Maxim Jakubowski - The Mammoth Book of Best British Mysteries 6

A couple of hours and the day would begin: endless, methodical duties of housekeeping, mindless routine, but it was better than doing nothing.

There was still a sporadic crackle of machine-gun fire and the whine of sniper bullets.

An hour till dawn.

Joseph was sitting on an upturned ration case when Sergeant Renshaw came into the bunker, pulling the gas curtain aside to peer in. “Chaplain?”

Joseph looked up. He could see bad news in the man’s face. “I’m afraid Mordaff got it tonight,” he said, coming in and letting the curtain fall again. “Sorry. Don’t really know what happened. Ashton’s death seems to have… well, he lost his nerve. More or less went over the top all by himself. Suppose he was determined to go and give Fritz a bloody nose, on Ashton’s account. Stupid bastard! Sorry, Chaplain.”

He did not need to explain himself, or to apologize. Joseph knew exactly the fury and the grief he felt at such a futile waste. To this was added a sense of guilt that he had not stopped it. He should have realized Mordaff was so close to breaking. He should have seen it. That was his job.

He stood up slowly. “Thanks for telling me, Sergeant. Where is he?” “He’s gone, Chaplain.” Renshaw remained near the doorway. “You can’t help ‘im now.”

“I know that. I just want to… I don’t know… apologize to him. I let him down. I didn’t understand he was… so…”

“You can’t be everybody’s keeper,” Renshaw said gently. “Too many of us. It’s not been a bad night otherwise. Got a trench raid coming off soon. Just wish we could get that damn sniper across the way there.” He scraped a match and lit his cigarette. “But morale’s good. That was a brave thing Captain Holt did out there. He wanted the chance to do something to hearten the men. He saw it and took it. Pity about Ashton, but that doesn’t alter Holt’s courage. Could see him, you know, by the star shells. Right out there beyond the last wire, bent double, carrying Ashton on his back. Poor devil went crazy. Running around like a fool. Have got the whole patrol killed if Holt hadn’t gone after him. Hell of a job getting him back. Fell a couple of times. Reckon that’s worth a mention in dispatches, at least. Heartens the men, knowing our officers have got that kind of spirit.”

“Yes… I’m sure,” Joseph agreed. He could only think of Ashton’s white face, and Mordaff’s desperate denial, and how Ashton’s mother would feel, and the rest of his family. “I think I’ll go and see Mordaff just the same.” “Right you are,” Renshaw conceded reluctantly, standing aside for Joseph to pass.

Mordaff lay in the support trench just outside the bunker two hundred yards to the west. He looked even younger than he had in life, as if he were asleep. His face was oddly calm, even though it was smeared with mud. Someone had tried to clean most of it off in a kind of dignity, so that at least he was recognizable. There was a large wound in the left side of his forehead. It was bigger than most sniper wounds. He must have been a lot closer.

Joseph stood in the first paling of the darkness and looked at him by candlelight from the open bunker curtain. He had been so alive only a few hours ago, so full of anger and loyalty and dismay. What had made him throw his life away in a useless gesture? Joseph racked his mind for some sign that should have warned him Mordaff was so close to breaking, but he could not see it even now.

There was a cough a few feet away, and the tramp of boots on duck-boards. The men were stood down, just one sentry per platoon left. They had returned for breakfast. If he thought about it he could smell cooking.

Now would be the time to ask around and find out what had happened to Mordaff.

He made his way to the field kitchen. It was packed with men, some standing to be close to the stoves and catch a bit of their warmth, others choosing to sit, albeit further away. They had survived the night. They were laughing and telling stories, most of them unfit for delicate ears, but Joseph was too used to it to take any offense. Now and then someone new would apologize for such language in front of a chaplain, but most knew he understood too well.

“Yeah,” one answered his question through a mouthful of bread and jam. “He came and asked me if I saw what happened to Ashton. Very cut up, he was.”

“And what did you tell him?” Joseph asked.

The man swallowed. “Told him Ashton seemed fine to me when he went over. Just like anyone else, nervous… but, then, only a fool isn’t scared to go over the top!”

Joseph thanked him and moved on. He needed to know who else was on the patrol.

“Captain Holt,” the next man told him, a ring of pride in his voice. Word had got around about Holt’s courage. Everyone stood a little taller because of it, felt a little braver, more confident. “We’ll pay Fritz back for that,” he added. “Next raid-you’ll see.”

There was a chorus of agreement.

“Who else?” Joseph pressed.

“Seagrove, Noakes, Willis,” a thin man replied, standing up. “Want some breakfast, Chaplain? Anything you like, on the house-as long as it’s bread and jam and half a cup of tea. But you’re not particular, are you? Not one of those fussy eaters who’ll only take kippers and toast?”

“What I wouldn’t give for a fresh Craster kipper,” another sighed, a faraway look in his eyes. “I can smell them in my dreams.” Someone told him good-naturedly to shut up.

“Went over the top beside me,” Willis said when Joseph found him quarter of an hour later. “All blacked up like the rest of us. Seemed okay to me then. Lost him in no-man’s land. Had a hell of a job with the wire. As bloody usual, it wasn’t where we’d been told. Got through all right, then Fritz opened up to us. Star shells all over the sky.” He sniffed and then coughed violently. When he had control of himself again, he continued. “Then I saw someone outlined against the flares, arms high, like a wild man, running around. He was going toward the German lines, shouting something. Couldn’t hear what in the noise.”

Joseph did not interrupt. It was now broad daylight and beginning to drizzle again. Around them men were starting the duties of the day: digging, filling sandbags, carrying ammunition, strengthening the wire, resetting duck-boards. Men took an hour’s work, an hour’s sentry duty, and an hour’s rest.

Near them somebody was expending his entire vocabulary of curses against lice. Two more were planning elaborate schemes to hold the water at bay.

“Of course that lit us up like a target, didn’t it!” Willis went on. “Sniper fire and machine guns all over the place. Even a couple of shells. How none of us got hit I’ll never know. Perhaps the row woke God up, and He came back on duty!” He laughed hollowly. “Sorry, Chaplain. Didn’t mean it. I’m just so damn sorry poor Ashton got it. Holt just came out of nowhere and ran after him. Obsessed with being a hero, or he’d not even have tried. I can see him in my mind’s eye floundering through the mud. If Ashton hadn’t got caught in the wire he’d never have got him.”

“Caught in the wire?” Joseph asked, memory pricking at him.

“Yeah. Ashton must have run right into the wire, because he stopped sudden-teetering, like-and fell over. A hell of a barrage came over just after that. We all threw ourselves down.”

“What happened then?” Joseph said urgently, a slow, sick thought taking shape in his mind.

“When it died down I looked up again, and there was Holt staggering back with poor Ashton across his shoulders. Hell of a job he had carrying him, even though he’s bigger than Ashton-well, taller, anyway. Up to his knees in mud, he was, shot and shell all over, sky lit up like a Christmas tree. Of course we gave him what covering fire we could. Maybe it helped.” He coughed again. “Reckon he’ll be mentioned in dispatches, Chaplain? He deserves it.” There was admiration in his voice, a lift of hope.