Death of a Century

by Daniel Robinson

  He checked his watch and found that he had over four hours before Marcel and his men would arrive at the Gentilhomme.

  Even though he planned on arriving early to watch them enter, see where they stood, who they were, how they presented themselves, he still had hours to kill, so he decided to use the time profitably. A visit to the American Library would provide him with something he felt sorely in lack of—knowledge.

  He crossed the Seine at Port Royal Bridge and crossed through the Tuileries, the grass wet and the hundreds of chestnut trees empty of leaves. A huddle of men, all dressed heavily against the weather, played pétanque in one corner, but Joe didn’t slow to watch. He avoided the large boulevards and took to the narrow side streets and stayed in shadows in case he encountered any police.

  The library was on rue de l’Elysée in a palatial building once owned by the Papal Nuncio. Above the large double doors was painted in a Roman script, ATRUM POST BELLUM, EX LIBRIS LUX: AFTER THE DARKNESS OF WAR, THE LIGHT OF BOOKS. They were words that Joe had first read in the spring of 1919 when on leave in Paris he stumbled up the stairs to the library in search of a place that did not serve beer or coffee or women. The large and open reading rooms and thousands of American volumes proved a daily escape from his nights.

  The scent of old tomes wafted in the building’s air and dust motes bounced in the window-light as Joe stepped through the doors and scraped his boots on a rough rug just inside the entryway. He had come to read about the battle and the American Library was the only English-language library that he knew. He asked a young man who sat behind a small reading table with a VOLUNTEER sign facing out.

  The young man, not too young to have been in the war, was writing. In front of him was a tablet for writing and he had filled better than half the page, and he was writing furiously and without consideration, as though his mind was moving faster than his brain. Joe had heard of it, automatic writing, and knew that some people were using it as a treatment method for shell shock. Joe had visited a small asylum for the wounded sons of rich men where young doctors were experimenting with it, older doctors disdained it and favored the decades old Rest Cure of Weir Mitchell and wondered why their patients blew their brains out at the first chance. This new method, automatic writing, came from Freud through the Frenchman Andre Breton, and Joe thought that it might work in helping the young vets deal with their trench demons. Maybe not for him, but for others.

  The young man suddenly stopped writing, and with a nervous jerk he looked up at Joe and saw that he was being watched. That inchoate sense developed in the trench; those who lived in the trenches of France had grown accustomed to being under watch, under the view of scoped eyes, watched by new officers looking for an improperly buttoned jacket or haggard sergeants looking for a volunteer or a Heine bastard across the distance looking to place a bullet in your brain. You never got used to it. Even when your own eyes closed in sleep, you felt the scrutiny. It was a feeling embedded.

  The young man capped his pen, black and heavy, maybe Mont Blanc, and looked up as Joe stepped closer. The young man’s eyes were old and sad, a contrast to their clear color, and his left eye twitched a couple of times.

  He swallowed and asked, “May I help you?” His fingers, set to either side of the tablet continued to worry against his thumbs as though they needed to catch up with their lost writing.

  “London Times History of the War,” Joe asked and the man’s twitch triggered.

  Joe had seen it before—other veterans of the war who carried the war with them. Gresham had once told the difference between fact and truth and provided an example. “This is a fact,” Gresham had said. “This is incontrovertible. The war ended on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in the year of our Lord 1918.” Following a moment filled with a drink from his glass of scotch, he added, “This is the truth. The war will never end. You and me and hundreds of thousands of others who fought in that slaughter will carry it with us every single day of our lives.”

  Joe had seen men who slept underneath their beds or who would not stay in room unless a door was left propped open. He had seen men who walked always hunched to keep their heads from appearing above a trenches lip. He knew one man in Greenwich who refused any job that made him work during the daylight hours and would only work between sunset and sunrise and once the matin sun rose he was safely barred within his shuttered house. Shellshock, some doctor had called it, and Joe felt that he was lucky that he carried only a slight neurosis with him from the war.

  The young man, who if one were to see him sitting at a café with his arms crossed and his eyes closed in contemplation of a lovely day one would think nothing of him, blinked several times and his body shuddered and stiffened to control. He swallowed with a jerk and pointed Joe down a row of shelves filled with books and told Joe which shelf to see.

  The young man had obviously looked through those books himself, maybe searching for a reason if not hoping for a cure.

  Joe pulled the sixth volume from the Times history along with other histories. Those by Vast and Hayes, whom he had remembered from Gresham’s house, as well one by Alexander Powell and another by Yves Neuville. The story from the first three was much the same—a brave assault and stunning victory. The sort of patriotic jingoism that Joe come to despise.

  However, Powell’s narrative of the battle was more visceral and Neuville’s history contained the questions that Joe had come to hear.

  The battle had begun with an extended artillery barrage, over seventy hours of almost constant shelling of the German lines which only increased in ferocity on the morning of 25 September 1915. The French soldiers were told by their officers that nothing could survive such a bombardment and that the worst that they would encounter would be the German wounded who had survived. One major, who was on a general’s staff and therefor would not take part in the advance—much to his regret, he had said—had announced that more French soldiers would suffer from sprained ankles crossing through the shelled-out no-man’s land than would be shot by Germans.

  The Germans, it was supposed, would not have constructed trenches of depth and strength to withstand the barrage. However, the Germans had constructed rooms and tunnels well below the depth of destruction rained down upon them, so that the bombing would have sounded like a strong thunderstorm. They emerged just before sunrise that Friday morning in time to reestablish their positions and knew the trails the French soldiers would follow and where best to place their old Maxim guns and newer MGs. The killing field they produced became filled with the bodies of twenty thousand Frenchmen. Some killed so many men that German soldiers cried as they hoped the French would discontinue the assault, their machine guns overheated and barrels warped, and still the French came.

  Neuville theorized that the Germans had known when and where and how the assault would proceed. “A traitorous coward,” he theorized, “had undoubtedly sold the honor of France, and one can only hope that that man will have to live a long life with the memory of his perfidy and the blood of his countrymen forever on his hands and forever staining his damned soul.”

  Joe read them. Unlike Neuville, he hoped the traitor’s life would end soon. As he left, he turned to the young man, right hand shaking, and said, “It will get better, brother.”

  He hated lying, but he felt some need to offer hope.

  At the Gentilhomme, most of the tables were surrounded by people eating early dinners of soup and eggs and sausages. Joe saw the broad back of Quire at the bar, the back of a serious worker or the hunch of a serious drinker. Joe took the stool next to him and rubbed the cold from his hands.

  He patted Quire on the shoulder as he sat and asked, “How you doing?’ He wanted the words to sound jolly.

  Quire turned to him. His left eye held the livid mark of a hard knuckle, a play of green and yellow and plum-purple. Quire squinted through the other eye until he recognized Joe. “Hello, Joe,” he said and raised his pint. “Want one?”

  “What happene
d?”

  The bartender leaned over the bar and stared at Joe. He ordered a pint, Alsatian, and the bartender brought it. Joe fished in his pants pocket for a coin.

  Quire took a Franc coin from the pile in front of him and slapped it down. “On me,” he said. “Hell, it’s only a Franc. That’s what? About twelve cents in real money. You can get the next round.”

  Quire offered his glass for a toast, “To the Lost,” and Joe met it. Holding the pint at eye level and looking through it toward the mirror, Quire said, “Down to the sea in ships. Down to life in schooners.”

  They both drank, with Joe glancing toward the front doors each time they opened and checking the mirror with regularity.

  “Tell me,” Joe said. “What happened?”

  Quire scratched the back of his neck. “One of those damn things that makes no sense. We both been inside those deals.”

  “Yes.” Joe drank, waiting for Quire to explain further.

  He watched the mirror as a woman hipped her way across the room and nudged against him to stand at the bar. She had fresh skin and high cheekbones. Her hair was black and cut tight against her face, the favored style from Colleen Moore although even more severe than the film star’s cut. The French, Joe thought, did everything a bit more severe. Her eyes, ringed heavily with kohl, were obscured, and she had a small mouth with lips as red as drawn blood.

  “Pardon,” she said. She waved to the bartender and smiled at Joe, a smile with promises of adventure.

  The bartender came and she ordered a Corpse Reviver, which the bartender mixed and served with no reaction beyond a deep breath. She pretended to search for money in pockets that did not exist on her short dress, then drew her mouth into a pout toward Joe and Quire. Quire took another Franc from his pile and handed it to the bartender.

  “Merci,” she said.

  “Pleasure’s mine,” he said.

  “My name is Elle,” she said in accented English, extending her hand across Joe to shake with Quire. “It means ‘She.’”

  “He’s Joe. I’m Quire.”

  “Quire? What does Quire mean?”

  “I’m American. In America, names don’t mean anything.”

  She smiled and nodded. “But your eye,” she said, her mouth curved down. “That means something.”

  He shrugged, “The streets can be mean.”

  “Monsieur, you must be careful.” She smiled again but only at Quire. Joe felt as though he had become an audience. “I return now to my friends. Are you here often?”

  “Yes,” Quire answered, nodding.

  “I will see you sometime.” Not a question, but a very confident statement. She knew her power. “After Christmas,” she said, holding Quire’s gaze long enough to pass some message Joe was not privy to.

  Quire nodded and smiled. “After Christmas.”

  She left and the scent of her perfume drifted in a wake behind her. Joe watched her move through the room to her table, her walk a work of art. The room seemed to follow her.

  Joe said, “Hell, man, was I even here?”

  “Not that I could see . . . nor her apparently.”

  Joe drank from his beer. “That did a lot for my ego.”

  “She wasn’t thinking no ego, bud.” He winked and drank.

  “I noticed. Believe me, I noticed even if you two thought I was one of the invisible.” Joe turned and looked at the woman and her cloche-hatted friends together at their table. His thoughts grew darker and sadder as he thought of how he sometimes envied people like them, smart set people who seemed to have nothing to think about and nothing to destroy their dreams at night.

  She didn’t need to buy her own drinks, she didn’t need to pay for the things of life.

  “Nice,” Quire said, turning to look.

  “Damn nice,” Joe agreed.

  “Pretty smart all right. She’s got It.”

  They finished their beers and ordered another as well as a plate of fresh baguette and butter. They talked for a while about women they had known. Joe kept his tone light, not letting a sadness invade just then for he knew the price of morose moments. So he welcomed the next beer gratefully and drank fully.

  “You going to tell me?” he asked Quire.

  “Tell you what?”

  Joe pointed a finger at Quire’s face.

  Quire touched the swollen area around his eye. “I’m not exactly certain what happened,” he said. “I’m walking home and some guys punch me, and one tells me to forget about helping somebody named Gresham. It doesn’t mean a shit-load of sense to me. I don’t even know anybody named Gresham.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Joe said.

  “What?”

  “You do know someone named Gresham, in a way.”

  “What do you mean, Mr. Ford?”

  Joe did not even consider how much to withhold from Quire. It was too late to protect him now. Quire deserved to hear everything. That was what Joe told him. He left few details out, concluding as Quire finished his beer and began another, “Someone must have seen us last night, thought there was some connection and decided to convince you to get lost. I’m sorry.”

  “You didn’t know.” He shrugged and drank. “If you don’t mind, though, I’ll be taking the guy’s advice. I’m not too keen on dying any earlier than necessary.”

  Joe nodded. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “It’s my fight.” He drank and waited for the tight silence that followed to end.

  When they talked again, they talked about the war. It was a subject that each knew well and neither could easily discard. They talked about the smells of sage and pine that they remembered from their youths but neither had known in many years, and then about the French. Joe told Quire about working on a newspaper. Quire told Joe what the woman at the bar had meant when she said that she would see him after Christmas, “The week following Christmas is St. Catherine’s Day. All the beauties wear disguises and go around kissing men they’d like to bounce. It’s a helluva’ time, no commitments, just a good night’s roll.” They toasted that. “You just have to be certain you don’t end up in bed with a fire ship.”

  Joe laughed, “How will they ever get us back on the farm once we’ve seen the sights of Paris?”

  “Ah, yes,” Quire agreed, glancing again toward the woman with kohl-rimmed eyes. They toasted and laughed and talked some more.

  The room then darkened; the night began to turn over.

  He first noticed the Turk’s presence in the shadows by the rear exit as he had turned for one more glimpse of the beautiful woman and her friends. The Turk walked from the shadows near the rear door and into the canted light of the café. Shadows followed him. His darkness moved with him like a deadly slipstream.

  The Turk formed a rear guard, protecting against Joe’s escape through the café’s rear as well as securing a possible exit for whoever came later through the front. Looming above the seated patrons at tables, he looked even larger than Joe remembered. Below the furrow of his heavy and dark eyebrows, his eyes glared. He smiled at Joe like the eternal footman smiling. With a roll of his shoulders he set himself, a massive standing at the ready.

  The café’s front doors opened. In walked Dapper. He wore a black overcoat that was buttoned to the collar and extended below the knees. He wore no hat and had dark hair thinning and wet from the wet snow falling outside. He walked slowly into the room, sliding around tables and searching faces until he saw Joe at the bar. When he saw Quire seated next to Joe, he stalled for a second.

  “That’s him,” Quire said and Joe followed Quire’s gaze to Dapper. Quire began to rise from his seat. “I’m going to kick that bastard into the last century. Let him know that his big mouth wrote a scrip his little ass can’t cash.”

  Joe placed a hand on Quire’s shoulder to steady the block of a man. “Hold on,” he said. “You’re involving yourself in what you just said you don’t want a part of.”

  “Things change when could-be become what-is.”

  “In that case, you’l
l get your chance, but wait a minute and see how things play out.”

  Hesitating for a moment, Quire’s gauged Joe’s words, but the man’s eyes carried full fire in them. He nodded and sat back down. His low growl, like that of a dog just before its let loose, told Joe that Quire was not willing to wait long. “See, what’d I tell you? A magnet for trouble. Don’t even have to go looking for it.”

  As Dapper ringed around tables filled with drinkers, Joe asked, “You Marcel?”

  Dapper looked at him then at the Turk, who nodded, before turning to study Joe’s face.

  “Non, Monsieur,” he said with a careful voice. He breathed and repeated, “Non.” His voice, like his eyes, was dark and callous. He faced Joe, unblinking.

  “Where is he?”

  “Marcel sent me.” The man’s eyes darted between Joe and Quire. “You can do business with me.”

  “I do business with Marcel.”

  Dapper gave a French shrug that could have meant okay or fuck you or I don’t care.

  “I have the manuscript but not here,” Joe said in English. He paused to watch the man’s reaction. There was very little other than a slight curl of the upper lip, like a mongrel before it bites. “If Marcel wants it, he comes to me.”

  After a moment of silence between them, the man’s eyebrows raised. Joe could see some cogs and gears working overtime as Dapper chewed on that puzzle he had just been tossed.