Covenant with Death

by John Harris

  He was trying to write a letter to the girl next door, one of his normal enthusiastic epistles glorifying the war, and his sheet of grubby notepaper grew grubbier all the time from contact with his grimy fingers.

  ‘If only we could have a go at them,’ he said gloomily. ‘A real go, I mean. Make a bit of noise, instead of all this crawling all over No Man’s Land pretending we’re dead.’

  We were in one of the bigger dug outs, a gloomy foetid cavern of a place, stinking of stale cigarettes and unwashed bodies, and fitted with wire-netting beds. It was lit by candles and bits of four-by-two in tins of paraffin, and by what daylight filtered down the steps. On the walls were pictures from La Vie, old calendars, bits of broken mirror and festoons of equipment. Outside, Catchpole had hung a sign: FOR SALE OR TO RENT. OWNER DESIROUS OF LEAVING.

  Mason and Barraclough were playing cards on a blanket. MacKinley and Tim Williams were asleep. We’d all acquired the habit of falling into a deep sleep in a moment. Sleep had become the most precious thing in the world, and we could drop off at any time and in any cramped position amid the ceaseless noise and in clothes and boots that hadn’t been removed for days.

  Spring was sprawling on a bed among the scattered equipment, trying to dry a wet sock over a candle. He was singing gloomily with Catchpole some music-hall dirge they’d picked up from one of the Manchester battalions:

  ‘We’re reet down in t’cellar ’ole,

  Where t’muck splarts on t’winders,

  We’ve burned all our co-al up,

  We’re nah burnin’ cinders.

  If t’bum bailiffs come along,

  They’ll never find us…’

  Eph was busy over his monthly epistle home to his wife. All the estaminets sold sentimental cards decorated with lace, which depicted women staring into fires showing soldiers’ faces that looked remarkably French in spite of the British uniforms they wore, or soldiers staring into clouds containing women’s faces, but Eph stuck rigidly to the official green issue which only had to be filled in and never taxed his ingenuity.

  You could hear him all round the dugout. When Eph filled in his card it was always a communal occasion, because he liked to read his answers aloud, and his rasping voice had a curious piercing quality that penetrated even the warmest desire for privacy.

  ‘I wish you’d shut up,’ Murray growled.

  ‘What’s up, kid?’ Eph asked. ‘You sound proper hipped. Your girl got fed up with you? You ain’t ’ad many letters lately.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I watch out for ’em. I like to see you young lads ’appy. I wonder if we oughta cut your ear off and send it to ’er as a reminder that you’re still alive. Write “Faithful unto death” or summat in blood on the box.’

  He sighed. ‘Pity there ain’t a pub round the corner,’ he said. ‘Writing letters always makes me thirsty.’

  As he tossed aside his pencil, boots rattled on the board treads of the steps down from the trench. He looked up quickly and Spring’s song stopped abruptly.

  ‘Now what?’

  Bold’s voice came down to us, sharp, high and rasping with authority. ‘Corporal Fenner down there? And Corporal Mason?’

  ‘Here, Sergeant-Major!’

  ‘Let’s have you! To the captain’s dugout, quick! The rest of you stand by. I’ll be needing you.’

  ‘Here comes trouble,’ Mason said, throwing down his cards and reaching for his equipment. ‘Wonder what it is this time.’

  ‘The colonel’s lost his terrier,’ Catchpole suggested. ‘And he wants a party sent out to find it.’

  Eph turned and stared at Murray accusingly. ‘It’s your fault,’ he said. ‘Last time you complained about wanting to ’ave a go at ’em, we got sent in with the Worcesters. This time it looks like we’re putting on a raid. You want to keep your flippin’ mouth shut.’

  Company headquarters was a dark hole like our own, shored up by pit-props and nine-by-two timbers, with room for several officers and a few stores. Four or five guttering candles in tin lids threw moving shadows on the walls, and the air was foul and smoky. Only a glimmer of daylight managed to pierce the gloom.

  The colonel was there, fiddling with his button as usual. His dog was on the mud floor by the telephone, its muzzle in a bully-beef tin. The adjutant stood behind him, morosely spreading Gentleman’s Relish on a biscuit and looking more like his twin than his normal brother.

  Sergeant Bernard and one or two other N.C.O.s were there, crowding round the table, and Pine stared at us with his one good eye and jabbed his finger at a map spread among the mugs and bottles and candles and Nestlé’s milk tins.

  ‘It appears that our predecessors have been too – gentle with the Hun opposite,’ he said. ‘B-Brigade say we’ve got to make war. We’ve got to start being offensive.’ He took a deep breath as though to control his stammer. ‘The Push’s due any time,’ he went on, ‘and we’ve got to k-keep him on the hop. Got it?’

  We got it.

  Pine stared round at us for a moment, then he stooped over the map spread across the shabby table. His brother opened a tin of cigarettes and passed them round to us all, and Ashton gave us his matches. It was as though they were trying to put us all at ease, and I sensed the unpleasant part was still to come.

  At last, when he seemed almost to have forgotten us, the colonel straightened up.

  ‘They’re expecting big things of this battalion,’ he said, and his hand went to the button again. ‘I’d like to see that we come up to expectation. Brigade have laid on the artillery right here.’ He jabbed at the map. ‘And we’ve got to go in and find out who’s opposite. That means prisoners. Understood?’

  He paused and stared round at us. We exchanged glances but said nothing.

  ‘Mr Bub-Blackett’s going to take command, because he’s probably had more experience of this sort of thing than anyone else. He’ll tell you what he’s got in mind.’

  He nodded to Blackett and stepped back into the shadows, whispering to Ashton, while Blackett leaned forward into the circle of light round the map, his green eyes glowing in his ugly face, and began to talk.

  He planned to use chiefly bombs and coshes. He was going to split the raiding party into three. The first group – his own – was to go in with ladders, while Welch was to wait with a second group close up to the wire with bombs and rifles to cover them as they retired with their prisoners. Sergeant Bernard was to wait behind with another party on the lookout for German patrols.

  Blackett paused as he finished, and stared round at us. ‘One more thing,’ he said, as though it were a postscript. ‘If anything goes wrong, run like ’ell. We don’t want heroics.’

  We paraded at dusk. Pine was there to see us off, his brother just behind him as usual, looking like his reflection in a mirror, and the little white terrier skipping about his heels. The excitement that had started when the parties had been selected had subsided to a murmur, but there were a few wry jokes being bandied about.

  ‘Let’s pick a fat one,’ Eph was saying. ‘Then we can cook him for supper instead of that eternal bloody bully-beef.’

  The Mandy brothers had picked themselves in and lined themselves alongside Tom Creak. They were being noisily aggressive, and Frank Mason slapped their backs and teased them for their Irish tempers. There was a hint of swagger about him that didn’t ring true and a trembling eagerness about Murray. Locky stood a little to one side, pale and silent, his face taut and strained.

  Tommy Mandy was testing his knobkerry on the trench wall. It looked like a mace and he’d made it himself with a short pole and a length of barbed wire. The solid thump as it hit the wooden props set my nerves on edge, and I was just going to turn on him and tell him to stop it when Henny Cuthbert did it for me, sharply, his voice full of irritation. He looked nervous and ill at ease, and half-drowned under his equipment.

  Men stood about, watching us curiously as we rubbed burnt cork on our faces and tightened the broad canvas belts of bombs we wore.
Then we gripped our ‘cosher sticks’, handling them nervously, and looked round for Blackett to give the word to go.

  The evening was full of yellow light as the sun disappeared and darkness began. You could hear the usual noise of carts in the distance, coming up with the rations. Occasionally, there was a bang from one of our guns in the wood behind us, and once a trench-mortar bomb burst over on the right, dull white smoke floating over darkening grass that was spotted with moonpennies and buttercups and saffron weeds. Nobody was speaking much now and there was only the clink of weapons and the thump and shuffle of boots on the duckboards. In front of us we could see the German communication trenches, like faint seams on the hill with the last of the light on them, and a demolished church, touched along its ragged edge with bronze. It seemed too peaceful to go out there and risk your neck. Then a rifle popped somewhere and there was the crash of a five-nine that broke the spell.

  ‘Who’s for a Blighty one tonight, boys?’ Murray asked with a flash of white teeth.

  He spoke in undertones, but excitedly. Everyone’s movements were swifter than normal, hiding confidence or lack of it.

  Pine appeared at last out of Ashton’s dug-out, followed by his brother and Blackett and Ashton and young Welch. They were comparing watches.

  ‘All we want is prisoners,’ Pine said again. ‘Not casualties. You all know what to do?’

  ‘Yes…’ I heard Eph’s voice from just behind, nervous and faintly unhappy. ‘Up, one two, point, one two, six inches of cold Sheffield is enough for anybody…’

  With willing hands under our behinds, we were pushed up to the parapet as soon as it was dark, and we crawled through the gap in the wire and lay down to wait for the rest to catch up, feeling the long grass against our faces and the chalky stones under our hands.

  After a while, Henny’s voice whispered nervously by my ear.

  ‘Fen,’ he said.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I think I’ve got a stiff here next to me. We couldn’t move along a bit, could we?’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ I said. ‘Shut up. We’ll be away in a moment.’

  I could hear a muttered conversation going on just behind us, then Welch appeared and we started to crawl out over the grass.

  My ears tingled as I strained for the sound of men talking or working. Once a cascade of Very lights went up, and I dropped flat in the long grass with the others, my eyes looking for the enemy, the smell of damp turned earth filling my nostrils.

  There was a whispered consultation between Blackett and Welch, then the party split up into the three groups, Sergeant Bernard’s staying behind and Blackett’s and Welch’s pushing on.

  After a while Welch touched my elbow. ‘We’ve got bags of time,’ he said. ‘We’ve got a good half-hour before the barrage starts.’

  While he was still whispering into my ear, I heard a distant gun go off, and the first express-train sound of a shell approaching. It grew louder and louder, until it seemed to be heading straight for us, paralysingly direct, shrieking as though it were aimed for us and us alone.

  Welch turned scared eyes to me and we all hugged the earth, digging at it with fingers and toes as though we could pull ourselves closer.

  The shell burst on the German parapet right in front of us, and in the glare I caught a momentary glimpse of sandbags and clods of earth flying through the air.

  Welch lifted his head and stared round, then we all ducked again as more shells began to drop.

  ‘They’ve started too soon,’ he shouted in a frightened voice. ‘What the hell do we do now?’

  In that first moment of panic, I was aware of a feeling of frustration and resentment, and a deep personal secret horror that things were going wrong, and the only thing I could suggest was that we should move up quickly in case Blackett’s party went in after all.

  We stumbled and wriggled forward as fast as we could go in the glare of the flashes, trying to get into position, tripping over obstacles and falling into holes. A machine gun started with a vicious suddenness on our left, piercing the din with a noise like tearing cloth.

  In the hurry the party became scattered, and when we flopped down again there were only six of us, Murray and MacKinley and me, and Mason, Eph and Henny Cuthbert. Everybody else seemed to have disappeared.

  ‘They’re going to get us all killed,’ Henny was muttering nervously, his eyes caged and desperate in the flare of the exploding shells. ‘You see, they’re going to get us all killed!’

  ‘What’ll we do, Fen?’ Murray demanded in a cracked excited voice. ‘There’s only us. Do we hook it?’

  For a moment, I was consumed with a wild desire to beat it as fast as I could, full of an angry resentment that some fool had thrown the whole raid into confusion.

  ‘Well, come on,’ Eph squeaked, his voice breaking in his agitation. ‘What the hell do we do? Skedaddle?’

  ‘Better hang on,’ I said. ‘Stand by. See what happens.’

  ‘Welch’s gone,’ Henny wailed.

  ‘For God’s sake, what if he has? There’s no need for us all to go. He might turn up.’

  I turned to Mason. ‘Stay here, Frank,’ I said. ‘Stay here with Eph and Henny. I’ll move up with the others. You let ’em have your share as we fall back.’

  I knew Henny was timid and Eph a dodger; and I thought it wiser to leave them with Frank where they couldn’t get into trouble.

  While I was still wondering if I’d done right, the shelling stopped abruptly, and, without thinking, I nudged Murray and MacKinley and we ran forward and dropped flat again by the German wire. I distinctly heard the words ‘Achtung, raus, raus, die Tommies’ shouted in a hoarse voice, and a few more frightened words that were drowned by the crash of a bomb going off behind the parapet.

  The noise made me jump. The flash threw the sandbags into relief again and I heard the shuffle of boots on stones and the sound of a whistle and realised to my relief that the bombing party were going in and we hadn’t done wrong.

  ‘Blackett’s going in,’ I said. ‘Come on! Up closer!’

  There was a concentration of thudding bangs and angry flashes as several bombs all went off together in a group. Immediately, away on our right, a flare shot up into the sky, and in its glow I could see Murray’s eyes white in a black face. Then I saw shadowy figures running and heard groans and curses as another salvo of bombs burst. A few rifles went off and the machine gun started traversing again in a hammering stutter of flame and I saw sparks fly as the bullets struck against stones.

  There were shouts and yells of pain and men started spilling from the German trenches in a stampeding confusion. Young Murray was quivering like an excited terrier alongside me. He half-started to his feet and I grabbed him and pulled him down.

  ‘Wait,’ I said.

  In the flashes of bombs exploding just below the German parapet, I saw the figures of Blackett’s men running back. I could hear someone moaning in the darkness beyond the wire, and a low wailing sound from the trench, then I saw the flashes of rifles over the parapet.

  Blackett and his party were past us now, and I let go of Murray.

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘Now!’

  We threw our bombs as fast as we could, and the firing stopped abruptly. I heard a shriek of pain and the harsh shouting of orders, then we were running, bent double, for our own lines, tripping and stumbling as the red and green rockets went up, sweating with fear that the machine guns would get us.

  There was no sign of Mason’s party where we’d left them, and MacKinley began to swear in a low vicious undertone as we flopped down again and looked round, rifles ready. There was no indication that Mason and the others were still near and, after a while, we got up again and ran for our lives.

  I dropped to the earth at last by our wire, panting, sickened with fear, unable to speak, my throat dry, the sweat soaking my shirt and tunic. The machine gun was spraying the area liberally and, as we stumbled on the heels of Blackett’s party, I glanced round for Murra
y and MacKinley and, seeing two dark shadows behind me, I dropped into the trench and was promptly knocked flying as Murray landed on top of me.

  He was on his feet in an instant, grabbing me by the arm and dragging me up after him, pulling at my sleeve and twittering in a spasm of excitement and fear.

  ‘They got Mac,’ he said. ‘I saw him fall.’

  ‘Who’s that then?’ I indicated the shadow behind him and he burst out in a wail.

  ‘It’s one of Blackett’s crowd,’ he said. ‘Mac’s back there.’

  Consumed by anger and fear, I pushed him aside.

  ‘Why the hell didn’t you say so before?’ I shouted. ‘I’m going back to look for him.’

  The thought of going over those damned sandbags again with the machine gun chattering away appalled me, but I couldn’t think of any alternative.

  Murray looked at me, his jaw hanging open, his eyes big and round. He was blubbering softly but unafraid. ‘I’ll come,’ he said. ‘You’ll need a hand.’

  His face twisted abruptly into a rage. ‘Where the hell was Mason?’ he stormed. ‘If he’d been covering us, we’d have got away. It’s his fault.’

  There was someone who looked like Frank just in front of me. I could hear him muttering softly and I thought he’d been hit. In the crowded trench I could see dark faces and white eyes staring at me in the flashing beams of torches. Someone was cursing, and down in the shadows out of sight I could hear groans.

  I pushed Murray up to the parapet and, as I started to scramble out again myself, a hand grabbed my sleeve. It was Locky and he looked shocked and scared.

  ‘For God’s sake, where are you going?’ he demanded.

  ‘MacKinley’s out there,’ I said. ‘I’m going to get him.’

  ‘Don’t be a fool!’

  I shook his hand off irritably and climbed after Murray, who was waiting by the wire. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘We haven’t all night!’

  In front of us the concentration of angry flashes and thudding bangs continued, as the Germans searched in the darkness for the raiders, and bullets were cracking through the long grass on our right.