John Walters

by Sapper

  For a while the tired brain refused to act; the man felt himself falling into unplumbed depths – depths which echoed with monstrous reverberations.

  “Molly, where are you, dear? It’s cold, and my head is throbbing to beat the band. If only that cursed drum would stop! Do you hear it echoing through the air? And the noise hurts – hurts like hell, Molly. Ah! Heaven, but it’s cold; and I can’t see you, beloved; I don’t know where you are.”

  Once again he became conscious of figures moving around him. They seemed to be carrying motionless men past his feet – men on stretchers covered with blankets. With staring eyes he watched the proceeding, trying to understand what was happening. In front of him was a window in which the glass had been smashed, leaving great jagged pieces sticking out from the sides of the frame. He wondered vaguely why it had been left in such a dangerous condition; when he and Molly had their house such a thing would never be allowed to happen – if it did it would be mended at once. He asked one of the passing figures what had caused the damage, and when he got no answer he angrily repeated the question.

  He fretted irritably because no one seemed to take any notice of him, and suddenly his head began throbbing worse than ever. But the hazy indistinctness was gone; the man was acutely conscious of everything around him. Memory had come back, and he knew where he was and why he was there. He remembered the fierce artillery bombardment; he recalled getting over the parapet, out on to the brown shell-pocked earth, sodden and heavy with the drenching rain; he recalled the steady shamble over the ground with boots so coated with wet mud that they seemed to drag him back. Then clear in his mind came the picture of Chilcote cheering, shouting, lifting them on to the ruins of what once had been a village; he saw Chilcote falter, stop, and, with a curious spinning movement, crash forward on to his face; he saw the Germans – he saw fierce-faced men like animals at bay, snarling, fighting; he heard once again that trembling cry of “Kamarade”; and then – a blank. The amazing thing was that it was all jumbled up with Molly. He seemed to have been with her lately – and yet she couldn’t have been out there with him. He puzzled a bit, and then gave it up: it hurt his head so terribly to think. He just lay still, gazing fixedly at the jagged, torn pane of glass…

  “They are all out, doctor, except this one.”

  A woman was speaking close beside him, and his eyes slowly travelled in the direction of the voice. It was another woman – a woman he hadn’t seen before – swaying slightly as if she would drop.

  “Good heavens! it’s Billy Saunders!”

  A man in khaki was bending over him – a man whom he recognised as a civilian doctor he’d known at home – a man, moreover, who knew Molly.

  “Do you know me, old chap?”

  “Of course,” answered the man. “What’s all the trouble?”

  The doctor bit his lip, and the man noticed his hand clench hard. Then there started a low-voiced conversation to which he listened attentively – his hearing seemed abnormally acute.

  “Has he spoken since he’s been in, sister?”

  “No – only those dreadful moans. The whole of his face – absolutely hopeless – spinal cord.”

  The man lying motionless caught the disjointed words. What did they mean? They were mad – insane. Dying? He – Billy Saunders! What about Molly – his Molly? What about… Gentle fingers once again touched his head, and, looking up, he saw the doctor’s eyes fixed on his.

  “They’re shelling the hospital, dear old man; we’ve got to get – Great Scott, look out!”

  Like the moan of a giant insect, the shrill whine came through the air, rising to an overwhelming scream. There was a deafening crash – a great hole was torn in the wall just by the window with the jagged pane, and the room filled with stifling black fumes. A sudden agonising stab, and the man, looking up, saw Molly in front of him. She was standing in the acrid smoke – beckoning.

  “I’m coming, dear, I’m coming!” he cried; “it’s good of you to have waited, girl of mine – so good.”

  “Are you hurt, sister?” The doctor, who had been crouching by the bed, stood up.

  “Not touched, thank you.” She was white and shaking. “Did you hear the bits whizzing through the room?”

  “I did,” remarked the doctor grimly, holding out an arm from which the blood already dripped. “And I felt one of them too. But there’s no time to lose – I don’t know what to do about him, poor old chap.”

  He turned once again to the bed, and even as he turned he knew the decision had been made for him: and he thanked the Maker. Billy Saunders had also felt a bit – a jagged bit – through the heart.

  Chapter 14

  The Booby-trap

  The trouble is that in War retribution so rarely comes on the man who deserves it. The thing is such an impersonal affair: shells, trench mortars, and rifle bullets slay or miss impartially, and there are so many pawns the less to carry on the good work. Even the bayonet cannot be said to settle any long-standing feud: the gentleman who dies and the gentleman who kills him are really complete strangers. Very annoyed with one another undoubtedly; but there is no question of the grievance being an old one.

  And so, when some act of poetic justice is done, it is apt to impress itself forcibly on the memory. They are very rare, those acts: opportunities are few and far between. But sometimes they do, and… However, this was the way of one such occasion.

  The name of the village is immaterial. It lies in the country evacuated by the Hun during February and March of 1917, and it is not yet marked on the small-scale maps. For the beginning of the affair one must go back to a certain night in March, twenty days after the Germans had gone. They had left it, as they left most of the villages in that district, destroyed but not gutted. The trees were cut, the little bits of garden were ruined, and the inhabitants bore in their eyes the hopeless despair, the frozen apathy, of those who have been down into the pit. Old and decrepit – for of their children none save babies remained – they sat about round the doors of their ruined houses, hardly speaking, just watching and wondering. To them had come the desolation of war, in full measure pressed down and running over, and the poor old tired brains could scarcely grasp it. The fruit of years, a whole life’s work gone – finished; and no one to build it up again. Just them and a few little children – and desolation. Old men would mutter soixante-dix: old wives would shake their heads, wiping their eyes furtively with their aprons: the babies would stare solemnly and fearfully at the khaki soldiers who had replaced the field grey. For the spirit of Death does not leave those who live with it in a moment…

  Now, in this particular village, on the day in question, were the headquarters of two battalions of infantry. The battalions in question were the Royal Loamshires and the South Devons, and from time immemorial the Loamshires and the South Devons had been friends. In the days before the war this friendship manifested itself in many ways, which it were, perhaps, indiscreet to mention. There was the occasion, for instance, when a battalion of the Loamshires, homeward bound after many years abroad, stopped for the night at a certain port of call where a battalion of the South Devons had its temporary residence. And there was a dinner to mark the happy occasion.

  It has been handed on, the account of that dinner, in the archives of both these famous regiments. The unfortunate mishap which caused a distinguished general, specially invited for the occasion, to be greeted with an over-ripe melon in the chest just as he entered the ante-room; the sudden disappearance of the visiting colonel as he was making his fourth speech owing to his being torpedoed by an enterprising officer under the table; the celebrated feat of a subaltern who rode his bicycle five times round the billiard-table while other enthusiasts tried to poke him off with cues – all these and many like bonds to friendship occurred that night and on other gala occasions.

  So it is not surprising that such a regimental tradition, founded and cemented in times of peace, should endure in the stress of war, and be passed on to the Service battalions for g
uidance and future action. Owing to circumstances beyond our control, ripe melons and billiard-tables are no longer available; but much may be done in the local estaminet where the omelette is good and the red wine better – where Madame’s coffee is superb and the Benedictine comforting. Moreover, the two battalions with which we are concerned were quite alive to that fact.

  Their friendship, however, did not prevent the really serious matters of life being taken with due solemnity. When a move was contemplated, the rival billeting officers became for the time sworn enemies. They vied with one another in lying and contumely to obtain the best accommodation for their own people, and the state of the score at the time showed that the South Devons were two up. That last point had rankled dreadfully with Finlayson, of the Loamshires: he swore that it was entirely due to the Town Major of the place where it occurred being soft in the head: he swore – many things, but the fact remained he was two down. And so when he discovered the battalion’s destination, and further elicited from the Staff captain that they might be there anything from one hour to four days – the Staff captain disliked being a false prophet – he again swore. He swore a mighty vow that if Tremayne, of the South Devons, again did him down in the race for billets – which, in this case, were likely to prove even more sketchy than usual – thereby making the score three up, he personally would murder him with his own hand. Then he went and dined with him and discussed “Blighty.”

  By what vile deceit he succeeded is neither here nor there. All that is known officially is that Tremayne approached the village some half an hour after Finlayson had arrived, and that he looked thoughtful. Occasionally his lips moved – it is to be assumed in silent prayer; occasionally he raised a protesting hand to heaven and jibbered feverishly. He was met on the outskirts by Finlayson, smoking a fat cigar and smiling offensively.

  “Good ride, dear old boy? I’m afraid you’ll find the billeting accommodation a bit limited.”

  Tremayne dismounted in silence. “James,” he remarked slowly, “I wouldn’t have believed it of you. After all these years, to treat me thus – me, your almost brother! Why, you damned old scoundrel!…”

  Finlayson held up a protesting hand. “This language grieves me to the quick, Peter. And the score is now one.”

  They stopped in front of the only decent-looking house in the village, and Tremayne inspected it with a professional eye. “Two windows, no door, a leaking roof. Great Scott! Old boy, I suppose that is where we’ve got to go?”

  But Finlayson was not to be drawn. “Not so, Peter,” he answered; “that is where we have gone. Yours is far worse – just down the road here. You haven’t got a window at all!”

  “Do you really mean this is the next best?” Tremayne demanded, when he had fully explored the second selection down the road. “The bally place is a series of holes indifferently held together by plaster!”

  “I’ve had a good look round, and you won’t find anything better.” Finlayson gently fell through the wall he was leaning against and swore, while Tremayne pondered pessimistically. Under the rules of the game they did one another down only in so far as to who got the first pick. After that the second would be chosen by the conqueror with punctilious care and held against all corners till his rival should arrive.

  “I would like,” murmured Tremayne, when the other emerged from the debris, “to catch the Hun that did this.”

  “We have got a kitchen of sorts,” spluttered Finlayson, at length, “so you’d better all lunch with us.”

  And this occurred on the twentieth day after the Germans had gone. On the twenty-first the two battalions were still there. The Staff captain had arrived – principally to find how the score stood – and had left again. The Sapper commanding the Field company had arrived ostensibly to find if he could help anybody – in reality, to cadge lunch. The men, strolling aimlessly about, were fraternising with the inhabitants; and over the village there brooded an air of peace. The guns were more or less silent, and not too near; the aeroplanes seemed to be taking a day off, when – of a sudden, it occurred.

  A rumbling, shaking roar; a great sheet of flame, and a belching cloud of dust; a rending sort of crash, as timbers and walls were torn asunder; the sound as of a mighty hailstorm, as bricks and rubble came raining down into the street; and it was over. The headquarters of the Royal Loamshires had ceased to exist. The house had disappeared, and in its place there hung a thick cloud of acrid smoke.

  Mortimer, the CO of the South Devons, who was just preparing for his afternoon siesta, dashed into the road, colliding with his adjutant and Tremayne.

  “What the devil was that?” he cried, only to stop abruptly and stare at the slowly-drifting pall of smoke. “My God! What’s happened?”

  From all directions men had come into the street, out of houses and barns, to see what had occurred. There had been no whine of a big shell; in the sky above there was no sign of an aeroplane; and yet a house had suddenly disappeared, and bits of it were still coming down, hitting the ground with a vicious thud.

  Tremayne was the first to recover himself and walk up the village street towards the scene of the disaster. The roof had been completely blown off, and of the outside walls nothing except a few jagged splinters remained. A great mass of broken bricks and rubble blocked the near side of the road, filling the bottom story of the house; and, even as he approached, a big lump of brickwork broke off from the top of a still standing corner and narrowly escaped braining him as it fell.

  But this was no time to worry about trifles of that sort. Only half an hour previously had he been lunching there with Finlayson and the CO and adjutant of the Loamshires. The doctor had been there, and the interpreter, and two or three other pals. Only, as I say, that had been half an hour ago.

  Tremayne clambered up over the heap of debris, and almost at once he saw what caused him to curse savagely – an arm stuck out from the top. He hurled away the bricks which covered the rest from view and recognised what he found by the badges on the uniform. It was the doctor. Then he cursed again and turned to the Colonel, who was standing in the road behind.

  “We’ll want a fatigue-party, sir,” he said. “I’ve found the doctor, and I’m afraid they’re all in here, buried.”

  The Colonel nodded, and gave a brief order to his adjutant. Then he turned to the Field Company officer beside him. “What the devil do you think did it?” he asked.

  “No shell, no aeroplane; it can only have been one thing.” The Sapper thoughtfully studied the wreckage. “No shell except the very biggest could have made such a mess, and everyone would have heard it coming. No aeroplane bomb could have done it either. The Huns, before they left, laid a delay-action mine under the house, and it’s just gone off.”

  “But it’s twenty-one days, my dear chap!” objected Tremayne, who had joined them and heard the last remark.

  “With a little ingenuity you could arrange a delay-action mine for twenty-one weeks,” returned the engineer. “A question of acid eating through wire – connection being made when the wire severs. That’s only one of many ways, and the time would depend entirely on the strength of the acid and the thickness of the wire. They knew this village would be occupied; they knew that that house, being the best available, would be occupied by an officers’ mess. And the swine have drawn a winner.”

  In silence they watched the salvage operations, which were being directed by the adjutant.

  “Just to think of the rotten luck of the thing!” burst out Tremayne suddenly. “Poor old Jimmy Finlayson – so damned pleased at having got the bulge on me and got this house. And now this happens! By Jove! There is the old boy now!”

  He went to help two of the men who were carrying into the road all that was left of Finlayson, billeting officer of the Royal Loamshires.

  “Carefully, boys,” said Tremayne. “Lay him down there beside the doctor.” For a while he looked at his dead friend in silence, and then he bent down and covered up his face with a handkerchief. “If,” he remarked
quietly to the Sapper officer, “I was ever privileged to meet the man who ordered that mine to be laid, he would die – nastily. Unfortunately, those things don’t happen except in stories.”

  “No,” replied the Sapper. “I’m afraid they don’t.”

  Now we come to what happened on the twenty-second day in that little village in the evacuated area. The ball was started rolling during a stroll which Tremayne and the adjutant took before lunch. To all outward appearance the village was normal again; tragedies, however sudden, lose much of their sting when they happen in the Land of the Great Tragedy. At intervals heaps of brickwork from the tottering walls slithered down on the pavé below, raising a little cloud of dust; at intervals some old peasant would look with quavering eyes at the ruin by the corner and mumble foolishly to his wife. To them it was all part and parcel of the whole scheme of things – just one more of the upheavals in which they had lived for the past two years. Stray limbers still clattered down the street; limbers whose drivers never turned their heads to look at the heap of rubbish as they passed it. Similar heaps were too common to excite even the most casual remark. Lorries jolted on their way unheeding; dispatch-riders, in their khaki overalls, rushed past on bumping motor-bicycles; the normal life of France six miles behind the line, which must not be dislocated even for a second, carried on as usual.

  Tremayne and the adjutant came to the end of the village, and paused for a moment in front of the last house. In silence they glanced at the fruit-trees, each with the usual ring cut round it; with a cynical smile they noticed the little bit of garden systematically and thoroughly destroyed.