"They're still there—they're still answering, Paul!"
"Yes, but listen!"
Even above the roar of the battle now they could hear sounds of cheering. And, on one side, much of the lighter rifle fire now died away.
"The Germans are advancing! It must be a charge against our men. And they can't have had time to intrench!" said Paul. "Look! Didn't I tell you so?"
It was almost as if they had been able to see. They could follow the bending of the Belgian line as it gave way before the furious advance. The artillery firing on the German side—on the German left wing, that is, and the Belgian right—ceased. And then, nearly half a mile beyond where it had been before, the rifle fire broke out again.
"There, can you tell what has happened?" asked Paul. "They've turned our wing—they must have rushed a lot of troops this way. We're holding them well enough on the other side and in the centre, but our men will have to retire very soon. It's awfully bad for us, because now the Germans are between us and Tirlemont, and I don't see how we can get around them, because they will keep spreading out, no matter how far we go," keen disappointment in his voice.
"I don't see how you can tell that from here, Paul!"
"Watch the flashes from the guns nearest us—those are the Germans, now. The rifles, I mean—do you see, there? They're firing pretty regularly, and the flashes are very close together. They haven't spread out much. When they're firing, it looks as if a whole lot of lightning bugs were flashing all at once, and it makes a line along the ground. That's a curved line, now. A few minutes ago it was straight."
And now the German batteries opened up again on their left flank, and they were firing from a position that had been moved considerably westward since they had ceased firing after the infantry had begun pushing back the Belgian line. That was the most significant thing. These batteries had now evidently taken up a position that, at the beginning of the fight, had been held either by the most advanced of the German skirmishers or by the Belgians themselves. The German policy of concentrating the attack at one spot, which has been the policy of great generals throughout all history, had worked well for them again.
But it was not the result of this fight, which could hardly be of really great importance whatever happened, that bothered Paul. It was the fact that by this sudden sweep of the German left he and Paul were again in the enemy's country, and almost hopelessly cut off from reaching the Belgian lines. For a moment he was almost ready to give up in despair. But that was not his style at all, and he soon recovered his spirits.