On presenting our letter from the Colonel at Headquarters, the Officer in command ordered one of his men to accompany us, so leaving the car here to await our return, we started off without delay. Our guide, a brawny and typical young Italian mountaineer, leading the way at a pace that soon compelled us to ask him to slow down a bit.
We had been advised, as we were unaccustomed to climbing, not to “rush” it at first, as we had at least two hours of strenuous plodding to reach the fort, and it was a very hot day, which would make us feel the strain the more.
To our athletic cicerone this was evidently but an ordinary walk in the day’s work; in fact, so light did he make of it that he obligingly insisted on carrying our overcoats and other paraphernalia in spite of his being encumbered with his rifle, ammunition belt and heavy cape.
We were not long in discovering that the stiffness of the climb we were undertaking had not been exaggerated, and also that we were neither of us as young as we had been. This latter point in particular I recollect was irritatingly brought home to me at one time when we were really making splendid progress as we thought. Some Alpini, in full marching order, caught us up and passed us as easily as if we had been standing still. However, it was no good being discouraged because we were no longer youthful, and we continued to make our way slowly but surely up the winding rocky track.
We had got about half way, and so far there had been nothing in the nature of an incident, and no indication whatever that we were actually right up at the Front and within range of the Austrian batteries, for a dead silence had reigned in the mountains all the morning.
Suddenly, as we were crossing a comparatively level bit of boulder-strewn ground, the report of a big gun resounded in the still air, and in a few seconds we heard a wailing sort of shriek approaching, and an instant after the loud crash of a shell bursting a short distance away.
We stopped and looked at each other, uncertain what to do as there was no cover anywhere near. Our guide settled it for us without a moment’s hesitation.
“The Austrians have seen us, that’s why they have commenced firing in this direction; they probably think we may be part of a detachment of troops going up to the fort—we must hurry on, and with intervals of a couple of hundred yards or so between us.”
There was no time to lose, for whilst he was speaking another shell burst nearer than the previous one.
So off we went again with the Alpino leading the way. Rateau was in the centre, and I brought up the rear. Two hundred yards are not much on the level, but on a steep mountain track the distances are difficult to estimate, so the soldier was quite out of sight at times from where I was.