There was a gentle sound overhead, like the cry of a wounded bird. An aide-de-camp crossing the hill-top fell with a groan. A bearer-party marked with the Red Cross appeared from behind the tower and swiftly bore him out of sight.
Schwab flattened himself as much as his rotund form permitted against the floor of the trench. The cannonade was resumed with redoubled fury. The din was incessant; shells whistling and shrieking; musketry crackling; the Russian batteries in their emplacements thundering as they replied to the Japanese.
Whole ranks of the Japanese were mowed down in the fields; still they pressed on. They were attempting to turn the Russian right. Reinforcements were hurried to the threatened regiments; battery answered battery; the ground trembled under the repeated shocks. The attack was repulsed, and long blood-stained tracks marked the path of the bearers as they conveyed thousands of wounded to the rear. Stackelberg had held his own.
Dusk was falling, the rain ceased, and a steaming mist rose over the ground. There was a lull in the firing. Jack stood upon the epaulement. To the left he saw a village in flames.
"My hab catchee nuzza velly good pictul, masta," he said.
"Goot boy! Zink you it is now safe for me to shtand opp?"
"My tinkey so. He fightey man tinkee hab plenty nuff."
Schwab got up slowly on his knees, peered over the edge of the trench, then stood upon his feet. He was beginning to regain his spirits.
"So! Famos!" he exclaimed. "I see all ze whole fielt of battle; I see burning villages, black fielts, hundert or tousand dead men. Zis is var. Vat a—vat a"—Herr Schwab was at a loss for words—"vat a zink is var!" He threw out his chest and snuffed the smoke-laden breeze. "But I muss go and describe ze battle for my journal, illusdraded viz photographs taken by a Gairman sobjeck on ze sbot. My ancestor Hildebrand——"
They were turning to walk down the hill; a belated shrapnel shell burst within a few yards of them, peppering the ground in all directions. A splinter shaved off an inch or two of the leather cover of the camera. Schwab cut short his reminiscence by dropping flat upon the rain-soaked ground. When he arose, a pitiable object, after a short period of self-communing, without further words he hastened towards the path.