So Little Time

by John P. Marquand

  If you were used to it, you did not sleep so badly, either. Sometimes you could hear the gunfire, but you hardly noticed. It seemed to Jeffrey that his dreams were always happy, if he dreamed. Then the orderly would shake him and tell him it was four o’clock, sir, and no one made much noise, so as not to disturb those who were not going. Then you would hear the motors warming up on the field. There was hot water to shave with, unless you wanted to put off shaving until later, and there was toast and coffee at the mess table. You could get your real breakfast later, and everyone was a little distrait, perhaps, but very thoughtful of everyone else, and there was talk about the weather and a conscious effort to be very sure that everyone had the sugar and the evaporated milk. If you were casual, you might suggest doing something that afternoon, but you seldom did. If you stopped to think of it, the coffee tasted very good, except that sometimes there was a bitter taste of bile in your mouth as you walked out of the shack across the dusky field. That feeling of not having much time was always gone for the moment. There was no time at all now, since you were face to face with something that was very close to zero. You might wonder why you were there, but there was a great deal else to think about—whether it would be worth while to take a pistol or a cake of chocolate or some chewing gum, whether you should have written a letter last night. Still, it was over quickly. It was all right when the motors were going. When you started moving, you did not give a damn, for there never had been anything like it again—the clouds and the road and the lines and all the world unrolling like a map.

  It was only when you were back on the field, when you knew that all of the others would not come back, that the old realization was waiting for you. You were through with it for this time, but something was waiting to call your number, something as implacable, as unfathomable as the blueness of the sky. You could not go on with that sort of thing forever. You did not have much time.

  It was possible to treat the disappearance and death of others not callously, but calmly, even if someone of whom you were very fond had gone. There was no particular impression of shock or of bereavement. You were only sorry for him because his time was up. There was no point in wondering what he might have become if he had lived through it, because it was best to dismiss the idea that anyone would live through it. In spite of any sort of hope, or any individual belief that you would never get it, common sense and the law of averages told you that you would. Your conceivable future stretched to a matter of weeks, and not much further, and yet this was something to which you could adjust yourself, because everyone was in the same box with you. That mutual impermanence built up a relationship which was hard to explain, if you had not experienced it. There was a universal courtesy and kindliness. You never cared what you had been before, since what there was in you that amounted to anything came out very quickly. Jeffrey had never known his capabilities and perhaps he never would have known them, until he faced that experience. As it was, he saw that he had a mental equipment as good as anybody’s there. He was no longer shy, no longer impressed, because there was not much time.

  When they came back and ordered coffee, they would look at each other inquiringly, like old friends who were surprised at the coincidence which had allowed them all to meet again. Jeffrey could remember how Minot Roberts would give his head a little shake when he finished his coffee. His hair was done in a crew cut. His eyes were dark and deep-set and his mouth was very firm, and he and Stan Rhett were always having a wonderful time. They had been made for that sort of thing, but they understood how important it was to live as long as they could. He could remember how Minot would pull out his gold cigarette case, and there was no doubt that it was solid gold and so were the backs of the military brushes in his toilet kit. Money was a detail then, because they did not have much time.

  “All right,” he heard Minot call, “let’s go.”

  Those were the days when the Squadron car was ready, and Minot wore his broadcloth breeches which were not strictly regulation, and his whipcord tunic, and all their belts were polished.

  “All right, boys, let’s go.” He could still hear Minot calling. When you only had two days’ leave, you did not have much time.

  “Montmartre … A suite at the Crillon … the Bois … the Dôme … Voisin … Foyot … Rue du Brais … Let’s go.” He could still hear Minot calling out the names. You had to see all you could.

  “Come on,” he could hear Minot calling to him on mornings after. “Take a pull of this.” He could hear Stan Rhett splashing in the bathtub. Stan Rhett was always bathing.

  “Take it down.” He could still hear the urgency in Minot’s voice, and Minot was handing him a tumbler of brandy. “It’s ten o’clock. Let’s go.”

  There was no use sleeping when you were on leave. You did not have the time. He could remember the Place de la Concorde and the bridges, the Left Bank and the shop windows, crisscrossed with paper in case of bombing, and all the girls smiling. He felt that old desire to see it all and drink it all.

  The insistence of that past was drumming in Jeffrey’s pulses—that old belief that he might never drink again or love again, that he must explore what there was to living because he did not have much time. He had not realized how far he had been carried away, until the past of which he had been thinking and the present seemed to draw together like the converging of light rays through a strong but eccentric lens. It was as though he were trying to read through someone else’s glasses. He was under the tree with the map case on his knees. He was no longer young and misbehaving in Paris. The recollection was receding somewhere into the shadows in his mind where it had stayed for years and where it should have stayed. His son Charley had emerged from the side door and was walking toward him again, kicking at the blue gravel of the path. All the minor irritations of living were back again. If Charley went on kicking gravel onto the grass, it would dent the lawn mower and then the lawn mower would have to be carried in the station wagon downtown for an old man named Mr. Sykes to sharpen.… Somehow extreme old age and a bad disposition went with sharpening lawn mowers. If Charley kept on kicking the stones, he would ruin the toes of those shoes of his, known to the trade as “Moccashoes.” It made Jeffrey think that someone always had a name for everything. Charley was eating a piece of bread and jam, and his face was dirty.

  “Hey,” Charley said, “when is Mums coming back?”

  Jeffrey wished that Charley would not refer to his mother as “Mums,” instead of “Ma” or “Mama.” When he referred to her as “Mums,” it made Charley incomprehensible again, a part of the new juvenile jingles to which Jeffrey could not adjust himself, or like a picture in a department-store advertisement, which stated that the emporium had a corner for little tots and bigger tots.

  “She’ll be back in about half an hour,” Jeffrey told him. He felt abused because Madge had told him distinctly that he need not do anything about Charley while she was away—that Charley could look out for himself—but Charley still stood there watching him, eating his bread and jam.

  “Hey,” Charley said.

  “Yes,” Jeffrey answered. “Yes, what is it?” Charley was looking at the map case; at first Jeffrey thought that Charley would want to play with it, but he did not.

  “When you fought the Germans, did you hate the Germans?”

  “What?” Jeffrey asked him, and Charley repeated the question. It was much too precocious a question for a boy of Charley’s age to have asked. Jeffrey wondered how it had ever got into Charley’s mind, and then he realized that, of course, it had come from the progressive school, where children now discussed such problems. He recalled that Charley had participated in a pageant there dealing with the fallacies of war and the beauties of peace. Jeffrey could see himself, before he answered, through his son’s eyes as an incomprehensible and rather a grim human being. He realized that he had never asked himself that question. They had all been there in the Squadron for a definite purpose. There had been no rancor, but there had been instinct.

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p; He lifted the map case from his knees, put the papers back, and snapped it shut.

  “Take this back and hang it up where you found it,” Jeffrey said, but Charley asked him another question.

  “Did you ever kill a German?” Charley asked him.

  Jeffrey frowned at Charley. Somehow it was like endeavoring to explain the principles of procreation; in order to answer Charley’s question, it would be necessary to give a number of specious explanations.

  “Yes,” he said, “I did.”

  “What with?” Charley asked.

  “What with?” Jeffrey repeated. “Never mind it, Charley.”

  Jeffrey moved uneasily in his chair. Charley’s interrogation was impersonal and almost disinterested, but as lucid as some line from Wordsworth. He had never dreamed that Charley could put him in a position where he would be so completely uncomfortable.

  “Did he make a noise?” Charley asked.

  “What?” Jeffrey said. “Did who make a noise?”

  “When you killed him,” Charley asked again, “did he make a noise?”

  Jeffrey pushed the map case at him.

  “Never mind about it now,” he said. “You take this back where you found it.”

  Charley took the map case, but he did not move away.

  “Were you sorry?” Charley asked.

  “What?” Jeffrey asked him.

  “Sorry when you killed him?” Charley asked.

  There was no use being impatient with a child.

  “Put that thing away where you found it, Charley,” Jeffrey said, “and don’t come back here to disturb me. I’m busy.”

  Charley went away again. Jeffrey could see the striped back of his sweater as he moved slowly toward the house, still kicking at the gravel, but even when he was gone, something uncomfortable moved in Jeffrey’s mind. If human beings were sorry enough, if such actions shocked them sufficiently, there would be no war, but all that it had meant to Jeffrey was the solution to a problem. In war, killing was the natural reflex of training, coupled with an instinct for survival.

  Just the summer before—that was in 1934—he and Madge had taken a trip to Germany. Madge had gone there once to some watering place with her Fräulein as a little girl, and she always had wanted to see Germany again. Jeffrey had never been there. He had wanted to sail on a French or British ship as he always had when going abroad, but Madge had wanted to go on the Bremen. She had told him that the Germans were marvelous with ships. There were all sorts of things in the shop on the Bremen—beautiful cameras and fountain pens that always worked. It had been a fine ship, and they had sat at the Captain’s table, but when they had stopped at Cherbourg, he had wanted to get off. Though he had been comfortable, he had not liked it. The stewards had all looked alike—clear skin, pale eyes, close-cropped hair—but then, English stewards, and French stewards, had always looked alike. They had been completely courteous, absolutely understanding. The Purser had explained to him carefully about travel-marks, which visitors could buy at a lower rate, but Jeffrey had never been able to get the system through his head.

  The Captain had asked them to his quarters for cocktails—that sailor’s duty foisted upon captains by steamship agents. The Captain’s quarters had been carefully arranged, giving an impression of unnaturally elaborate hospitality. The Captain himself was as jolly as a cruise director, and so were the junior officers, all heavy, capable men. It was easy to see that they were all going through a perfunctory ceremony which had been ordered for every trip, but somehow Jeffrey could not be sorry for the Captain, as he was sometimes for unfortunate French and British commanders in similar circumstances. It was all done too well and too efficiently. He and the other passengers were being pushed through the party, whether they wanted it or not, yet Madge had said that the party and the officers were cunning. She had said it all showed the inherent lovable quality possessed by the Germans, like Christmas trees and Grimm’s fairy tales. She had asked Jeffrey if he had not loved the way the Captain had laughed and said “Ach,” but Jeffrey had not loved it. He had not loved it, either, when the Captain slapped him on the shoulder and asked him if he did not like a ship where there were so few Jews, and laughed again and said “Ach.” Jeffrey had not liked it when the Captain said he would be comfortable in Germany; they were all one race together and they should be friends. He had not wished to seem hostile. The war had been over long ago, but he was not at ease. He felt that he should not have been there, and he had felt the same way when he had seen the German shore. Madge had asked him to look at the soldiers on the dock—they looked like toys. Nevertheless, the sight of them gave him a strange sensation. The trouble was that he could not get it into his mind that the war was over, now that he was in Germany.

  Madge had said that he had simply made up his mind not to like Germany, that he acted with all those people as though there were still a war with Germany, when the war had been over for more than fifteen years. He could not understand the language—he did not wish to—and the people who spoke English, the waiters and the guides and concierges, would never speak frankly, though they told of the efficient beauties of their country. He felt they were not at ease with him and that they did not like him. When he had motored with Madge from Bremen through Hamburg to Berlin, he was impressed by the steely neatness of the countryside—trees growing just so on every hill, fields plowed in meticulous, even furrows. Nature was completely subjugated, too, in England and France, but not with such relentlessness. Jeffrey found himself being on the side of weeds and cutworms, wishing that he might observe some blight or other agricultural misfortune. The Teutonic faces seemed to him neither happy nor unhappy, the expressions ironed-out and masklike.

  Although the sun was out and the weather settled, he could not like Berlin with its endless parks and statues. The restaurants were modernistic and garish and the public buildings dull. When he went to that museum which housed an entire marble temple brought from somewhere in Asia Minor, the women with their tightly knotted hair and the men with their bristly heads, walking conscientiously up and down the steps reading from their guidebooks, gave him a sense of indignant revulsion. He felt they had no right to possess such an antiquity, and yet he had never felt that way about the Elgin Marbles in the British Museum, a much more bare-faced piece of appropriation. It did no good to tell himself that he should not dislike those people because there had been a war, for there remained an ingrained instinct which he could not conquer. When they changed their money at the frontier and he eventually heard Italian voices, he knew that he never wanted to go to Germany again. He did not like the Germans, and that was all there was to it. He could try, but he could not like them because he had learned to hate them once.

  Now that his mind was on Europe, he recalled an earlier visit which he and Madge had made. It must have been in the summer of 1926, that he and Madge had left the children and gone to France, and Madge had wanted to see the battlefields, so they had rented a car in Paris and had motored through Château-Thierry to Verdun. The country around Château-Thierry already looked as though nothing had ever happened to it. The red-tiled roofs were back on the houses and the farms had risen again out of their rabble. It was only on the heights around Verdun that any trace of the war was left. The soil of Dead Man’s Hill and of Hill 302 had been so churned by shellfire that no one had tried to touch it or fill in the remains of caving trench systems and dank pools of stagnant rain water. The French Government was constructing the Voie Sacrée that year, and there was a hideous concrete shelter over the Trench of Bayonets, beneath which the bayonets of the dead still rose above the ground. Some laborers near by were still raking through the rubbish, resurrecting human bones for burial, placing those bones in heaps beside the road. Madge had walked beside him, speaking occasionally, in a voice which was only intelligently curious. At first this made him surprised and indignant—until he realized that she could not notice as much as he did. A young soldier, too young to have been in the war, took them through Fort Vaux a
nd explained in a parrotlike way the methods of defense in the battle of Verdun. Madge had listened carefully, as she always did, because she always wanted to see everything and to get the most out of everything when she traveled, particularly out of churches and picture galleries. As far as he could see, Madge looked upon that ruined fort as another sort of church. He could almost imagine her looking for the nave and the apse. When they emerged from the fort and stood looking toward the north, Madge had spoken to the French soldier in her fluent and precise French—Madge was always good at languages.

  “But the Boches,” he remembered Madge saying, “will never come again.”

  He should never have taken her to such a place. He wished that Madge had not been so fluent and that she had not called them “Boches.” He still remembered the soldier’s answer. The boy had obviously been taken from some farm to do his military duty, and his uniform did not fit him. The sleeves of his tunic were too short, and the cloth looked shoddy. The blue spiral puttees were frayed. The boy had an unintelligent dish face with high cheekbones. He was enrhumé and not possessing a handkerchief, he occasionally wiped his nose on his sleeve. He did so while Madge spoke about the Boches.

  “But yes, madame,” he said, “they will certainly come again.”