*CHAPTER XXIX*
*THE LAST ZERO*
The boche shells were now breaking in the hollow below the spot whereHal and Chester found themselves. Hal was congratulating himself onhaving a lucky spot in which to witness the closing minutes of the war,when, just on his right, a geyser of earth and rock was hurled up by amighty explosion.
His first thought was of Chester. But after he had successfully dodgedseveral falling stones, he peered over the edge of his funk hole andthere was Chester, grinning broadly.
"How are they coming, Chester?" he called out.
"Closer than I like," Chester answered. "But here is an old friend ofyours and I am afraid he has got his."
"Who is he?" demanded Hal.
"Sergeant Bowers."
"What? Bowers here?"
"Yes, but he's rolling on the ground right now, and I can't get to him.He seems to be about all in."
"Is he dead?" Hal asked.
Chester listened for a moment to make sure that a shell wasn't headedhis way, then he took another peep.
"No, I think he is still alive, but is badly wounded."
Hal and Chester, braving the enemy fire, both crawled out of their funkholes and started for Sergeant Bowers, who had fallen just outside thefunk hole in which he had sought refuge. But they were back quickerthan a man could say "Jack Robinson."
A shell can be heard coming when it is passing to one side or overhead,but when it is headed straight toward you its cry is heard usually afterthe explosion, or is drowned out by the explosion. Common mathematicswill show why. Air conditions also help. If the wind is traveling withthe shell, one stands a fair chance of hitting the earth before theshell explodes. But if the wind is traveling against the shell, onehasn't much salvation.
In this case the wind was in the lads' favor. As they both heard theshell coming, they moved like lightning. It is surprising sometimes howfast one can move at a time like this.
In taking their places in the funk holes, which had been dug by theGermans when they were in possession of that piece of ground, Hal andChester had calculated on just one thing--having time to fit themselvesinto the holes before shells should find them. And now that both foundit necessary to make a quick fit of it, they were disgusted with theirlaziness in not spending enough energy and taking the chances necessaryto making them big enough in the first place.
"Why didn't I?"
That was the question each lad asked himself a dozen times during thebrief space of a moment they lay there half exposed and waiting for thatwhich they feared.
It broke at last. The earth boiled, up, a mass of clods and stones,only a few yards in front of Hal. A piece of shell fragment struck hishelmet a glancing blow; another buried itself in the earth only a fewinches from his nose.
Hal crawled out of his funk hole and reinserted himself, making surethis time that he was below the surface. By his watch it lacked stillfive minutes of 11 o'clock. Almost time for all this business to stop.
At intervals for several seconds, Boche shells came screaming in,exploding hither and yon.
"Gas! Gas!" came the startling cry down the line.
Chester crawled deliberately into his gas mask, for the bursts, which herecognized on the moment as being gas shells, had been too far away tocause them any immediate alarm.
There followed then a strange, unbelievable silence, as though the worldhad died. It lasted but a moment, for perhaps the space that a breathmay be held. Again Hal glanced at his watch.
"Eleven o'clock!"
He uttered the words aloud.
Eleven o'clock. The armistice was now effective. Fighting should cease.
Came suddenly such an uproar of relief and jubilance, such a shriekingof claxons--gas claxons that shrieked now with pure joy--and such ashout from both lines that only men possessed of sheer happiness canutter.
Chester pulled off his gas mask and shouted with the rest. And even ashe did so he caught a faint odor which he knew to be that of mustardgas. But nothing mattered now.
Hal and Chester piled out of their funk holes with the rest, wavingtheir helmets and shouting at the top of their voices. Then, like acovey of quail scurrying from a hawk's shadow, they piled back again.
"Whizz--bang!"
Scarcely ten yards from Chester's hole a shell exploded.
"Wow!" exclaimed a voice. "Who said the war was over? Marshal Foch'llhave to come out and tell me himself before I believe it."
Another brief silence. A 75 barked behind Hal and Chester. Then thebattle seemed to start anew, one of the American batteries firing andthen another; the contest seemed to be between two batteries of 75's.
Chester could never remember which battery fired last, but he heard, afew days later, that two second lieutenants of artillery were haledblushingly before a general and severely reprimanded for disregardingthe rules of the armistice.
After the two batteries had ceased firing and the roar of the lastcannon died out across the valley, there came a silence that was evenmore appalling than the first. It was something like the lull thatfollows a terrific thunderstorm, only this storm had been raging fornearly fifty-two months.
In the midst of this ghastly silence, a startling thing occurred. Thesky line of the crest ahead of the American troops grew suddenlypopulous with dancing soldiers, and, down the slope, all the way to thebarbed wire entanglements, straight for the Yankees, came the Germantroops.
For a moment there was confusion in the American ranks. It seemed thatthe enemy was launching his troops forward in a desperate charge. Yankeeofficers shouted hoarse commands. Gunners sprang to their batteries,and these were trained on the advancing foes.
But the excitement soon died out. No danger threatened.
The Germans came with outstretched hands, grins and souvenirs to tradefor cigarettes, so well did they know the weakness of their foes.
But neither Hal nor Chester had time for the Germans. They werethinking of Sergeant Bowers, who still lay just beyond his funk hole,apparently badly wounded.
Hal hurried to his side. His face was chalky white, but his eyes werewide open. Chester also hurried to Sergeant Bowers' side. The sergeantrecognized them immediately and greeted them with a faint smile. Thelads smiled back at him.
"Is the war over?" he asked.
"It's all over, sergeant," Chester said, "and the Germans are licked,"Hal explained. "Look at them out there--" and Chester waved his arm inthe direction of his erstwhile enemies.
"That's good," said Sergeant Bowers. "Great sight, isn't it? It'stough though, to be killed on the last day of the war, and almost at thelast minute."
But Sergeant Bowers did not die.
Tenderly Hal and Chester helped him back of the lines where he couldreceive proper medical attention. His wounds were dressed and withintwo hours the sergeant of marines announced that he was feeling as fitas ever.
"Nevertheless, you'd better lie quiet for several days," said Hal.
"I guess not," declared Sergeant Bowers. "Why should a big healthy manlike me be idle when there is so much work to do. Of course, I'll admitI'm naturally lazy and all that, but I don't like to stand around andsee the other fellows do all the work."
"All the same," said Chester, "I'll venture to say that when you get tobed you won't want to get up again in a hurry."
"As for that," said Sergeant Bowers, "I never do want to get up."
When night fell on the battlefield the clamor of the celebration waxedrather than waned. It seemed that there was no darkness. Rockets and aceaseless fountain of star shells made the lines a streak of brilliancyacross the face of France, while by the light of flares, the front withall its dancing, boasting, singing soldiers was as clearly visible asthough the sun were still high in the heavens.
When morning dawned again, peace and quietness--the quietness that wasstrange and unbelievable--had transformed the front from a roaring,seething strip of madnes
s into a rest camp. Rather, it had thatappearance until a bugler broke the spell.
Hal was sleeping in the corner of what had once been a church. Chesterwas resting comfortably upon a pile of green camouflage a few feet away.Sergeant Bowers, despite his wounds, also slept near by.
"I can't get 'em up, I can't get 'em up--" said the bugler.
"You sure can't," said Chester. "Not me, anyway."
Then he turned over and went to sleep.
Hal did likewise, after one sleepy look at the sun.
Sergeant Bowers merely rolled over.
It was almost noon when the sergeant finally crawled out from under hisblanket. Hal and Chester were standing nearby.
"What's the use of getting up?" Sergeant Bowers complained. "The war'sover, ain't it?"
When the sergeant and the two lads finally emerged from the shatteredchurch, the former soon discovered that life on the front line hadbecome suddenly complicated by the presence of a young lieutenant.
"Where have you been all day?" the lieutenant demanded of SergeantBowers the moment he saw him.
"Sleeping," replied Sergeant Bowers briefly.
"Well," said the lieutenant, "you're on guard. You go on duty rightnow."
Sergeant Bowers bit of a chew of tobacco and strode off. But before hewent he delivered this parting shot, addressed to Hal and Chester:
"This old armistice," said he sadly, "isn't what it's cracked up to be,is it?"