see two black streaks go to ground. From the vantage-point of your tree you watch a salvo of shells explode in, on, or about the temporary abode of those two officers. You realise from what you know of the Hun that this salvo probably concludes the evening hate; and the opportunity is too good to miss. Edging rapidly along the road—keeping close to the ditch—you approach the houses. Your position, you feel, is now strategically sound, with regard to the wretched pair cowering behind rubble heaps. You even desire revenge for your mental anguish when discovery in the rodent's lair seemed certain. So light a cigarette—if you didn't drop them all when you went to ground yourself; if you did—whistle some snappy tune as you stride jauntily into the village.

Don't go too fast or you may miss them; but should you see a head peer from behind a kitchen-range express no surprise. Just—"Toppin' evening, ain't it? Getting furniture for the dug-out—what?" To linger is bad form, but it is quite permissible to ask his companion—seated in a torn-up drain—if the ratting is good. Then pass on in a leisurely manner, but—when you're round the corner, run like a hare. With these cursed Germans, you never know.

Night—and a working-party stretching away over a ploughed field are digging a communication trench. The great green flares lob up half a mile away, a watery moon shines on the bleak scene. Suddenly a noise like the tired sigh of some great giant, a scorching sheet of flame that leaps at you out of the darkness, searing your very brain, so close does it seem; the ping of death past your head; the clatter of shovel and pick next you as a muttered curse proclaims a man is hit; a voice from down the line: "Gawd! Old Ginger's took it. 'Old up, mate. Say, blokes, Ginger's done in!" Aye—it's worse at night.

Shrapnel! Woolly, fleecy puffs of smoke floating gently down wind, getting more and more attenuated, gradually disappearing, while below each puff an oval of ground has been plastered with bullets. And it's when the ground inside the oval is full of men that the damage is done.

Not you perhaps—but someone. Next time—maybe you.

And that, methinks, is an epitome of other things besides shrapnel. It's all the war to the men who fight and the women who wait.

PART ONE

PART ONE

CHAPTER I

THE MOTOR-GUN

Nothing in this war has so struck those who have fought in it as its impersonal nature. From the day the British Army moved north, and the first battle of Ypres commenced—and with it trench warfare as we know it now—it has been, save for a few interludes, a contest between automatons, backed by every known scientific device. Personal rancour against the opposing automatons separated by twenty or thirty yards of smelling mud—who stew in the same discomfort as yourself—is apt to give way to an acute animosity against life in general, and the accursed fate in particular which so foolishly decided your sex at birth. But, though rare, there have been cases of isolated encounters, where men—with the blood running hot in their veins—have got down to hand-grips, and grappling backwards and forwards in some cellar or dugout, have fought to the death, man to man, as of old. Such a case has recently come to my knowledge, a case at once bizarre and unique: a case where the much-exercised arm of coincidence showed its muscles to a remarkable degree. Only quite lately have I found out all the facts, and now at Dick O'Rourke's special request I am putting them on paper. True, they are intended to reach the eyes of one particular person, but ... the personal column in the Times interests others besides the lady in the magenta skirt, who will eat a banana at 3.30 daily by the Marble Arch!

And now, at the very outset of my labours, I find myself—to my great alarm—committed to the placing on paper of a love scene. O'Rourke insists upon it: he says the whole thing will fall flat if I don't put it in; he promises that he will supply the local colour. In advance I apologise: my own love affairs are sufficiently trying without endeavouring to describe his—and with that, here goes.

I will lift my curtain on the principals of this little drama, and open the scene at Ciro's in London. On the evening of April 21st, 1915, in the corner of that delectable resort, farthest away from the coon band, sat Dickie O'Rourke. That afternoon he had stepped from the boat at Folkestone on seven days' leave, and now in the boiled shirt of respectability he once again smelled the smell of London.

With him was a girl. I have never seen her, but from his description I cannot think that I have lived until this oversight is rectified. Moreover, my lady, as this is written especially for your benefit, I hereby warn you that I propose to remedy my omission as soon as possible.

And yet with a band that is second to none; with food wonderful and divine; with the choicest fruit of the grape, and—to top all—with the girl, Dickie did not seem happy. As he says, it was not to be wondered at. He had landed at Folkestone meaning to propose; he had carried out his intention over the fish—and after that the dinner had lost its savour. She had refused him—definitely and finally; and Dick found himself wishing for France again—France and forgetfulness. Only he knew he'd never forget.

"The dinner is to monsieur's taste?" The head-waiter paused attentively by the table.

"Very good," growled Dick, looking savagely at an ice on his plate. "Oh, Moyra," he muttered, as the man passed on, "it's meself is finished entoirely. And I was feeling that happy on the boat; as I saw the white cliffs coming nearer and nearer, I said to meself, 'Dick, me boy, in just four hours you'll be with the dearest, sweetest girl that God ever sent from the heavens to brighten the lives of dull dogs like yourself.'"

"You're not dull, Dick. You're not to say those things—you're a dear." The girl's eyes seemed a bit misty as she bent over her plate.

"And now!" He looked at her pleadingly. "'Tis the light has gone out of my life. Ah! me dear, is there no hope for Dickie O'Rourke? Me estate is mostly bog, and the ould place has fallen down, saving only the stable—but there's the breath of the seas that comes over the heather in the morning, and there's the violet of your dear eyes in the hills. It's not worrying you that I'd be—but is there no hope at all, at all?"

The girl turned towards him, smiling a trifle sadly. There was woman's pity in the lovely eyes: her lips were trembling a little. "Dear old Dick," she whispered, and her hand rested lightly on his for a moment. "Dear old Dick, I'm sorry. If I'd only known sooner——" She broke off abruptly and fell to gazing at the floor.

"Then there is someone else!" The man spoke almost fiercely.

Slowly she nodded her head, but she did not speak.

"Who is it?"

"I don't know that you've got any right to ask me that, Dick," she answered, a little proudly.

"What's the talk of right between you and me? Do you suppose I'll let any cursed social conventions stand between me and the woman I love?" She could see his hand trembling, though outwardly he seemed quite calm. And then his voice dropped to a