misremember 'is name--you know, that bloke what got into trouble at the
ole farm for giving a cow a tin o' bully beef, and the cow died next
day. I was in 'is trench with a machine gun when 'e got 'is little bit.
A chunk out of an 'and grenade 'it 'im in the thigh, and 'e laughed like
'ell becos 'e'd got a 'cushy' wound. Why, 'e even said as 'ow 'e could
walk down to the dressing station, and we envied 'im like 'ell and
thought it was only a flesh wound. I got 'it the next day and went to
the same 'orspital where 'e was. 'E'd 'ad 'is thigh bone smashed all to
bits, and they'd jest taken 'is leg off when I saw 'im. 'E was weak as a
kid and chirpy as a sparrer, and only cursin' becos 'e was out of things
for the rest of the war. I never 'eard what 'appened to 'im, but the
nurse told me as 'ow they was afraid 'e wouldn't recover becos of
emmyridge, or something with a name like that. And 'e wasn't more nor
twenty-one years old neither, pore bloke."
"But you won't beat the Medical Orficer anywhere," said Jones, one of
the stretcher-bearers who was on duty in the trenches. "'E don't 'ave to
fight, but you should see 'im when things is busy up 'ere. Coat off an'
sleeves up, workin' for 'ours on end till any man what wasn't an 'orse
would drop dead. 'E's 'ard on the shirkers and scrimshankers--e's the
sort of bloke what would give you a dose o' castor oil for earache or
frost-bitten feet, but 'e's like a mother with the wounded. I've seen
'im, too, goin' along the cutting when the whizz-bangs was burstin' all
the way down it, carryin' some wounded fellow in 'is arms as calmly as
if 'e were an ole girl carryin' a parcel along Regent Street. And then,"
said Jones, as he named the greatest point in the M.O.'s favour, "'e's
the best forward on a wet day as ever I seed."
Just at that moment a voice sounded from farther up the trench.
"Simpson," it said, "where the deuce is my toothbrush?"
"Jest comin', sir. I've got 'un," answered "Pongo" Simpson as he
produced a greasy-looking toothbrush from his pocket. "'Ere, give us
that canteen of 'ot water," he said quietly, "I used 'is toothbrush to
grease 'is boots with yesterday--didn't think 'e'd miss it, for you
don't come out 'ere to wash your teeth. They 'ave got funny ways, these
'ere orficers. 'Owever," he continued as he wiped the brush dry on the
sleeve of his tunic, "what the eye don't see, the 'eart don't grieve
over. 'E'll only think as 'ow it's the water what's greasy."
"Simpson," came the voice from farther along the trench, a moment or so
later, "this is the greasiest water I've ever tasted. What the deuce
you've done to it I don't know."
XX
THE HAND OF SHADOW
"Come in," said Margery Debenham, as she opened her eyes lazily to the
sunlight. "Put my tea on the table, please, Mary. I'm too sleepy to
drink it yet.
"There's a letter from the front, miss," said Mary with emphasis, as she
went out of the room.
Margery was awake in a second. She jumped out of bed, slipped on a
dressing-gown, and, letter in hand, ran over to the window to read it in
the morning sunshine. As she tore open the envelope and found only a
small sheet of paper inside, she made a little _moue_ of disappointment,
but the first words of the letter changed it into a sigh of joy. It was
dated September 13th and ran:
"MY DARLING,
"At last I have got my leave, and am coming home to be married. Our
months of waiting are over. I leave here to-morrow afternoon, shall
spend the night on the way somewhere, and shall arrive in London late
on the 15th, or during the morning of the 16th. I must spend the day in
town to do a little shopping (I couldn't be seen at my own wedding very
well in the clothes I have on now) and expect to get down to Silton at
3.20 on the 17th. I have to be back in this hole on the 24th, so that if
we get married on Saturday we shall have quite a nice little honeymoon.
Darling little one! Isn't it too good to be true? I can hardly realise
that within a week I shall be
"Your devoted and hen-pecked husband
RONALD."
"P.S.--I have written to father, and he will make all arrangements for
Saturday.
"P.P.S.--Shall I be allowed to smoke in the drawing-room?"
* * * * *
Margery Debenham leant out of the window and gazed at the garden and the
orchard beyond. The light flickered through the trees of the old flagged
path along which she and Ronald had so often wandered, and she could
just see the tall grass waving down at the bottom of the orchard, where
they used to sit and discuss the future. Everything reminded her of her
lover who was coming back to her, who would be with her again to-morrow
afternoon. At the thought of the five long, weary months of waiting that
were passed, and of the eight days of happiness that were coming, two
little tears crept out of her eyes and down her cheeks. She brushed them
impatiently away, for she was too busy to cry. She must run and tell her
parents; she must hurry over to talk to Ronald's father; she must write
to her friends; she must run down to the bottom of the orchard and watch
for a while the trout that lay in the little stream; she must laugh and
sing until the whole village of Silton knew that her waiting was over,
and that Ronald was in England again.
* * * * *
Captain Ronald Carr hoisted his pack on his shoulder, and turned to
three officers who were looking at him enviously. "Cheer oh, you
fellows," he said, "think of me in two days' time, while you are being
'strafed' by the Hun, rushing about town in a taxi," and, with a wave of
his hand, he marched off to battalion headquarters, followed by Butler,
his servant. From battalion headquarters he had a distance of two miles
to walk to the cross roads where he was to meet his groom with his
horse, but the day was hot and progress was rather slow. His first
quarter of a mile was along a narrow and winding communicating trench;
after that the way was along a hidden road, but huge shell craters all
along told that the German artillery had it well marked.
Away to the right a bombardment was in progress, and the dull thuds of
the guns came sleepily through the September haze; above him, a skylark
sang lustily; the long grass by the roadside smelt sweet and lush. As
Ronald Carr strode down the road, he laughed to himself at the fairness
of the world.
Of a sudden, a shell burst over some trees a few hundred yards away,
and, as the white smoke rolled away, he felt aware of a change.
Supposing he were to get wounded on the way down! With the next warning
whine of a coming shell he found himself ducking as never before, for
Captain Carr was not a man who often crouched for nothing.
Another shell came, and another, and with each his feeling grew. Just so
must a mouse feel, he thought, when a cat plays with it. He felt as
though he were at the mercy of an enormous giant, and that, each time he
thought to escape, the shadow of a huge hand fell on the ground around
him, and he knew that the hand above was waiting to crush him. At the
thought, the hair on his forehead grew damp; time after time he checked
his mad impulse to quicken his pace, and caught himself glancing
covertly at his servant to see if he noticed his captain's strange
behaviour. Suppose the hand should crush him before he could get back to
England, to his home, to his marriage!
Suddenly there were four short, loud hisses, and four shells burst along
the road close in front of them.
"They're searching the road. Quick, into the ditch," shouted Carr to
his servant, as he jumped into an old trench that ran along the
roadside. Butler turned to do the same, slipped on the _pave_, and fell
heavily, his ankle badly sprained. Those hateful hisses would come again
before the man could crawl into safety, and this time they would
probably be nearer, and escape almost miraculous. Captain Carr leaped
out of the trench again and helped his servant to his feet.
"Cling on to me, man!" and, a moment after, he shouted, "down, here they
come again!" and they flung themselves on their faces scarce two feet
from the ditch and probable safety.
When Butler raised his head again after the four explosions, Captain
Ronald Carr lay at his side, dead. The hand had grasped its prey.
* * * * *
Margery Debenham was standing in front of her mirror, getting ready to
go to meet Ronald by the 3.20 train, when Mr. Carr came to announce the
receipt of the War Office telegram.
She could find no tears when she heard the news; she felt stunned, and
vaguely bored by the platitudes of consolation people uttered. When she
could escape, she went slowly down the flagged path, where they used to
walk to the orchard, where the future had been planned by two people
full of the happy confidence of the young. She flung herself down in
the long grass by the stream, and buried her hot face in her hands.
"What does it all mean?" she said to herself. Then, a minute later, she
thought of all the other women who had to bear the same pain, and all
for no reason. "There is no God," she cried passionately. "No one can
help me, for there is no God." Day after day, night after night of
waiting, and all for nothing. All those hours of agony, when the papers
talked of "diversions" on the British front, rewarded by the supreme
agony, by the sudden loss of all hope. No more need to hunt for a loved
but dreaded name through the casualty lists every morning; all that was
finished now.
The splash of a jumping trout in the pool under the willow tree took her
thoughts away from her pain for the fraction of a second--just
sufficient time to allow the soothing tears to come.
"O God," she murmured, "help me to see why. Help me, God, help me!" and
she burst into sobs, her face pressed down into the cool, long grass.
XXI
THE VETERAN
Old Jules Lemaire, ex-sergeant in the 3rd regiment of the line, raised
his wine glass.
"Bonne chance," he said, "and may you fight the devils as we did in 1870
and 1871, and with more success too."
"Enough of you and your 1870," said someone roughly. "We go out to win
where you lost; there will be no Woerth or Sedan in this war. We will
drive the Prussians back to Berlin; you let them march to Paris. We are
going to act, whereas you can only talk--you are much too old, you see,
Pere Lemaire."
The ex-sergeant put down his glass with a jerk as though he had been
struck. He looked around on the company that filled the front room of
the Faisan d'Or, and on the faces of the men who had looked up to him
for years as the hero of 1870 he now saw only the keenness to fight. He
was old, forgotten, and no longer respected, and the blow was a hard one
to bear.
The cloud of war was drifting up from the east, and the French Army was
mobilising for the Great War. The peasants of the village had just been
called up, and within half an hour they would be on their way to the
depots of their different regiments, while Jules Lemaire, sergeant of
the line, would be left at home with the cripples and the women and the
children.
"I will serve France as well as any of you," he said defiantly. "I will
find a way." But his voice was unheeded in the general bustle and noise,
and Madame Nolan, the only person who appeared to hear him, sniffed with
contempt.
Men destined for different regiments were saying good-bye to each other;
Georges Simon, the blacksmith, with his arm round his fiancee's waist,
was joking with Madame Nolan, who hurried about behind her little zinc
counter; the door slammed noisily at each departure--and Jules Lemaire
sat unheeded in the corner by the old clock.
And presently, when the front room was quiet and Madame Nolan was using
her dirty apron to wipe away her tears, the ex-sergeant crept out
quietly into the street and hobbled along to his cottage. He reached up
and took his old Chassepot rifle down from the wall where it had hung
these many years, and, while the other inhabitants thronged the road,
cheering, weeping, laughing, Jules Lemaire sat before his little wooden
table, with his rifle in his hands and a pile of cartridges before him.
"There will be a way," he murmured. "I will help my country; there will
be a way."
* * * * *
The grey invaders swept on through the village, and Jules Lemaire, from
his hiding-place on the church tower, watched them come with tears of
impotent rage on his cheeks. Battalion after battalion they passed
by--big, confident Germans who jeered at the peasants, and who sang as
they plodded over the _pave_. Once, when a company was halted beneath
him, while the officers went in to the Faisan d'Or across the road, to
see what they could loot in the way of drinks, the ex-sergeant aimed
carefully at the captain, but he put down his rifle without firing.
At last, late in the afternoon when the dusk was beginning to hide the
southern hills, Jules Lemaire's waiting came to an end. A large motor
car drew up outside the inn, and a general with three officers of his
staff got out into the road. One of the officers spread a map on the old
door bench--where Jules Lemaire had so often sat of an evening and told
of his adventures in the war--and, while an orderly went to procure wine
for them, the four Germans bent over the plan of the country they
thought to conquer.
Suddenly a shot rang out from the church tower above them. The general
fell forward on to the bench, while his blood and his wine mingled in a
staining stream that ran across the map of invincible France, and
dripped down on to the dust below.
* * * * *
They met Jules Lemaire coming down the spiral steps of the church tower,
his rifle still in his hand. They hit him with their rifle butts, they
tied him up with part of the bell rope, and propped him up against the
church wall.
Just before they fired, Jules Lemaire caught sight of Madame Nolan, who
stood, terrified and weeping, at the doorway of the inn.
"You see," he shouted to her, "I also, I have helped my country. I was
not too old after all."
And he died with a smile on his face.
XXII
THE SING-SONG
As soon as the battalion marches back from the trenches to the village
in the first light of the morning, everyone turns his mind to methods
which will help the few days of rest to pass as pleasantly as war and
the limited amusements afforded by two estaminets and a row of cottages
will permit.
"Chacun son gout." As he tramps along the street, B Company
Sergeant-Major challenges Corporal Rogers to a boxing match on the
morrow; Second Lieutenant White, who is new to war, sits in his billet
and, by the light of a candle stuck in a bottle, traces the distance to
the nearest town on the off chance that he will get leave to visit it;
the doctor demands of his new landlady, in the most execrable French,
where he can find a field suitable for "le football"; and Private
Wilson, as he "dosses down" on the floor, suggests sleepily to Private
Jones that he will be thirsty in the afternoon and that Private Jones
has been owing him a drink since that day in Ouderdom three weeks ago.
Besides such methods of passing the time, there are baths to be had in
the great brewery vats of the village, there is an inter-company hockey
tournament to be played with a Tickler's jam tin in lieu of a ball, and,
best of all, there is the "sing-song."
Be it in a trench, or in a barn, or out in the open fields where the
battalion lies bivouacked under rows of waterproof sheets strung up as
inadequate tents, the sing-song is sure of success, and a man with a
voice like a mowing machine will receive as good a reception as would
Caruso or Melba at Covent Garden. There is a French Territorial regiment
which has a notice up at the entrance of its "music hall"--"Entree pour
Messieurs les Poilus. Prix un sourire." Admission a smile! There is
never a man turned away from its doors, for where is the "poilu" or
where is the "Tommy" who is not always ready with a smile and a laugh
and a song?
There are little incidents in life that engrave themselves deep in the
memory. Of all the sing-songs I have attended, there is one that is
still vivid--the brush of time has washed away the outlines and edges of
the others.
We were billeted, I remember, in Eliza's farm--Eliza, for the benefit of
those who do not know her, is fair, fat, fifty, and Flemish; a lady who
shakes everyone in the farm into wakefulness at five o'clock each
morning by the simple process of stepping out of bed--when the Captain
decided that we wanted "taking out of ourselves." "We'll have a
sing-song," he announced.
So the Company Sergeant-Major was called in to make arrangements, and at
eight o'clock that evening we wandered into the Orchestra Stalls. The
concert hall was a large barn with a double door in the middle which had
been opened wide to allow the admittance of a cart, which was placed in
the entrance to act as a stage. All around the high barn, and perched
precariously on the beams, were the men, while we of the Orchestra
Stalls were accommodated on chairs placed near the stage. Behind the
cart was a background consisting of Eliza and her numerous gentlemen
friends, her daughter, an old lady aged roughly a hundred, and a cow
that had no right to be there at all, but had wandered in from the
nearest field to see the show. An orchestral accompaniment was kept up,
even during the saddest recitation, by dozens of little pigs that
scrambled about in the farmyard and under the stage. And beyond the farm
swayed the tall poplars that stood along the road which led straight
away into the distance, whence came sudden flashes of light and the
long, dull rumble of the guns.
Of the programme itself, I have but the vaguest recollection, for the
programmes are the least interesting part of these performances. The
first item, I remember, was a dreadful sentimental song by Private
Higgs which accident converted from comparative failure into howling
success. Just as he was rendering the most affecting passage, Private
Higgs stepped back too far, the cart--of the two-wheeled
variety--overbalanced, and the sad singer was dropped down amongst the
little pigs below, to the great joy of the crowd.
Then came a Cockney humorist, who, in times of peace, was the owner of a
fried fish and chip barrow in that home of low comedians--the East End.
After him appeared Sergeant Andrews, disguised in one of Eliza's
discarded skirts, with a wisp of straw on his head to represent a lady's
hair. Some vulgar song he sang in a shrill, falsetto voice that caused
great dismay among the pigs, as yet unused to the vagaries of the
British soldier.
After the interval, during which the audience _en masse_ made a
pilgrimage to Eliza's back door to buy beer at a penny a glass, there
came the usual mixture of the vulgar and the sentimental, for nothing on
earth is more sentimental than a soldier. There was the inevitable
"Beautiful Picture in a Beautiful Golden Frame," and a recitation in
Yiddish which was well applauded simply because no man had any idea what
it was about. The Sergeant-Major gave a very creditable rendering of
"Loch Lomond" in a voice that would terrify a recruit, and we finished
up the evening with a song requesting a certain naughty boy to hold out
his hand, which was shouted by everyone with so much vigour that one
wondered how it was the men could still sing "God save the King" when
the time came.
And far into the night, when the farmyard lay still and ghostly, and the
pigs had gone off to bed, we still sat and talked in the "Officers'
Mess," and recalled jokes of George Robey and Harry Tate, or hummed over
the tunes we had heard at the last Queen's Hall concert. As the Captain
had said, we wanted "taking out of ourselves," and it had just needed an
impromptu concert in an old Flemish barn to do it.
XXIII
THE "STRAFE" THAT FAILED
There is a certain battery in France where the name of Archibald Smith
brings a scowl to every brow and an oath to every lip. The Battery Major
still crimsons with wrath at the thought of him, and the Observing
Officer remembers bitterly the long, uncomfortable hours he spent,
perched up in a tree a hundred yards or so from the German lines. And
this is how Archibald Smith was the unwitting cause of so much anger to
the battery, and the saver of many a German life.
One morning shortly before dawn the Commanding Officer of an infantry
regiment was wading down a communicating trench, when he met an
artillery officer, accompanied by three men with a big roll of telephone
wire.
"Hullo, what are you doing at this hour?" he asked.
"We hope to do some good 'strafing,' sir," said the subaltern. "I'm
coming up to observe. Some aeroplane fellow has found out that Brother
Boche does his relieving by day in the trenches opposite. We hope to
catch the relief to-day at ten."
"Where are you going to observe from?"
"There's an old sniper's post in one of the trees just behind your
trenches. If I get up there before light I shall get a topping view, and
am not likely to get spotted. That's why I'm going up there now, before
it gets light."
"Well, are you going to stick up on that confounded perch until ten
o'clock?" asked the C.O. "You'd better come and have some breakfast with
us first."
But the Observing Officer knew the necessity of getting to his post as
soon as possible and, reluctantly refusing the Colonel's invitation, he
went on his way. Ten minutes later, he was lying full length on a
platform constructed in one of the trees just behind the firing line.
With the aid of his glasses, he scanned the German sandbags and, in the
growing light, picked out a broad communicating trench winding towards
the rear. "Once they are in that gutter," he muttered, "we shall get
lots of them," and he allowed this thought to fortify him during his
long wait.
* * * * *
"Quite sure the telephone's all right?" asked the Observing Officer for
the fiftieth time. "If that wire were to go wrong we should have no
means of getting on to the battery, for the infantry can only get on by
'phoning to Brigade Headquarters first, and you know what that means."
The telephone orderly, situated in a trench almost underneath the
observer's tree, smiled consolingly, "That's all right, sir," he said.
"I can ring up the battery in a second when the 'Uns come, as they ought
to in a minute."
He had hardly spoken when they came. The subaltern could see them quite
distinctly at the turnings of the trench, and at other times an
occasional head or rifle showed itself. "God!" said the subaltern, "if
we search that trench with shrapnel, we must get heaps of them," and he
issued a hurried order. Trembling in his excitement, he awaited the
report "Just fired, sir," but nothing happened. The orderly called and
called the battery, but there was no reply. The wire was cut!
Half an hour later, the Battery Major came across his Observing Officer
and a sergeant gazing dismally at two ends of cut wire.
"I was just coming down to see what was the matter. I hear from the
Brigade that some doddering idiot has cut our wire. Who in the hell was
it?"
"I don't know, sir. All I know is that I have seen a wonderful target,
and couldn't fire a round at it. The relief's over by now, and, as we
leave this sector to-night, we've lost a priceless chance."
"It must be some wretched infantry blighter," said the Major. "I'll just
go and have a talk to their C.O.," and he hurried off to the Colonel's
dug-out, leaving the Observer to lament his lost target.
The C.O. smiled soothingly. "My dear Wilson," he said to the Major, "I
don't think it could have been one of our men. They have been warned so
often. What do you say, Richards?" he asked the Adjutant.
"Well, sir, I'm not sure. I saw that young fellow Smith with some wire
about half an hour ago, but I don't expect he did it. I'll send for him
to make sure."
Second Lieutenant Archibald Smith certainly looked harmless enough. He
was thin and freckled, and his big blue eyes gazed appealingly through
his glasses.
"Where did you get that wire you had just now?" asked the Adjutant.
Smith beamed. "I got it just behind the wood, sir. There's a lot of old
wi ..." but the Major interrupted him. "That's the place," he cried
excitedly. "Well, what the devil did you go cutting my wire for?"
Archibald Smith looked at him in alarmed fascination. "I didn't think it
was any good, sir. I wa-wanted some string, and...."
"What did you want string for? Were you going to hang yourself to the
roof of your dug-out?"
"No, sir. I wanted to wrap up a p-parcel to send home, sir. I wa-anted
to send back some socks and underclothes to be darned. I'm very sorry,
sir."
"Sorry? Sorry be damned, and your underclothes too!" And the Battery
Major, who had more bad language at his disposal than most men in the
Army, for once forgot he was in the presence of a senior officer.
* * * * *
While the Major, his subaltern, and three men with a roll of wire wended
their sorry way back to the battery, Archibald Smith, surprised and
hurt, sat in his dug-out, amusing himself by making fierce bayonet
thrusts at his parcel, and alternately wishing it were the Major or
himself.
XXIV
THE NIGHTLY ROUND
I swear, and rub my eyes.