AT 29 (26 page)

A hint of a smile crossed her face. “Depends on the baby and what happens after that. I'm not really thinking beyond nine months. I miss him so much. He was always up, never said or did anything that wasn't positive. I know if he were here we'd be fine, baby, school, whatever our parents reaction might be. He would have gotten us through it.”

“Is that why you came today?”

“Kevin's mother made me come because she couldn't face it and she didn't want his father to be alone.”

“What about his brother?”

“He hasn't stopped crying since it happened.”

“Kevin said they didn't get along.”

“They adored each other. I was the third wheel when they were together.”

“What becomes of your band?”

“Kevin's gone. Nobody's thinking about it.”

Jimmy stopped. “I can show you around.”

“The campus?” Ginger looked at the buildings then back toward the quad.

“I mean, if you want to know…”

“I want to know.”

He led her among the buildings, talking along the way about how Kevin had cajoled him into doing the talent show. He brought her into Wilder Auditorium and up onto the stage, explaining his jitters and Kevin's trick to calm his nerves. They wandered through the cafeteria to the table where they often sat together to eat. Back at the quad, he described the Crusader's after show party. In the basement of Regent Hall, he took her to the spot at the front of the room where they played for their classmates. Kevin's drums were still sitting in place, ready to be played.

“I forgot to tell his dad about these,” Jimmy said.

“We can break them down and take them to the car.”

They disassembled the set and carried the pieces up the stairs and out to the parking lot. Kevin's father was standing by the car, looking impatient. He took the drums, piece by piece, and set them in the trunk. Ginger kept the drumsticks as she walked over to the passenger side. Jimmy opened the door for her.

“Thanks for the tour.” She slid onto the seat.

He stepped back as the car started. Before putting the transmission in gear, Kevin's father leaned across Ginger and spoke through her open window. “I left his records with you. If you don't want them you can sell them or throw them out.” Then he drove off without waiting for an answer. Jimmy never saw either of them again.

The sun burned through the overcast, shining a ray on the window of his old room. For a moment he considered going up the stairs to take a look inside, but he knew it wouldn't be the same. Kevin was gone.

Melba received Aaron's letters with alarm. Little news of the Gallipoli Campaign reached Apollo Bay. Within months of his departure, she could stand the empty silence of the cottage no more. She packed her clothes and moved to the village. There, she took a small apartment above the combined postal and telegraph office and settled in, praying desperately for his safety.

Letters also came from Nantucket. Her father, they said, was growing frail from his many years at sea. Her brother remained on the Island, but there was little for him to do and he was restless for change. Her younger sister had moved to Cambridge with her husband, a literary professor. They had children of their own and could not visit the island as often as her mother would like.

The whaling industry that had provided a comfortable life for the islanders had waned. Over-hunting, combined with larger and more modern fleets from Asia and the Nordic nations, had driven many of the American ships from the sea. The population of her former island home had dwindled from ten thousand to only one thousand with more preparing to leave. Each letter pressed Melba to return when the war to end all wars was over.

She wanted to return. Despite her fears, she harbored a sense of resentment. She loved Australia, this vast land of extraordinary beauty, but her son had left her alone. It was no longer her home. With her in-laws gone, and now, Aaron off to find his way, she could find no purpose to the endless days that stretched before her. She knew it was useless to fret and worry, even though she also knew she could not stop. Still, in the occasional moments when her mind drifted from her worries, she began to think about herself and what was to become of her when her son returned. She doubted that Aaron would be the same person she knew when he departed. He will have seen and, perhaps, committed acts that she could never understand. He will be independent and self-reliant, as she knew he must be if he was to carry on with his own life. He would care for her, but he would not need her. She recognized that she might be a burden. She was tormented by this war that forced the whole world to stand still unable to discern a future.

***

By May 15, the Anzac fortifications were shored up with deep trenches completed all along the ridges above the cove at Gaba Tepe. Machine guns and artillery were brought up, fixed in place and protected by massive mounds of dirt. Seventeen thousand men manned the line.

Aaron was grateful for the constant hours of work, digging and reinforcing the trenches. It kept his mind occupied. The strange panics that made his body tremble occurred more often. He tried to hide his involuntary twitches from the other men, but he knew that his mind was also affected, carrying him off to some frightful place and leaving him with no memory of what may have transpired. He noticed some of the men eyeing him when they thought he was not looking. Others kept their distance except at night when he was compelled to sing softly. The panics never interrupted these tranquil moments.

On May 19, movement was detected across the short divide. The Turks emerged from the mist and with gathering speed, headed straight toward the Anzac fortifications. Along the line shouts went up from the joint Australian and New Zealand commanders,
alerting the troops to prepare for action. As Aaron lifted his rifle, steadying his eyes to fire, he could barely make out the figures coming toward him. Then in a blazing flash the enemy artillery opened fire, sending a deafening barrage into the sky. In the flash of light that preceded the exploding shells, the mist was penetrated, allowing Aaron to make out hundreds of Turkish infantrymen running toward him. He fired his gun at the first soldier he saw, re-cocking feverishly and firing again and again as the men around him followed his lead with their own weapons.

Quickly, the advancing enemy fell in a heap only to be followed by hundreds more, screaming as they clambered over the bodies of their countrymen, trying desperately to maintain their momentum forward. The Anzac machine guns, positioned strategically along the defensive lines, sent up an incessant chatter of lead with devastating effect as more of the enemy fell. Bullets whizzed by Aaron's head as he leaned over the edge of his hole, aiming and firing at anything that moved only tens of meters away. Three Turks rushed forward with a machine gun, turret and ammunition belts in hand. They knelt behind a pile of their dead countrymen and began to set the gun in position. Aaron brought his sights to bear on the first man with the machine gun barrel held tightly in his arms. As the enemy soldier waited nervously for his comrades to position the turret, Aaron fired, watching dispassionately as his bullet slammed into the man's chest, propelling him backwards, instantly dead. Then, he calmly shot the other two men where they knelt, unable to retaliate before their own deaths came.

Through the morning the battle continued non-stop with line upon line of Turkish soldiers directed into the killing field by their commanders, determined to drive the hated Anzac invaders back to the sea.

Strangely, the enemy artillery fire grew less as the morning progressed. Aaron also noted that many of the Turkish infantry were holding their fire, even as they attempted to breach the Anzac lines with fruitless rushes across the obliterated landscape, littered with so many dead and wounded that it was hard to see any space among the prone uniforms.

Still, the human waves came. The Anzac line held, although ammunition began to dwindle at the center where Aaron and his platoon were positioned. Fresh crates were delivered and quickly opened. With no ear protection, he lost all ability to hear his commander's orders although there was little need to do anything, but endlessly fire his red-hot weapon. Occasionally, a stray bullet would find its way near his position, but the enemy artillery that Aaron and his fellow soldiers feared above all else, was all but silent. Only sporadic shells whistled through the sky, landing harmlessly beyond his position. By afternoon, the shelling ceased altogether. Yet the Turks kept coming.

The terror-filled hours passed, leaving soldiers on both sides weary. The Turks, seeming to have an endless supply of men to sacrifice, continued to throw themselves at the Anzac line, but with less determination than those who fell before. The New Zealanders took the battle from the trenches, climbing from their holes to crawl forward in the mud and blood to set up a new forward line fortified by the bodies of dead Turks behind which, they sighted and fired. Soon, the Australians followed. The combined actions gained not more than fifteen meters, but it broke the will of the Turks who had lost thousands only to lose precious ground to a smaller, but stalwart enemy.

By nightfall, the Turks ended their fruitless assault. Aaron retreated to his hole, set his rifle aside and leaned his back against the dirt wall of the trench. Smoke and the
smell of gunpowder filled the air above his head. His ears rang and the muscles in his arms ached as he brushed the dirt from his uniform, but he was relieved to be free of the battle. He looked down the long line of the trench. Others were slipping from no man's land back into the hole, just as he had done. He could see a few men being helped, arms and legs swinging wildly, uncontrolled from wounds. Some had lost their helmets in the melee. They looked odd, not fully dressed. All, like Aaron, were exhausted, too tired and shaken to fidget in their sacks for sustenance to soothe their hunger. Many just stared wide-eyed at nothing.

In the gathering darkness few words were spoken. The commanders walked among the men, occasionally stopping to look at a wounded soldier and calling out for a stretcher. Some of the younger officers held small notebooks and pencils, jotting down some unknown information that would find its way into a report to the generals. Others climbed to the edges of the trench and peered out at the carnage, again, taking notes for their reports.

After an hour, Aaron's eyes grew heavy. He dosed a dreamless sleep, semi-conscious, but unable to move or hold his chin above his chest. Not even the damp chill that began to slide with the mist down into his hole could cause him to stir from his trance. He wanted only to sit motionless, letting his mind drift aimlessly while his aching body rested.

At mid-night, a whistle blew, one of those tiny toys that the officers used to summon the soldiers' attention. Aaron forced his eyes open, reaching for his gun. He clutched it in both hands and checked the chamber to be sure it was loaded. The thought of more fighting filled him with despair. Others also reluctantly roused themselves. The whistles grew louder and closer. Two officers, younger than Aaron, but just as experienced from the weeks of struggle, called out to the men from above.

“Truce!” they shouted, up and down the line. “Make ready to clear the dead and wounded from the field!”

Aaron only vaguely understood the order. Truce meant he would not suffer another enemy charge. He took a breath of relief, sighing as he exhaled. But clearing the dead and wounded filled him with dread. In the daylight, he was horrified as he witnessed the writhing bodies twisting and screaming in the final throes of agony. Some of those bodies had died by his hand. He knew it was the nature of war to kill, but he never expected it to fill him with revulsion and remorse. Now, he was ordered to mingle among the corpses, to cleanse the field so filled with death and stench that it overwhelmed his senses. He could envision no peace, no happiness, no future that would return him to the carefree joys of his pleasant farm above Apollo Bay.

Gradually, the Anzacs set their weapons aside and climbed from the trenches. Aaron followed his platoon leader into no man's land. Even in the darkness the devastation gave him pause. The many trees that stood tall and full at daybreak were reduced to blackened stumps with branches lying charred and broken all around. The grass that had been two feet high was now beaten down and burned, still emitting wisps of smoke here and there. Enemy rifles were scattered about like sticks. Aaron unintentionally kicked a metal helmet that had been blown from the head of a luckless Turk. He stooped to pick it up only to find that it was speckled with blood, flesh and bits of bone. He dropped it quickly, wiping his hands on his uniform.

The sea of bodies transfixed him. They stretched motionless as far as his eyes could see. As he looked down at those closest, he was shocked by the way the dead had fallen, twisted into unnatural positions, legs and arms broken or missing. The faces showed no peace, eyes frozen, mouths contorted in a final scream that remained long after the sound and the man who uttered it had died.

Then the slow, sad night's labor began. The commanders spread out and walked among the corpses, stopping to blow their whistles and plant a small flag when they came upon an Australian or New Zealand uniform. Stretchers were called whenever a groan was heard, but they were few. In the distance, the Turks also came onto the field. Their task, Aaron knew, would be far greater.

They worked through the night, gathering their wounded and dead countrymen, and carrying them to dressing stations at the far end of the trench lines. By mid-morning, the Anzac dead had been cleared. Commanders from both armies met to negotiate more time to allow the Turks to continue their work. In an unusual gesture, the Anzacs offered to assist. The Turks accepted the offer.

In the days that followed, the rival armies settled into a protracted skirmish of light fire back and forth, but only during the daylight hours. More often, the battlefield was silent as commanders on both sides let their men rest in an uneasy state of wariness. Aaron remained at the center where the best marksmen had been stationed from the start. He hunkered down in his damp trench, rarely making the effort to peer out, preferring to simply rest, listening for orders or a new enemy assault. None came.