Heart of War

by John Masters

  Quentin said, ‘Sergeant Stratton could make a dugout look and feel like a palace … and make anything mechanical work …’ He moved on. Khaki wool gloves, knitted by devoted women back in England, covered all their hands. The officers wore the short greatcoats called British Warms – short, so that there were no skirts to be soiled and weighed down with the mud of the trenches. All four wore khaki wool scarves round their necks, half covering their ears. The cold was the damp, raw cold, a degree or two below freezing, of the ice-sodden flatlands of Flanders. In a month or two spring would come, and release the ground from the iron grip of frost, turning all this, now hard and dry, to heavy clinging mud, and wetter mud would slosh over everyone’s boots and into the dugouts where they sought shelter from the sniper’s bullet, the stray shell, the sudden grenade.

  The little procession passed from A Company to B. Captain McDonald fell back, Captain Kellaway stood forward, a tall thin figure with worried eyes, a little stoop, and waving, long-fingered feathery hands. Quentin acknowledged Kellaway’s salute with a glare. Why did he glare? Kellaway was a millionaire dilettante, about thirty-six; he was quiet, almost shy, but a good, brave officer. So why did he always make Quentin feel uncomfortable? He wished he knew, and to hide his own embarrassment, snapped, ‘Everything all right, Kellaway?’

  ‘Y-yes, sir,’ Kellaway stammered. ‘I think we got a German sniper a few moments ago.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘No, sir. But the pile of rubbish where we think he was has altered shape a little – as though something slipped or fell in it.’

  Quentin nodded and peered down into a cave dug into the front wall of the trench. From behind him the Regimental bellowed ‘Room – ’shun!’

  The six figures crowded into the dugout stiffened like marionettes and Boy, peering over his uncle’s shoulder, thought as he often had before that the scene was like some weird painting, or an image that comes livid before you in a nightmare.

  ‘Breughel,’ Kellaway muttered from behind him, and Quentin turned – ‘What? What’s that? Broogle? None of these men is called Broogle. We don’t have a Broogle in the battalion.’

  ‘I was clearing my throat, sir,’ Kellaway said, blushing. Boy thought he was right not to try to explain. The only art his uncle liked was fox hunting prints. And he himself would never have heard of the Breughels if Kellaway had not talked of them, in long evenings they’d spent together in billets. Before the water, he’d have been debagged in Mess, at the least, for talking about anything except horse racing or fox hunting.

  The five officers and the Regimental stared at the six motionless soldiers. In one corner three candles guttered on the lid of a wooden box full of hand grenades, casting men’s shadows on the corrugated iron roof of the dugout. Two dirty planks, stretched across more ammunition boxes, these for .303 small arms, were covered with khaki tunics, shirts, and vests. The men were all naked from the waist up, and beginning to shiver in the raw air. Their bodies were covered with the pink spots and stains of louse bites and louse defecations. Two of the men, totally naked, held lighted candles rigidly in one hand, like reform school altar boys, as they stared straight ahead at the hard mud walls; in their other hand they held their khaki serge uniform trousers, turned inside out.

  ‘They were chatting, sir,’ Kellaway said.

  ‘I can see that,’ Quentin snapped. ‘Is your whole company doing it?’

  ‘No, sir, only six men per platoon at a time … They didn’t want to waste any time in the rest area delousing, so they’re doing it now.’

  ‘Carry on,’ Quentin said, and the frieze broke up. The men holding candles lowered them and ran them slowly along the seam of the trousers, thus killing not only the lice but also their eggs.

  Quentin and the others stepped back up into the trench. ‘I’ll have an equipment check at the next dugout,’ he said.

  ‘Very g-good, sir,’ Kellaway stammered. ‘Here, sir.’ He stood aside at the entrance to another dugout. ‘Room – ’shun!’ the Regimental bellowed again.

  Quentin looked round in the gloom. ‘Private Sandilands, show your equipment.’ Boy took a notebook from a pocket of his British Warm and began to read aloud. At each item the soldier showed the piece of equipment, either hung on pegs stuck into the wall, or in his pack, or on his person – ’Greatcoat … mess-tin … steel helmet … forage cap … shirt … spare shirt … socks … spare socks, two pairs … soap … comb … knife, fork, and spoon … toothbrush … housewife … holdall … razor and case … shaving brush … cardigan … cap comforter … paybook … ammunition, one hundred and fifty rounds … rifle cover … oil bottle … ’

  ‘Check that it’s full, Kellaway.’

  ‘It is, sir.’

  ‘Water bottle, full … first field dressing … tin of boot grease … bootbrush … gas mask …’

  ‘Put it on, Sandilands. Shut off the tube, Boy … . All right.’

  ‘Spine protector … equipment, complete with frog, belt, and pouches … spare bootlaces … rifle … bayonet … pull through … entrenching tool.’

  ‘Let’s have a look at that rifle barrel,’ Quentin said.

  ‘For inspection … port, arms!’ the Regimental snapped. ‘Examine – arms!’

  Quentin peered down the barrel of the presented rifle, where the soldier’s thumb was reflecting the sparse light up the barrel towards his eye.

  ‘Corroded,’ Quentin said, ‘two patches. And cordworn muzzle.’

  ‘They’ve been reported, sir, and another rifle indented for.’

  Quentin grunted and stepped back up into the trench. The soldier’s equipment he had just been inspecting weighed about sixty pounds dry. In mud or rain that would go up to near eighty. The greatcoat weighed seven pounds dry, but he himself had weighed one after hours of continuous cold rain, and it was then nineteen pounds. The average weight of his men at recruitment was 132 pounds … nine stone six. It was a damned shame, but what could be done about it?

  In the next bay he stopped where a private soldier was greasing his boots on the firestep, his back to the enemy, the feet of a Lewis gun sentry close to his buttocks.

  ‘Everything all right?’ Quentin said. ‘It’s Brace, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was houseman at Laburnum Lodge, sir, under Mr Parrish.’

  ‘I remember … Well?’

  Brace was on his feet, the tin of grease in his left hand and brush in his right, just as they had been when he leaped to his feet on seeing the C.O. come round the traverse; he did not salute, for as he was bareheaded that would have been a fearful military crime. He now said, ‘The jam doesn’t taste of anything, sir … and the meat’s bad.’

  ‘All of it?’

  ‘No, sir. But nearly all Hoggin’s is. The meat smells rotten, sir, when you open the tin, and … ’

  ‘I know,’ Quentin said. ‘We get it, too.’

  Brace put down his brush and tin and held out a folded newspaper, on which he had been sitting. He said, ‘It’s the same everywhere, sir. Here’s a letter to “Tommy & Jack,” in John Bull, about the rotten food. He specially mentions Hoggin’s.’

  ‘You didn’t write that letter, did you?’ Quentin asked suspiciously. Horatio Bottomley was a charlatan and probably a criminal; but his newspaper, John Bull, was widely read by the men in France, and the “Tommy & Jack” section, where soldiers and sailors could air their grievances, wielded more influence than all the efforts of the commanding officers in the field. Writing letters to “Tommy & Jack’ was against regulations, but the soldiers did it, and the authorities at home who could have stopped it by arresting Bottomley, did nothing. Quentin was outraged that a man like Bottomley could get more done for his men than he could, but now, as many times before, he would have to swallow his anger; it was the results that mattered.

  ‘Oh, no, sir!’ Brace said; and Quentin said, ‘Let’s hope John Bull can get some improvement. But I’ll make a complaint, too.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Quent
in nodded and moved on. Over his shoulder he said to Kellaway – ‘Next time you get some really bad smelling meat, or plum and apple that’s all fibres – send it to me at once … at once, understand? … so that I can take it to brigade.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And see that your men shave again before the Royal Scots Fusiliers relieve us tonight. Some of them look like out-of-work dago waiters.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Quentin led off down a communication trench towards the rear. Following him, Boy thought, the Fusiliers weren’t going to be able to notice much stubble on the men’s cheeks in the middle of a dark night, but that wouldn’t make any difference to his uncle. In the Weald Light Infantry you shaved properly, whatever the circumstances, and that was that; as also, you died with your boots clean – unless they were under a foot of mud. His uncle really resented the mud, not because it made the going difficult, but because it dirtied the men’s boots.

  The Regimental appeared in the opening of A Company Headquarters dugout, where Quentin waited with Boy and Captain McDonald, the company commander. ‘Scots Fusilier party approaching, sir,’ the Regimental said in a conspiratorial hiss. The three officers stood up, put on their steel helmets – their gas masks were already hung on their chests – climbed up the two small steps to the trench level, and stepped over the plank sill.

  They waited, not looking at each other. A lisping voice floated to them over the traverse from the next bay, ‘But this war’s a very dangerous business, I told him,’ the voice lisped, ‘so perhaps the cavalry should be excused from it.’

  Someone gave a servile chuckle, then the speaker appeared, saying, ‘And here we are, facing Plugstreet Wood … and Lieutenant Colonel Quentin Rowland, if I do not mistake. It is an honour, sir.’ He saluted slowly, with a civilian half-bow thrown in. Quentin saluted back. Boy, his hand at the rim of his steel helmet, searched his mind … the colonel of the 6th Battalion the Royal Scots Fusiliers was quite plump, and not very tall … his nose was turned up, his eyes snapping blue. He really looked quite like his Uncle Quentin, except that his uncle was taller and more heavily built, and his eyes popped more out of his head. The newcomer was wearing a French Army greatcoat, the skirts buttoned back as the poilus wore them; and on his head a flanged French Army steel helmet. In his left hand he carried a lighted cigar.

  Boy and his uncle recognized him at the same moment, though only Quentin spoke the name aloud, ‘Winston Churchill!’ he gasped.

  ‘The same,’ Churchill said, ‘and I trust you will permit me to smoke in your trenches. It is a vice I cannot tame.’

  Winston Churchill, Boy thought. One didn’t often see ex-Cabinet Ministers in the front line, especially not in uniform.

  ‘You look astounded, Rowland,’ Churchill said, pulling out a cigar case and offering Quentin one. ‘Perhaps you think I have been conscripted?’

  ‘No, no!’ Quentin exclaimed, ‘only I didn’t know … No, thanks.’

  ‘The air is cleaner here than it is in the Palace of Westminster,’ Churchill said. ‘I can think of a good many gentlemen in England now abed who would much benefit from being caught in the net of conscription … but those who would benfit the most are also the most adept at slipping through the meshes. It is a law of nature. Preservation of the slipperiest.’

  Quentin laughed suddenly, and his constraint melted. ‘Come into the dugout and I’ll show you the trench map of our sector, and then we’ll go round … and later fix details of the relief. My Adjutant and R.S.M. are here … ’

  ‘Mine, too. I would not dream of venturing into the zone of battle without such competent dragomen … What time is it?’

  Quentin looked at his watch. ‘Ten past ten.’

  ‘Ah. Time to toast our acquaintanceship.’ He produced a silver flask from the back pocket of his greatcoat. ‘In the dugout? And perhaps you can supply us with a modicum of water … a very small modicum, sir.’

  He preceded them down the steps into the dugout, drawing comfortably on his cigar.

  The five private soldiers sat in the back room of the estaminet, singing softly, bottles of vin blanc on the bare table beside them, glasses in hand. The top brass buttons of all their tunics were undone, and they were not carrying gas masks, and their heads were bare; but the bowl-like steel helmets were slung over the backs of the chairs, or hung on the coat rack with their greatcoats.

  She was poor but she was honest,

  Victim of a rich man’s whim:

  For he wooed and he seduced her,

  And she had a child by him.

  Private Stan Quick sang the verse in a pleasant tenor, exaggerating the cockney accent, as was customary whenever this song was sung. All five joined in the chorus:

  It’s the syme the whole world over,

  It’s the poor what gets the blyme,

  While the rich gets all the pleasure,

  Ain’t it all a bleeding shyme!

  Quick began the second verse, while the others drank, hummed or sang, sotto voce:

  Then she cyme to London city

  To recover her fair nyme,

  But another man seduced her

  And she lost her nyme agyne!

  Oh, it’s the syme the whole world over,

  It’s the poor what gets the blyme,

  While the rich gets all the pleasure,

  Ain’t it all a bleeding shyme!

  One of the soldiers pushed back his chair with a loud scrape and yelled, ‘Madame Frog, more van blong!’ He tried to get up, staggered, and nearly fell. Quick broke off his singing to say amiably, ‘You’ve had enough, Harry!’

  The owner of the estaminet came through from the front room, a slight woman dressed in black, about forty-five, hard of eye.

  England yelled again, ‘More van blong!’

  ‘Tais-toi,’ she snapped. ‘Ze militaire police will come.’

  ‘Fuck the M.P.s, I want some more van blong!’

  Madame went out, returning a few seconds later with a bottle. She cradled it in one hand and held out the other, palm up – ‘Four francs.’

  ‘Four francs!’ the soldiers cried in unison. ‘We only paid three for the first two bottles, and that was a bloody rook!’

  ‘Differ’n wine,’ she said shrugging. ‘Bettair. No more of othair.’

  Grumbling, England smacked four silver francs into her hand. She gave him the bottle, and went out.

  Quick began to sing again, but no one joined in, and he let a phrase die on his lips.

  ‘Fuck the French,’ Harry England said sullenly. ‘Fucking robbers, that’s what they are. The whole bloody lot of them.’

  ‘Robbers or whores … or both,’ Bob Jevons said, whose father was the baker in Walstone: as Harry England’s was the blacksmith, and Charlie ‘Dusty’ Miller’s the stationmaster; and Stan Quick’s the postman; the fifth man, an old regular with nineteen years’ service, mostly in India, was called Lucas, an unemployed labourer before taking the King’s shilling to avoid starvation in the slums of Birmingham.

  ‘Don’t take it so hard,’ Lucas said now. ‘Afore we go back up the line, we’ll have a few chickens and ducks out of these bleeding Frogs. Are we in France or Belgium?’

  ‘ ’Oo the ’ell cares? Wot’s the difference?’.

  ‘It is in France, just. Like Armenteers,’ Quick said, breaking once more into song.

  Two German officers crossed the Rhine, parly voo,

  Two German officers crossed the Rhine, parly voo,

  Two German officers crossed the Rhine,

  To fuck the women and drink the wine, inky pinky parly voo!

  Madame appeared, her sour mouth more tightly pursed than ever. ‘Taisez-vous!’ she snarled. ‘Be more quiet, or I call militaire police!’

  The old soldier got up. He had drunk near a bottle of wine to himself but his leathery face showed no sign of it. He said over his shoulder, ‘Got to treat these Frog cunts nice …’ He reached the madame – ‘We very ’appy ’ere, madame … Good food, good van blo
ng … ’

  Her stony face softened a little – ‘Am glad …’ The rumble of shelling from up the line, ten miles to the east, continually shook the little brick building. Harry England’s hand trembled round the wine bottle.

  Old Soldier Lucas said, ‘Bote thik hai… pukka memsahib you are … We all kushy avec you, eh?’ He put an arm halfway round her waist. She swung a small iron hard fist in a fierce sweep, landing on Lucas’s nose. Blood spouted as she turned and strutted out, hurling ‘Cochons!’ behind her.

  Quick doubled up with laughter. ‘That’s right, Snaky! Treat ’em nice, and they’ll eat out of your hand!’ He slapped Miller joyously on the back. England drank. Lucas dabbed his nose with a handkerchief soaked in wine, and mumbled, ‘ Now wot the ’ell got into her? All I said was, we was ’appy ’ere … Kushy. That’s ’Industani for ’appy.’

  ‘She doesn’t speak Hindustani,’ Jevons said. ‘She wasn’t with the old 2nd Battalion in the Shiny.’

  ‘Fuck the war!’ Miller said. His best friend in Walstone when they were boys had been Sam Mayhew; and he’d seen Sam’s life seeping out of his lungs in red froth, soaking his tunic … near Neuve Chapelle that was. Took two days to die. They’d both been eighteen. He still was by the calendar. The calendar didn’t tell the truth any more.

  ‘The war ain’t so bad,’ Quick said, ‘it’s the people you meet.’

  England said, ‘Why the ’ell did we join up, when we could ha’ waited, and they’d have to come and get us?’

  ‘Patriotism,’ Miller said. ‘ Our King and Country needed us … ’

  ‘But they don’t need half the fellows back there now, going out with our girls, earning five times what we do … then going on strike for more … eating off the fat of the land while we get Hoggin’s fucking pig swill … ’

  ‘ Aren’t many left in Walstone, who could go,’ Bob Jevons said. ‘The gentry’s sons have all gone, too. I can’t imagine Walstone without us … Why, it’s today Miss Stella’s being married, and none of us there to drink her dad’s champagne!’

  ‘What’ll it be like when it’s all over?’

  ‘We’ll all be napoo … This war’s going on for bloody ever, if you ask me.’