Our first shot went plus, our second minus, our third scored a direct hit on the barricade. As the sandbags crumbled and the gray uniforms became plain, our infantry leapt from their places of hiding, charging up the gorge with their cold bayonets. We saw hands thrust up in an appeal for mercy, then nothing but khaki, stabbing and cheeking wildly. When we had hooked in and rode by five minutes later, four men in smoke-gray lay watching the sky with unblinking eyes. They were decent looking men, with flaxen hair and high complexions. They were perfectly ordinary individuals, with nothing either noticeably noble or brutal in their appearance. Had we encountered them as waiters in a London or New York restaurant, they would probably have proved entirely in keeping with their situation. By the accident of war they had been called upon to perform a deed quite as desperate as that of the Roman Horatius, who kept the bridge against unnumbered foes. The gorge was one of the keys to the great plain across which the Huns were retiring. These four men, single-handed, with no hope of saving their own lives, had held up our advance for half an hour against repeated infantry and cavalry charges, accounting for fully twenty times their own number in casualties. It was an act of superb sacrifice, which could only have been inspired by the highest sense of duty and patriotism. Had we met them in fable, we should have done them homage; meeting them where we did, we clubbed them like rats escaping from a cage. Even now that they were dead we detested them.
At the top of the gorge we struck a level stretch of country, which appeared to be surrounded by a solid belt of forest; but from the map we learnt that the forest was actually made up of separate woods between which passed channels of sward. Hidden in these separate woods were towns and villages, the spires of whose churches peeped above the trees and speared the horizon. Across the plain ran a net-work of white roads, some of which were mere tracks trampled out of the chalk by military traffic, others of which dated back to the days before the coming of the Germans. The main road was the one which we had shelled from our first position. It was littered with men, horses, broken limbers, guns and abandoned transport. A hospital-tent stood at a road-juncture with the Red Cross flag still flying. Whatever it had been used for, it had been stripped naked—not a cot or a bandage had been left. We cast our eyes across the green level for miles; there were all the signs of recent frenzy, but nothing stirred. It was uncanny, this sudden disappearance of men and armaments. There was fighting behind us—we could hear that. There was fighting to the right and left; but before us only the silence. We began to suspect that we had pressed on too hurriedly and were in front of our own attack. This suspicion was strengthened when one of our own batteries, far in the rear, opened fire on us, mistaking us for the enemy. To avoid their shells, we clapped spurs to our horses and went forward for yet another mile at the gallop. Then we halted behind a cutting to consider matters.
Our position was trying. We were utterly exhausted and only upheld by the excitement. We had food for neither horses nor men. The water in the men’s bottles had been expended on the wounded: the horses had had nothing to drink since noon. There was very little chance of the Major’s keeping his promise and sending us up our rations; the battery must have moved by now and neither they nor we had any knowledge as to each other’s whereabouts. To add to our complications Tubby’s arm proved to have been badly smashed by a machine-gun bullet and, though he would not own it, he was suffering intensely. The light was beginning to fail and within two hours darkness would have settled. It was absolutely essential that we should find food and water, and discover what was the military situation. If we were actually in front of our attack, then it was evident that our people-had lost touch with the enemy; in which case, under the cover of night, the enemy was likely to return. If he did, we and our outfit would be killed or captured.
Tubby refused to stay with the guns and rest, so we started out in separate directions to reconnoitre. Tubby went mounted on account of his arm being in a sling; I went on foot, since thus I should afford a smaller target. Throughout the day, as our difficulties and exhaustion had increased, he had grown gayer and more reckless. He had treated his broken arm as nothing; in the presence of his gallant high spirits none of us had dared to recognise hardship. As he rode away he flung back his old jest, “How’s your father?” Several of the men, not to be outdone in this game of brave pretence, shouted after him, “He’s all right, sir. Till the war ends he’s got his baggy pants on.”
My direction took me over to a long line of woods on the right, from which came the spiteful sound of rifles firing in volleys. The sun had begun to set; as I glanced across the plain I could see Tubby, trotting far out into a sea of shadows and greenness. I felt misgivings for his safety; we had no information as to what lay ahead. Presently I met an infantryman with a bandaged forehead, who confirmed my doubts. He told me that he and fourteen others had pressed on, keeping the enemy in sight and supposing that the rest of the advance was following. The enemy had made a stand; it was then they had discovered that they were out of touch and unsupported. “My mates,” he said, “I don’t know whether they’re alive or dead. They were holding out when I left; they sent me back for help. Fritzie was getting ready to counter-attack. He may be coming any moment.” He looked back apprehensively and, without waiting to say more, staggered on. I reached and entered my wood.
Bullets were tearing through the leaves and branches, going by with the hiss of serpents. Beneath the shadow of the trees I found stables and a camp; but the Huns, before they had cleared out, had loaded up every particle of food and forage. Nothing but the bare buildings were left. Following a track, I came to water-troughs, but it would be impossible to lead our horses down to them while the rifle-fire lasted. On the farther edge of the wood I came across our infantry.
They were lying flat on their stomachs and crawling from point to point on their hands and knees, sniping at the enemy. They were very few in numbers, over fifty per cent of their force having fallen during the day. By their vigilance and the rapidity of their fire they were trying to create the impression that they were stronger than they were. I found their colonel. He was not certain, but believed they were the Front-line. The tanks and the cavalry had disappeared entirely. They might be still pursuing; they might have been captured; they all might have become casualties. At any rate, the line of these woods was the front that he intended to maintain throughout the night; so I arranged to run a telephone wire up to him and to stand to throughout the hours of darkness in case of a surprise attack. One definite piece of information I gleaned from him—that his left flank was “up in the air.” Any time that the enemy discovered the fact, he could get round behind this handful of men; in the direction which Tubby had taken there was nothing between himself and the enemy.
Hurrying back through the wood I found, when I came out on the farther side, that my section had followed me. While I had been gone, the sergeants had also learnt that nothing stood between themselves and the Hun. When I asked them whether they had news of Mr. Grain they shook their heads; the last they had seen of him was an insignificant dot dwindling into the distant landscape. They had left two mounted men in the cutting to guide him on to us if he returned.
The horses were “all in” by this time from lack of water, so there was nothing for it but for some of us to take a chance and go down to the trough with buckets. I lost two of my best drivers there.
We had one piece of luck to console us. In my absence the men had run across some of our fallen cavalry and had collected sufficient oats from their feed-bags to go the rounds and sufficient rations from the haversacks of the dead to last the men.