Read The Rest is Silence (Billy Boyle World War II Mystery) for Free Online

toward us, a smile on his face. His blond hair was slicked back, and his step was quick and steady. It had to be Martindale, but at first I saw no sign of a wound or injury.
    “Piotr!” he said, extending his hand as he drew nearer. “It’s so good to see you.”
    As he came into the bright hallway and turned to greet us head on, I almost gasped.
    It was his face.
    “David,” Kaz said, gripping his hand in both of his. I saw the slightest evidence of struggle cross his features as he worked to find another way to say it was good to see his friend. “It has been too long. I’ve missed you.”
    “And you must be Captain Boyle,” Martindale said. “Kaz has told me so much about you.”
    “Don’t believe half of it, Flight Lieutenant. Thanks for inviting me.” We shook, and his grip was firm, but I detected a tremor in his hand. Still, he put on a good show. He’d been burned. Badly. But only the right side of his face. It looked as if the flesh had melted, then frozen into a hard, shiny skin. He’d had surgery, to be sure. His right eye was visible, but barely, peeking out from a slit that looked like it never closed. His nose was perfect on the left, a tight bump of scar tissue on the right.
    “Glad to have you. And let’s leave rank aside, shall we? From what Piotr tells me, I sense you’d rather not bother about it. I’ll show you to your rooms, and you can wash up before dinner. Thank you, Williams,” he said to the butler, who quietly departed. David waited until he was out of earshot.
    “Look, Piotr, I’m sorry I never told you about this,” David said, gesturing vaguely in the direction of his ruined face. “I should have prepared you. It must be a shock.”
    “It is a shock you are still alive, after all the battles you have seen,” Kaz said. “And I have not come through the war unscathed either.” He made the same small gesture toward his own scar.
    “What, that little thing?” David said, and they both laughed, the kind of laughter that comes when two old friends reunite and pick up as if the intervening years had never occurred. Maybe this would be good for both of them. I kept a few steps behind, letting them chat as David led us upstairs.
    “I don’t know what to think,” Kaz said later in my room. “I should be glad he’s alive and has all his limbs, but what a price he’s paid. I can’t imagine what life will be like for David.”
    “It will be a life. Don’t forget that,” I said as I tied my field scarf, which the army insisted on calling a plain old necktie.
    “Yes,” Kaz said, with little enthusiasm. He stared out the window as I finished dressing. I’d brought my new tailor-made Ike jacket. It was a new short-waisted coat, based on the British army’s battle jacket. General Eisenhower had pushed for the new design, and his namewas linked to it, even though the quartermaster insisted on calling it the M-44 jacket. I wore it with my dark brown wool pants and chocolate-colored shirt. I looked pretty damn good—sort of a cross between an American gangster and a military intelligence officer. Bit of an exaggeration on both counts, but you get the idea.
    Kaz looked elegant, but he always did. All his uniforms were custom-made, and for a guy with a small frame he wore them well. He removed his glasses and cleaned them carefully. I stood behind him and gazed out at the lawns and gardens below, the river in the distance, the sun lighting the horizon with reds and yellows. Below, a couple walked briskly toward the house.
    The woman was tall and thin but big-boned, with a purposeful chin and a broad-brimmed burgundy hat that covered the rest of her face. She was gesturing with her gloved hands and seemed to be in earnest conversation with the guy next to her. Husband, probably. He held his hands behind his back, his head tilted slightly as if to catch her every word. He wore a tweed suit and a worried look.
    “I wonder who they are,” Kaz said idly. “And how they reacted