Adventure Magazine Cover — page 27: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Fresh Yank two guns in action there firing toward the heights. “‘Those are my regiment’s guns,” thought the Yank, ‘“‘for we are the only lot in this part of the town.” There was a terrific explosion in the horse- battery field, that made the two troopers cover their heads. They looked to see what had happened. Apparently nothing; the gun still fired. The Yank watched. Were there still three guns there? It was some time before he could be certain, but there was no doubt at last. But two guns fired. A haystack in the battery field began to blaze. There was a sudden barking from the fog at a little distance. ‘““Machine-guns,”’ shouted the sergeant in the Yank’s ear, who immediately began to run in that direction, gripping his sword. The sergeant was weaponless, but he hunted about the ground for a moment, and having found that for which he was searching, he followed the Yank. The two ran on, expecting at each step to be mowed down. They fell over bodies and abandoned kits, a pile of dead horses forced a detour, they collided with a collection of benches and tables, where an officers’ mess had taken its supper out of doors. The sound in- creased, as if by an accession of strength. ‘What folly,” thought the Yank, “for two men to rush a group of machine-guns!”’ Suicide! Still, as well die this way as cowering under a house-wall like a rat. And then, he assured himself, why should he, a broken man, outcast, expatriate and disgraced, leave a stricken field where so many brave men had already died? The sound of the guns was like rapid hammering now. They must be almost upon them. The sergeant panted at the Yank’s shoulder, his eyes wide, and his lips drawn tightly together. The Yank stopped and pointed. | THERE were the guns; there was the source of the sound. The ser- geant nodded and the two men, shouting hoarsely, charged through the fog. The barking of the guns abruptly receded, and the sound of their firing was lost in the wilderness of noise. The Yank stopped short and looked about wildly. Was this some new device of the enemy to lure men to their death into the German lines? He heard other guns, simi- 17 lar to those that had disappeared firing, faintly, then the sound was smothered by the crash of a high explosive shell, or the bang of shrapnel. “Did you ever hear anything like that?” yelled the sergeant. “Lad, this is the best —— fight as never was!” They were between two houses now and they crouched in the shelter of the wall, while they got back their breath. PUP-PUP-PUP-PUPUPUPUP! In front of the house it was, almost within arm’s reach. The Yank leaped to his feet, but the sergeant barred the way. The Yank turned his head to see what the sergeant was watching. There was a window in front of them, in the wall of the house opposite. A line of holes appeared in the ‘casement, like those stitched by a sewing-machine needle mov- ing at high speed. Dust curled from the cracks.. The glass disappeared like thin ice on a hot stove melting away before their eyes. Sash, panes and casing disintegrated, curtains fluttered as though in a breeze. For the space of four or five seconds, no more, the gun fired deafeningly. Abruptly it ceased. The sergeant and the Yank ex- changed glances, then they began to crawl along the house-wall. The Yank strained his ears for the sound of voices, the clink of metal, the rattling of a new belt being placed in the gun, but the exploding shells made too great a noise. The gun before the house was still silent. “‘They haven’t gone,” thought the Yank, “or. we would have heard them moving away.” : Then the sergeant stood up, and the Yank, making his sword whistle, echoed his companion’s yell and followed his dash into the street. The sergeant went down, hands out- stretched, and the Yank, following close behind, swerved, only to catch his foot in something and go headlong. He hurt him- self cruelly in the fall, but his heart sang, for he felt the machine-gun under hin, still hot from the firing. He floundered in a tangle of arms and gun, then raised himself on one arm and stabbed blindly into the mist with his sword. His searching point felt no resistance. “Keep down!” cried a voice, ‘‘keep down, we've blooming well acted the ruddy fool, we have!” The Yank turned. CoOmicloool. 1 @)