Summary

It is Saturday Evening, mid-January, 1917 and five French soldiers who have been convicted of self-mutilation are being marched through a trench full of mud, and muddied soldiers, to a destination they do not know. The first man in the line is called Eskimo but his number is 2124. He is 37-years-old, a carpenter, and a decorated soldier who had taken prisoners in 1915. He is not guilty of his crime, having shot himself in the hand accidentally while attempting to pull a gray hair from his head. He is wearing German boots.

Number 4077, a welder with a wife and two daughters, is next in line. He really has shot himself, but he has done it just to be among the group. It was a sign of unity; there had been twenty-eight of them. Eventually, he thinks, they will all refuse to fight. He is called Six-Soux.

Third...