MAC IS SLEEPY
Mac's luck was out. He had had practically no sleep the night
previous, or, for that matter, for the two nights before that again,
and he was not going to get any chance to make it up now. A distant
echo of his name from somewhere up the sap brought a swift awakening.
It was an evil omen, portending the worst fatigue. He decided to
follow the lazy course of action, namely, to avoid it if possible.
"Mac! Where in the devil are you? Mac! Mac!"
The exhorting voice of the corporal came nearer; but the trooper
decided he was a heavy sleeper and knew, moreover, that his whole form
was well shielded by his grey blanket. As usual though, all this was
futile, and no effort of will could persuade the corporal to pass
unmolested his shrouded form. The blanket was pulled from over his
face, and, with a slap on the thigh and "Come on, Mac!" shouted down to
him, he could hardly, with decency, pretend to be asleep any longer.
He carried the thing to rather too flourishing a finish, awakened
violently with a suspicious suddenness, and blinked rapidly at the
corporal, "Oh! Rations you're after. All right. I'll dodge away down
after them. You might give a feller a chance to sleep though." He
knew well it was about his turn to wander away down the hill for
rations, but a fellow was sorely tempted to put off the evil moment to
the last, when, utterly weary, he was enjoying some rare hours of
settled sleep.
Mac trudged wearily away down the ridge, at times almost letting his
legs run away with him on the steep paths. At the depot, he persuaded
the water-guard to let him fill his water-bottle, and then, while the
Quarters calculated together, he drowsed in the shade of a bank. For
some time the Quarters chewed the ends of their pencils, studied
note-books and tapped boxes. Then they retired in the direction of a
comfortable service corps dug-out, whence issued spirals of blue smoke
and odours of rum. By and by they emerged, and all struggled into
activity again. Some of the fatigue party had disappeared though, for
they were not often so close to the beach. Still, the Quarter was not
worried, for he knew all would return anon, each to lump his load up
the track. Mac had been too sleepy to wander off for a bathe, though,
as a matter of fact, he had been endeavouring for the last twenty
minutes before the Quarter's return to summon up sufficient energy to
follow his cobbers' example. Still, boxes of biscuits would be their
portion, while, getting in early, he would be able to secure easy
freight, flitches of bacon or the like.
He shouldered his load and set off homewards. He rested often for the
first half of the journey, but then, pulling himself together, plugged
steadily upwards. Towards the summit, where the track ran up a
razor-back, his progress was hastened by the Turkish artillery on the
"W" Hills. He deposited his bacon at the Quarter's bivvie, and
wandered down the sap to his ledge under the wall. Delving into a
battered biscuit tin, he produced some characterless dried flour tiles,
a tin of bully and a tin of apricot, the choicest of Deakin. His three
cobbers, who were the only other inhabitants of this section of the
sap, had breakfasted, and now lay, like three mummies, on their
respective ledges. This trench was merely the wing of a sector, and
was not directly opposed to an enemy trench. Here it was the privilege
of his section to make its headquarters every third day, when it was
their additional privilege to do the ration and water fatigues, to
furnish sapping and burying parties, sentries and guards, and such
other toilers as might be necessary; while occasionally, with great
luck and better management, an hour or two on the beach might be worked.
Here, with his back against a traverse, Mac set about his repast. He
devoured half a tin of bully. That was his limit, no matter how hungry
he was, for he was aware by experience of the effects of overmuch
bully. He shied the remainder over the parapet, and promptly set about
his second and last course. The flies were fonder than he of Deakin's
apricot, and he had to be circumspect to dodge them successfully. He
knew too well their other sources of food supply--and was not over keen
on swallowing any, nor of having them beating him for his jam, Deakin's
though it was. With some difficulty he broke the bullet-proof biscuits
into mouthful sizes, grasped the tin of jam between his knees with his
hand over it, and dipping each bit first into the jam, popped it into
his mouth. Mac had good teeth, but, all the same, it took many long
minutes of hard jaw work to get on the outside of a biscuit and a half.
This, he had calculated, was as much dry tack as his daily ration of
dirty water could comfortably counterbalance.
He then set about putting his domestic affairs in order--tidying up his
kit and his bivvie, overhauling the larder, shaking his dusty blankets
and the like. He surveyed his weather-beaten countenance in a broken
triangle of glass. "What-o, mother, that you should see me now!" and
he winked whimsically at himself. A fortnight's black beard formed a
dark halo round his features, plenty of dust from the heaps of earth
above stuck in his hair, and he was already a bit thinner than in
Egyptian days. At the present moment a pair of ragged shorts, hanging
insecurely about his middle, was his only garment. The rest of his
body was, like his face, tanned and dusty.
He now performed to the full such toilet as was possible in his present
quarters. He rubbed himself vigorously with a towel, cleaned his teeth
with about two dessert-spoonfuls of water, and brushed his hair. He
gave his rifle a few runs through and a dust, and restored round the
bolt a careful wrapping of cloth. This completed the setting of his
house in order.
A corporal sang out from up the sap that the troop was to be ready for
the front line at one o'clock, so Mac roughly, but good-naturedly,
tumbled his cobbers off their ledges and admonished them to turn to and
prepare.
The next half-hour was spent in getting ready, dressing, having some
lunch, which varied not from the earlier repast, and attaching gear.
They looked a shabby mob, with their equipment slung round them and
their clothing adapted to individual taste. As mounted men put in
suddenly to reinforce the foot, their equipment was not all it might
have been for trench warfare; but they had come to work and not to a
beauty show.
They filed away up the dusty, sun-scorched sap, through narrow
communication trenches, bringing forth disgusted curses from the
dwellers therein, whose cooking and living arrangements were suspended
during their passage; and settled finally in an advanced sap leading
out towards the enemy lines. It was deep and narrow and had no
conveniences either for comfort or fighting. The afternoon drowsed
slowly past, a spell of sapping at the sap-head occasionally breaking
the monotony.
With sundown, both sides revived for the evening activity, a meal, and
preparations for the night. The Turks, since their heavy but futile
attacks of two nights previous, had not returned into that placidity
which betokened cessation of evil intentions. There was an erratic
nervousness of fire; instructions were that an attack would eventuate
during the night, and that no one was to sleep.
Just about sunset, word floated up from behind that a white flag was
approaching, but it was some time before it and several attendant Turks
appeared through the scrub about a chain to the right. Too many
accompanied the flag, but nearer approach being severely discouraged
they retired speedily again into the scrub. A few minutes later, the
flag returned, this time direct towards the sap-head, and now the
Colonel, armed with German and Turkish vocabularies, was there to
welcome it. They halted about twenty yards away, and a rather
fruitless conversation followed. The Turks jabbered excitedly a
meaningless chorus, to which the Colonel, full of importance and
dignity, replied with deliberate and forceful phrases of alleged
Turkish and German, fluttering the while through the vocabularies and
prompted and admired on all sides by an audience of officers and men.
The Turks were unimpressed, and gabbled on. Now arrived the right man,
the interpreter--all would be well. But, alas, he was so nervous and
alarmed at being thrust on the parapet that the conversation profited
little by his presence! All that could be impressed upon the
flag-bearers was that they were to return home as speedily as possible,
which course they wisely adopted, and immediately a burst of firing
broke out along both lines. This calmed as rapidly as it had begun,
and the troopers, chuckling over the comical scene of the Colonel
airing his German and Turkish, drank their rum and settled down to the
long vigil.
A glorious night it was, still and starry, and sound travelled far.
But it was very weary, standing hour after hour waiting for the attack.
From the sap-head came the steady tapping of the picks and occasionally
the sound of muffled voices. Water was very scarce, but the drowsiness
which crept over the trooper was the worst of his troubles. Attack or
no attack, he could not keep awake. Every few seconds he fell asleep,
his knees kinked under him, and he was once more awake. This grew
monotonous, but there was no stopping it. His interest was caught at
times by the jabbering of assembling Turks in the hollow just over the
scrub-covered rise. Searchlight beams had been scouring the hills to
the north, and one was suddenly thrown on no man's land. Batteries
ashore and destroyers opened fire. Shells whirred up from below,
screamed overhead and burst beyond the rise. The jabbering rose into
an impassioned chanting to Allah. The searchlight switched off, the
shells fell less frequently, the Oriental obligato fell away in a
diminuendo of pathetic cries and a staccato of terrified jabbering.
Mac's knees again kinked frequently.
In his state of alternate consciousness, the minutes dragged wearily,
he lost all count of time, and the whole business merged into a vivid
distorted dream. The drama was repeated, the mutterings of the
assembling Turks, the long-searching beam coming up from the sea, the
sudden tearing and crashing of the artillery, and the agonized howlings
of the enemy. Then came another period of quiet and deep drowsiness.
There may have been a third enactment, though on this point Mac has
always been hazy. At any rate, in due course came the dawn. The sky
brightened behind the Turkish lines, the searchlights faded away, and
gradually the spasmodic rifle fire of the night fell to occasional
single shots along the line. "Stand to" laboured by on leaden wings.
A single sentry was posted at the sap-head; then, in awkward attitudes
and angles, like the corpses on the ground above, they fell asleep in
the bottom of their sap.