the nerve-racking, deafening din went on and on without a respite. bracques was hit in the head—he was a living, breathing horror, his whole jaw gone—one hand plucking at his coat. he lay grotesquely uncomfortable on his back, rolling this way and rolling that way on his knapsack and his tin gamelle and the dozen other accouterments he couldn’t get rid of. a dozen lads he had gone to school with in toulouse were screaming. one called for his mother again and again, “maman! maman! maman!” most of the wounded lay still in their blood, or moaned and writhed in their agony. on coco’s left, he said, was a body without a head. coco, he confessed, thought more than once of running. what was the use of33 staying only to be butchered? they could do no good that way. but still the regiment held its place; yes, but the regiment was getting strangely thin. it could not last long.
coco looked round for fran?ois, who should have been beside him. there he was, close by, grinning. he called out something to keep up coco’s courage, but in that inferno coco couldn’t hear a word. then, instantly, there was a gigantic explosion; and when coco rose again, he looked—he grew numb. there was fran?ois on his back—with both legs queerly bent in an impossible position. with a sickening wave of nausea coco saw that both the boy’s legs were shockingly crushed, all but torn off, and his red pantaloons were soaking in blood. fran?ois’s face was horrible now; his eyes were shining wildly. coco, shrinking with horror, managed to crawl toward him....
34
in the hospital at toulouse, when coco told me this, lying in his cot, he shrank convulsively into himself with horror, just as he must have recoiled, i fancy, that day. he wouldn’t look at me. his eyes were fixed on the window. coco told me then that fran?ois’s legs were torn “quite off”—he was sure of it; but i imagine that, in his agony of horror, coco must have been mistaken, or fran?ois would have bled to death very quickly. coco says he lived for nearly three-quarters of an hour. at any rate, his chum was done for, and suffering torments unspeakable.
“he just looked at me and begged me to kill him,” said coco, his eyes still on the window. “he said”—coco could hardly speak now—“he said if—i was his friend—i’d finish him—so he wouldn’t suffer. there was such a terrible noise of the shells bursting that i couldn’t quite hear at first35— i had to hold my head close to get what he said.... he said—if he had helped me, ever—now was my chance to be his friend ... and put him out of his misery....”
we were silent for a while. i was looking at him, getting up my courage to ask a question. finally i dared. i simply had to ask it:
“did you do it, coco?”
the tears poured into coco’s eyes now. he shook his head slowly, without a word.
“do you regret not having—done what he wanted, coco?”
coco said simply, “i don’t know. i would have wanted to die quickly. perhaps as his friend i ought to have done it. but i am a good catholic, you know, m’sieur; and i was taught that it is a sin to take human life.” quite naturally he added: “and yet i suppose i have killed a lot of germans.” he shook his head wearily. “i can’t under36stand it. i must leave it for the church to decide. i did the best i could....”
