So Much Life Left Over

by Louis de Bernières

‘Oh, Archie,’ said Daniel, ‘how can you live like this? In this…’

  ‘Squalor?’

  ‘Yes, this squalor.’

  ‘No choice, old boy. No money. Pension doesn’t stretch. Damned Geddes did for me. What does an old soldier do? I’m buggered, old boy.’

  ‘You can’t live like this,’ said Daniel. ‘It’s not on. You’re in a slum.’

  ‘I’m good for nothing,’ said Archie. ‘What am I good for? Can’t start a business. No one’ll lend me a sou. Damned duffer at school, can’t be a master. Might as well stick to being a sweeper. Only thing I’m fit for.’

  ‘You were very good at Latin and Greek at Westminster, and you speak half a dozen Indian languages. You could teach French, for God’s sake! There must be something.’

  ‘Rien du tout,’ replied Archie. ‘Tried all the local prep schools. Nothing doing. I’m buggered.’

  ‘There must be lots of people who would want private tuition. Archie, you’ve got to pull yourself together! Isn’t it freezing here in winter?’

  ‘Perishing. The water runs down the walls. Not as bad as the Kush, though. Got to keep things in perspective.’

  ‘Where’s the thunderbox?’

  ‘Backyard. Have to go out the front and round the back. Not much fun. It’s damned sordid and there’s always someone in there shitting their heart out. Feel dreadfully sorry for the children. Grimy little buggers, hearts of gold though.’

  ‘We’re going out to lunch,’ said Daniel. ‘I’ve got bugger all as well, so let’s go out and spend it.’

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ said Archie.

  In the Palace Hotel, Daniel watched as Archie tucked away an immense plate of ox liver and gravy with mashed potatoes and cabbage. He had plainly not eaten properly for a very long time. He felt saddened beyond measure by what time had done to his brother, a man who had been athletic and splendid, heroic and indomitable. Archie was now a starving drunk who had been repaid for his service to the Empire with penury and neglect.

  ‘I’m going to get you away from here,’ said Daniel, as his brother wiped his lips with a napkin. Daniel noticed that Archie’s hands were trembling rhythmically.

  ‘Wish you would, old boy,’ said Archie. ‘ ’Fraid it probably can’t be done.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ replied Daniel. ‘You weren’t born to live like this.’

  ‘How’s Rosie?’ asked Archie. ‘And the children?’

  ‘Rosie does everything she can to make sure I never see the children. And she refuses to give me a divorce. I hardly know how the children are.’

  ‘Must be dreadful. Did you say you want to get divorced?’

  ‘Desperately. I’m trapped, completely trapped. I can’t possibly be a bigamist, and I haven’t yet met a woman who wants to live in sin forever.

  Archie seemed to perk up. His hands trembled a little more, and his eyes lost some of their alcoholic dullness.

  ‘It’s vile,’ said Daniel. ‘Every time I arrange to come and take the children out there’s a new excuse. They’re too tired or they’ve got a cold or it isn’t convenient, or it’s raining so I can’t take them away in the combination, and no, I can’t come in, or even that they don’t want to see me. It’s all piffle. And what can I do? Argue on the doorstep? Thrust my way in? Sometimes I come all the way from Nottingham and then have to go back again without seeing them, and Rosie says, “You haven’t sent us any money recently.” Bloody cheek! She wants me to pay her for kidnapping them? It makes my blood boil! And when I do send a cheque she doesn’t cash it, just to show that she doesn’t need me. And then when I’m leaving, I look up at the window and I see little Esther, waving to me. I’ve lost Bertie, I know it. I’m their legal guardian, and yet I am completely powerless unless I take them away from her altogether.’

  ‘I do dislike it when you speak badly of Rosie,’ said Archie.

  Daniel looked at him and said, ‘Archie, I do know, you know. I have always known.’

  ‘ ’Bout what, old boy?’

  ‘Rosie. I know you have always adored her, from when we were boys. Even when she only had eyes for Ash.’

  ‘Don’t want to talk about it, old boy. Not unless I have to. Too much pain.’ He tapped his chest. ‘Gives me a pain. In here.’

  ‘Archie, mon frère, mon pauvre frère, tu dois parler. J’ai déjà tout compris.’

  ‘I can’t,’ replied Archie miserably.

  Daniel gesticulated as if to take in the whole world. ‘You never married, you never even had a flirtation as far as I know. You’ve let yourself go and you’ve given up hope.’

  ‘Just drinking myself to death,’ said Archie honestly. ‘Jusqu’à la mort.’

  ‘Archie, I have to be honest. You must understand. Elle…She is no good as a wife. She has no fire. She’s the only one of the sisters who has no…she may have had it for Ash…she’s…Look, Archie, even if she and I divorced, she wouldn’t marry you, because she doesn’t want what marriage implies. If she did marry you, you would be utterly miserable, because all the affection and tenderness you can give her wouldn’t make any difference. You’d be throwing your heart at the wind. You’d be as miserable as I was. Elle manque la flamme. T’as compris?’

  Archie nodded slowly and put down his fork. He stared at his empty plate, which he had scoured clean with a piece of bread, à la française, and didn’t look up for what must have been at least a minute. Daniel reached over and took his hand across the table. When Archie did look up, he had a tear coursing down each cheek. ‘Néanmoins…even so…’ he said, ‘I can’t do anything. Never thought of another. Jamais. Je ne peux pas. J’suis perdu. Perdu.’ He paused, looked at his brother levelly, and added in his clipped and aristocratic English accent, ‘I am completely snafued and fubared, old boy.’

  He stood up and pushed his chair back. ‘Going out for a minute,’ he said. ‘Blubbing in public. Not very British. Conduct unbecoming.’

  Whilst Archie was out in the yard recovering himself, Daniel reflected that his beloved older brother was two very different people, depending on whether he was being French or British. He knew that he was the same himself.

  When Archie returned, he sat down and said, ‘Got a coffin nail? I’m cleaned out.’

  Daniel reached inside his jacket for his case, and noticed once again the inscription in elegant italics: ‘With fond memories of some jolly decent scraps. Keep Flying. Fluke’. Daniel had given up smoking years before, but he still carried his case with a few cigarettes in it. It was surprising how often someone asked him if he could spare a gasper, and how easy it was to break the ice by offering one. Archie took a cigarette and asked a passing waiter for a light.

  Archie inhaled the smoke deeply. ‘Did you know,’ he said, ‘that if you buy your own papers you can roll one new cigarette out of the butts of ten old ones?’

  ‘Sounds pretty desperate,’ said Daniel.

  ‘I’m living like a tramp, un vrai clochard,’ said Archie, looking directly at his brother. ‘Do you know what I want? What I really want?’

  ‘Apart from Rosie?’

  ‘Yes, apart from Rosie. I want to go back to Peshawar. I was happy there. I loved it. I want to go back to Peshawar, even though it’s too damned hot and full of assassins. I want to live there and die there and be buried there.’

  ‘You should have married Ottilie. She was very sweet on you. She always asks after you. You missed a good chance. You could have been happy with her. She’s a sweet girl.’

  ‘I could give you similar advice,’ answered Archie. ‘You married the wrong woman, didn’t you?’

  ‘I didn’t have anyone else who was sweet on me,’ said Daniel.

  He flipped open his cigarette case and gave the few that were left to his brother, sliding them into his breast pocket.

  ‘I’ve got a plan,’ he said. ‘I’m going to take two weeks of
f. I’m sure I can swing it. Business is very slow, and I’ve been working my socks off. I’m going to take you to France.’

  ‘Oh, mon brave,’ said Archie, his face lighting up. ‘Do let’s go to Saumur.’

  ‘And Limoges.’

  ‘In Limoges we will eat magret de canard.’

  ‘We will eat tripe in Caen and snails in Poitiers!’

  ‘Tally-ho! Let’s drink a toast!’

  They raised their glasses, chinked them together, and said, ‘Santé!’

  ‘Fraternité!’ proposed Daniel, and they drank again.

  On the way back to Archie’s hovel they passed a small shop selling toys and sports equipment, and Daniel went in and bought a three-quarter-size football. He tucked it under his arm and found the little boy still kicking his ruined ball against the wall, with his baby sister in his arms. ‘Have you been kicking that ball all this time?’ asked Daniel.

  ‘No, mister. We’ve been sitting in your sidecar, mostly. It’s nice and cosy, that is.’

  ‘Well, here’s your shilling.’ Daniel held out the coin, and the little boy took it eagerly. He bit into it and grimaced.

  ‘It is real,’ said Daniel, ‘and I’m not sure that the biting test is any good.’

  ‘It works for me, mister,’ said the child.

  ‘If I give you a new football, will you give me the old one for sixpence? I’ll get it mended.’

  The boy looked at him suspiciously. ‘What’s the catch?’

  ‘The catch is that you get a new football and sixpence.’

  ‘Blimey,’ said the boy.

  ‘Blimey indeed,’ said Daniel.

  ‘Can I see the ball, mister?’

  Daniel handed it over. ‘Corks,’ said the urchin, ‘it’s a Comet, three-quarter-size.’

  ‘Take my tip, and don’t ever head it when it’s wet. I did that in a game once, and it nearly took my nut off.’

  ‘Thanks, mister!’

  ‘Can I have your old one for sixpence, then?’

  When the deal had been struck, and the sixpence bitten, Daniel tossed the bulging old ball into his sidecar, and then whispered in the boy’s ear: ‘You ought to play with Archie. He’s wonderful in goal. And he hasn’t got a son to play with.’

  ‘He’s always pissed,’ said the boy in a whisper that was really rather too loud.

  The boy ran indoors with his trophies, and the brothers looked at each other. ‘I’ll be in touch soon,’ said Daniel. ‘We’ve got a trip to organise. I’ll drop you a line or send you a telegram.’

  They stood with nothing further to say, until Daniel broke the silence with ‘Remember what I said. About Rosie.’

  ‘Elle manque la flamme.’

  ‘Tout à fait. She only knows how to create unhappiness. She has the cruelty of saints. Je t’assure.’

  ‘Even so, you know how it is,’ said Archie forlornly. ‘And it really isn’t her fault, you know. Ash getting killed. She’s never got over it. Ça explique, n’est-ce pas? C’est la faute de la guerre. It was the war.’

  ‘I know how it is,’ said Daniel sadly. ‘Of course I understand about Ash. How could I not? We all remember how wonderful he was. But all the same…elle m’a raté la vie. Sans vouloir.’

  This time Archie did not hold out his hand. They embraced and kissed each other’s cheeks.

  On the way home Daniel realised that he didn’t even know whether or not Bertie liked to play football. He tried to quell the rage that welled up inside him so often and so uncontrollably.

  34

  A Letter from Willy and Fritzl

  Kirchenstrasse 104

  Dortmund

  Westfalen

  11 November 1930

  Our dear Captain Daniel Pitt,

  We are you for your recent letter very much thanking. My name is Gretchen Brand, and I am this letter on behalf of Willy and Fritzl writing, because I have good English, and it for them is too difficult. Willy my special friend has become, and this happiness.

  Willy me what to write is telling. He says ‘Good greetings, old comrade’, here Willy is. We all very sorry that life for you shit has become, because of no job and a woman departed. A broken heart and at the same time no job indeed shit is, but all to eat you a kilo of shit before you die, not true?

  Old comrade, Fritzl and I like to invite you again to Germany. Germany not very good, big mess, big politics, too much chaos, too many election, all buggered and scunnered. But to Germany we you invite, because all of us getting too old are becoming, and it twelve years since you us captured did and us saved from being in battle killed. We happy memories of captivity in Scotland. We have still a wee dram in the evening afore bed.

  Still we you for not shooting us down when we helpless were grateful forever are, and we once more to embrace you wish and in our own homeland to honour. We of drinking your health tired are when you not here are.

  We, Willy and Fritzl, a new shop for motorcycle here in Dortmund have begun. We hear of British motorcycle many good things, and we too have very excellent. We, Willy and Fritzl, wish to British here sell, and in England our good German. A swap!

  Also we will maintenance and repair do, and that our bread and butter will be.

  OK, Germany economy at the moment in big shit, and our idea very stupid, and it will not at all work, but, our dear Captain Daniel Pitt, anyway come, and we will eat and drink and sing and on motorcycle adventures, and old days remember.

  We, Willy and Fritzl, would like gladly a Brough Superior to see. The best famous of all! We are very jealous envious, and is our secret intention to bury you in the woods, and the Brough keep. We joke.

  Come, even if only holiday. We have Rhein wine for broken hearts, and Gretchen will to you songs sing, and beautiful women we have who also for broken hearts.

  Farewell greetings!

  Your best friends who to see you again very big pleasure,

  Willy, Fritzl, and me Gretchen who this writes, and I of you from Willy and Fritzl have very much heard and I too you invite.

  35

  Daniel Writes to Esther

  Villa Primel

  Waldstrasse

  Dortmund

  Westfalen

  5 June 1931

  My dearest darling daughter,

  Well, here I am in Dortmund! Who would have thought it? It took me days and days and days to drive here, but luckily the Brough didn’t break down and my luggage didn’t get too wet in the sidecar. I didn’t get lost very much on the way, and I only had one tummy upset, which I think was caused by a mischievous omelette near Lille.

  I expect you remember me telling you that I am here to see Willy and Fritzl. I captured them and their Walfisch in the Great War, and we remained friends ever since, by post of course, because I haven’t seen them for about thirteen years. Longer than you’ve been alive! They came up with a plan to set up a business importing our motorcycles to Germany, and exporting theirs to Blighty and France, and in the meantime to establish a nice workshop for sales and repairs. I have been very much looking forward to getting my hands on a German motorcycle, just to see how it compares. I have high hopes for the morrow, but I don’t honestly think that the importing idea is going to work, because nobody in Germany has the money for a new motorcycle, but that does mean that you are always busy repairing the old ones.

  I’ve had a big welcome here. Willy has got fatter and Fritzl has got thinner, and we all have less hair, and what’s left is going grey at the edges, and our complexions are not particularly rosy, as they were in 1918. Willy and Fritzl are still the same underneath, though. We are at present communicating in French, although theirs is terribly bad, and so I am setting about the serious business of learning German. Willy has a girlfriend who is ten years younger than him (lucky dog), and she is a Wandervogel. ‘Gracious me! What’s that?’ I hear yo
u enquire. Well, Willy’s Wandervogel paramour has a guitar disguised as a lute, and she likes to roam about with her friends in picturesque parts of the country, especially the hills and mountains, singing songs about the beauties of Germany, and its many mystical connections with all that is praiseworthy and noble and brave. She is very pretty and has long blonde hair and blue eyes, and strong ankles, and always wears a dirndl, and, I must say, she does looks very sweet in it. She reminds me of pictures of milkmaids. I am going to buy you a dirndl and bring it back for you. The girl is called Gretchen, and she gave me a posy of flowers which she picked for me on a song-filled expedition to a hillside (valderi valdera), and she said they were the most beautiful flowers in the world. They’re exactly the same as ours, but I decided not to tell her so. Next Sunday we are all going to go on a Wandervogel expedition together, and I expect to be taught some rousing Teutonic choruses as we roam the byways, and chew blades of grass, and occasionally skip like newborn lambs.

  I should pick up German quite quickly. Just think, I will soon be able to speak in Pashtun, English, French, Tamil and German! How will I find the space in my head? By forgetting ever more Pashtun and Tamil, I fear.

  Germany is all in a fidget because of a little strutting and yelling Austrian fellow called Adolf Hitler. Dortmund isn’t too bad, but elsewhere there are flags everywhere with swastikas on, and people marching about in columns, wearing uniforms. You will see that I have drawn a swastika at the top of the page. Dortmund is a communistic kind of place, so I don’t think the National Socialists are ever going to get anywhere, but they come out on the streets in gangs and look for gangs of Communists who are out looking for them. There are terrible brawls and melees, which are quite fun to watch…from a safe distance. Bottles get broken on people’s heads, and windows get smashed. Everyone thinks that Germans are very orderly and disciplined, don’t they? But they would soon be disabused of that idea if they were to come here on a Saturday night. What is certainly true is that Germans have a great passion for slogans and uniforms. At present there is a certain amount of bloodshed, but so far not many have actually been killed. They say it’s much worse in other towns.