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learned any more about how the sapper came to lose half his hand?"
    "He did not lose half his hand!" Marie O'Day snapped. "And will you please keep your voice down? In fact, you'd better get out of here altogether. This is a hospital ward, not a cafe for you to stand around in the way, chatting to people." She was within an inch of his height and she was defending her territory and the men she cared about with a savage admiration and pity.
    Prentice recognized that he was beaten, at least for the moment, and retreated.
    Joseph gave Marie O'Day a beaming smile, then went over to Corliss's bed and looked down at him. He was lying with his eyes open, staring blindly into the distance, his face without expression.
    It was situations like this that Joseph knew he should have some answer for, words that would ease the pain, take away some of the fear that twisted the gut and turned the bowels to water, something to make sense of the unbearable. Only the divine could serve; there was nothing human big enough to touch it.
    But what could he say? Looking at Corliss now he knew at least that he was aware of being suspected, and that he could not prove his innocence. He had lost his hand. It might even become infected and then he could lose his whole arm. If he was found guilty of causing the wound himself, he would be blindfolded and shot to death in dishonour. Could anything worse happen to a man?
    The words died on Joseph's tongue. He simply sat on the bed and put his hand on Corliss's shoulder. "If you want to talk, I'm here," he said quietly. "If you don't, that's all right."
    For a long time Corliss did not move. When at last he spoke it was hoarsely, as if his throat were dry. "What did Major Wetherall say? It hurts like a knife in my belly to let him down."
    Joseph saw the tears on Corliss's face. "He sent me to keep the journalist out of your way," he answered.
    "Cos he's after me," Corliss said. "He thinks I did it myself, on purpose. I heard him say so."
    "He doesn't know a thing," Joseph replied. "I might see if I can take him down a sap. That'll give him a good idea of what it's like. If he wants a story, that would be a great one. Make a hero out of him."
    Corliss smiled only slightly, and gulped.
    "And Major Wetherall knows what it's like down there," Joseph went on.
    Corliss blinked.
    Joseph allowed the silence to settle.
    "Thanks, Chaplain," Corliss said at last.
    Half an hour later Joseph spoke to each of the other men in the room, then went outside to find Prentice again. He needed to appeal to the man's better nature. If he understood what the losses had been, how many wounded and dead there were in every battalion, and no reserves to take their places, then he would not attack the morale of the men left who were trying desperately to stay awake day and night, sometimes to watch an entire length of trench from one dogleg to the next. They had been sodden wet most of the winter, and frozen half of it. They lived on stale food, dirty water and little enough of that. They slept in the open. Every one of them had lost friends they had grown up with, men they knew like brothers.
    Many of them did not want to kill Germans. Some had guilty nightmares, blood-drenched dreams from which they woke screaming, soaked in sweat, afraid to tell anyone of thoughts that might be seen as disloyalty, cowardice, even treason, but were simply humanity.
    Prentice was talking to Sergeant Watkins. He looked relaxed, standing a little sideways next to a table with splints and bandages on it. His weight was more on one foot than the other, as if he had infinite time to spare. Opposite him, Sergeant Watkins stood almost to attention, his jaw tight, his heavy face flushed.
    "So morale is pretty low," Prentice was saying with assurance. "In fact, about as low as it can be. I've heard that some men don't even want to fight the Germans. Is that so?"
    "No sane man wants to kill another, if 'e don't 'ave to," Watkins replied in a low, angry voice.