Summary

The third section of the novel opens with Alfa sneaking into the enemy trenches in Chapter 12. He is so close to their camp that he can hear them singing. In an effort to "avenge my friend Jean-Baptiste," Alfa kidnaps a solider smoking alone and drags him to no-man's land to kill him (62). The soldier is "small and light, like a child of fifteen or sixteen" (63). Alfa reflects that the only reason he managed to snatch him away from his trench-mates was because he was smoking, and questions whether the hand of God played a part in his death.

In Chapter 13, the captain and the lead infantryman want Alfa to turn in his seven heads. "They wanted proof of my savagery so they could lock me up, but I would never tell them where I'd hidden my seven hands" (69). Meanwhile, Alfa's trench-mates grow tired...