Fig. 2 Depiction of the First Battle of the Marne
Edinburgh – Early December, 1914
Elizabeth and Margaret met yet one last time at the Boar’s Head’s Behin’, sharing a gloomy embrace in validation of their mutual sense of loss.
“It’s all just too awful, Margaret,” Elizabeth murmured, “There’s nobody left at university. The boys are all gone off to war.”
Margaret responded pensively, “Yes, it’s all totally incomprehensible, and it appears that classes will be cancelled in the spring for lack of enrollment,” adding solemnly, “Did you hear the news?”
“What news?” Elizabeth responded, an ominous glance creasing her visage.
“One of the boys was killed in France,” Margaret replied matter-of-factly.
Now clutching her throat ominously, Elizabeth croaked, “Which boys?”
“You know, from that day when we climbed Arthur’s Seat.”
“Oh, my goodness! Which one?”
“It was the quiet one, Richard, Richard Campbell.”
“That’s terrible, Margaret. What happened?”
“I’ve no idea, Elizabeth. From what I hear, they’re in a pretty fix over there. The Germans seem to have the better of us. The casualty list is growing by the day. I’m afraid we’d better be prepared for plenty more like Richard.”
Staring off into space, Elizabeth mumbled, “God, this is unbelievable! It seems like only yesterday, we were sitting right here in the Behin’, and the world was at our feet, ready for the taking.”
“Yes, just so,” Margaret responded sadly. “The world has changed, Elizabeth, and there’s no going back. But one good thing happened, of that I am now quite certain.”
“What? What was that?”
“Those boys got some special training from the fairer of the sexes before they went off to war. At the time, I doubted the decency of it, but now I am certain - it was the right thing to do.”
“You think so?” Elizabeth queried. “I’ve been doubting the rightness of it, too.”
“No, there’s no need to even give it a second thought now. Richard’s passing was all the confirmation we needed. He went to his death, having kissed a woman and, even more so, having attained a tiny bit of familiarity with the finer aspects of the fairer sex. Surely, every soldier who dies in this war is deserving of some special sendoff. In our small way, we gave that much to Richard Campbell.”
“Yes, I see your point,” Elizabeth responded thoughtfully. “God, I hope no more of them die…”
“Well, unless the men in power in this world grow up very quickly, I’m afraid there is no avoiding it,” Margaret responded wistfully.
“What shall we do?” Elizabeth blathered forlornly.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m going to join up,” Margaret responded brusquely.
“Join up? What do you mean?”
“I’m going to become a nurse in the army,” Margaret replied.
“What? How? I didn’t even know there was such a possibility.”
“Well, I’m not sure what the Brits are doing, but my father has been sending me telegrams. The Aussies and the New Zealanders are forming an army corps. It’s going to be called the ANZAC, short for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. They’re enlisting nurses to support the troops.”
“Where?” Elizabeth inquired.
“I don’t know yet. It seems they were planning to form the corps in England, but the winter weather in England turned out to be a problem for the Aussies. So they’re forming the unit somewhere warmer. I should know exactly where quite soon.”
“What will you do then?”
“I’m not sure. I shall most likely go down to London and sign up there.”
“I say, I have an idea,” Elizabeth said, “Since you’re planning to travel in that general direction, why don’t you come with me to York for Christmas? After all, you have no family to spend the holiday with here in Scotland.”
“Actually, I’ve been hoping you’d ask,” Margaret responded with obvious relief. “That’s very kind of you, Elizabeth. I would love to join you, assuming that it is alright with your family.”
“I’m sure it will be, but I shall check just to be certain.”
“Thanks. When would we expect to leave?”
“I’m going down on the twentieth, and I shall be staying for at least two weeks. Why don’t you ride down with me on the train?”
“That sounds perfect,” Margaret responded, “And by then I should know more about what my plans might be.”
The Western Front – Two Weeks Later
Robert sat sullenly in the mud and muck, shivering from the frigid weather enveloping him within the trench. Having grown deeper and deeper through the onset of winter, the walls of the trench were now so tall that he could see only a quarter of the sky above him. Gazing upwards in confirmation at the low expanse of gray clouds blanketing the sky no more than a hundred feet overhead, he mumbled to himself, “I may never see the sun again.”
Somewhat incongruously, a sputtering hoard of tiny snowflakes emanated from the obscuring mass above and, dancing enticingly on the wind, they seemed to send a message that some things never change. “But of course,” he contemplated to himself, “A bit of snow is only a diversion. The fact is - everything has changed, and nothing will ever be the same.”
He gazed down at his boots, half covered with the stagnant mixture of water and ice. Were his boots leaking? He had no idea; he couldn’t even feel his feet within. Unthinkingly, he idly raised one arm, staring blankly at the back of his outstretched hand. Was that grimy mess really his own hand? For some reason, he was instantly transported in his mind’s eye to the sitting room, back within the ethereal expanse of Wharton Manor. How long had it been? He had no idea, but somehow, a memory spewed forth, of sitting before a warm fire, cleaning his once perfectly manicured fingernails.
Snapping back to the present, he inspected the incongruous hand before him. Two of his fingernails were so coated with mud that he couldn’t even make them out. The remaining three were so badly maintained that he doubted they would ever attain their former brilliance. Such an inconsequential subject – the maintenance of fingernails - how could one even consider such things here within the field of battle, the greatest battle in the history of the world?
Still, unable to control his thoughts, his mind wandered to better times. Inspecting his hand yet again, he noticed a spot of mud that was somehow reminiscent of a morsel of haggis. The thought transported him immediately to that night on Arthur’s Seat, the entire group partaking of a ceremonial batch of Alastair’s haggis. He wondered where they all were now. Could it have been only scant few months since that night? Somehow, it seemed as if years had passed.
His thoughts wandering yet askance, he considered the bizarre ‘gam’ they had played before the fire that evening. “Why did she do it?” he wondered to himself for perhaps the thousandth time – why had Margaret flashed her knickers to the lads on that mystifying and surreal night?
Suddenly, an explosion ringing out somewhere off to his left, the shock struck him nearly simultaneously, thereby enfolding him instantaneously within reality. The morning shelling had begun. Best to squat down even lower, thereby pushing his boots yet deeper into the icy slime. Looking to his left, he saw his troops, uniformly immobile, each one simply waiting out the by now all too familiar bombardment. To his right, the scene was identical, each soldier intent on surviving one more day. And everywhere he glanced, an endless impression, one of shades of brown and gray, even the tiniest hint of color having long since disappeared from this dismal place of death, dismemberment, and inhumanity.
Eventually the shelling ended and, as there was no attack ordered on this day, the soldiers gathered here and there to converse idly, a few of them assigned to keep watch for enemy incursions.
Sensing that his feet needed attention in order to avoid frostbite, Robert took th
e opportunity to attempt to empty the frigid slime from his boots. Accordingly, he found the designated spot for this activity, a small outcropping in the trench wall, just wide enough for a single soldier to prop himself up high enough to escape the frigid and life-threatening swamp within the depths of the trench.
A tiny bench had been constructed from purloined duckboards and arranged for this purpose, thereby affording Robert the opportunity to painfully remove one boot, then the other. He gingerly removed his socks and, twisting each one tortuously in turn, he squeezed every possible ounce of the slimy goo from them. He subsequently massaged his feet furiously in an attempt to restore circulation to them. God forbid that he should die of gangrene of the feet - a bullet to the head would be infinitely preferable.
Suddenly a noxious odor wafted over him, for no discernible reason reminding him of the night of Beltane, the bonfire on the point flashing into his mind. Such a wonderful occasion it had been, from his current vantage point of a grimy trench on the Western Front, something very nearly beyond the realm of comprehension. And on that night he had shared a kiss with the lovely Margaret MacCreedy. Such a winsome lass she had been, to share a first kiss with such as she was surely to his good fortune. But she had flashed her knickers to the lads – something unbefitting a lady.
Now, sitting in a mud-filled morass, feet freezing from exposure, he wondered - was he to die in this misbegotten place, having failed to build a lifetime of memories? Was that all there was? Had his good fortune run its entire course, blessed only by the memory of a single kiss? It was all far too enormous to comprehend, forcing him to push it all from his consciousness – better to die wanting nothing more than the joy of the long sleep, away from the endless struggle in harm’s way.
Christmas Day, 1914
Robert peered out into no man’s land, wondering if anyone on either side would have the temerity to fire a shot on this holiest of days. It was now getting onto sunset, and not a single scrape had occurred along the line, the entire front incongruously silent for the first time since he had arrived nearly four months earlier.
He sat listening, the absolute silence playing like music to his ears, a sound he had never thought to hear again. Suddenly, a piercing wail of a sound lilted toward him from somewhere off to his right, perhaps several hundred yards away. There was no mistaking - it was a bagpipe, the lone moaning sound penetrating the solitude of the desolate setting. Entranced by the sound, he crawled upwards toward the peak of the sodden precipice and peered in the direction of the sound, attempting to place it. Finally, he made out a single Highlander, kilt flowing gently in the breeze. Standing motionless fifty yards beyond the Allied trenches, he was playing ‘Amazing Grace’. Transfixed by the surreal scene before him, he strained to make out the soldier more clearly.
Suddenly, a mannerism, a single tiny motion seemed familiar to him and, recognition sweeping over him, he realized it was Alastair Stewart! “My God,” he murmured to himself, “It’s Alastair, not three hundred yards down the line, taking his life within his own hands, playing his bagpipe for the combatants on both sides.”
Now he began to hear ragged and discordant vocal accompaniment and, gazing toward the battlefield, he saw soldiers climbing from the trenches. Making their way out into no man’s land, thousands of troops emerged onto the battlefield, caroling the mournful refrain of ‘Amazing Grace’. Unable to resist, Robert clambered over the wall of the trench and, joining his fellow soldiers, he sang along, tears streaming uncontrollably down his frigid cheeks.
Now, impossibly, the opposing army joined them on the battlefield. Stepping from their own trenches, they stood no more than a hundred yards distant, singing in their own language, a surreal scene beyond all human comprehension. Robert was stupefied, as was every other soldier on the battlefield. And through it all, not a shot was fired, not a single act of aggression partaken, on this, the holiest of days in Christendom.
Much later, as he sat once again on the pedestal, still contemplating this amazing day, a soldier came forward. Gingerly dancing his way amidst the duckboards, he arrived at his side, saluted, and simultaneously announced, “Captain, you’re wanted at headquarters, right away.”
“Thank you, Private Wilson,” he responded and, carefully covering his feet with his only dry pair of socks, he replaced his boots. Rising from his perch, he scampered onto the duckboards and traversed them warily, by now long since accustomed to the ebony mud that permeated absolutely everything imaginable.
As he made his way to headquarters, he had to wonder for the thousandth time who on earth was running this war. Four months on the front, accompanied by steadily deteriorating conditions, had invested an irreparable atmosphere of cynicism among the troops. With each passing day, another inane charge was ordered somewhere up or down the line, and each advance led to the same result: an initial breakthrough lasting some few hours, followed by re-entrenchment in the selfsame trenches they had leapt from at the start of the day. The only perceptible difference at the ending of each senseless assault was the heart-rending roll call at day’s end, whence was heard the deafening silence from yet another one, two, or more comrades in arms.
“If this is intended to be a war of attrition,” he thought to himself, “I wonder which side has the bigger army.” But then he pushed such macabre thoughts from his mind, his immediate responsibility to report to battalion headquarters.
On arriving within the musty command bunker, he announced, “You sent for me, Colonel Fitzpatrick?”
“Yes, Lieutenant Sutherland,” the colonel responded grimly. “Take a seat,” to which Robert did as instructed, and as he did so he noticed incongruously that he was sitting on a once elegant but now squalid French dining chair, a strangely misplaced item that had found its way into a war zone.
Forestalling Robert’s loss of focus, the colonel now observed bluntly, “You’ve served quite well here, lieutenant.”
“Thank you, sir,” Robert responded noncommittally, sensing that a deleterious pat on the back was not the reason for his summons.
“Lieutenant, you’re being transferred out. Here are your orders. You are to make your way to Paris, and thence to London, where you shall be reassigned.”
“What! Why, sir? Why am I being transferred?”
“No idea. However, I would not get my hopes up if I were you. Your exceptional military record suggests that you shall be assigned somewhere equally important. Now, get your gear together. There’s a transport vehicle departing for Paris in two hours.”
At this Robert saluted and responded, “Thank you, sir.”
Colonel Fitzpatrick returned his salute and put out his hand, saying, “It’s been –how shall I put this – an honor serving with you, Sutherland. I wish you a Happy Christmas.”
“Thank you, sir. I wish you a Happy Christmas as well,” and at this, Robert made his departure.