Alone In The Trenches

by Vince Cross

  “What’s happened to your foot?” I asked, changing the subject. Charlie was still hobbling.

  “Oh, that!” Charlie laughed. “I don’t know who made my boots,” he said, “but whoever they were, I’d have ’em sacked. The left one started falling apart up at the line, and by the time I’d pulled myself out of a hundred squelchy mud-holes and tripped over a dozen rotting tree-stumps, the sole came off completely. It was slowing me down, so it had to go, and now I hope I can find myself a new one from somewhere. Meanwhile, I’ll have to make do with this.” And he pointed down at the khaki bandage he’d wound round his foot, made from the tight stockings or “puttees” the soldiers wore on their lower legs for extra support. “But don’t you mind about that. Let’s go and find the corporal and tell him we’re on our way.”

  The corporal was busy and spoke only to Charlie, not to me. And considering Charlie was now a hero, he spoke rather roughly, I thought.

  “It’s all very well, Private Perkins, you chasing after the likes of our Captain Garvey and his pet schemes, but I need your mind back on your job. You say the young lady has family in Witney, so if no one’s got a better suggestion, you could tell Transport she should be sent there. At least she doesn’t come from Penzance or the wilds of Scotland. That might be more difficult for the Oxfordshire regiment to arrange.”

  I opened my mouth to say something, but Charlie motioned me to keep quiet. I hadn’t thought things through. I’d never met any of my Witney family – though Dad had often talked about them. Even if they were willing to take me in, perhaps I’d be no happier than I’d been with Mum and Grandma. As we walked down a lane towards Transport, Charlie said, “Lots of your people have made the journey to England, you know. You won’t be the first. From what I’ve heard half of Belgium’s there. A few months back, when we were coming up to Ypres, we passed hundreds of them on the road, poor devils. All they had was what they were stood up in, or could throw on a cart.”

  I think I must have been whimpering a little as he said this.

  “Now then,” he said, stopping and turning me round to look at him. “That won’t do at all. Let’s put on our best face, so we make a good impression.”

  *

  Transport had taken over the offices of a timber yard in a large village a couple of miles from Rosie. Next to the yard was the railway station, with a number of sidings containing wagons and carriages. The station buildings had been turned into a hospital. I was shocked to see a long line of men lying on stretchers next to the station door.

  One of them was groaning loudly and thrashing around where he lay. A man with a Red Cross badge on his arm ran to him and knelt over him, trying to get him to drink, but the injured soldier knocked his arm away, spilling the contents of the cup. Then I saw that most of his right leg had been blown off, leaving just a stump covered with dirty bloodied bandages. He screamed at the orderly, “For God’s sake help me. Help me, man. I’m dying…”

  “I’m trying,” the orderly said calmly. “The drink will make you feel better. But I can’t help you if you won’t help yourself…”

  Charlie pulled at my hand, “Sometimes it’s best not to look,” he said. “Gets the imagination going too much.”

  But I’d already seen the pain on the soldier’s face and wouldn’t forget it in a hurry. And I’d seen the other line of stretchers too, where just the shapes of men were visible under blankets that covered their bodies from head to toe. I didn’t want to believe what I saw, but in my heart I knew they were dead.

  A train had just arrived in the station and soldiers were milling around the wagons, looking for their packs and sharing a joke. Charlie asked where he could find the Chief Transport Officer. A couple of chaps shrugged their shoulders, but a gangling lad who was doing his best to make the yard tidy with a broom pointed us in the direction of a tall, haughty-looking man with a hooked nose and a wispy moustache.

  “You can try Captain Leveson, I suppose. He doesn’t take any nonsense, but he knows his stuff.”

  Captain Leveson was standing outside one of the doors of the offices watching the chaos. He was tapping his officer’s stick impatiently against one thigh and shaking his head. It didn’t look a good moment to be asking a favour. “Private Perkins, sir, ‘B’ company, 2nd Battalion Oxfordshires. I’ve been sent to you to ask if you would take this young lady, sir.”

  “Take her?” Captain Leveson barked impatiently. “Take her where?”

  “She’s lost her family, sir, who rightly speaking are Belgian people. But she has other family in Witney, Oxfordshire, and my corporal thought that you might be able to help.”

  “Oh, he did, did he?” the officer snapped. “How very kind of him! Has he any idea, I wonder, of the difficulties we’re working with here?” He spread his hands out towards the crowded yard. “Has your corporal by any chance considered what would happen if I let one small Belgian girl waste His Majesty’s time and money by being evacuated hundreds of miles to the middle of England? I suppose I should shortly be overwhelmed by thousands of children presenting excellent reasons why they should be given special treatment too. No, Private Perkins, my compliments to your corporal, but please tell him he must return the young lady to the Belgian authorities for them to help her. Have I made myself clear? Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

  And he strode away, his stick under his arm.

  “Now that’s what I call a jumped-up, self-important little toff,” said Charlie to the captain’s back. “If I’d known I was going to be working for the likes of him, I’d have thought twice about volunteering for foreign service. Well, we’re for the high jump now. Corporal Warren isn’t going to like Captain Leveson’s message one little bit. But I can’t see anything for it – it’s back to Rosie for us.”

  The idea of Witney had given me cold feet, so secretly I wasn’t too unhappy about that. And I got the impression Charlie felt the same way. After all I was his “lucky charm”. As we were about to go out of the yard gate on our way back to ‘B’ company, Charlie said, “Just hang on here a mo’, Miss Annette, I’ve had a thought,” and he limped away towards the station building. Ten minutes later he was back. This time he ran easily across the yard, kicking his feet up in the air like a dancer as he came.

  “At last the old horse is properly shod,” he said. “Just have a look at these new boots. Fit like a glove. Much better than the old ones.”

  “Where did you get them?” I asked innocently.

  He tapped his nose, “Well, let’s just say they were a present from someone who doesn’t need them anymore.”

  I didn’t understand. “You mean a wounded soldier…”

  Charlie looked sheepish. “Well, not wounded as such. More sort of… permanently out of action.”

  I still looked puzzled.

  “Passed away?” Charlie explained. “Pushing up the daisies?”

  And then I got it. It seemed shocking to me that Charlie should be so happy walking around in a dead man’s shoes, so as we trudged the road back to Rosie, Charlie chatted away while I listened. Puttees were all very well for keeping your trousers from flapping about, he said, but the lads agreed they cut off the circulation.

  “And word is,” he added, “when you’re up to your knees in water every day for a week and your feet are rotting away, they only make the problem worse. ‘Trench foot’ they call it.”

  The sides of our road home were broken by shell-holes that were now half-filled with water. The surface of the road was a patchwork of repairs.

  “That’s from when we chased the Germans back over the canal a couple of months ago,” he said. “They tried blowing up the road to make it harder for us to catch them.”

  On the muddy grass outside Rosie’s stable yard, a game of football was being played. Charlie gave a yelp of pleasure.

  “It’s our lads against the Frenchies from near Messines,” he cried. “I did hear mention they’d fixed up a match.”

  We stood and watched for half an hour as the war was for
gotten. The goalposts were piles of coats. The heavy ball had seen much better days. It was coming unstitched and wasn’t really round anymore. After a while one of the English players shouted to Charlie,

  “See you’ve found yourself some new boots, Chas. Well, I’m about done, so come and put ’em to good use!”

  “Excuse me, miss,” Charlie said, “But a fella’s got to do his duty for King and Country.” He whizzed around the pitch, running from side to side at full tilt and never getting anywhere near the ball. Where did his astonishing energy come from? Charlie reminded me so much of Michel. He’d been exactly the same.

  As the game was drawing to an end, we heard the sound of an engine puttering towards us high in the sky. Everyone stopped and looked to the east. Against the backdrop of the grey clouds could be seen the fat cigar shape of a long balloon.

  “By God, it’s a Zepp,” someone shouted. “Shoot the blooming thing down.”

  “Better to take cover,” cried someone else. Not waiting to find out if they were about to be bombed, the French soldiers were busy declaring the game a draw. They snatched up their coats and knapsacks, shook hands with the English players and lit cigarettes as they clambered onto the lorry that had brought them there. A handful of English soldiers ran out of the stable yard and aimed their rifles at the Zeppelin. They let loose a round or two but then gave up. The balloon was well out of range.

  “Taking snapshots of us, I wouldn’t wonder,” Charlie said. “So they know where to aim their big guns. Wonders of the modern world, they do say, but I hate Zeppelins with a vengeance. Those German devils have got all kinds of tricks up their sleeve. You hear tell of poison gas and flame-throwers and all kinds of mischief they’ll make if we don’t finish this war off quickly. What are things coming to?”

  At last the great machine wheeled around in the sky and its engine faded into the distance. The excitement over, calm briefly returned to the house. We still had to report to the corporal. As Charlie had guessed, he wasn’t best pleased.

  “Sergeant major’s going to give me a good kicking because of that idiot Leveson,” the corporal growled. “I suppose you did your best, Perkins. No offence, miss, but you need to make yourself scarce for the rest of the day while I put this man to proper soldiering. And then tomorrow morning we’ll see if there are any policemen left in Ypres who know what to do with you.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Charlie, when we were alone again, “but you heard the corporal…”

  “It’s all right,” I answered, although it wasn’t “right” at all. “There are books I can read up in the house.”

  I let Charlie take me back to my pretty room and for a few hours did what I was told. The rest of Rosie was a mysterious dark brown place. As we’d passed the drawing room on our way upstairs, I heard men talking earnestly in low voices. Charlie put a finger to his lips.

  “The generals are in there,” he whispered confidentially as we climbed towards the bedroom door. “Making life-and-death plans...” He laughed hollowly “…though you can bet your life they won’t be the ones who end up dead.” I thought it wasn’t much of a joke.

  He sighed because he hadn’t made me laugh and for a moment looked very forlorn. Then he pulled himself up straight. “There now, that’s quite enough of that because you’re right and it’s disloyal talk. You must pretend you never heard me say such a thing. Let’s do as the nice corporal said, and I’ll see if I can sneak back to say hello later.”

  I tried to read, but the books stacked on the bookshelf were dusty and boring. There was nothing to see from the window but roofs and sky. Eventually, I plucked up courage to open the bedroom door. I shut it quietly and tiptoed along the corridor. No one was about. At the end of the passage I found the back stairs and went down. Still no one to be seen or heard. Another flight of stone steps took me round a corner and into a magnificent kitchen. Gleaming pots and pans hung from the walls. Cupboards held mounds of china. Large sinks which had once allowed a team of scullery maids to do the washing-up were now gathering a film of dust.

  I was puzzled. Outside in the cold courtyard, I’d tasted what was served up to the soldiers from the carts. Why weren’t they using this wonderful old kitchen with its cutlery and kitchen tools?

  Two doors led out of the kitchen. I opened the nearer one with difficulty and saw more stairs leading down into a dark, musty cellar. The second door was half- glassed and led from the kitchen to the outside world. There was a key in its lock. I turned it. The door had been well-oiled and it opened easily without a squeak. Beyond was a kitchen garden with a gravel path leading to a gate and empty fields. For a moment I considered abandoning Charlie and Rosie. I could escape to the west. I’d be safe if I followed the sun away from the fighting armies. I stepped out of the shadow of the house and was surprised to see a figure hunched down against the wall. It was a soldier, though he looked more like one of the miserable beggars I remembered seeing in Antwerp when I was small. But there was one shocking difference. The soldier’s fingers were resting on the handle of a black handgun, which he was pointing at his own right leg, just above the ankle. Huge sobs were shaking the soldier’s chest. He didn’t look up. Clearly he hadn’t seen or heard me.

  “I can’t do it,” he was saying to himself over and over again. “I can’t do it. Not anymore. I want to go home!”

  I hadn’t the foggiest what to do. Even if I tiptoed past him over the gravel path, he’d be bound to hear me, and with a gun in his hand there was no telling what might happen. But it seemed wrong to ignore someone in such a bad way. I wanted to lay a hand on his shoulder and tell him everything would be all right. But I couldn’t.

  I took the coward’s way out. I stepped back silently towards the door, and squeezed myself into the safety of the kitchen. Almost as soon as I’d carefully shut myself in, there came the sound of a single gunshot. It was followed by a scream of pain that seemed to go on for ever. I put my fingers in my ears and fled back up the two flights of stairs and along the top corridor. Even before I’d left the kitchen, boots were running across the flagstones and gravel outside. Whatever had happened, it was someone else’s problem now.

  Half an hour later I was still shaking and shivering under the blankets when Charlie knocked on the door and came in. I sat up. He smiled toothily. You’d have thought he didn’t have a care in the world.

  “Hello, Miss Annette. Been having a nice forty winks, have we?” he said softly.

  I said nothing, but I must have looked frightened.

  “Hey, what’s the matter? Nothing to be scared of. It’s only old Charlie, not a blinking ghost. Now, I’ve come to tell you something.”

  I nodded feebly.

  “I’ve got to be up and about again tonight. There’s a large pile of timber to be carried up to the line … to keep the lads’ feet dry. ‘B’ company have copped for the job.”

  “I heard a noise,” I said, not really paying attention to what he was saying.

  “Oh, that…” Charlie was trying to sound casual. “That was nothing.”

  “I heard a shot from a gun. There was a man…”

  Charlie gave me a funny look.

  “What man? Has someone been bothering you?”

  “The man outside…”

  Charlie sat down on the end of the bed.

  “Oh … that man,” he said, looking serious. “You mean little Joe Thorp? How did you hear about him? Look, sometimes … it can all get too much, you know? In a war things can easily get on top of you. Just imagine. You’re hundreds of miles from home. You’ve seen stuff no one should be expected to see, so you get scared. Or worse, you go completely bonkers. So you mistakenly think you can buy yourself a boat ticket back to England with a revolver. There’s plenty will say Joe took the coward’s way out. Though Lord knows, it takes courage to shoot yourself in the leg, don’t you think?”

  I nodded again, even more uncertainly.

  “So let’s not think about that poor old chap, or the troubles he’ll face at the
court martial once they’ve put his leg back in one piece. You stay here like a bug in a rug. I’ll see you tomorrow. And I’ll ask the nice sergeant major to keep a special watch out, so that you’re not spooked by any more noises. Remember, you’re my lucky girl, so just keep saying your prayers for us all. While you’re safe up here, nothing can go wrong. Can it?”

  I snuggled into the blankets and let him go.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  These days anything that happens around the house at night wakes me. I hear the wind moving the branch of a tree against a window, or the creak of floorboards when someone gets out of bed to use a chamber- pot, and I sit bolt upright and catch myself wondering if a burglar has broken in and we’re all going to be murdered in our sleep. It all goes back to that night in 1914.

  What woke me sometime before dawn the next morning must have been the swoosh of the incoming shell seconds before it landed. I swear I actually saw the blue and yellow flash from the first explosion light up the room. I felt the pressure on my ears and heard the terrifying, ear-splitting thump as it blew out the window glass onto the bedclothes. I leapt out of bed, felt for my coat where I’d put it on a chair, and pulled the belt tightly around my waist. There were spare candles and matches on the mantelpiece. I grabbed them and lit one of the candles just as a second shell slammed into the far side of the house, rocking the whole building and jarring my teeth.

  I threw open the bedroom door and ran across the house down to the kitchen as fast as the flickering flame of the candle would allow. I opened the cellar door and hurled myself downwards, twisting my ankle as I misjudged the last steps to the cellar floor. Even below ground level, the dull explosions were loud enough to rattle the wine bottles in the racks that surrounded me. It was Ypres all over again. I huddled myself against the damp wall. I thought about the poor soldier and his revolver. “This time,” I said to myself, “you really are going to die, Annette. And down here, they’ll never find you.”