By Delbert R. Gardner

Esther had almost forgotten until the letter came--that is, she had not thought about it for several weeks. She would never really forget; the knowledge would remain within her like a biding weight, more a feeling than a knowing.

She should have been expecting it after the ground had thawed and the fresh shoots of green pushed up among the old brown grass. It was the painful season of rebirth with its premonition of sacrifice. Subconsciously, she probably did expect the letter but her conscious mind wanted a few more days of unthinking peace. Now the fact could no longer be ignored; there in its official envelope was the Peace Department's annual greeting. It said the same thing it had said every spring for the past twelve years:

"Madam: It is our regrettable duty to remind you, on this anniversary of the beginning of the Last Great War, that your son David lost his life in that horrible conflict. Inasmuch as he made the supreme sacrifice, and in the interest of Eternal Peace, you will proceed to make your pilgrimage to the shrine by the prescribed route between the dates of March 22 and April 21. If unable to do so for any reason, please advise in triplicate with all necessary affidavits."

John came home for supper at five. He was an expert cabinetmaker, nearly sixty but still strong and erect, with large capable hands and a lean face. He sensed that his wife was disturbed.

"What's wrong, dear?"

"Don't you know it's spring?" she snapped. Then she said in a gentler tone, "I'm sorry, dear. The letter came today."

John's fork clattered to his plate and a look of pain contorted his face. "I should have known. You'd think we would be used to it by now and be able to accept it. But I guess there are some things a person never gets used to." Retrieving his fork, he took a mouthful of meat and chewed thoughtfully. "When do you plan to leave? I'll have to make arrangements to leave work."

Esther hesitated, struggling with her growing bitterness and dread. "I thought maybe I wouldn't go this year," she said slowly. "I haven't been feeling too well lately. And we're not young anymore."

"Are you serious?" John gave her a penetrating look. "You know what that means, don't you? Two doctors will have to certify that you can't travel. Do you actually feel that bad? I know you hate this, Esther--I hate it too--but we can't have the doctors here on a slim pretext. What if they report us?"

Tears of resentment shone in her eyes. "I don't care! Why do we have to go through this torture year after year? How can they expect us to keep giving, giving, when there's nothing left to give? It's inhuman! Nobody with an ounce of feeling would even ask it. And what good can it possibly do?"

John slowly stirred his coffee. He was profoundly touched by his wife's tears and by the memory of their common loss, but he made a determined effort to remain calm. "They say it's necessary," he said with resignation. "They say it's the only way we can keep from destroying the human race."

"How do we know it's the only way? We have only their word for that. Maybe there are other ways, better ways, but we never get a chance to try them. There must be an easier way!"

John rose and pulled his wife to him. It was always like this: always the same tearful rebellion, the same desperate questioning, and finally the same acquiescence. They both knew from the beginning that they would go.

"We have no choice, dearest," he whispered as he stroked her graying hair.

Esther pulled away and began clearing the table, still not ready to commit herself completely. "Well, I can't get ready before the end of next week anyway. Let's wait and see if I feel better before we make up our minds."

On Friday the telephone rang. When Esther answered, a voice said, "This is a recorded message. Your answers will be monitored electronically. Between now and April 21 you will make your pilgrimage. Is there any reason why it is impossible for you to go?"

Again the rebellious urge goaded her. "Well, I--I haven't been feeling well lately and--"

As if Esther had not spoken, the voice repeated, "Is there any reason why it is impossible for you to go?"

She remembered that at this point the machine would accept only yes or no answers. If she said "Yes," the machine would demand specific reasons, and she shrank from having her flimsy excuse officially recorded.

"No," she said.

"When do you plan to leave?"

"Probably sometime next week."

"Good," said the impersonal voice. "You will be expected at the shrine between March 29 and April 5. We wish you a good journey."

That settled it; barring unforeseen calamity, they could not back out now. Accordingly, at dawn on March 30th they set out on the seventy-mile trek dressed in hiking clothes and carrying staffs. In a large shoulder pack John carried blankets and food.

Turning north at the intersection, they joined a continuous stream of pilgrims, whose shoes had churned the dirt road into sticky slime. Two hundred yards to the west they could hear the hum of high-speed transport, but they were forbidden to travel by any means other than walking. As long as they could stay on their feet, they kept walking. When they could go no farther, they dropped full-length on the grass at the roadside and rested, then ate a snack before continuing. At dusk they stopped at one of the public rest houses, which were huge one-room affairs, laid their blankets on the floor, and slept like the dead until dawn, when they rose up and continued their grim journey. On the afternoon of the third day they reached their destination, the City of the Shrine, North-Central Area, and entered the huge shiny building.

Inside they blinked in the merciless glare coming from the vast dome. An attendant, checking their identity cards, gave them unneeded directions: "Fourth aisle to the right, fifth statue from the east wall."

As they walked between the seemingly endless rows of statues, their footsteps ringing hollowly on the marble, Esther had the impression that they were intruders in an enormous pagan tomb. Fingers of dread clutched at her throat. "It ought to be easier after so many years, but every year it seems harder."

John patted her arm. "It'll soon be over, dear; then we can go home."

Stopping in front of one of the statues, the couple refrained from raising their heads for a moment while they read again the inscription in the base: "David Buchanan, beloved son of John and Esther Buchanan. Gave the last full measure of devotion to the cause of Eternal Peace." Below this in large luminous script was a quotation: "THAT THESE DEAD SHALL NOT HAVE DIED IN VAIN."

Above their heads towered the bronzed figure of a soldier fixed in an attitude of agony. Except for the size, one might have thought it was the actual suffering flesh immortal in bronze. The soldier's left hand was clenched over his head, and the other hand clutched at a ghastly wound in his side. The cracked lips were parted as if to give vent to either a curse or a prayer, and the anguished eyes seemed to bore fiercely into Esther's, so that she trembled violently and fell to her knees in weakness and supplication. As always in the past she experienced an overpowering illusion that the figure was alive, doomed to suffer eternally without release, and somehow she was responsible. She who had borne him as flesh of her flesh and bone of her bone, who had fed him with her own substance, had betrayed him into a world of sacrifice. For an awful moment she believed it.

"David!" she gasped through parched lips. "David, forgive! Forgive me, David!"

"Don't, Esther," urged John softly, tears scalding his cheeks.

"David is alive!" she whispered with fierce intensity. "He's alive and it's our fault: he can't die because we betrayed him! Oh, God," she wailed to the vaulted ceiling, "when will You let him die?"

"Don't, Esther. Don't. It's not real. It's only a statue."

"You fool! Can't you see he's hurt terribly?" She tugged at her husband's sleeve. "We must help him! How can you stand by and watch him suffering?" Her voice rose to a scream and her grief-torn face pleaded with him. "John, for God's sake, help him!"

John's fingers dug into her shoulder. "I can't, Esther. Nobody can. David is dead, thirteen years dead. There's nothing we can do."

"Dead?" she repeated in stupefaction. No. She knew better. Her glance wandered from her husband to the accusing eyes of the statue and back again. Soundlessly her lips again formed the word, "Dead?" Then the spell was over, and she collapsed sobbing on the cold stone floor.

Later, as they were speeding homeward on the public transport, Esther stared unseeing at the blurred countryside. After a long interval, she leaned her head on her husband's shoulder.

"I don't think I'll go back next year," she said wearily. "I don't think I'll ever go back. I don't care what they do to me."

John gave her shoulder a squeeze and said nothing. But he knew how it would be: the long, long months of agonized remembering, then a short respite of seeming forgetfulness and peace; and in the spring when the earth again groped toward its destiny of birth and sacrifice, they would make the pilgrimage.