CHESTER SAVES THE DAY.
The day was at its noon!
From the first break of dawn the battle had raged; now, at mid-day, it
was at its height. Hour after hour the fighting had continued under a
shadowless sky, blue as steel, hard as a sheet of brass. The Germans had
attacked the Belgians and French with the first streak of light.
Circling, sweeping, silently, swiftly, a marvelous whirlwind of force,
the Germans had rushed on. Swift, as though wind-driven, they moved. An
instant, and the Allies broke into violent movement. Half-clothed
sleepers poured out. Perfect discipline did the rest.
With marvelous and matchless swiftness and precision they got under arms.
There were but fifteen hundred or so in all--six squadrons of French
Lancers, the only French troops yet to reach Belgian soil, and a small
body of infantry, without artillery.
Yet, rapid as the action of the Allies was, it was not as rapid as the
downward sweep of the German horde that rushed to meet them.
There was a crash, as if rock were hurled upon rock, as the Lancers, the
flower of the French cavalry, scarce seated in the saddle, rushed forward
to save the pickets, to encounter the first blind ford of the attack and
to give the Belgian infantry, farther in, time to prepare for defense.
The hoofs of rearing chargers struck each other's breasts, and these bit
and tore at each other's throats and manes, while their riders reeled
down dead. The outer wings of the Germans were spared the shock, and
swept on to meet the bayonets of the infantry.
The cavalry was enveloped in the overwhelming numbers of the center. It
was a frightful tangling of men and brutes.
The Lancers could not charge; they were hemmed in, packed between bodies
of horsemen that pressed them together as between iron plates; now and
then they cut their way through clear enough to reach their comrades, but
as often as they did so, so often the overwhelming numbers of the Germans
surged in on them afresh like a flood, and closed upon them, and drove
them back.
It was bitter, stifling, cruel work; with their mouths choked with dust,
with their throats caked with thirst, with their eyes blind with smoke;
while the steel was thrust through nerve and sinew, or the shot plowed
through bone and flesh.
The answering fire of the infantry kept the Germans farther at bay, and
mowed them down faster--but in the Lancers' quarter of the field--parted
from the rest of their comrades, as they had been by the rush of that
broken charge with which they had sought to save the town and arrest the
foe--the worst pressure of the attack was felt, and the fiercest of the
slaughter fell.
The general in command of the cavalry had been shot dead as they had
first swept out to encounter the advance of the German horsemen; one by
one the officers had been cut down, singled out by the keen eyes of their
enemy, and throwing themselves into the deadliest of the carnage with
impetuous self-devotion characteristic of their service.
At the last there remained but a bare handful of the brilliant squadrons
of 600 men that had galloped down in the gray of dawn to meet the
whirlwind of German fury. At their head was Captain Derevaux, and beside
him rode Hal.
It was not the gallant captain's fault that Hal was thus in the thick of
the battle. This had been an accident, and had come about in this manner:
Late the night before Hal and Chester had been called to the quarters of
the commanding general and dispatched on separate missions. Their ways
led past the outposts--even beyond the farthest--where the six squadrons
of French Lancers and a small body of infantry had been thrown out, under
orders, to make a reconnaissance in force in the morning. Advancing
beyond this line, Hal had turned east and Chester west.
His mission accomplished, Hal had just reached the Allies' line upon his
return, when the Germans bore down on them. Hal saw that his one chance
for safety lay in throwing in his fortunes with the troops.
Accordingly he turned his horse, just as the Lancers swept past on their
first charge, and reined in beside Captain Derevaux. The latter had
recognized the danger and realized that the boy's keen wit had detected
his one hope of life. He had greeted him with a smile; nor had he blamed
him for his choice.
And so Hal had swept forward in the charge. Seizing a sword from a
falling trooper, Hal, riding at the captain's side, was soon in the thick
of the terrible carnage, and, in spite of the terrible fighting, had
escaped injury.
Two horses had been killed under Captain Derevaux. Twice he had thrown
himself across fresh, unwounded chargers, whose riders had fallen in the
fray, and at whose bridles he caught as he shook himself free of the dead
animal's stirrups. His head was uncovered; his uniform, hurriedly thrown
on, had been torn aside, and his chest was bare; he was drenched with
blood, not his own, that had rained on him as he fought, and his face and
hands were black with smoke and with powder.
Hal could not see a yard in front of him; he could not tell how the day
went anywhere save in that corner where the Lancers were hemmed in. As
fast as they beat the enemy back, and forced themselves to some clearer
space, the Germans closed in afresh.
No orders reached the little troop, and Hal could not tell whether the
Belgian battalions were holding their own or had been cut utterly to
pieces under the immense numerical superiority of their foes.
Glancing about the field, Captain Derevaux could see that every officer
of the Lancers save himself was down, and that, unless he took the vacant
place and rallied them, the few troopers still left would scatter.
With Hal at his side, he spurred the horse he had just mounted against
the dense crowd opposing him--against the hard black wall of dust and
smoke and steel and savage faces, which were all that either could
see. He thrust his horse against the mob, while he waved his sword
above his head:
"_En avant_!" he shouted.
His voice reached the troopers, clear and ringing in its appeal. Hal,
turning in his saddle at this moment, caught from the hands of a reeling
trooper the Eagle of France, and as he raised it aloft, the light,
flashing upon the golden wings, brought an answering shout from those
that remained of the troop.
"_En avant_!" came the rallying cry.
The young French captain glanced back on this little troop, guarding
his head the while from the blows that were rained on him, and his
voice rang out:
"Charge!"
Like arrows launched from a hundred bows they charged, Hal and the young
captain still slightly in advance, Hal striking aside the steel aimed at
him, as they pushed on, and with the other hand holding high the Eagle
of France.
The effort was superb.
Dense bodies of Germans parted them in the front from the part of the
field where the infantry still was engaged, harassed them in the rear
with flying shots and forced down on them on either side, like the
closing jaws of a trap.
Their fierce charge was, for a moment, irresistible; it bore headlong all
before it. For a moment the Germans gave way, shaken and confused. For a
moment they recoiled under the shock of that desperate charge.
As Captain Derevaux spurred his horse against the enemy, twenty blades
glittered against him. The first would have pierced his chest had not Hal
struck up the blade with a quick move.
To pause was impossible. Though the French horses were forced through a
bristling forest of steel, the charge availed little.
Hal waved the Eagle aloft, as the captain looked around at the few who
were left and shouted:
"You are the sons of the Old Guard! Die like them!"
"Surrender!" came a cry from in front.
Hal looked back once more on the fragment of the troop, and raised the
flag higher aloft, as he muttered to himself:
"This will be the end. I wish I could have seen Chester once more; good
old Chester!"
Hot and blinded, with an open gash in his shoulder where a sword had
struck a moment before, but with his eyes flashing and a smile on his
lips, the young captain cried his reply to the command to surrender:
"Have we fought so poorly that you think we shall give up now?"
Then, with upraised swords, the troop awaited the onward rush of
the Germans; and, as they waited the young captain found time to
murmur to Hal:
"I am sorry to see you here now, but you are a fighter after my
own heart."
Hal was unable to speak. He put out his hand and the young Frenchman
grasped it warmly.
"I guess it is good-by," he said quietly.
Then came the shock. With a yell the Germans threw themselves
forward. A moment more and the onrushing horde would have massacred
them like cattle. But, even at the moment of impact a voice rang out
over the field:
"Forward! Charge!"
Above the din of shouting and rifle shots it came; and from behind came
a full troop of Belgian light cavalry; and in front, with drawn sword,
rode Chester.
The troop came on at a whirlwind rush; and, even as they did so, Captain
Derevaux urged his men into another charge, and pressed forward into the
thickest of the conflict. And Hal rode by his side.
Blow after blow was aimed at them, but none found its mark. Parrying and
striking, they pushed on; and then a German bugle sounded a recall, and
the enemy drew off.
Panting, Chester rode to Hal's side.
"I was afraid we would be too late!" he exclaimed.
"I am not even scratched," returned Hal, grasping his friend's hand.
A Belgian officer hurried up to Captain Derevaux.
"You have this lad to thank for our opportune arrival," he declared,
indicating Chester. "He told us of your plight, or we would not have
arrived in time."
The captain grasped Chester's hand.
"You saved the day!" he said simply.