All Quiet on the Western Front / На Западном фронте без перемен. Книга для чтения на английском языке

Geese! A glance towards Katczinsky; a glance back from him; we understand each other.

�Kat, I think I can hear a candidate for the cooking-pot —’

He nods. �We’ll do it when we get back. I know my way around here.’

Of course Kat knows his way around. I bet he knows every drumstick on every goose for miles.

The trucks reach the firing area. The gun emplacements are camouflaged with greenery against air reconnaissance[89 - air reconnaissance – воздушная разведка], and it all looks like a military version of that Jewish festival where they build little huts outdoors.

The air is getting hazy with smoke from the guns and fog. The cordite tastes bitter on the tongue. The thunder of the artillery fire makes our truck shake, the echo rolls on after the firing and everything shudders. Our faces change imperceptibly. We don’t have to go into the trenches, just on wiring duty, but you can read it on every face: this is the front, we’re within reach of the front.

It isn’t fear, not yet. Anyone who has been at the front as often as we have gets thick-skinned about it. Only the young recruits are jumpy. Kat gives them a lesson. �That was a twelve-inch. You can hear that from the report – you’ll hear the burst in a minute.’

But the dull thud of the shell-bursts can’t be heard at this distance. Everything is swallowed up in the rumble of the front. Kat listens carefully.

We all listen. The front is restless. �Tommy’s[90 - Tommy – прозвище солдат вооруженных сил Великобритании] already firing,’ says Kropp.

You can hear the guns clearly. It is the British batteries, to the right of our sector. They are starting an hour early. Ours never start until ten on the dot[91 - on the dot – ровно, точно].

�What’s up with them?’ calls out Muller. �Are their watches fast or something?’

�There’ll be a show, I tell you.

Three guns thunder out just beside us. The gun flash shoots away diagonally into the mist, the artillery roars and rumbles. We shiver, happy that we’ll be back in camp by tomorrow morning.

Our faces are no more flushed and no paler than they usually are; they are neither more alert nor more relaxed, and yet they are different.