Part 13

This, then, was the position of affairs when 'A' section of the Southland Company of Engineers came up to take a hand, and this communication trench was the task that Sapper Duffy, J., found himself set to work on. Personally Sapper Duffy knew nothing of, and cared less for, the tactical situation. All he knew or cared about was that he had done a longish march up from the rear the night before, that he had put in a hard day's work carrying up bales of sandbags and rolls of barbed wire from the carts to the trenches, and that here before him was another night's hard labour, to say nothing of the prospect of being drilled by a rifle bullet or mangled by a shell. All the information given him and his section by their section officer was that they were to dig a communication trench, that it must be completed before morning, that as long as they were above-ground they would probably be under a nasty fire, and that therefore the sooner they dug themselves down under cover the better it would be for the job and for all concerned. 'A' section removed its equipment and tunics and moved out on to the 'neutral' ground in its shirt-sleeves, shivering at first in the raw cold and at the touch of the drizzling rain, but knowing that the work would very soon warm them beyond need of hampering clothes. In the ordinary course, digging a trench under fire is done more or less under cover by sapping--digging the first part in a covered spot, standing in the deep hole, cutting down the 'face' and gradually burrowing a way across the danger zone. The advantage of this method is that the workers keep digging their way forward while all the time they are below ground and in the safety of the sap they dig. The disadvantage is that the narrow trench only allows one or two men to get at its end or 'face' to dig, and the work consequently takes time. Here it was urgent that the work be completed that night, because it was very certain that as soon as its whereabouts was disclosed by daylight it would be subjected to a fire too severe to allow any party to work, even if the necessary passage of men to and fro would leave any room for a working party. The digging therefore had to be done down from the surface, and the diggers, until they had sunk themselves into safety, had to stand and work fully exposed to the bullets that whined and hissed across from the enemy trenches.

A zigzag line had been laid down to mark the track of the trench, and Sapper Duffy was placed by his sergeant on this line and told briefly to 'get on with it.' Sapper Duffy spat on his hands, placed his spade on the exact spot indicated, drove it down, and began to dig at a rate that was apparently leisurely but actually was methodical and nicely calculated to a speed that could be long and unbrokenly sustained. During the first minute many bullets whistled and sang past, and Sapper Duffy took no notice. A couple went 'whutt' past his ear, and he swore and slightly increased his working speed. When a bullet whistles or sings past, it is a comfortable distance clear; when it goes 'hiss' or 'swish,' it is too close for safety; and when it says 'whutt' very sharply and viciously, it is merely a matter of being a few inches out either way. Sapper Duffy had learned all this by full experience, and now the number of 'whutts' he heard gave him a very clear understanding of the dangers of this particular job. He was the farthest out man of the line. On his left hand he could just distinguish the dim figure of another digger, stooping and straightening, stooping and straightening, with the rhythm and regularity of a machine. On his right hand was empty darkness, lit up every now and then by the glow of a flare-light showing indistinctly through the drizzling rain. Out of the darkness, or looming big against the misty light, figures came and went stumbling and slipping in the mud--stretcher-bearers carrying or supporting the wounded, a ration party staggering under boxes balanced on shoulders, a strung-out line of supports stooped and trying to move quietly, men in double files linked together by swinging ammunition boxes. All these things Sapper Duffy saw out of the tail of his eye, and without stopping or slacking the pace of his digging. He fell unconsciously to timing his movements to those of the other man, and for a time the machine became a twin-engine working beat for beat--thrust, stoop, straighten, heave; thrust, stoop, straighten, heave. Then a bullet said the indescribable word that means 'hit' and Duffy found that the other half of the machine had stopped suddenly and collapsed in a little heap. Somewhere along the line a voice called softly 'Stretcher-bearers,' and almost on the word two men and a stretcher materialised out of the darkness and a third was stooping over the broken machine. 'He's gone,' said the third man after a pause. 'Lift him clear.' The two men dropped the stretcher, stooped and fumbled, lifted the limp figure, laid it down a few yards away from the line, and vanished in the direction of another call. Sapper Duffy was alone with his spade and a foot-deep square hole--and the hissing bullets. The thoughts of the dead man so close beside him disturbed him vaguely, although he had never given a thought to the scores of dead he had seen behind the trench and that he knew were scattered thick over the 'neutral' ground where they had fallen in the first charge. But this man had been one of his own company and his own section--it was different about him somehow. Yet of course Sapper Duffy knew that the dead must at times lie where they fall, because the living must always come before the dead, especially while there are many more wounded than there are stretchers or stretcher-bearers. But all the same he didn't like poor old 'Jigger' Adams being left there--didn't see how he could go home and face old 'Jigger's' missus and tell her he'd come away and left 'Jigger' lying in the mud of a mangel-wurzel field. Blest if he wouldn't have a try when they were going to give Jigger a lift back. A line of men, shirt-sleeved like himself and carrying spades in their hands, moved out past him. An officer led them, and another with Sapper Duffy's section officer brought up the rear, and passed along the word to halt when he reached Daffy. 'Here's the outside man of my lot,' he said, 'so you'll join on beyond him. You've just come in, I hear, so I suppose your men are fresh?'

'Fresh!' said the other disgustedly. 'Not much. They've been digging trenches all day about four miles back. It's too sickening. Pity we don't do like the Boches--conscript all the able-bodied civilians and make 'em do all this trench-digging in rear. Then we might be fresh for the firing line.'

'Tut, tut--mustn't talk about conscripting 'em,' said Duffy's officer reprovingly. 'One volunteer, y'know--worth ten pressed men.'

'Yes,' said the other, 'but when there isn't enough of the "one volunteer" it's about time to collar the ten pressed.'

Two or three flares went up almost simultaneously from the enemy's line, the crackle of fire rose to a brisk fusillade, and through it ran the sharp 'rat-at-at-at' of a machine-gun. The rising sound of the reports told plainly of the swinging muzzle, and officers and men dropped flat in the mud and waited till the sweeping bullets had passed over their heads. Men may work on and 'chance it' against rifle fire alone, but the sweep of a machine-gun is beyond chance, and very near to the certainty of sudden death to all in the circle of its swing.

The officers passed on and the new men began to dig. Sapper Duffy also resumed work, and as he did so he noticed there was something familiar about the bulky shape of the new digger next to him.

'What lot are you?' asked the new man, heaving out the first spadeful rapidly and dexterously.

'We're 'A' Section, Southland Company,' said Duffy, 'an' I say--ain't you Beefy Wilson?'

'That's me,' said the other without checking his spade. 'And blow me! you must be Duffy--Jem Duffy.'

'That's right,' said Duffy. 'But I didn't know you'd joined, Beefy.'

'Just a week or two after you,' said Beefy.

'Didjer know boss's two sons had got commissions? Joined the Sappers an' tried to raise a company out o' the works to join. Couldn't though. I was the only one.'

'Look out--'ere's that blanky maxim again,' said Duffy, and they dropped flat very hurriedly.

There was no more conversation at the moment. There were too many bullets about to encourage any lingering there, and both men wanted all their breath for their work. It was hard work too. Duffy's back and shoulder and arm muscles began to ache dully, but he stuck doggedly to it. He even made an attempt to speed up to Beefy's rate of shovelling, although he knew by old experience alongside Beefy that he could never keep up with him, the unchallenged champion of the old gang.

Whether it was that the lifting rain had made them more visible or that the sound of their digging had been heard they never knew, but the rifle fire for some reason became faster and closer, and again and again the call passed for stretcher-bearers, and a constant stream of wounded began to trickle back from the trench-diggers. Duffy's section was not so badly off now because they had sunk themselves hip deep, and the earth they threw out in a parapet gave extra protection. But it was harder work for them now because they stood in soft mud and water well above the ankles. The new company, being the more exposed, suffered more from the fire; but each man of them had a smaller portion of trench to dig, so they were catching up on the first workers. But all spaded furiously and in haste to be done with the job, while the officers and sergeants moved up and down the line and watched the progress made.

More cold-bloodedly unpleasant work it would be hard to imagine. The men had none of the thrill and heat of combat to help them; they had not the hope that a man has in a charge across the open--that a minute or two gets the worst of it over; they had not even the chance the fighting man has where at least his hand may save his head. Their business was to stand in the one spot, open and unprotected, and without hope of cover or protection for a good hour or more on end. They must pay no heed to the singing bullets, to the crash of a bursting shell, to the rising and falling glow of the flares. Simply they must give body and mind to the job in hand, and dig and dig and keep on digging. There had been many brave deeds done by the fighting men on that day: there had been bold leading and bold following in the first rush across the open against a tornado of fire; there had been forlorn-hope dashes for ammunition or to pick up wounded; there had been dogged and desperate courage in clinging all day to the battered trench under an earth-shaking tempest of high-explosive shells, bombs, and bullets. But it is doubtful if the day or the night had seen more nerve-trying, courage-testing work, more deliberate and long-drawn bravery than was shown, as a matter of course and as a part of the job, in the digging of that communication trench.

It was done at last, and although it might not be a Class One Exhibition bit of work, it was, as Beefy Wilson remarked, 'a deal better'n none.' And although the trench was already a foot deep in water, Beefy stated no more than bald truth in saying, 'Come to-morrow there's plenty will put up glad wi' their knees bein' below high-water mark for the sake o' havin' their heads below low bullet-mark.'

But, if the trench was finished, the night's work for the Engineers was not. They were moved up into the captured trench, and told that they had to repair it and wire out in front of it before they were done.

They had half an hour's rest before recommencing work, and Beefy Wilson and Jem Duffy hugged the shelter of some tumbled sandbags, lit their pipes and turned the bowls down, and exchanged reminiscences.

'Let's see,' said Beefy. 'Isn't Jigger Adams in your lot?'

'Was,' corrected Jem, 'till an hour ago. 'E's out yon wi' a bullet in 'im--stiff by now.'

Beefy breathed blasphemous regrets. 'Rough on 'is missus an' the kids. Six of 'em, weren't it?'

'Aw,' assented Jem. 'But she'll get suthin' from the Society funds.'

'Not a ha'porth,' said Beefy. 'You'll remem--no, it was just arter you left. The trades unions decided no benefits would be paid out for them as 'listed. It was Ben Shrillett engineered that. 'E was Secretary an' Treasurer an' things o' other societies as well as ours. 'E fought the War right along, an' 'e's still fightin' it. 'E's a anti-militant, 'e ses.'

'Anti-militarist,' Jem corrected. He had taken some pains himself in the old days to get the word itself and some of its meaning right.

'Anti-military-ist then,' said Beefy. 'Any'ow, 'e stuck out agin all sorts o' soldierin'. This stoppin' the Society benefits was a trump card too. It blocked a whole crowd from listin' that I know myself would ha' joined. Queered the boss's sons raisin' that Company too. They 'ad Frickers an' the B.S.L. Co. an' the works to draw from. Could ha' raised a couple hundred easy if Ben Shrillett 'adn't got at 'em. You know 'ow 'e talks the fellers round.'

'I know,' agreed Jem, sucking hard at his pipe.