‘You were well out of it.’
‘Yes.’
‘Clifford went berserk. Do you remember Clifford? Swarthy looking chap, bit of a gypsy. Went completely berserk, they couldn’t hold him down, couldn’t shut him up, couldn’t do anything with him at all.’
‘Was he hurt?’
‘No.’
‘What happened in the end, then?’
‘Oh, he shot himself.’
Garrett’s voice trailed off. Hilliard did not remember the man, Clifford, but that did not matter, either. He wondered how long it was since Garrett had talked so freely. Talked at all. He could not say anything either at Brigade Headquarters, or to the newcomers. He had been waiting for Hilliard.
Then, he seemed to come to abruptly, and his eyes refocused. He said, ‘Well, what about you? You seem all right.’
‘I am, thank you, sir.’
‘Home?’
‘Fine, thanks.’
‘I’m due for a turn of leave. Doesn’t look as if I’ll get it, not yet, anyway.’
No, and better not, Hilliard wanted to say, you had far better stay here, in this farmhouse among the apple trees. Don’t go back to London, to England, don’t go and listen to what they say and read their papers, don’t try and talk to them as you are talking to me, for there is nobody, no one knows. Don’t go.
But that was not right. For Garrett was not like him. He would enjoy all the time he spent with his wife and family, would play golf and stroke the cat and go for a week to Cowes or Ventnor, and up to London to see a show, would drink malt whisky and china tea and eat in good restaurants, stay in the most comfortable hotels, would close his eyes and ears to what he did not want to see and hear, and his mind to what he wanted to forget. If he could. So much had changed, he was changed, he would not belong in England now. None of them belonged there. And Garrett had lost his faith.
Hilliard felt a wave of misery, that there was no one left and, of those who were, Garrett could no longer be relied upon. Garrett had been like a rivet, hard and secure, down the back of the Battalion.
He finished his whisky. The guns thundered. It had gone quite dark.
‘Have you met Mr Barton yet?’
As soon as he put his foot on the bottom rung of the loft ladder, he could see the other man’s shadow above him. Then he heard a board creak, as Barton walked across the room. Hilliard waited. He had never felt it before, this irrational disinclination to come face to face with someone. He was not shy though he did not make close friends. He had found his feet easily enough in the army, from the beginning. There were always new arrivals, changes, people to get used to, just as there had been at school. Some he liked, some he was indifferent to, a few he detested. As was normal. He knew nothing at all about the new subaltern except that Garrett had said. ‘Pleasant young chap. Lively.’ BARTON D.J.C. He had been here three days.
There was no further sound from above. He would have to go up, it was almost time for dinner. The large measure of whisky had made him slightly giddy.
Oh, for heaven’s sake….
But he did not want to meet Barton. He wasn’t going to like him.
He went very quickly up the ladder.
Barton had his back to him, was reading a letter.
‘Good evening.’
At once the other man turned, said, ‘Hilliard?’ with pleasure. Hilliard stood upright in the loft and cracked his head again on the beam.
Barton grinned. ‘I’ve been doing that for three days! You think you won’t forget it another time but you generally do.’
He came across and shook hands. There was a lamp on the small table which lit up only the immediate area encircling it, and cast long fingers of shadow on to the wooden roof. The corners of the loft were in darkness. Hilliard could not see him distinctly, the side of his head blocked out the light.
‘I saw your things. I knew you’d arrived.’ He hesitated. ‘To tell you the truth, I was frightened to death of you!’
At once, Hilliard felt a wave of relief, coupled with an instinctive suspicion. It was all very well to feel something, to think it, but not to say so openly. ‘I was frightened to death of you.’ He himself would never have said, ‘I didn’t want to meet you, I thought I was going to dislike you.’ He realized now, that he Had been quite wrong.
Barton was younger than himself, though Hilliard was uncertain by how much, and he was more than a head taller. He had a particularly deep voice, with a faint hint of amusement in it, not at Hilliard but at himself.
He said, ‘I was just going down.’
‘Yes, we better had. I’ve been talking to the C.O.’
‘He told me rather a lot about you as soon as I got here. He was wanting to have you back.’
Hilliard brushed the sleeve of his tunic.
‘He thinks a lot of you, doesn’t he?’
‘I really don’t know.’
At once he was ashamed of himself for being so curt. But there was an openness about Barton which for some reason made him uneasy.
‘You carry on,’ he said, ‘I’ll join you.’
Barton hesitated. Then moved towards the ladder.
In the officers’ dining room, which had been the old dining room of the farmhouse and still retained the long refectory table, the light was better, he could see Barton clearly. He did not seem a man who would ever attract dislike. He was not quite twenty, and he looked older because he was mature, in complete possession of himself. It was not the premature ageing that often came to those who had been a short time at the front. He had some kind of central poise and calmness. But all around that, on the surface, nothing was calm or still, he talked easily and quickly, smiled, laughed at himself and, on all sides, attracted a response. Attracted, simply, liking. He did not seem a stranger, among all those here who were strangers. Looking around him, Hilliard realized for the first time exactly how many had gone.
He found himself watching Barton, listening, he felt drawn into the circle of his attention. He was talking about some relative, an aunt, who dashed about the Warwickshire countryside on a horse, riding astride not side-saddle, wearing breeches not skirts, to the horror of all who met with her. She was called Eustacia.
‘Only we none of us could ever say it properly, we all called her You-Stay-Shy. We still do.’
We?
Barton was cutting a wedge of cheese. He looked up for a moment, catching Hilliard’s eye. His own were a curious green-blue, under a low forehead and thick, black hair. His voice was still full of amusement.
‘The best thing is, she’s had nine children to date and I shouldn’t have thought there’s anything at all to stop her having another nine, in between the hunting seasons.’
What is it, Hilliard thought, why are we all listening and laughing and waiting for more? Is it that he is simply very young and new to this place, has no idea at all of the future, of what it is really like, and so there is still time left, a short time, for him to entertain us. He has seen nothing, he can talk in this way and assume that we have nothing else to occupy our thoughts. We might simply be out to dinner at some hotel in England, a party of officers on leave. The wine, reasonably good wine, was going round the table freely. He felt light-headed and warm, companionable, even among so many strangers, in the lamplight. He saw Colonel Garrett watching Barton too, and although the terrible change was still so noticeable on his face, he was more relaxed, smiling occasionally, in his old, tight way, he was clearly anxious for Barton to continue.
The others, the few who were left that he knew, had greeted Hilliard warmly enough, had said a word or two about what he had missed, and then changed the subject, hurried to eat and drink and introduce him to the strangers. To the new Adjutant, Franklin. A particularly tall man. Now, Hilliard saw that it was only Franklin whose attention was not wholly taken up with Barton’s story. He leaned back in his chair, one hand resting on the table in front of him, a blank, faintly detached expression on his face. He did not look at Barton, did not smile, was drinking little. Hilliard wondered where he had come from.