The time had arrived at last. Pierre felt glad to have lived to see it. He wondered how bad the devastation would be. Young men were lucky to survive such clashes of might. Old men should not dare to imagine that they would, too.
At that, he knew he had two tasks to perform, if he could get himself safely back down that ladder. Only two, but each was an act of conscience. A man of finite days should not ignore such opportunities.
Pierre left the loft door wide. He climbed down with cautious feet and shaking hands, and when he reached the ground he patted his pocket, confirming that the pipe was still there. He left the ladder in place and the barn door open. If what was coming rivaled what he had seen before, there was no point in closing or locking anything. It would ravage everything in its path.
Entering his house, Pierre removed his old beret and hung it on a hook. He dragged an old trunk out from a closet, searching through its carefully folded contents until he found what he was after: a sergeant’s cap from the Great War, gray blue, round at the crown with a black bill sticking forward. The sight of it straightened him, and he pulled the hat onto his head the same old way, back to front, using the stiff bill to set the correct angle.
The hat still fit after all these years. Pierre smiled: a man’s head does not change size, regardless of the rounding of his stomach or the bending of his back.
His plan required violating curfew, but Pierre suspected the usual guards would be busy elsewhere. He fetched his walking stick, then turned his girls out in the side yard. If no one came to milk them, they would suffer. But he knew from personal experience that hunger would hurt them first.
No one knew the hedgerows better than Emma, with her barters and gambits, but Pierre had learned a few tricks himself over the years. Dogs barked and he could hear people outside their homes, discussing in worried voices the red haze to the east, but he kept to the edges of the road. A military truck roared up suddenly, one poor private with a flashlight strapped to the hood, the rest of a long convoy following in the dark. But they were in a hurry and Pierre hid behind a tree until they had passed. He managed to reach the village undetected. Seeing a thin line of light around the blackout shades of his first stop, he paused to rest a moment. Then, adjusting his hat and with a deep breath, he set out across the square for the home of DuFour.
Pierre rapped on the door with his cane. “Do not shoot. I am not armed.” He listened, but could not be sure if anyone had replied. He gripped the handle. “I am coming in.”
DuFour sat in an armchair by the cold hearth. A bottle of Calvados sat empty on the table. The town clerk lifted his head, recognizing the old farmer, then raised a glass stained pink with the drink. “Here’s to the great noisy world,” he said, and tipped the last sip into his mouth.
Pierre stood evenly in the doorway, feeling strength and a long-forgotten sense of cleanness as he beheld the town clerk. “I am here because I pity you,” he said. “This bombing is the beginning, and I believe an ugly time has come.”
DuFour inspected the Calvados bottle, tilting it to confirm that it was empty. “Why is that my concern?”
“I should not have left you alone with my injured horse. You were young, and weak. I should have mastered my grief and finished Neptune myself.”
“What are you talking about? You are speaking in riddles.”
“I felt it only decent to warn you. I have seen times like these, I lived through them before you were born. Regardless of who prevails, I do not believe tomorrow will go well for you.”
DuFour sniffed. “Pish. Don’t you know who I am now? Whose favor I enjoy?”
“If you stand in the middle, both sides will be shooting at you. My advice would be for you to gather a few things, and several days’ food, and get a head start.”
DuFour set glass and bottle down on the table and folded his hands on his belly. “I am expected at the offices tomorrow. People are depending on me. The Kommandant.”
“He will be too busy trying to stay alive to notice your absence. If he is not gone already. Save yourself while you can.”
“The old ways are done, you know. The new ways are here to stay.” DuFour ran a fingertip around the mouth of the bottle. “And you are the worst kind of fool: boring, and old.”
Pierre drew himself up, tugging on his wool vest. “Think what you will of me. I have warned you. My conscience is clear.”
Outside the nightfall was complete, vague moonlight as the last of the day’s rain clouds lingered overhead. Pierre was glad he had brought his cane. He held it ahead almost as a blind man would, feeling his way around the village, across a hedgerow gap and past the crossroads. The walk to his second task took nearly an hour, though normally it would require one quarter that time. But when the eastern well came into sight, he paused to lean against it, wiping his face with a handkerchief.
What would he say here? How could he be more persuasive than he had been with the clerk? Pierre put a pinch of tobacco in his pipe bowl and struck a match on the stone of the well. In the distance, the bombing continued. The answering fire had become more intense. Pierre could not say for sure, but he thought he had seen a plane with no engine, gliding silently across a bit of cloudless sky. But that would be impossible, and he cursed his old eyes for playing tricks.
Soon the pipe was smoked and no better words had come to him. Pierre followed his cane to the barnyard door, which he eased open, its hinges making a rusty complaint. A rooster perched on a shed perked up his head, but Pierre tapped his pipe out on the boards and the bird, instead of crowing, hopped over, pecking to see whether the ashes were something to eat.
The old man heard the murmur of two women talking. Through a side window, he saw them sitting at a table, lit by a stub of candle. Mémé was carrying on while Emma mended something, a sock, while giving her grandmother half an ear.
He knocked on the door and heard chairs scraping. Emma swept the door open. “Philippe?”
“Ah, no, it’s only Pierre,” the old man answered. “Only me.”
“What are you doing out at this time of night?” She drew him inside. “You could be shot.”
“I’ll only be a moment,” he said, removing his military hat. “I wanted to warn you.”
“You are sweet, Pierre,” Emma said. “But I could be warned about everything I do all day.”
“This is different.”
“I like your hat,” she said. “I wish I could offer you something to eat or drink.”
“Emmanuelle.” Mémé brought a finger to her lips. “Listen.”
“Yes,” Pierre said. “For one moment, please. I know these sounds. I heard bombing like this in the Great War.” He took Emma’s hand. “The true battle has arrived. You must leave at once.”