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Updated: May 19, 2025
"Ghastly business . . . cruel messy smash, he murmured. 'Beg pardon, sir? said the telephonist. The Forward Officer made no answer but continued to stare after the disappearing stretcher-bearers. The signaller shuffled his feet in the mud and hitched up the strap of the instrument on his shoulder. 'I suppose it's all over now, sir, he said.
Thereafter a deep silence fell on the dug-out, the recipients of letters crowding with bent heads round the guttering candle, the disappointed ones watching them with envious eyes. An exclamation of deep disgust from the Signaller brought no comment until the last letter was read, but then the Limber Gunner remembered and remarked on it.
'Number one fired two fired three fired, the signaller called rapidly, and the Observing Officer watched narrowly the white cotton-wool clouds of the bursting shrapnel of his guns. 'Number three, ten minutes more right all guns, drop twenty-five repeat, he ordered, and in swift obedience the guns began to drop their shrapnel showers, sweeping along the ground in front of the German trench.
The enemy's bombardment, as far as we were concerned, was beginning to slacken a little, but was still heavy. The Major, out on the road with a signaller mending wire, was hit in the face with shrapnel. It turned out, happily, not a serious wound, but at the time it looked less hopeful.
Our captain, by mistake of the signaller, invited the Yankee captain to dinner, and the reply from the American, who good-naturedly took it as a joke, was "Bad roadstead here." Our captain thought they were chaffing him, and had not the mistake been discovered in time, the rencontre might not have ended as pleasantly as it did.
Now the officer who had remained, calmly smoking his cigarette, flung the remains of it over the cliff, turned, surveyed the forest behind him with minute deliberation, then stepped into the excavation down which the signaller had disappeared. Some instinct kept the girl motionless after the man's head had vanished; minute after minute passed, and Evelyn Erith never stirred.
They will be ready to start in an hour. A signaller from the 11th Soudanese shall go with you; and you can notify, to us, the approach of any strong party of the enemy, and their direction; so that the gunboat can send a shell or two among them, as a hint that they had better keep out of range."
The voice stopped; the signaller whipped his dirty tattered flags in the sunlight for a few moments more, then ceased and stood stiffly at attention, his sun-dazzled gaze fixed on a far mountain slope where something glittered perhaps a bit of mica, perhaps the mirror of a helio.
The Captain of the ship asked us to post a signaller to read any signals, Serjt. Diggle was told to keep a look out and assist the official signaller, a sort of nondescript Swede or other neutral, like the rest of the crew. We soon sighted some war vessel, and asked if they had any orders, the reply being, according to Serjt. Diggle, "No go" according to the Swede, "No no."
'What was that you was rearin' up an' snortin' over, Signals? he asked, carefully retrieving a cigarette stump from behind his ear and lighting up. The Signaller snorted again. 'Just 'ark at this, he said, unfolding his letter again. 'I'll just read this bit, an' then I'll tell you the sort of merry dance I've 'ad to-day. This is from an uncle o' mine in London.
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