Everyone assumed a battle was imminent. The top brass wouldn’t talk about it, but it was inevitable; that was why they were here after all. Walking into gunfire was a ludicrous concept, if you thought about it for even a second. Suicide, to all intents and purposes. Sitting in a trench waiting to be shelled somehow made them still more fearful, as they all knew to dread shell wounds more than a bullet. A direct hit would annihilate, abolish a man’s very existence; something a bit off target tore off limbs and faces, leaving monsters behind. The silence was the worst. When the Germans stopped firing and shelling, horror truly set in, because then the only question was when would it begin again.

Rations and letters were the only boost. Tinned stew, a mug of tea, perhaps some bread and jam on a good day, although none of it tasted as it should; everything was watered down, thinned out. The letters were snatched from the hands of the men playing postie. Some seized upon them and ripped open the envelopes immediately, desperate to be transported back to cobbled streets, kitchen ranges and warm beds. Others savoured the moment: sniffed the letter, caressed it, kept it in their pocket until they could carve out some privacy, preferring to read it by the light of a stub of candle. Nine days in, Howard hadn’t received a letter, so he didn’t yet know what he would do with one when the time came. At night they slept on wooden planks. Few tried to lie horizontal; there was always the thought of a rat settling on you. Better to sleep sitting up, one man slumped against the next, stiff and cold, a rehearsal for death. Their bones ached; not even the fat lads who had righted all the world’s wrongs with a pie and a pint before the war were cushioned enough to get comfortable in this life.

Her letter came on the tenth day. He’d feared she would not write, that she loved him too much to forgive him, but he was relieved that wasn’t the case. She loved him more than that after all. The letter was a comfort; it offered solace when he thought the world was devoid of such a thing. Just her handwriting on the envelope provided that. She was angry and confused, as he’d expected.

Why? Why now, when you have everything to live for, would you leave?

He didn’t know how to explain it to her. He started the reply ten times over in his head, three or four times in actuality. In the end, all he was able to say was, You know I couldn’t have done anything other.

Sergeant Bowler came and found him, said he was wanted in the officers’ dugout. Howard hadn’t bothered to form an opinion of his own, but he’d been told that Bowler was the sort of sergeant none of the men liked or even feared; he was simply despised for being petty and unjustifiably uppity. His mouth stayed in a thin line, suggesting neither pleasure nor annoyance, but his eyes shone with malicious excitement. As they set off along the long corridors of trenches, Howard was more curious than concerned. He hadn’t had anything to do with Owens since he arrived; why would he? A lowly foot soldier, beneath notice. Whilst they had once upon a time played games as boys on the same village green, there had been no familiarity between them since. Howard was not the sort to romanticise the past. Aubrey had been a miserable snob as a child. Even then it had seemed to Howard that he only played with the village boys to spoil their fun because his superior social status meant they’d had to let him win.