On the 20th June I was detailed to discover by listening in front of the enemy trench whether mining was going on, and at eleven o’clock I clambered through our pretty high wire entanglements with Fähnrich Wohlgemut, Lance-corporal Schmidt, and Fusilier Parthen felder. We covered the first stretch stooping, and then crawled on close together through the long grass and weeds. Memories of school reading-books came back to me as I crept on my belly through dewy grass and thistle stems, painfully anxious to avoid cracking the least twig, for fifty metres in front the English trenches rose as a black streak in the half-light. The bullets of a distant machine-gun fell almost perpendicularly round us; here and there a Verey light went up and threw its cold illumination on the desolate plots of ground.
Once there were loud crackling sounds behind us. Two shadows passed along swiftly between the trenches. Just as we made ready to jump on them they vanished. Immediately after, the thunder of two bombs in the English trench told us it was two of our men who had crossed our path. We crawled slowly on.
Suddenly the Fähnrich clutched my arm: “On the right, quite close—gently, gently.” Directly after, I heard sundry rustlings in the grass ten metres to our right. With one of those lightning intuitions that come to one on such occasions I saw the whole situation. We had been crawling the whole time along the English wire. They had heard us and now had come out of the trench to examine the ground in front of them.
Such moments on the prowl by night are unforgettable. Eyes and ears are stretched to their utmost. The sound of the enemy’s feet coming nearer through the tall grass assumes a remarkable and portentous distinctness that takes almost entire possession of one. The breath comes in gasps and it is all you can do to suppress the noise of it. The safety-catch of your revolver goes back with a little metallic click—a sound that goes through the nerves like a knife. The teeth grate on the fuse-pin of the bomb. The fray will have to be short and murderous. You are aquiver with two violent sensations—the tense excitement of the hunter and the terror of the hunted. You are a world in yourself, and the dark and horrible atmosphere that broods over the waste land has sucked you in utterly to itself.
A succession of indistinct figures rose up close behind us. Whispering voices came to us. We turned our heads in their direction. I heard Parthenfelder, a Bavarian, bite on the blade of a dagger.
They came still a few steps nearer, but then began to work on the wire, apparently without having observed us. Without taking our eyes off them we crawled slowly back. Death, after towering up between the two parties in eager expectation, took himself off in disgust. After a time we got on to our feet and were soon safely back in the trench.
The happy issue of our excursion inspired us with the thought of taking a prisoner, and we resolved to see about it the next evening. In the afternoon, when I had just lain down to get a little rest in view of our plans for the night, I was scared out of my wits by a terrific crash close to the dugout. The Englishmen were sending toffee-apples over which, in spite of the moderate report they made when fired off, were of such weight that the splinters from them smashed the stout tree-trunk posts of the revetment clean through. I clambered cursing from my coucher and into the trench, intending to jump down the nearest deep dugout with a shout of “Bomb left!” as soon as I saw one of these black fellows describe his circular course through the air. We were so generously provided with trench-mortar bombs of every calibre and description during the next weeks that it became second nature when going along the trench to keep one eye aloft and the other on the nearest deep dugout entrance.
That night, then, I once more prowled about between the trenches with three companions. We crawled on all-fours right up to the English wire and there took cover behind scattered clumps of grass. After a while several English appeared dragging a roll of wire. They stopped just in front of us and began cutting at the roll of wire with wire-clippers and talking in whispers. We crept nearer together in order to hold a muttered consultation. “A bomb in the middle of them and then grab him.”
“But there are four of them, man!”
“Don’t talk rot!”
“Mind, mind!” My warning came too late; as I looked up, the English crept like lizards under their wire and disappeared in the trench. We now felt somewhat uneasy. The thought that they would lose no time in bringing a machine-gun into action gave me a nasty taste in the mouth. The others, too, bad the same anxiety. With much rattling of weapons we retreated on our bellies. There was a great stir in the English trench, hushed voices and a loud pattering of feet to and fro. Swish!—a Verey light! All round us
