Justin Go - The Steady Running of the Hour

— Aren’t you glad you came to Paris now?

I shake my head. — I just feel stupid. It’s not just that I wasted time. It’s the way I made the mistake. Looking for a picture because I liked the idea of it, because I thought I knew something about paintings.

I lie back on the carpet, resting my head against the side of the couch. I take a sip of whisky.

— All I need is one good piece of evidence, and I keep getting sidetracked. It’s hard because when I was doing my senior thesis, every time I got sidetracked I found the best stuff. I was reading all these diaries and letters in French—

— You wrote about France?

— Sort of. I wrote on the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. But I got interested in the French and Belgians. There was one guy in Toulouse who was still alive, he’d been at the Siege of Madrid. I was supposed to interview him, but his daughter canceled three times. He was always too tired to talk. By the fourth time my paper was already done.

— So you never talked?

I shake my head. — I should’ve done it anyway.

— You should have. Maybe he could have told you something.

— Maybe.

— I don’t mean something for your paper.

— I know.

There is a long pause. Mireille looks up at the clock. It is after six and the trains have started running again. I excuse myself to go, but Mireille says she will walk me to the métro. We leave Claire sleeping on the couch and start down the rue de Montreuil, the morning sky dim and murky. I put my hands in my pockets to keep warm.

— What was it you wanted to ask me?

Mireille shrugs. — It doesn’t matter. Claire was always there, I didn’t want her to hear—

— We can talk now.

— On the street?

We walk up to the green cast-iron entrance of the métro. I look at Mireille.

— It’s your city. Take me somewhere. You must know a place.

24 August 1916

The Langham Hotel

Marylebone, Central London

The lovers stand beneath the portico. A porter sets Ashley’s haversack on the space beside the motorcab driver’s seat, cinching a canvas strap over it. Ashley passes a coin to the porter and waits behind Imogen as she takes her seat in the cab. He leans up to the glass, whispering to the driver.

— Victoria Station.

The driver pushes the red flag down on the meter. He touches his cap to the doorman and shifts the taxi into gear.

Ashley and Imogen do not speak. They are not sitting close to each other, the hem of the girl’s skirt some distance from his woolen puttees. Ashley lowers his window and leans his head toward Regent Street, the morning air cold upon his face. He hopes the breeze will wake him. He watches a motor omnibus come into view, the passengers at the back clutching the brass handrail and stepping or jumping from the running boards as it slows. A uniformed female conductor climbs the staircase to the upper deck, calling out to the passengers.

— Gentlemen, please hold tight.

The huge placard beneath the conductor advertises Dewar’s White Label. The omnibus disappears from view. Imogen crosses her arms.

— It’s cold—

— I’ll shut it, Ashley says.

— Keep it open.

Imogen’s eyes are bloodshot. She puts her hand to Ashley’s chest.

— Careful, he warns. You’ll smudge the buttons. They’re meant to gleam like a mirror.

— Let them throw you in jail.

— They’ll throw me in the front line. Only as a private.

— You said the men last longer than the officers.

— So I’ve heard. But neither lasts forever.

Imogen shakes her head. — You needn’t say such things.

Ashley’s mouth tightens, but he says nothing. He unfolds his embarkation orders and rereads them. He replaces them in his pocket.

— I’m sorry, Imogen says. I don’t feel well at all.

— It’s no wonder. How much have we slept this week?

— Perhaps two nights in five.

— It’s good practice for France.

The motorcab passes Hyde Park, rounding the Wellington Arch. Ashley resolves not to speak for the rest of the journey. It will be better that way. He will report to the RTO at the station and then they will say good-bye.

The station is teeming. Swarms of returning soldiers in tin hats emerge from the long troop trains, their greatcoats and haversacks caked with dirt, entrenching tools and shovels swaying from their bodies as they walk toward Victoria Street or queue for the free buffet, some of them already holding cups of tea and cakes or sandwiches. The soldiers bound for France are cleaner but equally burdened, brown paper parcels of foodstuffs or extra clothing dangling from their shoulder straps.

Ashley leads Imogen by the hand, pushing his way through the crowd until they are halfway down the train platform. They stop here, the traffic of soldiers streaming past the island of their two bodies. An idling locomotive periodically steams and screeches. Amid the chaos they can barely hear.

— Damned hard place to say good-bye, Ashley says.

— Then let’s not say it.

— You know the things I would say to you. I’ve said them already. It was the best week of my life—

— Is that all it was?

Ashley shakes his head. He looks up at the dusty glass roof, the sunlight breaking in among the ironwork.

— I shouldn’t have come onto the platform, Imogen says. I’d sworn I wouldn’t do it.

— It doesn’t matter. You’ll have a letter from me before you miss me.

— I miss you already.

The conductor marches down the platform, blowing his whistle and calling for boarding. Ashley holds his rail ticket and his stamped orders in his hand.

— I ought to board.

Imogen unwraps the silk scarf around her neck. She folds it and puts it in his hands.

— I know you don’t want to take it, she says, but I don’t care. You don’t believe I can protect you, but the protection doesn’t come from me.

Ashley pushes the scarf back toward her.

— I’d lose it. It would be torn, or dirtied—

He closes Imogen’s hands around the scarf.

— There’s a note in your bag, he says. Read it when I’ve left.

They stand awkwardly apart. Imogen’s face is turned away, her eyes on the puffing locomotive. Ashley knows he will regret not embracing her, but still he does not do it.

— Good-bye, he says.

Imogen turns to him, shaking her head in exasperation. Her voice breaks.

— You can’t just stand there. You can’t leave like this, when we’ve only just begun—

— Imogen.

— You ought not to go, she insists. You ought to choose me instead.

He kisses her on the cheek, but she only stands there woodenly as he touches her and backs away.

— I shan’t say good-bye, she whispers.

Ashley steps onto the train and takes his place in the cramped compartment of an officers’ carriage. He greets the other three officers, a pair of boyish second lieutenants and an RAMC captain reading the newspaper. Ashley sits down and his legs graze those of the captain. Gruffly the captain shuffles his newspaper. Ashley recrosses his legs, resisting the urge to look out the window. Finally he looks down to the platform, but he does not see her there.

Ashley hears a clatter a few compartments down. The RAMC captain lowers the corner of his newspaper to look.

— Madam, a voice barks. Madam, the train is departing.

Imogen comes into the compartment, the conductor trailing in the corridor behind her. Her eyes are wet. The scarf is in her hands.