The next day the weather continued vile and the operations were indefinitely postponed. Therefore there was nothing further to do but to return to H.Q.
St. Quentin, for the present, was to me a blank, although I had continued for some time preparing all the scenes leading up to its capture.
The weather was changing, the ground was drying. Our line, just north of the town, was being pushed further forward. Holon-Selency, Francilly-Selency, Fayet and Villerete had fallen to our victorious troops, but the main attack was not yet.
To obtain scenes of our men actually in the front line trenches facing the town, I made my way through Savy and Savy Wood, in which not a single tree was left standing by the Bosche. Through the wood I carefully worked forward by keeping well under cover of a slight rise in the ground. I met a battalion commander on the way who kindly directed me to the best path to take.
"But be careful and keep your head down. Hun snipers are very active and he is putting shrapnel over pretty frequently. Although it doesn't hurt us—it evidently amuses him," he said, with a smile. "There is one section where you will have to run the gauntlet—for you are in full view of the lines. Keep down as low as possible."
I thanked the C.O. and went ahead. The weather was now perfect—a cloudless blue sky flecked here and there by the furry white balls of our bursting shrapnel around Hun aeroplanes, keeping them well above observation range.
I noticed a flight of our men winging their way over enemy lines. I could hear the rapid fire of the Bosche anti-aircraft guns, and see their black balls of shrapnel burst. But our birdmen went on their way without a moment's hesitation. I recalled the time when I was up among the clouds, filming the Bosche lines thirteen thousand feet above mother earth.
Suddenly a sharp crack, crack and whir of a machine-gun rang out. A fight was going on up there; our anti-aircraft guns ceased, being afraid of hitting our own men, but the Bosche still kept on.
It was impossible to see the progress of the fight; the whole flock was now directly overhead. Watching the "strafe" with such keen interest, this point quite escaped me until pieces of shrapnel began to fall around in alarming proportions, causing me to beat a hasty retreat out of range, though I still hung about in the hope of a Bosche machine being brought down, thereby providing me with a thrilling scene. But it did not happen. The airmen disappeared in a southerly direction, still fighting until the sharp cracks of the guns droned away in the distance.
In a few minutes I came in full view of one of our strong points in the shape of a disused quarry. Around the inner lip our Tommies had made a series of funk-holes, which looked quite picturesque in the bright sunlight.