The next day was so misty that you could see practically nothing over five hundred yards, and the new post was useless. The following day it had frozen again, and an inch of snow lay on the ground. It was a sunny morning, and from the new post all Fricourt lay in full view before me. How well I remember every detail of that city of the dead! In the centre stood the white ruin of the church, still higher than the houses around it, though a stubby stump compared to what it must have been before thousands of shells reduced it to its present state. All around were houses; roofless, wall-less skeletons all of them, save in a few cases, where a red roof still remained, or a house seemed by some magic to be still untouched. On the extreme right was Rose Cottage, a well-known artillery mark; just to its left were some large park-gates, with stone pillars, leading into Fricourt Wood; and just inside the wood was a small cottage—a lodge, I suppose. The extreme northern part of the village was invisible, as the ground fell away north of the church. I could see where the road disappeared from view; then beyond, clear of the houses, the road reappeared and ran straight up to the skyline, a mile further on. A communication trench crossed this road: (I remember we saw some men digging there one morning). With my glasses I could see every detail; beyond the communication trench were various small copses, and tracks running over the field; and on the skyline, about three thousand yards away, was a long row of bushes.
And just to the left of it all ran the two white lace-borders of chalk trenches, winding and wobbling along, up, up, up until they disappeared over the hill to La Boiselle. Sometimes they diverged as much as three hundred yards, but only to come in together again, so close that it was hard to see which was ours and which the German. Due west of Fricourt church they touched in a small crater chain.
It was a fascinating view. I could not realise that there lay a French village; I think we often forgot that we were on French soil, and not on a sort of unreal earth that would disappear when the war was over; especially was No Man’s Land a kind of neutral stage, whereon was played the great game. To a Frenchman, of course, Fricourt was as French as ever it had been. But I often forgot, when I watched the shells demolishing a few more houses, that these were not German houses deserving of their fate. Perhaps people will not understand this: it is true, anyway.
I was drawing a sketch of the village, when lo! and behold! coolly walking down the road into Fricourt came a solitary man. I had to think rapidly, and decide it must be a German, because the thing was so unexpected; I could not for the moment get out of my head the unreasonable idea that it might be one of our own men! However, I soon got over that.
“Sight your rifle at two thousand yards,” said I to Morgan, who was with me. “Now, give it to me.”
Carefully I took aim. I seemed to be holding the rifle up at an absurd angle. I squeezed, and squeezed——
The German jumped to one side, on to the grass at the side of the road, and doubled for all he was worth out of sight into Fricourt! Needless to say, I did not see him again to get another shot!
“They’ve been using that road last night, sir,” said 58 Morgan, while I was taking a careful bearing on my empty cartridge case. (A prismatic compass is invaluable for taking accurate cross-bearings.)
“Yes,” I said. “Why yes, of course, they must have used it last night. I never thought of that. Good. We’ll get the artillery on there to-night, and upset their ration-carts.”