John Buchan - The Collected Works of John Buchan (Illustrated)

At that I exclaimed. ‘D’you mean to tell me we’re going to lose Peronne?’

‘Peronne!’ he cried. ‘We’ll be lucky not to lose Amiens!… And on the top of it all I’ve got some kind of blasted fever. I’ll be raving in an hour.’

He was rushing off, but I held him.

‘What about my old lot?’ I asked.

‘Oh, damned good, but they’re shot all to bits. Every division did well. It’s a marvel they weren’t all scuppered, and it’ll be a flaming miracle if they find a line they can stand on. Westwater’s got a leg smashed. He was brought down this evening, and you’ll find him in the hospital. Fraser’s killed and Lefroy’s a prisoner—at least, that was my last news. I don’t know who’s got the brigades, but Masterton’s carrying on with the division … You’d better get up the line as fast as you can and take over from him. See the Army Commander. He’ll be in Amiens tomorrow morning for a pow-wow.’

Laidlaw lay wearily back in his car and disappeared into the night, while I hurried to the train.

The others had descended to the platform and were grouped round Archie, who was discoursing optimistic nonsense. I got them into the carriage and shut the door.

‘It’s pretty bad,’ I said. ‘The front’s pierced in several places and we’re back to the Upper Somme. I’m afraid it isn’t going to stop there. I’m off up the line as soon as I can get my orders. Wake, you’ll come with me, for every man will be wanted. Blenkiron, you’ll see Mary and Peter safe to England. We’re just in time, for tomorrow it mightn’t be easy to get out of Amiens.’

I can see yet the anxious faces in that ill-lit compartment. We said goodbye after the British style without much to-do. I remember that old Peter gripped my hand as if he would never release it, and that Mary’s face had grown very pale. If I delayed another second I should have howled, for Mary’s lips were trembling and Peter had eyes like a wounded stag. ‘God bless you,’ I said hoarsely, and as I went off I heard Peter’s voice, a little cracked, saying ‘God bless you, my old friend.’

I spent some weary hours looking for Westwater. He was not in the big clearing station, but I ran him to earth at last in the new hospital which had just been got going in the Ursuline convent. He was the most sterling little man, in ordinary life rather dry and dogmatic, with a trick of taking you up sharply which didn’t make him popular. Now he was lying very stiff and quiet in the hospital bed, and his blue eyes were solemn and pathetic like a sick dog’s.

‘There’s nothing much wrong with me,’ he said, in reply to my question. ‘A shell dropped beside me and damaged my foot. They say they’ll have to cut it off… I’ve an easier mind now you’re here, Hannay. Of course you’ll take over from Masterton. He’s a good man but not quite up to his job. Poor Fraser—you’ve heard about Fraser. He was done in at the very start. Yes, a shell. And Lefroy. If he’s alive and not too badly smashed the Hun has got a troublesome prisoner.’

He was too sick to talk, but he wouldn’t let me go.

‘The division was all right. Don’t you believe anyone who says we didn’t fight like heroes. Our outpost line held up the Hun for six hours, and only about a dozen men came back. We could have stuck it out in the battle-zone if both flanks hadn’t been turned. They got through Crabbe’s left and came down the Verey ravine, and a big wave rushed Shropshire Wood… We fought it out yard by yard and didn’t budge till we saw the Plessis dump blazing in our rear. Then it was about time to go… We haven’t many battalion commanders left. Watson, Endicot, Crawshay… ‘ He stammered out a list of gallant fellows who had gone.

‘Get back double quick, Hannay. They want you. I’m not happy about Masterton. He’s too young for the job.’ And then a nurse drove me out, and I left him speaking in the strange forced voice of great weakness.

At the foot of the staircase stood Mary.

‘I saw you go in,’ she said, ‘so I waited for you.’

‘Oh, my dear,’ I cried, ‘you should have been in Boulogne by now. What madness brought you here?’

‘They know me here and they’ve taken me on. You couldn’t expect me to stay behind. You said yourself everybody was wanted, and I’m in a Service like you. Please don’t be angry, Dick.’

I wasn’t angry, I wasn’t even extra anxious. The whole thing seemed to have been planned by fate since the creation of the world. The game we had been engaged in wasn’t finished and it was right that we should play it out together. With that feeling came a conviction, too, of ultimate victory. Somehow or sometime we should get to the end of our pilgrimage. But I remembered Mary’s forebodings about the sacrifice required. The best of us. That ruled me out, but what about her?

I caught her to my arms. ‘Goodbye, my very dearest. Don’t worry about me, for mine’s a soft job and I can look after my skin. But oh! take care of yourself, for you are all the world to me.’

She kissed me gravely like a wise child.

‘I am not afraid for you,’ she said. ‘You are going to stand in the breach, and I know—I know you will win. Remember that there is someone here whose heart is so full of pride of her man that it hasn’t room for fear.’

As I went out of the convent door I felt that once again I had been given my orders.

It did not surprise me that, when I sought out my room on an upper floor of the Hotel de France, I found Blenkiron in the corridor. He was in the best of spirits.

‘You can’t keep me out of the show, Dick,’ he said, ‘so you needn’t start arguing. Why, this is the one original chance of a lifetime for John S. Blenkiron. Our little fight at Erzerum was only a side-show, but this is a real high-class Armageddon. I guess I’ll find a way to make myself useful.’

I had no doubt he would, and I was glad he had stayed behind. But I felt it was hard on Peter to have the job of returning to England alone at such a time, like useless flotsam washed up by a flood.

‘You needn’t worry,’ said Blenkiron. ‘Peter’s not making England this trip. To the best of my knowledge he has beat it out of this township by the eastern postern. He had some talk with Sir Archibald Roylance, and presently other gentlemen of the Royal Flying Corps appeared, and the upshot was that Sir Archibald hitched on to Peter’s grip and departed without saying farewell. My notion is that he’s gone to have a few words with his old friends at some flying station. Or he might have the idea of going back to England by aeroplane, and so having one last flutter before he folds his wings. Anyhow, Peter looked a mighty happy man. The last I saw he was smoking his pipe with a batch of young lads in a Flying Corps waggon and heading straight for Germany.’

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Next morning I found the Army Commander on his way to Doullens.

‘Take over the division?’ he said. ‘Certainly. I’m afraid there isn’t much left of it. I’ll tell Carr to get through to the Corps Headquarters, when he can find them. You’ll have to nurse the remnants, for they can’t be pulled out yet—not for a day or two. Bless me, Hannay, there are parts of our line which we’re holding with a man and a boy. You’ve got to stick it out till the French take over. We’re not hanging on by our eyelids—it’s our eyelashes now.’

‘What about positions to fall back on, sir?’ I asked.

‘We’re doing our best, but we haven’t enough men to prepare them.’ He plucked open a map. ‘There we’re digging a line—and there. If we can hold that bit for two days we shall have a fair line resting on the river. But we mayn’t have time.’