A brazier fire at twilight,
And glow-worm fires ashine,
A searchlight sweeping heaven,
Above the firing-line.
The rifle bullet whistles
The message that it brings
Of death and desolation
To common folk and kings.

We went back from the trenches as reserves to the Keep. Broken down though the place was when we entered it there was something restful in the brown bricks, hidden in ivy, in the well-paved yard, and the glorious riot of flowers. Most of the original furniture remained—the beds, the chairs, and the pictures. All were delighted with the place, Mervin particularly. "I'll make my country residence here after the war," he said.

On the left was a church. Contrary to orders I spent an hour in the dusk of the first evening in the ruined pile. The place had been shelled for seven months, not a day had passed when it was not struck in some part. The sacristy was a jumble of prayer books, vestments, broken rosaries, crucifixes, and pictures. An ink pot and pen lay on a broken table beside a blotting pad. A lamp which once hung from the roof was beside them, smashed to atoms. In the church the altar railing was twisted into shapeless bars of iron, bricks littered the altar steps, the altar itself even, and bricks, tiles, and beams were piled high in the body of the church.

Outside in the graveyard the graves lay open and the bones of the dead were scattered broadcast over the green grass. Crosses were smashed or wrenched out of the ground and flung to earth; near the Keep was the soldiers' cemetery, the resting place of French, English, Indian, and German soldiers. Many of the French had bottles of holy water placed on their graves under the crosses. The English epitaphs were short and concise, always the same in manner: "Private 999 J. Smith, 26th London Battalion, killed in action 1st March, 1915." And under it stamped on a bronze plate was the information, "Erected by the Mobile Unit (B.R.C.S.) to preserve the record found on the spot." Often the dead man's regiment left a token of remembrance, a bunch of flowers, the dead man's cap or bayonet and rifle (these two latter only if they had been badly damaged when the man died). Many crosses had been taken from the churchyard and placed over these men. One of them read, "A notre dÉvote fille," and another, "To my beloved mother."

Several Indians, men of the Bengal Mountain Battery, were buried here. A woman it was stated, had disclosed their location to the enemy, and the billet in which they were staying was struck fair by a high explosive shell. Thirty-one were killed. They were now at rest—Anaytullah, Lakhasingh, and other strange men with queer names under the crosses fashioned from biscuit boxes. On the back of Anaytullah's cross was the wording in black: "Biscuits, 50 lbs."

Thus the environment of the Keep: the enemy's trenches were about eight hundred yards away. No fighting took place here, the men's rifles stood loaded, but no shot was fired; only when the front line was broken, if that ever took place, would the defenders of the Keep come into play and hold the enemy back as long as that were possible. Then when they could no longer hold out, when the foe pressed in on all sides, there was something still to do, something vitally important which would cost the enemy many lives, and, if a miracle did not happen, something which would wipe out the defenders for ever. This was the Keep.

The evening was very quiet; a few shells flew wide overhead, and now and again stray bullets pattered against the masonry. We cooked our food in the yard, and, sitting down amidst the flowers, we drank our tea and ate our bread and jam. The first flies were busy, they flew amidst the flower-beds and settled on our jam. Mervin told a story of a country where he had been in, and where the flies were legion and ate the eyes out of horses. The natives there wore corks hung by strings from their caps, and these kept the flies away.

"How?" asked Bill.

"The corks kept swinging backwards and forwards as the men walked," said Mervin. "Whenever a cork struck a fly it dashed the insect's brains out."

"Blimey!" cried Bill, then asked, "What was the most wonderful thing you ever seen, Mervin?"

"The most wonderful thing," repeated Mervin. "Oh, I'll tell you. It was the way they buried the dead out in Klondike. The snow lies there for six months and it's impossible to dig, so when a man died they sharpened his toes and drove him into the earth with a mallet."

"I saw a more wonderful thing than that, and it was when we lay in the barn at Richebourg," said Bill, who was referring to a comfortless billet and a cold night which were ours a month earlier. "I woke up about midnight 'arf asleep. I 'ad my boots off and I couldn't 'ardly feel them I was so cold. 'Blimey!' I said, 'on goes my understandin's, and I 'ad a devil of a job lacing my boots up. When I thought I 'ad them on I could 'ear someone stirrin' on the left. It was my cotmate. 'Wot's yer gime?' he says. 'Wot gime?' I asks. 'Yer foolin' about with my tootsies,' he says. Then after a minute 'e shouts, 'Damn it ye've put on my boots,' So I 'ad, put on his blessed boots and laced them mistaking 'is feet for my own."

"We never heard of this before," I said.

"No, cos 'twas ole Jersey as was lying aside me that night, next day 'e was almost done in with the bomb."

"It's jolly quiet here," said Goliath, sitting back in an armchair and lighting a cigarette. "This will be a jolly holiday."

"I heard an artillery man I met outside, say that this place was hot," Stoner remarked. "The Irish Guards were here, and they said they preferred the trenches to the Keep."

"It will be a poor country house," said Mervin, "if it's going to be as bad as you say."

On the following evening I was standing guard in a niche in the building. Darkness was falling and the shadows sat at the base of the walls east of the courtyard. My niche looked out on the road, along which the wounded are carried from the trenches by night and sometimes by day. The way is by no means safe. As I stood there four men came down the road carrying a limp form on a stretcher. A waterproof ground-sheet lay over the wounded soldier, his head was uncovered, and it wobbled from side to side, a streak of blood ran down his face and formed into clots on the ear and chin. There was something uncannily helpless in the soldier, his shaking head, his boots caked brown with mud, the heels close together, the toes pointing upwards and outwards and swaying a little. Every quiver of the body betokened abject helplessness. The limp, swaying figure, clinging weakly to life, was a pathetic sight.

The bearers walked slowly, carefully, stepping over every shell-hole and stone on the road. The sweat rolled down their faces and arms, their coats were off and their shirt sleeves rolled up almost to the shoulders. Down the road towards the village they pursued their sober way, and my eyes followed them. Suddenly they came to a pause, lowered the stretcher to the ground, and two of them bent over the prostrate form. I could see them feel the soldier's pulse, open his tunic, and listen for the beating of the man's heart, when they raised the stretcher again there was something cruelly careless in the action, they brought it up with a jolt and set off hurriedly, stumbling over shell-hole and boulder. There was no doubt the man was dead now; it was unwise to delay on the road, and the soldiers' cemetery was in the village.

In the evening we stood to arms in the Keep; all our men were now out in the open, and the officers were inspecting their rifles barely four yards away from me. At that moment I saw the moon, a crescent of pale smoke standing on end near the West. I felt in my pocket for money, but found I had none to turn.

"Have you a ha'penny?" I asked Mervin who was passing.

"What for?"

"I want to turn it, you know the old custom."

"Oh, yes," answered Mervin, handing me a coin. "Long ago I used to turn my money, but I found the oftener I saw the moon the less I had to turn. However, I'll try it again for luck." So saying he turned a penny.

"Do any of you fellows know Marie Redoubt?" an officer asked at that moment.

"I know the place," said Mervin, "it's just behind the Keep."

"Will you lead me to the place?" said the officer.

"Right," said Mervin, and the two men went off.

They had just gone when a shell hit the building on my left barely three yards away from my head. The explosion almost deafened me, a pain shot through my ears and eyes, and a shower of fine lime and crumpled bricks whizzed by my face. My first thought was, "Why did I not put my hands over my eyes, I might have been struck blind." I had a clear view of the scene in front, my mates were rushing hither and thither in a shower of white flying lime; I could see dark forms falling, clambering to their feet and falling again. One figure detached itself from the rest and came rushing towards me, by my side it tripped and fell, then rose again. I could now see it was Stoner. He put his hands up as if in protest, looked at me vacantly, and rushed round the corner of the building. I followed him and found him once more on the ground.

"Much hurt?" I asked, touching him on the shoulder.

"Yes," he muttered, rising slowly, "I got it there," he raised a finger to his face which was bleeding, "and there," he put his hand across his chest.

"Well, get into the dug-out," I said, and we hurried round the front of the building. A pile of fallen masonry lay there and half a dozen rifles, all the men were gone. We found them in the dug-out, a hole under the floor heavily beamed, and strong enough to withstand a fair sized shell. One or two were unconscious and all were bleeding more or less severely. I found I was the only person who was not struck. Goliath and Bill got little particles of grit in the face, and they looked black as chimney sweeps. Bill was cut across the hand, Kore's arm was bleeding.

"Where's Mervin?"

"He had just gone out," I said, "I was speaking to him, he went with Lieut. —— to Marie Redoubt."

I suddenly recollected that I should not have left my place outside, so I went into my niche again. Had Mervin got clear, I wondered? The courtyard was deserted, and it was rapidly growing darker, a drizzle had begun, and the wet ran down my rifle.

"Any word of Mervin?" I called to Stoner when he came out from the dug-out, and moved cautiously across the yard. There was a certain unsteadiness in his gait, but he was regaining his nerve; he had really been more surprised than hurt. He disappeared without answering my question, probably he had not heard me.

"Stretcher-bearers at the double."

The cry, that call of broken life which I have so often heard, faltered across the yard. From somewhere two men rushed out carrying a stretcher, and hurried off in the direction taken by Stoner. Who had been struck? Somebody had been wounded, maybe killed! Was it Mervin?

Stoner came round the corner, a sad look in his brown eyes.

"Mervin's copped it," he said, "in the head. It must have been that shell that done it; a splinter, perhaps."

"Where is he?"

"He's gone away on the stretcher unconscious. The officer has been wounded as well in the leg, the neck, and the face."

"Badly?"

"No, he's able to speak."

Fifteen minutes later I saw Mervin again. He was lying on the stretcher and the bearers were just going off to the dressing station with it. He was breathing heavily, round his head was a white bandage, and his hands stretched out stiffly by his sides. He was borne into the trench and carried round the first traverse. I never saw him again; he died two days later without regaining consciousness.

On the following day two more men went: one got hit by a concussion shell that ripped his stomach open, another, who was on sentry-go got messed up in a bomb explosion that blew half of his side away. The charm of the courtyard, with the flower-beds and floral designs, died away; we were now pleased to keep indoors and allow the chairs outside to stand idle. All day long the enemy shelled us, most of the shells dropped outside and played havoc with the church; but the figure on the crucifix still remained, a symbol of something great and tragical, overlooking the area of destruction and death. Now and again a shell dropped on the flower-beds and scattered splinters and showers of earth against buildings and dug-outs. In the evening an orderly came to the Keep.

"I want two volunteers," he said.

"For what?" I asked him.

"I don't know," was the answer, "they've got to report immediately to Headquarters."

Stoner and I volunteered. The Headquarters, a large dug-out roofed with many sandbags piled high over heavy wooden beams, was situated on the fringe of the communication trench five hundred yards away from the Keep. We took up our post in an adjacent dug-out and waited for orders. Over our roof the German shells whizzed incessantly and tore up the brick path. Suddenly we heard a crash, an ear-splitting explosion from the fire line.

"What's that?" asked Stoner. "Will it be a mine blown up?"

"Perhaps it is," I ventured. "I wish they'd stop the shelling, suppose one of these shells hit our dug-out."

"It would be all U.P. with us," said Stoner, trying to roll a cigarette and failing hopelessly. "Confound it," he said, "I'm all a bunch of nerves, I didn't sleep last night and very little the night before.

"

His eyebrows were drawn tight together and wrinkles were forming between his eyes; the old sparkle was almost entirely gone from them.

"Mervin," he said, "and the other two, the bloke with his side blown away. It's terrible."

"Try and have a sleep," I said, "nobody seems to need us yet."

He lay down on the empty sandbags which littered the floor, and presently he was asleep. I tried to read Montaigne, but could not, the words seemed to be running up and down over the page; the firing seemed to have doubled in intensity, and the shells swept low almost touching the roof of the dug-out.

"Orderly!"

I stumbled out into the open, and a sharp penetrating rain, and made my way to the Headquarters. The adjutant was inside at the telephone speaking to the firing line.

"Hello! that the Irish?" he said. "Anything to report? The mine has done no damage? No, fifteen yards back, lucky! Only three casualties so far."

The adjutant turned to an orderly officer: "The mine exploded fifteen yards in front, three wounded. Are you the orderly?" he asked, turning to me.

"Yes, sir."

"Find out where the sergeant-major is and ask him if to-morrow's rations have come in yet."

"Where is the sergeant-major?" I asked.

"I'm not sure where he stays," said the adjutant. "Enquire at the Keep."

The trench was wet and slobbery, every hole was a pitfall to trap the unwary; boulders and sandbags which had fallen in waited to trip the careless foot. I met a party of soldiers, a corporal at their head.

"This the way to the firing line?" he asked.

"You're coming from it!" I told him.

"That's done it!" he muttered. "We've gone astray, there's some fun up there!"

"A mine blown up?" I asked.

"'Twas a blow up," was the answer. "It almost deafened us, someone must have copped it. What's the way back?"

"Go past Gunner Siding and Marie Redoubt, then touch left and you'll get through."

"God! it's some rain," he said. "Ta, ta."

"Ta, ta, old man."

I turned into the trench leading to the Keep. The rain was pelting with a merciless vigour, and loose earth was falling from the sides to the floor of the trench. A star-light flared up and threw a brilliant light on the entrance of the Keep as I came up. The place bristled with brilliant steel, half a dozen men stood there with fixed bayonets, the water dripping from their caps on to their equipment.

"Halt! who goes there!" Pryor yelled out, raising his bayonet to the "on guard" position.

"A friend," I replied. "What's wrong here?"

"Oh, it's Pat," Pryor answered. "Did you not hear it?" he continued, "the Germans have broken through and there'll be fun. The whole Keep is manned ready."

"Is the pantomime parapet manned?" I asked. I alluded to the flat roof of the stable in which our Section slept. It had been damaged by shell fire, and was holed in several places, a sandbag parapet with loop-holes opened out on the enemy's front.

"Kore, Bill, Goliath, they're all up there," said Pryor, "and the place is getting shelled too, in the last five minutes twenty shells have missed the place, just missed it."

"Where does the sergeant-major stick?" I asked.

"Oh, I don't know, not here I think."

The courtyard was tense with excitement. Half a dozen new soldiers were called to take up posts on the parapet, and they were rushing to the crazy stairs which led to the roof. On their way they overturned a brazier and showers of fine sparks rioted into the air. By the flare it was possible to see the rain falling slanting to the ground in fine lines that glistened in the flickering light. Shells were bursting overhead, flashing out into spiteful red and white stars of flame, and hurling their bullets to the ground beneath. Shell splinters flew over the courtyard humming like bees and seeming to fall everywhere. What a miracle that anybody could escape them!

I met our platoon sergeant at the foot of the stairs.

"Where does the sergeant-major hold out?"

"Down at Givenchy somewhere," he told me. "The Germans have broken through," he said. "It looks as if we're in for a rough night."

"It will be interesting," I replied, "I haven't seen a German yet."

Over the parapet a round head, black amidst a line of bayonets appeared, and a voice called down, "Sergeant!"

"Right oh!" said the sergeant, and rushed upstairs. At that moment a shell struck a wall at the back somewhere, and pieces of brick whizzed into the courtyard and clattered down the stair. When the row subsided Kore was helped down, his face bleeding and an ugly gash showing above his left eye.

"Much hurt, old man?" I asked.

"Not a blighty, I'm afraid," he answered.

A "blighty" is a much desired wound; one that sends a soldier back to England. A man with a "blighty" is a much envied person. Kore was followed by another fellow struck in the leg, and drawing himself wearily along. He assured us that he wasn't hurt much, but now and again he groaned with pain.

"Get into the dug-outs," the sergeant told them. "In the morning you can go to the village, to-night it's too dangerous."

About midnight I went out on the brick pathway, the way we had come up a few nights earlier. I should have taken Stoner with me, but he slept and I did not like to waken him. The enemy's shells were flying overhead, one following fast on another, all bursting in the brick path and the village. I could see the bright hard light of shrapnel shells exploding in the air, and the signal-red flash of concussion shells bursting ahead. Splinters flew back buzzing like angry bees about my ears. I would have given a lot to be back with Stoner in the dug-out; it was a good strong structure, shrapnel and bullet proof, only a concussion shell falling on top would work him any harm.

The rain still fell and the moon—there was a bit of it somewhere—never showed itself through the close-packed clouds. For a while I struggled bravely to keep to the tight-rope path, but it was useless, I fell over first one side, then the other. Eventually I kept clear of it, and walked in the slush of the field. Half way along a newly dug trench, some three feet in depth, ran across my road; an attack was feared at dawn, and a first line of reserves were in occupation. I stumbled upon the men. They were sitting well down, their heads lower than the parapet, and all seemed to be smoking if I could form judgment by the line of little glow-worm fires, the lighted cigarette ends that extended out on either hand. Somebody was humming a music-hall song, while two or three of his mates helped him with the chorus.

"Halt! who goes there?"

The challenge was almost a whisper, and a bayonet slid out from the trench and paused irresolutely near my stomach.

"A London Irish orderly going down to the village," I answered.

A voice other than that which challenged me spoke: "Why are you alone, there should be two."

"I wasn't aware of that."

"Pass on," said the second voice, "and be careful, it's not altogether healthy about here."

Somewhere in the proximity of the village I lost the brick path and could not find it again. For a full hour I wandered over the sodden fields under shell fire, discovering the village, a bulk of shadows thinning into a jagged line of chimneys against the black sky when the shells exploded, and losing it again when the darkness settled down around me. Eventually I stumbled across the road and breathed freely for a second.

But the enemy's fire would not allow me a very long breathing space, it seemed bent on battering the village to pieces. In front of me ran a broken-down wall, behind it were a number of houses and not a light showing. The road was deserted.

A shell exploded in mid-air straight above, and bullets sang down and shot into the ground round me. Following it came the casing splinters humming like bees, then a second explosion, the whizzing bullets and the bees, another explosion....

"Come along and get out of it," I whispered to myself, and looked along the road; a little distance off I fancied I saw a block of buildings.

"Run!"

I ran, "stampeded!" is a better word, and presently found myself opposite an open door. I flung myself in, tripped, and went prostrate to the floor.

Boom! I almost chuckled, thinking myself secure from the shells that burst overhead. It was only when the bees bounced on the floor that I looked up to discover that the house was roofless.

I made certain that the next building had a roof before I entered. It also had a door, this I shoved open and found myself amongst a number of horses and warm penetrating odour of dung.

"Now, 3008, you may smoke," I said, addressing myself, and drew out my cigarette case. My matches were quite dry; I lit one and was just putting it to my cigarette when one of the horses began prancing at the other end of the building. I just had a view of the animal coming towards me when the match went out and left me in the total darkness. I did not like the look of the horse, and I wished that it had been better bound when its master left it. It was coming nearer and now pawing the floor with its hoof. I edged closer to the door; if it were not for the shells I would go outside. Why was that horse allowed to remain loose in the stable? I tried to light another match, but it snapped in my fingers. The horse was very near me now; I could feel its presence, it made no noise, it seemed to be shod with velvet. The moment was tense, I shouted: "Whoa there, whoa!"

It shot out its hind legs and a pair of hoofs clattered on the wall beside me.

"Whoa, there! whoa there! confound you!" I growled, and was outside in a twinkling and into the arms of a transport sergeant.

"What the devil—'oo are yer?" he blurted out.

"Did you think I was a shell?" I couldn't help asking. "I'm sorry," I continued, "I came in here out of that beastly shelling."

"Very wise," said the sergeant, getting quickly into the stable.

"One of your horses is loose," I said. "Do you know where the London Irish is put up here?"

"Down the road on the right," he told me, "you come to a large gate there on the left and you cross a garden. It's a big buildin'."

"Thank you. Good night."

"Good night, sonny."

I went in by the wrong gate; there were so many on the left, and found myself in a dark spinney where the rain was dripping heavily from the branches of the trees. I was just on the point of turning back to the road when one of our batteries concealed in the place opened fire, and a perfect hell of flame burst out around me. I flopped to earth with graceless precipitancy, and wallowed in mud. "It's all up 3008, you've done it now," I muttered, and wondered vaguely whether I was partly or wholly dead. The sharp smell of cordite filled the air and caused a tickling sensation in my throat that almost choked me. When I scrambled to my feet again and found myself uninjured, a strange dexterity had entered my legs; I was outside the gate in the space of a second.

Ten minutes later I found the sergeant-major, who rose from a blanket on the ground-floor of a pretentious villa with a shell splintered door, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. The rations had not arrived; they would probably be in by dawn. Had I seen the mine explode? I belonged to the company holding the Keep, did I not? The rumour about the Germans breaking through was a cock-and-bull story. Had I any cigarettes? Turkish! Not bad for a change. Good luck, sonny! Take care of yourself going back.

I came in line with the rear trench on my way back.

"Who's there?" came a voice from the line of little cigarette lights.

"A London Irish orderly—going home!" I answered, and a laugh rewarded my ironical humour.

"Jolly luck to be able to return home," I said to myself when I got past. "3008, you weren't very brave to-night. By Jove, you did hop into that roofless house and scamper out of that spinney! In fact, you did not shine as a soldier at all. You've not been particularly afraid of shell fire before, but to-night! Was it because you were alone you felt so very frightened? You've found out you've been posing a little before. Alone you're really a coward."

I felt a strange delight in saying these things; the firing had ceased; it was still raining heavily.

"Remember the bridge at Suicide Corner," I said, alluding to a recent incident when I had walked upright across a bridge, exposed to the enemy's rifle fire. My mates hurried across almost bent double whilst I sauntered slowly over in front of them. "You had somebody to look at you then; 'twas vanity that did it, but to-night! You were afraid, terribly funky. If there had been somebody to look on, you'd have been defiantly careless. It's rather nerve-racking to be shelled when you're out alone at midnight and nobody looking at you!"

Dawn was breaking when I found myself at the Keep. The place in some manner fascinated me and I wanted to know what had happened there. I found that a few shells were still coming that way and most of the party were in their dug-outs. I peered down the one which was under my old sleeping place; at present all stayed in their dug-outs when off duty. They were ordered to do so, but none of the party were sleeping now, the night had been too exciting.

"'Oo's there?" Bill called up out of the darkness, and when I spoke he muttered:

"Oh, it's ole Pat! Where were yer?"

"I've been out for a walk," I replied.

"When that shellin' was goin' on?"

"Yes."

"You're a cool beggar, you are!" said Bill. "I was warm here I tell yer!"

"Have the Germans come this way?" I asked.

"Germans!" ejaculated Bill. "They come 'ere and me with ten rounds in the magazine and one in the breech! They knows better!"

Stoner was awake when I returned to the dug-out by Headquarters.

"Up already?" I asked.

"Up! I've been up almost since you went away," he answered. "My! the shells didn't half fly over here. And I thought you'd never get back."

"That's due to lack of imagination," I told him. "What's for breakfast?"