"I don't like going up that road over the hill," said I. "We will be in sight of the Huns for some distance. I wonder if this house boasts a cellar?"
Examination showed a cellar existed, but it was nearly full of water.
"I guess the cellar steps provide the best roosting-place," was my conclusion. "Me for the lowest one for a bit. Won't you share it with me?"
"I don't like it," replied Nicholson. "We will be much better out of it. Let's go."
We argued the various possibilities, but Nicholson was so strongly in favour of departure that I acquiesced, and we started away.
We had gone about one hundred feet when a series of crashes close behind us quickened my pace. Nicholson turned and looked. I called to him, and he again came on.
As he came up he said: "Did you see where that lot landed?" "No," I answered. "Too close to suit me, but just where I didn't notice."
"It interested me," said he, as we pushed on, "because all four of those shells exploded in that rickety old house in which you were so keen on taking cover. But little would be left of us by now had we stayed, for the poor building collapsed like a house of cards."
The Germans shelled the road vigorously as we kept on, but luckily the shrapnel fell behind us, and we were soon back in Ypres.