The face of this man becomes suddenly evil with anger. His thin lips writhe, his nostrils expand, his eyes are fierce.
“We’re not winning the war, sir, we’re losing it.”
I am a little shocked by his fierce candour.
“O, no, Fosdyke, surely not?”
But he is in no mood to respect either places or persons. I realize that the truth is blazing in him with a ferocity that is beyond control. It is not merely that he has been through hell, and been scared by the horror of it. His rage is against the cynical stupidity of the pseudo-supermen who sit upon Olympus.
“I don’t care if all the red hats hear what I say. They are losing the war for us, sir. Send us to fight in a bloody bog against concrete and machine-guns. Do you know what our Div.’s losses were in the last show? Four thousand men or so, and what did we get for it? About an acre of bog-holes.”
He pauses, draws breath through fierce, whistling nostrils, and lets fly again like some furious Hebrew prophet.
“No brains. Just butting like bullocks at a gate. They boast at home of our having guns wheel to wheel, but our ruddy generals are wrecking the British army. Just getting it butchered. All the blood and guts of the country being blown into shell holes. I tell you they are losing the war for us, sir. What about next year? Where will they get the men to fight like the men they have wasted here, and on the Somme? It’s just bloody, brainless butchery.”
I am conscious of a kind of secret and profound dismay, for I feel that I am listening to a man who is inspired beyond fear to utter the truth terribly. I do not doubt what he says. His rage is not hysteria. And suddenly I am aware of his face growing tired and old, and pinched like the face of a corpse.
“Sorry, sir. Afraid I’ve gone off the deep end.”
“Don’t be sorry, Fosdyke. I understand what’s boiling in you. And one’s so helpless.”
Almost his eyes become gentle.
“I’m glad of that, sir. Most officers seem to drug themselves. They’ll neither see nor think. I know Colonel Frost would be glad to see you.”
“How far?”
“Three minutes, sir. I’ll show you.”
“I’m waiting for my C.O. but I think I can manage three minutes.”
I find Frost sitting alone in a steel shelter tucked into the basement of a ruined house. His face shocks me; it looks so grey and old and grave. He does not recognize me for a moment, but when he does he gives me a little, frosty gleam of the eyes. Almost, he strikes me as being beyond smiling.
“Brent! Well I’m damned!”
He makes me sit down and offers me a whisky, but I explain that I have only a few minutes and that I have rushed along just to see him.
“What do you belong to, Stephen?”
“An ambulance of the 81st.”
Frost looks at me sharply.
“Why, you’re relieving us. Are you the forward ambulance?”
“I don’t know, sir, yet.”
“If so you will be here.”
He sniffs, just as he used to do, and taps on the table with the fingers of one hand, a new trick.
“You are coming in to attack?”
“I suppose so, sir. What are the conditions like?”
“O, pretty sticky. I lost two officers, one killed, one wounded. Our bearers had a perfectly bloody time. Eight men to a stretcher sometimes.”
I am aware of an unpleasant, sinking feeling in my stomach. Frost does not let himself go like Fosdyke, but I suspect that he has no illusions.
“Well, if we have to take over from you, sir, I shall see you again. My C.O.’s at Divisional Headquarters. I came with him. I mustn’t keep him waiting.”
Frost gives me a kind look.
“What sort of C.O. Stephen?”
“Oh, a white man, the sort of man you can work for.”
“Good.”
I salute him and smile, though my smile is like crackle ice, and I make my way back along that desolate road to the Menin Gate.
Fairfax appears just as I reach the Ford ambulance. His face is infinitely serious.
“It’s as I thought, Stephen; we are to have the job.”
I try to confront the occasion with a bright face, but my tummy feels down in my boots.
“Well, that’s that, sir.”
But I am thinking of the casualties in Frost’s ambulance: one officer dead, one wounded.
* * *
Two days later. It is raining when Fairfax, Hallard and I go up to the dressing-station on the Menin Road to be shown the posts we are to take over. I can still see Frost buttoning up his raincoat and adjusting his box-respirator as he talks to Fairfax. Frost is taking us round himself; it is the sort of thing he would do.
“I haven’t seen anything of your A.D.M.S., Fairfax.”
“No?”
Frost and Fairfax are liking each other, and as they go on ahead I hear them talking intimately.
“I shouldn’t risk more of your officers than you can help up at the posts. It’s pretty sticky. Does your A.D.M.S. know anything, or does he just adhere to a chair in his own office?”
“Rather adhesive.”
“I wonder what his operation orders will be like? Unless a man goes and looks at things for himself he can land you in no end of a mess. Our man sees everything.”
We come to that salubrious spot called Hell Fire Corner, and take to a duckboard track. It is supposed to be a quiet day, and the desolation is supreme, nothing but wreckage and shell-holes, miles of muddy craters lying lip to lip. Most of them are full of muddy water, and without the wooden track it would be impossible to traverse this infernal country. I see nothing but an expanse of yellow-brown soil that seems to merge into the grey sky. Strange desolation. No human figure is visible, though thousands upon thousands are secreted up yonder in the pock-marked and seamed earth. We four men appear to be the only living creatures in the landscape. The horror of the place seems to eat into one’s bones and belly.
Hallard is ahead of me, and he turns and shows me that sardonic smile.
“Strange sort of place to choose for a battle, old man.”
“Isn’t it a case of, ‘We’re not to ask them why. We’re only damned sheep to do and die’?”
Hallard walks on.
“I suppose all the wounded have to be humped for miles down this wooden tapeworm.”
“I suppose so.”
We see fountains of yellow mud spurting regularly in the near distance. The damned things seem very near the duckboard track, but Frost does not hesitate. He knows the lie of the land. I hear him say that Jerry is searching for one of our batteries. Are there guns up here in this morass, and how the devil did they get them here? We continue. I wish to God the Huns would cease from sending over those plunging shells. They are bursting about a hundred yards from the track, and the great geysers seem to soar fifty feet up into the air. I hear Frost say that the beastly things are pretty harmless, as the burst is smothered by mud, but that if we hear him shout and go flat, we are to flop on our bellies instanter. I get a glimpse of part of the battery, a gun wallowing in a sandbagged shell-hole. Not a man is to be seen. They are all under cover.
We go on and past those damned yellow geysers. I want to duck every time one goes up. We top a low ridge and see more desolation, an expanse of shell-holes, lip to lip. Here and there a grey, box-like structure squats in the mud, captured German pillboxes. We diverge towards one, and a duckboard track leads to it. The place is known as Bourne End, and it is one of our posts. We find one of Frost’s officers, and half a dozen men there. The pillbox has a fearsome crack in it, the result of a direct hit, and from our point of view the door faces the wrong way. It has been protected by a wall of sandbags, but the flimsy barrier is not very reassuring.
The officer is a stranger to me. I notice that his eyes are red, and that he has not shaved for a couple of days.
“Anything doing to-day, Petter?”
“No, very quiet, sir. He put a few gas shells round us af
ter breakfast. Rations came up rather muddy. The carriers fell into a shell-hole.”
We have another post farther on the right, and Frost gets us going again. This second post is even more like a little hell than its predecessor. It lies in a swampy hollow surrounded by dead and mutilated trees, and has the appearance of a huge brick oven, or a vaulted cellar that has been pushed up into the air by an upheaval of the ground. A bank of earth shelters it on the German side. All sorts of debris is littered about, and I notice what appears to be a bloated body half-submerged in one of the squdges of water.
Frost warns us.
“Mind where you step. Two dead Huns are buried in front of the door. I put my foot in one’s belly the last time I was up here.”
The officer here is also a stranger to me, a mild-faced, frightened little man in spectacles, whose breeches are caked with mud. But he beams upon us; we are God’s messengers heralding a relief. He points out to us a narrow, muddy track that once was a road, and tells us that our bearers who collect from the right-hand aid-post on this sector, use that track. This post is known as “The Bakery.”
We turn back, with the little man in spectacles still beaming on us, and I hear Frost say to Fairfax, “Looks rather like a frightened fœtus, doesn’t he? But he is a great little man in a sticky corner.”
* * *
The Menin Road dressing-station is ours. Our Division has taken over the Lancashire line on a brigade front. One of our other brigades is to attack on the third day; the remaining brigade is to go through and exploit a successful advance.
September’s fine spell has passed. The weather is filthy. What a life it must be for the infantry, lying out in shell-holes!
Cleek has come in to interview Fairfax. I happen to be dressing some wounded, and I can hear their voices in the orderly-room, which is next door. I hear Cleek say, “You have been over your ground, Fairfax? Good. I want experienced officers in charge of the collecting posts. I shall assign you advanced posts for use when the line goes forward.” He sounds very throaty and pompous, like a man issuing decretals, and who would regard any question as an impertinence.
“You will get my operation orders to-night. Of course you will go over the ground again with your officers before zero hour.”
When Cleek has departed Fairfax calls me out into the road. He is looking fierce.
“Do you know what we are up against, Stephen?”
“What, sir?”
“Neither Cleek nor Bliss has been over the ground. He is going to issue orders from a chair. It’s absolutely damnable.”
“It doesn’t seem possible, sir.”
“But that’s the situation. I am to be responsible. One more point. I am to send two of my most experienced officers up. I shall send Gibbs and either you or Hallard. I want you and Hallard to toss or cut cards for it.”
“Very good, sir.”
“That’s fair to both of you.”
“It couldn’t be fairer, sir. Shall I tell Hallard, or will you?”
“Oh, I’ll tell him.”
Hallard and I tempt our fortune after tea. Gibbs holds the cards, and it is agreed that we shall each draw one, and that he who draws the lower of the two shall go up to the collecting post. Hallard draws first. His card is the nine of clubs and he lays it on the mess table. It is rather damnable that one should be in competition with one’s friend, but for the moment the self in me is dominant. I draw a card, turn it over, and display the Queen of Hearts.
I see Hallard’s eyes half close. Then he looks straight at me across the table and smiles.
“The lady fancies you, Steevie. Good luck.”
I am conscious of a spasm of shame.
“No, I’ll take it on, old man. You have more to think of than I have.”
“Rats! You’ll do nothing of the sort. Nothing could be fairer.”
Cleek’s operation orders have come in. Fairfax brings them into the mess, and spreads the typed sheets on the table. He begins to read them over to himself, and I see his eyes grow big and his forehead run into creases.
“Good God!”
We sit and wait upon his words.
“He has given us map references for the advanced collecting posts.”
“Map references!”
“Incredible but true. Map references in a sea of shell-holes.”
We sit and look at each other. We have to relieve Frost’s officers and men at Bourne End and the Bakery to-morrow. Fairfax is profoundly and obviously worried.
“I wonder if I ought to protest? But going to headquarters above one’s senior—— No, I suppose it can’t be done.”
Hallard makes the obvious suggestion.
“Hadn’t we better go and scout around for Cleek’s map references, and see what sort of blind man’s hole he has pricked on the map?”
Fairfax agrees. After all, one must be sure of one’s ground before registering any protest.
“We’ll go up at dawn to-morrow and reconnoitre. You had better come with me, Hallard, and you, Gibbs.”
I ask to join them.
“Isn’t it just as well I should know the ground, in case——?”
Fairfax nods at me, and goes on reading the operation orders.
“Two officers of the 203 F.A. are to reinforce us at headquarters with bearer sections. Wait a moment. Well, I’m damned. Cleek has disposed of one more bearer section than we possess.”
He pushes the papers across to me, and after reading the orders carefully I see that it is so.
“Incredible carelessness.”
“Shall you notify him, sir?”
Fairfax looks grim.
“No; we’ll keep that up our sleeves. I’ll use one of the 203 Section’s. Let somebody stew.”
We go up before dawn next morning with the sergeants who will be in charge of the bearers. Our party is rather a large one, and we string ourselves out, Fairfax and Hallard leading. The morning is strangely still, and a slight drizzle is falling. Our first quest is for Cleek’s map reference in advance of Bourne End. We find ourselves stodging about between immense shell-holes, and realize that Cleek’s advanced post is nothing but an imaginary point in a wilderness of mud and water.
We get down into a more or less dry shell-hole, and confer. I remark that we shall have to be in touch with the M.O.s of the battalions in the line, and that we might ignore Cleek’s references, and if there is an advance, take over the aid-posts as collecting stations. Fairfax jumps at the idea.
“That’s a brain-wave, Stephen. It will solve the whole problem. Our bearers will have some idea where the new posts are, and so will the battalion bearers. Come on, while peace reigns.”
We stodge about through this desolation, getting muddied up to the knees. We are somewhat unsure of the position of our lines, and no enterprising soul is taking a country walk as we are. Hallard slips half into a shell-hole and curses. I suppose we are making too much noise, and also bunching up together, for a head in a tin hat pops up out of the ground.
“What the hell do you think you are doing here? You’ll be spotted, and we shall get the consequences. And who the hell are you, anyway?”
Fairfax laughs and explains.
“We are looking for the battalion aid-post on the left of this sector.”
“This is it.”
We wade forward and descend into two large shell-holes that have been joined together and partly roofed with ground-sheets. The M.O. apologizes when he sees Fairfax’s badges.
“Sorry, sir.”
But he is able to help us considerably. He is an old hand, and when we explain the problem he approves of my solution, and points out a narrow track which his bearers have used and marked with discarded rifles stuck butts upward in the mud. We thank him, and hurry back to Bourne End, and making our way to the Bakery, get Frost’s officer, who has not yet been relieved, to give us a guide to the other aid-post. He comes with us himself, and guides us to the second post which is a shallow recess dug into a bank and roofed on one side wi
th rubber sheets.
I am appalled at the idea of having to deal with wounded in such a mud-hole, but we realize that our one aim must be to get the wounded back out of this morass to some place where they can be properly dressed. But we have seen the ground and made our plans, and eliminated Cleek’s map references. Also, Frost’s man warns us that this peaceful interlude will not last, and that if we are wise we shall leg it homewards for all we are worth.
We do so. We are all of us hot and sweating after stodging and floundering about among the shell-holes, and when we reach the duckboard track we do not dally, but we are fated to sweat more furiously and poignantly before we escape from this devil’s country. Fritz elects to shell the duckboard track, and for half an hour we have to abandon it and take refuge in shell-holes. My shirt seems to be sticking to my back, and my knees are all mud. Sweat is running down from under my tin hat, and my heart is thumping like a hammer. Hallard and I are together, and I see he has a mud splash on one cheek.
“Nice morning walk, Stephen.”
He shows his teeth in a smile that is like a snarl.
“Rum idea, isn’t it, civilization coming to this.”
“Well, we are all in it up to the neck.”
“By God, I wish we had old Cleek here.”
The shelling dies away, and we emerge like rabbits and leg it down the track. Sections of it have been blown away, and we have to slither round the ruins of shell-holes. I fall back and walk with Sergeant Simpson, who looks pretty done. He is an oldish man for this game, and rather short in the neck.
“I could do with a bath and some breakfast, Simpson.”
I see that he is almost too distressed to answer me, but we are close to the road now, and our morning’s agony is nearly over, but I am thinking of the men who will have to carry other men, perhaps at night, across this damnable morass. It has been done before and will be done again; but, truly, man—plain man—is a marvellous creature.
XVII
Looking back upon the happenings of the last few days I am moved to set them down in the simplest of language, for such language alone, like a few broken words spoken over a grave, can draw the breath of sincerity. We want neither the parson nor the poet here. The conscious cleverness of the professional scribbler would be an impertinence, and disgust one.
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