They stopped. The nuns were back again, bringing great cups of hot black coffee, coming quietly, and going quietly away. It was wonderful, all that beauty and gentleness and peace existing in the horror of the war, and through this horror within horror that John had made.
They drank their coffee, slowly, greedily, prolonging this distraction from their torment. Charlotte finished first.
"You say I want you. I own I did once. But I don't now. Why, I care more for the scrubbiest little Belgian with a smashed finger than I do for you."
"I suppose you can satisfy your erotic susceptibilities that way."
"I haven't any, I tell you. I only cared for you because I thought you were clean. I thought your mind was beautiful. And you aren't clean. And your mind's the ugliest thing I know. And the cruelest…. Let's get it right, John. I can forgive your funking. If your nerves are jumpy they're jumpy. I daresay I shall be jumpy if the Germans come into Ghent before I'm out of it. I can forgive everything you've done to me. I can forgive your lying. I see there's nothing left for you but to lie…. But I can't forgive your not caring for the wounded. That's cruel…. You didn't care for that boy at Melle—"
John's mouth opened as if he were going to say something. He seemed to gasp.
"—No, you didn't or you wouldn't have left him. Whatever your funk was like, you couldn't have left him if you'd cared, any more than I could have left you."
"He was dead when I left him."
"He was still warm when I found him. Billy thought you were bringing him away. He says he wasn't dead."
"He lies, then. But you'll take his word against mine."