But that was just rhetoric. His mind was flooding itself with rhetoric that it might keep its sanity. His mind was squeezing out rhetoric like a sponge that he might not see dry madness face to face.
And all the while his hard footsteps along the frozen road beat in his ears bringing him nearer to the village where the division was quartered. He was climbing a long hill. The mist thinned about him and became brilliant with sunlight. Then he was walking in the full sun over the crest of a hill with pale blue sky above his head. Behind him and before him were mist-filled valleys and beyond other ranges of long hills, with reddish-violet patches of woodland, glowing faintly in the sunlight. In the valley at his feet he could see, in the shadow of the hill he stood on, a church tower and a few roofs rising out of the mist, as out of water.
Among the houses bugles were blowing mess-call.
The jauntiness of the brassy notes ringing up through the silence was agony to him. How long the day would be. He looked at his watch. It was seven thirty. How did they come to be having mess so late?
The mist seemed doubly cold and dark when he was buried in it again after his moment of sunlight. The sweat was chilled on his face and streaks of cold went through his clothes, soaked from the effort of carrying the pack. In the village street Andrews met a man he did not know and asked him where the office was. The man, who was chewing something, pointed silently to a house with green shutters on the opposite side of the street.
At a desk sat Chrisfield smoking a cigarette. When he jumped up Andrews noticed that he had a corporal's two stripes on his arm.
“Sure, I'm fine,” said Andrews. A sudden constraint fell upon them.
“You're a corporal now. Congratulations.”
They were silent. Chrisfield sat down in his chair again.
“It's a hell-hole, this dump is, a hell-hole.”
“Goin' to move soon, tell me.... Army o' Occupation. But Ah hadn't ought to have told you that.... Don't tell any of the fellers.”
“Ye won't know it; we've got fifteen new men. No account all of 'em. Second draft men.”
“You bet.... Come with me, Andy, an Ah'll tell 'em to give you some grub at the cookshack. No... wait a minute an' you'll miss the hike.... Hikes every day since the goddam armistice. They sent out a general order telling 'em to double up on the drill.”