Blue Damask Page 32

  She was prepared to see a whole village turn out to attack, but all was peaceful. There was no army of goatherds approaching. No angry villagers waving staves and shovels. She saw only Sonnenby’s broad back far below and heard only the wind in the trees along the river. His boots slid a little as he neared the bottom of the steep bank and raised some dust but he kept his feet. She watched him walk back and forth, eyes on the ground like he was looking for something. Finally he stopped and bent his knees. When he stood up he had something in his hand. She watched him slap it against his thigh, raising a puff of dust around his knees, and then slowly smoothed the fedora onto his head.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Elsa sat by Descartes’ body holding his hand until the sun touched the tops of the hills in the west, then reluctantly made her way to the grazing animals and dug out the camp shovel from the pack. Sonnenby was still pacing the river bank and she would not wait for him any longer. She had watched him from up on the hillock, worried he might take off toward the village in a fury of revenge, then worried he might throw himself into the river, then worried he might take Descartes’ pistol to his head. He did none of these things, but paced back and forth, back and forth at the place where Descartes had fallen.

  She unfolded the shovel handle and locked it onto place. She measured a spot on the gentle slope and started to cut a line in the sod. She had two meters done along one side and about half a meter down when the light went out. She straightened up to see Sonnenby standing over her, blocking the sun. His face was ravaged under the brim of the fedora and he did not speak, but took the shovel from her hand and bent to the work without a word. She was grateful for the rest, but he should not be digging with his hands so bruised and swollen.

  Her palms had hardened in the last few weeks, her blisters no longer bothered her and her back and shoulders had grown used to hard work. Harder than sitting at a desk with a pen in her hand, anyway. But grave digging was brutal on the body. She welcomed a brief break from the work. Sonnenby dug with a determination that defied his injured hands.

  She rubbed her back as she picked her way to the pile of supplies near the saddles and tents. She moved her briefcase and Sonnenby’s satchel and tugged at the leather straps of Descartes’ bag.

  Inside she found fresh khakis, his shaving kit, and his passport. At the bottom there was a little pouch that held some tie tacks, cuff links, a woman’s ring and three starched collars. A small folded frame made of silver and wood hinged with steel lay at the bottom and she brought that up, too.

  It opened to show two photographs. On the left was Jean-Philippe, considerably younger, in a fine suit with a pretty dark-haired woman in a wedding dress standing at his shoulder. Both young people were smiling too broadly for what was obviously supposed to be a formal portrait. There was none of the serious ‘posing for posterity’ look on their faces. They were grinning at the camera.

  The bit of blurring on both their cheeks and on the delicate bouquet the woman held suggested that a great deal of laughter had probably exasperated the photographer as he tried to position them properly. The right side of the frame was a photograph of the same laughing woman with an infant in a fancy christening gown resting on her knees. She had one hand behind his head, and was lifting him to face the camera. It seemed to Elsa that even the baby was laughing. She snapped the frames shut and stood.

  Descartes had said he had been in the Levant twenty years. She did not want to try to imagine what had happened to his family. He had come to the desolate wastelands of Mesopotamia and Syria to live a death, buried in the desert.

  Elsa picked up the canvas they used to cover their pack against the wind and sand. She tried to stop thinking as she climbed higher to the top where Descartes lay very still, no longer laughing. She unrolled the canvas the length of his body and then knelt and went through his pockets. His safari khakis had many pockets and she examined every one. She found the expected geologists’ tools, his firestarter, his pens and notebooks, which contained words written in crabbed French that she could not read, a small flask of whiskey, half full, a compass and maps, pencils, and his pocket watch.

  She sat back on her heels. The pocket watch she took and tucked into her décolletage, the frame with the smiling family she put in his hand and curled the fingers around it. Rigor had not set in, but was imminent. The fingers were stiffening but were still flexible enough for her to give him his photographs. She turned her head to see Sonnenby’s progress. Dirt and small stones were flying up around his head. He was attacking the ground with considerable energy despite his injuries. It would be more efficient to get Descartes in his grave soon, before rigor made it impossible to position the body.

  She rolled Descartes onto the canvas, then repositioned him and gently brushed off the bits of sand and soil and grass from his face before folding the edges of the cloth over his corpse. She bent down near his head and got a firm grip on the canvas and dragged him toward Sonnenby. She lined him up with the dark hole that was opening in the earth, then sat down to rest. Sonnenby knew she was there but he did not look up from his digging. He was down about a meter, now. That should be deep enough. They could pile dirt and stones on top later to make it more secure.

  Elsa realized she would have to eventually stop him. He was like a machine. She could see from the sharp focus of his eyes on the ground that he was not thinking about what he was doing. She stood, feeling the ache in her shoulders and back from her own efforts. She felt the ache in her heart for Descartes, and she felt a greater ache for Sonnenby.

  “Henry, that is deep enough.” He did not respond. Another shovelful arced up and over one arm to land in the growing pile near his shoulder.

  She said sharply, “Heinrich!”

  He stopped and stood up straight at the sound of his name. The shovel dropped from his hands and landed at his feet. He looked startled, his dark eyes big and round in his face. He was covered in dirt, the fedora on his head buried in several centimeters of soft dark soil.

  Elsa extended her hand to him. “Henry,” she called softly. He seemed far away. She crawled closer, her hand extended, almost touching him. “Heinrich.”

  He finally looked at her. He bent to retrieve the shovel and handed it to her. Then he climbed up and out of the hole. He lay on his back; the fedora tipped its load of dirt and fell to the grass upside down. She let him rest, panting there beside her. The wind had picked up, blowing the horses’ manes and tails, and her hair. It felt cool on her sweating face and arms. She had no idea where she was. This could be anywhere in Anatolia. She tried to memorize landmarks before the sun set, but the river cut its way through the low hills and culverts making for miles of repetitive scenery. She might never find this place again.

  But there was no reason to ever come back here. She turned to look at the grave. Two men lay stretched out beside it, one breathing in great gasps, one not breathing at all. No, she did not need to remember where this place was. It would be with her forever.

  Elsa sat beside Sonnenby until he was breathing normally again, then together they lowered Descartes’ wrapped corpse in the earth and covered him. Again they lay resting beside the mound of earth.

  After a while Elsa brought Sonnenby the water bags and they emptied them into their mouths and over their faces and into their hair. They sat there wet, unwilling to move though the sun was low in the sky and they had not eaten all day, nor finished preparations to spend night here. They had seen nothing move but birds. No villagers or goatherds had come out to look for them, no scouts, curious about the European strangers or covetous of the horses and supplies. No one and nothing. They heard only the wind and the birds and the constant singing of the river below them. She was exhausted and did not relish the idea of a night ride through this country without a guide, or the work in setting up the tent and preparing food for another night. She just wanted to lie there.

  She turned her head. Sonnenby looked terrible. He was not making any decisions either. He lay on the ground b
linking at the sky and his eyes moved in a way that suggested deep thought. She knew better than to disturb him. She wondered if this current trauma was leading Sonnenby toward revelation or relapse. He had spent many hours in thought today. Asking him how he felt in the face of this horrible event would be a terrible mistake. She knew how he felt. It was in his face and in the way he held his body.

  In the hospital, one of her duties had been to help the men write home to tell their families what had happened to them, and prepare them for their homecomings.

  Most of the amputees were terrified. She would sit quietly next to them, pencil in hand and they would look at her with stricken eyes. “I am half a man”, they would say to her. “What do I say to Mother? To my sweetheart? How can I go home?”

  Elsa had the same answer for those who could write, “Start the letter with, ‘Mother, I am alive and am coming home soon.’” She wrote those words many times for men who were missing an arm. She knew the mothers who read those words would rejoice. So many mothers received typewritten letters that began, “We regret to inform you….” But it was difficult to convey maternal joy to these men. Many of the men assumed their lives were over, and many refused to see their survival as a joyful event, no matter how enthusiastically their mothers greeted them upon their return.

  It was her experience with the amputees that led her to psychology in the first place. Her own joy and satisfaction over a grievous wound well-healed was not shared by her patients. Her fine stitching that left beautiful straight scars without a lump were not admired by their bearers. Her careful care that prevented infection and eased their pain meant nothing to them. Their morphine-glazed eyes haunted her at night as she lay in her little bed in the nurses’ barracks.

  Their bodies healed, but their minds were broken. No one took the time to help them adjust to these drastic changes. They were packed up on trains and sent out like baggage.

  Elsa regarded the end of the war as the beginning of her career. Shell shock and depression. These wounds were not being treated in the hospitals and the survivors were released before they healed. She could not bear to see their eyes. The suffering continued even when the pain was gone. She pressed her fists to her eyes to stop the memories. She had to stop them. If she could not stop them, she must accept them and move on. Life moves on. Time moves on. Time does not stop for death.

  Sonnenby groaned beside her. She lay back and stared at the clouds that floated across the darkening blue. He might be one of the many who limp though the rest of their lives, healed but permanently damaged. Society did not want to look at the wounded. She turned her head and this time saw that he was looking at her too.

  He said, “We have to stay here tonight.” His voice was rough, like his throat was sore.

  “I know,” she answered.

  “I will finish setting up camp,” but he didn’t move like he would get up.

  “Good.” She told him.

  Neither of them moved. She said, “We could just lie here.”

  “I have to picket the horses.”

  “Yes.”

  He rolled to his feet, limped to the baggage and to the picketed horses, which had exhausted the grass in circles around the picket pins. She watched him work. If they survived the journey to Vienna, she would return to Doctor Engel with great swathes of notes. She would miss this year’s conference, but next spring what a dissertation she would present. She had been writing it in her mind for weeks.

  Sonnenby was using the tent canvas to cover their supplies. He walked back to her with a handful of tins he dropped at her feet. “Bully beef, courtesy of the British Army.” He curled his lip with disgust.

  “I am not hungry,” she told him honestly.

  “I can’t eat,” he agreed.

  “Sit down.” She patted the grass next to her and he folded himself. “Without Descartes we can’t be sure where we are,” she said.

  “We have his compass and his maps?” He nodded to the little pile of his things beside her.

  She nodded and touched them lightly with the tips of her fingers. “If we get back—“

  “We will,” he interrupted.

  “If we get back,” she insisted, “What will you do?”

  He grimaced. “I have been thinking about that all day.”

  She knew that. “You will come with me to Vienna,” she told him.

  He nodded, but the way he rubbed his beard with one filthy and bloody bandaged hand told her he was agreeing with some conclusion he had come to, and not her statement. He raised his chin and met her eyes. “I am still your patient, aren’t I.” He did not phrase it like a question.

  She tried to keep her face impassive. He was asking her to deny it. She did not have an answer. Inside this question was a great pain not related to hunger or exertion. Maybe it was fear. She rubbed her stomach where the pain was greatest. She was disgusted that it took her so long to parse out her feelings.

  “Of course you are my patient,” she answered before she had time to think about the more dangerous answer.

  His face fell and his throat moved with a hard swallow. He lowered his eyes then got up and walked around the top of the hillock. The silhouette of his body, topped with Descartes’ fedora, was stark against the glow of the sunset. She wondered if he would build a fire. He paced the hill looking off into the horizon and then down to the river. He and Descartes had shared the night watch, taking turns sleeping and watching the horses. Without a partner to spell him, she would have to stay awake at least part of the night. She might have to sit with a loaded pistol on her knee as Descartes did.

  She prepared herself for that. She still hurt inside, so food was not a problem. She could use more water, and tea or coffee would be nice to have as the chill of the night descended. She wondered again if he would build a fire.

  He disappeared and was gone so long she decided to build a fire herself before it got too dark to gather wood. She slid lower down the hill to where cottonwoods grew along the banks of the river and carried two loads of brush and tree-fall back to the mound of earth. She built the small fire and had it crackling with the light and sound that had comforted mankind for thousands of years. The fire brought Sonnenby back. He set down the filled water skins, and then followed them to the ground.

  Elsa put the coffee pot in the fire to boil and began to grind their coffee beans with Descartes’ mortar and pestle. Sonnenby brought the horses closer to the grave and ferried their supplies to the edges of the firelight.

  “Do you think we will be attacked?” She asked him while the coffee boiled.

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  When he was finished he sat down across the fire from her and stared into it as she did. She passed him a tin cup of hot coffee. “Drink. You will feel better.”

  He took the cup, but glared at her. The planes of his face were harsh in the firelight.

  “You will,” she insisted.

  “What is the point?” He drank his coffee and poured himself more.

  “Of feeling better?” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I am trained to make people feel better. It is what I do. I suppose the point is to relieve suffering, but if one enjoys suffering then I am doing them a disservice by relieving them of their pleasure, aren’t I? One should know the difference.”

  He snorted. “Answered like a therapist.”

  “I am a therapist.”

  “I don’t want to talk to a therapist. I want to talk to you.”

  Elsa was silent. Her stomach started to hurt again. She rubbed it with her hand and drank her coffee. She poured another and then said, “Did you know Jean-Philippe had a wife and a child?”

  He shook his head. “He never told me.”

  “I have to assume they are dead,” she continued.

  “Why?” He drank his coffee and set the cup down by his knee.

  “Because he would never leave them to come out here to the wilderness.”

  “How can you be so certain? Perhaps he couldn
’t wait to get away from her. Perhaps she was an unfeeling shrew who hounded him day and night.” He bit off each word.

  Elsa sighed. She got up and moved around the fire to sit beside him. He tensed but made no effort to move away from her.

  “An unfeeling shrew?” She kept her voice low and soft and took his right hand in hers and rested it on her lap. “Hounded day and night?” He tried to take his hand away but she held tight. “Henry, you are my patient. I cannot be your lover.”

  “I don’t need a nurse.”

  That might be true. He might improve more with a lover than a caregiver, but Elsa’s heart sank. He would find it difficult to entice an honest one. Some women might be attracted to the idea that he had money and a title, but there was no escaping his past. He was labeled a lunatic. This usually marked a man loveless for life. This is what he is thinking. The only love he could expect would be false love from prostitutes and gold diggers.

  Elsa felt a pang in her middle again. She was surprised that thoughts of strange women locked in embrace with Sonnenby brought out ferocious feelings of jealousy. How odd. She looked up at him. He was looking down at her under the brim of Descartes’ fedora. He was calm. He blinked steadily, his breathing normal and even. His hand was warm and heavy in hers. Descartes blood and the dirt from his grave were ground into the bandages on his hands. The bandages needed to be replaced. Elsa stopped herself. That was a nurse’s thought. She realized she didn’t want to be his nurse.

  She said, “Hamlet worried.”

  His eyes slowly widened. “Hamlet? We are talking about literature now?”

  She nodded and started to unwrap his hand absently, picking at the edges of the cloth. “Hamlet wondered if he were really mad. The idea terrified him. It was better to tell his friends he was pretending. This way they would not suspect the truth.”

  “I thought he was quite sane,” Sonnenby murmured, watching her unwrap his hand.