A Fight to a Finish
A growl came from the man seated at the breech end of the machine-gun:
"Bah! It is smashed! That grenade has burst the casing and shaken the whole apparatus. Give me a rifle, one of you."
He searched in the darkness for the weapon, and indeed there were enough and to spare now, for the bomb which had lit in the chamber, and had exploded in that confined space, had damaged not a few of the defenders. It had stunned the majority of them, in fact, so that now, as they manned the barricade, they were half-stupid, more than half-deafened, and hardly knew what had happened. Henri and Jules, leaning against the bags and peering out into the darkness, could see the flash of men's rifles as they fired from below, and caught a glimpse of dusky figures. Then they felt the wall wobble, while something struck Henri a blow on the arm, and, stretching out his hand, he gripped first a pole and then an iron hook at the end of it. But it was only one of half a dozen such implements, which German cunning had suggested. They were at work then all about him. Those hooks caught in the upper layer of bags, and at once they were dragged outwards; Others followed, and even the storm of bullets from the rifles of the defenders could not stop them. Indeed, in quite a short space of time the better part of the barricade on which the defenders had counted had been swept away, dragged down the stairs, and flung into the passage.
"Bayonets ready!" shouted Henri grimly. "We have got to cut our way out of this place and through the Brandenburgers. Make ready!"
He could feel men swarming up beside him, and heard Jules at his left shouting encouragement to them. Then one of the poles armed with an iron hook, failing to catch a bag, became entangled in his clothing, and in a trice, before he knew where he was, Henri was dragged over the remnants of the wall, and found himself floundering down the stairway. A minute later, with a loud shout, the poilus charged over him, making play with their bayonets to right and to left, and driving the Germans backward. Then, in that narrow gallery at the foot of the stairway, and at the wide exit from the hall, there took place as desperate a combat as had ever been in the whole of this desperate warfare. Men used their bayonets till the weapons were beaten out of their hands, or clubbed their rifles and swung them overhead. Then, undefeated though outnumbered, they gripped their enemies about the waist and wrestled with them, while some, a few only, for the art does not come naturally to the poilu, dealt swinging blows with their fists, and, driving a way through the Germans, escaped into the passage. It was a mêlée in which all was confusion, in which shouts deafened the combatants, a pack of struggling, bellowing men, which seemed as if it would fill the place for ever, and which, as so often happens, suddenly burst asunder and scattered.
An hour later, when Henri recovered consciousness—for he had been stunned by his fall—he found himself lying at the foot of the stairway, his legs still resting on the last steps and his head on the narrow railway. A man lay across his body—a huge, beefy individual of extraordinary weight, who pressed him hard against the concrete. There were other men lying all about him—dead men, no doubt, for they made no movement—while the stairs themselves, what was left of the parapet of bags which he and his comrades had erected, and the entrance to the gun chamber above, were littered with soldiers, French and German. Strangely enough, though the place had been sunk in darkness during that last desperate attack, it was now illuminated, not brilliantly, it is true, but sufficiently for him to be able to make out his surroundings and to discern objects.
With a desperate effort, Henri contrived to throw off the dead weight which lay across him, and, raising his head slowly, peered in all directions, feeling dazed and shaken, and as yet hardly appreciating what had happened. Then, little by little, he realized the situation, realized that his band of noble poilus had broken up, that many, indeed, lay dead about him, and that the rest had scattered, perhaps had been dragged off as prisoners, and perhaps—and how he hoped it—had gained the open and had made their way back to the French lines.
"Better be careful. Better be a little cautious," he told himself, beginning to peer over the broad back of a man who lay beside him. "That's that hall in which the Brandenburgers had taken up their quarters. Why, they've a fire burning, and are eating a meal round it. And—and—who's that? I've seen that chap before; who is he?"
In his semi-dazed condition he was horribly puzzled, and, shading his eyes with one trembling hand, peered round the corner of the entrance to that hall at the group occupying its centre. There were perhaps a hundred Brandenburgers seated in a wide straggling ring round a fire which blazed in their midst, and which lit up their surroundings and threw long shadows upon what was left of the concrete walls of the fortress. The beams from those flickering flames fell too upon another group—a group, it seemed, of officers—occupying a retired corner, and upon two solitary individuals who stood near by under the eye of a sentry squatting on a block of masonry not far from them. It gave, no doubt, some indication of the strenuous time through which Henri had passed, and of his stunned condition, that it was quite two minutes before in one of those figures he recognized Jules—the jovial Jules, sadly dishevelled now, his helmet gone, his clothing torn, and a blood-stained handkerchief round his forehead. Yet it was the old Jules—that cheery, optimistic, unconquerable individual—looking about him with a careless air and watching the Brandenburgers as they laughed and smoked and chatted as if he would have gladly joined them. That, indeed, was one of the characteristics of the gallant Jules; he could fight like a tiger if need be, though always with a smile on his lips, and, when the time for fighting had gone, no more friendly individual could have been discovered. Yes, it was Jules, a prisoner, and with him another of the poilus who had formed one of Henri's party.
"Wait a moment! Jules right enough!" said Henri, still inclined to be doubtful; for his limbs shook, his head wobbled badly, and his eyes were bloodshot and almost incapable of seeing. "But, who's that other fellow—the chap up in the corner, with his helmet tilted back, that swaggering beggar who's laying down the law to the officers with him? Jingo! That man! Good Heavens!"
No wonder that he gave vent to such an exclamation, for now, as his shaken brain slowly cleared, and his eyes, becoming more accustomed to the flickering light, enabled him to see better, he realized that not only was his old friend a prisoner amongst the Brandenburgers, but that one of their officers—their commanding officer it seemed—was indeed none other than that individual whom he had accosted earlier. The man seemed to be dogging Henri's footsteps. For, consider: it was he who had followed the two young Frenchmen and the bulky Stuart along that tunnel when they were escaping from Ruhleben; it was he again with that party of officers into whose midst Henri and Jules had stumbled the other evening when out on a reconnaissance; and, once more, it was he who had demanded the surrender of the garrison manning that gun-chamber.
"Bah! He again!" growled Henri. "When lots of other Brandenburgers—better Brandenburgers, I should say—have been killed by our fire, he is still living, and he's the man who wanted to shoot us out of hand down in the forest. Wonder whether he's recognized Jules already?"
He had no need to wonder for very long, for hardly had he made this last discovery when the officer in question—that arrogant, snappy little individual, who peered about him with an indefinite something which stamped him as a man of lower caste, one who had gained promotion from the ranks—rose to his feet, a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, and swaggered towards the prisoners, his hands thrust deep in his pockets, his head pushed forward, and a truculent, domineering, brutal air about him. Halting in front of the two prisoners, he gave them the benefit of a stare which would have been rude at any time, and which even warfare hardly excused, and then, without the smallest warning, so swiftly in fact that Henri was staggered, he suddenly drew one hand out of his pocket and dealt Jules a blow across the jaw with his open hand which sent that young fellow staggering.
"Ha, ha! That moved you," the German laughed, turning his head over his shoulder to make sure that his brother officers had watched the movement. "That's stirred you up, my friend! Yes, my friend—for don't forget we have met before, haven't we? What, you don't remember? Then let me tell you: at Ruhleben, my friend, my Frenchman—at Ruhleben, where I happen to remember very thoroughly the manner in which you treated me. Do you forget, then? Do you deny that it was you who crept through that tunnel, and, breaking a hole through the earth beyond the entanglements, reached the open; and later, when I followed—having dared the journey along the tunnel—you and that huge brute of an Englishman—that swine of an Englishman—who was with you, pulled me up as if I were a puppy and threw me back again, shaking the teeth out of my head almost? Burr!"
The little dried-up German officer's eyes flashed vengefully as he spoke of the matter, and he was all the more incensed an instant later when, rather anticipating some fun—for to the German comrades of this officer the ill-treatment of a prisoner was certainly fun—these men drew nearer, and, hearing his words, one of them—a huge, fat, unwieldy person, with flabby cheeks and pendulous chin, to say nothing of the huge girth which he presented—giggled and chortled loudly, and suddenly placed a heavy hand on the lieutenant's shoulder—a hand the weight of which caused him to stagger.
"Drew you out like a puppy, ho?" he shouted. "Drew our dear Max up out of the earth as a bird draws a worm; and then had the daring, the effrontery, to dash our immaculate, if not extremely dignified friend backward till his teeth shook. Ho! That's fun! And how one would like to see the thing repeated!"
The steely-grey eyes of Lieutenant Max turned towards this hulking German, and shot at him a glance which was angry and threatening, a glance, however, which failed altogether to impress the man who had addressed him. For this hulking officer roared with laughter, and shook to such an extent that the wreaths of fat on his body wobbled.
"But this is fine!" he shouted, "We have roused the lion in our little Max, and he is angry—angry with me, mark you, my friends—because I would like to see repeated something which no doubt was most entertaining. But, surely, Max, you were not defeated by this fellow, this puny Frenchman?"
The big German ran a pair of critical eyes over the dishevelled figure of Jules, standing helpless before him, eyes which nevertheless did not fail to note the determined look of this young man, his unflinching attitude, and the gleam of anger which came from behind his eyes, and which threatened retaliation. Yes, at that very moment the impetuous Jules, stung by the blow which Max had dealt him, and understanding every word that passed, was on the eve of throwing himself upon the German; and then, as he glanced from one to the other, and helplessly round the hall at the backs of the Brandenburgers—indifferent to what befel their prisoners—to the exit from that hall and the stairway beyond it, at the summit of which he and Henri and those other comrades had put up such a fight, his wandering eyes lit upon the figures of Germans and Frenchmen—the fallen men who had grappled at the foot of the stairs—and, passing from one to another, came upon a face, an eager face, wherein two eyes were set—eyes which were staring hard in his direction. The face moved, while the owner of it sat up a little and held up a warning finger.
"Henri!" exclaimed Jules, and at once took command of himself, and pulled his somewhat shaken frame up at attention.
"What's that?" demanded the big German abruptly. "See, Max, he is defying you, this fellow. And you say that he drew you out of the earth and threw you back, almost shaking the teeth out of your head? Unbelievable! Yet, if it is true, why, no Brandenburger will sit still under such an insult."
The jeering laughter of this giant, the covert smiles and the outspoken remarks of other German officers, sent the blood flaring again to Max's cheeks. He scowled, first at one and then at others of his comrades; and, turning once more to the prisoner, and catching at that moment a gleam of defiance from his eyes, struck out again with one hand and almost floored the unfortunate and helpless Jules.
"That to commence with," he told him, "and then to finish the matter. I don't forget, mind you, the blow that you landed on my body in that forest the other night. No, believe me, I, Max, forget nothing of that sort. Then I would have had you shot out of hand, though the occasion was not convenient; but now there is no reason why the execution should not be carried out. You are an escaped prisoner of war; you have assaulted a German officer in the execution of his duty; and here you are, captured, defying the captors of the Fort of Douaumont. March him to the far end of the hall, and call out half a dozen of those guzzling fellows to shoot him."
The armed sentry, who had stood by all this while, taking but little notice of the scene, looking tired and bored and as if he longed to join his comrades, pulled himself together, and, shouldering his rifle, gave a husky order.
"Over there!" he called. "Stand up against the wall! Sergeant Huefer, the officer requires a shooting-party."
The selfsame Sergeant Huefer, at that moment engaged in finishing a hasty meal, looked round and scowled; and then, seeing the snappy little German officer, called Max, looking at him, stood up promptly.
"A shooting-party, sir?" he asked.
"A shooting-party," came the abrupt answer. "Draw them up in front of those two prisoners."
"Two!" exclaimed the big German officer, who with the others was watching the scene.
"Yes, two," snapped Max, swinging round upon him, ready to vent his anger on any one of them.
"But wait! Not two; one only—the escaped prisoner of war, who struck you."
The big German and this snappy little fellow, Max, stared at one another, the former looking urbane and jovial and unconcerned, whilst Max was trembling with rage. He could have kicked this big German who ventured to obstruct him, and who seemed about to thwart his purpose. Yet Max was a careful individual, who had indeed worked his way upwards in the German army, and obtained slow if certain promotion, by constant observation of the regulations. The shooting of captured Frenchmen was one thing—a common enough thing no doubt—but disobedience, defiance of a senior officer, was an altogether different matter, and this big, hulking German happened to be Max's senior by a very slender margin. So slender, indeed, that the position was almost doubtful. Indeed, at that moment neither Max nor this big German could say which of the two was the senior in rank, and entitled to command this party, though it happened that the bigger of the two was not a Brandenburger, but belonging to some other corps, who had by chance fallen in with the party told off to attack the fort of Douaumont, and so found himself amidst its captors. For a moment, then, the two regarded one another, Max flaming with anger, defiant, on the point of abruptly ordering this hulking individual to mind his own business. And then that sense of discretion which had helped him in the past came to his assistance, and he forced a smile—an unwilling smile—while his eyes flashed a vengeful glance at his opponent.
"Then you object?" he asked sharply. "Well, then, let it be one—the prisoner of war. We will shoot him, and get it over quickly. Sergeant, march the firing-party forward, I will give the word to shoot."
Still shaken, his head swimming yet after that struggle on the stairway, his bloodshot eyes fixed upon the figures of Jules, of the officers, and of Sergeant Huefer and the party of men he was now parading, Henri never felt more helpless in all his life before. He felt pinned to the spot, incapable of action; and, indeed, common sense—what little of it he still possessed after the blow which had rendered him unconscious—told him that action of any sort was useless. Yet, could he see a friend, an old chum, a comrade as dear to him as any brother, shot down in cold blood in front of these leering men? Could he watch him put up as a target, to be butchered by these unfeeling Germans? No. The thought that Jules's fate hung heavily in the balance, that some desperate action on his part might bring him assistance, spurred Henri to movement, and, rising to his knees, he groped his way towards the entrance to the hall wherein the firing-party were then assembling. As he crawled across the bodies then littering the gallery along which the tiny railway ran, and crossed the foot of the stairway, his hand lit upon a rifle, which he seized instantly and raised to his shoulder. Then he dropped it again, for the movement was too much for him, and, stumbling forward, fell on his face, his head swimming once more, his brain in a whirl, and his pulses beating in his ears till he was deafened. It was just at the moment when Sergeant Huefer, undisturbed by the task allotted to him, in fact, eager to finish off the prisoner and get back to his meal, gave a short, sharp order and set his firing-squad in motion, that Henri's outstretched fingers came into contact with another object—a round, cylindrical object attached to a short stick, a hand-grenade, one of those bombs which had helped to blow in the barricade which he and his gallant poilus had erected at the top of the stairway.
With an effort he pulled himself together, and, gripping the stick, felt for the safety-pin, removal of which would allow explosion of the grenade once it came into contact with any body. Then, rising to his knees, and unsteadily to his feet, he stretched out his left hand to the wall, while with his right he swung the hand-grenade backwards and forwards. By then the firing-party had been halted in front of Jules, who, head in air and arms folded, stood against the far wall.
"Load!" he heard the command ring out and echo down the gallery. "Present!"
Up went the rifles to the shoulders.
Henri gave a sharp jerk to the handle of the grenade as he loosened his hold of it, and sent it flying forward into the hall, where it landed a moment later—landed, indeed, within a foot of the fire which the men had built in the centre of this big place, and about which they had been seated. There followed a blinding flash, a thundering detonation, and then shouts and shrieks and groans, and clouds of dust and falling debris. An instant later, Henri had fallen backward into the gallery, and lay, much as he had lain before, among the bodies of those who had taken part in the fight on the stairway.
