While Lena dawdled, Hattie fiddled with a tortoiseshell button on the front of her dress. Finally, her friend extracted herself from her admirers who begged her not to leave. “We can’t go yet,” Lena said, nearly breathless with twinkly eyes. “I’ve barely spoken to Arno, and this,” she tilted her head toward the animated soldiers, “is rather fun.”
“If you want to talk to your brother, do it. Don’t waste your time with these fellas.” Hattie motioned toward the men and rolled her eyes.
“Words hurt, lady,” a soldier hollered as his friends laughed.
Hattie drew a labored breath. Why hadn’t she lowered her voice? During the last few minutes, her day had slithered down a disappointing hole, one requiring more than a ladder to free herself.
A second soldier, leaning backward on the hind legs of his chair, pouted. “Say now, we have feelings too.” And then he pretended to cry. Howl, really.
The lump wedged in Hattie’s throat refused to budge. She’d pay a buck for someone to get her out of her current mess. She looked around but couldn’t find any takers, not even Lena who’d cupped a hand over her mouth as if suppressing a fit of giggles. “I’m so, so sorry. I never meant to offend.”
“Too late,” a fellow, diminutive and freckly, yanked a handkerchief from his pocket to sop at artificial tears. “How you gonna make it up to us, lady?”
“Gentlemen,” Lena raised her voice, “this is your lucky day. Before you stands the one and only Hattie Waltz, singer extraordinaire. An admirer once claimed her voice rivaled the songbirds—from a robin to a meadowlark.”
A half-dozen enthusiastic faces grinned with encouragement.
Hattie squirmed. No, no, no! But the sooner she complied and gained the overblown need for forgiveness for her thoughtless words, the sooner she’d ditch the Y.’s Hostess House.
“If Hattie agrees to sing you a ditty, do you promise to let bygones be bygones and welcome my friend into your good graces?” Lena, reveling in her heyday, glowed.
A swarm of agreements followed, and then one man rose. “Miss, if you know the words to “Danny Boy,” I’d be eternally indebted. Even the chorus alone would comfort my homesick Irish heart.”
She’d never see these soldiers again. If she made a fool of herself, at least it wasn’t in Split Falls. She clenched her trembling hands together and emptied her thoughts before tugging the touching lyrics from her memory.
“Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling.
From glen to glen, and down the mountainside.
The summer’s gone, and all the flowers are dying.
’Tis you; ’tis you must go, and I must abide.
Oh, Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.”
After a hushed silence, a swell of applause stormed. The soldiers gushed forward with praise, jostling her toward a nearby doorway. Did it lead outside the grounds? Hemmed in by the suffocating attention, she gulped for breaths. What if she fainted? Not that she ever had.
She spotted Lena tied to Arno in conversation and Priscilla alongside Barrett. With the hope nobody noticed, she ducked into the afternoon air—crisp and quiet—and sucked in the sunshine before hurrying away from the chaos.
Hours ago, the three women had agreed to meet at the facility’s entrance gate if they separated during the day. With thirty minutes to spare, Hattie scurried toward the designated location, savoring the solitude. Soon, they’d collect their suitcases from Priscilla’s relatives and head home.
Across the street stood rows of unpicked corn as rigid as soldiers. A low flock of geese honked overhead. Camp Dodge wasn’t what she’d expected. It was clean and tidy, despite more men underfoot than she’d met in a lifetime. Plus, the rules appeared different than back home, with silent salutes and nods, even the lingo sounded foreign at times. In the library, the scent of masculinity had overpowered the familiar aroma of old books.
Hattie leaned her back against the chilly bark of an elm tree. She missed why Lena longed for adventure. But that wasn’t completely true. Parts of the two-day jaunt had exceeded her expectations. Even Arno’s attentiveness had turned her head, although not for long. Or did she mean not for long enough?
A squirrel scampered across a dangly branch, bobbing the overhead limb. Hattie moved to a safer tree. She slumped to the ground. How many times had she told herself to forget Arno? He’d never once proven himself worthy of her time and attention, not to mention love. And now a handsome man with a warm drawl appeared more than smitten. But a big, brawny roadblock obstructed their path to happiness.
Hattie sighed, raising her face to the sky. Barrett carried chinks in his armor too. He’d certainly displayed his shortcomings today.
Eyes closed, she repeatedly bumped the back of her head against the tree trunk but not hard enough to hurt.
Seconds later, she gasped, ramming her shoulders against the unmovable elm.
Arno squatted before her, grasping a bouquet, strangely similar to the flowers gracing the tables in the hostess house. His grin tightened her stomach muscles. “I realize they’re not wildflowers, but they’re the best I can do on short notice.”
She inhaled the glorious posies, sweet and perfumed by God. “Thank you. They’re beautiful. Did you pick them yourself?”
“I chose them for you.”
She refused to smile at his thievery, but it wasn’t easy. His heart-melting grin perked up her pulse. “Can you give me an honest answer?”
“I’ll try my best.”
“Are fisticuffs in your past or part of your present too?”
Minutes of silence blared the answer.
CHAPTER SEVEN
* * *
“Forward, march,” boomed a drill sergeant.
Arno, along with the rest of Company E, advanced toward the rifle range, a lengthy jaunt from the barracks. A flock of ducks quacked their farewells overhead. The temptation to point his gun at the unsuspecting fowl nagged, conjuring visions of a roasted duck dinner with all the trimmings.
Low-flung clouds delivered a chill. It was anything but a typical autumn day. He wasn’t in the field picking corn or squirrel hunting in the timber. He was surrounded by acquaintances and strangers, except for Karl, and miles and miles from the comforts of home.
Camp life had fallen into a predictable pattern of endless drilling. He’d only missed one target during rifle practice, meaning the odds of securing a spot on the sharpshooter squad had spiked over the last few weeks. With any luck, he’d snare a position after today’s showing. Would that finally impress Father? Maybe.
Unlike some of the other soldiers, Arno had wielded a gun for years. The first time Father propped a small-gauge shotgun, minus the ammunition, into Arno’s hands coincided with day one of grammar school. In time, they’d hunted together, tracking everything from foxes to bucks, honing their art with each shot. At least, they had before Oliver’s death.
At the rifle range, Arno stood three men deep behind CW Hyland. The soldier still whispered “German-lover” whenever their paths crossed and nobody else stood within earshot. Arno suspected the bigot would continue the trend, an excellent reason to avoid the man.
He studied the competition at the one-hundred-yard mark. The first soldier missed two targets, the second man three, and then CW nailed all five shots like a deadeye. His gun spoke again at the two-hundred and five-hundred targets, reverberating across the grassy acre.