If he had hoped to escape detection by the alert and vengeful Huns, he was vastly mistaken. Already streams of bullets from half a dozen machine-guns were playing upon the calcined earth that formed the rims of the craters, while bombs were being lobbed into the burning debris of the crashed biplane on the off-chance of "doing in" the pilot should he have escaped being battered to death by the fall.
Even as he crawled a hot searing pain swept across his forehead. Involuntarily he clapped one hand to his eye. His fingers were wet with a warm fluid. It was his blood welling from a wound. A machine-gun bullet had inflicted a clean gash on the lower part of his forehead, completely cutting away the left eyebrow. It was a mere scratch, but very painful, the worst result being the flow of blood that, running into his eyes, temporarily blinded him.
It was some moments before Derek realized the comparatively slight nature of his wound. Many a man has been hit in action, and regarded his wound as slight when he has actually been hit in a vital spot. Numerous instances have been recorded of a mortally-wounded man "carrying on" in ignorance of the fact that in a very few moments his name will have to be added to the list of "killed in action". On the other hand, there have been cases of men but slightly hit, writhing and squealing and moaning in the genuine belief that their "number is up".
Finding himself hit, Derek lay motionless, his face buried in the soft earth. Presently the hot stabbing pain diminished. A sense of numbness that was almost soothing, compared with the searing throb of the bullet-wound, began to assert itself. Even the cold ground seemed like a downy pillow.
The while Fritz in the nearmost trench was indefatigable in his efforts to complete the strafing of the crashed pilot. Thousands of pounds of machine-gun ammunition were practically thrown away in sweeping the dun-brown ridge of earth that encircled Derek's place of concealment. Bombs, too, were continually being thrown, only to explode harmlessly in the crumbling, carbonized soil, for beyond sundry and various showers of dirt, the effect of these missiles was negligible.
A quarter of an hour elapsed. Then Derek bestirred himself. It was not the thought that he was lying in a somewhat exposed position, and that a safer retreat in the bottom of the second crater was within a few yards, that urged him to move. It was the sudden realization that every second he was lying with an open wound in contact with the earth he was running the greatest possible risk of septic poisoning from the highly impure soil. He had known several cases where men with chilblains had knocked the open sores against the side of a trench, and the momentary contact with the septic soil had been sufficient to cause acute blood-poisoning, resulting, in several instances, in loss of a limb. On the other hand, the extreme velocity of a bullet generates heat to such a degree that the missile is sterilized before it hits a man, and, provided that no vital spot is touched, the chances of complications arising from a bullet-wound are very slight. With shell-wounds there is a difference. Minute particles of German shells frequently cause slight wounds that, unless carefully treated, become septic.
Derek freely admitted to himself that he "had the wind up" over the possibilities of tetanus. Even as he resumed his tedious crawl he incautiously showed the top of his head above the frail cover afforded by the ridge. The Huns, quick to perceive something in motion, swept the spot with their machine-guns. As a result Daventry ducked, but not before there were three or four bullet-rents in his leather flying-cap, while his triplex goggles, which he had pushed back just before he had been hit, were cut away by a piece of metal.
Into the second crater he dropped, his legs buried above the knees of his fleece-lined flying-boots in the soft soil. Here he was relatively safe. He sat up and took stock of his surroundings: a circular sloping wall of debris descending to a pool of stagnant water eleven feet below the ordinary ground level. Here and there were coils of rusty barbed wire and the remains of calcined posts, while a Hun's "Dolly Varden" tin hat, sporting a bullet-hole front and back, and a battered dixie, alone served to break the monotony of the limited expanse of landscape.
Derek's wound was still bleeding freely. He made no attempt to staunch the flow, knowing that there was a chance of the cut cleansing itself. His old 'bus had practically burnt itself out. The fierce flames were succeeded by a thick, oily smoke that drifted in clouds across the crater and eddied down the slope, as if reluctant to soar and dissolve in the comparatively pure air above. It was with the greatest difficulty that the pilot managed to refrain from coughing. Temporarily the musketry-fire had ceased and comparative silence reigned. Any noise coming from the crater would inevitably betray the presence of a yet-living man to the vigilant Huns. Yet, on the other hand, the smoke was of service. It acted as a screen and prevented the Germans seeing their foes; and behind this pall of smoke fresh British troops were massing for another attack, while the methods adopted for bridging the canal for the passage of the tanks were being carried out at high pressure.
Then ensued a tedious period of inactivity. Both British and German guns were firing desultorily, the former putting over heavy stuff, while the Huns contented themselves by "watering" the back-areas with high-velocity shells of medium calibre. Overhead British aeroplanes passed and repassed—big bombing-machines, intent on their ceaseless task of harrying Fritz's lines of communication.