Thoughts of our "scrap" had entirely left us, for Bennett and I had before us one of the most uncongenial tasks that an officer can have. The news has to be broken by someone when a wife is suddenly made a widow, and the task is generally taken on by the dead man's platoon commander, who sends back home his letters and papers. There were many men who had died that afternoon, and letters of condolence and bad news are always difficult to write, so that there was silence in our dug-out for the next two hours.

The last pay book I examined had belonged to Private E. Spiller. His other belongings were scanty—a few coppers, a much-chewed pencil, and two letters. I looked at the latter for a clue as to whom I ought to write; one was in his own handwriting and unfinished, the other was from a girl with whom he had been "walking out," apparently his only friend in the world, as she alone was mentioned in the little will written at the end of his pay book. But her love was enough. Her letter was ill-spelt and badly written, but it expressed more love than is given to most men.

"Take care of yourself, Erny dear, for my sake," she wrote. "I am so proud of you doing so well in them horrid trenches.... Dear Erny, you can't have no idear how pleased I am that you are so brave, but be quick and come back to me what loves you so...."

So brave! I tried to laugh at the unconscious irony of it all, but my laugh would not come, for something in my throat held it back—perhaps I was a little overwrought by the recent shelling.

I turned to the other letter, which I have thought fit to transcribe in full:

"DEAREST LIZ,

"I hope this finds you as it leaves me at present in the pink. Dear Liz, i am doing very well and i will tell you a secret—i am going to be rekermended for the V.C. becos i done so well in the trenches. i don't feel a bit fritened wich is nice, and, dear Liz, i hope to be made Lance Corpril soon as my officer is so ..."

* * * * *

And here it ended, this letter from a liar. I balanced it on my knee and wondered what to do with it. Should I tear it up and write to the girl to tell her the truth—that her lover was a liar and a coward? Should I tear his letter up and just announce his death? For some minutes I hesitated, and then I put his half-finished letter in an envelope and added a note to tell her.

"He died like a soldier," I finished. "His letter will tell you better than any words of mine how utterly without fear he was."

And I wish no other lie were heavier on my conscience than is the lie I told to her.



XI

THE CITY OF TRAGEDY

What does it matter that the Cloth Hall and the Cathedral are in ruins, that the homes and churches are but rubble in the streets? What do we care if great shells have torn gaping holes in the Grande Place, and if the station is a battered wreck where the rails are bent and twisted as bits of wire? We do not mourn for Ypres, for it is a thousand times grander in its downfall than it was ever in the days of its splendour.

In the town, the houses are but piles of stone, the streets are but pitted stretches of desolation, the whole place is one huge monument to the memory of those who have suffered, simply and grandly, for a great cause. Round the town run the green ramparts where, a few years ago, the townspeople would stroll of an evening, where the blonde Flemish girls would glance shyly and covertly at the menfolk. The ramparts now are torn, the poplars are broken, the moat is foul and sullied, and facing out over the wide plain are rows of little crosses that mark the resting-places of the dead.

For herein lies thy glory, Ypres. To capture thee there have fallen thousands of the German invaders; in thy defence there have died Belgians and French and English, Canadians and Indians and Algerians. Three miles away, on Hill 60, are the bodies of hundreds of men who have fought for thee—the Cockney buried close to the Scotchman, the Prussian lying within a yard of the Prussian who fell there a year before, and along the Cutting are French bayonets and rifles, and an occasional unfinished letter from some long-dead poilu to his lover in the sunny plains of the Midi or the orchards of Normandy.

And all these men have died to save thee, Ypres. Why, then, should we mourn for thee in thy ruin? Even thy great sister, Verdun, cannot boast so proud a record as thine.

But the awful tragedy of it all! That the famous old town, quietly asleep in its plain, should be shattered and ruined; that so many hopes and ambitions can be blasted in so few hours; that young bodies can be crushed, in a fraction of a second, to masses of lifeless, bleeding pulp! The glorious tragedy of Ypres will never be written, for so many who could have spoken are dead, and so many who live will never speak—you can but guess their stories from the dull pain in their eyes, and from the lips that they close tightly to stop the sobs.

God, how they have suffered, these Belgians! Day after day for over a year the inhabitants of Ypres lived in the hell of war; day after day they crouched in their cellars and wondered if it would be their little home that would be ruined by the next shell. How many lived for months in poky little basements, or crowded together in the one room that was left of their home—anything, even death, rather than leave the place where they were born and where they had passed all their quiet, happy years.

I knew one woman who lived with her little daughter near the Porte de Menin, and one day, when the next cottage to hers had been blown to bits, I tried to persuade her to leave. For a long time she shook her head, and then she took me to show me her bedroom—such a poor little bedroom, with a crucifix hanging over the bed and a dingy rosebush growing up outside the window. "It was here that my husband died, five years ago," she said. "He would not like me to go away and leave the house to strangers."

"But think of the little one," I pleaded. "She is only a girl of five, and you cannot endanger her life like this."

For a long time she was silent, and a tear crept down her cheek as she tried to decide. "I will go, monsieur," she said at last, "for the sake of the little one."

And that night she set off into the unknown, fearful to look back at her little home lest her courage should desert her. She was dressed in her best clothes—for why leave anything of value for the Germans, should they ever come?—and she wheeled her few household treasures before her in the perambulator, while her little daughter ran beside her.

But next morning I saw her again coming back up the street to her cottage. This time she was alone, and she still trundled the perambulator in front of her.

I went out, and knocked at her door. "So you have come back," I said. "And where have you left the little one?"

She gazed at me dully for a minute, and a great fear gripped me, for I saw that her best clothes were torn and dust stained.

"It was near the big hospital on the Poperinghe road," she said in a horribly even voice. "The little one had lingered behind to pick up some bits of coloured glass on the roadside when the shell came. It was a big shell ... and I could find nothing but this," and she held up part of a little torn dress, bloody and terrible.

I tried to utter a few words of comfort, but my horror was too great.

"It is the will of God," she said, as she began to unpack the treasures in the perambulator, but, as I closed the door, I heard her burst into the most awful fit of weeping I have ever known.

* * * * *

And, day by day as the war goes on, the tragedy of Ypres grows greater. Each shell wrecks a little more of what was once a home, each crash and falling of bricks brings a little more pain to a breaking heart. The ruins of Ypres are glorious and noble, and we are proud to defend them, but the quiet, simple people of Ypres cannot even find one brick on another of their homes.

Somewhere in England, they tell me, is a little old lady who was once a great figure in Brussels society. She is nearly eighty now, and alone, but she clings on tenaciously to life till the day shall come when she can go back to her Chateau at Ypres, where she has lived for forty years. One can picture her—feeble, wizened, and small, her eyes bright with the determination to live until she has seen her home again.

I, who have seen her Chateau, pray that death may come to close those bright eyes, so that they may never look upon the destruction of her home, for it is a desolate sight, even though the sky was blue and the leaves glistened in the sun on the morning when, two years ago, I tramped up the winding drive.

The lodge was nothing more than a tumbled pile of broken bricks, but, by some odd chance, the Chateau itself had never suffered a direct hit. In front of the big white house there had once been an asphalt tennis court—there was now a plain pitted at every few yards by huge shell holes. The summer-house at the edge of the wood—once the scene of delightful little flirtations in between the games of tennis—was now a weird wreck, consisting of three tottering walls and a broken seat. Oddest of all, there lay near the white marble steps an old, tyreless De Dion motor-car.

I have often wondered what the history of that battered thing could be. One can almost see the owner packing herself in it with her most precious belongings, to flee from the oncoming Germans. The engine refuses to start, there is no time for repairs, there is the hurried flight on foot, and the car is left to the mercy of the invading troops. Perhaps, again, it belonged to the staff of some army, and was left at the Chateau when it had run its last possible mile. At all events, there it stood, half-way between Ypres and the Germans, with everything of any possible value stripped off it as thoroughly as though it had been left to the white ants.

By the side of the tennis court, where had once been flower beds, there was now a row of little, rough wooden crosses, and here and there the narcissi and daffodils had sprung up. What a strange little cemetery! Here a khaki cap and a bunch of dead flowers, there a cross erected to "An unknown British hero, found near Verbrandenmolen and buried here on March 3rd, 1915," there an empty shell case balanced at a comical angle on a grave, and everywhere between the mounds waved the flowers in the fresh breeze of the morning, while away in the distance loomed the tower of the Cloth Hall of Ypres, like a gigantic arm pointing one finger up to heaven.

The Chateau itself, I have said, had never had a direct hit; but do you think the hand of war had passed it by, and that the little old lady would find in it something of home?

Every window on the ground floor had been choked by sandbags, and no glass remained in those upstairs. In a room that had once been a kitchen and was now labelled in chalk "Officers' Mess" were an old bedstead, two mattresses, a wooden table, and three rickety chairs; but for these, and a piano in the dining-room upstairs, the house was absolutely devoid of furniture. Even the piano, which must have twanged out the tunes of at least three nations since the war began, had sacrificed its cover for firewood.

Rooms where once ladies had powdered and perfumed themselves to attract the fickle male were now bare and empty, and pungent with the smell of chloride of lime. In the dining-hall, where fine old wines had circulated, were a hundred weary, dirty men. In the kitchen, where the fat cuisiniere had prepared her dinners, were now a dozen officers, some sprawling asleep on the floor, some squatting round the table playing "vingt-et-un."

For this is war.

* * * * *

There is one more memory of Ypres—a very different one—that comes back to me. It is the recollection of our regimental dinner.

The first thing that I heard of it came from Lytton's servant.

"Please, sir," he said one morning, "Mr. Lytton sends his compliments, and can you tell 'im where the Hotel Delepiroyle is?"

"The Hotel de what?"

"The Hotel Delepiroyle, sir. That's what 'e said."

"Ask Mr. Lytton to write it down—no, wait a minute. Tell him I'm coming over to see him about it." So I strolled across to the other side of the infantry barracks to find him.

"What, haven't you heard about it?" asked Lytton. "The new C.O., Major Eadie, is giving a dinner to-night to all the officers of the regiment as a farewell to Major Barton before he goes off to take command of his new crowd. It's at the Hotel de l'Epee Royale, wherever that may be. Let's go and track it down."

So we wandered down the Rue de Lille, as yet relatively free from the ravages of war, for the shops were open and the inhabitants stood talking and gossiping at the doors of their houses. Here and there rubble lay across the pavement, and what had once been a home was now an amorphous pile of bricks and beams. Just by the church was a ruined restaurant, and a host of little children played hide and seek behind the remnants of its walls.

On our way down the street we came across Reynolds, who had only joined the regiment the night before, while we, who had been nearly three weeks at the front, felt ourselves war-beaten veterans compared to him. He was standing on the pavement, gazing excitedly up at an aeroplane, around which were bursting little white puffs of smoke.

"Come along with us," said Lytton. "You'll get sick to death of seeing aeroplanes shelled when you've been out here as long as we have. Come and discover the scene of to-night's orgy."

In the Grande Place, at the side of the Cloth Hall, we discovered the Hotel de l'Epee Royale. A "Jack Johnson" had made an enormous hole in the pavement just in front of it, and a large corner of the building had gone.

"By Jove," said Reynolds in an awed voice. "What a hole! It must have taken some shell to do that."

Lytton smiled patronisingly. "My dear fellow," he said, "that's nothing at all. It's hardly any bigger than the hole that a spent bullet makes. Let's go inside and get some lunch to see what sort of a place it is."

But Reynolds and I were firm. "Rot!" we said. "Let's go home and fast. Otherwise we shall be no good for this evening; we've got our duty to do to the dinner."

So we went back to the Company Mess in the infantry barracks, past a house that had been destroyed that morning. Hunting in and out of the ruins were a man and a woman, and another woman, very old, with eyes swollen by weeping, sat on what was left of the wall of her house, a broken photograph frame in her hands.

There are many fellows who have laid down their lives since that little dinner in the Hotel de l'Epee Royale; he who gave it died of wounds six weeks later, as gallant a commanding officer as one could wish to have. If the dinner were to take place again, there would be many gaps round the table, and even the building must long since have been pounded to dust.

If this should meet the eyes of any of you that were there, let your minds run back for a moment, and smile at your recollections. Do you remember how we dosed Wilson's glass so that he left us before the sweets were on the table? Do you remember how we found him later sitting on the stairs, poor fellow, clasping his head in a vain effort to stop the world from whirling round? Do you remember the toasts that we drank, and the plans we made for that dim period, "after the war"? I confess that I have completely forgotten everything that we ate—beyond the whisky, I forget even what we drank; but I know that the daintiest little dinner in London could not have pleased us nearly so much. And then, when it was all over and we broke up to go home to bed, do you remember how young Carter stood in the middle of the Grande Place and made rhapsodies to the moon—though, to the rest of us, it seemed much like any other moon—until we took him up and carried him home by force?

It does you good to look back sometimes. You may find it sad because so many are gone that were our companions then. But this is the way of war; they must die sooner or later, and they could not have chosen better graves. If one must die, why not die fighting for England and Ypres?

* * * * *

There is one street in Ypres that I knew in peace time. It wound in and out between the stiff, white houses, and the little Flemish children would make it echo to their shouts and laughter, until you could scarcely hear the rumble and the rattle of the carts on the cobbles of the main street, near by. And I passed along the same winding way during the second battle of Ypres. The shattered houses stretched jagged edges of brickwork towards the sky, the road was torn up, and the paving stones were piled up grotesquely against each other. Outside the convent, where I seemed to catch the dim echo of children's laughter, lay a smashed limber—the horse was on its back, with its legs stuck up stiffly; and, just touching the broken stone cross that had fallen from above the convent door, lay the figure of the dead driver.

And, of all that I remember of Ypres, it is of this that I think most often, for it is a symbol of the place itself—the dead man lying by the cross, sign of suffering that leads to another life. The agony of Ypres will render it immortal; for if ever a town deserved immortality, it is surely this old, ruined city on the plains of Flanders.



XII

"PONGO" SIMPSON ON GRUMBLERS

I was in my dug-out, trying to write a letter by the intermittent light of a candle which was extinguished from time to time by the rain drops that came through the roof, when I suddenly heard the squelching of mud, the sound of slipping, and an appalling splash. Someone had fallen into the shell hole just outside.

I waited a moment, and I heard the well-known voice of "Pongo" Simpson. "Strike me pink!" he spluttered, as he scrambled up the steep bank out of the water. "An' I gone an' forgot me soap. The first bath as I've 'ad for six weeks, too." And he blundered into my dug-out, a terrible object covered in slimy mud from head to foot, and when he breathed little showers of mud flew off his moustache.

"Hullo," I said, "you seem to be wet."

"Sorry, sir," said "Pongo," "I thought as 'ow this was my dug-out. Wet, sir? Gawd! Yes, I should think I was wet," and he doubled up to show me, while a thin stream of muddy water trickled from his hair on to my letter. "'Owever, it ain't no good to grumble, an' it's better to fall in a shell hole than to 'ave a shell fall on me. I've got some 'ot tea in me own dug-out, too."

When he had gone, I crumpled up my muddy letter, and I confess that I purposely listened to his conversation, for his dug-out was only separated from mine by a few horizontal logs piled up on each other.

"Well, you see, it ain't no good to grouse," he was saying to someone. "I've got mud up me nose an' in me eyes, and all down me neck, but it won't go away 'owever much I grumbles. Now, there's some blokes as grouses all the time—'ere, Bert, you might 'and over your knife a moment to scrape the mud off me face, it all cracks, like, when I talk—if they've got a Maconochie ration they wants bully beef, an' if they've got bully beef they carn't abear nothink but Maconochie. If you told 'em as 'ow the war was goin' to end to-morrow they'd either call you a bloomin' liar, or grouse like 'ell becos they 'adn't 'ad the time to win the V.C.

"There was young Alf Cobb. 'E wasn't arf a grouser, an' 'e 'ad good luck all the bloomin' time. When 'e came to the front they put 'im along o' the transport becos 'e'd been a jockey before the war, an' 'e groused all the time that 'e didn't 'ave none of the fun of the fightin'. Fun of the fightin', indeed, when 'e'd got that little gal what we used to call Gertie less than ten minutes from the stables! She was a nice little bit of stuff, was Gertie, an', if only she'd spoke English instead of this bloomin' lingo what sounds like swearin' ..." and here "Pongo" wandered off into a series of reminiscences of Gertie that have little to do with war and nothing to do with grumbling.

"'Owever, as I was sayin'," he continued at last, "that there Alf Cobb used to fair aggryvate me with 'is grousin'. When 'e got sent up for a spell in the trenches, and 'ad all 'the fun of the fightin',' 'e groused because 'e couldn't go off to some ole estaminet an' order 'is glass o' bitters like a dook. 'E groused becos 'e 'adn't got a feather bed, 'e groused becos 'e 'ad to cook 'is own food, an' 'e groused becos 'e didn't like the 'Uns. An' then when a whizz-bang landed on the parapet an' gave 'im a nice Blighty one in the arm, 'e groused becos 'e was afraid the sea'd be rough when 'e crossed over, an' 'e groused becos 'e couldn't light 'is own pipe. 'E's the sort of bloke what I don't like.

"What I like is a bloke like ole Lewis, who was always chirpy. 'E 'ad the rheumatics something fearful, but 'e never grumbled. Then 'e'd jest gone an' got spliced afore the war, an' 'is missis got 'im into debt an' then ran off with a fellow what works in the munitions. 'No good grousin',' says ole Joe Lewis, an' 'e still stayed cheerful, an' the night 'e 'eard as 'ow 'is young woman 'ad gone off 'e played away on 'is ole mouth-organ as 'appily as a fellow what's on 'is way to the Green Dragon with five bob in 'is pocket. The other blokes what knew about it thought as 'ow Joe didn't care at all, but I was 'is mate an' I knew as 'ow it 'urt a lot. When 'e got knocked over in that attack down Lee Bassey way, I jest stopped by 'im for a minute. 'Don't you worry about me, Pongo,' says 'e, 'I couldn't stand 'ome without 'er'—meanin' 'is missis, you see—'an' I'd rather 'op it like this. If I 'ad me ole mouth-organ 'ere, I'd give you chaps a tune to 'elp you on like.' That's the sort of bloke 'e was, chirpy up to the end. I 'ad to go on to the 'Un trenches, an' I never saw 'im again, for a big shell came along an' buried 'im.

"After all," continued "Pongo" after a pause, "it's a life what 'as its advantages. I ain't got to put on a 'ard collar o' Sundays out 'ere like me ole woman makes me do at 'ome. Then, I might 'ave stuck in that shell 'ole and 'ave been drowned; I might not 'ave 'ad a clean shirt to dry meself with; I might 'ave been 'it by a 'crump' yesterday. Yes, it might be worse, an' I ain't never a one to grouse."

Then someone who knew "Pongo" well made an apparently irrelevant remark. "There's plum and apple jam for rations again," he said.

"Pongo" rose to the fly at once. "Gawd!" he said, "if that ain't the bloomin' limit. I'd like to get me 'and round the neck of the bloke what gets all the raspberry an' apricot an' marmalade. 'Ere 'ave I been two years in the trenches, an' what 'ave I seen but plum an' apple? If it ain't plum an' apple, it's damson an' apple, which is jest the same only there's more stones in it. It do make me fair wild...."

"Pongo," insinuated someone at this moment, "I thought as 'ow you never grumbled."

"Pongo's" voice sank to its ordinary level. "That ain't grumblin'," he said. "I ain't a one to grumble."

But for the better part of an hour I heard him growling away to himself, and "plum and apple" was the burden of his growl. For even "Pongo" Simpson cannot always practise what he preaches.



XIII

THE CONVERT

John North, of the Non-Combatant Corps, leaned over the counter and smiled lovingly up into the shop girl's face. By an apparent accident, his hand slid across between the apple basket and the tins of biscuits, and came into gentle contact with hers. Knowing no French, his conversation was strictly limited, and he had to make amends for this by talking with his hand—by gently stroking her palm with his earth-stained thumb.

Mademoiselle Therese smiled shyly at him and her hand remained on the counter.

Private John North, thus encouraged, grew still bolder. He clasped her fingers in his fist, and was just wondering if he dared kiss them, when a gruff voice behind him caused him to stiffen, and to pretend he wanted nothing but a penny bar of chocolate.

"Now then, come orf it," said the newcomer, a private with the trench mud still caked on his clothes. "She's my young laidy, ain't yer, Therese?"

Therese smiled rather vaguely, for she knew no more Cockney than John North knew French.

"You clear out of 'ere," continued the linesman. "I don't want none o' you objector blokes 'anging around this shop, and if you come 'ere again I won't arf biff you one."

Unfortunately, it is the nature of woman to enjoy the sight of two men quarrelling for her favours, and Therese, guessing what was happening, was so unwise as to smile sweet encouragement at John North.

Even a Conscientious Objector loses his conscience when there is a woman in the case. John North turned up his sleeves as though he had been a boxer all his life, and proceeded to trounce his opponent with such vigour that the biscuit tins were hurled to the ground and the contents of a box of chocolates were scattered all over the floor.

As far as we are concerned, Mademoiselle Therese passes out of existence from this moment, but the little incident in her shop was not without consequences. In the first place, the Military Police cast the two miscreants into the same guard room, where, from bitter rivals, they became the best of friends. In the second place, John North, having once drawn blood, was no longer content with his former life, and wanted to draw more.

In the end he joined the Westfords, and fired his first shot over the parapet under direct tuition from his new friend. It matters little that his first shot flew several yards above the German parapet; the intention was good, and it is always possible that the bullet may have stung into activity some corpulent Hun whose duty called on him to lead pack horses about behind the firing line.

* * * * *

For weeks Holy John, as his company called him, passed out of my life. There were many other things to think of—bombs and grenades, attacks and counter-attacks, "barrages" and trench mortars, and all the other things about which we love to discourse learnedly when we come home on leave. John North was, for the time, completely forgotten.

But one day when the Great Push was in full swing, I met him again. From his former point of view he had sadly degenerated; from ours he had become a useful fellow with a useful conscience that told him England wanted him to "do in" as many Huns as he could.

I was supervising some work on a trench that had been German, but was now ours—the red stains on the white chalk told of the fight for it—when a voice I knew sounded from farther up the trench.

"If you don't bloomin' well march better, I won't arf biff you one, I won't," I heard, as the head of a strange little procession came round the traverse. At the rear of six burly but downcast Germans, came Private John North, late Conscientious Objector, driving his prisoners along with resounding oaths and the blood-chilling manoeuvres of a bayonet that he brandished in his left hand.

"They'll all mine, sir, the beauties," he said as he passed me. "Got 'em all meself, and paid me little finger for 'em, too," and he held up a bandaged right arm for my inspection.

And, far down the trench, I heard him encouraging his prisoners with threats that would delight a pirate or a Chinaman.

How he, single-handed, captured six of the enemy I do not know, but he was the first man to reach the German wire, they tell me, and he brought in two wounded men from No Man's Land.

Personally, then, it hardly seems to me that six Germans are enough to pay for the little finger of Holy John, erstwhile Conscientious Objector.



XIV

DAVID AND JONATHAN

I

Strangely different though they were, they had been friends ever since they first met at school, eleven years before. Jonathan—for what other names are necessary than the obvious David and Jonathan?—was then a fat, sandy-haired boy, with a deep love of the country, and hands that, however often he washed them, always seemed to be stained with ink. He had a deep admiration, an adoration almost, for his dark-haired, dark-eyed David, wild and musical.

The love of the country it was that first made them friends, and David became, so to speak, Jonathan's means of expression, for David could put into words, and, later on, into music, what Jonathan could only feel dimly and vaguely. Jonathan was the typical British public-schoolboy with a twist of artistic sense hidden away in him, while David was possessed of a soul, and knew it. A soul is an awkward thing to possess at school in England, for it brings much "ragging" and no little contempt on its owner, and Jonathan fought many battles in defence of his less-understood friend.

Eleven years had wrought but little material change in them. Jonathan, after a few minor rebellions, had settled down in his father's office and was learning to forget the call of the open road and the half-formed dreams of his youth. David, on the other hand, was wandering over the Continent nominally studying languages for the Consular Service, really picking up a smattering of poetry, a number of friends, and a deep knowledge of music. From Jonathan, he had learned to hide his sentiments in the presence of those who would not understand, and to make his reason conquer the wilder of the whims that ran through his brain. Jonathan, in turn, had gained a power, which he scarcely realised, of appreciating music and scenery, and which no amount of office life would ever diminish.

Then the war broke out, and brought them together again.

At the beginning of it, David, who had been amusing himself in Madrid by teaching the elements of grammar and a large vocabulary of English slang to any Spaniard who would pay for it, came home and enlisted with Jonathan in a line regiment. For two months they drilled and exercised themselves in the so-called "arts of war." Then, chiefly on account of a soulless section commander, they applied for, and obtained, commissions in the same regiment.

In the same billet, they re-lived their schooldays, and over the fire in the evenings would call up old memories, or David would tell of his adventures abroad, until late in the night.

When the time came for them to go to the front, the Fates still favoured them; they went out together to the same regiment in France, and were drafted to the same company. Together they went up to the trenches for the first time, together they worked, together they crouched under the parapet when the German shells came unpleasantly close, and, all the time, Jonathan, calm and stolid, unconsciously helped the other, who, being cursed with a vivid imagination, secretly envied his friend's calm.

Now, nothing has more power to cement or break friendships than war. The enforced company, the sharing of danger, the common bearing of all imaginable discomforts combine to make comrades or enemies. There are so many things to tax one's patience, that a real friend in whom one may confide becomes doubly dear, while you end by hating a man who has the misfortune to irritate you day after day. War made David and Jonathan realise how much their friendship meant, and how necessary each was to the other, the one because of his continued calm, the other because of the relief his love of music and of Nature brought with it.

II

Near the end of April 1915 they came back to billets near Ypres. To the north a terrific battle was in progress, the last inhabitants were fleeing from the town, and huge shells screamed on their way, and burst with appalling clouds of smoke among the already shattered houses. Occasionally a motor cyclist would come racing down the road, and, once or twice, an ambulance came by with its load of gassed and wounded from the fighting to the north.

One morning, when the Germans seemed fairly quiet, David and Jonathan set out arm in arm towards Ypres, to explore. An occasional shell—a hum, increasing until it became a roar, followed, a moment after, by a fearful explosion—warned them not to proceed beyond the outskirts of the town, and here it was that they came upon a large villa, with lilac budding in the garden. By mutual consent, they turned in at the tall iron gate, and entered the half-ruined house.

The part of the house giving on the road had been destroyed by a large shell. Over a gaping hole in the ceiling was a bed, its iron legs weirdly twisted, which threatened to overbalance at any minute and to come hurtling down into the hall beneath. Shattered picture frames still hung on the walls, and on the floor near at hand lay a rosary, the Crucifix crushed by some heedless boot. The furniture lay in heaps, and the front door was lying grotesquely across a broken mirror. Everywhere was wreckage.

The other half of the house was still almost intact. In what had once been the salon they found comfortable chairs and an excellent Pleyel piano, while a copy of the Daily Mirror gave the clue that the room had until recently been occupied by British troops.

David seated himself at the piano and began to play, and Jonathan threw himself in an arm-chair near the window to listen, and to watch the alternate cloud and sunshine outside. It was one of those perfect mornings of April, bright-coloured and windy, and the breeze in the lilacs combined with the notes of the piano until they could hardly be told apart. The rare whirr and explosion of a shell only had the effect of accentuating the intervening peace. Jonathan had never felt so at one with Nature and with his friend, and more than once, stolid and calm though he generally was, he felt a tear in his eye at an extra beautiful little bit of music or the glory of the world outside.

III

"Coming up to the villa this morning?" asked David of his friend a day or two later.

"I've got a confounded rifle inspection at half-past ten. You go on and I'll get up there as soon as I can," answered Jonathan, and he went off to talk to his platoon sergeant while his friend strolled off to the villa.

When he was going up the road to Ypres an hour later, he met an orderly on horseback. "Excuse me, sir, I don't think the road's extry nice now," he said. "They're dropping some heavy stuff into Yips again."

Jonathan smiled. "Oh, that's all right," he said. "Thanks, all the same, for warning me. I'll take care." And he hurried on up the road.

It was not until he was inside the villa that he noticed anything out of the ordinary. Suddenly, however, he stopped aghast. The door by which they entered the salon was gone, and in its place was a huge gap in the wall. The furniture was buried under a mass of debris, and instead of the gilded ceiling above him was only the blue sky. The piano was still untouched, but on the keys, and on the wall behind, were splashes of blood. Lying on the ground near it, half covered in plaster, was David. He forced himself to approach, and looked again. His friend's head was completely smashed, and one arm was missing.

For some minutes he stood still, staring. Then, with a sudden quiver, he turned and ran. In the garden he tripped over something, and fell, but he felt no hurt, for mad terror was upon him, and all sense had gone. He must get away from the dreadful thing in there; he must put miles between himself and the vision; he must run ... run ... run....

IV

Two privates found him, wild-eyed and trembling, and brought him to a medical officer. "Nerves, poor devil, and badly too!" was the diagnosis; and before Jonathan really knew what had happened, he was in hospital in Rouen.

Everyone gets "nervy" after a certain amount of modern warfare; even the nerves of the least imaginative may snap before a sudden shock.

So with stolid Jonathan. After a year, he is still in England. "Why doesn't he go out again?" people ask. "He looks well enough. He must be slacking." But they realise nothing of the waiting at night for the dreaded, oft-repeated dreams; they cannot tell of the horrible visions that war can bring, they do not know what it means, that neurasthenia, that hell on earth.

It is difficult to forget what must be forgotten. If you have "nerves" you must do all you can to forget the things that caused them, but when everything you do or say, think or hear, reminds you in some remote way of all you must forget, then recovery is hard indeed.

That is why Jonathan is still in England. If he hears or reads of the war he thinks of his dead friend: if he hears music—even a street organ—the result is worse; if he tries to escape from it all, and hides himself away in the country, the birds and the lilac blossom take him back to that morning near Ypres, when he first realised how much his friendship meant to him. And whenever he thinks of his friend, that horrible corpse near the piano comes back before his tight-closed eyes, and his hands tremble again in fear.



XV

THE RUM JAR

AND OTHER SOLDIER SUPERSTITIONS

The most notable feature in the famous history of the "Angels of Mons" was the fact that hundreds of practical, unpoetical, and stolid English soldiers came forward and testified to having seen the vision. Whether the story were fact or fancy, it is an excellent example of a change in our national character.

Before the war, the unromantic Englishman who thought he saw a vision would have blamed in turn his eyesight, his digestion, his sobriety, and his sanity before he allowed that he had anything to do with the supernatural. He now tells, without the least semblance of a blush, that he puts his faith in superstitions, and charms, and mascots, and that his lucky sign has saved his life on half a dozen occasions.

Of all the many and weird superstitions that exist in the British Army of to-day, the most popular has to do with the jar that contains the ration of rum. Rumour has it that once, long ago, a party that was bringing up rations for a company in the trenches was tempted by the thought of a good drink, and fell. When all the rum had been consumed the question arose as to how to explain matters, and the genius of the party suggested breaking the jar and pretending that it had been hit by a bullet. When the party filed into the trench, the waiting company was shown the handle of the jar, and had to listen to a vivid tale of how a German bullet that had just missed Private Hawkes had wasted all the company's rum. Rumour also has it that the unsteady gait of one member of the party gave the lie to the story—but this is beside the point.

From this little incident there has sprung up a far-reaching superstition—German bullets, the men have it, swerve instinctively towards the nearest rum jar. A few stray shots have helped to strengthen the belief, and the conviction holds firm down nearly the whole length of the British line that the man who carries the rum jar runs a double risk of being hit.

Mascots and talismans hold an important place in the soldier's life. I know of one man who used to carry in his pack a rosary that he had picked up in one of the streets of Ypres. One day his leg was fractured in two places by a large piece of a trench-mortar bomb, but, in spite of his pain, he refused to be taken down to the dressing station until we had hunted through his pack and found him his rosary. "If I don't take it with me," he said, "I'll get 'it again on the way down."

And this is by no means an isolated example. Nearly every man at the front has a mascot of some sort—a rosary, a black cat, a German button, or a weird sign—which is supposed to keep him safe.

Their superstitions, too, are many in number. One man is convinced that he will be killed on a Friday; another man would rather waste a dry—and therefore valuable—match than light three cigarettes with it; another will think himself lucky if he can see a cow on his way up to the trenches; a fourth will face any danger, volunteer for any patrol, go through the worst attack without a qualm, simply because he "has got a feeling he will come through unhurt." And he generally does, too.

I once had a servant who used to wear a shoe button on a piece of string round his neck. At some village billet in France a tiny girl had given it him as a present, and he treasured it as carefully as a diamond merchant would treasure the great Koh-i-noor stone—in fact, I am convinced that he often went without washing just to avoid the risk of loss in taking it off and putting it on again. To you in England it seems ridiculous that a man should hope to preserve his life by wearing a shoe button on a piece of string. But then, you have not seen the strange tricks that Fate will play with lives. You have not watched how often a shell will burst in a group of men, kill one outright, and leave the others untouched; you have not joked with a friend one moment and knelt by him to catch his dying words the next; you have not stood at night by a hastily dug grave and wondered, as you mumbled a few half-remembered prayers, why the comrade who is lying there on a waterproof sheet should have been killed while you are left unhurt.

Besides, there are so many things which tend to make a man superstitious and to confirm him in his trust in mascots and charms. Many a man has had a premonition of his death, many a man has come through long months of war, and then has been killed on the day on which he lost his mascot.

The thought of superstition recalls to me Joe Williams, the ex-policeman. Joe Williams was a fatalist, and believed every word he read in his little book of prophecies, so that the dawn of September 4th found him glum and depressed.

"It ain't no bloomin' good," he grumbled. "It says in my book as 'ow September 4th is a disastrous day for England, so it will be. There ain't no way of stopping Fate." And when his section laughed at him for his fears he merely shrugged his shoulders, and sat gazing into the brazier's glow.

The day wore quietly on, and I had forgotten all about Williams and his gloomy prophecies when a corporal came along to my dug-out. "Williams has been hit by a bomb, sir," he said, "and is nearly done for."

At the other end of the trench lay Joe Williams, near to death, while his comrades tied up his wounds. The glumness had gone from his face, and when he saw me he signed for me to stoop down. "What did I tell you, sir, about the disaster for England?" he whispered. "Ain't this a bloomin' disaster?" and he tried to laugh at his little joke, but the flow of blood choked him, and he died.

Perhaps, though, he was nearer the mark than he imagined, for it is a rash thing to say that the death of a man who can joke with his dying breath is not a disaster to England.

* * * * *

It may all seem intensely foolish to you, and childish; it may strike you that our men at the front are attempting to bribe Fate, or that we are returning to the days of witches and sorcerers. But it is not without its good points, this growth of superstition. Man is such a little, helpless pawn in the ruthless game of war, and death is so sudden and so strange, that the soul gropes instinctively in search of some sign of a shielding arm and a watchful power. The Bible, the Crucifix, a cheap little charm—any of these may bring comfort to the man in the trench, and give him the illusion that he is not one of those marked for the sickle of Death.

A man who is confident that he will come through a battle unhurt generally does so, or, if Death comes, he meets it with a smile on his lips. The man who expects to be killed, who has no belief in some shielding power—though it be but symbolised by a common shoe button—is taken by Death very soon, but, even then, not before he has gone through those long, morbid hours of waiting that breed the germs of fear.

The penny lucky charm that can bring comfort to a man in danger is not a thing to be ridiculed. It may be a proof of ignorance, but to the man it is symbolical of his God, and is therefore worthy of all respect and reverence from others.



XVI

THE TEA SHOP

Baker came to me directly after lunch. "Look here," he said, "I'm not satisfied."

"What's the matter now?"

"I want something respectable to eat. Let's go into Poperinghe and get a properly cooked tea."

"It's six miles," I objected, "and a confoundedly hot day."

"All the better for an omelette appetite."

I thought of the omelettes in the tea shop of Poperinghe, and I knew that I was lost. "Can't you get horses?" I asked.

"No luck. The transport has to shift to-day and there's nothing doing in that line. I asked just before lunch."

The omelettes danced up and down before my eyes until the intervening miles over hard cobble stones dwindled to nothing. "All right," I said. "Will you go and get leave for us? I'll be ready in a minute." And I went off to borrow some money from Jackson with which to pay for my omelettes.

The church tower of Poperinghe shimmered in the heat and seemed to beckon us on along the straight road that led through the miles of flat country, relieved here and there by stretches of great hop poles or by little red-roofed farms where lounged figures in khaki.

In every field grazed dozens of horses and in every lane were interminable lines of motor lorries, with greasy-uniformed men crawling about underneath them or sleeping on the seats. In one place, a perspiring "Tommy" hurried round a farmyard on his hands and knees, and barked viciously for the benefit of a tiny fair-haired girl and a filthy fox-terrier puppy; and right above him swung a "sausage" gleaming in the sunlight. Just outside Poperinghe we met company after company of men, armed with towels, waiting by the roadside for baths in the brewery, and, as we passed, one old fellow, who declared that his "rheumatics was that bad he couldn't wash," was trying to sell a brand-new cake of soap for the promise of a drink.

The sun was hot in the sky, and the paving, than which nothing on earth is more tiring, seemed rougher and harder than usual; motor lorries, or cars containing generals, seemed, at every moment, to compel us to take to the ditch, and we were hot and footsore when we tramped through the Grande Place to the tea shop.

But here we were doomed to disappointment, for not a chair was vacant—"Not room for a flea," as Madame explained to us, and we had to curb our appetites as best we could.

The tea shop at Poperinghe! Where could you hope to find a more popular spot than was the tea shop in the early part of 1915? Where could you get better omelettes served by a more charming little waitress?—was she really charming, I wonder, or did she merely seem so faute de mieux? Where could you find a nicer place to meet your friends from other regiments, to drink coffee, to eat quantities of dainty French cakes? It is not surprising that the shop at Poperinghe was always crowded by four in the afternoon in those old days before the second battle of Ypres.

As patiently as might be, Baker and I waited, lynx-eyed, until two chairs were vacated.

"Mademoiselle," we called, "deux omelettes, s'il vous plait."

"Bien, messieurs, tout de suite."

But we were far too hungry to wait, and before the omelettes arrived we had cleared a great plate of cakes. After weeks of indifferent trench cooking the first well-done omelette is a great joy, and, as I put down my fork, I glanced inquiry at Baker.

"Rather," he answered to my unspoken question.

"Mademoiselle, encore deux omelettes, s'il vous plait," I ordered. "Nous avons une faim de loup."

"Je m'en apercois, messieurs les officiers," answered our fair enchantress, as she hurried off to repeat our order in the kitchen, while a crowd of predatory officers glared murder at us when they found we did not intend to leave our places so soon. "Some fellows are pigs," murmured one.

"That was splendid," said Baker when we started off on our homeward walk. "But six miles is a hell of a long way."

Personally, though, I enjoyed those six miles through the dusk, for we seemed to hear the hum of the traffic and the shouts of newsboys. Our tea brought back souvenirs of England, and we talked of London and of home, of theatres, and of coast patrol on the southern cliffs, until the little low huts of our camp showed up ahead.

* * * * *

It is nearly two years now since Baker was killed. He was found gassed in a dug-out on Hill 60, and by his side lay his servant, who had died in the attempt to drag him out to the comparative safety of the open trench. Nearly two years since another friend gave up his life for his country; nearly two years since another mother in England learned that her son had been killed in a "slight diversion on the Ypres salient"!

But it was thus that he would have wished to die.



XVII

"HERE COMES THE GENERAL"

A servant brought me a note to my dug-out:

"Come down and have some lunch in trench 35D," it ran, "in C Company officers' dug-out. Guests are requested to bring their own plates and cutlery; and, if it is decent, their own food. Menu attached. R.S.V.P."

The menu was as follows:

MENU OF LUNCHEON GIVEN BY C COMPANY AT THEIR COUNTRY RESIDENCE, "THE RETREAT," 15/5/15.

SOUPS

Soup a la Bully Beef. Soup a l'Oxo.

FISH

Salmon (and Shrimp Paste) without Mayonnaise Sauce. Sardines a l'Huile (if anyone provides them).

ENTREES

Maconochie, very old. Bully beef and boiled potatoes.

SWEETS

Pineapple Chunks, fresh from the tin. English Currant Cake.

SAVOURY

Welsh Rarebit.

I read through the menu, and decided to risk it, and, procuring the necessary crockery, I clanked through fully half a mile of trenches to C Company. The officers' dug-out was in the cellar of an old cottage which just came in our line of trenches. The only access to it was by means of a very narrow stairway which led down from the trench. The interior, when I arrived, was lit by three candles stuck in bottles, which showed officers in almost every vacant spot, with the exception of one corner, where a telephone orderly was situated with his apparatus. I occupied the only untenanted piece of ground I could find, and awaited events.

The soup was upset, as the moment when the servant was about to bring it down from the outer air was the moment chosen for a rehearsal of that famous game, "Here comes the General." The rules of this game are simple. The moment anyone utters the magic phrase there is an immediate rush for the steps, the winner of the game being he who manages to arrive at the top first and thus impress the imaginary general with his smartness.

The soup stood but a poor chance in a stampede of eleven officers, the candles were kicked out, and a long argument ensued as to whose plate was which, and why Martin's spoon should have gone down Fenton's neck, and if the latter should be made to forfeit his own spoon to make up for his unintentional theft.

Order was at length restored, and the meal was proceeding in comparative peace, when, suddenly, Jones, who had not been invited to the luncheon, appeared at the top of the steps.

"I say, you fellows," he cried excitedly. "Here comes the General."

"Liar!" shouted someone. But the magic words could not be allowed to pass unnoticed, even though we were eating pineapple chunks at the time, and they are very sticky if you upset them over your clothes.

A fearful scramble took place, in which everyone—with the exception of Walters, who placed himself in the further corner with the tin of pineapple—tried to go together up steps which were just broad enough to allow the passage of one man at a time.

A conglomerate mass of officers, all clinging convulsively to each other, suddenly burst into the open trench—almost at the feet of the General, who came round the traverse into view of them at that moment.

When I returned to C Company's dug-out, an hour or so later, to try to recover my plate and anything else that had not been smashed, I found three officers reading a message that had just come by telephone from Battalion Headquarters. It was prefixed by the usual number of mysterious letters and figures and ran:

"The Brigadier has noticed with regret the tendency of several officers to crowd into one dug-out. This practice must cease. An officer should have his dug-out as near those of his own men as possible, and should not pass his time in the dug-outs belonging to officers of other companies."

"Here comes the General!" whispered somebody.

I got first up the steps and hurried, a battered plate in my hand, along the trenches to my dug-out.



XVIII

THE RASCAL IN WAR

Even the most apathetic of us has been changed by war—he who in times of peace was content with his ledgers and daily office round is now in the ranks of men who clamber over the parapet and rush, cheering, to the German lines; she who lived for golf, dances, and theatres is now caring for the wounded through the long nights in hospital. Everyone in every class of life has altered—the "slacker" has turned soldier, and the burglar has become a sound, honest man.

Strange it is that war, which might be expected to arouse all the animal passions in us, has done us so much good! There are among the men in the trenches many hundreds who were, before the war, vastly more at home in the police courts and prisons than is the average Londoner at a public dinner. That they should be brave is not astonishing, for adventure is in their bones, but they are also as faithful, as trustworthy, as amenable to discipline as any soldiers we possess.

There was "Nobby" Clarke, for instance. "Nobby" was a weedy little Cockney who became my "batman," or servant. He had complete control of my privy purse, did all my shopping, and haggled over my every halfpenny as carefully as though it were his own. Then, when he had served me for over six months, I overheard him one day recounting his prison experiences, and I discovered that he had been a pilferer and pickpocket well known in all the London police courts. In his odd moments out of jail, he would hover outside the larger stations, touch a bedraggled cap with a filthy finger, and say, "Kerry yer beg, sir?" in a threatening tone to all passers-by; his main income, however, appeared to come from far less respectable sources.

And yet he served me more faithfully than I have ever been served before or since, and I have seldom been more sorry than I was when "Nobby" Clarke was hit. As we were tying him up—he had been wounded in eight places by a rifle grenade—he signed to me and I stooped over him.

"I ain't got no one at 'ome as cares fer me," he said, "so yer might 'and me things round to the blokes 'ere. I've got a photograph of me ole woman wot died five years ago. It's in me pay book, sir, an' I'd like yer to keep it jest to remind yer of me." Then, his voice getting weaker every moment, "I ain't been such a bad servant to yer, 'as I, sir?" he whispered, his eyes looking appealingly into mine. And when "Nobby" Clarke, onetime loafer and pickpocket, passed away, I am not ashamed to own that there was a queer sort of lump in my throat.

And he was only one of many, was "Nobby" Clarke. There was Bennett, the tramp, who was always ready with a song to cheer up the weary on the march; there was a Jewish money-lender who was killed while trying to save a man who was lying wounded in No Man's Land; there was Phillips, who had been convicted of manslaughter—he became a stretcher-bearer, and was known all over the battalion for his care of the wounded.

In every regiment in every army you will find a little group of men who were tramps and beggars and thieves, and, almost without exception, they have "made good." For the first time in their lives they have been accepted as members of great society, and not driven away as outcasts. The Army has welcomed them, disciplined them, and taught them the elements of self-respect—a quality whose very existence they ignored before the war.

There is an Italian proverb—"Tutto il mondo e paese"—which means, in its broadest sense, "All the world is ruled by the same passion and qualities." In the old days it needed a Dickens, and, later, a Neil Lyons to discover the qualities of the criminal classes; now war has brought us all together—the erstwhile city merchant warms himself before the same brazier as the man who would have picked his pocket three years before—and we suddenly find that we are no better than the beggar, and that a man who stole apples from a stall is no worse at heart than the inhabitant of Mayfair.

It is not that our ideas of greatness have degenerated when we call these men heroes; it is not that war is entirely a thing of evil, so that the criminal shines as a warrior—it is that these "outcasts" have changed. Statistics prove that crime has decreased since the war began, and crime will continue to decrease, for that indefinable instinct we call patriotism has seized on all classes alike, so that the criminal can make the supreme sacrifice just as magnificently as the man who has "kept straight" all his life.

And the best of it is that this reform among burglars and beggars is not for the "duration of the war only." War has lost us our sons and our fathers, it has brought appalling sorrow and suffering into the world, but it has given the very poor a chance they have never had before. No more are they outcasts; they are members of society, and such they will remain. If this were all the good that war could do, it would still be our ultimate gain that the great scourge is passing over the world.



XIX

"PONGO" SIMPSON ON OFFICERS

"Orficers," said "Pongo" Simpson, "is rum blokes. I've got a fam'ly of six kids back at 'ome, not counting Emma what's in service, an' I reckon my orficer's more trouble to look after nor all the lot of 'em put together. It's always: 'Simpson, where the dooce is my puttees?' or 'Simpson, you've sewed this 'ere button on in the wrong place,' or 'Simpson, the soup tastes like cocoa and the cocoa tastes like soup'—does 'e expect me to kerry a bloomin' collection of canteens? Don't 'e think it better to 'ave cocoa what's got a bit o' soup in it than to 'ave a canteen what's been washed in a shell 'ole along of a dead 'Un? Why, if we was goin' to charge to Berlin to-morrer I'd 'ave to spend 'arf the night cleanin' 'is boots and buttons.

"Yes, 'e's a funny sort o' bloke, my orficer, but, my Gawd!"—and here Simpson expectorated to give emphasis to his statement—"I'd foller 'im against a crowd of 'Uns, or a lot of wimmen what's waiting for their 'usbands what ain't come 'ome at three in the morning, or anythink else you like. 'E's an 'elpless sort of chap, an' 'e's got funny ideas about shavin' and washin'—sort of disease, you know—but 'e's a good sort when you knows 'is little ways.

"Do you remember that young Mr. Wilkinson?" asked "Pongo," and a few of the "old hands" in the dug-out nodded affirmatively. "'E was a one, 'e was," resumed "Pongo." "Do you remember the day we was gassed on 'Ill 60? 'E used to be my bloke then, and I was with 'im all the time. 'E was a proper lad! When the gas 'ad gone over there was only five of A Company left, with 'im in charge, and we knew as 'ow the 'Uns would attack as soon as they thought we was properly wiped out. And Mr. Wilkinson was fine. All down the trench 'e put blokes' rifles on the parapet, and the 'ole bloomin' six of us ran up an' down the trench like a lot of rabbits, firin' off rifle after rifle till the Alleymans must 'ave thought we was an 'ole battalion. The only times when Mr. Wilkinson wasn't firin' rifles, 'e was fusin' bombs, jest as busy as that little girl be'ind the counter of the Nag's 'Ead of a Saturday night. 'E must 'ave sent a good number of 'Uns 'ome that day with bits of bombs inside of them.

"And you should 'a' seen Mr. Wilkinson when the Sergeant wos for givin' in and goin' back to the second line! We'd all the gas in us more or less, and 'e could 'ardly talk, 'e was that bad, but when 'e 'eard the Sergeant say as 'ow 'e was goin' back, 'e shouted like the Colonel on a battalion parade. 'Curse you, Sergeant!' 'e yelled, 'what's the good of goin' back? We've got to 'old this trench or 'op it. If you don't like the air down there, come up on the parapet with me.' And up 'e jumps on to the parapet with the gas clearin' away, and the Fritzes only 30 or 40 yards off.

"'It? Why, of course 'e was 'it. 'E was laughin' like a kid what's stealin' apples—all excited like—when they got 'im right through the 'ead, and 'e fell down on the other side of the parapet. But 'e'd done what 'e wanted to, for the Sergeant wasn't talkin' any more about goin' back. 'E crawled out over the parapet and brought poor Mr. Wilkinson back, and got 'it in the leg while 'e was doin' it, too. But that didn't matter to 'im, for 'e was out to 'ave 'is own back, was the Sergeant, and we 'eld that bloomin' trench for another hour until the blokes got up the communication trench to 'elp us. There's a lot of medals what ought to go to blokes as don't get them, and it might 'ave 'elped Mr. Wilkinson's mother if they'd given 'im the V.C., but there weren't no other orficers about, and they didn't take any notice of us chaps."

"Talkin' of 'Ill 60," said Bert Potter, "there was that Captain—I misremember 'is name—you know, that bloke what got into trouble at the ole farm for giving a cow a tin o' bully beef, and the cow died next day. I was in 'is trench with a machine gun when 'e got 'is little bit. A chunk out of an 'and grenade 'it 'im in the thigh, and 'e laughed like 'ell becos 'e'd got a 'cushy' wound. Why, 'e even said as 'ow 'e could walk down to the dressing station, and we envied 'im like 'ell and thought it was only a flesh wound. I got 'it the next day and went to the same 'orspital where 'e was. 'E'd 'ad 'is thigh bone smashed all to bits, and they'd jest taken 'is leg off when I saw 'im. 'E was weak as a kid and chirpy as a sparrer, and only cursin' becos 'e was out of things for the rest of the war. I never 'eard what 'appened to 'im, but the nurse told me as 'ow they was afraid 'e wouldn't recover becos of emmyridge, or something with a name like that. And 'e wasn't more nor twenty-one years old neither, pore bloke."

"But you won't beat the Medical Orficer anywhere," said Jones, one of the stretcher-bearers who was on duty in the trenches. "'E don't 'ave to fight, but you should see 'im when things is busy up 'ere. Coat off an' sleeves up, workin' for 'ours on end till any man what wasn't an 'orse would drop dead. 'E's 'ard on the shirkers and scrimshankers—e's the sort of bloke what would give you a dose o' castor oil for earache or frost-bitten feet, but 'e's like a mother with the wounded. I've seen 'im, too, goin' along the cutting when the whizz-bangs was burstin' all the way down it, carryin' some wounded fellow in 'is arms as calmly as if 'e were an ole girl carryin' a parcel along Regent Street. And then," said Jones, as he named the greatest point in the M.O.'s favour, "'e's the best forward on a wet day as ever I seed."

Just at that moment a voice sounded from farther up the trench. "Simpson," it said, "where the deuce is my toothbrush?"

"Jest comin', sir. I've got 'un," answered "Pongo" Simpson as he produced a greasy-looking toothbrush from his pocket. "'Ere, give us that canteen of 'ot water," he said quietly, "I used 'is toothbrush to grease 'is boots with yesterday—didn't think 'e'd miss it, for you don't come out 'ere to wash your teeth. They 'ave got funny ways, these 'ere orficers. 'Owever," he continued as he wiped the brush dry on the sleeve of his tunic, "what the eye don't see, the 'eart don't grieve over. 'E'll only think as 'ow it's the water what's greasy."

"Simpson," came the voice from farther along the trench, a moment or so later, "this is the greasiest water I've ever tasted. What the deuce you've done to it I don't know."



XX

THE HAND OF SHADOW

"Come in," said Margery Debenham, as she opened her eyes lazily to the sunlight. "Put my tea on the table, please, Mary. I'm too sleepy to drink it yet.

"There's a letter from the front, miss," said Mary with emphasis, as she went out of the room.

Margery was awake in a second. She jumped out of bed, slipped on a dressing-gown, and, letter in hand, ran over to the window to read it in the morning sunshine. As she tore open the envelope and found only a small sheet of paper inside, she made a little moue of disappointment, but the first words of the letter changed it into a sigh of joy. It was dated September 13th and ran:

"MY DARLING,

"At last I have got my leave, and am coming home to be married. Our months of waiting are over. I leave here to-morrow afternoon, shall spend the night on the way somewhere, and shall arrive in London late on the 15th, or during the morning of the 16th. I must spend the day in town to do a little shopping (I couldn't be seen at my own wedding very well in the clothes I have on now) and expect to get down to Silton at 3.20 on the 17th. I have to be back in this hole on the 24th, so that if we get married on Saturday we shall have quite a nice little honeymoon. Darling little one! Isn't it too good to be true? I can hardly realise that within a week I shall be

"Your devoted and hen-pecked husband

RONALD."

"P.S.—I have written to father, and he will make all arrangements for Saturday.

"P.P.S.—Shall I be allowed to smoke in the drawing-room?"

* * * * *

Margery Debenham leant out of the window and gazed at the garden and the orchard beyond. The light flickered through the trees of the old flagged path along which she and Ronald had so often wandered, and she could just see the tall grass waving down at the bottom of the orchard, where they used to sit and discuss the future. Everything reminded her of her lover who was coming back to her, who would be with her again to-morrow afternoon. At the thought of the five long, weary months of waiting that were passed, and of the eight days of happiness that were coming, two little tears crept out of her eyes and down her cheeks. She brushed them impatiently away, for she was too busy to cry. She must run and tell her parents; she must hurry over to talk to Ronald's father; she must write to her friends; she must run down to the bottom of the orchard and watch for a while the trout that lay in the little stream; she must laugh and sing until the whole village of Silton knew that her waiting was over, and that Ronald was in England again.

* * * * *

Captain Ronald Carr hoisted his pack on his shoulder, and turned to three officers who were looking at him enviously. "Cheer oh, you fellows," he said, "think of me in two days' time, while you are being 'strafed' by the Hun, rushing about town in a taxi," and, with a wave of his hand, he marched off to battalion headquarters, followed by Butler, his servant. From battalion headquarters he had a distance of two miles to walk to the cross roads where he was to meet his groom with his horse, but the day was hot and progress was rather slow. His first quarter of a mile was along a narrow and winding communicating trench; after that the way was along a hidden road, but huge shell craters all along told that the German artillery had it well marked.

Away to the right a bombardment was in progress, and the dull thuds of the guns came sleepily through the September haze; above him, a skylark sang lustily; the long grass by the roadside smelt sweet and lush. As Ronald Carr strode down the road, he laughed to himself at the fairness of the world.

Of a sudden, a shell burst over some trees a few hundred yards away, and, as the white smoke rolled away, he felt aware of a change.

Supposing he were to get wounded on the way down! With the next warning whine of a coming shell he found himself ducking as never before, for Captain Carr was not a man who often crouched for nothing.

Another shell came, and another, and with each his feeling grew. Just so must a mouse feel, he thought, when a cat plays with it. He felt as though he were at the mercy of an enormous giant, and that, each time he thought to escape, the shadow of a huge hand fell on the ground around him, and he knew that the hand above was waiting to crush him. At the thought, the hair on his forehead grew damp; time after time he checked his mad impulse to quicken his pace, and caught himself glancing covertly at his servant to see if he noticed his captain's strange behaviour. Suppose the hand should crush him before he could get back to England, to his home, to his marriage!

Suddenly there were four short, loud hisses, and four shells burst along the road close in front of them.

"They're searching the road. Quick, into the ditch," shouted Carr to his servant, as he jumped into an old trench that ran along the roadside. Butler turned to do the same, slipped on the pave, and fell heavily, his ankle badly sprained. Those hateful hisses would come again before the man could crawl into safety, and this time they would probably be nearer, and escape almost miraculous. Captain Carr leaped out of the trench again and helped his servant to his feet.

"Cling on to me, man!" and, a moment after, he shouted, "down, here they come again!" and they flung themselves on their faces scarce two feet from the ditch and probable safety.

When Butler raised his head again after the four explosions, Captain Ronald Carr lay at his side, dead. The hand had grasped its prey.

* * * * *

Margery Debenham was standing in front of her mirror, getting ready to go to meet Ronald by the 3.20 train, when Mr. Carr came to announce the receipt of the War Office telegram.

She could find no tears when she heard the news; she felt stunned, and vaguely bored by the platitudes of consolation people uttered. When she could escape, she went slowly down the flagged path, where they used to walk to the orchard, where the future had been planned by two people full of the happy confidence of the young. She flung herself down in the long grass by the stream, and buried her hot face in her hands.

"What does it all mean?" she said to herself. Then, a minute later, she thought of all the other women who had to bear the same pain, and all for no reason. "There is no God," she cried passionately. "No one can help me, for there is no God." Day after day, night after night of waiting, and all for nothing. All those hours of agony, when the papers talked of "diversions" on the British front, rewarded by the supreme agony, by the sudden loss of all hope. No more need to hunt for a loved but dreaded name through the casualty lists every morning; all that was finished now.

The splash of a jumping trout in the pool under the willow tree took her thoughts away from her pain for the fraction of a second—just sufficient time to allow the soothing tears to come.

"O God," she murmured, "help me to see why. Help me, God, help me!" and she burst into sobs, her face pressed down into the cool, long grass.



XXI

THE VETERAN

Old Jules Lemaire, ex-sergeant in the 3rd regiment of the line, raised his wine glass.

"Bonne chance," he said, "and may you fight the devils as we did in 1870 and 1871, and with more success too."

"Enough of you and your 1870," said someone roughly. "We go out to win where you lost; there will be no Woerth or Sedan in this war. We will drive the Prussians back to Berlin; you let them march to Paris. We are going to act, whereas you can only talk—you are much too old, you see, Pere Lemaire."

The ex-sergeant put down his glass with a jerk as though he had been struck. He looked around on the company that filled the front room of the Faisan d'Or, and on the faces of the men who had looked up to him for years as the hero of 1870 he now saw only the keenness to fight. He was old, forgotten, and no longer respected, and the blow was a hard one to bear.

The cloud of war was drifting up from the east, and the French Army was mobilising for the Great War. The peasants of the village had just been called up, and within half an hour they would be on their way to the depots of their different regiments, while Jules Lemaire, sergeant of the line, would be left at home with the cripples and the women and the children.

"I will serve France as well as any of you," he said defiantly. "I will find a way." But his voice was unheeded in the general bustle and noise, and Madame Nolan, the only person who appeared to hear him, sniffed with contempt.

Men destined for different regiments were saying good-bye to each other; Georges Simon, the blacksmith, with his arm round his fiancee's waist, was joking with Madame Nolan, who hurried about behind her little zinc counter; the door slammed noisily at each departure—and Jules Lemaire sat unheeded in the corner by the old clock.

And presently, when the front room was quiet and Madame Nolan was using her dirty apron to wipe away her tears, the ex-sergeant crept out quietly into the street and hobbled along to his cottage. He reached up and took his old Chassepot rifle down from the wall where it had hung these many years, and, while the other inhabitants thronged the road, cheering, weeping, laughing, Jules Lemaire sat before his little wooden table, with his rifle in his hands and a pile of cartridges before him.

"There will be a way," he murmured. "I will help my country; there will be a way."

* * * * *

The grey invaders swept on through the village, and Jules Lemaire, from his hiding-place on the church tower, watched them come with tears of impotent rage on his cheeks. Battalion after battalion they passed by—big, confident Germans who jeered at the peasants, and who sang as they plodded over the pave. Once, when a company was halted beneath him, while the officers went in to the Faisan d'Or across the road, to see what they could loot in the way of drinks, the ex-sergeant aimed carefully at the captain, but he put down his rifle without firing.

At last, late in the afternoon when the dusk was beginning to hide the southern hills, Jules Lemaire's waiting came to an end. A large motor car drew up outside the inn, and a general with three officers of his staff got out into the road. One of the officers spread a map on the old door bench—where Jules Lemaire had so often sat of an evening and told of his adventures in the war—and, while an orderly went to procure wine for them, the four Germans bent over the plan of the country they thought to conquer.

Suddenly a shot rang out from the church tower above them. The general fell forward on to the bench, while his blood and his wine mingled in a staining stream that ran across the map of invincible France, and dripped down on to the dust below.

* * * * *

They met Jules Lemaire coming down the spiral steps of the church tower, his rifle still in his hand. They hit him with their rifle butts, they tied him up with part of the bell rope, and propped him up against the church wall.

Just before they fired, Jules Lemaire caught sight of Madame Nolan, who stood, terrified and weeping, at the doorway of the inn.

"You see," he shouted to her, "I also, I have helped my country. I was not too old after all."

And he died with a smile on his face.



XXII

THE SING-SONG

As soon as the battalion marches back from the trenches to the village in the first light of the morning, everyone turns his mind to methods which will help the few days of rest to pass as pleasantly as war and the limited amusements afforded by two estaminets and a row of cottages will permit.

"Chacun son gout." As he tramps along the street, B Company Sergeant-Major challenges Corporal Rogers to a boxing match on the morrow; Second Lieutenant White, who is new to war, sits in his billet and, by the light of a candle stuck in a bottle, traces the distance to the nearest town on the off chance that he will get leave to visit it; the doctor demands of his new landlady, in the most execrable French, where he can find a field suitable for "le football"; and Private Wilson, as he "dosses down" on the floor, suggests sleepily to Private Jones that he will be thirsty in the afternoon and that Private Jones has been owing him a drink since that day in Ouderdom three weeks ago.

Besides such methods of passing the time, there are baths to be had in the great brewery vats of the village, there is an inter-company hockey tournament to be played with a Tickler's jam tin in lieu of a ball, and, best of all, there is the "sing-song."

Be it in a trench, or in a barn, or out in the open fields where the battalion lies bivouacked under rows of waterproof sheets strung up as inadequate tents, the sing-song is sure of success, and a man with a voice like a mowing machine will receive as good a reception as would Caruso or Melba at Covent Garden. There is a French Territorial regiment which has a notice up at the entrance of its "music hall"—"Entree pour Messieurs les Poilus. Prix un sourire." Admission a smile! There is never a man turned away from its doors, for where is the "poilu" or where is the "Tommy" who is not always ready with a smile and a laugh and a song?

There are little incidents in life that engrave themselves deep in the memory. Of all the sing-songs I have attended, there is one that is still vivid—the brush of time has washed away the outlines and edges of the others.

We were billeted, I remember, in Eliza's farm—Eliza, for the benefit of those who do not know her, is fair, fat, fifty, and Flemish; a lady who shakes everyone in the farm into wakefulness at five o'clock each morning by the simple process of stepping out of bed—when the Captain decided that we wanted "taking out of ourselves." "We'll have a sing-song," he announced.

So the Company Sergeant-Major was called in to make arrangements, and at eight o'clock that evening we wandered into the Orchestra Stalls. The concert hall was a large barn with a double door in the middle which had been opened wide to allow the admittance of a cart, which was placed in the entrance to act as a stage. All around the high barn, and perched precariously on the beams, were the men, while we of the Orchestra Stalls were accommodated on chairs placed near the stage. Behind the cart was a background consisting of Eliza and her numerous gentlemen friends, her daughter, an old lady aged roughly a hundred, and a cow that had no right to be there at all, but had wandered in from the nearest field to see the show. An orchestral accompaniment was kept up, even during the saddest recitation, by dozens of little pigs that scrambled about in the farmyard and under the stage. And beyond the farm swayed the tall poplars that stood along the road which led straight away into the distance, whence came sudden flashes of light and the long, dull rumble of the guns.

Of the programme itself, I have but the vaguest recollection, for the programmes are the least interesting part of these performances. The first item, I remember, was a dreadful sentimental song by Private Higgs which accident converted from comparative failure into howling success. Just as he was rendering the most affecting passage, Private Higgs stepped back too far, the cart—of the two-wheeled variety—overbalanced, and the sad singer was dropped down amongst the little pigs below, to the great joy of the crowd.

Then came a Cockney humorist, who, in times of peace, was the owner of a fried fish and chip barrow in that home of low comedians—the East End. After him appeared Sergeant Andrews, disguised in one of Eliza's discarded skirts, with a wisp of straw on his head to represent a lady's hair. Some vulgar song he sang in a shrill, falsetto voice that caused great dismay among the pigs, as yet unused to the vagaries of the British soldier.

After the interval, during which the audience en masse made a pilgrimage to Eliza's back door to buy beer at a penny a glass, there came the usual mixture of the vulgar and the sentimental, for nothing on earth is more sentimental than a soldier. There was the inevitable "Beautiful Picture in a Beautiful Golden Frame," and a recitation in Yiddish which was well applauded simply because no man had any idea what it was about. The Sergeant-Major gave a very creditable rendering of "Loch Lomond" in a voice that would terrify a recruit, and we finished up the evening with a song requesting a certain naughty boy to hold out his hand, which was shouted by everyone with so much vigour that one wondered how it was the men could still sing "God save the King" when the time came.

And far into the night, when the farmyard lay still and ghostly, and the pigs had gone off to bed, we still sat and talked in the "Officers' Mess," and recalled jokes of George Robey and Harry Tate, or hummed over the tunes we had heard at the last Queen's Hall concert. As the Captain had said, we wanted "taking out of ourselves," and it had just needed an impromptu concert in an old Flemish barn to do it.



XXIII

THE "STRAFE" THAT FAILED

There is a certain battery in France where the name of Archibald Smith brings a scowl to every brow and an oath to every lip. The Battery Major still crimsons with wrath at the thought of him, and the Observing Officer remembers bitterly the long, uncomfortable hours he spent, perched up in a tree a hundred yards or so from the German lines. And this is how Archibald Smith was the unwitting cause of so much anger to the battery, and the saver of many a German life.

One morning shortly before dawn the Commanding Officer of an infantry regiment was wading down a communicating trench, when he met an artillery officer, accompanied by three men with a big roll of telephone wire.

"Hullo, what are you doing at this hour?" he asked.

"We hope to do some good 'strafing,' sir," said the subaltern. "I'm coming up to observe. Some aeroplane fellow has found out that Brother Boche does his relieving by day in the trenches opposite. We hope to catch the relief to-day at ten."

"Where are you going to observe from?"

"There's an old sniper's post in one of the trees just behind your trenches. If I get up there before light I shall get a topping view, and am not likely to get spotted. That's why I'm going up there now, before it gets light."

"Well, are you going to stick up on that confounded perch until ten o'clock?" asked the C.O. "You'd better come and have some breakfast with us first."

But the Observing Officer knew the necessity of getting to his post as soon as possible and, reluctantly refusing the Colonel's invitation, he went on his way. Ten minutes later, he was lying full length on a platform constructed in one of the trees just behind the firing line. With the aid of his glasses, he scanned the German sandbags and, in the growing light, picked out a broad communicating trench winding towards the rear. "Once they are in that gutter," he muttered, "we shall get lots of them," and he allowed this thought to fortify him during his long wait.

* * * * *

"Quite sure the telephone's all right?" asked the Observing Officer for the fiftieth time. "If that wire were to go wrong we should have no means of getting on to the battery, for the infantry can only get on by 'phoning to Brigade Headquarters first, and you know what that means."

The telephone orderly, situated in a trench almost underneath the observer's tree, smiled consolingly, "That's all right, sir," he said. "I can ring up the battery in a second when the 'Uns come, as they ought to in a minute."

He had hardly spoken when they came. The subaltern could see them quite distinctly at the turnings of the trench, and at other times an occasional head or rifle showed itself. "God!" said the subaltern, "if we search that trench with shrapnel, we must get heaps of them," and he issued a hurried order. Trembling in his excitement, he awaited the report "Just fired, sir," but nothing happened. The orderly called and called the battery, but there was no reply. The wire was cut!

Half an hour later, the Battery Major came across his Observing Officer and a sergeant gazing dismally at two ends of cut wire.

"I was just coming down to see what was the matter. I hear from the Brigade that some doddering idiot has cut our wire. Who in the hell was it?"

"I don't know, sir. All I know is that I have seen a wonderful target, and couldn't fire a round at it. The relief's over by now, and, as we leave this sector to-night, we've lost a priceless chance."

"It must be some wretched infantry blighter," said the Major. "I'll just go and have a talk to their C.O.," and he hurried off to the Colonel's dug-out, leaving the Observer to lament his lost target.

The C.O. smiled soothingly. "My dear Wilson," he said to the Major, "I don't think it could have been one of our men. They have been warned so often. What do you say, Richards?" he asked the Adjutant.