Will pulled Helen to the rim of the dancers on the wet sand, but she skipped into the center of the group, stomping in surf. A wave rolled over Will’s ankles as a long series of white blasts shot off the barge. A crowd of a few hundred now stood on the boardwalk. The encore of rockets exploded in the sky; the horn players blasted their instruments to be heard over the roar. The cascading white streaks unfurled over the water, riding waves toward the beach. Most dancers stopped to watch the barrage, but Helen kept kicking up the liquid-light dance floor. She held her arms down at her sides, but her wrists flared up as she skipped in a circle in the center of the light. Her ginger-colored hair aglow under the falling final flash. The ragtag band stopped, and the crowd cheered and whistled. The men on the barges took bows, their fuse lighters shining through the thick curtain of volcanic haze that engulfed their ghost ship as an acrid cloud of sulfur permeated the salty air. Under the haze of the boardwalk lamps, the band started marching in place; turning back to the pavilion, they struck up “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.” Couples tagged on to the end of their parade, grabbing the shoulders of the person in front of them. Folks belted out the first verse:
“Come on and hear, come on and hear
Alexander’s Ragtime Band
Come on and hear, come on and hear
It’s the best band in the land.”
Helen stepped to join the tail of the procession, but Will spun her around, loosening her French twist. Copper-colored in the light, the wisps clung to her flush cheeks and neck.
“Let’s go.” She tugged at his hand, but he didn’t budge. Helen rolled her eyes. She put her hands on her hips and tapped her toe jauntily on the soft sand. “What’s it gonna be, Will Bartlett?”
He stepped closer to see her clearly through the haze. The fistful of sweet pickles he’d scoffed down while Helen danced with Burt churned angrily in his stomach. He’d been too nervous about the dance to eat his dinner, and now his pickle gorging was going to ruin everything, perhaps even Helen’s pretty new dress. He turned his face as a wicked belch roared from his mouth.
“Excuse me,” he hiccupped.
“You gonna be sick?”
“Wait,” Will coughed. The music swelled and then softened as the band entered the pavilion. There were just a few songs remaining.
“If I get caught in the undertow I hope you’re nowhere near the beach.”
“Why’s that?” Will dusted sand from his suit.
“Cuz I’d drown,” she said. “Now or never.”
Will’s gut tightened as he suppressed another belch. They’d been assigned to opposite ends of the puberty yardstick for too long, and tonight, goddamn it, he was determined to be the man. He whirred and clamped his arms around her shoulders and squeezed. It was a move he’d seen the other boys attempt. Helen stumbled backward on her heels.
She shook him off and said softly, “Let’s try that again.”
She anchored his hands to her hips. “Start simple.”
He closed his eyes and inched forward. Her warm breath coated his chin. He felt her hand on his jaw, guiding his mouth to hers. His face stiffened. Her lips tickled the tiny hairs on his lower lip.
“Salty.”
“Loose lips,” she said, and squeezed his cheeks in three quick bursts.
Will craned his head back to get a look at her. “How do you know so much?”
Helen slipped her hand behind his head and pulled his face to hers. “Looser,” she intoned from deep in her throat. Girls’ lips are spun from silk—Ray had told him that earlier that summer at the beach in Westport. He opened his eyes to see if anyone was watching, but gray smoke enveloped the beach. Helen clutched his coat, crunching the cotton lapels between her hands. He heard a soft cry. Was she weeping? He couldn’t be sure. Was he ? He moaned, and she squeezed the lapels tighter. The orchestra began the last set. The smoke thinned down the length of the beach; other couples were going through the same awkward motions. He saw a boy skate his fingers up and down his girl’s back. Will unmoored his right hand from her hip and gently stroked Helen’s hair. When she didn’t recoil, he pulled the pins from the French twist, setting her hair free down her back. Will closed his eyes, surrendering to the weightlessness of the moment.
Helen broke the spell.
“Must”—she panted—“breathe.” They doubled over, catching their breath. Will stood wide-eyed, thinking Helen’s smile could power half the mills in Fall River.
“Pretty proud of yourself, aren’t ya, Will Bartlett?” Helen blushed. She kicked sand on him. “I’ve been waiting.”
“And?”
“Not too bad.”
“Not bad? I was great,” he said, raising his eyebrows.
“Race you back?” Helen lifted her dress and darted across the dry sand. Will stumbled behind laughing, stopping only to scoop their shoes off the seawall.
part iv
1918
wounds old & new
victory arch
First Lieutenant Hollister Bartlett crouched in the trench, sucking a long, hot drag. It was a Hun butt taken from a pack of Prinz Heinrichs he’d pilfered from the breast pocket of a dead German hung out in no-man’s land. The tobacco was poor, like most Hun supplies at this stage of the war and unlike the comfort of his beloved Chesterfields, but fresh smokes were scarce as the operation moved into its seventh day. Still, the nicotine calmed his nerves before going over the wall. The trench was littered with tin cans, spades, cracked stocks and barrels from discarded Springfields, but no other doughboys. Etched initials and farewells to sweethearts and parents were carved into the wooden supports. To avoid frontal assaults across no-man’s land into waiting German machine guns, and perhaps survive the war, Hollister had volunteered for reconnaissance. But his job in Europe’s damn war—more important than repelling the Hun from French soil—was getting home alive. Not to Fall River—hell no—but back to Commandant Blunt and a job teaching warfare at White Mountain. Working alone increased the odds of survival.
It had rained the night before, and a shallow puddle inched over the heel of Hollister’s leather boot. Down the tunnel, he heard squeaking—probably rats gnawing on chunks of flesh blasted into the muddy walls. Frogs croaked in a nearby riverbed, and the guns in Bouresches, where the Marines were mopping up their victory and turning back another German offensive, shook the earth to the east. In the rush to get there, the American brass had passed by the artillery and machine gun nests in Belleau Wood that had not succumbed to the artillery barrage from the fifty batteries pounding the dense growth of trees. Hollister’s mission was to find the tiny forts that the Germans had carved in the rocky strongholds of the oak forest and diagram their whereabouts in the gullies and underbrush for the next round of bombardment. After the howitzers had devastated the forest, the drawings would pass to Fourth Brigade Commander James Harbord to plan the next frontal assault. Hollister was tapped for the mission because he was the best. The French were pushing the Americans hard—Paris was fifty miles to the east. And yesterday, June 6, 1918, had been the worst day of casualties in the history of the Marine Corps.
Hollister licked his fingers and extinguished the cigarette. He stowed the remaining stub for his return to the trench. It had become his ritual. A small reward for another mission accomplished, and the only thing he felt he had going for him. He wedged his boot between two planks supporting the wall and popped his head over the embankment; he turned his ear toward the wood. After a few minutes, he climbed up on the parapet, then tumbled forward quickly so he wouldn’t be silhouetted against the first traces of moonlight. He crawled forward through a decimated wheat field and lay on his stomach in a deep shell hole, listening for German voices. He peeked over the edge of the crater, hoping to glimpse a burning Prinz Heinrich. Three hundred yards from the black mass of forest, all he could hear were the owls.
Hollister traveled light; he carried lea
d pencils and a writing tablet in a cloth wrap, plus his well-oiled Colt, bayonet, gas mask, and two bombs in his pockets in case he chanced close enough to destroy one of the forts. His heightened senses registered each rock and stick jabbing into his torso and knees, even the bead of sweat rolling down the black polish covering his face. He’d learned to control his nerves, but his possible discovery by Hun machine gunners hidden in brush piles or snipers perched in treetops ate a hole in his stomach. Each sound was amplified, but his experience helped him differentiate between a hare darting down a hole and a German’s heel dragging across the forest carpet.
He waited ten minutes in the crater and then advanced on his belly to the next one, zigzagging a path behind enemy lines. His long, wiry limbs snaked beneath or between the barbwire enforcements the Germans had haphazardly assembled in their retreat to the woods, though much of the line had been destroyed by American bombs. Closer, he encountered abandoned trenches and mortar positions. What little breeze there was carried with it the sweet smell of blooming lilac. He stopped every few feet to listen. On the rim of a large hole he stopped. Across the pit two German jackboots stood upright in the soggy mud with a soldier’s feet and brown corduroy trousers snug inside, but missing the boot’s owner above knee; the remaining flesh and bone, ragged like a torn loaf of bread. A blackened steel helmet lay upside down beside the boots. Rainwater collected in the bucket. Hollister swallowed the bile collecting at the back of his throat and rolled down an embankment out of the heart of the field and into a damp creek bed, hoping the frogs would drown out his advance.
After another hundred yards he reached the edge of the wood. He stopped and put an ear to the air. German voices. He undid his kit in a dry clearing beside the creek. The frogs had quieted, the owls too. He’d traced the area before setting out and quickly recalibrated his bearings by touch, finding the blotches of wax he’d melted onto the map. The Germans were holed up in a clump of woods covering a knoll that rose sharply from the wheat field. He’d marked his route, so he had a good idea how far he’d advanced. He jotted down the distance for artillery. Aided by the moonlight, he sketched the locations; he crawled fifty yards forward to the top of a dirt mound and sketched the machine gun nests dug out beneath a boulder.
He heard a German patrol, and he stowed his kit and rolled to the base of the mound. Two—no, three sets of feet. He smelled burning tobacco and heard the soft rap of a canteen against a hip. Hollister slipped his bayonet noiselessly from its leather scabbard and raised the Colt, hoping the men would change course and pass by unaware.
He fired when the first set of boots hit the top of the mound. The German’s head snapped back as the slug split open his forehead. His body crumpled to the ground. The others jumped at the blast. Hollister aimed at the next silhouette on the mound and fired. The shot clipped the man’s right shoulder. His left hand jerked to the wound as the next round found his chest. The force blew him back down the hill. The last man launched himself off the mound, his short spade reflecting the moonlight. Hollister thrust his bayonet in the air, piercing the German’s gut as the spade lopped off the corner of Hollister’s shoulder. Voices called from the woods. The bayonet jutted out the man’s back; he slid down the blade pinning Hollister to the ground. Blood gushed between them, and Hollister wasn’t sure who was dying till the German screamed, his spastic arms batting Hollister’s neck and head. Hollister felt for his Colt. He rammed the barrel into the German’s temple, closed his eyes, and fired. The man’s head snapped left and his body heaped. Hollister pried his left arm free from between their bodies and shoved the dead German into the trampled wheat. He clutched his shoulder. No pain, but blood seeped between his fingers. He bit his lip and pressed the hot metal barrel of the Colt to the wound, hoping to cauterize the blood vessels. Through the ringing in his ears he heard the popping of flare-lights. This surprised him. He had expected to be dead momentarily. But the Germans were cautious, not wanting to shoot their own. Perhaps reserves were low. With his good arm, Hollister threw two hand grenades in the direction of the closest machine gun nest, then secured his gas mask and scurried back to the creek bed as the night sky lit up in red.
Near dawn, a four-man wiring party from Battery F found him on the outskirts of the wheat field, near dead from crawling through the night. He still clutched his kit. The field surgeons at the dressing station in Lucy-le-Bocage removed a slug from his broken right leg and treated the blisters caused by mustard gas, but the poison had entered his bloodstream through the shoulder wound, and by the time he was transferred to England, his vision was failing. He told his friend Michael Murphy that the last thing he remembered was the ripping burst of a machine gun and the cracking sound, not unlike the breaking of an egg, of a gas canister snapping open against the moss-covered rocks lining the creek.
* * *
Joseph received a letter from the army describing Hollister’s wounds in July. The English and American doughboys that survived the field dressing stations in France were shipped across the Channel. Hollister spent weeks with other gassed soldiers recuperating from the mustard-colored blisters that appeared on their neck and arms. And unlike many, his leg had been properly set in Lucy. Many boys had to go through the painful process of having their crooked limbs rebroken and reset in England. His son was alive, Joseph thanked God for that. The papers were vague on details except the naming of the dead. But as he reread the letter in the subsequent days, he couldn’t shake his guilt. He had given up on the boy all those years ago. Joseph feared that when his time came, neither of his boys would remember him fondly. Now he desperately wanted Will to return to Fall River from New Haven. The boy was his only hope. Hollister’s future was unknown, but he’d return a hero. Now that was something.
The second correspondence was postmarked from Dover, but Joseph seriously doubted his boy ever saw the white cliffs. The letter sat in a china bowl on the end table in the breezeway. It was dated August 12. Joseph didn’t recognize the handwriting on the envelope.
Dear Sir,
I am writing on behalf of your son Hollister. We met in the hospital and discovered we are neighbors of a sort. My family lives across the river in Somerset. Hollister is making progress and may be home near the harvest. His leg is mending nicely. He’s had quite a shock; his memory fails at times. He shouts his mother’s name but not much else. Though the doctors believe he will walk soon, there is one other complication. Your boy is losing his sight. That gas is the devil’s work. The eyes are near swollen shut, but he suffered a low concentration. He can see shapes and color in the magazines I fetch him. I will mind him on the sail home.
Sincerely yours,
Lieutenant Michael Murphy
When Mayor Kay heard a slew of wounded boys were returning, he commissioned the construction of an arch in front of city hall. Each wave of returning boys would receive a parade and medals. After a review of the town’s books, it was decided the arch should span Main Street; trolley cars would pass beneath it. The wooden arch was to be covered with plaster and then painted to look like marble.
By the end of September the tide of the war had turned against the Germans. The wire reports published in the Evening Herald described worn-down Hun guns hitting their own troops and American firepower hailing down on badly trained German teenagers, many suffering from starvation, dysentery, and typhus. When Bulgaria signed an armistice the end was near, and the prognosticating mayor set about finding a statue of Winged Victory for the arch’s apex and ordered the Italian artisans to change valiant atop the arch to victory. But the mayor’s monument was behind schedule. Only the wooden understructure was complete when the first wounded soldiers returned.
The city’s mills had done well during wartime, and job rolls swelled. Government contracts flowed like the yarn off a spindle. Cloth to clean big guns and rifles. Cloth for leggings and knapsacks. Cloth for bandages and uniforms. Millions of yards of cheap, coarse cloth meant high dividends and paid taxes. C
loth Joseph had chosen not to manufacture. He doubled his niche in fine cloth and silk but contributed to the mayor’s memorials and parade committees like the rest. As Fall River’s boys boarded a ship for home all the papers sent reporters for the crossing. All the papers ran stories of heroism—Black Jack Pershing had become sort of a folk hero—people had chosen to forget the four hundred thousand killed at Verdun, the horrors of razor wire, mustard gas, daisy cutter artillery, and hand-to-hand fighting in the narrow trenches. The wounded local boys would be the town’s first contact with the fight itself.
the queen of boathouse row
Before Helen arrived, Will stood on the deck watching the orange sunset reflect across the still water of the Westport River. The slack tide temporarily brought the tidal body to a halt, but soon millions of gallons of saltwater would flow in from the Atlantic, raising the wooden boat docks and floating catboats far above the shallow eelgrass where he and Hollister netted fiddler crabs and minnows. The family’s only watercraft, a single-mast beetle cat, sat on its mooring twenty feet off their small dock, which was littered with white seagull poop and bits of crab and lobster shell. The stilt houses lining Boathouse Row were dark, shut up for the winter. Across the channel he spotted a flickering bonfire on Cherry Point. The mild fall weather echoed summer. The water temperature was in the low sixties, spurring talk of a possible hurricane, but nothing came from Buzzards Bay but warm September days and cool nights. The waves gently beat the thick pylons supporting the house. The lighthouse bell at the Point of Rocks, at the mouth of the rocky harbor, rang, and for a moment Will remembered the fun house incident. And now a returning hero. Will shook his head. He had not seen his brother in two years.
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