At Some Disputed Barricade wwi-4

by Anne Perry

  Somewhere a clock chimed and then struck eleven.

  “You wish me to intervene on Corracher’s behalf. I assume you believe him innocent? Although perhaps that is not the major issue. You are right, a scandal would damage morale when we are too vulnerable to bear it easily. Thank you for bringing it to my attention, Reavley. I shall do what I can. Your argument is persuasive.” He smiled and rose to his feet, holding out his strong, narrow hand with its long fingers.

  Matthew took it, still not certain what he had learned. “Thank you, sir.”

  They stood for a moment, neither moving. Then Sandwell let go and turned to the door. Was his smile a shade less certain? Or was it only a change in the light and Matthew’s imagination?

  Matthew was a little late the next morning and was still eating a slice of toast when the telephone rang. He picked it up to hear Shearing’s voice. It sounded tense and very formal, as if he might have been aware of being overheard.

  “Morning, Reavley. Will you go to Wheatcroft’s house, please. Immediately. Take full identification with you.”

  Matthew drew in his breath to ask why, and then let it out again. “Yes, sir.”

  He took his car this time. A taxi would have had to fight traffic just the same, and he knew London almost as well as any cab driver. It took him half an hour, even though he had to break the speed limit in several places and cut a dozen red lights too fine.

  He was met at Wheatcroft’s door by an elderly policeman who was well past the age at which he would usually retire. He looked distressed, which was sufficient to warn Matthew that whatever had happened was very grave.

  “Yes, sir?” the sergeant said stiffly.

  “Captain Reavley, Intelligence Service,” Matthew identified himself.

  “Yes, sir. Sergeant Roberts. I was expecting you. Mr. Wheatcroft’s in the bedroom, sir. But there’s no question how it happened.”

  “How…?” Matthew began.

  “Suicide, Captain.” Roberts swallowed. “There’s a letter. Wife said it’s his handwriting, and we compared it with other papers we know were his. There’s no doubt.”

  Matthew felt a wave of guilt rise up and choke him, tightening his chest till he could hardly breathe. He was gasping, his lungs struggling for air.

  “You all right, sir?” Roberts’s voice came from a distance.

  “Yes, thank you. What did the note say?”

  “That he was innocent, but he couldn’t face the shame of the prosecution. That he’d been haunted over a piece of foolishness, his career was finished and there was no use or happiness left for him. For his family’s sake he wasn’t going to begin on a downward path which had no end.”

  Matthew cleared his throat awkwardly. “Those words?”

  “Yes, sir. The note’s up there beside him. Room’s locked. Doctor’s with the wife. Very strong woman, taking it with great courage, no hysterics, but looks like she should be buried alongside him, right enough, poor thing.”

  “Thank you.” Matthew held out his hand for the key, then turned and walked up the stairs, leaving the sergeant at the bottom. He knew where the bedroom was. It seemed only hours since he had been there.

  He opened the door, fumbling for a moment before he could turn the lock, then went in and closed it behind him. The curtains were drawn to a twilight gloom, but rather than pull them back he switched on the electric light.

  Wheatcroft was lying on top of the bed. He had either not undressed last night or he had risen and dressed this morning. He had apparently shaved also. Matthew touched the bloodless face. It was cool. Had he died hours ago? He looked ravaged now, wasted as if by disease, his flesh sunken.

  Was it despair that had driven him to this? And how would it reflect on Corracher? Was that another blow waiting to fall? This certainly would not stop the prosecution.

  He picked up the note. It was quite long, and not addressed to anyone in particular—not even to his wife, as might have been expected. It mentioned his work and how he had believed in it, and that his successor, Marlowe, lacked the connections in Hungary to carry it through.

  After that, it was pretty much as Roberts had said. He proclaimed his innocence and said he could not face the humiliation and would not publicly fight a battle he could not win, but significantly, he did not blame Corracher.

  Matthew folded the note and put it in his pocket. He searched the papers, letters, notes of meetings, diaries, but there was nothing else there to help or hurt Corracher’s cause.

  Finally he left to go back and report to Shearing. He felt miserable, guilt-dogged, and yet confused as to what he could or should have done differently. Perhaps Wheatcroft was guilty after all, and the whole thing was a catalogue of small errors and profound tragedies, and the Peacemaker had simply seized the opportunity to use his weakness and destroy Corracher with it.

  Was this suicide now a result of Wheatcroft’s guilt over accusing Corracher? He had not openly admitted the lie; perhaps that was too much to ask, for his family’s sake. But the prosecution against Corracher would have to be dropped.

  Another victim of the Peacemaker, intentionally or not.

  Had Matthew’s conversation with him provoked the guilt? Or had it been brought about subtly, ruthlessly, by Sandwell, after Matthew’s discussion with him last night? Probably he would never know.

  CHAPTER

  SIX

  B y now Joseph had concluded his fruitless questioning about Northrup’s death. He had gone through the motions so that Hook could tell General Northrup honestly that they had done everything they could to ascertain the truth of his son’s death. But if anyone had known it and was willing to speak, they must have been among the casualties, which increased by the thousands every day.

  After seventy-two hours Joseph went to see Hook in his dugout. It was yet another gray morning, with a weeping pall of cloud across the sky. The rain seemed to have soaked into everything. There was no dry ground, no food or equipment untouched. Everything dripped and was clammy to the touch. Bread was moldy before it arrived at the forward trenches, battle tunics never dried out, socks and boots were permanently sodden. Men’s hair was plastered to their heads, and their pale skins shiny wet, streaked with mud and blood.

  Joseph slipped on the step and jarred himself against the wooden lintel on the way down to the dugout. Hook looked up as he heard him and called out to come in.

  “Morning, Reavley,” he said a little huskily. His face was colorless and lined with exhaustion.

  Joseph let the sacking fall back over the entrance and stood to attention.

  “Morning, sir.” He gave the casualty figures as he knew them, and mentioned the names of those men he was aware Hook had known personally. Then he moved on to close the issue of Northrup’s death. “I’ve made all the inquiries I can, sir. If it was the sort of thing we feared, no one is saying anything. Of course it shouldn’t have happened, but in the face of the circumstances, I strongly recommend that we close the issue. There seems to me to be two possible answers: either the whole thing is no more than loose talk by men angry and demoralized, speaking out of turn. This could be the best answer for all of us, especially Major Northrup himself. Or there was a piece of very regrettable indiscipline, but those concerned are themselves dead now. We can’t now determine what it was, and in respect to Major Northrup, who can’t defend himself, we should mention it no further.”

  Hook regarded him with a bitter humor in his eyes. “You did actually ask?”

  “Yes, sir.” That was the truth, although he had neither expected nor wanted an answer.

  “Thank you, Reavley. I’ll inform General Northrup. I don’t imagine he’ll be pleased, but he’ll have to accept it.”

  But Northrup did not accept it. He sent for Joseph personally and demanded a more detailed explanation, and there was nothing Hook could do to protect him from it. It was in Hook’s dugout again, in the early afternoon. Joseph had spent almost twenty hours helping wounded and dying, endlessly carrying stretchers. He
had struggled through the mud and round the awkward corners of the few trenches that were still negotiable in the ever-deepening water. He had watched young men he knew and cared for die in indescribable pain.

  He had managed to snatch a couple of hours’ sleep, his body bruised, wet to the skin and shivering. Now he fumbled to straighten his clothes, splash his face with moderately clean water, and report back to Hook again. There was no time to shave, none even to try to light a flame and heat water for a cup of tea.

  Outside, the earth smelled of death. The light was gray and the air close and warm.

  Inside the dugout one oil lamp was burning, the light red and green on the backs of a pile of books. He saw General Northrup immediately. He looked thin, a little stooped; his face was tight with anger.

  Joseph drew himself to attention, pulling his shoulders back with an effort. The muscles in his body shot through with pain and he could not fill his lungs with air.

  Hook’s voice was rough-edged. “I gave your report to General Northrup, Captain. However, he has made certain inquiries himself and he is not satisfied that we have exhausted all possibilities.”

  “I know of no others, sir,” Joseph said doggedly. He knew that Hook was prepared to back him, and the men.

  Northrup did not wait for Hook to reply but cut across him looking straight at Joseph. There was both pain and contempt in his voice. “I can understand your desire to shield your men, Chaplain. I even have some sympathy with your reluctance to believe any of them capable of such a crime. But if we have any right to claim that we fight for civilized values, a way of life acceptable to man and God, then we do not look away from the truth because it is not what we wish it to be or find comfortable to deal with.”

  Joseph was speechless with fury. The word comfortable was a blasphemy in this blood-soaked gateway of hell. He croaked the word, almost unintelligibly, like an animal sound in the back of his throat.

  Hook heard the warning in it, the self-control fraying and coming apart. He intervened. “Chaplain, General Northrup has been speaking to the men also, and he believes that Corporal Fuller may have been involved and knows what happened. He insists that we ask him, under pressure if necessary.”

  “Punch Fuller?” Joseph was startled. “I haven’t seen him for days. He must be…” he blinked, trying to hold back his emotion. “Among the dead.” He had liked Punch with his pleasantly ugly face and his inexhaustible memory for the words of every song, orthodox and otherwise.

  A nerve twitched in Northrup’s cheek. “He is not dead, Chaplain! Not even wounded. Corporal Fuller is on leave in Paris, and no doubt enjoying himself. If we fight for anything, it must be for honor. If we have lost that, then there is nothing else left worth winning—or losing.” His voice thickened. “I will not bury my son the victim of a cowardly murder and keep silent about it. I do not know if you would—that is not my concern—but if you would, then I pity you, and those who love or trust you I pity even more. What use are you to your men, sir, if you have neither the courage nor the strength to uphold the truth or the honor of the God you chose to serve?”

  “General…” Hook began to protest, leaning forward a little, his skin yellow now in the lamplight.

  Joseph could not allow Hook to fight in a defense he was not prepared to make for himself. “General Northrup.” He turned to face him. “If Corporal Fuller knows something of Major Northrup’s death, then with Colonel Hook’s permission, I will go to Paris, find him, and learn what it is. Supposing you believe that is of more service to my men than remaining here to help them.” He stared at Northrup’s tired, wounded eyes without wavering.

  Northrup blinked.

  It was Hook who answered. “I think you had better try, Reavley. You could get a little sleep on the train, some dry clothes, maybe hot food. Give it a couple of days anyway.”

  “Yes, sir. Immediately?”

  “Might as well,” Hook replied. “If Fuller comes back and you miss him, you might not get another chance.” He gave Northrup a sidelong glance, but Northrup was impervious. He could see only justice; the near certainty of death in battle seemed not to touch him.

  “Yes, sir.” Joseph saluted and left.

  He was tired enough to sleep most of the journey from Ypres to Paris, jammed into a seat between other soldiers going on leave, a few staff officers, and several silent and uncomfortable civilians in cars rattling and jolting over the tracks. He was barely aware of them. Exhaustion lent him a few hours of oblivion, and when he finally disembarked at the station and pulled his thoughts together it was to consider at which of the many places the men on leave stayed in Paris he should begin to look for Punch Fuller.

  He had heard many of the men joke about the music halls that were still open, the nightclubs, the cafés, and the brothels.

  He stood on the platform outside the railway station looking at the street, hearing the clip of horses’ hooves and the hiss of tires on the wet cobbles, the blare of motor horns and someone singing loudly and offkey, miserably drunk. A boy with a cap too large for him was selling newspapers, black headlines counting more losses at Passchendaele, Verdun, the Somme, and right along the front. A group of sailors swung by, with trouser legs flapping around their ankles. An ambulance passed, driven by a woman.

  Joseph felt an overwhelming sense of being lost, even though he had been to Paris many times, both before the war and then on leave. He had spoken French passably since school. It was not that he did not care about France, or appreciate the country’s wit, history, and culture; he just ached for the familiar, the idioms of his own people. He longed for things he did not need to think about, places his feet would find unguided. He was too tired to begin a search for one man in all this weary, grieving city that had lived the last three years with the enemy on its doorstep, trying to keep a brave face while smiling at disaster, pretending it wouldn’t really happen. God knew how many of its sons would never return. Did they hear the guns in their sleep?

  It would be dusk soon. He must find a billet of some kind for the night, maybe three nights. He did not really want to find Punch Fuller, but he had to try. Damn Major Northrup for his stupidity, a father too blind to let his son lie buried in peace.

  He found a room; it was small and expensive, but quite clean. The landlady made him an omelette with herbs and charged for it extortionately. But it was the best meal he had eaten since the early spring and he told her so with gratitude. There was no tea, and the coffee was bitter, but at least it was served in a cup, not a Dixie can, and there was no taste of oil to it.

  He slept late, vaguely discomforted by the physical ease of a bed, and the silence compared with the guns he was used to. It should have wrapped him round in peace, but it didn’t.

  He went out again, asking first at the half dozen or so small hotels he knew the men used when in Paris. He kept his chaplain’s collar showing to allay suspicion that his search had any ill intent, but it didn’t help. He spoke of Punch Fuller by name, and described him fairly closely: his long nose and sharp chin, his slightly rolling walk, his ready wit. They all stared at him with blank faces, many openly hostile.

  Then he tried the cafés, bars, and other drinking places—all without success. By near midnight again he was nursing a glass of rough red wine in a nightclub in the cellar of one of the older hotels. There were several other British soldiers there. They seemed determined to stay awake for every precious hour of leave, savor it to the last breath of smoky, wine-filled atmosphere, hear every aching note of the music from the three-piece band. A middle-aged woman with a thin body sang in a languorous voice filled with heartbreak.

  Suddenly Joseph could no longer keep from his mind the awareness of how everything had changed since he was last here on leave himself, too short a time to go home. It was only three months ago, but now it was all just a little shabbier; a few more chairs were broken and not mended, and the tables more deeply scarred. Windows were cracked, lamps missing pieces of colored glass. It was this room he could see
as he sat, but in his mind it was everywhere. Coffee was thin and bitter. Women’s faces were bleak, numbed with loss. Clothes were patched and repaired, the few shreds of style left a little more desperate. Outside there was uncollected rubbish blowing in the gutters, and windows were boarded up where there was no glass to mend them.

  The comradeship was still there, the anger and the pain, and a shred of the old ironic wit. But the shell was thin, and too near to breaking.

  Joseph sipped his wine again and watched the group of Tommies at the bar. None of them looked more than twenty, several far younger, maybe sixteen or seventeen. They were laughing too loudly. They thought they were pretending to be brave, knowing that tomorrow or the next day they were going back to be killed. Joseph knew the courage was real—but behind the stupid jokes, white faces were slicked with the sweat of uncertainty and fear. Finally, Joseph realized, each man was desperately alone.

  The three-piece band started a Cole Porter song. Porter himself was somewhere here in Paris, so Joseph had heard, but he would be in a better place than this, more sophisticated.

  He should start looking for Punch Fuller again. He had to tell General Northrup that he had tried. Stupid man. The truth would hurt everyone, himself most of all.

  And yet Joseph knew that some Englishman had shot Major Northrup on purpose, to save him from bringing on them even more destruction, and more of his friends sacrificed for nothing. Did duty require you to die pointlessly? If Punch were to ask him that, what would he say?

  He had no idea. Too many of the old certainties were gone. Once he would have known exactly what to say to Morel about honor and leadership. Now he understood Morel’s belief that his duty was toward the men whose lives were in his charge, to save them from incompetents who would take their loyalty and sacrifice it hideously and for nothing, unaware even of what they were asking.

  He had tried again to argue with Morel. He could hear the words in his mind—“You can’t lead them to mutiny! Think what it means. They’ll be shot.”