I
The old canal lay dreaming under the
autumn sun, tranquil between its green banks and its
two rows of stiffly-rimmed bordering poplars.
Once a busy highway for barges, it was now little
more than a great drainage ditch, with swallow and
dragon-flies darting and flashing over its seldom
ruffled surface. Scattered here and there over
the fat, green meadows beyond its containing dykes,
fat cows lay lazily chewing the cud.
It was a scene of unmarred peace.
To the cows nothing could have seemed more impregnable
than their security. Off south-westward and southward,
to be sure, the horizon was columned, decoratively
but ominously, by pillars of dense smoke, sharp against
the turquoise sky. But such phenomena, however
novel, failed to stir the cows to even the mildest
curiosity. The spacious summer air, however, was
entertaining a strange riot of noises. It thumped
and throbbed and thundered. It seemed to be ripped
across from time to time with a dry, leisurely sound
of tearing. Again, it would be suddenly shattered
with enormous earth-shaking crashes. But all
this foolish tumult was in the distance, and it gave
the cows not the slightest concern. It had not
interfered with the excellent quality of the pasturage;
it had not disturbed the regularity of milking-time.
Strategically considered, the lazy
old canal led from nowhere to nowhere, and the low
levels through which it ran were aside from the track
of the fighting. The peasant folk on their little
farms still went about their business, but very quietly
and with lowered voices, as if hoping thus to avoid
the eye of Fate.
Along the grass-grown towpath, marching
in half-sections, came a tiny detachment of long-coated
Belgian riflemen with a machine-gun. The deadly
little weapon, on its two-wheeled toy carriage, was
drawn by a pair of sturdy, brindled dogs-mongrels,
evidently, showing a dash of bull and a dash of retriever
in their make-up. They were not as large as the
dogs usually employed by the Belgians in this kind
of service, but they were strong, and keen on their
job. Digging their strong toes into the turf,
they threw their weight valiantly into the straps,
and pressed on, with tongues hanging out and what
looked like a cordial grin on their panting jaws.
They seemed desperately afraid of being left behind
by their quick-marching comrades.
The little band kept well under the
trees as they went, lest some far-scouting aeroplane
should catch sight of them. In the south-eastern
sky, presently, an aeroplane-a Taube-did
appear; but it was so distant that the young lieutenant
in command of the detachment, after examining it carefully
with his field-glasses, concluded that it was little
likely to detect his dark line moving under the trees.
The Taube, that execrated dove of death, was spying
over the Belgian trenches, and doubtless daring a
hot fire from the Belgian rifles. Once it made
a wide sweep north-westward, rapidly growing larger,
and the little band under the trees lay down, hiding
themselves and the gun behind the dyke. Then
its flight swerved back over the Belgian lines, and
the commander, lowering his glasses with a deep breath
of relief, gave the order to march. Two minutes
later, around the questing aeroplane appeared a succession
of sudden fleecy puffs of smoke, looking soft and harmless
as cotton-wool. One of these came just before
the nose of the aeroplane. Next moment the machine
gave a great swooping dive, righted itself, dived
again, and dropped like a stone.
“Thank God for that!”
muttered the young lieutenant, and his men cheered
grimly under their breath.
Three minutes later the detachment
came to an old stone bridge. Here it halted.
The men began hastily entrenching themselves where
they could best command the approaches on the other
side. The machine-gun, lifted from its little
carriage, was placed cunningly behind a screen of reeds.
The two dogs, panting, lay down in their harness under
a thick bush. In an amazingly brief time the
whole party was so hidden that no one approaching
from the other side of the canal could have guessed
there was anything more formidable in the neighbourhood
than the ruminating cows.
The neglected, almost forgotten, old
bridge had suddenly leapt into importance. Reinforcements
for the sore-pressed division to the south-east were
being sent around by the north of the canal, and were
to cross by the bridge. The detachment had been
sent to guard the bridge at all costs from any wide-roving
patrols of Uhlans who might take it into their heads
to blow it up. In war it is a pretty safe principle
to blow up any bridge if you are quite sure you won’t
be wanting it yourself. The fact that the other
side has spared it is enough to damn it off-hand.
The tumult of the far-off gunfire
was so unremitting that the ears of the bridge-guard
gradually came to accept it as a mere background,
against which small, insignificant sounds, if sudden
and unexpected, became strangely conspicuous.
The crowing of a cock in the farmyard a few fields
off, the sharp cry of a moorhen, the spasmodic gabbling
of a flock of fat ducks in the canal-these
small noises were almost as clearly differentiated
as if heard in a stark silence.
For perhaps an hour the detachment
had lain concealed, when those ominous pillars of
smoke against the sky were joined suddenly by swarms
of the little white puffs of cotton-wool, and the confused
noises redoubled in violence. The battle was
swaying nearer and spreading around a swiftly widening
arc of the low horizon. Then another aeroplane-another
bird-like Taube-came in view, darting up
from a little south of west. The young lieutenant,
in his hiding-place beside the bridge-head clapped
his glasses anxiously to his eyes. Yes, the deadly
flier was heading straight for this position.
Evidently the Germans knew of that out-of-the-way
bridge, and in their eyes also, for some reason, it
had suddenly acquired importance. The Taube was
coming to see in what force it was held.
“Spies again!” he grunted
savagely, turning to explain to his men.
Flying at a height of only five or
six hundred metres, the Taube flew straight over them.
There was no longer any use in attempting concealment.
The riflemen opened fire upon it furiously as soon
as it came within range. It was hit several times;
but the Taube is a steel machine, well protected from
below, and neither the pilot nor any vital part of
the mechanism was damaged. It made haste, however,
to climb and swerve away from so hot a neighbourhood.
But first, as a message of defiance, it dropped a
bomb. The bomb fell sixty or seventy yards away
from the bridge back in the meadow, among a group of
cows. The explosion killed one cow and wounded
several. The survivors, thus rudely shocked out
of their indifference, stamped off down the field,
tails in air and bellowing frantically.
“That cooks our goose,”
snapped one of the riflemen concisely.
“Their shells’ll be dead
on to us in ten minutes’ time,” growled
another. And all cursed soberly.
“I don’t think so,”
said the young lieutenant, after a moment’s
hesitation. “They want the bridge, so they
won’t shell it. But you’ll see they’ll
be on to us shortly with their mitrailleuse and half
a battalion or so, enough to eat us up. We’ve
got to get word back quick to the General for
reinforcements, or the game’s up.”
“I’ll go, my lieutenant,”
said Jean Ferreol, an eager, dark Walloon, springing
to his feet.
The lieutenant did not answer for
some moments. He was examining through his glasses
a number of mounted figures, scattering over the plains
to the rear in groups of two and three. Yes,
they were Uhlans unquestionably. The line of
combat was shifting eastward.
“No,” said he, “you
can’t go, Jean. You’d never get through.
The Bosches are all over the place back there now.
And you wouldn’t be in time, even if you did
get through. I’ll send one of the dogs.”
He tore a leaf out of his note-book and began scribbling.
“Better send both dogs, my lieutenant,”
said Jan Steen, the big, broad-built Fleming who had
charge of the machine-gun, unharnessing the dogs as
he spoke. “Leo’s the cleverest, and
he’ll carry the message right; but he won’t
have his heart in the job unless you let Dirck go
along with him. They’re like twins.
Moreover, the two together wouldn’t excite suspicion
like one alone. One alone the Bosches would take
for a messenger dog, sure, but two racing over the
grass might seem to be just playing.”
“Bon!” said the
young lieutenant. “Two strings to our bow.”
He hurriedly made a duplicate of his
dispatch. The papers were folded small and tied
under the dogs’ collars. Big Jan spoke a
few words crisply and decisively in Flemish to Leo,
who watched his lips eagerly and wagged his tail as
if to show he understood. Then he spoke similarly,
but with more emphasis and reiteration, to Dirck, at
the same time waving his arm toward the distant group
of roofs from which the detachment had come.
Dirck looked anxiously at him and whined, and then
glanced inquiringly at Leo, to see if he understood
what was required of them. He was almost furiously
willing, but not so quick to catch an idea as his
more lively yoke-fellow. Big Jan repeated his
injunctions yet again, with unhurried patience, while
his leader fumed behind him. Jan Steen knew well
that with a dog, in such circumstances, one must be
patient though the skies fall. At last Dirck’s
grin widened, his tail wagged violently, and his low
whining gave way to a bark of elation.
“He’s got it,” said
Jan, with slow satisfaction. He waved his arm,
and the two dogs dashed off as if they had been shot
out of a gun, keeping close along the inner base of
the dyke.
“Dirck’s got it,”
repeated Jan, with conviction, “and nothing will
put it out of his head till he’s done the job.”
II
Side by side, racing wildly like children
just let out from school, the two dogs dashed off
through the grass along the base of the dyke.
Leo, the lighter in build and in colour, and the more
conspicuous by reason of a white fore-leg, was also
the lighter in spirits. Glad to be clear of the
harness and proud of his errand, he was so ebullient
in his gaiety that he could spare time to spring into
the air now and again and snap at a low-fluttering
butterfly. The more phlegmatic Dirck, on the
other hand, was too busy keeping his errand fixed in
his mind to waste any interest on butterflies, though
he was ready enough to gambol a bit whenever his volatile
comrade frolicked into collision with him.
Soon-Leo leading, as usual-they
quitted the dyke and started off across the open meadows
toward the hottest of the firing. A couple of
patrolling Uhlans, some distance off to the right,
caught sight of them, and a bullet whined complainingly
just over their heads. But the other Uhlan, the
one who had not fired, rebuked his companion for wasting
ammunition. “Can’t you see they’re
just a couple of puppies larking round?” he
asked scornfully. “Suppose you thought they
were Red Cross.”
“Thought they might be dispatch
dogs, Herr Sergeant,” answered the trooper deprecatingly.
“Well, they’re not, blockhead,”
grunted the cocksure sergeant. And the two rode
on, heading diagonally toward the canal.
The dogs, at the sound of the passing
bullet, had crouched flat to the ground. When
the sound was not repeated, however, they sprang up
and continued their journey, Leo, excited but not
terrified, more inclined to frolic than ever, while
Dirck, who by some obscure instinct had realized that
the shot was not a chance one, but a direct personal
attack, kept looking back and growling at the pair
of Uhlans.
But though Leo, the exuberant, gambolled
as he ran, he ran swiftly, none the less, so swiftly
that plodding Dirck had some trouble to keep up with
him. Ten minutes more, and they ran into the zone
of fire. Bullets hummed waspishly over them,
but, after a moment’s hesitation, they raced
on, flattening themselves belly to earth. The
German infantry were in position, quite hidden from
view, some six or seven hundred yards to the right.
They were firing at an equally invisible line of Belgians,
who were occupying a drainage ditch some three hundred
yards to the left. The two dogs had no way of
knowing that the force on their left was a friendly
one, so they kept straight on beneath the crossfire.
Had they only known, their errand might have been
quickly accomplished.
A little farther on, the grass-land
came to an end, and there was a naked, sun-baked stubble-field
to cross. As the two raced out over this perilous
open space, the battle deepened above them. The
fire from the Belgian side went high over the dogs’
heads, seeking the far-off target of the enemy’s
prostrate lines. But the German fire was sighted
for too close a range, and the bullets were falling
short. Here and there one struck with a vicious
spat close to the runners’ feet. Here and
there a small stone would fly into the air with a
sudden inexplicable impulse, or a bunch of stubble
would hop up as if startled from its root-hold.
A ball just nicked the extreme tip or Dirck’s
tail, making him think a hornet had stung him.
With a surprised yelp, he turned and bit at his supposed
assailant. Realizing his mistake in a second,
he drooped the injured member sheepishly and tore
on after Leo, who had by now got a score of paces
ahead.
Next moment a shrapnel shell burst
overhead with a shattering roar. Both dogs cowered
flat, shivering. There was a smart patter all
about them, and little spurts of dust, straw, and
dry earth darted upwards. The shrapnel shell
was doubtless a mere stray, an ill-calculated shot
exploding far from its target. But to Leo it seemed
a direct attack upon himself. And well he knew
what was the proper thing to do under such circumstances.
Partly by instruction, partly by natural sagacity,
he had assimilated the vital precept: “When
the firing gets too hot, dig yourself in.”
With his powerful fore-paws he attacked the stubble,
making the dry earth fly as if he were trying to dig
out a badger. Dirck watched him wonderingly for
a moment or two, till a venomous swarm of bullets
just over his head seemed to let light in upon his
understanding. He fell to copying Leo with vehement
enthusiasm. In a brief space each dog had a burrow
deep enough to shelter him. Dirck promptly curled
himself up in his, and fell to licking his wounded
tail. But Leo, burning to get on with his errand,
kept bobbing up his head every other second to see
how the bullets were striking.
Another shrapnel shell burst in the
air, but farther away than the first, and Leo marked
where the little spurts of dust arose. They were
well behind him. The rifle bullets pinging overhead
were higher now, as the Germans were getting the range
of the Belgian line. The coast seemed clear enough.
He scrambled from his hole and dashed onward down
the field, yelping for Dirck to follow. And Dirck
was at his heels in half a second.
The tiny canal-side village which
was the goal of these two devoted messengers was by
this time less than a mile away and straight ahead.
When they left it with the machine-gun that morning,
it had seemed a little haven of peace. Now the
battle was raging all about it. The tall church
spire, which had risen serenely above its embosoming
trees, had vanished, blown off by a shell. A
cottage was burning merrily. Those harmless-looking
puffs of cotton-wool were opening out plenteously above
the clustered roofs. But all these things made
no difference to these two four-footed dispatch-bearers
who carried the destiny of the bridge beneath their
collars. They had been ordered to take their dispatches
to the village, and to the village they would go,
whether it had become an inferno or not.
But now the spectacle of the two dogs
racing desperately toward the village under the storm
of lead and shell had caught the attention of both
sides. There was no mistaking them now for frolicsome
puppies. There was no question, either, as to
which side they belonged to. The German bullets
began to lash the ground like hail all about them.
Leo, true to his principles, stopped at a tiny depression
and once more, with feverish eagerness, began to dig
himself in. The earth flew from his desperate
paws. In another minute he would have achieved
something like cover. But a German sharpshooter
got the range of him exactly. A bullet crashed
through his sagacious brain, and he dropped, with his
muzzle between his legs, into his half-dug burrow.
But Dirck, meanwhile, had for once
refused to follow his leader’s example.
His goal was too near. He saw the familiar uniforms.
Above the din he could detect the cries and calls
of encouragement from his people. Every faculty
in his valiant and faithful being bent itself to the
accomplishment of his errand. The bullets raining
about him concerned him not at all. The crash
of a shrapnel shell just over him did not even make
him cock an eye skyward. The shrapnel bullets
raised jets of dust before and behind him and on either
side. But not one touched him. He knew nothing
of them. He only knew his lines were close ahead,
and he must reach them.
The Belgians cheered and yelled, and
poured in a concentrated fire on that section of the
enemy which was attacking the dog. For a few seconds
that small, insignificant, desperate four-footed shape
drew upon itself the undivided attention of several
thousand men. It focussed the battle for the
moment. It was only a brindled dog, yet upon its
fate hung immense and unknown issues. Every one
knew now that the devoted animal was carrying a message.
The Germans suddenly came to feel that to prevent
the delivery of that message would be like winning
a battle. The Belgians turned a battery from
harrying a far-off squadron of horse to shell the
lines opposite, in defence of the little messenger.
Men fell by the score on both sides to decide that
unexpected contest.
And still Dirck raced on, heedless of it all.
Then, within fifty yards of the goal,
he fell. A bullet had smashed one of his legs.
He picked himself up again instantly and hobbled forward,
trailing the mangled limb. But the moment he fell,
a score of riflemen had leapt from their lines and
dashed out to rescue him. Three dropped on the
way out. Half a dozen more fell on the way back.
But Dirck, whining and licking his rescuers’
hands, was carried to shelter behind the massive stone
wall of the inn yard, where the Brigadier and his
officers were receiving and sending out dispatches.
An aide drew the message from under
Dirck’s collar and handed it, with a word of
explanation, to the General. The latter read it,
glanced at the time on the dispatch and then at his
watch, and gave hurried orders for strong reinforcements
to be rushed up to the old bridge. Then he looked
at Dirck, whose shattered leg was being dressed by
an orderly.
“That dog,” he growled,
“has been worth exactly three regiments to us.
He’s saved the bridge and he’s saved three
regiments from being cut off. See that he’s
well looked after, and cured as soon as possible.
He’s a good soldier, and we’ll want him
again.”