Battlewrack

by F. Britten Austin

The brigade waited, but no further orders came. For the moment their work was done. The guns stretched across the field, their muzzles elevated, like a row of silent, expectant dogs. The lieutenant commanding the adjacent section came up and asked the subaltern for a cigarette. The subaltern gave it, repressing a smile. That lieutenant never had any cigarettes.

As he relaxed from the strain of those few furious minutes the subaltern felt suddenly hungry. He remembered that he had filled a pocket with biscuits and munched at one as he gazed idly along the battery. Fitfully his mind returned to the brief activity of his guns and he contemplated the recollection with comfort. Never had he lost mastery over himself. He was a man tried and proved.

With a vague dull curiosity he watched the group by the wood on the hill above him. Members of it were moving to and fro. He noticed one figure standing with both hands up to his face, his elbows sticking out. He was examining something through his glasses. The subaltern wondered whether it was the colonel and the thought came to him that on a word from that man he and his fellows might be hurried to death as if to execution. Every minute, orderlies rode at speed up to the group.

Presently an order came to the battery. It opened fire again, this time deliberately, without haste, at 2500 yards and in a slightly different direction. Again the subaltern appealed to the captain for information.

"Infantry advancing. We've only got a screen there. Sixth Corps coming into action on our right. We're filling the gap between it and the Second Corps. Enemy are trying to break through."

"Oh," said the subaltern, "we're in for a hot time, I suppose." He said it carelessly, without any idea of what was coming.

"We most certainly are," said the captain. The emphasis of the reply startled the subaltern, made him feel uneasy. He devoted himself to his guns in an effort to banish the anxiety which threatened him. The gun-squads were working with unhurried precision. A man kneeling behind the wagon drew out the long projectile, set the fuze, passed the shell to his fellow at the gun, the breech was closed, the lever pulled, and the gun spoke with an exactly equal interval between rounds. They might have been feeding a machine in a factory, so regular, so unemotional was the operation. Behind the wagon the ground was littered with the canvas cartridge clips. Behind the gun the flung-back brass cartridge cases mounted to a heap. In front the air was blurry with gases. Away to the right a new series of reports broke out. More batteries had evidently come into action. Coalescing all individual sounds the general clamour of the battle swelled in surges of hideous noise from one deep-toned, continuous roar. The subaltern became habituated to it, scarcely noticed it.

Happening to look round he saw a howitzer battery coming into the field. A few minutes later the regular sequence of its detonations told him it had got to work. It was evident that troops were being hurried up to meet the threatened attack. Along the hill-side to the right a line of infantry was strung out, advancing towards the wood. Another followed it. When he turned again he saw more infantry entering the field and deploying. He got a glimpse of the road filled with brown caps that just showed above the hedges. Almost immediately the battery ceased fire. Only the periodic discharges of the howitzers continued. The battery commander was kneeling over a map spread upon the ground. Up by the little wood a heliograph was flashing rapidly. A little further on a couple of men were flag-wagging with vigour. Some crisis was approaching. Behind him the infantry commenced to advance. On his left front a couple of men spurred horses up the flank of the bare hill-side.

The infantry passed the battery in their advance, the company that had remained in column to avoid the guns deploying into the line. Another line of supports followed and behind them another. They went steadily up the hill, the two scouts from the battery passing through them as they galloped back. The subaltern thrilled with a sense of imminent danger. As yet he had seen no shell burst. Now it was going to begin. The howitzer battery still fired over the heads of the advancing troops.

Up and up went the first line. The subaltern watched it with a throbbing heart. It opened its files as it went, and, when nearly to the crest, broke into a steady run. It reached the summit. For a moment it showed black against the sky. Now? Nothing. The line disappeared over the hill. The second line mounted, doubled, showed against the sky and instantly a crowd of smoke-puffs leaped into the air above it. He saw tiny figures knocked all ways to the ground and immediately afterwards a run of sharp crashes came to his ears. The line disappeared over the hill, leaving behind figures that lay still and figures that tried to crawl out of the way of the third line. He watched them, fascinated, through his glasses. The third line advanced, undaunted. The crowd of smoke-puffs broke out again ere it reached the summit and continued while it passed. When it had gone, the subaltern noted an increase in the number of prostrate figures. Behind him more infantry collected in the field but no more advanced. The hostile shrapnel continued to burst over an empty hill-side. Presently it ceased. From the other side of the hill arose a furious, feverish crackling, noticeable even in the general uproar. The battery waited for it knew not what.