Then this intrepid man mounted "Big-Bang" upon a base to which were affixed four small wheels with broad treads. Having fired the mortar, he would trundle it away down the trench as fast as he could go, invariably getting clear of the fatal area before the shells began to fall. Then he would stop and fire another shot and again make off, dragging his mortar at the end of a rope. His ammunition he placed in recess here and there along the line. The enraged infantry took to heaving the canisters over the parapet until one so thrown exploded, blowing in the trench, upon which they left them severely alone. But whenever the maker of those canisters appeared with his mortar round the corner of the traverse they cursed him heartily.
In this way X—— became the best-hated man from Richebourg to the sea. Refused admittance to dug-outs, he was obliged to sleep on firing-platforms, on the floors of side trenches, or in saps where night working-parties trod on him. No one spoke to him except to utter oaths. Men said upon seeing him:—
"Here comes the Kaiser's best friend!"
Sarcastic remarks were also passed on his mortar; and, strangely enough, these hurt him more than personal abuse. He had come almost to love his creation. Hatred of it he could tolerate, but anything savouring of contempt; anything derogatory uttered against its power as a destroyer, touched him to the quick; and I fancy singularly biting language was heard in those winter trenches of 1914 and 1915.
So he dragged on his solitary existence—desolate, hated, yet feared because of his power of avenging himself by firing his weapon from any spot he pleased, and thus dooming it to a tremendous "strafing" by the enemy. He wanted someone to own him, and tried to attach himself to the artillery, but they refused to have anything to do with him. The thing his peculiar nature found it hardest to endure was the knowledge, gradually forced upon him, that he was "out of it," a mere independent unit belonging actually to neither side, a man whose decease many of the British, equally with the Huns, would have hailed with much glee.
This must have weighed upon him. Possibly he brooded. And all the time, with an invincible obstinacy that was almost heroic, he fired and fled and fled and fired, retreating sometimes up, sometimes down the trenches, dodging the shells all day and sometimes at night. And then he broke down.
"It was one of those illnesses your Army doesn't recognize officially," he told me. "It began with a sort of tired, discouraged feeling, and I used to have queer dreams. The noise of 'Big-Bang' going off made me jump like a marionette. I'd sweat and grow dizzy and my knees trembled and my stomach rose. I fell down one day and they came and took me away to the field ambulance, and after a bit they sent me down to Boulogne. I don't quite know what happened there during the first weeks. But when I got better they gave me a pretty good time—made quite a fuss of me, in fact. The colonel wanted to send me to England, but I told him how great I am on seeing this war through, and he grunted and said he'd see what he could do. When I came out I found this staff job waiting for me. It's not what I'd like exactly, but I suppose I'm getting old now. Still, we're close to the guns and I have a pretty free hand here, and can make trips to the trenches to say 'How-do' to the boys and see how things are getting along. Oh, yes; it's not so bad. But I was sorry to leave old 'Big-Bang.' I made her and I worked her, and I guess she did her bit."
For a space he meditated, puffing clouds of smoke from a ten-sou cigar. Then with a start he returned to life.
"Will you have a vin blanc, old chap? Hi, papa, deux vins blancs!"