Süßmann just laughed and said they were safe against shrapnel, nothing more. In an emergency, they might withstand one 7.5cm shell, but not 10. If the rain came, it would get inside. He pointed to the pale, hazy ball of the moon, which cast a faint glow, and said that rain was on its way as surely as their wages. The newly replenished battalion of over 700 men had 12 light and six heavy machine guns at its disposal, and with that it was expected to hold an area twice as wide as the previous month. And the French were always putting fresh divisions in the front line, and they withdrew their men after a short stint for a proper rest and a good feed. They didn’t undermine their nerves with inadequate rations of fat, poor quality jam and stale bread made with leftovers. The four mine throwers were to replace two batteries taken out of the line. Everyone was ready for peace, that much was clear, but it didn’t much look like peace. Men in helmets and caps kept rushing past them, stumbling and swearing under their breath. Like a dark cloud, danger, palpable to all, seemed to roll in across the upturned earth from the other side of the trenches. Two hundred metres of land is a broad stretch but for a bullet it’s nothing. Advancing infantrymen cover it in five minutes, a shell in a second. So this is the war at last, thought Bertin. Now you have it. You’re stuck on its outermost edge like a fly in glue. Your heart and lungs are pounding, and the enemy isn’t even doing anything. Pale light poured down from above, casting black shadows in the trench. Had they missed the sound of the rockets going up? There’d definitely be more action tonight. Bertin noticed that his knees and hands were trembling with suppressed tension. He made to leave his cover and climb up the recess cut into the trench wall.
‘Have you gone mad?’ Süßmann hissed in his hear. ‘They’ll be able to pick out your pale face against the black earth quite easily from over there with their night glasses.’
Nothing would happen in their sector, but if the French were paying attention the battalion that was being relieved might get some grief as the troops were being exchanged. Suddenly – and Bertin’s heart seemed to stop – the machine gun they had passed earlier spat out a furious volley. It thrust maliciously up into the night, though he didn’t see its fire. Three or four of the same weapons continued the noise. Nearby, rockets whistled up and released their signal lights, bathing the huddled soldiers’ faces in a strange red glow. Soon, a wild gurgling roared over their heads and there was a crash far in front of them.
‘Barrage fire,’ said Süßmann in Bertin’s ear. ‘It’s just for show to fool the Frogs.’
From the way the two Saxons had pressed themselves into the ground, Bertin could tell that they were frightened too – the guns often shot too short. What if the diversion worked and the French replied? It did work. Flashing and roaring ahead, with blinding light from the sides. Men in artillery caps appeared from the dugout with an aiming circle. Under the protection of the mine throwers’ screen, they sighted the flashes from the French guns and shouted figures to one another. Bertin wondered how long this terrible din would last, the explosions, flames, flickers, howling and droning in the starlit night. He couldn’t stand it. There was a thunderous ringing his ears, and the once repellent dugout now seemed like a refuge. He stumbled down the stairs, pushed aside a tarpaulin and saw brightness and men sitting and lying on wire grating, their weapons to hand beside them. A stearin cartridge on a box cast a thin glow, and the air underground was thick and smoky. The faces of the sappers, gunners and Saxon riflemen made him feel almost sick. Until now he had garlanded them with splendid delusions, draped them in noble titles. But no illusion could hold out here. The men in this boarded clay grave were just lost battalions, the sacrificed herds of world markets, which were currently experiencing a glut in human material. Crouched on a plank under the earth 200m from the enemy and yawning suddenly from exhaustion, he saw that even here the men were just doing their duty – nothing more than that.
The earth rumbled above him, chunks fell from the walls, dust rained down from the timbers and as the infantrymen calmly carried on smoking their cigarettes, he wondered hesitantly how he had come to see this truth. It hurt! It robbed you of the strength to endure life. Surely it couldn’t be the same everywhere else as in his own company. He must tell Kroysing about it. Was that Kroysing coming through the door? Yes, there was young Kroysing in his sergeant’s cap, smiling engagingly. Things were pretty jolly in the cellars at Chambrettes-Ferme. The sausage machines were rattling away and guts were being stretched for sausage skins, and on the door hung the new regulation about using human flesh, grey human flesh…
Sergeant Süßmann looked at Private Bertin’s face both in amusement and complete sympathy. He’d fallen abruptly asleep and his steel helmet had fallen from his head. Süßmann took Bertin’s hand and moved it to and fro, establishing that the boy had come through it all fine.
‘The relief of the battalion took place one and a half hours ahead of schedule. Nothing to report.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
The gift
AROUND 11PM, SÜSSMANN woke Bertin in darkness; the candle had burnt down and gone out. He’d been dreaming about an incredibly violent storm on Lake Ammer. Lightning seemed to whip up the expanse of water, and thunder echoed off the mountain walls against underwater banks.
‘Up you get,’ said Süßmann. ‘Big fireworks display. It’s worth a look.’
Bertin knew immediately where he was. His head hurt, but it would clear in the open air. Outside, the trench was full of men, all looking behind them. A roar like an organ playing filled the night with thunderous tones. Flames sprang up over the neighbouring sector. Fiery discharges rained down, methodically spread out across the approach routes and familiar hills and valleys. As the shells hit, they hurled up fiery gasses and earth in cloud-like columns. The howl as they approached, the pounding tide of vicious hissing, the ringing, rattling and manic cracking, made Bertin’s heart tremble, but he also pressed Süßmann’s arm in fascination as the full force of the human drive to destroy was unleashed – rejoicing in evil’s omnipotence.
A thin, bespectacled Saxon sergeant standing next to Bertin surprised him by calmly observing: ‘That’s what we can do, bastards that we may be.’
As Bertin looked at the man’s stubbly face under his helmet, his narrow cheekbones and shrewd eyes, and the two ribbons, black and white and green and white, in his top buttonhole, he felt a surge of pride and admiration for his comrades, these German soldiers with their sense of duty, their hopelessness, their grim courage. They’d seen it all.
Luckily, the first battalion was to get off lightly this time. It would all be over in 10 minutes, Süßmann shouted in his ear. Then, Bertin knew, the German artillery would take its turn, and this squaring of accounts would create more destruction – a new day of anti-creation.
In the meantime, the young Saxon calmly lit his pipe, and a couple of others shared his lighter. The wild noise gradually petered out. They could hear one another again. It was only above the Adalbert line that shrapnel was still exploding. That’s where the long 10cm guns were, said the Saxon. They’d obviously received a big batch of ammunition and were now getting rid of it. Of course, his neighbour confirmed. Otherwise, they’d have to take it back home if peace broke out that day. The young sergeant pooh-poohed this. Peace wouldn’t break out that quickly. Plenty of time to pour a few more pots of coffee before that happened. There were many more medals to be pocketed and bestowed before peace could be allowed to break out.