Pass Guard at Ypres Page 6

  In Ypres these difficulties are accentuated, ammunition dumps being substituted for trench-mortar stores and the digging of cable trenches for trench fatigues. Furthermore, as Major Baggallay discovered, together with many both before and after, life in Ypres is a peculiar thing. Dug-outs and cellars that would be safe elsewhere are sometimes to be looked upon askance in Ypres. You shift your quarters, sometimes as the result of a hurried visit from a perturbed brigade major or staff captain, or of instinctive premonition, from north to south of the Menin Gate, or from a street near the Water Tower to the vicinity of the Prison, set your men in and settle down, your candle is suddenly extinguished or you are lifted bodily across your dug-out, and you wonder whether your reading of the riddle was correct. Finally, in brigade reserve at Vlamertinghe, these and other visitations come upon you thick and fast. There is at Vlamertinghe no lack of 8.6s and 5.9s, of brigade majors and inspecting generals, of days devoted to interior economy on an advanced scale, of rumours of imminent gas attacks and break-throughs by the Boche, of sudden orders detailing you to take a working party and report to an R.E. major or corporal at Birr Cross Roads at 10 p.m., and, if all else fails, there is always the Transport Officer to entertain when he “drops in to have one” on his way to the transport lines.

  The news of the withdrawal for a week at Flammers was received with satisfaction and approval by “C” Company and the rest of the 8th Battalion of the Loyal Southshires. But within twenty-four hours Robbie and Freddy Mann, seated within a caisson, watching two farms going up in flames, pondering the unexplained deficiencies in kuives and mess tins and endeavouring to restore their tunics to some semblance of decency for the G.O.C.’s parade, realised what they were in for, and began to pine for the relative peace of Cambridge Road. There certainly wasn’t much rest for subalterns at Vlamertinghe when Townroe, Toler, the M.O., the Quartermaster and the German shells were round about. They were there for six days, during which Freddy Mann had four inspections—one of a very special order to satisfy a Labour member who looked rather like a Belgian spy that we were winning the war—and spent the remainder of the time inquiring into the whereabouts of razors, socks and mess-tins, examining rifles, taking his platoon to divisional baths, receiving what Toler was pleased to call map instruction, doing his battalion and platoon parades and taking working parties for routine jobs behind the line. But it was a merry enough time, with reasonable weather and flea-bags to sleep in at night, and the Fancies at “Pop” in the evening when he wasn’t booked. With the shelling, too, they were lucky on the whole. They got on to the transport lines once or twice, but that did the Q.M. good, and as far as actual casualties, they only dropped six from “C” Company and none from his platoon. And, after all, if they were to return to the line on Thursday, there was Wednesday ahead; and on Wednesday Toler, with a sudden access of humanity or as a result of Harry’s persuasion, had told Robbie and himself that they could shove off for a day’s lorry jumping and get back when they liked, and—the message was conveyed through Harry—they didn’t want to see their ugly faces till they turned up on parade next morning.

  “Eight weeks today,” remarked Freddy Mann, as he set his glass upon the table and leaned back in the corner of the little Watou estaminet.

  “Eight ruddy weeks,” corroborated Derek Robinson. He blew into the bowl of his pipe with even more than his usual slow deliberation. “Eight ruddy weeks. What about another drink?”

  “Yes. Remember passing here, eight weeks ago. Seems longer. Seems the hell of a time since then. Rather thrilled we were at the idea of going up to Wipers. Not much thrill about it now. Remember that old dame at Watten? She knew all about it. Since May we’ve been there—devil of a time since May. Why don’t they put the 9th in and take us out a bit? Getting fed up with it, the men.”

  “Don’t blame ’em. Hullo, who’s this?” as the door swung open and a conspicuously martial figure appeared.

  “Morning. Morning all!” The newcomer was obviously of a markedly friendly disposition. “Mind if I join you? Damned hot today. Phew! Cognac, mademoiselle. Sure,”—as if with an afterthought—“I’m not butting in? Kaye of the A.S.C. I am. Quite sure I’m not butting in? Glad to see you, you know. Don’t often see people in this damned place. Get out of it when I can. Rotten job, the A.S.C. Rotten place, Belgium—dull, damned dull—that’s what’s the matter here. Have another with me. Don’t you find it dull?”

  “Well.” Robinson refilled his pipe. “We’ve come up from Ypres, you see. In brigade reserve and we got a day off. You wouldn’t call it dull there—no, dull’s not exactly quite the word.”

  “Ypres. Ah yes, I know Ypres.” Lieutenant Kaye nodded with infinite wisdom. “Know Ypres well. Seen it more than once, matter o’ fact. Seen it from Vlamertinghe, Brielen, places round like that. So you find it a bit on the lively side, up there at Ypres?”

  “Tends to be, you know.”

  “Ah well.” Lieutenant Kaye looked with a cheerful and reassuring smile upon the rather pale curly-haired subaltern on his left and the raw-boned Devonian in front of him. “Make the best of it, as I do—that’s what you’ll have to do. Devil of a long time yet we’ll be there.”

  “You think so? Is that the feeling here?”

  “That’s what they all say, all those that know. I was up at 2nd Army yesterday, and met a fellow there who’s in the know, one of the high-up Johnnies, don’t you know. He was telling me all about it. They don’t worry, any of ’em. Just a matter of time it is, that’s all. But it’s bound to take some time.”

  “What?”

  “Wearing ’em out—you know our game. Killing each other off, you know, and see who can keep it up for the longest. That’s our game.”

  “Is it?”

  “Yes. Bound to be. Pays us, because we’re bound to win. Fellow I saw at Cassel, he worked it out. Got it here somewhere I believe—yes, here it is.”

  Lieutenant Kaye produced from the pocket of his immaculate and well-cut tunic a folded paper covered on both sides with scribbled figures.

  “Yes, this is it. We were working it out after dinner. This is how he reckons it. Say the Germans have 3,000,000 effectives and we can put 6,000,000 into the field altogether, and the casualties on each side on all fronts are roughly 100,000 a month—70 per cent. of those wounded, allow 30 per cent. of those return—let’s see, how did he work it out?”

  Freddy Mann and Robbie glanced at each other and remained silent while the prophecies of the unknown priest of Delphi were disentangled and expounded. Lieutenant Kaye thought a moment, scribbled a few additional figures hastily and then looked up with a cheery smile.

  “That’s it, that’s got it. Allow a million and a half to keep the front, let each side drop 1,200,000 a year, of which 800,000 return, put on 300,000 each year for those going up, take off 100,000 for general wastage and that’s—no, it isn’t—anyway, I remember he worked it out to something between four years and five. Didn’t think much would happen before then.”

  “And what happens then?”

  “German front collapses and in we go. Perfectly simple; it can’t go wrong. It’s just a matter of time, and not getting hurried, that’s all it is. He explained it all to me—clever chap—fellow on the Staff, you know. They get all this worked out there. Nothing left to chance at G.H.Q.” He nodded solemnly, ordered another cognac and looked inquiringly at the others.

  “You hadn’t looked at it quite like that before?”

  “Well.” The Cherub looked half amused and half perplexed. Robbie solemnly shook his head, and filled his pipe.

  “No?”

  “Ah well, glad I told you. Cheer you up; it’s bound to, to know how it’s working out. But that’s why I say, you’ll have a good deal more of Wipers.”

  “What about you?”

  “Don’t worry me. Nice fat job, this job, car o’ me own whenever I want it, decent pay, spot o’ leave this summer—all the same to me. Let the war go on for all I care and the more of it the better. Haven’
t got any job to go back to—just hanging about at home. Same with this fellow I was telling you about—it doesn’t worry him. Six hundred thousand he reckoned our total casualties this year—bound to take some time. Not keeping you chaps, am I?”

  “No. We’re just out for the day, no special programme.”

  “How are you getting round?”

  “Lorry jumping. Came up by Proven, and we’re going back through Pop.”

  “Pop. I thought of running in there meself. Got a little bit in 5 Bis, you know,” with a knowing grin. “Tell you what. Come and have a spot of lunch with me, and we’ll flip down to Pop this evening and dine and see the Fancies. You can easily shove along from there at any time. That’s what we’ll do—you just come along. Just along there’s our mess—just along the road. Just one more and then we’ll push along.”

  Given the company and the freedom, there was nothing better than a day in Pop. What Blackpool is to Lancashire, or Brighton to the Metropolis, that, or something like it, was Poperinghe to the Salient in 1915. The members of the A.S.C. mess appeared as care-free as Lieutenant Kaye, and two of his fellows found after a cheerful lunch that it was possible for them to tear themselves away from their duties and accompany them on the flivver down the road from Watou, through St. Jan-ter-Biezen. In Pop itself they had tea, indulged in a little desultory shopping, dined, arranged to meet Lieutenant Kaye outside 5 Bis, within the hallowed portals of which it was not apparently thought advisable that they should enter, and to finish the evening dropped in at the Fancies, where Freddy Mann, thoughts of raids, standtos and shelling far removed, helped to cheer Margarine and Glycerine to the echo and joined manfully in the chorus of Jerry Brum. Good sort of a day, they concluded, as they finally bade goodnight outside the Town Hall and Robbie and he set out past the station on their homeward trek. A peaceful day, fine weather, and a peaceful night. There was nothing the matter with the Wipers Road on a night like this. Just the usual traffic moving along—ambulances, a few guns, an odd working party or two, a battalion of the neighbouring division moving from the line—nothing ahead but the usual star shells and clatter of machine guns, and just a little shelling here and there. Somewhere in the region of Vlamertinghe it seemed to be, but as something usually was happening in that region of Vlamertinghe, there was nothing much in that.

  “P’raps it’s Goldfish Château,” remarked Robbie hopefully. “About time they had something at D.H.Q. Let’s shove along. It’ll probably die down soon.”

  After a few minutes even this disturbance ceased, and the subalterns walked for the last mile along a quiet and deserted road to turn the somewhat forbidding corner by the mill and take the lane to the left that led towards their huts. Here for the first time they were conscious of some disturbance: figures were moving quickly in the distance, and two men, one an officer, were doubling down the lane.

  “What’s the matter with Harry?” asked Freddy Mann, as the tense features appeared in the darkness, lips drawn thin and white and the corners of the mouth hard set. “What’s up, Harry? Anything up?”

  “Go and see. They got on to us, the devils. Six direct hits. Done Malcolm in and knocked out B.G. and God knows how many in “C” Company alone. Better get along and help. ’Bout time you came. Better get along and see what they’ve left of your platoons. Where the hell are those ambulances? Sort of thing that would happen. You get along.”

  There was nothing to the already partially trained eyes of Freddy Mann and Robbie unusual in the sight they saw by the wrecked huts one hundred yards to the left of the lane. They’d seen men bleeding to death before, an officer minus a leg, a head lying by itself in the corner of a field, figures tossing on stretchers and moaning as they rolled along the ground. It was a little unexpected, perhaps, and it seemed a curious thing to return from a peaceful countryside, peasants working in fields and children playing on the roads, to this. But, as Freddy Mann realised as he knelt to close Malcolm’s eyes, it showed that it was difficult to know what would happen next at Ypres, and that the theory of the war of attrition so well expounded by Kaye was working as it should. This loss of eighty men meant 120 casualties in the last ten days of rest. Roughly, that tallied with the figures, and so long as the number was not exceeded we might expect to win the war.

  CHAPTER XII

  Der Colonel Ludwig von Rutter stood still as any statue upon the firestep, listening to the stream of shells that screamed towards the west, and peering through the darkness towards the bursts of fire upon the trenches three hundred yards away. There was a certain tension in his manner; for some days he had spoken even less, and delivered his orders in an even sharper voice than usual. This was to some extent to be attributed to the strain of trench warfare. Colonel von Rutter was doubtless beginning to feel the need for leave: since October he had been at this game, since October he had promised from time to time first his company and then his battalion that they should be in Ypres within three days and at the sea within a week. Far be it from Colonel von Rutter to say that the men were ceasing to believe it; but the fact remained that things were not going quite the way they should. These offensives had a habit of succeeding up to a point, but never quite coming off. October 31st—they ought to have been through that day: he had been told as a fact since that there had been nothing at all behind the British line except headquarters, and they had had division after division coming up, the roads behind packed with troops and guns from Menin back to Courtrai. Then again, last April, Pilckem, St. Julien, Frezenberg, Hooge—they were all but through; he had seen the towers of Ypres from the woods beyond the château, had looked on the railway crossing from a distance of only three fields away; but always at the last moment some straggling disordered lines would come toiling up the slopes, or struggling through the shell-fire of the Menin Road, pressing on and on as if every inch of those few square miles of ground was of greater value than their very souls. And now, to crown all, that last attack in June, when they had actually been turned out of the Hooge Château by a crowd of wild, yelling barbarians dressed in women’s skirts. Von Hügel himself had been pretty fed up about that, and he wasn’t the only one. When it comes to Duke Albrecht himself sending Ilse, his chief-of-staff, up to Gheluvelt to ask what the devil they were playing at.—No—Colonel von Rutter stiffened his back and pressed his lips together—it wasn’t good enough. The men’s discipline was all right still, but they were getting a bit sick of it, beginning to talk a bit among themselves; and it wasn’t the men only, or even his own reputation or that of his battalion: there was something more in it than that. This Ypres, that was really nothing more than a Belgian market town, was beginning to be talked of by the British apparently as a symbol, almost as a holy place, a sort of Belgian Verdun. Well, if that were so, the issues must be joined: if they had staked their strength in its defence, it was the German might, the German God against the British in the last resort. “Gott strafe . . .” Yes, and sooner or later he would do it here. Von Rutter looked a moment from the dank grass and wire to the quiet stars above. There—there—somewhere in the universe of distance, riding the storm of battle, was the God of their Fathers, whose hand was with them still. If till now He had denied them victory, it was but that victory might be the sweeter when it came and men better for chastening might reap it. They had striven before to win their way down the last two miles of that tortured road and failed; but tonight they would fight through, even if it were through Hell to the gates of Paradise: hell—nay, rather hell should be their ally, for the fires of hell should help them. Poison is good, but a man may choke and live; but can a man live when the cloud that comes upon him is a cloud of fire? One last look upward and out to where the shells burst unceasingly, and von Rutter moved to join another figure which was busying itself beneath the parapet of the next fire bay. The younger officer, as his Colonel approached, turned, straightened himself and gave a stiff salute.

  “All well, Karl?”

  “All well, Herr Colonel.”

  “It is ready?�
��

  “Yes.”

  The officers looked at each other with understanding eyes.

  “This time, I think.”

  “Yes, I believe this time: nothing can stand against it.”

  “So we thought about our gas: but still—this time.”

  He leaned his arms upon the parapet facing eastward.

  “Hell there.” He pointed to the bursts. “That is hell—for them. There goes a body now.” He pointed to a dark object that circled for a moment in the air. “And for ten days they have had it: there can be little left.”

  “They have put fresh troops in there tonight. Kurt told me at Brigade.”

  Von Rutter nodded.

  “I know. New troops—those of Kitchener.” He smiled.

  “The better for us, good Karl. Old men, boys from school, clerks, keepers of shops, and for them—this.” He pointed to the bottom of the trench, then stood for a moment silent.

  “It is ten to three. But thirty minutes more. The men are ready?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your company shall win the honour, Karl. It is time—that God was with us. This time—tomorrow is the last day of July. By August we shall be there.” A sudden new light appeared two miles away. “That is Ypres burning. They are the flames of wrath. It is the funeral pyre. By sword and flame, good Karl. Our sword tonight shall be a sword of fire.”

  That was Robbie. Well, anyway, thank God he was still alive. So long as Robbie was still alive there would be someone on his left, between him and the Menin Road. That was the thing to remember tonight, that the Menin Road was on his left: it had always been on his right before, with Y Wood in between them. Y Wood was across there now, and these woods here were Zouave and Sanctuary Wood, that he had never been near before. He must keep that clear, whatever happened: and this was their support line and whatever happened they mustn’t budge, not even if the companies in front, up at Hooge there, couldn’t stick it. The other fellows they relieved had stuck it for ten days on end, but perhaps it hadn’t been quite as bad as this. He didn’t see how many people could be left alive at Hooge—even in “C” Company there’d been three people blown to bits since they got in three hours ago, and God knows how many wounded. Yes, that was Robbie. He thought that shell had got him, but there he was. Funny how cool he kept, but he was always cool like that. Perhaps it was easy to keep cool if you didn’t get that feeling in your legs and knees: his own would hardly work now, when it came to climbing over sandbags. Still, he’d just get round this traverse and meet Robbie at the sentry post. There was something moving there, so Gibbs was still alive as well. They’d burst in the sap-head, which was a pity, but if they went on shelling like this they couldn’t help bursting in everything in time, which he hoped wouldn’t happen, as it would take a long time to build it all again and——