“Steady, steady!” He called the range to the rifle teams behind him, and he could see the fire take effect.  All along the Hun lines men were stumbling and falling.  They swerved a little to the left; he called the rifles to follow, directing them with his voice and with his hands.  It was not only that from here he could correct the range and direct the fire; the men behind him had become like rock.  That line of faces below; Hicks, Jones, Fuller, Anderson, Oscar....  Their eyes never left him.  With these men he could do anything.

The right of the Hun line swerved out, not more than twenty yards from the battered Snout, trying to run to shelter under that pile of debris and human bodies.  A quick concentration of rifle fire depressed it, and the swell came out again toward the left.  Claude’s appearance on the parapet had attracted no attention from the enemy at first, but now the bullets began popping about him; two rattled on his tin hat, one caught him in the shoulder.  The blood dripped down his coat, but he felt no weakness.  He felt only one thing; that he commanded wonderful men.  When David came up with the supports he might find them dead, but he would find them all there.  They were there to stay until they were carried out to be buried.  They were mortal, but they were unconquerable.

The Colonel’s twenty minutes must be almost up, he thought.  He couldn’t take his eyes from the front line long enough to look at his wrist watch....  The men behind him saw Claude sway as if he had lost his balance and were trying to recover it.  Then he plunged, face down, outside the parapet.  Hicks caught his foot and pulled him back.  At the same moment the Missourians ran yelling up the communication.  They threw their machine guns up on the sand bags and went into action without an unnecessary motion.

Hicks and Bert Fuller and Oscar carried Claude forward toward the Snout, out of the way of the supports that were pouring in.  He was not bleeding very much.  He smiled at them as if he were going to speak, but there was a weak blankness in his eyes.  Bert tore his shirt open; three clean bullet holes.  By the time they looked at him again, the smile had gone... the look that was Claude had faded.  Hicks wiped the sweat and smoke from his officer’s face.  “Thank God I never told him,” he said.  “Thank God for that!”

Bert and Oscar knew what Hicks meant.  Gerhardt had been blown to pieces at his side when they dashed back through the enemy barrage to find the Missourians.  They were running together across the open, not able to see much for smoke.  They bumped into a section of wire entanglement, left above an old trench.  David cut round to the right, waving Hicks to follow him.  The two were not ten yards apart when the shell struck.  Then Sergeant Hicks ran on alone.

XIX

The sun is sinking low, a transport is steaming slowly up the narrows with the tide.  The decks are covered with brown men.  They cluster over the superstructure like bees in swarming time.  Their attitudes are relaxed and lounging.  Some look thoughtful, some well contented, some are melancholy, and many are indifferent, as they watch the shore approaching.  They are not the same men who went away.