We Shall Not Sleep (36 page)

Matthew stopped in the rough grass by the edge of the road, staring at him.

Schenckendorff smiled. 'You were wondering if I would change my mind when I got to London. I know. You all are. You would be foolish if it had not at least crossed your mind. You must take every possibility into account. I won't change. The cost of the peace I thought of is too high, and I am not sure now that it is peace at all." His face shadowed. "I think it might be the beginning of a slow death. Life, real, growing, passionate life, is not peaceful. Learning hurts, and has costs. My onetime friend Sandwell misunderstood that, and he lost sight of the purpose of it all."

Matthew waited.

"Individuals matter," Schenckendorff said quietly. "Moments of joy, a man's victory over the darkness within himself, a perception of beauty, whether it is of the eye or the mind. I think we had better get back into the ambulance. Your remarkable sister is waiting to leave."

Some of these same thoughts crossed Joseph's mind, but he was preoccupied with Lizzie. As a child he had watched his mother endure the same distress, but she had been in her own home, secure and deeply loved, and the children she was carrying were wanted.

For Lizzie it was in every way different. She was alone, facing an unknown future and a child she must dread. Would she think of the violence, assault, degradation every time she looked at its face? Could she possibly learn to love it, to be tender, to laugh, to find joy in its growth, its achievements?
It.
Would it be harder if it was a boy?

Now she was sick again, desperate for privacy, and surrounded by men, two of whom she barely knew. They were always in a hurry, feeling the urgency all the time, the need to move, the knowledge that if they made even one slip they could be stopped, imprisoned, even executed summarily. The hunger for revenge was in the air like the smell of decay.

How could he help her? She was walking back over the grass a little shakily. Her face was bleached of all color, and her hair was straggling out of its pins. He ached to comfort her, but might he be making promises he could not keep? Could he love that child as if it were his own, and never even for a moment look at it and hate it because Benbow was its father?

He remembered how he had felt as a child: the certainty of his father's interest, his time and attention. He thought of countless hours shared: in listening to his father's long, rambling funny stories; in pottering in the garden feeling he was helping, learning weeds from flowers. Later there had been more complicated discoveries about the first thoughts in philosophy, feeling his way toward wisdom. He remembered long walks in comfortable silence, always certain that he was not only loved but liked, valued, believed in, a necessary part in the greater happiness. Arguments meant nothing; the security was always there underneath, like a deep ocean with an inexhaustible current.

A warmth opened inside him, a steadiness that had been absent for some time—he could not remember how long. It was back again now, a bedrock on which every good thing could be built. Lizzie's child deserved that. Everyone did. Nothing less was enough.

He walked toward Lizzie and took her arm, lending her his strength. She looked up at him quickly, and he met her gaze without wavering.

She saw the knowledge of something new in him, a complete absence of fear. She took a deep breath and smiled at him, hope flaring up.

By evening the rain had returned, steady and hard. They were grateful to be offered both food and shelter at what before the war must have been an excellent cafe. During the occupation it had housed German soldiers. Now the original owners had taken it back and were trying to salvage all they could of the past.

"Broken!" Madame said furiously, picking up a blue-and-white china platter to arrange the food on. It had been cracked across the center and carefully glued together again. "Everything is tired and dusty and broken. I'd kill every last one of them if I could."

Joseph struggled for something to say. She clearly wanted justice, some answering pain to compensate for all that had been taken from her and from all the others she had known and loved.

"I know," he answered her. "There's not much left."

She grunted and regarded his chaplain's uniform with contempt. "Aren't you going to tell me to have faith in God?" she demanded. "Or at least remind me that we should be grateful to you British for fighting for us? That's what my husband tells me."

"You don't do what you think is right for other people's sake," he said. "You do it for yourself."

She was surprised. It robbed her momentarily of the response she had been going to give. "I suppose you'd like something decent to eat?"

"Wouldn't we all? But we'll be grateful for anything," he replied.

"Don't be grateful!" she snapped. "I'm not giving it to you."

But when the meal came it was prepared not only with care but with imagination and skill as well. Dark bread was set out on the mended blue-and-white platter, made to look inviting with a few leaves of parsley and red radishes. There were small dishes of something that resembled Brussels pate, and others of pickled fish to add taste, and the suggestion of meat. They were all sitting around one long table, and she placed them in the middle with a baleful glare, daring them to make any remark.

They thanked her and shared the meal in equal portions, although Lizzie gave half of hers to the others.

Monsieur came and stood in the doorway smoking a clay pipe with something dark and pungent in it. It might have been half tobacco, but it smelled as if it were at least half dung.

"So what are you doing away from the fighting, then?" His English was thickly accented, but he had some confidence in the language. "Isn't over yet, you know. Still some men out there being killed."

They had expected this, and were prepared.

"Taking information back to London," Matthew replied. "It's urgent, and secret. Can't trust it to letters."

"All six of you?" Monsieur clearly did not believe them. He looked at Mason. "You're not a soldier. Why not? You look fit enough. Flat feet, have you? Shortsighted? Know what I tell people who are shortsighted? Get closer to the enemy. You'll see him all right when he’s a bayonet length away."

Madame mumbled something unintelligible at him.

He ignored her and glared at Mason, waiting for an answer.

"War correspondent," Mason said truthfully. "Miss Reavley is an ambulance driver and Mrs. Blaine is a nurse. Major Reavley is an intelligence officer." He indicated Schenckendorff. "And Major Sherman is also. He's been behind the lines and, as you can see, been injured."

Monsieur was mollified, but not happy. He looked at Schenckendorff doubtfully. "What's any use behind the lines now?" he asked. "Kill them, I say. Same as they killed us."

Everyone stiffened. Joseph drew in his breath sharply, afraid of what Schenckendorff would answer. He loathed what the Belgian was saying, but perhaps—if this had been his land and his people—he might have felt much the same.

Monsieur was waiting, a challenge in his eyes.

"Exactly," Judith said, swallowing her mouthful of food with a gulp. "We are not so different from them."

Monsieur's face flushed hot red. "Speak for yourself, woman! We are nothing like them. They are animals, pigs! They steal and they rape and they kill."

Lizzie's spoon slid out of her hand, spilling gravy on the table.

Joseph searched frantically for something to say or do to cover it. Nothing came to his mind but fury.

Judith looked at the man. "Yes, of course. I only see the enemy who have been wounded. I forget: The ones who are able to be are violent. We are not like that. We don't steal, we don't hurt women, and we don't kill the unarmed."

Mason bent his head to conceal his expression.

Madame glared at Schenckendorff, challenging him to argue.

The silence grew.

"The hunger for revenge is natural," he responded uncomfortably at last. "Especially after so many years of being helpless."

Monsieur glared at him. "We're not helpless! Where do you come from? You have a funny accent. You don't sound English at all."

Joseph's throat tightened. He dared not look at Matthew. He reached under the shelter of the tabletop and took Lizzie's hand, and felt her fingers grasp his.

"I'm not," Schenckendorff said calmly. "I'm Scots. From the Western Isles. We spoke Gaelic when I was young."

Joseph prayed silently that no one in the room had the faintest idea what Gaelic sounded like. Actually, he had none himself.

Monsieur seemed satisfied. "Really? Western Isles, eh? Rains a lot, doesn't it?"

"Yes, I suppose so," Schenckendorff went on, turning to the woman. "You can make the most ordinary ingredients taste good. That is an art."

"There's no more," she said ungraciously, but there was a flush of pleasure in her cheeks and she very nearly smiled at him.

Joseph slept well. It was the first time he'd had a real bed in more than half a year, since he had been at home on his last leave in the spring. He was woken violently by a banging on the door. Even before he could sit up, it burst open and a large Belgian policeman stood just inside the room, a German pistol in his hand, pointing it at Joseph.

"Get up," he ordered. "Slowly. Don't touch your uniform!"

"I can't get up without my clothes," Joseph pointed out. "Who are you, and what's wrong? We're British army officers and volunteers, going back to London with important information." He was sick at the thought that perhaps he had actually been posted as a deserter, and Hook had sent out his information. Surely not so soon?

"Maybe.Maybe not." The man moved toward Joseph cautiously and, with one hand, picked up his uniform shirt off the back of the chair where Joseph had left it. He shook it hard. Papers fell out of one of the pockets. He dropped the jacket and picked up the trousers, shaking them also.

"I'm not armed," Joseph said patiently, controlling himself with difficulty. "If you look at the collar, and the insignia, you'll see that I'm a chaplain. I don't carry weapons."

"How do I know the uniform's yours?" the man demanded. "Anyone could wear it."

There was no reasonable argument to that. It was true. Going through the lines last year Joseph had worn a Swiss chaplain's uniform to which he had had no right. "They could," he conceded. "But why bother? What is it you think I am? An army deserter, with a war correspondent, two army officers, a nurse, and an ambulance driver?" He tried to convey the absurdity of it in his voice.

"No, I think you're a collaborator trying to get a German occupying commander out of
Belgium before we can catch him and hang him, like he deserves," the man replied quite calmly. "We'll give you over to the families of those he murdered."

Joseph looked at his face and saw the years of suffering burned into his heart, the deaths he was helpless to prevent, and, more bitter than that, the corruption of fear and loneliness and greed that had destroyed what had once been clean. He had found weakness and disappointment that peace would never have revealed. He did not want to forgive.

Joseph felt real fear, hot and sick inside him. Lizzie would be hurt, and Judith. They did not spare women. He and Matthew would be killed. They would never catch the Peacemaker now. Bitter, terrible irony—the Reavleys would never exact their own vengeance.

Would John Reavley have wanted vengeance? Probably not. When Joseph thought about it, after four years of mutilation and death, he felt that his father would definitely not have. It ended nothing. The Peacemaker must be stopped because of the damage he could still do; no more than that.

"There may be such people, I don't know," he said quietly. How much of the truth should he tell? One lie, if caught, could kill them all. But they must all tell the same story, true or false.

"Let me get dressed, and we can all answer your questions. I presume you do not wish to imprison British army officers on military duty. Or perhaps you do? Maybe it's you who are helping the occupiers to escape, and you think we will discover that, and—"

The policeman lifted the gun and swung his arm around. Joseph only just managed to fend off the blow, but he did it hard, with his weight behind it, and the gun clattered to the floor. He thought for an instant of diving to get it first, and realized he would be just too late. He forced himself to stand still.

The policeman watched him, eyes hard and angry, then bent and retrieved the gun, pointing its muzzle at Josephs stomach. "Wise," he said between his teeth. "Very wise. I'd have shot you."

"I can see that," Joseph answered. "You would have had a lot of explaining to do to the British army as to why you'd shot an unarmed priest in his bed, but it would have been a bit late to help me."

"You say you're a priest. I say you're a collaborator."

"By then it would be obvious that you didn't care. You just wanted to shoot someone, and you didn't have the guts to pick anyone who could fight back," Joseph said with contempt. He was frightened, especially for Lizzie and Judith, but he was beginning to be angry as well. "For heaven's sake, think about it! We're in British army uniforms. The ambulance is pretty obviously a real one; you can see the state of it. There's years of blood on its boards, it's splintered with shot, and any fool can see it's at least four years old."

"Oh, it's real enough," the man agreed. "I don't doubt you stole it from a real British hospital. But we got reliable information that you have a German officer with you who's one of those that led the invasion and occupation of our country. To collaborate with the enemy makes you one of them. Worse, you betrayed your own." He said it with total conviction, the contempt in him scalding like acid. "Put your clothes on, priest. You're going to answer to the Belgian people. Unless you want to come as you are?"

Ten minutes later they were all downstairs in the gray early-morning light, shivering and silent. There were three more policemen, all with guns. Madame and Monsieur were there, too, bristling with anger because they had been made fools of, their hospitality abused. Madame, her puffy face gray, her hair in a thin braid over her shoulder, glared at Joseph in particular and spat, her loathing too deep for words.