And we knew that the war, which was coming closer and closer to the city, was coming closer to us.  It had been Charlie Thesiger first, now it might be Reggie.  At least, we knew that Reggie’s regiment, the Third ——­shires, had come up from Ostend the day before, that it was quartered somewhere between Ghent and Melle, and that it had been engaged at Quatrecht.

Our own orders were to stick to Melle.

I suppose from the way the ambulances were massed there that the end had been foreseen.  That afternoon the battle began to sweep round from Quatrecht to Melle; and on our third journey out a rumour reached us at the barrier where the sentry stood guard.  It was one of those preposterous rumours that run before disaster and are started God knows how when a retreat begins.  I think it was the Belgian Red Cross men who spread it, for I heard the guide who went with Jimmy’s Field Ambulance assuring him seriously that seven thousand British had been surrounded and cut to pieces on the road between Quatrecht and Melle.  To be sure the number diminished with each repetition of the tale, dropping from seven thousand to seven hundred and from seven hundred to seventy.  But in another hour we were bringing in the men of the ——­shires.

And towards the end of the day the real bombardment of Melle began, and on our last journey out we and Jimmy’s Field Ambulance were in the thick of it.

I can remember nothing of that bombardment but the three shells.

The first ripped open the roof of the Town Hall and set fire to it.

The second struck the Greek pediment and brought the whole front toppling into the street.

Then, about five minutes after, there was the third shell.

The light was going out of the sky, so that we saw the first shell like a sheet of curved lightning making for the village as we approached from the Ghent side.  There was a deadly attraction about the thing that made you feel that it and you were the only objects in God’s universe, and that you were about to be merged in each other.  It looked as if it were rushing out of heaven straight for us, so that we were surprised when it apparently swerved aside and hit the Town Hall instead.

(Jimmy and I were in the front of the car.  Kendal, whose flesh wound was beginning to worry him, sat behind.)

A battery of artillery charged past us, followed by the remnants of a French regiment on the run.  Jimmy put more speed on.  By the time we got into the village the Town Hall was spouting flame.

Jimmy drew up his car about fifty yards away from it.  The Field Ambulance had turned, and took its stand a little further away behind us, under the cover of the opposite walls.  Its men began dragging out their stretchers.  Kendal and I made ready with ours.  The wounded were being brought out of every house they were in.

A Belgian Colonel rode past us, trying to look unaware that he was retreating.  He shouted to us to clear out of it.  This was the only sign of interest that he showed.