Maybe Cavendish had been born in 1918, maybe not. If he had, he was still making messes in his nappies. He hadn't seen-or, for that matter, smelled-the Western Front. He hadn't got shot there, either. Walsh had done all of those things, however much he wished he hadn't.

For a wonder, Cavendish heard the reproach in his voice. The youngster blushed like a schoolgirl. "I know you've been through a good deal, Sergeant," he said stiffly, "but I do believe I am gaining on you when it comes to experience."

That he could come out with such claptrap straight-faced only proved how much experience he didn't have yet. Telling him so would have been pointless precisely because he lacked the experience that would have let him understand what an idiot he was being.

Walsh didn't even try. "Whatever you say, sir," he answered. One of the things staff sergeants did was ride herd on subalterns till their nominal superiors were fit to go around a battlefield by themselves without getting too many of the soldiers under their command killed for no reason.

Cavendish might have been doing his best to prove he hadn't reached that point yet. Pointing east, he said, "Well, we've given the Boches a proper what-for this time, eh?"

His posh accent only made that sound even stupider than it would have otherwise. Walsh wouldn't have thought such a thing possible, but Cavendish proved him wrong. "Sir, the Germans came from their own border all the way to Paris. We've come from Paris all the way to Messy," Walsh said. "If you want to call that a proper what-for, well, go ahead."

"There are times when I doubt you have the proper attitude, Sergeant," Cavendish said. "Would you sooner be fighting behind Paris?"

"No, sir. Not a bit of it." Walsh's own accent was buzzing Welsh, and lower-class Welsh at that. What else to expect from a miner's son? He went on, "I'd sooner be fighting in bloody Germany, is what I'd sooner be doing. But that doesn't look like it's in the cards, does it?"