‘Pozieres,’ Liam answered, convinced it would mean nothing.
‘Ah, I see.’ There followed a noticeable silence. Then the Padre turned to him and said clearly, ‘Come back with me to Talbot House. It’s just along here. Have something to eat and a cup of tea. And if you’d prefer to sit quiet for a while, you won’t be disturbed.’
It took a moment for the man’s words to sink in. There was such kindness in his face, such unspoken depths of understanding, Liam felt his resistance crumble. Clearing his throat of a sudden obstruction, he said, ‘We haven’t been paid for weeks. I haven’t any money.’
‘No need. We ask only what a man can afford. And if he has nothing, we ask nothing – as simple as that.’
The tall white house was on a street Liam had walked already. Seeing the open door, the sign outside, he wondered how he could have missed it. In the depths of the house he thought he heard the notes of a piano, and voices raised in song, but the Padre steered him through to the garden, long and deep and still wet with rain.
Shrubs and climbing plants made silent arbours, hiding seats and benches set back from the paths. Against the wall, roses were in bloom, nodding heavy heads, shedding drops like tears from velvet petals. A soothing place, a million years, surely, from the shifting sands of Pozieres. Hardly noticing that he was alone, Liam slowly lowered his numb, unfeeling body into a seat and closed his eyes. Not to sleep, just to breathe the scented air, to feel its moist sweetness against his skin and taste it on his lips. And when he opened his eyes it was to look at everything, each tiny leaf and tendril, the dazzling intensity of colour in every bloom.
It was so perfect it was almost unbearable.
A woman came with a tray of food. Potatoes and tiny green beans, and some sort of chicken stew, the whole meal a feast of delicate flavours, as perfect as the garden. He had barely finished when the Padre came out to join him, smiling, bearing two mugs of tea.
‘How was that? Good? We have an excellent cook – she can make something out of nothing, believe me!’
Watching him, almost lip-reading because of his deafness, Liam found himself smiling in response. It felt strange – he hadn’t smiled for a long time. ‘I believe you, Padre. Thank you.’
‘No need. Glad to be of service. You know,’ he continued, accepting one of Liam cigarettes, ‘you haven’t told me your name, or where you come from. I’d lay bets you’re not Australian born. Let me see now – don’t tell me – you sound as though you might be from Lincolnshire or perhaps further north. East Riding of Yorkshire?’
‘You’ve a good ear, Padre. I’m from York.’
‘Ah, a lovely city – I know it well. The Minster, the walls, the river – what a combination. Some lovely old churches too.’ He mused for a moment, smiling. ‘I don’t expect you’ve been home for a long while?’
‘No.’
‘Have you applied for leave to England?’
‘I have, but I shouldn’t think I’ll get it.’
‘Why not?’
Liam shook his head, words beyond him.
After few moments, very gently, the other man touched his arm. ‘My boy, if you’d rather I left you alone, just nod your head and I’ll go. But if you’d like to talk then we’ll go inside, where there’s less chance of being overheard.’
He wanted to say no, he was fine. He was not fine, he knew he was touching the edge; but somehow, words were more frightening than the war. Even as he rose to his feet, with every intention of leaving, Liam found himself following the stockily-built little man. He was not old – indeed Liam would have been hard put to guess his age – but there was a quality of fatherliness in him that drew a response, a warmth difficult to resist. He entered a room on the first floor and held the door for Liam; above it, there was a sign which read: ‘Abandon rank all ye who enter here.’
Despite himself, Liam smiled. The Padre chuckled. ‘Yes, some people do need reminding! But sit down – make yourself comfortable. You know,’ he added, settling himself into an easy leather chair, ‘you still haven’t told me your Christian name. I don’t want your surname, rank and serial number, that doesn’t matter, but I would like to know what to call you.’
‘My mates call me Bill, but my family always called me Liam. It’s short for William.’
‘And what would you rather I called you?’
For a moment he hesitated. ‘Liam, I think.’
To begin with, it was a terrible effort to speak, but the Padre kept talking, facing Liam, lifting the pitch of his voice so that he could hear. With the odd question here and there, it soon became clear that this was a man who knew, who understood all the terrors to which Liam had been subject, the effort it cost to stay calm under fire, the energy required to transmit that calmness to men who were on the verge of panic. He knew, too, of the terrible cost afterwards, even to men who were otherwise strong, otherwise unmarked. And he understood the despair.
He neither defended nor condemned the war; and other than a gentle reminder that the General Staff were men too, as fallible as the rest of humanity, he offered neither praise nor blame in that direction; but he did listen, and he did try to penetrate the despair.
To a certain extent he succeeded. Liam was unaccustomed to sharing burdens, and the enormity of what he felt about the war was difficult to express; but once the first words were found, the rest came tumbling out like water from a broken dam. The sense of release was curative in itself, and although the Padre commented that he wished he could do more than simply listen, Liam was acutely aware that having such a listener was as much, at that point, as he needed. The suggestion that he should report sick, however, was dismissed with a sharp laugh.
‘Begging your pardon, Padre, but that’s a joke! I’m no more sick than any of my mates – and if I’m sick, they’re all sick, every last one of them!’
The chaplain shook his head, insisting that Liam should continue to press for leave, that he needed time away from the war, time to recover his spirit.
Liam’s response to that came without thinking, and it shocked him. ‘I don’t want to go home.’
There was a long silence. ‘Do you want to tell me why?’
He shook his head, aware of a hard lump in his chest. ‘Not really.’
‘Is it to do with why you left home in the first place – why you went to Australia?’ At Liam’s abrupt nod, he said: ‘Was it a crime you committed?’
Laughter released the hard lump inside him, but it threatened to get out of hand. With an effort, Liam calmed himself and apologized. On a deep breath, he said: ‘I discovered, in a very shocking manner, that my father was not who I thought he was. That is, not my mother’s husband. I have a brother and a sister, and the man who fathered us was someone I thought was just a distant relative.’
For a moment, it was impossible to say more. He tried to light a cigarette, but the trembling which had begun with talk of the war, had gone beyond his control; the Padre lit two and passed one across to him. Liam smoked in a short, angry fashion, leaning forward, forearms pressed against his knees.
‘It wouldn’t have been so bad,’ he said, ‘but I’d fallen in love with his daughter. I thought we were no more than – oh, I don’t know, second cousins, I suppose – it was never clear. She was older than me, and I never really thought it would come to anything, but…’ He coughed, sharply, and shook his head. ‘Oh, God, I was eighteen years old and I loved her...’
‘Was she aware of it? Did she encourage you?’
‘No. No, she knew what the relationship was – she was just fond of me, I suppose.’ On a short, sardonic laugh, he added: ‘Like a sister should be.’
For a while, digesting that, the other man said nothing. Then, ‘What about your mother?’ he asked. ‘And the man you thought was your father? I presume he raised you?’
‘I can’t forgive her. I’ve tried, but I can’t. Oh, I write home, I write to them regularly – and I’ve even promised my brother that I’ll go home when I get some leave – but I d
read seeing them. I dread having to see my mother again.’
‘Were you very close to her? Before all this, I mean?’
Liam’s voice failed at that. Eventually he nodded. ‘But still I can’t forgive her for what she did to me. The lies, the deceit — letting me think…’ He broke off. ‘I can’t tell you what it was like...’
‘You don’t have to. I can imagine.’ After a little while, the Padre said: ‘And what about this sister of yours – the one you love. Are you afraid of seeing her, too?’
‘Yes. But I want to see her, that’s the terrible thing.’ Inhaling deeply, stubbing out the remains of his cigarette, Liam sat back, aware, now that he had given voice to the core of it, of a sense of exhaustion. There was nothing to be done, just as there was nothing to be done about the war; but he felt so much lighter, the trembling had abated, and, quite suddenly, he could have slept.
After that the conversation seemed at one remove, and Liam could not recall, afterwards, what he had said. A great deal, he suspected, since he was in that quiet little study for almost two hours. He did remember the chaplain saying to him that he should press for leave, should see his mother; that only in facing her would he be able to achieve the forgiveness he was looking for. And then, perhaps, he would be able to see his sister in the proper light. The chaplain’s kindness, and his sense of conviction, penetrated that haze of tiredness and stayed with Liam. He made his promises and gave his thanks; then, with a short prayer and blessing, was sent on his way.
In the doorway, however, that same doorway which insisted that before God and in this room all men were equal, Liam paused for a moment.
‘Padre, why did you stop and speak to me this evening? You didn’t really need a light, did you?’
The round, cheerful face beamed. ‘Not really, no, but it’s a way of getting into conversation. Most soldiers smoke, most will accept a cigarette even from a man of the cloth!’
‘Why me, though?’
‘Why not you? God hears us, even in our despair. Especially in our despair.’
Liam hesitated. ‘And do you really hear His voice?’
The other man chuckled. ‘Well I don’t know about a voice – not like yours or mine, anyway. But quite often He gives me a nudge – a little prompt, if you like, to do or say something. I don’t always know why, and I certainly don’t think it’s exclusive to me. Perhaps you’ve felt it yourself — that urge to do something out of the ordinary, or against what you think is your nature?’
With a regretful sigh, Liam shook his head. ‘No, I can’t say I have.’
It was only when he was outside and alone in the darkness that truth dawned. He had done something extraordinary; he had acted against his nature. In following the little Padre, in listening to him, and most especially in talking to him, Liam had stepped aside from his usual path…
There was trouble to pay when he got back. The remaining three members of his team were on guard duty outside the warehouse, their faces eloquent as he approached. He remembered instantly, and his heart sank; how on earth could he have forgotten that it was his section’s turn to mount guard that night?
‘Keenan’s hopping,’ Matt hissed from a corner of his mouth.
‘Where is he?’
Carl jerked his head. ‘In the office. What’re you going to do, Corp?’
‘Get it over with, I suppose.’
Squaring his shoulders, Liam marched inside. At a temporary desk inside the old foreman’s cubbyhole, Sergeant Keenan was going through some papers, cigarette burning, a mug of greasy tea beside his hand. He looked up as Liam entered, gooseberry eyes narrowing dangerously.
‘Oh, Corporal Elliott – you’re back! This is a surprise – thought you’d gone for good this time.’
‘Not me, Sergeant – you know me better than that. I went out for a walk – and completely forgot it was my guard tonight. I’m sorry.’
‘Forgot? You forgot? That’s no excuse! Corporals aren’t paid to forget, corporals are paid to remember. And why? It’s so they can round up all the skivers and lead-swingers and get them to the bloody church on time. Or in this case, the picket-line! Oh, your mob turned up all right, ten minutes late, half-dressed and no credit to you!’
He paused for breath, but Liam knew better than to interrupt. Better to let the flow go on, until Keenan had worked the ire from his system.
‘I could have your bloody stripes for this, Elliott. It’s not the first time you’ve wandered off, God-knows-where, and taken your bloody time about coming back. You’re not here on a Cook’s bloody Tour, you know – you’re here to fight a bloody war, and somebody’s paying you over the odds to do it!’
He strode round the desk, coming up short a foot away from Liam.
‘And let me tell you this,’ he declared, emphasizing each point with a jab of his finger, ‘if it weren’t for the fact that we’re going back into the bloody line the day after tomorrow, with about half the men we should have, I’d have you up on a charge right now!’
Knowing the truth of that, Liam stiffened his jaw and stared over Keenan’s head. On the wall opposite was pinned a map of the trenches in the Zillebeke sector, south-east of Ypres. Concentrating on that, he winced as the sergeant’s voice rattled his ears again.
‘One more little stunt like this, Elliott, and I will have you, good and proper, you see if I don’t!’ With a final jab into Liam’s chest, he returned to his seat, eyes gleaming maliciously. ‘Tomorrow you’re on fatigues, sanitary, along with the rest of your team. I want those bloody latrines filled in like they were never there – and new ones dug at least six feet deep!’
The latrines were perhaps a hundred yards from the warehouse, in an open field. They had been dug hurriedly the day before, and were not very deep; owing to the storm and the saturated nature of the land, the pits were half-full of liquid, which overflowed as they were being filled in. The stench was unbearable, and Liam waved his men away from it, knowing that this punishment was entirely his fault, brought about by his absent-mindedness, not theirs. He had left them sleeping.
Getting the turf back was no easy matter, and beneath that deceptive greenness the filled-in pit squelched like a quagmire.
‘Maybe we should get Keenan to come and take a look,’ Gray suggested, leaning wearily on his spade. ‘If he tries to tamp that little lot down, he’ll end up in it – up to his flaming neck!’
The others laughed. Liam was less amused, anxious to get them away and cleaned up, now that the job was done.
‘I wonder what he’ll find for us to do this afternoon?’
‘I don’t give a damn what it is,’ Matt declared, ‘the other poor buggers are off on a bloody route march. Anything’s got to be better than that!’
There was more heavy rain that afternoon, which made a joke of Matt’s convictions, as the punishment detail was set to unloading heavy boxes of stores from a series of motor lorries. Within half an hour they were aching and soaked to the skin, in no better state than the rest of their company, taking foot exercise. The only consolation was that they were finished well before the others returned, clothes drying over a feeble stove in the draughty warehouse, while they sat huddled in blankets, trying to keep warm.
The chill, north-easterly wind had veered round to the west by the next morning. Warned to be ready by two o’clock, Liam had the gun stripped and cleaned first thing, and damp overcoats set out to air in the morning sun. Dinner was a nondescript stew consisting mainly of vegetables in a greyish liquid, and a small portion of matching potatoes. He forced it down, thinking of the delicious meal he had been given at the Talbot House and wondering how it was that army cooks could destroy food so thoroughly.
By mid-afternoon the battalion with its supporting company of machine-gunners was ready to move to the station at Poperinghe. A short rail journey took them to the outskirts of Ypres, to a little halt near an asylum. Hanging about, waiting for orders, Liam had plenty of time to remember the Retreat and the evening he had cycled up to meet Ge
orgina. The last time he had seen her, spoken to her: the last hour of innocence.
Odd snatches of conversation returned to him, no longer painful but curiously poignant. He recalled giving voice to his dreams, so broad, so ambitious; and the joy of her understanding. Remembered, too, that he had said he would write a book one day when he settled down, when he had done all he wanted to do. There was irony in that when he thought how little he had managed to achieve; how, without knowing it, time had been loaded against him.
It still was. Not one man on this battlefield could look forward with any reasonable expectation to a comfortable old age; if I get through it was as far as it went. Forty-eight hours ago Liam had been in despair, preferring death to life; back on the side of the living, he was still weary, still unsure of himself, full of vague apprehensions which seemed to be making themselves felt in a physical way. His stomach was churning unpleasantly, and it was hard to tell whether it was simple fear or the greasy stew he had eaten earlier. In an effort to divert his mind, he kept thinking about Georgina, about what they had talked about that evening. It seemed important, suddenly, not to lose sight of those old ambitions.
Above the western horizon, rain clouds threatened, rising, gilt-edged, to swallow the sun before it set. Its disappearance was like a signal from HQ; moments later orders were given for the troops to form up and proceed.
Within the first mile the rain began, drenching haversacks and overcoats, turning already muddy roads into glutinous slime. Treachery lurked with every footfall; shell-holes gaped, full of the detritus of war, rain spattering like shrapnel-fire from the surface of every puddle. In the fading light, the bloated carcases of horses loomed hideously by the wayside, twisted bits of guns and limbers their permanent companions. Up ahead, the ruined towers of Ypres formed stark silhouettes against the flickering glow in the east. It was a place of gothic horror, a place to strike a chill even on the warmest night. With rain seeping through his greatcoat, Liam shivered, wondering what it must be like in winter. If this was the end of August, what would January bring?
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