CHAPTER VII
THE DEATH GRIP
Two reasons have impelled me to tell the story of Hugh Latimer, and both I think are good and sufficient. First I was his best friend, and second I know more about the tragedy than anyone else—even including his wife. I saw the beginning and the end; she—poor broken-hearted girl—saw only the end.
There have been many tragedies since this war started; there will be many more before Finis is written—and each, I suppose, to its own particular sufferers seems the worst. But, somehow, to my mind Hugh's case is without parallel, unique—the devil's arch of cruelty. I will give you the story—and you shall judge for yourself.
Let us lift the curtain and present a dug-out in a support trench somewhere near Givenchy. A candle gutters in a bottle, the grease running down like a miniature stalactite congeals on an upturned packing-case. On another packing-case the remnants of a tongue, some sardines, and a goodly array of bottles with some tin mugs and plates completes the furniture—or almost. I must not omit the handsome coloured pictures—three in all—of ladies of great beauty and charm, clad in—well, clad in something at any rate. The occupants of this palatial abode were Hugh Latimer and myself; at the rise of the curtain both lying in corners, on piles of straw.
Outside, a musician was coaxing noises from a mouth-organ; occasional snatches of song came through the open entrance, intermingled with bursts of laughter. One man, I remember, was telling an interminable story which seemed to be the history of a gentleman called Nobby Clark, who had dallied awhile with a lady in an estaminet at Bethune, and had ultimately received a knock-out blow with a frying-pan over the right eye, for being too rapid in his attentions. Just the usual dull, strange, haunting trench life—which varies not from day's end to day's end.
At intervals a battery of our own let drive, the blast of the explosion catching one through the open door; at intervals a big German shell moaned its way through the air overhead—an express bound for somewhere. Had you looked out to the front, you would have seen the bright green flares lobbing monotonously up into the night, all along the line. War—modern war; boring, incredible when viewed in cold blood....
"Hullo, Hugh." A voice at the door roused us both from our doze, and the Adjutant came in. "Will you put your watches right by mine? We are making a small local attack to-morrow morning, and the battalion is to leave the trenches at 6.35 exactly."