The position of our machine guns, and the endangered right wing, which had utterly disarrayed the Germans by their bayonet onslaught, demanded attention. It would require but a few minutes for the arrival of a new division of the enemy, and already a greater force was seen detaching itself from the main body on the road, crossing the field below the hill, with a run. Everywhere in front of us the Teuton front seemed to be enlarging, and the glittering helmets of the plumed Uhlans, like a sheet of kindling fires, suddenly emerged within it. There was nothing for it but retreat, and a retreat quickly made. I trembled for the safety of the thin file of defenders on the hilltop. Their certain extinction or capture was inevitable.
Then something most unexpected happened. Dropping shells from the extreme right of our second line of defense, where the danger had been reported, covered the hillside with a rapid succession of eruptions. It was insupportable, though, with characteristic stubbornness--the German officers rushed more men to the desolated slope, where the shells ripped the ground, and filled the air with iron splinters. It was terrific, and our gunners and infantry, dismayed for their own safety, in the superabundant rescue, scrambled back and, together almost, entered the lines of the second defense. I remember well enough my own struggles to get there, for at the very conjuncture when my legs should have best succored me, the injured member became almost useless. I rolled into a lucky hole, where there had been at some time an excavation made, or begun, for some reason, possibly the building of an outhouse or cattle shed. An intense pain developed, and I found myself quite, as the Americans say, "out of commission." Within sight was our second line of defense, bristling with rifles and concealed machine guns, a strong position, well garrisoned, and immediately before me raced the parting remnants of the small parleying party that I had adventurously joined.
My predicament was dangerous. The very thought of capture and isolation for months or years from St. Choiseul and Gabrielle and the domestic duties I was so sorely needed to perform, terrified me, but it also made me more methodical and ingenious. I searched the possibilities of a return to my friends, and the obvious plan was to "lie still," and in the night, if the positions of the armies remained unchanged to steal under the cover of darkness back to the French lines.