I looked as unconcerned as possible and dipped my own biscuit into the pot. "Tell that fellow to stop making such a noise," said Captain Jones, angrily putting his head round the dug-out.
I felt myself that it was a pity the Germans should know the good result of their shooting and that the fellow ought not to make such a fuss. However, the groaning went on as loudly as ever, and at last Jones got up exasperated to go and see what was the matter.
He came back with a grave face.
"Only hit in his 'sit-upon,' wasn't he?" My fellow-subaltern looked up smiling.
"H'm, it's worse—went through and has lodged somewhere in his intestines," and murmuring "in agony, poor fellow!" Captain Jones looked to see if we had emptied the jam-pot while he was away.
It did not take more than an hour or two to pick up the rudiments of trench life. We passed the morning sitting in the dug-out, reading a few old papers and smoking and talking. By eleven the sun was high enough to peep in over the top of the parapet and warm us, and it all seemed to me a very pleasant, lazy sort of existence. There was no firing except for an occasional "ping" from a sniper Goyle kept posted at the corner of the trench, and an answering shot or two from the German side. Rifle fire seemed a matter of tacit arrangement. When our sniper was joined by a friend, or fired two or three times in a minute instead of once every three or four, the German fire grew brisker and life in the trench less tranquil. Our sniper was thereupon reproved by Goyle and was silent, whereupon the German fire died down.
At midday Goyle suggested we should lunch, and Evans pulled the wooden box towards him. He gave us out each two large square army biscuits and opened a small tin of bully beef, which he turned out on a piece of paper and cut into three portions. The beef and biscuits did not make a bad meal at all, but the best was to follow. Goyle produced from his haversack a tin cup, and from the box a wine-bottle about a third full. He then mixed a tot of rum with the same quantity of water in the cup and drank, passing on the emptied cup to Evans, who took his share; after I had had mine there was just enough left for us each to have half a cup more. How delicious that rum was! I rolled myself a cigarette, lay back in the straw, and basked contentedly. I felt comfortable and warm and drowsy.
Away in the distance one could hear the booming of big guns which went on all day, but this was the only thing to remind one that one was in the middle of the battle of the Aisne. I saw Evans opposite me lean back and close his eyes, and remember thinking Goyle was rather energetic to sit so bolt upright all the time.
It was a sound of firing that woke me. Phizz—Phizz—Phizz! through the leaves above and some sharp cracks from our men. Goyle and Evans were still sitting where they had lunched, listening intently. I sat up, too, wondering what was going on. "Were we being attacked or what was happening?" I asked Goyle, who replied briefly that he did not know.
"Just take No. 8 platoon and line that trench along the end there," he said to Evans. Evans got up and crept out of the dug-out along towards the sound of firing.