Blackstone and the Great War by Sally Spencer Read Free Book Online

Land under heavy enemy fire – knowing that his only hope of salvation lay in reaching the enemy trench – and then suddenly coming up against this evil, impenetrable web of sharpened metal. There could be no despair in the whole world quite like that, he thought.
    Yet that was just what had happened to Lieutenant Fortesque’s platoon, the morning after he died. The big guns were supposed to have cut the wire, but they hadn’t – and there was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.
    Blackstone took a deep breath, and looked beyond the fire to a meadow, glistening green as the sun caught the morning dew. There were summer flowers, too, poking up between the lush blades. But there were also holes – deep pits made by the shells which landed short of their target, and gouged up the earth.
    Beyond the meadow was more barbed wire – German, this time – and beyond even that, the enemy lines.
    â€˜Seen enough?’ Carstairs shouted into his ear.
    â€˜More than enough,’ Blackstone told him.
    â€˜Then we’ll go and look at the dugout,’ the captain said.
    The dugout where Lieutenant Fortesque met his death was located midway down the section of trench.
    Captain Carstairs opened the door, and waved Blackstone through.
    â€˜Here you have it,’ he said. ‘The scene of the crime.’
    The bombardment continued, but it did not seem quite as loud inside the dugout as it was outside, and when Carstairs spoke again, it was almost in his normal voice.
    â€˜When you were looking through the periscope, did you happen to notice the pits that the shells had made?’ he asked.
    â€˜It would have been hard to miss them,’ Blackstone replied, grimly.
    â€˜They’re where the wounded crawl to die,’ Carstairs said. ‘There are bodies lying at the bottom of most of them. Once in a while, we get the opportunity to clear them out, but by then, the rats and the maggots have done their work, and they hardly look like men at all.’
    â€˜Why are you telling me this?’ Blackstone wondered.
    â€˜I’m doing it because I want you to see the world through our eyes,’ Carstairs said.
    â€˜Go on.’
    â€˜In your world, death is a significant event, but out here it’s commonplace and relatively unimportant. It’s not human life that we value here – it’s those things that we are shedding our lives to protect that truly matter.’
    â€˜Like patriotism?’ Blackstone suggested.
    â€˜Yes, like patriotism,’ Carstairs agreed wearily. ‘But, above all, it is honour that drives us – our own, and that of the regiment.’
    Blackstone nodded, then looked around him.
    This dugout was smaller than the one which served as the company headquarters, he noted, but in all other respects it was very similar. There was a rough wooden table (with two upright chairs), a wind-up gramophone, an easy chair and a camp bed.
    â€˜When we found Lieutenant Fortesque, he was sitting at the table, facing the door,’ Carstairs said. ‘As you probably already know, his skull was completely smashed in.’
    â€˜What direction did the attack come from?’ Blackstone asked. ‘Was he hit from behind – or from the front?’
    â€˜Neither from the front, nor from behind,’ Captain Carstairs said. He touched the side of his own head lightly, with his right hand. ‘This was where he was struck. And from the damage done, I would judge it was not one blow, but several. There were fragments of bone all over the floor.’
    â€˜Which probably led you to believe that the killer was in a state of rage,’ Blackstone said.
    â€˜Naturally,’ Carstairs agreed. And then something in Blackstone’s tone made him reconsider his response. ‘Is there any reason I shouldn’t have thought that? Aren’t all murderers enraged?’
    â€˜Some are,’ Blackstone said, ‘and some of them commit