I stood around while we were getting ready to start back to the cars,
and one of the officers was with me.
"How often do you get a shell right inside the pit here?" I asked
him. "A fair hit, I mean?"
"Oh, I don't know!" he said, slowly. He looked around. "You know that
hole you were singing in just now?"
I nodded. I had guessed that it had been made by a shell.
"Well, that's the result of a Boche shell," he said. "If you'd come
yesterday we'd have had to find another place for your concert!"
"Oh--is that so!" I said.
"Aye," he said, and grinned. "We didn't tell you before, Harry,
because we didn't want you to feel nervous, or anything like that,
while you were singing. But it was obliging of Fritz--now wasn't it?
Think of having him take all the trouble to dig out a fine theater
for us that way!"
"It was obliging of him, to be sure," I said, rather dryly.
"That's what we said," said the officer. "Why, as soon as I saw the
hole that shell had made, I said to Campbell: 'By Jove--there's
the very place for Harry Lauder's concert to-morrow!' And he agreed
with me!"
Now it was time for handshaking and good-bys. I said farewell all
around, and wished good luck to that brave battery, so cunningly
hidden away in its pit. There was a great deal of cheery shouting and
waving of hands as we went off. And in two minutes the battery was
out of sight--even though we knew exactly where it was!
We made our way slowly back, through the lengthening shadows, over
the shell-pitted ground.
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