Under Fire by Henri Barbusse Read Free Book Online Page B

I'll make you rattle directly!' I took my time and squared up behind him, and kicked into his tailpiece with all my might. I tell you, he fell down half-strangled."
    "Strangled?"
    "Yes, with rage, when it dawned on him that the rump of an officer and nobleman had been bust in by the hobnailed socks of a poor private! He went off chattering like a woman and wriggling like an epileptic--"
    "I'm not spiteful myself," says Blaire, "I've got kiddies. And it worries me, too, at home, when I've got to kill a pig that I know--but those, I shall run 'em through--Bing!--full in the linen-cupboard."
    "I, too."
    "Not to mention," says Pepin, "that they've got silver hats, and pistols that you can get four quid for whenever you like, and field-glasses that simply haven't got a price. Ah, bad luck, what a lot of chances I let slip in the early part of the campaign! I was too much of a beginner then, and it serves me right. But don't worry, I shall get a silver hat. Mark my words, I swear I'll have one. I must have not only the skin of one of Wilhelm's red-tabs, but his togs as well. Don't fret yourself; I'll fasten on to that before the war ends."
    "You think it'll have an end, then?" asks some one.
    "Don't worry!" replies the other.
    * * * * * *
    Meanwhile, a hubbub has arisen to the right of us, and suddenly a
moving and buzzing group appears, in which dark and bright forms
mingle.
    "What's all that?"
    Biquet has ventured on a reconnaissance, and returns contemptuously pointing with his thumb towards the motley mass: "Eh, boys! Come and have a squint at them! Some people!"
    "Some people?"
    "Oui, some gentlemen, look you. Civvies, with Staff officers."
    "Civilians! Let's hope they'll stick it!" [note 3]
    It is the sacramental saying and evokes laughter, although we have heard it a hundred times, and although the soldier has rightly or wrongly perverted the original meaning and regards it as an ironical reflection on his life of privations and peril.
    Two Somebodies come up; two Somebodies with overcoats and canes. Another is dressed in a sporting suit, adorned with a plush hat and binoculars. Pale blue tunics, with shining belts of fawn color or patent leather, follow and steer the civilians.
    With an arm where a brassard glitters in gold-edged silk and golden ornament, a captain indicates the firing-step in front of an old emplacement and invites the visitors to get up and try it. The gentleman in the touring suit clambers up with the aid of his umbrella.
    Says Barque, "You've seen the station-master at the Gare du Nord, all in his Sunday best, and opening the door of a first-class compartment for a rich sportsman on the first day of the shooting? With his 'Montez, monsieur le Propritaire!'--you know, when the toffs are all togged up in brand-new outfits and leathers and ironmongery, and showing off with all their paraphernalia for killing poor little animals!"
    Three or four poilus who were quite without their accouterments have disappeared underground. The others sit as though paralyzed. Even the pipes go out, and nothing is heard but the babble of talk exchanged by the officers and their guests.
    "Trench tourists," says Barque in an undertone, and then
louder--"This way, mesdames et messieurs"--in the manner of the
moment.
    "Chuck it!" whispers Farfadet, fearing that Barque's malicious tongue will draw the attention of the potent personages.
    Some heads in the group are now turned our way. One gentleman who detaches himself and comes up wears a soft hat and a loose tie. He has a white billy-goat beard, and might be an artiste. Another follows him, wearing a black overcoat, a black bowler hat, a black beard, a white tie and an eyeglass.
    "Ah, ah! There are some poilus," says the first gentleman. "These
are real poilus, indeed."
    He comes up to our party a little timidly, as though in the Zoological Gardens, and offers his hand to the one who is nearest to him--not without awkwardness, as one offers a piece of bread to the