by Nevil Shute
“Aye,” said Mr Frobisher. “That all that happened?”
“Aye. Chap come up ‘n said something to her, ‘n put his arms round her, ‘n give her a hug and a kiss. Then when she started struggling, he let her go.”
“That’s right, is it?” said Mr Frobisher. “He let her go?”
“Aye, and she run round the corner and bumped into an American policeman. ‘Course a young girl gets a bit upset about a thing like that, specially when it’s a black man. But some of these things, least said soonest mended. I told her mother, I said — after all, it’s not as if she come to any harm.”
“Seems to me,” said Mr Frobisher slowly, “the man’s come to more harm than Gracie has.”
“Is that right what someone told me, that he cut his throat?”
“Aye,” said Mr Frobisher, “that’s right enough. They got him in the hospital.”
“Whatever did he want to do a thing like that for?”
Mr Frobisher told him what he knew, and they discussed it for some time. “He’s for court martial soon as he comes out o’ hospital,” he said.
“What’s he charged with, then?” asked Mr Trefusis.
“Attempted rape.”
“O’ my Gracie?”
“That’s it.”
“But that ain’t right. He let her go.”
“That’s what he’s to be charged with, all the same.”
Mr Trefusis sat silent for a minute or two, smoking and thoughtful. At last he said: “There was a couple of Americans come to the house soon after I went to work this morning, an officer and a sergeant. God knows what the wife told them.”
There was another long silence. At last the railwayman said: “They’re kind of hard on these black fellows, aren’t they?”
Mr Frobisher drew thoughtfully at his pipe. “Well, it does seem like it,” he said at last. “ ’Course, we dunno what they may be like in their own place back in the States. They may have a lot of trouble with them that we don’t know about. But I must say, times it seems as nothing they can do is right.”
Mr Trefusis said: “D’you know the one they’ve caught, the one that cut his throat?”
“Aye, he comes in here. Decent enough sort of lad, he seemed to be, like most of them are. Always willing to lend a hand with shifting casks, or that. His sergeant was in here just this evening, speaking up for him.”
They could reach no conclusion in the matter, indeed, it seemed to be clean out of their hands. Next day it became known in the village that Dave Lesurier was being held under guard in hospital and was to come before court martial on a charge of attempted rape as soon as he was well enough. In the streets the military police redoubled their vigilance; every Negro seen to be walking with a white girl was followed by an armed military policeman, to the sullen fury of the Negro and the blazing indignation of the girl. The Negroes took to walking in the streets in bands of ten or fifteen, looking for trouble, and fights with similar bands of white American troops took place on two occasions. One night Jim Dakers was set on by a gang of Negro soldiers, and cruelly beaten up.
Mr Frobisher watched these developments with grave concern, and discussed them discreetly with the traveller from his brewery, with the vicar, and with various men of Trenarth in the forces, home on leave from various parts of the country. He learned of pitched battles with firearms between American white troops and American Negroes at Leicester and at Lancaster, reports of which were censored from the newspapers. He thought about these stories gravely while he stood behind the bar, or tapped new casks down in the cellar, or sat and smoked in his back parlour when the bar was closed. He did not think quickly and it took him a week or two to decide upon a course of action, but when he did make up his mind upon the line that he was going to take, it was not a bad one.
He sat down in his shirtsleeves one Sunday afternoon after dinner, and breathing heavily with every word, he wrote a letter to General Eisenhower.
It ran:
White Hart Hotel,
Trenarth,
Nr Penzance,
Cornwall.
Dear Sir,
I take up my pen to tell you things are not as they ought to be here in Trenarth on account of there being trouble between your coloured soldiers and your white soldiers. It is not my place to say which is right but if things are not put right I think there will be shooting here like other places because there are fights and things are getting very bad. We don’t want that to happen in Trenarth because in all the twenty-seven years I have held this licence we have had nothing worse than an affiliation order.
I think if you could see your way to do something about Pte David Lesurier, coloured, now being held on a charge of attempted rape of one of our young ladies it would assist and stop things getting worse because the black fellows are very sore about this charge and we think it is a bit of humbug too because the young lady struggled and he let her go at once. It is very kind of Colonel McCulloch to see that men who interfere with our young ladies get punished as they should be, but between you and me the young lady come to no harm and it would be better to forget it because the black fellows say this is a trumped up charge.
Pardon me writing when you will be very busy, but we don’t want things to be let go and get so bad that there is shooting here like other places.
Yours respectfully,
James Frobisher, Landlord
He sealed this in an envelope and addressed it to General Eisenhower, Headquarters of the US Army, care of GPO, London, and posted it.
Three days later Major Mark T. Curtis arrived in Trenarth from the office of the Staff Judge-Advocate. He came nominally in connection with the application for court martial filed by Colonel McCulloch, and announced that he had come for a preliminary examination of the evidence. According to the book this seemed irregular to the colonel, but he was not one to question any officer from the Staff Judge-Advocate, and laid the whole matter before Major Curtis.
“You see the way it is,” he said at last. “These colored boys have been alone here too long, and they’ve got uppity.’
“Yeah,” said the major. “Had any other trouble of this sort here, Colonel?”
“No,” said Colonel McCulloch. “They haven’t needed to go raping. I don’t know what to make of these darned English girls. You just can’t keep them away from the niggers. I tell you, in this place the girls seem to prefer going with a colored man to one of our white boys. The whole place is plumb color crazy. The landlord of the pub down in the village here, he’d rather have the niggers than the white boys in his bar. Say, can you beat that?”
Major Curtis said casually: “Does he stir up trouble?”
“I wouldn’t say that,” said the colonel. “He’s made a packet of trouble for me because he won’t have the white boys and I’ve had to find alternative accommodation for them. But I don’t think he makes any trouble between whites and colored.”
The major said: “You think this attempted rape is part of the same picture, that the colored boys got swelled heads?”
The colonel said: “That’s right. You get the colored out of place, and they’ll start thinking about white women right off. That’s always the way.”
The major smiled. “I come from Maine,” he said. “I wouldn’t know about a thing like that.”
“I come from Georgia,” the colonel said. “I do.”
“You’re pretty sure about the evidence?” the major asked.
“Oh, sure. Lieutenant Anderson, he’s interviewed the girl — you’ve got it all in his report there, in that file.” He turned the pages and picked out a paper. “This one.”
The major read it through again. “I’d like to have a talk with her myself,” he said. “And with the colored man in hospital. The Staff Judge-Advocate, he’s mighty anxious not to get anything irregular in these mixed cases with the British. We’ve got to be right all along the line.”
“Sure,” said the colonel. “The colored is in hospital in Penzance, and I’ll send a driv
er who knows how to contact the girl. You like anyone to come along with you?”
The major shook his head. “Guess I’d better see them alone. They’ll talk more freely.”
“Any way you like,” said the colonel.
He put a jeep at the disposal of the major, driven by a sergeant in the military police who knew the district; that afternoon Major Curtis drove into Penzance. He went with an open mind, realizing the limitations of his knowledge and wondering a little why the Staff Judge-Advocate had picked him for the job. He knew very little about Negroes. He came from Portland, Maine, and had been through the law school at Harvard; he had practised for a time in Albany and later had become junior partner in a firm of attorneys in Boston. He had defended a coloured janitor upon a charge of stealing coal, and got him off; he could not recollect any other occasion in his legal life when he had been in contact with the Negro. It seemed to Major Mark T. Curtis that in all the Staff Judge-Advocate’s department there were few officers less suitable than he for this assignment, but he was an open-minded man and quite prepared to do his best with it, working from the elementary first principles of law. It never struck him that this was why he had been sent.
He found Private Dave Lesurier sitting up in bed with a dressing round his throat; he seemed to have boils all over him and he was looking thin and ill. The guard upon the door arranged with the sister for a screen around the bed, for there were other men in the ward; the major sat down on a chair behind this screen with the Negro and said: “I’m from the Staff Judge-Advocate’s office, at Headquarters. You know there’s been some talk about court martialling you, Lesurier?”
The Negro said: “Yes, sir.”
“Well, that’s all in the future,” the major said. “If you have done anything very wrong, you will not get away with it without being punished. If it comes to a court martial you will have a couple of officers who know the law to help you. Before it gets that far, we’ve got to make up our minds if you’ve done anything so bad as to make it worth while putting you on trial. That’s why I’ve come to see you, to get your story of what happened. Do you understand me?”
The Negro said: “Yes, sir.”
“Well now, would you like to tell me what it’s all about?”
The Negro said: “I guess you know that already.”
The officer was silent for a moment. “Maybe I know some of it,” he said. “I’ve seen a statement Miss Trefusis made. I’ve seen nothing from you.”
The boy said: “If you’ve seen what Miss Trefusis said, I guess you’ve seen everything, sir.”
“There’s two sides to every question, Lesurier. I want you to tell me yours.”
There was a long silence. The Negro sat studying the grey blanket on his bed covering his knees, with the red lettering upon it, PENZANCE GENERAL HOSPITAL. “I guess there’s nothing much to say,” he said at last. “I don’t want to deny it. I just grapped a holt of her, ‘n kissed her. That’s all there is to it.”
Major Curtis said unexpectedly: “Have you got a girl back home?”
Lesurier looked up in surprise. “No, sir. Not one regular one.”
“How long have you been over here?”
“Four months, sir.”
“Got to know many girls since you got over here?”
The Negro shook his head.
“None?”
The boy hesitated. “Not unless you count Miss Trefusis,” he said.
“Apart from her, Lesurier, have you been out with any girls at all since you got over here?”
“No, sir. I haven’t spoken to one since I left Nashville.”
“How old are you, Lesurier?”
“Twenty-two, sir.”
The major thought, a mighty long time for a boy of twenty-two to go without speaking to a girl. He said: “What were you doing before you got drafted?”
He sat patiently, asking a question now and then, building up the background to the case. He heard all about the Filtair Corporation and the James Hollis School for coloured back in distant Nashville, and about the garage, and the truck driving, and the bulldozer. He had very seldom probed into a Negro’s life before; in his home at Portland the help had all been white; except in sleeping cars and shoeshine parlours he had not come in contact with the coloured much. He sat patiently making the boy talk, realizing the imperfection of his own knowledge, anxious to learn.
At last he said: “Well now. Tell me about Miss Trefusis. Where did you first meet her?”
The boy said: “In the store.”
“I see.” The major glanced at him, and there was humour in his eye. “Like to tell me what you said to her?”
“Sure,” said the Negro. “I asked her for ten Player’s.”
“That all you said?”
“That’s all, sir.”
“Well, what happened next time you met her? Where was that?”
“In the store again, sir. I asked for another ten Player’s.”
For an instant Major Mark T. Curtis felt that he was being trifled with; then, suddenly, he wasn’t quite so sure. He said: “Apart from asking her for cigarettes, when did you first speak to her?”
“I never did, sir. Only to buy Player’s.”
The officer stared at him. “Do you mean you never said a thing to her before you grabbed hold of her and kissed her, except to ask for ten Player’s?”
The Negro said: “That’s right, Major. I know it sounds mighty dumb, but that’s right.”
“I’ll say it sounds dumb.” The major sat in silence for a moment, conning the evidence so far. Amongst white folk there were nuances in these affairs; sometimes the spoken word did not count for so much. He had not known before that coloured folks knew anything about nuances, and he was incredulous now. But his duty was to ascertain the truth.
He thought very deeply for a moment, and then said: “Was she nice to you?”
Lesurier said evasively: “She never spoke to me except to give me change and that.”
“I know. But when she did that, was she nice to you?”
Their eyes met for an instant; the Negro dropped his glance down to the grey blanket with the red lettering. “She was mighty nice,” he said quietly.
“I see.” There was a short pause. “Well now, Lesurier, what happened in the street that night? You’d arranged for her to meet you?”
“No, sir. I told you, I never said a thing to her except to buy things.”
“Well, were you waiting for her?”
“That’s right, Major.”
“What for?”
“I wanted to ask her if she’d care to take a lil’ walk with me one evening.”
The major felt that he was getting on to firmer ground. “You could have asked her that in the store,” he pointed out. “Why didn’t you?”
“There was always other folks around,” the Negro said. “I didn’t think she’d like it if I asked her that with other folks around.”
“I see. So you waited for her in the street to ask her. Why did you pick ten o’clock at night, though?”
“I didn’t pick it, Major. I started waiting for her around six, when I came down from the camp.”
“You hung around from six o’clock till ten to try and get a chance to speak to her alone?”
“That’s right.”
“Have you got any way of proving that, Lesurier? Did you tell anyone what you were doing?”
“No, sir.” The Negro thought for a minute. “I walked down from the camp with Corporal Booker Jones,” he said. “He said to come on into the White Hart and have a lil’ drink, but I said I guessed I would stick around outside. That was around six o’clock or soon after. He might remember.”
Major Curtis made a mental note of the name. “Well now,” he said, “in the end she came along. Was she alone?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What happened then?”
The Negro hesitated. “I went up to her to ask her,” he said at last. “And then I thought it was kind of late to ask her if
she’d like to take a lil’ walk, and I didn’t know what to do. After waiting all that time, and that . . .”
“What did you do?”
The boy said: “I gave her a kiss, Major. That’s all I did.”
“Kind of sudden, wasn’t it?”
The Negro said wearily: “I guess so. It sounds mighty silly now. The only thing I got to say is that it didn’t seem so silly then.”
“I see. What did she say about it?”
“Called me a beast, ‘n started struggling,” the boy said heavily. “I let her go.”
“You let her go as soon as she struggled?”
“Of course, sir,” the boy said. “I wouldn’t want to do nothing she didn’t like.”
Major Curtis sat with him for some time longer, drawing out the rest of the story. He questioned the Negro very closely over the attempted suicide, feeling that it must have some connection with a guilty conscience over Miss Trefusis. All he got was:
“I was just plumb scared of what they MPs would do if they caught me, after messing with a white girl, sir.”
In the end, Major Curtis said: “You realize that what you did was very wrong, Lesurier? You just can’t go around treating women that way, any women, white or colored. And especially a British girl over here. You realize that?”
The boy said: “Sure I done wrong, Major. I know that. Will they send me up for a court martial?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to see Miss Trefusis and the military police and then write the whole thing up, and make out a report. The Staff Judge-Advocate decides if you’re to be court martialled, not me.”
“I don’t want to make no trouble,” the boy said. “I done wrong and I can take what’s coming.” He hesitated, and then said: “Would I get a chance to tell the little lady I’m real sorry about what I did?”
“I don’t know,” said the major thoughtfully. “That might help.”
He went down to his jeep and drove out to Trenarth. He knew from his own experience, as every soldier knows, that sex starved men may not be altogether normal; that justice is not served by trying to apply civilian standards to conditions they were not set up to govern. It seemed to him that Miss Trefusis was a casualty of the war. If she had lived in one of the big cities of Great Britain she might have been shattered by a bomb; as she lived in the country she had been kissed against her will by a Negro soldier. Both were very unpleasant experiences, and both were due entirely to the war. The landlord of the pub had described this case as a bit of humbug; Major Mark T. Curtis was inclined to agree with him.
