A Star for Mrs. Blake (31 page)

“They’re like a bunch of children. Sometimes I want to thrash them.”

“Almost home,” Lily promised.

“Halfway, anyway.”

Back at the table, the others noticed that Katie was silently pressing a hand to her mouth and her shoulders were trembling.

“Are you all right?” Cora asked.

“I’m just so happy we’re going to the graveyard,” she said, although they could see she was crying.

“Of course you are,” Bobbie said, eager to prove her magnanimous side.

“What I just said … that’s a lie,” Katie managed finally. “I’m not happy a’tall.” She sobbed into a napkin.

“Maybe it’s just too hard …” Minnie whispered. “Losing both.”

Katie shook her head. “It’s because they’re over here.”

“But Tim and Dolan are together, like they always were,” Minnie said, her arched eyebrows knit in concern. “Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“We wanted them home.”

“We all did, dear,” Wilhelmina said sympathetically.

Katie wiped her eyes. “We wanted them close, in the parish cemetery. But we didn’t have the money. We only had enough to bring one back. We couldn’t do that, could we? Leave the other one alone? When we got the letter askin’ where they were to be laid to rest, we had to say overseas, both together, side by side, the way they always were. But I have to tell ye—when I saw them yesterday—it broke me up all over again, knowin’ they’re here and I have to say goodbye. Forever, this time.”

There was agonized silence.

Cora searched for some way to ease it, but there really wasn’t any. Remembering her lonely decision to bury Sammy in France, she simply said, “It’s a hard choice.”

“We tried to put the best face on, we said it was the patriotic thing to do. But inside we were ashamed. We bore it in private, Ian and myself. And to be honest, everybody has troubles, nobody wants to hear yours.”

Wilhelmina nodded. “They think you’re crazy and put you in a hospital,” she said, but no one was paying attention.

“What about your husband?” Cora asked.

“The boys in Ian’s district put a plaque up at the station house for Tim and Dolan. My husband is a teetotaler, but he goes out to the pub and of course, they’re Irish, so they’re great talkers. Me, I’m all alone at the mistress’s house. I can’t say a word to anyone. It’s like a tomb of silence around me and my sons. Thank goodness our church in Dorchester is just down the block. I go to the early mass every day, because I know He listens.”

Bobbie put her fist down gently on the table and said firmly, “There’s no shame in it. You’re a brave person. Everyone can see that.”

Katie raised her reddened eyes, about to challenge Bobbie, but in the older woman’s steady blue stare she saw benevolence and understanding, and she softened.

“Would you like to see a picture of my boys, Mrs. Olsen?”

“Very much.”

Katie opened her purse and took out a dog-eared studio portrait of two sharp-featured young men with dark hair parted in the middle,
posed before a curtain with their hands in the pockets of their vests. At once everyone got up from their chairs and spontaneously crowded around—to admire the photograph, to touch her in some way. Hands squeezed her hands. Hands patted her back.

Bobbie leaned over and said quietly to nobody in particular, “We all do what we have to do, and it may not always be noble. Myself included. I would lie, cheat, and steal if it had to do with my son. Wouldn’t you?”

Before anyone could answer, the German family came marching back into the breakfast room carrying wicker hampers of food and leather holders with bottles of wine. The old man in his wheelchair was holding a pile of folded blankets in his lap.

“Avec nos compliments,”
said the son with a bow.
“Veuillez profiter.”

“Ah!” Bobbie said with relief. “Here’s our picnic!”

The day was glorious, filled to the brim with warmth and summer fragrance. High white clouds swelled across the sky as the breadbox bus, with Émile driving, took the road going north from Verdun along the river to Brieulles-sur-Marne. Hammond opened the official U.S. Army Expeditionary Forces map of northwestern Europe. It was a khaki-colored sheet backed with linen that unfolded into rectangular segments, so that he could easily isolate the battle zones of the Argonne.

“We’re almost there,” he announced. “Just after this next town.”

Émile honked and waved at a country woman carrying shopping bags. She waved back, puzzled because the blue bus wasn’t stopping as usual. Instead, it made a laborious circle around a war monument and continued northwest toward the Argonne Forest. In less than an hour they’d passed several farming villages, each less populated the farther they got from Verdun. This was nothing but a single muddy street with no one in sight. The only sound was the echo of cows hallooing and frantic barking from a pink-bellied mutt in a doorway who was shivering with mange. Cora noticed swallows veering into an open barn. She glimpsed a farmer milking on a three-legged stool.

“You see that roof?” Hammond called as they passed the barn. “That’s old galvanized iron they pulled from the trenches.”

Cora strained to look out the window. “Where are the trenches?”

Hammond ran a finger along the color-coded markings. “They’re a bit ahead, mostly up in the forest now. These fields have been pretty well scavenged.”

When they were back out in rolling countryside, Hammond announced that they had reached the forward line of the American
Expeditionary Forces during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, the final chapter in the war. Although civilians might picture disciplined formations advancing neatly, he knew from his studies that the fighting was chaotic. Untrained troops reporting for duty were told to “go where the smoke is thickest”—in other words, were thrown into the bonfire like human wood chips. It was common for half of a company of 250 replacements to be dead within an hour. A commander of four companies of 1,000 men had to figure on losing 60 to 80 percent. The numbers had been drilled into Hammond at West Point as an example of an unwarranted strategy drawn up by egotistic generals with their heads in the military tactics of the last century.

The American plan had been to attack the German city of Metz, which the high command believed would have cut off the enemy’s railroad lines, but British general Sir Douglas Haig had another idea, which was for
his
army to punch through the German-held Hindenberg Line, farther north at Le Cateau. Haig prevailed. The Americans took responsibility for the Argonne, figuring that if Haig had claimed the victory that ended the war, the Americans could at least hold up the Meuse-Argonne Offensive as the crucial mission that pushed the Brits over the top. The problem was that the Brits didn’t really need support to get through the Hindenberg Line, and meanwhile, the American forces had overly committed to the Argonne, with not enough time to prepare or staff to supervise. They eventually cleared the forest and pushed to the city of Sedan after an excruciatingly slow crawl in which Hammond’s father, Colonel Thomas West Hammond, had commanded a regiment, over rough terrain in a complete downpour, resulting in the bloodiest single engagement in American history, and seen by officers even then as tragically unnecessary.

Émile slowed down and honked at two peacocks that were walking blithely down the center of the road, causing a burst of excitement as the women stood up to see, but Hammond’s thoughts were grim. He believed in his country and his superiors, and that President Wilson had been correct when he said, “The world must be made safe for democracy—the right is more precious than peace,” so when they’d settled down, he assumed his military posture in the front of the bus,
and bravely met the expectations of the mothers in his care. His duty was to represent the army, not to rewrite history. But he could show it to them in a more gentle light.

With the expectant faces of the pilgrims before him, he gestured at the distant hills. “Here you have it. This is where the Allies made the final push to end the war. Mind you, there had already been four years of fighting, with the British and French holding the line at enormous cost—but now, in September of 1918, here come the Americans!”

Everyone on the little bus broke out in applause. Wilhelmina put two fingers in her mouth and whistled. Hammond smiled, more uncomfortable than ever to be a stand-in for their sons. He was supposed to justify how a boy from Boston or Prouts Neck ends up dead in France because of a war between decaying monarchies whose top brass cared more about the plumage on their helmets than the blood on the ground. He could see in their eager eyes that they wanted to trust what he was saying. They had to go home with something. It was up to him to deliver.

“The Germans were afraid. When they knew the Americans were coming, they launched the Spring Offensive—but when we actually arrived, and finally took our place beside the French, at Saint-Mihiel on September twelfth, frankly, it struck a killing blow to the enemy’s morale. Our boys didn’t have much experience, but they did have moxie, and more than anything, they were determined to defend freedom. The Germans quickly knew they were finished. The last great battles of the American Expeditionary Forces, which were fought right here on these fields, led directly led to the Armistice on November eleventh. Your sons made the ultimate sacrifice for peace. And we all know they couldn’t have done it without the mothers who stood beside them, every step of the way. You should be very, very proud.”

There was more applause. Hammond exhaled with relief, instructed Émile to pull over, and one by one they helped the mothers step down. For several moments the American women stood uncertainly at the side of the road, in their cloche hats and light summer coats, staring at a field of millet grass.

“What was it like?” Cora asked quietly.

“See the bumpiness of this ground? This is French and American artillery firing that way and German artillery firing back. See that hill? We were absolutely wanting that hill.”

“What about those trees way back there?”

“I believe that’s a stream. It’s likely that the Germans were bunkered up behind it.”

“Can we see it?”

“No, sorry,” said Hammond. “It’s possible that the field still contains unexploded shells.”

Cora didn’t really want to walk out there. The atmosphere that hung over the empty field was strangely hushed. She knew what the soil would be, blackened like the burned-out clumps that fell out of Sammy’s scorched uniform when she unfolded it from the package from the War Department that she hadn’t gotten herself to open for several days. It was as if the violence of those deaths had sunk in and corrupted the very earth.

But she persisted: “And our soldiers? Where were they?”

“Trying to push across. But it wasn’t nice and pretty like this. Imagine dust and noise so thick you can’t hear anybody talk. Crater holes and dead horses. The Germans would set up and cover themselves with grass so the Allies couldn’t tell where the fire was coming from. And if anyone got too close to the hills, they had a nasty way of stringing barbed wire across the trees with gaps in the wire and machine guns aimed at the openings. We had to guess their position and shell where we thought the lines were. Sometimes we’d shell our own men.” He stopped, afraid he’d gone too far. “There are always regrettable mistakes in war, but the point is, by the end we had two million troops over here—and that’s the key to why the Allies won.”

Cora had another question, but Wilhelmina broke into her thoughts.

“If they fought here and died here,” she asked, “how did they get to the cemetery?”

“No need for you to worry about the details.”

“How did they keep track? Of who was who? Some of our boys were blown to smithereens, you know.”

Her remark, tossed off so matter-of-factly, had a numbing effect on the group. Cora bit her lip and Minnie had a coughing fit. Katie held her pocketbook up to shield her eyes from the sun, the better to hide beneath it. Only Bobbie and Wilhelmina drilled demanding looks at the young lieutenant.

“That’s what the army is in business for, Mrs. Russell. Keeping track.”

“You owe us an explanation,” Bobbie insisted. “How
did
they know, with all that smoke and noise you describe?”

“Fair enough.”

Hammond squared his shoulders and explained that the army had a special burial unit. For every soldier, it was a priority and sacred duty to tend to the fallen, which meant to properly care for and identify the remains. His voice came from the gut, from the place that held the things he deeply believed. He was surprised by its authority.

“If a man fell, his comrades would pull him out. If they were under fire, the burial unit would follow. This was a great contribution of the Negro soldiers. Often they’d be assigned the duty of picking up the dead. A temporary wooden cross would be erected with the name, serial number, and division. Sometimes they’d hang his dog tags on the cross. After the war, the remains were moved by the burial unit from the battlefield to the American cemeteries. Believe me, the records were immaculate.”

Wilhelmina’s long furrowed face seemed to have no expression at all. Under the shade of a straw hat, her eyes were lowered and unreadable. She kept fingering the top button buried in the frills of her blouse.