"What is it? But take cover!"
"That's it! Retreat! Oh, my God!"
I also stood up. Sure enough, sections of infantry were crossing the ridges and falling back.
"Take cover, you idiots!" yelled Bréjard.
A shell swooped down. The splinters whistled through the air and the displaced earth pattered round us on the dry field. I had stooped down instinctively, but Hutin had not moved, being too much occupied in observing the retreat of the infantry, which was becoming more general every moment.
"There you are," said he, "now it will be our turn.... I bet ... we shall retire too.... Here's an A.D.C. coming up.... Oh, if we're always going to retire like that we may as well take a train!"
As he had suspected, the A.D.C. brought orders for us to retreat. The teams trotted up the slope to join the guns. The moment was critical, and, as ill-luck would have it, the first gun, in position on the counterslope, began to roll downhill as soon as the spade, which had been solidly jammed in the ground by the recoil, had been pulled out. It took eight of us to drag the gun back, and at every instant we asked ourselves whether we should succeed in assembling the train. The drivers began to lose their nerve, and backed the horses at random, this way and that.
"Now then, all together.... Whoa, there, whoa!... Steady!... Whoa back!"
A final pull, and we had limbered up.
"Ready!"