II

I do not know if all this seems tedious and unnecessary; I hope not, for

it is very relevant to the end of the story, and if this record had been

in the hands of certain persons the end of the story might have been

different. I do not know. Certainly it ought to have been different.

Anyhow, Harry came to France and found us in the line at Souchez. The

recuperative power of the young soldier is very marvellous. No one but

myself would have said that this was not the same Harry of a year ago;

for he was fit and fresh and bubbling over with keenness. Only myself,

who had sat over the Dardanelles with him and talked about Troy, knew

what was missing. There were no more romantic illusions about war, and,

I think, no more military ambitions. Only he was sufficiently rested to

be very keen again, and had not yet seen enough of it to be ordinarily

bored.

And in that summer of 1916 there was much to be said for life in the

Souchez sector. It was a 'peace-time' sector, where divisions stayed for

months at a time, and one went in and out like clockwork at ritual

intervals, each time into the same trenches, the same deep dug-outs,

each time back to the same billets, or the same huts in the same wood.

All the deserted fields about the line were a mass of poppies and

cornflowers, and they hung over one in extravagant masses as one walked

up the communication trench. In the thick woods round Bouvigny and

Noulette there were clusters of huts where the resting time was very

warm and lazy and companionable, with much white wine and singing in the

evenings. Or one took a horse and rode into Coupigny or Barlin where

there had not been too much war, but one could dine happily at the best

estaminet, and then ride back contentedly under the stars.

In the line also there was not too much war. Few of the infantry on

either side ever fired their rifles; and only a few bombers with rifle

grenades tried to injure the enemy. There were short sectors of the line

on either side which became spasmodically dangerous because of these

things, and at a fixed hour each day the Germans blew the same portions

of the line to dust with minenwerfers, our men having departed elsewhere

half an hour previously, according to the established routine from which

neither side ever diverged. Our guns were very busy by spasms, and every

day destroyed small sections of the thick red masses of the German wire,

which were every night religiously repaired. The German guns were very

few, for the Somme battle was raging, but at times they flung

whizz-bangs vaguely about the line or dropped big shells on the great

brows of the Lorette Heights behind us. From the high ground we held

there was a good view, with woods and red and white villages on the far

hills beyond the Germans; and away to the left one looked over the

battered pit country towards Lens, with everywhere the tall pit-towers

all crumpled and bent into uncouth shapes, and grey slag-heaps rising

like the Pyramids out of a wilderness of broken red cottages. To the

south-east began the Vimy Ridge, where the red Pimple frowned over the

lines at the Lorette Heights, and all day there was the foam and

blackness of bursting shells.

In the night there was much patrolling and bursts of machine-gun fire,

and a few snipers, and enormous labours at the 'improvement of the

line,' wiring and revetting, and exquisite work with sand-bags.

It was all very gentle and friendly and artificial, and we were happy

together.

Burnett had left us, on some detached duty or other, and in that gentler

atmosphere Eustace was a good companion again.

Men grew lusty and well, and one could have continued there indefinitely

without much injury to body or mind. But sometimes on a clear night we

saw all the southern sky afire from some new madness on the Somme, and

knew that somewhere in France there was real war. The correspondents

wrote home that the regiments 'condemned so long to the deadening

inactivity of trench warfare were longing only for their turn at the

Great Battle.' No doubt they had authority: though I never met one of

those regiments. For our part we were happy where we were. We had had

enough for the present.