Behind the Lines (36 page)

They set off again at right angles to their former line of march. Another hour went by, but no road or identifiable landmark appeared. The fog seemed to have grown more dense. They came upon a narrow weed-grown track and halted. “Tracks lead to roads,” said Rawley. “But which way?” They listened for the rumble of gunfire eastwards, but the guns were silent or their voices were muffled by the fog. The mist drifted about them in clammy wreaths, and they seemed to be alone in a dead world. Now that the crunch of their boots was hushed, the silence was uncanny. “Fair give yer the creeps,” shivered Alf.

Rawley had no notion of direction, but he set off at a venture along the track. It led them down a steep slope, across a marshy flat, through some bricky hummocks, and ceased. The situation was becoming desperate. Both were dog-tired and hungry. Long since they had abandoned their object of finding the derelict canteen; they had but one desire: to find their way back to the safety of the cellar and sleep.

They trudged on, hoping against hope. They moved through a silent, invisible world, penned as it were in a tiny grey chamber that moved when they moved, and halted when they halted. They moved slowly and stumbled as they walked; it was agony to drag one leaden foot after another. They no longer kept a sharp look out into the mist ahead, although they knew that at any moment they might stumble upon a sentry. They were past caring; the longing to rest and sleep had numbed all other feelings.

A wire entanglement loomed dimly to their right, but in their exhausted condition they but glanced at it and did not notice that the pickets seemed to be unbent and the wire taut. A trench yawned at their feet, and they halted on its brink. The hope of finding a place where they could rest was uppermost in the minds of both. A yard to the left, the dark rectangle of a dug-out entrance shadowed the mist. They dropped clumsily into the trench and stumbled down the steps. Rawley swung his flash-lamp. The place was bare and the chalk walls leapt up dazzlingly white in the sudden glare. In a dazed way he was aware that the place seemed new. They dropped upon the floor, and in a few minutes were asleep.

III

Rawley was dragged back to consciousness by a feeling of being violently jolted. He had dreamt that he was sliding swiftly down a snowy slope in a large box, and just at the steepest part when the box was travelling at its swiftest an elephant had loomed suddenly in the fog right ahead. The resulting thud and jolt had awakened him. He sat up with a start. A noise like a few pebbles bouncing down steps came from the darkness, but the sounds ceased almost before he was aware of them. He rubbed his sleep-laden eyes and turned over. And then in the darkness and silence he became aware of another sound. It was a gentle throbbing, almost inaudible, undercurrent of sound like that of a smooth-running engine in a stationary motor car.

He scrambled to his feet and switched on his torch. Alf lay inert on the floor like a half-filled sack of corn, his head pillowed on one arm. Rawley switched off the light and tip-toed to the dug-out steps. That undercurrent of sound was louder now, and it came from above. He went slowly up the steps. Pebbles and loose earth crunched beneath his boots. The mist hung thickly in the trench above, but it was of a pale luminous colour that told that dawn had come. Up there above ground there was no mistaking the meaning of that continuous rumble of sound. It was the drumming of a heavy barrage. And were confirmation needed, a second later the scream of a shell tore the mist above his head, to be followed by the familiar bump and crashing roar of the explosion. He turned and clattered down the steps with the whine of flying fragments in his ears.

He roused Alf and spoke with suppressed excitement. “There's a hell of a barrage going on up there.”

“What's that got to do with us?” complained Alf sleepily.

“A lot,” retorted Rawley. “In the first place it means that it has come—the great Bosche attack, I mean. And in the second, there's heavy stuff landing pretty close. That means we must have wandered a long way east; we're among the troops, and the sooner we get out the better.”

He swung his torch round the dug-out and for the first time really noticed that it seemed to have been dug recently. But he said nothing, and they went up the steps. The rumble of the barrage went on ceaselessly. Alf was impressed by it. “Struth! Someone's 'aving a 'appy birfday,” he exclaimed.

They moved along the trench through the mist. Alf stumbled over something, and they pulled up precipitately. The obstacle proved to consist of two boxes. One was an open box of S.A.A.—small arms ammunition—the other a small case of iron rations. A waterproof sheet and a half-filled bread sack lay beside them.

“Out of the trench,” whispered Rawley. “It's occupied.” He stuffed two or three tins of beef into his pockets and climbed out. Alf took a loaf and three or four of the linen bandoleers of ammunition and followed. “If there's goin' to be dirty work, we might as well 'ave some ammo,” he whispered as they went cautiously forward. They heard voices behind them and passed a belt of wire, but they knew their direction was right by the steady drum fire behind them.

Once they stopped and lay flat while a party of men went by. The column was invisible in the mist, but the rattle of equipment and the dull thud of feet sounded quite close. Shells detonated noisily at intervals. To their right they heard the crunch of wheels on a road. The light was increasing, and it was possible to distinguish objects fifteen or twenty yards distant. Sounds of movement came fitfully from all sides, and they halted with beating hearts at every tree stump or battered wall that loomed indistinctly in the mist.

“This is too dangerous,” said Rawley at last. “We may walk into a party at any moment, and if the mist rises we're done. We must find somewhere to lie up. We have had a narrow escape as it is. That is the rear battle position
we have just left. That dug-out was brand new. They are manning them now. Another ten minutes and we should have been caught.”

Weary though they were they went on quickly but with infinite caution. They stumbled suddenly among the brick rubble of an isolated cottage. Alf lay down on guard while Rawley prowled about. There seemed to be no cellar or hiding-place, but at last under one corner of the pile of splintered wood and plaster he discovered a small brick cubby-hole, half underground. It was half full of plaster and broken bricks, but empty would just be big enough for two men to crawl into. They cleared out the debris and crawled in.

They ate ravenously of the tinned beef and the loaf of bread. The sounds of battle went on, and they discussed in whispers the meaning of each distant fusillade of musketry or stutter of machine-gun fire. Occasionally the deafening roar of an aeroplane engine passed over their heads. But they had slept no more than an hour or two in the dug-out, and now that the immediate pangs of hunger were satisfied, fatigue exacted its due. They dropped again into a deep sleep.

IV

When Rawley awoke he was astonished to find that night had come, but his first movement was checked by a whispered warning from Alf. “Shush, chum! There's some ruddy gunners not mor'n five yards away. When I woke up
bout an 'our ago there was a bloke standing an' talking just outside. Gave me the fright of my life, it did.”

Rawley lay silent in the darkness. From the sounds that reached him he knew that a battery was bivouacked all round him, and that for the moment, at any rate, it was impossible to get through them unseen. All sounds of gunning had ceased, and the night was very quiet. He argued from this that the German attack had failed, but the occasional Verey lights that soared into his view through a chink in the debris seemed very close.

Hour after hour they lay cramped and aching in the darkness, but no chance of successful escape offered.

As dawn approached the quietness of the night gave place to intermittent gunfire, and with the first filter of grey light into their cramped hiding-place the throbbing rumble of a heavy barrage broke afresh. Several heavy shells burst quite close, shaking their little cubby-hole violently and sounding a tattoo of fragments on the debris above them. The sound of rifle and machine-gun fire came in gusts of fierce intensity that told of infantry attacks pressed home. Low-flying aeroplanes tore overhead with sudden brief tornadoes of sound, and the earsplitting pom, pom, pom, of the field battery nearby added to the din.

“Proper dorg fight!” said Alf. “Somebody'll get 'urt if this goes on.”

“I'm dying to have a look at those guns out there,” said Rawley. “There they go again—battery fire. They must have got a hell of a good target. Aren't you just itching to fire one of the little beggars again?”

“Not 'arf! But I ain't too 'appy about our billet, chum. I reckon that machine-gun's getting closer.”

Later they heard the jingle of harness and the thud of hoofs. “By gad, they're getting the teams up,” whispered Rawley. “They're going back.”

They heard the thunder of hoofs and the creak of wheels as the guns and wagons drove by. Alf thrust his head out cautiously. “They've gone, mate,” he announced.

They crept out and started back. The mist was still thick enough to shroud objects at a distance of more than thirty yards. The shelling was fairly heavy. Great dark uprearing fountains spouted now and then in the mist, and overhead heavy shrapnel burst with a stunning thunder-clap though the accompanying thick woolly cloud was but dimly visible behind the grey pall. They descended a grassy slope to a broad, flat depression where a dead Tommy lay huddled by a deep black shell crater. Rawley picked up the rifle and hurried on.

The ground rose again gently to a low crest outlined against the sky. Rawley pulled up suddenly near the top. “The mist is lifting,” he exclaimed. “We had better wait a bit and have a look at the lie of the land.” To their right was a short length of disused trench from which they could observe unseen. They dropped into it.

Ahead the mist seemed to be as thick as ever, but behind them visibility had improved greatly. Below them in the depression they had recently crossed they could see the dead Tommy quite plainly, though he must have been nearly two hundred yards away, and the slope beyond
was clear, a low grassy hill, bare except for two or three shivered tree stumps. To their left, seemingly behind them, a machine-gun was stuttering in short bursts.

Movement caught the eye on the slope opposite. Two or three little figures were coming over the crest. “ 'Bout time we walk marched,” remarked Alf. Rawley, watching the distant figures, saw for an instant against the sky the silhouette of a long-necked helmet and high square pack. “My God, they're Bosches!” he cried.

They regarded each other with consternation. “Jerry's broke through,” grunted Alf. Moved by a common impulse they picked up the rifles. Rawley adjusted the sights. “About five hundred, I should think,” he said. He rested his elbow on the parapet of the shallow trench, cuddled the butt against his cheek and took aim. At his second shot a figure fell. But the others came on. They were trickling over the skyline all the way along the crest, and the slope was dotted with moving figures. But there was not a vestige of cover, and Rawley, firing deliberately, picked off man after man. Alf was blazing away light-heartedly. “Like a ruddy shooting gallery,” he cried as he rammed another clip into the magazine. “Walk up, walk up! All you ring you 'ave.”

Rawley cast anxious eyes towards his flanks. “We shall have to get back. They will be round behind us if we stay too long.”

They fired ten rounds rapid, rammed in a fresh clip, and climbed out of the trench. Bullets were cracking and whispering overhead, but twenty yards covered at top
speed brought them to dead ground. They dropped into a walk and went down the reverse slope. The hollow below them was still bathed in mist, and shells that from their sound seemed to be British, were bursting somewhere ahead. Half-way down the slope they found themselves again enveloped in mist. At the bottom they jumped a ditch and ran suddenly into six or seven figures standing on a narrow road. They recognized the coal-scuttle steel helmets and high square packs of German infantrymen, but retreat was impossible. Bayonets were at their throats. Their rifles clattered on the road; their hands shot up.

V

In the very first-half second that he stood there with his arms raised above his head, Rawley realized with grim clarity the full significance of their position. They were caught, caught in civilian clothes with arms in their hands. It would be useless to claim treatment as prisoners of war. By the rules of international law they were liable to be shot. He felt strangely calm and detached as though he were a spectator of this drama rather than one of the principal actors in it, and he scanned the faces of his captors without emotion though he knew that he would find his fate written there.

There was no comfort to be found in the hard eyes that met his and that travelled ominously over his tattered civilian clothes. Barely two seconds had gone by since the first encounter. It needed only one impetuous word to set
in motion the common impulse to plunge bayonets into these treacherous civilians.

A Feld-Webel pushed his way through the little group of men and confronted the two. He shouted at them angrily in German. Rawley answered calmly and clearly, “We are British soldiers,” and repeated in French, “
Soldats anglais.
” A torrent of exclamations, unintelligible but clearly hostile, broke from the German infantrymen. They pointed to the ragged civilian clothes, the dropped rifles, the linen bandoleers. The Feld-Webel silenced them and spoke again threateningly and accusingly to the prisoners. Rawley shook his head and repeated his assertion that they were British soldiers.

The Feld-Webel gave an order and the two prisoners were marched up the road. Thirty yards brought them to a place where the banks on either side rose to a height of six or seven feet. Half a dozen German wounded sat on the grass; one of them was being bandaged by a stretcher-bearer. Ten yards farther on was a chalk quarry cut in the side of the sunken road. An officer was coming towards them. The party halted while the Feld-Webel spoke to the officer. Rawley's ignorance of German prevented him from following the conversation, but the drift of it was clear. The officer spoke to him in German. Rawley shook his head and replied in English. The officer spoke in halting French. Rawley repeated his parrot phrase, “
Soldats anglais.
” The officer shrugged his shoulders and walked slowly away. He seemed to be bored with the whole proceeding. A runner brought
him a message, and the party stood waiting while he sat on the bank and read it.