They’d been harrying our line for weeks and were escorted back to Brindeau amid hurled insults. They were lined up on the parade ground—a P.G., for prisonnier de guerre, chalked onto their jackets—and then shoved into a crumbling cellar, our makeshift camp prison, until they could be moved. We all hoped the ceiling would come down on them. They were kept without water or food for the rest of the day. It began raining mid-morning, but only mud seeped through the stones of their prison. The Germans bore it in stoic silence. When I came to the cellar with a petrol can of the same oily-tasting water we all drank, all I was greeted with were sullen stares. I stood in the doorway, waiting for them to come forward. Better that then stepping down into the cramped, low cellar full of Boche. But they stayed hunched around the edges of the room. No one stood. No one even looked up. Muddy rain dripped from the ceiling. “Yeah, they don’t deserve it.” The guard nudged me with the butt of his Lebel.
What do You think about At The Edge Of Summer (2016)?
