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Updated: May 20, 2025
Away behind him lay the trenches he had just quitted, peaceful and still in the faint moonlight; and looking to his front he could see the German lines, just as still, only much closer. He tried to realise that he was shortly going to be inside those trenches, and that when he got there he would meet real live men, who would endeavour to kill him, Samuel Pipston.
All soldiers must learn the first lesson; only a limited number can learn the second and third. So it came about that for the good of his soul Reginald played a very minor part in this raid, and my information on the doings that occurred in the Hun lines was obtained from the lips of one Samuel Pipston, sometime auctioneer's assistant, who had joined the battalion with the last draft.
The little dear with a cracked jaw, and a face reminiscent of Hindenburg on the morning after, looked the part. . . . But I have neglected Samuel Pipston. As I mentioned, he was a bomber, and he was also excited.
He don't quite know how he killed him; in fact, it is quite on the cards that it wasn't he who killed him at all. The fact remains that the German died; and whether it was the sergeant, or whether it was the subaltern, or whether it was Samuel, is immaterial. All that matters is that as far as motive and endeavour went Samuel Pipston killed his first rat, and gloried in the operation.
Every new draft that came heard the story; every new draft realised it had got something to live up to. No longer sand bags and smells their horizon, but the memory of one glorious half-hour. And when he thought over it afterwards, there was only one small thing that struck Samuel Pipston as peculiar.
He was just retailing to Reginald Simpkins with some wealth of detail his experiences in the German dug-out, when he became aware of the Honourable James beside him, who listened for a while until he had finished. "So you had a good time did you, Pipston?" he remarked. "Splendid!" Then he turned to Simpkins.
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