Angels in the Gloom_ A Novel - Anne Perry [27]
“What did he say?” she asked.
“He told me about Paul,” Abby answered, her eyes desperate. “He told me how much he had liked him. What they did, what they talked about during the long days when they were bored stiff and had lots of time to be frightened, to think of what sort of night it would be, how many would be injured, or killed. He said Paul used to tell jokes, awful ones that went on and on, and sometimes he’d forget the end and have to make it up. Everyone knew he’d lost his place, and they all joined in, getting sillier and sillier.” She gulped. “He said no one else ever made them laugh the way Paul did.”
Hannah felt the fear slip away from her. It was only pain that tore at her. Abby was missing him all over again, the sharpness renewed. It wasn’t any terrible revelation after all.
“It’s good his men liked him,” she said aloud. “He was with friends.”
There was no comfort whatever in Abby’s eyes. “This man—his name was Miles,” she went on. “He told me about one concert party they had, all dressed up like women and singing songs. He wouldn’t tell me the words because he said they were racy, but Paul had a gift for rhymes, and he wrote a lot of them, even though he was an officer. He didn’t take credit for it, but the men knew. All sorts of absurd rhymes, he said.” She tried to smile. “Actually ‘ridiculous’ and ‘meticulous’ was one, and ‘crazy horse,’ ‘pays, of course’ and ‘could be worse,’ only he pronounced it ‘worss.’ It was all incredibly silly, and it made them laugh.” She looked at Hannah wretchedly. “I never heard him do that!”
Hannah was lost for words. She could see that Abby was hurt almost more than she could bear, but not why. Everything this man had said about Paul was good.
“He told me Paul was incredibly brave,” Abby went on. “The men were filthy a lot of the time, mud and rats and things, and lice. Can’t get rid of the lice. They shaved every day, but not enough water to wash any more than their faces.” Her voice was rising and getting faster. “Miles told me you can smell the stench of the front line long before you get there. Paul never said that.”
Hannah waited.
“Miles said he’d never liked anyone more than he liked Paul.” Abby did not even try to stop her tears now. “His men trusted him, he said. He was hard. He had to be. But he was always fair. He agonized over decisions he made which could have been wrong. Miles told me about once when he had to send almost twenty men over the top, and he knew they had hardly any chance of coming back, but he couldn’t say that to them. It haunted him afterward, that he had to tell them only part of the truth, so it amounted to a lie.”
She swallowed hard. “They knew that, and they knew what he felt, and why he couldn’t do anything else, but he still had nightmares about it. He’d wake up white-faced, with his body aching. I try to imagine him there alone in a tiny, cramped dugout—thinking about looking men in the eyes and ordering them out to be killed while he stays behind. And they still loved him!”
“I expect they knew he had no choice,” Hannah spoke at last.
“That’s the point, Hannah!” Abby cried, her voice almost strangled with emotion. “They knew him! They really knew him—they understood! I didn’t! To me he wasn’t that man at all. I never saw that kind of honor in him, that kind of laughter, or pain. I just knew him as he was at home, and that was so little. And now it’s too late. I never will. . . . I can’t even tell Sandy what his father was really like.” She closed her eyes. “It’s all gone, slipped away, and I didn’t grasp it when I could. I was too busy with my own life. I didn’t look.”
“You couldn’t have known what he was like in France,” Hannah said gently. “None of us at home know what it’s like for them.”
Abby jerked her head up. “But I didn’t want to!” she hissed. “Don’t you understand? I knew it was