“That’s unfortunate,” said Cass.
“Yes,” I answered softly. “But maybe it’s just as well.” I flashed her a smile. “He might have played havoc with my concentration and made it harder for me to keep my promises . . .”
For only a moment I glimpsed the old Cass again. “That good?” she asked.
And I nodded.
After our last run of the day, the same volunteer who’d brought me Jimmy’s letter searched me out again. We ate in the mess hall, although Cass looked pensive and strange and only picked at her food. The volunteer said that someone had come and now waited for me outside.
Jimmy! Somehow, he’d come back.
“Pay me no notice,” Cass said and made a shooing motion with her hand. A classic Cass move, but I saw no heart in it, as if it had become mechanical. It seemed to me that she relied on ingrained responses to hide what went on inside her now.
I said, “Please eat.”
She shooed me again.
I’d only had a chance to wash my face and hands since we’d stopped driving. So I pinched my cheeks for color and strode away with the volunteer. Despite my concerns about Cass, I smiled.
Night had fallen completely, and a light wind had temporarily blown the smoke and ash of war away. In an impeccable uniform with his back to me as I approached, he suddenly turned around and projected a dashing smile.
I almost fell as I realized . . .
It was Captain Felix Brohammer.
Chapter Fourteen
I stopped.
“There’s my girl,” he said, the dazzling smile even more dazzling, if that was possible. Apparently I was the only person who saw something sinister in that grin.
My girl? He’d said it loud enough that some people in the courtyard had heard. A few glances landed on us. And my fear began to swell.
Still the same incredibly handsome man that women swooned over, tonight he looked strangely ill-at-ease. I stayed paralyzed by his presence the way a fox freezes when it senses some other creature has caught its scent. What was he doing here, and how had he found me, and why? Obviously he saw something appealing about me and had ignored what I’d said before.
But I rapidly told myself I had nothing to fear. Felix Brohammer, although an unlikable narcissist, didn’t pose a danger. He was an American officer, an educated man, a man who’d come very far already in his life. Besides, others talked and walked and smoked nearby, and he’d never given me any reason to think he could turn violent.
I swallowed back the fear and calmly walked up to him. If I could handle all the horrific scenes and suffering at the front, I could certainly handle Felix Brohammer. “Good evening, Captain,” I said. “What brings you here?”
His smile faded, but he laughed in a way that sounded forced. “You know what brings me here. I can’t stop thinking about you. I can’t stop missing you.” He opened his arms and beamed again. “How are you, darling?”
I made no move.
His arms fell back to his sides, and then his eyes roved over my uniform. He looked back at my face with another grim smile. “I see. You need to get yourself cleaned up so I can take you out.”
I didn’t move. I already knew how I looked, and of course my appearance had suffered. I’d driven for hours on end, transporting the injured and sometimes the dead. He must have not done any work that day. His uniform looked perfect. Most of the other officers I’d seen appeared as haggard and worn out as the rest of us did. Felix Brohammer was a mystery, but one I had no desire to solve.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t have time to go out,” I said as firmly as I could while also trying not to project any fear or anger.
His expression fell flat, and his face tightened. “Do you know how difficult it’s been to track you down, my dear? I thought you were in Neufmoutiers, so I wasted a trip there only to find out you’d moved here. Do you know how long I’ve been driving around to find you?”
Not far from him sat a Cadillac open touring car like the ones officers used. An enlisted man lounged behind the wheel, smoking cigarettes and puffing out perfect smoke rings that slowly rose in the air.
“Is that your driver?” I asked while making a small gesture that way.
He glanced over quickly, and just as quickly dismissed the fact that he himself hadn’t driven. “Of course I have a driver. And of course I’ll get rid of him so you can take a drive with me. I know a place—”
“I can’t go. I just got in a little while ago, and I have too much to do.”
As if I hadn’t spoken, he went on: “It’s a ridge overlooking a valley that’s still untouched. It’s clear tonight; we’ll see stars. You’ll love it.”
“I can’t. I can’t go off like that; I still have things to finish tonight.”
Standing very tall, he said, “I’ll wait. I went to a lot of trouble getting here, so what’s it to me if I have to wait for you to get dolled up?”
Dolled up? So many things this man said made me incredulous. How could he possibly have assumed that we ambulance drivers had any clean clothing left with which to get dolled up? But I let that go.
“Come on, sweetheart. Come out with me.”
Genuinely dumbfounded, I asked, “Why?”
He grinned. “I have selfish reasons.”
“Well, that’s a surprise.”
He threw his head back and laughed, a touch on the hysterical side, I thought. Then he stopped and looked at me with arrogance like I’d never seen before. “You’re so adorable; you know that, don’t you? And your resistance is rather fetching, too. But even you can’t mask the obvious desire you have for me.”
I shouldn’t have made him laugh. “Captain Brohammer, I’m flattered by your attention, but I don’t understand what you’re looking for. I went out with you once, and as I recall, the evening didn’t end well.”
His face turned crimson, and his posture lowered for just a half second. Then his back jolted upright again. “The evening was perfect. You were the perfect blend of naivete and sophistication, of defiance and longing.”
I wondered if the captain suffered from a different form of the shell shock plaguing so many soldiers. Maybe this was another manifestation of that illness, and maybe he needed help. Those considerations kept my heart leaning toward kindness.
But I had to remain firm and put any sarcasm aside, couldn’t act in any way playful. In fact something about him felt even more off-kilter tonight. A little bit ominous, not just odd. “I’m sorry, but it wasn’t that way.”
“Of course it was. You mesmerized me. And look at all I’ve done to track you down.”
His assertion hit me as a bit desperate. “As I said before, I’m flattered, but that doesn’t mean we’re a couple. We weren’t a couple in Paris, and we aren’t one now, either. I apologize if that’s not what you want, but . . . it’s the truth. I’m genuinely sorry if I gave you the wrong impression.”
“It’s not just an impression. It’s something I know.”
“But I don’t see it the same way.”
He took a few breaths while studying me, his eyes now darker with anger. A line etched between his brows, marring his silky face. “No one ever turns me away.”
Reason wasn’t working, and now I saw him as rather wretched. “Look, I’m sorry. I really am,” I said. “Any other girl would find your interest most flattering. You can date any American woman, British woman, French woman you want. You’re very eye-catching, as you know. It’s just bad luck that you set your sights on me; I didn’t come here for romance.”
An image of Jimmy’s face jumped into my mind. I had planned to meet him that night, and who knew where that might have led us? But Jimmy’s presence had moved me and pulled me in, whereas Brohammer frightened me and made me want to run away.
I pushed those thoughts aside, however, and said, “There simply is no time for it, and my team leaders forbade us to fraternize with men while over here anyway.”
His pupils went huge. “But you went out with me in P
aris.”
I said simply, “I did. But I shouldn’t have done so.”
How I wished I hadn’t done it. I should’ve followed my instincts. I could’ve avoided all of this unpleasant business.
He interrupted my reflections. “At Neufmoutiers, I spoke with the lady in charge . . . it’s Dr. Logan, isn’t it?” Hair lifting on my arms, I slowly nodded. “She told me straightaway where I could find you. And she smiled as if you were her daughter. She was more than a little charmed, if I must say so myself. She knows a prize when she sees it.”
“Did you see Kitty, Lottie, and Eve? The other ambulance drivers? They’re all adorable.” I stopped myself. I couldn’t send someone ailing from a strange delusional state to those sweet girls. Any one of them would jump at the chance to be his girl, and I couldn’t imagine anything good resulting from that.
“I saw them,” he said matter-of-factly. “Do you think you’re going to convince me to turn away and find someone else?” As if I’d answered yes, he went on. “You don’t know me very well, then. When I go after something, I usually get it.”
“All I can offer you is my friendship.”
He stood still for several long moments, blinking every few seconds. As if soaking it in, trying to make himself believe it. Then his shoulders lowered. “Friendship it is,” he finally said with another forced smile. “For now.”
I nodded. “Thank you.”
“So now that that’s settled, will you go for a ride with me?”
This man was relentless, and I then knew that I didn’t have the knowledge to deal with this. I’d convinced myself I wouldn’t have to see him again, but now it seemed I’d created a personal mess, one I could’ve avoided had I not gone out with Brohammer in the first place. “I really can’t. It’s hectic here from the crack of dawn until nightfall. This isn’t a party. I can’t just . . . just . . . go off on a drive . . .”
“A stroll, then?”
I had no idea what to do. Would I make it better or worse if I went for a stroll? Would he see it as encouragement, or would he finally see that my mind was made up?
“Come on, say yes,” he said, and then his smile gleamed again. How could someone who looked so well in fact be so troubled? “I don’t bite.”
Breathing out a big release of held-in air, I answered, “Very well.”
We made plans to meet again in an hour’s time.
When I returned to the mess hall table, Cass sat and played with her food. She perked up when she saw me.
“And . . . ?” she asked.
I shook my head. “It was Brohammer.”
She openly gaped and dropped her fork. “Brohammer? You don’t mean—”
“Yes, I thought I’d gotten rid of him, but he has found me.”
She stared hard at me now as I slipped down beside her on the bench. At least I’d taken her focus off the war for a few minutes. She said, “This is getting kind of odd now, isn’t it?”
“I agree. He thinks we’re a couple. It’s odd, yes, but I also wonder if it’s some weird effect from the war.”
“I doubt that. Everything has hit me hard here, but I’m not having any delusions. Bad memories, yes, but really, Arlene, I don’t think fooling oneself about love is a symptom of shell shock.”
Relief washed over me. Cass had brightened. Maybe some focus on my problems had helped her. “I said I’d take a stroll with him later.”
“What?”
“At first he insisted we take a drive. I turned him down and offered my friendship.”
“He’s disturbing, isn’t he?” She paused as something dark seemed to cloud her thoughts. “Everything about this place is disturbing. I’d never imagined . . .” Tears gathered in Cass’s eyes. “I haven’t slept a full hour.”
Cass took turns so quickly.
I shifted my weight to face her. My problem couldn’t compare to hers. “We won’t stay here forever. The front will move, Cass; believe me, the needs will change, and at some point, we’ll move back from the front lines. All we have to do is get through it a little longer.”
She shook her head. “I hated it back in Neufmoutiers, too.”
“But you seemed fine.”
“I wasn’t fine.”
I had to watch as she moved even farther away. Somehow I’d used sheer determination to get through it all, but the same ability loomed just beyond Cass’s reach. She disappeared again, back into the nightmare.
I touched her arm. “We’ll stay together. That helped today, didn’t it?”
Her brows knitted. “Not much,” she eventually answered, and the way she spoke told me it came from within some gory scene in her mind.
I sighed and said, “Well, it sure helped me.”
“You’re different. I never saw it before.”
“Yes, we’re different. You’ve always had more strength, much more than me.”
She shook her head and then whispered, “Nothing . . . nothing . . .”
“Cass.” I scooted closer. “What do you mean by nothing?”
“Nothing can help me.”
After Cass told me she wanted to rest and left the table, I returned to the spot outside where I’d talked to Felix Brohammer. An hour hadn’t yet passed, but he stood there already, or perhaps he’d never stepped away. His car, however, was no longer parked in the same place, and the area seemed deserted.
“Captain,” I said as I walked up. There it came again, that dazzling smile so bright that few people would ever see beneath the shine. “I can’t go for a stroll with you after all. I’m worried about a friend of mine and don’t want to leave her alone. I’m sorry.”
His smile soured. With his eyes trained on me, he laughed without mirth. “Sure you are.”
I gave a half shrug. “Believe what you will, but someone else needs me tonight.”
He shifted his weight. “So, who is he?”
“He?” I spurted out. This was getting even crazier. “It’s a woman, a dear friend of mine. She’s not dealing with all the awfulness over here as well as she thought she would. And I’ve pledged to myself that I’ll remain as close as possible to her until she gets better.”
“Very noble of you,” he said.
I prepared to turn away and leave. “As I said, believe what you will.”
“What’s her name?”
I halted and turned back. Why would he want her name? Perhaps he was trying to make me stumble and somehow reveal that my cause for refusing him was another man. But I’d never give him Cass’s name. I couldn’t imagine what he might do with it.
“I’m not giving you her name.” I took a step backward. “Good night, Captain.”
He said nothing as I turned and strode away.
Another voice, however, caught my attention. I hadn’t noticed them before, but a couple of French soldiers sat in the grass over in the shadows, their elbows resting lazily on their knees as they smoked cigarettes. Their eyes glued to me. How long had they watched? I witnessed them glance back at Brohammer, too.
The conversation was muffled and in French. Still, I distinctly heard one of the soldiers say in a disgusted manner, “Il se fait du beurre sur le dos de ses propres hommes,” a French saying that essentially translates to “He makes money off his own men.”
Someone was making money off his own men? Brohammer?
At the door, I glanced behind me. Brohammer still stood there, but I never met his eyes. No one else stood or sat close to the two men sitting in the grass. They must have been talking about the captain.
I waited a while inside, giving Brohammer time to leave, while my thoughts turned into a maze. Then I went back outside to search for the French soldiers I’d overheard. I needed to ask them what they had meant.
Makes money off his own men . . .
Instead I saw that Brohammer had left, but so had the French soldiers.
I returned to the mess hall, where on many evenings small groups of medical staff stayed up late, often drinking, playing cards, and gambling. They told
trench jokes, and one doctor who could speak English translated the Wipers Times, a British trench magazine full of tongue-in-cheek humor, and read it out loud to the others.
Knowing I probably wouldn’t sleep, I joined them for a while and found myself admiring how people so close to the battlefield could laugh and play and talk, completely absorbed in the moment, as if no war existed and certainly not just outside their door.
I didn’t stay long. I couldn’t stop hearing those soldiers’ words in my head.
Makes money off his own men . . .
That night as I lay in bed, sleepless as I’d predicted, I turned that phrase over and over in my mind. Why had they said that, and did they really say it about Brohammer? How had I let them slip away? I would have to search for them in the morning to find out more.
Makes money off his own men . . .
Chapter Fifteen
When I looked back on France later in my life, I would remember it as a series of contrasts. We stepped from quiet scenes of beauty and tranquility into the urgency and thunder of war, like stepping from one foot to the other. One call, one sight in the distance, one message received, and everything changed.
I would remember lounging amid flowers in a Meaux garden, eating cake and listening to the sounds of a softly tinkling fountain; I might see a burst of artillery fire in the distance, but all else around me made no sound, no movement. At the start of the day, we could gaze at a field coming into daylight and teeming with life. I might look up into a cloudless sky and spot a single star or an airplane looping lazily overhead.
Then orders would come to leave, and we would immediately enter a world of horrors. We drove past stiff bodies and partially decayed bodies, crumbled villages, weary poilus on the road, and charred and cratered fields, while nearby, men in barbed-wire-protected trenches waged war with machine guns. A world of ruin—gray skies, gray roads, gray fields, empty gray villages—a place decaying before its time. What a mess man had made of it.
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