think of a response, or perhaps they were looking at each other lovingly, or maybe there was a touch. I am not sure, but I think whatever happened in that moment had sealed their relationship. Edgar did not come inside but went around the side of the house toward his room at the back. Helene came into the house with a poppy tucked behind her ear.

  It bothered me that Edgar had clearly chosen between us. And perhaps I was more bothered by the fact that I didn’t see this coming. I was sour all evening, and Jerome caught me in the barn, brushing the horses, to inquire about my sullen mood. I did not respond, and he left frustrated with his arms in the air.

  That evening Helene had replaced her trousers for a dress, which Jerome noticed also with a curious glance, and Edgar was in good spirits, asking me about the horses and Jerome about the town, about the customs and the fruit seasons. I realized how beautiful she was with her green eyes; her thick, dark lashes; and the dress exposing much of her brown shoulders. She was a flower in full bloom. I had never felt jealous of her before because I had always drawn the attention toward me, and Helene, being shy, had liked that also.

  Helene gave Edgar a larger portion of mashed potatoes and less to herself, and Jerome looked at me with eyes that were smiling. But I felt no joy. I lasted only as long as dinner and returned to our room because I could not bear to look at them. Then Jerome went to bed, and later Helene and Edgar, I saw from the window, took a midnight stroll.

  The next day Edgar was due to leave, and I decided that I did not want to say goodbye. I slipped into the fields in certain protest that I had been left out, my sister the victor of the soldier’s affection. I was wishing that Helene would go away and leave and marry an old widower in the village and have seven babies. I had walked into town and sauntered past the other soldiers to encourage their admiration and flirtations. It did not make me feel any better, and suddenly I felt cruel, and I ran all the way home again, but by that time Edgar had left. A truck had picked him up and taken him to the front, and I felt miserable and confused. I cannot say why my head and my heart were all over the place, because part of me was happy for Helene and part of me feared for Edgar’s safety. But perhaps the remaining piece of me was just conceited and irrational.

  When Helene asked why I had left that morning, I just shrugged. She shook her head and said that it was time to show more respect like an adult if I wanted to be called one, and I went to my room and cried, feeling shallow and childish. Then thoughts of their togetherness frightened me even more. What if Helene and Edgar got married and moved away to England? What if I lost her? And suddenly my jealous feelings were replaced by the thought that I might lose the one person who had been with me from the beginning. My sister who had never hurt anyone, had loved me unconditionally through all my wildness and willfulness.

  Wiping away my tears, I saw a piece of paper under her pillow, a corner jutting out from the edge. It seemed important somehow because of where it was placed, and I sh
ould have left it there, but I couldn’t help myself. I opened it up, and inside was a message written in a neat but quivery hand. The note in French said, Dear lovely Helene, you have made my time here the best it has been, and I sincerely hope that I see you again soon. Edgar

  It was very formal and not a love note, but his feelings were there in the spaces between the words. He had fallen hard for Helene, too, it seemed. The pieces fell into place just like her tidy bed. Helene’s pillow was in its proper spot, and a little cross hung on the wall above her bed. Everything was where it should be. And love sat also in a tidy corner of that bedroom. Edgar and Helene had found each other in a situation that neither he nor even Helene had predicted, and they were now connected by love and promises. Suddenly I stopped wanting Edgar for myself, and in some strange way the letter freed me from my fantasies. I had grown up, and the lives of others were suddenly more important than my own.

  I slipped the note back under the pillow.

  When Helene came in a short time later, she sat on the edge of the bed and put her hand on my leg.

  “I don’t know what’s got into you, but if it’s something I’ve done, please tell me. I don’t want to see you so upset. This isn’t like you, and it scares me a little.”

  I said nothing.

  “Is it because of Edgar and me?”

  I nodded.

  “I can’t help falling in love, Mariette.”

  I realized before she had even finished that sentence that I didn’t deserve her, and I threw my arms around her and cried into her neck.

  “Will you go away?” I asked.

  “Who knows? But I can tell you that wherever I go, it will not be without you.”

  I said I was sorry for being such a brat, and she knew that I was jealous also, though she would never say it. She would never humiliate me. The idea of finding a suitor was suddenly not as important as being with my sister.

  “I hate seeing good men go to war,” said Jerome at dinner. He didn’t say it, but we all thought it: that Edgar may not come back.

  “Are you sweet on him?” he asked Helene one evening when he was puffing on his pipe and Helene and I were playing a game of cards by the lantern on the table.

  “Who?” said Helene innocently, though she was struggling to meet his gaze.

  “I thought so,” he said.

  I laughed hard then; it had been a while since I had. Helene and Jerome joined me, and it was one of those moments that defined a change in the direction of our lives. It was acceptance that there was someone else now that had formed a part of our little family.

  Helene grew a bit depressed as the days wore on, and her beautiful smile disappeared. She would not hear from Edgar for weeks. She had changed back into her trousers and shirts, and our cleaning, sewing, and darning tasks grew as more bullet holes appeared in the uniforms for repair. Though these ones had no owners to return them to.

  More men were billeted in the room at the rear of the house. Jerome regularly went to the town hall to learn the news of soldiers we had met, in particular Edgar. He would also go to hospitals. One day he came back and said that one of the men who had been billeted here, Roger, had been badly injured with gas. Many others also, but Roger was one of the worst and had to be sent back to England. Dinner was a very solemn affair that night, and Helene had lost interest in our games of charades and cards.

  Sometimes we would hear explosions, and we would rush outside to watch the fire from some distant battle, and always after these times, Helene did not wish to speak. I sometimes would catch her in the stable, crying, her face on the warm neck of Carmello.

  “She has lost her heart to him,” Jerome said once when we were collecting the last of the fruit.

  “Will he come back, do you think?” I asked, knowing there was no real answer.

  “If God wills it,” he said.

  The next day I found Helene stitching up the hem of a soldier’s trousers, and I sat cross-legged opposite her to darn more socks. These times always reminded me of our childhood beside campfires when we only had each other. She smiled then as if she knew what I was thinking. And it had always been us. We rarely had to question each other on thoughts. We just knew, and she reached out and put up her hand, and I put up mine, palm to palm. I don’t think we could have been any closer.

  She said she didn’t like the fact that people were dying “for us.” It didn’t feel right that we were here with a roof and warm food, while they were there in rain or sleet, burnt and blistering from the sun or their fingers and toes frozen, their bodies aching. She wished she could have gone, too, and we toyed with the idea of stealing uniforms and cutting our hair and pretending to be men. But we were just girls again, and it was idle talk, because we were young and full of good ideas that would never see light.

  That night the soldiers who were billeted brought us big steaks of ham and coffee, and we added our potatoes and peas, and we had a feast. We left no plate with any food. Jerome brought out wine for the men and poured us two small glasses, too, and we toasted to success and we prayed that night to our God, because we knew only the one, not the spirits that the gypsies spoke of but the one that Jerome prayed to for our men to come home. We claimed the foreign soldiers currently in the town as our own, and everyone else who had come far to free us.

  The next morning, early, there was a knock at the door, and it was Edgar. He was thin and haggard, with scratches on his face. Helene ran into his arms, and he picked her up, arms tightly around her, and I saw tears pouring out from his eyes, while Helene sobbed into his shoulder. And I knew then that it was real love, the kind that many of us dream about at some point.

  CHAPTER 24

  The soldier at our house was kind enough to swap billets with Edgar, and he had the place again, and Helene was smiling, and she wore her prettiest dress, and there was a spring in her step, and I loved to see her so happy. Even Jerome smiled more. And we weren’t thinking about the future. We were rejoicing one day at a time. But Edgar’s leave this time would only be short.

  Helene and Edgar spent much time together, and their relationship was serious. I was awake when Helene sneaked out during the night and went to the room at the back. And the first night, I could smell pipe smoke and knew that Jerome was awake and probably knew about it, too. And the second night as she was leaving, I whispered a warning to Helene that she would get caught by Jerome, but she gave me a kiss and tucked me into bed like she was my mother because to me she always had been. I didn’t know any other.

  The morning following, the lovers were quiet, and they avoided eye contact, and I knew that something more had happened. Jerome said Helene could have the day off, and the pair took a basket of food and disappeared into the fields and trees behind the orchard, and when they came back, he had his arm around her and she was flushed, and there were grass stains on the back of her dress. But these weren’t the only signs of their love. She was radiant and talkative. I had never seen her so free: so unlike the solemn, silent girl I had known my whole life. I liked this new Helene, though I was also very wary. I was afraid of losing her to Edgar forever. Though if I had to lose her to anyone, it would be to him.

  One day one of our customers from Bailleul visited. We rarely had visitors, so it was a little strange. He made light talk, asked Jerome about the fruit, and spoke about the war, a topic that was offered at every new meeting. Jerome had already suspected that the visit was a specific one and tilted his head in my direction to suggest I leave them. Helene and Edgar were out riding. I walked into my room and listened intently through the door.

  “Thought you should know that they’re singing about your girl down at the tavern.”

  “Mariette?”

  “No. Your other one. They sing a song called ‘The Gypsy and the Soldier,’ which they have written themselves.”

  I laughed into my hand because it sounded wonderful, but I could hear from Jerome’s forceful tone that he did not think it was funny at all.

  “Who sings this
?”

  “The tavern owner, Gerard, and his wife, Aloise . . . It’s rather lewd.”

  There was silence from Jerome.

  “Anyway I thought you should know.”

  Jerome didn’t thank the visitor but instead asked after his wife. Perhaps Jerome was too proud to admit or show that he was offended. But he was. And not just a little. After the visitor left, Jerome climbed straight onto the trap. I followed him a short way, and when he said he had some private business to do, I rushed to the other side and climbed up anyway. He was too angry to argue, I could tell. He had other things on his mind.

  We rode into the town with the wind biting any exposed flesh, and Jerome said nothing but looked straight ahead. I read the sign not to speak to him. In the rare moments that Jerome was angry about something, we let him be, gave him time to sort it out in his head.

  Jerome climbed off the trap, and this time he looked at me directly.

  “Don’t follow!” he said.

  His look was so serious I was forced to oblige. Well, in part. I stood close enough to the tavern windows to see and hear everything.

  He went up to the counter and spoke directly to Gerard but loud enough that other people in the tavern heard also. He said that they should get their minds out of gossip. That while they were making fun of people, hundreds of soldiers were dying close by. He said to start thinking of them instead, start doing some good instead of trying to be hurtful. He didn’t sound angry, just direct and forceful and disappointed. No one in the tavern there spoke. I think that they were too shocked and embarrassed to say anything. Then Jerome walked out, put on his hat, and climbed into the cart.

  We didn’t talk about it on the way home. Only when we had a view of the farmhouse did he tell me not to mention it to Helene. He did not want to see her hurt.

  “And don’t go finding out what was sung. It is best you not learn such things. And don’t go telling Helene about it.”