At Some Disputed Barricade_ A Novel - Anne Perry [60]
The man opened his mouth to argue, then met the Peacemaker’s eyes, and changed his mind. He left without speaking further.
The Peacemaker returned to his bed, but sleep eluded him. It required all his concentration and discipline of mind not to allow the Reavleys to dominate his thoughts and become an obsession. They were a nuisance, but peripheral to his main activities. The great cause was peace: first with Germany, then with the world. Never again would there be pointless slaughter like that going on at this moment at Passchendaele. The thought of it was enough to make humanity tremble and weep.
It was the night after that, with the air close and damp, and promising thunder, when Richard Mason returned from the Western Front and reported in the upstairs room. His face was gray with exhaustion. He had obviously shaved hastily and cut his chin. But it was the emotional tension in him, the grief in his eyes, the nervous tic at his temple that moved the Peacemaker to pity and a sense of the enormity of the horror. Mason had seen almost every battlefield of the war, not only in Europe but in Russia and the Middle East. He had never looked as haunted as he did now.
“Sit down,” the Peacemaker said quietly. “Whisky? Tea? Have you eaten? What can I get you?”
Mason smiled bleakly. It was no more than a bare curving of the lips, hardly noticeable. “Tea would be nice. I can’t afford to be light-headed. And a sandwich. Bread that isn’t moldy. And a clean cup to drink out of.”
The Peacemaker rang for the manservant. They spoke of trivialities until the food and drink came and they could close the door and be assured of privacy. He allowed Mason time to eat and drink before he approached the subject of his report.
“Thank you,” Mason said. He met the Peacemaker’s eyes. “It’s beyond description. It’s beyond human suffering. It is hell itself.”
“But you have come with something to tell me.” The Peacemaker had seen it in Mason’s patience, his assurance. He had watched the man report on one atrocity after another over years, and he knew every mood of his mind and read its reflection in his face. Mason had brooding, sensitive features, powerful and yet more expressive than perhaps he himself realized. The depth of his emotion was mirrored too easily.
Now he answered slowly, measuring his words. He described Howard Northrup and his appointment to replace the much-respected Penhaligon. With no more than a trace of anger, he told of his stubborn incompetence. Watching him intently, the Peacemaker saw in Mason not only fury but pity as well for a man placed beyond his depth both of experience and of character.
Then, still slumped in the armchair, Mason told of Northrup’s body being found with a single bullet through the brain, fired from right in front of him, and Joseph Reavley’s unsuccessful attempt to learn from the men exactly what had happened.
“Reavley, the chaplain?” The Peacemaker kept his voice devoid of emotion with the greatest effort. He had not forgotten how Mason had thrown away his article on the nightmare of Gallipoli, with all its propaganda value, because of Reavley’s sense of futile, narrow patriotism. “And what did Reavley find?”
Mason laughed. It was a jerky, painful sound that said more vividly than words how lacerated he was inside. “Nothing! Which I imagine was what he wanted, and intended. He’s learned since Prentice’s death. He’s investigating because he has to. Neither he nor the Colonel wants anyone charged. The whole army in that section is facing slaughter. It will take both genius and lunacy to keep them facing forward and over the top, God help them! And God forgive us!” He left the words brittle and sharp in the air, unsaid between them, that they could have prevented it all, if any of their plans had succeeded.
“There’s open talk of mutiny, and it won’t take much to bring it about,” he went on. “Then they’ll have to fire on their own men. They’ll have no choice.” There was absolute