now.
‘You’re both going to work hard today, my friends. Winter will go back to the village and bring a burial party up to number-three post. It’s time we got rid of those bodies: it stinks down there.’ Slap, slap, went the riding crop against the skirt of the trenchcoat. He turned to Alex and nodded. ‘Horner! The major wants someone to supervise the detail rebuilding the long dugout. It should have been finished two days ago. Hurry them up. I’ll be along later to see what’s happening.’
Pauli said, ‘I’m going back to Divisional Headquarters today, Herr Leutnant. My brother is coming. The major gave permission.’
‘You’ll do as you’re told, Winter. I want those bodies buried tout de suite.’ Leutnant Brand liked to use French phrases; the officers in his cavalry regiment had all done so.
‘My brother is coming from Brussels. The major asked the colonel: it’s all official.’
‘The war is official, too,’ said Brand. He was enjoying himself now. He looked at both of them and gave a grim smile, as if inviting them to join in the fun. Then he slapped the skirt of his trenchcoat with the riding crop. ‘Family reunions take place with the commanding officer’s permission, but even then they are subject to the needs of the military situation. I don’t know if your brother is a slack, good-for-nothing nincompoop like you, Winter. He probably is. But unless he is a complete idiot he’ll know that the army comes first. Right, Winter? Understand now, Winter?’
Leutnant Brand was unusually agitated that morning and the reason for this became clear when the Vizefeldwebel came to report that the wiring party had still not returned. Brand went back to surveying no-man’s-land, but this time he used the trench periscope. The sky had gone blood-red and it was getting lighter every minute. If the wiring party – twelve men – were still alive somewhere out in the mud, their chances of surviving through the day were slight. The British would shoot up anything unusual out there; it was the standard practice for both sides. Anything that might be some new sort of weaponry was to be feared, ever since the tanks had appeared last year. And today the weather forecast said the wind was from the west, a light breeze, which would exactly suit the British if they decided on another gas attack. What would happen to the wiring party then? They had gone out wearing the bare minimum of equipment – some without helmets, even – and it was doubtful there would be one gas mask amongst the lot of them.
‘You two, get going!’ said Brand as he remembered that they were still waiting his orders. ‘And don’t let me see you slacking off. Remember what I said: you are going to set an example to the men.’
The Vizefeldwebel watched the exchange with a blank face, but Brand was not willing to let the old man stay out of it. As he watched the two officers hurrying back along the trench, he smiled to show that he was really a good fellow, an ex-Feldwebel who knew that young officers were lazy rogues. But the old man didn’t respond to the smile.
Once Pauli and Alex got back to where the communication trenches started, Pauli said, ‘I so wanted to see my brother. I miss him. It’s nearly a year and he’s come all the way from Brussels.’
‘Just go,’ advised Alex. He knew what the meeting meant to his friend: Pauli had been talking of little else for the last two weeks. ‘The burial party don’t need you to watch them work. They won’t slack on that detail: you can be sure of it. They’ll work to get that stinking job done as quickly as possible.’
‘They’ll need an officer to collect the identity discs from the bodies,’ said Pauli doubtfully.
‘Rubbish!’ said Alex. ‘The NCO will do that. It’s Winkel, a good fellow.’
‘Brand will find out.’
‘How will he find out? Will you tell him? Will I tell him? Winkel won’t make trouble.’
‘He’ll go and check on the burial.’
‘Not Brand. He won’t go near number three until they are all buried. Brand doesn’t like that sort of job. That’s why he always gives them to us to do: it’s the worst thing he can think of to do to us.’
‘I promised Peter….’
‘Go! Go! I told you, go.’
‘I’ll go as far as the village and talk to the NCO in charge of the burial party.’
‘I told you, Winkel is in charge. What are you going to say to him? That you’re frightened of Brand but you are going to disobey him anyway?’
‘I suppose you’re right.’
‘Tell no one. Get the ration truck from the village and go to HQ. Is that where you’re meeting your brother?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, get going. It’s a long walk. I’ll cover for you. I’ll have plenty of opportunities to get away from the party rebuilding the long dugout. It will take them ages yet. You know the way it’s flooding. Only an idiot like Brand would make them persevere with that job.’ He slapped his friend on the arm.
‘Thanks,’ said Pauli. His fears and doubts began to fade as he hurried back along the trench towards Divisional HQ. He decided to consult his brother about dealing with Leutnant Brand. Peter would know how to handle him; Peter knew everything. The more he thought about it the happier he was. The prospect of seeing his brother again filled him with joy.
It was a long way to HQ. To start with, it was just over half a kilometre along communication trenches before the road was reached, but in the drizzling April rain it seemed much farther. At places the trench walls had collapsed and there was a constant movement of men coming the other way. Pauli had to ease his way past ration details and had to wait while reinforcements came through, so it was nearly an hour before the trenches gave way to a sunken road. The road – little more than a track in places – was unseen by even the best positioned of the British artillery observers, and safe from everything except the odd salvo of twenty-five-pounder fire that greeted any dust that was raised at the crossroads. And in this weather there was no dust.
At the crossroads were three military policemen. Two of them were squatting in a dugout shelter roofed with galvanized iron. All three were young, not much older than Pauli. Chains at their collars supported the small metal gorgets that were the badge of their trade and caused their fellow soldiers to call such unpopular men ‘chained dogs’. But theirs was an unenviable job. They were there not only to check the papers of any soldiers leaving the front-line area but also to keep the traffic moving through this place in which the British artillerymen were so interested. Such a task would produce more regular casualties than even the front-line infantry suffered. Pauli felt somewhat better to find that there were more dangerous jobs than his own.
Pauli asked one of the policemen the way. He knew the way, but he still felt nervous about deliberately disobeying Brand’s order, and talking to the military policeman was somehow reassuring. The policeman – a well-fed fellow with a pale, pocked face and a straggling moustache – welcomed a chance to talk. He was not insubordinate, nor was he properly deferential to the difference in rank. Pauli had found this same man to man attitude among some of the men in his regiment, often the older men with families. It was usually the mark of a man who has resigned himself to the inevitability of death.
‘The general found a conspicuous landmark for himself,’ said the military policeman. There was a note of derision in his remark. Conspicuous landmarks were not eagerly sought after in this wartorn terrain. ‘A
