Two hours later, the guns still thundering, the marines started up the road on which the Frenchman had flagged Hal the night before. A hundred yards beyond where he had encountered the marines lay a dead German. Near him was a machine gun placed to command that road.
This road was a replica of other roads. If anything, the congestion was worse than it had been the day before.
Huge trees, uprooted by giant shells, required detours while the engineers worked like beavers to clear away the massive tops. Reserve tanks and artillery lined either side of the road. Ambulances now mixed with the various wagons of war.
Weaving in and out through the traffic came the walking wounded; Germans bearing improvised stretchers and batches of from ten to twenty prisoners. The air was peopled with aeroplanes. The sharp chatter of machine guns occasionally rose above the rumble of the artillery.
In their first encounter of any moment with the Boche the marines learned many things. They learned that the German infantry had a horror of hand-to-hand fighting, and would run or surrender rather than try such combat. They learned that the sole protection of the Boche artillery lay in the effectiveness of front-line machine guns and its own accuracy. They came to believe the backbone of the German infantry was its artillery. Such a situation in any army, they knew, must have a demoralizing effect. The infantry should be the backbone of the artillery.
Meantime the American battalion to which Hal and Chester were attached took up a position at the edge of the woods and awaited orders. After the first excitement had passed, the attention of the troops fell back to their empty stomachs. They counted again the hours since their last meal. They totalled forty-two. For that many years, it seemed, they had been without food, sleep and water rations, and had worked as men had never worked before.
Then the miracle happened. A big truck drew up by the roadside and began to dump boxes—boxes of canned beef, tomatoes, prunes and bread. Fifteen minutes later there were a thousand happy marines in that section, ravenously gulping down a real “feed” and quenching their thirst.
But war considers no man’s pleasure. In the midst of the feast came the rattle and clatter of machine guns, temporarily acting as aerial defense.
Came sweeping down from the sky four aeroplanes, directly over where Hal and Chester stood conversing.
“The Iron Cross!” cried Sergeant Bowers.