The Opened Cage

by S. C. Howe

  They ate in silence. When the plates were cleared, Joss sat up.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said, looking directly at Tom; his dark blue eyes were kind now. ‘You caught me a bit off guard there.’

  ‘I had no right to ask.’

  ‘Yes you did. I’ve taken your cherry, as it were. You have every right to know.’ Joss sighed. ‘All this talk of brothels makes me feel awkward, and, if I’m honest, I don’t want to lose you to anyone else.’ The last sentence was quick, like a confession.

  Tom looked astonished. ‘You’re not going to. I only want you.’ The words were spoken with such surprise, such sincerity, Joss flapped his hand as if to stop the conversation. It was one of the small gestures Tom had noticed about Joss: when he was feeling under threat or awkward he would flap a hand, as though this alone could push away any threat. It was an odd, endearing gesture for such a physically imposing man.

  ‘If you want to know, I’ve never felt this sort of jealousy before and it’s horrible,’ Joss said. ‘And I’m not proud of myself. On one hand, I know I have no right to stop you finding what you need, or want, and it goes through my head that by being with me, you might be blocking yourself from a relationship with a woman. On the other, I want you, for me. It’s as simple as that.’

  Tom’s mind spun. This was not what he had expected, but then wasn’t that feeling of running towards a cliff a warning?

  ‘Don’t you think I know what I want by 25?’ he asked. ‘I didn’t grow up in isolation, you know; I was approached at various times by several young women at the farm, and they made it quite clear they wanted me. So I had plenty of opportunity, but I didn’t want it. And then, when I met you, it all made sense.’

  Joss sat back in his seat, looking oddly ill-at-ease. He blinked a few times, scratched his ear and then grinned. Unusually, he seemed stuck for what to say.

  ‘So no more talk about me sowing my oats, or going off with anyone else?’

  Joss smiled openly, ‘Agreed.’

  Downing a mug of beer, they ordered a bottle of wine, yellow, syrupy stuff, which was agreeable to taste. Soon they were leaning over the table, talking sentimentally in loud voices as the world tilted and began revolving. Then they were bawling conversations about their lives before the war, a conversation they’d already had a short while before. Outside it was streaming with rain and had become cold as the daylight melted into dusk. Inside the estaminet it was warm and womblike. The place began to fill with soldiers returning from brothels. Tunics were left open, shirts unbuttoned at the neck, and faces flushed in the fierce glow from the stove. In the haze of blue tobacco smoke and cooking fumes, Tom felt his mind dipping and surging as if he was spinning around the walls. The next second the old woman accidentally spilled a large jug of water over the stove and it went out with a frenzied hissing. There were howls of childish laughter as the woman shuffled outside to get wood and matches. She relit it. The soldiers cheered. ‘Aw, les Anglais!’ she croaked and carried on throwing the chips from a heap on the bench. They hissed and popped in the pan, like mad things. In the half-light, some of the men started up, ‘If you were the only girl in the world’ and the old lady tutted, unashamedly pleased. Amidst all this, Joss leaned over the table, smoothed the hair away from Tom’s forehead, and whispered, ‘I love you.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  The place was almost empty when they were at last shaken-to. The old woman peered at Tom who lay with his head on the table, his arms stretched out over the tabletop. Looking at Joss, she spoke rapidly in French, frowning as she leaned over Tom’s prone form. Joss answered in fluent French as the old woman kept poking twists of grey hair back into her headscarf. Together they eased Tom up who lurched back towards the table. More insistent talk in French and Joss loaded him onto his back. Tom’s last vague memory was of being pitched gently into the waiting truck.

  It was light when he at last woke. Peering up, he found he was lying on his side, back in the barn on a straw mattress, and covered with a blanket. Joss was snoring to one side with Nico stretched over his chest. Tom manoeuvred down into the blanket, feeling secure and warm, wanted to reach out and embrace Joss, but knew he couldn’t. As he imagined a time when they might be free to do this, he fell back into sleep.

  They were up at reveille. After the usual chores, they were given time off. It was a bright spring afternoon and they lay on a bank overlooking the white, dusty road that wound below them through a fringe of poplars, still naked of leaves. They had taken their tunics off and were lying with their hands behind their heads, enjoying the warmth of a returning sun.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t have a hangover?’ Joss said.

  ‘Yes, sure.’ And Tom did seem bright-eyed and unexpectedly chirpy.

  ‘With the amount we drank last night, and how drunk you were, I’m astounded that you don’t have the world’s biggest hangover.’

  ‘Was I that bad?’

  Joss smirked. ‘You were sick over me twice on the way back.’

  Tom held his face in his hands.

  Joss laughed. ‘I had another change of uniform, so I’m not complaining. The others thought it was hilarious.’

  ‘They must think I’m a bloody sop.’

  ‘They don’t. In fact they were having a go at me for getting you that drunk.’

  Tom chewed his lower lip.

  ‘Don’t start worrying,’ Joss said, putting a hand on his arm. ‘They expect me to look out for you, as I am apparently so much older.’

  ‘Only four or five years.’

  ‘An old dodderer by their standards.’

  ‘I am sorry about your uniform.’

  Joss rolled over him and held him down. ‘Stop apologising!’

  Tom pushed him off. ‘Not here. Everyone can see us.’

  ‘Can you imagine being on leave and having the privacy to do what we want,’ Joss said sitting up.

  ‘Why don’t we try to get leave together?’

  Joss looked at him and smirked.

  Rolling over on his side, his head crooked up in his hand, Tom peered at him. ‘When did you know you only wanted men?’

  ‘As far back as I can remember. It was realising what the rest of the society thought that was the problem. What about you?’

  Tom shrugged. ‘I knew what I didn’t want, quite early on. I felt attracted to a few of the older boys at school but I kept that hidden. When I went to work on the farm...well, let’s just say I wouldn’t have dared show anything like that. Anyway, I was so low-spirited for most of the time and I didn’t think about...you know.’

  Joss smirked. ‘Yes, it acts rather like bromide.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Kills off lust, so I’m told.’

  Tom gave him an odd look. ‘It was probably just as well, because the people I worked with were as enlightened as a lump of wood. They called me virtually every name when I first started; if they had known I was attracted to men, I think they’d have lynched me. It was only by being unnoticeable that I survived.’

  ‘That’s sad.’

  ‘Realistic.’

  ‘The schools I went to, it was almost the norm.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘In the romantic sense – I don’t know about the physical.’ Joss was aware of Tom studying him closely. ‘I lost my cherry when I was about sixteen to an older boy at the school; he had me over the cricket pads in the pavilion. It was a rather unromantic introduction.’

  ‘I don’t know that I wanted to hear that.’

  Joss coloured up. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and looked uncharacteristically embarrassed. ‘I thought it was what you wanted to know.’

  ‘You must have thought I was ridiculously naive,’ Tom said as though he had not heard. ‘But at school, we were surprisingly innocent; on the farm it was the opposite. The talk was about women and it was lewd.’

  ‘And then I came along and corrupted you.’ Joss’s voice was humourless.

  ‘No you didn’t. Even though nothing was happening, I did have
an active imagination, you know. And it always revolved around a man who looked uncannily like you.’

  Joss glanced at him sideways. ‘Are you making that up?’

  ‘No. In those moments when, well, you know...I thought about a man built like you, who looked like you. I got by.’

  Joss gave a ghost of a smile, a look that Tom could not work out.

  ‘What did your parents say about…?’ Tom asked.

  ‘I didn’t exactly tell them, Tom. They don’t need the responsibility of knowing, as it’s technically illegal. Anyway, I think they must have a fairly good idea. Various suitable young ladies have been trailed in front of me ever since I was out of school at social gatherings, but to no avail.’

  ‘Might you?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Be attracted to a woman?’ Tom felt a trickle of insecurity, voicing questions he did not want to ask.

  Joss laughed. ‘No. As I said in the cafe, you could line up the prettiest girls, naked, and nothing would happen sexually. It just isn’t there.’

  ‘It is.’ Tom smirked at him.

  ‘Not for women. And, as far as I’m concerned, only for you from now on.’

  ‘The same here.’

  They sat in silence for a moment.

  ‘One of the canaries at training camp made a rather astute observation,’ Tom said grinning. ‘I was making a mess of bayoneting a dummy and he bawled over, “What do you think you are Fielder, a fucking Nancy boy? A fucking fairy or summat?’ ’

  ‘Would be rather nice to tell the old fool you’re the ‘summat’,’ Joss said.

  The sun was climbing higher and, for the first time in months, they felt its heat. Looking around, Joss pulled off his shirt and undervest. Then he lay back with his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. Tom sat up and gazed at him. Following suit, he stripped off his upper clothes and the kiss of the sun on his skin was unexpected and deeply sensual. Joss looked at his back and whistled.

  ‘You have the most marvellous back,’ he said, looking at the way Tom’s shoulder blades dipped into the valley of his back. Tom turned to him, sheltering his eyes from the sun.

  ‘And the front view is even better,’ Joss approved, looking at the way dark chest hair ducted down into Tom’s trousers. ‘I sometimes can’t quite believe my luck.’

  ‘Ironic really, isn’t it,’ Tom said. ‘The war’s given us the freedom to be together.’

  Joss winced.

  On the dusty road in the late afternoon sun, a small figure came into view pushing a handcart. Briggs sat on a stile, considering his future. Only his current goals concerned him now: he must show Barratt that he was a competent officer, tackle it bit by bit, goal by goal. Respect seemed more important than survival just now, so secondary had his survival become to him that, in quieter moments, he was genuinely shocked at how indifferent he was becoming. So what seemed to trip him up, even before he began? If he knew that, he would understand what he had to do. Lighting a cigarette, he involuntarily cupped his hand, then looked up and saw the figure with the handcart coming towards him. The person, a young woman, seemed to be having difficulty moving. Briggs jumped off the stile, and the crawling, limping pictures of the battles he had just seen spewed out at him. Refocusing, he saw the young woman pushing the cart, her bright clothes standing out against the deep blue sky. The handcart was laden with old boxes and bags in danger of falling out, so that she stopped every few yards to steady them and summon more energy to push on.

  ‘Mademoiselle, allow me,’ Briggs said, then realising she might not speak English, added, ‘Mademoiselle, voulez-vous–’

  ‘I can speak the English, thank you officer,’ she called out. It was a strong, slightly amused voice.

  Briggs’ mouth went dry. She smiled at him. She was an attractive woman, probably in her early twenties, with a clear, sun-browned complexion and an agile expression. She was tall and slim.

  ‘My command of French is rather shaky,’ Briggs said. ‘May I help you with you load?’

  ‘Well, thank you very much. If I carry some of the bags, then maybe you will push the cart?’

  Briggs stepped forward and the young woman picked out the bags, and they started walking companionably.

  ‘This is my family’s provisions. We have no horses now, you see. My father is putting the crop on.’

  ‘Sowing.’

  ‘Ah yes, the sowing.’

  They walked on in silence. Briggs, feeling his correction bitterly, felt now that with each step he failed a little more.

  ‘The countryside is still beautiful,’ she said. ‘Even through all this.’

  Briggs nodded. This relaxed comment was so unexpected it felt like a gift.

  ‘Yes very, mademoiselle.’

  ‘My name is Victoria. What is yours?’ She turned to look at him; her interest seemed so genuine.

  ‘My name’s Robert. Robert Briggs,’ Briggs smiled, which surprised him for it had been a long time since he had done that.

  ‘Victoria Rousse.’

  ‘Bonjour.’ Briggs stopped wheeling the cart and held out a gloved hand.

  Victoria put down the bags, and shook it. They laughed.

  Tom nudged Joss as he sat up.

  ‘Isn’t that Briggs?’ he asked, nodding towards the road where the two figures were deep in conversation.

  Joss leaned up on one elbow. ‘Yes, I think it is.’

  The sun came out and two copper butterflies danced above their faces as they sank back down on the grassy bank. Joss tickled Tom’s nose with a grass stalk.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about your farm idea.’ Tom said, gazing up at the sky. ‘If I can’t sell the cottage, I could rent it out, so either way I could buy into the scheme.’

  Joss propped himself up. ‘Scheme?’ he asked. ‘I was rather thinking of it being our life together.’

  Tom met his gaze, ‘And me.’

  ‘As I said before, you don’t have to ‘buy in’. I just want you with me.’

  They sat up. ‘I appreciate that Joss, but I want to make the cottage part of it. I think it’s a good idea and we could make a go of it.’

  Joss grinned.

  ‘But won’t people realise what we were up to?’ Tom asked quickly.

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘In as much as we can be sent to prison, yes.’

  ‘Do you think all the men who share houses are merely platonic friends?’

  Tom shrugged. ‘Won’t you’re family object?’

  Joss peered at him in surprise. ‘I doubt it. Anyway, at 29, I can pretty well please myself. I think they’ll actually be glad I have a goal at last. We make a good team, you and I.’ Joss nudged him. ‘Anyway, let’s not get too solemn about it. Here,’ he pulled out two bottles of beer from his pack, ‘let’s drink to it.’

  They opened them, took long refreshing draughts, belched contentedly.

  ‘Odd, isn’t it,’ Tom said at last. ‘Several months ago, we hadn’t met, and now... Put it this way, if anything happened to you, I’d join you within minutes.’

  ‘I take the cart,’ Victoria was saying. ‘And I bring our supplies back home from the market to help.’

  Briggs frowned in enquiry.

  ‘It makes my parents – understand I am...what – genuine about my help.’

  ‘Yes.’ Briggs was gazing at her.

  ‘That I can help as much, too. My brothers, they are off at the war and they – we – miss them too much.’

  The sun came out from behind a white cloud and Briggs looked over the meadows on either side of the hedgeless road as the two copper butterflies danced over the grass. A warm breeze brought the smell of hawthorn blossom.

  ‘Ah, the spring,’ Victoria said. ‘I cannot bear to think what my brothers are suffering out there,’ she added, waving to the horizon. ‘They are officers, like you. They have many times been wounded. They are in constant danger. But I can do little. I hate this war!’

  ‘So do I.’

  Victoria looked at h
im for several seconds. ‘Yes, I see that.’

  They walked on in silence up an increasingly uneven side-track that made the handcart pitch and wobble. Poplar trees swayed on one side, on the other and in the distance, a man was scattering seed in a ploughed field.

  ‘My father,’ Victoria said. ‘He thinks me funny for doing this.’

  Briggs smiled at her, caught his breath. She really was an attractive woman.

  ‘How do you get this cart to the farm by yourself?’ he asked as they reached the top of an incline to a farmhouse.

  ‘My father usually meets me,’ she explained. ‘Near where we met. But today he can see I have help. You will have a drink with us. Our ‘afternoon tea’? My mother, she makes big cakes.’

  Briggs nodded eagerly. Looking up he saw a small, robust woman walk out of a whitewashed scullery. Stopping, she shielded her eyes to get a better look at Briggs. Sunlight caught her, making her face look golden, her apron a brilliant white.

  ‘Maman! Monsieur Briggs, he has helped me with my cart. I have invited him for a drink.’

  Madame Rousse nodded, gave a shy smile, and walked into the farmhouse. The kitchen smelled of freshly baked bread and dried herbs. Age-sooted beams spanned a wide inglenook-type fireplace in front of which, on scrubbed stone flags, was a table with settles against the wall. Madame Rousse smiled at Briggs and gestured for him to sit down, and then busied herself with preparing coffee and cutting a huge crumbling fruit cake, still warm from the oven. It smelled deliciously of warm honey. Briggs sat opposite Victoria who was discussing the war, when Monsieur Rousse came in, curious to see who it was that had helped his daughter with the cart. Clearing his throat and squinting into the gloom of the kitchen, he studied the English officer who had been nodding in reply to a question. Hearing Monsieur Rousse, he stood up and held out his hand. Monsieur Rousse frowned and shook the proffered hand stiffly, as though unused to the action.