CUT OFF
ENTERING the main room of the spacious dug-out Ralph and his comrades
found the place illuminated by a couple of candles that the Huns,
with characteristic forethought, had lighted in anticipation of the
failure of the electric current.
The place was a combined dormitory and living-room. Against three
walls were tiers of bed-boxes, showing that there was accommodation
for at least fifty men. Tables and chairs, looted from French houses,
occupied most of the floor space. Even though intended for the German
rank and file the dug-out, in the matter of comfort and security, was
far more habitable and commodious than those of the British troops.
It was constructed with a view of lasting, whereas the British
dug-outs were of a temporary nature, pending the long-promised and
eagerly awaited Great Advance. It was one of the numerous concrete
works that the Huns never expected to have to evacuate so long as the
war lasted. To their cost they found that British tenacity and
courage, backed by the powerful shells supplied by the munition
workers at home, were more than a match for German ingenuity and
machine-like methods of waging modern war.
Crowded into one corner of the dug-out were eleven Prussians, for the
most part sullen and brutal in features and with the fear of death in
their bloodshot eyes. Some of them were wounded; all were caked from
head to foot with mud and soot.
Armed with a German rifle and bayonet stood Private Bartlett, as
proud as a peacock.
"Glad you came," he exclaimed. "I knew things were going all right
when these fellows came skeltering for shelter, and still more so
when you flung a bomb down the stairs----"
"We didn't," expostulated Alderhame jocularly. "We wouldn't do you
such a dirty trick, Sidney. Blame your pal, Ginger."
"He's all right, then?" asked the rescued man.
"And so are you," added Ralph. "Good for promotion."
"'Cause why?"
"I heard you being cross-examined by the Prussian officer and your
replies," continued Setley. "Simply had to report to the O.C., you
know. Well, what happened afterwards?"
"They knocked me about a bit," declared Bartlett. "Thought I was
kidding them, I suppose, but as it was the right way as far as they
were concerned they got a bit more civil. Finally, when the
bombardment commenced they pushed me down this dug-out. Crikey! I
thought the roof was tumbling in every second, and fifty feet below
ground at that. Then when the bomb was chucked down the stairs the
Huns here knew the game was up. They nearly fell over themselves
trying to get me to take them prisoners--and there they are."
"Any way out there?" asked Setley, pointing to a door at the remote
end of the underground room.
"Don't know," said Bartlett. "I'll soon see."
He came back with the information that it led only to a smaller room,
evidently set apart for non-commissioned officers.
"Good enough," declared Ralph. "We'll leave the prisoners here until
we can send them to the advance-cages."
"You our lives save?" enquired a Hun corporal anxiously.
"Yes, if you behave yourselves," said Bartlett. "We won't drop a bomb
amongst you as we clear out. That's not the British way, you know."
Collecting the captured rifles and side-arms, the three Wheatshires
returned to the open air, where Ginger greeted his restored pal with
grim Cockney humour.
"Wot, more of 'em dahn there?" he asked. "S'welp me. 'Ere goes."
Like a terrier after a swarm of rats Anderson was about to plunge
down the flight of steps when Bartlett arrested his movements.
"It's no go," he said. "We've promised them quarter."
"After they tried to do the dirty on us," grumbled Ginger, still
fumbling with the safety-pin of a bomb. "I'll give 'em quarter--not
'arf."
Sidney barred his way. Setley and Alderhame joined in an attempt to
check the ferocious ardour of their comrade. How the dispute might
have ended if allowed to continue must remain in doubt, for a heavy
shell, landing in the bay of the captured trench, exploded and threw
the four men to the ground.
Half buried with debris they extricated themselves, none the worse
except for a severe shaking. All thoughts of the dispute were
forgotten.
The Wheatshires were occupying the captured section of the trench,
the men toiling strenuously to convert the parados into a parapet. A
hundred yards to the right the Huns still held their own. A traverse,
heavily defended with machine-guns, had proved too great an obstacle
to be rushed in a frontal attack. To the rear of the Wheatshires'
position was the barbed wire entanglement that had held up the
luckless Coalshires; in front the Germans were massing for a gigantic
counter-attack, while on the right of the British battalion the
Blankshires had been compelled to give ground. Added to this the
German guns had got the exact range of the captured section of
trenches, while inexplicably the British artillery were putting up a
barrage in front of a position where the Huns had made no serious
effort to counter-attack.
This error was the result of one of those elements of chance that
often win or lose battles. The telephone wires from the observer's
post to the battery had been severed, and already three devoted
linesmen had lost their lives in heroic efforts to repair the means
of communication. A signaller mounted the parapet and attempted to
convey the much-needed information to the gunners, but he fell almost
immediately, pierced by a dozen machine-gun bullets.
However well the advance was faring elsewhere the grim fact was
patent that the Wheatshires were cut off.
The men knew it. They were literally fighting with their backs to the
wall--and it is said that a Briton never fights better than in such a
position.
"Stick it, men!" shouted the colonel.
The Wheatshires responded with a cheer.
"Reminds a fellow of the winning goal at Yatton Park," remarked
Alderhame, as he shoved a fresh clip of cartridges into the magazine
of his rifle. "It's getting a bit of a hot corner."
"Garn! It don't beat my old woman on Saturday night," retorted Ginger
contemptuously.
The hurricane of hostile shells continued without intermission for
the space of nearly ten minutes. The hastily constructed parapet of
sand-bags disappeared in clouds of dust and noxious smoke. The men,
gasping for breath, clung tenaciously to the side of the trench,
except on the left flank where British and German bombers were
hurling their missiles with deadly ferocity. Not only in the captured
section of the trench, but along the outer lip of the huge
mine-crater, the Wheatshires and their supporting battalion doggedly
held their ground, despite the pounding of huge shells that several
times blew half a dozen men into a state of unrecognizability.
"What the deuce are our guns doing?" was the oft-repeated question,
for, although the gigantic messengers of death were still hurtling
through the air, the shells were not directed upon the dense columns
of German infantry who were slowly following up the barrage set up by
their guns.
Then the crash of the exploding shells from the Hun batteries ceased.
Only the distant roar of the artillery duel and the sharp bark of the
bombs broke the silence. Compared with the titanic thunder of the
bombardment the residue of sound was hardly noticeable. It was the
signal for the Wheatshires to pull themselves together to withstand
the counter-attack.
In dense serried masses the columns of Bavarian infantry advanced.
They came on without hesitation, yet in comparative silence,
confident that their guns had so pulverized the trenches their
Prussian comrades had lost that the charge would be little more than
a "walk-over."
"Five hundred yards! Fire!"
From Maxims and Lewis guns, hastily mounted on the battered parapets,
from scores, nay, hundreds, of rifles the hail of nickel from the
Wheatshires smote the ranks of their opponents. Like a giant
receiving a knock-out blow betwixt the eyes, the field-grey masses
recoiled, wavered and broke, in spite of the efforts of their
officers to check the rout as the men rushed past them.
Ironical cheers greeted the discomfiture of the Bavarians, then the
Wheatshires settled down to undergo the renewal of their punishment,
for certain it was that the German gunners, exasperated at the check
of the infantry, would renew the bombardment with increased violence.
What seemed worse was the fact that several regiments of the enemy
had succeeded in working round both flanks. On the left the Huns,
still in possession of part of the same trench as the Wheatshires
held, were strongly reinforced. The British infantry were now in a
dangerous salient, but still they had not given an inch of ground.
Nor could reserves be rushed up to strengthen the advanced position,
for the comparatively level stretch of ground was completely exposed
to machine-gun fire, to say nothing of the formidable barbed wire
that the British guns had failed to demolish earlier in the day.
An aeroplane droned overhead at an altitude of less than a thousand
feet. By the red, white, and blue concentrated rings on the planes it
was recognized as a British machine. In spite of a warm greeting from
the anti-aircraft guns, for mushrooms of white smoke was bursting all
around it, the biplane circled serenely. Its object was soon
apparent, for, like a whirlwind, shells from the British guns
commenced to put up a barrage behind the Huns holding the section of
trenches on the Wheatshires' left flank.
Simultaneously four indistinct shapes, resembling gigantic tortoises,
appeared in view, ambling leisurely towards the uncut wire.
"That's the sort!" commented Ginger Anderson. He could now reasonably
risk drinking the remainder of the contents of his water-bottle.
"'Ere come the bloomin' Tanks."