Letters to Helen Part 11

A perfect letter from old Norman to-day. He must be quite useless as a soldier, whereas at his own job he stands alone, with a wonderful future before him. Well, well! I meant not to grouse to you again. And here's a letter nearly full of it. But there, I made a stupid mistake to-day, and it's all so boring and beastly.

Anyhow, we are fighting for civilization, and the Huns are, too, in a way. But our idea of civilization is better than the Huns' idea. So we gradually win.

_December 21._

I have at last made up my mind. I'm going to take on this job. How unwillingly I can hardly tell you. I wanted to be in the great Push next year so badly. Everyone, everything, is preparing for it. The cavalry will get through, and I shall be driving about behind in some gilded car, or watching from some very distant hill with Jezebel (who won't care a d.a.m.n whether the cavalry get through or not).

But I had two interviews with the Major and the General to-day. Coves like painters seem to be rather wanted, and--well, it's clear now. I must go.

To-morrow or next week, perhaps, the extreme fascination of the job will obliterate a certain feeling of flatness, of disappointment, of ... of ... of shirking. Yes, that's it: I feel as if I were shirking all the horrors. You see, I shall enjoy this job immensely. All the hateful "arrangering things" for large numbers of men, all the tiresome formalities, all the discomfort, all the future dangers, finished with--over. I don't say that we've had _long_ periods of danger or _much_ discomfort; but we've had quite enough to make a very ordinary mortal hope never to go through it again.

But to think that I've deliberately chosen the easy path. Well, I don't care! I've chosen it. I meant to choose it. I'm glad I've chosen it.

That is the one job in the whole war that I could do really well. How best to serve the country--that's the only question. So there you are.

I've been and took the plunge, and I believe I'm right.

First of all a week or two getting to know the ropes in _this_ corps, and then off with the Major and the General to another corps.

My aunt! what an egoistical letter this is. However, to you no apologies.

_December 22._

[Sidenote: A DECISION]

Letters have been lurching in, in threes and fours. But what matters it how they come? I always know that they are coming. And the future's where _my_ heart is always. So here's to the letters to come, and here's to our meeting again, and here's to Life--long, sweet, glorious Life.

We shall see the Christmas roses of the Cotswolds together one day, and I think the war will have given them a mysterious loveliness that we never understood before. Every year they'll come up out of the ground again and surprise us. I shall be getting older and older--and so will you, too. And all our little plans will have a quiet, peaceful joy for us that wouldn't have been possible but for the war. Art will be like angels coming and going. Effort will be intensified. The lives of the poor must be happier, because everyone will be more ready to give and take.

It won't come all at once. But there'll be a difference. The war will have made a difference. Thank G.o.d for the war!

_December 25._

[Sidenote: CHRISTMAS 1916]

Never talk about the "idle" staff. Yesterday we were working absolutely solid without any break at all except an hour for lunch and an hour for dinner (tea? away frivolous thought!) from 9 a.m. till 11.30 p.m. Most interesting; but let's hope this first day's experience won't be a fair sample, or I shall simply melt down like a guttered candle. None of the Generals and people seemed to think it unusual. At least they never said so. Personally I found it quite kolossal.

_12.30 a.m._

Such a funny Christmas Day! I've been fixing on a large map all the gun positions on the corps front. There are a very great many, and the positions must be marked very exactly. I was quite nervous lest there should be a mistake. It has taken since about two o'clock till now. And I think it is accurate at last.

At about 10 p.m. I found out an awful mistake. One of the heavies quite 100 yards wrong, which might have meant that it would be ranging on the wrong place, and probably do no damage whatever. Desperate thought!

Well, the staff is the most hard-working body of men I've ever seen.

They don't appear ever to get any exercise. And, really, the work is all so vital that I don't see how they ever can expect to get any exercise.

About leave. Possibly on the way up to the other corps a side-slip to Blighty will be allowed.

Don't depend on anything. There seems to be a dearth of people who can do this work, and so it would be unwise to count on getting away. The thing is, however, conceivable--that is all.

_December 27._

First of all about current affairs here.

Captain G---- is probably going to Army, so it is suggested that I shall take his place here. He runs all the plotting of the aeroplane photographs, etc., for the corps. It's a most awful and alarming responsibility, and I don't feel that I can do it yet. May he not get taken away just for a little while, or I'm lost.

The corps commander sends for him (he has been doing the job for nine months), and says: "Now, where is our line at the present moment? Has so-and-so trench been repaired, and where is so-and-so German battery that was sh.e.l.ling the ---- Brigade yesterday?" Well, of course I simply couldn't answer these questions yet.

The prospect is murky. Given a little time, I think I could do it; but ... well, one can but try.

I asked the Captain if he thought leave at all possible. He most strongly advised me not to dream of asking. The corps is certain to refuse in any case, as they will want me to sweat up the show and get to know all about it as rapidly as possible.

_January 2, 1917._

I think I shall be going to live with the R.F.C., so as to be able to s.n.a.t.c.h their photographs the instant they come in--puzzle them out--put them quickly on to a map--and send them off. Everyone then will know far more quickly what Fritz is up to.

So don't be surprised if letters are addressed from R.F.C. shortly. I shall take a couple of draughtsmen and a clerk and an orderly, and Hale.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE b.u.t.tE DE WARLENCOURT This small chalk mound was one of the most difficult obstacles on the way to BAPAUME. In the foreground a large 'crump-hole' and the remains of a little copse.]

_January 11._

[Sidenote: AEROPLANE PHOTOGRAPHS]

I don't know when leave will be possible. This job is rather in the making, and is really very important stuff. A great responsibility, says the corps commander. In fact, I am just a bit nervous about things generally. That battery that was reported in so-and-so wood. Is it there still? Well, where has it moved to, then? You are not sure? Why not? No recent photographs of it? But why not? Can it be in so-and-so quarry, perhaps? That light railway has been repeatedly smashed up by our heavies. Repaired? What? What evidence have you? Let me have a map as soon as possible, showing exactly where you believe that line has been repaired, and the exact position of that battery in the quarry--if it really is there. But don't tell me it's in the quarry unless you are quite sure. Yes, sir. And you'd better have the map duplicated. How many can the draughtsmen print before to-morrow? About 300. Well, send out copies. I must have that battery silenced at once. Do you see? Can I rely on it being sent out in time? Yes, sir.

That's the sort of thing. Things that _must_ be done and quickly.

Perhaps it sounds nothing much--a mere bit of a map. But maps are like lamps to men in the dark. And they must be accurate. To me, therefore, the most inaccurate, absent-minded mortal before the war that ever breathed, it is all a source of great anxiety.

_January 12._

I've got a bedroom with a brick floor in a cottage. I really hardly know what it's like, as I arrive there about twelve o'clock every night and fall into bed, and then up again at 7.30 next morning as a rule, and frowsy at that. The roads here are just as muddy as ever, and if you go off the roads you go too deep. We are camouflaging the whole place, and I think it will soon be very difficult for the Huns to see it. At least, when I say "we" are camouflaging, I mean that I run out for two minutes about every three hours, and give hurried directions to a few bewildered men, and rush in again. I'm sure they think the extraordinary patterns that I order them to paint all over the huts, etc., are quite mad. The R.F.C. show isn't ready yet, but it's likely to be so shortly.

_January 17._

To-day's letter got me into an absurd fit of internal laughter. Hale brought it in while I was poring over some new photographs of Boche emplacements, or dug-outs, or something--poring with a magnifying gla.s.s.... And then came your drawings of the rooms at the cottage.

That'll be admirable. I tried to hold my head and think of exactly how the cottage looked, and where the new rooms were to be; but somehow I've got no brains left. And I leave it all to you. One day we shall be able to discuss it peaceably, but at present this brain is like some limp jellyfish floating in the sea.

To-day I'm doing a map, and the draughtsmen are copying it, of some Boche dug-outs. Ye G.o.ds! what do I care about dug-outs! As well make maps of all the rabbit-holes in Glamorganshire. But there, what's the good of talking like that. It's got to be done.