Excerpt from Too Bad to Die by Francine Mathews, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Grinds always are."

"I shall live forever," Ian said gloomily.

The plimsoll sounds had died away in TP's office. He fancied he heard sniffling, a wet admission of inferiority. It would be his turn next. He closed his eyes and saw a length of rattan hissing through the tobacco fug of TP's rooms.

Nobody would dare to stuff Peter's Latin in the privy. Peter would never be caned in his life.

"My mother was too good to live," Hudson said suddenly. "There was a baby, too, but it didn't live, either."

"I expect it was a girl, then," Ian offered.

"Dad didn't say. He just packed us up and made tracks for England."

Ian listened for TP's footsteps across the worn wooden floor. The brass knob would turn with a metallic screech and there would be TP's face, purple with the outrage of Ian's grammar.

"We buried my mom there. In Vienna." Hudson's voice was a bit shaky and his knees were buckling. He slid slowly to the ground. "Dad said we had to. Her family's Austrian."

Ian whistled. "You mean you're related to Huns?"

"Not after this war."

Ian rocked uneasily on his heels, too well trained to sit on the floor. It must be terrible to be a Yank with a father who didn't fight and a mother who was too good to live but was still the wrong sort, after all. Hudson was taking a chance, telling Ian about himself. He clearly lived in an appalling state of innocence that would get him killed at Durnford School within the week. Ian thought, suddenly, that he would have to be Hudson's friend now, whether he liked it or not. He would call him Hudders and show him the best places for tiffin in the village, and the best spots for plover's eggs anywhere on the Isle of Purbeck.

The door behind him opened. A small boy sidled out, his hands to his backside. His nose was streaming.

"Ah. Fleming." To Ian's surprise, TP was not grim and furious. He wore a tender expression Ian had never seen before, and the strangeness of it was terrifying.

Peter, he thought. Taken. His stomach twisted and he was afraid he might be sick.

"Come inside; there's a stout lad." TP scowled at the pile of loose limbs that was Hudson. "Get off the floor, boy. I won't be wanting you today."

—

THE HEADMASTER moved a pile of letters from an aged club chair and suggested Ian sit on it. He pulled up a hard-backed one himself, his large hands dangling between his knees. TP was beloved for the way he bellowed "Nell!" whenever he misplaced his wife, for his magnificent mustache and spectacles, for his ancient tweeds and his willingness to dive with the boys off Dancing Ledge into the frigid English Channel. He had Tennyson by heart. He was less well versed in tragedy.

"There's been a telegram," he said.

"From home?"

"Afraid so, old man." TP cleared his throat with a noise like gargling. "You must be proud, Fleming. Very proud. He died for King and Country."

Peter. With his throat bound up and his special treats. Ian hadn't known it was for England. A buzzing began in his ears and TP's face blurred at the edges. The buzzing grew louder, and behind it the thud of his heart, as he glimpsed the thought at the edge of his brain, the words he must never say. Not Peter. Somebody else. TP was still talking, the same tender look on his face. Ian was going to scream.

". . . a hero, Fleming. We must all wish for such a glorious end. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori."

Ian sat rigidly in his chair while the Latin washed over him. He would not think of Mokie. Who, if he once walked into Ian's brain, would be killed absolutely and forever.

". . . mortar attack," TP was saying. "Near St. Quentin. Your father meant to take the trench. He'll be mentioned in dispatches, I expect. Perhaps even in the Times. You must do your best to be worthy of him, Fleming."

Excerpted from Too Bad to Die by Francine Mathews. Copyright © 2015 by Francine Mathews. Excerpted by permission of Riverhead Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.