Fall of Giants

The man answered him in the flat guttural accent of the Cardiff docks. “I don’t know how it happened, sir, exactly. Some of the Jerries got up on their parapet, unarmed, and shouted, ‘Happy Christmas,’ then one of our boys done the same, then they started walking towards one another and before you could say chips everyone was doing it.”

“But there’s no one in the trenches!” Fitz said angrily. “Don’t you see this could be a trick?”

The sergeant looked up and down the line. “No, sir, if I’m honest, I can’t say that I do see that,” he said coolly.

The man was right. How could the enemy possibly take advantage of the fact that the frontline forces of both sides had become friends?

The sergeant pointed to the German. “This is Hans Braun, sir,” he said. “Used to be a waiter at the Savoy Hotel in London. Speaks English!”

The German sergeant saluted Fitz. “Glad to make your acquaintance, Major,” he said. “Happy Christmas.” He had less of an accent than the sergeant from Cardiff. He proffered a flask. “Would you care for a drop of schnapps?”

“Good God,” said Fitz, and walked away.

There was nothing he could do. This would have been difficult to stop even with the support of the noncommissioned officers such as that Welsh sergeant. Without their help it was impossible. He decided he had better report the situation to a superior and make it someone else’s problem.

But before he could leave the scene he heard his name called. “Fitz! Fitz! Is that really you?”

The voice was familiar. He turned to see a German approaching. As the man came close, he recognized him. “Von Ulrich?” he said in amazement.

“The very same!” Walter smiled broadly and held out his hand. Automatically Fitz took it. Walter shook hands vigorously. He looked thinner, Fitz thought, and his fair skin was weathered. I suppose I’ve changed too, Fitz thought.

Walter said: “This is amazing-what a coincidence!”

“I’m glad to see you fit and well,” Fitz said. “Though I probably shouldn’t be.”

“Likewise!”

“What are we going to do about this?” Fitz waved a hand at the fraternizing soldiers. “I find it worrying.”

“I agree. When tomorrow comes they may not wish to shoot at their new friends.”

“And then what would we do?”

“We must have a battle soon to get them back to normal. If both sides start shelling in the morning, they’ll soon start to hate each other again.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“And how are you, my old friend?”

Fitz remembered his good news, and brightened. “I’ve become a father,” he said. “Bea has given birth to a boy. Have a cigar.”

They lit up. Walter had been on the eastern front, he revealed. “The Russians are corrupt,” he said with disgust. “The officers sell supplies on the black market and let the infantry go hungry and cold. Half the population of East Prussia are wearing Russian army boots they bought cheap, while the Russian soldiers are barefoot.”

Fitz said he had been in Paris. “Your favorite restaurant, Voisin’s, is still open,” he said.

The men started a football match, Britain versus Germany, piling up their uniform caps for goalposts. “I’ve got to report this,” said Fitz.

“I, too,” said Walter. “But first tell me, how is Lady Maud?”

“Fine, I think.”

“I would most particularly like to be remembered to her.”

Fitz was struck by the emphasis with which Walter uttered this otherwise routine remark. “Of course,” he said. “Any special reason?”

Walter looked away. “Just before I left London… I danced with her at Lady Westhampton’s ball. It was the last civilized thing I did before this verdammten war.”

Walter seemed to be in the grip of emotion. There was a tremor in his voice, and it was highly unusual for him to mix German with English. Perhaps the Christmas atmosphere had got to him too.

Walter went on: “I should very much like her to know that I was thinking of her on Christmas Day.” He looked at Fitz with moist eyes. “Would you be sure to tell her, old friend?”

“I will,” said Fitz. “I’m sure she’ll be very pleased.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN – February 1915

“I went to the doctor,” said the woman next to Ethel. “I said to him, ‘I’ve got an itchy twat.’”

A ripple of laughter ran around the room. It was on the top floor of a small house in East London, near Aldgate. Twenty women sat at sewing machines in close-packed rows either side of a long workbench. There was no fire, and the one window was closed tight against the February cold. The floorboards were bare. The whitewashed plaster on the walls was crumbling with age, and the laths beneath showed through in places. With twenty women breathing the same air the room became stuffy, but it never seemed to warm up, and the women all wore hats and coats.