No Man's Land - Бесплатная аудиокнига

VII

It was the distinguished-looking gentleman in blue who came alongside just after they dropped anchor at the Rock, who brought the glorious news. He ascended the gangway with great dignity, and disappeared into some secret place with the skipper. After some delay and a slight commotion, various flags were hoisted, and he majestically appeared again. It seemed that the hoisting of the flags had apparently been successful. Suspicion had been averted by this simple act; there was no longer any danger of being made a target for enthusiastic gunners. And, what was more to the point, the distinguished gentleman was now free to impart his great tidings.

"The German fleet, gentlemen," he remarked genially, "has ceased to exist."

"Who said so?" asked a doubting voice.

"It is in all the Spanish papers." The Admiral, or whatever he was, eyed the speaker compassionately. "A great action has taken place in the North Sea; we have lost nineteen big ships in addition to destroyers, and the German fleet is wiped out."

"It doesn't seem good enough, does it?" murmured a graceless member of the group.

"But if it's really authentic?" Draycott turned to him doubtfully.
"And there must be something in it if it's in all the Spanish papers."

"On the contrary," returned the graceless one. "It is precisely that fact that makes me believe there is nothing in it."

The remark seemed conclusive; and yet so detailed was the information all over Gib, so definite the lists of vessels sunk on each side, that even intelligent Scorps—as the inhabitants of the place are known—were impressed. Strangely enough, exactly the same detailed lists, with just sufficient difference to make them credible, were in all the Italian papers at the same time—though this only transpired later.

At the moment nothing much mattered but the time of the next boat going East: it was their own little personal future that counted. A naval battle—yes, perhaps; nineteen ships down—the German fleet as well; fifty or sixty thousand men—gone, finished, wiped out. And yet it was the next boat they wanted to know about.

Callous—I think not; merely a total incapability to realise a thing so stupendous. It has been the same all through the war: the tragedies have been too big for human minds to grasp. It is the little things that tell; the isolated thumb-nail impressions that live in one's mind, and will go with us to the grave. The one huddled form lying motionless in the shell-hole, with its staring, sightless eyes; the one small, but supreme sacrifice: that is the thing which hits—hits harder than the Lusitania, or any other of the gigantic panels of the war. The pin-pricks we feel; the sledge hammer merely stuns. And the danger is that those who have felt the pin-pricks may confuse them with the sledge hammer; may lose the right road in the bypaths of personal emotion. War means so infinitely much to the individual; the individual means so infinitely little to war. Only it is sometimes hard to remember that simple fact. . . .