Steele sat on an empty hardtack box and the others sprawled on the grass. Sergeant Fitch cleared his throat. “Lieutenant Kelly, I wonder would you sing us that Irish lullaby?”
“Now what would a strapping man like you be wanting with a lullaby?”
Red sang in his fine tenor voice.
As other soldiers gathered around, Tim stood up and left the group. He walked back to the tent. A warm breeze blew in from the ocean. He reached for his poncho and spread it on the ground not far from the tent. He lay on his back with his hands behind his head.
Red’s voice came clear in the silence of the starlit night. Tim thought of Kate. The last time he’d written her he’d known in his heart he was writing the thoughts of a boy who had left home two long years before. If only he and Kate could meet and talk for a while.
He remembered the first time he’d danced with her, the light from the chandeliers striking the whirling figures in the white-painted room of the new Town Hall. As he drifted into sleep Tim thought about the dresses, pink and salmon and powder blue against the men’s black suits.
When reveille sounded Tim woke up and rolled over. Red lay on the sand a few feet away, groaning as he opened his eyes in the predawn light. “Last night when I curled up here,” he said in a rasping whisper, “I thought you had a good idea, sleeping on the ground.”
Tim felt his poncho and his clothes. They were soaked with dew.
Captain Kautz was already up, sitting on a keg outside the tent, straining his eyes to take in every detail of the waking camp, already thinking about the day that lay ahead. “We break camp now. The transport moves with the morning tide.” He stood up. “I suppose we have to set off a charge of powder by Dawson’s head to get him up.”