Touch the Silence

by Gloria Cook

  ‘The other one hurts the most. Feels like it’s been stabbed with a red-hot drill,’ he groaned, turning the chair round. She repeated her ministrations. ‘Still feels like there’s grit in it.’ ‘Put your head on the table.’ He moved again, placing a hand on her waist. She pulled down the lower lid of his eye and saw a particle of grit in the bloodied seepings. ‘You really need a doctor to look at this.’

  ‘I can’t wait till then. Do something, Em.’

  She fetched a clean hanky and, twisting a comer, she used the pointed edge as a lever. Ben winced. ‘Keep still, Ben.’

  ‘I’m trying to. Hurry up, I’m in agony.’

  She repeated the probing. The particle moved. She wiped it out of his eye.

  He yowled like a savage, pushing her away and rubbing at the site of intense pain. Blood-stained tears gushed down his cheek. ‘God in heaven, what did you do to me?’

  ‘Shush, Ben! You’ll wake the others. I’m sorry, it had to be done. Stop rubbing it. Let me bathe it again. It should stop hurting soon.’

  He allowed her to irrigate his eye until the water ran clear. She gave him the hanky to mop his face. Ben was brawnier than most youths his age, but now he seemed small and hunched, wistful and pathetic.

  ‘Oh, Ben, if you find this so terrible, how will you cope in the trenches?’ With compassion and anxiety, she enclosed him in her arms. ‘I’m so sorry, my poor love. I feel awful for neglecting you.’

  Ben clung to her, then moved position so his legs were either side of hers. He dragged her head down and kissed her fiercely. Emilia leaned into him. When he began to move his hands inside the negligée, she allowed him to continue.

  He got up, ignoring the pain in his left eye and the stinging moisture leaking from it. He pulled at the ties of the negligée, and when the glossy material parted he took a close lingering look at her womanly contours, revealed in fine detail in the nightgown. ‘You’re perfect, Em. You’ll get cold here. Let’s slip into the sitting room and cuddle up on the sofa.’

  How she wanted to, but duty and common sense took priority. ‘I must go back to your gran, Ben.’

  ‘I’ll come with you. The couch is large enough for two.’ ‘But your Gran’s in the room. It doesn’t seem right.’

  ‘Even if she wakes, she won’t know what we’re doing. Em, we’re going to get married. It doesn’t matter if we do anything now, you know what I mean…’

  Although Emilia was kept away when the bull served the cows, it was inevitable that she knew what few other girls her age did, the details of the act of physical union. She wouldn’t countenance doing anything of the kind with someone close by. ‘Not now, Ben. We need to talk about it first.’

  He searched her expression. ‘You do want me, Em?’

  ‘Yes, Ben, of course, but it’s not going to be easy to find the right place.’

  ‘You do love me?’

  ‘Yes, I love you.’

  The floorboards in the room overhead creaked, making the dark varnished beams close above Ben’s head seem to press down on them both.

  ‘Bloody Alec,’ Ben swore. ‘Why can’t he rest like normal people?’

  ‘I must go, Ben. He mustn’t see me like this.’ Emilia wrapped the negligée in tight.

  Ben placed a fiercer hold on her. ‘Swear you’ll meet me alone the very first chance we get.’

  His plea reminded her of the old days, when Ben made her and Billy and Honor swear allegiance to him. He took such an undertaking seriously. ‘I swear, Ben. With this woman coming tomorrow, we should get the chance quite soon. Now we must go. I’ll tidy up here in the morning.’

  Thinking if Alec came down he would use the back stairs, she hastened to the front flight, only to be confronted by him halfway in descent, still dressed.

  ‘Is everything all right, Emilia?’ He kept his gaze on her face.

  Feeling exposed and foolish, and guilty, as if she’d been discovered doing something wrong, she looked down at the bottom step. ‘I’ve had to bathe Ben’s eyes. He needs to see the doctor.’

  ‘I’ll see he does. Thank you, Emilia.’ He moved against the banisters so she could pass him by with plenty of space. Then he added, ‘What would we do without you?’

  Chapter Three

  ‘Post for you, sir.’ Billy Rowse beavered into an officer’s dugout, just one tiny section of the miles of trenches of warfare hewn out of the Belgian soil.

  Lieutenant Tristan Harvey glanced up from the official diary where he was filling in the details of the deaths of two of his men, one from sniper fire while inching his way along a communication trench, the other had been buried alive under an avalanche of mud and slime from a shell blast near his position when on stand-to at dawn. These sort of incidents were accounting for as many losses of life among the British Army as its frequent direct assaults on the German front lines. ‘Thank you, Corporal. At ease.’

  Billy handed over a collection of letters. ‘Took eleven days to catch up with us this time, sir. September twenty-fourth, my post’s dated. Not bad, eh? I got a parcel from my mum and dad with a tin of biscuits in it – here, sir.’ Apologetic over his dirty hands, due to the frantic rescue attempt of his dead comrade, the rebuilding of the blasted-out area, and the scarcity of water for washing, he offered Tristan a couple of plain biscuits wrapped inside a used envelope. Tristan thanked him and motioned for him to sit on the camp bed. Billy’s cheery voice grew unsure. ‘And I got a letter from Em. Says she and Ben are courting.’

  Tristan knew what Billy was thinking. Did he approve? ‘Well, good for Ben. I’ve got a letter from him too, bearing the same news, no doubt. I suppose it was inevitable, it’s hard to imagine one without the other. Ben’s always thought himself the strong one, but Emilia could always keep him in line.’

  The dugout shook as an incoming shell exploded only yards away. It was part of German tactics never to allow British troops well back from their front lines any peace. Particles of earth and clay rained down over the two men and the field furnishings. Candle flames flickered and Tristan shot up a hand to steady the lantern hanging near his head. Both men snatched at their breath. Although used to the constant boom-boom-boom of enemy and friendly artillery, its significance today made them particularly tense. It was the start of another ‘big push’, and short hours ago, along the front lines the battle order had been given, the whistles had blown. Men just like themselves, perhaps men from another section of the ‘Shiny Sixth’, of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, attached to the 14th Infantry Brigade, had joined soldiers of the many other battalions in the offensive to capture the Passchendaele ridge. Somewhere out there thousands of ordinary men like them had and were sacrificing their lives. A fact. Another fact, one they accepted, was that their turn to make a direct assault would come.

  The two men shut out the thought that either, or both of them, were likely soon to become the subject of a sorrowful letter or a black-edged telegram. Fighting the ravages of cold, the lice and the rats, the need to somehow keep dry in the infernal, never-ending rain, and the aching loneliness of separation from their loved ones, was enough for their minds to dwell on. Right now, they were glad to be in this pseudo-shelter, out of the bone-shivering, skin-withering, teeming rain.

  Yesterday had been a rest day in their billet two miles away, the cellar of a cafe for Billy, one of its small basic bedrooms for Tristan, and they were now a little energized. When not on trench duty, they trained in mock battle, practising with live ammunition, so were feeling some confidence about their ability to fight.

  Billy was tapping his fingers on his knees and banging his heels together. A constant fidgeter, short, agile and boyish, able to nip anywhere with stealth, he had earned his nickname, Nipper, from his training days. A ready volunteer, he had told Tristan on the first day of their arrival here that he felt up to anything thanks to his childhood games with Ben, and later, he had said thinking of those times was helping him get through the daily miseries.

  It had been Billy’s deter
mination and trustworthiness, rather than any residual notion of boyhood bravado, that had made Tristan take him along on an intelligence-gathering mission and, on another occasion, send him out with three privates to capture a shell crater in no man’s land, a small but important advancement towards enemy lines. Any time now he expected Billy, on his recommendation, to be promoted to sergeant.

  ‘Mr Harvey won’t mind, Em being a dairymaid?’ Billy asked, watching his superior anxiously, although he had never known him to look down on anyone.

  ‘Definitely not. From Ben’s letters to me, Emilia has been a mainstay on the farm for quite some time.’ Tristan lit a cigarette, hungry for the nicotine. He shared his brothers’ dark colouring and grey eyes, but wasn’t handsome like Ben, or impressive in stature like Alec. Tristan was hushed and simplistic, and this despite the necessary adaptation of having to scrub out his own worries, and his hopes and memories of comfort. His calm made men of all ranks seek his company and his counsel, to help dispel, among the usual fears of death and mutilation, that their personalities had not yet been swallowed up for ever. ‘You’d have to go a long way to find someone with as much strength of character as your sister. I remember her skidding across the yard as a little girl, skinning her forearms until the blood ran, and she got up and carried on as if nothing had happened.’

  ‘All the blokes want to meet her.’ Billy took a family photograph, taken in a Truro studio prior to his embarkation, out of the few personal effects in his tunic. He gazed in awe at his sister’s image. Emilia had dressed up for the occasion, demure and poised in the obligatory manner, yet smiling her warm, restive smile. ‘I don’t really know how to explain about Em sometimes. She’s always made me feel safe, like she can make everything wherever she is all right.’

  A sudden cheer went up outside. ‘One of ours,’ Billy glanced up at the claustrophobic roofing, referring to an aeroplane outside of the Royal Flying Corps. ‘Hope he hits the right spot.’

  Tristan was pondering Billy’s description. Safe? When was the last time he had heard that word? Emilia Rowse was hardworking and loyal, and passionate where her affections lay – the qualities of a good wife. He turned over the letter in his hands that bore his wife’s writing. Would it contain mostly information about Jonathan, and while expressing her hopes for his safety, as for a time long standing, not a single loving message from herself? Where had all her devotion for him gone? His letters to Ben and Alec seeking reassurance about Ursula had been met with just that, reassurance, mentioning that she was living quietly and they were looking after her, but he remained unconvinced. Alec had always been protective towards his younger brothers and might have dictated that Ben write what he thought was best for a man facing combat daily.

  Billy sprang up. He had lingered long enough. The lieutenant’s batman soon would be bringing in his lunch. ‘I got a letter from Honor Burrows too, sir. She supports everyone she knows by keeping in touch, but I’m hoping she’s a bit sweet on me.’ When he stepped outside, his bashful expression changed into one of tight resignation while he tied his rubber groundsheet over his shoulders for added protection against the pitiless weather.

  A chill spread all the way through Tristan as he recognized an ominously familiar rustle. A huge rat leapt on to his desk and dashed towards the biscuits Billy had given him. ‘Bastard!’ Crashing down his fist, Tristan crushed the thief’s head with one blow.

  Leaping up in disgust, he flung the dark-brown corpse outside by its long, tapering tail. He was used to rats on the farm, but the home-bred variety were docile in comparison to the evil-looking creatures he came across here. They were too used to gorging on dead horseflesh – and fallen soldiers, even those who were alive and wounded if they didn’t have the strength to fight them off.

  The rat lay on the mud-lagged duckboard. Feeling sick, Tristan washed off his bloodied hand with drinking water from an old petrol can; to do so in one of the pools of death-contaminated water was a sure way to disease. A huddle of men, lined up with mess tins for their helping of bread, and offal, potatoes and onions cooked over a wire grid, were grinning at the spectacle that had suddenly broken the awful tension.

  ‘Well done, sir. He was a particularly big bugger,’ a private said, whipping out a pencil and scrap of paper from somewhere. Private Leslie Jory, a muscular, redheaded builder’s mate, the section joker and the most accomplished maker of foul oaths, led the huddle into whispers.

  ‘Are you writing a book, Jory?’ Tristan said, the smell of food making his guts agitate further.

  Private Jory stood to attention. ‘Sir?’

  Tristan glared at the mangled corpse. ‘Put my name down, five bob says the rat’s every bit of fifteen inches.’

  ‘Yes, sir!’

  Tristan returned to the dugout to murmurs of him being, ‘A bloody good bloke.’ ‘The best.’ ‘Nothing’s left of that rat’s skull. God help the Fritz what he gets his hands on.’ Drinking the tea but ignoring the meal brought into him, Tristan finished his report. He put aside the letter from Ursula, not wanting to become depressed by the expected lack of her affection. Then he opened it, needing to hear news about his son. The letter was headed by the address of Ford House, the property, the only legacy, left him by his father. Ursula had never complained about living there in the disparaging way Lucy had about the farm. Ursula had rarely complained about anything, but he had always known she preferred town life and had moved in with her parents at the end of each of his leaves. Her explanation for remaining home after his last leave, thirteen months ago, had been that she no longer got along with her mother; not unlikely, her mother was a sharp-tongued, uncompromising snob.

  The letter was all about Jonathan, ending with, ‘Your loving wife, Ursula.’ Loving? Not measured against their romantic courtship and the early passion they had shared as husband and wife.

  Ben’s letter, enthusiastically prosed, contained the news about his newfound love for Emilia. What was Ben thinking of, forming a romantic attachment when he’d soon be leaving home to learn how to fight? What was Alec thinking of by allowing it? But after their father’s early death from cancer, Alec had been a quiet guide rather than a disapproving father figure to Ben. The letter went on to say they were still finding it a struggle at the farm. Damn your jealousy over that scullery maid, Lucy Harvey! Tristan’s thoughts were savage. It was you who couldn’t get enough sex, not Alec. Sex – the lack of it – surely that wasn’t what was the matter with Ursula? He couldn’t bear to think about it any more.

  There was a kind letter from the rector. The final envelope bore an unfamiliar hand. There was no return address given. Tristan studied the postmark. Truro. It read:

  Dear Lieutenant Harvey,

  I’m sorry to have to inform you of this but I have the impression your brothers have not written to you about the appalling fact that your wife has been having an illicit affair for several months. It’s with a man called Bruce Ashley. Your wife met him in the mayor’s chamber during a function to raise funds for the war. Ashley is a hanger- on, one of those fellows with good looks who turn up out of nowhere and who prey on lonely or gullible women.

  Tristan read no more, except to look for a signature. ‘From a well-wisher.’ He believed every word of the insidious, heartless communication. He had the reason for Ursula’s coolness. Unfaithfulness. She had fallen out of love with him and attached herself to another man. While she hadn’t been cold or unresponsive towards him during his last leave, she had been unsettled, anxious and lonely. Ripe to be swept away by some handsome lounge lizard.

  He had to get back home immediately! But it was impossible. There were at least a dozen other men higher than him on the list for leave. There was nothing he could do about his marriage; he was helpless here so far away. He could write to Ursula, but it was unlikely to be of any use if she was in love with this man. He was plunged into his worst nightmare: not dying or being horrifically injured or becoming insane, but of losing the woman he had thought of as his lifeblood.

/>   He had experienced many horrors and fears in this war, but he had never hated the enemy. Now his sense of rejection made him hate with a force he would never have thought possible. He hated the man who had stolen his wife, desecrated his family, possibly his home, the reasons that had kept him hoping to survive and look towards a new future. Hate, and the desire for retribution seeped into his soul and for one terrible moment it took him over completely. Ursula had cast him off, and while part of him was desperate to win her back, another part of him wanted to retaliate in kind. Leave me and be damned! But if she did, he might lose Jonny for ever too. And if this Bruce Ashley bastard character deserted them, what would happen to them?

  Rent by worry, grief, hurt and anger, he tore the letter to shreds. He took refuge in fury. Fury against the ‘well-wisher’. Fury against the war. But he forced himself to dissolve it. He had to, for the sake of the men under his command, when at any moment they might have to face the greatest danger. Ben’s and Alec’s silence on the matter? Right or wrong of them? He’d think about that later, when the despair in his soul had dissipated a little. He clung to the hope of Alec’s protective nature.

  The field telephone rang. Burying his emotions, he listened to the colonel’s voice and filled in a different page of the war diary. He took a moment to empty his mind, he would not allow others to bear the cost of his distress. Then he put on his greatcoat and peaked cap and went outside under the sadistic grey emptying skies and called the NCOs, including Billy Rowse, together.

  ‘Tell the men that when darkness begins to fall we’ll be moving up to the first line. This is it. We’ll be leading the assault on the German positions tomorrow morning.’