SOMEWHERE NEAR CAMBRAI, 30 NOVEMBER 1917
‘Jean! Jean!’ It was Alan’s voice, no, Major Galbraith, she thought vaguely.
‘Miss McLain!’ That was definitely Mealworm. But she could see nothing, hear almost nothing, though the world around still shook with the vibration of the shelling.
‘Mmmfff,’ she managed, spitting dirt out of her mouth, rubbing it from her eyes and trying to sit up, and banging her head before someone’s hands forced her to lie down again.
‘Are you all right?’ demanded Major Galbraith.
All of her was a single bruise, and scratched as well, but that wasn’t what he was asking. Nothing was broken, and she was dizzy but could think clearly — maybe. ‘I’m all right. You two?’
‘The concussion from the blast must have knocked us down, then the table was pushed over us somehow, luckily legs down, protecting us as the roof fell. You were half buried, but we managed to pull you out.’
Which explained the bruise and scratches.
‘W-what happened?’
‘Direct hit,’ said Major Galbraith, already using his trenching tool to dig upwards, to somewhere there might be air, even if no safety. Mealworm copied him, then Jean, the confined space making it easier to coordinate. ‘Dig,’ she’d been told. ‘Digging may save you.’ Now, automatically, she dug, pushing the dirt from her trenching tool into the space under the table.
It might be futile. There might be tons of dirt above them, and they would suffocate long before they found the surface. Another shell might hit them any moment. Or maybe others had survived, and were already at work above them, trying to rescue them before their precious air ran out.
It didn’t matter. There was only one thing they could do, and so they did it.
They dug.
It was impossible to know where the dirt might be thickest above them, or where the stone reinforcements might block their path. Jean dug on one side of Major Galbraith, and Sapper Mealworm on the other, to make a single tunnel, though it soon became clear that the dirt above them was too loose to keep a proper tunnel shape — it kept collapsing.
They kept digging anyway.
Every time they extracted a shovel full of dirt more trickled down on them, and then Sapper Mealworm’s trenching tool struck stone. He swore, briefly. All of them were panting from exertion and little air. If they had struck part of those well-built stone walls they had no chance at all. Jean dug her tool into the dirt beside the stone quickly, savagely.
Her tool stabbed through soil, not rock. Strangely she felt no relief or elation. Everything focused on this one job.
Dig.
Sapper Mealworm crawled around them on his stomach — there wasn’t even room to sit upright now, as they had piled so much dirt under the table. Mealworm thrust his trenching tool up next to Jean’s.
For a brief second, Jean thought she smelled fresh air. Then it was gone. But after two more shovels full they knew they had reached the surface, though it took long precious minutes for them to dig their way out into the smoke-dusted air.
It was dark above, except where the air burned red or green or yellow, the stars and any moon hidden. They must have been digging most of the day. Major Galbraith signalled to Jean and Mealworm to move back into their new tunnel and under the table again, his finger to his lips to warn them to be quiet.
Jean crawled in first, with Mealworm then Major Galbraith behind. Why were they heading underground again? What if their tunnel collapsed? She told herself not to worry: they had dug themselves out once, and the air had been refreshed. They could dig again. There must have been air pockets in the rubble, too.
For some reason Major Galbraith began to dig again as soon as they reached the table. Jean realised what he was after. Her portable transmitter. Any of the three of them had the skills to splice a cable to her transmitter, and to repair damaged cable. If the transmitter was undamaged — if they could find it — and if they could find or repair an intact length of cable, they could send that last vital message to the front.
Do not retreat. Reinforcements are coming.
The whole future of the war might depend on that one message.
Jean had been sitting at one edge of the wide table, so the transmitter would be just above where they’d dragged her out — unless it had been blown yards away by the explosion or crushed by falling rock or timbers.
Major Galbraith gave a mutter of triumph, making short jabs with his trenching tool, then pulling. The transmitter slowly slid from the dirt, its case still intact, and the contents. The soil had been loose enough to cushion it.
Major Galbraith tucked it under his arm then began to crawl on his stomach, snakelike, up through the hole they had dug. Sapper Mealworm followed him. Whatever happened to ladies first? thought Jean hysterically, though she knew they would be assessing the safety of the area before they signalled to her to come after them. At last, two hands descended: the major’s and Mealworm’s. She grabbed both of them and let them pull her from the hole, then lay on the shattered ground, panting, staring up at the sky, trying to find stars. All she could see was dust and smoke and the flares of light from fires or explosions.
She rolled over onto her stomach to find the major and Mealworm kneeling on either side of her, peering around in each flash and dazzle. A tree to one side of them burst into flame. Jean was sure it had been blackened, like every other tree nearby, but it evidently had enough wood left to burn for vital minutes as they assessed their situation.
What had been a well-engineered trench was now half crater, half mounds of rubble. Jean could make out bodies; it was possible others lay buried further along from the transmission room too. There’d been the storeroom, Major Galbraith’s room, and the area kept for the wounded, but there had been no solid furniture in any of those that could have sheltered someone, except possibly under the beds, and no one had had enough notice of the blast to crawl under them.
But it was possible, just possible, that others still waited in the stink of soil, crouched in the darkness, hoping to be dug out. Jean pressed her ear to the ground in case the dirt carried sound better than air. But the bellows and cracks of shells and weapons, the far-off yells and screams of men on the surface made it impossible to hear any faint cry or tapping from below; nor did they dare call out in case they drew attention to themselves.
Major Galbraith nudged her, offering her something. Chocolate! He handed a hunk to Mealworm too, then half lunged, half pushed himself to his feet. He stood unsteadily for a moment, then helped Sapper Mealworm up, then Jean. Then he picked up the transmitter.
Jean felt desolation for the men they were leaving behind, the possible survivors and the dead. But tens of thousands were dying tonight. Her job, Mealworm’s and Alan Galbraith’s, was that of every soldier on their battlefield, Allied or German: do your duty. Others would tend the wounded — perhaps.
They had to get the message through.
Do not retreat. Reinforcements are coming. The words pounded in her head, the only reality she must cling to now.
Any landmarks had vanished in the explosion. Major Galbraith pulled out his compass, then pointed silently. He began to move in a half crouch, zig-zagging automatically — steady movement was more obvious in the flickering lights. Sapper Mealworm did the same. Jean tried to copy them, grateful she was in overalls, not a skirt, feeling the air cold on wet trickles from her forehead that must be blood. But she was moving, so any wound must just be cuts and scratches.
Sapper Mealworm stopped, grabbing at a length of exposed cable, but the whole piece came up in his hands. He dropped it. More cabling, and still more, none of it intact.
Finally they found a piece that didn’t move when they tugged it. The men crouched over it, stripping it back to its two wires, then attaching them to the signal box. Jean put on her headphones.
Nothing. The headphones even muted much of the battlefield clamour. She slipped them off, shaking her head.
Major Galbraith nodded towards where the cable snaked across the ground. There must be a break further ahead. Sapper Mealworm pulled the wires off the signal box. They crouched again, moving more quickly now they had the cable to follow. The ground was still mostly flattened by the tanks that had pushed through here days earlier. They passed a tangle of barbed wire, jumbled with broken wood, and then a grove of broken men. There must have been hand-to-hand fighting here. Then they were past, with nothing but broken soil on either side, moving faster now. Jean’s eyes had adapted to the intermittent light.
A pistol shot, and Sapper Mealworm fell.