There is little more to tell you for the moment. Life here changes so much and yet essentially changes very little – the daily routine is the same, the food is the same, the weather is the same, we live without a sense of time – or rather with a sense of being in army-time, which bears little relation to the time you live in. Preparations are going ahead for a manoeuvre about which I cannot tell you, we are almost off our heads with exhaustion and driven mad with orders sent along every five minutes, and with conferences every day and heaven knows what else. We are grateful for the tiny improvements in our physical conditions – life cannot have been worse than it was during those two weeks further north, we were in as bad a state as men can be. If only the rain would stop, if only I could remember what it feels like to be clean and dry.
I got your parcel, for which many thanks. I have had little time yet for appreciating the books you chose so carefully. But I have been able to retreat into otherworlds once or twice – reading the Forster novel, which is so elegant and intelligent and urbane. I shall leave the rest of him up till things are a bit quieter, I like it so much. The Japanese anthology, of which I manage a paragraph every night before my eyes close (which they do too easily), is beautiful – that world seems even farther off, full of cherry blossom and reeds and still water, snow and wise thoughts. I find I can read absolutely anything (or could, if time permitted) and soak it up and it only refreshes me, whereas music has become almost impossible. We have use of the gramophone for three days out of seven now, because we have to share it with some of A Company. But of all the records you have sent, there is only the ‘Winterreise’ which I can bear at any time – and anything of Mozart. John is the same. Don’t ask me why. I hope all the rest will not be spoilt for leave, or peace-time. Meanwhile, we know the Schubert songs by heart and each of us can always tell when the other is around by snatches of whistling.
You asked if I was very afraid of the thought of a full battle. Difficult to answer because you see I have no real idea of what it will be like apart from tales I have heard and from the academic, tactical lectures. But I have seen enough injury and terrible death and destruction here to have no illusions about it certainly. I shall know how afraid I am when the time comes – some men say they feel only elation, others keep silent, which means they know real terror. But it is these long weeks of trench life, with the constant possibility of accident, which erodes one’s courage worst of all. We have had a pep talk from the Brigadier, and last week, a pep letter came round to all officers and N.C.O.s – entirely unmoving. Yet when we were given our first marching orders at home at the end of our time in the training camp I felt (and we all did) a great rush of blood and glory, a singing in the ears and an eagerness to do or die. It lasted half an hour or half a day, according to how good your memory was for florid sentences!
The food here has got steadily worse and scarcer too. No idea why. God knows what they make the jam of – tree roots I think, and the stuff in the stews is obscene. We get by with the help of John’s parcels, though I must say I wish that they would send less delicacies and frills and some more plain and substantial things too. Last week we had marrons glacés and crystallized pineapple.
John has just come in to say we are to go and see the C.O. yet again. Another trek and it’s raining torrents, which means we shall crowd into the dugout H.Q. and sweat and steam and smell. And it won’t be anything more than boring orders, more work, work, work.
‘Gentlemen, I am here to tell you that we have been ordered to make a further series of reconnaissance raids up to the enemy line as far as the edge of their trenches near Barmelle Wood.’
The C.O. was looking straight ahead of him, his eyes on the patch of air, avoiding any individual face. His hands, which usually fidgeted with papers or cigar tin, were folded in front of him. He looked relaxed and curiously happy, his face was without any of its recent strain and even the skin seemed to have become smoother and taken on a more healthy look.
‘There have been, as you know, five raids from B and C companies in the past week. The information obtained from these has been negligible, through no fault of those concerned. In the course of these raids, the Battalion has lost six officers and thirteen men killed, and two officers and eleven men have been seriously wounded. In addition, B Company lost three men when in a similar raid at Leuillet a fortnight ago.’
He was silent for a moment. Barton and Hilliard sitting side by side and opposite to him in the cramped dugout, each felt the stillness of the other. Something was different, they had come for a routine briefing but the atmosphere was full of foreboding, they heard this news of the planned raids and expected that something more was to follow, the date and details of the expected offensive on Barmelle Wood.
Instead, Garrett said. ‘I have made a decision and it is my duty to tell you all of the nature of that decision. I have said that in my opinion such reconnaissance raids are pointless in terms of strategy and a criminal waste of men. I have categorically refused, therefore, to pass on the orders for further raids of this sort. I will no longer accept responsibility for the fruitless loss of life which they entail. Not unexpectedly, my objections have been overruled. Not unexpectedly, I have been ordered to relinquish my command of this Battalion and to return to England. I expect to leave within the next two or three days. If I am wrong, I am sorry. I would ask each of you to feel entirely free to place upon record your dissent from my opinion on this matter if you wish to do so. But I cannot continue against the dictates of my conscience and my common sense, and I am entirely content that the action I am taking is the correct one.’
They realized that he had written, rehearsed and learned his speech by heart. Now that it was over he leaned back in his chair and began to look into their faces for the first time, his eyes moving quickly from one to the other, seeking some response or approval or reassurance – or hostility. He did not know what to expect. He reached for the cigar tin, opened the lid. No one spoke.
‘Gentlemen, do you wish to say anything to me at all? Do you wish to ask me anything?’
Silence again.
‘Then I will ask you to return to your posts and to say nothing to the men of the Battalion. Your new Commanding Officer will make whatever arrangements he thinks fit. I shall myself hope to come round the lines before I go.’
Still silent, avoiding one another’s eyes, they herded out of the dugout into the teeming rain and running mud of the trench. The men glanced up apprehensively as they passed along, and their faces had the sunken-eyed look of suppressed fear. They were huddled in greatcoats and waders, trying to get what rest they could after the previous night’s work of carrying up large quantities of ammunition.
‘He’s right,’ Barton said at once when they reached their dugout. He felt suddenly faint and light-hearted from tiredness and from a sense of shock. ‘He’s right and he’s courageous.’
Hilliard hung up his mackintosh. ‘I think he just wants to be out of it all.’
‘That’s bloody unfair!’
‘No. I think he is right about it but I simply think that he’s been half-looking for something like this, though perhaps without altogether realizing it himself. He isn’t the man he was. He’d never have done something like this last spring when I first came out here.’
‘Then perhaps he has just learned some sense.’
‘It’s the end of him of course. His career, I mean.’
‘Does that matter?’
‘Would it to you?’
‘No.’
Hilliard wondered whether Barton were not right after all, whether the C.O., who stood to lose most, might not simply be courageous, a man of conscience. He said. ‘I’ve always liked him. But he’s in better sympathy with you now.’
‘I know.’
‘And he’s had Franklin for an Adjutant – that can’t have made life easier.’
‘Come now – Franklin is efficient.’
‘I wish you weren’t so bloody charitable!’
Bart
on smiled, turned over on his stomach, slept.
Two days later Garrett had gone. He took his leave of no one.
It was the end of November.
‘Is everything all right?’
‘Very quiet, yes.’ Hilliard set down his torch. ‘They’ll get what sleep they can.’
‘John – I’m afraid. I’m very afraid indeed.’
‘Yes.’ They looked at one another across the dugout. ‘I’d forgotten what it was like – it seems a long time since the summer, such a lot has happened. I’d forgotten this feeling.’
‘Sick.’
‘That’s it.’
‘What about the men?’
‘Oh, Fraser’s gunning for victory, he’s keeping them cheerful. But they don’t give much away, you know how it is. Some of them are looking so tired they ought to be in hospital, let alone sent into battle.’
The near approach of the offensive on Barmelle Wood had redoubled the calls on the front line for fatigue parties, the men had worked from early morning until late afternoon, snatched two or three hours sleep and then spent the nights bringing up ammunition and supplies.
Until early on Thursday evening the rain had continued, the whole area for miles around was a sea of mud. But yesterday it had stopped, a wind had got up, bringing a sweet stench across into their faces and flapping against the sack curtains of the dugout. Now there was a frost. For the first time their clothes had had a chance to dry out.
Hilliard said, ‘We’d better turn in.’
‘I shan’t sleep.’
‘You’ll sleep.’
But Barton shook his head, reached for his greatcoat. An hour earlier Keene, the new C.O., had come down the line and the men had surveyed him, faintly suspicious, disliking changes in command. They had been loyal to Garrett – there were one or two still left who had served under him since August 1914. Colonel Keene made little impression upon them: he was a thin man, softly spoken, apparently hesitant. But a reputation for both thoroughness and toughness had preceded him to the Battalion and the required reconnaissance raids had been carried out, costing the lives of fourteen men. At the final briefing conference he had spoken concisely, had made the battle plan eminently clear to them, asked rapid questions around the table. He had, also and immediately, remembered their names.
‘It seems very straightforward,’ Barton had said, coming back. ‘Is it likely to go off to that eminently reasonable plan of his?’
‘No.’
‘Are we likely to find the time schedule followed down to the last five seconds in that way?’
‘No.’
‘No. I thought not.’
‘But to be fair, it isn’t his plan, it’s come from the Division and they’re always like that; they’re based on early cavalry manoeuvres which often did work as intended. Trench warfare is an entirely different thing, every battle since Neuve Chapelle has been some kind of mess but it will take some years until they learn about it, you see. By the next war, the message will have got through.’
‘There will never be another war.’
‘There will always be wars.’
‘Men couldn’t be so stupid, John! After all this? Isn’t the only real purpose of our being here to teach them that lesson – how bloody useless and pointless the whole thing is?’
‘Men are naturally stupid and they do not learn from experience.’
‘You haven’t much faith in humanity.’
‘Collectively, no.’
‘Individually?’
‘Oh, yes. You’ve only to look around you here.’
‘But you depress me.’
‘I’m sorry. I haven’t your naturally buoyant outlook upon the whole of life. That’s why I need you around.’
‘Me and Sir Thomas Browne!’
‘That’s right.’
‘But perhaps tomorrow won’t be so bad. Perhaps we really are in a stronger position than when you were here last summer. Perhaps it’ll work.’
Hilliard had not replied.
Now, he said, ‘If you are going out, don’t be long. You really need the rest.’
‘I know.’
Barton stepped out of the dugout and looked up. For the first time in weeks the sky was clear and glittering with the points of stars, a full moon shone above the ridge. The frost was thin and here and there it caught in the pale light on the barbed wire, tin canisters, helmets, and gleamed. The night cold had taken the edge off the smell of decay and the air was sharp and metallic in Barton’s nostrils. He moved quietly along the trench. In the next dugout, twenty or so men slept under greatcoats, a jumble of arms and feet. It was very still, no gunfire, no flares.
‘Sir?’
‘Hello, Parkin. All right?’
‘All quiet, sir, yes. Funny that.’
‘Hm.’ Barton leaned against the side of the trench.
‘You haven’t been in a big show yet, have you, sir?’
‘No. Have you?’
‘No.’
Parkin was a year younger than himself, one of the eleven children of a cobbler – which fact occasioned three or four jokes a day about his living in a shoe. He took it with good humour, as though he were still among boys at school, entirely used to the amusement it afforded them. Jokes among the company had become either simple or obscene and childish, as the life became more exhausting and tedious.
Barton said, ‘So we feel the same about tomorrow, then.’
‘Do we, sir? How’s that?’
‘A bit queasy.’
Parkin looked relieved, nodded. ‘I was thinking before you came along, sir – it’s all right here at the moment. Quiet. A bit chilly but I can cope with that. There’s a touch of something in the air – I don’t know, maybe it’s just that the bloody rain’s stopped. But it’s been reminding me of making bonfires and getting ready for Christmas, you know? I was feeling quite happy, just watching out and thinking. Then I got that feeling – like when you wake up and you know something a bit unpleasant’s due to happen and for the time being you’ve forgotten what. I thought – what’s up? Then I remembered.’
‘I know.’
‘Still – we’re ready, aren’t we? We’ve got the lot up here and we know what we’ve got to do. It’s just a question of getting on and doing it. Maybe we’ll be over there tomorrow night, they’ll have run for it and we’ll be kipping in Jerry’s feather beds. They have everything in those trenches of theirs you know, sir – so they say, anyway. All home comforts. They dug themselves in good and proper.’
Barton watched the man’s face as he talked so quickly, talked himself into some sort of reassurance, he saw the twitching at the corner of his eye, the way his mouth moved. He thought that he ought to say something to him, provide the expected words of comfort and support. He could say nothing. He knew. Parkin knew.
‘The left flank go off first don’t they, sir? Then it’s us. So we’ll get the best view of the first round.’
‘That’s right.’
The Rifle Brigade were to take the first wave, then their own Regiment, with Highlanders in support. The C.O. had drawn the plan on a blackboard in coloured chalks, had pointed white arrows to show the direction of the artillery barrage and blue arrows to show the movement of the lines of infantry. The targets, Barmelle Wood and Queronne, were in bright green. He was a clear map maker, the pattern of it all was engraved in Barton’s memory. He saw himself as a blue arrow.
‘Oughtn’t you to get some sleep, sir?’
Barton shifted. He was more reluctant to go in than ever, wide awake and afraid. He moved forward and looked cautiously over the parapet. No Man’s Land lay, still and moonlit and beautiful.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I just needed a breath of air. Goodnight, Parkin.’
‘Do you want to turn the lamp on?’ Hilliard said.
‘I thought you were asleep.’
‘No, I was waiting for you. If you want to read …’
‘No.’
Barton lay down, still in his greatcoat. ‘You’re r
ight. “Not a mouse stirring”.’
‘It often happens like this, it’s uncanny. I remember it in July.’
‘But they must know we’re up to something.’
‘Oh yes. Though that fact is never obvious to High Command, whose faith in the Element of Surprise in attack is really very touching. And quite unshakeable.’
‘John, shall I stop feeling so bloody afraid?’
‘Things will get so busy you’ll have no time for it, that’s all I can promise you. But this is the worst bit, this building up of tension.’
‘Like the dentist.’
‘Rather a pale analogy – but yes.’
‘Shall we be due for leave afterwards, do you suppose?’
‘Surely. We might even get home for Christmas.’
‘Both of us?’
‘Anything is possible. Don’t bank on it though.’
‘I’d like you to come to us for Christmas but your family would object, I imagine.’
‘I could come for part of the time. But really we had better not start building castles in Spain.’
‘John, I want you to come and see it all.’
‘Yes.’
‘I want to take you everywhere, show you everything – oh, it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t come off for Christmas, we’ll do it sometime. There’s so much … I want it all to look right and be right – I want you to like them all.’
‘Will they like me is much more to the point.’
‘Oh, of course they will.’
‘Of course?’
‘Yes, because they couldn’t help it and because you’re my friend – and because really, they like nearly everyone.’
‘So do you, don’t you?’
‘More or less, I suppose.’
‘Has it always been like that? Has it always been so easy for you to love people? To get on with them, to bring them out, say the right things at the right time? Have you always made friends as you’ve done out here?’