“Americans Seeking Our Own Lines,” Tom Spelled Out.

The BRIGHTON BOYS at
ST. MIHIEL

BY

LIEUTENANT JAMES R. DRISCOLL

ILLUSTRATED

THE JOHN C. WINSTON COMPANY

PHILADELPHIA

Copyright, 1919, by

The John C. Winston Co.

THE BRIGHTON BOYS SERIES

BY

LIEUTENANT JAMES R. DRISCOLL

AS FOLLOWS:

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

WITH THE FLYING CORPS

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

IN THE TRENCHES

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

WITH THE BATTLE FLEET

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

IN THE RADIO SERVICE

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

WITH THE SUBMARINE FLEET

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

AT CHÂTEAU-THIERRY

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

AT ST. MIHIEL

THE BRIGHTON BOYS

WITH THE ENGINEERS AT CANTIGNY

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

[“Americans Seeking Our Own Lines,” Tom Spelled Out]

[Ollie Hurled a Grenade Directly Into the Group That Remained]

[The Khaki-Clad Warriors Surged Into the Town for Hand-to-Hand Combat]

[With His Powerful Left Hand John Big Bear had the German in a Throat Stranglehold]

The Brighton Boys at St. Mihiel

CHAPTER I
Big Preparations

RAIN, rain, rain.

Not the puny patter of a slow and drizzling and short-lived storm, nor the gusty petulance of an April shower, but a steady, sullen inundation that had set in more than a week before.

For days and nights it had been nothing but a steady downpour, and from all appearances and barometric indications for days more it would continue to be nothing else.

It was as desolate a place and as gloomy a season as one could imagine, and the abominable weather was but adding to the depression of the thousands of sturdy American youths who for weeks had loitered in what seemed to them a useless and nerve-racking inactivity in a vast water-logged section of France, west of St. Mihiel, almost south of battle-scarred Verdun.

Now and then as the hours wore on toward late afternoon and early darkness, a rising wind seemed to whine something of an echo to the mental misery of those in the khaki-clad armies thus held as on a leash. Or was it more as a dismal-toned challenge to them as they wallowed through the slippery mud, unloading and distributing food, supplies, ammunition from the seemingly never-ending caravan of drab-colored motor trucks which hour after hour and day after day like the rain itself streamed in seemingly from nowhere to the veritable swamp in which the cream of American young manhood waded—and waited.

Tom Walton, despite himself, was thinking of Brighton and the pleasant school-days there, as, just relieved from a monotonous sentry duty, he headed toward the company kitchen where he knew his good friend Harper would hand him out a cup of steaming coffee to warm his blood and loosen his stiffened bones.

Often with Harper, and with Ollie Ogden, too, Tom Walton had played football on a sometimes soggy field at Brighton, but never, he was repeating to himself bitterly, had it been anything like this.

But pessimism or drooping spirits cannot for long grip a lad in perfect health and possessed of the knowledge that eventually, soon or late, and probably at no far distant date, he has a great mission to perform. And so, with the first thoughts of good old Brighton, the mood of Tom Walton began to change, even the weather did not seem quite so dreary, the outlook not so glum.

Like many of their pals from the famous school, these three had gone into the same service together—fighting doughboys, if you please—and at their own request had been directly associated in the same unit from the first hour that they went into training. And it had at all times been a happy trio, for in their days at school they had been inseparable pals.

Just at present Harper, by grace of his culinary capabilities, was doing emergency duty in the kitchen because of the temporary illness of one of the regular cooks, but this was more of an advantage than a hardship to his two friends, as a fat sandwich or a couple of hot doughnuts between meals often bore substantial testimony.

Tom Walton was thinking of these things when suddenly he was brought back to the realities of life by a loudly shouted “Hi, there!” accompanied by a clatter which sounded like a section of the German army advancing at a tremendous pace.

It was all so sudden, the ground so treacherously slippery, that Tom scarcely had attempted to turn when something of tremendous weight and momentum struck him a glancing blow and he went sprawling face downward in the muck, his mackinaw canopying out over him like a miniature dog-tent.

Before he could rise and scrape enough of the mud from his eyes to see what was going on, three or four men went galloping by him, one shouting warnings and futile commands, another grunting under the stress of his labors, a third laughing jerkily but uproariously.

In shocked surprise and disgusted recognition, Tom, rising monkey-like to all-fours, took in the situation in a single sour glance.

He had been bowled over by Maud, the company mule!

Maud, evidently, was on another privately-conducted tour of the works—a favorite diversion, by the way—and Maud was objecting strenuously to any curtailment of her pastime, especially in the shape of human company. It was the fourth time in three days that Maud had broken tether, and, so to speak, pulled stakes for another part of Europe—and always somebody got hurt.

Tom reflected with some satisfaction that at least he had come off better than “Buck” Granger, who in a pursuit of the escaped Maud the preceding day had attempted a flying flank attack just as Maud perceptibly increased her speed and let fly with her heels. Buck’s pained expression later, when the surgeon had finished plastering and bandaging him up, was: “The ornery cuss caved two of my slats.”

“That mule will get killed some day,” Tom muttered to himself, still scraping mud from face and garments. “Fellow won’t stand for this sort of stuff all the time. I believe she’s a German spy anyway, trying to kill off decent Americans the way she does.”

And he wended his way sorely toward Harper and the kitchen, while afar off he could hear the continued cry of the hunt as Maud, the incorrigible, cavorted around in the mud, defying sentries, dodging pursuers, having generally what Maud seemed to regard as an all-round good time.

“Any news?” he asked, as Harper handed him the cup of hot coffee for which he had come.

Harper looked off to the northward for a moment before he answered. Not that he could see anything but hundreds upon hundreds of men of all branches of the American arms, but he seemed to be conjuring a dismal picture in his imagination as he stood there in silence, seeming not to have heard the question.

“Well, are you in a trance?” Tom demanded impatiently.

“No,” Harper answered in a peculiar tone, “but I’m wondering just how much longer we’re going to be kept here this way. Of course, we shouldn’t complain or question, but I guess we all feel the same way about it. We’re all anxious to ‘go in,’ and I don’t think it ought to be much longer now.”

“What do you mean? What have you heard?” Tom asked, excitedly.

“It’s not what I have heard, for that hasn’t been very much. It’s what I have seen, what you have seen, what every man here has seen that makes me feel that the big clash of the war is soon to come, and that we will have a chance to be in it. The concentration of the entire First American Army in this sector isn’t for the purpose of giving us a vacation, and after all I guess we can best show our patriotism and loyalty right now by being ready for any emergency, rather than grumbling because Foch and Pershing haven’t asked us out to lunch to get our opinion on their plans.”

“Righto!” exclaimed Tom, with just that emphasis upon the word which the English Tommies had taught the Yanks.

“Yes,” continued Harper, “I’m satisfied that we are down for a big part on the program. Look what our men have been doing further north since June 11th, when they captured Belleau Wood and took three hundred prisoners.

“And just review all of that and last month. On June 19th our men crossed the Marne, near Château-Thierry. On June 29th it was a raid on Montdidier. July 2nd they captured Vaux. On the glorious 4th word came of American success in the Vosges. A month later Fismes was taken, and now—look at this.”

Harper liked nothing better than to spring a surprise—a happy surprise—on his friends. He pulled from under his blouse a late copy of “Stars and Stripes,” the official newspaper of the American Expeditionary forces. It was dated September 3rd, and across the first page, under bold, inspiring headlines, was the stirring story of the capture of the plain of Juvigny, north of Soissons.

With nothing of boastfulness about it, it told in vigorous language of the heroic valor of the American troops; how, behind a creep-barrage, they had steadily advanced until, with a final lifting of the artillery screen, the men, singing, shouting, cheering, advanced into open battle with the Hun hosts.

It was a story to stir the blood of any patriotic American, particularly one who was himself under arms and only awaiting the opportunity to perform like service in behalf of his country and humanity.

Tom Walton read it to the last word before he spoke.

“I think you’re right,” he said, “it won’t be long now until we, also, will be ‘going in’.”

“What else could all this mean?” was Harper’s way of reply. His arm swept the whole horizon, north, westward, south, and then up toward the east. “Haven’t you noticed the immense numbers of the Engineering Corps that are being brought up? Thousands upon thousands of them.”

“And the truck trains,” Tom supplemented. “Buck Granger told me last night that he heard a captain and a lieutenant talking, and how many of those trucks do you think they said already are here?”

“Don’t know. Couldn’t even guess. How many?”

“More than three thousand, and they’re still coming in by scores every hour.”

“It means business,” Harper assented, nodding his head vigorously. “It means business, and on a tremendous scale. Why, just this morning—”

But just at that moment their conversation was interrupted. Their school chum and army pal, Ollie Ogden, burst in upon them, wrathful to the point of pitched battle, and at the time too breathless to speak.

“Have you seen—,” he demanded, and then gasped for another breath. “Have you seen—.”

“Yes,” ventured Tom, in friendly mockery, winking at Harper, “We’ve seen a lot. But just what do you refer to?”

“MAUD!” almost shrieked the angered Ollie. “Have you seen that gol darned mule?”

George Harper and Tom Walton went into gales of uncontrollable laughter. Had they seen Maud? They sure had. Harper saw her on her way—whither it led she refused to say—and Tom had encountered her on the journey.

“Well, what are you two standing there guffawing about?” Ollie demanded, his rage in no way abated by the evident amusement of his friends. “You hee-haw like that beast itself.”

This was too much for Harper, and with his arms folded across his stomach he doubled up like a jack knife in his mirth. But his position was rather unfortunate. He had his back to, and was directly in front of, the outraged Ollie, who hauled off and gave Harper his boot with a force that straightway brought him upright.

“Look here,” he ejaculated in pained surprise.

“Look here!” repeated Ollie. “I’ve looked here, I’ve looked there, I’ve looked all over this blamed camp for that ornery offspring of Satan. I guess you fellow’s would like to see me get a couple of days in the guard for letting her get away.”

“Could anybody ever keep her when she made up her mind to go?” Tom asked, now laughing as well at Harper as at Ogden.

“Well, I couldn’t, anyway, and it’s not my fault,” Ollie asserted. “Just because a fellow’s doing stable police he can’t be personal valet to a beast like that all day. She—he—say, what is a mule, anyway? A he or a she?”

“A mule is what America was before Germany tested her too far,” Harper advised him.

“What do you mean?” asked Ollie, with a blank look.

“Neutral.”

“Oh, no. You’ve got Maud wrong. She’s never neutral. She’s belligerent all the time.”

Just then there was a wild whoop of mixed masculine voices, punctuated with a loud hee-haw, and Ollie dashed off to join a growing group of khaki-clad runners in pursuit of the elusive Maud.

But the mule’s present freedom was destined for an early and ignominious end. She hadn’t counted upon the slipperiness of the soggy mud. She was fanning the air with her two hind legs when the two in front went from under. She came down suddenly upon her side, and with a heavy grunt.

In that instant two of the leaders of the chase were upon her. The struggle that ensued was spectacular in the extreme. The next two men to arrive grabbed the two fore feet.

“A rope, a rope!” they cried in unison, but none dared go near, or even approach, Maud’s rapid-fire hind legs which were kicking out frantically in every direction.

But the men hung on—two at her fore legs and half a dozen across the body—and in a few minutes more another breathless doughboy arrived with the needed rope.

The struggle continued, but finally Maud’s capture was made complete. A slip-noose was made upon her neck; half a dozen huskies took death grips upon the other end; the signal was given, and all at once those who were grappling with her jumped to a safe distance.

Maud gave one disgusted glance around, and then with a mighty effort rose to her four feet and her full dignity. The six men gave a quick tug at the rope around her neck.

Wow! The response was immediate and expressive. Maud’s heels cut the air and she made a bee-line for her captors. They wildly scrambled to escape the onslaught, but bravely held to the rope. The mule went crashing by, and the slack line began to be taken up. With a sudden jerk it became taut, and the six men, feet outspread before them, but unable to take a grip upon the slippery mud, began a wild and involuntary ride in the rear of the cavorting Maud.

Across camp they took their undignified way, as hundreds of onlookers shouted in laughter, or made pretentious but ineffective efforts by the vigorous waving of arms and hats to stop the mule and the mud-bespattered retinue that went flying in her wake. But even Maud could not for long endure the strangulation that the dead weight of six men placed upon her windpipe, and so, after having traversed fully half a mile, she came to a halt that was as abrupt as had been the original beginning of her flight.

A strategist at all times, Maud knew by long experience how to accept defeat and capture. It was with a lamb-like docility that unfailingly won her immunity from the punishment which she so richly deserved.

But even Maud’s caprice, painful as it had been to a few, with the amusement it had provided all the others, was forgotten a few moments later in a rumor that ran the gamut of the square miles of armed camp with greater speed than the fastest mule ever could hope to attain.

“Buck” Granger, who was just wandering from a remote spot where he had dropped off in the pursuit, first brought the news to Tom Walton, Ollie Ogden and Harper.

“Listen!” he said, gathering them about him as though it was some secret not yet told to another soul. “Pershing is due to arrive here tomorrow morning.”

Pershing coming! The supreme commander of all the American forces in Europe! “Black Jack” Pershing, adored alike by the men under him and those at home! Coming into the American sector at that point! It could mean but one thing. Their time to show their mettle was near at hand.

The rumor ran back and forth through the vast area that the advance might be made within the next twenty-four hours. None could confirm it, of course. None wanted to deny it. All were on the tip-toe of expectancy.

No longer were there lingering doubts. It was perfectly clear and assured now that for a vast project, indeed, had all of these great preparations been made.

CHAPTER II
Ready To Go

ALTHOUGH there was scarcely an officer who long ago had not realized the full import and significance of the gigantic movement which had concentrated so many hundred thousand Americans in and around that section opposite the German-held St. Mihiel salient, comparatively few of the lads in the line had looked quite so deeply into the situation.

Now it was perfectly clear.

Hundreds of the biggest guns, together with the famous French “75’s” had been concentrated in position a few miles back. Aeroplane squadrons had been constantly patrolling the skies. Every branch of the Engineers had been brought up, and now those brave and intrepid men, the Pioneers, were adding the final touches to the preparations for their hazardous, self-sacrificing task.

For the Pioneers, if you did not know it before, go first of all when it is a concentrated attack upon a well fortified and entrenched position.

It is the Pioneers who pave the way, doing what previous artillery bombardment may have failed to do in cutting wire entanglements, etc.; theirs is the necessary preliminary work, in which, much of the time, they are open targets for the enemy fire.

And then come the engineers, bridging streams, cutting and blasting away earthen and concrete obstructions, filling in shell holes, levelling roads—making ready for the great attack in which every branch of the service on land will participate; infantry, cavalry, light artillery, tanks, trucks, ambulances, field hospitals, everything.

These were the things for which everyone was making ready at ten o’clock the following morning when the first actual order was received. It was an order which in no way affected the men and lesser officers directly, and yet it was one which marked the first step in the tremendous program.

Brigade, regimental and even battalion commanders, which is to say brigadier-generals, colonels, lieutenant-colonels and majors, were summoned to Division Headquarters.

There, as it soon became known, they met not only the major-general in command, but General Pershing himself. Unheralded, he had arrived by fast auto with the break of dawn, and since that time, as hundreds of maps spread out before them testified, he and the major-general had been in most important conference.

To Corporal Tom Walton fell the never-to-be-forgotten privilege of witnessing this historic sight.

His colonel’s aide arrived back from the conference a few moments after it had begun, to get some maps from the colonel’s quarters. He needed someone to help carry them over.

“Corporal Walton,” his direct commander’s voice called, “you will accompany and assist Lieutenant Behring.”

And that was how Tom Walton got his first glimpse of the great American commander, General Pershing. It was a close view, too, for he had to deposit the maps and photographs upon a table only a few feet away from where the generals sat.

In that instant, while Tom was furtively staring at him, General Pershing looked up. It may have been that he did not give a thought to the youth who thus was overcome by a sudden confusion, but Tom believed otherwise, for the eyes seemed to twinkle kindly for just the fraction of a second, the square jaws relaxed just a little, and the line of the mouth relaxed.

Perhaps, on the other hand, with the biggest job of his big career before him, General Pershing was not unmindful of the fact that he had behind him a whole army—thousands upon thousands—of just such clean-cut, courageous, never-say-die Americans as this young man from Brighton.

In a second, however, he was concentrated again upon the problems before him, and Tom, his job completed, was on his way back to his comrades, to tell them over and over again just how General Pershing looked, spoke, acted, and a dozen other details of information which Tom did his best to give.

What actually was going on at that conference was American and world history in the making. It was, as it became known later, the beginning of the end for the Boche and for Germany.

Thousands of maps and photographs were distributed. Every foot of ground to be traversed by every separate unit was marked off, timed and scheduled to the whole program. Each colonel knew to the exact moment the time when his regiment was to go forward from a given point of concentration; every major knew how his battalion was to be divided and thrust eastward under instructions which he was to convey to his respective captains.

No war strategy ever was worked out to finer detail. None ever attained its objective so quickly and successfully.

That afternoon, as the captains were summoned to receive their detailed orders, the greatest excitement prevailed everywhere. Orders are not revealed to the men and non-commissioned officers until the time has arrived to carry them into effect. But there was no longer any concealing the fact that activities of tremendous import were imminent, and all down the lines, as men examined their accoutrements, the word passed and was repeated, “We’re going in.”

And finally some bright mind hit upon a recollection, and thenceforth there was no further doubt as to the day of the advance; only the hour was in doubt.

On September 12, 1914, the Germans, at tremendous sacrifice in their first drive toward Paris, had established the St. Mihiel salient. It had been held steadily ever since, and on this September 10, 1918, it was within two days of that fourth anniversary. It would be fitting punishment that the Huns should begin to suffer retribution on the very day when they might be expected to be feeling as boastful as only a German can.

Yes, there was no doubt about it in any man’s mind. They were going to attack on September 12th.

And so, with this almost definite assurance in mind, the preparations went forward with even renewed vigor and anticipation. No need to urge the men. They worked as boys would for a holiday. The rain, which continued with only slight and infrequent abatement, was no annoyance, was hardly even noticed now.

The big work for which they had prepared for months—first in America, then in England, and finally behind the lines in France—was now at hand. Their mettle was to be tested against the Boche. Their numbers, their ability, their courage were to be thrown into the world contest of Liberty against Autocracy.

“Do you remember how you used to feel just before we went into a game against an eleven that we knew to be at least our own weight?” Ollie breathed to Tom and George, as the three of them were completing the last essentials to a critical inspection.

“Sure do,” replied Tom, the biggest and heaviest of the three, “and I never put on a head-piece with greater anticipation than I do this,” and he clamped his heavy helmet on as though the battle already were under way.

In a muffled voice Harper wanted to know how his gas mask became him, and if really, after all, he wasn’t the long-sought missing link.

There is a cheerfulness about men about to go into battle that only those who have been through it can understand—a thrilling of every nerve that makes one jest, even though death may be stalking only a few yards or a few hours ahead—a forgetfulness of all else but the determined will to fight to the last, and to win.

Suddenly from far to the east there came the muffled thunder of heavy cannonading which brought all three men upright. For a moment they thought that real hostilities were on; but the illusion was not for long. The sporadic reply of their own batteries told them as clearly as words could that it was just “one of those messages from Fritz and Heinie” which of course required a reply, but did not after all amount to very much. It was a sort of exchange of compliments, the lads in the trenches termed it.

Nevertheless every man was on edge, and when a simultaneous shout of warning and expectancy went up from two or three alert fellows who had been gazing skyward, a thousand heads went up, to witness one of those most daring and spectacular exhibitions of the entire war—a battle in the air.

The three Brighton boys—for as such they were known to all their companions—rushed for an elevation already occupied by half a dozen others, and from which a wider sweep of the skyline was to be had.

Even as they did so the real preliminaries to the battle began. The American pilot, who it was now plain had been merely playing the role of the pursued to lead the enemy beyond the aid of any of his own machines, suddenly swerved for the attack.

The Boche pilot was in a small and speedy Albatross, but in maneuvres and tactics he was outmatched by the American, who came at him with such speed and directness that the witnesses, a thousand feet below, held their breath in expectation of a crash that would bring both machines and their pilots to the ground a battered, mangled mass.

But the American pilot knew his game well. He swerved a little upward and over, just as the Hun took a swift nose dive to avoid contact. There was the rat-tat-tat of machine gun fire, that sounded from the distance more like the popping of toy guns. Neither made a hit, apparently, but the American plane had the position in which the Boche had to pass under, over or around him in any attempt to reach his own lines.

The German had no heart for battle and headed straight south. Again the American came at him like a streak of lightning, began to climb at the same time, and the enemy tried a downward sweep and a turn northward at the same time. The American turned, too, and those on the ground began to applaud at the advantage he had gained. He was but a relatively short distance behind, but at a much higher altitude.

As the Hun headed northeastward with all the speed he could get out of his Albatross, the American came down the wind, dropping as he came, and with momentum adding to the power of his propeller. When just within range he opened up with a fusilade from his machine gun. The German tried swiftly to change his course, but the effort was made too late.

His plane was seen to hover for a moment first on one wing and then the other, as it seemed to come to a dead halt, and then, just as a little tongue of flame shot outward there was a loud explosion, the Albatross turned its nose downward and crashed to earth.

The American machine circled for a moment, as though the pilot were seeking his exact bearings, and then began a long, slow, gliding descent.

From all directions men by the score hurried over to where the machine would land, learn the identity and get a glimpse of the pilot who had furnished the entertainment.

As he came to the ground, the plane halted and the first of them gathered around, there was a gasp of astonishment and sympathy, the pilot lay back in his seat as white as a ghost, his left arm hung limp at his side, blood trickled from a wound in his shoulder, and obviously he would have fainted and fallen had the battle lasted a few moments longer.

“A stretcher!” cried a lieutenant of the Aviation Corps, who had run to the spot to congratulate his colleague.

A stretcher was brought, and an ambulance came hurrying up. The man was unconscious when he was lifted in.

“Serious, but not fatal,” was the abrupt diagnosis of a surgeon after a cursory examination. “Mostly weakness from loss of blood.”

“But why did he stay up after being hit?” asked one man, more of himself than anyone else.

“The Hun would have been glad to get away at any time,” put in another.

The lieutenant who had called for the stretcher turned in no unfriendly way toward them.

“He didn’t come down until he’d gotten his objective,” he said, “because of the stuff that he’s got in him—the same stuff that you fellows have got, too. You’ll be doing the same and just as good things on land, once you get started—and that won’t be very long now.”

He added the last few words in more of an undertone, as though speaking to himself, but everyone caught the significance of them.

“I believe it’s a good sign,” said Ollie Ogden, as the three friends were slushing over the still slippery return journey, although the long rain had ceased early that morning.

“Believe what’s a good sign?” demanded Harper, impatient that Ollie should be so indirect.

“The way that pilot stayed up and won his fight.”

“Well, how’s that a sign? A sign of what?” Tom broke in.

“Why,” explained Ollie, “I believe it’s a sort of a forecast of this new drive we’re going into, and for that matter the whole war. Some of us may and will get hurt, but we’re going to stick at it until we win, and we’re going to make the quickest possible job of it.”

“Bravo!” exclaimed Tom, “Only in our case we’re not going to invite the enemy over our lines to do it. We’re going to carry the fight to him.”

“You’re right,” added Harper, “and this looks as if it’s not many hours off.”

He pointed to a long string of motor trucks bearing pioneers, engineers, snipers, wire-cutters—the forerunners of a battle in which preliminary difficulties must be overcome.

Tom looked at his wrist watch. It was 6.16 and the sun was just setting. Darkness would soon enclose that part of France in the cloak of night—and it was upon the eve of the fourth anniversary of German-established St. Mihiel saliant!

“Not long is right,” he said, reminiscently.

And Harper added, while Ollie nodded his head in assent:

“We’ll soon be ready to go.”

CHAPTER III
The Silent Call to Battle

AT nine o’clock that night the order came. Or rather, it better be said, that it was nine o’clock, the appointed hour, when the top sergeants silently formed their men, reported to lieutenants, who in turn relayed the statements to captains, who passed them to majors, and thus to the colonels and the brigadier generals.

Not a word as to their destination; as few spoken orders as possible; very few lights.

The very air seemed to tingle with the mystery of it as Tom and George and Ollie fell into their places in the first platoon of Company C.

Company after company strode away until entire regiments were on the move. It was ten-thirty when Company C entered the march.

So far as the boys could determine, their direction was northeast, which was calculated to bring them in direct contact with the entrenched Germans holding the southern leg of the St. Mihiel salient.

They had gone perhaps two miles, their own platoon somewhat separated now from the rest of the company as each unit took its own particular divergent route, when the lieutenant, Gaston by name, halted them for a moment while he consulted his wrist watch, and then, more guardedly, a map and the landscape thereabouts.

Those men would have gone anywhere for Gaston. He was one of those born leaders of men, but what was more, he was always willing to go where he would ask another man to take a risk. The men knew that, and as a result there was no finer morale in any platoon in the whole American army, which was saying a great deal.

“We’re a trifle behind schedule,” he announced in a quiet voice. “We’ll hustle up a bit as we go down this incline.”

And setting the pace himself, they dogtrotted for the next half mile. Then a second stop was made, and as the men under him watched his countenance by the brief glare of his pocket searchlight they knew that they had made up their lost time, and were now at the point where the program scheduled them to be at that particular moment.

Hardly a word was spoken. If one man wanted to speak to his “bunkie,” he first gave him a slight nudge on the arm or in the ribs, and then leaned over close to whisper whatever it was he had to say.

Heavy clouds obscured the stars. It was a pitch black night. But despite that, there were few accidents, although a few of the lads stumbled and went to the ground, only to rise and adjust themselves without a word.

They passed through a thick wood, but the engineers had been before them, and there was at least the semblance of a broad path, now well beaten down by the hundreds of their fellow men who had passed through before them during the last two hours.

Once a felled tree which had not entirely flattened to the ground, broke off at the stump with a sharp crack and crunching sound. On the instant every man was flat on the soggy earth, listening, intent, ready for a surprise attack or any emergency.

But Tom recognized the voice of his own captain, fifty feet on the other side of it, instructing the men as to the route of their passage, and in a moment more they were again on their way.

They were coming now into the area of the furthest obstacles and entanglements that had been thrown out by the Germans, and as they swung into a broad and fairly level road, the piles of barbed wire along its sides testified to the rapid, but efficient work of the wire-cutters who had been there for two preceding nights unobserved, and were even now but a short distance ahead, paving the way with the pioneers for the great hosts of infantry and tanks that soon were to attack the enemy.

“Lively now, men,” Lieutenant Gaston instructed as they came upon this highway; and again they swung into a trot, after ten minutes of which, as though it had all been done by clock work, they closed in with the balance of Company C.

“If an enemy flare goes up, each man into the gutter along the roadside without a second’s hesitation,” Captain McCallum ordered. “And no noise from now on.”

It was as though he had said to them: “A few hundred yards ahead are the enemy outposts, with sentries listening for the slightest warning.” And indeed that was true.

They entered a rocky, shell-torn, treacherous field, where even the art and energy of the Engineers had failed entirely to fill all the pits or level all the mounds thrown up by the powerful projectiles which the Boches had directed there.

The pace slackened, to avert accident or discovery, and the men literally crawled along, their unit only kept intact by each man keeping in touch with those on either side of him.

Their baptism of fire came while crossing this vast stretch of open ground. They were on their final lap of the march to the communication trenches when there was a roar from behind the German lines and a big shell broke almost directly in front of Company D.

By the spasm of light that accompanied the explosion the boys from Brighton saw at least half a dozen of D company men go down. Whether they were killed, wounded or merely thrown to the ground by the force of the shock they did not learn until later. But it proved that three men had been killed outright, two others fatally and a third slightly injured.

Tom and Ollie shuddered as Harper whispered the names, as they had been passed along from man to man. One of the killed was Henry Turner, as fine a fellow as ever breathed, as Tom himself learned when they had played guard positions opposite each other on opposing boarding school football teams.

“Too bad,” Ollie muttered. “Lots worse that could be better spared.”

They were halted here for nearly ten minutes, the officers waiting for any further evidence that the enemy was aware of their movement, but apparently it was but a chance shot, for no other followed it. They resumed the advance, but even more cautiously than before.

They could sense rather than see now that before and about them on either side were thousands upon thousands of their own men, coming up in separate companies, becoming battalions and these in turn regiments, until whole brigades and entire divisions lay stretched along the line, waiting for the opening of the tremendous artillery bombardment and barrage that was to screen their final advance into the enemy’s lines.

It was as Company C was entering the second line trenches from a tramway that an incident occurred that caused both mirth and many a heart pang.

The leading men in the first platoon came to a sudden halt and for no apparent reason did not immediately take up progress. There was grumbling and growling, punctuated by sounds of suppressed mirth. When the delay had lengthened into minutes, and couriers had arrived from the commanders of both D and E companies, bearing their respects and asking if the line would not move on, Captain McCallum himself pressed impatiently forward to determine the cause of the hold-up.

He found the men in the lead maintaining a respectful distance from the rear end of an army mule that stood, with head down, ready to kick out at any moment, and effectively blocking the passageway.

“Buck” Granger, who was in the lead, informed the captain that the animal was adamant to all coaxing.

“See if you can slide by,” Captain McCallum ordered.

“Buck” tried it. He was about midships of the mule when it suddenly leaned over against him. He was caught as though in a trap.

“Oh, gosh,” he panted in misery.

“What’s the matter now?” the captain demanded.

“Nothing,” Granger answered with what breath he had left, “only it’s Maud, and she’s got me fast, paying up back debts.”

“Three or four of you huskies try to lift her out of the trench,” the officer then ordered, and as the designated number applied their strength to trying to budge the mule upward, half a dozen others clambered out of the trench to lend a helping hand from above.

But it was a useless effort. Not only were the men risking their life in futile efforts to raise the heavy beast, but the men above leaned over and whispered to the captain, “No use, there’s a high wire fence on either side.”

By this time the Germans—apparently without any knowledge of the movement beyond their lines, however—were letting go occasional shells.

“With the next blast from Fritz, shoot the beast,” Captain McCallum ordered; for not only were his own men being delayed, but all of those who followed. The entire program might fall with the failure of the required regiments to be at their appointed place when the opening of the artillery signalled the forward movement behind a curtain of shells.

How Maud got there no one in the entire regiment could have told. It was like Maud—German spy, Tom had called her—to be forever upsetting law and order and the best-laid plans. She was interfering now with the movement of a large part of an American army, and yet the lads who had known and loved the beast despite its unruly disposition felt much as though a personal friend thus was to be put forever out of the way.

A corporal who had mounted the trench side to try and help lift Maud out, jumped down in front of her and placed his pistol at her head.

“And be careful not to hit Granger,” was the captain’s final warning, as he again noticed “Buck,” still in the vice-like grip and rapidly being crushed breathless.

The corporal pointed his pistol in such a way that the bullet could not endanger “Buck;” a German gun went off and simultaneously with it there was a flash at Maud’s head, her whole body quivered for an instant, and then she went down in a heap.

The hundreds upon hundreds of men who followed those of Company C through that trench, stepped upon something big and bulky and soft, but none knew until later that it was the dead body of what had been one of the most cantankerous mules in the American army.

How the word came none knew, but nevertheless the various regiments hardly had taken up their appointed places before it became whispered from man to man that simultaneously with the American attack upon the southern wing of the St. Mihiel salient, the French were to launch an equally vigorous attack from the north.

It was satisfying information, or prediction, although the Americans, needless to say, required nothing to sharpen their enthusiasm, nothing to bolster up a courage which was prone at times even to sweep away discretion and better judgment and carry them into unnecessary hazards.

Nevertheless, it was good news to know that the poilus were “going in,” too—that it was to be a strike-together battle for quick and indisputable supremacy.

It was not known until later how true the information was, but the German high command would have paid a fat price to have been apprised of it; for not only was it exactly what did happen, but had the Boches known of the plan undoubtedly they would have been able to put up a stouter defense, even though it was bound to crumble in the end under such terrific attacks as Foch and Pershing launched against the armies which for four years had lain impregnable in that bulging line, a menace to the Allies in any forward movement that the Huns might be able to put under way.

The marvel of it all, though, to the men who entered the trenches that night, was the completeness and the readiness of the preparations for the opening of the battle they were to make.

When you, who read this, stop to think how long a distance 5,000 miles is, and then consider that just that amount of telephone wire, 5,000 miles, had been laid and connected for keeping every unit and the various commanding quarters in complete touch with every advance, every development, every emergency or contingency, you may realize, too, that these Americans were being sent in only after the most careful planning, and after every precaution of whatever nature had been taken to insure success. It was no haphazard undertaking, there was no reliance upon luck or chance. It was a scientific operation, computed and arranged to the last detail.

Not only that, but more than 100,000 detail maps and 40,000 photographs were prepared, largely from aerial observations, and distributed to the officers in charge of carrying the operation forward. These maps and photographs showed practically every foot of ground to be traversed, every natural and artificial defense which they would be called upon to conquer, and put upon paper even more clearly than words could have expressed it the exact route and objective of every single company and platoon that was engaged in the fight.

And in addition to that, as the men of the regiment to which our friends were attached lay down upon their arms that night, awaiting the outbreak of the artillery onslaught which would indicate that the first phase of the battle was on, 10,000 men sat at the various instruments connected up to the improvised telephone system, and 3,000 carrier pigeons were being distributed among different units, to be released when their objectives had been obtained, or insurmountable difficulties were encountered—provided word could not be gotten back to headquarters by any other means.

Captain McCallum looked at his wrist watch, and then at a paper he held in his hand. He went down the trench repeating the information which was the first thing definite that the men had learned since they started for the front.

“Our army is attacking along a twelve-mile front,” he said. “Our own immediate objective for tomorrow will be Thiaucourt. I need not tell you more. That is our objective. It means that we must take that town. Pershing has placed his trust in you for that; so, also, has Marshal Foch. We are at about the centre of the line driving upon that point.”

And without further word he passed along to another group, to which he issued the same information and instruction.

“Thiaucourt,” repeated Tom, as the captain left. “Never heard of it before, but I guess it’s got to be ours by tomorrow night.”

“Righto!” assented Harper and Ollie together.

CHAPTER IV
The Thunder of Mars

NEVER has there been such a sudden and simultaneous crashing outburst of artillery of every conceivable kind and calibre as ripped the darkness and the silence at two-thirty o’clock on the morning of September 12th on the southern side of the St. Mihiel salient.

For the five minutes preceding the appointed time every officer of the staff and line had stood gazing at his wrist watch, counting off the seconds, knowing what was coming, waiting for it, wishing for it, and yet withal unprepared for the terrible shock which seemed to make the very earth rock and roar.

With such an uninterrupted banging and booming and screeching and swishing as never before had been heard upon the face of the earth, thousands upon thousands of guns, massed side by side along a line twelve miles long, were belching forth as in one thunderous voice a new and world wide Declaration of Independence.

America, come to another continent to avenge mankind and save humanity and civilization, was pouring the wrath of the universe into the Hun lines and defenses.

Under the terrific shock of the thing men fell upon their faces in the trenches, their hands to their ears in a vain effort to shut out the screaming, nerve-racking death-cry of the cannon. The attempts were futile. Never for an instant did the guns pause; never was there the slightest break in their awful rhythm.

Men in the trenches whose duty still lay before them, marveled at the strength and endurance, the proficiency and the tenacity of those other men, far behind the lines, who were feeding, feeding, feeding shells into the maw of this tremendous array of artillery.

A veritable cloud of projectiles—death-dealing, trench-destroying shells—were being hurled over the heads of the infantrymen into the long-held defenses of the Boche.

And then, as if that was not enough for men to endure, just before they were to throw their own lives into the battle, the German guns began to reply.

They had no range, for the attack was a complete surprise. Had they been less self-complacent they might have realized that for days before, when an invincible fleet of aeroplanes of every description had kept their own air observers from flying over this area, something of great significance was under way.

But if they sensed it, their efforts to learn were of no avail, and so when the awful thunder of shelling began, they could only guess where the infantry and tanks were massed, which inevitably would follow in the wake of the artillery carnage.

So, when they opened up, terrifically, too, it is true, but with nothing like the force of the assault directed against them, it was with a sweeping shelling much like the playing of a searchlight over an area. It was not a barrage; it was more like the blind, helpless and hysterical hitting back of one who knows not where his opponent is.

Nevertheless shells fell dangerously near; and once a big one landed directly in the second line trenches, less than a hundred yards below where Company C was stationed. Its toll of death was appalling. A dozen men were blown to atoms. Rocks that had been part of the trench formation were thrown in all directions, dealing death and injury as surely as the explosive itself.

The inadvertent first cry of a dozen injured men was enough to shake the nerves of the strongest; for after all in warfare, it is not so much the risking, or even the giving, of one’s life, as it is the agonized suffering of others dying that makes a man quake, and for the moment falter.

Tom leaned over toward Harper and tried to shout something in his ear, but the effort was as useless as though the one had been dumb and the other deaf. It was absolutely impossible to make the human voice heard. When an officer wished to issue some brief order, it was only by signs that he could make himself understood.

Hour after hour it continued without the slightest halt.

Tom Walton began to wonder how much longer it would continue—how much longer such an earth-shaking onslaught could continue. Men who have gone through it know that the strain of such a thing, the absolutely inactive and helpless waiting, is the worst mental torture of all warfare, and far worse than rushing forth into battle which may mean almost certain death.

For a time thought seems to be suspended, and there is nothing but the frightful burst of explosions, during which one cannot think. And then comes a period of dulled senses—dulled to the present, and taking one into the past.

It is not like the mental sensations of a drowning man, in which the entire past life flashes before the mind in a clear but lightning-like panorama; but rather one takes up separate events, finds himself analyzing them for causes, motives; and, try to shake himself together as he will, cannot for the time rid himself of the melancholy fascination of it.

So it was with Tom Walton—perhaps also with Ollie Ogden and George Harper.

Men were not cowards who broke down and wept during that awful night. They were not afraid of bodily injury or death. It was the terrible strain upon nerves already strung taut with preparation for, and in anticipation of, the battle which they must fight and win. The very restraint which for the time curbed the fulfillment of their determination was the severest sort of sap upon their vitality.

Tom wondered at his own impersonal and disinterested detachment as he stood watching a man of his own company wringing his hands, unable to repress his feelings, the tears rolling down his cheeks. He had known the fellow intimately for months. Twice he had seen him risk his life to aid a comrade. He gazed at him now, but his own feelings were calloused to the other’s misery.

His own thoughts, strangely enough, were not of the present nor of the task so near at hand, but of his school days. And of all the incidents that crossed his mind, one stood out with particular insistence. It was shortly before he had entered Brighton, and when his mother, dear soul, was skimping herself of everything she could (as he knew now) to give him the education which she realized would be his asset later.

The day stood out before his distorted mind now as a great blot upon his whole career. He shuddered as he thought of it, and yet he could not turn his mind to other things. He reviewed it again and again.

He had started for school as usual that morning, but on his way had met companions. They, too, were pupils in the same school, but it was the late springtime of the year, and they were going to try the old swimming hole. At first Tom refused to join them, but finally the temptation became too great.

He joined them in their truancy, and they started for what they planned to be a rollicking day. On their way they invaded an apple orchard and pulled branch after branch of the blossoms that, left to grow, would have become ripe and useful fruit. Tom’s mother hardly would have believed that he would deliberately stay away from school, much less go swimming at that season when she had warned him that illness inevitably would be the result. But he had done both. And on their way home one of the lads, who had a sling-shot, had killed a chirping robin. It was probably that last act of heartlessness that showed Tom the exact character of the companions he had chosen for his day of deception.

That night he had had a chill, and for days his mother had nursed him through a sickness for which she could not account. And he had never told her. A feeling of revulsion and shame overcame him. For the time he even forgot the thousands of shells that were being hurled over his head. He wondered if in this battle he would be killed. A great longing came over him to see his mother, and in the old spirit of boyhood confidence to tell her the whole story. Yes, if he should live, he would tell her at the first opportunity. He did not want anyone else to have the chance to tell her first.

And with the good resolution came mental relief. He seemed to come back to himself again, and looking about him began to speculate as to what sort of thoughts were passing through the minds of the men about him. From one to another he looked, wondering what confessions, if any, they would make if they could.

But in such an inferno as that neither introspection nor retrospection can last very long, and it was the nearby explosion of a heavy German shell, sending a shower of steel and rock fragments into the trench, that brought Tom Walton to a keen realization of the present. A piece of metal plate nearly circular in shape, fully three inches in diameter, and most peculiarly scrolled by the forces that had blown it from the shell, fell directly at his feet. He picked it up, examined it for a moment, and then dropped it into his blouse pocket as a souvenir of his first night under such a cannonading.

A lieutenant tapped him on the shoulder, and he swung around as though shot. The officer smiled grimly an instant and thrust before Tom a sheet of paper on which was a brief instruction which could not be given verbally because of the din:

“We go over in forty-five minutes. Be ready when the artillery lets up.”

Tom nodded and the lieutenant passed to Ollie and George Harper, and so on from man to man along the entire section of trench occupied by Company C.

In forty-five minutes! The time was getting close. Well, anything was better than remaining there motionless under such a strain, not knowing at what moment a Boche shell might come thundering into their shallow stopping place to spread sudden death and mortal injury.

Men began tightening and adjusting their equipment, examining their rifles, cartridge belts and small arms.

A Salvation Army man came down the trench lugging a great can of steaming coffee. The boys of Company C greeted him with cheers which their lips formed but their voices could not make heard; and as they took cautious quaffs of the hot beverage it seemed to soothe ragged nerves and give them new vigor.

Tom looked at his wrist watch and compared it with Harper’s. They were exactly the same time. But half an hour now remained.

That instant marked another move in the game, too. In little groups men climbed out of the trench and went forward. Tom knew instinctively that they were the dare-devil wire-cutters—that the American artillery, adjusted like clockwork, had moved forward and these men were going out to cut away any entanglements that it had not smashed and entirely destroyed.

In this conflict war had become an exact science, and the men going out knew that except for an occasional German shell that might fall in their vicinity they were working behind an invincible screen of steel and fire.

There flashed across Tom Walton’s mind the picture of General Pershing as he had seen him on the preceding day in conference with the officers who were to direct and carry out the gigantic project which he and the other great commanders had formulated; and in the recollection Tom found new confidence and determination. Whatever indecision may have possessed him fell away; it was as though he suddenly had been shorn of shackles which weighted him down; he breathed in deeply of the powder-tainted air, and his only sensation was that of a great and noble strength of purpose.

Tom examined his watch again. But ten minutes more!

Suddenly, almost with as great a shock as it had begun, the firing ceased. If the expression can be made, the tremendous silence that fell upon the area came like a crash. For the men had become gradually tuned up to the dreadful uproar, and to have it abruptly break off set their heads ringing.

“Get ready, boys!” Captain McCallum’s perfectly controlled voice spoke out down the trench, and the lads could hear other captains giving like orders to their own men.

And then the artillery began again, but it was more subdued than before. Tom looked upward and realized that the first streaks of dawn were stretching out across the sky.

He was immediately aware of something else, also. The smoke screen was being laid down!

This was the final of the preliminary moves to their “going over.”

It began only a few yards out from the trench line and gradually moved off toward where the enemy had been undergoing such terrific punishment.

Lieutenant Gaston was alternating his attention upon the smoke screen and his watch. Tom looked at his own timepiece. It was 5.25 on the morning of September 12, 1918, four years to a day since the Germans had established the St. Mihiel salient!

Men were readjusting their steel helmets or tugging impatiently at uniform and equipment.

Captain McCallum raised his right arm and the men as best they could in their cramped quarters came to attention.

“Thiaucourt!” the commander shouted.

A great cheer came from every throat. It was taken up and echoed by companies on their right and on their left.

The captain again raised his right hand. His eyes were on his watch. The second hand was ticking round to 5.30.

The men stood with outstretched hands grasping the wall of the trench in front of them to leap up and out.

Abruptly the captain’s hand fell. “Let’s go.”

And with a wild shout of exultation men of that company, and men of other companies on either side, miles up and down the trench, were up and over, in pursuit of the smoke screen—and the Hun.

CHAPTER V
Thiaucourt at Any Cost

SHOCK troops are all that the name itself implies. They are the troops sent forward, in human waves, to receive and break the first shock of contact with the enemy lines. Invariably a large number of them are doomed to death or injury, and the men themselves know it. But the very knowledge seems to drive them forward with greater fury, and the clash, therefore, is one of carnage for one or both sides.

These were the shock troops that were going over with the dawn against the entrenched Germans—if they still remained entrenched after the terrible fire to which they had been subjected for hours by the massed American artillery, augmented by the world-known French 75’s.

Even through the rolling smoke screen the light was becoming stronger, and Tom, Ollie and Harper, plodding ahead rapidly with their comrades, knew that soon it would be full dawn, that the screen would be lifted, and behind a barrage of fire that still would precede them for a short distance, the infantry would come to position to launch its close-range avalanche of rifle and machine gun bullets upon the enemy.

It was just as they were beginning to quicken the pace that Tom heard a grunt and a gasp, followed by a muttered word or two, and looking down upon his left side saw Ollie, almost up to his neck in a huge hole dug by one of the shells with which the Boche had made futile effort to stop the American fire.