The boche shells were now breaking in the hollow below the spot where Hal and Chester found themselves. Hal was congratulating himself on having 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 a mighty explosion.
His first thought was of Chester. But after he had successfully dodged several falling stones, he peered over the edge of his funk hole and there was Chester, grinning broadly.
"How are they coming, Chester?" he called out.
"Closer than I like," Chester answered. "But here is an old friend of yours 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 headed his 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 funk holes and started for Sergeant Bowers, who had fallen just outside the funk hole in which he had sought refuge. But they were back quicker than 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 after the explosion, or is drowned out by the explosion. Common mathematics will show why. Air conditions also help. If the wind is traveling with the shell, one stands a fair chance of hitting the earth before the shell explodes. But if the wind is traveling against the shell, one hasn't much salvation.
In this case the wind was in the lads' favor. As they both heard the shell coming, they moved like lightning. It is surprising sometimes how fast one can move at a time like this.
In taking their places in the funk holes, which had been dug by the Germans when they were in possession of that piece of ground, Hal and Chester had calculated on just one thing—having time to fit themselves into the holes before shells should find them. And now that both found it necessary to make a quick fit of it, they were disgusted with their laziness in not spending enough energy and taking the chances necessary to making them big enough in the first place.
"Why didn't I?"
That was the question each lad asked himself a dozen times during the brief space of a moment they lay there half exposed and waiting for that which 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 his helmet a glancing blow; another buried itself in the earth only a few inches from his nose.
Hal crawled out of his funk hole and reinserted himself, making sure this time that he was below the surface. By his watch it lacked still five 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 he recognized on the moment as being gas shells, had been too far away to cause them any immediate alarm.
There followed then a strange, unbelievable silence, as though the world had died. It lasted but a moment, for perhaps the space that a breath may 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 shrieking of claxons—gas claxons that shrieked now with pure joy—and such a shout from both lines that only men possessed of sheer happiness can utter.
Chester pulled off his gas mask and shouted with the rest. And even as he did so he caught a faint odor which he knew to be that of mustard gas. But nothing mattered now.
Hal and Chester piled out of their funk holes with the rest, waving their helmets and shouting at the top of their voices. Then, like a covey 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'll have to come out and tell me himself before I believe it."
Another brief silence. A 75 barked behind Hal and Chester. Then the battle seemed to start anew, one of the American batteries firing and then another; the contest seemed to be between two batteries of 75's.
Chester could never remember which battery fired last, but he heard, a few days later, that two second lieutenants of artillery were haled blushingly before a general and severely reprimanded for disregarding the rules of the armistice.
After the two batteries had ceased firing and the roar of the last cannon died out across the valley, there came a silence that was even more appalling than the first. It was something like the lull that follows a terrific thunderstorm, only this storm had been raging for nearly fifty-two months.
In the midst of this ghastly silence, a startling thing occurred. The sky line of the crest ahead of the American troops grew suddenly populous with dancing soldiers, and, down the slope, all the way to the barbed wire entanglements, straight for the Yankees, came the German troops.
For a moment there was confusion in the American ranks. It seemed that the enemy was launching his troops forward in a desperate charge. Yankee officers 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 trade for cigarettes, so well did they know the weakness of their foes.
But neither Hal nor Chester had time for the Germans. They were thinking 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 were wide open. Chester also hurried to Sergeant Bowers' side. The sergeant recognized them immediately and greeted them with a faint smile. The lads 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 in the direction of his erstwhile enemies.
"That's good," said Sergeant Bowers. "Great sight, isn't it? It's tough though, to be killed on the last day of the war, and almost at the last minute."
But Sergeant Bowers did not die.
Tenderly Hal and Chester helped him back of the lines where he could receive proper medical attention. His wounds were dressed and within two hours the sergeant of marines announced that he was feeling as fit as ever.
"Nevertheless, you'd better lie quiet for several days," said Hal.
"I guess not," declared Sergeant Bowers. "Why should a big healthy man like me be idle when there is so much work to do. Of course, I'll admit I'm naturally lazy and all that, but I don't like to stand around and see the other fellows do all the work."
"All the same," said Chester, "I'll venture to say that when you get to bed 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 waxed rather than waned. It seemed that there was no darkness. Rockets and a ceaseless fountain of star shells made the lines a streak of brilliancy across the face of France, while by the light of flares, the front with all its dancing, boasting, singing soldiers was as clearly visible as though the sun were still high in the heavens.
When morning dawned again, peace and quietness—the quietness that was strange and unbelievable—had transformed the front from a roaring, seething strip of madness into a rest camp. Rather, it had that appearance until a bugler broke the spell.
Hal was sleeping in the corner of what had once been a church. Chester was 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 his blanket. Hal and Chester were standing nearby.
"What's the use of getting up?" Sergeant Bowers complained. "The war's over, ain't it?"
When the sergeant and the two lads finally emerged from the shattered church, the former soon discovered that life on the front line had become suddenly complicated by the presence of a young lieutenant.
"Where have you been all day?" the lieutenant demanded of Sergeant Bowers the moment he saw him.
"Sleeping," replied Sergeant Bowers briefly.
"Well," said the lieutenant, "you're on guard. You go on duty right now."
Sergeant Bowers bit of a chew of tobacco and strode off. But before he went 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?"