Isle Royale Page 6

  When the order came to fire, I felt shock and amazement as the butt of my rifle jerked against my shoulder. I saw fire and a puff of grayish smoke pour from my muzzle, watched as Jacques collapsed, then slowly settled to his knees. His dead eyes stared straight ahead, looking directly into mine, it seemed. Then he fell backwards and bent at the waist, his legs doubled up beneath him, his face turned to the overcast sky.

  Army training works well. I had accomplished my duty without even thinking. I had killed my first man, and it was one of our own.

  I am only a little man. What can I do?

  JL

  April 14, 1918, St. Quentin, France

  Dear Collene,

  There is no word from you. Not one letter or telegram. Are you still there, Collene? I know much mail gets lost in the confusion. I do not even know if you receive these letters. Are you still waiting for me? Perhaps there’s no point, anyway, for I’m beginning to believe the world has truly gone mad.

  This last week I’ve slept perhaps eight hours. I stay sane and awake by drinking a bottle of whiskey each day. I despise drunkards, but it is certainly helping me get through the horror of trench life. I have the whiskey smuggled to me here by the caseload to share with my comrades in the trenches. I’ve gotten quite good at smuggling. It is far simpler earning money this way than all those fruitless hours spent on the fishing boat back home, though I would give anything to be on that boat at this moment.

  Our first day was tinged with excitement. At last, the war! After so many weeks of training, we were finally here. But first we came across a bad omen: a pair of French peasants alongside the road were busy crafting white crosses from wood scraps. Our NCO tried to make them stop, to hide the crosses from the men, but the peasants only shrugged and pointed in back of the small hut from which they worked. As we passed by, we saw a huge pile of crosses, ten feet high, waiting for the next assault upon the German lines. Some of the men were unnerved. I kept my gaze on the road, staring straight ahead, trying to concentrate on our destination.

  Our arrival at the trenches was greeted by the thunder of some far-away artillery. The noise was loud and continuous. The men we relieved shuffled past like ghosts—gaunt, filthy, saying not a word. Puttees and surplus ammunition were discarded. Their uniforms were disheveled, their general manner unkempt, even slovenly. (I did notice, though, that their rifles were carefully covered to protect against the moisture. These were battle-hardened men who knew the priorities of war.) There was an air of resignation about them, as if they no longer cared about themselves, their country, their world. It was like their souls had departed, leaving only shells that walked blindly over the earth.

  The landscape looked deserted to me. Men in trenches sitting around, eating, drinking, smoking. Sometimes a man would take a peek over the top of the trench with a periscope, but nobody was fighting. Overhead I could see observation balloons hanging in the sky. Occasionally, an aeroplane would buzz through the morning mist.

  I set about doing odd jobs. Suddenly, there was a terrific boom as a shell exploded overhead. I was flung backwards for many yards. I picked myself up and laughed nervously. Nearby was a man with half his head gone. Next to him another man, an officer, walked down the trench line, his femur sticking out of his trousers, blood spurting in every direction. He seemed not to notice. Both men were quickly replaced, and I soon came to realize that this was a war of attrition, not glory and valor.

  The filth and the mud and the squalor are indescribable here. Worse still is the cold, a bone-chilling iciness that creeps through the trenches in the dead of night. I wear long johns, thick socks, and even layers of newspaper under my sodden uniform, but still the cold seeps in. Boots freeze in seconds if taken off, and our beef stew rations turn to red ice. Some nights, I think I shall never be warm again.

  We are all Canadians, and we take it as best we can. Our unit is the same that captured Courcelette during the bloody Somme Offensive, that took Vimy Ridge in the Battle of Arras. We’ve lost thousands, but still we serve God and country, all for the sake of a few miles of French countryside.

  Yesterday, we went over the top. It is mostly a blur to me now. I remember waiting for the “rain of steel,” a rolling artillery barrage that softens up the Germans and hopefully blasts through the barbed wire in no-man’s land. I felt sorry for the Germans then. I know what it is like to live under the constant fall of shells. It destroys both body and mind. And there are so many different kinds of shells! After a few days in the trenches we became accustomed to each. Some go off with a crack, like a man hitting a golf ball. Others sound like a newspaper being torn in half. The big shells start with a head-pounding bang, then slowly arc across the sky like a whistling man on a bicycle. Then they accelerate and smash into the earth with a deafening roar.

  After four hours of this, the order was given. I gripped my Lee Enfield and hoisted myself over the lip of the trench. After so many shells falling on the Germans, it was hard to imagine anything left living on the other side. I began my run with confidence. But then the man next to me was immediately shot back into the mud, a hole planted neatly between his eyes from some unseen sniper.

  The dash across no-man’s land seemed endless; my feet were like lead, slipping and sliding in the muck. All around me, men screamed and fell to the ground. Explosions ripped through the air, and the staccato tat-tat-tat of enemy machine guns filled my ears.

  When it was over, we’d taken our objective, the trench at Hill 56. I never fired a shot, though I do remember stabbing a German with my bayonet. It went in like butter, but the muscles and tissue gripped my steel blade and it refused to budge. The man stared up at me as I struggled to free my weapon. But my training came back to me. I made a half twist with the bayonet in proper army fashion, then jerked back and felt the blade come free. I do not know what became of that man. All I remember is the shocked look on his face as he sat there, his guts running into his cupped hands.

  The next day we were relieved and sent to a support trench farther back. But later, we discovered that the Germans had retaken their trench at Hill 56, so that night we went over the top again. This time, it was like a scene from hell, as flames and explosions lit up the black night. The rains began, and of course this made it all the more difficult. Finally, we took back our precious trench. Of the fifty men I knew from training camp, only three were left alive.

  The artillery quieted momentarily. All around us, through the pitter-patter of the rain, we could hear the sounds of the wounded on the battlefield. Voices cried out to us in the darkness. “I can’t swim!” one man kept shouting. With a chill running up my spine, I realized the wounded men had crawled into fresh bomb craters, which were now filling with rainwater. There was nothing we could do, except listen, as our comrades slowly drowned.

  But there were more horrors to bear. The trench we occupied was filled with bloody carnage, the bodies of Canadian and German soldiers stacked one on top of another. We set off to bury them immediately, shoving them to one side of the trench and shoveling dirt over the corpses. Now, as we walk down the lines, the earth is mushy and soft from the bodies buried just underneath. Limbs often get uncovered and stick out of the mud. Hands always unnerve me the most. There was one hand that each soldier shook, saying a hearty “Morning,” as he passed by. Even I did this. Gallows humor is one way we keep from going mad here. That, and the whiskey.

  The stench is truly overpowering. We tie cloths over our mouths, but it does no good. The rats and mice are terrible, but the flies are the pests I hate the worst. They come into the trenches in multitudes. Sometimes, their buzzing drowns out even the artillery. At night they settle on the walls of the trenches. When the moon shines, the trench walls look like a living mass of black carpet. We go through the trenches with shovels, smashing the flies dead by the millions. But by the next morning, they’re back in full force.

  The lice make it impossible for me to sleep; I feel as if I’m slowly being eaten alive. None of us can stop shittin
g because of the dysentery. I’m tired and weak. My thoughts are filled with impending doom. There is a rumor that we will go over the top again soon. I hope we are relieved before then. Let some other poor bastard go over the top. What more does my country want from me?

  Is there a God? I no longer think so.

  JL

  April 22, 1918, Dunkirk, France

  Collene,

  I write this from an army hospital. I think I will be shipped home soon, if I don’t die first.

  Do you remember my last letter, when I told you my fears of going over the top yet again? The rumor proved untrue. Instead, I volunteered for something far worse: night patrol. Why I put myself in harm’s way, I do not know. Perhaps insanity had finally gripped my mind. I know one part of me wanted to strike back at the unseen enemy that was inflicting so much pain. Night patrol was my chance to sneak out in inky blackness and make my mark upon the war. A vision kept dancing in my head, that of the German on Hill 56, holding his guts in his hands. The vision was not altogether unpleasant. My courage bolstered by a bottle of whiskey, I leapt at the chance to show Fritz what we Canadians are made of.

  There were two of us that night, myself and Private Campion, from Montreal. Campion was a rough sort of fellow, with blazing eyes that I swear burned yellow. He was the kind of man who would stab quick and hard even if he met the devil in no-man’s land. I was happy to have him by my side. We stood there preparing ourselves in the trench that night, blackening each other’s faces with burnt cork, putting socks over our bayonets so the gleaming steel would not give us away to enemy snipers. We equipped ourselves with knives and clubs, and a few grenades, in case of emergency. (The noise that grenades produce would surely bring a hell-storm of machine gun fire down upon us.)

  As we prepared, Campion let loose a horrendous series of belches. This worried me, but Campion just smiled sheepishly and told me he was getting it out of his system. Our diet is very poor here in the trenches. In addition to making us thin as rails, it also produces a nasty variety of gasses, adding to our misery. More than a few patrols have had their positions given away by an untimely fart. I did not wish to die because of another man’s gastric distress.

  The purpose of night patrol is to skulk about in no-man’s land, checking for gaps in the wire and sniffing out enemy patrols. In the darkness, when the artillery is silenced, an eerie stillness comes over the trenches. One can actually hear the Germans on the other side, their voices lowered to harsh whispers, feet shuffling about on duckboard, hacking coughs occasionally exploding. But mostly, on that clear moonless night, I heard the pounding of my own heart as we lifted ourselves over the parapet and onto the killing grounds.

  Campion and I made for a gap in the wire, which we had noted earlier while peering through a periscope. We crawled ever so slowly, slithering through the muck like two deadly vipers. We made it through the gap, then crawled onward through an obstacle course of barbed wire beyond, each roll containing thousands of tiny daggers that bit into our flesh unless treated gingerly. First came trip wire, lined with tin cans to alert us of the enemy crossing over. Then, a high apron of barbed wire. More trip wire. Another high apron. Through this morass we crept and crawled, checking our compasses often, making all of thirty yards in half an hour.

  Eventually, we made it to the German side, having encountered no enemy patrols. A large shell crater lay before us, heavily ringed with more barbed wire. It was a German sentry post, probably manned by only one or two soldiers. Campion and I quietly dragged ourselves forward, separating so as to take opposite ends of the crater. Death was all around us. I could hear more Germans whispering in trenches not far from our position. To be discovered now meant instant death by machine gun fire.

  When I reached my destination, I carefully lifted the trip wire and slid underneath. Then I slowly, ever so slowly, poked my head over the lip of the crater, fully expecting my face to be blown off by some expectant German. To my surprise, I did not die then. Instead, I was presented with an opportunity: a single German sat in the crater. Though his back was turned to me, I could tell he was a small man, weakened from the cold, and probably only half awake after manning the sentry post most of the night. He sat there shivering, his breath coming out in clouds of steam, as he tried to warm his hands over a tin cup filled with some sort of hot liquid. His rifle lay at his side.

  Slowly, inch by inch, I slid on my belly down the steep side of the crater. Holding my knife between clenched teeth, I kept my eyes trained on the back of the unsuspecting German. Finally, I reached the bottom of the crater. Still no sign of movement from my target. I got into a low crouch, then gripped my knife in my hand, ready to strike.

  Just then Campion popped his head up over the lip of the crater opposite me, right in front of my prey. The startled German gave a shout and reached for his rifle. Campion, rather than retreat, raised his knife to hurl it at the man. But the German was too quick. He swung his weapon up and fired from the hip, striking his mark. My eyes went wide as I saw Campion, his head shattered and brains flying in every direction, pitch forward and slide into the pit. His arms and legs writhed as he refused to die, his knife still gripped in one white-knuckled hand. Finally, Campion lay still in the muck, prostrate before his executioner. The German stood there impassively, head down, his muzzle still smoking.

  Enraged, I gave a shout and leapt forward, so quick the German never had a chance to react. I wrapped one arm around him from behind, then drew my knife across his throat. I felt the blade slice through tissue and arteries, then scrape across his spine. I jerked the knife free and stepped back. The German made an inhuman gurgling noise as he brought both hands up, clutching at his throat. He turned towards me, and as he did, great spurts of crimson sailed through the air, splashing my face and uniform.

  I stood there in shock, not from the blood, but from the round, blue-eyed face staring back at me. The “soldier” whose throat I’d just slit couldn’t have been more than fourteen years old. The Germans were sending children to the trenches! I staggered and fell backwards into the mud.

  The boy stood there, looking down on me, his eyes wide with fear, his hands still clutching at the mortal wound. Dark red liquid gushed from between his fingers. He mouthed something I couldn’t make out, then finally collapsed, jerked over onto his back, and lay still.

  Up above, outside the bomb crater, I could hear the German trench line waking in response to the racket we’d made. Voices shouted amidst sporadic rifle fire as the Germans tried to determine the source of the disturbance. Somewhere, a machine gunner with a hair trigger began firing blindly into no-man’s land, creating a noise like angry metallic hornets whizzing above the crater. Star shells went off, casting a harsh flat light against the wasteland. I was good as dead once the Germans discovered I’d occupied their sentry post. But that’s not what was on my mind at that moment.

  I crawled over to the boy, still reeling from the realization I’d just slashed a child’s throat. I cupped his head in my hands, wincing at the sight of the ugly gash below the chin, which still oozed blood. The boy’s eyes fluttered, then he looked up at me. Under the grime and dirt caking his skin, I saw the face of a boy who should be home playing in a schoolyard, climbing trees, or kissing his first girl, not thrown into the living hell of the trenches. His eyes were like pools of blue light, flickering and waning, extinguished before their time. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  The boy croaked something. I leaned closer, trying to make out his words from what little German I understood. As I came within inches of his face, once more I froze in shock. The blue eyes, which moments ago seemed such a bastion of innocence and purity, now blazed with hate. It seemed that they should burst then, and all the fury of hell come shrieking out to consume me.

  With his remaining strength, the boy raised his head and spat in my face. The mix of saliva and foaming crimson burned against my cheek. I knelt there, unmoving and tight-lipped, letting the liquid drip off me. The boy dropped his head back an
d lay still, ready to receive death as the last of his blood flowed into the mud.

  From my pocket I produced a hand grenade. I pulled the pin and held the grenade in front of me for the boy to see. He stared at it a moment, then looked back up into my eyes. A faint, bitter smile crept onto his lips. Death took him then.

  I honestly meant to blow us both up then, Collene. How could I live with myself, now that I was a child murderer? I could no longer exist in the hell of the trenches. At that moment, I would have done anything to escape. I was the scum of humanity. Surely, God had already cast me aside. I gripped the bomb in my hand and shut my eyes tight.

  Once again, though, army training took over. At the last moment I hurled the grenade over the lip of the crater toward the German trench line. It went off with a boom, mingled with the screams of enemy soldiers. More blood on my hands, all because I lacked the courage to put an end to my miserable existence. Add another title to my name: Coward.

  I lobbed two more grenades at the German trenches, hoping to create enough mayhem to enable me to make a dash for my own side. It was a futile hope, I knew, for as soon as I raised my head over the crater’s lip, the machine guns would tear me to ribbons. Still, what other choice did I have? It was either make a run for it or sit there, waiting for the Huns to come over and put a bayonet in my stomach.

  Then I heard a noise, a wondrous yet, at the same time, terrifying sound that made my heart leap to my throat. It started as a low rumble, then crescendoed to a fever pitch of shouting and screaming, guns firing and bullets whizzing overhead. Our side was going over the top!