To-day there happened to be no letters for Michael, and the paper which he glanced at seemed a very feeble effort in the way of entertainment.  There was no news in it, except news about the war, which here, out at the front, did not interest him in the least.  Perhaps in England people liked to know that a hundred yards of trenches had been taken at one place, and that three German attacks had failed at another; but when you were actually engaged (or had been or would soon again be) in taking part in those things, it seemed a waste of paper and compositor’s time to record them.  There was a column of letters also from indignant Britons, using violent language about the crimes and treachery of Germany.  That also was uninteresting and far-fetched.  Nothing that Germany had done mattered the least.  There was no use in arguing and slinging wild expressions about; it was a stale subject altogether when you were within earshot of that incessant booming of guns.  All the morning that had gone on without break, and no doubt they would get news of what had happened before they set out again that evening for another spell in the trenches.  But in all probability nothing particular had happened.  Probably the London papers would record it next day, a further tediousness on their part.  It would be much more interesting to hear what was going on there, whether there were any new plays, whether there had been any fresh concerts, what the weather was like, or even who had been lunching at Prince’s, or dining at the Carlton.

He put down his uninteresting paper, and strolled out into the farmyard, stepping over the legs of the junior officer who blocked the doorway, and did not attempt to move.  On the doorstep was sitting a major of his regiment, who, more politely, shifted his place a little so that Michael should pass.  Outside the smell of manure was acrid but not unpleasant, the old sow grunted in her sleep, and one of the green shutters outside the upper windows slowly blew to.  There was someone inside the room apparently, for the moment after a hand and arm bare to the elbow were protruded, and fastened the latch of the shutter, so that it should not move again.

A little further on was a rail that separated the copse from the roadway, and here out of the wind Michael sat down, and lit a cigarette to stop his yearning for the bubbling stewpot, which would not be broached for half an hour yet.  The day, he believed, was Wednesday, but the whole quiet of the place, apart from that drowsy booming on the eastern horizon, made it feel like Sunday.  Nobody but the fat Frenchwoman who bustled about had anything to do; there was a Sabbath leisure about everything, about the dozing sow, the buzzing flies, the lounging figures that read letters and papers.  When last they were here, it is true, there were rather more of them.  Eight officers had been billeted here last week, before they had been in the trenches and now there were but six.  This evening they would set out again for another forty-eight hours in that hellish inferno, but to-morrow a fresh draft was arriving, so that when next they foregathered here, whatever had happened in the interval, there would probably be at least six of them.