You have never seen such a desolate place as this, it has got uglier and uglier the further up we have come and now it doesn’t look like a land made by either God or man, it was thrown up by some prehistoric monsters or devils with no sense of anything but chaos. The road coming was just like a river, with trucks and cars and horses bogged down in the mud and what houses were left just a few bits of wall sticking up out of the ground. As far as the eye can see it is flat and wasted. There are some stumps of trees left and at night they take on all kinds of weird shapes, lit by the Verey flares. The men tell one another they have seen spectres and dead Germans rising up, and although nobody believes it, there is a fashion for telling these rather crude ghost and horror stories just now. It’s amazing how many people can produce a tale of haunting when called upon.
The ground is full of craters and of course they are full of water. A canal not far from here overflowed its banks. I suppose that didn’t help the general water level, and bodies which had been lying at the bottom since July all came to the surface and were spewed over the countryside.
Ahead I can just see the enemy line and their sandbags, poor devils, they are in just the same mess as we are, suffering all the same problems, I can’t blame them for strafing us all the time just to relieve their feelings. Their wire looks horrifying. It’s much deeper and thicker and more carefully set up than ours, even though we spend all night and use bale after bale of the wretched stuff, which cuts into your hands even if you have gauntlets on. Of course their shells just keep breaking it all down.
Well there, I have told you what it’s like and made it sound bad because that is the truth and I would have you believe it all, and tell it to anyone who asks you with a gleam in their eye how the war is going on. A mess. That’s all. I shouldn’t say that but we censor our own letters, unless we’re unlucky enough to have one stopped at random going through the next sorting-post. I’ll chance it. Tell all this to anyone who starts talking about honour and glory. I know you will understand, though John, who has been reading this, says he could not write such things to his own family. They believe we are making advances the whole time, that by Christmas we shall all come home as conquering heroes, that every death of ours is really a nail in the coffin of the Boche, and we will chase them out of France like a pack of dogs, over the top of the hill. He doesn’t complain to them about his physical condition, either, as I have been doing to you. But in fact he has far less resistance than me – hence his cold, which I have not had and nor did I get the dysentery which went the rounds not so long ago. My only injury so far as been some kind of small sore on my foot where I must have trodden on something. Scarcely worth going all the way to the M.O. to complain about!
I almost gave up a short while ago. I can tell you about it now. A deserter is shot if found, of course. I had come to feel that I would rather be shot. You will be ashamed of me. But in fact I did not intend to desert, I had thought of surrendering as a conchy. I didn’t and will not do so now. I can’t say any more about it here. I would need to sit round with you all and talk about it. I am better, in any case, I think I have come out of the other side of whatever wood it was.
But I am no longer so gay and light-hearted. I keep worrying that when you see me you will notice changes. But a few days with you at home would restore everything. The men, in spite of their weariness, keep us all sane, particularly Coulter and the Platoon Sergeant called Locke. He is a fisherman from Suffolk, and tells us amazing stories of storms and lifeboats and also of long days spent fishing miles off shore, when the water is smooth and glitters like silk and the wind drops and the fish pour into his nets and he rocks in his boat and smokes a pipe and is the happiest of men. Oh, I envy him: he will go back to it and ask nothing more. He has five sons. You wouldn’t think he’d be at home here but he is more good-humoured and long-suffering and patient than anyone, and behaves as though most of the younger men were extra children of his! He is also very religious though in a rather stern way. He talks to the young privates when their swearing gets too blasphemous or obscene, and it is as though he is really hurt by it. He gives us all good advice about marrying nice wives and rearing broods of boys! We love him, because he is so straight and conscientious.
Everybody grumbles about the wet and the food and the general low state of health, everyone is on edge with being shifted from pillar to post but there is still this constant, grim good humour, jokes fly back and forth, nobody is cantankerous. Otherwise we would all have given up long ago. Every now and again Coulter gives us his pep talk, about how we are going to ‘go out there and show ’em’. I think he isn’t entirely convinced that John and I share his fighting spirit, but he never gives up!
LATER
We have had a very bad day. Trench flooded and like a river again. But the shelling has been simply awful. We were strafed for about three hours without a break and all we could do was to sit tight and watch and pray. The C.O. and the Adjutant had just come down and they spent part of the raid in our dugout. We all huddled together in the near dark and every minute or two there was a crash and we all avoided one another’s glance. Earth kept thudding down on the roof – I thought we were all going to be buried alive. When I did have to go out into the trench I felt a lot safer. Then there was a constant cry for stretcher bearers. The C.O. went up and down several times in the middle of it all. The men like and respect him for it. He looks very ill though. He brought a bottle of whisky with him and left it for us to finish when he went. Neither of us much likes whisky but we have been needing it, I can tell you.
Captain Franklin is imperturbable, as cool as a cucumber. Very efficient, which the men also respect. They know he isn’t going to lose his head. John says he may have a head to lose but certainly not a heart. I wonder.
For much of the time when we emerged into the trench, we could see nothing beyond about 20 yards, for the smoke and mud being sent up in great spouts like water from a whale. The noise was unbelievable. It’s like being in a tunnel with trains both roaring towards you and coming at you from behind, and then going on over your head, screeching and wailing. And then the crash crash, crump crump. I thought my brain, or at the very least, my eardrums, would burst from the din. A lot of men had been sent fancy ear-muffs and plugs and heaven knows what other bits and pieces by well-meaning aunts at home but you would need a lot more than some rubber or cotton wadding to shut out any of this. I should think you must be able to hear it all where you are. Every gun of every size must have been trained on us for the whole of three hours. We lost a lot of men. The Suffolk Sergeant whom I told you about just above, which upset us all, and a subaltern called Glazier, who was horribly mangled but lived for a while, in a terrible state. He was, I’m told, incredibly brave and kept on telling them not to bother to send down stretcher bearers, he wouldn’t live to need them, they were to save them for someone else. I had never liked him much, and so had occasionally gone out of my way to be friendly to him – a bit hypocritical, but I’m glad I did now. I’m sorry he’s dead, because he was looking forward to leave which was due shortly, and which would come nicely at the start of the fox hunting season. He lived for hunting. They did fetch a stretcher party for him which was, as it happened, the worst luck of all, because no sooner had they got him on and gone a few yards than they were all hit, which meant three dead men instead of one and we needed all the stretchers and bearers we could get.
John and I are quite unharmed.
The worst thing apart from the noise and mess is being so thirsty, after the constant breathing in of shell dust and cordite and so on. Your throat feels as if it’s being burned out. Well, and after all that, nothing came. We had, of course, been expecting an attack, the Germans were surely on their way down into our trenches, the men had fixed bayonets the whole time, and were waiting and waiting – Coulter, I may add, with something near to glee. He can’t wait to get his bayonet stuck into someone, which I find very chilling, and more so because he is basically such a nice chap. But whe
n the strafing finally stopped, everything just went quiet. They left us to pick up the pieces. I don’t know what the point of it all was. Garrett said they were expecting us to retreat out of here, but we couldn’t have done so successfully, and in any case, nobody thought of it.
Now we are left in the mud and rain to begin the dreary business of repairing the damage as best we may and getting the dead moved. B Company has lost 2 officers and 3 wounded, and about 30 of other ranks. Very bad indeed for one day’s shelling.
I hope you got the note asking for the Sir Thomas Browne. It’s on my fourth shelf, a blue book. I’d also like the Japanese verse anthology and The Tempest, if you can send them, and a good novel, which choice I leave to you – just in case I ever get five minutes for reading. The same address, though it is all taking ages, as I told you. No, I have no news of leave and shouldn’t hope for any yet. I have no idea about Christmas. It’s all the luck of the draw.
John sends his love. He is much better at getting through all this than I am in spite of his not being well. He’s kept me going lately, though he would say that the boot’s on the other foot. But that cannot be true, I’ve not been fit company for anyone lately. Even Coulter remarked that ‘Mr Barton looks a bit seedy’, which is his way of saying ‘bad tempered’. Have you a chance of getting anywhere to buy me a few postcards with reproductions of paintings on them? I’d like Turner, particularly. Don’t go to a lot of trouble or expense. But I should so much like to look at something as far as possible removed from this dun, grey, muddy scenery. I think of you all having been in Wales with great envy. I should like more than anything else to be at St David’s now. Or anywhere. But I’m here because I’m here because I’m here!
‘How do you feel?’
‘Wet. I’m sick of this.’
‘Yes. What’s it like down at that end?’
Barton sat on the bunk and began to unwind his puttee. ‘Much the same. Race got his legs blown off this morning – that shell we thought had landed behind out of the way, I think. Apparently it didn’t.’
‘I can’t remember which one is Race?’
‘Glazier’s platoon. The one with the odd eyes.’
‘Odd?’
‘One blue, one green.’
Hilliard was still amazed at how much Barton took in, how many of the men he had come to know well, the small things he remembered about them. He said, ‘If you stay here long enough you’ll be a C.O.’
‘I wouldn’t want to Promotion isn’t my line.’
‘You’d make a good C.O.’
‘No, because I’d tell them the truth; I should have a demoralizing effect.’
‘That is exactly the opposite of what you do. You keep us all going, you should know that by now.’
‘There’s something wrong with this sore on my foot. It looks a peculiar colour.’
‘Let’s look – did you cut it?’
‘I suppose I must have.’
‘You’d better get dressed. Go and see Farquharson.’
‘Not with this. Anyway, I want to eat and sleep. I’ll stick a dressing on it myself if it doesn’t heal up.’
‘My father sent us a bottle of brandy in the parcel today. I’ve only just got around to opening it. And some quince jam.’
‘Praise be!’
Hilliard found a cup and poured out a good measure of the brandy and handed it to Barton. Then he said, ‘There was a letter from my sister.’
‘Beth.’
‘Yes. She’s getting married. She says on Saturday. I don’t know which Saturday – that could be tomorrow, I suppose. Tomorrow is Saturday, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’ Barton put a finger into the alcohol and was dabbing it experimentally on to his foot. ‘Anaesthetic,’ he said.
Hilliard touched the envelope which lay on top of the opened parcel. ‘You can read it.’
‘Do you want me to?’
‘Yes.’
Barton took the single sheet of thick paper.
Dear John,
It is so nice to have your letters and we are glad to know you are fit and cheerful. We wish you were home but it seems that things are going well from what we read in the papers, and that you will all be back before very long. This letter will come to you with a parcel from father, but it is really to let you know that I am getting married on Saturday. It will be quiet, though there will be what mother calls ‘a few’ (and I think are a lot!) people back here for luncheon afterwards. We shall miss you, of course. It may seem that it has all been arranged suddenly but I have been thinking about it for some time as I told you when you were home and we have been planning things here for a while. There has seemed no time to write to you.
We are going to the Isle of Purbeck for ten days and after that I shall be
Mrs Henry Partington
The Lodge
Astor Avenue
Hawton
Do write. I must stop now, there are so many things to do you wouldn’t believe. I shall never be ready. Mother has a marvellous new lilac dress and coat in silk from Worth, for the wedding.
Our love to you and all kind wishes from Henry.
Beth.
Barton held the letter for a long time after he had finished reading what it contained, for he did not know how to comment, it was so brisk and cool and distant, so lacking in emotion or character. John had talked about his sister, but mostly as she had been when they were children. What was she like now, what did she conceal beneath this formal letter in the plain, dull handwriting? He thought of the long, loving, detailed letters from his own family, which came by every mail and the difference between them. He wished suddenly that John had no father or mother or sister, so that he would be able to bring him entirely under the wing of his own. These aloof strangers ought not to exist at all.
‘She said she was going to marry Henry Partington.’
‘Yes. You told me.’
‘He’s a lawyer. He is a dull, stuffed, crass, insensible fool and he will put my sister in a rich home like a padded cell and she will give luncheon parties and tea parties and dinner parties and knit socks for the men and believe that we shall all be home by Christmas and be dutiful to the son by his first marriage and in a short time she will become indistinguishable from my mother – except that she will never be so beautiful or so elegant. She will be quite content and whatever she used to be will have gone, be buried. I’m glad I’m here, David, because I would truly rather be in the middle of this than sitting in that church in a tight collar and then sitting at our dining table and hearing my father make a dull speech and Henry Partington make a stupid speech, and the vicar and Beth’s godfather and … I should go off my head.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Barton reached out a hand. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Oh, that’s enough of it. I’m sick of the whole business.’
‘Yes.’
‘But poor Beth! And how happy she sounds!’
‘Does she? Is that a happy letter?’
‘Did it seem a miserable one?’
‘It seemed – I didn’t get the impression that she felt anything at all. It’s so – formal.’
‘She is, now.’
‘What you should be doing is drinking some of this excellent brandy.’
‘How’s the foot?’
‘Hurts. Go on – have some.’
‘Yes. Then I’ve got to do these letters – oh, I’m sick of reading other men’s secrets, I feel like Paul Pry every day.’
‘I wish Coulter’d bring up the dixie, I’m hungry and I’m dropping asleep on my feet and I daresay I shan’t get more than a couple of hours anyway.’ Hilliard had slept while he was out in the trench, supervising the carrying party.
‘Talk of the devil.’
‘Speak of angels is what you should say, sir!’ Coulter ducked involuntarily as a shell roared overhead and crashed somewhere far off, down the road. But it had been quiet tonight and all the previous day. ‘Message from Captain Franklin, sir.’
Barton looked up. Hilliard
read the slip of paper, got to his feet. ‘No sleep, no supper – get your boots back on, Second Lieutenant Barton.’
‘Oh Lord …’
‘A nice little reconnaissance party all the way out there through the lovely mud, in a downpour, just the sort of adventure you’d have enjoyed at the age of nine. Coulter, send Sergeant Davies up here, would you please?’
Barton was pulling his boots on again, and then the rubber waders, reaching to his thighs. He caught Hilliard’s eye. ‘It’s what you’ve been promising me,’ he said, ‘a recce party? I’ve been looking forward to it for weeks.’
‘Quite.’
Coulter ducked his head back inside briefly. ‘Cheer up, sir. It’s stopped raining and they’ve been nice and quiet as mice across there for hours. Just right!’
‘Coulter …’
He went again rapidly, his boots making a slopping noise down the trench. Hilliard paused a moment. Then said, ‘It’s absolutely bloody pointless. Even if the rain has stopped. We won’t be able to see a thing, it’ll be like going through mud soup, we’ll get soaked – what the hell do they think they’re doing? We can see all we want to see of their lines from the o.p. during the day and they’ve been sending planes over every half hour.’
‘What are we supposed to be finding out?’
‘Oh, everything.’ Hilliard began to look about for his compass and stick. ‘All possible information you know. Everything.’
‘Time spent in reconnaissance is seldom wasted,’ Barton said. ‘Field Service Regulations Part I Chapter 6.’
Hilliard shot him a look.
‘Will you go and meet Davies? We need eight volunteers, but don’t let Devine come, though he’ll ask to – he isn’t fit. And not Lawrence, either, he’ll make a noise enough to wake the dead and then panic. Tell them to black their buttons and their faces. And you do the same of course.’
‘What with?’
Hilliard smiled. ‘Mud, dear boy, mud. If you look carefully you should find the odd bit of it around somewhere. All right?’