Page 33 of The Last Kiss

The thought made him impatient with the morning. It was Sunday, and the household must be seen in Church. Ash hated church, even more so now than before the war when the ritual had simply bored him. Now he felt restless beneath the cold, silent weight of medieval stone as if he and it couldn’t exist in the same place. Now, the martyred saints looking down at him from stained glass windows reminded him of other martyred faces and he thought those long dead saints hadn’t suffered half as much as his newly dead men.

Now he wondered what use he was supposed to have for a God who’d witness hell on earth and not lift a finger to end it.

He sat with his parents, arms crossed over his chest, cane resting against the end of the pew. Sensation prickled the back of his neck and he glanced over his shoulder, his gaze unerringly meeting Harry’s. He sat near the back, with Boyd and the other servants, but Ash hardly noticed them. He smiled, couldn’t help himself, at the sight of Harry, his heart inflating with joy. Harry didn’t smile, not with his mouth, just gave a respectful nod. But Ash could see light in his eyes and felt his helpless grin broaden. It was an effort to turn back around when the service began.

He made a point of not listening as Reverend Pratham delivered his serman, bowed his head and let his mind drift during the prayers, lips mouthing ‘Amen’ when required. He decided he would find Harry in the stables after lunch, persuade him to ride out again this afternoon. Harry wouldn’t be working, so there could be no objection on that front, and if his father thought a Sunday ride wasn’t quite the thing then too bad. He was sick of his father’s antediluvian opinions.

“…our glorious dead,” Reverend Pratham said and Ash looked up sharply. Pratham, smug faced, stood with hands clasped piously before him. “In London, a great victory parade is to be held on Peace Day to mark the signing of the treaty, and here in Hinton we’re to have a Peace Pageant on the same day – Saturday the 19th of July – on the village green. I’m sure you’ll agree, it will be a fitting way to celebrate our victory.”

Celebrate. Ash shifted on the pew, a flash of liquid anger spreading out from behind his breastbone.Celebrate?His chest tightened and he had to loosen his tie. It was hot in the Church, the spring sun shining directly onto him through the sorrowing face of St. Stephen. He looked up and for a strange moment it was Harry’s face looking back at him, grey with fear as the whistles blew along the line.

Ash jerked his head around, sweat sticking his shirt to his back. Apageant? What use was a pageant to the dead, what use to the maimed? Pratham droned on and the air in the church thickened until it was unbreathable, sticking in Ash’s throat, clogging his lungs. He coughed, earned a reprimanding glare from his father, and clenched his fingers into fists.

He should say something — object — but the words stuck in his craw, choking him. What could he say that these people would hear?

The organ wheezed into life and the congregation stood. Ash pushed himself upright, swayed beneath a flash of light-headedness and had to catch himself on the pew in front. His stomach cramped and he felt sick, trying not to double over as his mother started warblingAbide With Me. His body expressed what his voice could not — the hard pressure in his chest was a scream of fury, pain and frustration buried deep and deadly as a mine.

A hand squeezed his arm. Harry stood in the aisle next to him. “You look like you need some air, Mr Ashleigh,” he said quietly. “Let me help you outside.”

Ash stared, that trapped scream choking him. When Harry gave him a meaningful look, head cocked, Ash could only nod. They walked up the aisle together, Harry’s hand on his elbow, steadying him, and the tap of his cane against the stone floor audible over the organ and the congregation’s singing. Eyes followed him but Ash ignored them all — all but John Pierson’s smirking gaze. He feltthatlike cold water against fevered skin, a cold fear squirming in the pit of his belly.

Stupid. Pierson was barely more than a boy.

Harry turned them to the left, through the door, and then they were past the vestibule and out into the spring sunshine. Ash gulped in a breath. It felt like the first one he’d taken in minutes, and Harry guided him to the bench beside the doorway. “Sit,” he ordered, and Ash sat, leaning forward to rest his head in his hands. “Bloody hell,” Harry said softly. “A parade. And a pageant?”

Ash barked out a laugh and it released some of the intolerable pressure in his chest. It was such a relief to be understood without having to explain. “Quite.”

“How much is it going to cost, that’s what I want to know. This bloody government can’t pay a soldier a decent pension, can’t find work for half the men back from the war, can’t house them — can’t even bloody well feed them — but somehow there’s money for a victory parade through London?”

Ash lifted his head, startled by the vehemence in Harry’s voice. “I hadn’t thought of that,” he admitted. “I was only thinking of…” He waved a hand, as if that could encompass the bloody ruin of war.

“I know.” Harry shoved his hands into his pockets and sighed. “Some people will like it, I suppose.”

“The likes of John Pierson and his mother,” Ash agreed, sitting up. The pain in his stomach had eased, his breath no longer too tight in his chest.

“They’re grieving.” Harry said that with more compassion than Ash felt. “It brings them comfort to think of the man they lost as a hero.”

Ash worked his jaw around a bitter reply, but if he couldn’t say it to Harry then he couldn’t say it to anyone. “What right do they have to comfort? Why should they imagine glory when the truth is blood and mud and horror?”

“Because it’s kinder.”

“Kinder?” Ash snorted. “Easier, you mean. Wrap it all in King and Country and forget what war really is. It betrays them, it betrays everyone who died.”

Harry fell silent. “You think they’ll forget?” he said after a pause. “You think the people in there willforgetwhat they’ve lost? Giving a grieving mother comfort doesn’t betray the dead, Ash. You think Jimmy Tilney would want his mother to know how he died?”

Ash felt himself pale, blood draining. “No,” he said softly, gaze fixed on Harry’s flushed, upset face. “No, of course not.”

“No. And the same goes for all the other poor buggers who bought it out there.”

“Except…”

Harry’s lips thinned but Ash pressed on regardless. He couldn’t seem to stop.

“Except it’s a lie, isn’t it? How can we respect the dead when we’re not even telling the truth about how they died? That’s not respect.” He shook his head. “A pageant, Harry. Acelebration.”

Harry sighed, shoes scraping against the paving stones. “I don’t like it, either. It feels…wrong.” A pause. “Everything feels wrong. Has done since I came back, if I’m honest.”

He was standing close enough that, when Ash reached out his hand, he could touch the tips of Harry’s fingers. “Not everything,” he said quietly.

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