A Fearsome Doubt - Charles Todd [91]
War was suffering. For the wounded, for the survivors, for their families at home, for the bled-out land around them and the dead horses and stark blasted trees that bore no resemblance to anything living.
As he spoke, it began slowly to dawn on him that he, too, was going to survive. After all, he would not die. It was such a horrific realization that he couldn’t cope with it. His mind went blank, and even the voice of Hamish MacLeod, his constant and unrelenting companion since the summer of 1916, was stilled.
He had no memory of what happened after that. Where he had gone, what he had done, how he had managed to simply walk away. This man, bleeding in his motorcar long after the war had finished, knew more than he did. Dr. Fleming at the clinic must have known a little about the blank days from official reports. There had been compassion in the doctor’s eyes, and it had hurt Rutledge more than the truth might have done. But Fleming had refused to tell him. It was, the doctor felt, far safer for his patient to come to it naturally. . . .
THE GERMAN WAS watching him. “I saw you at that ridiculous bonfire. And again on the road, when you tried to run me down. As a matter of interest, why did you leave me, back there in France? I was still alive!”
Rutledge said, holding on to reality with a grip that was iron, “I don’t remember the end of the war. I don’t remember you—or, yes, I do, a little, but only since the bonfire.”
“You don’t remember anything about ending up deep behind our lines? What the devil were you doing there? We looked up and there you were, standing within feet of us. Terrified us; we thought at first you were a dead man—some apparition out of hell! Someone spoke to you—”
Rutledge closed his eyes, and in the blackness there, like a flickering scrap of film, he found images. He had been walking—he had no idea where he was going, or why. And eventually he’d come to a road, for there were men all around him and voices buffeting him, making no sense—
He had stood there, waiting to be shot . . . waiting for oblivion.
The German beside him was saying something, but Rutledge couldn’t shut out the images now.
All he had wanted was for the pain to end. For the blessed release of a single shot. Instead, some half a dozen soldiers had turned toward him, a montage of faces with moving lips, defeated, tired eyes, and the filth of the trenches filling the cold November air.
One of the Germans had stepped forward, staring hard at Rutledge, then mimicking reaching for a cigarette to offer him. And then he took his hand back again with a shrug, when Rutledge made no move to accept it.
He didn’t want a cigarette—he wanted to be shot.
An officer came then, looking closely at his irregular visitor. And then he was saying something to his men.
The two of them were walking side by side, away from the rest. Rutledge thought, He doesn’t want to shoot me in front of them . . . and was content.
There were so many soldiers at first. And then the road seemed empty, and darkness was coming down. Not the darkness in his mind, but the early dusk of November. He found himself wondering if this was still the eleventh, and where the officer was taking him. One body lying along the road here would be anonymous, forgotten.
His sister would probably never know what had become of him. Just as well—it would spare her the shame—
He lost track of time. He couldn’t be sure whether he’d been following the German for a few minutes or for far longer. The only anxiety he felt was whether the man would lose his nerve and not shoot.
There was some sort of exchange—furious and loud-voiced. Unexpected, jarring. And as Rutledge struggled to make sense of it, there was a shot at close range.
In the split second after the report, as the echo faded, Rutledge gratefully waited for the pain, for the spreading agony and for the death that would end it.
But it didn’t come. There was nothing—
He turned toward the German officer,