Paths of Glory (9 page)

The 181st had lost thirty-two men, the Tirailleurs seventeen. It wasn't a bad record for a relief made during a heavy bombardment, nor did it make the slightest difference to the conduct of the war. Every day and every night men were being killed at the rate of about four a minute. The line remained the same, everything remained the same—uniforms, equipment, faces, statures, men. Men standing at the same posts, listening to the same sounds, smelling the same smells, thinking the same thoughts, and saying the same words. Forty-nine men had been killed, and one set of collar numerals had been replaced by another. Rats weren't interested in collar numerals, so it made no difference to them either.

Intelligence officers, on the other hand, were interested in collar numerals, interested in learning those of the troops opposite and in concealing those of their own.

Towards one in the morning, when the artillery duel had died down somewhat, Captain Charpentier sent for Paolacci. A quarter of an hour later Lieutenant Roget entered the captain's dugout to tell him that Paolacci could not be found.

“Yes,” said Charpentier. “I heard one of his sections got it at the chalk pit. I saw some bodies there when I passed. He's probably gone back to see about them. Anyway, we're short of officers and I can't wait. So you'll have to do. By the way, have you ever been on patrol before?”

“Only once, sir, when I was in the ranks.”

“Well, you'd better take Didier then. He's an old hand at it. The colonel wants a reconnaissance patrol to go out. Hand me that map over on the bunk there. Look at this, that's the Pimple. This is our frontage, see, from here to here. There's the Boche wire, about five hundred metres or so from our line. You are to go out on the left and work your way down to our right boundary where you can come in through our post, see it here, Post Number 8. Division is very anxious to know the depth and condition of the German wire. This map is not up to date and the Tirailleurs report that the Boches have been strengthening their wire. That's your main job, to find out about the wire. But you must also look for any Boche outposts. This is really just as important as the other because we want to know where they are so we can knock them out of action before the attack. The moon is bright, so if you find any you shouldn't have any trouble placing them exactly. Take a luminous compass and use the Pimple's summit for a landmark. And don't forget to bring back identifications of any German bodies you find.”

“Yes, sir. But how will I know where to re-enter my own line?”

“Let me see. You ought to be out about two hours. All right then, two hours after you leave I'll have Number 8 Post send up flares. One red flare at five-minute intervals until you come in.”

“And how many men shall I take?”

“Take two, besides yourself. Remember, this is a reconnaissance patrol, pure and simple. You are to avoid a fight at all costs and you're not to let the Boche get wind of you, if you can possibly help it. Go out, reconnoitre, and report, that's all. But do it thoroughly. You can depend on Didier. He's an ace at that sort of thing.”

“If you don't mind, sir, I'd rather take someone else.”

“What's the matter with Didier?”

“Well, er—er. Well, if it's the same to you, sir, I'd rather take some other man.”

“No, it isn't the same to me at all. As a matter of fact, Roget, if it weren't that the report had to be made by an officer, I'd be only too glad to put Didier in charge of the patrol. What have you got against him, anyway?”

“Me? Nothing. But what has he got against me, that's what I'd like to know?”

“Well, what has he got against you?” Charpentier had often wished he could put his finger on just what it was that officers (including himself) as well as the men seemed to have against this lieutenant.

“How should I know? I suppose because I was given a commission and he wasn't. We used to bunk together, you know, and it's quite contrary to custom, my being assigned back to the same company again. I don't know how that happened. He probably resents my being an officer now. He's a sullen, envious fellow. I just thought that if you . . .”

“That may be. But he's a first-class scout, and you're going to take him along. You may be very glad you did before the night's over. Now study that map carefully. Learn it by heart.”

 

As the moon moved higher into the sky, the shadow it cast moved lower on the side of the chalk pit down which Lieutenant Paolacci had fallen. Most of the bottom of the chalk pit was still in the shadow, a pestilential-looking place. Had Paolacci turned his head from where he lay on top of and athwart an entrance to a gallery, he might have seen the reflection of the moon in the pool of stagnant water which covered the floor of the pit. Much as he may have enjoyed seeing the moon, even in reflection, he did not turn his head. He did not do so for several reasons, none of which took form as such in his mind. First, the effort was too much for him. Second, the mere moving of his head already made him vomit each time he had tried it. Third, he didn't know there was a reflecting pool of water below him; in fact, he thought he was on the bottom of the pit as it was. Fourth, he could feel that his left check was wedged against some obstruction, something that smelt of horse dung.

“Tell me,” he said out loud and discursively, “tell me if you please, how it happens that there is horse dung in the bottom of this pit? How could a horse get in here? Easily enough; the way I did. But how did I get here? How could the horse get out again? He couldn't, the sides are too steep. Then there must be a horse down here somewhere. That's obvious.”

The simplicity of his logic, the clarity of his mind amazed him.

“This is a real pleasure,” he went on, “to find my thinking apparatus working so beautifully. I must make the most of it and dispose of some of my perplexities once for all.”

He fell to hunting for his perplexities, but he couldn't find any of them. They were there, he knew, but just once out of reach, exasperatingly so.

“Well, let's start over again. Where was I? Ah, yes, here it is. Horse dung, horse dung . . . But how the devil did I get here? Confound it, it isn't working at all now. All mixed up. Wait a minute and it'll clear up again. . . .”

He moved his head, trying to shake the confusion out of it, then choked. Bile welled up into his mouth and trickled out the corners. He tried to spit, but couldn't, so he was forced to swallow the rest. Darkness closed in on him and he was unconscious again.

The moon moved higher into the sky, the shadow moved lower on the side of the chalk pit. It moved imperceptibly across the figure of the lieutenant, then dropped away quickly from the roof to the threshold of the gallery entrance. A stone came bouncing down the side of the chalk pit and fell into the pool with a plop. There was a rustle of scurrying rats.

Paolacci came to with the smell of horse dung in his nostrils.

“Ah, yes. A horse down here somewhere. But he can't get out unless I help him. I'll see about that later, not now. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha . . .”

The thought of a horse down there had suddenly and inexplicably become a tremendously funny one. Paolacci was roaring with laughter, a laughter which came from his throat only. Imperceptibly as the movement of the shadow, Paolacci's laughter was transformed into tears, and from tears into deep, intestinal sobs. These sobs shook him in a way the laughter hadn't. A fiery pain took form in his left shoulder and he raised his hand to it. It came back stained and sticky. Panic burst in him.

“Help! Help! I'm hit. Help! Help! Stretcher-bearers! Get me out of this! Down here! For the love of Christ! Help! Help! I'm dying. I'm all alone. Down here! Here, in the chalk pit! Jesus! Stretcher-bearers! Help! Help! Help! . . . Help . . .”

His shrieks echoed back and forth on the walls of the chalk pit. Each time he paused long enough to hear an echo, he mistook it for the voices of rescuers and redoubled his cries.

The moon faded from his sight, and he was still for a while. A rat climbed noiselessly up the jamb of the gallery entrance and looked at Paolacci for a long time. Then it turned and went down again. Two shells burst along the opposite wall, and a shower of gravel fell upon the unconscious lieutenant....

Paolacci began to feel the pain in his shoulder. He also felt a lump between his shoulder blades. He realized he wanted to get up and climb out of the pit, then waited for the desire to become more impelling. While waiting, his right hand began to move in exploration. It came in contact with the obstruction wedged against his cheek. He pushed, and it gave way, the smell of horse dung receding with it. He moved his head gingerly to look at the thing. It was his own boot, unmistakably. But how did it get there, near his face? He formulated the will to straighten his leg out, but there was no response. His hand moved downwards, feeling over his own body. He could feel his body, but his body, below the third or fourth button of his jacket, didn't seem to feel his hand. He pinched, and his pinch closed on air. He groped for his thigh and couldn't find it. Instead, his hand entered an enormous, sticky cavity which seemed lined with sharp points....

Gradually, with weary patience and a persistence which was constantly being thwarted by waves of silent delirium, he untangled the chaos of his life. He had been hit by that shell. One wound in his left shoulder and another, a much worse one, in his right hip. In falling into the chalk pit, his leg had been buckled back diagonally under him, and he was now lying on it, with his left cheek against his own heel.

“I must have been standing in some horse dung,” he said. The voice, which he did not recognize as his, startled him, it sounded so loud, but his surprise lasted only a moment, for death was bringing its own anæsthetic with it. Fever was rising in him, giving comfort to his body and ineffable peace to his mind. The terror of being alone and helpless had gone. He closed his eyes the better to appreciate the delights of his hallucinations....

Later his eyes opened, and his jaw relaxed.

Later still, when the shadow cast by the moon was rising again on the side of the chalk pit, a rat climbed noiselessly up the jamb of the gallery entrance and watched Paolacci for a while. Then it stepped forward daintily, jumped onto the lieutenant's chest and squatted there. It looked to the right and to the left, two or three times, quickly, then lowered its head and began to eat Paolacci's under lip.

 

Lieutenant Roget went down the trench, looking for Didier. He found him standing on the firing-step, his rifle lying in a groove across the parapet, a little pile of hand grenades on one side and a Very pistol on the other. Another figure sat huddled on the firing-step, a figure which coughed at the lieutenant, as he came around the corner of the traverse, instead of challenging him.

“What's the matter, you two asleep?” said Roget.

“Yes,” said Didier, recognizing the voice.

“Sir,” said Roget.

“Sir,” Didier replied, emphasizing his reluctance.

The figure answered with another cough.

“Well, I've got something that'll wake you up. You two are going out on patrol with me.”

“Not him,” said Didier.

“Why not?”

“Because he's got a cough.”

“That's too bad. And I suppose you've got a pain in your tail?”

“Yes, I have. But that's different.”

“How's it different?”

“Because my pain in the tail is silent and his cough is a big noise in the face.”

“Well, I don't care which end you're indisposed in, you're both going on patrol. Now get started, will you? We haven't any time to lose.”

“Listen, Pierre, you know as well as I—”

“You Pierre me once more and I'll put you under arrest. I've had enough of it, see?”

“All right, lieutenant, I was only trying to tell you. You know how Marchand got killed, don't you?”

“Yes, on patrol. And served him right too, he was almost as insolent as you are.”

“Yes, on patrol. But why? Because he had a cough. So he coughed in a Boche's face that night, see? Well, that was the last cough he ever coughed. The Boche cured him of it on the spot. And that cough cost us three more men, two wounded and another killed, when they started to bomb us.”

“All right then, have it your way. But get a move on and stop jabbering. Get somebody else, anybody you want.”

“I'll bring Lejeune. He's been out with me before. He's a good man.”

Didier pulled his rifle in and stepped down. The man with the cough replaced him and set his rifle carefully in the groove.

“The S O S rockets are here,” said Didier. “They're not to be fired except on orders from an officer. Understand? We'll send up a man to take my place.” The use of the “we” pricked Roget. Decidedly, this fellow needed taking down a peg. But how was it to be done? Roget's vanity prevented him from admitting it in so many words, but he knew none the less that he had never gained an ascendency over Didier.

The man with the cough was staring into no-man's-land as the other two went off along the trench in the direction of their dugouts. The lieutenant was walking in front and talking to Didier over his shoulder:

“Reconnaissance patrol. Only three of us. German wire and machine-gun posts. Identifications of bodies, if possible. Go out on the left. Come in through Post Number 8 on our right. They'll send up red flares. Get Lejeune and get ready. Then go up to Number 8 and see that they understand. Then report to my dugout. And warn all the sentries on your way back that a patrol will be out. We'll tell the rest of them as we go along to the left. Now hurry up. And by the way, see to it that you make your behavior more respectful to me, especially when there are others around. None of that Pierre stuff, understand?”