"Rapid fire!" roared Killem. A terrific fusillade burst forth. The Turks fell in heaps, moaning, shrieking, and yelling. The sight was sickening. Heaps of dead and dying all around. But again the Turkish host came on. Two great columns of men burst out in front of the New Zealanders and The Kangaroos.
This was really the most critical moment of the day. Here entered the Drill Book maxim: "An attack should be met with a counter-attack." For this was to be the last and desperate throw of the Turkish Staff. If it broke the Australasian lines, the enemy would realise their boast of pushing them into the sea. The New Zealanders and Kangaroos appreciated the danger to the full. And so the command rang out: "Prepare to charge!" Every man placed his foot for the jump.
"Charge!"
Up leaped Killem and his willing men, and at their side charged the New Zealand boys. Grimly they gripped their rifles, bravely they ran and cheered. A charge is a thrilling and soul-inspiring affair. Danger and death pass away from the soldier's heart. He is alive, he is filled with the tingling blood and full of the traditions of his race. The Kangaroos met the Turkish host midway. A shock of men, a shock of arms, a blind confusion, a horrible fierceness and hacking of human flesh.
"Give it 'em, boys," roared Killem above the din. A Turkish officer heard him and aimed his revolver at Killem's head. But Doolan was there again. He pinned his man through the chest, and, with an oath, flung him off his bayonet—dead.
Claud got lost in the mêlée. He found himself surrounded. Bravely he fought, but a bayonet was stuck in his shoulder, and he fell into the struggling mass of wounded men. Bill, though wounded in the head, fought with the madness of a fiend. With Doolan, he kept close to the Colonel's heels, preserving the body and life of the bravest man in the Australasian force. In that awful hour Killem could often be heard shouting out, "Thanks, boys, thanks!"
At last tenacity and courage told. The Turks broke and fled, yelling in pain and fear. But the price of victory had indeed been costly. Still, it was worth it all. The position had been saved. Australasians had again written deep in the annals of war a story of valour as great as Corunna or Waterloo.
"Paddy," shouted Bill as they jumped back into the trenches.
"Yis."