The Long Green Shore by John Hepworth

the boards and the rest of the field nowhere.
    â€˜Well, Bertha, she’s jumping up and down and screaming for this Poppies Pride to come on! Come on!
    â€˜Then, of a sudden, she stops and sits down quiet and clasps her hands and looks at Bigfoot Bill and says in a gentle voice, sort of reverently: “Fall, you bastard, fall.”
    â€˜And the next hurdle Bigfoot Bill runs slap bang into it, falls arse over head and breaks his neck. Poppies Pride romps home and Bertha collects and I get my quid back.
    â€˜So, I wouldn’t altogether disbelieve in the power of prayer.’
    Cairo, the Log and Fluffy sat together on the edge of the end bed, facing into the darkness towards the sea.
    â€˜You won’t find it so bad,’ the Log was saying, quietly. ‘You’ll be frightened—everyone is—but you’ll get through it. You go through it with your mates, you rely on them, they rely on you. The worst is the loneliness—not so bad in the jungle, but down the desert—when you’re moving forward under fire, strung out in a thin line five yards apart, you get awful lonely. You find yourself edging over to the bloke next to you—it makes you feel better to be close to someone. But that’s a bad thing—keep scattered, keep apart all the time, then if they get you they only get one—if you’re together, the whole group cops it.’
    He nodded his head towards the crowded tent: ‘They’ll fight well, these boys…’
    â€˜Hell, there’ll always be wars, Harry,’ said Janos for argument. ‘It’s in the nature of man.’
    â€˜Then change his nature,’ said Pez.
    â€˜Is it the nature of man?’ demands Harry Drew. ‘Or is it the nature of those who lead him, of those who sell and buy?
    â€˜Is it man’s nature to destroy himself? To shut himself away from all the comfort of the world? Think! Think! While ever there are a hundred million people in the world who parrot like you that war is man’s nature—that wars will always be—then there’s no hope for us. There’s enough blindness and treachery in the high places without ordinary people turning to hatred and stupid cant.
    â€˜There’s probably not one of you really knows what he’s fighting for. You never think! All you can do is parrot that there’ll always be wars. It’s only by chance that you are fighting this time on the right side. It’s just that man is really good at heart, that injustice stirs him to anger of itself, that he will fight for liberty by instinct. Man progresses despite himself—out of a thousand, million blundering years…’
    â€˜But we progress,’ insisted Pez. ‘We progress.’
    â€˜Sure, we progress,’ said Harry. ‘We have done wonders! We have conjured new life, new states, new miracles of machines from the earth and air since the century turned. But how much faster, how much further, could we go if you and all the other millions like you realised your power and fought for that?’
    â€˜But you can’t do without the moneyed man,’ said young Bishie evilly.
    â€˜Can’t do without the moneyed man!’ snarled Harry Drew in disgust. ‘How long will it take you mugs to realise that the moneyed man can’t do without you?’
    â€˜Now, now,’ said Janos soothingly. ‘Don’t do the nana. Take it easy. Keep your shirt on.’
    â€˜I’m not doing the nana!’ yelled Harry Drew. ‘I’m trying to drum some sense into your bloody thick skulls.’
    â€˜Gentlemen!’ said Whispering John, ducking in under the tent flap.
    There was a sudden silence and he looked at them with an important malignant grin: ‘Now you new blokes are going to get your feet in the mud. It’s on—we’re moving tomorrow.’
    Everyone felt that faint thrill of coolness in their hearts. No fear, but a tightening of