At Some Disputed Barricade_ A Novel - Anne Perry [122]
He turned back just in time to see Morel fall over the parapet and raise his gun to fire at him.
He froze. It was the final absurdity. They had made it, and were going to shoot each other! He started to laugh, crazily, idiotically.
Morel lowered the gun and came toward him. “Chaplain, are you all right?” he asked sharply.
“In German!” Joseph snapped back at him, using that language for the command. “Are you badly hurt?” he went on.
“I’m not…” Morel began, then as a German corporal came around the corner of the trench he doubled over and all but collapsed in Joseph’s arms.
Joseph took his weight with difficulty. “It’s all right, I’ve got you,” he said in German. “I’ll take you back to the dressing station. Here!” He half-lifted Morel over his shoulder and, ignoring the corporal, set out along the supply trench.
“Can you manage?” the corporal called after him.
“Yes, thank you,” Joseph answered. “I’ll carry him to the surgeon, then I’ll be back.”
Morel muttered something into his ear, but he did not catch enough of it to make sense.
Joseph kept his head down, easing Morel’s weight higher—both because it was easier to walk, and because it allowed him to hide most of his face without arousing suspicion. He hurried, as if Morel were bleeding to death and he had to get him out of the range of fire and then attend to him.
He passed other people: stretcher bearers, medical aides, even another priest. There was enough noise from gunfire to make conversation difficult and everyone had their own duties. Even so, there were more offers of help, which he refused.
It was eerily like a mirror image of the British trenches he was so used to where he knew every yard, every bend and turn, every rise to stumble over or pothole to turn your ankle in. He knew every ledge and shallow dugout where a man could curl up and snatch an hour of sleep.
These trenches were deeper, drier. He passed a dugout with electric lights. It was harder going out into the darkness again. Morel was growing very heavy.
Suddenly there were two figures black in the gloom ahead of him, talking softly in German. Cigarette ends burned brightly for an instant, then disappeared.
Suddenly panic seized him and he slithered to a stop. Morel dropped over his shoulders to land in the mud, cursing roundly, but having remembered to do it in German.
“Bless you,” Joseph replied. “Are you hurt?”
“Bruised to hell.” Morel stood up slowly, wincing. “You might have warned me.”
“Geddes,” Joseph whispered, pulling Morel away from the men. “Which way?”
Morel looked around carefully. “There.” He pointed forward. “He’s getting away from the lines as fast as possible.”
“Does he speak any German? He must, or he wouldn’t dare come through.”
“Picked up some, but he won’t want to put it to the test this close to the firing line.” Morel started along the trench again and Joseph caught up with him, moving swiftly now.
They kept out of sight as much as possible, but always as if priests ministering to the wounded. Reluctantly, Morel had gotten rid of his gun also. It was too dangerous to keep if he wanted to maintain his disguise.
By dawn they were two or three miles behind the lines. The light came early in a clear sky, which held only a few shreds of gray cloud, lit from beneath with pale brilliance. It showed a land shattered by war. Trees were splintered, their naked trunks leafless, some scarred black by fire. Farmhouses were roofless, walls fallen away. Fields were scoured up, crops ruined.
Joseph glanced at Morel but did not speak. It was time he thought more clearly. Now they were through the German lines they needed to plan, and first to deduce what Geddes would have done.
“Change clothes,” Joseph said slowly, thinking aloud. “Eat. More important, drink. Water would do, anything clean. Need strength.” He imagined Geddes giddy with freedom, but so tired