‘Let ’em take my fuckin’ chance!’ shouted Weeper, vindictively.

‘There’s a good deal in what you say,’ said Bourne, who was a little embarrassed by the way they all looked at him suddenly. ‘I think there’s a good deal of truth in it; but after all, what is a brass-hat’s job? He’s not thinking of you or of me or of any individual man, or of any particular battalion or division. Men, to him, are only part of the material he has got to work with; and if he felt as you or I feel, he couldn’t carry on with his job. It’s not fair to think he’s inhuman. He’s got to draw up a plan, from rather scrappy information, and it is issued in the form of an order; but he knows very well something may happen at any moment to throw everything out of gear. The original plan is no more than a kind of map; you can’t see the country by looking at a map, and you can’t see the fighting by looking at a plan of attack. Once we go over the top it’s the colonel’s and the company commander’s job. Once we meet a Hun it’s our job…’

‘Yes, an’ our job’s a bloody sight worse’n theirs,’ said Weeper.

‘It’s not worse than the colonel’s, or the company commander’s,’ said Bourne. ‘Anyway, they come over with us. They’ve got to lead us, or drive us. They may have to order us to do something, knowing damned well that they’re spending us. I don’t envy them. I think that bit in the letter, about not stopping to help the wounded, is silly. It’s up to us, that is; but it’s up to us not to make another man’s agony our excuse. What’s bloody silly in the letter is the last bit, where they say they don’t anticipate any serious resistance from the enemy. That is the Staff’s job, and they ought to know it better.’

‘We started talking about what we were fighting for,’ said Shem, laughing. ‘It was Mr Rhys started it.’

‘Yes, an’ you’ve been talkin’ all over the bloody shop ever since,’ said Corporal Hamley. ‘You all ought to be on the bloody Staff, you ought. ’oo are orderly-men? Shem and Martlow; well, tea’s up.’

Shem and Martlow looked at the straight rain, and then struggled into their greatcoats.

‘All that a says is, if a man’s dead it don’t matter no more to ’im ’oo wins the bloody war,’ said Weeper. ‘We’re ’ere, there’s no gettin’ away from that, Corporal. ’ere we are, an’ since we’re ’ere, we’re just fightin’ for ourselves; we’re just fightin’ for ourselves, an’ for each other.’

Bourne stared as though he were fascinated by this uncouth figure with huge, ape-like arms, and melancholy, half-imbecile face. Here was a man who, if he lost his temper with them, could have cleared the tent in ten seconds; and he sat with them, patient under daily mockery, suffering even the schoolboy cheek of little Martlow indifferently, and nursing always the bitterness and misery of his own heart. Already dripping, Shem and Martlow dumped the dixie of tea in the opening of the tent, almost spilling it, as they slipped on the greasy mud, where many feet had made a slide by the doorway.