This is where I had died.
I stood
overlooking verdant fields that were now alien to me. In my day this was mud, shell
craters, barbed wire and death. Even the sky was different, intensely blue and
probably crisp on this October day. Ghosts do not feel cold, but I remember it,
clutching my rifle which seemed to suck the heat from my hands; white and
nerveless, shaking from either cold or fear -- I do not remember.
I looked to my
left; others were appearing. Friends and comrades that I had known so well in a
long forgotten past. Jack nodded, a smile hovering on his lips. I nodded back,
a response enacted every year on this Halloween day. My actions were not my own,
although this was how it had happened. Ghosts enacting a tearful day. I knew
what was to come, but I could not change it. I was in a play and we were
mannequin's, our strings pulled by an unseen hand, making us dance to a tune no
longer remembered.
Corporals
dressed the line, there was no sound for ghosts do not hear. Nevertheless Old
Frank's mouth formed words I knew so well. Old Frank was his nickname, but he
wasn't old. Twenty three, whereas I was a mere youngster having just turned
nineteen. We looked up to Frank; he gave the impression of knowing what to do. That
I couldn't hear him was a blessing in anticipation of the hell to come. The
guns had already fallen silent and the silence was soon to be replaced by the
clack of machine guns, the crack of rounds and the cries of the wounded and
dying.
To my right
others were appearing. Why did we dress the line, I pondered? I no longer
remembered. It was probably important once, but not now. Then the line was
moving and I took a few tentative steps. We were the second rank and the men in
front of us, including Frank, blocked our view. We could afford to be brave for
that line of soft, yielding flesh was a barrier against the hail of lead to
come. Hail of lead. Such an inadequate and over used phrase to describe the
reality of war. One throw away line that encompasses all the terror and horror
to come. I cried, but tears would not come, the puppet master had not yet
decided it was time for tears.
What a waste.
I had wanted a future; a wife and children and perhaps even grandchildren. A
dream far too distant for a nineteen year old boy. All too soon someone fell in
the line in front and then another man to my right. It looked as though he had
tripped. My eyes were riveted on the men in front of me, praying that my
protection would remain. I needed them to absorb the horror. Perhaps this time
I would live? I remembered hope and prayers. My eyes flickered to the heavens.
It was at this point that Old Frank had sworn, his left arm ripped from his
body as something unseen had ravaged his body. A preacher had told me that
swearing was a sin. I prayed that Old Frank went to heaven and not hell.
Swearing was not too bad, not among all this terror. Please God, forgive
Frank and do not commit his soul to purgatory.
His blood and
flesh had splattered my face and I ducked, as I had done, so many years ago. I remembered
the warmth of his blood and a copper taste in my mouth. I spat and wanted to
vomit. This was not how war was meant to be. When we joined up we had talked of
heroic deeds and how swiftly the enemy would collapse.
A gap had
formed in the line of men to my front and I could see the barbed wire and
beyond that the enemy trench. Terror tore at my heart. I remember I had wailed
then, not for Frank but out of fear for myself. I felt the wind of a round
buffet my cheek and my wail turned to a scream. That had been close and I
looked to my left just as Jack spun on the spot; I watched as he collapsed to
the ground; I could almost hear the puppet master's glee as his strings were
cut. Jack, a furrier from Blackheath. A man who had comforted me as I had
crouched crying at the bottom of our trench last night, so long ago. He had
given me his chocolate. Such a princely gift in this time of deprivation and
squalor.
I crouched as
more men in the front line fell. Blood misted the air and again I remembered
it's coppery tang. I wiped my eyes, nearly dropping my rifle and having to
fumble to hold it firm. I should have dropped it. I should have jumped in a
shell hole like some men did. The terror of failure and cowardice outshone the
fear of bullets. Why? Bullets are far more deadly; a testimony to the front
rank thinning dangerously now to the point that we were the first wave. I could
see helmets above the enemy trench and flashes from muzzles. I remembered the
sound: the din, the screams and the bangs and the thumps. The slap of something
fast hitting flesh. Men to my side fell and I stumbled, thinking that I was
hit. I remember the screams of incoherent rage from my remaining comrades, the
only act of defiance as we walked to our deaths. The enemy suffered then, our
screams must have haunted their dreams. We suffered more though. Flesh against
lead. It was a very uneven contest.
Simon fell. We
had worked at the same hop farm for several summers past. Our summer holiday
away from the colourless terrace street we called home. A different life. Cool
summer evenings spent outdoors under cloudless skies. Stars rather than shells.
I prayed that I was invisible, which I was. I was a ghost and yet terror tore
at every fibre of my once body. Memory is a terrible thing. I remember men
funnelling towards a gap in the wire. We had been told not to do this. It was a
death trap covered by more than one machine gun. Such a terrible weapon where
more than one round span bodies around, the puppet master working hard, tugging
at strings in time to some forgotten beat.
My time was
coming. I remember no longer caring. Death was better than this hell. Was I a
coward? I still walked forward, but my rifle was forgotten. I was doing my
duty, sacrificing myself for my king. I couldn't even claim that. I had been
told to advance. I had been trained to do so. Failure and the fear of cowardice
still dogging my steps.
I spun then as
something punched me in the kidney and then the other way as something slapped
my right shoulder impossibly hard. The sky and the earth exchanged places and I
looked up into a blue sky, a bird winging its way as though fleeing the battle.
I should have done that. I should have had the sense to flee. I would have had
children and spent my summers working at the hop farm. Life was leaving my
body. I remembered the pain fading and night surrounding me.
My thoughts
turned to my comrades. We would meet again. Next year.
