Chapter 12

OUT IN NO MAN'S LAND

SUDDEN ORDERS. THE BEGINNING OF A GREAT ADVENTURE. DIGGING IN

After a strenuous day's work, during which I had only time to take a mouthful of bread and cheese, which I carried in my pocket, I espied an orderly making his way towards me.

"The C.O. sent me, sir; you're wanted at once."

"Oh! any news?"

"I think we are in for a binge, sir."

"Which is the way to headquarters?"

"About two hundred yards back. Follow that narrow little track which winds around the shell-holes, and you can't miss it. Don't leave the track, or you will lose your way."

On arriving at H.Q. I found a small group of officers bending anxiously over a map. The C.O. turned to me as I approached:

"Ah! There you are. Get your books out, and take down your orders--ready! You are to take command of B Company. Well, now, here's our position; there's Combles and there's Leuze Wood. Take your company out into 'No Man's Land,' and extend along a line facing half right to our present position, with your left resting on the wood. C Company will be in the wood on your left; and A Company will be on your right--understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"You'll dig in to-night, and to-morrow we are going to take that trench that's formed like a square, to prepare the way for a frontal attack on Combles by the French. You'll take the upper portion of that perpendicular trench, passing the wood on your left."

"Then, I shall have to cross over the lower trench; isn't that occupied, sir?"

"The battalion bombers will clear that out for you during the night."

"When is zero hour, sir?"

"Don't know; I've told you all I know at present. Take ten flares, and send up two when you arrive at your objective, and send up another two at 6 o'clock the following morning."

"What about ammunition and water, sir?"

"The water you've already got is supposed to last forty-eight hours. I don't know about ammunition; I think there's an ammunition dump in the wood, but I will find that out and let you know. All right; it's dark enough now."

Sch!--Crash!--Zug! A 5·9 burst on the parapet a few yards away. The thud of an awky bit was felt in our midst, and the sergeant-major jumped up, holding his foot. The C.O. looked up without turning a hair:

"Any one hurt?" he asked.

"Only my boots, sir," replied the sergeant-major, suspiciously feeling his heel.

I took my departure and began to grope around in the dark in search of the narrow track which would guide me back to my company. I searched for about ten minutes, but in vain, and I became for a while hopelessly lost in a mass of shell-holes. I knew the direction roughly, but direction was of little use in that wild confusion of broken ground and débris.

What if I should be lost all night? What would they think? It would be put down to funk. A cold perspiration came over me. I felt an overwhelming sense of loneliness amidst that gruesome scene of destruction; and to crown it all, a feeling of responsibility and anxiety which made the craters seem deeper as I frantically scrambled out of one and into another. At last, to my intense relief, I found the little footpath and reached my trench safely.

Time was getting on. I gave orders for the men to dress and lie flat on the parados, ready for the word to move. When all preparations were completed, and bombs, picks, and shovels issued to each man, I signalled the advance, and with a few scouts in front and on the flanks, we slowly moved in single file into the unknown.

It was a pitch-black night, intensified by a slight fog, and I took my direction by compass bearing, wondering all the while if it would lead me right.

The men marched in silence. Nothing could be heard but the muffled footsteps over the soft ground, and occasional jingling of a spade or pick against the butt of a rifle.

Distance became exaggerated, and fifty paces seemed like five hundred, until I began to get a horrible fear that my compass had misled me, and that countless German eyes were watching me leading my men into the midst of their guns. Where were we going? When would we get back, and how many of us? Call it funk or what you like, but whatever it is, it's a devilishly creepy feeling; and when at last I found myself close to the edge of the wood, I felt as if I were arriving home.

But the real job had not yet begun. I signalled the halt to the leading file, and passed the word to turn to the right and extend two paces to the right and lie down. I next ordered a sentry group, consisting of one section to be sent out by each platoon to occupy shell-holes fifty yards in front as a protection against surprise.

The platoon on the left was to bend its flank to face the edge of the wood, and get in touch with C Company in the wood; while the platoon on the right secured connection with A Company. One Lewis-gun section took up position on the left flank at the corner of the wood, whilst the other Lewis gun protected my right.

These precautions against surprise being completed, I ordered the men to dig for all they were worth; rifles with bayonets fixed, and magazines charged to be placed within arm's reach at the back of the trench, the earth to be thrown in front until the parapet became bullet-proof.

I spotted one man leaning on his shovel, and looking vacantly into the darkness.

"Dig, man! Don't stand looking about you," I whispered hoarsely.

"The ground's hard, sir; it's all chalk here."

"Don't be a fool! Dig! I tell you we may be discovered any minute. If we get shelled you'll be glad enough of a hole to lie in."

Passing along the line, I overheard two men talking in an undertone:

"How do you like it, Timmy?"

"Fed to the teeth. It's all very well for the skipper to say: 'Dig like hell!'--Seems quiet enough here."

"Heard about Bill? Went balmy just after we started. He began by laughing and crying; he was as mad as a hatter. He nearly put the wind up us in the rear. The skipper sent him back with a couple of stretcher-bearers."

"Poor old Bill, hard luck. Thought he couldn't stand much. Got any water?"

"Not a drop; I'm as dry as a brick."

"Shut up; there's the skipper standing there."

The conversation stopped; but the latter part worried me not a little. Water-bottle empty, good Lord! and no more water for forty-eight hours.

All of a sudden the sky was illuminated. Half a dozen Very lights went up in rapid succession: we were discovered!

A moment or two later from two different points, three reds and a green light went up, falling in our direction. Every man stopped work and looked up in amazement. We were in for it; we wanted no telling.

"Dig like hell!" I whispered hoarsely, hurrying along the line of wondering men.

But they wanted no urging this time, and every man set to work with feverish energy.

Then the bombardment commenced, and in a few minutes the air was filled with whistling shells, screeching through the night and making the darkness hideous.

We were only a foot below the surface of the ground. Once again I hastened along the line:

"Dig like hell!"

Lights were going up in rapid succession, and the German line whence they came appeared only a couple of hundred yards in front, and seemed to form a semicircle around my left flank.

Clack! Clack! Clack! What was that?--Rifles! My sentry groups were firing. Again the rattle of rifles, this time all along the line of sentry groups.

"Stand to!"

Every man seized his rifle and crouched in the pit he had dug and faced his front. We waited: the bombardment had stopped, and the crack of the rifles alone disturbed the night.

I drew my revolver and waited in breathless suspense for the sudden rush which seemed imminent.

Were our preparations to be nipped in the bud, after all? Would it be a sudden rush; a desperate hand-to-hand fight?--and then, what then?

The minutes passed like hours in an agony of suspense, and then, unable to bear the strain any longer, I crept cautiously forward into the inky darkness towards one of the sentry groups to find out what was amiss.

"Halt! Who is there?"

"O.C., B Company."

"Advance!"

"What's up?" I asked, sliding into the shell-hole beside the corporal.

"There seemed to be a patrol moving about in front; it's all quiet now, sir."

"All right; double the sentries for the next hour."

I returned to the line and ordered the men to continue digging.

The bombardment continued, but by and by we began to grow accustomed to the din. Several casualties occurred; but still the work of digging in continued.

Time was getting on, and I must make my plans for to-morrow's attack.

A few minutes later I chanced to notice a figure sitting leisurely in a shell-hole.

"Why, Septimus, is that you?"

"I think so; I say, I think so. Unearthly row; devilishly dangerous place, this--what?"

"But what are you doing in there?"

"I was just coming to talk to you about ammunition. A shell burst, and my face is simply covered with dust. Has the ammunition arrived yet?"

"No; there's an ammunition dump in the wood somewhere."

"Like me to go and find it?"

I looked at him in amazement. It wasn't funk then, that made him seek safety in that shell-hole. Was it possible that dear old Septimus, this bland, indifferent tubby, blasé old thing of Bond Street, was anxious to go into that creepy, mysterious wood to look for ammunition?

"All right; take a corporal and 12 men, and bring back six boxes. Don't take unnecessary risks; we shall need every man to-morrow."

Septimus sprang out of the shell-hole, saluted in the most correct manner--something quite new for him--and disappeared in the darkness.

This was a new side of Septimus's character which had not shown itself before. Only the stoutest heart would have chosen to wander about in that wood at midnight, with enemy patrols lurking about. Septimus was a man, after all.

Five minutes later he passed me, leading his men. He gripped my hand as he passed, with the remark: "Well! Ta-ta, old thing."

"Cheer oh!"

And Septimus was gone. We may call men fops, simple vacant fools, or what we like; but the war has proved over and over again that the man within the man is merely disguised by his outer covering. Many a Bond Street Algy, or ballroom idol has proved amidst the terrors of war that the artificial covering of a peace-time habit is but skin-deep; and the real man is underneath.