Then the guns began to rattle by; always an ominous sign, for it meant that battle was imminent. It was a remarkable thing that neither infantry nor artillery took much notice of each other as they met. The guns and carriages would thunder and bump and clatter over the pavé, the thickset horses straining at their harness, the drivers urging them on. But the infantry would plod along just the same, regardless of the noise and bustle. The men would not even raise their eyes from the boots of the preceding four.
Very soon after the last gun-carriage had rattled past, sounds of a bombardment would be heard—the bangs and whizz of shells. The Column would probably be halted, while a reconnaissance was made to ascertain in what force the enemy was holding his position. As a rule, deployments were not necessary, for the artillery generally succeeded in dislodging the enemy off their own bat. Such affairs as this happened no less than three times before it was dark, and in each case the Germans had had to leave their dead and wounded behind them.
One poor fellow lay with his head propped up against a heap of stones by the wayside. His chin and mouth had been torn from his face, and the ragged flesh hung in tatters, red and bleeding, as it had been torn. Almost before their eyes the man was passing away. It was awful.
"Poor devil, all this 'ere wasn't 'is fault, yer know," a man muttered.
As far as the Subaltern could hear, no one answered him. Perhaps some of them were wondering where that dying man's soul was going to. One was a Christian, of course, but one wanted to know more. One wanted, very badly, a little precise, definite knowledge of What Happens—after. At that moment he hated Hamlet. Yet the words kept surging through his brain: "To die ... to sleep ... in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?... puzzles the will ... makes us rather bear the ills we have, than fly to others that we know not of!"
Not that conscience had "made a coward" of him, nor of any other man or boy he had ever seen, a great deal nearer to death and vital, elementary things than Shakespeare had ever been. He felt a little foolish for it, but all the same he was thrilled by a sensation of triumphant superiority to the Bard of Avon.
All the time the rain was streaming down, and all the time their clothes grew wetter and wetter. Just before dusk a halt was made by the roadside, and at last the booming of the guns died down to a silence that was only broken by the incessant patter of the rain upon the sodden earth.
There was not much to eat, only biscuits, whose freshness and crispness had been lost in moist pockets. Nobody was thirsty: there was too much water externally!
It was quite dark when they moved on. Somehow the darkness used to come to them as a tremendous relief, as an armistice. They felt, in a subtle way, more at home in it, for it shut out from their eyes the strange sights and horrors of a land quite foreign to them. After the wearing day, it brought a freshness that was exhilarating, a refreshing coolness to the cheeks and hands that was gratifying and soothing. In spite of everything their spirits rose.