VII
THE ATTACK ON THE PERSIAN FRONT
When I reached headquarters after the attack on the Euphrates front, I was expecting to hear that my transfer to France had gone through and receive orders to proceed thither immediately. It had always been my intention to try to join the American army once it began to take a real part in the war, and for some time past I had been casting about in my mind for the best method to carry out my plans. When affairs looked so very black for the Allied forces in March and April, 1918, I decided that France was the place where every one, who could by any possibility manage it, should be. General Gillman, the chief of staff, had on more than one occasion shown himself a good friend, and I determined to once more task his kindness. He said that he thought he could arrange for my transfer to France, and that once there I could work out the best way of getting into the American army.
Everything went well, and I was daily expecting my orders, when Major Thompson, who commanded the brigade of armored cars, sent for me and told me that an advance was being planned on the Kurdish front. Only two batteries were to be taken—the Eighth and the Thirteenth—but he said that he would like to have me go along in command of the supply-train. Of course I jumped at the chance, as the attack promised to be most interesting.
We were told to be ready to move on an hour's notice. For several days the weather held us back. The rain, helped out by the melting snow from the mountains, caused the rivers to rise in flood. The Tigris rose sixteen feet in a night. The lower bridge was broken and washed away. Everything possible was done to reinforce the upper bridge, but it was hourly expected to give way under the strain of the whirling yellow waters. The old Arab rivermen said that they could tell by the color just which of the tributaries were in spate. When they saw or thought they saw a new admixture, they would shake their heads and say: "Such and such a river is now also in flood—the Tigris will rise still further."
On the night of April 24 we at length got our orders and at six o'clock the following morning we set out, prepared to run through to Ain Leilah. The country was indeed changed since I passed through six weeks before. The desert had blossomed. We ran through miles and miles of clover; the sweet smell seemed so wholesomely American, recalling home and family, and the meadows of Long Island. The brilliant red poppies were more in keeping with the country; and we passed by Indian cavalry reinforcements with the scarlet flowers stuck in their black hair and twined in the head-stalls of the horses.
As we approached the hills they looked less bleak—a soft green clothed the hollows, and the little oasis of Ain Leilah no longer stood out in the same marked contrast as when last I visited it. The roads were in good shape, and we reached camp at four in the afternoon. I took one of the tenders and set off to look up some old friends in the regiments near by. As I passed a group of Arabs that had just finished work on the roads, I noticed that they were playing a game that was new to me. A stake was driven into the ground, with a horsehair rope ten or twelve feet in length attached to it. An old man had hold of the end of the rope. About the stake were piled some clothes, and the Arabs were standing around in a circle just out of reach of the man with the rope. The object was to dart in and snatch up something from the heap without the old man who was on guard catching you. They were enjoying themselves hugely—the oldest graybeards behaving as if they were children—a very pleasant side of the Arab.
Our instructions were to be ready to pull out before daybreak. The mission was, as usual, a flanking one. The direct attack was to be delivered on Kara Tepe, and, if that were successful, upon Kifri. We were to intercept the arrival of reinforcements, or cut off the retreat of the garrisons, as the case might be.