The Death of Hope by Andrew Wareham (inspirational books for women txt) 📕

“None, sir. Thought it better to keep themsafe in the trench, sir. Don’t want to risk losing a gun, sir.”

“Get one, now. With three pans of reloads.Give it to a corporal.”

“No corporals with us, sir. Better to keepthe valuable men back, I thought.”

“Get one, now. Send a runner to the otherthree parties to delay start time by thirty minutes.”

It took nearly ten minutes to identify acorporal who was big enough to carry the seventeen pounds weight of the gun andto ready him to go out with three men carrying a pan apiece and to stay at hisshoulder.

“Here, Corporal.”

“Sir. Corporal Miller, sir.”

“Are you used to a Lewis, Miller?”

“Yes, sir. One of the regular gunners,sir, being as I am bigger than most. Can tuck it into me shoulder easy like,sir.”

Miller was massive, a full head tallerthan Richard and broad with it.

“Good. Use your own discretion for openingfire, Miller.”

The big man nodded, seemed not at allupset at the prospect of having to make his own decisions.

Richard discovered that Draper had simplyadded the four men to the party, bringing them up to twenty, far too many for astealthy raid.

“Nominate eight riflemen to hold back, toprovide covering fire as we pull out, Draper. Have you a lance-corporal for them?”

He had, was able to name the eightquickly.

“Right, are we ready?”

At fifteen minutes past midnight theycrawled over the lip of the trench and through the narrow gaps in their ownwire, zigzagging along the marked passages between the twenty or so yards ofrazor-sharp barbs. They tied white rags to the exits to find them again on theway back.

Thirty yards across the narrow no-man’s-landof their salient brought them to the German wire. They dropped to their belliesand followed two men with cutters, slowly clipping the bottom wires and hookingthem up to give a passage eighteen inches high and a little more than two feetwide. It took half an hour to work their way underneath the wire, unseen andunheard, knowing that three other parties were doing the same and that if onewas spotted there would be flares up and machine guns raking the wire hopefully,randomly searching for more.

Draper was at Richard’s shoulder, pantingincreasingly heavily.

“Hush!”

The noise reduced, slowly grew again.

They came to their knees on the Germanside of the wire, readying themselves, waiting on the clock. The wire cuttersremained, enlarging the holes and to act as guides to the retreating raiders.

Twelve fifty precisely.

“Go!”

They lobbed grenades left and right intothe trench, waited for them to explode and jumped in, stabbing and battering atdark figures as they ran out of dugouts. Paisley worked his way along thetrench, tossing grenades into each opening he passed.

Richard watched the action, jumpingforward with his club once as a lost German tried to run past him.

The Lewis Gun rattled off half a pan, sprayingdown the trench at movement coming towards them.

They had been in for five minutes. He heardmore explosions distant a couple of hundred yards where the other raids wereactive.

“Fall back. Badges!”

They had thought it unlikely they would beable to drag prisoners back under the wire; every man should have been orderedto collect identifying badges and shoulder flashes instead.

They dived under the wire, a half-seenofficer numbering them off as they passed.

“Orpington?”

“Sir. Quickly. Explain later.”

Richard crawled, tight on the heels of theman ahead, a matter of seconds to traverse the made tunnel. Once through thewire, they came half upright, scrabbling as fast as they could, waiting for theguns to fire, running at full pelt through their own passages and over the parapet,falling into the arms of the men waiting for them, laughing and cheering nowthey were back. Sergeant Major O’Grady commenced a roll call; it should havebeen Draper or his lieutenant.

“Here, ‘Major.”

Paisley’s voice and Orpington’s, eightmore in succession, none of the raiders missing.

“Where’s the back-up, ‘Major?”

“Here already, sir. Under Captain Draper’scommand, sir.”

Draper stepped forward.

“Thought I’d better secure the rear, sir.Make sure you came to no harm in the withdrawal. Dropped back to command them sothey would not get in the way, sir. Held them this side of the German wire.”

“Did you get into the trench?”

“No, sir. Couldn’t as I was with theriflemen, sir. Behind the wire was the best place for them, I thought.”

“Your lieutenant?”

“Second, actually, sir. Only a boy. Kepthim with me, in case I needed to send a runner to you. No need for a great massof officers in the trench, sir.”

It was a thin argument. In front of acourt martial it would probably raise a sufficiency of doubt to prevent aconviction, would leave Draper with a stained reputation but not dismissed fromthe battalion or actually punished. His Company would be treated as pariahs bythe rest of the battalion; their whole efficiency would be downgraded.

“Very well, Mr Draper. Your men did well.Stand down now.”

His words were heard and would be repeatedexactly as he had said them.

Richard made his way back to the secondline and to his own dugout, turned to the field telephone, knowing thatBraithwaite would not have turned in.

“Highly successful, sir, at first sight.Waiting for reports from the other three parties. No casualties to mine and Ihave a collection of badges and one of those light machine guns, brought backby the Sergeant Major and young Orpington between them. A Madsen Gun, soOrpington tells me – I don’t know myself. Much the size of a Lewis.”

The Brigadier knew nothing of the gun, wassure it was a feather in their cap to have captured one for inspection.

“Got a problem, sir, and one I don’t knowhow to solve.”

He gave Braithwaite a detailed account of Draper’sactions.

“Bastard! Chicken as they come, Baker, andnot sufficiently flagrant that you can put him before a court. What you can dois limited… Put him at the front of any action we take to straighten the line –that is being considered, by the way, prior to a big push on the Artoisbattlefield for the third time this year. That penalises his whole company anddoesn’t guarantee that he will be among the casualties. A good chance that he willdive for cover early and be one of those who comes back,