The battalion was out of the trench now, and going forward, regulating its pace on the battalion ahead. All at once there was a snapping and crackling in the air—a corporal spun round and collapsed limply, while his blouse turned red under his gas-mask—the man beside him stumbled and went down, swearing through grayish lips at a shattered knee—the men flattened and all faces turned toward the flank.
“Machine-guns on the left!”—“Hell! It’s that Essen Hook we’ve got to pass—thank God, it’s long range! Come on, you birds.” And the battalion went on, enduring grimly. Finally, when well past its front, which ran diagonally to the line of advance, the 17th Company, that had the left, turned savagely on the Essen Hook and got a foothold in its rear. A one-pounder from the regimental headquarters company was rushed up to assist them, and the men yelled with delight as the vicious little cannon got in direct hits on the Boche emplacements. Hopelessly cut off, the large body of Germans in this formidable work surrendered after a few sharp and bloody minutes, and the 17th, sending back its prisoners, rejoined the battalion.
Others lay on the ground over which the battalion passed.
Prisoners began to stream back from the front of the attack, telling of the success of the 6th. Wounded came with them, some walking, some carried on improvised stretchers by the Boche “kamarads.” Most of them were grinning. “Goin’ fine up there, boys, goin’ fine!” “Lookit, fellers! Got a bon blighty—We’ll give ’em your regards in Paris!”
Others of the 6th lay on the ground over which the battalion passed. Some lay quietly, like men who rested after labor. Others were mangled and twisted into attitudes grotesque and horrible as the fury of the exploding shells had flung them. There were dead Germans, too. Up forward rifle-fire and machine-guns gave tongue, and all the Boche guns raged together. “Reckon the 6th is gettin’ to Blanc Mont now.” The second-in-command looked at his watch. Inconceivably, it was noon.
For a while now the battalion halted, keeping its distance from the unit ahead. The men lay on their rifles and expressed unreasonable yearnings for food. “Eat? Eat? Hell! Shock troops ain’t supposed to eat!” Officers cast anxious glances toward the utterly exposed left. The French attack had failed to keep abreast of the American.
The left company, the 17th, was in a cover of scrubby trees. The other companies were likewise concealed. Only the 49th lay perforce in the open, on a bleak, shell-pocked slope. A high-flying Boche plane spotted its platoon columns, asprawl eighty or a hundred yards apart on the chalky ground. “No good,” said the second-in-command, cocking his head gander-wise in his flat helmet, “is goin’ to come of that dam’ thing—guess all our noble aviators have gone home to lunch.” The plane, high and small and shining in the sky, circled slowly above them. Far back of the Boche lines there was a railroad gun that took a wireless from the wheeling vulture. “Listen,” said the captain, “listen to th——”
“Oh, Lordy! They’ve got us bracketed!”