Armistice Day

"Thank you," I offer, and for a moment I'm lost in her eyes and want to sooth her pain, take it from her and make her world right again. But we all carry the pain and scars and I dare say she takes on our pain too.

I even consider asking if I could offer her company later, seeing pools of green stare back with sympathy; pools of green, the colour of the clouds of chlorine. Shuddering, I break into a coughing fit, bending over with burning lungs, and I feel I'm going to pass out, and she helps me steady on my feet. I feel ashamed and useless and there's the niggling worry I'll not be fit as a husband for any woman, especially one so robust or stout as this young nurse.

"You're going to be fine," she says. "Time should hopefully heel your lungs. Rest them."

Every doctor and nurse tells me this, yet I'm not sure if it's true. Hope is all I have. Though, my coughing fits aren't as common as when I was in London, back when I wished I'd died rather than suffer the constant debilitating hacking, burning and breathlessness.

I'm steady again and she smiles, handing me back the papers. "The tram-stop is out there on the road. Take yourself into town and you'll be able to catch either a train of tram to Richmond where you will find your billet at Mrs McCotter's. And don't lose those papers, there's information on how to apply for pensions and even soldier settlement blocks, if you're interested."

She's nice, healthy, plump and buxom, and again I'm tempted by her, gathering my courage, but before I speak she leaves me standing out front, on my own for the first time in what feels like forever.

~0~

Melbourne is bustling; not quite like Paris or London, but I watch the locals going about their business from my tram, noting how motorcars are more prevalent here than what I'd seen in Brisbane before I left for the war. With the exception of the odd sailor or soldier among the crowds it's hard to believe there's even a war on.

Two young women sit across from me, whispering, glancing in my direction every time I cough. Down the back there is a young man in a sailor's uniform, chatting loudly with a young lady, and there's another Digger sitting on his own down front, staring absently out the window. Men and women get on and off along the way, and eventually the conductor calls out, informing all we're in Richmond.

The row of cream-coloured brick terrace houses are three-stories tall, where each individual house is maybe twenty feet across and joined to its neighbours on both sides by a common wall. They remind me of houses in London, all packed in tight together.

Doubt threatens to overcome me, so I double check the house number matches the one on my papers, then take a breath, open the wrought iron lattice-work gate between a head-height well-trimmed hedge, stepping into the tiny courtyard, up the three steps to the porch, then turn the handle on the bell, hearing it ring somewhere in the house. I feel like I'm intruding, like I shouldn't be here. Instead I should be on a train to Brisbane, then another train westwards to the valley I'd known as home until I joined the Army.

Looking back, there's a wagon hitched to two brown horses passing by on the street, laden down with produce of some sort in hessian sacks. The driver looks in my direction, then pays no more heed, his attention back on his horses.

The tiny courtyard indicates the house owner likes order by the way the plants are neatly trimmed, where in addition to the hedge around the border against the iron fence, there are lilies of some sort around the base of a small tree which is as tall as me, laden with large pink blossoms; whoever Mrs Carmel McCotter is, she takes pride in her garden, much more pride than many of her neighbours do with their weedy yards.

There is movement in the house, footsteps perceptible through the front door, a key in the lock, and the door opens a fraction. I see her eyes in the gap, and she asks, her voice almost quivering, "Yes, may I help you?"

I'm nervous, I'm intruding, and she doesn't appear to know why I'm here. Holding up my papers to the door, I greet her with trepidation. "Good afternoon, Mrs McCotter. I'm Corporal Graham. Alfred Graham. They sent me here from the hospital. Apparently you're giving me a room for a while, until they discharge me."

Her hand slips through the gap and she takes the letter from me, presumably reads it, then opens the door. Her voice loses the quiver, her tone sounding relieved when she speaks. "Please, Alfred, I'm sorry, I...I worried you were a messenger come to tell me about my boys. They're over in France and I haven't heard news from either in a while. Please, do come in."

"Thank you." She holds the door open and I enter, noting she's medium height, shorter than me by more than a head, roundish in every way, not plump like the nurse back at the hospital, but perhaps stocky or big boned, as my mother would say, naturally large. Her chest is enormous, pushing her apron out over a large pocket like a kangaroo's pouch, filled with a cloth of sorts. Her hair is a bob of grey and she watches me with warm light brown eyes, smiling a pretty smile.

"Come through to the kitchen, please," she says, closing the door behind me, leading me down the narrow hall past a small lounge room on the right and flight of stairs on the left, the house smells of cooking. "You're the second soldier who's arrived here unannounced. I asked the Army to at least give me warning when they send someone, but my request must have fallen on deaf ears."

"I'm sorry, I didn't realise. I hope I'm not intruding."

"No, don't be silly. I volunteered my spare rooms for boys like you. Like I said, my sons are fighting and the last letter I received from them suggested they were billeted with French civilians, so I thought it right, my duty even, to help where I can. And the Army does pay me an allowance when one of you boys is allocated, I just wish they'd give me a day or two's notice to I can prepare, that's all. If you don't mind, how long do they want you to stay?"

"The doctor said to see him in a month." I wonder if she's regretting her decision to take on a wounded soldier, but she nods.

"I suspect a month is what they tell every soldier."

"I can help you around the house or in the yard. Otherwise, you'll hardly know I'm here."

She nods again. "We'll see. Last fella didn't lift a finger around here. Mind you, he rarely slept here, so I didn't have to pretend he wasn't around, and when he was here he wasn't the neatest lad. Wasn't brought up well, I suspect, his mother did him no favours."

"I'll help out, I promise." I wonder about her sons, genuinely hoping they're alive, knowing how unlikely they were to be billeted in a nice warm room. If they weren't in a sodden stinking trench on the lines they'd be in a canvas tent, or if they were lucky, a barn or wooden hut somewhere, or maybe a drafty church. No matter where they were, they'd be cold and damp and uncomfortable.

"Please, have a seat," she says, gesturing towards the small table in the dark kitchen at the rear of the house. At the end of the room is a bench and a cast iron stove with a pot boiling away, the room smelling of corned beef like when my mother made it. Mrs McCotter bends down to a stack of small logs, picking one and placing it into the glowing coals behind the little door of the stove. "I assume you would like some tea, Alfred?"

"Thank you, yes please." I'd not even thought of tea but the smells in this room make me hungry.

Mrs McCotter places a kettle on the range, then leans her backside against the bench, her hands in the pocket of her apron. "I suppose you're hungry too? I have some vegetables I can boil or bake, and later when this silverside is ready we'll have some meat, but you must realise meat's always in short supply lately so we'll have to ration it out. I do apologise, but I'll try to buy some more in the next day or two."

"Please, don't go to any trouble for me, I'm grateful to have somewhere to sleep."

She smiles and I wonder how old she is, having two sons in the war. Mid-forties, I reckon. Watching me, she says, "You, er, came from the hospital. The last fella who stayed was missing his left leg, from his knee down. Didn't stop him going out and wasting his pay on two-up and alcohol and I assume women too. But you appear whole."

Tapping my head, I say, "None of us are whole anymore, Mrs McCotter. Bad dreams and my lungs are scarred, keeping me up at night. The cough is the worst because it comes on when the air is cool in the evening, irritating my airways."

"Yes, quite," she whispers. "I heard you through the house after you rang the bell."

"I didn't notice I'd been coughing, Mrs McCotter."

She smiles again. "Please, Alfred, call me Carmel. It is my name, after all."

Laughing even a little sends me into a coughing fit and Carmel comes over, rubbing my back, making soothing sounds, telling me, "I'm sorry, Alfred, I'm so sorry."

"Not your fault," I gasp, breathing shallow to sooth my damaged lungs.

"How did this happen to you?"

"A gas called chlorine. Burnt my airways. Could've been worse though..."

I'm about to say, Could've been mustard gas that burns everything it touches, or phosgene which takes hours or days to suffocate a man, or mercifully the gas could and probably should have ended in my death, but Carmel's watching me with wide eyes, reminding me her sons are still over there, and I have no need to say anymore.

"Those Germans," she whisperers, "Such a ghastly race of..."

I shake my head. "We gassed them too and they gassed us. We're all as bad as each other."

She nods, then changes the subject. "Do you have any spare clothes in your bag and would you like me to wash your uniform? If need be we can see if Henry or George's clothes fit you for the time being. For now, if you'd like to wash up there's hot water in the copper through the door there in the scullery. Draw the water into the bath if you wish, but first I'll also show you your room, and whip up some supper."

"You're too kind, Mrs McCotter."

"Carmel."

I smile. "Carmel McCotter. I have another pair of drawers, a shirt and pair of socks, plus my great-coat, but this uniform could do with a wash if I can borrow some trousers."

She smiles then stands. "Follow me."

The climb up the first flight of stairs leaves me breathless and coughing on the landing, but Carmel is patient, tut-tutting and cooing sympathetically. Any other time in my life I'd be embarrassed by her mothering, but I've never felt so low or so tired and I'm having to accept this is my life now.

At each end of the landing is a door, one open through which I can barely make out a double bed and dresser, which I presume is Carmel's room, and the door at the other end of the landing is closed, with another flight of stairs between. When I've recovered from my coughing, Carmel leads me to the attic, where she tells me, "This is Henry and George's room."

We stand in the dimness directly under the rafters of the sloping roof iron. At one end is a small window, where Carmel draws the curtains open, revealing the street below. Despite the brightness outside, the window only lets in a little light, thus the room remains dim, but it's easier to see the two beds, plus a wardrobe from which Carmel pulls an assortment of trousers for me to try. I look around the space, wondering how they ever managed to bring the beds and wardrobes up the narrow stairs.

"Here, try these but they might be a little short on such a tall boy like you. Meanwhile, I'll fix supper."

The pair of trousers are short for my long legs, but they'll do me fine for now, and I take them down stairs to the room Carmel calls the scullery, a small room immediately behind the kitchen at the rear of the house, with corrugated iron walls and roof. In the corner there's a large copper with small fire underneath, heating water, a cast iron tub next to it, a bench along the wall, and a cast iron bath along the other wall. I have a bird-bath with barely bucketful of water, pouring it over me in the bath, the first decent wash I've experienced since I can't remember.

Eventually I'm at the table with Carmel, eating her corned beef, baked potatoes, pumpkins, carrots, and blanched beans. "This is hands down the best meal I've eaten since...since I left home."

With a smile, she looks into my eyes. "Where is home for you?"

"Queensland. Fassifern Valley west of Brisbane."

"I've never heard of it."

"Not many have, Mrs Mc..."

"Carmel."

"Sorry...Carmel."

She smiles and we finish the meal in silence. Later, I cough again as the cooler night air begins to tickle my lungs, and Carmel lights a small fire in the tiny lounge room hearth at the front of the terrace.

"Sit here a while," she offers, gesturing to a single ornate timber chair beside the fire. There is a small table next to the chair and she places the kerosene lamp upon it, adding to the light of the fire and another kerosene lamp on the mantel next to the clock which recently chimed once for half-past-seven, its pendulum swinging back and forth in a timber and glass case. She draws close the thick curtains in the bay window facing the street. The fire's flue works well and the room isn't smoky like some barracks where I've stayed, so I stand in front of the fire for a while, and soon the air is warming my lungs.

While I stand there, I examine several photographs adorning the fire's mantel, one of a young gentleman with a fine beard and shorter lady in wedding attire; Carmel and her husband I reckon. I wonder about her husband, where he is and is this his chair she offered to me? There is a photo of the man and woman standing in front of a little girl who holds a baby, and two younger boys stand at her side. In this photo I can see the woman is indeed Carmel, a younger version of herself, and I guess the two boys are Henry and George, who are now soldiers in Europe.

Poor lads, I think, young fellas like myself going off to fight someone else's war. My father would tell me it's always the way, old men sending young men to fight pointless battles over real estate.

Examining the man at Carmel's side, her husband, I see he is handsome and tall, proud and healthy. And the girl in front holding the baby, a pretty young thing in a dress and long dark hair. I guess the girl is Carmel's daughter, and the baby she holds is likely Carmel's youngest child as well. She must have four children.

There is a photo of the girl when she's older, a young woman now, tall like her father but definitely Carmel's daughter with some nice curves. Her hair is pinned up and she's smiling on the arm of an older gentleman in a suit. This photo is another wedding, and the older man must be the daughter's husband.

Another photo draws my eye, two stocky strong boys, Carmel's sons, in fresh Army uniforms. They remind me of how Mick and Francis and Will and I decided to have group and individual photographs taken, dressed in our new uniforms right before we shipped out, fresh faced and naïve, ready to take on the world.

And like the four of us, these boys are alive when the photo was taken. I hope they still are.

"They're my sons, Henry and George," Carmel tells me, and I glance around to face her, semi reclining on the double ended chaise opposite the single chair she'd offered me. She's like her furniture, I think, plain and practical with a certain elegance, even beauty. There is a piano against the wall and two paintings hanging nearby, thus clearly she has some money, but not flashy with it. This is a working-class neighbourhood, after all. Nodding at the photographs, she continues, "I urged them not to join up, but they were desperate to get into the fight. Poor Henry and George were big kids for their age and received white cockatoo's feathers in the war's first year, back when they were still only seventeen and sixteen. Henry begged me to sign permission to allow him to join up when he was eighteen and I thought if he could wait till his brother was eighteen the war might be over, so I finally relented on George's eighteenth birthday, letting them both join. It's my biggest regret."

"My father didn't want me to join. He was hypocrite, because he served as a Light Horseman under Harry Chauvel in the Boer War."

"Your father probably knew the horrors," she whispers.

I agree, nodding. "I know this now. But back then, all my mates were joining. I begged Dad to write a letter too. He's our district police sergeant and threatened to lock me up if I thought of joining, but he knew he wouldn't stop me so signed anyway."

"Must have been a tough decision, sending his son to war," she sighs. "Sit, please. Would you like a night cap? A brandy or Scotch whisky?"

I shake my head. "No thank you. I don't mean to be rude, but I might hit the...I'll go to bed."

And she smiles. "Good night, Alfred."

"Please, call me Alfie."

"Night, night, Alfie."

"G'night, Mrs McCotter."

"Carmel," she says, smiling again.

~0~

No man's land is a muddy, bloody, stinking, deadly, lonely place. Much like the entire Western Front. One-hundred yards between our lines and theirs. One Jerry is snoring loudly, making me think perhaps all thirteen of us can simply manage to stroll up to their position undetected. Or maybe the snorer's keeping his comrades awake and alert?

Will crouches in the shadows with Archie and I glance in their direction, then back to my field of fire, watching intently for enemy. Signalling for us to move with a wave of his hand, Will slowly chooses a path. There could be mines here, there probably are. We sometimes lift them at night, but leave them for now, moving under a crescent moon.

Not for the first time I think my state-of-the-art Lewis machine gun isn't the most ideal weapon for trench raiding, but I'm rather fond of her, and four of us carry them, which is three-to-four more than allocated to the average infantry section in our army. Mug-gunners they call us, short for machine gunner, which is a mugs job. We practice firing our weapons from the hip and shoulder, advancing into combat or covering a withdrawal, and if we end up in a scrap we can bring considerable firepower to bear. They've saved us more than once.

Jerry doesn't hear us, the snoring man we've dubbed The Pig covering our approach, and we drop among the bastards, but my gun is a long-range weapon, heavy and cumbersome, so I watch as the boys brandish their rifles and trench clubs, Will caving in the skull of The Pig who was awake on his bench and reaching for his pistol, the rest becoming prisoners. I'm staring at the dead man and Will points to the end of the trench and I go there to stand sentry. Four Jerrys, and the boys round them up, tying them by the wrist and a rag through their mouths to keep them silent.

Will approaches me and he brings Archie too, one of the fellas, an Aboriginal stockman from Cunnamulla way. He's a blackfella to everyone else, but to us he's our mate, become like a brother, proving himself on each occasion he path-finds our way through to the enemy's defences, and he grins in the moonlight, whispering, "The boss wants me to keep you safe, Alf."

I nod and with my gun pointed low I check around the corner of the trench. Dirt explodes near my face, covering me with soil, the loud rifle-shot instantaneous and close, harsh yelling and movement from only feet away, rush of boots, an enemy charging at me as I bring my heavy weapon up, Archie stepping in to parry the man's rifle and bayonet which is aimed at my side. The man deflects Archie's weapon and lunges at Will, so I yell his name at the top of my voice, and Will tries to dodge but I see the cold steel at the end of the enemy's rifle slice into the hessian respirator bag on Will's chest.