by Robert Edric
‘If I’d known you were coming this way, I could have diverted and given you a lift,’ Guthrie said.
A distant loud bang – metal on metal – distracted them both and Reid told Guthrie about the men scavenging amid the abandoned lorries.
‘Stealing, you mean?’ Guthrie said.
‘I’m not sure. I suppose they see it as a way of getting back on their feet.’
Guthrie shook his head at the remark. ‘More excuses,’ he said. ‘These people take advantage at every possible opportunity. We make every conceivable effort on their behalf, and all they do in return is complain and then do the opposite of what we ask of them. The diggers at Fricourt, and beyond at the Highland cemetery, are mostly locals. You should give thanks that you employ soldiers. Apparently the Germans are also looking to build a cemetery at Fricourt.’ He smiled. ‘I’d like to see them get that one past the Commission.’
‘Of course,’ Reid said, unwilling to rise to the man’s remarks.
More noises distracted them and Guthrie said that perhaps he ought to go and speak to the men. He asked Reid how many he had counted there.
‘I didn’t,’ Reid said. ‘Count them.’
‘Still …’
‘Besides, I doubt you’d be telling them anything they didn’t already know,’ Reid said.
‘And perhaps that’s precisely why I should say something,’ Guthrie said.
‘Do whatever you see fit,’ Reid said. ‘Though I doubt they’d appreciate—’ He stopped abruptly.
‘Appreciate what? Appreciate being told of their wrongdoing by a man like me?’ Guthrie touched the collar he wore.
Reid stayed silent for a moment, and then said, ‘They consider it their right, their due. Something from which they might benefit rather than lose, for once.’
Guthrie shook his head at this, as though Reid were an ignorant child and he a wise teacher.
Only then did it occur to Reid that if Guthrie did confront the men, they might consider him to have been sent to admonish them by Reid. ‘It’s not really any of our business,’ he said, but with little conviction.
Guthrie remained silent. He looked at his watch and then at the driver beside him, who now sat with his head back and his eyes closed as though he were asleep. Guthrie finally rubbed at the fine dust which covered most of his face. ‘I ought to be getting back,’ he said eventually. ‘Let Abrahams know that his happy warriors are all safely settled. He wants me to go and dine with him in Paris. Perhaps a few days back in civilization will help to raise my flagging spirits.’
‘I daresay,’ Reid said.
Guthrie looked around them. ‘I sometimes wonder if our continued wandering in this particular wilderness doesn’t begin to have an adverse effect on us all. A change of air, of scenery, perhaps that’s what’s required to encourage us all in our endeavours.’ He paused. ‘Edmund told me of the proposition he’d put to you, about your own imminent change of scenery.’
‘Imminent?’ Reid said, wishing he’d contained the word and everything it revealed to Guthrie.
‘I told him you were a fortunate man indeed. It was always my own ambition to visit the Holy Land, and is something I shall no doubt undertake when my labours in this neck of the woods are less in demand.’
‘Wherever I go, I’ll still be burying the dead,’ Reid said, again wishing he’d remained silent.
‘And a noble and much—’ Guthrie began to say, when he was silenced by a further loud bang – an actual explosion this time; a small one, perhaps, but definitely an explosion – from the direction of the field around the curve in the road.
Both Reid and Guthrie turned to look. The driver woke with a start and stood up to scan the nearby land. In the distance, a thin plume of pale smoke rose into the air above where the wreckers worked.
Other than the driver dropping back to his seat, none of the three men spoke or moved for a moment.
Then Guthrie said, ‘As you say, I imagine they well understood the risks they were taking.’
‘Perhaps we should go to them and see if anyone’s injured,’ Reid said.
‘We’ll know soon enough,’ Guthrie said.
Several minutes later, a slow-moving horse and cart appeared on the road ahead of them, four men sitting abreast on its plank seat.
They came without any apparent urgency to where Guthrie and Reid awaited them. Arriving alongside the car, one of the men Reid had spoken to earlier showed them his loosely bandaged, bleeding hand.
‘Was no one else injured?’ Reid asked the men.
All four of them shook their heads.
‘Where are you taking him?’
‘To the doctor at Fricourt,’ one said.
‘And after that to Mametz to make a claim for compensation,’ another added, at which all four men burst into laughter.
The man with the bandaged hand unwound the cloth to show his injury to Reid. Blood pooled in the man’s palm and was smeared along his forearm.
‘Can you move all your fingers?’ Reid asked him. He had asked fifty other men the same question.
The man clenched and opened his fist several times, causing fresh blood to flow. He refastened his bandage. Reid guessed the blood would be even more in evidence by the time the men arrived in Mametz.
After that, the driver of the cart shook his reins and the horse continued on its slow journey.
When the men were beyond hearing, Guthrie said, ‘See?’ He then told his driver to start the engine and continue their own journey back to Amiens. ‘I daresay I shall see you in Morlancourt very soon,’ he said to Reid as he slid the goggles back over his eyes.
‘Of course,’ Reid said.
The car left him, making a faltering, chugging sound as it gathered speed along the road. Reid stood and watched it go. He looked in the direction of the smoke, but it had already thinned and drifted and was now barely visible where it rose off the land.
28
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, the whole of Morlancourt knew about the imminent arrival of Caroline Mortimer’s nurses.
Reid learned this from Benoît, who came out of his office the instant Reid arrived on the platform. Again, as during the previous few days, there were no bodies to be unloaded, only further supplies and materials sent by Wheeler in advance of the forthcoming ceremony.
It seemed to Reid as though the demands and diversions of only a week earlier had all now either ceased to exist or were being held in abeyance by Wheeler until the women were delivered and then buried. Everything, he realized, was reaching its natural conclusion in the place, his own authority and tenure there included.
He saw from the docket Jessop had sent him the previous evening that the load being delivered to them that particular morning included several hundred folding chairs, plank walkways, scaffolding and a marquee complete with all its poles and ropes, and he saw immediately how much extra work was involved in the unloading and then setting-up of all of this.
Having emerged from his office, Benoît waited while Reid told Drake and the waiting men what to expect. There were fewer men than usual, and Drake explained to Reid that those who were absent had finally received their discharge papers and were refusing to continue working at the cemetery. There had been no reasoning with the frustrated, impatient men, and no orders had come from Commission Headquarters insisting that they continue.
‘The men in charge don’t want any more riots,’ Drake said softly. ‘They’ve pushed people too far and now they’re paying the price.’
‘They could at least send us some new arrivals,’ Reid said, already calculating how to complete the work now being demanded of him with this reduced workforce.
‘There’s no stopping some of them once they’ve got their travel warrants in their hands,’ Drake said. ‘They’ll all be waking up drunk in either Boulogne or Calais some time later this morning. And this time tomorrow, they’ll be doing the same in Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool. I doubt if any of them will ever pick up a spade again.’
Reid smiled at the remark. As usual, Drake seemed considerably less concerned by the loss than he was.
‘How many are still here?’
‘Sixty-two,’ Drake said.
At the height of the work, Reid had commanded almost two hundred men. Recently, since the bulk of the actual graves had been dug and the work had turned to preparing the appearance of the cemetery, this number had been halved. Now he had lost almost forty of those men overnight.
‘Spilt milk,’ Drake said. ‘We’ll manage.’
‘Of course we will. We always do.’ Reid left the men and went to where Benoît awaited him.
Benoît beckoned him into his office, and Reid saw by the way the man avoided his eyes until the two of them were finally sitting facing each other that something was wrong.
‘Your nurses will finally come,’ Benoît said. ‘I have been instructed by my own superiors to assist you in any way possible. They have offered to send more men if necessary.’
‘Thank them for me,’ Reid said. ‘I doubt it will involve much – not here at the station, at least. The Commission will want to put on its main show at the cemetery itself.’
‘Of course.’
‘Apparently, we’re kowtowing to the newspapers and to public demand back in England.’
Benoît did not understand the phrase and so Reid explained himself.
‘But surely that’s a good thing,’ Benoît said. ‘For the people back in England to see.’
‘It’s what Wheeler and his superiors clearly believe.’
It had also been rumoured that other Commission members and an array of invited guests would now attend the ceremony. None of this information had been delivered to Reid directly, and this angered him as much as the lack of forewarning concerning his depleted labour force.
‘They’re sending two hundred chairs today,’ he said.
‘Two hundred,’ Benoît repeated, considerably more impressed by this than Reid.
It had even been rumoured that representatives from both the War Office and the Medical Council were also coming over from London to participate in the event, so great was the demand from the newspapers. And with every one of these tales and rumours, Reid saw yet again how far beyond his own control the ceremony had now moved.
‘They were brave women,’ Benoît said. ‘To come here and do what they did.’
‘They were indeed,’ Reid said.
‘And Mrs Mortimer has worked hard to achieve all this on their behalf.’
‘She has.’
Benoît busied himself preparing them coffee.
When this was ready, Benoît surprised Reid by taking a bottle of cognac from the drawer in his desk and pouring them both a glass. It was not yet seven in the morning. Soon the whistle would sound at the canal halt and a few minutes later the train would appear.
Finally, waiting until they had both sipped the spirit, Benoît said, ‘They’re closing the railway. The branch line and the station. It seems we are soon no longer to serve any true purpose.’
‘Following the completion of the cemetery?’
‘And the others by the river, yes. Temporary narrow-gauge lines can be more easily laid and operated where necessary.’
Reid could think of nothing to say to the man.
Benoît must have long since realized that the line would soon close, but this knowledge had clearly done little to cushion the blow now that it had finally been confirmed.
Reid knew that Benoît had been born only three miles from Morlancourt, and that he had lived and worked there all of his life – almost sixty years.
‘There’s a great new plan for the whole country,’ Benoît said, sipping his cognac again. ‘Hereabouts, especially. From Paris to the coast, and east into Belgium.’
‘I daresay a great deal was destroyed and damaged,’ Reid said.
‘Of course. And now, we are told, each and every one of us must grasp this unique and precious opportunity to build anew for the glory of France in the future. Mile upon mile of lesser lines will become redundant, replaced by new and direct connections and by new and better roads.’
‘Including here?’ Reid said. He put down his glass and sipped the bitter coffee instead.
‘The main line will now run directly from Amiens to Saint-Quentin. I am told that I will be offered an opportunity to apply for work in the stations there.’
Every word Benoît spoke pushed him further away from the likelihood of this ever happening. Besides, it was unlikely that he had any intention of leaving his own small kingdom of Morlancourt or of applying for any kind of work in either of these much larger places.
‘Is that a possibility?’ Reid said.
‘It would mean going to live elsewhere,’ Benoît said. ‘Otherwise how would I get there and back every day once the railway has gone?’
‘You might consider—’
‘Besides, my wife would never leave.’
Reid was glad the brief pretence was over.
‘Twenty years ago, perhaps, ten even,’ Benoît went on. ‘But not now. She would never abandon Pierre.’
And neither would you.
‘Of course,’ Reid said. It was the beginning and the end of all Benoît’s reasoning and argument. ‘Will you retire, then?’ he said.
‘I’m fifty-eight. All my wife ever really wanted was to become the grandmother to a brood of noisy, demanding grandchildren. It was once all the consolation she sought for her hard life.’ He sipped his coffee and brandy in succession.
‘When will it happen?’ Reid asked him.
‘They say within the year. The two others here have already made up their minds to go to Saint-Quentin. They’re young men. They have no true commitments here beyond their parents. Besides, both served in the war and both were wounded. We may not provide such grand burial grounds for our own dead, but France has always been a good mother at pushing certain of her children to the front of certain queues. I don’t blame them – it’s a great opportunity for them. If they stayed in this backwater they would only turn slowly and unhappily into me.’ He smiled at the suggestion.
‘It sometimes seems as though the whole world is about to become a completely different place,’ Reid said.
‘Oh, I don’t doubt it. And nor should you, Captain Reid. We shall all wander amid the ruins and the rubble for a few years more, and then a whole new country filled with prosperous towns and factories and farms will slowly rise up around us. All this suffering must surely one day be repaid. Surely, one day, we shall all see the purpose of everything we have just endured.’
Reid said nothing to contradict the man’s forced and desperate belief. He wanted to ask Benoît why he insisted on accepting the empty promises made by his own politicians. He wanted to tell him that England hadn’t been reduced to ruins and rubble, but that even there things were no better for the ordinary man.
Eventually, Benoît seemed to sag where he sat. He drank the last of his cognac and let out a sigh. ‘Do you think anything will ever go back to the way it was before?’ he said.
‘Some things,’ Reid said, but did not elaborate.
‘Important things – things that matter?’
‘I hope so.’
‘And for people like me and my wife – all those people for whom things can never be the same again?’ Benoît looked at the empty glass he held, and for a moment Reid thought he was going to throw it to the ground, or against one of the walls, but instead he set it carefully down on his desk.
‘Will there be other changes here in Morlancourt, do you think?’ Reid asked him.
Benoît shrugged. ‘What can change with the railway gone? We shall just go back to being what we have always been. Perhaps it would have been better for us all if the war had come more violently to the place. At least then there would be some need for all this grasping of the future.’
It then occurred to Reid that at some of the more recent Commission meetings there had been discussions concerning the employment of local labour to maintain the fini
shed cemeteries. Gardeners would certainly be needed, and occasionally stonemasons and builders. The gates and paths, monuments, memorials and boundaries would have to be tended. The register of burials at each site would have to be kept up to date for visitors to consult. And those same visitors, presumably, would also need knowledgeable guides and somewhere to stay, somewhere to eat and drink, perhaps even someone to drive them back and forth between the new stations and the cemeteries.
He told Benoît all this, but to his surprise and disappointment, the station master showed little real enthusiasm for what he was suggesting.
‘It’s worth a try, surely?’ Reid said.
Eventually, unable to listen to Reid’s speculation on all he was proposing, Benoît said, ‘And your Colonel Wheeler – you truly believe that he would act on your recommendation?’ He reached out and held Reid’s arm for a moment. ‘Please, my dear friend, do not prostrate yourself before the man on my account. These men – our so-called superiors – they see only themselves in all they do. The rest of us – you and I, my son, your soldiers – we are all only profit and loss to them, borrowed honour and other men’s glory, that’s all. All that truly matters to these men is their own standing in the world, their own reputations, bought with the lives and suffering of others.’ He released his hold on Reid’s arm, put both hands in his lap and bowed his head.
After this, neither man spoke for several minutes, both of them content to sit in silence and listen to the voices of the men along the platform waiting for the train.
Eventually, a distant whistle sounded. Benoît took out his watch, looked at it, held it to his ear for a moment, and then put it back in his pocket.
‘Six minutes late,’ he said. ‘There have been delays at the canal junction all week. The seven-twenty from Calais to Charleville will also be running late, and because of that, the signal at Douai will sit against the drivers for longer than usual to let the mainline trains through. The two mid-morning coal trains in from Liège will run late, but no one will care about them. The drivers won’t even bother to try and make up their time.’ He smiled at his simple understanding of all this, and at the small, inconsequential problems being encountered by all these other men.
