“This is nice muck-up,” said the Weasel to Lethbridge. “Strict orders not to fire after ten-thirty. The line dished and the Lord knows what may be happening.”
A man, telephone-case on his arms, climbed out of the trench; began making his way up the wire.
At the end of the gun-line, by an emptying ammunition-wagon, Peter stood talking to Bromley. They looked towards Vermelles. Suddenly, under a gray smoke-puff they saw a horseman at full gallop; behind him—drivers bending low in their saddles, whips plying,—a six-horse team came hell for leather, and behind the team, a leaping bumping thing on wheels. “Charge of the horse-artillery?” laughed Bromley. “No,” said Peter, “Lodden’s missing gun.” The team arrived with a clatter and jingle at the cross-roads. Lodden leapt by. They heard his furious voice. “Who told you to gallop, Bombardier? Who the hell told you to gallop?” Drivers grinning from their sweating mounts, the gun creaked past.
“Hurry up with those shells, you chaps,” said Bromley to his gunners. . . .
There jog-trotted slowly to the cross-roads a young Staff officer. He put hand to eyes, shading them from the sun; said, “Good Lord, it’s Peter”; trotted over to the guns. The horseman in the creaseless tunic looked very out of place, as he leaned from his saddle talking to the unshaven tired-eyed Gunners.
“What are you doing up here, Francis?” asked Peter.
“Trying to find Le Rutoire, and a prisoner or two. That’s it, I suppose.” He switched riding-stick towards the red buildings in front. “What’s supposed to be happening here—a battle?”
The three stood gossiping. The ammunition wagon, empty of its contents, wheeled past them; trotted across the field. “Well, so long,” said Francis, “I must be off.” He puts his horse to a trot. . . .
Peter heard the shell scream; flung himself on his face; heard the burst of it, the clods falling about him. “Christ!” he thought, “Francis. . . .”
Bromley, unhurt, was first to reach the bloody kicking heap at the roadside. Even as he came to it, the kicking legs jerked convulsively—the beast rolled over—lay still. Peter, rushing up, saw a gaping, steaming belly, a scarlet boot protruding from it. . . . Together, they dragged out the tortured thing that had been Francis Gordon. He lay there, face dead white, just muttering. Only the upper part of his body seemed human—the rest was blood, blood and dirt.