Lovely War(59)

Aubrey picked up Joey’s ankles and pinned them under his elbows. Lieutenant Europe hefted up the upper body. They staggered back to Europe’s quarters. Joey Rice’s body drooped like wet laundry.

Lieutenant Europe switched on the light. Fumbling with the weight, he managed to spread a towel over his bed before they laid Joey down upon it.

Aubrey backed away from the bed. “Should I get a doctor, Jim?”

Europe’s always-intense gaze searched Aubrey’s face. “It’s a bit late for that now.”

“But what if we’re wrong about that?” Aubrey panted. “What if there’s something we don’t see, and they can fix him up?”

Europe pulled up a stool from a writing desk in one corner.

“Sit down, son,” he ordered. “Put your head between your knees.”

Aubrey darted for the door. “I can’t do that; I gotta get help.”

Europe blocked Aubrey’s exit like a cinder-block wall. “Sit down.” He took a flask and poured him an inch of something. “Drink this.” He handed him the glass.

Aubrey stared into the swirling resin-colored liquid. “I don’t really drink,” he mumbled. “Not much of one for—”

“Drink it.”

It burned and stung his already wounded throat.

Europe found a sheet and draped it over Joey. Then he sat at the foot of the bed.

“Now,” he said slowly, “tell me exactly what you mean when you say this is all your fault, and you’re the one who did it.”

Aubrey didn’t know it, but he was beginning to shake.

Lieutenant Europe, with some effort, pulled a blanket out from under Joey’s body. He wrapped it around Aubrey. He fished a chocolate bar from his desk and thrust it at him. “Eat this.”

When Aubrey finally became still, Europe tried again.

“Aubrey,” he said gently. “I’ve known you for a long time, all right? You can trust me. I need you to tell me what happened. Unless you yourself choked and clubbed my cornet player to death, you’ve got nothing to fear from me. Tell me everything. All right?”

The sheet, covering Joey’s feet. Just as if he were asleep in bed.

He owed it to Joey to tell the truth. No matter what they did to him. They could do the worst, and it’d be nothing he didn’t deserve.

“I was out after lights-out,” Aubrey whispered. “Seeing a girl.”

Europe kept quiet.

“I’ve gone there before,” he said. “Once, a white soldier stopped me. A marine, I think. Pulled a gun. Threatened to teach me a lesson about laying my hands on white women.”

Whatever Europe thought of this, Aubrey was not to know.

“I got the guy’s gun away from him,” Aubrey said. “And I didn’t stop going out to see my girl. Joey always warned me that I shouldn’t. Sometimes he covered for me.”

“You didn’t think your attacker would come back?”

Aubrey looked up. “He was a coward. Figured I’d shown him we weren’t gonna put up with that. Whatever he was used to down South.”

Europe’s voice was low. “Go on.”

“I was out tonight, with my girl,” Aubrey said. “I think they followed me home. Must’ve been a bunch of them. I stopped to use the latrine, then went to my barrack. When I came in, Joey went out to use the latrine. See, I’d woken him up.”

“And that’s where you found him?”

Aubrey nodded. “I must’ve fallen asleep,” he said. “But I woke up all of a sudden. Something wasn’t right. When I realized Joey wasn’t in his bed, I went looking for him.”

Jim Europe allowed his head to droop. “Poor kid,” he murmured. “Poor kid.”

Aubrey clutched the blanket. Grief hit him like a sledgehammer, and he began to cry. Lieutenant Europe handed him a clean handkerchief. The kindness only made Aubrey cry harder.

“It’s my fault,” he said again. “I’m the one who should’ve got it.”

“Listen up, Aubrey Edwards,” Europe said, “and listen good.”

Aubrey blinked. His nose was inches from Europe’s.

“Going out at night was against the rules, and you ought to get in trouble for that.”

Aubrey nodded. Consequences were coming. It was only fair.

“Going out at night when you knew killers were hunting for you wasn’t your best idea.”

Aubrey nodded. God, if only he hadn’t be so damnably stupid.

“Some of you city boys have no idea what we who grew up down South understand.”

He sounded just like Aubrey’s dad.

“But let’s get this straight. You’re not the one who should’ve gotten killed. Joey shouldn’t have gotten killed. Nobody should’ve been killed. A black man’s got as much right to live, and see a girl, and go to the toilet, for Chrissake, as anyone else.”

Europe’s words crashed down like a wave, and then, like a wave, they slipped back out to sea. If Aubrey was supposed to find any comfort in them, it didn’t last.

Jim Europe paced back and forth, thinking. Aubrey watched the still form of Joey, under the draped sheet. How odd it was that not the slightest breath or movement stirred the sheet. Because he was dead. Over and over, the surprise of it clawed at him.