Through the Wheat

by Thomas Boyd

  It was felt certain that this time there would be an attack by the Germans to regain the woods from which they had been driven. The men were working the bolts of their rifles, or trying to check the tears that flowed from their eyes, inflamed by the heavy smoke. But while they were making ready to stand off the attack the company commander sent a runner to Lieutenant Bedford, telling him that the platoon would be relieved for the night by other men, and that they were to return farther back in the woods and rest in case there was no attack.

  Gasping and choking, the platoon made its way out of the ravine and up the hill. Exhausted, they dropped into the holes, slightly deeper than their own, that the relieving men had occupied. The captain, with his orderly and his runners in holes around him, was lying back on the ground, peacefully smoking a cigarette.

  But the attack which the officers had anticipated failed to be made. The sun withdrew from the scene and a pale gold moon took its place, stars peeped out like eyes, and the air became thin and chilly. The men were beginning to feel that they were to enjoy a night’s sleep.

  Far off a faint whining began. Nearer and nearer it came, growing louder and awe-inspiring. It was as if some high priest of the elements were working himself into a frenzy before hurling an incantation at his supplicants. It grew to a snarl, a bitter snarl full of hate, and it seemed as if the high priest had bared his teeth, which were long, narrow, and sharply pointed. The tree limbs bowed in fright, and against the dull-blue sky the leaves turned under, curling themselves up. Like a hurricane the shells descended, and with terrific noise they threw out splashes of reds and yellows, in the light of which the trees seemed to cringe.

  “We’re in for it,” thought Hicks, trying to co-ordinate his jangling nerves. He sought more closely to press his body against the clayey side of his burrow. Sharply and frighteningly another salvo of shells struck and burst in the little patch of woods. Hicks bit at the leather strap of his helmet. The tree limbs crackled and falling branches fell hesitatingly through the foliage to the ground. Other shells burst. “Oh, my God, I’m hit!” some one cried. And before he had ended his words another group of shells pounded over. Hicks’s spine felt bare with scorpions parading along the flesh. “I won’t get killed. I can’t get killed. I’ve got too much to live for,” he thought, as the bursting shells continued and pieces of their steel casing ripped past and viciously over him. “Oh, God, don’t let me die.” The shells mocked him. “Shall I pray? What shall I say? Oh, it wouldn’t do any good!” But he formulated an incoherent prayer between interruptions of his fancying that among the trees was a huge black animal with fiery eyes and hoofs of brimstone that were kicking and prancing all over the woods. The animal’s head was above the trees, and it snapped at their limbs with its long, punishing jaws. Hicks felt as if his eyes would pop from his head and that his temples would split. The animal’s hoofs kicked nearer him, and he closed his eyes and twisted his neck in fear. Red, purple, white lights danced before his eyes. He turned round to face the monster, forcing a grin over his stiff face. Then he began to cry and then . . . blackness, all was blackness.

  The morning sun sent wavering rays through the boughs of the trees, and exposed the white stumps whose tops had been blown to the earth by exploding shells. Tree limbs, with ghastly butts, lay dead-still on the thick, calm grass. Steel helmets, spattered with blood, were now and then encountered on the ground. On the space where the captain had been lying there was a blood-soaked shoe and a helmet, turned bottom up, and neatly holding a mess of brains. Near by lay a gas-mask which would never again be used. And near it the sleeve of a coat.

  Hicks awakened and cautiously sat up, his head peeping over the top of his burrow. Close enough to be touched a body, the legs spread wide, the chin raised high, and the chest slightly puffed, offered its belly to the sun. Hicks stiffly got out and looked at the body. “By God, they did come close all right,” he breathed.

  Hicks walked over to the helmet. Like an inexperienced surgeon prodding a wound, he touched at the helmet, finally discovering on the leather cover of the padding the initials “W. O. P.” As he straightened he felt a deep pity, a great sorrow. “I used to cuss him a lot and he was an awful bonehead, but he was a pretty good fellow.”

  Weighted down by two large food containers, four men made their way, stumbling and cursing, into the patch of woods. Seeing no one but Hicks, one angrily called: “Hey, you guys, don’t you want no chow?”

  Out of nowhere a group of perhaps twenty-five men gathered around the pails of food.

  “All right, you guys, snap it up. We can’t wait here all day. Quit fingerin’ your noses and grab your mess kits.”

  Another man, resting from carrying the heavy stuff, started forth:

  “Oh, the infantry and the cavalry

  And the dirty engineers,

  They couldn’t lick the leathernecks

  In a hundred thousand years.”

  Pugh looked at him sourly. “You all wouldn’t be singin’ that if you’d been wi’ us las’ night. You musta been hidin’ in some dugout eatin’ up our rations.”

  “Who?” The man broke off, indignant.

  “Who? Who?” said Pugh. “Your feet don’t fit no limb.”

  “Who do you mean?”—incensed.

  “Oh, gwahn.”

  With their canteen cups the men dipped eagerly into the thick, brown, greasy fluid.

  “God, an’ it’s hot, too.”

  But for the most part they were silent. One man tasted of the concoction in the other receptacle. He began to retch horribly.

  Usually, the early afternoon was the period of the day’s recreation for the men in the ravine, an hour more favorable to their personal pursuits. Between the time when an attack might be expected and the diurnal four-o’clock German bombardment, the moment gave the platoon a chance once more to assume their normal existence. At such a time the guardians of the ravine would emerge from their burrows and, under the shade of an overhanging tree, try to recollect their thoughts.

  It was now such a time, and Sergeant Harriman was sitting cross-legged in the ravine, assaulting with the point of his bayonet a can of Argentina beef. Events of late had left him shaken. He had entered the trenches with a handicap; he believed that he was a crusader reincarnate, engaged in the holy service of saving religion, morality, purity, and civilization from the barbaric hand of that nation whose people he referred to as Huns. He had enlisted because he was of draft age and would be unqualified to dodge the call of Congress, requesting him to join the selected army of the United States of America. Had he possessed a widowed mother, or a wife and child, he would as gladly have fought the Hun from an office desk in Kenosha.

  He had pierced the cover of the foul beef when a messenger from battalion headquarters parted the trees near Harriman and dropped in the ravine. Seeing Harriman, he spoke:

  “Is this the Third Platoon?”

  “It is, you know.” Harriman had picked up the postscript to his sentence from a man of many enlistments and whom he tried in many ways to emulate.

  “You one of the non-coms?”

  “Yes,” Harriman answered pleasantly.

  “Well.” The messenger reached in the leather saddle-bag suspended from his shoulders. “Got some mail for the Third Platoon. You take it?”

  “Bet I will.” Harriman fairly grabbed at the package of letters, so eager he was to see if it contained one for him. Yes, there it was. The one he had expected, waited for these many days.

  “Gillespie!” he called. “Gillespie, do you want to give out the mail?”

  Gillespie hurried forward, got the package, and ran to the middle of the ravine, calling: “Mailo, mailo, Third Platoon.”

  The envelope which Harriman fondly and carefully opened was different from the other letters in the package. On it the stamp had been glued at an angle which, to many young men and women, meant “I love you.” T
he stationery was lavender and a reminiscent odor of sachet was on it. The writing was cramped and affectedly schoolgirlish. Harriman unfolded the sheet of lavender paper.

  “Dear Carl,” it began. “You poor dear boy!! How you must be suffering over there in those horrid trenches. And how BRAVE of you to be so joking about it. But WE know how badly the conditions really are. The papers keep reporting the FRIGHTFULNESS of those Huns, and I pray each night that you won’t be taken prisoner and be treated as some of our poor boys have been treated. The other day Mrs. Wilwerscheid told mama the most AWFUL story of what the Huns were doing to our prisoner boys. Oh, Carl, it was so awful that I cannot repeat it. I ought not to even THINK of it. But we know that our Carl is too brave to let HIMSELF be taken prisoner.

  “Four of your letters came today and it set me wondering where you are. Are you, by any chance, at Chateau Therry? They say there are a great many of our American boys there. I sent you a box two weeks ago. I wonder if you got it. I put in a helmet that I had knitted ESPECIALLY for you, and six big bars of chocolate. You must have PLENTY of cigarettes. Both Helene Mason and I have subscribed to OODLES of soldiers’ tobacco funds. You know, you pay a quarter and get a box of cigarettes and tobacco. You can write whosever name on it that you want to and it will be sent to him. So of course I made Helene write yours. I know that you used to not smoke cigarettes, but the papers say that now that all the boys over there are smoking them and of course you would be doing what the rest of the boys are. Remember, I didn’t use to like to see boys smoke. But I am willing to sacrifice a mere prejudice for so great a cause as you boys are fighting for. And then Rector Tyson, of the First M. E., said from the pulpit the other Sunday that he thought it was all right for the boys over there to smoke. He is so broad-minded!

  “Carl dear, this war will never end. You have been over there so long. Almost a year, and mama keeps talking about John Ryder (he has a big farm now and is raising the food that the government most needs), and saying that Carl will never come back. Would you forgive me if I did, Carl? I mean, became Mrs. John R. Ryder? You better hurry or I will.

  Your loving

  ELLEN.

  “P.S. The papers say that we must call you Sammies now. Are you my little Sammy?”

  Hope was burned to a white crisp in his intense disappointment. It left him feeling cold and as if a large hole had been burned in his side. His eyes were blinded and weak as if by a sudden glare. “Oh, damn. Oh, damn.” He crushed the letter in the palm of his hand, making it a paper wad. Feverishly he unfolded the letter, spreading out the wrinkles. Ellen danced before him, a fiend with golden hair, an angel who had a forked tongue. She didn’t care, she never cared. But she did, a voice informed him, rationalizing his experiences with her, the words she had spoken to him. She must still care. There was hope. If only he could get back, could see her, could talk to her. . . . But that was ridiculous. He would stay there with the platoon until he was killed, or, by a piece of luck, wounded. He looked at the combat-packs whose owners never would wear them again, at the pierced helmets and the blood-stained gas-masks. Pieces of equipment were scattered over the ground alongside the small, pitiful holes which had been dug for safety. The tall, straight trees grew thicker in the distance. Their shadows invited him. The grass acted as a continual spring-board, pushing his body forward into the thicket. On he walked, a smile, half of gladness, half of bewilderment, turning up the corners of his mouth.

  At last, out of sight of every one, in the thickest of the woods, he sat upon a small hill and regarded his misshapen, hobnailed shoe. It held a curious fascination for him. Yes, the little bump was where the small toe curled. But none of his other toes reached to the end of the shoe, he reflected. What nice leather. A shame to spoil such leather as that. Yes, a shame, and besides. . . . From his pack he drew a small, round can of Argentina beef, which he balanced between his instep and the toe of his shoe. No harm in spoiling that! He wiggled his toes around in the shoe and felt squeamish. His hand felt for his pistol at his side. Yes, there it was and nicely oiled. He drew the pistol from the holster and aimed it at the small blue can. Forty-five-caliber pistols kicked up in the air when they were fired, he remembered. He aimed it a bit lower—and bang. For a moment he felt nothing. The grin was still on his face. Then his look changed to one of consternation. Better go back and report to the platoon. He rose to his feet, took a few steps, and fell to the ground. By heavens, this was no joke, shooting yourself in the foot. This was serious business. Hospital and everything. Then he remembered that he had done it himself. It was probably the first time that he had really known it. Court martial and disgrace. And he had only meant to get back home. He began to whimper.

  Lieutenant Bedford, his skin the color of sun-bleached ash, walked among the men, a beaten Napoleon. A patch of black, ragged beard, his heavy, bristling mustache, his dull brown eyes that seemed to pain, made him appear more dead than alive as he loped along. The men remained lying on the ground, recognizing his approach by a speculative glance. Their faces were interestingly similar. A dull gray pallor overspread them all. Their eyes were leaden, expressionless, save for a kind of apathetic fear of the inevitable. Each lower jaw hung at the same depressed angle. Lieutenant Bedford sat down as if it were his final act.

  “Any of you men feel like doing any work?” There was no answer. Lieutenant Bedford spoke again. “I got to have a work detail. These fellows must be buried. Are there any volunteers?” After a short silence some one asked weakly: “Where is that damned grave-digger battalion? What are they for?”

  “Yes, where are they? I didn’t come in this man’s army to dig graves.”

  Lieutenant Bedford tried to appear indignant. “How the hell do you expect the grave-diggers to be here when the artillery haven’t even got up here yet? Nope, we’ve got to bury them, that’s all. Besides, they’re our dead. They’ll be stinkin’ like hell by to-night if we don’t bury ’em,” he encouraged. “Harriman,” he went on in a sort of drone, “pick out a burial detail and have the men work in reliefs.” There was no “yes, sir” forthcoming. The men looked at each other and then at Lieutenant Bedford. “Harriman ain’t here.”

  “Did he get knocked off, too.” Lieutenant Bedford asked.

  “Naw, he was around here this morning.”

  “Does anybody know what happened to him? Where’d he go?”

  No one knew.

  “Well, if he’s gone, he’s gone.” Lieutenant Bedford grew decisive. “Lepere, you take charge. You don’t need to bury ’em so deep. They’ll have to be dug up again, anyway.”

  Lepere showed surprising signs of life. “All right, men.” His accents became almost crisp. “Hicks, Pugh, Bullis, Hartman, Kruger.” He pointed his finger impressively as he named off eight men.

  Sullen, they rose and stood around hesitatingly, asking: “Where are the shovels? Do you expect us to dig holes with our hands?” Bullis was weak and exasperated.

  Lepere had become a dynamo. He radiated energy. “You’ll find plenty of shovels right down by where Captain Powers was killed. Follow me.” The men trailed off in a group.

  They set to work laboriously. Soon the first hole had reached a depth so that the bodies would not be too near the surface when the dirt was thrown back in place. On a bloody stretcher a mutilated body was carried to the freshly dug hole and rolled over upon a blanket.

  “All right there, Pugh. Grab hold.” Lepere was peremptory.

  “Lepeah, Ah can’t. I’d throw up my guts. You call me when you’re ready to dig the next hole.” Pugh walked away.

  “Come back here, Pugh. I’ll report you for insubordination.”

  “Ah doan cah wot yo do. Go to hell.”

  While Lepere had been talking the body had been lifted into the hole and the first shovelful of dirt had been thrown over it.

  “Say, wait a minute. Stop that. We’ve got to git his dog-tag off.”

  Lepere s
tooped over the body and fumbled at the dirty collar. “Gimme a knife.” He snipped one of the identification disks from the greasy string. Stuffing it in his pocket, he drew back and ordered: “Now go ahead.”

  The business was continued silently. Bodies were carried to the clearing marked off for the temporary burial-place, rolled in a blanket, and dropped into shallow holes. Before they were dumped into their temporary graves their pockets were searched and the contents placed in little piles on the ground. Some of the bodies were unrecognizable, although the men at work had seen them and talked with them the day before. One or two of the bodies looked as if life had fled them peacefully. The uniforms were unspotted with blood, the faces were calm. But some of the faces were distorted. The lips rose from the teeth and made them look like fangs. One body, on which the skin looked like liver, had been struck lifeless a few days earlier. It stunk terrifically, and when Lepere’s hands sought out the neck for the identification tag, his fingers sank into the flesh. But he went stolidly on about his work. Hicks turned his body and engaged in a paroxysm of gagging. He turned again, his face the color of a piece of paper. The work went on.

  The late afternoon sun shone upon a group of mounds of fresh-dug dirt. Each mound was marked by two rough sticks, made to form a cross, at the juncture of which a small aluminum disk bearing a number was fastened. A few yards away men were eating cold beef, cold boiled potatoes, and drinking lukewarm coffee from their muddy canteen cups.