Sam Wellman - C. S. Lewis: Creator of Narnia

1997 by Barbour Publishing, Inc.

Print ISBN 978-1-62416-123-0

eBook Editions:

Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-62416-423-1

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All scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Cover illustration: Greg Copeland

Cover design: Kirk DouPonce

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Printed in the United States of America.

A new officers coming, Lieutenant Lewis, informed Sergeant Ayres.

Worst luck! thought Lieutenant C. S. Lewis of the 3rd Somerset Light Infantry, who did not feel like a welcoming presence that day in France. The German artillery, which had been dropping in shells more than usual all day, made him feel hunkered down. Rumors of mustard gas from the north had driven him to clutch his gas mask, and now his fingers ached. Worse yet, the scuttlebutt that approximately fifteen German divisions were ready to assault Arras, which lay directly behind Lieutenant Lewis, gnawed on his nerves. Blast it all, as ghastly as the trenches were, he was not fit to lead men against the Germans in the open. He would have to lean on Sergeant Ayres like he always did. No, he certainly didnt feel like a welcoming committee for any new officer.

Sighing, he studied the entrance of the communications trench. Suddenly the grimy face of a sergeant and the bright face of a new officer appeared at the entrance above him. A barely audible gasp revealed the officers sudden realization that he was on a precipice. Weve come to a new trench, and this one must be another ten feet deep, he chirped.

At least ten feet deep, sir, replied his sergeant. We have been walking in a communications trench. This is a real trench. Were at the front line, sir.

My legs are rubber, confessed the new officer, whose falsetto betrayed his youth. Why is the communications trench so zigzagged? Seems an awful waste.

Lieutenant Lewis spoke up. In case of a direct hit from artillery or a fusillade from small arms, we dont want the projectiles going up and down the whole straight-line trench killing every one of us, now do we?

WE DONT WANT THE PROJECTILES GOING UP AND DOWN THE WHOLE STRAIGHT-LINE TRENCH KILLING EVERY ONE OF US, NOW DO WE?

The new officer spotted Lieutenant Lewis and gulped. Of course not, Lieutenant. He descended a ladder and thumped onto the boarded bottom of the trench. He blinked. Say, dont I know you, old boy? Were you at Malvern School, by chance? Jack, is it?

Perhaps, replied Jack Lewis coldly, but that means nothing here. Cricket is temporarily postponed.

The man took the hint and shut up about elite public schools. Jack Lewis saw no need to get friendly. When this new man died, it wouldnt be so hard for him to accept. How many of his new friends had been killed already? He had lost count. Besides, this time he really felt like he was going to get killed himself. He watched the new officer climb up on the fire step by a periscope.

Hard to see through all the barbed wire, muttered the new officer, gawking through the periscope. How far away are the krauts?

Jack Lewis squirmed against the hard-packed sandbags at his back and waited for someone else to answer the new officer. He hated the word kraut, which was short for sauerkraut, a common German dish. He didnt like the word jerry to indicate Germans either. Words were special to Jack. Even up here where a man might die any second, he guarded his language and chose his words with precision. Must a man become a sloppy pig simply because he lived in mud?

When no one volunteered to answer the new officers question, Jack finally spoke up. The distance across no-mans-land to the German trench? Fifty yards or so.

But then shouldnt I be able to seeI do see a field-gray uniform and a soup-pot helmet! A kraut is walking along a trench over there! Careless bloke. I dare say I could plug him right in the head.

Good idea, drawled Jack dryly. Poke your head up and take a potshot.

Oh, I see. One of them might shoot at me first. I say then, better yet, why dont we lob a rifle grenade into their trench?

Someone groaned, but Jack Lewis had to laugh. He had voiced the same words exactly to Sergeant Ayres back on day one of his entry into this Great War. When had that been? Oh yes, it had been his nineteenth birthday, November 29, 1917, four and a half months back. Noticing that no sergeant seemed eager this gloomy day to answer the new officer, Jack decided he would be the one to set him straight.

Once you start that business, instructed Jack crisply, youll get it back in kind.

The new officer was startled. But arent we supposed to kill the krauts?

Oh, dont worry. Death is a common commodity in the trenches and even almost guaranteed in that no-mans-land between our trenches and their trenches. You see, every inch of hellish ground is covered not only by our machine guns, but their machine guns, too. Death is almost a certainty.

EVERY INCH OF THAT HELLISH GROUND IS COVERED NOT ONLY BY OUR MACHINE GUNS, BUT THEIR MACHINE GUNS, TOO. DEATH IS ALMOST A CERTAINTY.

So its a stalemate? concluded the new officer, amazed.

Only until some wine-sipping, chain-smoking general back at HQ gets antsy over his hors doeuvres because no map tacks are being moved on his map, grumbled Jack Lewis sourly, and decides one of his tacks, which happens to be one of our battalions, should charge the Germans.

You dont say. The young officer quirked an eyebrow.

Go warm yourself by one of the fires, intoned Jack, brotherlike. Pick yourself a nice wire bunk in some dugout. Eat some stew. Read a good book. Jack felt like adding, Because any day nowif you dont croak on mustard gas firsta whole division of Germans is going to storm across that fifty yards, and nothing our puny battalion can do will stop them, because this is their very last chance to win this terrible war before the Americans build up an army of several million men.

But Jack didnt feel mean enough. Truth was he himself was frightened numb, more scared than he had ever been. He watched the new officer squeeze past a traverse and disappear. Traverses were thick walls of sandbags perpendicular to the trench. They occurred about every ten yards and served the same tactical purpose as zigzagging. The enemy could not devastate an entire trench with an exploding shell or a fusillade of bullets.

I know far too much about trenches and warfare, muttered Jack to himself.