Flower of Iowa Read online

  “I do like, David of Dunster. I do like.” With the Briton taking the lead, they headed downhill in the waning light, on the well-traveled main road out of Rainneville.

  Chapter II

  Flowers remained troubled by the scene at the estaminet, and especially by Sanders’ taunting of Pearson.

  “I’m sorry about Sanders and the other boys,” he told David as they walked along, passing and being passed by a steady stream of mules, caissons, lorries, and men, Tommy loping to compensate for his longer legs. “We all just got here yesterday, and we were on buses all day and the night before–”

  “Buses? Don’t you mean lorries?”

  “I guess, if that’s what you call them.”

  “At least you di’n’t ’ave to take one of those trains — ‘Hommes 40, Chevaux 8’.”

  “Oh, we already took one of those, too, to get to Abbéville. But tell me: does that mean they can fit forty men or eight horses in those cars, or forty men and eight horses?”

  Although David knew full well it was the former, he answered, “No one knows.”

  “They smell like they fit in forty chevaux,” Tommy quipped, pronouncing the word perfectly.

  David laughed; but then his mood turned and he added, “They’re as nothing to the smells at the front.” When Tommy made no comment in reply, he said, “Your lot ’aven’t been up the line yet then, ’ave you?”

  Tommy shook his head, a little bit ashamed but even more excited. “No, though I hear we will soon. But you have, haven’t you?”

  David nodded. “Yes. I’m ready to fight Jerry, but … I can’t say I fancy the life in the trenches much.”

  “How come?”

  “It’s more of a bore than anything, really. The mud, the smells, the noise – and you never sleep.” David looked over at his companion. “Would you like to try a short-cut I know? It’s a better short-cut for me than for you, really, but it’s not so crowded as this road.”

  “I’m in no hurry. Lead the way.” David did, cutting down a side path Tommy hadn’t noticed. “You sure know this country well for being here such a short time,” the Yank observed.

  “I got a mem’ry for places. That’s why they use me for a scout sometimes, on wiring parties and such. Someday soon, maybe, on a stunt.”

  “A stunt?”

  “A trench raid.”

  “Oh.” A loud clap and a sudden flash of light split the late twilight. Tommy looked to his newfound friend for reassurance. “That wasn’t shells, was it?”

  “No, thunder. Looks to pour buckets any minute now.” With his head, David indicated a slight rise leading up off the side path they had taken. “There’s an empty farm building up there – a stable, I think. We’re still two miles, per’aps, from our billets. Shall we chance it this way, or go back to the main road, or ride it out in the stable?”

  A few large drops already had begun to fall. “I say let’s ride it out under cover if we can,” Tommy answered, and they charged up the rise, with him leading, then abruptly coming to a halt as he realized he had no idea where he was headed. David caught up with him, nodded toward a clump of trees on their right, and Tommy took off again. When he drew close to the trees, there was no building in sight, and the copse suddenly loomed dark and dangerous. For a wild, unnerving moment in the now-pelting rain, Tommy thought he’d been led into a trap. Maybe David wasn’t really a Tommy from Dunster, England. Maybe he was really a German spy, whose sole purpose that evening had been to lure away and murder a single Doughboy – him, Tommy Flowers.

  The notion fled as quickly as it had arrived when David tapped him on the shoulder and pointed to a small mass just beyond and to the left of the copse. This time Tommy let David lead the way, to a windowless stone building which looked to be of a size to house about four chevaux.

  In the deepening gloom and rain, David expertly located the door, pushed it open, and ignited a piece of straw with a tinder lighter, thereby revealing a section of stall with some old hay on the floor. The rest of the deserted stable, Tommy noticed as he followed inside, consisted of bare, hard ground, a few rusty and broken implements, and musty odors of livestock.

  “It’s lovely!” whispered David as he shook out the flaming straw and the place went dark.

  “Why?” asked an unconvinced Tommy, standing stock-still as he heard David cross the room.

  “A good roof, with cross-beams to brace it, a dry floor, and this.” As David set fire to a second straw, Tommy could see he was using it to light an old oil lantern, something Tommy had not spotted during their first brief reconnaissance. “Not much in it, but it’ll do for a while,” David said, adjusting the lamp so it gave off the least possible glow without flickering out.

  “Did you learn that trick at the front?”

  “You wou’n’t light a lantern at the front, mate. Blokes ’ave caught it between the eyes just for lighting a cig. ’Un snipers.” With the rain now pounding heavily on the roof, David took off his cap and began to remove his tunic. “Poor devils up the line. What a night to be out in it.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m wet,” David said simply. “That’s why the cross-beams are a spot o’luck.” He walked over to the hay, sat down, and began to remove his boots. Looking up at Tommy, he asked, “Will there be a roll call at your billets?”

  “An hour before dawn,” replied Tommy, still standing where he’d stopped.

  “Morning stand-to,” David said with an approving nod. “A good idea, to get you into the ’abit now.”

  “I guess so. Though the whole camp is still in an uproar.”

  “I should think so. Are you going to stand there all night?”

  “You want to stay here the whole night?”

  “Tommy, listen to that rain! We’ve a short walk when it lets up–”

  “If it lets up.”

  “–and it’s hours ’til dawn.” As he spoke, David slowly unwrapped the puttees that ran from ankle to knee on both his legs.

  “But why are you taking off your uniform?”

  “You don’t know, do you? In the trenches, they never let you take off your togs, ever. When they get wet – and they always do – they stay wet, and they stay on you. You’re never dry.” He gestured at the cross-beams. “This is ’eaven sent.”

  “Don’t you think it’s cool in here?” Tommy protested.

  “Not after being outside in wet togs day after night,” David replied, stepping out of his trousers and walking in his underclothes to one of the cross-beams, where he draped puttees, socks, and trousers next to his tunic and cap.

  Barefoot, he padded back to the American and added, “And there’s ’ay to sleep on. This is a bloody palace, Tommy. I thought you’d see that. I took you for a country lad. Are you a city boy, then?”

  “No,” said Tommy, finally removing his flat-brimmed field hat and beginning to unbutton his own tunic. “I told you, I’m from a small town in Iowa. I’m no city boy.”

  “Di’n’t you at least go to Chicago to join the army?”

  “No, I went to Camp Dodge, in Iowa. Then, when they needed replacements for the 33rd, they sent some of us down to Camp Logan in Texas. Then I was only there two weeks, and they put us all on a train to New York.”

  “Wou’n’t know if you were coming or going by then.”

  “That’s about right.”

  “Most of your chaps seem older’n you’n me. In their twenties, I’d say.”

  “They are. I lied to get in. I won’t be nineteen ’til October, but I told them I was twenty-one.”

  “Most of our blokes are either very old, or more your and my age. There aren’t so many of our lot left in their twenties, y’see.”

  “Oh.”

  David had removed his shirt, and was running a match up and down the seams. “Now what are you doing?” Tommy asked as he leaned up against a wall to remove his boots.

  “Reading me shirt.”

  Tommy laughed. “What’s the news?”

  D
avid smiled over at him and returned intently to his work. “Chats,” he explained, and when he looked over again and saw Tommy’s incomprehension, patiently added, “Lice?”

  Tommy abruptly stopped uncoiling his puttees to recoil himself. “Lice?”

  “You never ’eard of lice in Ioway?”

  “Not on clean people – no offense meant.”

  “None taken. Clean people don’t get chats in Blighty, either. But ’ere it’s another story.”

  “Blighty?”

  “England. You best get used to chats ’ere. You’ll ’ave them soon enough. They di’n’t tell you that in training? You cou’n’t ’ave lived in trenches, then.”

  Tommy walked over to David and seated himself on the hay to remove his trousers, an amicable gesture that still kept him a safe distance from the Briton and his chat-infested shirt. “We had hard training,” he replied defensively. “Good training. Back home, and here in France.”

  “When did your lot get ’ere?”

  David’s attention was still on reading his shirt. A surreptitious glance told Tommy that, small though David was, his upper body was fine, hard-muscled and healthy. “I told you, we just got here yesterday.”

  “I meant to France.”

  “Oh. We left New York the twenty-second of May, and we were ten days at sea.” Tommy mimicked David by carefully draping his outer garments over the other cross-beam. Returning again to lie on the hay, he went on. “We took the Leviathan. I’d never been on a ship before, and this was a great big one. I heard it was a German luxury liner before the war.”

  “You were in a convoy, then?”

  “Yes. And some U-boats came after us when we were practically to Brest. It was exciting, but we almost got tinfished. Felt like sitting ducks.”

  “Not a very good way to go under – torpedoed.”

  “I couldn’t believe I’d come all that way just to drown with thousands of other boys, without ever even seeing France.”

  “You cou’n’t be that unlucky.” His “reading” finished, David shook his shirt vigorously to rid it of dead lice and, he hoped, eggs. “Damned bloody itching,” he muttered as he put the garment back on. “D’you know ’oo it was your friend Carson wanted you to meet at the just-a-minute?”

  “He wanted me to meet that girl – Nicole?”

  “Blimey! You passed on the chance to meet Nicole?”

  “Do you know her?”

  “No one knows ’er, really. ’Er auntie watches over ’er like a ’awk. Wisht I knew ’er. ’Oo wou’n’t want to chat up Nicole?”

  “You mean make her lousy?”

  As they both laughed, David reached over and gave Tommy a playful punch on the shoulder. “You’re a funny one, Yank. But really, why di’n’t you stay to meet ’er?”

  “I’ve already got a girl, back in Brooklyn. Susan. I’ve known her all my life–”

  “The girl next door?”

  “Down the street.”

  “Really. What’s she?–”

  “–and I also wanted to talk to you.”

  “To me? You could ’ave met Nicole, but you wanted to talk to me?”

  Tommy nodded. “I felt bad ’cause it seemed like the boys were insulting you. That wasn’t right.”

  “That was right decent of you, mate. ’Twasn’t your doing.”

  “And I’ve met a lot of Frenchmen, but like I said, I never met an Englishman before.”

  “Nicole’s not a Frenchman, you silly bugger. She’s a French girl. You’re not just funny, you’re daft. Barmy.”

  Tommy seemed taken aback. “Do you really think so?” he asked quite seriously, surprising David in his turn.

  “No,” the Englishman replied with another smile and an emphatic shake of his head. “No, Tommy, I don’t. Don’t take everything I say so to ’eart.” David reached over to douse the light as the rain continued its steady thrum on the roof.

  “Are we going to sleep already?” came Flowers’ voice out of the ensuing blackness.

  “We’re going to try.”

  “But it’s kind of early, isn’t it? It still isn’t even quite dark outside.”

  “So? Last light ’ere takes a long time. There’s no such thing as too early for sleep. If you can rest, you rest. You’ll see.”

  There was quiet for a minute; then Tommy said, “David? I’m cold.”

  “‘Well, if you knows of a better ’ole, go to it.’”

  “Hey, that’s a cartoon! I’ve seen that.”

  “Brilliant, these Americans.”

  “I’m still cold.”

  “It’s all right for you to move closer, if you like. Our bodies will keep us warm.”

  “But you’ve got chats.”

  “Oh, excuse me, then! Suit yourself.”

  “Don’t be mad at me, David. I didn’t mean anything personal.”

  “I know, Tommy. You wou’n’t do that. But be a good lad now and keep quiet.”

  Chapter III

  Flowers had liked the dark-haired little Tommy with the soulful brown eyes from the moment he’d seen Pearson respond to Carson’s call – although taking an instant liking to people was nothing new for him. Lying wide awake and as still as he could, his arms folded behind his head, he listened as his new friend’s breathing quickly fell into the regular rhythm of sleep.

  David had been right: Tommy was a farm boy, more or less. Though he had grown up in town, he knew his way around farms, and had slept in a barn more than once in his life. But this place looked, sounded, and smelled completely alien to him. In Iowa, everything smelled fresh, clean, and new: the hay, the wood used to construct the buildings, even the livestock. Here everything seemed musty, damp, and old. The hay was stale, and the walls were stone, cold and moist with strange, ill-smelling greenish patterns on them.

  The steady rhythm of the rain finally began to lull him to sleep. Just as he was drifting on the edge of it, he distinctly heard a noise like crunching, and then another.

  Instantly alert, he assumed a tense concentration, and was rewarded with two, then four more of the crunching sounds. He felt the hair on his neck, then his arms, then his legs, stand on end. An unreasoning fear swept over him: they were miles behind the line, but what if it was a Hun? He and David were only a couple of miles from their camps, but suddenly he felt as if they were far from anywhere.

  You’re a soldier, Tommy, he began to repeat silently to himself. You’re a soldier, and you’re here to fight, and die for your country if necessary. How can you be a soldier and be afraid?

  Although he continued this voiceless chant, the fear, now verging on panic, still gripped him. Then, with no warning whatsoever, a shattering crash reverberated through the little stable, accompanied by a brief, brilliant flash. Tommy’s taut senses snapped, and he screamed; at the same moment, David, ripped from a sound sleep, began to yell incoherently, until he rapidly reached total wakefulness.

  “Wha–? What?” David finally began to form real words as, heart racing, he sat up, realizing and remembering where he was – and where he was not.

  “David?” Tommy’s voice came out of the darkness, barely above a whisper. “Was that a shell?”

  Tommy could actually hear David sniff the air. “No. Thunder again. That loud, it would ’ave been close enough we could smell it.” David lay most of the way back down, propped up only by his elbows. After a pause, he asked, “Are you all right, Tommy?”

  There was another pause. “I think … I think I heard something outside.”

  David took a long moment to consider that. “I ’ear nothing but the rain. What was it?”

  “It was … crunching sounds.”

  “Gorblimey!” Tommy heard David summarily reach over and strike his tinder lighter, then saw him flicker the lamp alive.

  “Do you think someone’s out there?” Tommy asked, still whispering.

  David was up and stalking about the small space, peering carefully everywhere. “More like something. And in ’ere.”

  “Som
ething?” In his mind, Tommy tried to picture French ghosts.

  “Rats, mate.”

  Now the Yank sat up, startled. “Rats?”

  “Yes. I’ve ’ad me bloody fill of rats, and you will soon enough, too.”

  “Any is enough.”

  “You best get used to them, too.” David came back over and sat down, placing the softly glowing lamp between them. “But not ’ere. There’s none ’ere.”

  “Then what was outside?”

  David, unconcerned, shrugged. “Cow, per’aps. ’Oo knows?” He looked searchingly at the American. “Are you all right, Tommy? You’re shaking.”

  “I’m cold,” Tommy replied. There was a prolonged pause; then, in a very low voice, he added, “And I guess … I reckon I was just a little scared.”

  “It’s too soon for you to be scared, or cold,” David said jocularly. “Soon enough you’ll be both all the time.”

  This did not have the desired effect of restoring Tommy to good cheer. Downcast still, he asked, “Do you think I’m a bad soldier, David?”

  “Now, don’t go getting the wind up. You’ll be all right. You’ll see.” David lay back down in the hay.

  Tommy, still sitting up, thought long and hard, then swallowed. “David? Can we sleep closer together?”

  “I told you we could. You said I got chats.”

  “I don’t care anymore. You said I’m gonna get ’em anyway.”

  “Well, come over ’ere, then,” David said as he turned out the lantern. “I don’t bite, even if me chats do.” There was a rustling as Tommy pulled closer. Though they weren’t quite touching, David said, “You’re still shivering, Tommy. I can feel it.” Without asking, and without saying anything more, he put his arms around the bigger man.

  “You’re shaking some, too.”

  “Per’aps I am.” There passed a long minute as the heat of their bodies warmed them both, then David began slowly stroking Tommy’s hair. “There, there. It’s all right now.”

  Tommy said nothing, but wrapped his own large arms around David to pull him closer yet. It was a strange new sensation. As an only boy with three sisters growing up in a large house, he had always slept alone. Even in the army’s close quarters he had, to date, always had his own bed. Now he could feel the bristles of David’s cheek, the way as a little boy he had felt his grandfather’s mustache and beard cutting into his face when the old man bent down to kiss him. But David’s stubble was much lighter, like hundreds of tiny pinpricks that didn’t really hurt at all. Thinking of the two or three times Susan had allowed him to kiss her, Tommy could remember the warm, soft feel of her in his arms, and her sweet, clean, vanilla scent. David was altogether different – not so sweet, hard here, soft there – but every bit as warm; indeed his breath, slightly sour with the wine he had been drinking at the estaminet, was hot on Tommy’s neck.