Eleven Eleven

CHAPTER 16

10.30 a.m.

Will ran until his lungs were bursting, expecting a shot in the head at any second. Did you hear it before it hit you? Did you feel it? Or would you never know? Men he had seen shot through the head sometimes had a look of dull surprise etched on their dead faces. Once, he had been working on a burial detail with the new padre, Reverend Oliver. There was a dead fellow with a surprised look on his face. Oliver had said it was because, at the moment of his death, he had seen an old friend who had come to take him off to heaven. Will tried to hide his annoyance. He was too old for stories like that.

Will could run no further and he collapsed on to a thick patch of vegetation, gulping down great lungfuls of air. His mouth seemed very damp, and when he wiped it he was surprised to find his hand was covered in blood. Then he remembered that when his helmet had been shot from his head it had been knocked down over his face. The rim must have hit his nose, which had bled quite profusely. Inspecting it now, he didn’t know whether it was broken or just badly bruised. It hurt like hell when he touched it.

His hearing was still not right either. It was as if someone was closing his ears with their hands, then taking them away again. He lay there, occasionally banging the side of his head to try to stop the whistling and those strange dense blanks when he could hear nothing at all.

He surrendered to the silence and lay on his back, staring up through the treetops to the cloud-covered sky. Will didn’t believe any of that nonsense about heaven. How God could put these good-hearted men through such a living hell was beyond his understanding. The new padre said God moved in mysterious ways. Will didn’t like the Reverend Oliver. He looked at you like the village vicar used to look at the poorer boys when they put their grubby fingers in the biscuit tray at the school fête. Will preferred the padre they had had before. But, oddly, he was the reason Will no longer believed in God.

The Reverend Charles Clare was a toff. He’d been to Oxford University. But he would come right down to the firing line to mingle with the men, helping the slower ones with their letters. His wife made beautiful fruitcake, and when a package came over, he’d share it with them all. And he’d put a word in for old Pierce, the one who had been shaking so bad he couldn’t hold his rifle. The one the CO wanted to shoot for cowardice.

One morning the reverend announced his wife had just had twins. They were his first kids. One of the blokes knitted a couple of pairs of socks for the babies and went off to find him. Will had been surprised to discover quite a few of the men knitted on the front line. The man came back white as a sheet, still holding on to those little blue socks. ‘He’s in the latrine,’ he said. ‘Trousers round his ankles, top of his head missing. Stray bit of shell burst must have had him.’ Then he turned round and threw up. None of the men could understand how God could do that to one of his own.

After that, Will was convinced he lived in a rudderless world and only blind luck was going to save him. That didn’t stop him praying though – when they were under heavy fire or the shells were falling.

Now, as he lay on the edge of the forest, Will’s breathing slowly returned to normal. His heart stopped thumping in his chest and he began to feel a creeping sense of fear – not for the sniper, wherever he was. He had missed him for now. But Will had run away. He examined his conscience. Had they all run, or was it just him? In his mind’s eye, he replayed the scene. The shot that set him off had glanced off his helmet, and they had all run off, at least that’s what he remembered. But where were the others now? He daren’t call out for fear of drawing the attention of the sniper. He was even reluctant to stand up and look around in case he was spotted. What was he going to do? If he stayed there, alone in his sheltered hiding place, was he deserting? Was he showing cowardice in the face of the enemy? You could be shot for that. What should he do?

They had shot a boy just like him in early September. Jim said they had done it to encourage the others. Damn right it had. It had certainly worked on Will.

Peering through the foliage, Will realised he was close to the very edge of the forest. A short distance away he could see the trees abruptly end and could just make out a wide, flat field ahead.

The outside world was intruding. In the distance he could hear firing and shell bursts. Will lay there for a few more minutes, trying to make up his mind what to do. Eventually, he decided he had to move on. He began to crawl forward to the edge of the forest and peered anxiously out.

Ahead lay flat ground, obviously the scene of a recent battle. There were fresh craters and the smell of explosives and wet earth still hung in the air, along with acrid smoke from the blazing fuselage of a plane. He wondered if that was the one he had seen flying low over the forest earlier that morning. For now he could not see any other soldiers, but he was beginning to feel an overwhelming urge to get out of the forest. The landscape ahead of him was unfamiliar. There was nothing he remembered from entering the forest in the early-morning light. Perhaps this was on the other side? He had completely lost any sense of direction.

He crawled away from the shadow of the trees and into the churned-up ground before him. It was a laborious process, crawling forward like that, but Will didn’t want to stand up. A lone soldier in a field was just asking to be picked off by an enemy soldier – or even a careless one from his own side. It was a pity he no longer had his helmet. That would have made it obvious who he was.

Close to the burning plane he could see a deep crater. Beyond that was a small village. There was a church tower, a manor house and a few buildings. Will decided he would head for that. See what he might find.

It took him ten minutes to reach the crater. He peered cautiously over the lip, then froze in horror. There were two figures down at the bottom, observing him with fearful expressions on their faces. Then an awful stench hit him. Something else was in there – a dead man at the other side of the crater.

One of the two who were still alive was a German soldier. It was at this moment Will realised, with a shiver that went all down his body, he no longer had his rifle. He could not remember where he had left it – probably in the forest when his helmet had been shot off, or close to the edge of the wood before he had crawled out here. There would be hell to pay for that. Throwing away your weapon was definitely a court-martial charge. How he had not noticed until now, he could not understand.

So far he had escaped the horrors of the day and his every instinct told him to flee. But then the German soldier called up, ‘Hilfe!’ and held out his hand. He sounded timid and desperate. Will looked again. He was barely older than him.

The other fellow down there was more difficult to place. The man’s head was slumped forward, but then he jerked it up, as if waking from a nap. He wore the leather helmet and goggles of an airman. It must have been him in that Yank aeroplane.

Will realised at once the two of them were stuck in the mud that oozed thick and black at the bottom of the crater. He didn’t care that one of them was German. He couldn’t leave them to sink and drown, like poor Stan.

He slipped down the crater’s side, but the closer he got the more he could feel he was sinking into the soggy earth. ‘Wait,’ he called. ‘I’ll come back in a minute.’

He heard a voice call after him. ‘Hey, pal . . .’ It sounded weak but panicky, someone who was using their last reserves of strength to beg for help. ‘Don’t go. Stay and help us. Don’t go like the other guys . . .’

Will turned around again. ‘I need a stick – a branch – something to reach you with,’ he said. ‘I promise I’ll be back as soon as I can.’ He began to scramble up again.

A shot rang out, burying itself into the wet earth just next to him. Will froze and turned. The one in the flying jacket held a pistol in his outstretched arms.

‘You gotta stay and help us,’ he pleaded. He sounded desperately weary. Will shouted angrily, ‘Why did you shoot at me? We’re on the same side, aren’t we?’

‘Look, if I stay stuck here much longer I’m gonna die,’ said the pilot. ‘I already had a bunch of my own soldiers come down and then run off before they could get me out.’

Will crept gingerly down the side of the crater, as near to the two of them as he could without getting sucked into the mud. The German boy stared at him with something approaching revulsion.

The pilot was still pointing his pistol at him. Will tried to sound as reasonable as he could. ‘Please don’t do that. I need to get something to help you. I don’t want to get sucked into the mud too.’ As he spoke, he felt dried blood crack on his face.

‘What the hell happened to you?’ said the pilot.

Will realised his face must be covered in blood. That was what happened when your nose bled. It looked so much worse than it really was.

‘If you let me go, I will come back soon with something to pull you out of here,’ he said.

‘Swear to me you’ll come back,’ said the pilot. He seemed close to panic. ‘Don’t go dying on us. Don’t get killed out there.’

‘I will come back, but only if you put your revolver away,’ said Will. The pilot gave an embarrassed grin – the nearest Will was going to get to an apology – and put the gun back in his holster.

So Will crawled back across the field to the edge of the forest. He didn’t care if one of them was a German, he was determined to get those two out. Sinking into mud to freeze to death, or even worse, to drown. It was the stuff of nightmares. He reached the dense line of trees, grateful that no one had taken a shot at him. It had gone quiet, and only in the distance could he hear the occasional shell or rifle shot. He wondered if it was his hearing, but when he clicked his fingers he could hear that perfectly.

On the edge of the forest, just where the trees gave way to the open field, was exactly what he was looking for – a long thin branch, recently fallen from a tree. He picked it up and bashed it on the ground. It seemed sturdy, certainly not rotten or so weak that it would snap if anyone grabbed hold of it.

Will crawled back, still surprised by how quiet this recently churned-up battlefield had become. He heard the occasional chirp and wondered if it was his hearing playing up again. Then he realised what he could hear was birdsong.

Will reached the crater, half expecting to find both of these strangers had gone. But they were still there and the look on their faces when he appeared reassured him that they were not going to do him harm. He slid down the inside again, dragging his branch, and held it out to the German boy.

‘Hey, Limey,’ said the flyer. ‘This kid’s OK. Don’t worry about him.’ His voice seemed stronger. He seemed to have revived, now the prospect of rescue was imminent.

Will noticed a German rifle at the side of the crater. The boy had obviously put it down there when he went to rescue the pilot. He would keep an eye on him though, make sure he got to the rifle before the German, if there was any funny business.

The flyer had noticed him looking at the weapon. ‘Don’t worry about him,’ he called wearily. ‘He’s a good kid, I told you. And if he decides not to be, I still got my revolver.’

Will held out the branch to the boy and dug his boots into the mud to steady himself. He could feel his feet sinking as the boy pulled hard, but he came out eventually. ‘Danke! Danke!’ the boy said, then, ‘Sank yew, Kamerad!’

The flyer was more difficult to get out. Both of them pulled on the branch, but the man was too weak to hold on. The German boy had an idea. He took off his leather belt and fastened it to the end of the branch with the buckle, just above a knobbly lump.

Then they both held it over the flyer’s head. The pilot grabbed the dangling leather strap, and wrapped it around his wrists. With all three of them straining to get him out, they made progress – and eventually he lurched forward in a great splash of mud and water, and an agonising yelp. They dragged him by the scruff of his flying jacket halfway up the crater.

The relief on the pilot’s face was heartening but Will could see how badly wounded he was. Blood mingled with mud all along his lower legs. Will carried a small first-aid kit in a pouch on his belt, but there was no point trying to patch up this Yank until they had the chance to wash those wounds.

Lost in the moment, neither Will nor the American thought to keep an eye on the German boy, and now they were out Will half expected to find himself staring down the barrel of a Mauser. But instead, the boy grabbed him by the sleeve and said something Will did not understand. But he knew it was urgent.

The pilot looked alarmed. ‘Oh yeah. There’s a shell here, landed about half an hour ago. We don’t know whether it’s a dud or whether it’s on a timed fuse,’ he said rapidly. ‘I’d quite forgotten about it.’

Will and the other boy grabbed the flyer and hauled him up. As they reached the lip of the crater, they could hear distant cheering. ‘What’s happening?’ Will blurted out.

The flyer turned to the German boy and smiled broadly, his pearly teeth flashing against the mud and oil on his face. ‘I told you the war was about to end,’ he said in German. Then he turned to Will and said, ‘It’s all over. Look. Eleven o’clock.’ He held out his wristwatch. It was covered in mud, but he wiped it so Will could see the time. ‘We’re done. It’s all over.’

Will was dumbfounded. He thought he’d be fighting all the way to Berlin – if he lived that long. Then he felt a sudden burst of anger. Why had they sent them in to the wood if they knew the war was about to end? He thought of the men who had been killed on the last morning of the war. What about those snipers? Did they know? He had to know if the Germans knew too. ‘Ask him – ask Fritz here if he knew the war was about to end.’

‘Hey, steady!’ said the pilot angrily. ‘He didn’t know either. I only found out about nine o’clock this morning.’

With sudden horror Will thought of Jim. He wondered if his brother had been caught by the sniper.

The American interrupted his train of thought by leaning forward and offering Will a hand to shake. ‘I’m Pilot Officer Eddie Hertz, American Air Service First Pursuit Group. How do you do?’ he said in an affectionate parody of a formal Englishman.

‘I’m Will, how do you do?’

‘And this here is Axel,’ said Eddie. The two boys shook hands stiffly. Will thought it was bizarre, these drawing-room manners, but the whole situation was like a strange dream.

Axel eyed Will warily. He had not forgotten that the British made a habit of dropping grenades in prisoners’ pockets.

‘We can all be friends again now,’ said Eddie airily. ‘The war is over, so play nicely.’ Then he collapsed on the ground. ‘Can you boys get me to a first-aid post,’ he said, first in English and then in German. ‘There’s a town over that way.’

The ground they were on was slightly raised above the rest of the terrain. They could see a small town a mile or so over to the east.

Axel spoke rapidly to Eddie who nodded weakly. He turned to Will and said, ‘Axel thinks it would take an hour to carry me to the town. He doesn’t reckon that would do these holes in my leg much good. I guess he has a point. He says there’s a German position by the church right behind us. I can get these wounds cleaned up there at least and wait for help.’

Axel didn’t know what his soldiers were likely to do to a pilot who had just bombed them, but the war was over. They would have to take that risk.

Will was wary too. Was this a ruse? Could they trust this German boy? They had no choice. The American was deathly white now. Will tried to put Jim out of his thoughts and felt a renewed determination to save this pilot. They would make sure he was comfortable, then Will would try to find his unit and hope to God his brother had managed to rejoin them too. He wondered why he didn’t feel pleased that he was still alive. He had assumed every day would be his last. Perhaps he couldn’t quite bring himself to believe it was really over.