Chapter XX: The Last Rung of a Broken Ladder

For a couple of strides he advanced towards them, deceived for an instant by the jacket of the dead German which Dennis was wearing. Then he sprang back with a startled cry, his light vanished, and the clang of the heavy door echoed dully in the pitch darkness.

Bob Dashwood's hand gave his brother's shoulder a warning grip, and the pair listened, scarcely breathing. In both their minds was the one thought: Had their enemy gained the outer room before the door closed, or was he still there, waiting for the first sound that should betray their whereabouts?

Dennis, who had been standing erect when the torch beam found him, now crouched low; but Bob stood motionless, his head turned sideways to listen, the half-smoked cigarette still in his mouth.

The silence of the room seemed to be intensified by the gunfire outside; and, without thinking, Bob Dashwood pulled at the cigarette.

The tiny end shone faintly, with a brighter glow, a loud report broke the unnatural stillness, and the bullet of an automatic pistol carried the cigarette from the smoker's lips and struck the wall behind him!

Even Bob Dashwood, to whom physical fear was unknown, felt himself turn pale at the narrowness of his escape.

The spy was still there, and evidently a crack shot, while they had no firearms!

After a long, thrilling pause, a gloating laugh came out of the darkness.

"The English are the greatest fools in the world; or is it perhaps that they have no weapons, hein?" said the spy's voice, the soliloquy being evidently intended for his listeners' benefit.

Dennis was conscious that his brother had edged away behind a large boiler, and groping desperately in the pockets of the German coat, hoping against hope that he might find something that would turn the tide in their favour, his own fingers closed on--a raw potato!

An idea occurred to him, and with a silent jerk of his forearm he threw it to the other end of the room. As the potato fell, Von Dussel swung round and fired two shots in the direction of the sound, and under cover of the reports Dennis joined Bob in his temporary shelter.

A snarl of vexation broke from the angry Prussian at his second failure; and, taking Bob's hand in his own, Dennis tapped out a Morse Code sentence on the back of it with his first finger, relieved to find from his brother's answering squeeze that Bob understood him.

"Give me that rifle," he tapped. "There might be an unused cartridge left in the magazine, after all."

Bob supported himself on the side of the boiler, and Dennis took the Mauser from him without noise.

He knew the barrel must be choked with earth from the use it had been put to, but, after all, it was a chance.

_Bur-r-r-r!_ The telephone bell struck an odd, imperative note at that moment, and Von Dussel spoke sharply.

"You hear that, you hound?" he thundered. "You Dashwoods, you! How long have you been here?"

They knew it was only a ruse to make them betray themselves, prompted by their enemy's keen anxiety to answer the summons, and they stood behind the boiler perfectly still.

_Bur-r-r-r!_

"So you will not speak," snarled Von Dussel. "Very well, I am going to answer that message. I shall have a Browning pistol in one hand and the receiver in the other. You had better look out; you will never leave this room alive, either of you."

Dennis, groping silently in front of him along the brick base in which the boiler was fixed, had found a heavy screw wrench, and, repeating his former manoeuvre, hurled it this time to the opposite end of the engine-room.

It dropped with a loud clang; but Von Dussel was on his guard, and before he fired he switched his light on for an instant, and Dennis pulled the trigger of the rifle.

It was only for a second's space that Dennis saw the man with his hand raised, and he could not repress a fierce shout of joy as a Mauser bullet dashed the Browning pistol from Von Dussel's hand.

"Perhaps we English are not such fools, after all!" he laughed. But when the spy's voice answered him, it was from the opposite side of the room.

"That remains to be seen," was his reply. "I tell you, you will not leave this place alive. The brewery is mined, and I am going to fire the charge. Good night. I will send Madame Dashwood a field post card to-morrow!"

In vain Dennis had pulled on the trigger while he spoke, the rifle pointed in the direction of the voice. That cartridge had been the last one; and as they heard the heavy door bang for the second time that night, they knew that the man had gone and would keep his word!

"Dennis, boy," said Bob quickly, "I'm rather afraid our number's up, after all. I'm useless with this leg, but where there's life there's hope. There's a permanent ladder at the end of this hole. Give me my crutch again, and, meanwhile, see where it leads to."

Dennis did not require telling twice.

"You're right, Bob," he said. "There's death on the other side of that door, so it's wasting time to try whether that hound has fastened it or no." And while he spoke he flashed his own pocket torch to the far end of the engine-room. "You'll be able to pick your way, and I'll be back in a shake," he concluded, tearing along the floor and bounding up a permanent ladder to the next storey.

A circling sweep of his invaluable light showed the lad a low-ceilinged room corresponding to the one he had just left, and a cool wind blowing in from somewhere reminded him of his adventure in the German dug-out, and the friendly passage he had discovered.

"Come on, Bob!" he called down the ladder. "I'll be back in a minute and give you a hand. We'll do the beggar yet."

He bounded through the door which his light revealed, and found himself in the open air upon an iron gallery running along the outside of the building.

His impulse was to lift up a shout of thankfulness at the sight of another iron ladder, obviously leading into the yard below. To make quite certain that the way was clear he ran towards it, and stole cautiously down for a short distance, trying to penetrate the intense blackness in quest of any sign of Von Dussel.

All at once his feet dropped into nothingness, for, unknown to him, an English shell had carried away the rest of the ladder a week before, and, clutching wildly at the last step, he clung there, dangling in space!

To let go, even had he known the distance between him and the ground, was absolutely unthinkable with his brother helpless and unwarned within the building, and though the explosion of the mine might happen any moment, his one and only effort was to get back by sheer strength of arm and return to Bob's assistance.

"If we've got to go out to-night we'll go out together," he muttered between his teeth, and he added something of a prayer to the resolve.

The fragment of the ladder vibrated under his weight as he worked himself slowly and cautiously to one edge, and the sharpness of the jagged iron rungs hurt his hands terribly.

"If I can only haul up high enough to get my knee on the first step it'll be all right," he thought, when something scrunched immediately underneath him, and he dangled motionless, as a brilliant star-shell burst directly overhead, making everything around as bright as day.

* * * * *

Caught in the open by the sudden fire of uncountable machine-guns, the 2/12th Battalion of the Royal Reedshires had gone down like grass before the scythe. Another fifty yards, and they would have reached the uncut wire in front of that ruined building with the broken chimney shaft.

So close were they that the word was already given to divide and sweep round the flank of the obstacle when cruel Fate said no; and as he lay with three bullets through him, tears of rage and anger had dimmed the keen eyes of their C.O. as he groped for his whistle and blew the retire.

They had made a fine rush by successive waves across the open, taking advantage of the tumbled ground to get close up to that seemingly deserted brewery which had shown no sign of occupation, and from which no shot had been fired. And then that thing had happened, and he blamed himself as he sent the brave remnant scurrying back to the trench they had captured, knowing that he should have rested content with his capture and not been greedy for more.

He did not realise that he was badly wounded, and he did not care. It was his own fault, and the tears in his eyes were for those khaki heaps that lay to right and left of him. He even resisted three of the survivors who ran to his help. They only grinned when he threatened them with pains and penalties; and, picking him up, they had carried him in under a murderous rain of bullets.

The battalion was barely half its strength when it reached the trench, and it had all happened just as the dusk drew down on the land.

When they called the roll the voices of the company sergeants were hoarse and shook with an odd quiver.

"Abbot, Anstey, Ashwell?" No answer. "Bellingham?"--"Here." "Burton?"--"Just died, sergeant," somebody else replied. And so it went on alphabetically from A to Z, and of the A's there were very few, and of the Z's there were none.

A senior captain took over command, and word was sent back to the brigadier.

"It's bad enough as it is, sergeant-major," said the senior captain. "He'd better not be told just now that both his sons are among the missing."

Later on there came to the young lieutenant, who was the only officer left in A company, two dusty, fierce-eyed little men who had gone through the burden and heat of the day without a scratch, although their bayonets were red enough.

And they had begged leave to go and search for Captain Dashwood and Dennis, and the young lieutenant had choked audibly as he refused the permission.

"Yes, I know, Hawke," he had replied to their earnestly repeated entreaties. "But I'm acting under strict orders. Not a man is to cross the parapet on any consideration whatever. If we're counter-attacked before reinforcements arrive, Heaven help us!"

Then the two fierce-eyed little men had gone away, having apparently accepted the inevitable, and neither had said a word until they reached the far end of the trench.

"Tiddler?"

"I should bloomin' well think so, 'Arry!"

That was all, but it was enough; and that was how Harry Hawke and his bosom pal came to be wandering under the eastern wall of the deserted brewery after a fruitless search among those khaki heaps that lay so still in front of the German wire.

For three hours they had crawled backwards and forwards, questioning the wounded and giving a hand where they could with the field dressing, but always receiving the same reply.

At length one man told them that the German stretcher-bearers had come out and carried some bodies away, but they had been recalled before they reached him, and there had been a great skedaddling from the building in front. He had heard them removing machine-guns; he could swear to that.

"Come on, Tid!" said Harry Hawke. "We may find them in there. It is our last chance."

They were working their way very carefully along the wall when a star-shell of unusual brilliancy burst, and Hawke jumped forward, gripping his rifle.

"Swop my goodness! Tiddler!" he cried, with a fierce chuckle, "here's a bloomin' Allemong trying to escape! You've left it a bit too late, sonny!" And he lunged upwards at the dangling figure in the light of the star-shell!