Casca 21: The Trench Soldier Read online

  And all of this meat had the clammy chill of death and the abominable stink of the rot and decay that had already started.

  Casca tried to shout, but there was an arm or a leg across his mouth, and others piled above that. He was struggling to breathe and was so weak from pain and loss of blood that he could scarcely make a sound.

  The wagon stopped. He heard the mule driver cursing then felt the wagon move again. This time backwards.

  A second later he was flying through air and crashed on a heap of tangled bodies. Some of the bodies broke his fall, but he felt all of his wounds reopen and felt the sticky wetness of blood at his side, his leg, and from his head.

  He must have lost consciousness for a moment. The next thing he knew was the smell and the taste of earth. He could hear the light rain of dirt falling onto the bodies above him. He was being buried alive.

  The Nazarene's words sounded in his ear as they had when he withdrew his spear on Golgotha. "Soldier, you are content with what you are, then that you shall remain until we meet again."

  For the eternal mercenary to be buried alive was a double horror – an unending one, for he would stay alive until the crucified Messiah's second coming. The prophet's curse denied him the ease of even the most dreadful death.

  With a mighty effort Casca shifted the leg of the corpse lying on top of him. He got his head beneath the dead man's crooked knee. He could breathe, and the earth was not falling into his mouth. But the effort had cost him dearly. He could make no further movement and lay there, hearing the soft fall of the thrown earth, feeling the blood seeping from his wounds.

  And then he was waking to light. Somewhere above him the black had turned to gray. And the gray lightened more as he watched. He recalled his arrival in the grave in the dark of night and concluded that the burial detail had only sprinkled the corpses with a layer of earth and would return with daylight to complete the job.

  He struggled to move and discovered that his strength had been somewhat restored. The Messiah's curse had repaired some of the torn blood vessels, slowing the flow of blood and rebuilding the damaged cells.

  But not enough. He was still as weak as death, and the weight of bodies above him was too much for his tiny strength. So be it. He closed his eyes and willed himself to return to sleep. Perhaps in a little while the repair would take more effect, and then he would try again.

  He was awakened by a dull thump which was followed by several more. He realized that more bodies were being thrown into the grave. A lot more bodies.

  He heard a voice. "Well, that's the lot, then. Let's fill 'em in and get done with it."

  Casca shouted, "I'm alive! I'm alive!"

  "Hey," he heard from above the grave, "did you hear something?"

  "Yeah," came the reply, "a voice from the grave, Arthur."

  "But I'm serious, Bill," the first voice objected, "I heard some sort of muffled shout."

  "Yeah, me too," the other replied, "but I've heard it before, Arthur. Some sort of effect from their being dumped, all jumbled up like, or maybe it's their guts rotting. I suppose the gas comes out through the throat, and it sounds like a voice."

  Earth started falling.

  "But what if one of them is alive?" Arthur's voice demanded.

  The rain of earth stopped. "Suppose one of 'em is," was the answer, "what difference does it make? We'd never find him. We'd have to lift every bleedin' corpse out of that stinkin' 'ole and check 'em over. And we don't even know how. The doctors have already said they're all dead; how are you going to know any different, Arthur?"

  Earth started falling again.

  "And anyhow," Bill's voice went on, "if we did get someone up alive out of that bleedin' hole, they'd shove him back in the line in a minute, and by tomorrow he'd be back here again."

  Earth started to fall more quickly.

  Casca took a long, slow breath, exhaled slowly, then breathed again. Concentrating the entire energy of his body into the one effort, he stamped down with his legs and thrust upward with his arms.

  "Ow, Jesus," he heard a squawk. The fall of earth stopped.

  "Yeah, I seen it too, Arthur," the laconic man said. "It happens sometimes. It's just gas escaping. I expect there's a lot of gas in all of them rotting bodies."

  Casca made another mighty effort, and this time he succeeded in shifting the corpses directly above him. Between the bodies he could see daylight and blue sky.

  "But, what if one is alive?" the worried soldier said.

  "You're going to make a lot of extra work for us, Arthur, if you go on like that," the other answered. "Let's get 'em filled in and get away for our tea.

  As the earth started falling again Casca repeated the movement, hurling the two corpses apart with his arms and bellowing, "I'm alive! I'm alive!"

  "Well," he heard the laconic voice say, "I suppose you could be right, Arthur. But you're making an awful lot of work for us."

  With an enormous sigh of relief, Casca lay back in his stinking hole to wait for the two soldiers to get to him.

  The army doctor was sorely confused and more than a little put out. "Only superficial wounds anyway," he scowled. "Don't see why you were ever in the hospital in the first place. You've made a damned awful mess of our records."

  "I can't remember coming here, sir," Casca replied. "Maybe I was concussed."

  "Or malingering to get out of the line," the doctor fumed and ordered him back to the front.

  "Could you tell me anything of my officer's condition? Captain Bryce-Roberts. We were together when we got hit."

  "Bryce-Roberts? He's gone west," the doctor stated. "You were in his balloon? Why, I was on duty when the two of you were brought in. He was dead already, shot full of holes. You weren't much better, bleeding like a stuck pig and scarcely breathing. I can't believe you're the same man."

  Casca certainly didn't wish to attract attention to his recuperative powers. He shrugged. "Well, I certainly feel a great deal more lively now, thank you, doctor."

  "I'm a captain, Corporal. There are no doctors in the army."

  "No, sir, Captain, I'll remember that."

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The laconic soldier had been right. The day after he was lifted out of the hole, Casca was back at the aeronaut station with a new officer, Captain Wothering, who told him that instead of a balloon, they would be observing from an airplane.

  "Have you flown in an airplane before?"

  "No, sir."

  "Oh, it's bags of fun, you'll find."

  A motorcycle outfit carried them to where a biplane stood bearing red and blue roundels on the wings and a huge Union Jack on the tail.

  "Not ours, of course," Wothering said. "It's a Nieuport, on loan from the Frogs."

  The captain climbed into the rear cockpit and told Casca to turn the propeller. After two turns he shouted, "Contact!" and when Casca tugged at the propeller blade, the engine fired and the propeller disappeared in a whirling blur.

  Casca got into the front cockpit, the ground crew dragged the chocks away from the wheel, and they were moving.

  Very fast. Much faster than Casca had ever travelled in his long life. Faster than he would have believed possible. The fastest car or train he had ever been in had not moved half as fast.

  The ground ahead was a blur flowing toward the nose of the plane. Alongside the airstrip trees raced past like demented giants running from some awful disaster. Something like the disaster toward which they seemed to be heading, Casca thought grimly.

  A terrifying upward lurch, and he felt his stomach thud downward in his body. They were up in the air. Another sickening lurch, this time downward. Casca looked over the side, expecting to see that they were crashing back to earth. But the ground was far below them. They were already very much higher than they had been in the balloon, and although they were still climbing, the motion of the plane was up and down, like a boat riding over waves. The ground below them was moving as if it were being unwound from a roll.

 
The German trenches came up quickly, and behind them their artillery positions, headquarters, and the ruined hospital.

  As they passed over the trenches several infantrymen and some machine guns fired at them. Casca heard Wothering laugh at their attempt. Then he asked in a serious tone, "You alright?"

  "Alright? Sure."

  "Good. I seem to have caught a packet back here."

  Caught a packet? What's a packet? Some sort of cold from this enormous altitude? Why the hell don't the English speak English? Casca thought.

  Casca's mind was much too occupied with other things: the horrifying height; the state of his stomach; the infernal racket from the engine; his terror that this racket might cease and the damned thing would fall like a stone.

  The nose dipped, and Casca saw the ground. Nothing but the ground. The sky had disappeared, and the ground was rushing up toward them.

  A sickening lurch and the ground was gone, and he was staring at nothing but sky. Another frightful lurch, and the plane was flying level again.

  Wothering's voice came calmly from behind him. "Jesus," Casca said to himself, "here I am terrified out of my wits, and this character talks like he's at a tea party."

  "Sorry about that, old chap. Getting a bit faint back here, I'm afraid. Fell on the jolly old stick."

  A bit faint? Don't tell me he's going to pass out on me. Wothering's voice confirmed Casca's worst fears. "Can't hold on, I'm afraid. Don't suppose you know how to fly one of these things, do you?"

  "Where does the British Army find these guys?" Casca asked himself. He turned in his seat to shout to Wothering, "No, sir, I can't properly drive a car!"

  "Oh, it's much easier than driving a car. Don't have to watch the road. No worries about frightening horses."

  Wothering suddenly sucked in his breath with a grimace, and Casca realized that the man was in severe pain.

  Caught a packet? A packet of lead – and somewhere that hurt.

  "Have a feel about in your map pocket, will you?" Wothering said. "Should be a spare stick in there."

  Spare stick? This nightmare was getting worse by the second. He felt around and found the stick. Some sort of baton with a thread on one end.

  "Stick the jolly thing in that socket sort of thing between your feet and give it a few twists."

  Casca homed the stick in its socket and turned it tight.

  "Jolly good. Now pull it back – whoops, not too much."

  The plane seemed to be standing on its tail. Casca felt that his bowels would have emptied onto his seat, but that they had congealed into a solid ball. He had the stick clutched to his abdomen with both hands. At least it was something to hang onto.

  "Let's ease it forward a bit – whoa, easy now."

  Casca lifted up out of the seat. He felt as if the plane were going to throw him out of the cockpit. And now he was looking at the ground again through the faint blur of the whirring propeller. He clutched the stick to him once more.

  The ground disappeared again, the sky came back, and Casca was being rammed down into his seat by some immense force.

  "That's the idea. You're getting the hang of it nicely. Now try to keep it about in the middle."

  Getting the hang of it? Oh shit, I'm flying this thing! His mind had at last made the connection between the movements of the stick and the swoops and dives of the plane.

  He pushed the stick forward. Oh, Jesus, the ground again. Back. Oh, my God! The ground and the sky alternated a few times, and then he had the stick centered and the plane was flying level.

  "Hang on, old chap." Casca's grip on the stick relaxed a little, and he could feel the slight pressure of Wothering's hand through the controls.

  "Now ease it over to the left, like this – easy."

  The lower left wing dropped out of sight, and the ground was moving past below the upper wing. He felt Wothering easing the stick back and moved with him, watching in wonder as the ground vanished, and the wings returned to level.

  "Now this way, to the right, that's it."

  Then it wasn't too bad, and he could actually feel the vibration of the wings against his hand.

  "Now try the jolly old foot pedals. Stick left and left rudder pedal, that's it."

  Casca felt Wothering move the pedals under his feet and the plane banked abruptly to the left. Casca closed his eyes, took a deep breath and forced himself to look again. The plane seemed to be pivoted on its wing tips, the ground spinning around below them. Men the size of ants were pointing toy guns at them that fired little bursts of light and puffs of smoke.

  They repeated the maneuver to the right, and Casca was almost beginning to enjoy himself.

  "By Jove, you've got it nicely. Now try that jigger by your right hand."

  Casca took the short lever in his hand and felt Wothering move it gently back, then hard forward. The engine note changed, and Casca swayed forward as the plane slowed and was then pressed back into the seat as it speeded up again.

  "That's about all there is to it, old fella. I'm going to take my stick out now. Mustn't fall on it, y'know. You'd never be able to move it."

  Suddenly the plane, freed of Wothering's hand, was lurching all over the sky. Everything Casca did seemed to be too much. The plane climbed and dived, banked and swerved.

  Gradually the wild movements modified, and they were more or less level.

  "Pretty good, old boy. Don't get the nose too high, though. Mustn't stall while we're up here. But the trick is to put her down. Ease off on the throttle, bring up the nose, and the bird'll do the rest herself..."

  The voice trailed off.

  "Captain," Casca called with no answer. "Captain Wothering! Captain!" He shouted louder and louder. There was no answer.

  Gingerly, holding the stick warily centered, Casca turned in his seat. Wothering was slumped forward, his leather helmet against the control panel.

  Near panic. What did he mean about putting her down? He looked over the side at the ground. Surely he doesn't expect me to land this thing?

  "Captain Wothering! Captain! Oh, shee-it!"

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Casca's stomach rebounded in his belly as he looked down over the side of the plane. Apart from the rocking-horse sensation, the plane seemed to be stationary. And seen from their height, the ground below no longer appeared to be moving.

  The river valley ran in all directions as far as he could see, almost featureless. He could just make out the shapes of low hills and what he guessed were roads and rivers. But there was nothing that looked familiar. Or rather, it all looked vaguely familiar and similar in every direction.

  The lines of the trenches and behind them the artillery emplacements, headquarters, and hospital were all now out of sight.

  Casca was flying as an artillery spotter which simply meant an extra pair of eyes to enable the pilot to concentrate on his flying. His only task was to call the pilot's attention to any activity or features on the ground which the pilot would then record on his maps.

  But the maps were in the pilot's cockpit, and there was no way Casca could get to them. Perhaps, he thought, if he were to fly back toward where he thought he might find the German position, he could recognize some minor feature in the landscape that would point him toward his own lines and the small airstrip.

  "Never flown in a plane before, eh?" Wothering had said to him as he climbed into the plane. "It's bags of fun, you'll find."

  "Well, this is no fucking fun at all," Casca fumed. "I don't know where I am. And I don't know where I'm going. I seem to be alright while I'm up here, but I don't know where I can put her down or how to do it. And I can't see the fucking ground except when I'm heading for it."

  As he stared desperately around, another horrible idea occurred to him. "I'll bet I'm about to run out of fucking gas."

  So what to do? Circle or grid pattern. Circling he could see the ground between the wings without losing too much height.

  Out or in?

  Out, he decided and pulled the stick le
ft, applying the left rudder as the now unconscious pilot had shown him. The plane dipped into a sharp, corkscrew dive, the spiraling valley rushing up fast.

  Oh, great wings of Mercury, how do I get out of this?

  Some instinct warned him that jerking the stick back to center and equalizing the rudder would not do. He guessed that such a maneuver would probably break the frail airplane apart.

  He gently eased off on the left rudder pedal, coaxing the stick back toward the center. The plane leveled out, but he had lost most of his altitude. The ground now seemed threateningly close. Carefully he inched the stick back right and sighed in relief as the plane soared gently upward and away to the right. He caught a glimpse of the ground but could make nothing of it.

  The plane continued to climb in a broad, clockwise sweep, and Casca could now watch the ground at his leisure, looking back and down between the right wings.

  But he was none the wiser. The pleasant ever-upward spiral brought more and more territory under his gaze but also removed it so far below that he could not discern anything.

  This could be fun - if I knew what I was doing, he thought. The climb was becoming intoxicating. "I am Icarus," Casca exulted.

  Up above, white clouds about the size of cathedrals or maybe cities wandered slowly toward them, passed overhead, and drifted away astern. A wispy gray cloud, much lower than the others, appeared dead ahead of them, and suddenly they were in it. The world disappeared in a gray mist, and Casca felt rain whipping at his face.

  Then they were free of it, but still Casca couldn't see, his goggles wet and misted. He took them from his face and was astonished at the force of the wind on his eyes and hurriedly replaced the eye gear.

  "Hey, Captain," he shouted over his shoulder, "wake up! You don't know what you're missing!" Casca was quite unaware that a large part of his ecstasy was due to the lack of oxygen being fed to his brain.