Tom, sharp-eared, heard an order shouted in German, somewhere on the right, not far away. A Maxim opened fire from there, followed by another on the left, and the men in front went down like ninepins. A few that were left crept into shell-holes. Others, stuck, unable to move, burrowed into the mud where they were. Tom found himself treading on a man’s shoulders.
The Germans had set up machine-gun posts in shelters of sandbags out in the open, and now the barrage had moved over, they came into action everywhere. The attacking platoons were in an ambush, receiving fire on both flanks, and the second wave went down like the first. D Company had suffered badly: all its officers had fallen and the remnants, pushing on, followed a subaltern of B Company, who had lost touch with his own men. He was calling to them and waving them on when a Maxim opened fire from the main German line, now visible a hundred yards off. He fell, wounded, and lay on his elbows watching men falling all round him.
‘It’s no good!’ he shouted, as the stragglers reached him. ‘Save yourselves! We can’t get through!’
But Sergeant Townchurch was urging them on.
‘Don’t listen to him, he’s raving!’ he said. ‘Of course we’ll get through! Follow me!’
Then his arms flew up and he toppled over into the mud, and everywhere behind him men took cover in the broken ground.
Fighting continued all day: fierce little battles conducted from shell-holes; and all the enemy machine-gun posts were at length destroyed. But the main attack was not renewed. Those men who were left were too few and too tired; there was no hope of reinforcements; and early darkness put an end to the day. Orders came to dig in. Rain fell harder than ever.
All next day, stretcher-parties were out from both sides, retrieving their wounded. The big guns exchanged some token fire, but all along the forward area an unofficial truce was observed, and the bearers moved across the open, searching the shell-holes. Enemy losses had not been great, and sometimes the German stretcher-bearers, having rescued British wounded, would set them down near the British lines.
Tom and Newers, with Braid and Costrell, worked on until after darkfall. They moved about the battalion aid post, doing what they could to help the wounded until the doctors could get to them. Townchurch lay groaning out in the open. He was asking for water. Costrell passed him many times, ignoring him, refusing to help him. Pecker Danson did the same. Tom fetched water and took it to him. He held the bottle while Townchurch drank. The man was in great agony. His face was contorted, his eyes glazed. He looked at Tom with slowly dawning recognition.
‘Currying favour?’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘You’re wasting your time ‒ I’m a dead man.’
Late that night, Tom was sitting with Newers and Danson, drinking tea from a field-kitchen before going off to get some sleep. A young doctor came out to them.
‘Your Sergeant Townchurch has just died.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ Danson said. ‘He was pretty far gone.’
‘He was saying some rather strange things.’
‘He was always like that, sir, even when he was in the pink.’
‘He wasn’t delirious,’ the doctor said. ‘He knew what he was saying and he claimed he’d been shot from close behind.’
‘Well, we had Jerry on both our flanks, sir, and if the sergeant was turning round ‒’
‘The hole in his body was definitely made by an English bullet I can guarantee that.’
‘Would you believe it!’ Newers said. ‘He must’ve got in somebody’s way. One of the accidents of war, sir. I’ve seen ’em often in the past year.’
‘I’ll have to make a report of the matter. I can’t just let it go at that.’
‘No, sir. Of course not, sir. Very sad thing to happen, sir.’
The doctor looked at them each in turn, and went away without further comment. Newers took a drink of tea, breathing heavily into his mug. He was sitting between Tom and Danson.
‘It wasn’t me, chums, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘Nor me,’ Danson said.
‘Nor me neither,’ Tom said.
‘Accident of war, that’s what it was. Lots of chaps’ve copped it that way, not all so deserving as Townchurch, of course, but there you are. Pity he never got his V.C.’
Three months later, on a foggy night late in November, Tom and Newers, with Danson and Rush, were in an estaminet in Poperinghe.
It was much patronized by British and Colonial troops and the wall was covered with their scribblings. ‘Lost, stolen, or strayed: one Russian steamroller,’ someone had written, and another: ‘On August tenth, at the new St Wipers nursing home, to the B.E.F., 12 baby elephants, all doing well.’ There were other jokes, too, less pure, that Danson said made him blush.
Newers ordered four glasses of wine. Neither he nor the others would touch Belgian beer. They had drunk better stuff from shell-holes, they said.
‘Have you seen the Americans yet?’
‘I dunno. What colour are they?’
‘Much the same as Canadians, really, but maybe more so,’ Danson said.
‘Watch it, limey!’ a Canadian said from the next table.
‘Sure, sure!’ Danson answered, through his nose. ‘Whaddya know! Ontario!’
‘Here, Toss,’ said Dave Rush. ‘There’s two chaps looking in at the window, making ugly mugs at you. I reckon they’re trying to get your goat.’
Tom turned in his chair and saw two faces pressed against the glass.
‘It’s William and Roger! My foster-brothers! Glory be, can you beat that?’
He went to the door and yanked it open. William and Roger sauntered in.
‘Catched you, ent we, drinking as usual?’
‘We heard your outfit was up here somewhere so we took a chance of tracking you down.’
‘Ent that a masterpiece?’ Tom said. He could not get over it even now. ‘Come over and meet my mates.’
The two Izzard boys were now big men. Even Roger had grown thickset. But they were as fresh-faced and snub-nosed as ever, bright fair hair brushed sleekly down, eyes very blue under colourless eyebrows, wide awake, missing nothing. William was now a bombardier but pretended to think it nothing much when Tom, amazed, touched the stripes on his sleeve.
‘Picked ’em up cheap,’ he said, shrugging, ‘from a chap that didn’t need ’em no more.’
‘You artillery chaps is full of swank,’ said Danson, rising to shake hands. ‘So you’re Bet’s brothers? Fancy that.’
‘You know my sister?’ William said.
‘We know her from snapshots,’ Newers said. ‘And her letters, of course, that she writes to Toss. She writes a good letter, your sister Bet. We always like it when Toss hears from her.’
The six of them sat at a small table. William ordered a bottle of wine. It was brought to them by a fierce old woman with frizzled hair who glared at them, scowling, as she set the bottle on the table.
‘Six francs,’ she said, one hand held out to William.
‘Get away!’ said Newers. ‘We’ve never paid more’n five before, and that’s five too many, you old bundle, you!’
‘Six francs,’ she said, and tapped her palm with an impatient finger.
‘Don’t pay it, mate,’ Pecker Danson said to William. ‘She’s trying it on ’cos she thinks it’s a party.’
‘Five francs,’ William said, and put the money on the table.
‘Non-non-non-non! Six francs! I insist! I insist!’
‘Five!’ William said. ‘And bring two more glasses if you please. You don’t expect us to drink from the bottle?’
‘Six! Six! I must insist!’
‘Bring two glasses, please, madame, and not so much of your ruddy nonsense.’
‘Toot sweet,’ Newers said, ‘and the tooter the sweeter.’
‘Non-non-non-non! Six francs. I insist! I insist!’
The argument was attracting attention. The Canadians were laying bets on the outcome, and a group of Gloucesters were shouting abuse at the old woman. S
he had grown purple in the face and was threatening to remove the bottle when a younger woman appeared on the scene. She came to the table, placed two glasses in front of William, and picked up the five francs.
‘Drink up, Tommees, and kill a few Boches for me tomorrow.’
‘I’d sooner get rid of your old woman.’
‘Don’t mind the old one. She is greedy for money to ransom her son. He is a prisoner with the Boches. She thinks she’ll be able to buy his freedom.’
‘Tell her from me it’ll soon be over.’
‘Never! Never!’ the old woman said, and there were tears in her eyes. ‘I do not believe it will ever end.’
‘That’s cheerful, that is! Are there more like her around these parts?’
William poured out the wine and raised his glass to the old woman.
‘Viva la victoree!’ he said. ‘Viva the happy smiling faces!’
The old woman went, still grumbling, led away by the young girl. William and Roger grinned at Tom.
‘If Mother and Dad could see us now!’
‘How come you’re here?’ Tom asked. ‘I thought you was down in the south some place.’
‘That’s right. Lafitte. But we had to come up to Armchairs on a course and we thought we’d take the long way back.’
‘How’re things with you, Tom?’ Roger asked.
‘All right,’ Tom said, and could think of nothing more to say.
‘Your lot’s been copping it again lately, I heard. Have you been in the new push?’
‘We was at Steenbeek,’ Tom said.
‘And the Menin road,’ said Pecker Danson.
‘And Passchendaele,’ said Dave Rush.
‘What was it like?’ Roger asked. ‘Was it as bad as people say?’
‘People!’ said Danson. ‘What people?’
He and Newers drank their wine.
‘I’m going on leave directly,’ Tom said. ‘Any message for them at home?’
‘Wish them all the best, Tom, and say you found us in the pink. Rog and me ent going on leave. Not till we’ve finished this bloody war. It’d mean splitting up if we went on leave and I promised Mother we’d stick like glue.’
‘The truth is,’ Roger said, ‘they can’t fight the war without us gunners.’
‘Why, are you the only two they’ve got?’ Newers asked, lighting his pipe. ‘No wonder it’s quiet in Picardy lately.’
‘We’re two of the best, that’s all.’
‘You’re all the same, you artillery blokes,’ said Pecker Danson, ‘but seeing how I’m drinking your vin I can’t hardly tell you what that is.’
When the party left the estaminet, they met two girls just coming in.
‘You buy drinks for us, yes, Tommee? Plentee monee! Buy café rhum?’
‘Après la guerre!’ William said, walking on, and then, to Tom: ‘If Mother and Dad could see us now!’
Outside the town the group split up, William and Roger going to their train, Tom and the others going to scrounge a lift back to camp. Their voices echoed across the street.
‘So long, Bill! So long, Rog! We’ll be thinking of you when we hear them guns of yours lousing off down there at Lafitte.’
‘So long!’ Tom said, watching the two boys walking away. ‘All the best!’
‘So long!’ they said. ‘Be seeing you, Tom.’
Home for ten days’ leave at Cobbs, Tom strolled about the carpenter’s shop, kicking the shavings that littered the floor and sniffing the old familiar smells of timber, putty, paint and glue. The carpenters watched him with some curiosity.
‘Well, young Tom? I suppose you find it pretty tame at home here now? Quiet, like? Nothing much happening in the old place?’
‘Ah. Quiet. Just like always, or very nearly.’
‘Have you been having a good time? Making the most of things? Getting a bit of experience, eh?’
‘A good time?’ Tom said.
‘Well, you’re only young once, that’s what I say, and you might never get the chance again.’
‘The mademoiselles, that’s what Sam means,’ said Bob Green.
‘Oh, them!’ Tom said, and stooped to pick up a knot of wood. ‘They’re just after your money, that’s all.’
‘Well,’ said Sam, ‘you don’t expect to get it for nothing?’
‘Get what?’ Tom said, and went a dark red as their laughter sounded along the workshop.
‘Laws, Tom, you ent as innocent as all that?’
‘A chap like you, turned twenty, and a soldier in the Army, too! Don’t they teach you nothing at all?’
‘You ent your father’s son, boy, if you’re as green as all that.’
‘Tom is keeping hisself nice for Tilly Preston. She’s the mademoiselle for him. Ent that so, Tom?’
Tom merely shrugged and walked away.
In the big kitchen, Beth Izzard sat at the table with writing-pad, pen, and a bottle of ink set out before her. Her husband, Jesse, stood behind her, smoking his pipe. Opposite her, a mug of tea in mittened hands, sat Mrs Clementina Rainbow, a handsome old gipsy from Puppet Hill, where the gipsies had always camped in winter ever since never, people said.
Mrs Rainbow could not read or write. She had therefore come to Cobbs for help. Her son, Alexander, was in the Army, serving somewhere on the western front, and a letter must be sent without delay to his commanding officer, requesting that Alexander be sent home at once, for his poor ma and da had received an enormous order for pegs and Alexander’s help was needed.
Beth sat, somewhat self-conscious, aware of her husband standing behind her and the boy Tom sitting quiet in the chimney corner.
‘My daughter Betony’s the scholar by rights. If you wait till this evening, Mrs Rainbow, she will write your letter for you.’
‘You can do it, Mrs Izzard. I seen you writing oftentimes. You done that notice for Georgie’s waggon.’
‘Very well,’ Beth said, and took up her pen. ‘What shall I say?’
‘Well, about the pegs, Mrs Izzard, please. An immendous great order we’ve had, tell him, and can’t manage without Alexander.’
‘They won’t send him home,’ Jesse said, ‘just to make pegs, Mrs Rainbow.’
‘You think not, Mr Izzard?’
‘I’m certain of it, Mrs Rainbow.’
‘Then put in we’ve had an order for baskets as well, Mrs Izzard, and must have’m ready in time for Christmas.’
‘Anything else, Mrs Rainbow?’
‘Tell the gentleman-colonel, please, that I seen things last night in the smoke of the fire that mean he’s coming into money.’
Beth, straight-faced, finished the letter and wrote Mrs Rainbow’s name at the bottom. She put it in an envelope and wrote the address.
‘Silly fella!’ the gipsy said. ‘Going to the Army and ’listing like that. He’ll never be the same again, Mrs Izzard, getting mixed up in this old war.’
‘No one’ll be quite the same, Mrs Rainbow.’
When the gipsy had gone, Beth looked up and met Tom’s eye.
‘I’d like to be there,’ he said, smiling, ‘when Alexander’s colonel gets that letter.’
‘How was William and Roger?’ asked Jesse. ‘Was they keeping hale and hearty?’ He had asked the question a dozen times.
‘They was fine,’ Tom said. ‘They’ve growed pretty big, the pair of them. William is nearly as big as a house.’
‘Ah, well, he’s a bombardier now, remember.’
William and Roger had had their photograph taken in Rouen and had sent it home. Then, in December, an old soldier had come through Huntlip, walking on crutches, having lost his left leg in the fighting at Mons in 1914. He eked out his pension by painting portraits from photographs of absent soldiers. He travelled about, knocking on doors.
‘Husbands, fathers, sons, lovers. ‒ If you’ve got a photo I’ll copy it for you, a proper portrait, done in oils.’
Beth had given him the photograph of William and Roger, together with details of their colouring, and he
had copied it, true to life. The portrait hung in the front parlour, on the wall above the fireplace, and the two boys looked out on all the family gatherings: sitting side by side, fair hair greased down, faces glowing, keen blue eyes looking straight ahead; proud to be sitting together in khaki, William with his two stripes, both with their buttons polished to perfection.
‘You should get your photo took as well,’ Jesse told Tom, ‘and we’ll get the artist to paint you too.’
He thought perhaps Tom might feel left out, because Granna Tewke, always knitting for William and Roger, never knitted anything for Tom.
‘Not that you miss much,’ he whispered once, ‘’cos Granna’s knitting is none too gainly nowadays.’
‘What’s wrong with my knitting?’ Granna demanded, sitting up and glaring at Jesse. Her sight might be poor, but her hearing was perfect. ‘What’s wrong with my knitting I’d like to know?’
‘Why, that glove you made last week had a finger too many, and there was a cap as I recall that was half purple.’
‘Young Dicky done that. Changed the wools when I warnt looking.’ Granna leant forward and touched Tom’s arm. ‘I’ll knit you something. What’d you like? Socks or gloves or a comforter?’
‘Don’t you bother. I’m all right.’
‘You never did seem to feel the cold.’
‘I’m all right,’ Tom said. ‘I’ve got plenty.’
Beth and Betony sent him woollens. They saw that he was kept supplied.
‘What’s the best thing to send?’ Betony asked him. ‘What would you find really useful?’
‘A big Dundee cake, like your mother sent in a tin one time. It was packed with fruit and had almonds on it.’
‘Don’t you know there’s a sugar shortage? It’s going on ration in the new year.’
‘I thought maybe Beth could spare some honey.’
‘My mother says she’s never known so many people ask so kindly after her bees as they have done lately since sugar got scarce. But no doubt she’s got some to spare for you.’
The two of them were alone in the kitchen. Tom sat staring into the fire. Betony watched him.
‘You never used to like fruit cake.’
‘We’re glad of it, though, out there.’
‘What do you mean by “we” exactly?’
The Sorrowing Wind (The Apple Tree Saga Book 3) Page 9