"Poor old chap!" said the gardener.
He leaned over the corpse with its ghastly, one-eyed face staring at the sky, and reverentlycovered it with the silver-badged cap which had fallen near the dead man's side.
Behind one of the blue-slated roofs, which was still intact, lively flames were now breaking out but were immediately stifled by the clouds of smoke. A magnificent cone-shaped fir-tree, of funereal aspect, mounted guard over the fire like a solitary sentry.
We approached the building. Near the wall of the yard were lying two gunners and a couple of horses. They had just been killed, and the blood on the ground was still red. I recognized one of the men as the orderly of one of our officers. The other had fallen face downwards, his arms crossed under him.
A shell had bored a great hole in the yard. Three ducks, despite the heat of the flames, were dabbling about in a little green pond near a square-shaped dunghill. Another, the head of which had been cut off by a shell splinter, was lying on its side at the edge of the water.
Against the background formed by the great dark curtain of smoke, which from where we were standing hid half the sky, the skeleton of a barn stood out like a fascinating framework of molten metal. Long flames darted out from the doorway and licked a plough and a harrow which had been abandoned there.Above the hay-shoot a pulley-wheel for hoisting fodder, mounted in a recess in the front of the building, was red-hot. The roar of the guns was no longer audible, being drowned by the crackling of the fire and the sharp hiss of the sparks as they fell in the pond. One of the ducks, stung by a glowing splinter, was shaking her feathers.
"We're none too soon," said the gardener. "The mutton will be half cooked already."
The sheepfold was only separated from the shed, which was now alight, by a bake-house, and was already full of smoke, through which the woolly backs of the animals loomed like even denser clouds. The door was open, but the stupid beasts had not fled, and had crowded together against the end wall under the window communicating with the bake-house, through which came the smoke which was gradually asphyxiating them. Huddling together they pushed forward as though trying to break down the wall with their foreheads.
"Come on," said the gardener. "You, Lintier, stand there ... at the door. That's how we'll work it. We'll both of us rush in and each pull out one of them, and you put a bullet through them as they come out. Understand?"
"All right!"
I had a glimpse of the shadowy forms of the two men dodging about in the smoke. Then I heard the scraping of hard hoofs on the ground and one of the gunners reappeared grasping with both hands the tail of a fat sheep which he pulled out backwards. I killed the animal on the threshold, and immediately afterwards a second. The gardener went in again to fetch a third.
I replaced my revolver in the holster, and each of us hoisted a sheep on to our shoulders. They encircled our necks like heavy furs, which we kept in place by grasping the pointed feet bunched together in front two by two. From their heads, hanging down behind, blood dripped down our backs. We started off across the mangel-wurzel field.
Suddenly the gardener cried out:
"Listen!"
We stopped.
"Down!"
"We're seen!"
We heard the scream of heavy shell approaching, and at once threw ourselves flat on the ground behind the sheep, which formed a sort of rampart. Down came the shells between us and the farm. We jumped up, and, in spite of our heavy burdens, ran till we were out of the line of fire. We passed the deadgendarmes and did not stop until we had reached a row of poplars which hid us from view. Three projectiles swooped down on the spot we had just left.
Winding our way through the copses and hollows of the plateau we regained the park in safety.
I resumed my seat on a bundle of wood near the fire, while a gunner, who was a butcher by trade, methodically cut up one of the sheep strung up by the foot to the store wagon.
As I led the horses down to drink at the tanks I took a short cut across the fields in the hope of finding some potatoes, beetroot, or perhaps some onions. We were specially in need of onions, for some of our food was most insipid and we knew of no other flavouring.
I found neither onions nor potatoes, but, on the other side of a knoll, I saw some foot-soldiers stretched out on the loose sheaves of wheat. Their red breeches were visible a long way off. Evidently some of those who had fallen in the engagements of the 12th.
In a hollow a little farther on I also came upon some German corpses. Thirteen Frenchmen and seventeen Germans had fallen there, almost side by side. And yet the Frenchmen seemed more numerous. Red patches on the yellow of the stubble-field, they caught theeye, whereas the Germans were hardly noticeable.
The arms and packs of the dead men had been taken away, and coats, tunics, and shirts had been unbuttoned so that the medals could be unpinned. Their necks, bared chests, and eyelids had already turned a greenish-grey. A little sergeant, who had fallen backwards on to some sheaves which now pillowed his head, still held his right arm starkly in the air. The stiffened fingers of his outstretched hand seemed clasped in a grip of agony. On his sleeve the gold bar shone in the sun.
As I passed on, some swallows, whose low flight announced rain, skimmed over the knoll, their pointed wings lightly touching the dead men.
Thursday, September 17
Our line of wagons still remains in the same hollow, nor has the battery changed position. Although during the last two days it has fired more than five hundred shells the enemy has not been able to discover its whereabouts.
Fighting continued, growing ever more violent in character, near Tracy-le-Mont, Tracy-le-Val, Carlepont in front of us, Compiègne on the west, and on the east, parallel to the Aisne, towards Soissons.
We neither advanced nor retired, andthat was all we knew of the engagement. We have begun to fall into regular habits here; soup is served and the horses are watered at the same hour every day.
On my way to the water-tanks this morning I saw an odd-looking priest. Sitting astride his horse in the middle of the road he was talking to a surrounding group of gunners and foot-soldiers. He was booted and spurred, and a long waterproof cape, fastened under his chin, floated down over the crupper of his horse. A big wooden cross hung from his neck on to the varnished strap of his revolver-holster, and into his wide black belt he had stuck a German bayonet.
Standing in the stirrups he looked like some strange militant monk as he stroked the neck of his horse.
"Yes," said he, "he's a nice beast. He belonged to a Uhlan whom I found after the battle last week, near Nanteuil, where I was going to hear confessions. He had been abandoned, so I took him. It is much better than walking."
And he added:
"He saved my life yesterday.... I was going to the outposts where there had been some fighting and where I had heard that I was wanted. I was quite alone, and suddenly Imet a patrol of Uhlans. They fired at me, but missed. I was angry at not being able to go where I wanted, and as I wheeled round I let them have a revolver shot. As a priest I ought not to have done that, ought I? But I couldn't help it. I saw one topple over. The others pursued me, but my horse went like the wind, and after a time they gave up the chase. So I turned round again and followed them. I found the man I had shot. He didn't understand a word of French. I was able to give him absolution before he died, but it was a near shave!"
Night was falling when we rejoined the battery. It was raining, and we wondered whether we should again have to sleep in the mud.
I found my comrades of the first gun—Hutin, Millon, and Déprez—covered with mire and black with powder, their faces gaunt with weariness.
"Hallo!"
"Ah, Lintier!" said Hutin. "We've had a bad time of it to-day! I really don't know how it is we are still here!... I don't know.... Ask Millon...."
Millon nodded his head. He seemed at the end of his strength.
"Gratien is dead."
"Oh!"
"Killed as he was mounting his horse ... a small splinter in the spine. He didn't move.... A shell came right through the shield of the third gun without bursting.... And another fell not two yards off our trench!"
"Ah! That one did burst. We were badly shaken.... My hair and beard were singed."
"No one wounded?"
"No one in the battery, except Gratien, who was killed.... Yes, though! Pelletier got his forehead grazed by a splinter. Come and have a look at the ammunition wagon—it's like a nutmeg-grater. It began to smoke at one time. Suppose it had blown up!... It was full ... thirty-six high-explosive shells!..."
It was now quite dark, so we lit the hurricane lamps. Somebody called out:
"Eleventh, to your billets!"
"Right!"
"First gun ... fifth gun...."
"Fifth!"
"To your billets, eleventh!"
We followed a man carrying a hurricane lamp, and found that we had to share ourbillets with some foot-soldiers from the south whose accent, so to speak, smelt of garlic.
The men of the firing battery let themselves fall in the straw like foundered horses, and, after having made sure of a warm place, I sallied out with a couple of comrades of the first line in order to find something to eat and drink.
The narrow, badly paved streets were alive with the shadowy forms of men jostling each other, the indistinct coming and going of horsemen and wagons, the noise of many feet plodding through the mud, and the confused sound of voices and respiration.
A little café, near which the pavement had been broken up by a shell in the afternoon, was crowded with foot-soldiers, A.S.C. men, and Zouaves.
The bottles, jugs, and glasses standing on the counter half hid the shadeless brass lamp with which the place was lit, and threw huge, uncouth shadows across the narrow, smoke-filled room on to the walls.
There was a babble of voices and laughter. Every one was drinking, and the proprietor still had some liqueurs and rum left. The tired-out soldiers soon became drunk with alcohol, tobacco, and tales of the war.
This diminutive café, where there was alittle light, a little warmth, and a whole world of oblivion, was a veritable haven in the immense weariness of the night, among the thousands of soldiers stretched out everywhere round us, in the open or in barns, sleeping as soundly as the dead men just laid low in the fields by the shrapnel bullets.
We succeeded in finding a bottle of champagne. Never had the sparkle of wine seemed to me so delicious.
Nobody was asleep when we returned to our billets. Despite the complaints of the gunners the southern infantrymen went on talking, swearing, and leaving the door open....
"Aren't you chaps ever going to go to sleep?" thundered a gunner from the depths of the darkness.
"Hold your jaw!"
"Here! shut the door, can't you?"
Men continually trod on our feet and chests and let their rifles and packs fall on us. The air was full of grumbling and vituperation. It was nearly midnight, and Moratin lost his temper:
"Now are you ever going to shut up, you ——! If you don't, I'll go and fetch the Major!"
A broadside of oaths rose from the straw.The gunners replied. Dozing men, waking up, yelled:
"Shut your mouths!Shut 'em, do you hear?"
Friday, September 18
Day was just breaking as we moved slowly along the roads across the plain, our horses sinking up to the fetlocks in clayey mud.
We met large parties of wounded—Tirailleurs, Zouaves, and, above all, soldiers of the line. They overflowed the road on either side as they plodded on with heavy steps which dragged in the gutters and puddles.
The dawn was misty. It was half-past four, but we could not see the faces of the wounded until they were actually passing our carriage, when we had a vision of white bandages and of others crimson-red. But when the troops had gone by in the vague, uncertain light, we could only perceive a slowly rolling sea of heads and shoulders.
In the eyes of some of my comrades who yesterday were so close to death and who to-day were still stiff, tired, and dejected, I caught sight of looks of envy. They were aware of the orders which had arrived during the night, namely, that we were to return to our positions of yesterday.
They were not afraid, but the familiaritywith danger, which had made them brave, had in no sense impaired their love of life—the life which they felt bubbling in their veins and which, in a few moments perhaps, might be spent, with all their red blood, on the field of mangel-wurzels. They were thinking of those who had died yesterday, of Corporal Gratien, of Captain Legoff—an officer adored by his men—of the six numbers of the 6th Battery who were reduced to a shapeless, bleeding pulp at the bottom of their trench.
It is at moments like these, at once melancholy and solemn, when the regular creaking and jolting of the wagons and the measured hoof-beats of the horses numb the senses and make one drowsy, that one's thoughts turn most bitterly to the future of bygone dreams, to all promised joys and pleasures, to all the happiness for which the past has paved the way and which might possibly have been realized without difficulty....
Dawn—I do not know why—is always a sad hour. And on the mornings of battle this inherent sadness is rendered more poignant by the dread of the terrible and perhaps final experiences which the day just born may hold in store. Regrets and fears become linked in a vicious circle of thought from which there is no escape.
One's only desire is to live—to return alive in the evening—but to conquer first, to prevent the enemy from reaching our homes, above all to protect the weak and loved ones behind us, in France, whose lives are even more precious to us than our own. To conquer! And still live to-night!
The battery again took up position near the holocaust of the farm, which was still burning, and the wagons returned to their gully.
My wrist was giving me considerable pain, and the medical officer wanted to send me behind the lines on sick-leave, but I preferred to rest with the wagons a few days longer and then return to my gun.
The rain began to fall in torrents. On the edge of a lucerne-field one of our horses, which we had to abandon yesterday, was rolling in its death agony. The straw we had brought with us, hashed up by the wheels of the vehicles and by the hoofs of the horses, and mingled with the water and mud which had collected in the clayey hollow, formed a kind of noisome quicksand into which we sank ankle-deep.
The men did not open their lips exceptto swear or complain. No more dead wood was to be found in the copses; all had been consumed yesterday and the day before. We could not light a fire. Some passing gunners told us that there were still some faggots in a farm near the water-tanks, and we at once hurried thither. On the plain the corpses were no longer lying among the loose sheaves. On one side of the Tracy road, which was now nothing more than a swamp, the earth had been dug up in the middle of the field of mangel-wurzels and two crosses roughly fashioned out of planks marked the grave.
The farm to which we had come in our quest for wood had been arranged as a first-aid post. The buildings surrounded a yard, in the centre of which, near the dung-heap, were ranged up several green-tilted carts marked with the red cross. In one corner a heap of cotton-wool and some blood-stained bandages and compresses were slowly burning.
In the stable and cow-sheds one could see, through the half-open doors, the recumbent forms of sick and wounded lined up on the straw underneath the empty troughs and mangers. Some hospital orderlies in canvas clothing were busy making soup. A medical officer stalked stiffly by in his white smock. Not a cry of pain was to be heard.
In the wood-shed some sick men—nine or ten pale and gaunt foot-soldiers—were lying on trusses of hay which they had not even untied. One man, whom we could not see owing to the darkness, was breathing stertorously with a noise like an engine.
The firing was less violent than yesterday. An aviation park had been formed a few hundred yards from our hollow, behind the farmhouses in which the Staff had taken up its quarters for the day. This proximity rendered our position increasingly unsafe. The enemy's Howitzers tried to reach the aeroplanes standing on the field, and though they seemed to be firing at haphazard, shells continually fell here and there on the outskirts of our park.
The day was drawing to a close without giving any indication as to the issue of the battle, which had already been in progress five days.
But towards evening a long convoy of MoroccanCarabaspassed on the road near-by, marching southwards towards the Aisne. They were followed by some infantry. What could be the meaning of it? We could not help feeling uneasy.
The dusk deepened into darkness and thelong golden beams of the searchlights began to sweep the plain. Under the hard, unyielding light the smallest objects—a hayrick, a shed—cast huge inky shadows on the field.
Next, some artillery passed by, also heading towards the Aisne. We could not see the carriages, but recognized them by the familiar creaking and rattling. Occasionally they halted a moment or two, and then another sound became audible—a sound like a far-off torrent—caused by infantry on the march on some other road across the plain.
It started to rain again.
We rejoined our batteries at the water-tanks. A ceaseless tide of men brushed by our carriages, their shadowy figures rising and falling as they passed in the darkness.
"What regiment is that?" I asked. No one answered.
"What regiment is that?"
Apparently a regiment of dumb men. They continued to march by in the gloom without giving any reply.
"What regiment is that passing? Can't you speak French?"
"Hundred and third."
"Where are you going to?"
"We don't know."
"Where are you going to?" I repeated.
"We don't know," came the answer again.
On the fields of mangel-wurzels flanking the road we could see masses of motionless artillery. Was the Army Corps retiring? And yet we had not been outflanked this time.... I was suddenly seized with anxiety.
It began to rain harder. Under the moving ray of a searchlight I caught a glimpse of a long road black with men and horses.
My carriage had ranged up close to those of the first gun.
"Hutin!"
"Here! Yes? Hallo, it's you!"
"Yes.... Well, are we retiring?"
"No."
"What? The whole division is falling back!..."
"We're being replaced."
"Think so?"
"Yes. I've seen some gunners of the Corps which is replacing us."
"In that case we shall get some rest."
"No, I don't think so. I've heard that they mean to make a turning movement over by the forest of Compiègne and the forest of Laigle with the Moroccan Division."
Rain ... darkness ... smoking prohibited. The surrounding gloom was alivewith distant footfalls, the muffled rumble of wheels, jingle of arms, and the heavy breathing of men and animals.
Behind the infantry regiments of the division we began a slow march interrupted by the halts of the foot-soldiers ahead and by other unknown impediments.
About midnight we crossed the Aisne. Rain was still falling. Two hurricane lamps marked the entrance of the pontoon bridge constructed by the Engineers. The planking gave under the weight of the column and one heard the water plashing against the metal bottoms of the boats.
The road was now clear, and the batteries on ahead broke into a trot. A horse which had become entangled in the traces stopped our wagons for a moment or two, and before we were able to catch up the head of the column a cross-roads suddenly brought us once more to a halt. In the dense darkness there was nothing to indicate which road the leading vehicles had taken. We listened.... A distant rumble seemed to come from the right, and we wheeled in the direction of the sound. The drivers urged their horses forward. We strained our eyes in an attempt to pierce the gloom, always hoping to see the bulky form of an ammunition wagon or gun loom out of thedarkness ahead. But we hoped in vain. The road became narrower, and at every moment we risked falling into the ditch. Finally we had to confess to ourselves that we had lost our way.
The Lieutenant gave the word to halt. We prepared to wait for daybreak before continuing our march. The downpour redoubled in violence, and it was impossible to find shelter. The gunners huddled together on the limber-boxes and became motionless, while the drivers stamped up and down in the mud at the heads of their teams.
Overcome by fatigue I had begun to get drowsy in spite of the cold and the wetness of my clothes, which stuck to my skin like icy poultices and seemed to suck all the warmth from my body. Suddenly I became aware of footsteps splashing in the gutters by the side of the road. Men were passing by the wagon. I thought that possibly somebody had discovered a barn and was leading them to it. I followed.
Sure enough, after a few minutes' walk we came to a house, the black bulk of which rose up suddenly before me, darker than the surrounding darkness.
My foot knocked against a ladder. Perhaps it led to a window? I clambered up andfound myself in a loft of which the flooring was rotten and gave way under my tread. I clutched the low framework of the roof and advanced cautiously. Some one was already asleep there; I heard his breathing. Stretching myself carefully athwart the beams and pillowing my head on a bundle of wood, I prepared to go to sleep. It was almost hot in the loft.
Saturday, September 19
We started off again at dawn in a drizzling rain. The road, studded at intervals with the bodies of dead horses, wound through interminable woods of tall beeches from which the rain dripped heavily. Endless enfilades of swamped and deserted trenches stretched away on either side and were finally lost in the undergrowth. Tall, heavy trees had been felled and laid athwart the road, which had sunk beneath their weight. And when they had been dragged into the ditches in order to leave the way clear for the troops, their stout branches had scored deep scratches in the road, which had soon been converted into quagmires by the rain.
We passed through Pierrefonds, where, beneath the leaden sky, the magnificent outlines of the château rose up amid the verdure darkened by the rain, and then entered theforest of Compiègne, with its lofty beeches standing in colonnades, below which lay long lines of swamped trenches zigzagging between the trees, with here and there a primitive hut made of branches and ferns, and more and more dead horses.
The sun, breaking out between two clouds and piercing the leaves, threw emerald-green lights on the wet moss. Among the dark tones the bright trunks of the birches flashed intermittently.
Compiègne! The town, occupied by the enemy for a few days only, did not appear to have suffered very much. Gun-fire was audible from far off, to the north-east.
We crossed the Oise and rejoined our batteries at Venette, an outlying suburb.
In the large hall of a farm to which I had gone in search of provisions the farmer's wife, a matron of over fifty summers, was depicting the horrors of the German occupation to four gunners.
She broke off as I came in.
"Some milk and eggs? You want to buy them? No! I won't sell them, but I'll give you them.... Please wait a moment."
And she resumed her story.
"Well, as I was saying, it was just like that... in front of their father. They trussed him up with his back to the wardrobe so that he couldn't help seeing everything. Five or six of them there were, and one officer. They violated both girls—only eighteen and twenty, and such nice, honest girls too!... Yes—all six of them, one after the other! The poor things screamed all the time!... Oh, those aren't men!... They're just beasts!..."
And lowering her voice a little, but without embarrassment, she continued:
"More than one woman went through the same thing. I did ... yes!... And yet I'm no young girl.... I've a son who is a soldier like you.... Oh, God, it's awful!... It happened one evening, at about this time ... four of them had arrived here to sleep. How was I to defend myself?... The best thing was to say nothing. There have been women who have tried to defend themselves and who have been simply ripped up ... that's all! My husband was out, getting in their things. I thought to myself, 'If he comes in, what will happen?... He'll kill some of them....'"
"Yes, I would, too! I'd have killed them!" interrupted a voice from the darkness at the end of the room.
I had not seen the man as he sat smoking his pipe in a corner of the hearth.
His wife turned towards him.
"Poor old dear! You'd perhaps have killed one of them, but the others would have killed both of us.... Besides, as far as I'm concerned—well—I know I'm too old!... That's what my husband said—afterwards.... That won't lead to any consequences!"
Sunday, September 20
A long march in a stinging hail-storm, first towards the west and then northwards. We are evidently attempting a turning movement against the German right wing.
Monday, September 21
The day broke with the calm brightness of early autumn. We continued our enveloping movement.
Towards midday a heavy French battery in position near the road suddenly began to fire. Our officers went off at a gallop to reconnoitre. We thought we were going into action, but were finally told that we should not be wanted to-day and were sent off to camp in a park near Ribécourt. We ranged up the guns on a lawn flanked by a magnificent wood of beech-trees bordered by rhododendrons.
On one side of us lay an unruffled sheet of water, reddening under the brilliant sunset, and, on the other, among the clumps of trees beneath which lay flower-beds set off by blood-red sage, rose a fine modern château. Under the rich foliage a little rustic bridge spanning the river gave an effect curiously Venetian.
The evening was sultry, but nevertheless we made our bivouac fires under the chestnut-trees flanking the river. In the darkness of the night, which had now fallen, the pond looked like an enormous blot of ink. We were almost blinded by the yellow flare of our fires and could no longer distinguish the river banks, thus risking at every step a fall into the water.
Tuesday, September 22
We passed the night on some straw in the outbuildings.
My wrist is now healed, and I am going to return to my post with the first gun.
Under the morning sun the pond shone like a silver mirror, and the little Venetian bridge struck a bright note among the dark tones of the trees, while the water flowing underneath, over the slime and rotten leaves, was jet-black.The château stood out starkly against the pale blue sky, and the yellow gravel of the walks and the vermilion sage afforded a bright contrast to the uniform green of the lawns.
The battery moved on. The crackling of rifle and machine-gun fire accompanied the roar of the artillery. The enemy was evidently making a stand against our enveloping movement, which it was doubtless the intention of the French commanders to accentuate. We resumed our march towards the north, heading for Roye. The success of the manœuvre depended on numbers, and I wondered whether we had sufficient men available.
In a field by the wayside some Senegalese Tirailleurs, fine-looking, ebony-coloured men dressed in navy blue uniforms, were making coffee with the simple gestures and admirable attitudes of people untrammelled by civilization.
The officers had gone off to reconnoitre. We halted at the foot of a long slope in the middle of some large mangel-wurzel fields forming a kind of basin near the village of Fresnières, where heavy shells were falling.
The line of fire, forming an angle towards Compiègne, stretched from north to south. We could not be more than a mile or two, asthe crow flies, from the plains we had been occupying during the past few days on the banks of the Aisne, near Tracy-le-Mont.
I do not know what echo or confusion of sound prevented us from locating the position of the battle exactly. Fighting was going on in the direction of Ribécourt and Lassigny, but the heavy battery which had been bombarding Fresnières was now silent. Behind the woods columns of black smoke were curling upwards. Fires or shells bursting? It was impossible to tell.
But our chief anxiety was the northern horizon, which was masked by a line of poplars, and from which occasional and unsustained rifle-fire revealed the presence of the enemy. The Germans might reply to our enveloping movement by trying to execute a similar manœuvre.
On the edge of the woods to the north-east large numbers of troops could be seen in movement. A long black column of artillery was winding its way across country. The hoof-beats of a far-off squadron, trotting, sounded like the reptation of some huge serpent. The whole countryside was alive. From where we stood one would have said that it was only the leaves of the mangel-wurzels moving inthe wind, but in reality it was infantry deploying in skirmishing order.
We took up position in a field. The ground under my gun was extremely soft, and it seemed a foregone conclusion that the carriage would continue to recoil with the result that a perpetual error in laying would retard our rapidity of fire. The second gun was no better placed than ours, but the other section, in position on a stubble-field, was on much firmer ground. The battery would thus lose all cohesion, but there was no help for it. It was impossible to use the position assigned to us to better advantage.
In front of us, some 77 mm. guns were sweeping the fields, but these did not cause us much anxiety. In relation to the position which, judging from their fire, they were occupying somewhere to the north-east, we were well covered. But, beyond Lassigny, standing out amid the verdure, rose a line of lofty, wooded hills which commanded the whole of the plain and from the summit of which our battery was certainly visible. We could not take our eyes off their threatening crests. What lay hid in their gloomy forests?
We were well within range of heavy artillery should the enemy install a battery at that point.
"Come on," said Bréjard, "we must make a hole and get to work quickly."
In feverish haste we dug a trench behind the ammunition wagon. Another group of ·75's, occupying a position parallel to ours, opened fire on Lassigny.
The ·77's now increased their range, and every round became more threatening.
"To your guns ... by the right, each battery!" commanded the Captain.
"What range? We haven't heard the range," shouted Millon.
"Eleven hundred!"
"How much?"
"Eleven hundred!"
"Oh, they're not far off!"
"Sounds bad, that," growled Hutin.
The gun reared, and immediately recoiled more than two yards. We had to man it forward into position, but the spade and wheels had sunk so deep in the soil that try as we would the six of us could not move it. Our shoulders to the wheels, struggling and sweating, we began to get nervous and angry. Finally we had to call to the detachment of the second gun to come and help us.
Some infantry had taken up position in front of the battery. We signalled to them to move to the left.
"They'll get cut in two, the idiots!"
"To the left!"
"What fools!"
"To the left!"
The Lieutenant, his lungs exhausted, waved his long arms.
"Lord! aren't they stupid, those fellows!" We shouted in chorus:
"To the left ...to the left!"
At last they moved off, and we could fire.
"Eight hundred!"
We thought we had not heard aright.
"Eight hundred!"
So the enemy was there, behind the crests, and was advancing....
What was the French command waiting for? Why did they not throw forward the troops which, over towards Fresnières, were swarming on the mangel-wurzel fields?
Moratin, who was standing on the refilling wagon, cried out:
"Go on, let 'em have it full! That shell from the first gun mowed down a heap of them. There! you can see them, the brutes!... You can see them!..."
His words gave us strength to push the gun, the wheels of which kept turning backwards, forward into position again.
"Hutin!"
"What?"
"Did you hear?"
"Hear what?"
"There it is again."
"Bullets ..."
"Yes."
"In threes, double traverse!"
The Captain had climbed into an apple-tree close to the fourth gun. The bullets, brushing over the crest, were too high to touch us, but they continually cut down leaves round the Captain. We begged him to come down. For the tenth time one of the gunners insisted:
"You mustn't stay there, sir!"
The Major interfered:
"Come down, De Brisoult!"
But the Captain, his glasses to his eyes, continued to scan the northern horizon and only answered quietly:
"But I can see very well, sir ... very well. Nine hundred!..."
"Nine hundred!"
"Nine hundred!" repeated the gunners.
Our infantry had doubtless retaken Lassigny. German shells were now bursting over the town, giving off clouds of yellow smoke.
"One thousand!"
We had at last found a more or less firmposition for our gun, and our fire accelerated as the enemy fell back.
"Eleven hundred!"
"Twelve hundred!... Cease firing!"
The detachments piled up in front of the trenches the ejected cartridge-cases which strewed the field. Bullets still continued to hum over our heads, but the 77 mm. shells were now falling wide of the mark. We remained motionless at the bottom of our trenches. Every few minutes Hutin asked me:
"What time is it?"
When I told him he became impatient:
"Confound it!" said he, "we don't seem to be getting on!"
In the afternoon, on an order from the division, the Major commanded the limbers to be brought up.
The drivers arrived on horseback, at a trot.
"Dismount!" shouted the Captain.
They did not hear. Bullets, skimming over the crest, still whistled by. They would inevitably be killed.
"Now then, altogether," said the senior N.C.O.... "One ... two ... three.... Dismount!..."
Twenty voices were raised in a single shout. This time they heard, and, without stoppingthe limbers, the drivers hurriedly tumbled off their horses.
We took up a fresh position still nearer the enemy between two lines of poplars in a meadow overgrown with tall grass. Almost immediately the 77 mm. guns, which since the morning had been searching for us without success, began to threaten our battery. The enemy could not have seen our movements, and no aeroplane was visible aloft. Had our position been signalled by a spy?
A foot-soldier passed, holding his abdomen with both hands and shifting from one foot to the other in the throes of intense suffering.
"Is there an ambulance over there?"
"Have you had a bullet in the stomach?"
"No, here ... between the legs. It burns, it burns frightfully!"
"Listen," said Millon, "make for our limbers—over there on the left, behind the trees. They've nothing to do, and will perhaps be able to help you."
"Thanks! I'll go to them."
"But take care between the trees in the meadow. The shells are falling thick there!"
The unfortunate soldier moved off slowly, writhing with pain.
The Captain was standing at the foot of thefirst poplar of one of the two lines, intent upon making observations. Men ready to transmit orders by word of mouth lay at regular intervals on the exposed ground between the battery and the observation-post.
The 77 mm. shells were now bursting directly overhead. We took cover. Every few seconds the enemy's shrapnels sowed the position with bullets, the lead twanging on the steel armour of the ammunition wagon. Nobody moved, and no one was wounded.
Then I saw Hutin, who, sitting on the layer's seat, was sheltering behind the gun-shield, suddenly jump to his feet:
"Good God!" he ejaculated, "the Captain!"
"Hit?" we asked anxiously.
"It burst just over the tree he was leaning up against!"
In spite of the danger the whole detachment at once stood up like one man.
"Can you see him, Hutin?"
"No...."
Lieutenant Homolle, the Major's little A.D.C., who quietly came up, unprotected, from the observation-post, shouted to us from a distance:
"Will you take cover, you idiots!"
"The Captain?"
"He's not hurt."
And, when he had reached us and taken shelter behind the ammunition wagon, he added:
"I've got two in the thigh.... That's nothing—they didn't go in ... a couple of bruises, that's all. The shell's got to burst pretty close to do any damage. The most annoying thing about it is that the Captain can't see the Germans. We can't fire!"
The enemy's fire redoubled in violence, and shrapnel bullets riddled the poplars, making a noise like falling hail. Shorn-off leaves, carried by the wind, were scattered round the guns.
One of the liaison officers—one of thehurleurs[3]as they are called—wounded in the side, hurriedly left the position. Astruc, wounded in the chest and vomiting blood, also left the field, leaning on the arm of a comrade.
We again became motionless under the shell-fire.
Since a moment or two I had felt an unaccustomed itching in my beard. Had I caught trench pest? Hutin lent me his looking-glass, but, while I was carefully combing myself, I felt a sudden burning sensation in my right hand, in which I was holding the glass, andwhich I had stretched beyond the protective bulk of the ammunition wagon. At the same time something hit me in the chest. Feverishly, with my left hand, I fingered the cloth of my uniform and found a rent in it breast-high. I felt myself suddenly grow weak. I tore open my tunic and shirt ... nothing ... I could see nothing. My skin was unscratched.
My pocket-book, letters, and letter-case, which I carry in the pocket of my shirt, had stopped the bullet. The blood was spurting from my wounded hand. That was nothing. Instinctively I had pocketed the looking-glass. I do not know how it had remained between my fingers, for my thumb was now no more than a pendant piece of tattered flesh.
"You'll have to clear off," said Lieutenant Hély d'Oissel, who was crouching down next to me.
Hutin stood up:
"Lintier!" he cried, in a voice vibrating with horror which went straight to my heart.
"It's nothing, old chap ... only my hand."
"I'll dress it for you!"
But shells were falling incessantly and I refused to let him get from under cover.
"Run off quick!" said the Lieutenant.
I ran off across the meadow, crouchingdown as much as possible under the menace of the shrapnel bullets. Blood was dripping on to my leggings and thighs, and sticking the cloth of my breeches to my knees. From my hand the bullet had projected a red, star-shaped piece of flesh and tendons on to my chest.
Suddenly came the whistling of approaching shells.
At the foot of one of the poplars two horses had just been killed. I threw myself down between them in the long, blood-stained grass. The shells burst. With a dull sound a large splinter ripped up one of the inert bodies protecting me.
I immediately set off again, rapidly getting out of the 77 mm. Howitzer line of fire. My wounded hand was covered with earth and horse's blood. As I crossed a road or embankment, I suddenly found myself faced by the threatening muzzles of twenty French field-guns lined up on the field. There was nothing for it but to retrace my steps.
Behind the motionless artillery some Moroccan Tirailleurs were lying among the mangel-wurzels. I nearly trod on them before I discovered their presence.
A Captain stood up and beckoned to me:
"Come here, gunner, and I'll bandage you.Got your first-aid dressing?... In the inside pocket of your tunic?... Hallo, it's all torn! Been wounded in the chest? No?... Well, you're lucky!..."
He examined my hand.
"H'm ... nasty!... lot of earth and gun-grease got into it.... We must clean that off and disinfect the wound as soon as possible.... I'll take off the worst with some cotton-wool."
I was out of breath with running, and the blood was throbbing in my temples and buzzing in my ears. The instinct of self-preservation suddenly deserted me, and, as I stood motionless, I began to feel faint. My legs shook and gave way as though broken at the knees. The figure of the officer standing by me seemed to turn round and round.
"Hallo! Steady!" he cried.
He forced the neck of a flask between my lips and poured a draught of rum down my throat. I immediately felt strengthened from head to foot and laughed as I thanked him.
"That's all right!" said he as he finished dressing my hand.
The field-hospitals of the division were at Fresnières, and I started off in that direction. My hand felt as though it had turned to lead, and, as I walked across country, holdingmyself stiffly erect with a view to resisting another fainting fit, buoyed up by the thought that I should soon be under cover, far from the shells and the battle, an unwonted lassitude, a yearning for sleep and silence, a weakening of will-power suddenly took possession of me and seemed to penetrate to the very marrow of my bones. It seemed to me that when I got to the hospital I should sleep for days on end.
To sleep—to sleep—and, above all, no longer hear the guns, no longer hear anything. To live without thinking, and in absolute silence; to live after so many times having narrowly escaped death. Suddenly I remembered what the Captain of Tirailleurs had said—that my wound was dirty, infected with earth and horse's blood. The fear of gangrene, of lock-jaw, and of all other forms of hospital putrefaction gripped me by the throat.
At Fresnières an enormous shell had just killed, in front of the door of the hospital, a medical officer, a nun, and four wounded men. The bodies were laid out side by side on the pavement, but the corpse of a Tirailleur, a great, dark-skinned giant whose arms, stretched out, spanned an extraordinary space, still lay in the cut-up roadway. The air was full of the distant whistling of shells. In the faceof this menace which remained hanging over my head, now that I could no longer fight, I was seized with an instinctive and puerile feeling of revolt. I was no longer fair game.
In the yard outside the hospital, among the stretchers bearing wounded, blood-stained men, some hospital orderlies were laying the more severe cases on a large table covered with a flowery-patterned oil-cloth. Two medical officers were hurriedly dressing them.
One, a big, brown-haired man with gold-rimmed spectacles, beckoned to me. I went up to him.
"Well, what's wrong with you?"
"Shrapnel...."
"Let's have a look!"
He unwound the bandage, and, as soon as he took off the compress, the blood began to spurt like a fountain. He looked at the wound and made a grimace.
"H'm ... it bleeds badly...."
He called one of his subordinates, a bearded officer, who hurried up.
"Look ... we'd better take the thumb right off, hadn't we?"
"I should think so!..." said the other.
"Right. We'll cut that off for you at once," said the officer with the gold-rimmed glasses.
I protested:
"Cut off my thumb!"
"Yes, unless you want to keep it on like that. Here, wait a moment...."
A Colonial infantryman had just been brought in, the blood gushing from a large wound in his shoulder. The medical officer knelt down beside him and feverishly felt about with his fingers among the torn shreds of flesh, trying to pinch the artery.
"Cut off my thumb!..." echoed in my ears.
I quickly made up my mind. Seizing a compress and a strip of rolled lint from the table I managed with the aid of my left hand and teeth to bandage my wound in a rough-and-ready fashion, and without being observed by the officers, who were intent upon the severed artery, I slipped out of the hospital.
I knew that I should find the other divisional hospitals at Canny-sur-Matz, about a mile and a half from Fresnières.
I came upon a café still open in spite of the shells, and bought a flask of brandy. I placed my revolver holster on my left side, within reach of my sound hand, for night was coming on, and often, under cover of the darkness, patrols of German cavalry managed to slip between the network of French outposts and supports.
The Canny road made a wide detour, so I decided to strike across country. The steeple of the village church, standing out sharply against the crimson sky, would serve as a guide.
My hand continued to bleed. I kept up my strength with frequent pulls at my brandy-flask and felt confident that I should be able to reach the next hospital.
On a sloping field, near a square-shaped hayrick, some infantry lay stretched out, their red breeches making bright patches in the shadowy grass. A passing puff of wind bore with it a disquieting smell. The arm of one of the prostrate soldiers on the top of the knoll stretched straight up in the air, motionless against the clearness of the western sky-line.
Dead men!
I was about to go on my way, when in the shadow of the hayrick I saw a human figure crouching over one of the bodies. The man had not seen me.... He turned the corpse over and began to search it. I at once cocked my revolver, and carefully, without trembling, aimed at the looter. I was about to pull the trigger when a sudden fear stopped me. I could see his movements quite clearly, but his face, turned sideways against the darkbackground of the hayrick, was not discernible. The thought that he might be a gendarme identifying the dead made me lower my weapon.
"What are you doing there?" I shouted.
The man jumped as though stung by a whip-lash, and stood up, his features sharply defined against the clear sky. I saw that he was wearing a flat cap with a broad peak.
"Mind your own business and I'll mind mine!" he retorted. With that he made off, running in zigzags under the menace of my revolver, like an animal trying to cover its tracks.
I fired ... he stopped a moment. Had I hit him? A streak of light flashed out from his shadow, and a bullet hummed past my ear. Off he went again but, just as he was about to disappear behind a bush, I fired a second time. I thought I saw him fall among the brambles.
I arrived at Canny, where a red lantern shining through the darkness marked the entrance to the hospital. Wounded were stretched out in the porch, and the yard was full of them. The medical officers were hard at work in a veranda adjoining the main building. Through the multicoloured glass windows a diffused light filtered slowly,vaguely illuminating the men stretched on the straw. Now and again, when the door of the veranda opened, a rectangle of crude light spread along the ground, showing up a line of stretchers and the suffering faces of the severely wounded who were waiting for first aid. Two orderlies carried off the first stretcher of the row. The door swung to behind them and the yard was again plunged in a flickering half-light.
I stood there, very tired, looking stupidly at the scene. My hand was still bleeding, but only drop by drop now.
I asked a passing orderly:
"Do you know when they'll be able to dress my wound?"
"To-night. Lie down in the straw."
I lay down where I was. Suddenly I heard a voice, at once infantile and yet grave, in my ear:
"You wounded?" it said, with a strange accent.
I turned and found a tall negro lying by my side. I could see nothing of him but two shining eyes.
"Yes, I'm wounded, Sidi. You too?"
"Yes, me wounded."
He appeared to reflect for a moment:
"Blacks ... wounded, wounded, wounded ... and then killed ... killed ... killed ... Boches ... oh! many, many Boches ... William!"
"Ah! so you've heard of William?"
"William ... bad chief ... lot of women ... many women!... ah!..."
He paused an instant and then continued:
"He many women ... big, bad chief ... like way back there ... back there ... killed the women ... cut ... cut.... Whish!... like that!..."
"Why?"
"Bad ... ah!... he got big house ... put women's heads on top ... on roof.... Ah, bad...."
He searched for words:
"Yes, put heads of women—many women—on roof of house ... bad, very bad...."
I was in too much pain to sleep, and had perforce to listen to his childish babble.
"So ... down there ... bad chief stick women's heads on roof ... not good, no!... down there!..."
And then the Senegalese began to speak in his own language, a lisping, sweet-sounding tongue. Perhaps he was delirious.
I felt cold, but nevertheless, after a time, found my eyelids growing heavy. Coveringmy legs with straw as best I could I stretched myself out and went to sleep.
It was still night when I awoke, and a thin rain, or rather drizzle, was falling. I was colder than ever, and my wound pained me severely. The veranda was still lit up. I could see the shadowy form of the negro lying next to me, but could no longer hear his breathing. I stretched out my hand and felt his. It was icy cold. The straw under me seemed wet. I looked, and discovered that my feet were lying in a pool of blood.
I stood up. The severely wounded had now been dressed. A fire had been lit in the kitchen of the farmhouse, and a white-faced Algerian was dozing in front of it. On the mantelpiece an alarum clock, standing between two brass candlesticks, marked two o'clock.
I had my wound dressed. It appeared that after all it would not be necessary to amputate my thumb. A N.C.O. took down my name, and on the cloth band which held my arm in a sling pinned a hospital ticket: "Severe shrapnel wound in left hand. To be invalided back, sitting."