William Boyd - Waiting for Sunrise

He switched off the torch, pulled the pin out of the bomb and tossed it into the sap. Clatter. Oaths. He did the same with the second and, in a running crouch, scrambled off in what he thought was the direction of the elms.

After what seemed an eternity he heard the bombs detonate — seconds apart — the flat blap! blap! of the explosions in the confined space below the tomb. Somebody started to scream.

Lysander dropped to his knees. The screaming continued, ragged and high-pitched. Almost immediately random gunfire began to come from both lines of trenches — sentries shocked awake by the bombs going off. Rockets curved up into the night sky — green, red, white. Suddenly he was in a world of glaring primary colours. Then came the whistle and thud of rifle grenades. A machine gun began to traverse. Lysander was now crawling on his belly, not daring to look up. He reckoned he must be sixty or seventy yards south of the ruin. Where were the fucking elms? Then he heard, in a moment’s silence, the anguished shout of, “ Foley? Foley! Where are you? ” A powerful white light from a rocket showed him he was past the elms. He had gone further than he thought — now he needed to change course to find the willows and the drainage ditch. He huddled in a ball and shone his torch on his compass. He was heading straight for the German lines — east — he should be going south. He turned through ninety degrees and set off again. There was a cacophony of shooting coming from behind him and now he could hear the bass crump of big mortars being fired. His little diversion had got somewhat out of hand — he hoped Foley and Gorlice-Law had made it back safely.

He fell into the drainage ditch and thoroughly soaked himself from the four inches of water in the bottom. He squatted and leaned back against the bank, allowing his breathing to calm. A few more rockets were going up but the shooting seemed to be dying down. False alarm. Nothing of consequence. Just a scare.

He took out his map again, hooded his torch with his cupped hand and tried to see where he was. If this ditch was the one Foley had described then he had only to follow it a hundred yards or so before it began to angle right and bring him up to the French wire. Then all he needed to look out for were the green rockets from the French lines that would tell him where to come in. Assuming all was going to Munro’s plan…He looked at his watch. 3. 30. It would begin to grow light in an hour or so — time to make a move.

He sloshed his way along the ditch and, sure enough, it did begin to bear right but then it seemed to come to an abrupt halt in the face of some ancient culvert. Lysander peered into the blackness. In theory, the front-line wire of the French Tenth Army should be facing him. But no sign of any of the green rockets that Munro had promised. Every ten minutes one would go up, he had said. Surely they would have heard the noise and the fuss caused by his bombs going off?

He thought then about the two bombs he had thrown into the sap below the tomb. He saw in his mind’s eye the snapshot of the two faces looking up at him — the man with the moustache and the fair boy — utterly shocked, astonished. Two signallers laying a telephone wire, setting up the listening post again, he assumed. He also had to assume that his bombs had killed or seriously wounded them both. There had been that screaming. Anguished, feral. The panic in the dark as the Mills bombs clattered off the stone. Fingers groping, searching, swearing frantically, then — BOOM!..

He felt himself start to shiver and he hugged his knees to his chest — no point in thinking about that, of what had happened to those two signallers. How was he to know that they would be there? No, he decided, the best course of action was to stay put and wait until sunrise. Then he might know what to do next.

♦

It was rather eerie and beautiful to watch the sky begin to lighten behind the German lines and as the dawn advanced he was able to make out the key features of the landscape — there were the three elms to his right and in front of him the dark cross-hatchings of the French wire. The culvert mouth was a crude stone arch and rushes were growing thickly around it, drawing on the extra moisture the drainage ditch provided. A breeze sprang up and he began to smell the smoke drifting across no man’s land as braziers were lit in the trenches. He felt hungry — some crispy rashers of bacon and a hunk of bread dripping with hot fat would do nicely, thank you.

Very carefully he parted the rushes above the culvert and saw the dense wire of the French lines about twenty yards away. Very thick and professionally laid, he thought. He couldn’t squirm through that. He saw a grey column of smoke rise from the trenches beyond, snatched at by the breeze, but no sign of a breastwork of sandbags or a sentry’s loophole.

He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted.

“ Allo! Allo! Je suis officier anglais! ”

After about five seconds he shouted “ Allo! ” again and was answered by the crack of a rifle shot.

“ Je suis un officier anglais! Je ne suis pas allemand! ”

More shots followed but none came near him. Then he heard a shout from the French lines.

“ Tu pense que nous sommes crétins, Monsieur Boche? Vas te faire enculer! ”

Lysander felt a moment of helplessness. Maybe talking in French was wrong.

“I’m English!” he shouted. “English officer. I’m lost! Perdu! ”

There were some more haphazard rifle shots. He looked over his shoulder at the German lines, hoping the Germans wouldn’t be provoked into shooting back, or else he’d find himself in a cross-fire.

“ Parlez-vous anglais? ” he shouted again. “I’m an English officer! I am lost!”

There was more swearing at him — colourful expressions he didn’t know or vaguely understood to do with various sexual acts involving animals and close members of his family.

He sat back in some despair. What should he do? He thought he might have to wait until night fell and make his way back to the Manchesters. Then it would be just his filthy luck to be shot by a nervous sentry, jumpy after last night’s exchange. But assuming he made it back how would he explain himself — the whole Geneva operation might be put at risk? Stupid fucking plan, he thought, anyway. Why did he have to disappear, ‘missing in action’? Why not simply go to Geneva as Abelard Schwimmer?

“ Officier anglais? ” The shout came from the French lines. Then, “Are you there?” in English.

“Yes, I’m here! In the ditch! Le fossé !”

“Move to your left. When you are seeing…” The voice stopped.

“Seeing what?”

“ Un poteau rouge! ”

“A red post! Je comprends! ”

“That is the entry to come through the…Ah, notre barbelé .”

“I’m coming! Don’t shoot! Ne tirez pas! ”

“Coming ver’ slow!”

Lysander hauled himself out of the drainage ditch and began to crawl to his left, staying as flat as he could, suddenly feeling very exposed. He squirmed and wriggled along for a minute or so until he saw a red post hammered in by a gap in the maze of wire. He changed course and crawled towards it — now he could see it marked a zigzag path through the labyrinth.

“ Je suis là! ” he shouted.

He crawled slowly into the wire entanglement and saw the sandbagged breastwork up ahead.

“I’m coming!” he shouted, suddenly completely terrified, convinced he was being lured close just to be picked off. He held his cap up, his khaki English army cap, and waved it above his head. Strong arms reached for him as he gained the sandbags and hauled him over, lowering him gently to the bottom of the trench.