The Single Solider: a moving war-time drama

by George Costigan

“What are you going to do?”

  “Anything else?”

  “We – people are worried.”

  “No, they’re not. They’re not worried. Not about me.” He stopped working. “You once said, when mother died, ‘Whatever you want – ask.’ Remember?”

  Chibret didn’t, but said, “Yes.”

  “I want to be left in peace. Thank you.”

  And he went back to work and Chibret drove back and everyone said he was a fool and they should get a new Mayor.

  With his roof covered, the bache attached and secure, Jacques was rewarded with a crystal-clear evening. He loaded the cart with the remaining four posts, beech cuttings to split, his chisels, plane, hammer, spades, bolts, the biggest ladder, the block and tackle and the other tarpaulin bache and food; yoked the cow and walked into the village. As he approached the square he put the blinkers on. Everyone stared. He couldn’t see them. He took the Maurs road. Took the blinkers off. Sara was not in her frozen field.

  At Janatou, in near-freezing moonlight, he picked his spot by the edge of the pine wood, offering the only shelter. There he dug four more holes, lined them with beech, constructed the block and tackle and through the night and dawn and morning built a house-sized frame, covered it with the bache and secured it. No-one watched, no-one knew. He walked back early the next afternoon.

  Jean Louis Duthileul, reading war-news in the snug of his Café corner saw him walk, blinkered and bearded, past. And considered the direction from which he had come. Folded his paper, drove to the letter-boxes, walked the dirt track, pushed aside the last branch and saw the bache, framed, and ready to take the house he thought he’d bought.

  Jerome came with Zoe.

  “Madman!”

  “I’m not mad.”

  “Digging up graves? Blinkers in the village? This—”

  “Are you in a position to judge sanity?”

  “Certainly not. Why have you sold the house to Duthileul?”

  “I haven’t.”

  “Eh?”

  Jacques bent down to Zoe.

  “Zoe, is Pappa a bit slow?” he asked her. “A bit dim? Bad luck.” He turned to Jerome. “I sold the land to Duthileul.”

  Jerome’s mouth dropped in respect.

  “Be a friend and tell everyone.”

  19

  St. cirgues was thrilled. Duthileul has been bested. The grave-turner with the blinkers and the bache wasn’t mad. He’d bested Jean-Louis. At Church they would wait gleefully for him to drive up so they could nod their heartfelt sympathy. And if he didn’t come it would prove it true, and they would hug the news tight as they knelt to pray. Such a nugget. Such a Christmas present.

  Sara and her mother were knitting and darning when Jerome came in the back door.

  “What do we give our daughter for Christmas?” He was drunk. Sara looked at her husband. Put down her work. Sara’s mother excused herself.

  “You speak to me…” She couldn’t finish her thought for the taste of her anger.

  “You treat me–”

  Sara took a breath to calm herself.

  “You speak to me – and you think of me – like you have no need to consider my emotions. You think like your Mother. You’re better than me. Us. And yet you’re guilty enough to try and drown your emotions. If you said ‘sorry’ and meant it, we could get on with being friends. And parents.”

  Behind the kitchen door Sara’s mother flushed with pride. “You were always smarter than me,” she heard him say.

  “How much is that saying?” the mother thought as her daughter said it.

  Silence fell.

  “Got this one wrong, too, then.”

  “Drunken remorse is less than nothing, Jerome. I’ve already got a child to care for.”

  He shifted in his chair, one leg wrapped hard over the other and his hands white, clenched. His knuckles purpled a little. His brain scraped for truth.

  “I’m trying to learn how to live.”

  “Apologise to me Jerome.”

  He looked hard at his fists. “I can’t. Yet.” He left.

  He began. Taking off his grandfather’s tiles. Claw back the ancient pins gently, pile the tiles till he’d an armful, down the ladder, stack them. Back up the ladder, another armful. His back began to ache. A slab of sunlight warmed the bache. Work.

  By hunger-time he’d taken off an eighth of one side of his roof, leaving the struts bare. A wind lifted the edge of the bache, but it held secure, and the breeze would chill the house all through. Good.

  He stacked the cart with the day’s tiles and sat on the house steps with his round-headed hammer and beat bent pins back into shape, bagged them and put them on the cart. A day’s work. Tomorrow, work till I’ve filled the cart, then take them.

  The dog slept by the fire. A candle on the table. Two peasants in a stone house. Drinking soup.

  Late December 1944.

  “Jacques? What’s the bache for?”

  “To protect the floor.”

  He nodded with his eyes to the ceiling.

  Ardelle looked blank.

  “When it rains,” he added patiently.

  Ardelle shook her head to indicate incomprehension.

  “I’m taking the roof off. First.”

  Ardelle’s brain stopped trying to understand.

  “I’m moving. The house.”

  Her eyes dilated. “To Janatou...”

  He’s mad.

  “To wait.”

  She dared herself to ask. “For – them?”

  His face glowed. “Yes.”

  She saw his tears form as he mistook her shock for understanding. Agreement, even. I don’t know what to say, thought Ardelle. I don’t even know what to think.

  The room fell silent.

  “Jerome’s gone back to his mother,” Jacques said.

  “Sara told me. He’s mad, too.”

  Jacques thought. “As mad as who else?”

  “Haven’t you noticed? All of us.”

  She looked at him. “No. You haven’t.”

  They finished the soup.

  Jacques rolled a cigarette and looked at her.

  “Jerome said you were dreading Arbel coming home...”

  She didn’t reply, didn’t deny.

  Her square stolid face.

  “What are you thinking to yourself day after day, Ardelle? What are you thinking of yourself?”

  She stood, her hands on the table. “I have to face his God.”

  “We. We have to face that. And His God didn’t strike us down dead.”

  “The soup was good.” She walked to the door.

  “You’ve changed your tune.”

  “We both have.”

  He came to the door. Opened it, freezing night came in. “Ardelle – whatever you need.”

  She left.

  At Janatou the view was misty. Bleached and bare. Like me. For now.

  He stacked the tiles and their pins in the furthest corner of the huge bache-tent. The bache isn’t big enough to take the whole house.

  Fool. It’s for the wood, the glass, bed, your pathetic furniture. The stone can wait outside – you can’t get colder than stone. And the tiles! They’re weather-proof, too! The dog looked up at his laughter. Stop worrying, you might be doing it wrong – but you’re doing the right thing. He turned the empty cart for home, checking for his blinkers.

  Jean-Louis Duthileul strode over the road. “Vermande!”

  “What?”

  “Come down here.”

  Jacques chilled a little. He’d thought of something. He came down the ladder, stood in the garden. Tayo growled a little, catching his fear.

  “You duped me.”

  “You duped yourself.”

  “Don’t use my cows to pull your cart.” He walked away.

  Chibret received the phone-call the whole commune had been waiting for. Arbel. From Strasbourg. Their train to arrive tomorrow, some time, at Maurs. Tell Ardelle.

  He bustled into the Café Tabac, self-
importantly spread the glow, and drove up to see her. Jean-Louis Duthileul drove up a minute behind him.

  Neither Jacques nor Ardelle had ever seen two vehicles on the lane. Not since The Germans.

  Jacques heard Ardelle’s scream of joy.

  “I’ll drive you there tomorrow,” Chibret announced proudly. Ardelle, in shock, must have nodded because he drove back beaming.

  She came straight round and he was waiting for her.

  “Tomorrow. At Maurs.”

  “We’ll go together,” he said, shortly.

  “Yes, please. Oh. No. Chibret said he’d take me.”

  Jacques revolted against the idea but what could he offer? Ride her down on the bike? How would the three of them get back?

  There was a soft knock at the door. Tayo barked. “Shush. It’ll only be Jerome.”

  It was Duthileul. The cold house chilled further as the door was jiggled open.

  “Yes?”

  “I wondered – Ardelle – might I offer you a lift tomorrow?”

  “Er...”

  “I’ll explain to Monsieur Le Maire.”

  “We were going to ride down on cows,” Jacques heard himself say.

  “What?” Ardelle said from the table.

  “But of course, we can’t use mine. Yours. I was just about to suggest using Ardelle’s. Ardelle?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Nothing.” He flushed and felt irredeemably stupid. He stalked to his empty fireplace, turning his back on his anger and embarrassment. Ardelle came to the door.

  “What is he talking about?” she asked their neighbour.

  Duthileul squinted at Ardelle. He’d no memory of when he’d ever spoken to her before. To nod on her wedding day. Now she was asking his business. He looked at her and nodded at Jacques and said softly, “He’s mad.”

  “He’s not that mad.”

  “Do you want to be driven? Tomorrow?”

  Ardelle could smell the glory-trail connecting Duthileul and the Mayor.

  “No, and explain that to Monsieur Le Maire, too, would you.”

  “Now what?”

  They almost laughed as she closed the door. “Walk down? And ask him to walk back?”

  Jacques thought.

  “Wait here!” and taking his blinkers, he left her.

  Jerome watched a blinkered Jacques cycle past the café and down the long lane.

  “Madame,” he gasped when she opened the door.

  “He’s in the bar.”

  “I came to see you.”

  Madame Lacaze’s body eased towards inviting him past her and into the house but she left the action incomplete. “Oh?”

  He told her. She smiled.

  “I’d be happy to. Do you want me to tell him,” she paused for the briefest second, “and her?”

  Jacques imagined forward to what he and Ardelle needed to tell Arbel.

  “But – how would they get there?”

  “Of course. Well, I’ll tell him anyway, shall I?”

  “Yes, Madame, tell him. He’ll be glad.”

  There was something so simply caring in his tone that made her relieved they were not now inside her house.

  “Tomorrow morning?”

  “Yes.”

  He rode back, told Ardelle.

  She told him it was Christmas the day after tomorrow.

  Their thoughts met in the black sky above their homes. Tomorrow he’ll be here. Home. My Arbel.

  Tomorrow we’ll find out if what we did was good or bad. By whether he forgives us.

  So, it’s nothing to do with God?

  If Arbel doesn’t forgive then it was wrong? Yes, of course! And if he does?

  What will be will be. You plant and sow and reap.

  They were at Maurs by eight in the morning, Christmas Eve. The bleary-eyed station-master knew nothing.

  “A train from Strasbourg? Bollocks! Pardon me, Mesdames – but there never has been nor ever will be such a thing.”

  Ardelle quailed.

  “Connections, dolt.” Madame Lacaze smiled. The man’s manner changed.

  “I’ll phone Aurillac.”

  “Thank you.”

  Other cars arrived.

  As the day grew conversations began between Ardelle and Jacques and the parents and wives, children and friends of Jean-Louis, Claude, Figeac and Yannick. None of them knew anything about anything. Just the phone-call they’d all been allowed from Strasbourg. So only now they gathered there were five of them. They all wondered how many more were lost en route. But this was no day of mourning.

  This was a Day of Returning Home – having survived – the most profound mutual feeling humans can know. Outside childbirth. And Madame Claude had a two year-old in her arms all day to meet her father for the first time. Maurs station teemed with latent, simmering emotion.

  Trains were scarce. They all leapt to their feet at the first bell and the station-master, now dressed in his best since his Mayor had telephoned, straightened his uniform and peaked cap, marched himself in front of them and as the train clattered past behind him, and bellowed, to their deafened ears, “Goods, Mesdames, Messieurs!”

  He phoned his spouse and she brought food for them all at lunch-time.

  A branch-line train after lunch. Another at four.

  No-one’s patience, beyond Claude the Boulanger’s daughter, wavered. They concentrated on the track and waited. And would wait all day. Positive stoicism.

  At six they all stood as another two-coach train steamed in. This was the one, Ardelle knew.

  She strode further to the front than she had yet and everyone caught her certainty – as they had caught someone else’s all day – but now there was a scream as the carriages slowed and hands waved and there was a crush at the doors and now tears and weeping and the out-pouring of years of anguish and still the damned fucking doors on the train had not been opened but there was never any mistaking the two-toothed grin beneath the aged eyes of Arbel Jammes. Jacques stood back from the scrum – as, strangely, did all the brothers, fathers, sons and uncles. This first touching was for the women. God knows why – but it was.

  Five men enveloped in a wave of Love, in the arms of rewarded faith – the warmest place they’d ever left and would ever find. You could hug all day – you could hold those bones and feel that skin and smell that forgotten smell and stay there rocking and crying till eternity froze.

  “Thank you very much, citizens – best of the season, very pleased, sincerely – but we have a timetable beyond all this, you know...” The station-master herded the scrum of weeping humanity towards the waiting men so he could release the train.

  Jacques stepped forward. She still held him in a grip. Let her – she deserves it. He stepped back. Arbel looked away from her eyes and saw him. Fresh tears leapt to his eyes, and to Jacques’, and Arbel wrapped the pair of them in his bony grip.

  And there they rocked.

  All four men made a point of telling Ardelle none of it would have even ever been considered and most definitely never accomplished without her husband; that he was a diamond and her heart flooded as he grinned, bashful and daft and deflecting their compliments.

  “And Claude with a child, a daughter!” he said as they drove Home. “I wondered if...”

  “No.” Ardelle squeezed his arm even tighter. “Plenty of time for that.”

  How easy it was to Love. Everything forgotten. “God! How are Jerome and Sara and…”

  “Zoe,” Ardelle said, watching Madame Lacaze’s back and neck straighten.

  “They survived,” she said, squeezing him, “like you...”

  Jacques, in the front, said to Madame Lacaze, “Please don’t drive through the village, Madame. Would you take the back road?”

  “Forgotten your blinkers, Vermande?”

  Arbel looked up from his wife’s eyes. She shushed him and signaled ‘later’.

  “If you wouldn’t mind. If not – I’ll walk.”

  Arbel looked directly at A
rdelle. What was this? She nodded towards their driver. Not here, not now. O.K...

  Madame Lacaze drove the back way. It was dark and Jacques was grateful Arbel wouldn’t see the bache over his house and so wouldn’t ask questions tonight. Not those questions anyway.

  They all thanked her and stood watching the headlamps drift down the lane. Arbel couldn’t breathe deeply enough. This air. The air of Home.

  They stood in his kitchen.

  Arbel looked around. How could very little be so exquisitely precious?

  Ardelle still held his hand.

  “Happy Christmas Arbel. Both. Happy Christmas,” Jacques said and left them.

  I faced his eyes, then.

  Now will we tell him on Christmas Day? My God! That’s sadistic.

  And will he give us the present we crave?

  Should we even ask him? Do we dare? Have we any such right? Let it pass Lord. Let it pass.

  And why should The Lord listen to me, now?

  Because He’s The Lord and us fools are only human, that’s why.

  Arbel had no desire for words or talk and Ardelle was only too happy to meet and share the desires he did have. Right into Christmas morning.

  20

  He opened his eyes. The sun was winter-high.

  “Mass!”

  “Too late,” Ardelle lied. “Leave it. We are Christmas.”

  “I’ve never missed. Not even there.”

  “Well, you have now.”

  “My God!”

  She reached down into the bed and distracted him. “My God,” he groaned and rolled onto his back.

  Do I work? On Christmas Day?

  He rose, pulled his filthy clothes together.

  No eggs. He’d forgotten to feed them so very often their eggs were pale green and putrid now.

  He pulled water from the well. Lit a fire.

  Throttled the last three chickens and sat and plucked them.

  Went to his store in the fournil and found potatoes, Ardelle’s winter beans still in the panier, and some straggly brussels in the garden.