A Duty to the Dead

about it while he could still speak.”

“Then why not write it in your letter?”

“I don’t know,” I said again. “It was almost as if-” I stopped.

“As if what?”

“It was almost as if he hadn’t wanted to put it in writing. He was insistent that I come to you personally.”

“But Arthur has been dead some months. If it were a pressing matter, surely it would have been better to come here at once?”

I prevaricated. “You were in France, Lieutenant Graham. And there were my duties as well. And this-” I indicated my arm.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking.” He continued to stare at me, but his mind was elsewhere. Then he said again, “And that’s all of the message? You’re quite sure?”

“Yes. I’ve given it word for word.”

“Thank you, Miss Crawford. It was kind of you to carry out my brother’s wishes. But I think you liked him, a little. Is that true?”

“He was a very likable man,” I answered honestly. “Very popular with the men and with the nursing staff.”

“And he said nothing about this matter until he was-dying?”

“To my knowledge, no. None of the other nurses told me anything about promises.”

“But then you didn’t tell them, either, did you.”

“No.”

“Why do you think he chose you?”

I knew I was pink again. “Because I took the time to be with him during his last hours. I assure you, he wasn’t the only one I watched over or read to-or wrote letters for. It’s hard to explain, Lieutenant Graham, but when you are sitting by a wounded man and he’s telling you what to say to his mother or his wife or his sweetheart, there’s an intimacy that can’t be avoided. I have had men say things to me that were terribly personal, messages to their wives that they would never have shared in any other circumstance.” I paused. “It’s almost as if I’m not there, they’re simply talking aloud. But I hear these things and try not to listen at the same time. If you understand what I’m saying.”

Jonathan Graham nodded. “Yes, I’ve asked the nursing sisters to write letters for me, when the bandaging covered my eyes.” After a moment he roused himself from whatever thoughts were distracting him, and said again, “Thank you. It was a great kindness. I hope you’ll consider staying the weekend. I think my mother would be grateful if you could.”

“I don’t wish to impose-”

“It’s no imposition. She would take it as a great favor.”

We walked on, the wintry sun trying to peer through the bare trees.

“Have you been to Owlhurst before, Miss Crawford?”

“No, it’s my first visit to this part of Kent.”

“We were once famous for our owls. On the far side of the churchyard there’s what’s left of the great expanse of wood that covered much of Kent in the distant past, an almost impenetrable forest. When my parents were first married, I’m told they could walk through it of an evening and count two or three species of owl calling in the dusk. I daresay they’re still there, those owls. I like to think of the continuity of life here. It helps, a little, in the trenches.”

“I remember Arthur saying something about them. He could never find where they nested.”

Jonathan smiled. “That was Arthur for you. Always trying to get to the bottom of things. My mother will tell you he was a very clever child, interested in science but with a leaning toward the law. I expect he’d have become a solicitor but for the war.”

I said nothing. Arthur had told me that he had turned away from the law as a profession. I tried to remember his words.

“There’s evil in goodness and goodness in evil,” he’d said. “I’ve seen too much of the evil in the law to be comfortable with it.”

“What would you like to do, then, when the war is over?”

“I think I’d like to grow coffee in East Africa. Somewhere new where I could start over.”

“Why should you wish to start over?”

“Because there would be no memories of the past infringing on the present.”

I’d thought he meant memories of the war. Now I wondered.

“Lieutenant Graham, I’d like very much to ask you a question. Though you needn’t answer if you don’t wish to.”

“Of course. What is it?”

“Can you right this wrong for your brother? Is it in your power?”

“Why should you doubt me?” His voice was cold.

“It isn’t doubting you so much as wanting to believe that his faith in both of us wasn’t misplaced. I saw his distress. This was on his conscience, if you will. He was helpless to rectify what lay in the past. But he thought you might be able to do that for him. I’d like to leave here with the feeling that Arthur will rest easier now.”

“Your sense of duty does you credit, Miss Crawford. You can rely on me to see to it that Arthur’s last wishes are treated with the greatest respect.”

“Indeed. Thank you, Lieutenant.”

We made our way back to the house in silence, and I tried to tell myself that I had faithfully kept my promise. There was, after all, nothing more I could do or say. And if Arthur had trusted his brother, I must believe he knew he could.

Then why did I have this feeling that treating Arthur’s last wishes with the greatest respect wasn’t the same as promising to carry them out?

I could almost hear the Colonel Sahib’s voice: Walk away, Bess. If Arthur had wanted more from you, he’d have told you more.

The question really was, would Arthur have felt satisfied?

Well, to be fair, it was possible that Jonathan Graham knew what it was Arthur wanted but not how to go about it. After all, he’d had only a matter of minutes to digest my message.

Who are you to talk? my conscience demanded. After leaving your duty to the eleventh hour. What would you have done, my lass, if Lieutenant Graham had died of his own wounds?

I sighed as we walked through the door and would have liked to go directly to my room for a bit.

But Mrs. Graham was standing there waiting for us, as if she’d watched our progress from a window, and she rushed me into the sitting room the instant I’d handed my cloak over to Susan.

“You must be freezing, my child. Come and sit by the fire. Would you like something warm to drink?”

“No, I’m fine, Mrs. Graham, thank you.”

“You saw the memorial?”

“It was-touching,” I said, trying to think how to answer.

“Yes. I think he’d have been glad of it.”

Jonathan had gone to some other part of the house, and I wondered if he would tell his mother any or all of that message. Or what he would tell her. I was just grateful now that she hadn’t brought up the subject again.

After lunch, she asked if I’d care to walk around the village. “For the sun is stronger now, and it will be more comfortable.”

It was the last thing I wanted. The cold, after the Mediterranean Sea, was penetrating. My arm preferred to sit by the fire. But I smiled and said that I would, and she sent me up for my coat.

Muffled once more in scarf and gloves, I followed her down the lane and into the churchyard. I thought at first she was going to take me back to see the memorial.

Instead we walked a little way among the gravestones, and I could admire the lovely mellowed stone of the church above us. Its air of age was comforting, like an anchor-or a rock-that spoke of centuries past and centuries to come.

Neither of us mentioned the raw graves marking where men had come home to die. Arthur might have been among them, if his leg had waited another few weeks to turn septic.