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Page 10
"I don't remember you. Anyhow, you weren't with me yesterday--I'm sorry,
but I can't have you."
"Nobody'll notice the difference."
"I'm sorry; the S.M. has told me off once already for having too many
men on my party. He went off the deep end [lost his temper] about it and
said I'd get him into trouble. I can't let you stay."
One after another the fatigue parties were called out and I fell in with
my own, the last of all and about eighty strong. Sergeant Hyndman was in
charge.
The Sergeant-Major blew his whistle and shouted, "Move off!" and one by
one the N.C.O.'s gave the words of command:
"Party--Tshn! Into File--Right Turn! By the Right--Quick March!"
As we passed out of the camp each of us drew a shovel or a pick from a
great heap of tools near the entrance.
We got on to the road and formed fours, and at last began the longed-for
march which would restore our circulation and warm our frozen feet.
The snow was still falling heavily and the wind blew it into our faces.
We bowed our heads and pulled our caps down over our eyes. Our feet
began to glow but our ears became painfully cold instead. We held our
hands over them and as our ears grew warm our fingers became numb and
frozen, so that we put our hands back into our pockets (although it was
against regulations) and tried to think of something else.
Gradually, however, I became warm in every member and was filled with a
sense of physical comfort that released my thoughts from immediate,
material things. I thought of home and made plans for the future. I had
a long, stubbornly contested argument with an imaginary opponent about
the issues of the war. And then physical discomfort made itself felt
again, all my free and wandering thoughts were gathered in by a
wide-flung net and roughly thrown into a narrow dungeon.
I was growing unpleasantly hot and I longed to get rid of my heavy,
sodden great-coat. The strap of my haversack was making my shoulder
ache. I became peevish and fretful once more.
We swung along the road with rapid strides. Some of the feebler marchers
showed signs of weariness and began to grumble at our speed. There was
an ironical shout of "Double up in front," whereupon the front fours
slowed down a little.
The wind increased in power and the snow flew past us in horizontal
lines obscuring the Flemish landscape. We marched on in silence for an
hour or more until suddenly the front fours halted and all the others
thronged up against them. We had reached our destination.
There was a broad-gauge railway. On one side of it huge stacks of
sleepers stretched away in long rows that were soon lost to sight in the
wintry atmosphere. On the other side was a barbed wire fence. Beyond it
lay flat fields on which the snow had settled evenly. In one of the
fields was the dim form of a farm-building, barely visible through the
rush and turmoil of dancing snowflakes.
A Sergeant of the Royal Engineers came up and told us what our work
would be. We were to carry all the sleepers across the line and stack
them in four rows on the far side of the fence.
"Is it a task job?" we asked.
The Sergeant did not know.
"What did they make us bring our shovels for?"
A voice, mocking such a na�ve questioner, answered:
"Don't yer know the army be now?"
We broke down a section of the fence. Two men were assigned to each
stack. They loaded each sleeper on to the shoulders of a couple of men
who carried it across the railway lines into the field, where it would
be received and stacked by other men.
Hour by hour we trudged to and fro in pairs, bearing our wet and heavy
loads. We lost consciousness of everything except driving snow,
squelching mud, aching backs and sore shoulders. When one shoulder
became so sore that mere contact with our load was intensely painful, we
changed over to the other, until that too became bruised, and then we
would change back again. And so on, hour by hour.
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