The Artist and the Soldier, Chapter Four

Cephas didn’t eat for an entire week. Grayness flooded his existence. His best friend was dead. Maria was in the hands of the enemy, who was willing to kill her. And he had lied to himself about a woman. Floro told him not to take such things lightly. A Parisian named Pierre stole him out of Paris in an automobile and drove him straight to Munich, where the city was teeming with young men eager to volunteer. I should be with them, thought Cephas as he watched them from a window.

“I doubt they’d like it if they saw a Frenchman here,” said Pierre, warily scanning the streets and clutching the steering wheel. “We are at war, you know, Cephas. Me and you.”

“I don’t understand war,” replied Cephas. His face was ashen white. Below his shirt, his ribs leaped against the flesh. “And I don’t think it understands me.”

“You told me about your friend. I’m sorry.”

Cephas didn’t reply. Pierre dropped him off a block before the draft office. After uttering a curt goodbye he zoomed away, leaving Cephas alone in a very cold world.

The man in the office looked at Cephas’s tongue and frowned at his ribs. “You aren’t usually like this, are you?” the doctor asked. “You don’t look it.”

“I haven’t eaten in a while. It makes me throw up.”

“And why is that? If you’re going to be a soldier you’ve got to take what food you can get.”

“I’ll eat again. Don’t worry.”

And he got in a dark bus, where the men laughed and smoked cigarettes. Just three weeks later Cephas saw the same men killed, smoking cigarettes in the dark where the French could see the yellow glow.

Three months later, in December, Cephas was sitting idly in a German trench. Shells screamed overhead, some of them quite nearby, and the crackle of machine guns was present, as always, providing stale background for a completely stale stage set. Through periscopes soldiers examined the naked and ugly land. Cephas had seen it many times, and each time he did, he saw nothing but contorted beauty. The air itself was grey and bland and tasted of smoke. Cephas imagined the land above him, the land that had no deformity. But such a place seemed not to exist. War was everywhere.

The air was also cold. Particles of ice bounced off of the earthworks. Cephas yearned for a better coat. When the British were killed, Germans would creep across no man’s land and pluck off the dead man’s coat to wear. The coats were made of thick wool and were prized among the soldiers. Cephas’s regiment hardly moved. He had been there for two months, gone over the trench twice, but they had stayed put, fighting a war that was already beginning to drag.

Not far from Cephas there stood a boy of about sixteen, who was eating a hot loaf of bread. Instantly Cephas was envious.

“Where did you get that?” he asked. The boy looked up, still chewing and replied in a slurred voice filled with food, “There’s a lady in the trench. She’s got hot bread with her.”

“A lady?” said Cephas.

“You know,” said the boy. “Female.” Cephas stood up but was careful not to allow his head to extend above the trench’s earthworks. “Let’s go,” he said. “I haven’t seen a woman in three months.”

“After this girl, you won’t see one for three years,” laughed the boy.

“I won’t be here in three years,” said Cephas.

“Where will you be?”

“I’ll be in Munich with my sister Maria.”

“How do you know?” The boy had finished the bread and was now searching his fingers for extra crumbs.

“I don’t,” returned Cephas. “But it’s what I believe. It’s what I have to hold on to.” Cephas had heard of women visiting the trenches because of the soldier’s boredom. When there was no fighting, the silence cut into the heart almost as accurate as a bullet did. Once Cephas saw the woman, handing out bread and allowing the men to kiss her, sometimes on the lips, his heart filled with desire.

“Did you get a kiss?” he asked the boy.

“Sure did!”

The woman glanced at Cephas and smiled. “God be with you,” she said, and handed him a piece of bread. “I’ll kiss you. You saw me do it to the other men.”

Cephas paused, remembered Ada, and quietly refused. He decided not to be led astray again by a kiss. He began to eat the bread in silence, eyeing the young man whose boyish eyes ogled at the food.

 “What’s your name?” asked Cephas.

“Gustaf. Are you going to eat all of that bread?” Cephas tore a quarter of the loaf and handed it to Gustaf. The crackle of machine gun fire suddenly began to drone along the French trench line. The bullets spattered and flicked across the sandbags. “Gustaf, keep your head down.”

 “You know something,” said Gustaf, “it seems like Paris is close, but still very far away.”

“We’ll never get there,” said Cephas. He ate the last of the bread, but was still hungry. He hadn’t tasted real food for three months. “If we do, I’ll be happy to see it,” Gustaf chimed. Cephas was silent. He remembered Paris. He remembered its golden tint that relied on the sun for its brilliance. He especially recalled the Seine that contained so much of this gold. “It’s a beautiful city,” he whispered. It was there in so much beauty where I met the poison of life.  

“What is your name?” asked Gustaf.

“Cephas. Like the world cares about what anyone’s name is. It is full of its own greed and seems to have total control of the people.” Gustaf’s eyes became troubled. “I don’t believe the world is in control of anything. As long as there is God, then there must be…..hope.” Cephas turned away. That night he tried to sleep. He wept instead. He thought of Maria. He thought of how both of them were being held captive in different prison units. He thought of Reuben with love and wept all the more when he remembered the fiery eyes, now doused with death. And he thought of Agostino. Red darkness crept into his heart when he pictured the lustful eyes holding Maria in their malice. He stood up and blindly made his way to a machine gun station. He imagined Agostino strapped to it. And he would be in total control of the trigger. Then he would have fired until there was a hole in Agostino’s chest. Though there were no bullets in the gun, he pressed the trigger and clenched his teeth. His eyes became slits and his face was soon contorted. The hole was there now. You could see daylight on the other side. The lust was gone from Agostino’s eyes. All that was left was the horror of being dead. Cephas released the trigger. All around him there was darkness; and above him there twinkled a remnant of stars which had not been blotted out by the haze of smoke. The silence cut into his heart like a knife and he collapsed in the midst of tears.

That night was silent and black. The only noise was the periodic rustling of rats on the trench floor and the wheeze of a soldier. Somehow Cephas slept. Many days he would receive no sleep; shells were poured forth continually and gave no chance for such luck. And yet in the morning, when a pale dawn whispered in the east, French artillery began to growl and rumble. The soldiers rose quickly. This was their wakeup call.

As Cephas stood he was ordered to man a machine gun turret that stood about ten feet behind the trench. Quickly he did so. From there, he was still protected, but could see no man’s land as if it were a picture jumping off of the page of a book. He saw a field of ash, speckled with blackened trees and striped with forgotten barbed wire, where corpses were decaying or the dying was entangled. Cephas caught sight of a French soldier’s head. His hands leaped for the trigger. Suddenly, however, the head was pushed down by a pair of hands. Cephas was relieved.

In the trench below, Gustaf fired his rifle after quickly popping up over the trench, just to pop back under before he could be shot. Another soldier took Cephas’s place. He swiftly slid back into the trench and joined Gustaf. The boy seemed to be enjoying himself by loading the gun. He thrust the bullet into the chamber and brought back the lever with the excitement of a child at Christmas. “I forgot to ask,” he chortled. “Suppose they charge? I’ve only been around a week.”

“Then three fourths of them are dead or wounded, and one fourth of them become shell shocked and go insane.”

“Oh.” They sat there for a while longer. At these words, Gustaf was nervous. He knew that the French weren’t the only ones who charged the opposite trench. The Germans would too. Cephas saw the anxiety in Gustaf’s eyes. They were constantly moving. Gustaf was not prepared to die. Ever since Cephas knew he was stuck in war, he had recognized such a chance. It wasn’t as hard as he had imagined. He wasn’t there by choice. If anything, he wanted to get away from it all. Therefore, he accepted death as part of the vast equation, which was one that consisted of only negative numbers and irrational signs. But he never anticipated it. If he did that, he would be even more surprised when the bullets coursed through his body. Instead, he embraced the immense chance that it would happen, and realized that if he was to die, then he would die. There was nothing more to grasp. He would see God.  Suddenly machine gun fire hissed and crackled across the German trench. It broke the silence like a stone shattering glass. Cephas covered his face as the fire continued to pulse like rain. Curses and shouts arose among the soldiers. When Cephas turned to Gustaf, he watched as three of the bullets caught him in his shoulder, nearly severing it. Immediately after this, a shell burst and a piece of shrapnel made a hole through Gustaf’s ribcage.  Gustaf gasped after a curt scream and fell backward as Cephas felt shrapnel burn past his face and explode. Blood that was not his own flooded from above and splashed over his face, reddening his vision until it blinded him. Men went airborne and fell behind the trench. Blood continued to spurt like a fountain. Cephas stumbled and fell next to Gustaf, who clenched his teeth and wheezed through them. He was kicking like a child. The fear turned into the reality of fear’s object: pain. It made Cephas want to save the boy more than anything else. “Hang on, Gustaf.” The screams began to rise like a plague and filled everyone’s ears. Men who had been blown into plain view were trying to crawl disconnected into the trench. Machine guns spattered their backsides, leaving them as nothing but shredded and distorted figures. “Please,” said Gustaf, clasping Cephas’s arm. “Don’t let me die!” The French guns continued to shriek, and presently a German shouted, “They’re coming! The French are charging!”

 A sergeant responded: “Everyone who’s able, shoot the crap out of them and don’t let up.” Cephas was torn. Gustaf began to scream. Soil rained as artillery smashed into the earth. With it, there came bits of flesh, fingers and parts of men’s limbs. Both German and French men sprung into the air, lifted by fire and force, looking like rain when they fell into the ashes. As Germans manned gun stations and the howitzers began to rumble, Cephas rose to his feet. He touched the sergeant’s shoulder and said, “This man’s about to die. Let me take him to the second level where the hospital is.”

The sergeant glanced at Gustaf. From there, his eyes followed the trench line where hundreds of more dying bodies littered the filthy floor. “Men die,” he said. “Obey orders, or you’ll be dead too.” Cephas flared with anger. Hardly thinking straight, he let his fist fly. His knuckles cracked through the sergeant’s chin. It sounded like a gunshot. The sergeant was stunned, and like a rag doll, crumpled to the ground. Cephas took Gustaf in his arms and started through the intricacy of tunnels. It was dark, and his breath haunted him as he walked. Gustaf was groaning now, weakly, and evidently with no recollection of what was going on. At last, Cephas arrived in light. He saw a large tent, and under it, screaming men and frantic nurses. Everything smelled of blood.

“Hey!” shouted Cephas. Someone bumped past him. No one heard him. His teeth clenched in pain and weariness, Cephas battled his way through the muddy span of chaos, until a nurse grabbed his shoulder and shouted, “I have an empty cot over here!” Cephas followed her. The cot was encrusted with drying blood; nonetheless Gustaf was laid gently upon it and stripped of his shirt.

“The bullets all went through,” said the nurse. She looked at Cephas. “You need to get back to the front,” she said. Cephas stood. “Is he going to die?” he asked. The nurse stared into the young boy’s face. The face was somehow calm although it spoke such pain. “I don’t know. You must return to the front. I am certain you came here without permission.”

“You make sure he eats plenty of bread when he wakes up.” The nurse smiled grimly, not understanding the joke but knowing it was meant as one. As Cephas backed away, Gustaf looked his way and forced a faint smile.

 Back on the front, the hellish mixture of noise continued. After men saw their friends being torn apart by the curse of heat and steel, they collapsed in misery to the floor of the trench, trying in vain to resuscitate the dead. French soldiers appeared above Cephas. He could see their faces, and the faces were no different from his own. They were faces of desperation, faces that only cared about survival and returning home. The enemy attackers never dropped into the trench. Flame throwers burst and sputtered forth as far as three hundred yards, charring and blazing all in its path. Bayonets thrust deep into men’s hearts, pain raced like a disease, and death seemed almost inevitable. Cephas fought because there was no escaping it. The noise and the pain was his prison. The bars were latched firmly and there was no key. If there was a key, he did not own it.

Once the fighting died down and the screams were silenced, Cephas poured water on the unconscious sergeant’s face. The officer coughed.  

“Ishk!” He looked at Cephas and frowned, and suddenly remembered his jawbone cracking and who had happened to be standing with him. “Did you do this to me, soldier?” asked the sergeant. He pointed to the bruise on his mouth. “I had to save the boy,” said Cephas. “But I also had to tell the truth.” The sergeant stood up, grunting. Unexpectedly, he punched Cephas squarely in the cheek and shouted, “You’re in the army, not some cub scout playhouse!”

Cephas was shocked and couldn’t reply before the sergeant continued, “Three thousand Germans died last night, and sometimes, death just happens. What is one life to you, especially that runt’s?”

“He helped me,” said Cephas.

“Helped you with what, to not poop your pants?”

“To see hope in life, and to see a way out of this stench trench.” The sergeant raised his fist again, but hesitated. “You know I could have you shot, Wolfgang,” he said. “You abandoned battle.”

“I saved a life,” returned Cephas. “Shoot me if you want to. I really don’t care.” This was the death that he wasn’t anticipating but knew was coming. The sergeant took out his pistol, cocked the hammer and pressed it firmly against Cephas’s forehead. Cephas closed his eyes, imagined Munich in its grey swirl, and prepared to die. But the sergeant let the gun drop to his side.

“You’re a case,” he said. “You didn’t crap you’re pants.” Cephas smiled grimly.

“We’re extending our supply trenches,” the sergeant continued. “Some people call it hell, you’ll you call it pain, since it what’s you asked for. You’ll dig until your hands will look like Vienna sausages.” The sergeant called for two soldiers. Presently they took Cephas’s gun and helmet and threw them both on the ground. The helmet rolled through the blood and mud and sloshed to a stop at the sergeant’s feet. “Thanks.”

The soldiers led Cephas into the tunnels and past the medical center until they reached the innermost trenches, where new guns, ammunition, and food were brought continually to the front. On the flat ground above him, Cephas could see the enormous howitzers, shining in the dim sunlight and waiting for attack like hungry wolves. Their power and accuracy was unheard of.

Cephas saw soldiers digging into scarred ground toward the east. One of his escorts said, “That’s where you’ll be. Keep your head low. Some of the French have good eyesight and actually have snipers that can take you out at this distance. Get a shovel and start working.”

A shovel was lying on the ground some feet away from Cephas. He picked it up and was surprised by how heavy it was. He followed the example of the other men: thrust, pull, dump, and repeat. This trench was wide, only reaching about five feet.  As Cephas worked, he could still hear the rumble of French artillery. The German artillery was very close however, and thundered like doom in his ears. One of the men was singing. His voice was deep, perfect and melodious but full of what sounded like sadness. A man who had been silent said to Cephas, “What did you do?” Cephas told him. The man laughed bitterly and shook his head. “It’s all about death,” he said. “Who cares if a man gets his arm blown off? That’s what they say. We’re all going to die, so trying to escape it is vain. It’s already become the philosophy of this war.” Cephas struck the soil twenty times and his hands shoulders and arms ached. His hands were fairly well kept, but when he pushed the blade into the ground a hundred or more times, blood began to drip down the handle. Blisters formed at the base of his fingers and soon burst. New blisters on raw skin were created. Cephas didn’t dare thrust the shovel downward again. His hands were covered in blood and his body was on fire. He threw the shovel aside and sat down, looking painfully at his torn palms. By then the sun reached the grey horizon and coated the earth in sudden darkness. Cephas had attempted to dig again; the pain made his brain disassemble itself. In exhaustion, he fell against the slanted wall of dirt and closed his eyes. The heat from labor didn’t recede until an hour later. Cephas was much too tired to retrieve his coat. He slept well. And he slept shortly.  

When it was still dark, a voice woke Cephas. The lights of a jeep were blared toward the trench diggers. Cephas squinted. “What the—” The voice came again and this time gave Cephas a kernel of comprehension. The heavy air was cold as he numbly gathered his feet. To assist such a task, he set his hands on his knees; and like he had touched fire gasped in pain and raised his hands. They were encrusted in dry blood. He could not move them without the pain racing through them. “C’mon!” came the voice of a lieutenant. “Board the trucks!” Like sloths the soldiers obeyed. Cephas and his fellow workers were not the only ones. Soldiers from the front joined them as well. All of them were wondering what was going on, and rightly so. Leaving the front was no small vacation.  As they climbed on the truck’s bed, Cephas was almost relieved to be escaping the front. Presently, however, he realized that only more hardship lay ahead. They rode over rough roads for nearly an hour, when the light of the stars was being washed away by a cool and soft dawn. Rolling hills were illuminated in this heavenly paleness.

Soon after the sun was in the air, they dismounted the trucks in a thick, silver forest, where everything was so silent it made the soldiers feel awkward. It was then that Cephas knew what they were doing. His regiment had been moved to the east. They were going to try and flank the French before they could build a trench that could combat them. Cephas was handed a rifle, and quickly let it drop into his arms because of his raw hands. “Can I have a bandage?” he asked a passing sergeant. The sergeant took one glance at the hands and winced. “Wait,” he said. Once the hands were wrapped in a smooth gauze, Cephas held the gun normally but not without pain. “You people listen and listen good,” said the lieutenant. “Some of you have been under disciplinary service, or in other words, have been put in the brig or torn your hands into shreds and bent your butt over until it got as hard as a rock.” The soldiers glanced at Cephas’s wrapped hands. “But we need the entire regiment. So if you screw again we’ll shoot you on the spot and if you screw once we’ll shoot you on the spot. This is the army. It’s near to condemnation, but that’s what war is.” He shrugged as some of the soldiers laughed. The comfort of Cephas’s bandages was quickly waning. In misery he listened as the lieutenant explained the layout plan. It was to be a flank through heavy forestland and toward the eastern side of the front. The goal was to reach this uninhabited territory before the French extended their trenches. If they got there in time, they could punch a hole through enemy defenses and the entire army would have a run at Paris. There were about one thousand men present, and someone asked, “Why don’t we just take the entire package instead of going small?”

“They aren’t idiots,” said the lieutenant. “If the whole trench goes stale then they’ll turn their heads on a swivel. They won’t notice this, but when they do, they’ll be like pigeons in a storm.” They started out immediately, but the trucks did not carry them. They walked through the forest in columns, led by the lieutenants who were on horseback. The sound of marching boots connecting with the earth carried through the thin trees and became a drumbeat in the soldiers’ ears. There was a tall Austrian next to Cephas. He was strong and sturdy, with a red beard and light green eyes.

“No one’s watching,” he said to Cephas. He was looking at the ground, the place where only a fraction of earth appeared in the midst of swinging boots. “We could run. Just look at these woods.” It was true. The forest was grey and cold, but its silence was intriguing. “The trees would hide us, and we could drink from the streams.” Cephas listened and tried to attack the thud of boots with his keenness. There it was. The soft laughing of water over a cool ground.

“Are you from Vienna?” asked Cephas.

“Just outside of Vienna,” the Austrian said. “It’s a beautiful place, but not untouched by war.”

“I’m from Munich,” said Cephas. “Or was.”

“Have you ever been to America?” asked the Austrian. Cephas shook his head no.

“That is a place that I could go right now. There are mountains, plains, lakes, deserts, and forests. It goes on forever.”

“Why didn’t you stay there?” asked Cephas.

“There was no war when I returned,” said the Austria, shrugging. “I missed my wife.”

“And you miss her now.” The Austrian nodded.

“The loveliest of all women,” he whispered. “If you have ever known true love, then you would know how I feel now.”

“I don’t know whether I’ve felt it before or not,” said Cephas, recalling Ada. “I know I want it.”

“It is a good desire,” he stated.

They marched for hours and to the extent that the soldiers were growing hot in the freezing weather. The soldiers gasped for breath while the blisters formed on their feet like hot cauldrons. “We’re almost there,” Cephas heard someone say. This was relief to everyone. They had set out early that morning and it was late afternoon. They would attack after gathering position. The sun had arrived in the western part of the sky and was painting the air cold red. When the trees subsided, shadow vanished and the light turned golden once it hit the hills. Cephas heard the clatter of artillery in the distance. Before them, the series of rising hills hid the horizon from view. The soldiers were ordered to spread out across the slopes and set up periscopes to see what lay beyond. Behind them, horse drawn howitzers steadied themselves at the foot of the hills. The Austrian set up a periscope that had been randomly given to him and stared through it, his face wrinkled in concentration. Cephas crawled next to him, impatient for a report. “I can see the French lines,” the Austrian said. “I can also see the edge of their trench.” Along the hilltop, soldiers began to quietly rejoice. They had hoped to reach the edge of the French defenses, and they had hit it right on the nail. The lieutenant said, “Load Big Bertha.” Shells over five feet long were inserted into the howitzer’s massive shaft. The gun boomed like a gathering storm. The shell whistled, and could be seen smashing the French lines two miles away. The lieutenant trotted up the hill and drew his sword. Pointing the blade upward so the sun caught its tip, he bellowed, “CHARGE!” With a shout the soldiers stood and pulsed over the hill. Like a wave they flooded across the earth, bayonets thrust forth so that they glistened like gold in the final rays of daylight. As Cephas topped the hill, the Austrian disappeared. But Cephas’s attention was drawn to the temporary beauty given by the sunlit field. Like fire, the grass shivered and curved with the wind. It lasted for just seconds, when suddenly the French noticed the flank. A German flare went up, signaling that they had found the gap and were ready to puncture it. Germans from the front were seen climbing out of the trenches and joining the charge. French machine guns screamed. And in that one instant, the sea of golden grain was set aflame. Hundreds of Germans collapsed.  

Cephas breathed steadily as he found cover behind a thick oak tree. His hands trembled; he loaded his rifle and tried not to close his eyes. This was a habit he had developed early on as a soldier. His back to the trunk, he watched in horror as twenty or more Germans flew through the air, to his right, after a wall of shells exploded and burned the air with shrapnel. Anger swelled within him, not at the French, but at the war. Cephas hated it. When he saw men clutch their faces as blood poured through their fingers, he wished earnestly to return to the peaceful city of Munich, or Paris. As of that time, he had no idea which city was unpolluted or not. But there was no escaping battle. A machine gun was pointed his way. It crackled and hissed just above him, and abruptly began to spatter against the tree. In only three seconds the tree was half gone, turned into nothing but a mass of falling splinters. Cephas’s insides tightened. He burst from behind the trunk to run again, almost blindly, until he discovered a small rift of earth that provided cover. Diving into the ditch, he heard shells whistle and whine all around him. Shrapnel shaved skin from his legs. And the bullets that pretended to be hot rain continued to speed and slam into both soil and flesh. Smoke clouded Cephas’s vision. He was preparing himself for another charge, where he knew death stood and where life was just a chance. As he saw piles of Germans form in a matter of minutes, he realized their attempts to overtake the French lines had failed. Both sides were still learning the horror of a single weapon: the machine gun. Cephas took the bandages from his hand. If he was going to leave the earth, he wanted to leave it with no hidden deformities. He drew a deep breath, lifted his head, and again began to run. He had gone only about ten feet when a shell burst in front of him. He was shocked by its power. As he was taken from his feet and hurled into the air, fragments of shrapnel penetrated his throat and peppered his thigh and side. He threw up his arms, falling, falling into the ashes of fire and war.

Across the globe, men were dying. The reasons had faded and were lost to understanding. Friends betrayed each other, searching for the correct allegiance and only coming up with handfuls of dust. Armies moved, destroyed each other until only misery remained, and all the time the trenches screamed. The feeling that the war bore no specific purpose was beginning to gnaw at all hearts, whether French, German, British, or even American. There was a house in Germany, nestled in homely green hills that were coated in morning mist, where a young boy lived with his grandfather. The boy was young, not quite ten years old, but was very strong, for he worked the field as his grandfather was growing in his infirmity. It was a harsh day in March, 1915, when the young boy spotted green vehicles and shrouds of men pass over the hills and head toward his farm. He was perched upon a fence, eating an apple when he saw them. He knew there was a war. Even toddlers now seemed to acknowledge it. But he had never seen its inhabitants, those that were affected in the deepest way. They were dirty, and were obviously exhausted as they walked. Horse drawn carts that carried all sorts of enormous guns also appeared at the top of the hill. The boy was afraid.

“Papa!” he shouted, starting to run toward the farm. His grandfather was shoveling hay into the barn, his hardened frame cast over and his white hair falling beneath his eyes and obscuring them. When he heard his grandson’s voice, and detected the panic within it, he turned quickly. When he too saw the soldiers, the guns, and the army vehicles, he said, “Get into the house, Enrich. They will want to take everything away from us.” Enrich obeyed. He climbed the stairs of the house and peered out the window as the soldiers climbed the fence he had been sitting on and the vehicles unexpectedly plowed directly over it. Enrich gasped. The trucks left ugly ruts behind it, like scars that carried the mark of war. He saw his grandfather trying to stop them from passing him, but they were strong, meant for harshness, and swept past him. They stripped the barn of everything. The harnesses they hoarded, along with lanterns, shovels, and hay. When they were through with that, Enrich’s grandfather pleaded with them some more. Enrich heard him say, “Please! We have little here as it is. Do not take what is not yours.”

“The war is everything, now,” said a soldier. “Either you accept that, or you are held at our discipline.” Enrich could hear them invading the kitchen below. He heard footsteps boom on the stairway. A soldier entered his room and jumped when he saw Enrich. The boy was trembling in fear and weeping. “I have a dog,” he said. “Please, don’t take my dog away.” The soldier opened his mouth, but no words came. He scanned the room, looked at Enrich in what could have been known as sympathy, and left.

In Munich, Cephas’s father and mother sat together on their sofa. The room was very dark, but the traditional white light of Munich flowed through the window, creating a patch on the floor. In the distance, they spotted the lines of Alps, rugged and fierce as they belted the horizon. But they were not happy.

 They did not know where Maria was and they suspected that Cephas was dead. They waited for a letter, a word, a sign from God that could take them from their constant uncertainty. The uncertainty had already led to torment. They tried to find peace in God, but they returned to the worry of their children and could no escape the sensation.

Ingrid, Cephas’s mother, rose from the sofa and stood near the window so her form was black against the white of light. She was seemingly young, and was still beautiful. Her eyes were originally green, but had faded with grief. “If my children are dead,” she said, “then I am very sure that I will die too.”

Raoul, her husband, stood and touched her shoulder. He was no good at comforting people, but had always tried. Perhaps this comforted them: his effort to do so. “If Cephas dies, he’ll die for his country.”

“What country?” said Ingrid. “This is not the beautiful Germany I knew. That is not the France I knew, or Austria, or England. It is a pool of blood.”

“Then he’ll die for the man next to him. It will be noble in the word’s purest form.”

“And what of my young Maria?” she said, clasping a hand to her mouth. “She is not yet twenty years old. Is she to die in the hands of a murderer?” Raoul knew of nothing to say. There were no words that could express his sorrow. The street below him was full of people. They had lives, he knew not what of, but he knew that each of them contained something sad, whether the sadness was present, pushed away, or completely forgotten within forgiveness. He had raised his two children in fierce discipline out of fierce love. And now they were just out of reach. His hands groped for them. And yet the world had hands too.

“When can there be happiness again?” Ingrid said. “Happiness cannot be a choice. It is too beneficial to choose independently.”

“God will provide,” Raoul managed. “He alone will give us happiness. Life and death are controlled by Him. If our children die, we must strive to meet them again.”

They embraced each other for hours, until the moon’s pale light held them in its arms.

When night fell on the front, three French soldiers searched the dead bodies, and presently came upon Cephas. Blood was oozing from the side of his throat, creating a small pool that was illuminated by the moon. His chest rose and fell softly. “This fellow ain’t dead,” one of the soldiers said. His name was Pierre. He was one of the shortest men of the trenches, probably French and German, but he had such courage that he was rarely known as small. The figure next to him said, “Just let him lay here. He’ll bleed to death in a couple of hours.” Pierre knelt to the ground. He put his fingers to Cephas’s wrist. The pulse was slow but not frighteningly. “He just got nipped,” he said, glancing at the wound in his throat. “He ain’t going to die.”

“Search him through,” another soldier urged. Pierre did. He found a photograph of a blonde German girl, whom they presumed to be his lover. It was, in fact, Maria, when she was sixteen. The picture was grainy, but one could discern her eyes and would easily conclude that they were magical. Pierre fell in love with her and put the picture in his pocket. They found a notebook and a pencil in Cephas’s bag amidst the tangle of supplies. “He’s an artist,” said Pierre, flipping through the book. “I wish I could see good.” Argument was passed to and fro, until at last it was decided that Cephas would be cared for under Pierre’s supervision, since none of the others wanted to carry the responsibility of a wounded German. They dragged Cephas into the trench and left Pierre alone in pitch black. Pierre found his handkerchief and lit a match. With the handkerchief he dabbed the wound on Cephas’s neck and ultimately stranded and tied it to stop the bleeding. He then realized that Cephas’s legs were also wounded. The shinbone was broken, it was certain. Pierre didn’t know whether to take him to the hospital or not. He knew the nurses wouldn’t be fond over treating the enemy. He was no doctor, however, so he decided to take the chance. He supposed anyone with a heart would have to take him in. The hospital was a small building about two miles away from his current position. He took control of a jeep, one that was guarded by a sleeping soldier, and laid Cephas in the back. He started the truck, shouted patrol, and zoomed off into the night.

When the hospital appeared, dappled in light, Cephas came to. With his consciousness came pain. There was utter darkness everywhere, as well as silence, save the squeaking of the jeep as Pierre dismounted. Cephas groaned.  He felt Pierre gather him in his arms. As he was carried, his head bobbed senselessly and his hands dipped to the ground, slightly curled and tripping in the dust. Meanwhile, Pierre hoped to God that the doctors would accept this wounded German. At the door, he peered inside. He could see a small room and then a grey stairway. Eerily the light bounced off of the concrete from suspended lights. On the second story, Pierre heard the muffled screams and groans of wounded soldiers. He glanced at Cephas. The wound in his throat was bleeding faster; Pierre pressed his thumb to it. He started up the stairs with difficulty. Keeping his balance was a struggle. He continued with unusual persistence, eyes trained on the door at the top of the stair and teeth clenched as he strained to keep Cephas from tumbling behind him. He shouted for help once he felt his knees start to sway. Three nurses appeared at the door above him.

“Don’t just stand there, you idiots!” screamed Pierre. “Come help me!” The nurses pattered down the steps and took Cephas by his arms and legs. As soon as the weight left Pierre, he staggered in relief and watched as the nurses carried Cephas through the door and into the hallway. He followed them warily. They didn’t seem to realize he was German. One of the nurses turned, angered by Pierre’s outburst, and said, “You don’t need to stay. Go back.”

“And be left in uncertainty?” Pierre declared. “I think not.” Blood dripped on the floor from Cephas’s lolling throat. Again anger welled within Pierre’s soul. “You’re too slow!” he bellowed. Swiftly, he grabbed Cephas by the waist and shoved his way into a room, where one man was already bedded. Pierre scanned him over with small blue eyes and saw that this soldier was recovering from a broken arm. The injury was braced appropriately. This soldier was not in pain. “Get up,” said Pierre.

The soldier stared at him, then replied, “You’re crazy.”

“Am I?” When the soldier remained immobile, Pierre set Cephas gently on the floor and wiped the blood from his hands. “You could be on the front right now,” he whispered. The muscles in his jaws popped through skin visibly, showing his rage and mounting impatience. Here was a man who was buying time and avoiding the trenches because of a minor injury. And there were still men like Cephas dying, being ripped, obliterated, and shredded while this passerby looked on without a care. “I think I broke my arm when I was twelve,” Pierre continued softly. His hands gripped the sides of the bed, and with one swift motion, he overturned the mattress. The soldier flopped from the covers, cursing appropriately as his head cracked against the concrete floor. Pierre righted the bed, the mattress, and the covers as the man sprawled against the wall, barely conscious. Once Cephas was on the bed, Pierre shouted for some nurses. They instantly appeared.  

“Take care of him,” he told them. “But don’t give a crap for the fellow on the floor. He is the biggest skunk in the world.” Pierre paused at the doorway. He extracted Maria’s picture from his pocket and fingered it, and finally he set it gently on Cephas’s pillow. After that he left.

A year passed. Cephas Wolfgang was in a prison yard some miles from Paris. His mind was still fresh of that moment when the shrapnel nearly killed him. French troops, for whatever reason, had dragged him into their midst. He was a prisoner, but he was alive. The walls of the prison yard were tall, made of a rather beautiful stone that reflected the sun’s light perfectly in the morning and appeared like snow in the evening. Cephas watched as some of the men threw a ball against the stone walls and caught it again. French soldiers stood at each locked exit. They were all tall and straight, their fair hair concealed underneath metal helmets. Cephas was attentive to neither type of people. He was only beginning to grow more and more aware that his two years were up, and Maria would die. He thirsted for Rome. There was a fire in his heart because of that city. It was so beautiful and so perfect when in the sunlight. But there was shadow that accompanied its inner self. He had to make it beautiful again. It wouldn’t happen unless Maria was safe and Agostino was dead.

For a year Cephas had never expected to see love again. As each day passed his heart drew close to hopelessness. He stopped marking his wall, because he began to think and know he would never leave the place for the duration of the war. And he thought of the war. He imagined 1940 still bathed in the curse of battle.

He hadn’t spoken a word in five months. He used to speak to the cooks who ladled him food, but routine had begun to ruin his cheer. But one day he saw love. In the prison yard, a young French nurse came to the prison. Cephas was astonished. Never had he thought they would bring a nurse into a prison yard, where supposedly men drained of life were. But when the surprise left him, there remained in his heart a fiery hope, because when he saw the perfect face, the golden curls that brushed a white neck, and the sapphire eyes, he saw love.

“We don’t think any of them are still suffering from wounds,” a sergeant told the nurse. “But we’ve been ordered to have someone check over them.”

“Do you believe in treating prisoners?” asked the woman. The sergeant grinned.

“Humans are humans. So why do we kill each other?” The prisoners were lined up in the yard and were each examined. One by one the soldiers were sent on their way. Cephas thought he recognized this nurse. He remembered some snow laden path where he saw the same dazzling eyes. It was as surreal as a dream. When Cephas arrived, he opened his mouth, which felt strange, and said, in his perfect French, “Someday I’ll marry you. I must know your name.” He bloomed red but kept his eyes trained on hers.

The sergeant pushed Cephas and said, “Shut up! Don’t you think anyone else has fallen in love with her?”

“I don’t doubt it,” replied Cephas. “She’s very beautiful.” The nurse bent over Cephas, identified a scar on the left side of his neck, and said very softly, “My name is Jasmine.”

“Cell number forty nine,” whispered Cephas. “Please. I must taste something.”

“That scar on your neck is healed,” said Jasmine, professionally. “All right. Next please.”

The night was slow and cold. There was a window above Cephas’s head, and it presently brought snow. Its small flakes drifted into the barred room and some of them landed on Cephas’s face. He was waiting patiently for her. He was not nervous. Although he had not seen a woman for a year, he was calm. The intensity of moonlight of the cell was his judge of time. It was nearing midnight when he heart soft footsteps along the hallway. At first she was coated in shadow, but he could tell she was wearing a white gown meant for sleeping in. Cephas stood quietly and stopped against the bars where his face was close to hers.

“So this is where you live?” said Jasmine.

Cephas nodded. “For a year,” he replied. “They call me Cephas, by the way. I’m German.”

Jasmine laughed under her breath. “I figured that out, Cephas. You told me you wanted to marry me. How do you know I’m not married already?”

“Because of your eyes,” said Cephas. “They’re dark blue, sapphire in real terms. Look at my eyes. They’re identical to yours.”

“It’s a rare eye color,” Jasmine admitted. “Does it prove anything?”

“Maybe God made our eyes the same just for that reason.” There was a pause.

 “Maybe He did,” replied Jasmine. “But that isn’t reliable, is it?” To Cephas’s delight she sounded quite wistful.

“In these times it is. Besides, I’m willing to take the chance. You might as well, right?”

“You’re German, Cephas.”

“Correct.” A finger of shadow crossed Cephas’s face. He felt his heart tremble within him from desperation. It was not for simply a kiss but truly for love itself. Eros. “Please,” he begged. “Have you ever just wanted something to hold on to, just because you’re afraid to fall for anything?”

“I can’t give you something to hold on to,” she said. “I’m only human, you know.” After a pause, she whispered, “But I can help you find it. I’m not married.”

For some reason, Cephas began to softly weep. “What’s wrong?” Jasmine asked.

“It’s just dawned on me,” said Cephas. “You were the one I met in the woods so long ago.” He inched forward so his face was clear under the moonlight. “The Parisian.” Jasmine’s lips parted slightly, and she began to laugh.

“I remember,” she said. “In the Alps.”

“And another thing,” added Cephas. “I’ve just realized you’re the one I’ve been waiting for all my life.”

“After the war, I’ll show you ever part of Paris: the river, the tower, all of it.” Cephas smiled down on her and he too began to laugh. From down the hall it echoed, like a ghostly, quiet symphony. A prison guard passed on his way to bed. He saw Jasmine standing there in the rays of moonlight. He soon realized this was the beautiful nurse that had examined the soldiers. Something inside enraged him. This was the fact that she was speaking to a German, a man who had killed French men. Something else, however, overpowered this anger. It was the pleasant, melodious sound of laughter, a sound he had never heard in the prison or anywhere on the front. With a bow of respect, the guard backed away and vanished within the folds of darkness.

The next morning Jasmine was gone. And Cephas spoke again to the cooks. “Thank you, sir.” They glanced at him in surprise. “You drunk?” they said. Cephas laughed and took the bowl of food.

The days passed well and easy because there was always anticipation for Jasmine. Before, Cephas thought the war could become interminable. Now it didn’t matter. The year turned into 1916, which reminded Cephas he had only ten months until Agostino would cut the cord. Somehow his worries of that were lessened as well. The prison walls didn’t seem as thick as they had before. As Cephas watched the new arrivals enter the yard, he saw a face that he knew. It was covered in a beard; he recognized the tall body and the slightly bowed head. Reuben Brandt had always held such pose and he held it then. His hands were tied but his eyes were alive and showed his ancient and likable fire. Cephas dropped the bowl of food, rising to his feet as the world stopped. Reuben caught Cephas’s eyes and they were strung there as if by real ropes.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::

They assigned Reuben to a cell opposite of Cephas’s division. Cephas didn’t see him again until the next morning, when all the prisoners were getting their breakfast. Cephas was still stuck in disbelief, thinking and wondering over the fact that his sadness for his close friend had been in vain. He was alive! When breakfast was served and the prisoners took their spots in the vast prison yard, Cephas and Reuben set down their bowls and clasped arms.

“Sweet angels of heaven,” said Reuben.

“I thought you were dead,” said Cephas.

“Not surprising,” replied Reuben.  For seconds Cephas stared into the fiery eyes with a beaming smile on his face. Slowly this melted away.

“Agostino told me he had killed you.” Reuben’s grip on Cephas’s forearms loosened. His hands dropped to his sides and his face grew cold. “He assumes much,” he said. Reuben held up his shirt. Just above his bellybutton there gaped a grey scar, still red on the sides.  

Cephas’s eyes widened. He wondered how Reuben had recovered from such a wound. “What happened?”

Reuben went into detail of that night over a year before; how Abel had taken care of him until he was ready to leave. “I was going to try and pursue him,” said Reuben. “But I didn’t know where to look, and before I knew it, I was drafted. We and some other boys were captured about a month ago in Austria. They took us here.”

“Agostino wants me,” said Cephas, staring at the ground. “In the letter, he said he was to give me two years before he would kill Maria, and then he would do his best to kill me.”

“Because you saved her.”

“Because I saved her.” They sat in silence, eating only slightly while their minds stormed.

“Then we have to get out of here,” said Reuben, much quieter. “You have until October, or around then. If the war goes on like it has been, there won’t be a treaty signed until 1925, folks say.”

“Everything is stone and concrete,” said Cephas. “Guards are at every corner of the prison, and they have machine guns.”

“I love your sister,” said Reuben, suddenly. “You may not know it, Cephas, but I fell in love with her in the Alps. I’m just as passionate of saving her as you are.”

Cephas was silent.

“I can hardly stand another day without her,” continued Reuben. He glanced around him. “All the cell floors are made of concrete, it’s true,” he said. “But where the bars are inserted, the flooring cracks. I’m sure you know what I mean.” Cephas nodded.

“If we can hide our work underneath our cots then we can pry open that thin layer of concrete and start to make tunnels. The walls are thick, but they only go down about seven feet.” Cephas wanted more than anything to see Maria’s face. He wanted to see her unafraid, and was devastated that she was undergoing such horror. But he remembered Jasmine. If he left, there would still be a war. She would have every reason to forget about him, to make out he was dead.

“If we don’t try this, Cephas,” said Reuben, “then Maria will die.”

“It could be a trick,” said Cephas, running a hand through his shaggy hair. “He probably has her in America, or England.”

“He wants to face you. Where did he say he was keeping her?”

“In Rome.”

“Then he is in Rome.”

Cephas bowed his head. “God gives companions,” he said. “Even here, He showed me one.”

“Who? I don’t see any women in this terrible place.”

“She came as a nurse,” said Cephas. “She came to my cell. I told her I wanted to seek the truth with her.” Reuben was shocked.

“Are you saying that you couldn’t bear to leave her?” he asked.

“I’m saying that I don’t know if I could ever find her again. I need her.”

“A French nurse.” Reuben was angry. They were the enemy. Reuben told Cephas so.

“Enemy she may be,” Cephas said, softly. “But what a beautiful enemy I have!”

Reuben was silent. All Cephas heard was Reuben standing and the sound of his feet waning. Reuben went to his cell. He examined the crack from the bars and determined that it was nearly an inch thick. Inconspicuously he broke off a leg of his cot, which was steel, and began to pry at the crack. Already the concrete shifted.

Meanwhile Cephas stared at the point where the concrete walls subsided to reveal the sky’s deep blue color.

Jasmine was sitting clustered in the back of truck that was buzzing toward the western front. The women spoke cordially, often laughing, but Jasmine was silent. Her blond curls danced as the truck bounced. Her eyes hardly blinked. She was thinking of Cephas, curiously, and almost felt him as surreal. This German boy had the nerve to speak to her in one of the most dismal places she had ever seen. Perhaps it was simply desperation. She pitied this, but also realized this could have been childish, grabbing the first chance as if it were candy. Cephas Wolfgang could be like thousands of other soldiers who just wanted a kiss. She was troubled. And if that wasn’t enough, she had stayed at his cell for three hours, doing what she thought could be punishable. She acquainted herself with the enemy. And yet she had laughed with the enemy. She had told the enemy that she would show him Paris. And how could it be?

The truck dipped into a rut. Like fruit on a cart the nurses lifted into the air, and with a curt squeal, rocketed back to earth with a thud. Jasmine winced.

“Blood got to you then, Jas?” said one of the nurses, Amelia. “You’re mighty quiet. Have fun at the prison camp?”

“Prisons aren’t fun,” replied Jasmine, simply. Amelia laughed. She was rather big boned, but had a pleasant face in which wounded soldiers found enjoyable to look at.

“Sure they ain’t,” said Amelia, snorting. “Something’s got you wound up like a clock. Find some German lovers?” Jasmine bloomed red. She was happy to see the hospital, a low and rectangular building, as it appeared around a curve of stripped trees. Once the truck came to a stop, the nurses all dismounted. Jasmine started away by herself, but Amelia tagged along. She was no longer smiling. “Jasmine,” she said. “Really! What is the matter?”

“How can you ever know what’s right or not?” Jasmine replied, not turning her head. “You asked if I had a good time at the prison? I think I may have actually fallen for a German boy. A simple and crazy boy!” Jasmine stopped. “I don’t know why I did it, Amelia.” Amelia arrived next to her side, surprised but concerned. She was bipolar and yet always in a positive direction. “It’s all right,” she said, shrugging. Like a wise mother she put an arm around Jasmine’s shoulder. “This is war. Love is hard to come by.”

The night was met with a coating darkness. It fled over the front, over the dead land as well into the pastures full of cattle and meandering horses. Jasmine was lying on a cot inside a small tent. Cold wind whipped through the tent flap and chilled her. Artillery thundered and rolled. She hated the sound. Amelia appeared. Blood was spattered across her skirt. “The Germans attacked not too long ago about a mile down the front,” she said, breathing heavily. “We need everyone we can get.” Jasmine threw on her coat and followed Amelia into the darkness. She stumbled over knots of earth and presently began to gasp for breath. It began to snow and wasn’t long until the flurries were as dense as the night. Ahead of them, the hospital gleamed with light. With it came the sea of screams. It was a sound that both nurses had grown accustomed to.

“How many injured?” asked Jasmine.

“About a thousand,” replied Amelia. “About a quarter of those have lost a limb. Half of them will die within the hour.” They reached the hospital. The screams were now vivid, and so close that it felt as if the very air was made up of it. Jasmine and Amelia were sent to the east wing on the second story, where dozens of soldiers were being carried and stacked into rooms. Jasmine was put in charge of a man who looked to be nearing forty. Blood spurted from both his legs, and when Jasmine looked closely, she realized that he had no fingers on his right hand. They were red stubs, flowing with red.
“You’re going to be all right,” said Jasmine as the man squirmed where he lay, still too shocked to scream.

“Please,” he gasped. His wounded hand shot out and tried to hold Jasmine’s wrist. It slipped because of blood.

“Everything’s going to be all right,” Jasmine repeated. Now the man began to whimper, and these presently grew into shrieks. Red soon splotched the walls. Amelia appeared.

“The main thing now is to stop the blood loss!” she shouted above the noise. “Get the bandages, stop the blood from flowing.” Jasmine obeyed. Snatching rolls of dense wrap, she wound it round and round the man’s legs until no more blood seeped through. She did the same with the hand.

“It hurts,” said the soldier, his eyes closed tightly and his jaws clenched. “The whole war hurts.” He was so shocked that his entire body was trembling. “Don’t…” he rasped. “Don’t be afraid.” His eyes opened and met Jasmine’s. “Don’t be afraid……to hold on to something.” The soldier shuddered one last time and was forever silent. Jasmine turned from the body quickly, her chest heaving, and laid her head against the wall. As she wept, her golden locks danced. Amelia laid a hand on her shoulder. “Go to Paris, Jas,” she whispered. “It’s all right. I’ll fix it with Gwendolyn.”

::::::::::::::::::::::::

Paris. It was the city that Jasmine grew up in. The Seine River, dark and rolling, and the many buildings that consumed the fire of the sunsets, and the clouds of birds that constantly fleeted above. Jasmine saw it and felt younger, although she was just twenty-one. The sun was shining over everything and yet it was very cold. She walked silently into the streets where the flow of people was constant. She saw men sipping coffee with the cafés; some of them were absorbed into a large novel, or were simply dozing. She speculated as homeless children fled through the alleys after snatching apples from a passing fruit cart. She stayed in small hostel, and though she had no idea, it was the same one Cephas had stayed in with Ada long ago. She wondered at the patched holes in the wall.

She didn’t sleep until later that night, when the moon was waxed and silver above the city. She was near to the river and could hear it softly rising and falling as if it were given a special rhythm.

In his cell, Cephas gazed at the same moon.

Jasmine thought of Cephas intently. And the more she did so, the more she admired him. The dying soldier’s words remained vivid inside her brain. “Don’t be afraid.” She closed her beautiful eyes and settled into slumber. She dreamed of arms and light, both mixed together so it showed something quite profound in its own turn: love. As Cephas slept, he dreamt of God creating Jasmine, using nothing but His own hands that perfectly crafted her face. And with His breath He breathed the sapphire into her eyes. Cephas smiled in his sleep.

Jasmine was an artist. She arose early in the morning, just as the first cells of grey dawn were leaking through her window. She produced a large drawing board, a pen and ink, and some parchment. She supported the board with a pair of wooden legs. The light turned into something like honey and warmed Paris. Jasmine took her pen and formed the shape of a man’s head. Then she added the shape of eyes and faint traces of hair that wisped across the forehead. She first elaborated on the eyes. The pupils formed under meticulous care, and finally appeared what they were meant to be: quiet and astonishingly mournful, and yet embedded with a grasping hope that was unable to fade. These were the eyes she had seen in Cephas. She created his neck and at its bottom formed the outline of a German uniform. His mouth was closed and his nose straight and slender. The hair was long and shaggy and hid his ears. The beard was scanty and showed Cephas’s youth. Two hours later, Jasmine felt as if Cephas himself was staring back at her. She smiled, picked up the paper, and held it close to her chest.

For the remainder of the morning she illustrated. She drew the view outside her window, which was mainly a raised balcony, and below it the streets, humming with people and activity. When noon came, she leaned out the window and let the crystal air touch her face and arms. Her golden curls blew with the breeze. She looked out where the city faded into the countryside, and thought she could see a farm upon the crest of a hill. Beyond this there was green and blue, and even more than that if observed at a closer distance. This was to the south. To the north, however, she discerned tendrils of smoke. The war prison was not far, and not far beyond that stood the front. Jasmine saw it all, the beauty and the ugliness. Its contrast was astounding.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::

A week passed in the prison. Reuben sat with Cephas. There was breeze in the yard. It whipped up dust into small flurries, which sailed into freedom over the massive walls and dissipated into nothingness. Since their clothes were thin, they were chilled. A dark snowfall drifted and wafted above them. The flakes looked like ashes, cold and miserable all though they may have come from fire. Reuben’s face was solemn and wise and perfectly matched the environment. His deep eyes still showed flame and intense hunger.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “War has gotten to me as well.”

“It got to me when I saw the first shell burst,” Cephas returned. A tear formed and dropped. “I hate the war. It will probably kill Jasmine, both of us, and Maria. It doesn’t discriminate. It kills everyone.”

“Perhaps it’s a good thing that it doesn’t discriminate,” said Reuben. “If it did, someone would feel superior, and someone would feel like a dog.”

A shout went up among two German prisoners. Evidently one had smuggled extra soup into his bowl. The man behind him protested, and presently both were rolling across the ground, gathering dust and throwing punches. Cephas saw there thin faces for a split seconds. They were scrunched and unrecognizable, dripping blood. Presently a guard ordered them to stop, and when they didn’t, he raised his pistol, simultaneously cocking the hammer. Six shots rang out. The two men were motionless in the dust, and the bowl of soup they had fought over was overturned some yards away. The weak liquid, hardly able to be called soup, turned the dust into mud. Cephas and Reuben were silent for a moment, while the wind began to softly moan through cell doors. The prisoners stared at the two dead men, solemnly and with such implanted wisdom that they would have unanimously been stated as war veterans. Cephas and Reuben also looked on them, watching as dark blood pooled across the ground, below their distorted and wretched faces. It was the epitome of war. Desperation, sometimes causing innocence, and the death that followed soon afterward.

The two friends elaborated their plan each day. They were both lucky. Their beds were on the side of the wall and were very near to the cell bars. Therefore, the cracks reached and webbed underneath the cots, making it simple to conceal. They worked at night, after the guards had resigned to outdoor duty and had stopped patrolling the cell panels. They moved their cots aside and pried at the cracks, gingerly but in repetition. The guard’s knife that Cephas had stolen was firm and did not bend. After he plunged the blade into the crevice and lifted it up, he saw soil on its tip. They were careful to be quiet. Many other prisoners were bored, so they were capable of reporting them. For days they pried, until finally both of them had broken a hole two feet wide, revealing blackened and beautiful soil. Immediately they started digging. They threw the dirt out the window and at small intervals, so even if a guard did see it he would think an apparition of night. With the concrete slab they simply shoved it next to the hole, where the bed could conceal both objects. Cephas was working diligently when suddenly he heard footsteps approach his cell. His heart twisted, and he tried vainly to shove the cot over the hole before the person saw. He was too late. Jasmine looked weathered, but twice as beautiful as she had last appeared. When Cephas saw his heart soared.  

“What are you doing?” she said when she saw the gaping aperture in the floor. Cephas was at a loss of breath. He reached through the bars and wrapped his arms about her. “For heaven’s sakes, you came back!” he sighed.  

“You’re trying to escape,” she whispered. “Cephas, they’ll catch you.”

“I wasn’t going to try,” said Cephas. “I’m sorry. I almost gave up hope of you coming back. But now that you have, I can see you may possibly love me.”

For a moment Jasmine was silent. And yet she felt Cephas’s hands, how they were clasping to her, holding on to her. She recalled Paris. Again she recalled the dying man’s last words.  

Truthfully she said “I love you.” After a pause she continued, “You can’t try this, Cephas.” When she said his name it was like honey on his tongue.

“You don’t know my reasons,” said Cephas, still holding her. “A man by the name of Agostino kidnapped my sister over a year ago. He threatened, to me, that if I didn’t appear in two years that he would kill her.” Cephas rested his forehead on a bar.

“Why did he kidnap her?” she asked, thunderstruck.

“Because I hurt him. He ran away. It’s typical of a man. He wants revenge on me, because his cowardice was finally discovered.”

“Please,” said Jasmine. She saw so well the mournful eyes that she had drawn in Paris. “We’ll send someone.”

“It has to be me,” said Cephas. “And I have to escape.” Cephas stood silently for quite a time, thinking hard of the things to come. Things yet unseen. “You have to promise me something,” he said. “Will you wait for me? After the war, I’ll come for you. It may be three years, it may be ten. But will you wait for me?”  

“I will. Where?”

“In Paris, next to the Seine River.” Suddenly Cephas didn’t want to let her go. He began to tremble. “If I don’t appear three months after the war, then forget about me.”

“Oh, Cephas.” They stood there for hours, while a pale moonlight strung her lantern high in the field of stars and shined through the small, rugged window of the prison cell. Like the departure of a warm coat, Jasmine left him. Cephas turned to the dark hole and with a fiery hope again began to dig.

His tunnel was growing. Two weeks after Jasmine left, it went down five feet. He was only about three feet from the wall, but the objective was to go deeper than the foundation, which, they decided, was about eight feet downward. By a month, when it was almost March, they both reached eight feet. They began to throw the dirt farther away, into the grass, because they noticed that the soil was piling beneath their cells. The guards would be suspicious.

“We have to remember that once we’re outside of the building’s limits, we still have to tunnel eight feet back up to get to the surface.”

“How are we going to do it without them seeing us?” asked Reuben.

“The dirt’s pretty wet down there,” said Cephas. “The night will have to be moonless, and preferably cloudy, but that’s not as important. If it’s dark enough, we can get away by covering ourselves with the mud.”

“I’m ready to go underneath the wall,” said Reuben. “Just a week more and then we’ll be on our way upward.”

“When we get out, remember that we’re not close together. Since I’m facing east, that’s where we’ll run.”

“The front’s fairly close,” Reuben stated. “We have to be careful. If they see us, they’ll shoot. The French shoot at anything that moves.”

“Because the people that always move are German,” Cephas chuckled.

They started to dig horizontally. It was pitch dark in the tunnel, so they had to align their feet perfectly when they dug. Cephas reached stubborn clay that stuck to his knife. Over and over he had to pluck the clay from his knife and do his best to clean it from his pants. When the work was over for the night, they looked dirty. They began to sit in the dirt of the prison yard to cover up the look.

Cephas was a foot across the wall’s boundary when he began to dig upward. He stabbed, pulled, and hacked at the clay, which was slowly turning into topsoil. After five and half feet of vertical digging, he was forced to start tunneling diagonally since he knew he couldn’t climb up walls of dirt for eight feet. He felt as if he as the core of the earth. Cold sweat engulfed him. Anxiety racked him. He was on his stomach, slipping as he pushed the knife and rotated it so the clay deteriorated and rolled past him into the darkness below. Specks of soil landed in his eyes. It didn’t matter. He was blind anyway. The tunnel was growing narrow, and he began to push directly up until he felt the earth suddenly give way. The knife sliced into nothingness and the icy air above touched his hand. Like a wave it poured through the aperture. He gasped in shock; this, however, melted into ecstasy. He was tempted to burst into the openness then and there, but he remembered Reuben, and slid down the slope until he dropped five feet, crawled the flat four feet, and then jumped and caught the edges of concrete. Once his head was visible, he stared into the eyes of a guard, who had his rifle trained on Cephas’s head. The moment was so terrible and surprising that it left Cephas (and the guard) frozen. Cephas gave a shout and fell back into the tunnel just as the rifle crackled and the bullet sank into the cell wall. Breathing hysterically, Cephas groped through the darkness as if he were a blind bear. Shouts reverberated angrily behind him. He grasped the clay from and scrambled upward until his head burst through the weak earth. He struggled through the broken aperture, and, with all his might, screamed Reuben’s name. He had no choice but to run. The grass was tall. He was still yards away from any forestland. As his feet spun and churned the soil, machine guns blared. The bullets zipped and hissed behind him, in front of him, and on both sides of him. He covered his head with his hands and ducked as the noise shrieked. Suddenly, he saw his shadow leap vividly against the grass as a search light was activated. He dove to the ground and walked on his hands and knees, obscured within the grass as the bullets continued to rain all around him. He heard footsteps approach. He drew the knife from his pocket as three French soldiers cast eyes on him and immediately tried to stab him through with their bayonets. Cephas jumped to his feet and slashed the knife across one of the soldier’s chest. This soldier slumped to the ground, while the other two fired after Cephas as he fled toward the woodland. One of the bullets grazed his head and drew blood. He was stunned, yet undeterred. The two soldiers began to pursue him; abruptly they stopped. Reuben struck one of them across the neck with the iron bed post, and the other he wreaked unconscious by pinching a tendon near the neck’s nape. He joined Cephas in a blur, while the cascades of invisible bullets drew clouds of dust. Finally they reached the woods, where the trees blocked most of the fire. “We can’t stop,” said Cephas. “More are coming.” They continued to run through the forest. The trees were dark silhouettes and the streams black blood vessels that scarred the ground. In exhaustion, both fell on their backs, careless if the air was knocked from them. As they lay still, breath pumping violently and hearts seething like torrents of rain, their eyes grew accustomed to the light of the stars. The moon was a sliver of yellow. The blood on Cephas’s head was warm and surpassed the pain. “God,” said Reuben. “All I ask is to see her again.” Cephas glanced at his friend’s face. It was glistening with sweat, but the eyes were still unblemished and happy. As always they showed fire. “We did it,” he said.

When the dawn arrived, they washed their dirty faces in a stream. Through the trees, light was pouring in as if it were some sort of liquid. Both of them stared at it and both were reminded of the golden city of Rome.