Part 30 (1/2)
I strop ; the bayonet stand ismy mirror on I often use it, too, As handle for the dixie, sir, and lug around the stew
”But did you ever fire it, son?” Just once, but never more
I fired it at a Gereant down the barrel glanced, and looked at me and said, ”Your hipe is dirty, sloppy Jiht Over ht; the darkness, blue and transparent, splashed with star-shells, hung around athered itself into a dark streak on the floor of the trench beneath the banquette on which I stood Away on ht were the Hills of Lorette, Souchez, and the Labyrinth where big guns eternally spoke, and where the searchlights now touched the heights with long tremulous white arms To my left the star-shells rose and fell in brilliant riot above the battle-line that (p 293) disfigured the green meadows between my trench and Ypres, and out on my front a thousand yards aere the Ger to clay a-out, in which my mates rested and dreamt, lay silent in the dun shadows of the parados
Suddenly a candle was lit inside the door, and I could see our corporal throw aside the overcoat that served as blanket and place the tip of a cigarette against the spluttering flame Bill slept beside the corporal's bed, his head on a bully beef tin, and one naked ar the earthen floor The corporal caht air
”Quiet?” he asked
”Dull enough, here,” I answered ”But there's no peace up by Souchez”
”So I can hear,” he answered, flicking the ash fro towards the hills where the artillery duel was raging ”Have the working parties come up yet?” he asked
”Not yet,” I answered, ”but I think I hearthe trench, about two hundred strong, engineers (p 294) and infantry,rifles, spades, coils of barbed wire, wooden supports, &c They were going out digging on a new sap and putting up fresh wire entangle our fire trench three hundred yards nearer the eneed on si out towards our lines
The working party came to a halt; and one of them sat down on the banquette at arette
”You're in the village at the rear?” I said
”We're reserves there,” he answered ”It's alorking-parties; at night and at day Sweeping gutters and picking papers and bits of stew from the street Is it quiet here?”
”Very quiet,” I answered ”We've only had five killed and nine wounded in six days How is your regi?”
”Oh, not so bad,” said the o west at times, but it's what one has to expect out here”
The working party were edging off, and so over the parapet
”Hi! Ginger!” soer Weeson; (p 295) coot to his feet, put out his cigarette and placed the fag-end in his cartridge pouch He would sround between the lines a lighted cigarette wouldover the parapet and handed hio was now up and I went into ain at one, three-quarters of an hour later
”What's up?” I asked the corporal akeneddown to the rear for rations,” I was told
”So you've got to take up sentry-go till stand-to; that'll be for an hour or so You're better out in the air now for its beginning to stink everywhere, but the dug-out is the worst place of all”
So saying, the corporal entered the dug-out and stretched hi to have a sleep despite his athers itself in the early , in that chill (p 296) hour which precedes the dawn one can al line It is penetrating, sharp, and well-nigh tangible, the odour of herbs, flowers, and the dawnmeat and of the dead You can taste it as it enters your mouth and nostrils, it comes in slowly, you feel it crawl up your nose and sink with a nauseous slowness down the back of the throat through the windpipe and into the stos and looked across the field; I fancied I could seein the darkness, but when the star-shells went up there was no sign of les of earth stretched out chalky white towards the enemy; the sap was not more than three feet deep yet, it afforded very little protection fro eerie fro ”Oh!” wrung fro, deafening So party was hit I knew A third ”Oh!” folloeak it was and infantile, then intense silence wrapped up everything as in a cloak But only for (p 297) a moment The enemy must have heard the cry for a dozen star-shells shot towards us and frittered away in sparks by our barbed-wire entanglements There followed a second of darkness and then an explosion right over the sap The ene party Three, four shells exploded simultaneously out in front I saw dark for into shelter There was a crunching, a stuainst the barbed entanglements, and like trodden mice, the wires squeaked in protest I saw a low of a star-shell, strugglingfro and tearing of tunics and trousers A shell burst over theto the arm of a mate, the other man crawled on his belly towards the parapet
In their haste they fell over the parapet into the trench, several of the along crouching as they ran Out in front several for to the wounded Froe (p 298) ca