A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, February 1950 — page 105: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THREE LINES OF OLD FRENCH 105 machine-gun hail just as he was breaking through. The shock of the swift, manifold death had hurled his left arth about the neck of the comrade close beside him; -and this man had been stricken within the same second. There they leaned, em- bracing—and as the star-shells flared and died, flared and died, they seemed to rock, to try to break from the wire, to dash forward, to return. Laveller was weary, weary beyond all understanding. The sector was a bad one and nervous. For almost seventy-two hours he had been without sleep—for the few minutes now and then of dead stupor broken by constant alarms was worse than sleep. The shelling had been well-nigh con- tinuous, and the food scarce and perilous to get; three miles back through the fire they had been forced to go for it; no near- er than that could the ration dumps be brought. * And constantly the parapets had to be rebuilt and the wires repaired—and when this was done the shells destroyed again, and once more the dreary routine had to be gone through; for the orders were to hold this sector at all costs. All that was left of Laveller’s conscious- ness was concentrated in his eyes; only his seeing faculty lived. And sight, obey- ing the rigid, inexorable will commanding every reserve of vitality to concentrate on the duty at hand, was blind to everything except the strip before it that Laveller must watch until relieved. His body was numb; he could not feel the ground with his feet, and sometimes he seemed to be floating in air like—like the two Scots upon the wire! Why couldn’t they be still? What right had men whose blood had drained away into the black stain beneath them to dance and pirouette to the rhythm of the flared? Damn them—why couldn’t a shell drop down and bury them? : There was a chateau half a mile up there to the right—at least it had been a chateau. Under it were deep cellars into which one could creep and sleep. He knew that, because ages ago, when first he had come into this part of the line, he had slept a night there. : It would be like reentering paradise to, _ ¢rawl again into those cellars, out of the pitiless rain; sleep once more with a roof over his head. e “T will sleep and sleep and sleep—and sleep and sleep and sleep,” he told him- self; then stiffened as at the slumber-com- pelling repetition of the word darkness began to wather before him. The star-shells flared and died, flared and died; the staccato of a machine gun reached him. He thought that it was his teeth chattering until his groping con- sciousness made him realize what it really was—some nervous German riddling the interminable movement of the dead. There was a squidging of feet through . the chalky mud. No need to look; they were friends, or they could not have passed the sentries at the angle of the traverse. Nevertheless, involuntarily, his eyes swept toward the sounds, took note of three cloaked figures regarding him. There were half a dozen of the lights floating overhead now, and by the gleams they cast into the trench he recognized the party. One of them was that famous surgeon who had come over from the base hospital at Bethune to see made the wounds he healed ; the others were his major and his captain—all of them bound for those cellars, no doubt. Well, some had all the luck! Back went his eyes to the slit. “What's wrong?” It was the voice of his major addressing the visitor. “What's wrong—what’s wrong—what'’s wrong?” The words repeated themselves swiltly, insistently, within his brain, over and over again, striving to waken it, Well, what was wrong? Nothing was wrong! Wasn't he, Laveller, there and watching? The tormented brain writhed angrily, Nothing was wrong—why didn’t they go away and let him watch in peace? He would like it; much better. “Nothing.” It was the surgeon—and again the words kept babbling in Lavel- ler’s ears, small, whispering, rapidly re- peating themselves over and over: “noth- ing—nothing—nothing—nothing.” But what was this the surgeon was saying? Fragmentarily, only half under- stood, the phrases registered : “Perfect case of what I’ve been telling you. This lad here—utterly worn, weary —all his consciousness centered upon just one thing—watchfulness . . . i Sar arnt o [ difins an tr, toe Pa ‘ i fy ONE ik ih h i. Sh ae AR: eat