During the day Fritz had been actively engaged in "watering" the line with high-explosive shells. Not only did the advance and support trenches get it hot, but for miles behind the lines hostile shells were dropping promiscuously, on the chance of blowing up one or more of the numerous dumps and otherwise hampering the supply columns. But as night fell the "strafe" became desultory, and under cover of darkness the fatigue and foraging parties were able to set to work with a reasonable chance of getting through without being "done in".
"Come along, boys," exclaimed the young corporal--Billy Preston from Timaru--a veteran of Egypt and Gallipoli notwithstanding the fact that he was within a month of his twenty-first birthday. "The sooner we get the job done the better."
The men were dog-tired. A couple of hostile raids had kept them on the qui vive the previous night, while throughout the day they had had but few opportunities for sleep. And now, just as they were preparing to snatch a few hours' rest, they had been told off to bring up the rations.
"We've got to assemble at two, haven't we?" enquired Rifleman Joliffe--commonly known as Grouser Joliffe. "They say our chaps are to attempt to take Messines Ridge. Attempt, I say, mind you, and our guns haven't hardly touched the job. There's uncut wire, you can see that for Yourselves, and machine-guns every yard of the way. 'Struth! I'm for swinging the lead. You don't catch me hurrying when the whistle goes."
His remarks fell on unheeding ears. The men were used to Grouser Joliffe's complaints by this time, They knew that when the critical moment arrived Joliffe would be amongst the first to mount the fire-step and clamber over the parapet. Yet there were grounds for belief in what the rifleman had said. The formidable ridge was to be attempted. The British knew it; the Huns knew it. With its labyrinths of wire and nests of skilfully-hidden machine-guns Messines Ridge was far more difficult to assault than in the earlier stages of the war, when French won and lost the important position.
Meanwhile Malcolm had rolled out of his narrow uncomfortable perch and was stretching his cramped limbs. Selwyn was fumbling with his puttees.
"Hang it," he exclaimed. "A rat has been gnawing at them. Anyone got a piece of string?"
The deficiency remedied, and the scanty toilet operations performed (the inhabitants of the dug-out had turned in "all standing", even to their boots), the men put on their shrapnel helmets, seized their rifles, and sallied forth into the night.
For some moments Malcolm could see nothing. The transition from the smoky, ill-lighted dug-out to the darkness of the open air confused his sight. All he could do was to keep in touch with the man preceding him until he grew accustomed to the change of venue.
Fresh air--is there such a thing anywhere within miles of No Man's Land? Malcolm doubted it. The atmosphere reeked of numerous and distinct odours. Traces of poison gas lurked in the traverses, pungent fumes from bursting shells wafted over parapet and parados, while the report, passed on from various successive occupants of this section of the line, that a dozen dead Huns had been buried under the floor of the support trench--the old first-line trench of a Prussian regiment--seemed to find definite confirmation.