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A haunting melody wove through the air and pulled Eugéne from his silent vigil beside their camp's burial site. It was hardly a grave for any of the dozen men buried there, tossed as they were into a pit he and his comrades had dug once the surgeons and chaplains had confirmed they bore no infection. They were among the lucky few of those who were given a burial at all; more often than not, the armies marched on with little care paid for the dead. Such was the way of things, such was the way it had to be.
These were the thoughts he was pulled from, and he looked for the lone fifer. The man sat some yards away, at one of the few fires amongst the tents and exposed bedrolls. He was dressed down to his waistcoat, whatever jacket he wore to distinguish his regiment out of sight. Eugéne watched him, wary but curious, and waited for somebody else to move first.
It took only a minute for someone to do so. A man wearing a scarlet jacket with green facings joined the fifer and sat on the ground, leaning back on one arm with the other resting on a bent knee. A third man, dressed similar to the second but whose jacket was a darker red, joined them and set down a pair of glasses. The second man took one and took a long draught from it with his eyes closed. The third man followed suit, and when he was done he began to sing.
How stands the glass around? For shame, ye take no care, my boys.
The second man joined in, deep voices intertwining in the night to form a melancholy trio.
The trumpet sounds, the colors, they are flying, boys, to fight, kill, or wound. May we still be found content with our hard fate, my boys, on the cold ground.
The meaning of the English words were lost on Eugéne, but a cold shiver ran through him. As he stood and watched, more British men trickled out from their tents to join the trio and add their voices. It seemed ethereal, the firelight flickering across the men's faces, tipped back to meet the moon in a shared, mournful soliloquy.
It felt an eternity before the last warbling note of the fife tapered off into silence, and the gathered men slowly dispersed once more. The fifer lowered his instrument and looked at his two companions, who remained at the fire with him. They conversed softly, whatever spell had overtaken them broken.
Something brushed Eugéne's arm, and he jumped back with a defensive fist raised before recognizing it as the touch of another man. "Alexi," he greeted, none too happily. With effort, his hand returned to his side. The younger man approached again, close enough to talk almost directly into his ear.
"What do you make of that?" he asked. With no fire of his own, his expression was unreadable in the dark. Eugéne shrugged.
"You have better English than I," he replied noncommittally. "What the lobsters get up to is of no concern to me."
"Oh, come on. It was about soldiering, why resent it when we chose to join."
"I'm tired, Alexi."
"Well, alright. Where's your bedroll? Or do you have a tent? Might I join you?"
"No, you might not. A Prussian will not be taken to well, even now." His head cocked, and he may have smiled.
"Then goodnight, Eugéne. We can talk tomorrow." He spared not a glance to the overturned mound of earth as he turned and sauntered off from wherever he had came.
Eugéne returned his attention back to the paltry grave, and a line of the Englishmen's song worked its way out of his throat before he, too, departed.