James Benn - Billy Boyle

After a little more chitchat the group broke up and we headed to our seats. Vidar Skak came in and stopped to talk with Rolf and Major Cosgrove, pointedly turning his back on Birkeland, who was standing nearby. I bet their place cards weren’t next to each other.

I sat with the Home Guard officers and wives and spent most of my time listening to complaints about the Americans overrunning their village. A newly arrived division had just been based nearby, and to listen to this group they were all girl-crazy cowboys who should never have been let off the base. They were probably right but I said nice things about my countrymen anyway.

The food was bland-more fish and boiled potatoes. Servers brought out plates with the fish already doled out, still piping hot. Bowls of potatoes and turnips appeared, followed by brussels sprouts and cabbage. There was food rationing here and it probably wasn’t easy to put on a feed like this, but the local victory gardens must have been overflowing with brussels sprouts.

“Used to love them,” said a woman next to me as she passed the bowl, “on Sundays, with a nice roast beef. But every day, it does wear one down.”

A basket of bread came from the other direction, but no butter. Even gold couldn’t buy butter with U-boats sinking freighters every day in the Atlantic. The speeches were thankfully short, and there were enough toasts to Allied unity to keep my wineglass permanently in motion.

“To the Americans,” a Home Guard colonel opposite me said, offering a toast to our group at the end of the table. “May they arrive in sufficient numbers to defeat Jerry, but not so many as to take up all the room in the village pub!”

“Hear, hear,” went around the table, and the colonel winked at me, having his bit of fun. He was gray at the temples, and by the lines around his eyes, over fifty.

“Oh dear, Maurice,” his wife said, “what terrible manners! Please excuse my husband, Lieutenant, he had to wait fifteen minutes for his pint recently and hasn’t been the same since.”

“That’s all right, ma’am, I understand it must be difficult having so many GIs around. If I remember my history lessons, we had the same problem in Boston a while ago, until the redcoats left.”

“Touche,” said the colonel. “I deserved that. Don’t think we don’t appreciate America coming into the war, we do. It’s just that, for my generation, having gone through the First World War, and now this, it’s all so damned repetitive. And here we are, too old to serve… .”

“The Home Guard is service, and important service too,” his wife said. “Why, after Dunkirk, you were all that was left to stand up to the Germans if they invaded. And a good account you would have given of yourselves, all of you!”

There was silence around the table, and I watched their faces. Older men, lost in memories of battles past and opportunities lost to prove themselves once again. Maurice patted his wife’s hand, and she placed her other hand on top of his and squeezed. There were a lot of jokes about the Home Guard, old men drilling with broomsticks, and all that. Looking at them, I had no doubt that these gray-haired, middle-aged retreads would have gone down fighting if it had come to that. It must be hard keeping their spirits up when the U. S. Army showed up, rich in supplies, arms, cash, and optimism, eliminating the very need for a local guard just by their presence. And not understanding how close things had been for them. I raised my glass.

“To the Home Guard,” I said, surprised at the lump I felt in my throat.

“To the Home Guard,” came back at me from up and down the table, and I watched the colonel puff out his chest a bit as he raised his glass and basked in the smile his wife gave him, her moist eyes lingering a little as she watched him.

I realized the talk about Americans all around me was uneasy. I was one of the thousands from across the sea, easy with money, informal beyond the bounds of their polite society, a threat and a salvation wrapped up in one. Their young men were spread out across the globe, fighting in North Africa, in the jungles of Burma, sitting in German POW camps, and we were here, well fed and feeling our oats. They scrimped along with food rationing while your typical U.S. Army base probably threw away more than their whole village ate every day. I wondered how we’d react if the tables were turned.

After that toast, the mood lightened a bit. We talked about the last war, in which all of them had fought, and this war, in which their sons were fighting now and, for some, in which their daughters were taking part, too. The colonel and his wife had lost their oldest son on the Hood, sunk last year by the Bismarck. Their youngest was a pilot in the RAF.

“Fourteen hundred men on the Hood, including Michael,” said the colonel. “Only three were picked up out of the water.”

“At least you sank the Bismarck,” I said, offering what feeble comfort I could.

“I didn’t mind hearing that news, not at all,” the colonel said, taking his wife’s hand.

“What was it, Maurice?” she said. “Over two thousand on the Bismarck, and only a hundred survived. The numbers of war are so horrible. We say two ships sank, but that’s over three thousand men as well.”

The table fell silent.

“They are more than numbers.”

“Your Highness!” None of us had noticed the king standing just behind me, making his way down the table to greet his guests. Everyone started to rise.

“No, please, stay seated,” King Haakon said, gesturing with his arms, palms down, for everyone to stay in their seats. “I am sorry for your loss, for all the deaths in this war. There are no words worthy of such a loss.”

“God bless you, Your Highness,” said the colonel’s wife. The king walked around the table and stood at her side, reaching down from his height to take her hand.

“No, I ask God to bless you.”

I had never thought much about what it took to be a king. Guess I thought it was all giving orders. Shows what I know.

I had another glass of wine and was feeling a little tipsy when the king finished making his rounds and left the room, which I took to mean I could, too. I said my good nights to the Home Guard group and not for the first time wondered what Uncle Dan would say if he saw me now. The party was beginning to break up, and people were starting to file out. I noticed Daphne at the head table, a shock of green surrounded by brown and khaki. Cosgrove arose and intercepted me as I made for the door. For a big guy with a gimpy leg, he could move pretty fast when he wanted to.

“Lieutenant Boyle, I must ask for your assistance. It seems we are a bit short of Home Guard chaps for the exercise tomorrow. We need a few more fellows to fire off some blank rounds at the Norwegians and play the Huns. You’ve been volunteered!” I looked over at Harding, still sitting at the head table just outside the crush of men around Daphne, and he raised his glass with a smile. Thanks a lot.

“I guess so, Major. What do I do?”

“Be at the main entrance at 0600 hours, and you’ll be driven to the exercise area. The baron is going as well, and Mr. Birkeland has offered to lend a hand. They both think it will be great fun!”

Kaz would.

“And wear something more suitable for the field. It’s bound to be muddy out there.”

He was off, leaving me wondering why all armies seemed to start things before the sun came up, and wishing I had something besides my one dress uniform with me. I walked down the hall and up the stairs to my room, each step increasing the pounding in my skull. Too many damn toasts.

Minutes after I made it to my room there was a knock on the door. An enlisted man stood outside, a pile of clothes and boots weighing him down.