The meadows are flat, the wood is too far away and too dangerous; the only cover is the military cemetery and the grave mounds. We stumble into the darkness, and soon every man has flattened himself behind one of the mounds.
Not a moment too soon.[103] The dark turns into madness. It rocks and rages. Dark things, darker than the night itself, rush upon us in great waves, over us and onwards. The flashes of the explosions light up the cemetery.
There is no way out. In the light of one of the shell-bursts I risk a glance out on to the meadows. They are like a storm-tossed sea, with the flames from the impacts spurting up like fountains. No one could possibly get across that.
The wood disappears, splintered, shattered, smashed. We have to stay in the cemetery.
The earth explodes in front of us. Great clumps of it come raining down on top of us. I feel a jolt. My sleeve has been ripped by some shrapnel. I clench my fist. No pain. But that is no comfort, wounds never start to hurt until afterwards. I run my hand over the arm. It is scratched but still in one piece. Then I get a knock on the head and everything blurs. But as quick as a flash comes the thought: you mustnt faint! I sink down into the black mud but get up again immediately. A piece of shrapnel hit my helmet, but it came from so far off that it didnt cut through the steel. I wipe the dirt out of my eyes. A hole has been blown in the ground right in front of me, I can just about make it out[104]. Shells dont often land in the same place twice and I want to get into that hole. Without stopping I wriggle across towards it as fast as I can, flat as an eel on the ground there is a whistling noise again, I curl up quickly and grab for some cover, feel something to my left and press against it, it gives, I groan, and the earth is torn up again, the blast thunders in my ears, I crawl under whatever it was that gave way when I touched it, pull it over me it is wood, cloth, cover, cover, pretty poor cover against falling shrapnel.
I open my eyes; my fingers are gripped tight on a sleeve, an arm. A wounded soldier? I shout out to him no answer must be dead. My hand gropes on and finds more shattered wood then I remember that weve taken cover in a cemetery.
But the shelling is stronger than anything else. It wipes out all other considerations and I just crawl deeper and deeper beneath the coffin so that it will protect me, even if Death himself is already in it.
The shell hole is gaping in front of me. I fix my eyes on it, grasping at it almost physically, I have to get to it in one jump.
Then I feel a blow in the face, and a hand grabs me by the shoulder has the dead man come back to life? The hand shakes me, I turn my head, and in a flash of light that lasts only a second I find myself looking into Katczinskys face. His mouth is wide open and he is bellowing, but I cant hear anything; he shakes me and comes closer; the noise ebbs for a moment and I can make out his voice: Gas gaaas gaaaaas pass it on[105]!
I pull out my gas-mask case Someone is lying a little way away from me. All I can think of is that Ive got to tell him: Gaaas gaaaas.
I shout, crawl across to him, hit at him with the gas-mask case but he doesnt notice I do it again, and then again he only ducks it is one of the new recruits I look despairingly at Kat, who has his mask on already I tear mine out of the case, my helmet is knocked aside as I get the mask over my face, I reach the man and his gas-mask case is by my hand, so I get hold of the mask and shove it over his head he grabs it, I let go, and with a sudden jolt I am lying in the shell hole.
The dull thud of the gas shells is mixed in with the sharp noise of the high explosives. In between the explosions a bell rings the warning, gongs and metal rattles spread the word Gas gas gaas
There is a noise as someone drops behind me, once, twice. I wipe the window of my gas-mask clear of condensation. It is Kat, Kropp and somebody else. There are four of us lying here, tensed and waiting, breathing as shallowly as we can[106].
The first few minutes with the mask tell you whether you will live or die. Is it airtight? I know the terrible sights from the field hospital, soldiers who have been gassed, choking for days on end as they spew up their burned-out lungs, bit by bit.
I breathe carefully, with my mouth pressed against the mouthpiece. By now the gas is snaking over the ground and sinking into all the hollows. It insinuates itself into our shell hole wriggling its way in like a broad, soft jellyfish. I give Kat a nudge: it is better to crawl out and lie up on top rather than here, where the gas concentrates itself the most. But we cant. A second hail of shellfire starts. Its as if it is not the guns that are roaring; its as if the very earth is raging.
There is a crash as something black flies over and on to us. It strikes the ground right beside us: a coffin that has been blown through the air.
I see Kat move, and crawl across to him. The coffin has crashed down on to the outstretched arm of the fourth man in our shell hole. He tries to tear off his gas-mask with his other hand. Kropp gets to him just in time, twists that arm hard behind his back and holds it there.
Kat and I set about freeing the wounded arm. The coffin lid is loose and damaged, and we easily manage to wrench it free; we throw out the corpse, which flops down, and then we try to loosen the rest of the coffin.
Luckily, the man passes out, and Albert is able to help us. Now we dont have to be so careful, and we work like mad until the coffin gives way with a sighing noise to the spades which we shove in underneath it.
It is lighter now. Kat takes a piece of the coffin lid and puts it under the shattered arm, and we wrap the bandages from all our field dressing packs[107] around it. There isnt anything else we can do at the moment.
My head is throbbing and buzzing in the gas-mask, it is nearly bursting. Your lungs get strained, they only have stagnant, overheated, used-up air to breathe, the veins on your temples bulge and you think you are going to suffocate
A grey light trickles into our shell hole. Wind sweeps the cemetery. I haul myself up to the edge of the hole. Lying in front of me in the dirty light of dawn is a leg that has been torn off, with the boot on it still completely undamaged I see it all perfectly clearly in a moment. But now, a few yards away, somebody is standing up; I clean the goggles, and because I am agitated they mist over again at once, but I stare across the man over there isnt wearing his gas-mask any more.
I wait for a few seconds longer but he doesnt collapse, he looks around cautiously and takes a few steps the wind has dispersed the gas, the air is clear and gasping for breath I rip my mask away from my face too, and my knees give way[108]. The air pours into me like cold water, my eyes feel as if they could burst from my head, the wave sweeps over me and plunges me into darkness.
The shelling has stopped. I turn back to the crater and wave to the others. They scramble up and tear off their masks. We pick up the wounded man, one of us holds the arm with the splint on it. And in a group we stumble away as quickly as possible.
The cemetery has been blown to pieces. Coffins and corpses are scattered all around. They have been killed for a second time; but every corpse that was shattered saved the life of one of us.
The fence has been wrecked, the rails of the field railway[109] on the other side have been ripped out and bent upwards, so that they point to the sky. Someone is lying on the ground in front of us. We stop. Kropp goes on alone with the wounded man.
The man on the ground is a recruit. He has blood smeared all over one hip; he is so exhausted that I reach for my flask, which has tea with rum in it. Kat holds back my hand and bends over him. Where did you cop it, mate?[110]
He moves his eyes, too weak to answer.
Carefully we cut away his trousers. He moans. Its OK, OK, itll soon be better
If hes been hit in the stomach then he mustnt drink anything. He has thrown up, and that is a good sign. We expose the hip area.
It is just a pulp of torn flesh and splintered bone. The joint has been hit. This lad will never walk again.
I wet my fingers and run them across his forehead, then give him a drink. Some life comes into his eyes. Its only now that we realize that his right arm is bleeding as well.
Kat spreads out two field dressings as wide as he can, so that they cover the wound. I look around for some cloth, so that I can tie it up loosely. We havent got anything, so I cut more of the wounded mans trousers away so that I can use a piece of his underpants as a bandage. But he isnt wearing any. I look at him more closely. Its the blond lad from earlier on.
Meanwhile Kat has fetched a couple more field dressings from the pockets of dead soldiers, and we place them carefully on the wound. The lad is looking at us with a fixed gaze.
Well go and get a stretcher now.
But he opens his mouth and whispers, Stay here
Kat says, Well be back in a minute. Were going to get a stretcher for you.
It is impossible to say whether he understands or not; he whimpers like a child behind us as we go: Stay here
Kat looks all round and then whispers, Wouldnt it be best just to take a revolver and put him out of his misery?
The lad is not likely to survive being moved, and at the very most hell last a couple of days. But everything hes been through so far will be nothing compared to those few days until he dies. At the moment he is still in shock and cant feel anything. Within an hour hell be a screaming mass of unbearable agonies, and the few days he still has left to live will just be an incessant raging torture. And what difference does it make to anyone whether he has to suffer them or not?
I nod. Youre right, Kat. The best thing would be a bullet. Give me a gun, he says, and stops walking. I can see that he is set on it[111]. We look around but were not alone any more. A small group is gathering near us, and heads are appearing out of the shell holes and trenches.
We bring a stretcher.
Kat shakes his head. Such young lads He says it again: Such young, innocent lads
Our losses are not as bad as might have been expected: five dead and eight wounded. It was only a short barrage. Two of our dead are lying in one of the re-opened graves; all we have to do is fill it in.