Battle Cry - Leon Uris [82]
What can I say? What can I tell her? He took off his gloves and knocked. For a long period he stood there. Then the door opened slowly. A frail, pale-faced woman stood before him. She was plain but neat and had a wonderful calm about her. Twenty-seven or twenty-eight, Danny thought.
“Yes?” she asked softly.
“Mrs. Norton?”
“Yes.”
“I was a friend of your husband’s. I’m Danny Forrester.”
“Won’t you come in?”
She ushered him into the small apartment. It was modestly but well furnished. Untidy, but untidy in a very neat way. Untidy as a college professor might be. It was like Milton Norton. A large leather chair beneath a floor lamp, a desk littered with papers, shelves of books, including many whose covers were faded and aged beyond reading their titles. A bed without a backboard nestled in an alcove. It was covered with a spread and filled with colored cushions to serve as a couch in the daytime. A comfortable and homey room. Snug and friendly. The walls were covered with pictures of former students.
The room was full of peace of mind. The pale woman who stood in its center was peace of mind. Danny took off his cap and fidgeted.
“Won’t you sit down?”
“I can only stay a moment, Mrs. Norton. I’m on furlough from the coast, on the way to Baltimore.”
“It was very nice of you to take time to look me up. Do call me Gib. All of Milt’s friends do. I’ll put on some coffee.” She disappeared into the kitchen. Danny walked over to a picture of Nort. He was wearing his uniform. Nort didn’t look good in a uniform. It sort of hung on him. He wore his overseas cap straight on top of his head as if he were balancing a basket. Danny studied the picture till she returned.
“The cake is two days old, but I’m told that you fellows have cast-iron stomachs.”
Danny smiled. His inner tension had been relieved.
“Let’s see now, you’re Danny. He wrote about you. He was very fond of you.”
“I was fond of the professor…I mean Nort. Everybody was, Gib. He had a slow, easy way of looking at things that sort of made a fellow feel like—well, like he was talking to his dad.”
She lit a cigarette. “Milt was like that, Danny. This room used to be a madhouse, a dozen kids a night dropped in. People always felt at home around him, especially young people.”
“He…he was a great guy. I know how much of a loss it was.”
She managed a sad little smile and leaned back on the cushions. She spoke of Nort as though he were right this moment teaching at the university and she might expect to hear his footsteps coming up the stairs with the voice of laughing students trailing behind him.
“Gib, these bums followed me home, do you suppose we could feed them?” he would say; or “Gib, I’m worried about the Weber girl. She’s got all the brains in the world, but with her family trouble she’s liable not to come back to school next year. It would be a shame.”
Danny, now relaxed, spoke of their humorous adventures in boot camp with the two Texan drill instructors. Gib laughed and repeated a dozen times, “Poor Milt. Poor dear, I suppose he was a terrible Marine.”
Then they ran out of words. The quiet of the room fell over Danny. Nort was still here, in every book, in every messed-up paper.
“Milt told me about you, Danny, and your problem.”
“It is awful nice of you to think about me at a time like this. You’re a lot like Milt. He was always trying to give somebody a lift.”
He stood up and walked slowly towards the door, then turned. “Gib,” he said, “are you sorry—are you sorry, now?”
“What do you think, Danny?”
He shook his head.
She took his hand. “Thanks again for coming. It was very nice of you. Would you like to drop me a line once in a while and let me know