Don’t you write to one another?
He shook his head. We know what we’re both up to, he said. Thing is, it’s always been us when the others have left. Always that spark when the lights have gone out. Is that love?
Oh, don’t look at me. I’ve not stayed long on that particular horse.
Never?
Once or twice, maybe.
Once is enough. We just need to know what the heart’s capable of, Evelyn.
And do you know what it’s capable of?
I do. Grace and fury.
Evelyn smiled, and drew heavily on her cigarette.
So that – and she pointed to his lip – was Peg and not a sniper.
No, that was definitely a sniper. Look, he said, and he raised his right arm and showed the scar along his wrist. Shrapnel, he said.
He leant towards her and parted his hair. Sniper, he said. He pulled up his trouser leg. Evelyn winced. Artillery fire. That one got infected. And then this, and he unbuttoned his shirt.
Good Lord, said Evelyn. Another near miss?
A lucky escape, he said. There’s a difference.
How so?
It’s all mental. How I see life at that time. This last one was in Trieste, and there’s been nothing since. And now I know I’m not going to die. And I’m a lot happier.
Excuse me? said Evelyn.
Not die here, I mean.
Italy here?
War here, he said. It’s like having a debt hanging over you. You know it’ll be called in, but it’s how it’s gonna get called in that’s the question. What I mean is, all those opportunities to kill me off. I’m still here. There’s a reason for that.
Poor aim might be one, said Evelyn.
You’re funny, Evelyn.
And you’re a very optimistic young man.
I am, he said, I’m glad you noticed that. And he went on to explain that his optimism came from his father, Wilbur, whose wise counsel of ‘Life’s what you make it, son,’ had been firmly entrenched in him from a young age. The man was a dreamer, he said. Had a loser’s luck and a winning smile and was never happy unless he had a churn in his guts that denoted money riding on an outcome. A feeling he often equated to love.
But then one day it happened for real. He walked into the pub, stood on a table and declared he’d fallen head over heels and everyone thought she’d be some tidy young thing, but she wasn’t. She was almost as old as him, slipping down the other side of fifty. Tired, kind face with the keenest blue eyes that looked at him as if he was a meadow of wildflowers. And two months later – against all odds – she told him they were having a child, a first for both.
The most beautiful words in the world, said Ulysses.
Having a child? said Evelyn.
Against. All. Odds.
This recognition of double luck – wife, and kid incubating – brought back a familiar taste to Wilbur Temper, like sucking on a coin.
And his palms are tingling, said Ulysses, the soles of his feet too, and he knows this feeling because it’s a winning feeling and you can never let a winning feeling pass because that would go against nature. So, he goes to my mum and explains what he needs to do. Last time, she says. Last time, he promises.
Now, his mate Cressy has told him about this illegal greyhound meeting out in Essex, all hush-hush and big money and they go out there together and study form and he scribbles in his notebook a beautiful constellation of numbers, subtractions, additions, an algebraic formula of luck. Last race. Everything on the black. That’s what he used to say. All or nothing. And he places life and savings on a tan and white dog called Ulysses’ Boy at 100-1.
The rest is folklore. Dog came in first, thus ensuring two things: enough money to set up a modest business in handmade globes, and a memorable name for his sole son and heir.
You were named after a greyhound? said Evelyn.
A winning greyhound, Evelyn. Winning.
The heavy presence of artillery guns and infantry came into sight long before the villa. At the checkpoint, they were waved on through. Along the driveway they could see military guards and Italian civilians placing ‘Off Limits’ signs at every entrance to the ornate building. Captain Darnley was waiting for them outside. He was wiping his glasses on the tail of his shirt. He looked up, squinting at the sound of the jeep. His dark hair had a premature dusting of grey at the sides that made him appear older than his thirty years, and his dark eyes peered out from dark sockets and gave him a perpetual look of sorrow. Rather like the last panda facing extinction. He put his glasses back on and approached the jeep.
Temps! he called. Temps!
Ulysses parked the jeep and got out.