The action unfolds in the confined area of a dugout on the Western Front. Stanhope, a British Army officer, shattered by the strain of 3 years' fighting, turns to liquor to bolster his courage. Osborne, his righthand man and a philosophical schoolmaster, tries to reassure young Raleigh, fresh from school, to the satisfaction of Stanhope, whom the boy optimistically worships as a college hero. Although Stanhope, who loves Raleigh's sister, resents the boy's presence, he is crushed by the boy's spirit and loyalty in battle. He confesses his own fears to Hibbert, a coward who feigns illness to avoid fighting; Osborne and Raleigh are selected to lead a raiding party on the German trenches, and Osborne calms the boy by quoting from Alice in Wonderland and talking of home. Many men, including Osborne, die in the raid, and Stanhope drowns his grief in drink; a rift develops between him and the boy until Raleigh is mortally wounded. Friendless and grief-stricken, he goes to face another furious attack.