The Single Solider: a moving war-time drama

by George Costigan

  “Tell me.”

  Her soul lifted into the thin waters of hysteria and she gripped her glass to steady herself. In the quiet she turned from Arbel to Jerome.

  “You tell me.” Her face, fierce. Silence. “Pair of cowards.”

  Jerome sat up, stung, moving past Sara’s warning arm.

  “It’s a Reléve. A call. For volunteers. To work in German factories. Why haven’t you told her this?”

  “Because...”

  “You’ll go?” Jerome exploded. Heads lifted.

  “Yes.”

  Silence. A sudden tablecloth of it.

  “Your duty?” Simone said quietly.

  “Yes.”

  “To who?” Jerome leaned forward.

  “France.” Arbel met Jerome evenly. Challenge in his eyes, too.

  “Ardelle is France, too.” said Sara.

  “Not to him,” Ardelle shook her head hard so as not to cry here. Now.

  “Arbel,” Jerome ransacked his brain, “if we three went, they would, they say, return one French Prisoner Of War. Right? A Frenchman. Captured and imprisoned by The Germans, for fighting them. And now, should we three go and help a nation that invaded and killed and imprisoned our people? Help them? Willingly? Arbel?”

  “I’m a peasant Jerome. I raise cattle. I am cattle. I answer the biggest stick. The Government’s.”

  “Over the top. Cannon fodder.”

  “If that’s what I am.”

  “It’s voluntary,” Jerome said to Ardelle, and sat back. “Now.”

  “I’ll go.” Arbel said.

  Ardelle looked at him, stood and walked home alone.

  Arbel finished his cigarette, crushed it under his foot and walked home a hundred metres behind her, his conscience neither consolation nor company.

  “Husband.” Sara punched at him.

  “Wife.”

  “Take that smirk off your face please, I want to slap you.”

  “Jacques?” Jerome faced his fear.

  “Yes?” Jacques faced his. “You’ve thought...?”

  “It’s not possible Jerome.”

  Jerome’s face fell as his anger rose. “Afraid?”

  “No.”

  “Sure?”

  “Quite.”

  The four of them drifted. Apart.

  “They say,” Jerome drained his glass, his throat scorched, “single women’ll be called, too.” Jacques’ dilating eyes saddened him. He ignored it. “But you could solve that problem, Simone.”

  Jacques blushed and Simone sat forward.

  “I won’t be any part of your bright shining future Jerome, since it has no regard for the feelings of friends.”

  “Only a joke. Christ!”

  She stood. “At whose expense?”

  “Oh mine! Mine. Forgive me. Please.”

  “Forgive yourself.”

  His mouth dropped a little. “For what?”

  “Exactly. For what?”

  They walked where they had held hands. A metre apart.

  “What did he want? Jerome?”

  “The barn. Hide guns. For the Resistance.”

  “Why did you say no?”

  “The children...”

  “Couldn’t we do both?”

  His mouth drooped. “I never thought of that.”

  “What’s the difference? Two dangers?”

  “I never thought of that.”

  He stopped. She stopped.

  “I’ll go back,” he said.

  “I’ll go back. I’ll tell him.”

  “All right.”

  He turned for home, turned back and asked. “We won’t marry, will we?”

  “No, Jacques, we won’t.”

  “No.”

  He walked home and Simone strode back.

  “Lunch? Mamman.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Talking. To Lacaze.”

  “Oh, God.”

  Jacques scoured the room for simple conversation.

  “Lunch?”

  “Nothing. Water.”

  He made a soup.

  Simone found Jerome drinking. Sara had gone. Duthileul Pére grudged his head a millimetre as their eyes met. It was the first time they had. She sat next to Jerome, their backs to him.

  “You can have the barn.”

  “Eh?”

  “You heard.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you can pay.”

  “What?”

  “I need money. You can have the barn if I can have money.” Jerome’s brain struggled to clear, to sober. It needed another drink. He waved a hand and Janon came out.

  “Drink?”

  “Coffee.” Simone nodded.

  “Another,” he gave the old one his glass. Janon lumbered away.

  “I have no money.”

  “What?”

  “My mother has money. I don’t. Not since I wed ‘the slut’. And she had said no money unless I married her. A liar, my mother. Dishonourable.”

  “Oh.”

  “That’s why I need the barn.”

  “It’s all you have to offer?”

  “And my life.”

  “Yes. But no money.”

  “No.”

  The drinks came.

  “Why do you want money?” he asked.

  “A good cause.”

  They sat there. At dinner-tables starved imaginations would serve up this morsel to chew on. Her and Lacaze...

  “He’s got money. Shit-head. Behind us.”

  “And what would he want me to do to get it?”

  Jerome enjoyed the stench in his imagination for a second.

  “Nothing! If he masturbates he comes in centimes. Can I still have the barn?”

  Simone thought.

  “Can I speak to your mother?”

  Jerome leaned forward.

  “If I get half of anything you get out of her.”

  “I can speak to her?”

  “Go ahead. My mother’s weakness is her Christianity. It’s pious. My mistake has been to not play along with her charade. That’s the key-hole.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Quasimodo.”

  When the broth was simmering he remembered the water. “I forgot. Sorry.”

  The mother nodded, left the glass. He looked again for conversation, didn’t find it and went back to the food which was ready when Simone came in. He took a tray in to his mother.

  “I’m not hungry. I said.”

  Jacques closed the door. Put the tray down. “This is not right.”

  “Not feeling hungry?”

  He took a breath. “Starving yourself.”

  “God’s will.”

  “No, it isn’t. It’s yours.”

  She barely shrugged. He came and stood by the bed.

  “Suicide is a mortal sin.”

  She looked away. He sat on the bed.

  “It’s not forgiven, mamman. It’s not forgiven.”

  With horror he saw she was passing beyond religion’s blackmail.

  “Was it God’s will Father died?” he asked.

  “It must have been.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  She looked at him. “No.”

  “I have a future, mamman.”

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “No.”

  “And neither do you.”

  “No.” She nodded. “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t you want to see it? Share it?”

  “I’m tired.”

  “You’re frightened. And iffing.”

  “I’m tired, Jacques. I’m sorry.”

  “But –won’t you stay long enough not to frighten her away?”

  A quiet followed as mother and son looked sad and selfish at their lives.

  “Oh, mother I ...”

  She looked at him again. “You’re a good son.”

  “Oh mother.”

  Their lives clouded.

  The mother ate less, ro
se less, did less and talked less and Jacques was helpless.

  This woman is dying because I’ve come. So, am I to take this woman’s place? Why? Because the woman imagines something ordained in me? Because, like him, she thinks I’m some form of miracle? Because, even if it was so, and it isn’t, why wouldn’t the woman stay for the son’s pleasure? Because she meant only to entrap? To shed her responsibility and not stay to see any failure? She went to speak her mind.

  “This weight is too heavy,” she told the mother. “You may do as you wish, you must, but not because of me. Either you eat or I must leave today.”

  “Then I’ll eat.”

  “Thank you.”

  Simone needed more time before she dared Madame Lacaze. She borrowed Arbel’s bike and rode to Souceyrac to give the Curé the news. He blessed her and Jacques and asked about money. She shrugged. He understood. All she could do now was wait. For the first child. He wouldn’t tell her more. Ignorance was a profound form of safety.

  Jerome’s guns arrived.

  Jacques levered up six huge cubes of his barn floor, dug out beneath, buried four cloth-covered weapons, replaced the stone, earthed in the cracks, shook hands once with the silent man, Roger the Basque, and resolved to forget about them. This was insane. No one could get those weapons in a hurry. No-one but him and the silent man could even find them in a hurry. He wondered if people weren’t making this war up as they went along.

  Rommel began his attack on Montgomery’s Eighth Army. Five days later he was back where he started. Montgomery waited.

  Curé Phillipe shook hands outside Mass, leaned weakly towards her and she heard, “Tuesday.”

  I’ll see one of these children and then I can ask Madame Lacaze.

  At the Tabac the villagers drank in silence. The Reléve was now news not rumour and some of the old ones looked at them with pity. Some. When Valet raised a glass and winked Jacques felt an entirely new impulse, the desire to maim. He and Simone walked home, the beauty of autumn irrelevant.

  “Tuesday. The first child.”

  “My God. How long for?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Will someone come for them?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Are we supposed to take them?”

  “Jacques –I don’t know.”

  She turned to him. “Are you afraid?”

  “Er –yes. You?”

  “No.”

  “O.K. Then me neither.”

  Montgomery talked and talked to his troops, day and night, waiting till he was sure they had all heard his voice, till he was sure they knew he believed they were invincible.

  On Tuesday night they sat and he smoked and she read and they fed a tiny fire and waited. Drank coffee but still her eyelids fell and the book sagged and dripped in her hand and he reached across and silently took it and leaned back to watch. He wanted her so asleep he could lift her. She slumped right forward; jerked, shocked upright, smiled unseeing at him and he took one hand and lifted her to her feet.

  “What? Wait. What?”

  “You’re asleep.”

  “Is he here?”

  “No. Bed.”

  “Wait. We must wait, Jacques.”

  “I’ll wait. You sleep.”

  “O. Sure?”

  They weaved across the room, her weight sliding into his chest, and he opened the door. His bed.

  “Bed, Simone.”

  “Wait.”

  “I’ll wait.”

  She looked at him. “Good.”

  He closed the door. He heard the brief bed sounds and waited. He heard nothing, then a fly, then her breathing, long and deep. It was almost cold.

  He went back to the fire and smoked.

  The cat washed and bit at her spine. Now she suddenly looked up, eyes dilating, body lowering. A house-cricket fell. She missed it with her paw, leapt after it, the dog following. She cuffed the dog away and bit at it again. She had a mouthful, a wing, and spat it out. It lay motionless between her and the dog and she spat twice and padded away. The dog trapped it against a wall and ate it. The cat washed itself.

  His cigarette finished. Black outside, surrounding a three-quarter moon yellower than his cheese. Sleep, no-one coming now. A moth circled his candle all the way upstairs. He lay and watched it, then put the flame out before it killed itself.

  No-one came the next day.

  Evening found them by the fire again.

  “She’s dying.” He thought aloud.

  “Yes.”

  ‘And will you stay?’ he thought silent. ‘Will you stay?’

  There was a knock at the door.

  The dog barked itself awake, angry and ashamed and he shushed it.

  They looked at each other and he went to the door.

  The latch stuck, his hand not steady. Now it was.

  And there stood Herrisson.

  “Vermande. Salut.”

  “Salut.” Jacques’ mouth dried.

  “Mademoiselle.”

  “Monsieur.”

  Simone throbbed. Jacques’ face whitened.

  “Come in.”

  Herrisson took his Gendarme’s hat off and stepped in.

  “Storm coming.”

  “You think so?” Jacques blurted.

  Herrisson looked at him, surprised. “Don’t you?”

  He put his hat on the table and stretched his shoulders.

  Jacques closed the door. One glance at Simone – if they should come now.

  “Reading?”

  “Mm.”

  Simone stood in the fireplace, Herrisson by the table, Jacques at the door.

  He knows. He knows.

  Jacques walked a kilometre to the fire. Stood there eyes fixed on the metal buttons.

  No. It’s the eggs. He knows.

  No! The Mairie. It’s the Mairie.

  Herrisson sat, flattened a big paw on the table.

  “I might have to move.”

  “Eh?”

  “Toulouse. Posting.”

  He looked at Jacques.

  “I hate Toulouse.”

  “Oh.”

  “Been there?”

  “Me! No.”

  He knows.

  “Hell’s kitchen. But Duty calls, eh?”

  Duty. It’s his duty to arrest me. Oh, Mother of God – it’s the Guns! I’ll be deported. Put in a camp as a Maquisard.

  “Maybe not. Hope not.”

  Jacques’ mind failed him. He looked at Simone. Since she came I’ve robbed my own Mairie, hidden guns, listened to illegal radio – De Gaulle! – he knows about that, too – Feyt – and now I’m waiting for a Jew. Me. Vermande. Which crime has he come about? All of them? I’ll be shot.

  “A drink?” Simone asked.

  “Please. Wine.” He unbuttoned his great-coat. He leaned back in the chair and looked at Simone and Jacques, side by side in the fireplace.

  “No-one likes me. Why? Because everyone thinks I know something; no-one believes I know nothing, so they all stand like you two, frozen with fear. What have you two done? Eh?”

  He laughed, a pistol crack, and they both jerked in shock.

  “Look at you. Guilt all over you. That’s all I ever see. I’m sick to death of it.”

  Simone poured a glass for him.

  “Thank you.” He downed it. “Shit! Jauliac’s? You know he taps it from his toilet. Wait.”

  He went outside.

  They stood, looking at the empty doorway and listening to his footsteps go around the barn.

  “What does he know?” Jacques whispered, “Which?”

  “I don’t know. The guns?”

  “Or the radio. Feyt.”

  “Course. Oh, yes. I meant the child.”

  “Which is worse?”

  “Are you thinking of bargaining?”

  “I can’t think. I’m frozen. Or the Mairie...”

  “What Mairie?”

  “Oh nothing, nothing. What do we do?”

  “Pray they don’t come now.”
/>
  “Why has he come?”

  “I don’t know Jacques! Stop asking me stupid questions.”

  Her fear shocked him, his ears reddened. Herrisson clattered up the stone steps.

  “Voilà!” A bottle of red, labelled, and the label lined with gold. “Corkscrew?”

  They looked at each other. He was drinking good wine with them. Was this Iscariot kissing Christ? Their last supper together. Had he a macabre streak?

  “Yes,” Simone passed the corkscrew.

  “Where was I? Yes, you two, a perfect example of my view of humanity. It says – you’re saying now – ‘You could possibly be a half-way decent human being, but please, fuck off.’ All day, every day.”

  He pulled the cork and Simone, half hypnotised, washed glasses.

  “And so why did I ever want to be a Policeman? Forgotten. I looked it up the other day in a dictionary. ‘An organised force of civil officers to preserve order!’ My life’s a very bad joke. There’s no organization, no force, no officers, no civility. Order to preserve, oh yes indeed, sir. But, when that order is broken, what can I do?”

  There was a silence. Simone and Jacques wondered whether they should respond, and if they could.

  “Chibret.” He hadn’t seemed to notice their reticence. “When the Mairie was broken into, he expected me to find someone. Why? Because I’ve got the cap. I’m the flic. But all a policeman sees that a Mayor can’t is people looking guilty. It’s not good for the soul, believe me. Here.”

  He poured them a glass each.

  “The summer of ‘36. Peace, glorious weather, just married, posted here – taste it – its reality.”

  Jacques stopped breathing the first time Herrisson said the word “Mairie” and now he had to consciously inhale to gather the strength needed to reach the glass and then hold it.

  Herrisson toasted.

  “To reality. Six fucking years ago –pardon me.”

  “To Peace.” said Simone.

  “Yes,” managed Jacques, and they drank.

  The grape took them through taste into after-taste and then warmth, reaching from the vines’ roots to theirs.

  “Ahh. Eh? Softly now. It won’t last. 1936 didn’t. Make it last.” What does he want?

  Simone’s fear shifted enough to see this man was drunk. Drunk because he had to arrest her and Jacques?

  “Can’t have children.”

  Jacques’ glass froze half-way to his mouth. What? Can’t have children? Jewish children?

  “Chayriguet says I’m firing blanks.”