the maltese angel (52 page)

"What? When who grows up? Who?"

"My girl."

She lifted the eggs off a plate where they had been standing on the hob of the dying fire, slapped them on to the bread, then took them to the small table, pulled out some cutlery from a box to the side, then said,

"Come and get it. No! Stay where you are. I'll lift the table round and I'll sit on the bed," and she continued to contain her

feelings, at least until they had started to eat, when she said, "What did you mean, when she grows up?"

"Just what I said. She must be ... well ... oh, twelve, thirteen, going on fourteen now."

"Oh you! You're a funny fellow. You know that, Gerald?"

"Yes, I've been told that before. By the way, this tastes

marvelous."

It was some time later. The meal had been finished with a cup of milky coffee. The greasy plates had been put into an iron pan half filled with water and placed at the front of the boiler fire, which prompted him to ask, "Won't it put it out completely?"

"No; it will still be on in the morning. I'll just have to give it a blow."

Again he remarked, "You are well organised, aren't you?"

"Just some parts of my life."

When later he was about to sit again in the chair, he hesitated,

saying, "My next effort will find me through on the floor. You sit there."

"No; I prefer the edge of the bed."

And that's how they sat; and when she leant against his shoulder, he put his arm around her. And after a moment of holding her so, he said,

"You're a very nice person, you know, Susie."

"How is it you've just found that out?" She didn't turn to look at him as she spoke, but nestled her head closer to him.

"I haven't just found that out; I've thought so all along."

"You've been rather backward in telling me then."

"Have I?" There was a surprised note in his voice.

"I've always talked to you. I found you easy to talk to, comforting in a way."

"In a way? You're lost, aren't you, Gerry? I've always wanted to call you Gerry, but that would be classing you with them over there." Her head moved under his chin.

Then she went on, "This is not your scene. It staggers you. I can see that every time you come back. You take things to heart too much.

You put me in mind of a fellow that used to be on the trains just

before you came. He was always spouting poetry. He'd be speaking

ordinary to you, then he'd come out with a quotation or other. But when he started to go up and down the ward oh well," she said with a small hunching of her shoulders, 'they took him back home. "

"And you think I'll go the same way?"

"Oh, no." Her tone was emphatic now. Yet she added, "It's the look of you at times, and you keep things bottled up. David says you do."

He brought her head up from his shoulder, saying, "Then I'm discussed between you and David? Why?"

"Oh, we have a natter at times. He's very fond of you. Well, he thinks you're great, your principles and all that. Quite candidly, I think all you fellows in that unit, in all your units, are great

because of your principles. But you haven't got to let them get on top of you, not out here."

She now put her hand up and stroked his cheeks and her touch sent a quiver through him. She began to unloosen his tie and the last button of his coat that hadn't been undone, and he did not stay her hand. And when a few minutes later they were both standing up and her last piece of clothing fell to the floor, she stood looking at him for a moment before, stretching her hand behind her, she rolled back the blanket on the bed. And then they were both lying side by side, and when she

whispered, "You hadn't to get wounded," he made no answer, but as his lips passed over her face he wasn't seeing it.

After rising from her side, he got into his clothes before, bending over her again, he kissed her on the brow and said, "Thank you, Susie.

Thank you. "

She was half asleep as she murmured, "You're welcome any time, sir."

There was no longer any moonlight as he stepped out into the night, but he stood looking at the stars in the sky. He was feeling greatly

relaxed, changed somehow. Would anybody believe that had been his

first night with a woman? No, he could hardly believe it himself. And now the question he asked was, why had he put it off for so long?

Why?

For it had been the most marvelous, most wonderful experience. He

could face the morrow now and the days ahead on the train, for there'd always be Susie to come back to. And what about the seven days'

leave?

Yes what about it .. ?

As it turned out, she wasn't able to get seven days off, but was given a forty-eight hour pass. And they spent it in a little village some long way behind the lines. And he experienced a feeling of comfort and ease that was like a soothing salve on his mind.

Things were going from bad to worse. They all knew this and it was being voiced in many quarters: where were the bloody generals who were ordering them forward only for them to be thrown back on all sectors again and again? Exacerbating comments but, in truth, very telling when voiced by the wounded crammed now like sardines in the trains.

Why didn't they come up to the front? No; they were sitting in their comfortable billets and drinking their bloody port after dinner,

toasting the Royal Family .. England .. the Flag.

And the officers. Who did they think they were anyway? Young snots, hardly able to wipe their own noses. When it came to leading men ..

leading men, huh! Doing it in their pants, some of them, but they

still looked down their noses at you.

Yet in the trains there was no distinction of rank, no officers and men, only a bloody mass of mutilated bodies. Even so, here and there, a voice would rise in defence of a particular officer, or even a

sergeant who had perhaps risked his own life and in doing so had

enabled a speaker to be on that particular train.

He had stopped writing so many letters home. Although he had the

occasional comfort of Susie whenever she was free, the horror of the war seemed, at times, to be turning his brain: as David described it, the world had turned into a slaughterhouse and the abattoir was very messy. And to the comment of their latest addition, one Sydney

Allington, "God made the back to bear the burden," David immediately retorted, "Yes, Mother Shipton," a reference which the young man did not understand, but nevertheless one which simply strengthened his growing opinion

of Gerald, David and Jim as being strange company, and further made him question why any of them were there at all, at least in their

capacities as non-combatants. And he continued to address them

formally.

It was in March 1918 that three outstanding things happened, two of which were to propel Gerald's mind into the oblivion for which he would often crave in order to escape the horror of the everyday scenes he was forced not only to look upon, but to deal with.

The first took place when again the train was making slow progress back to base. They had taken on four sitting passengers, now propped up against the end partition of the carriage.

While entraining, he had noticed that two of these men had helped each other, one using his only usable arm to help his companion hop. And now bending down to the nearest man, he asked, "How's it going?"

"Not too bad. But Lawson, my friend here, I think his leg's giving him gip." And the tone of the man's voice made Gerald look more closely at the mud covered uniform. Then he leant across to the man Lawson and said, "Feeling low?"

"Not too bad, sir. I'm all right, thanks to the captain here."

Gerald turned his attention back to the other man, saying now, "Rough show, sir?"

"Yes, you could say that." He was about to speak again when Allington, the odd man out of their particular team, tapped him on the shoulder, saying "Mr. Ramsmore, you're needed further down; Mr. Mayhew requires your assistance."

After nodding at the soldiers, Gerald turned away, thinking to himself.

Requires your assistance. That fellow got on his nerves more than did the war. He had almost said, bloody nerves and bloody war, and he must stop that: he was becoming as bad as the others in using such

expletives with every other word.

He found David having trouble with a delirious and very ill man: "Get the needle," was David's greeting, and inclined his head further along the carriage to explain his call for assistance: "Jim's got his own hands full."

Gerald knew it was no use saying, "What about Allington?" because David couldn't stand the fellow. How odd that one individual could mar a team. Yet if they were to go into it, Allington's motive for being here at this moment was purer than theirs, for in his case God had come into it.

It was more than an hour later when he made his way back to the men propped up at the end of the carriage. The train had gathered some speed, and he could see that the private was dozing. The officer had his eyes wide open, and, on seeing him he put up his good hand to

beckon Gerald down to him.

"Ramsmore?"

"Yes. Yes, that's my name."

"Strange coincidence, so is mine."

"Really? Well, well, it's a small world, as they say."

"May I ask if your Christian name is Gerald?"

"You may, and it is."

Gerald straightened up a little; then bending again, he peered into the young officer's face and said, "Don't tell me your father's name is Beverly?"

There was a small chuckle now as the young man answered, "No, but my grandfather's is."

"Good Lord!"

"I've heard a lot about you."

Somewhat stiffly now Gerald answered, "I bet you have."

"Oh, not in the way you're inferring." The words had been rapidly spoken.

"Oh, no; I mean, along this route. Those over there know damn all about it. I'm ... I'm very pleased to meet you." And when the hand came out Gerald shook it warmly.

"My name is Will. We must get together and have a crack after this.

Are you on the same run all the time? "

"Most of it."

"My God! You chaps certainly have had your bellyful of war and no medals. How long are these runs?"

"Eight, ten hours; it all depends."

The young officer peered at his wrist-watch and remarked, "We've been going for five and a half hours. Good Lord!" And the next moment he asked, "Have you been home lately?"

"No; not since I came out here last year."

There was a pause; then peering up at Gerald, the younger man said somewhat thoughtfully, "You know, I have never seen my

step-grandmother, or is she my step-great-grandmother? Yes, she would be, wouldn't she? They say she's a very nice lady."

"Yes, she is. And you must rectify your omission when you get back.

She would be delighted to see you. Although, as I understand it, most of the house has been taken over by the military. "

"My grandfather often talked of the Hall where he was brought up. But he seemed to think you had lost all the land."

"Not quite; there's still a few acres left. I ran a small holding you know."

"You didn't!"

"Yes."

"Good for you. You must be longing to get back out of this

hellhole."

Gerald did not answer but straightened up. Was he longing to get

back?

He'd had a strange thought in his mind of late that he would never get back, that he would never live in that house again. It had become an obsessive thought about which he could do nothing other than aim to ignore it.

There was a commotion further down the carriage: a man was crying out, not for his mother or father, but for someone called Little Jackie, perhaps a son.

He intimated that he must go, and the young man nodded and said, "We mustn't lose touch," in answer to which he himself nodded and muttered, "No. No .."

He saw his distant relative twice while he was in the base hospital prior to his being moved on down to the port when they had shaken hands and promised to meet up again. Will had also said he would go and see his step-great-grandmother.

The second thing that occurred shocked his system more than even war scenes and the ambulance trains had done.

The last stretcher had been passed over to the hospital orderlies, who had protested loudly as to where it was expected it should be put.

"They're hanging from the ceiling," said one.

"And if they don't soon clear some of them to the boats, you can put off your next run, for they might as well lie outside where they are, as lie outside here."

David and Jim had heard it all before, and they gave as much as they got, but Gerald had turned away. He was now making for the showers and his bed. But having to pass the nursing staff kitchen and day

quarters, he stopped a nurse who was coming out of the door and asked,

"Is Susie about?"

She glanced behind her into the room, then closed the door; and now, looking up at him, she said stiffly, "She's gone."

"What do you mean, she's gone?" He turned and looked about him. There was no evidence of a bomb having been dropped overnight.

The girl now said, "She left yesterday. She's been posted."

"Posted! Where to?"

She shrugged her shoulders; and when it seemed she was going to walk away, he said, "Well, do you know where she's been posted to?"

"Not quite. I hear it's back home ... sort of training job or something." She now smiled and bit on her lip before walking away, leaving him standing perplexed.

It had been three days since He had seen her, and then only to have a quick word. Surely, she must even then have had an inkling it was

about to happen. Why hadn't she mentioned it to him? Why? She had

been a bit .. well, offhand lately. He swung about to go hurriedly in search of David.

He met him emerging from the bunkhouse, and with out any lead-up he said to him, "Do you know anything about this? Susie's gone, they say.

Well, the nurse seemed to think that she might have been sent home. "