With Joffre at Verdun Part 22

Heroic "Poilus"

Who can describe the condition of affairs in the shattered fort of Douaumont on that night when the gallant Bretons of the 20th Corps hurled themselves against the captors of the position? The whole of the fighting round the salient of Verdun since that eventful 21st February--now seemingly so long ago, for so much had happened, yet in reality less than a week--had been marked by the incessant thunder of guns, the continuous detonations of exploding sh.e.l.ls, the intermittent rattle of machine-guns, and by the crescendoes of rifle-fire mingled with the shouts and shrieks of men, the cheers of triumphant attackers, and the grim, hoa.r.s.e commands of officers leading their sections.

There had been many a silent, yet grimly ferocious struggle with the bayonet; when men stood outside their trenches or struggled with the enemy in what remained of their battered positions. Such scenes we know had taken place inside the fort of Douaumont, for had not Jules and Henri partic.i.p.ated in such an adventure on the stairway? And now they were being repeated--those scenes--in many an odd part of that fortress.

Bursting in by a gateway to the west, the Bretons forced their way forward; while the Brandenburgers, beating a hasty retreat, threw up barricades and fought for them. Thus, as Henri and his chum crept along that gallery, comparatively silent for the moment, for the fight had drifted forward, and the Brandenburgers were holding a position farther to the east of the fortress, they came within sound of the combatants, and heard the shouts of men and the crack of rifles. Yet never a sight did they catch of Max, the German, though here and there torches threw a fitful gleam about the masonry.

"Then on!" said Henri, now rising to his feet and staggering forward.

"Where's the beggar gone to? And what's he up to?"

"Can't say. Perhaps he's merely trying to escape; or more likely he's trying to join his own people, for you can tell quite easily that they are still holding a portion of the fort."

Yet to follow in the tracks of the German was an impossibility; for, let us explain, the interior of a fortress such as Douaumont is not so planned as to make progress easy and direct at the best of times. Such a place is designedly erected in sections, so that, should one portion suffer capture, the others may be held intact; while often enough such works are constructed so that one portion of the fortress commands by its fire the works immediately surrounding and attached to it. That gallery, then, did not run in a straight line for long: it curved abruptly to the left just as it had done before at the point where the German contrived to evade our heroes. It dropped down a flight of steps, and opened into a wide hallway much like that other in which Jules and Henri had already seen some adventure; and from this hall galleries led off, some reached by means of stairways, and others once barred by doors, now for the most part lying blackened and shattered on the flags which floored the galleries.

"Which way? Which one? How can a chap choose?" cried Henri peevishly, running the fingers of one hand through his matted hair, and looking from one to the other of the openings.

"A conundrum," smiled Jules, though he looked grim enough as Henri stared at him. "And those German sh.e.l.ls have not made the question any the easier, have they? Who knows? The beggar may have disappeared down this hole, and one almost hopes so."

Gripping a torch suspended in a crevice between two fallen blocks of stone, he stepped towards a huge, jagged hole near the end of the hall, and held the flaming torch over it. Beneath there was a pit, with crumbling earth sides, and at the bottom a ma.s.s of shattered stonework and debris. Then, holding the torch overhead, he pointed upwards, and, glancing there, Henri saw a corresponding hole with jagged edges, through which the ponderous sh.e.l.ls had entered. There, indeed, displayed at their feet, and just above them, was as fine an example as could well be discovered of the work of modern sh.e.l.ls--of sh.e.l.ls of huge calibre--projected by guns of such weight that weeks are required to move them, and filled with such a ma.s.s of high explosives that little can resist them. Indeed, let one of the huge projectiles sent by those German or Austrian howitzers. .h.i.t fairly upon some building, and, be it a church--their favourite objective--a peasant's cottage, a convent, or even a ma.s.s of concrete and steel--such as, for instance, a modern fortress, such as, indeed, this fortress of Douaumont--and the result was likely to be little different. Destruction followed in the wake of those ponderous sh.e.l.ls, and wreckage resulted. Here, then, before Henri and Jules, was displayed direct evidence of the wisdom which had caused General Joffre to dismantle every fort round the city of Verdun, and to convert the salient into an ordinary defensive position. A fortress might, and indeed would, be smashed by German artillery; but trenches were more movable, more replaceable, objects, and the picks and spades of _poilus_ could easily repair damage.

"Nice little hole--eh?" smiled Jules. "But I don't see any sign of that German."

"Nor I. Let's get on. I've an uneasy feeling in my mind that he's up to some particularly vile sort of mischief. Let's push on," said Henri.

"And which way?"

"Which way? Any way! Straight ahead! The noise of rifles is getting closer, so that any way is likely to lead to the spot we're seeking."

"Then you think he has gone towards the fighting?" asked Jules.

"Yes!" came abruptly from Henri. "He's sneaking up behind our fellows, I feel sure. From what I've seen of this Max, this German, I feel positive that he'll think of escape last of all. To do him bare credit, he'll consider his own safety only when he's done his worst to our people. Let's push on! We've got to get to the beggar."

Glancing about them doubtfully for a second or two, they finally chose a central opening, only to be forced to turn back when they had progressed a dozen yards, for a fall of masonry blocked egress.

Returning, therefore, to the hall, they skirted the edge of that giant pit the sh.e.l.l had burrowed through the flooring, and entered another gallery, where, attracted by loud shouts ahead and by heavy firing, they pushed on as fast as they were able.

Meanwhile; outside, the combat had for the moment subsided, for the dash of the 20th Corps of those gallant Bretons had taken them right up to the trenches. .h.i.therto held by that thin band of n.o.ble _poilus_ who had sustained and held off the first German onslaught. The Bretons, indeed, were now repairing, in furious haste, and consolidating the trenches running along the edge of the plateau of Douaumont right up to the eastern corner of the fort, almost, in fact, surrounding the fortress and cutting it off from the Germans.

Yet a portion of the works projected beyond them to the east, and there an underground pa.s.sage gave shelter to the Brandenburgers, and, indeed, allowed the enemy to reinforce their troops still holding a portion of the interior. Elsewhere there was little fighting; for on the Cote du Poivre and the Cote de Talou no German attack was possible, French guns on Mort Homme and Hill 304 still commanding every avenue of approach, and already having given the Germans practical, if dreadful, evidence of their deadly work. But along the whole line sh.e.l.ls still plunged about the positions held by our allies, and, as the snowflakes whirled and the wind swept first from this quarter and then from another, the distant thud of cannon came in one low, continuous, muttering roar, which never stopped, and which for seven days now had gone on practically without intermission.

Pushing along that gallery, stumbling over blocks of fallen stone, and every once and again coming upon the bodies of fallen Brandenburgers, Henri and Jules at length reached a part where the gallery broadened out, and where the sound of combat was louder. In the distance they could see moving figures and the flash of rifles, while every few seconds there was a dull thud or a curious scuttling noise on the walls of the gallery as bullets flew by them. Then, as they drew nearer, the faint light shed by another torch showed them a number of Bretons sheltering behind an opening which led on eastward, while others lay full length on the floor, their packs in front of them to protect them.

A glance into the room on the left--a store-room, no doubt, in which sh.e.l.ls had been piled in other days--disclosed a number of wounded Frenchmen in the care of members of their ambulance corps, while, almost opposite, was another room packed with Bretons waiting to reinforce their friends when called for. Yet there was no sign of the German.

"Strange!" thought Henri. "Then where can he have gone? Surely he has not slipped from the fort elsewhere?"

"Hist! I thought I saw some fellow moving along there at the top of that flight of stairs," Jules said suddenly, pointing to the right just behind the room occupied by the Bretons in reserve, where stone steps led upward to another corridor, which itself gave entrance to another row of gun-chambers.

Darting to the foot of the stairway, Henri and Jules began to climb it cautiously and as noiselessly as possible; not that they had much to fear from noise, for, what with the shouts of the combatants and the sharp crack of rifles, rendered all the louder by the containing walls and masonry, there was little chance of their footsteps being heard.

Then, too, there were the voices of those French reserves, those gallant and gay-hearted little Bretons of the 20th Corps, a.s.sembled in that room to their right, waiting till their comrades had cleared the way before them, or until a shrill whistle should call them to dash to the attack. The last peep which Henri had obtained of them had shown those very cheerful and collected individuals seated on the floor smoking heavily, chatting and laughing uproariously, as if, indeed, they were gathered miles away from the conflict, and as if fighting, and bullets, and sudden death were things of no consequence whatever.

"Hist!" Jules gripped his friend's arm again and pointed.

It was not so light in this higher gallery, and for a while it was almost impossible to make out their surroundings. But Jules had seen something, and presently Henri, too, caught a fleeting vision of a man's figure--a figure which stooped, and which crept along the farther wall, perhaps some fifty feet from them. More than that, there came a glimpse of the face of this individual on which a few scattered beams of the torches, smoking and flaring down below, happened to fall.

"Max! That German scoundrel!" he whispered to Jules. "What's he up to? Certainly not trying to make his escape. Let's close in on him."

They crept to the top of the stairs and along the gallery, their pulses fluttering not a little. For intuitively they realized that they had a struggle before them. And yet, judge of their disappointment, now that they had reached this higher gallery, for to all appearance it was empty. It was so dark up there that a man might have stood within ten paces of them and not have been discovered, while any sound he made would have been drowned quite easily. However, Henri pressed on cautiously, bent almost double, one hand against the wall to guide him, while Jules came immediately behind him, peering over his chum's shoulder. Then, when they had covered perhaps twenty feet or more, both suddenly stopped again--Henri so abruptly that Jules b.u.mped into him.

"There!" Jules heard him say in a hoa.r.s.e whisper, "There! See him!

Watch him! What's he doing?"

Farther on, round an abrupt corner in the gallery, where it skirted the large room down below filled with Breton soldiers, there was a strange illumination, the source of light being uncertain. A moment or two later both those young Frenchmen following the tracks of that sinister German realized that a shaft led up from the room down below, and either the room itself borrowed its light from the gallery which in turn borrowed it from the embrasures and gun-emplacements on the farther side, or the shaft was merely for ventilation purposes. In any case, it was a wide affair, perhaps five feet square, and could the two of them have peered down it they would have discovered that it sloped steeply, and that, looking through it, they could see the happy fellows down below still smoking heavily, still chatting and joking, waiting patiently for the moment when their services would be called for.

And opposite that opening, peering through it, the upper part of his frame illuminated by the torches flaring down below him, was Max--Max, that sinister, dried-up, snappy German officer, who had already on more than one occasion given Henri and Jules some indication of his brutal nature. The man was gripping a heavy bag--a bag which undoubtedly required some effort to lift and handle--and, as he stood with his eyes glued upon the men down below, was slowly extricating some object from the bundle he carried.

"What on earth is it? What's he up to?" Jules asked breathlessly.

"He's taking something out of the bag, and is fumbling. Look! He's put the bag down now, and has lifted the something so as to take a good look at it. It--it's----"

"A bomb--a hand-grenade of sorts. The beggar's got a whole bag of 'em!

He's----"

They watched, rooted to the spot, as the German lifted that object in one hand till the light from the room below fell upon it. And then, fumbling at its base, presently extracted something. Then they saw him stoop over the heavy bag placed on the floor, lift the flap, and commence to insert the object. It was just then that Henri realized the villainy intended by this ruffian. Perhaps you will say that "all is fair in love and war", and that Henri himself had but a little while before given the Germans an exhibition of bomb-throwing. But that was in order to save his friend about to be executed, about to be murdered, indeed, by this selfsame ruffian. Now, taking a leaf from his book as it were, this Max was preparing a load of bombs to thrust down among the Bretons.

One grenade alone might be expected, exploding amongst them, to kill numbers, but what would happen if the whole bag of them, detonated by the one he had just prepared, fell into the crowded room below and exploded? It would mean death to every man there; death to many of those outside; and might easily break down the work already done by those gallant Frenchmen, and enable the Brandenburgers to push on again into the fort and eject them. Even Henri and Jules might not escape unscathed, and Max, too, might be injured. It was, indeed, a moment for action, for swift decisive action, and, though Henri had felt rooted to the spot a moment before, any hesitation there might have been was gone in an instant. His whirling brain cleared, as it were, as need for swift movement came, and, at once bounding forward, he gripped the German by the nape of his neck and seized the hand which was lifting the bag upwards.

And then commenced a struggle in that gallery, for, to do him credit, as we have already done indeed, this German was a tenacious fighter.

Making frantic efforts to throw off Jules and Henri, and to toss the bag into the room below, he staggered about the gallery with the two Frenchmen hanging to him, and then, of a sudden breaking loose, he dashed away from them. It looked, indeed, as though he would make good his escape; but Jules raced after him, while Henri dipped his hand in the bag before he moved, and then went rushing down the gallery, shouting for the German to stop and deliver himself up as a prisoner.

A sharp crack, a flash in the darkness ahead of them, and the fleeting vision of a man pointing a revolver at them followed, and then a swift movement of Henri's hand. Bringing it back over his shoulder he suddenly jerked the grenade forward, and hurled it at the German, the flash which followed lighting up the gallery from end to end, while the blast of the explosion drove the two Frenchmen backward. As for Max, that sinister German who seemed to have dogged their footsteps from the very commencement, from the days, indeed, when they were helpless prisoners in Ruhleben, the bomb made short work of him--just as short work as it would have made of those gallant Bretons. He was dead!

Hoist, indeed, by his own petard!

"And one isn't sorry!" Henri said, as the two of them returned and descended the stairs to join the Bretons. "I'd sooner kill a roomful of Germans than that one Frenchman should be hurt. And here, all that we've done is to reverse the numbers. Come along, Jules, and let's get out of the fort and back to an ambulance! My head's splitting, and we shall both want rest before we can take a further part in the fighting."

No need to follow them back to that ambulance, nor to tell how those two gallant young Frenchmen, now corporals, were soon promoted to the rank of lieutenant when they returned to their regiment, and for weeks and weeks saw fighting along the Verdun salient. As we write they are still there; for German attacks surge all round the trenches on the heights of the Meuse, and, though here and there the line has been dented, Verdun, that sleepy old town down by the river, is still French, still beyond the grasp of the Kaiser.

The ruthless War Lord who caused this terrific contest to break out, who has deluged Europe and Asia and Africa with blood, and who has been instrumental in the slaughter of hosts of people, is still thwarted.

True, he has gained certain yards of land--French land--the steep, sloping sides of that plateau of Douaumont, and the lower ground opposite the Mort Homme and Hill 304. But at what a price! The slopes are thick with dead Germans. Returning again and again to the attack, hounded on by their War Lord, German soldiers still advance over fields carpeted with their fallen comrades; and still French guns and gallant French _poilus_ smile grimly down at them, as if to say:

"Come! Come on! Here is Verdun behind us. There is yet land to sell between these trenches and the city. Come, then! We will sell that land at a price as heavy, nay, heavier, than that which you have already paid. Come! But only so far! For Verdun is ours, and shall remain so always."