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It is just a pulp of torn flesh and splintered bone. The joint has been hit. This lad will never walk again.

I wet my fingers and run them across his forehead, then give him a drink. Some life comes into his eyes. It’s only now that we realize that his right arm is bleeding as well.

Kat spreads out two field dressings as wide as he can, so that they cover the wound. I look around for some cloth, so that I can tie it up loosely. We haven’t got anything, so I cut more of the wounded man’s trousers away so that I can use a piece of his underpants as a bandage. But he isn’t wearing any. I look at him more closely. It’s the blond lad from earlier on.

Meanwhile Kat has fetched a couple more field dressings from the pockets of dead soldiers, and we place them carefully on the wound. The lad is looking at us with a fixed gaze.

‘We’ll go and get a stretcher now.’

But he opens his mouth and whispers, ‘Stay here —’

Kat says, ‘We’ll be back in a minute. We’re going to get a stretcher for you.’

It is impossible to say whether he understands or not; he whimpers like a child behind us as we go: ‘Stay here —’

Kat looks all round and then whispers, ‘Wouldn’t it be best just to take a revolver and put him out of his misery?’

The lad is not likely to survive being moved, and at the very most he’ll last a couple of days. But everything he’s been through so far will be nothing compared to those few days until he dies. At the moment he is still in shock and can’t feel anything. Within an hour he’ll be a screaming mass of unbearable agonies, and the few days he still has left to live will just be an incessant raging torture. And what difference does it make to anyone whether he has to suffer them or not?

I nod. ‘You’re right, Kat. The best thing would be a bullet.’ ‘Give me a gun,’ he says, and stops walking. I can see that he is set on it[111]. We look around – but we’re not alone any more. A small group is gathering near us, and heads are appearing out of the shell holes and trenches.

We bring a stretcher.