And away in front of them, where he had no earthly right to be, since he did not belong to them and had only brought a message, went young Nolan, waving them on with insistent arm.
They swept along at a gallop in two long lines, and the rush and the rattle got into Jim's blood, and the blood boiled up into his head, and he thought of nothing--nothing, but the fact that their chance had come at last--least of all of fear for himself.
Fear? There were Russians ahead there!----them all!--and every faculty in him, every nerve and muscle, every drop of boiling blood, every desire of his mind and heart and soul rushed on ahead to meet them. He wanted at them, he wanted to hew and thrust and kill. He wanted blood.
Head down, forward a bit, sword-hilt fitting itself to his hand as it had never done before, knees so lightly tight to the saddle that he could feel the great brown shoulders working like machinery inside them, a glance forward from under his busby and an impression of a vast multitude of men--and the roar and crash of numberless guns in front and on both flanks--a scream just ahead, and young Nolan's horse came galloping round at the side, with young Nolan still in the saddle--but dead--his chest ripped open by a shell.
Men were falling all round now, men and horses hurling forward and down in rattling lumbering heaps.
Jim's face was cast-iron, his jaw a vice. Not the Jim we have known--this! His dæmon--nay, his demon, for he had but one thought, and that was to kill. No man who knew him would have known him.
Belching guns in front. Shot and bullets coming like hail. Men falling fast. Lines all shattered and anyhow. But the thick white smoke and the venomous yellow-red spits of flame were close now, and so far it had not struck him as wonderful that he still rode while so many had gone down.
He had felt hot whips across his face, something had tipped his busby to the back of his head, several other somethings had plugged through the flying jacket which covered his bridle arm. Then he had to swerve suddenly from the smoking black muzzle of a gun, and he was among flat-caps and gray-coats, and his sword was going in hot quick blows, and every blow bit home.
A big gunner struck heavily at him with a smoking mop. He had an honest brown hairy face and blue eyes. The sweep of Jim's sword took him in the neck, and . . . .
An infantryman behind had his gun-stock at his chest to fire. Jim drove the big brown at him, the man went down in a heap, arms up, and the gun went off as he fell.