Finally, Devon got up and turned to Stanley. He kissed him on the mouth, and cupped his face in his warm hands, and Stanley started to feel a little better.
“Maybe it’s in one of the books,” said Devon.
“Maybe,” said Stanley, and he couldn’t keep his lack of enthusiasm out of his voice.
“I’ll just look for a little while and then I’ll stop, okay?” asked Devon.
He looked so hopeful, as though he thought it would help Stanley somehow to know a code that he’d been unable to complete on account of a broken radio and his lack of ability to run through a cloud of mustard gas. So Stanley nodded, put on a smile, and thenrealized that this was who Devon was. He loved to do research, and as the war was what his paper was on, he had a great many books to look through. As they both sat down on the couch, his hands went unerringly to a particular pile on the floor.
“Life in the Trenches, it’s called,” said Devon.
Stanley flicked a glance at the glossy cover and then concentrated on Devon’s fingers as he turned through the pages. Devon talked to himself while he searched, and just when Stanley began to imagine that this could go on for quite a while, Devon straightened up.
“So you were in the 44thBattalion, right?” asked Devon.
“Yes,” said Stanley. “That’s the one.”
His attention sharpened because it might be interesting to see his former world from an outsider’s perspective; it felt objective and slightly clinical that way, and he could bear it if the information didn’t reveal too much about the actual men who had died. Besides, the information was in a book, and printed words couldn’t hurt him.
“Says here that there were a series of trenches built around the village. It was Lt. Billings, not your Commander Helmer who deserted, who had half the code for retreat, and all the upper ranks, the ones who needed to know, had the other half.”
Stanley nodded. He knew that much.
“What was your half of the code?” asked Devon.
Devon looked over at Stanley. Stanley straightened up, thinking for half a second that Devon might be a German spy who was tricking Stanley into revealing what he knew, and he was tempted not to tell him. Except that a wrinkle appeared between Devon’s eyebrows, as though he was on the verge of realizing this, and Stanley could have kicked himself over it.
“You’re going to laugh,” said Stanley. “My half of the code was,There are penguins on the ice.”
Devon’s straight white teeth came into view as he smiled, nodded, and bent over the book in his lap. With one finger, he traced his way down what looked like a list. As Stanley leaned close, hooking his chin over Devon’s shoulder, he could see what it was. A list of codes ofvarious sorts, all broken into their respective parts. If you knew the first part, you could find the second.
“This one,” said Devon, tapping the page. Then he read the code out completely. “There are penguins on the ice and they skate brilliant figure eights.”
A sense of sadness swamped through Stanley. If he’d known that phrase, he could have saved Isaac. The radio. He could have savedeverybody. He could have saved himself, even. And then nobody would be buried beneath the green grasses topped row on row by white crosses. But he’d failed and didn’t deserve his current happiness.
He barely heard Devon slap the book closed, but he did feel Devon’s arms come around him.
“Don’t be sad, Stanley, please,” whispered Devon in his ear, his breath soft and warm. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize this would hurt you so bad. I shouldn’t have kept looking.”
“It’s okay, Devon,” said Stanley, his voice low. “Now I know at least what the code was, had I been able to make it through.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“Ishouldn’t have told you,” said Devon. He’d taken his research too far, again, as usual, and upset Stanley, which was the last thing he wanted to do. Stanley deserved better than to have Devon keep dragging him back into the past, when both of them knew that was the last thing either of them wanted.
He put the book down on the pile of books that belonged to the university and that would be shipped back home when his research was done. Scanning the room, he fought against the impulse to get up and tidy the piles, or to get to work. It wasn’t a hard impulse to fight because, after all, he had an American doughboy sitting right next to him.
“I wanted to know,” said Stanley, his whiskey-colored eyes on Devon and that sad expression, as though all he wanted to do was to be of use. “I wanted to know if what I’d done had made any difference, and of course it hadn’t. None of it mattered.”
Then Devon did give in to the impulse to pull Stanley into his arms, to pet his shorn hair, to kiss his temple.
“None of it matters,” said Devon. “After what you’ve been through, my paper, all my studies, they just seem stupid. I’m going to throw in the towel—”
“Throw in the what?” asked Stanley.
“I’m just going to stop,” said Devon, dismissing the idea that Stanley should have known the idiomatic expression but didn’t. “Stop everything and switch over to meteorology.”
He felt a chill as Stanley pulled away and sat up straight, not touching the back of the couch.
