Lovely War(71)

Lieutenant James Reese Europe directed his band members to find rooms, eat, and meet for a first rehearsal on the theater stage in two hours. Before he could disperse along with the others, Lieutenant Europe pulled Aubrey aside.

“You,” he said. “Get some food, then find yourself a piano somewhere. The casino, or a hotel. I want you playing ragtime piano until sundown. Do you hear me?”

Aubrey’s head drooped. “That’s okay, Jim,” he said. “I’ll just go to sleep—”

“That’s an order, Private,” Europe replied. “You’re gonna play with the band eventually, but you’d better get your sorry hands moving first. I want you so solid on the ‘St. Louis Blues’ that you could solo it backward for me. Understood?”

Aubrey saluted. Understood. Then went straight to bed.





ARES


Private James Alderidge rejoined his regiment outside Gouzeaucourt early in the morning of February 15, 1918, after riding north all night to Bapaume and hitching a ride east on a supply train on to the stop closest to his combat sector. He was exhausted after a sleepless night of swinging between bliss and torment. But he was ready, by the time he rejoined his comrades, to answer their questions about his Valentine’s outing with “his girl.”

“Yeah,” he said at least dozen times that morning, “we had a grand time of it.”





APHRODITE


Tante Solange was more than a little put out that she hadn’t had another chance to lay her eyes, and presumably, her hands, on the handsome British soldier before he left. It took several board games to appease her. But by midafternoon on Friday, Hazel and Colette had stowed their bags and boarded a slow train headed toward Saint-Nazaire, riding straight into the setting sun.





APHRODITE


     Waiting for Letters—February 19–28, 1918





IT TOOK A few days for James’s letters to begin arriving at Hut One in Saint-Nazaire. They followed in a steady stream.

Colette returned to Saint-Nazaire eager to rehearse songs each night. She checked the door at the slightest sound.

Days passed, and Colette grew anxious. Had something changed Aubrey’s mind about her? She visited the commissary and finagled excuses to pass by the parade grounds. No Private Edwards had been in the infirmary’s colored soldiers’ wing.

She asked other members of the 15th New York if they knew where Aubrey was. With nearly two thousand soldiers in the regiments, most didn’t know him. Finally she found one who did.

“Haven’t seen him in a while, miss,” he told her. “He must’ve traveled with the band.”

Better gone than faithless. But why go? And why not write to her?

Weeks passed without word. Surely if he’d sent a letter, she’d have it by now.

She dispatched a letter to Private Aubrey Edwards, 15th New York National Guard, Aix-les-Bains, US Army HQ, and waited.

Nothing came back.





HADES


     Hideaway—March 1–12, 1918





TRAINLOADS OF AMERICAN soldiers began pouring into Aix-les-Bains. First Lieutenant James Reese Europe’s 15th New York Infantry Band was the most popular feature there. Their engagement was upgraded, by popular demand, from two weeks to four.

Finishing the winter under blue skies, beside a crystal glacial lake, certainly could have been worse. It was warmer here, and when the soldiers weren’t rehearsing or performing, they hiked the foothills surrounding the town. They could almost forget la Grande Guerre was going on.

Aubrey sat by the shores of Lac du Bourget. He watched the water and saw Joey’s swollen face. He didn’t hear birdsong, but Joey ragging on him for staying out late. Joey giving Aubrey a hard time, Joey rescuing his sorry hide.

He tried to play piano, but it only brought back Colette.

It slashed his heart to hurt her, after all she’d lost.

Maybe it had only been a beginning. But he loved her. With a girl like Colette, it didn’t take long to be sure. But where could it lead? He had nothing to offer her now.

He loved her, and Joey had died because of it.

In a better world, the war wouldn’t have started. Colette Fournier would be in Dinant, in the arms of her old beau, Stéphane.

The only honorable choice was for Aubrey to let her find a new Stéphane.

So when her letter reached him, asking if he could let her know he was safe, he did the hardest thing possible. He put it away without answering it.





APOLLO


     Three Million Notes—March 13, 1918





“SO, HAVE YOU written much to your girl since you got here?”

Aubrey Edwards looked up from the desk in Lieutenant Europe’s hotel room. It was after midnight, and his eyes were tired from the painstaking work of transcribing musical notation, scoring new pieces for the band.

“No,” Aubrey said slowly. “I haven’t.”

Jim Europe peered over Aubrey’s shoulder.

“You’re not writing it in B-flat.” He pointed at an offending measure.

Dang. How did Europe spot that so fast? He’d forgotten he was writing for horns, not piano. He needed sleep. He reached for a fresh sheet of staff paper. Some soldiers stayed up all night digging trenches or manning lookout posts. Some stayed up all night setting ditties to jazz accompaniment.