The Open Boat and Other Stories
A long pointed shell flashed through the air and struck near the base
of a tree, with a fierce upheaval, compounded of earth and flames.
Looking back, Peza could see the shattered tree quivering from head
to foot. Its whole being underwent a convulsive tremor which was an
exhibition of pain, and, furthermore, deep amazement. As he advanced
through the vale, the shells continued to hiss and hurtle in long low
flights, and the bullets purred in the air. The missiles were flying
into the breast of an astounded nature. The landscape, bewildered,
agonized, was suffering a rain of infamous shots, and Peza imagined a
million eyes gazing at him with the gaze of startled antelopes.
There was a resolute crashing of musketry from the tall hill on the
left, and from directly in front there was a mingled din of artillery
and musketry firing. Peza felt that his pride was playing a great trick
in forcing him forward in this manner under conditions of strangeness,
isolation, and ignorance. But he recalled the manner of the lieutenant,
the smile on the hill-top among the flying peasants. Peza blushed and
pulled the peak of his helmet down on his forehead. He strode onward
firmly. Nevertheless he hated the lieutenant, and he resolved that on
some future occasion he would take much trouble to arrange a stinging
social revenge upon that grinning jackanapes. It did not occur to
him until later that he was now going to battle mainly because at a
previous time a certain man had smiled.
IV
The road curved round the base of a little hill, and on this hill a
battery of mountain guns was leisurely shelling something unseen. In
the lee of the height the mules, contented under their heavy saddles,
were quietly browsing the long grass. Peza ascended the hill by a
slanting path. He felt his heart beat swiftly; once at the top of
the hill he would be obliged to look this phenomenon in the face. He
hurried, with a mysterious idea of preventing by this strategy the
battle from making his appearance a signal for some tremendous renewal.
This vague thought seemed logical at the time. Certainly this living
thing had knowledge of his coming. He endowed it with the intelligence
of a barbaric deity. And so he hurried; he wished to surprise war, this
terrible emperor, when it was growling on its throne. The ferocious and
horrible sovereign was not to be allowed to make the arrival a pretext
for some fit of smoky rage and blood. In this half-lull, Peza had
distinctly the sense of stealing upon the battle unawares.
The soldiers watching the mules did not seem to be impressed by
anything august. Two of them sat side by side and talked comfortably;
another lay flat upon his back staring dreamily at the sky; another
cursed a mule for certain refractions. Despite their uniforms, their
bandoliers and rifles, they were dwelling in the peace of hostlers.
However, the long shells were whooping from time to time over the brow
of the hill, and swirling in almost straight lines toward the vale of
trees, flowers, and grass. Peza, hearing and seeing the shells, and
seeing the pensive guardians of the mules, felt reassured. They were
accepting the condition of war as easily as an old sailor accepts
the chair behind the counter of a tobacco-shop. Or, it was merely
that the farm-boy had gone to sea, and he had adjusted himself to the
circumstances immediately, and with only the usual first misadventures
in conduct. Peza was proud and ashamed that he was not of them, these
stupid peasants, who, throughout the world, hold potentates on their
thrones, make statesmen illustrious, provide generals with lasting
victories, all with ignorance, indifference, or half-witted hatred,
moving the world with the strength of their arms and getting their
heads knocked together in the name of God, the king, or the Stock
Exchange; immortal, dreaming, hopeless asses who surrender their reason
to the care of a shining puppet, and persuade some toy to carry their
lives in his purse. Peza mentally abased himself before them, and
wished to stir them with furious kicks.
As his eyes ranged above the rim of the plateau, he saw a group of
artillery officers talking busily. They turned at once and regarded
his ascent. A moment later a row of infantry soldiers in a trench
beyond the little guns all faced him. Peza bowed to the officers. He
understood at the time that he had made a good and cool bow, and he
wondered at it, for his breath was coming in gasps, he was stifling
from sheer excitement. He felt like a tipsy man trying to conceal his
muscular uncertainty from the people in the street. But the officers
did not display any knowledge. They bowed. Behind them Peza saw the
plain, glittering green, with three lines of black marked upon it
heavily. The front of the first of these lines was frothy with smoke.
To the left of this hill was a craggy mountain, from which came a
continual dull rattle of musketry. Its summit was ringed with the white
smoke. The black lines on the plain slowly moved. The shells that came
from there passed overhead with the sound of great birds frantically
flapping their wings. Peza thought of the first sight of the sea during
a storm. He seemed to feel against his face the wind that races over
the tops of cold and tumultuous billows.
He heard a voice afar off--"Sir, what would you?" He turned, and saw
the dapper captain of the battery standing beside him. Only a moment
had elapsed. "Pardon me, sir," said Peza, bowing again. The officer was
evidently reserving his bows; he scanned the new-comer attentively.
"Are you a correspondent?" he asked. Peza produced a card. "Yes, I came
as a correspondent," he replied, "but now, sir, I have other thoughts.
I wish to help. You see? I wish to help."
"What do you mean?" said the captain. "Are you a Greek? Do you wish to
fight?"
"Yes, I am a Greek. I wish to fight." Peza's voice surprised him
by coming from his lips in even and deliberate tones. He thought
with gratification that he was behaving rather well. Another shell
travelling from some unknown point on the plain whirled close and
furiously in the air, pursuing an apparently horizontal course as if it
were never going to touch the earth. The dark shape swished across the
sky.
"Ah," cried the captain, now smiling, "I am not sure that we will be
able to accommodate you with a fierce affair here just at this time,
but----" He walked gaily to and fro behind the guns with Peza, pointing
out to him the lines of the Greeks, and describing his opinion of the
general plan of defence. He wore the air of an amiable host. Other
officers questioned Peza in regard to the politics of the war. The
king, the ministry, Germany, England, Russia, all these huge words
were continually upon their tongues. "And the people in Athens? Were
they----" Amid this vivacious babble Peza, seated upon an ammunition
box, kept his glance high, watching the appearance of shell after
shell. These officers were like men who had been lost for days in the
forest. They were thirsty for any scrap of news. Nevertheless, one of
them would occasionally dispute their informant courteously. What would
Servia have to say to that? No, no, France and Russia could never allow
it. Peza was elated. The shells killed no one; war was not so bad. He
was simply having coffee in the smoking-room of some embassy where
reverberate the names of nations.
A rumour had passed along the motley line of privates in the trench.
The new arrival with the clean white helmet was a famous English
cavalry officer come to assist the army with his counsel. They stared
at the figure of him, surrounded by officers. Peza, gaining sense of
the glances and whispers, felt that his coming was an event.
Later, he resolved that he could with temerity do something finer.
He contemplated the mountain where the Greek infantry was engaged,
and announced leisurely to the captain of the battery that he thought
presently of going in that direction and getting into the fight. He
re-affirmed the sentiments of a patriot. The captain seemed surprised.
"Oh, there will be fighting here at this knoll in a few minutes," he
said orientally. "That will be sufficient? You had better stay with us.
Besides, I have been ordered to resume fire." The officers all tried to
dissuade him from departing. It was really not worth the trouble. The
battery would begin again directly. Then it would be amusing for him.
Peza felt that he was wandering with his protestations of high
patriotism through a desert of sensible men. These officers gave no
heed to his exalted declarations. They seemed too jaded. They were
fighting the men who were fighting them. Palaver of the particular kind
had subsided before their intense pre-occupation in war as a craft.
Moreover, many men had talked in that manner and only talked.
Peza believed at first that they were treating him delicately. They
were considerate of his inexperience. War had turned out to be such a
gentle business that Peza concluded he could scorn this idea. He bade
them a heroic farewell despite their objections.
However, when he reflected upon their ways afterward, he saw dimly that
they were actuated principally by some universal childish desire for a
spectator of their fine things. They were going into action, and they
wished to be seen at war, precise and fearless.
V
Climbing slowly to the high infantry position, Peza was amazed to
meet a soldier whose jaw had been half shot away, and who was being
helped down the sheep track by two tearful comrades. The man's breast
was drenched with blood, and from a cloth which he held to the wound
drops were splashing wildly upon the stones of the path. He gazed at
Peza for a moment. It was a mystic gaze, which Peza withstood with
difficulty. He was exchanging looks with a spectre; all aspect of the
man was somehow gone from this victim. As Peza went on, one of the
unwounded soldiers loudly shouted to him to return and assist in this
tragic march. But even Peza's fingers revolted; he was afraid of the
spectre; he would not have dared to touch it. He was surely craven in
the movement of refusal he made to them. He scrambled hastily on up the
path. He was running away.
At the top of the hill he came immediately upon a part of the line that
was in action. Another battery of mountain guns was here firing at the
streaks of black on the plain. There were trenches filled with men
lining parts of the crest, and near the base were other trenches, all
crashing away mightily. The plain stretched as far as the eye can see,
and from where silver mist ended this emerald ocean of grass, a great
ridge of snow-topped mountains poised against a fleckless blue sky. Two
knolls, green and yellow with grain, sat on the prairie confronting the
dark hills of the Greek position. Between them were the lines of the
enemy. A row of trees, a village, a stretch of road, showed faintly
on this great canvas, this tremendous picture, but men, the Turkish
battalions, were emphasized startlingly upon it. The ranks of troops
between the knolls and the Greek position were as black as ink.
The first line of course was muffled in smoke, but at the rear of it
battalions crawled up and to and fro plainer than beetles on a plate.
Peza had never understood that masses of men were so declarative, so
unmistakable, as if nature makes every arrangement to give information
of the coming and the presence of destruction, the end, oblivion. The
firing was full, complete, a roar of cataracts, and this pealing of
connected volleys was adjusted to the grandeur of the far-off range of
snowy mountains. Peza, breathless, pale, felt that he had been set upon
a pillar and was surveying mankind, the world. In the meantime dust had