Love and the Loveless (39 page)

“So far as I can make out, we are about three hundred yards from what was the front line yesterday before the attack. I think perhaps instead of going on up the cutting, we should strike north-east, along Flandern One, until we meet with our fellows.”

This entailed a scramble over the yellow sandy soil, on top of which was a clear view of a straight road with tree-stumps and broken cottages along a line which ended at a tower startlingly high. There in front was Passchendaele!

‘Spectre’ West studied it through field-glasses. “It looks as though it was once even taller,” he said. “I wonder if the bells are buried below in the rubble, or have they been taken away. They found Messines bell, you know, the big tenor, and Plum presented it to the mayor. Well, we must get on.”

Following up the German trench, they came to an out-post in a shell-hole. “Is this the front line?”

“One on’m,” replied a Lancashire voice.

“Do you know who is on your flank?”

“The man in charge. Over yon.” He jerked his head.

“Where are the Germans?”

“Doan’t know, chum.”

“Have you seen any?”

“Aye, some’s about.”

“Why are you here, and not going forward? The way seems clear.”

“Officer told us stop ’ere.”

“Where is he?”

“Doan’t know, chum.”

“A second-line territorial division, first time in action,” said ‘Spectre’ West to Phillip.

A tin hat bobbed above the rim of a shell-hole twenty yards away. “Hullo there! Keep down, I say. You’ll give the position away. Who are you, the relief?”

‘Spectre’ West walked over. “Halt! Stay where you are! I’ve got you covered!” Two rifles were raised out of the shell-hole.

“You should be looking for the enemy. Where are the Germans? What is holding you up?”

“We were ordered to remain here, sir, after withdrawing this morning.”

“Why did you withdraw?”

“We got about half a mile forward without much opposition, then emma gees enfiladed from Defy Crossing over there.” He pointed to the right. “Then we saw field guns being turned round. We couldn’t deal with them, owing to the Lewis guns being clogged, and they were out of range of rifle grenades. When they fired at us over open sights, the order to withdraw was given. Since then, we’ve held this line.”

“Has there been any firing?”

“None in front of us, sir, since this morning.”

“Get your men out of shell-holes and come with me.”

*

Strung out in file, a score of men under their young subaltern followed ‘Spectre’ West along the road. It was passable, and gave some sort of cover from the débris of tree trunks and stumps. Most strangely, there was no firing on the ridge; but from the north-west, in the unseen lower ground, came intermittent machine-gun fire. After going forward about eight hundred yards they halted, while ‘Spectre’ West looked at his map. He said to Phillip,

“If we had two battalions, we could clear the Hun out of the pill-boxes along these spurs from behind,” pointing to the map which showed indentations in the contours of higher ground rising from the swampy areas of the Ravebeek. “So far, it looks as though the Hun has taken his troops from the ground here to reinforce his mebus groups. We’ll go on, and see what happens. In file, ten paces between each man.”

After another half-mile they halted again. He beckoned the Lancashire Fusilier subaltern to his side.

“In front of us should be the Flandern Two position. I want you to deploy your men, one half-section on the right of this road, the other on the left, and move forward in extended order fifty yards behind me. Do not fire unless you are fired on first. This is a reconnaissance, not an offensive, patrol. I shall go on ahead, down the road. Phillip, will you come with me.”

The trench was not held. It was unwired. The tower of the church was now large. To the right Phillip could see, over the rubble of cottages and houses lining the road, a countryside of green fields and woods. It was strange to see, even a couple of hundred yards away, grass and hedges. It was rather ominously quiet. Perhaps the village was already held by units which had taken the pill-box line overlooking the Ravebeek? Perhaps Passchendaele was taken at last? How strange, and yet so ordinary.

They entered through the ruins of the village proper. Nothing happened. The church was a great pile of bricks, out of which arose the peppered tower, with holes in it, through which low-trajectory shells had entered, some to burst on impact, others, with delay-action fuses, to pass through.

“We are now about a mile in rear of the Flandern One position,” said ‘Spectre’ West, looking at the map, “still held by the Germans. Yet here we are, through the Switch Line, Flandern Two, which comes back at right angles from Flandern One, north of Fürst farm on the Bellevue spur. The Second Anzac Corps, with the First East Pennine and Second West Pennine divisions, is more or less back on the starting tape.” He marked the map. “Between them and Flandern One is a new belt of wire, then a fence of new apron wire around each pill-box in a line of mebus still occupied by the enemy.” He wrote in his message book; closed it.

“We must go back and report the situation, as soon as we can. We must not be seen, lest we advertise the fact to the enemy that there is a gap in his line. I think we should remove our helmets, too. It is known by Intelligence that there is at least one fresh division, the Sixteenth ‘Iron’, on the way here, if it hasn’t arrived already at the mebus line from the Ravebeek to the Poelcappelle-Westroosebeke road.” He pointed to German positions marked on the map in red, and the approximate British line in blue, “Right! We shall now withdraw down the
road, in single file. Bring in your men, will you, Mr. Dixon?” He folded his map.

A moment later Phillip cried, “No——No——!” but warning came too late: upon the whistle, in the platoon commander’s mouth, a blast was blown, while he looped an arm with his fingers on his tin-hat, the sign of recall. “Keep quiet, you fool!”

The patrol had crossed Flandern II and the 58-metre rise—the highest ground on the ridge—and was about to leave the road to go direct over the crater zone to Keerselaarhoek cemetery when a machine gun opened up from the direction of Defy Crossing, and by the direct crack of one bullet ‘Spectre’ West knew instantly, before he could think, that he was hit.

*

He was a shadow looking down at his body on the ground. With calm remote wonder he thought,
poor
little
body.
He was distantly aware of other figures speaking but could neither see nor hear them. This phenomenon was outside life. The shadow of himself dissolved, and he was suspended in pale blue serenity above the body he saw lying far below, as though asleep. His entire being was remote in the thought,
That
is
not
me.
He saw only the cratered ground, no other figures.

*

Kneeling on the wet sand, Phillip said, “Where are you hit, Westy?” which afterwards he thought rather a silly question. No reply. The pale eye stared as though unseeing. “There’s a hole there, sir,” said one of the men, pointing to the top of the cape. Phillip unbuttoned it, kneeling by a face the hue of tallow. His brain felt clear, his determination was without inner flurry. He opened the tunic, there was a tear in the cloth above the M.C. riband. Pulling away the field dressing, he gave it to Dixon to hold. Then opening the shirt he saw a similar tear in the vest beneath, stained with blood. The vest had to be slit by a clasp knife, and there in the white flesh was a puncture through which a bubble of blood swelled and subsided irregularly. It broke, there was a sighing sound, and Westy’s eye was opening.

“Don’t try and speak, Westy! It’s only a little wound, through the top part of the lung only. You’ll be all right!” To the others, “Lift him up, gently now. Gently, gently! No, don’t open the field dressing yet. Keep it clean. Keep his arm down.”

“I can’t get his tunic off unless I lift his arm, sir.”

“Then cut the tunic. Take your time. Slit it gradually. Well done!”

The wound was small at the back. He felt a surge of joy. “The bullet went clean through!”

“The trouble may be internal bleeding, sir.”

“Have you done any medical work?”

“A little, sir. In the Boy Scouts.”

“Good man! Yes, lucky it’s the top of the lung; though, as you say, it may be bleeding inside. Can you hear me, Westy?”

‘Spectre’ West moved each arm and leg in turn, and the knowledge that he was able to move them gave him impulse to say, “Where am I hit?”

“Just a slight puncture below the collar bone. I’m going to put on a dressing.”

He made a muddle of it, and was going to try again when the helper said he knew how to do it. Phillip watched him passing the dressing bandolier-fashion around the shoulder. When the tunic was buttoned again, he said, “It’ll be growing dark in an hour or so. Then we’ll get you down, Westy.”

His face less ghastly, ‘Spectre’ West said, “Listen carefully, Phillip, until I have finished speaking. Take my marked map in my map-case just as it is and do not open it. Take my field message book. Keep both dry. Go at once to the Town Major of Ypres, in the old prison, and ask for my driver. Tell him to take you immediately to Advanced G.H.Q. and there report to OA ——”

“Where is that, Westy?”

“I asked you not to speak. The driver knows the way. If you do not find him, get a car and go at once to Westcappelle railway siding. That is about twenty miles west of Ypres, near Dunkerque. Ask for Colonel Firling, of OA. If he is not there, ask for Brigadier-General Davidson, of OA. Explain what you have seen, and what I have told you. OA—Operations ‘A’. Now go.”

“Shall I help get you back, first?”

“Go, damn you! Go!”

“Right, sir. I’ll see you later.” Then to the platoon commander, “Detail men to take Major West to the first-aid post. And send back a report that Flandern Two is unoccupied. Everything, in fact. Good luck, everyone. Au revoir, Westy.”

“Go!”

Voiding thought on what would happen when he got out of the shell-hole, his mind set on his mission, he slithered into an adjoining hole, then rolled over its sandy lip into another. No
clakkercrack of emma gee—jubilation—up the old Bloodhounds,—come on Cranmer!—fancy me, Phillip Maddison, carrying dispatches to G.H.Q.——

With no interruption, filthy, hot, and wet with sweat, he got through the cemetery, with its tangle of rusty iron spiked fencing, monuments, and marble-chip flowers, and passing through the out-post line, reported to a company commander about the patrol 600 yards N.W. of the cemetery. The captain had tired eyes. Khaki figures closed round him.

“Who are you?”

“G.H.Q. Special Reconnaissance, attached Operations.”

“How do I know you’re not a spy?”

“Don’t be such a ——fool! Do I look and talk like one?”

“Where have you come from?”

“Passchendaele. One of your platoons under a subaltern called Dixon came with us, under orders from Major West, G.S.O. Two, G.H.Q. He’s lying out six hundred yards away, over there. Will you please send a stretcher as soon as possible. Now I have to get back with my report. Make way!”

Darkness had fallen before he reached the area of wooden tracks and walks; then, abruptly, a thousand guns opened up. He could not see for light. He lost all sense of direction. If only he had a prismatic compass! Again he thought how he had scorned compass exercises at Heathmarket in the summer nights of 1915, because “they didn’t have them in the trenches”. Bloody conceited fool he had been then! A compass, of course, would be no help to find a way across the watery morass, but it would at least indicate in which direction lay Ypres. He tried to imagine Westy’s map, with the shape of the British line marked in blue. Diminishing stalks of flares were discernible on three sides, in the crashing seas of light. But where lay Ypres, where, where, where?

He waited, telling himself not to flare up, but to remain calm. Now, calmly to think. Was he facing a practice barrage by the Second and Fifth Armies; or a German barrage to catch reliefs
and working parties? If the German guns were blazing into his eyes, then he had gone in a circular movement and was back on Passchendaele ridge, looking down upon the Flanders plain. In which case he was done for.

Damn that for a tale! He tried to imagine a map of the Salient, but it was no good. He nearly closed his eyes to limit the reflection of the flashes. Presently he thought that he could determine two kinds: one, white, stabbing, brief; the other, yellow, bulging, fluttery at the edges. White stabs of guns, yellow fans of howitzers.

As the barrage fire gave way to a slower bombardment he thought he could recognise a pattern in it. The field-guns appeared to be firing from a line across his front. This would fit in with his mind-map: for the heavier howitzers lined the roads out of Ypres, because they could not be hauled across the crater-zone; while most of the 18-pounders were along the west bank of the Steenbeek. Through eyes almost closed he tried to flash-spot the lines of fire. Yes, three main orange-flash lines, diminishing back—howitzers along the three main roads out of Ypres: Poelcappelle–St. Julien–Wieltzje: Frezenberg–Potijze: Menin. He was pleased with his calmness.

Yes, the flashes had a time pattern. He imagined the field-guns almost wheel to wheel, rocking on platforms just off the timber cross-tracks linking the three main roads up and down from Ypres. He was facing west.

The next problem. He knew the general direction: now for the particular one. Which track could he follow, and how could he find it without getting bogged down? If he went down an UP walk, and met exhausted troops, he wouldn’t stand a chance. Pushed off, or even stepping off, he was sunk. He felt suddenly grey and weary. If only he had brought whiskey in his water-bottle. But Westy having gone on the waggon, he had, too. Pull self together, no good giving way. A five-mile walk lay before him, that was all. Ration and work parties using duck-walks would soon leave them vacant. So an UP walk would be the same as a DOWN.

He sploshed on to find one, feeling in front with his stick, advancing cautiously about a yard a minute against the suck of mud. This told him that he was already below the sandy Broodseinde ridge. Steady now. While the slow bombardment continued, at least he would be able to see ahead through the red shadows of the night. Why red? Shells swooping overhead and bursting in front. The Alleyman must be retaliating.

He came to the head of an UP duck-walk, and waited there for the muffled clatter of working parties to pass. Then away, away down the corduroy path, in jubilation. He had no certainty of where he was, until he realised that the glimmer of flares was behind his back and over his left shoulder. That at least confirmed his mind-map: for the line turned back just before Gheluvelt, which village was at the far end of the plateau, now almost entirely taken—with no Alleyman guns captured. Suddenly, in the midst of bric-à-brac thoughts, in which the main roads or wooden routes below him were serpents breathing yellow fire and the cross-tracks were snakes scintillating in every scale, he found himself among mounted men, mules, and limbers. Zonnebeke! He was as good as home, he thought, as he set off down the board track.

Thenceforward the way was hindered by a double line of limbers glomerated with pack mules. There were descents into holes between beech slabs, striking knee and thigh. At a cross-track he lost direction, and trying a short cut was nearly bogged down in what later he decided must have been the Hanebeek in Sans Souci valley. Somehow he got back to the Frezenberg board-road, wildly grateful to God for his luck. Once on the beech track it was fairly level going, and when daylight came he had passed most of the howitzer batteries east of the ramparts of Ypres.

*

The Town Major was not yet in his office in the prison building. He had a billet in the Ramparts, said the corporal turned out of bed. He said he knew nothing about a Major West’s driver. “We get hundreds, sir, coming and going. But the Major may know.”

“It’s extremely urgent. Will you get in touch with him immediately?”

“He’s not on the telephone.”

“Then send a runner, why not?”

The corporal smiled. “You don’t know the Major, sir, like I do. I couldn’t very well upset his routine, sir. Sharp at nine pip emma, he’ll be here.”

“But I can’t wait two hours. I have to get to G.H.Q. I am supposed to have a car waiting here for me, or rather for my superior officer, who has been wounded. We got into Passchendaele yesterday afternoon.”

“It’s not really anything to do with me, sir.”

“Will you inform the Town Major at once that the deputy of Major West, G.H.Q., is here, and urgently needs to get to Westcappelle.”

“I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place, sir. I can’t help you. This office deals only with area billeting, and matters like that. We’re under the Area Commandant.”

“Will you get him by telephone, then?”

“Well, sir, it’s hardly my——”

“Ask at once for the Area Commandant. It is extremely urgent.”

After some buzzing of the box, and much holding-on, this authority was apparently obtained. He went forward to take the transmitter, but the corporal said, with hand over mouth-piece, “Just a minute, sir, they’re fetching ’im——” and turning his back, went on listening.

“Yes, sir. This is Town Major Ypres’ office speaking. I have here an officer just come in who says it’s extremely urgent that he gets at once to G.H.Q. He wants a motorcar to be placed at his disposal. He says he expected a driver to be here.”

The corporal seemed to be listening to someone at the other end. It took over a minute. At last he said, “Very good, sir,” respectfully. Then turning to Phillip, “Would you mind giving me your name and unit, sir?” Phillip did so, and the corporal repeated the words over the telephone.

After a period of silence, while the corporal listened again, Phillip said, “What’s happening?”

“I was told to hold on, sir.”

More time passed; then he heard the corporal say, “Very good, sir,” as he put back the receiver.

“They’re going to see about it, sir,” he said to Phillip. “Right away.”

“Who were you speaking to?”

“Someone in the Area Commandant’s dug-out, sir. They said would you wait here, and they’ll try and arrange transport for you right away.”

He sat by the stove, half-asleep; then the corporal was saying, “You’re pretty muddy, aren’t you?”

“Yes, it’s pretty thick up there.”

The corporal had been ordered to “play up” to the caller, keep him there, until the Military Police arrived.

“Care for a wash, sir?”

“Thanks.” Phillip took his revolver from the holster.

“Have you a bit of four-by-two I can clean this with?”

“I’ll get it cleaned for you, sir. And how about taking off those gum boots, and letting me give them a dry? Your tunic, too, could do with a clean.”

“Good idea! I suppose you haven’t a spare pair of eleven-size boots, and some puttees, knocking about? I’d let you have them back.”

After pulling off waders, he removed webbing equipment and tunic, slinging them on the table.

“I could dry your breeches too, sir, if you like.”

Thoughts of a “Commend Card”—‘this Non-Commissioned Officer showed commendable resource in depriving an armed deserter first of his boots, then of his revolver and breeches’—made the desk-soldier somewhat tremulous. “I can manage a pair of pants, and a pair of issue trousers, if you care to try them on.”

“Thanks.”

Phillip was sitting by the stove, resisting sleep, when the door opened and two redcaps came in, revolver in hand, followed by the A.P.M., who said as he pointed with his leather-covered short cane, “You’re under arrest. Stand up, and put up your hands! You’ll be shot if you attempt to escape.”

He stood up, clad only in issue grey-back shirt with pink woollen pants from waist to ankle, and held out his hands with a gesture, half weariness, half amusement. Dear old Brendon, true to form.

Questions followed. Major Brendon realised that a false alarm had brought him out of bed. This fellow had nothing to do with Broncho Bill’s little lot. And having recognised Phillip, he assumed the slightly amused, patronising manner of former acquaintance.

“So you want a motorcar, do you? To catch up with your unit, what?”

“No, sir. To get to Advanced G.H.Q., Westcappelle, at once. To give a message, and report.”

“Really. And you’ve been rolling in the mud, to make it more convincing, what?”

“I don’t understand, sir.”

“Don’t you? Well, let me help you to understand. You’ve been on the spree, and you’ve got the wind up because your unit is due to leave camp this morning, so you thought you’d chance your arm for an army taxi, to get back to camp in time.”

“No, sir. I knew of no move when I left early yesterday morning, to go up the line with Major West. I had permission for the day off from my C.O., sir.”

“Who is this Major West?”

“G.S.O. Two, OA, G.H.Q., sir. He’s a friend of mine, I went up with him.”

“What for?”

“A sort of holiday, sir.”

“So you chose to spend your spare time going up the line, eh?”

“Yes, sir. Also I wanted to be with my great friend, sir.”

“How did you come to know a staff officer at G.H.Q. well enough to go for a holiday with him up the line?”

“I first met him at the battle of Loos, sir.”

“Really. And you expect me to believe you?”

“It’s true, sir.”

“How far did you get, while on this holiday up the line?

“Into Passchendaele, sir.”

“You mean the village itself?”

“Well, the ruins, sir. Then, on the way back, Major West was hit. He ordered me to go at once to Westcappelle. I was to call here and ask the Town Major for his driver. Major West’s driver, that is. I imagine that the driver would be billeted somewhere, while waiting for him.”

“It sounds an extremely unlikely story to me.”

“Sir, time is getting on. Will you please consider ringing up Advanced G.H.Q. at Westcappelle, and ask for Brigadier-General Davidson? He is Major West’s chief.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that you’ve got the names right, but all the same I don’t believe you. As far as I’m concerned you’re a deserter, and I’m going to keep you under lock and key.”

“But it’s my duty to get to Westcappelle, sir!”

“You can keep that story for the Area Commandant.”

“Sir! With all due respect, I make a formal request to you, before witnesses, that you telephone to Westcappelle, and explain that when Major West G.S.O. Two, attached OA, was hit, he handed over his information to me. Also that when I left him yesterday evening, he was lying in a shell-hole four hundred yards north-west of—of—of——” His voice broke, and tears fell.

He recovered himself at once, and wondered if it would help to convince Brendon if he showed him the message book and map
case—which he had kept in his haversack, slung over his shoulders like a valise to keep out of the wet on the way down. But Brendon would be likely to take them to the Area Commandant, and so waste valuable time. The whole point was, as Westy had said, new wire had been put up in front of the Bellevue mebus line; and also around each pill-box, to keep phosphorus-bombers and rifle-grenadiers beyond range. The frontal attack planned for tomorrow morning would not have a hope, with howitzer shells burying themselves in the mud. The only way was round the flank, isolating the German garrisons in the pill-box line by getting behind them, on the higher ground.

“If only it wasn’t you,” said Brendon, not unkindly, as he sat down opposite Phillip, and opened his cigarette case. “You were a harum-scarum sort of chap at Heathmarket, and hadn’t the slightest idea of anything.”

“I admit that, sir. My only soldiering, such as it was, had been at the front.”

“Sarcastic, eh?”

“No, sir. I meant in the way the R.S.M. of the Lilywhites, when we came up to reinforce the First Brigade, during First Ypres, in the woods off the Menin road, said, ‘It’ll be a good thing when all this is over, and we can get back to real soldiering’.”

“Good for him,” said Brendon. “That’s the spirit! Well, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’m going to take you before the Area Commandant. I’m inclined to believe part of your story. Now get properly dressed and we’ll see General Ludlow.”

“It’s General Davidson, sir, of OA.”

“General Ludlow is the Area Commandant.”

Brig.-General W. R. Ludlow was out when they got to his headquarters. “You’ll have to wait until he returns.”

“But I have urgent information, sir. Why can’t I be allowed to telephone?”

“I might have believed you, if you hadn’t gone too far, and put in that bit about getting into Passchendaele village,” said Brendon. “You see, I happen to have read the latest situation report! No! You’ll stay here, with me, until the General returns. I’m putting you in charge of an officer, who will be responsible for your carcase. Tell my groom,” he said to the sergeant, “to bring round my charger now.” He went to the lavatory.

When the horse arrived, Phillip said to the groom, “I’ll just try this for the major a moment,” and vaulting into the saddle, kicked in his heels, and galloped away.

While he was cantering along the grassy verge of the road to Dunkerque, the Commander-in-Chief, at his H.Q. in Montreuil, told a meeting of war correspondents that the failure of the battle of Poelcappelle two days before had been due solely to mud. “We are now practically through the enemy’s defences,” he said. “The enemy has only flesh and blood against us, not ‘blockhouses’; they take a month to make.”