A Soldier's Friend

by Megan Rix

  British, French and Belgian trenches led from one to the other, but to visit the German trenches she had to cross no-man’s-land. Mouser preferred to walk along the top of the trenches to running along the bottom of them where it was muddier and there were more boots walking about.

  The dog she saw wasn’t large like the one that had growled and lunged at her. This was a very small dog and as it ran it wagged its tail. There was something very familiar about it and as Sammy came bounding closer towards her she knew for sure. This was her friend!

  Mouser quickly slipped down from the parapet of the trench on to the duckboard below and waited for him, her tail twitching.

  When Sammy saw Mouser, he skidded to a halt and then he was dancing round her with excitement and sniffing at the cat and wagging his tail.

  Mouser put her nose to Sammy’s in greeting and then together the two of them headed on down the trench back towards Oliver.

  Oliver bit at his nails as he waited for Sammy. He’d been worried about him ever since he got back to the reserve trench. So worried in fact that Patrick had made clucking sounds and when Oliver had raised an eyebrow Patrick laughed and said, ‘You’re acting like an old mother hen fussing over her chick.’

  ‘Am not,’ Oliver said. But Patrick did have a point. ‘You don’t think he’s got lost, do you? Or gone off in the wrong direction by mistake?’

  ‘Ollie, look!’ exclaimed Patrick as he saw the little dog coming back.

  Then Oliver burst out laughing. The last thing he’d expected was that Sammy would bring a friend with him when he returned.

  ‘We’ll have to send him off on his own again if he’s going to bring cats back with him,’ Patrick said as the pets headed towards them. ‘We could do with a cat around here. I’m sick of those huge rats.’

  ‘Here, Sammy,’ Oliver called, and Sammy ran to him with Mouser right behind. Oliver was very pleased to see that Sammy’s distinctive message tin was still in place.

  When she saw Oliver, Mouser instantly recognized him and made a beeline for him, curling herself round his legs and purring.

  ‘Well, hello,’ said Oliver. ‘Who are you?’

  Mouser was covered in mud, and looked so different to how she did back home that Oliver didn’t recognize her. But he was pleased the cat seemed to like him so much. Mouser purred and carried on circling Oliver’s legs while Sammy wagged his tail and looked up at him with shining brown eyes.

  ‘New friend?’ the cook said, nodding at Mouser and Sammy.

  Oliver grinned. ‘Sammy came back with the cat on his first solo messenger run.’

  ‘And very welcome she is too,’ the cook said. ‘My supplies are always getting raided by vermin.’

  ‘It’d be good if we can persuade her to stay. There’s too many rats for Sammy to keep down and, to be honest, he’s not even all that interested in trying to catch them.’

  The cook went away and returned with two tin plates full of bully beef for Sammy and Mouser.

  ‘So, has it got a name?’ asked the cook.

  ‘It reminds me of a cat some friends of mine have back at home … But it just can’t be …’ Oliver told the cook as they watched Mouser and Sammy tuck in.

  ‘Yeah, it looks a bit like my gran’s black cat Tibbles to me too,’ said Patrick.

  ‘The Jensons’ was called Mouser, but she was grey and fatter than this cat,’ Oliver said. At the sound of her name Mouser looked up at him and miaowed.

  ‘Looks like she likes that name.’

  Oliver smiled. ‘Mouser it is then.’ The cat did remind him of Mouser, although it was so much thinner and dirtier than her. Also this cat was letting the soldiers stroke her and was being friendlier than he remembered Mouser being. Not that the original Mouser wasn’t friendly; she was, but only when she wanted to be.

  As Oliver headed along the reserve trench, Sammy and Mouser followed him.

  ‘Here we are,’ Oliver said to Mouser as he picked up his kitbag. ‘Home sweet home.’

  As soon as he sat down, Mouser jumped up into his lap and he stroked her as she purred. She reminded him so much of home and the Jenson family.

  He was sitting thinking of home when Patrick came to find him. He looked serious.

  ‘We’re needed back at the front line,’ he said.

  Oliver sighed. ‘It’s not our turn to go back yet, is it? We’ve only just come from there.’

  ‘I know,’ Patrick said. ‘But orders is orders.’

  Oliver started collecting together what he’d need. He wasn’t looking forward to going back, but he didn’t have a choice. He threw his kitbag over his shoulder.

  ‘Sorry, lads,’ the sergeant said, but they knew it wasn’t his fault. He was only obeying orders just like they had to.

  ‘There’s not room for a football down in the trenches,’ the sergeant said as Sammy ran along pushing the ball with Mouser close behind him.

  ‘It isn’t doing any harm and it’s keeping him happy, sir,’ Oliver said.

  The sergeant made a harrumph sort of sound, but he didn’t say any more and Sammy was allowed to take the ball with the men as they trekked down the communication trench towards the front line.

  ‘How long are we going to be up here for this time?’ Oliver asked.

  But no one knew for sure.

  ‘You’re on first watch,’ the sergeant told him, and Oliver stood on the fire step with his gun ready for any surprise enemy attacks.

  He couldn’t understand more than a few words of German, but he could tell when the German soldiers, who were in their own trench a hundred feet away, were joking with each other and laughing, and when their days dragged miserably by – which rainy days in the trenches did. Oliver listened out as the sun sank low in the sky, hoping he might hear voices from the other side.

  Chapter 23

  When Lizzie went to visit the two blanket cats, Daisy and Daffodil, after school, she told them all about Mouser being missing and Oliver having found a cat similar to her.

  Both of the cats peeped out from under the blanket together to listen. They were definitely less scared of her than they had been at first. But not brave enough to come completely out from under the blanket and say hello yet.

  ‘When they do get brave enough, you could try a cat greeting,’ Kenneth told her.

  ‘What’s that?’ Lizzie asked.

  ‘Have you seen how cats who like each other often touch noses?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘They’re sharing their scent.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Obviously, if you tried to put your nose to a cat’s, especially a scaredy cat’s, it wouldn’t be a good idea, but what you could do is try holding up your finger at cat’s nose height and wait to see what happens.’

  The blanket cats weren’t brave enough to come to Lizzie yet so she thought she’d try Kenneth’s finger suggestion with Herbert. He definitely wasn’t scared of people.

  But when she asked Kenneth if he’d like her to spend some time with Herbert today Kenneth shook his head.

  ‘Not today. Herbert already has a visitor. She sat with him most of yesterday afternoon and came back first thing this morning – complete with a picnic, no less.’

  As Lizzie went down the corridor, she saw an old lady sitting in the ancient armchair close to the cats’ cages with Herbert on her lap. She beckoned Lizzie to her. When Lizzie hesitated, she beckoned her again, more insistently.

  ‘Have you met Herbert?’ the old lady asked her.

  Lizzie nodded. ‘He’s a lovely cat.’

  ‘Oh yes, he is,’ the lady agreed. ‘Really I think he’s quite unique. He understands, you know, he really does.’

  Lizzie smiled, not quite sure what Herbert had understood.

  ‘I’ve told him all about losing my son at the front and he looked right at me and I think he was trying to tell me something. I think he wanted me to know that everything is going to be all right. They haven’t found my son yet so they don’t know for sure exactly what’s happ
ened … I believe he’s going to be coming home to me and until he does … well, I have Herbert to stroke and tell him all about my son and what a special boy he is.’

  ‘Amelia’s right, isn’t she?’ Lizzie said when she saw Kenneth a few minutes later. ‘She’s right about the difference an animal can make.’

  Kenneth nodded. ‘Yes, I think she is. Now all she has to do is convince everyone else.’ He laughed. ‘Knowing my sister, she’ll find a way!’

  At the hospital Amelia was sure if she could just distract the soldier patients, even for a little while, from thinking about the war and remembering the terrible things they’d seen, it would be a start. She’d taken some of the men to float boats on the stream that ran beyond the field at the back of the hospital. She’d taught others how to basket weave and paint, neither of which she had any talent for herself.

  ‘What sort of basket is that?’ one of the soldiers asked her, staring at Amelia’s best effort.

  ‘I believe it’s called a discarded bird’s nest,’ Amelia told him, and was delighted when she caught him grinning to himself.

  ‘What they need is time,’ she told Kenneth later. ‘Time to come to terms with it all before they’re sent back over there.’

  Sometimes just spending time with the men, playing cards and gently chatting to them, seemed to make a difference.

  ‘Time’s something they don’t have,’ Kenneth told her.

  The army needed the soldiers back out at the front as soon as possible.

  ‘Most of them are just boys …’ Amelia said.

  All the men at the hospital needed gentle care and attention, but Amelia was particularly worried about one young soldier called Charlie. Charlie showed no hint that he was listening to any of Amelia’s suggestions about which card he should play. He hadn’t seemed to have heard anything anyone had said since he’d arrived in the ward and just stared into space, lost in his own world. Charlie looked so young to Amelia, apart from his eyes. His eyes were old – they’d seen too much – and when she looked into them she saw such pain. She couldn’t bear to think of him having to go back to war.

  ‘That’s quite a hand you’ve got there, Charlie,’ she said to the dazed-looking soldier. ‘I don’t know if I can beat you with a hand as good as that.’

  She forced a smile on her face and kept her voice light as if she were engrossed in the game and didn’t sigh when the cards slipped from Charlie’s fingers on to the bed.

  If only he’d try just a little bit. But maybe cards weren’t the therapy Charlie needed. Amelia bit her bottom lip as she picked the cards up and put them back in his hand.

  She was so sure having pets at the hospital would make a difference that when the doctor in charge of the ward made his rounds she decided to ask him if it might be possible, rather than trying to talk to her matron again.

  ‘Doctor, I fear if we don’t do something to help this soldier …’

  ‘Yes, nurse?’

  ‘It’s just he’s so very low. He doesn’t seem to believe he deserves to get better. If only we could give him some hope.’

  ‘And how do you expect us to do that? He’s not the only one who’s seen things no one should have to see, you know,’ the doctor said sternly.

  Amelia nodded. It had been made perfectly clear to her every day she came to work that the men and boys who’d been sent to war and come here were not just wounded physically. The mental scars remained far longer. No one could ever be sure if they would ever go away.

  Amelia told him about her idea to bring pets into the hospital.

  ‘I’ll consider it,’ he said, which Amelia sincerely hoped meant she was a step closer to what she was sure could only be a good thing for both the pets and the wounded men.

  Chapter 24

  ‘Yeeuk!’ Oliver shouted in horror when he saw a partially eaten rat on his kitbag. Mouser’s way of showing Oliver how pleased she was to have found him was to bring him a ‘gift’ and leave it on his kitbag or blanket. He’d much prefer no gifts from the cat. It had been nearly bad enough to turn him off his breakfast, but not quite.

  Sammy and Mouser bounced over to see what was on offer.

  ‘It’s Maconochie stew again, I’m afraid,’ Oliver told them. ‘This one’s made from sliced turnips, carrots and potatoes, so I’m not sure you’re going to like it that much, Mouser.’

  ‘If you’re lucky, you might find a stinging nettle,’ added Patrick, pulling out a suspicious-looking bit of green leaf. ‘I heard the cook put them in to bulk it out.’

  ‘It’s not so bad once it’s heated up,’ Oliver said as Mouser and Sammy sniffed at the stew.

  Mouser was much fussier when it came to food. She preferred the little bits of meat from the stew to be given to her separately rather than having to find them among the vegetables. But then she wasn’t ever really hungry due to the many large and readily available rats that she caught each day.

  Sammy didn’t seem to mind the army food at all, even when it was cold, and quickly gobbled up what Oliver had given him, licking the tin plate clean. Oliver had to stop the other soldiers from giving Sammy extra from their rations.

  ‘He’s only a little dog and just because he’ll eat it doesn’t mean he should,’ Oliver said. But it was hard for the Battersea Beasts not to feed Sammy when he looked up at them with his big brown eyes, and virtually impossible when he put out a paw.

  ‘He looks hungry …’

  ‘Just a little won’t hurt.’

  ‘He won’t be able to run if his stomach is touching the ground and he’s going to have a very important job to do if the rumours of gas attacks turn out to be real,’

  Oliver had said enough, and everyone promised they wouldn’t feed Sammy any more, however much the little dog tried to persuade them to do so. More gas gongs had been placed along their section of trench. The empty shell casings would be hit and make a clanging sound to warn everyone – if there was time. There hadn’t been any gas attacks along their stretch of trench yet, but everyone was worried about them and they wanted Sammy to be able to do his job.

  Sammy was so good at being a messenger dog, in fact, that he was much better than Oliver. A small, determined dog could easily slip down the often clogged communication trenches much faster than a man could. It was hard for Oliver to pass soldiers going the other way along the trench and still keep up a running pace. But it wasn’t hard for Sammy. He raced past them, often yapping as he ran towards the men, and they always made space for him to pass through.

  It was the same when the food cart was blocking the trench. This could be a problem for Oliver, but not for Sammy who simply ran underneath it, barely breaking step.

  Lieutenant Morris had been as good as his word and, when he’d left to take up his new role at the final section of their trench, he’d left his shortbread biscuits behind for the little dog.

  Sammy raced into HQ with his messages in his tin and always found a biscuit and someone to make a fuss of him waiting. Oliver only put the tin on him when he was to take a message, so Sammy knew what was expected of him.

  ‘You’re a good dog, you are,’ Corporal Bates told Sammy as Sammy crunched up the biscuit, drank some water, sat down and panted for a few minutes while a new message was written and put in his tin. Then he ran all the way back to find Oliver.

  At first, when Oliver sent Sammy off with a message wearing his special tin, Mouser didn’t want to be left behind and went running with her friend. But once she knew Sammy always came back, and Oliver often spent the time that he was away playing with her, she didn’t try to follow him any more, and soon started travelling off on her own adventures.

  Whichever of the Battersea Beasts was on firing-step duty watched as she ran across no-man’s-land, light as a feather.

  ‘Hello, Mouser, off exploring, are you?’

  ‘Hope you find some tasty rats to eat.’

  When he wasn’t on firing-step duty, Oliver played with Mouser and Sammy. Sammy couldn’t play football when they were
in the trenches, even though they now had a football, because there wasn’t enough room. But Oliver did roll the ball down the trench for Sammy to run after and Sammy raced after it, wagging his tail and yapping excitedly as the soldiers he ran past smiled.

  As winter drew in, night-times in the trenches became very cold and the attacks on both sides increased.

  Oliver and the rest of the Battersea Beasts saw men who’d been injured in the attacks being carried to the field hospital by the stretcher-bearers under cover of darkness.

  All of them understood that they could be called on to fight at any moment and face the same fate. That night Oliver was glad of the warmth of Mouser and Sammy lying beside him. Christmas was fast approaching and Oliver was grateful he’d have the two animals for company, to distract him from thinking about home and having to go over the top to fight, and worrying about all the talk of gas attacks. Mouser liked to lie with her head nestled under his chin. Sammy lay squeezed in between Oliver and the earth side of the trench. Occasionally a woodlouse or an earthworm would come into view, only to be swiftly swallowed by the dog as a late-night bonus snack.

  Chapter 25

  Mouser liked night-time in the trenches best of all. After sleeping for most of the day, she was wide awake as the soldiers were sent down the communication trench to the rear to bring up food, ammunition and water as well as medical and maintenance equipment.

  The fire step was manned continually throughout the night and day. But each shift was only two hours at night usually, because of the deadly risk to everyone if a soldier fell asleep.

  It was at night-time also that the patrols into no-man’s-land took place.

  ‘Barbed wire needs repairing to the left,’ Sergeant Wainwright told Oliver and Patrick.

  ‘Right, sir.’

  The two friends crept into no-man’s-land with Sammy and Mouser following close behind them.