'they have no trouble getting it in Rome.'
The waiter's face quivered, and Michael could almost hear him saying unhappily to himself, 'Ah, here is another one who is blaming me for Mussolini. This war, oh, this sickness of a war.'
'Yes, Sir,' the waiter said, smiling, 'it is possible that you are right.' He backed away, trying to disclaim, by the tortured small movements of his hands and the sorrowful upper lip, that he had any responsibility for the Italian Army, the Italian Fleet, the Italian Air Force.
'Well?' Peggy said loudly.
Michael sipped his brandy slowly, in silence.
'O.K.,' said Peggy. 'I catch on.'
'I just don't see the sense,' Michael said, 'of getting married now.'
'You're absolutely right,' Peggy said. 'It's just that I'm tired of seeing single men get killed.'
'Peggy.' Michael covered her hand softly with his. 'This isn't at all like you.'
'Perhaps it is,' said Peggy. 'Perhaps all the other times weren't like me. Don't think,' she said coldly, 'you're going to come back in five years with all your medals and find me waiting for you, with a welcoming smile on my face.'
'O.K.,' Michael said wearily. 'Let's not talk about it.'
'I'm going to talk about it,' Peggy said.
'O.K.,' said Michael. 'Talk about it.'
He could see her fighting back tears as her face dissolved and softened. 'I was going to be very gay,' she said, her voice trembling. 'Going to war? Let's have a drink… I would've managed, too, but that damned sailor… The trouble is, I'm going to forget you. There was another man, in Austria, and I thought I'd remember him till the day I died. He was probably a better man than you, too, braver and more gentle, and a cousin of his wrote to me last year from Switzerland that they'd killed him in Vienna. I was going to the theatre with you the night I got the letter, and first I thought, 'I can't go out tonight,' but then you were at the door and I looked at you and I didn't really remember the other man at all. He was dead, but I didn't remember very much about him, although at one time I asked him to marry me, too. I seem to have terrible luck in that department, don't I?'
'Stop it,' Michael whispered, 'please, Peggy, stop it.'
But Peggy went on, the mist of tears barely held back in the deep remembering eyes. 'I'm silly,' she said. 'I'd probably have forgotten him even if we had been married, and I'd probably forget you, if you stayed away long enough. Probably just a superstition on my part. I guess I feel if you're married and it's there, all settled and official, to come home to, you'll come home. Ridiculous… His name was Joseph. He had no home, nothing. So, naturally, they killed him.' She stood up abruptly. 'Wait for me outside,' she said. 'I'll be right down.'
She fled out of the small, dark room with the little bar near the window and the old-fashioned maps of the wine sections of France hung around the smoky walls. Michael left some money on the table for the bill, and a big tip to try to make up to the Italian waiter for being rude to him, and walked slowly out into the street.
He stood in front of the restaurant, thoughtfully smoking a cigarette. No, he thought finally, no. She's wrong. I'm not going to carry that burden, too, or let her carry it, either. If she was going to forget him, that was merely another price you paid for the war, another form of casualty. It was not entered on the profit-and-loss balances of men killed and wounded and treasure destroyed, but it was just as surely a casualty. It was hopeless and crippling to try to fight it.
Peggy came out. Her hair shone in the sun as though she had combed it violently upstairs, and her face was composed and smiling.
'Forgive me,' she said, touching his arm. 'I'm just as surprised by it as you are.'
'That's all right,' Michael said. 'I'm no prize today myself.'
'I didn't mean a word of what I said. You believe that, don't you?'
'Of course,' said Michael.
'Some other time,' Peggy said, 'I'll tell you about the man in Vienna. It's an interesting story. Especially for a soldier.'
'Sure,' said Michael politely. 'I'd love to hear it.'
'And now,' Peggy looked up the street and waved to a taxicab that was slowly coming down from Lexington Avenue, 'I think I'd better go back to work for the rest of the afternoon. Don't you?'
'There's no need…'
Peggy smiled at him. 'I think it's a good idea,' she said.
'Then tonight, we'll meet as though we never had lunch today at all. I'd prefer it that way. You can find plenty of things to do this afternoon, can't you?'
'Of course,' Michael said.
'Have a good time, darling.' She kissed him lightly. 'And wear your grey suit tonight.' She got into the cab without looking back and the car drove off. Michael watched it turn the corner and then he walked slowly west on the shady side of the street.
He had put off thinking about Peggy, half consciously, half unconsciously. There were so many other things to think about. The war made a miser out of a man, he saved all his emotions for it. But that was no excuse, either. He still wanted to postpone thinking about her. He knew himself too well to imagine that for two, three, four years he could remain faithful to a photograph, a letter a month, a memory… And he didn't want to make any claims on her. They were two sensible, forthright, candid people, and here was a problem that millions of people all around them were facing one way or another, and they couldn't handle it any better than the youngest, the most naive, the most illiterate backwoodsman come down from his hills to pick up a rifle, leaving his Cora Sue behind him… He knew that they wouldn't talk about it any more, either that night or any night before the end of the war, but he knew that in the nights of memory and recapitulation ahead of him, on continents he had never travelled before, he would suffer as he thought of this early summer afternoon and a voice would cry within him, 'Why didn't you do it? Why not? Why not?'
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE General had come down to inspect the line, exuding confidence, so they all knew something was up. Even the Italian General in the party of ten bulky, binoculared, goggled, scarved, glittering officers had exuded confidence, so they knew it was something big. The General had been particularly hearty, laughing uproariously when he talked to the soldiers, patting them heavily on the shoulder, even pinching the cheek of an eighteen- year-old boy who had just come up as a replacement in Himmler's squad. This was a certain sign that a great many men were going to be killed, one way or another, very soon.
There were other signs, too. Himmler, who had been at Divisional Headquarters two days ago, had heard on the radio that the British had been burning papers again at their headquarters in Cairo. The British seemed to have an unlimited number of papers to burn. They had burned them in July, and then again in August, and here it was October, and they were still burning them.
Himmler had also heard the man on the radio say that the overall strategy was for them to break through to Alexandria and Jerusalem and finally to join up with the Japanese in India. It was true that this seemed a little grandiose and ambitious to men who had been sitting in the same place in the bitter sun for months, but there was a reassuring sound to the plan. At least it gave evidence that the General had a plan.
The night was very quiet. Occasionally there was a random small rattle of fire, or a flare, but that was all. There was a moon and the pale sky, crusted with the mild glitter of the stars, blended gently with the shadowy expanse of the desert.
Christian stood alone, loosely holding the machine-pistol in the crook of his arm, looking out towards the anonymous shadows behind which lay the enemy. There was no sound from them in the sleeping night, and no sound from the thousands of men all about him.
Night had its advantages. You could move about quite freely, without worrying that some Englishman had you in his glasses and was debating with himself whether or not you were worth a shell or two. Also, the smell died down. The smell was the salient fact about war in the desert. There was not enough water for anything but drinking, and not enough for that, so nobody washed. You sweated all day, in the same clothes, week in and week
