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Show I HA tDAl1'Llb)I v- Th Wfir ft Cloe R unfit PiMi riNnl to n KtmurA- af'lc Nci its try an Ojjttvr u I he Mdt im- "Snvc your n nuiiiiiil I lull mill lay low," Hit" word viis jmssi d. "We're en our own out here." And the Imitation, n very small battalion now, lillle more than it hundred men, lny along the event (hoy had stormed, with their doacl (ind wounded nnd the Boche dead iiml wounded around them. Almost Imnudliitely the Boche began 1o road. o opened on them ii storm of lire, high explosive nr.d shrapnel, mid Ids machine-guns dinned lloroely. A count era I lac); began to form -toward Kt.-Kt lonno. Sweating pimniTS strutrglod Into position with Hit- two machine-guns (lint wore loft In (lie hallallon, and llio.se with their crows, were knocked out by shell-lire before either had been In action lone; enough to (Ire n clip. Rut the rlllos gave tongue and continued to speak the last few men are always the most dillli-ult to kill and the Boche had little taste for rifle-fire that begins to kill nt 700 yards. That counterattack counter-attack shortly returned whence It came, and the one that followed It wont back also. Whitehead, of the Sixty-seventh company, plumped down alongside the captain of the Forty-ninth. Small, very quick and wiry, with his helmet cocked on the side of bis bead, he gave the Impression of n fierce and warlike little hawk. "Hunt's comln' Capt. JOHN W. THOMASON, Jr. U-JtrtHl ly Author from Sin to hen KU.l on U tUltlatMd) by th BiU SytHlU-uto. Inc.) CHAPTER VII Continued 11 "Any one of those nine-Inch babies would have blotted out twenty of us," marveled n lieutenant, lending bis platoon nround n thirty-foot crater that still smoked. "Or ripped, the heart out of any conerete-and stool fort mention ever built the good Bawd was certainly with us!" To the company commanders, gathered gath-ered at dark In a much disfigured Bocbe shelter In the Wood of Somme-Py, Somme-Py, the major save Information. "The Sixth took Diane Mont, and they are holding It against heavy eounter-at-tacks. Prisoners say they were ordered or-dered to hold here nt nny costs they're fighting damned well, tool The infantry regiments piped down .the Rols de Vipre, just as we did the Essen hook. The division is grouping around the ridge, but we're pretty -' well Isolated from the French. To- gained In other battles, and their hearts lifted up to meet what might iiimo. "More Interval more Interval there on the left! Don't bunch up, you ' The first shell came screaming down the line from the right, and broke with the hollow cough and poisonous yellow puff of smoke which marks the particular abomination of the foot-soldier. It broke fairly over the center of the Forty-ninth, and every head ducked in unison. Three men there were who seemed to throw themselves prone; they did not get up ngaln. And then the light closed upon the battalion with the complete and horrid unreality of nightmare! The silent ridge to the left awoke with machine-guns nnd rides, and sibilant' sibi-lant' rushing flights of nickel-coated missiles from Maxim nnd Mauser struck down where the shells spared. An increasing trail of crumple 1 brown figures lay behind the battalion ns It went. The raw smell of blood was in men's nostrils. .i in. t.i ii.ii night we are going on up nnd take the front line, and attack toward St.-" St.-" Etlenne-a-Arnes town north of the ridge nnd a little west. Get on up to F.lanc Mont with your companies P. C. will be there, along the road that runs across the ridge. CHAPTER VIII v"' Biting the Boche with the American Saw-Tooth Formation. For-mation. Not greatly troubled by the Eochi-ehelling, Eochi-ehelling, that died to spasmodic bursts as the night went on, the battalion mounted through the dark to its appointed ap-pointed place. Here, beside a blasted road that ran along Blanc Mont, just behind the thin line of the Sixth, the' weary men lay down, and, no orders being Immediately forthcoming, slept like the dead that were lying, thickly thick-ly there. Let the officers worry over the fact that the French bad fallen behind on each flank, that the division divi-sion was, to all purposes, isolated far out in Boche territory let any fool worry over tle chances of stopping vojiii jiMiuiru wiiii ins men, a uiiie dazed perhaps with shock nnd sound such as never were on earth before, the second-in-command was conscious of a strangely mounting sense of the unreality of the whole thing. The woods on the crest were as far away as ever through the murk, their strides got them nowhere, their legs were clogged ns in an evil dream they were falling so fast, these men he had worked with nnd helped to train in wnr. There was a monstrous anger in his heart ... a five-inch shell swooped over bis head, so near that the rush of air made his eardrums ear-drums pop nnd burst. He was picked up and whirled away like a leaf, breath and senses struck from him by the world-shattering concussion. The second-in-command was pulled to his feet by Gunner Nice, who had taken the second platoon. His head lolled stupidly a moment, then he heard words "an' that shell got all the captain's group, sir all of 'em ! An' my platoon's all casualties" He pulled himself together as he went forward. His raipeoat was split up the back, under his belt. His map case was gone the strap that had se- over, n-nncls," he said. "Bad place; worst I ever saw. Got about thirty men left. Hell that our machine-guns got knocked out so quick, wasn't It? must be two regiments of Fritzies on our front yonder !" Captain Hunt, senior In the field, a big, imperturbable' Californlan, came, and Lieutenant Kelly, promoted by casualties in the last hour to command of the Sixty-sixth company. "How does It look to you, gentlemen?" said Hunt. "Damn bad" was the consensus of opinion, with profane embellishments. embellish-ments. Followed some technical discussion. dis-cussion. "Well," concluded the senior captain, "we've accomplished our mission mis-sion broke up their attack better hook up with the rest of the regiment. We'll find them through the woods to the right. Move off your companies Kelly, you go first." Nobody remembers very clearly that swing to the right, through a hall of machine-gun fire nnd an Inferno of shelling. They found the companies i of the Second battalion digging In astride a blasted road, nnd went Into position beside them. "I've organized the company sector with twenty men all we've got left one tomorrow tomorrow wouui come soon enough. "The lootenant says to get all the rest you can don't nobody no-body need to tell me tha " In the deep dugouts behind the road the battalion commanders prodded at field-maps "and swore wearily over the ominous gaps behind the flanks three kilometers on one flank, five on the other, where the French divisions had not kept pace. Into these holes the- Boche had all day been savagely striving to thrust himself, and his success suc-cess would mean disaster. Already the Sixtli had a force thrown back to cover the left rear, disposed at right 1 angles to the line of advance. . , . And orders were to carry the attack forward at dawn. On tcp of that, after midnight a Boclui deserter crawled into the. line with the cheering cheer-ing news that the Germans were planning plan-ning to attack in force on the Amer- lln.il-n .1.-1. . r ,i:..(t.. .! you and I make twenty-two," reported the second-in-command, dropping wearily wear-ily into the shell-hole where the captain cap-tain had established himself. "Lord, I'm tired . . . and what I can't see," he added in some wonder, fingering fin-gering the rents In his raincoat, "Is why we weren't killed, too. ... ." That night, lying in its shallow, hastily dug holes, the remnant of the battalion descended through further hells of shelling. The next night tins of beef and bread came up. There wns some grim laughter when it came. "Captain," reported the one remaining remain-ing sergeant, after distributing rations In the dark, "they sent us chow according ac-cording to the last strength report three days ngo 2P0-odd rations. The men are building breastworks out of thfe corned-willy cans, sir twenty of 'em " Some runners got through, and Divl- sion H. Q., well forward In a pleasantly pleas-antly exposed spot on the Souain road, built up a picture of a situation sufficiently suffi-ciently interesting. Four infantry regiments regi-ments were thrust saw-wise northeast to northeast of Blanc Mont; all were isolatfcd from each other and from the French, who had lagged behind the flanks. Four little islands in a turbulent Boche sea, and the old Boche doing his damnedest. (TO BE CONTINUED.) fresh troops Prussians had just been brought up for that purpose. It looked bad it looked worst than that. "Weil," said Major George Hamilton Ham-ilton of the First battalion of the Fifth, "orders are to attack, and, by C,od, we'll attack" a yawn spoiled the dramatic eifect of his pronounce- t mcnt "and now I'm going to get sonife' sleep. Coxy, wake me at 5:D0 that will be an hour." And nt dawn, while the ridge shook nnd thundered under the barrage that went before the Boche flank attack, and the Sixtli held with their rifles the branch behind the left, the Fifth marines went forward to carry the battle to St.-Elienne. Noon found them well forward of the ridge, lying in nu open flat, while the leading battalions disappeared in pine woods on a long slope ahead. It bad fallen strangely quiet where they lay. Up forward, though, all hell suddenly sud-denly broke loose. Artillery, machine-guns, machine-guns, rifles, even (he coughing detonations de-tonations of grenades, mounted to an Inconceivable fury of sound. "Here comes a battalion runner there's the skipper, over there what's up, anv- wy?" The second-in-command came through his company willi a light in ids eyes, and he sent his voice be-fore be-fore him. "Deploy the first platoon. Mr. I.aiigford. Three-pace interval, be From Men That Knew fio Mercy. j cured It hung loosely from his shoulder. shoul-der. There was blood on bis hands, and the salt taste of It in ills mouth, but it didn't seem to be bis. And the front of the battalion was very narrow, now. The support platoons were all in the line. Strangest of all, the gray slope was behind them the trees on the crest were only a few yards away. . Behind nnd to the left the machine-guns machine-guns still raved, but the artillery fell away. A greenish rocket flared from the pines ahead, and right in the faces of the panting marines machine-guns and rifles blazed. In the shadow of the pines were men in cumbersome green-gray uniforms, with faces that looked hardly human under deep round helmets. With eyes narrowed, bodies slanting forward like men in heavy rain, the remnant of the battalion bat-talion went to them. It was the (lank of the Boche column col-umn which bad come out of St-Etienne St-Etienne and struck the leading battalions bat-talions of the Fifth. It had watched first with keen delight, then with Incredulity, In-credulity, the tortured advance of the battalion. Tt had waited too long to open its own fire. And now, already shaken by the sight of -these men who would not. die, it shrank from the long American bayonets and the pitiless, furious faces behind the steel. A few Mire. 'here's Mr. Connor? Oh, Chuck, j you'll form the second wave behind Tom. About fifty yards. Other two platoons In column behind the company com-pany Hanks. - On yo' feet, cliiUun I We're goin' up against 'em !" And so, all four companies in line, the First battalion, a thousand men, went up against the Boche. "Captain," said the t'econd-ln-command, as they started, "we're' swlngln' half-left. This tack will take up right to St.-Ktlonne, St.-Ktlonne, won't it? We were pointln' a little one side of It before major give you any dope?'' "The Boche have come out of St.-Etienne two full infantry regiments, anyway, and a bunch of Maxim guns and hit the second and third In the Hank. Must be pretty bad. We're goin' up to hit them In the flank ourselves. 'Bout a kilometer, I'd say. Walt until their artillery spots this little promenade. None of ours In support, you know." Every man knew, as :hey moved out of the flat and ascended the slope ahead, that the case was desperate, but to this ffiul was all their strength and skill la war. all their cunnluj Brandt nburger zealots elected to die on their spitting Maxim guns, working work-ing them until bayonets or clubbed rifles made an end. A few iron-souled Prussians the Boche had such men stood up to mpet bayonet with bayonet, bayon-et, and died that way. A great- many more Hung away their arms and bleated "Kamaradon" to men who In that red minute knew no mercy. Some bid In holes, or feigned death, to be bunted out as the press thinned. There was a battery of field-guns field-guns down the slope, f00 yards or so. The . gunners those who were lucky took to cover after the first burst of lire. "Thank Gawd for a shot at them dam" artillerymen! Battle-eight, an' aim low, you birds don't let any of them get away!" . . . "Sergeant, reckon the lootenant would let us go down an' take (hem 77s?" "Shut up an' work yo' bolt, you dam' fool I Whalinell you think you are a army core?" "Besides, Mr. Connor's dead. . . ." On the hill beyond St.-Elienne St.-Elienne new trenches scarred the slope; there were many Germans milling mill-ing there, some J.D00 yards war. |