A Cup of Tea - Amy Ephron [36]
She answered instantly. “Vanessa cardui. They migrate, you know,” she said to Philip. “Can you imagine that flying two thousand miles to a warmer climate? They look as though they could barely fight the wind.”
Henry Fell put the butterfly down, carefully, so as not to bang the glass. “Very few of them survive the journey home the following year,” he said. “But the females lay eggs along the way. And then the children do it again the following year.”
Rosemary walked over to where her father was sitting. “Once, Papa, remember, when I was eight, we saw a flock…”
He corrected her, “A swarm…”
“A swarm of monarchs, like a patch of gold across the sky. We were in Connecticut…”
“And your mother was there. I remember,” said Mr. Fell. He picked the butterfly up again and looked at it. “Is it instinct or sense that makes them do it?” he asked.
“Is there a difference?” asked Philip.
“Yes, I think there is,” said Mr. Fell. “In more sensible times. You know we’re sending more troops to France and Italy.”
“What choice do we have?” said Philip.
“Don’t you always have a choice about war?” asked Rosemary sounding female and pacifist and slightly petulant. “It’s not as if we’ve been attacked. I sometimes think we may have entered into something that wasn’t our business. I’m sorry. I have trouble making sense of it.” She was quiet after this. She looked at Philip across the table. They had dressed in silence—neither of them mentioning the events the night before. It occurred to Rosemary, they should get their own place. Maybe, in their own apartment, there would be more room for honest interchange, less occasion to keep up appearances all of the time. She poured herself a cup of coffee and took a piece of buttered toast and topped it with preserves. Mr. Fell busied himself with the small note that had come with his butterfly. “Caught by the meadow at Sheepshead Bay, June r, 1918.”
“What are you doing today, dear?” Rosemary asked Philip, finally, after they had sat in a thick silence for a few minutes.
He looked surprised at the question. “I’m working,” he said.
“You’ve been there every day since you got back. Don’t you need a day off?”
Philip shook his head. “Teddy ran it by himself for long enough. If you want to, you can meet me for lunch,” he said.
“I have a lunch,” said Rosemary, “one of those charity things. You’d just be bored…Then I’m working at the hospital.” If she’d looked at his face, she might have had a different answer.
“Another time then,” said Philip who shortly after that excused himself and went to work.
That day at lunch, he took a walk and, almost without meaning to, found himself on the street outside Miss Wetzel’s Boarding House. There was a group of young boys playing stickball. Philip caught the ball as it almost rolled out into the street. He kicked it back. He considered taking off his jacket and joining them but they ran off. He stood across the street and looked up at Eleanor’s window. The window was half-open, the curtain was blowing in the wind. And then he saw her framed in the window.
The street receded. There was darkness all around him and the piercing sound of an incoming shell as the night-sky exploded in a burst of light and next to him, the one they called “Dutch” because he was from Pennsylvania, no one knew his mother called him “Sweets”, guts wrenched open spewing in the clay-red mud, writhed in agony and then lay motionless. Keep a cool facade. Can’t let the men know you’re afraid. Order the men to fire. No, don’t. As, if they do, they’ll only draw more fire on themselves. What was the rule, “Fire when fired on”…Was that the rule? Run. No. Retreat. A proper, provisional retreat, carried out before dawn. Make a list. Won’t be able to take them with you, carry the dead on your back…or arrange a burial. Better, make a list so their families can be notified. Incoming…And the sky blasted white. Order the men to fire. No, don’t. And