“Here comes a battalion runner—what’s up, anyway?”
The second-in-command was pulled to his feet by Gunner Nice, who had taken the second platoon. His head lolled stupidly a moment, then he heard words—“an’ that shell got all the captain’s group, sir—all of ’em! An’ my platoon’s all casualties—” He pulled himself together as he went forward. His raincoat was split up the back, under his belt. His map-case was gone—the strap that had secured it hung loosely from his shoulder. There was blood on his hands, and the salt taste of it in his mouth, but it didn’t seem to be his. And the front of the battalion was very narrow, now. The support platoons were all in the line. Strangest of all, the gray slope was behind them—the trees on the crest were only a few yards away.
Behind and to the left the machine-guns still raved, but the artillery fell away. A greenish rocket flared from the pines ahead, and right in the faces of the panting Marines machine-guns and rifles blazed. In the shadow of the pines were men in cumbersome green-gray uniforms, with faces that looked hardly human under deep round helmets. With eyes narrowed, bodies slanting forward like men in heavy rain, the remnant of the battalion went to them.
It was the flank of the Boche column which had come out of St.-Etienne and struck the leading battalions of the 5th. It had watched first with keen delight, then with incredulity, the tortured advance of the battalion. It had waited too long to open its own fire. And now, already shaken by the sight of these men who would not die, it shrank from the long American bayonets and the pitiless, furious faces behind the steel. A few Brandenburger zealots elected to die on their spitting Maxim guns, working them until bayonets or clubbed rifles made an end. A few iron-souled Prussians—the Boche had such men—stood up to meet bayonet with bayonet, and died that way. The second-in-command saw such a one, a big feldwebel, spring against one of his sergeants with the long Prussian lunge that throws the bayonet like a spear to the full reach of the arm. It is a spectacular thrust, and will spit like a rabbit what stands in its way. But the sergeant, Bob Slover, a little fiery man with a penchant for killing Germans, ran under it and thrust from the ground for the Boche’s throat. And as his point touched, he pulled the trigger. The feldwebel’s helmet flew straight into the air, and the top of his head went with it.
A great many more flung away their arms and bleated “Kamaraden” to men who in that red minute knew no mercy. Some hid in holes, or feigned death, to be hunted out as the press thinned. And the rest scuttled through the fringe of trees and back down toward St.-Etienne, while the Marines, lying prone or taking rest for their Springfields, killed them as they ran. This same rifle-fire, directed against the flank and rear of the column which had pushed to the right against the other battalions of the 5th, broke that force and dispersed it. There was a battery of field-guns down the slope, 500 yards or so. The gunners—those who were lucky—took to cover after the first burst of fire. “Thank Gawd fer a shot at them dam’ artillerymen! Battle-sight, an’ aim low, you birds—don’t let any of them bastards get away!”... “Sergeant, reckon the lootenant would let us go down an’ take them 77s?”—“Shut up an’ work yo’ bolt, you dam’ fool!—Whatinell you think you are—a army core?”—“Besides, Mr. Connor’s dead....” On the hill beyond St.-Etienne new trenches scarred the slope; there were many Germans milling there, some 1,500 yards away. “Save your ammunition and lay low,” the word was passed. “We’re on our own out here.” And the battalion, a very small battalion now, little more than a hundred men, lay along the crest they had stormed, with their dead and wounded and the Boche dead and wounded around them.
A few iron-souled Prussians—the Boche had such men—stood up to meet bayonet with bayonet, and died that way.
The last few men are always the most difficult to kill.
Almost immediately the Boche began to react. He opened on them a storm of fire, high explosive and shrapnel, and his machine-guns dinned fiercely. A counter-attack began to form toward St.-Etienne. Sweating gunners struggled into position with the two machine-guns that were left in the battalion, and these, with their crews, were knocked out by shell-fire before either had been in action long enough to fire a clip. But the rifles gave tongue and continued to speak—the last few men are always the most difficult to kill—and the Boche had little taste for rifle-fire that begins to kill at 700 yards. That counter-attack shortly returned whence it came, and the one that followed it went back also.