‘Hate you? Stephen, don’t you know that I...’ He shakes his head. ‘I care about you. I care very much.’
25
The air is restless with the buzz of aeroplanes. High up in the blue, one little whiteish-yellow bumblebee drones back and forth over the Front, occasionally swooping low as if toying with the German gunners. I wonder if it was this pilot’s reconnaissance photographs I saw on Gallagher’s desk back in Étaples. Grainy images that convinced old generals to roll the dice and order the big push.
Suddenly a missile goes up from the German side. I watch, heart in my mouth, as the shell shrieks into the air and then, reaching its apex, bursts into the path of the plane. It’s a coal box, a high explosive fired from a howitzer, its cloud of dense black smoke smudging out that scrap of sky. Seconds creep by. And then I hear a gentle puttering and the fragile little craft drifts with a kind of triumphant calm back into view.
‘That’s it, you plucky wee bastard! You show ’em!’
A couple of Tommies lying on the chalk hillside a little way above me leap to their feet, whooping and cheering. Catching sight of their celebration, the pilot banks towards us, tipping his wing in salute. It’s a ridiculous, delightful, heady moment and I wish Danny were here to share it with me.
I give the pilot a wave and begin to pack up my satchel. It’s been a long afternoon of careful sketching and notetaking but now the light is starting to fail. Rising to my feet, I flex my fingers around the bag strap and feel the dull ache in my palm. Danny rebandaged my hands this morning and, despite the odd twinge, they’ve not bothered me too much. Now my thoughts return to him, as they’ve continued to return to him, over and over, throughout the day. I hope he found his way safely back to battalion HQ. I hadn’t wanted to let him go alone but the information we’d gleaned from our time in the listening post could be important, especially our conclusions about the possible depth of the German trenches. Still, I go over all the dangers he might have encountered across those wearisome miles and I can’t help but worry.
His voice echoes inside my head as I start back down the hill:I care about you. I care very much.
Words that mirror my own feelings about him. Gazing over the scene before me – the rolling hillside sweeping down to the British line and, beyond, the German-occupied town of Ovillers – I realise that I feel lighter than I have in months. I’m not sure yet whether the ghosts of my platoon and the German boy will continue to haunt me. Perhaps they should. But Danny’s acceptance of what I did, his understanding, has lifted at least a little of the burden. That and his kindness, his tenderness, his care.
I move slowly along the gravel path, checking the time as I go. Almost seven. I should be back at our trench before ten. I hope I’ll find him there, waiting for me. I think of the listening post, of his hand on mine, so strong, so reassuring. The touch of his skin, the softness of his lips, that warm tingling in my stomach. I ache to touch him. To see him again.
My feet pace out the miles, through communication and support trenches, zigzagging along traverses and then plunging into the eternal mud of the Front line. I hardly notice the soldiers I pass, their mutterings, their laughter and complaints. All I can think of is that sensitive, soulful man who slipped into the bunk beside me last night and held me while I slept.
Waking just before dawn, I had found him busy scraping the last of the mud from my uniform.
‘There,’ he grinned, holding up the tunic for inspection. ‘Good as new. And look, I even managed to give your watch a polish.’
He dangled it like a mesmerist before my eyes, swinging the case on its chain. I pictured my mother passing it to me over the garden gate before I left, her face wet with tears. She would like Danny. If the world were different, I think she would.
Tucking the watch back into the breast pocket, he leaned over to hand me my tunic. Then, leaning closer still, he smiled down at me in the bunk. I’d wondered if he meant to kiss me. I had wanted him to. Jesus, I had. But all he did was brush back a sweep of hair from my forehead.
‘Good morning, Stephen.’
‘Good morning, Danny.’
His brow had creased a little. ‘After what we talked about last night, I want you to remember something,’ he said. ‘I will never think badly of you. I only hope...’
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ He turned away. ‘It’s nothing.’
I wondered if he was going to tell me his own secrets. After all, I had told him mine. Instead, he disappeared in search of our breakfast, leaving me with a head full of questions. Now, plunging on through the trenches, I remind myself that I know all I need to about Danny McCormick. As Captain Jackson rightly said, he is a good man.
Clouds mass in from the north. Rain rattles against my helmet, lashing the brown sludge at my feet. Down one avenue I pass mud-splattered men trying to pump water from the overflowing sump holes that seethe and bubble under every duckboard. It’s a losing battle, like trying to bail out a sinking ship with a teacup. Round another bend, I see a repair party perched on a step, wiping rain from their eyes with their thick protective mittens as they screw down a new entanglement of barbed wire. The impenetrable coil winks in the downpour and makes me think again of Danny’s doubts about the bombardment clearing the German defences.
Half a mile to go and I’m soaked through, puttees sodden, my bandaged hands wringing wet. It’s here that I run into a horde of men clogging the trench. The ration carriers from each platoon, bringing up the next day’s supplies from battalion HQ: sacks of bread, bacon, butter, cheese, bottles of rum, tins of indescribable stew.
One carrier – a man with a walrussy moustache to rival Lieutenant-Colonel Gallagher’s – spins around and shouts at his mate: ‘Christ’s sake, Jezza, don’t go spilling bits of bread on the ground, or they’ll be out of their holes before you can say Jack Robinson.’
But I can see that his warning has come too late. A dozen pairs of jet-black eyes glint greedily in the wall of the trench. It’s so dark and gloomy with the storm that a moment ago you might not have noticed those few holes peeping out between planks and sandbags. Now that they’re unleashing a flood of slick black bodies, you can’t miss them. Fat trench rats wriggle and writhe, squeeze and siphon out of the wall, an inky cascade that tumbles chaotically into the mud and across the duckboards, surging around soldiers’ boots. With them comes that teeth-clenching chitter, a sound of insatiable hunger that cautions any man to keep out of their way. Two years of war has made generations of these monsters fearless and I have seen them attack wounded men, gnawing at ears and fingers. Now the carriers kick out at them as the vermin plunge after discarded scraps, claiming a portion of our ration as their due. After all, they were here first and they will probably be here long after the last of us has fallen.
As quickly as it appeared, the ravenous tide vanishes, sliding back into the earth that had so recently entombed me. I shiver, half through the icy rain that has found its way under my collar and half through the idea that those shining teeth might easily have discovered my corpse in the dark.
‘Fucking things!’ the walrus-moustachioed carrier exclaims. ‘I swear they get bolder every day. Did you see ’em on the body of that poor bugger from the Manchesters? Couple of ’em very nearly tore his throat out before he pegged out. What a way to go.’
‘You saw a soldier from the Manchesters killed? When was this?’
Walrus turns to me, blinking belligerently from under his helmet. ‘What’s it to you?’
I thrust my arm in his direction and he sees the pip on my sleeve. ‘Out with it, Private.’
