Shoulder the Sky (6 page)

"It's a Joseph started to say, looking for a medical excuse.

Prentice ignored him, keeping his eyes on Watkins. "Matter of military duty to collect the evidence," he finished the sentence. "Find the truth. There must be someone who saw it. The only reason not to speak to the witness is that you fear what he will say." He smiled for an instant. "I'm sure that isn't the case .... is it?"

"Course it isn't!" Watkins said tightly, his lips drawn into a thin line. "I'll look into it. If there's evidence, there'll be a court martial. But it's none o' your business, mister! You get the hell out of here. Go do your job, an' leave us to do ours!" He swivelled on his heel and strode out past Joseph, too angry to speak, and perhaps ashamed that he had allowed himself to be trapped.

Joseph had failed. Far from protecting Corliss, he had been instrumental in allowing Prentice to force Watkins into investigating the incident, and Joseph already felt the sick fear that Corliss was guilty. People had different breaking points. A good commander could tell when it was coming. Sam had seen it and had tried to protect him. It was himself Corliss had hurt, no one else. He had not left his post, or fallen asleep, or allowed anyone else to take the blame. It was one of those cases where turning a blind eye would possibly have saved him, given him time to recover at least his self-esteem, the control to build something out of what was left. Prentice had no idea what any of the men faced, let alone sappers. Joseph should have found a way to prevent this.

He went back and talked with Marie O'Day. She was furious with Prentice, but she could not help. Then he spent a couple of hours talking to the other men, every so often going back to Corliss and simply sitting beside him.

They could all hear the bombardment. The heavy artillery seemed to have a very good range tonight. The walls shivered and the lights swayed, casting wavering shadows on the walls. About ten o'clock the first casualties came in: some with broken arms and legs, a man with a deep shrapnel wound in the chest, another with a foot blown off. The surgeons operated in desperate haste. The smell of blood filled the air. Everybody seemed to be splashed and stained with red.

The night stretched on. The noise of the artillery stopped and started, stopped and started. Prentice was somewhere around. Joseph saw him half a dozen times: once he was carrying tea; often he was helping a wounded man or lifting a stretcher. His clothes were now as creased and blood-stained as anyone else's, his fair skin pale from fatigue and perhaps horror as well, his voice rasping with emotion.

Then at about four in the morning Wil Sloan came in, grey-faced, carrying one end of a stretcher on which Charlie Gee lay. His skin was almost blue, eyes sunken in their sockets, and a great scarlet streaming wound was in the pit of his belly where his genitals should have been. Wil had tried to pad it with all the bandages he could find, but everything was soaked through.

"Help him!" he cried out, his voice close to a scream. "Help him! Sweet Jesus, do something!"

The surgeon dropped the needle he was stitching with, and an orderly picked it up and carried on. Marie O'Day let out a moan of anguish and lurched forward to help the other bearer ease the stretcher on to the table.

"All right, soldier," the surgeon said gently. "We'll look after you. We'll stop the worst of the pain, and stitch you up." He barely looked at the young VAD nurse who had come down from the other operating table. "Get water, plenty of pads, instruments," he told her.

She stepped closer and saw the wound, and in a hideous moment of realization understood it. Her face went paper-white and she staggered backwards and crumpled to the floor.

Joseph saw the movement but he was too slow to save her.

Marie O'Day picked the girl up and dragged her to the corner, then went about collecting the things the surgeon had asked for.

Joseph knew Charlie had understood at least some part of the meaning of his blinding pain, and the wrenching panicky horror in other people's faces. He tried to look at Joseph. His lips moved but he had not the strength to make any sound.

Joseph thought of the girl who wrote to Charlie every day, and felt so sick he was afraid he might faint, just as the girl had done. But Wil Sloan was standing almost beside him, his eyes bright with tears, gulping to find enough air to sustain him, desperate, pleading without words, praying.

What God would let this happen to a young man? He would be better dead. He will probably die anyway, even from shock and loss of blood, or from infection, but couldn't it have been without knowing what had happened to him?

Joseph put out his hand and grasped Charlie's, holding on to it, feeling the fingers move a tiny fraction. "Hang on, Charlie," he said hoarsely. "We're with you."

The surgeon was beginning to work already. The anaesthetic mask was not there yet. Charlie was still conscious.

The wound was ghastly, still pumping blood, even though the first-aid station had done all they could.

Then Prentice was there, staring. "What's happened to him?" he asked. "God in heaven! His genitals have gone! There's nothing left!"

Charlie's eyes filled with tears and there was a gurgle in his throat. Joseph felt his fingers curl, and then loose again as the surgeon at last put the anaesthetic mask mercifully on his face.

Wil turned round and looked at Prentice. The young American's skin was grey, his eyes wild and he gasped and gagged for breath. He teetered for a moment, as if trying to keep his balance, then he lunged forward, swinging his fists, and caught Prentice on the side of the jaw.

Prentice went staggering backwards, but Wil followed him, lashing out again and again, left fist, then right, then left. Prentice crashed into the far wall, sending a tray of instruments flying off the small table. He put up his arms to shield his face, but it was useless. Wil was in a red rage and he went on striking him on any part of his body he could reach head, shoulder, chest, stomach.

The surgeon swore. "For God's sake, stop him! Somebody get hold of the bloody lunatic!"

Prentice fell over and slid down against the wall, half on top of the girl who had fainted. Wil grabbed his arms and yanked him up again, punching at him at the same time. Prentice gave a high-pitched scream as his shoulder dislocated with the twist of his own weight against the grip. Still holding on, Wil hit him again and he crumpled.

The orderly stood frozen. Marie O'Day looked around for something to hit Wil with, before he actually killed Prentice.

Joseph, forcing the picture of Charlie Gee out of his mind, stepped forward behind Wil and put his arms around his neck, throwing his weight backwards so Wil was forced to let go of Prentice to save himself. But he struggled, trying to swing round and rid himself of the restraint.

"Stop it!" Joseph said fiercely. "You'll kill him, you fool! That isn't going to help anyone."

Wil jerked against him, almost pulling Joseph off his feet, then recoiled back again as his neck met the lock of Joseph's arm.

Prentice was clambering to his feet, his face streaming blood, his uniform torn and his left arm hanging limply, oddly angled at the shoulder. His mouth was a snarl of pain and fury, but he was equally clearly terrified.

Joseph kept his grip on Wil, but he met Prentice's eyes. "Back off," he said 'or I'll let him go."

Prentice was gasping, blood from a broken tooth running down his lip. "I'll have him court-martialled he choked out the words. "He'll spend the next five years in the glasshouse!"

"You can't have him court-martialled Joseph replied coldly. "He's a volunteer. You can sue him in civil court, if you can get an extradition order. He's an American over here to help us in the war."

"General Cullingford is my uncle!" Prentice wiped his hand over his moth and winced with a cry as it jagged his broken tooth. The gesture did nothing to stop the blood. "I'll see he's kept here!"

"For what?" Joseph asked, eyes wide. "Nobody here is going to have seen a thing! Are you?" he demanded, glancing sideways at Marie O'Day, working beside the surgeon, up to her elbows in blood, and the orderly, passing instruments, swabs, needles threaded with fresh silk.

"Don't know what you're talking about," the surgeon said without looking up. "Get that bloody idiot out of here."

"You should take him out under arrest!" Prentice gasped, spitting more blood.

"Not him, you!" the surgeon snapped.

"I'm injured! He's broken my damn teeth!" Prentice said furiously.

"I don't do teeth." The surgeon was still working on Charlie, head down. "See the regimental dentist, if you can find him."

"You'd better tell him you got too near an explosion, and fell on one of the props," Joseph eased his hold on Wil Sloan, who straightened up, coughing now that he could get his breath back.

Prentice glared at him. "You think I'm going to lie to protect you? There's military discipline for this sort of thing. You can't attack somebody and get away with it. He's a raving madman!"

"Really?" Joseph said, an exaggerated lift in his voice. "I saw nothing in particular. I was too busy thinking about a man shot half to pieces to worry about what was happening to a stupid journalist who didn't know how to keep his mouth shut in an operating theatre."

"I saw nothing," the orderly added, his face twisted with anger and pity. "Did you, Mrs. O'Day?"

"Not a thing," she replied. "Nor did Janet," she gestured to the girl now climbing up slowly from where she had been slumped against the wall. The whole episode had taken only minutes. She stared at the scene in front of her, at Wil and Joseph, at the operating table, and then at Prentice. Her face was filled with shame, but it was only Marie O'Day's opinion she cared about. What had happened between the men barely touched her consciousness.

"Take them away." Marie O'Day gestured to the blood-soaked swabs in one of the dishes. "Bring me some more quickly."

The girl moved to obey, grateful for a second chance, but still keeping her eyes averted from the operating table, in case her nerve betrayed her again.

"Out!" Joseph ordered Prentice. He pushed Wil in front of him also, and a moment later they were in the entrance, and then outside on the wooden walk. "You'd better get out of here," he said to Wil. "You're a volunteer, you can go wherever you like. If you've any sense, you'll go at least as far as Divisional Headquarters for a while. They'll find you something to do."

"What about Charlie?" Wil demanded. "I can't leave him!"

"You can't help," Joseph said gently. "You getting thrown out won't make it any better for him. Just lose yourself for a while. Go to Armentieres, or somewhere like that, and get a grip."

Wil's eyes were still sunken with shock and now, after the exertion, and his rage having cooled off and the horror returning, he started to shake. But reluctantly, stumbling and slipping on the boards, he made his way along the line of the huts and round the corner.

"Don't think I'll forget this!" Prentice snarled, blowing bubbles of blood through his bruised and rapidly swelling lips. One eye was already darkening with a huge bruise and the other cheek was blotched. His arm hung uselessly and obviously with pain.

"You can remember what you like," Joseph replied, 'but you'd be wise to say and do nothing. If anyone hears about what you said in front of Charlie Gee, you'll get no co-operation from any of the men. And you may find you have other "accidents" on dark nights. As you pointed out to Sergeant Watkins, friendship is about all we have here that, and loyalty to your unit and a belief that we're fighting for something that matters: honour, a way of life, people we love."

He looked at Prentice's face. The journalist was not used to physical pain, and he was obviously hurting pretty badly.

"You'd better go up to one of the forward first-aid stations," Joseph advised. "You're hardly a hospital case, but you could do with a little attention, a stitch or two, perhaps, and someone to put your shoulder back. It's quite a simple thing to do, but it'll hurt like hell." He said that with pleasure. "Wait your turn, and tell them anything you want. A shrapnel burst near you would probably be best. It looks as if you fell. There'll be lots hurt worse than you are, so you'll make a fool of yourself if you raise a fuss. People are hard on cowards." He gave a very small, tight smile. "And do it smartly, before I arrest you."

Prentice was furious. "That lunatic attacked me! I didn't even hit him back! Or are you going to lie about that too?"

"For getting in the way of treating the wounded, and wasting medical officers' time," Joseph replied without hesitation. "You didn't hit him back because he didn't give you a chance. Be grateful I haven't arrested you already."

Prentice stared at him just long enough to realize he meant it, then turned on his heel and went off, shambling unevenly, feet slithering on the boards, physical and emotional shock making him dizzy.

Joseph went back inside the hospital hut to see if Charlie Gee would live, not certain if he wanted him to. If he did, what could Joseph say or do to make his life bearable? It was too much. He remembered how alone and inadequate to the burden he had felt when his parents were killed, and suddenly he was the head of the family, expected to know the answers, and have the strength and the inner certainty to help.

That had been nothing compared with what he needed to do now. No teaching, no ministry prepared you to have answers for this. What kind of a God hurled you into this hell without teaching you what you were supposed to do, to say, even to think,