The reply came like a shot from a gun,
"The Germans have reached Charleroi!"
Horace pondered for a minute to think what this might mean, then raised himself on his elbow, suddenly wide-awake.
"That smashes the corner!" he cried. "They've pierced our line! The whole strategy is gone!"
"Not quite," said the hunchback grimly, "but unless something happens to-morrow, it will be smashed."
Therein, Croquier was right. The next day, Saturday, August 22, Von Buelow attacked Charleroi in full strength. The two main bridges east and west of the city, at Chatelet and Thuin, fell under the impact of the combined light and heavy field howitzers, and, before noon, Charleroi was in German hands. Von Buelow thrust swiftly round the eastern end of the Fifth French Army, in order to roll up its flank and force it into the arms of Von Kluck for annihilation.
"Unless something happens to-morrow!" Croquier had said.
That something did happen.
The Chasseurs d'Afrique, Turco and Zouave troops which had been detached from the Fourth Army to help the Belgians at Namur, arrived unexpectedly in Charleroi during the middle of the engagement. They were too late to keep the Germans from entering the city, but not too late to drive them out again, not too late to put a spike in Von Buelow's plan to flank the Fifth Army.
In all the history of modern war, there has never been more savage street-fighting, hand to hand, tooth and claw, sword and bayonet, than in Charleroi. The Germans were more than five to one, but they could not stand cold steel. The onslaught of the French colonials was a spume of wrath that the invaders dared not face. They fled like gray rats.