The Moon Field

by Judith Allnatt

  ‘Who’s the youngster?’ a new voice said. ‘Looks like he’s got the wind up.’

  ‘Farrell,’ Chalky answered. ‘Leave him be. He’s all right.’

  George shifted, trying to get a bit more space. The mud sucked at his feet with each step and he longed to get out, to go back. The lance corporal took charge of the ammo, opening the box and handing out linen bandoliers of rounds to his comrades, whilst another started hauling sandbags up to repair the damaged breastworks and parapet. George joined in with the others, handing up the sandbags, which the man laid header and stretcher to make a tight wall.

  ‘Will a sandbag stop a bullet?’ George asked Chalky.

  ‘Not likely,’ he said. ‘Not on its own. You need about five feet of clay to stop a machine-gun bullet, that’s why there’s so much earth mounded up. It slopes too, see? That’s for when there’s shelling: to push the blast upwards.’

  As George moved along with the next sandbag on his shoulder, he tripped over something sticking out from the front trench wall and a voice, thick with sleep, said, ‘Give over. What time is it?’ A man was huddled into a small hollow: bent over with his feet tucked in; he was trying to get a little rest before his watch and George had tripped over his rifle. George noticed that there were several such niches dug straight into the clay. He shivered at the thought of sleeping with the earth around you: curled up as tight as an egg in a spoon. What if the trench were hit and the walls caved in? No, you’d never get him into one of those; he would have to sleep on the fire step and take his chances. At camp when they were digging they had sometimes found shards of pottery or the occasional coin, and wondered over the detritus of other ages, men long gone. George disliked these reminders of mortality. He knew the earth was full of worms.

  He stepped up and peered gingerly through a gap in the damaged parapet. Beyond the tumbled mess of earth and sandbags and the glinting strands of wire, a wide stubble field stretched, its flatness broken only by the uneven lips of shell holes and the shapes of fallen men. In the distance, like a mirror image: more wire, another trench.

  At first sight, the only moving things seemed to be the rise and fall of flares but George had an uneasy sense of movement caught from the corner of his eye, the outline of the humped shapes of corpses shifting slightly as if in the bright light there were shadows where no shadows should be: dark streaks running over them … George shuddered.

  The barrage a couple of miles to the right was growing stronger: the flashing light bellying out from the line, the noise a tumult in which the separate call and answer of enemy and defending guns was no longer discernible.

  ‘Our lot are getting a pounding tonight,’ Chalky said.

  George ventured to repeat what he’d heard, that, unable to get through for floods near the coast, the full force of the Germans’ resources would be thrown against them in the Brown Wood Line.

  There was a silence.

  ‘Cheery sort, your boy,’ said one of the men.

  All eyes were turned towards the firing.

  ‘Well, if they break through down there and take Wipers, that’ll be the end of it, they’ll be through to the Channel ports in no time.’

  ‘And if they don’t, it’ll be our turn next,’ said another, picking up his spade. The others followed suit and returned to the task, working on until the breastworks were rebuilt. In the next section, beyond the traverse, more men with spades hoisted themselves up and crept forward into no man’s land.

  ‘What are they doing?’ George hissed.

  ‘Burial party,’ Chalky said. ‘Come on, time we got back and hit the sack.’

  By the time they had retraced their steps back to the wood, creeping and bent double, answered the heart-jarring challenge of a sentry and trooped on past the hunched forms of men sleeping with their backs against the tree trunks, George felt transparent with physical and nervous exhaustion. He dragged along behind Chalky, thinking of nothing more than putting one foot in front of the other until they finally reached the farm. As they came level with the farmhouse an officer was approaching from the opposite direction, returning to his billet. George recognised the gait of Captain Hunton and kept his head down as they passed, hoping to escape his notice. They trailed on to the farm buildings where Chalky said he would show George where his mates would be sleeping.

  Hunton picked his way over the masonry and clods of the garden to the farmhouse door. After inspecting the trenches and delivering his report, he had had a pleasant evening at HQ, where they had been served a half-respectable bit of beef and a very decent brandy. Now this. Obviously, the absentee private had been merely put on fatigues; Lyne had blatantly ignored his recommendations. He felt the onset of indigestion and knew that he would have yet another sleepless night. He cursed under his breath; the man was becoming a thorn in his flesh.

  George followed Chalky into a stone barn and climbed up a wooden ladder to the loft, with the others following behind him. The wooden doors, which had been used in better times for unloading straw, were ill fitting, and the gap between doors and frame yielded only a little moonlight. A chorus of groans and curses met the returning party as they stumbled around trying to find a space in which to bed down for the rest of the night.

  ‘Mind yer fucking feet!’

  ‘What d’you think you’re doing?’

  ‘Settle down, for Christ’s sake.’

  George, recognising Turland’s voice joining the others in protest, edged his way across. ‘Is that you, Ernest?’

  ‘George? I thought they’d thrown you in the guardroom,’ Turland whispered. ‘I’ve got your stuff.’ He sat up and pulled out George’s pack from beside his feet, revealing that Rooke was sleeping back to back with him, a mutual arrangement they had hit on early in their travels as affording both a bit of extra warmth.

  ‘What was the M.O.’s verdict on Percy?’ George sank down on to the thin covering of straw strewn on the boards.

  ‘A pill and two days’ rest. He’s been asleep ever since he got back.’

  George fished out his blanket, rolled his greatcoat into a pillow and lay down on his side.

  ‘Are you all right? You’re shaking,’ Turland said.

  A voice nearby said, ‘Can’t you shut up and get your napper down?’

  ‘All right, all right.’

  George put both hands under his cheek to stop them trembling. Scenes from the wood and the trench kept replaying in his mind. He was glad of the chance to say nothing to Ernest. As he closed his eyes, the slow descent of pale flares played out behind his eyelids. When he finally slept he dreamt that he was lying face down, unable to move, and that something passed quickly over his hand, something that felt smooth and warm followed by a trail of something long and scaly. He woke with a start not knowing where he was. Staring into the darkness, for a moment he was terrified by the still, dim shapes surrounding him, but then he fell into a troubled sleep once more.

  10

  HOME COMFORTS

  Kitty was late for the Grand Bazaar. She pushed the last letter through the final letterbox and set off directly to the hall; she’d promised to help and there wasn’t enough time to go home. Besides, although it would have been nice to wear her best coat and the new hat that she’d had for her birthday, she felt proud to wear her uniform and of her recent, more public role of delivering the mail rather than just working behind the scenes. However much her father went on about ‘men’s work’ she didn’t see why she shouldn’t do the job: she was just as quick as the boys, in fact she always took the heaviest route and didn’t complain half as much as they did. Her father was fond of quoting to her the rhyme that had appeared in a newspaper cartoon under the heading ‘The Development of a Suffragette’:

  At five a little Pet,

  At fifteen a Coquette,

  At forty not married yet!

  At fifty a Suffragette.

  It made her feel cross and even more rebellious. She rather liked the idea of turning up at the bazaar in uniform and being
seen to be ‘doing her bit’. She didn’t see why women should try and hide the fact that they were doing men’s jobs or that her rather smart, tailored uniform made her look any less feminine.

  Sure enough, when she entered the hall her mother was waiting anxiously at the door and her first words were: ‘Kitty, couldn’t you have changed?’

  ‘There wasn’t time. The market crowds slowed me up,’ Kitty said, hanging her empty postbag on a coat peg.

  Her mother rolled her eyes. ‘Well, you’d better come and help me at the handiwork stall,’ she said, leading the way into the crowd milling around the stalls. ‘There’s still lots to unpack.’

  The usual musty, church-hall smell was overlaid by the smell of baking from the cake table and the refreshment stand. Over the stage was a large banner that read ‘SUPPORT YOUR COTTAGE HOSPITAL’, a cause that had drawn together Church and Chapel and many ladies’ voluntary groups in the town. Stalls lined the walls and ran back to back along the middle of the room: trestle tables pinned with swags of material in red, white and blue, framed above by poles entwined with paper flowers supporting fretwork trellises hung with goods for sale. Some stands had names; a stall piled high with baskets of apples and plums and stacked with jars of preserves had ‘Cornucopia’ stencilled on a sign, whilst another selling scent sachets, patriotic stick pins and penny soaps in envelopes had a sign reading ‘Keswick Scouts Troop Fund’.

  Kitty followed her mother, returning the greetings of people she knew and looking at the stalls selling pottery, framed watercolours, postcards and stamps. On a haberdashery stall, amongst ribbons and feather trims, she noticed some silk flowers that would look very well on her birthday hat; she would spend what was left of her wages on them when she got a chance to take a break from her sales duties. She reached the Methodist Ladies’ Handiwork Stall, slipped in at the back and started laying out embroidered tray cloths and crocheted hot-water-bottle covers. Alongside these homely items, her mother was arranging others made as comforts for the troops: socks and Crimean sleeping caps. When she had finished, she let her hand rest for a moment on a pile of knitted blanket squares, patting it as if she would send her touch to all the boys like her Arthur, so far from home.

  Kitty was serving a lady who was looking for antimacassars when Mrs Farrell approached with the children in tow. She gave some pennies to Ted and sent him off with Lillie; then she came over to speak to her mother. ‘How are you, Mabel? Have you had any news of Arthur lately?’

  ‘We’re well, thank you,’ her mother said. ‘We gather Arthur’s in France now. He sent a photograph of himself and a couple of friends outside the cookhouse tent.’ She gave a weak smile. ‘He says he’s in the best of health. How’s George getting on with his training? Will he get leave at Christmas, do you think?’

  Mrs Farrell sighed. ‘No chance of leave, I’m afraid. He’s gone overseas – somewhere in Belgium is all we know.’

  Kitty looked up sharply from giving the lady her change. ‘I thought he was in camp! I thought you couldn’t go overseas until you were nineteen! What on earth did he want to go and do that for!’

  ‘Kitty! Shush!’ her mother said, seeing Mrs Farrell’s face falling. ‘I’m so sorry, Maggie.’ She reached over and touched her arm. ‘Believe me, I know how difficult it is.’

  Seeing George’s mother’s bereft expression, Kitty stopped short. She shut the little metal cashbox with a clang. She had told him that he shouldn’t join up, that he wasn’t the fighting kind. Hadn’t she said that he didn’t know what he was getting into? How could he be so daft! The thought of him in a trench somewhere, maybe even under enemy fire, gave her a horrible panicky, powerless feeling. Now she would have both George and Arthur to worry about. She muttered, ‘Stupid, idiot boys,’ under her breath.

  Her mother said, ‘I think we could all use some tea. Maggie, why don’t you come and take my place and I’ll fetch some.’

  They exchanged places and George’s mother sat down heavily on the stool next to Kitty’s. As Kitty automatically refolded the antimacassars that the customer had picked through, she was aware of her curious sidelong glances.

  ‘We haven’t seen much of you lately, Kitty. Have you been busier than usual? You know you’re always welcome to visit any time.’

  ‘It’s all the letters going back and forth from the Front,’ Kitty said. ‘It seems as though the post’s doubled since the war started. I’d rather be busy than sitting around worrying though, even if it is pretty hard work.’

  ‘I expect you’re busy in the evenings too, now you’re courting. George tells me you have a follower?’

  ‘Not so much, nowadays,’ Kitty said quickly, regretting the lie she’d told George so hastily in retaliation when he had hurt her by shutting her out. ‘I mean … oh dear …’ She felt herself blushing to the roots of her hair. ‘That is, we’ve parted ways.’ She took out another pile of linen from a basket beneath the stall and busied herself in untangling the snarled threads of the price tickets.

  Maggie looked at her sympathetically. She hesitated and then said, ‘Were you very angry with George for going away?’

  ‘Well, I felt he should have told me before, not just gone and done it without a word to anyone. If he’d talked to me about it first I might have had a chance to persuade him out of it. Although I don’t know why I should think that, given that he told me it was none of my business …’ She yanked at the tickets, pulling some of them right off, made a sound of annoyance and dumped them back on to her lap.

  ‘Are you still angry with him?’

  Kitty bit her lip and nodded.

  Maggie sighed. ‘I don’t mean to interfere but George is very fond of you, you know,’ she said mildly. ‘He always asks for news of you in his letters.’

  ‘Well, his letters to me are about a paragraph long and limit themselves to the state of the food and the weather,’ Kitty said tartly, ‘so he obviously still doesn’t feel inclined to confide in his oldest friend.’ She picked up the mess of cloth and price tags and stuffed them back into the basket. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered. ‘I don’t know what gets into me these days; I get a bit over-tired with all the extra work and then when I stop I’m wondering about Arthur, and now there’s George to worry about too—’ She broke off as her mother returned with teacups on a tray. Kitty stood up to let her have a seat. ‘Can you spare me for a few minutes?’ she said.

  She left the mothers talking and walked slowly around the hall looking at all the goods for sale. She cast an eye for the last time over the bunch of silk flowers with its cluster of red berries that would make a fine hat trimming but then moved on until she found a stall selling comforts for the troops. Amongst the chocolate and tins of biscuits was a little Oxo trench heater with half a dozen Oxo cubes and lighters. It would be useful. It would help keep him warm. She bought the heater and then went back for a tin of Needler’s Military Mints as well and had them both wrapped.

  When she returned to the stall, George’s mother had just left to find Ted and Lillie and take them home. Kitty caught up with them all at the door, where Ted was trying to get Lillie to put her arms into her coat sleeves. ‘Do you send a box out to George?’ she said, out of breath.

  ‘Every fortnight or so,’ George’s mother said.

  ‘Could you put these in with the rest, please?’ Kitty pushed the parcels into her hands.

  ‘Don’t you want to send them yourself?’ she asked but Kitty was already turning away. ‘Do come and see us, Kitty, whenever you’d like to …’ she called after her as Kitty threaded her way back into the crowd and disappeared from view.

  Violet inspected the table settings: silver and crystal gleaming on a field of white damask cloth, pink roses and dark fern in a low display in the centre with candelabra either side.

  ‘Change the candelabra for the tall lamps with the amber glass shades,’ she said to Mrs Burbidge. ‘They’re just as elegant and they won’t obscure the guests’ view of each other.’

  Two days ago, out of the
blue, her mother had received a letter from her father saying that he was bringing a few people down for the weekend, for some country air: business acquaintances and their wives. They would arrive by motor, in time for dinner, and arrangements must also be made to accommodate valets, ladies’ maids and the chauffeurs.

  The news had thrown Violet’s mother into a spin. Not content with leaving Mrs Burbidge to marshal the domestics, she had marched around the house demanding that windows be washed and carpets be beaten, until Mrs Burbidge had looked so red in the face that Violet had thought she might go off like a fire-cracker. After a morning playing havoc with the household, however, her mother had tired and Violet had been able to persuade her that since time was so short she could better spend it in resting, so she would be fresh for entertaining her guests. She had retired to consider her costume for dinner and left Violet to quietly oversee the essential preparations and drop the inessential from Mrs Burbidge’s itinerary.

  After two days of frantic activity by the servants and extra staff engaged from the village, the rooms had been made ready, provisions had been supplied and a massive amount of cooking and baking had been accomplished: cold meats, pies, potted fowl, Dundee cake and macaroons filling the shelves of the pantry to groaning point. The table lighting was duly changed and Violet released Mrs Burbidge to oversee preparations in the kitchen and ensure that the staff were tidy and ready to greet the master of the house.

  Violet’s feelings about seeing her father were mixed. He hadn’t visited for over two years. Granted, he was often away in Europe looking after business interests in logging and textiles but Violet had seen the London postmark on his occasional letters to Mother and deduced that he was staying at his club. He wrote rarely to Mother, letters that made polite enquiries about her health and longer enquiries about money: the estate accounts, inheritances, her allowance. He never wrote to Violet. She told herself that she was only curious to know what brought him home, with people in tow, and that she was only nervous about impressing unaccustomed guests. She tried to ignore the curiosity she felt about whether he would notice her at last as a full-grown woman, and struggled to silence the voice of her neglected child-self who still craved his attention. Despite her best efforts at rationality, she couldn’t help but wonder whether the visit might mean some kind of rapprochement and that something might change.