‘I’ve no complaints. I was dealt with in a perfectly fair and reasonable way. Probably better than I deserved.’
‘What kind of questions did they ask?’
Sassoon smiled. ‘Don’t you know?’
‘I’ve read the report, if that’s what you mean. I’d still like to hear your version.’
‘Oh: “Did I object to fighting on religious grounds?” I said I didn’t. It was rather amusing, actually. For a moment I thought they were asking me whether I objected to going on a crusade. “Did I think I was qualified to decide when the war should end?” I said I hadn’t thought about my qualifications.’ He glanced at Rivers. ‘Not true. And then… then Colonel Langdon asked said “Your friend tells us you’re very good at bombing. Don’t you still dislike the Germans?”’
A long silence. The net curtain behind Rivers’s head billowed out in a glimmering arc, and a gust of cool air passed over their faces.
‘And what did you say to that?’
‘I don’t remember.’ He sounded impatient now. ‘It didn’t matter what I said.’
‘It matters now.’
‘All right.’ A faint smile. ‘Yes, I am quite good at bombing. No, I do not still dislike the Germans.’
‘Does that mean you once did?’
Sassoon looked surprised. For the first time something had been said that contradicted his assumptions. ‘Briefly. April and May of last year, to be precise.’
A pause. Rivers waited. After a while Sassoon went on, almost reluctantly. ‘A friend of mine had been killed. For a while I used to go out on patrol every night, looking for Germans to kill. Or rather I told myself that’s what I was doing. In the end I didn’t know whether I was trying to kill them, or just giving them plenty of opportunities to kill me.’
‘ “Mad Jack.” ’
Sassoon looked taken aback. ‘Graves really has talked, hasn’t he?’
‘It’s the kind of thing the Medical Board would need to know.’ Rivers hesitated. ‘Taking unnecessary risks is one of the first signs of a war neurosis.’
‘Is it?’ Sassoon looked down at his hands. ‘I didn’t know that.’
‘Nightmares and hallucinations come later.’
‘What’s an “unnecessary risk” anyway? The maddest thing I ever did was done under orders.’ He looked up, to see if he should continue. ‘We were told to go and get the regimental badges off a German corpse. They reckoned he’d been dead two days, so obviously if we got the badges they’d know which battalion was opposite. Full moon, not a cloud in sight, absolutely mad, but off we went. Well, we got there – eventually – and what do we find? He’s been dead a helluva lot longer than two days, and he’s French anyway.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘Pulled one of his boots off and sent it back to battalion HQ. With quite a bit of his leg left inside.’
Rivers allowed another silence to open up. ‘I gather we’re not going to talk about nightmares?’
‘You’re in charge.’
‘Ye-es. But then one of the paradoxes of being an army psychiatrist is that you don’t actually get very far by ordering your patients to be frank.’
‘I’ll be as frank as you like. I did have nightmares when I first got back from France. I don’t have them now.’
‘And the hallucinations?’
He found this more difficult. ‘It was just that when I woke up, the nightmares didn’t always stop. So I used to see…’ A deep breath. ‘Corpses. Men with half their faces shot off, crawling across the floor.’
‘And you were awake when this happened?’
‘I don’t know. I must’ve been, because I could see the sister.’
‘And was this always at night?’
‘No. It happened once during the day. I’d been to my club for lunch, and when I came out I sat on a bench, and… I suppose I must’ve nodded off.’ He was forcing himself to go on. ‘When I woke up, the pavement was covered in corpses. Old ones, new ones, black, green.’ His mouth twisted. ‘People were treading on their faces.’
Rivers took a deep breath. ‘You say you’d just woken up?’
‘Yes. I used to sleep quite a bit during the day, because I was afraid to go to sleep at night.’
‘When did all this stop?’
‘As soon as I left the hospital. The atmosphere in that place was really terrible. There was one man who used to boast about killing German prisoners. You can imagine what living with him was like.’
‘And the nightmares haven’t recurred?’
‘No. I do dream, of course, but not about the war. Sometimes a dream seems to go on after I’ve woken up, so there’s a a kind of in-between stage.’ He hesitated. ‘I don’t know whether that’s abnormal.’
‘I hope not. It happens to me all the time.’ Rivers sat back in his chair. ‘When you look back now on your time in the hospital, do you think you were “shell-shocked”?’
‘I don’t know. Somebody who came to see me told my uncle he thought I was. As against that, I wrote one or two good poems while I was in there. We-ell…’ He smiled. ‘I was pleased with them.’
‘You don’t think it’s possible to write a good poem in a state of shock?’
‘No, I don’t.’
Rivers nodded. ‘You may be right. Would it be possible for me to see them?’
‘Yes, of course. I’ll copy them out.’
Rivers said, ‘I’d like to move on now to the… thinking behind the Declaration. You say your motives aren’t religious?’
‘No, not at all.’
‘Would you describe yourself as a pacifist?’
‘I don’t think so. I can’t possibly say “No war is ever justified”, because I haven’t thought about it enough. Perhaps some wars are. Perhaps this one was when it started. I just don’t think our war aims – whatever they may be – and we don’t know – justify this level of slaughter.’
‘And you say you have thought about your qualifications for saying that?’
‘Yes. I’m only too well aware of how it sounds. A second-lieutenant, no less, saying “The war must stop”. On the other hand, I have been there. I’m at least as well qualified as some of the old men you see sitting around in clubs, cackling on about “attrition” and “wastage of manpower” and…’ His voice became a vicious parody of an old man’s voice. ‘“Lost heavily in that last scrap. You don’t talk like that if you’ve watched them die.’
‘No intelligent or sensitive person would talk like that anyway.’
A slightly awkward pause. ‘I’m not saying there are no exceptions.’
Rivers laughed. ‘The point is you hate civilians, don’t you? The “callous”, the “complacent”, the “unimaginative”. Or is “hate” too strong a word?’
‘No.’
‘So. What you felt for the Germans, rather briefly, in the spring of last year, you now feel for the overwhelming majority of your fellow-countrymen?’
‘Yes.’
‘You know, I think you were quite right not to say too much to the Board.’
‘That wasn’t my idea, it was Graves’s. He was afraid I’d sound too sane.’
‘When you said the Board was “rigged”, what did you mean?’
‘I meant the decision to send me here, or or somewhere similar, had been taken before I went in.’
‘And this had all been fixed by Captain Graves?’
‘Yes.’ Sassoon leant forward. ‘The point is they weren’t going to court-martial me. They were just going to lock me up somewhere…’ He looked round the room. ‘Worse than this.’
Rivers smiled. ‘There are worse places, believe me.’
‘I’m sure there are,’ Sassoon said politely.
‘They were going to certify you, in fact?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Did anybody on the Board say anything to you about this?’
‘No, because it was –’
‘All fixed beforehand. Yes, I see.’
Sassoon said, ‘May I
ask you a question?’
‘Go ahead’
‘Do you think I’m mad?’
‘No, of course you’re not mad. Did you think you were going mad?’
‘It crossed my mind. You know when you’re brought face to face with the fact that, yes, you did see corpses on the pavement…’
‘Hallucinations in the half-waking state are surprisingly common, you know. They’re not the same thing as psychotic hallucinations. Children have them quite frequently.’
Sassoon had started pulling at a loose thread on the breast of his tunic. Rivers watched him for a while. ‘You must’ve been in agony when you did that.’
Sassoon lowered his hand. ‘No-o. Agony’s lying in a shell-hole with your legs shot off. I was upset.’ For a moment he looked almost hostile, then he relaxed. ‘It was a futile gesture. I’m not particularly proud of it.’
‘You threw it in the Mersey, didn’t you?’
‘Yes. It wasn’t heavy enough to sink, so it just’ – a glint of amusement – ‘bobbed around. There was a ship sailing past, quite a long way out, in the estuary, and I looked at this little scrap of ribbon floating and I looked at the ship, and I thought that me trying to stop the war was a bit like trying to stop the ship would have been. You know, all they’d’ve seen from the deck was this little figure jumping up and down, waving its arms, and they wouldn’t’ve known what on earth it was getting so excited about.’
‘So you realized then that it was futile?’
Sassoon lifted his head. ‘It still had to be done. You can’t just acquiesce.’
Rivers hesitated. ‘Look, I think we’ve… we’ve got about as far as we can get today. You must be very tired.’ He stood up. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow morning at ten. Oh, and could you ask Captain Graves to see me as soon as he arrives?’
Sassoon stood up. ‘You said a bit back you didn’t think I was mad.’
‘I’m quite sure you’re not. As a matter of fact I don’t even think you’ve got a war neurosis.’
Sassoon digested this. ‘What have I got, then?’
‘You seem to have a very powerful anti-war neurosis.’
They looked at each other and laughed. Rivers said, ‘You realize, don’t you, that it’s my duty to… to try to change that? I can’t pretend to be neutral.’
Sassoon’s glance took in both their uniforms. ‘No, of course not.’
∗
Rivers made a point of sitting next to Bryce at dinner.
‘Well,’ Bryce said, ‘what did you make of him?’
‘I can’t find anything wrong. He doesn’t show any sign of depression, he’s not excited—’
‘Physically?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Perhaps he just doesn’t want to be killed.’
‘Oh, I think he’d be most insulted if you suggested that. To be fair, he did have a job lined up in Cambridge, training cadets – so it isn’t a question of avoiding being sent back. He could’ve taken that if he’d wanted to save his skin.’
‘Any trace of… er… religious enthusiasm?’
‘No, I’m afraid not. I was hoping for that too.’
They looked at each other, amused. ‘You know, the curious thing is I don’t think he’s even a pacifist? It seems to be entirely a matter of of horror at the extent of the slaughter, combined with a feeling of anger that the government won’t state its war aims and impose some kind of limitation on the whole thing. That, and an absolutely corrosive hatred of civilians. And non-combatants in uniform.’
‘What an uncomfortable time you must’ve had.’
‘No-o, I rather gather I was seen as an exception.’
Bryce looked amused. ‘Did you like him?’
‘Yes, very much. And I found him… much more impressive than I expected.’
Sassoon, at his table under the window, sat in silence. The men on either side of him stammered so badly that conversation would have been impossible, even if he had wished for it, but he was content to withdraw into his own thoughts.
He remembered the day before Arras, staggering from the outpost trench to the main trench and back again, carrying boxes of trench mortar bombs, passing the same corpses time after time, until their twisted and blackened shapes began to seem like old friends. At one point he’d had to pass two hands sticking up out of a heap of pocked and pitted chalk, like the roots of an overturned tree. No way of telling if they were British or German hands. No way of persuading himself it mattered.
‘Do you play golf?’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘I asked if you played golf.’
Small blue eyes, nibbled gingery moustache, an RAMC badge. He held out his hand. ‘Ralph Anderson.’
Sassoon shook hands and introduced himself. ‘Yes, I do.’
‘What’s your handicap?’
Sassoon told him. After all, why not? It seemed an entirely suitable topic for Bedlam.
‘Ah, then we might have a game.’
‘I’m afraid I haven’t brought my clubs.’
‘Send for them. Some of the best courses in the country round here.’
Sassoon had opened his mouth to reply when a commotion started near the door. As far as he could tell, somebody seemed to have been sick. At any rate, a thin, yellow-skinned man was on his feet, choking and gagging. A couple of VADs ran across to him, clucking, fussing, flapping ineffectually at his tunic with a napkin, until eventually they had the sense to get him out of the room. The swing doors closed behind them. A moment’s silence, and then, as if nothing had happened, the buzz of conversation rose again.
Rivers stood up and pushed his plate away. ‘I think I’d better go.’
‘Why not wait till you’ve finished?’ Bryce said. ‘You eat little enough as it is.’
Rivers patted his midriff. ‘Oh, I shan’t fade away just yet.’
Whenever Rivers wanted to get to the top floor without being stopped half a dozen times on the way, he used the back staircase. Pipes lined the walls, twisting with the turning of the stair, gurgling from time to time like lengths of human intestine. It was dark, the air stuffy, and sweat began to prickle in the roots of his hair. It was a relief to push the swing door open and come out on to the top corridor, where the air was cool at least, though he never failed to be depressed by the long narrow passage with its double row of brown doors and the absence of natural light. ‘Like a trench without the sky’ had been one patient’s description, and he was afraid it was only too accurate.
Burns was sitting on his bed, while two VADs helped him off with his tunic and shirt. His collar bones and ribs were clearly visible beneath the yellowish skin. The waistband of his breeches gaped.
One of the VADs tugged at it. ‘There’s room for two in there,’ she said, smiling, coaxing. ‘Have I to get in with you?’ The other VAD’s frozen expression warned her of Rivers’s presence. ‘I’ll get this sponged down for you, Captain.’
They hurried past Rivers, bursting into nervous giggles as they reached the end of the corridor.
Burns’s arms were goose-pimpled, though the room was not cold. The smell of vomit lingered on his breath. Rivers sat down beside him. He didn’t know what to say, and thought it better to say nothing. After a while he felt the bed begin to shake and put his arm round Burns’s shoulders. ‘It doesn’t get any better, does it?’ he said.
Burns shook his head. After a while Rivers got up, fetched Burns’s coat from the peg behind the door and wrapped it round his shoulders. ‘Would it be easier to eat in your own room?’
‘A bit. I wouldn’t have to worry about upsetting other people.’
Yes, Burns would worry about upsetting other people. Perhaps the most distressing feature of his case was the occasional glimpse of the cheerful and likeable young man he must once have been.
Rivers looked down at Burns’s forearms, noting that the groove between radius and ulna was even deeper than it had been a week ago. ‘Would it help to have a bowl of fruit in your room?’ he asked. ‘So you cou
ld just pick something up when you felt like it?’
‘Yes, that might help.’
Rivers got up and walked across to the window. He’s agreeing to make me feel useful, he thought. ‘All right, I’ll get them to send something up.’ The shadows of the beech trees had begun to creep across the tennis courts, which were empty now. Rivers turned from the window. ‘What kind of night did you have?’
‘Not too good.’
‘Have you made any progress with what we talked about?’
‘Not really.’ He looked up at Rivers. ‘I can’t make myself think about it.’
‘No, well, it’s early days.’
‘You know, the worst thing is…’ – Burns was scanning Rivers’s face – ‘that it’s a… a joke.’
‘Yes.’
After leaving Burns, Rivers went up a further short flight of stairs and unlocked the door to the tower. Apart from his own bedroom, this was the only place in Craiglockhart he could hope to be alone for more than a few minutes. The patients weren’t allowed out here, in case the hundred-foot drop to the path below should prove too tempting an exit from the war. He rested his arms on the iron balustrade and looked out towards the hills.
Burns. Rivers had become adept at finding bearable aspects to unbearable experiences, but Burns defeated him. What had happened to him was so vile, so disgusting, that Rivers could find no redeeming feature. He’d been thrown into the air by the explosion of a shell and had landed, head-first, on a German corpse, whose gas-filled belly had ruptured on impact. Before Burns lost consciousness, he’d had time to realize that what filled his nose and mouth was decomposing human flesh. Now, whenever he tried to eat, that taste and smell recurred. Nightly, he relived the experience, and from every nightmare he awoke vomiting. Burns on his knees, as Rivers had often seen him, retching up the last ounce of bile, hardly looked like a human being at all. His body seemed to have become merely the skin-and-bone casing for a tormented alimentary canal. His suffering was without purpose or dignity, and yes, Rivers knew exactly what Burns meant when he said it was a joke.
Rivers became aware that he was gripping the edge of the parapet and consciously relaxed his hands. Whenever he spent any time with Burns, he found himself plagued by questions that in Cambridge, in peacetime, he might have wanted to pursue, but which in wartime, in an overcrowded hospital, were no use to him at all. Worse than useless, since they drained him of energy that rightly belonged to his patients. In a way, all this had nothing to do with Burns. The sheer extremity of his suffering set him apart from the rest, but the questions were evoked by almost every case.