and with a suggestion of relief, as if more usually accustomed to inanities. Talbot asked one question only, to which Carroll had his prompt and measured reply: Yes, the scientists examining the site and the survivors were inclined to think that there remained some danger in the atmosphere, though not for so brief a visit as our own.
The girders of the dome had been examined for their unaccountable resilience. Why yes, the casualties were estimated at a quarter-million, that being a tentative figure only. Why the explosion had not been directed initially to an uninhabited zone, or why the first exercise had been followed by the raid on Nagasaki, he had no idea, those decisions having been made in the closed and no doubt wise councils of our leaders. However, he did ask Leith if he could suggest a strategic reason. He had never sought an opinion before. Aldred, turning to him from the front seat where he sat beside Talbot, remarked, 'I doubt there was logic, other than that shaped to the predestined act. By then, neither side was interested in sparing anyone, even themselves.'
Carroll said, 'Yes' — for him, a daring intervention. After a hesitation, added, 'I was on Okinawa that year, through June.'
At the American nucleus near the port, they had beers tasting of tin and wrote addresses on unlikely scraps of paper. Driving back to the compound, Talbot mumbled, 'I suppose, a decent bloke.' They left it at that until the driver said, 'He has a different voice, for a Yank.'
'Not a Yank at all. He's from the Deep South. That's their accent. He's from Georgia.'
Talbot laughed. 'Well, I'm from the Deep South myself, as far south as you can go. And with the accent, too, to prove it.'
Benedict asked him, 'What will you do with it all?'
'I'll write it, and it will be published. The account of China, which was proposed to me. Japan has been my own addition.' He said, 'It has all come upon me by chance.'
Late in the war, he had been asked, by persons in power, to write in confidence about the town of Caen, all but destroyed in the first days of June 1944. In those times there was no lingering and his work was completed quickly. But he had spoken with many persons grieved and embittered by ruin, and by the gross ambiguities of their liberation; and related these matters with simplicity and truth. The report, in French and in English, had been presented in good time, and he had never expected to hear of it again.
In Paris, on a cold morning of April 1945, he was sent for. Dark grey, diminished, chipped, and soiled, the city seemed a scale model of its former self; a wintry film in black-and-white. In the offices to which he was directed, dinginess gave place to splendour. Paintings, rugs of stitched roses, fine furniture signed by the ebeniste were less of a luxury than the warmth, which even pervaded corridors. Senior officers came and went, apparently without the pinched signs of suffering: immune, as they would have had you believe, not so much to glorious death as to the squalor of chilblains, boils, and empty bellies in the surrounding streets. The man who had sent for him was unexpectedly young, not tall, but with a clever face and elegant limbs. Logs were burning in a marble fireplace, to which they drew up velvet chairs.
'My paper on Caen had reached his desk. He had informed himself, and knew about my youth in the East, the languages, the war. He'd grown up in China and Indochina, and knew that these places were evaporating, transforming. The last days of all their centuries should be witnessed and recounted by someone who was not a spy, not a sociologist, beholden to no one.' All this very concise from the young general aslope in his chair, stretching crossed feet to the fire. 'He offered me two years in China, and a free hand. I should keep my military rank, which, as he said, would sometimes help me if it did not otherwise provoke my death. A contract would be drawn up protecting my right to publish. Official circles
The girders of the dome had been examined for their unaccountable resilience. Why yes, the casualties were estimated at a quarter-million, that being a tentative figure only. Why the explosion had not been directed initially to an uninhabited zone, or why the first exercise had been followed by the raid on Nagasaki, he had no idea, those decisions having been made in the closed and no doubt wise councils of our leaders. However, he did ask Leith if he could suggest a strategic reason. He had never sought an opinion before. Aldred, turning to him from the front seat where he sat beside Talbot, remarked, 'I doubt there was logic, other than that shaped to the predestined act. By then, neither side was interested in sparing anyone, even themselves.'
Carroll said, 'Yes' — for him, a daring intervention. After a hesitation, added, 'I was on Okinawa that year, through June.'
At the American nucleus near the port, they had beers tasting of tin and wrote addresses on unlikely scraps of paper. Driving back to the compound, Talbot mumbled, 'I suppose, a decent bloke.' They left it at that until the driver said, 'He has a different voice, for a Yank.'
'Not a Yank at all. He's from the Deep South. That's their accent. He's from Georgia.'
Talbot laughed. 'Well, I'm from the Deep South myself, as far south as you can go. And with the accent, too, to prove it.'
Benedict asked him, 'What will you do with it all?'
'I'll write it, and it will be published. The account of China, which was proposed to me. Japan has been my own addition.' He said, 'It has all come upon me by chance.'
Late in the war, he had been asked, by persons in power, to write in confidence about the town of Caen, all but destroyed in the first days of June 1944. In those times there was no lingering and his work was completed quickly. But he had spoken with many persons grieved and embittered by ruin, and by the gross ambiguities of their liberation; and related these matters with simplicity and truth. The report, in French and in English, had been presented in good time, and he had never expected to hear of it again.
In Paris, on a cold morning of April 1945, he was sent for. Dark grey, diminished, chipped, and soiled, the city seemed a scale model of its former self; a wintry film in black-and-white. In the offices to which he was directed, dinginess gave place to splendour. Paintings, rugs of stitched roses, fine furniture signed by the ebeniste were less of a luxury than the warmth, which even pervaded corridors. Senior officers came and went, apparently without the pinched signs of suffering: immune, as they would have had you believe, not so much to glorious death as to the squalor of chilblains, boils, and empty bellies in the surrounding streets. The man who had sent for him was unexpectedly young, not tall, but with a clever face and elegant limbs. Logs were burning in a marble fireplace, to which they drew up velvet chairs.
'My paper on Caen had reached his desk. He had informed himself, and knew about my youth in the East, the languages, the war. He'd grown up in China and Indochina, and knew that these places were evaporating, transforming. The last days of all their centuries should be witnessed and recounted by someone who was not a spy, not a sociologist, beholden to no one.' All this very concise from the young general aslope in his chair, stretching crossed feet to the fire. 'He offered me two years in China, and a free hand. I should keep my military rank, which, as he said, would sometimes help me if it did not otherwise provoke my death. A contract would be drawn up protecting my right to publish. Official circles
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