by Hill, David
On they sailed, into a storm that sent the big liner lurching from side to side, and also sent men staggering across decks, thudding into rails, skidding off-balance and nearly falling down stairways.
One young soldier did fall, flung down a ladder as the ship plunged into a trough between two huge waves. He smashed head-first into a steel bulkhead, and died two days later.
His funeral was held on a morning when the ocean lay still and glittering. The storm was gone. Bells rang, and the ship’s engines stopped. The body lay wrapped in a sheet, under a New Zealand flag, while rows of troops stood silently. ‘Atten-shun!’ a sergeant-major shouted, and hundreds of pairs of boots crashed together. ‘Hats off!’
An army padre read the service. A trumpeter played ‘The Last Post’, its notes fading across the sea where two grey birds glided and called. The stretcher was tilted, and the white-shrouded body slid from under the flag, to disappear beneath the surface. Total silence for a few seconds, then Jack began to sing quietly in Maori. Other voices joined in, and William felt a shiver run down his spine. Another moment he’d never forget.
They crossed the Equator. Two weeks since South Africa. Three. The daytime training went on. Officers told them in lectures how the Germans were dropping bombs on London from their huge Zeppelin airships, but British fighter planes were shooting many of them down. The United States was sure to enter the war on Great Britain’s side. New weapons to fight the Hun were being invented, and it could only be a matter of months before Germany surrendered. ‘We heard better rumours in camp,’ Herbert whispered. Meanwhile, a couple of NCOs who’d fought in the first years of the war muttered and shook their heads.
The days grew cooler, the sky duller. Europe was getting closer. White clouds lay along the horizon. More seabirds appeared, curving over the ship, fighting for the rubbish tipped from the stern.
A Thursday morning. Nearly seven weeks since they’d left home. They were on deck, starting a session of physical drill, when one of the lookouts shouted. ‘Ships!’
They came sweeping towards the Empire Star. Four of them, small and grey and dangerous-looking. ‘They’re British!’ another voice called. Yes, William realised. They had to be, since the liner kept its course, sailing steadily towards them. After five minutes, he could see the white ensigns of the Royal Navy streaming from their masts.
Uniformed sailors stood on their decks, waving. The troops waved back and cheered. Deep blasts from the liner’s horn; answering blasts from the four newcomers. ‘Destroyers,’ someone said. ‘Come to see us safely into port, in case there are any Hun submarines around.’
The grey shapes wheeled, white water curving from their bows, and took up positions on either side of the liner. William could see the guns on their decks, long and dark and lethal.
The cloud on the horizon was grey this time. No, not a cloud. Land. Slowly it took shape. Hills and valleys. Trees and farms. Houses. A town – a big town, with wharves and cranes and bustling tugboats.
Jerry stood beside William at the rail. ‘Is it London?’ he asked eagerly.
‘No, Portsmouth,’ said one voice.
‘No, Bristol,’ said a second.
‘No, Dover,’ said a third.
‘Wait and you’ll find out,’ said Sergeant Molloy.
Tugboats eased them towards a grimy wharf. The men waiting there with ropes looked small and tough. They didn’t wave or smile.
‘Look!’ went another voice from 3 Platoon. ‘Over there.’
William and the others stared at where the man was pointing. A warship, up against another wharf. A bigger one than the destroyers: a cruiser perhaps? One funnel shattered and hanging over the side. Great holes torn in the other funnel and all along the hull. Smashed gun turrets with gun barrels pointing crookedly at the sky. The bows half ripped away. Black stains where fire must have swept through the ship. Everyone stared in silence. The war wasn’t far away.
PART 4
Getting Ready
Dearest Ma,
Here’s another letter that may never reach you. I’m in an army camp in England. I don’t know exactly where. We travelled here through beautiful countryside – farms, cottages with thatched roofs, white horses pulling a hay wagon. It’s hard to believe England is at war.
I don’t know where Archie is, either. Or if there are any other people like me in the camp. The Army likes to keep things secret! Several officers have tried to make me change my mind, but I feel more determined than ever.
There are wounded soldiers here, working in the kitchens and gardens. Some of them have lost an arm or a leg. Some look as if they have seen dreadful things. I keep thinking: Why should young men have their lives ruined like this? I think of William, too. Please send him my kind wishes. I don’t want this bitterness between us to last.
Dear Ma, I may not see you for a long time. My love to you and Jessie always. I don’t know what may happen to me, but I’ll never regret what I’ve decided to do.
Your Loving Son
Edmund
Edmund
In fact, Edmund did have some idea of what might happen to him.
Soldiers – those who hated him because he was a CO – had told him. ‘They’ll take you to France, march you up to the trenches and stand you out in front so the Huns can have target practice,’ said one. ‘They’ll sentence you to death by firing squad,’ went another. ‘They’ll lock you in a cell and let you starve like the rubbish you are,’ sneered a third.
Yet it wasn’t easy to believe in trenches or death, with the peaceful English countryside around. Beyond the high wire fences circling the camp were farms with new green wheat or black-and-white cows like those at home. On a low ridge a mile or so away, the grey bulk of an ancient castle stood against the sky.
The camp itself wasn’t pretty. It was rows of big round tents in which the troops slept, plus bare wooden buildings going up as fast as carpenters could build them. The ground had been churned to mud by thousands of boots. Lines of rough boards, nailed together in five-foot lengths (‘duckboards’, Edmund learned they were called) provided pathways that slowly sank into the ground as feet tramped across them. Inside the camp, there were no trees or shrubs. No grass. Just tents, raw new buildings, weapons and thousands of men training.
As he was marched in for the first time by yet another escort, rows of troops were at bayonet practice. Stripped to the waist, sweating and yelling, they charged and stabbed at straw dummies strapped to posts. ‘Should put you there, conchie,’ grunted the corporal leading him. ‘If you’ve got enough guts to make a target.’
He was brought before another officer, a tall elderly man with a crown and two pips on his shoulder tabs. ‘I’m Colonel Brabin,’ the man told him, pleasantly enough. ‘As Camp Commandant, it’s my duty to see you are treated fairly. But I must tell you that you’ll find life here far more pleasant if you give up this nonsense now and agree to serve your King and Country.’
It was the same approach that Edmund had met before. He replied politely. (‘Always show good manners,’ Archie had told him. ‘We want people to see we’re civilised as well as stubborn.’) ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I can’t accept orders to kill other people.’
The colonel watched him. ‘But you’re the only person here who feels that way. What good can you do?’
This wasn’t hard. ‘There are many who think like me. But even if I was the only one, that wouldn’t make my feelings any less genuine.’
Colonel Brabin tapped his pen on the table in front of him. ‘Don’t you have any loyalty to the British Empire, man?’
Edmund had already heard this argument, too. ‘Yes, I do. But that’s no reason to kill other humans, just because they come from a country we don’t agree with.’
‘So what would you do if you saw a German soldier attacking your mother or your sister? Stand by and watch?’
Edmund almost smiled. He and Archie had talked about this very question. ‘No, I would try and stop him – with as little violen
ce as possible. But what has that got to do with war and being told to murder young men who have never done me any harm?’
The colonel’s neck began to turn red. ‘I’m asking the questions, Hayes!’ He was silent briefly, then: ‘Surely you can serve as a stretcher-bearer. Then you won’t be taking lives. You’ll be helping save them.’
Edmund felt tired suddenly. Always the same questions. Wouldn’t people ever listen to him? Perhaps the cause he and Archie believed in was hopeless after all?
He made himself stand taller. This was exactly what the Army wanted him to feel. ‘Of course, if a person was injured, I’d want to help. That’s simply common kindness. It has nothing to do with war.’
‘Don’t start giving me lectures! The Army has been more than reasonable with you. If you persist in your stupidity, you’ll be sent to the battlefront.’
A chill touched Edmund’s back, but he tried to keep his voice calm. ‘I will still hold to my views.’ He remembered Archie’s advice. ‘Thank you for listening to me.’
The colonel didn’t seem to know what to say. He flicked his hand at the escort. ‘Take him away.’
The cell was much the same as other cells, although made of wood instead of stone. Bare walls, a door with a grille, one window too high to see through, no furniture except for a toilet bucket in one corner.
But it was so cold. A bitter grey wind seemed to blow endlessly across the camp. It whined through gaps in the hastily built walls, chilling Edmund to his bones. He had no blanket until evening, when a thin grey one was tossed into his cell. Until then, he paced up and down, slapping his arms across his body, stamping his feet in their badly fitting army boots, blowing into his cupped hands in a vain attempt to get warm. He tried to count as he walked, the way he had on ship. ‘One … two … three …’ But he was shivering too much to speak the words.
There was no mattress, and on the cold floor it was hours before he slept. The thin blanket hardly helped at all. He was still huddled miserably on the floor, half-aware that the square of high window had changed from black to dull grey, when the door crashed open, and the corporal who had talked about using him for bayonet practice stamped in, two other soldiers behind him. ‘On your feet, conchie! Report for drill!’
Edmund struggled up, body shuddering with cold. ‘I can … not,’ his teeth were chattering, and it was hard to form the words, ‘… not obey any military order.’
Next minute he was sprawling on the floor again. The corporal had kicked his legs from under him. His head hurt, where it had struck against the wall. The man glared down at him. ‘Report for drill, I said.’
Edmund managed to shake his head. ‘No. I—’ He saw the NCO draw back his boot and knew another kick was coming. He tried to hunch up, to protect himself.
A voice said something, and other boots stepped forward. One of the soldiers gripped the corporal’s arm, pulled him back. The NCO spun around and snatched his arm free. He stared at the soldier, down at Edmund, then strode from the cell.
The soldier spoke to Edmund. ‘Get up if you can, chum. Corporal McKean says we’ve got to take you around the camp, so the lads can see you. Better to walk than be dragged.’
Edmund hauled himself up. The corporal was out in the corridor, angry-faced. ‘March him right around. Let them see what a coward looks like. Put the cuffs on him!’
For a moment, Edmund tried to decide whether to let his arms go limp, so the soldiers had to seize them for the handcuffs. But there was no point in just making their job harder. He held out his hands, and the steel bracelets were snapped on. He noticed that the soldier had been careful not to make them painfully tight.
For two hours, he was marched around the muddy paths and across the drill squares of the camp. Rather, his escort marched. Edmund walked. Yet again, he kept his head up as he went, met the gaze of the soldiers they passed. They looked puzzled. Some frowned, but he got a few nods that were almost sympathetic. He was glad of the exercise; it put some warmth into his body.
The next three mornings, he was taken out again and marched around. By the fourth morning, several soldiers were greeting him. One walked up, ignoring the escort, and put some biscuits into Edmund’s cuffed hands.
But the cell was hard to endure. He was locked in all afternoon and night, and he’d never been so cold in his life. The lukewarm food didn’t help. By the morning of the fifth day, his throat was sore, and his forehead felt hot.
His escort had begun putting the cuffs on him, as usual. Corporal McKean, who had waited out in the corridor on previous mornings, stalked in and glared. ‘Tighter!’
One of the other soldiers began to speak. Then they all sprang to attention as another figure appeared in the doorway. A captain.
The newcomer stepped into the cell. He glanced at where Edmund’s single blanket lay waiting to be taken away. ‘Is this prisoner on special punishment?’
‘No, sir,’ said the corporal. ‘But—’
‘Then give him another blanket. What’s the point of having another sick man to deal with?’
The captain left. Corporal McKean gave Edmund a glare. But that night, two blankets were tossed into his cell.
He was getting weaker. He didn’t have the work and exercise he’d had in the prison quarry back in New Zealand. The freezing cell, poor food and uncertainty about what would happen were all wearing him down. He’d felt himself losing strength on the ship. Now, alone and locked away for long hours out of the daylight, with a heavy cold that kept him wheezing and coughing, he knew his health was fading.
Three days later, the pair of soldiers in charge of Edmund took him as usual past the parade grounds where lines of troops did physical training or rifle drill. But instead of carrying along inside the wire fences of the camp, they marched him out the front gate and into the countryside.
At first, Edmund wondered if he was being taken to another camp, or even on the first stages of a journey to France and the battlefields. But after half a mile, the three of them reached a lane leading off between rows of green trees. They followed the lane for another hundred yards, then turned off and walked around to the back of a stone-walled barn.
‘Sit yourself down,’ one of the soldiers told Edmund. ‘You look like you could do with some fresh air.’
The sudden kindness, plus the sight of gentle fields of wheat stretching away to soft green hedges, was almost too much for Edmund. He managed to murmur thanks, then he sat with his back against the barn wall, already warm from the sun, and took deep, slow breaths. Bees hummed among the wildflowers beside him. A bird trilled in the high blue air.
The soldiers sat beside him. One offered a cigarette. Edmund shook his head. ‘No, thanks.’ For a few minutes, the three sat in silence. A wagon or something rumbled along a road in the distance.
‘Why are you doing this, pal?’ the soldier who’d led them down the lane finally asked. ‘You’re giving yourself a rough time.’
It was harder to explain to these quiet listeners than to the officers and others he’d faced. Edmund tried. ‘I’m opposed to all killing … wars only make things worse.’
The other soldier nodded. ‘I joined up because my missus needs the money. There’s little work where I come from. Plus someone sent a pal of mine a white feather in the post because he hadn’t enlisted. That says you’re a coward. So I joined up before they did the same to me.’
The first soldier’s voice was tight. ‘The Huns killed my older brother. In the first year of the war. A machine-gun got him. I joined because I want to kill some of them. I don’t hate you, chum. It’s Germans I hate.’
They were quiet again. Edmund thought of his own older brother. The wagon rumbled on. It didn’t seem to be any nearer or further away. Then the first soldier spoke again. ‘Hear the guns?’
As Edmund stared, the soldier continued, ‘It’s the artillery. Thousands of them, they reckon, all firing at once. No wonder you can hear them all the way from France.’
More days passed. Even with the ex
tra blanket, Edmund’s cell was almost unbearably cold. He coughed most of the time now. A couple of mornings as they marched him around the camp, he had to ask his escort to stop. ‘I need … to breathe,’ he wheezed. The soldiers who’d taken him out into the country had been replaced by others. Edmund hoped the first two hadn’t got into trouble.
He worried about William. The artillery rumbling – fifty? eighty? – miles away showed how huge this war must be. He worried about Archie as well. Where was he? How was the older man’s health standing up to things? As he was taken past the cookhouse one morning, Edmund glimpsed a thin, pale figure reflected in a window, trudging between two soldiers. His stomach lurched as he realised it was himself.
Doubts began to nag at him. He knew from what he’d heard that troops in the trenches were suffering far more, but how much longer could he endure this empty, pointless life? Should he agree to be a stretcher-bearer, or offer to work in the camp garden? ‘No!’ He jerked as he heard himself speak out loud again. Both of those would be supporting the Army, and he’d never do that.
Only two things happened in the weeks that followed. First, the United States declared war on Germany, after a German submarine sank an American passenger liner. The soldiers were delighted. ‘Millions of new blokes on our side. The Hun has signed his own death warrant.’
Perhaps the war will end faster now, Edmund thought. Perhaps William will be safer.
Three days after that, as he was being marched past the cookhouse again, a man in civilian clothes came out, heading for a wagon piled with cabbages and onions. Edmund glanced at him, then stared.
The left side of the young man’s face was one huge scar, a twisted ridge of white-blue flesh from mouth to ear. In fact, there was no ear on that side, just more scar tissue. No eye, either: only a raw slit between two folds of skin.