The Moon Field

by Judith Allnatt

  Have you seen Kitty or Mr and Mrs Ashwell? Kitty still hasn’t written to me although I’ve written to her. I hope that Ted is enjoying using my rod, and that Lillie’s head has healed up after that nasty bump you mentioned in your last letter. Give them both my love.

  We had another long march today and I am very fit and ready to take on anything.

  Your loving son,

  George

  PS Give Lillie a kiss on that bump from her old George, a.k.a. ‘Big Bear’.

  George put the letter into the envelope, addressed it and quickly stuck down the flap as if to trap inside the wave of homesickness that had come over him. He doodled on another piece of paper, a little drawing of a stone bridge and a winding stream, and then, feeling unwilling to leave the peace of the dusky tent, a sketch of a kingfisher on a branch. He thought about Kitty and of why she hadn’t written. Maybe she was taken up with her ‘follower’. He wondered, for the umpteenth time, who it could be and when Kitty had started seeing him and why she had said nothing until now. It made him feel uncomfortable to think that she might be too busy with someone else to write to him. She was most likely still sulking over their argument and the fact that he wouldn’t confide in her. Why did she always want to know everything? Well, he had written to her, hadn’t he? Surely that was an olive branch. George tried hard to convince himself but knew fine that the letter he’d sent would not have been seen as such by Kitty as it was limited to enquiring after her health and that of her parents and an account of the food he was getting and the weather. He knew he wasn’t very good at writing letters. Quite possibly she would see such a paucity of information as adding insult to injury. George sighed.

  Looking up, he saw that he had been busy with his writing and reflections so long that many of the original visitors to the tent had gone and been replaced by newcomers. Leaning back in his seat he scanned the company for anyone he knew. He stiffened. Over by the main entrance, Edmund Lyne was sitting alone, writing, with papers spread out in front of him and a newspaper at his elbow. George sat up slowly and then leaned forward as if to reach for more paper so that he could get a better view. Without his hat, Lyne looked younger but also somehow more athletic. George envied him his loose-limbed, rangy build. He watched him for a while. His head was bent intently over his writing, and his hand moved across the page fluidly at a steady pace, without the stops and starts George experienced whilst trying to think up what to say. George hoped against hope that he wasn’t writing to Violet. He would get a good look at him on the way out, he thought. He would be able to walk right past him.

  Picking up his letter and his drawing, he set off, edging sideways between the closely packed tables. As he approached, his heart gave a lurch. The papers in front of Lyne included a pile of letters and poking out from the bottom was a blue envelope, of a shade he knew well, having seen it often enough in Violet’s hand. He hadn’t realised that he was staring but Lyne looked up and met his eyes.

  ‘Did you want a glance at the paper?’ he said pleasantly, mistaking George’s interest. ‘There’s been another push.’

  Panicked, George said, ‘That would be jolly decent of you, sir.’ He took it and, thinking quickly, turned to the casualty lists.

  ‘Have you got family out there?’ Edmund asked.

  George shook his head. ‘Just a friend.’

  ‘Everything all right, I hope?’ Edmund was puzzled by the way this young man was blushing, his colour rising as he watched. Perhaps it was a close friend, for whom he was concerned. He noticed the little silver badge above his breast pocket and wondered if his evident emotion was perhaps a funk about going overseas. He seemed terribly young: so many of them were.

  ‘Thank you, sir. Everything’s fine,’ George managed to say, handing the paper back again.

  ‘That’s good, then,’ Edmund said gently. ‘Give my regards to Keswick,’ he added, trying to lighten things. At this, the young man looked shocked, as if he had been caught doing something wrong. Edmund pointed at the envelope that George was holding, addressed to 26, Leonard Street, Keswick, and George’s face cleared.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ he said again.

  George went out into the evening air. It struck him coolly, making him realise that he was in a lather of a sweat. He walked down to the post, hoping that the regularity of his steps would calm his beating heart. He felt shaken up and unable to disentangle his emotions. He had been near enough to just put out his hand and touch Violet’s letter … His hope that Edmund might have broken off their engagement had been self-delusion. He tried to quell the rush of jealousy he felt. The man seemed a decent sort; what right had he to hate him or even harbour a grudge against him? Violet had always been beyond his reach, in any case. But it pained him so, to think of them together … Oh, why couldn’t things be as they used to when he and Violet met and talked so easily together! He remembered the day when he rode out in the bright afternoon, the picture in his pocket: the release of leaving the cobbled streets and cramped buildings behind, the wide green spaces of the park and the freshness that seemed to rise from the moving river. He had ridden fast as flying, such joy was rising in him.

  Everything had changed that day. He recognised that he would never capture that sense of limitless possibility again.

  Edmund refolded his newspaper. What a strange young man, he thought. There had been something intense about him … Well, it had been an odd day and perhaps the news that they would be overseas in a couple of days affected people in different ways. He settled back to his letter.

  On the morning of their departure, they arrived at the station and stood around at ease in the freight yard. The horses were brought in: a string of forty led along, roped together in eights. They were a fine sight: all light draught horses, chestnuts, greys and bays. Well groomed and with shining coats, they tossed their heads and snorted, some of them skittering at the unfamiliar noises of the railway, but they soon calmed as the leading group, chosen for their docility, slowed to a walk as they entered the far side of the yard. Haycock, whose father was a blacksmith, was fond of horses. He wanted to watch them being loaded and he suggested they move to the end of the platform to see the beasts walked up the ramp and into the covered wagons.

  George was surprised to see that they were led into the wagons and left loose, with no head-ties, and commented on it to Haycock.

  ‘In theory it’ll be safer for them that way,’ he said. ‘They can’t get entangled with each other and they can move a bit and get comfy, like, although if they’re jammed in too tight they’ll end up stepping on each other’s hooves or pasterns and then there’ll be biting and kicking.’

  They stowed their kit on the parcel shelves to show those places as taken and then watched the horses being loaded, and the sliding doors shut and barred. Between the wooden slats were glimpses of flared nostrils as a horse snuffed the fresh air or a rolling eye as they jockeyed for the best position. George and the others got into the carriage and then a few more men from further down the train came looking for a seat and joined them. Turland and Rooke let George and Haycock take the window seats, as they were so keen on the horses, which meant they could watch when the train stopped for the horses to be watered.

  A whistle blew and doors slammed as soldiers left the last embrace of wives and sweethearts and boarded the train. They started off, passing families waving handkerchiefs and little groups of women and children clinging to each other: small tableaux of grief.

  Thoughts of the continent made George’s stomach turn over, yet again, with the queasy mixture of anxiety and excitement that had beset him since he woke in the early morning. He had lain among the huddled, blanket-covered shapes of his companions, looking at the shadows of leaves on the tent canvas, and wishing someone else would wake up. Now he longed for the smell of bruised grass and unwashed socks that was at least familiar, a kind of temporary home.

  The chaps who had joined their party were from Kendal and Penrith and the conversation turned to places th
ey knew in common, and the fortunes of the local football teams, so that the first hour or so of the journey passed quickly. After a while, George’s restless night and early waking caught up with him and he leant his head against the polished wooden frame of the window, closed his eyes and, despite the engine noise and the faint bumps and bangs from the wagon as the horses continually shifted and braced themselves, he soon fell asleep.

  Half an hour later he woke as the train stopped with a tremendous jolt, throwing him forward in his seat so that he nearly landed in Haycock’s lap. It was pitch black.

  ‘What’s happened?’ he said. His voice came out higher than he’d intended, as the darkness, the closeness and the awful banging behind him shot him straight into panic. The familiar dread of being shut in overwhelmed him.

  ‘We’re in a tunnel, you idiot,’ said a disembodied voice from the other corner of the carriage. ‘God knows why we stopped so suddenly.’

  With less engine noise, they could hear whinnying, and kicking and sliding noises from the horse wagon behind them.

  ‘They’re getting a bit restive,’ Turland said.

  ‘Why don’t they get a bloody move on?’ Haycock said. ‘Those horses are all shod; they’ll be kicking seven shades of shit out of each other in there.’

  The train took another jolt forward and Rooke, who had been trying to light a match, dropped it as the movement jerked him from his seat. There was a moment’s confusion as everyone tried to stamp it out at once; then as they sat back down they became aware of a regular and massive thumping in the wagon behind as if one of the horses was having some kind of seizure.

  ‘One of them has gone down,’ Haycock said. ‘The others’ll close over and take up the standing space …’

  The rest of his words were drowned out by the approach of a train going the other way. It passed them in a flicker of lighted windows and a cloud of steam and soot, shaking their stationary carriages as it went. As the noise began to die away, a most horrible sound took its place: the sound of the fallen horse screaming.

  George, who sat frozen in panic, put his hands over his ears and pressed out the terrible sound. His breath came short and quick; he was gasping for air … he had to get out … At last, the train jerked forward again and this time kept on moving until they emerged from the tunnel and into the light that revealed their anxious faces and George with his head between his knees and his hands clamped over his ears.

  Turland put his hand on George’s back. ‘Are you all right?’ he said. ‘Here, look, we’ll be out of it in a minute and they’re sure to stop and sort it all out.’

  Haycock’s face was grim.

  The train moved on slowly, gathered pace and then slowed again, and all the time they could hear the noise of the horse struggling to rise and others kicking and neighing. George couldn’t seem to calm down. He stared out of the window trying to find something to focus on that would stop him picturing the panicking crush of horses in the dark wagon.

  At last, they pulled into a station at the edge of a village. There were fields beside the station and an orchard with sheep beyond. They heard the sound of doors opening further up the train. Haycock pulled down the window and leant out and George stood up so he could see over Haycock’s head. Some men got out ready to fetch water but hearing Haycock’s shout and the noise from number-one wagon, they looked alarmed. The farrier sergeant and a private came straight over and started unbarring the sliding door of the stock car, the sergeant keeping up a steady stream of swearing; another man hurried towards the front of the train.

  The horses nearest the door were led out by their halters, one at a time, and tied to the station railings. One had a bad bite on its neck with a big flap of skin hanging loose. They were jumpy, pulling and shying until more men turned up with buckets of water, then they put their heads down and drank. As soon as enough space had been cleared there was a scrabbling, thumping noise as the injured horse was helped to scramble to its feet.

  Captain Hunton and the two lieutenants arrived as the men half pulled, half coaxed the horse from the wagon. It was a grey; blood on its withers showed bright against its light coat. The animal’s hindquarters seemed strangely sunken and scrutiny showed that its back legs were buckling under its weight because of a bad injury above the hock; the flesh had sheared away right through to the bone. It stood shivering and then staggered as its back legs almost gave way. Captain Hunton walked around it, looking it over. He gave an order and Lieutenant Carey took its halter and led it, lamed and halting, down into the field. Hunton and Lyne moved to one side and seemed to be having quite a discussion. As George watched, it seemed to him that the more animated Lyne became, moving his hands as though sketching something in the air as explanation, the more impassive was Hunton. He heard Lyne out; then he looked over to where Carey was standing with the horse, its head drooping, and gave Lyne an order.

  Through the bustle and movement of the men going back and forth with buckets, George saw Lyne join Carey. He ran his hand over each of the horse’s uninjured legs in turn. Captain Hunton stood watching with a look of intense annoyance and fiddled with the fastening of the holster at his belt. Lyne stood talking to Carey, one hand on the beast’s neck.

  Suddenly, as if he had lost all patience, Captain Hunton strode down the platform and into the field. He said something to the lieutenants and George saw Lyne and Carey step away sharply from the horse. Hunton grasped the halter; then, as casually as if it had been his handkerchief, he took out his service revolver and discharged it into the beast’s temple. It dropped as though its legs had been taken from under it. A spasm went through its body. Hunton had walked off before the last twitch died away.

  It was all so quick that George could hardly believe it had happened, but there was Lyne, standing looking down at the horse as if stupefied, and Carey kneeling and taking off the animal’s halter. He turned to Haycock.

  ‘It had had it,’ Haycock said, and sat back down in his seat as if to say ‘the show’s over’.

  Captain Hunton came up the platform with his face set hard. He spoke to the station manager about the disposal of the carcass, asked the farrier sergeant how much longer the watering operation would take and then strode back towards the front of the train. Carey and Lyne returned and handed over the harness to the sergeant. They too began to walk back up the length of the train. George bobbed his head back into the carriage before they drew level; he didn’t want to draw further attention to himself after his encounter with Lyne in the marquee.

  When they had passed, George leant out of the window as if to check the evidence of his own eyes once more. All was quiet. A faint cidery smell of windfall apples hung in the air. A dark cloud of flies moved around the animal’s head.

  As they set off again, everyone was silent for a while. Eventually, Rooke suggested cards, one of the new chaps shared out some cigarettes and gradually conversation returned. The train sped on through fields of stubble, past canals and factories, villages and wooded valleys, taking them ever nearer the docks where the ships waited at quays scattered with limbers, water carts and rolls of wire, all bound for the Front.

  PART TWO

  FLANDERS, AUTUMN 1914

  8

  POLDERS

  George and Rooke were lost. The track that they were following ran through pasture and fields of ploughed-in stubble, and was lined on one side by poplars that were meant to act as a windbreak against the storms that blew straight off the sea. Instead, over time, the wind had weeded out some of the trees and left the others leaning, all at the same angle in an uneven row. Between the trees, scrubby bushes merely sieved the sharp October wind: the steady rush of cold air chilled one side of their bodies, finding its way into sleeves and under collars.

  They had been slogging along under their packs on their way to the Front. It had soon become clear that their duties would not continue to be limited to ‘lines of communication’, but were to include taking their turn in the line like everyone else. En route, they
had fallen behind the others because Rooke was on his last legs and it was George’s turn to stick with him. So when the low buzzing of the first Jack Johnson split the air, there was no one to shout out to in warning and they simply scrambled for the ditch as, whump, an eruption of soil shot up from the field on the right and pattered back to earth like dark hail. They threw themselves face down with their arms over their heads, their packs crushing them down so that bandolier and pouches stuck into their chests. The crumping explosions continued as the shells hit somewhere in the field beyond. George dug his hands into the soggy vegetation and held on tight; he thought that this must be how a spider feels under the shadow of a man’s boot. He pressed himself into the damp earth, feeling the water well up from the clay soil and seep coldly through his clothes.

  At length, the explosions ceased. At first, it seemed as if the quietness surged back and then George became aware of the small noises of the countryside once again. The rustle of the wind in the branches, a blackbird’s fluting call from its singing post at the tip of a poplar, a pheasant croaking somewhere in the field.

  Rooke lifted his head. ‘What on earth are they shelling right back here for?’

  ‘After our guns, I should think.’ George wondered if the Alleyman thought there were guns being stored ready to be brought up to the Front. He hoped that the others up ahead were in a lane with a ditch and trees for cover too and not out on the road through the open fields. The polders were low-lying lands reclaimed from the sea. In this flat country, criss-crossed by canals and drainage ditches, the file of men would be exposed like a column of ants on a chequered cloth. He shuffled forward on his elbows and looked over the edge of the ditch. Dark holes pitted the field. Slabs and clods of yellow clay were scattered across its surface. An old wooden harrow that had stood abandoned had completely disappeared. The evening sky was streaked with vivid lemon and lavender close to the flat horizon, its tranquil mood at odds with the wounded earth below.