Lovely War

by Julie Berry

“It would be fun to see you try,” she said. “This is my friend Colette Fournier. Singer extraordinaire. Colette, this is Aubrey Edwards, King of Ragtime and Emperor of Jazz.”

  Colette held out her hand to shake, but Aubrey kissed it.

  “What is ‘jazz’?” Colette asked. “Is that what you call the music the band played here last week? C’était fantastique!”

  He swelled up like a bullfrog. “That’s jazz, or something like it,” he said. “We’re not just the best band in the US Army. We’re the best band in the whole dang war. We’ll set you free, then we’ll set you on fire with our jazz beat.”

  “Watch what he can do, Colette.” Hazel gestured Aubrey toward the piano bench.

  He found the melody to her song and explored chords until he’d shaped it into a rag.

  To him, it was child’s play, but to Colette, Aubrey had musically parted the Red Sea.

  “Do that again,” Colette demanded.

  Aubrey was glad to oblige her. Soon they were ragging her other sheet music.

  Apollo, you remember what this felt like, for musicians first experiencing the baptism of fire that was jazz. Ragtime seized Colette. Her mind fizzed, her hips swayed. Gone were the old swoony, melodramatic refrains and hackneyed, chirpy tunes. This was oil lamps becoming electric lights. It was dynamite. Voodoo. Sorcery.

  It was sexy. And so was its athletic high priest at the piano bench. He played for Colette with a there’s-more-where-that-came-from gleam in his eye. She found her gaze returning to him oftener than it should. And lingering there.

  Non, Colette told herself. Non, non, non.

  But there was something about the King of Ragtime that wasn’t just the music.

  Aubrey had never encountered Rococo perfume, straight from Paris, and short, sleek curls pinned up like that, so glamorous and daring. And her figure! But it was her voice that hooked him. She knew where he’d take the music; when he improvised, she followed, and sometimes even steered him to modulate to a new key.

  Hazel began to yawn. It was getting late. The time had come.

  Aubrey made himself stand up. “I’d better go.” The hardest words he’d said in a while.

  Colette offered him her hand. “Enchantée.”

  “Good night, Aubrey,” Hazel said.

  He made his way to the door. They didn’t invite you back, his mother’s voice told him.

  He grinned into the cold night air. Who needs an invitation?

  APOLLO

  The Next Morning—January 13, 1918

  “WHERE WERE YOU last night?”

  Joey Rice jabbed Aubrey in the ribs. They shivered in line, waiting for the latrine.

  “You look like a dead body,” Joey said. “I heard you come in. What was it, midnight?”

  Aubrey rubbed his eyes. “S’matter, Rice? Did I disturb your beauty rest?”

  Joey poked Aubrey in the chest. “I had to lie to Lieutenant Europe and say you were at the infirmary last night at lights-out.”

  That got Aubrey’s attention. “He was looking for me?”

  “You’re lucky it wasn’t Captain Fish. I told him you’d got the runs.”

  “Gee, thanks.” He hopped on one foot. “Move it along there, fellas! I gotta go!”

  “Seriously,” Joey said, “where’d you go?”

  Aubrey hesitated, then gave in. “You’ve gotta keep it secret.” He spoke into Joey’s ear. “I met someone.”

  “Here?” Joey’s eyes grew wide. “She pretty?”

  Aubrey’s eyes rolled heavenward. “Oh man. You don’t even know.”

  Joey’s eyebrows rose. “Did you . . . ?”

  Aubrey shoved him in the shoulder. “Shut it, Rice,” he said. “It’s not like that.”

  “Well, don’t get sore at me. I’m only asking.” He rubbed his shoulder. “So, is she at the Y hut in Camp Lusitania? They’ve got some lookers. Strictly business, most of ’em.”

  Aubrey remembered Colette’s perfume. “Nah,” he said. “The girl I met is Belgian.”

  Joey’s mouth hung open.

  “You look like a codfish,” Aubrey told him. “Relax. That officer’s watching us funny.”

  Joey shut his mouth. After a minute, he whispered once more to Aubrey.

  “So you found yourself a Belgian hooker,” he said. “Did you go into town alone?”

  Aubrey dug two knuckles between a pair of Joey’s ribs.

  “Ow!”

  “Say that again,” Aubrey hissed, “and I’ll knock you over. I told you it wasn’t like that.”

  Joey elbowed Aubrey away. “Cut it out,” he said. “I’m the reason you’re not in the clink this morning. So I’d cool it if I were you.”

  Aubrey considered. He might need an ally again. He was definitely going back.

  “Well,” Joey said, “what’s she like? Besides pretty.”

  Aubrey sighed. “You should hear her sing,” he said. “In the States, she could be a star.”

  “What, they don’t have stars here in Europe?”

  Another soldier vacated the latrine.

  “Speaking of Europe,” he said, “What did Lieutenant Europe want with me last night?”

  Rice pretended to play his cornet. “Something about band practice tonight.”

  Aubrey clapped his hand on his forehead. “Tonight? Shoot!”

  “What’s the matter?”

  Aubrey shook his head. “I was gonna go see her tonight.”

  “Look,” Joey said. “Captain Fish doesn’t want us getting tangled up with girls, period.” He lowered his voice. “And if you mess with a white girl, there’ll be trouble.”

  Aubrey was in no mood for a lecture. He began to wish he hadn’t opened his mouth. “Forget it,” he told Joey. “I only just met her, all right? I didn’t propose.”

  Joey ignored him and went full throttle. “It was hard enough getting here. Don’t screw it up. Our job is to work hard, play great music, and smile big no matter what. You get tangled up with some nice white gal, not a hooker, I mean, and you’ll get yourself killed.” He lowered his voice. “I heard guys talking. About a regiment of marines. Lotta Southerners’ve been making threats.”

  Aubrey shook it off. “Relax, Rice,” he said. “You worry like my mom.” He clapped Joey on the shoulder. “You’ll see. I’ll be fine. Nothing bad’s gonna happen to Aubrey Edwards, King of Ragtime and Emperor of Jazz.”

  “Except I’m gonna knock that big head of yours off those skinny shoulders.”

  “I’d like to see you try.”

  “You’re the King of Stupid, is what you are.”

  “Then you’re my loyal subject. Who’re you calling skinny?”

  Finally they were next for the latrine. A soldier exited it, pinching his nose.

  “Lemme in,” Joey said. “I’m gonna explode.”

  “No way.” Aubrey darted ahead and beat him to it. “You said I had the runs. Wouldn’t be right to make you a liar.”

  APOLLO

  At Band Practice—January 13, 1918

  I FOLLOWED AUBREY to band practice that night to remind him of his goals. Here, I thought, Aphrodite wouldn’t have her claws in him. No offense, Goddess.

  “I said, listen up! You clarinets, shut your mouths and listen up!”

  Lieutenant Europe’s spectacled eyes glared at the 15th Army Band.

  Aubrey thought a crash of the cymbals would quiet everyone down, so he produced one. Drum Major Noble Sissle, the band’s baritone vocalist, flicked the back of Aubrey’s head.

  “Ow!”

  Half a minute of Europe’s evil eye finally shamed the rest of the band into silence.

  “All right, all right!” said Europe. “We’ve got a lot of work tonight. Two more performances this week. One at Hut Two, and one at the Camp Lusitania Y. We’re a huge hit, fellas, with all t
he troops. Officers, too! You’ve done great.”

  Europe allowed himself a smile as the band whooped and cheered.

  Aubrey rubbed the back of his head. Next time, he’d wear his helmet to rehearsal.

  “Not only that,” the band director went on, “but there’s talk of us being sent on the road, all around France. A goodwill tour to boost morale until the American army’s here in force.”

  Aubrey should’ve been excited. This was just the break I needed for him. More exposure! He once dreamed of playing around France. Now he had nothing but a pretty face on his mind.

  “It’s like I told you,” Europe said. “We’re saving lives, one rag at a time.”

  Yuk, yuk.

  “One trunk at a time,” said Alex Jackson, tuba. Murmurs rippled through the band.

  “Look, I know you’re sick of unloading trunks and boxes,” Lieutenant Europe said. “We came to France to fight, so we’ll fight. Colonel Hayward’s figuring it out. But we also came to play jazz. So let’s get to it. Sis, pass this new music around, will you? It’s labeled by instrument.”

  Noble Sissle took the pile of pages and began distributing them to the band.

  Lieutenant Europe consulted his notes. “Now, let’s see. Oh yes. You piccolos, you were dragging two nights ago on ‘Stars and Stripes Forever.’ What do I always say? Without you, it’s just a bunch of blatting horns. If you don’t get those trills on time, and on pitch, so help me God, I’ll take a flute and trill you over the tops of your heads, you hear me?”

  Muttering and elbowing among the woodwinds.

  The bandmaster returned to his notes. “Oh. Get this, boys: the army has taken over a luxury resort for American troops on leave,” he said. “Place called Aix-les-Bains. It’s got baths and a spa, mountains and a lake. Casinos, theaters, you name it. Quite the hot spot. J. P. Morgan and Queen Victoria used to vacation there. We’ll go at the end of our tour. We’re the opening act.”

  “Sending us there to relax?” asked Pinkhead Parker, saxophone.

  “To play music, not roulette,” Europe replied. “Maybe, in free time, you could, but . . .”

  “But what?” demanded Pinkhead.

  Europe paused. “We’re the entertainment,” he said. “The resort’s not for black soldiers.”

  Silence, that rare commodity, fell over the band.

  “Just like back in New York, playing for the swells,” said Pinkhead. “Use the servant’s entrance, and eat your soup in the kitchen.”

  Jim Europe sighed. “We’ll figure something out, all right?” The band was full of flat expressions. “It’s a big place. I’ll do what I can to make sure you fellas get some fun.”

  Drum Major Sissle handed Aubrey his music. He took it without much interest. Leave Saint-Nazaire? Go play Dixieland at some fancy resort?

  Come on, Aubrey. This kind of chance is the reason you enlisted. Seize it!

  But all he thought of was that girl. Not, at that moment, what a fine musician she was, nor how they could duo their way to fame. This was your dirty work, Goddess.

  “Edwards . . . Edwards!”

  Aubrey blinked. Lieutenant Europe had his fists on his hips and was glaring at him.

  “You with us today, or what, Private?”

  Aubrey stood up straight and held his drumsticks at the ready.

  “Perhaps you’d care to take a glance at your music, once in a while?”

  Any idiot could read a drumbeat if they understood rhythm. Aubrey was made of rhythm.

  “I see it, sir, Lieutenant, sir!”

  “Do you, now.”

  Snickers ran through the woodwinds.

  Aubrey looked around. Behind Lieutenant Europe, off to one side, stood Noble Sissle, all eyebrows and exclamation points, holding up a sheet of music and pointing hard at the top.

  “Reveille Blues,” it read. By A. Edwards. Orchestration by Jas. R. Europe.

  “Oh,” said Aubrey.

  You’re on your way, I told him. Barely twenty, and Jim Europe’s scoring and performing your music! The future’s yours! This is your moment. You’re at a fork in the road. One fork leads to certain heartache. The other, immortality. Choose your music!

  But all he could think of was what it would sound like if Colette sang along.

  Goddess, I tell you, you do not fight fair.

  ARES

  In the Trenches—January 9, 1918

  NOTHING IN THIS world had prepared James Alderidge for life in the trenches.

  The message came. Replacement troops needed in the trenches. Forming a new section. Get your packs ready, and wait to meet your commanding officer.

  They ate, mailed letters home in case they might be their last, said a prayer if they were that sort, and strapped on their seventy pounds of gear. Six new conscripts: James Alderidge, Billy Nutley, Mick Webber, Chad Browning. An Alph Gilchrist and a Vince Rowan. Two returning soldiers: Frank Mason, whom they knew, and Samuel Selkirk, whom they didn’t.

  An officer appeared. “Morning, lads,” he said. “I’m Sergeant McKendrick. This section is under my command. You’re the Third Section, First Platoon, D Company, Thirty-Ninth Division.”

  3rd, 1st, D, 39th. Stationed outside the town of Gouzeaucourt. James tried to file that where he could remember it.

  “Button that top button, soldier,” the sergeant told Billy. “Slovenly dress is punishable.”

  He worked his way down the line. “Who taught you to wrap your puttees like that, Private?” The cloth strips wrapped around Chad Browning’s chicken legs drooped. “We’re soldiers, not mummies, for God’s sake.”

  This emergency addressed, the sergeant ordered them to open their packs for inspection. They slung them off their backs and opened them. When satisfied, he led them on their march.

  They wove through artillery mounds, field kitchens, and wound clearing stations, past live horses and dead horses and trucks and motorcycles. From time to time, in a lazy sort of way, artillery shells sailed over from the German lines and exploded, sending up geysers of dirt.

  One landed close enough for them to feel its impact, and a few of the new men screamed.

  “That’s nothing,” the sergeant said. “Just a bump. Didn’t even knock you over.” He pointed. “See that black smoke? That’s a Jack Johnson. Like the American prizefighter, you know. Big black chappie. You’ll learn how to spot ’em from the noise they make.”

  Soon walls of earth rose around them. As a boy, James had visited grand old country estates, where for a penny you could wander through a garden maze of high hedges. He’d hated them, though they, at least, were made of flowering bushes, and country gardeners never shot trench mortars.

  This labyrinth wound on and on. The dark corridors turned at right angles every couple of yards, so you never knew if you were in step with the others unless you ran into them, or they collided with you. The narrow passageways couldn’t fit two people abreast, so they flattened against the wall to let stretcher-bearers pass by.

  “What’s the matter, soldier?” Sergeant McKendrick watched James stare at a groaning man on a stretcher with blood seeping through his shirt. “This is a quiet sector. You wait.”

  “Try not to look shocked,” Mason told him quietly. “It doesn’t help to look green here.”

  James lost all sense of direction. He tried to picture the diagrams he’d seen in training at Étaples. Zigzag front firing lines, then support lines, then reserve lines, all more or less parallel, with communication trenches running between them like filaments in a spider’s web. Behind the reserve trenches, a row of heavy guns, manned by artillery gunners. The little shoots that ran off the front firing line trenches into no-man’s-land to spy on Jerry were called saps. What did it matter what name you called it? A trench by any other name would smell as sweet, right?

  These smelled like rotting human flesh, urine, and fec
es. And cheap cigarettes.

  The path opened up to a right turn, revealing a wider trench. It felt less like a passageway and more like a chairless waiting room where grubby men stood in an endless queue to see a dentist. Some soldiers had stretched themselves out on their packs or on sandbags to sleep.

  Here Sergeant McKendrick addressed them. “Home sweet home, lads,” he said. “You’ll spend ten days here in reserve, then move up to the support lines. Ten days there, and you’ll move up to the Front. After that, if all goes well, you’ll get a few days’ rest.”

  Thirty days in the trenches. Could rest mean leave and seeing Hazel?

  “Of course,” added the sergeant, “if the Germans attack, the whole plan goes bugger up.” He looked around. “Well, lads, make yourselves at home. The old-timers here can fill you in. They’re Thirty-Ninth Division, just like you. Second Section. Now, take a load off your feet until lunchtime, and after that we’ll have gas mask training.” And he was gone.

  The other soldiers peeled themselves off the trench walls where they’d been leaning and came over to sniff out the new additions to the wolf pack.

  “Welcome home, me darlings,” said one, a lanky, wiry fellow. “What’d you bring me?”

  Billy, Chad, and Mick eyed one another. James looked at Frank Mason for some hint.

  Mason pulled a cigarette tin from his pocket. “Box open.” Billy, Chad, Mick, and James stared. Five or six experienced soldiers, standing by, wasted no time crowding in around Mason and grabbing at his Woodbines, with calls of “Thanks, mate” and “There’s a chum.”

  “Box shut.” Mason pocketed the tin. The soldiers who didn’t get any weren’t bitter.

  Chad whispered in James’s ear. “Nobody told us we were supposed to bring a bribe.”

  “I’m Frank Mason,” Frank told the 2nd Section lads. “What’s it like up there?”

  “Pretty quiet,” said a stocky, broad-faced soldier. “Benji Packer. We don’t hear much from Fritz except at stand-down and stand-to, and even then, his heart’s not in it.”

  James was puzzled. “But then, what’ve we been hearing all day?”