John Boyne - The Absolutist

I set my face like stone and stare at him, feeling angry that he dares to presume to know me at all after how he has behaved towards me. “What do you want from me, Will?” I ask him eventually, running the back of my hand across my tired eyes, my voice filled with exhaustion. “Just tell me, all right?”

“I want you to back up my story,” he says. “No, that’s wrong. I want you to simply tell Sergeant Clayton what happened. I want you to tell him the truth.”

“Why would I do that?” I ask, confused. “You just told me that you already have.”

“He refuses to believe me. He says that no English soldier would behave in such a fashion. He brought Milton and Attling in and they both deny it. They agree that there was a German boy alive when they left us there but they claim that he tried to attack us and that Milton had no choice but to shoot him in self-defence.”

“They say that?” I ask, both surprised and not surprised at the same time.

“I’m for going to General Fielding about it,” continues Will. “But the old man says that’s out of the question without anyone else to corroborate my story. I’ve said that you saw it all.”

“Jesus Christ, Will,” I hiss. “Why are you dragging me into this?”

“Because you were there,” he cries. “My God, man, why am I even having to explain it to you? Now, will you back me up or won’t you?”

I consider it for a moment and shake my head. “I don’t want to get involved,” I say.

“You already are involved.”

“Well, just leave me out of it then, all right? You’ve got some bloody nerve, Will, I’ll give you that. You’ve got some bloody nerve.”

He frowns and looks at me, cocking his head a little to the side as he takes me in. “And what’s that supposed to mean?” he asks.

“You know precisely what it means,” I say.

“Jesus Christ, Tristan. Are you telling me that because your feelings are bent out of shape, you’re going to lie to protect Milton? You’re going to do this to get back at me, are you?”

“No,” I say, shaking my head. “That’s not what I’m saying at all. Why must you continually distort what I say? I’m saying that on the one hand I don’t want to get involved in this business because there’s too much going on and I can’t see what one extra dead soldier matters in the great scheme of things. And on the other hand—”

“One extra—?” he begins, sounding amazed at the casual nature of my phrase, although no more appalled than I am to hear myself say it.

“And on the other hand, since you’re finally deigning to speak to me, I want nothing to do with you, Will. Can you understand that? I want you to leave me alone, all right?”

Neither of us says anything for a few moments and I know that this can go one of two ways now. He can grow aggressive with me or he can repent. To my surprise, he chooses the latter.

“I’m sorry,” he says. Then, louder: “I’m sorry, all right?”

“You’re sorry,” I repeat.

“Tristan, can’t you see how difficult this is for me? Why do you always have to be so bloody dramatic about everything? Can’t we just… you know… can’t we just be friends when we’re lonely and soldiers the rest of the time?”

“‘Friends’?” I ask, almost ready to laugh. “That’s your word for it, is it?”

“For God’s sake, man,” he snaps, looking around nervously. “Keep your voice down. Anyone might hear.”

I can tell that I have unsettled him. He looks as if he wants to say something to me in return and takes a step towards me, a hand lifting slightly towards my face, then changes his mind, and retreats as if we barely know each other.

“I want you to come with me,” he says. “I want us to go to Sergeant Clayton right now where you will tell him exactly what happened with the German boy. We will report it and insist that the matter be referred to General Fielding.”

“I won’t do it, Will,” I say unequivocally.

“You realize that if you don’t, then the matter is at an end and Milton will have got away with it?”

“Yes,” I say. “But I don’t care.”

He stares at me long and hard, swallows, and when he finally speaks again his voice is quiet and exhausted. “And that’s your last word on the matter?” he asks.

“Yes,” I tell him.

“Fine,” he says, nodding his head in resignation. “Then you leave me with no choice.”

And with that, he takes his rifle off his shoulder, opens the magazine, empties the bullets into the mud, and places the gun on the ground before him.

Then he turns around and walks away.

MARIAN AND I had lunch in the window seat of the Murderers public house on Timber Hill. The incident with Leonard Legg had been put behind us, although the bruise on my cheek served as a reminder of what had taken place outside the café.

“Is it sore?” asked Marian, noticing me touch the bump gingerly with my finger to test for pain.

“Not really. It might be tender tomorrow.”

“I am sorry,” she said, trying not to smile at my discomfort.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“Still, it’s not on and I shall tell him so next time I see him. He’s probably gone off somewhere to lick his wounds. We won’t see him again today if we’re lucky.”

I hoped that would be the case and busied myself with my food. In the time it had taken us to walk there we had avoided controversial topics and settled for bland small talk instead. Now, as I finished my lunch, I remembered that I knew very little of what Will’s sister actually did here in Norwich.

“You didn’t mind meeting me on a weekday?” I asked, looking up. “You were able to take time away from your job, I mean?”

“It wasn’t difficult,” she replied with a shrug. “I work mostly in a part-time capacity. And it’s all voluntary, anyway, so it doesn’t really matter if I show up or not. Well, no, that’s not right. I only mean that it doesn’t affect my standard of living since I’m not being paid.”

“Can I ask what you do?”

She pushed away the last of her pie with a grimace and reached for a glass of water. “I work mostly with ex-servicemen like yourself,” she told me. “Men who’ve been through the war and are having difficulty coming to terms with their experiences.”

“And that’s a part-time position?” I asked, a flicker of a smile on my lips, and she laughed and looked down.

“Well, I suppose not,” she admitted. “The truth is I could work with them twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and I still wouldn’t even scrape the surface of what needs doing. I’m really only a dogsbody, of course, for the doctors, who actually know what they’re doing. I suppose it’s what you’d call emotionally draining. But I do what I can. It would be better if I was a professional.”

“Perhaps you could train as a nurse?” I suggested.

“Perhaps I could train as a doctor,” she replied, correcting me. “It’s not such an outlandish idea, surely, Tristan?”

“No, of course not,” I said, blushing slightly. “I only meant—”

“I’m teasing you. There’s no need to feel so awkward. But if I could go back a few years I certainly would have trained for medicine. I’d have liked to become involved in a study of the mind.”

“But you’re still a young woman,” I said. “It’s not too late, surely? In London—”

“In London, of course,” she said, interrupting me and throwing her hands in the air. “Why is it that everyone from London always believes it to be the centre of the universe? We do have hospitals here in Norwich, too, you know. And we have injured boys. Quite a few of them, in fact.”