company was sent to hold the third redoubt on the slope in front of
Port de Vaux. Perhaps you have heard of that redoubt. That was a
bitter job. But we held it many days and nights. The boches pounded
us from Douaumont and from the village of Vaux. They sent wave
after wave up the slope to drive us out. But we stuck to it. That
ravine of La Caillette was a boiling caldron of men. It bubbled
over with smoke and fire. Once, when their second wave had broken
just in front of us, we went out to hurry the fragments down
the hill. Then the guns from Douaumont and the village of Vaux
hammered us. Our men fell like ninepins. Our lieutenant called to
us to turn back. Just then a shell tore away his right leg at the
knee. It hung by the skin and tendons. He was a brave lad. I could
not leave him to die there. So I hoisted him on my back. Three
shots struck me. They felt just like hard blows from a heavy fist.
One of them made my left arm powerless. I sank my teeth in the
sleeve of my lieutenant's coat as it hung over my shoulder. I must
not let him fall off my back. Somehow--God knows how--I gritted
through to our redoubt. They took my lieutenant from my shoulders.
And then the light went out."

The priest leaned forward, his hands stretched out around the
soldier. "But you are a hero," he cried. "Let me embrace you!"

The soldier drew back, shaking his head sadly. "No," he said,
his voice breaking--"no, my Father, you must not embrace me now.
I may have been a brave man once. But now I am a coward. Let me
tell you everything. My wounds were bad, but not desperate. The
_brancardiers_ carried me down to Verdun, at night I suppose,
but I was unconscious; and so to the hospital at Vaudelaincourt.
There were days and nights of blankness mixed with pain. Then I