By this time every wire to headquarters was cut by the enemy artillery. If they were allowed to attack, the companies in the trench would be annihilated and the hard-earned position lost. The situation was desperate.
Only one chance of averting disaster remained.
A runner must get through with a message to our artillery asking them to smash the German attack. Private Harry Brown and another runner undertook to deliver the message. When they set out on their desperate mission a hostile barrage was raking the open behind the newly occupied ground, the enemy's intention being to prevent supports coming up. The messengers had to get through this curtain of fire, a curtain under which nearly every yard of ground was being churned into a mess or torn up savagely in tons and tossed on high as if by some unseen Brobdignagian hand.
They had gone but a little way on their adventurous journey when one was killed and Brown was left, the only link between his isolated battalion and its hope of succour. If he failed to get through his comrades would be wiped out to a man.
He continued to stumble along, sinking into new, smoking craters, now and then up to the waist, dragging himself out and crawling through the debris, lying still for short intervals till the shock of the explosions had passed. Flying missiles hit him and shattered an arm. He was bleeding and exhausted. He sat down, dazed and uncomprehendingly. But his will forced him to his feet again. He staggered onward towards the support lines, walking like a man in a dream, his brain in constant dark motion, his thoughts in a flux even as the ground on which he strove for a footing.
It was a pained, dreary thing, sore and weary, that kept doggedly crawling and staggering on through the intensity of the shrapnel and the high explosive. His strength ran from him with the blood from his mangled arm. His steps were automatic. The last part of the journey was the worst. It was his Via Dolorosa.
An officer standing in a dug-out in the support line was peering out at the devastation which the enemy artillery was spreading so prodigally. Shells rained on every side, the earth shuddered and shrank at every blow. But the telephone to headquarters was working.
A dark form crawled out of the ruin and stumbled towards the dug-out. It was a soldier—hatless, pale, dirty, haggard, one arm hanging limp and bloody by his side, his clothing torn and stained. He reached the steps of the dug-out, and seeing the officer, tried to descend. But his strength was gone, his limbs refused to act. He fell down the short stairway, spent—utterly spent and dying.
The officer lifted him gently and brought him into the dug-out and laid him down. Then Brown handed over his precious slip of paper.