At the front of the cemetery is a cross. They pause for a while and look up. Edie links her arm through his. The stone is inscribed with the words THEIR NAMES LIVETH FOREVERMORE. He remembers Francis on the post, his arms and ankles tied, the shape of his bound body reminding Harry of a painting of the crucifixion that he had once seen. He remembers Francis then with his arms spread and his face at that last moment. That is the image of Francis that will endure in his mind forevermore. It’s an image that he means Edie’s eyes to never know.

“Come away,” he says to her.

Chapter Forty-Six: Harry

Chapter Forty-Six

Harry

Proven military camp, west of Ypres, October 1917

THERE HAD BEEN A PAINTING OF THE CRUCIFIXION IN DENHAM HALL. Harry had stood in front of it for some time. It was a gilded panel that, one of the staff had told him, was a section from a fifteenth century altarpiece; it had been brought back by a member of the family two centuries earlier, a grand tour souvenir from Siena. Harry had stared at the painting’s blue receding hills, the curve of the valleys, and the flooded low places. There was great serenity and antiquity in that smoky retreating landscape. It was a smooth and still backdrop that he would like to have walked into with a day’s leisure and a thermos flask. In the foreground figures in robes of vermilion and ultramarine were making busy gesticulations. In the center Christ was a small, thin mortal man on a cross too diminutive to inspire awe. His face, eyes cast down, was just weary.

Harry hadn’t seen anything divine in this painting, it hadn’t filled him with righteousness or courage; he had just felt pity for the poor pained arms and the quiet sadness that showed in the shadows around Christ’s eyes. Looking now, beyond the window of Rose’s hut, and seeing his brother slumped on the cross, he felt pity again, but also an anger that he hadn’t found in the painting.

“They’ve taken his stripe off him,” said Rose.

“They? None of this is your doing, then?”

“I spoke up for him, Harry. I told them that he’d been under strain and that this was completely out of character.”

“It’s barbaric.”

“It’s two hours per day. It’s not like he’s being flogged.”

“Only because it’s been outlawed. It’s two hours a day for thirty-five days! It’s humiliating. Have you seen his face? His disgrace is written all over it.”

“Regrettably, it’s meant to be. It’s a show—a demonstration. He’s being made an example of.”

“He won’t speak to me.”