Read Secrets of the Red Box Online
Authors: Vickie Hall
Corporal Glen Taggart stood on the cobblestone street of a small Italian village, searching for
his friend Charlie Larkin. The news of Germany’s surrender had swept the tiny town as throngs of
people crowded into the narrow streets, wailing and cheering their deliverance. Women of every
shape and size seized the American soldiers, hugging and kissing them, moving from one soldier to
another as quickly as they could. Glen’s gaze peered over the crowd, looking for Charlie.
An elderly woman grabbed Glen about the neck and kissed him. Her face was so deeply
wrinkled that it looked as if she’d been run over by a half-track. She smiled a toothless smile at him
and clasped her hands together as if in prayer. “
Grazie, grazie
,” she said to him, on the verge of tears.
Glen was almost embarrassed. She acted as though he alone had liberated her country from the
Nazis and Fascists. He bowed his head a bit in a nod of humility, then tried to maneuver his way
through the crowd. His eyes scanned the exuberant swarm again in search of Charlie. He knew their
work wasn’t yet done. They had loose ends to tie up, prisoners to dispatch, duties to perform. It
wasn’t as if they could put down their weapons and catch the next boat home.
A man in a butcher’s apron snagged hold of Glen’s hand and shook it vigorously. Glen smiled
and clapped the man on the shoulder. In his limited grasp of Italian, Glen understood the gist of
what the man said to him…
thank God…American…free—
the rest escaped him. He smiled at the man,
and offered him a relaxed salute and moved on.
A truck honked repeatedly and parted the crowd in the street as it made a slow progression
forward. As the sea of people ebbed aside to let the truck pass, Glen caught a glimpse of Charlie
across the street. He waved his arm and called to him as he jogged his way toward his friend.
Charlie looked up as he heard his name, his blue eyes piercing the shade from beneath his
helmet. “Hey!” He waved back at Glen, his smile as wide as the Montana sky. “We made it, Glen.
We made it!”
“A few more days and we’ll be headed home,” he said, shaking his head as if he could scarcely
believe it. “A few weeks and I’ll be home with Amy.”
In a few weeks, Glen thought, he’d be in Omaha, but he’d be at his dad’s house. There wouldn’t
be an Amy there for him. He pushed that thought away as a man came up to them with a camera.
“
Sorridere
,” the man said, motioning them to smile. Glen and Charlie draped an arm across the
other’s shoulders and smiled for the camera. The man snapped the picture. “
Grazie!
”
They’d been captured on film, a brief second fixed in time forever. They’d be placed in the
man’s picture album, and someday he’d probably point to the photo and tell someone the story of
the two brave men whose names he didn’t know.
“Can you believe this?” Charlie laughed, taking in the celebration. “It’s crazy.”
Glen nodded and saw one of his squad motion for him. “Be right back,” he said. “Stay put so I
don’t have to hunt for you again.”
“Sure thing,” he said.
///////
Glen bled into the clot of people and Charlie watched the happy villagers with a wide grin on his
face.
“Hey,
Americana
!” shouted a woman overhead. “
Venire qui.
” Charlie didn’t look up. The woman
leaned over the balcony and cupped her hands beside her mouth. “Hey,
Americana! Venire su
, eh?”
Charlie craned his neck back and looked up. There on a tiny balcony, five women crowded
together, waving and beckoning him to come upstairs. They were pressed together like a skewed
stack of cordwood, too many to fit side by side. He waved back.
“
Venire, venire
,” she shouted again. “Come!”
Charlie blushed. He understood they wanted to show their gratitude, but even if he had the time,
he hadn’t the inclination. Charlie was faithful to Amy, always had been. “No,
grazie
,” he managed to
yell back with a shrug.
“No, no,” one of the women complained. She raised her skirt to expose a shapely limb. “You
like, eh?”
Charlie waved his hands as if to decline the offer, looking up at her with a smile. A strange
groaning sound seemed to filter through the noise of the celebration. He strained against the hurrahs
and tried to make it out. To the side of the balcony he saw bolts quivering against the old brick, the
balcony creaking now against the weight of the women. He backed up to warn them, waving his
arms and shouting for them to get back inside the building. They laughed at him, waved back and
then the balcony shuddered. A sudden look of panic flashed across their faces as it gave way. It first
slammed down against the building, the women screaming as they spilled out like milk from a
pitcher. Then the ancient iron platform ripped from the wall on the left side, hanging precariously by
the right.
Charlie bolted forward, his heart thudding against his ribcage. He reached the mass of knotted
arms and legs, ignoring the blood as he picked up a woman and carried her into the shop below,
then dashed out to help another.
The townspeople seemed too stunned to act, circling the women like helpless victims
themselves. A woman screamed and covered her face from the horrible sight. Finally a man from
the shop came forward and picked up one of the woman as Charlie took hold of another. Moans
from the women had replaced the joyous celebration as the people nearby observed in stunned
silence. Finally, another man stooped to gather a woman into his arms.
The balcony creaked and jerked as the crumbling brick sifted away from the iron. Charlie bent
down to lift the last woman. She wasn’t moving. Her head lolled back over his arm, her eyes open.
Villagers gasped and pointed, yelling at him in Italian that Charlie didn’t understand.
///////
Glen was on his way back when he saw the balcony collapse against the building from across the
street. He ran, shoving people aside, yelling for them to let him through. He couldn’t comprehend
why they seemed so immovable, as if they were welded together by fear and shock. The crowd
began to thin as he reached the edge of the accident. He saw Charlie taking the last woman into his
arms, called to him, warning him of the danger, but it was too late.
Charlie craned his neck toward the sound of his name. He looked up as the balcony quivered.
Glen watched helplessly as the heavy metal balcony careened toward his friend. It crashed down
on him like an angry fist and landed with a clatter, dull metal against sidewalk, trapping Charlie and
the dead woman underneath. Glen shouted at the stunned observers. “
Soccorso! Soccorso!
” he yelled as
he motioned for help to lift the balcony. He bent low and gripped the iron, heaving with his back
and thighs, straining to budge it upward. Some men came forward, lifting it high enough for
someone to pull Charlie and the woman from below. When the two were clear, Glen let go.
“Medic!” he shouted into the crowd. “Medic! Get some help over here!”
He went to his knees and rolled Charlie onto his back. He didn’t see any blood. Charlie’s eyes
were open. He appeared only stunned and breathless. “Hey, buddy,” Glen said. “Help is on the
way.”
Charlie looked up, his hand reaching for Glen’s. “Take the letter,” he wheezed. “Give…it
to…Amy…”
Glen’s eyes fastened on his friend. “You’re going to mail it yourself,” he said with a fleeting
smile. Charlie’s face had gone ashen, his skin glistening with perspiration. Glen felt his grip tighten a
little.
“No,” he said. “Take it…pocket…”
The back of Glen’s throat began to burn. He gritted his teeth to force back his fear. Charlie
blinked slowly and smiled. He coughed and spurted a fountain of blood from his mouth. A shiver of
panic chattered through Glen’s gut. He tried not to let it show on his face, tried not to let his friend
see how desperate he felt. Glen took Charlie into his arms, pulling him up on his lap. “Get the damn
medic!” he shouted again.
“The letter…”
He opened Charlie’s pocket, withdrew the letter, and stuffed it inside his shirt. “I’ve got it,” he
said, choking on his words, “but only until you get it mailed.”
Charlie coughed, more blood oozed down his chin and onto his chest. “I thought I’d made it…”
Glen tightened his hold on Charlie. “You’re
going
to make it. Hang on, Charlie. Just hang on.”
Charlie’s eyes began to fade, the blue turning to steely gray. He tried to speak, choked on the
blood, then gasped. Glen pulled him more upright in his arms, hoping it would help him to breathe.
“Stay with me, Charlie. Come on…”
“It’s okay…I’m okay…” He steadied his gaze on Glen, the blood coming from his nose now.
“Take the letter to Amy…tell her I love her…”
Glen grimaced and tears flowed like molten lava down his cheeks. He tried to wipe away the
blood from Charlie’s face with his hand. So much blood… “No, Charlie, not yet. Stay with me…”
He coughed, his body quivering beneath Glen’s embrace. He caught his breath, looked into
Glen’s eyes, and held them fast, as if by sheer will. “Promise me…the letter…” he sputtered.
“I promise, I promise. I’ll take it to her myself.”
Charlie managed a weak smile, the blood gurgling now from his mouth and nose. His chest
stopped moving, his eyelids closed, and his body went slack in Glen’s arms. He held him, buried his
face against the crook of Charlie’s neck. His anguished tears mingled with the blood as a gaping hole
opened in his heart. “
Damn
you, Charlie,” he sobbed. “It should have been me.”
The medic arrived and dropped his field kit on the sidewalk. “Let me—”
Glen slid his eyes up to the medic. He went hot inside as fury began to rage within him. “Where
were
you?” he shouted. “Where the hell were you?”
The medic’s mouth dropped open, his palms extended. “I . . . I”
Glen lowered Charlie’s body to the sidewalk and got to his feet, his hands and chest covered in
blood. He shoved the medic into the crowd. “You’re too late! You’re too damn late!”
The medic tried to come forward again. “Corporal Taggart, I got here as—”
Glen tore the helmet from his head, spun, and heaved it against the building. He pushed his way
through the dwindling crowd, blinded to their sympathetic faces. He stormed up the street, his anger
and his rage subsiding into grief. He could do nothing for Charlie now. And then a sickening
realization crept into his brain. He’d told Charlie to stay where he was, there under the balcony, to
wait for him. But how could he have known? He couldn’t have, but it didn’t matter.
Glen stopped, his shoulders slumped, and he closed his eyes against the vision of Charlie’s
blood-covered face. He’d failed him. He’d failed in his self-appointed mission to get Charlie home
alive, home to Amy. He didn’t even know why he’d given himself such a stupid obligation in the
first place. Maybe it had been Charlie’s youth, his affable character, his optimism. But deep inside,
Glen knew it was because of the way he talked about home, about the love he had for Amy,
something Glen had never had. Maybe in some way he thought if he could just get this kid back
home, it would be one good thing to come of this war. It was as if by sending Charlie home, life
could go on, and everything would be normal again.
But he’d failed Charlie in this one thing, the one charge he’d given himself. All he knew now was
that his best friend was dead, and that he had his letter inside his shirt. All the months of watching
after Charlie, trying to keep him safe—as if he really could—had amounted to nothing. He kicked at
a stone in disgust. Just a few more days, he thought, and Charlie would have been on his way home.
His mouth drew into a hard, bitter line. A few more days…
Glen turned back, knowing he couldn’t allow Charlie’s death to keep him from his obligations.
Despite the fact that all he wanted to do was drop to his knees and sob, wanted to curse the fates for
this unjust loss, he forced himself back into the village, back to face his responsibilities. In time he
would mourn, mourn for Charlie and all the men he’d known and seen die on the battlefield. In time
he would try to put this horror behind him, try to go on, live some sort of normal life. How he
would do that, he didn’t know. How he would erase the devastation, the revulsion, the terror of
everything he’d seen and done and felt, Glen couldn’t begin to guess.
Paul opened the car door for Bonnie. She rose from the seat, dressed in ice-blue chiffon, and
floated into the warm July night. She let him take her hand as he escorted her up the street to the
theater. She watched the flow of people dressed in their tuxedos and fine gowns surge into the
building, chatting in appropriate tones. He smiled at her as they neared, his perfect teeth a flash in
the dim light of the entrance. She smiled back, but not with the same feeling, the same intensity. It
was more a polite response rather than a genuine display of emotion.
Bonnie liked the life Paul led, the places he took her, the upscale parties they attended, a life that
only money could buy. She liked everything about it…everything but him. For all his pleasant
manners, intelligence and good looks, he bored her. His constant prattle about law and politics, his
interest in the Civil War—it all added up to a dullness she could barely tolerate.
She began to doubt whether she could endure their relationship much longer. And to make
matters worse, she could tell he had feelings for her, deep feelings, feelings she could never return.
He’d been admirable in his sexual restraint; she had to give him that, but eventually he would want
more, not to mention he made her skin crawl every time he touched her. As tempting as living Paul’s
lifestyle was to Bonnie, she just couldn’t bring herself to be smothered in boredom or live with the
idea of having to submit to his urges.
Paul took her by the arm as the usher escorted them down the aisle. She settled in her seat, and
Paul took her hand and kissed it. “You look beautiful tonight,” he murmured against her fingers. “If
music be the food of love, play on.” He sat beside her and linked her arm through his, resting his
other hand over hers. He turned his face and smiled. “Comfortable?”