He sat on the Fannings’ porch, all alone in dusty midnight. Cybo whined from the cellar. Insects hissed ferociously, and upstairs Dan knew that Irene was lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling with open eyes. It did not seem that either of them could draw warm, undisciplined breath again until this weight of muddling armies was lifted from their hearts. Back and forth, from bedroom to silver-white porch, their disordered thoughts poured one to the other, and the sprawling brigades lay too thickly and too close to them, bearing them down with cruel impassiveness.

Book Four: July First

Book Four

JULY FIRST

Chapter 1

1.

Toward morning Bale slept at last with the peculiar, hopeless discomfort of the sleeper who knows that some unsolved problem is looming close at hand—whose dreams are shaped but vaguely, and yet carry in them a devilish succession of accusing faces. He was awakened at five o’clock by the deliberate pound of hoofs and crunch of saddles, and Mr. Fanning’s voice saying, “If you will come inside, gentlemen, you shall have a cup of it.”

Fully clothed, Dan got up from the sofa and opened the door which led from sitting room to rear hall. Beyond, in the outer doorway of the kitchen, Mr. Fanning stood wrapped in his wife’s gray shawl, and still wearing his night-cap. He looked like a masquerader, half parson and half witch; his eyes were gelatin in his haggard face. A tall coffee-pot bubbled furiously on the stove; its nutty odor scented the room, and even at this hour the stove fire had made the kitchen stuffy. With midday the place would be a baking hell.

Fanning returned to the stove, nodding nervously at Dan. “I felt the need of coffee,” he said in explanation. “Mother allowed me none yesterday, but now I crave it. Sadly.”

Dan asked, “How do you feel?”

“I am greatly improved. All pain is gone—” In the yard sounded a mutter of voices, a clatter of dismounting men. “A party of officers just crossed the lawn,” whispered Fanning, “and they commented upon the odor of coffee. I made bold to offer them some. You will join us, of course?”

“Thank you,” Bale said. “I’d like to rest up a trifle.” He went to the farther end of the rear hall and entered the dark wash-room. Beyond the heavy, closed doors he could hear soldiers tramping into the kitchen; men seemed to move with a thunderous tread, once they were girded for war. Dan filled the lead-colored bowl and buried his face in the cool, dark water. In the dim mirror he looked at himself as he combed his hair. He thought that he appeared very grim, disconsolate to the point of soullessness, perhaps because he needed to shave.