"Contemptible" Part 7

Luckily, another similar incident relieved the situation, shortly afterwards. During a few minutes' halt, a cow near the road stood gazing, with that apathetic interest peculiar to cows, at the thirsty men. It was not for nothing, as the French say, that one of the reservists had been a farm hand. He went up to the cow, unfastening his empty water-bottle as he went, and calmly leant down and began to milk the neglected animal until his bottle was full. It was not in itself a funny proceeding, but there was something about the calmness of both the cow and the man, and something about the queerness of the occasion, that appealed to the sense of humour of the dourest old Puritan of them all.

They laughed, they roared, they shouted, in a way that reminded the Subaltern of the last "soccer" season.

The noise must have mystified the pursuing Uhlans not a little.

But the laugh did not last long on their lips. Directly afterwards they swung into a road already occupied by a train of refugees. After the sight of a good strong man struck down in his strength, this, perhaps, was the saddest sight of the whole war. How miserable they were, these helpless, hopeless people, trailing sadly along the road, the majority with all they had saved from the wreckage of their homes tied in a sheet, and carried on their backs. Some were leading a cow, others riding a horse, a few were in oxen-driven wagons. They looked as if they had lost faith in everything, even in G.o.d. They had the air of people calmly trying to realise the magnitude of the calamity which had befallen them, and failing.

Here and there the Subaltern thought he saw a gleam of reproach in their faces. It hurt him not a little. Only a few days ago the British had been advancing, as they thought, to certain victory. All had been sunshine, or at any rate hope. How the villagers had shouted and cheered them! How the women had wept with sheer joy, and shy young girls had thrust flowers into their b.u.t.tonholes! What heroes they had felt swinging forward to meet the enemy, to defend the homes of their friends and Allies, and avenge their wrongs!

The role had been melodramatic, superb! But here they were, skirting the very gates of Paris, apparently fleeing before the enemy, and this without having made any very determined effort at resistance. Poor protectors they must have looked! Those simple peasants would not understand the efficacy, the necessity even, of running away "to live and fight another day," with a greater chance of success.

The Subaltern often used to wonder what the poor wretches thought of troops, which, though in possession of arms and ammunition, still retreated--always retreated. They could not understand.

The march came to an end about one o'clock. A halt of half-an-hour for dinner was ordered in the shade of some huge trees in a park. The mess-cart and Cookers arrived, and a meal was soon in progress. The Regimental Officer of what is now referred to as the "Old Army" was perhaps the best-mannered man one could possibly meet. His training in the Mess made him so. He was the sort of man who would not have done anything which so much as even suggested rudeness or greed. He was as scrupulous of his Mess Rules as a Roman Catholic Priest is of his conduct at High Ma.s.s. To the newly-joined Subaltern, Guest Night conveyed the holy impression of a religious rite. But here was a comic demonstration of the fact that the strictest training is only, after all, a veneer. Two Senior Officers were actually squabbling about a quarter-pound tin of marmalade! The Subaltern could not help smiling.

The incident merely showed how raw and jagged the Great Retreat had left the nerves of those who survived it.

An hour's halt pa.s.sed only too soon, and its later moments were made uneasy by the instinctive aversion which every one felt for the sound of the whistles that would mark the end of it. The Battalion, however, had no sooner swung into the road, than the Colonel, who had been reading a message with an expression of surprise, held up his hand to signal the halt. The moment was historic. Although none knew, it was the end of the Great Retreat.

CHAPTER XVI

THE TURN OF THE TIDE

The next day the Battalion linked up with the Brigade, and instead of proceeding in the usual direction--southwards--they turned to the north.

There was a great deal of subdued excitement. They were not going to move off for a precious hour or so, and, as "battle seemed imminent,"

the Subaltern did his best to make up the "deficiencies" in his equipment.

Another Subaltern lay stricken with dysentery in one of the regimental wagons, and he "borrowed" his revolver and ammunition. Apart from the fact that the poor fellow was in too great pain to dispute the robbery, he declared with embellishments that he never wanted to see the ---- thing again. "Take it, and be ---- to it!" he said.

Curiously enough, the Subaltern was able to stick to the loan through all the troubles that followed, and was eventually able to return it to its owner, met casually in the London Hippodrome, months later.

Soon afterwards, when they were marching through a village called Chaumes, he learnt that in the forthcoming battle they were to be in General Reserve, and this relieved the nervous tension for the moment.

There was a feeling that a great chance of distinguished service was lost, but as the General Reserves are usually flung into the fight towards its concluding stages, he did not worry on that score.

The four Regiments of the Brigade were ma.s.sed in very close formation in a large orchard, ready to move at a moment's notice. There they lay all day, sleeping with their rifles in their hands, or lying flat on their backs gazing at the intense blue of the sky overhead.

The heat, although they were in the first week in September, was greater than ever. The blue atmosphere seemed to quiver with the shock of guns.

General Headquarters had been established in a house near by, a middle-cla.s.s, flamboyant, jerry-built affair. How its owner would have gasped if he could have seen the Field-Marshal conducting the British share of the great battle in his immodest "salle a manger!"

Aeroplanes were continually ascending from and descending to a ploughed field adjacent to the orchard. Motors were ceaselessly dashing up and down. a.s.suredly they were near to the heart of things.

That afternoon some one procured a page of the _Daily Mirror_, which printed the first casualty list of the war. Perhaps you can remember reading it. One was not used to the sensation. One felt that "it brought things home to one." Not that this was by any means necessary at that time and place. Still it was very depressing to think that in G.o.d's beautiful sunlight, brave, strong men were being maimed and laid low for ever. One had a vague feeling that it was blasphemous, and ought to be stopped.

It was not until dusk that a start was made, and the Regiment halted again about a mile further on and settled down for the night in a stubble field opposite a very imposing chateau.

Evidently the fight had gone well, for they pa.s.sed at least two lines of hasty trenches quite deserted.

The Germans had at last been driven back!

Any joy that this discovery might have occasioned was sobered and tempered by the sight of small bodies of men bent double over their work in the purple twilight. They were burying-parties. Two twigs tied together and stuck in the brown mounds of earth was all the evidence there was of each little tragedy. During the retreat the Subaltern had naturally had little opportunity to realise this most pitiable side of war, the cold Aftermath of Battle.

I will tell you of the inglorious way in which one man spent this momentous day, the wonderful hours in which the tide turned, and a Continent was saved--in chasing chickens! He was the Mess Sergeant, and it was his duty. Anyway, the Mess dined gloriously off the chickens he caught, and as a couple of hayricks had been dismantled and distributed, everybody spent a tolerably comfortable night.

CHAPTER XVII

THE ADVANCE BEGINS

Although they stood to arms at the first flush of daylight on the following day, they did not march off until nearly eleven o'clock. The men were moved into the leafy grounds of the chateau to keep them out of the sun, and beyond the observation of hostile aircraft.

The regimental butchers slew one or two sheep during the wait; but the meat subsequently proved to be abominably tough, and the fat collected to oil the bolts of the men's rifles only served to make them stiffer than ever.

The Subaltern had entertained fond hopes that owing to his recent unusually long hours of sleep he would not be attacked by the same nauseating sensations of fatigue; but his hopes were vain. The sleep seemed to have made things worse. A little rest had developed an overwhelming desire for more, and he felt worse than ever.

He longed as he had never longed before for long cool drinks and clean white sheets. He imagined himself at home. What would he do? He pictured himself in the bathroom eagerly peeling off his puttees as the water splashed into the pale blue bath. How he would wallow in it! He could feel how the water would caress his body, tepid and soothing.

On the table in the dining-room, green and cool with its view of the sombre pine wood, stood a long cold drink of what? Cider, perhaps, or lime-juice and soda, something you could drink and drink and drink. Last of all--culminating pleasure of heaven--his red bedroom, with the sheets ready turned down for him, soft and white and alluring. That would have been heaven.

But this heaven of his was very far away from the hard dusty road and the eternal poplars! With a painful jolt his thoughts would return to the realities of life; he would feel dazed and annoyed, and in his heart of hearts he wanted to cry.

Sir Archibald Murray pa.s.sed in a car, holding an animated conversation with a much-beribboned and distinguished-looking French General. He looked very pleased with himself, as well he might, for the greatest work of his career had begun the day before with astounding success.

The Subaltern must have felt very tired and dissatisfied that afternoon.

Having exhausted the painful thoughts of home, he began to tell himself what an awful life Active Service was. It never occurred to him to be thankful that a youth so young should have the luck to play his part in such tremendous events. He did not at the time realise that there were thousands of adventurous souls at home who would have given an arm to have been where he had been.

He did not realise that in after days the memory of every weary hour of trudging, of every bullet that had hummed by, and of every sh.e.l.l that had burst, would be a joy for ever. The thought had never struck any of them, unsentimental souls!

At this point his memory confessedly breaks down. He remembers perfectly a certain "ten minutes' halt" spent in the shade of a sheaf of corn. He remembers plunging into a pine forest; but thenceforward there is a blank. His memory snaps. He cannot recollect pa.s.sing through that wood, much less pa.s.sing out of it. A link in the chain of his memory must have snapped.

When next he recollects anything clearly it may have been that night, the next night, or the night after that. Anyway, it was very dark, and the Battalion was eventually halted in an open field. Somehow or other, straw was procured for the rest, but his own Platoon was sent forward to hold an outpost position along the banks of a small stream.

Although in the daytime the sun shone with undiminished fervour, the nights were getting certainly far more chilly than they had been in August. But when one has to get up at daybreak, having never had more than four hours sleep, one does not notice it much.

During the night a fresh draft arrived.

The next morning they very soon encountered an entirely new sight, a French village hastily evacuated by the enemy. At least half of the houses had been broken into, and all the shops and inns. The Germans had dragged chairs and tables to the roadside, and they must have been sitting there drinking and smoking when the news of the British advance, and orders to retire had come upon them. Everything seemed to show that the enemy had left at the shortest notice. He had not had time to perpetrate any of his well-known barbarities on the few inhabitants who had remained in their houses, and no attempt had apparently been made even to burn the village!

A little further on, the abstemious Hun had obviously made a halt. The litter of bottles was appalling. There was a perfect wall of them for about a quarter of a mile. The proportion of bottles to the number of men estimated to occupy four hundred yards (1000) was alarming. There must have been enough drink to upset a British Army Corps. Most certainly the Germans in front must have been out of hand, and very drunk. The men were vastly amused.

The day dragged on very wearily, and no deployment was made. Apparently the enemy had taken about as much as he could comfortably endure on the previous two days. He was not waiting to be pushed back; he was speeding north-east as fast as his legs could carry him.