A British subaltern with a machine gun and two private soldiers entered the inn and were setting the gun up at McDermott's window when a German bullet struck the officer and he fell dead across the slumbering McDermott. Nevertheless, the gun was manned and fought for half an hour above McDermott, who stirred now and then, but did not waken. Just at dusk an Irish battalion struck the Germans on the right flank of their assaulting force, a half mile to the north of the village, rolled them back temporarily, and cleared the village of them. This counter attack took the firing line a good thousand yards eastward once more. McDermott roused, crawled from beneath the body of the British officer, and viewed it with surprise. “That war has been here ag'in an' me aslape,” said McDermott. “I might jine that war if I c'u'd ketch up wid it--but 'tis here, 'tis there, 'tis gawn ag'in! An' how c'u'd I jine it wid no weapons, not even a good thick club to m' hands?” He foraged and found a piece of sausage that he had overlooked in his former search, ate it greedily and then stood in the doorway, listening to the sound of the firing. It was getting dark and northward toward Messines and Wytschaete and southward for more miles than he could guess the lightning of big guns flickered along the sky. “Anny way I w'u'd go,” mused McDermott, “I w'u'd run into that war if I was thryin' to dodge ut. And anny wray I w'u'd go, I w'u'd miss that war if I was thryin' to come up wid ut. An' till I make up me mind which wan I want to do, here will I sthay.” He opened another bottle of brandy, and drank and cogitated. Whether it was the cogitation or the drinks or the effect of the racket of war, his head began to ache dully. When McDermott's scar ached, it was his custom to take another drink. After a while there came a stage at which, if it still ached, he at least ceased to feel it aching any more. “The hotel here,” he remarked, “is filled wid hospitality and midical tratement, and where bet-ther c'u'd I be?” And presently, once more, a deep sleep overtook him. A deeper, more profound sleep, indeed, than his former one. And this time the war came still nearer to McDermott. The British were driven back again and again occupied the town, the Germans in close pursuit. From house to house and from wall to wall the struggle went on, with grenade, rifle and bayonet. A German, with a Scotchman's steel in his chest, fell screaming, back through the open window, and his blood as he died soaked McDermott's feet. But McDermott slept. Full night came, thick and cloudy, and both sides sent up floating flares. The square was strewn with the bodies of the dead and the bodies of the maimed in increasing numbers; the wounded groaned and whimpered in the shadows of the trampled Place, crawling, if they still could crawl, to whatever bit of broken wall seemed to offer momentary shelter and praying for the stretcher bearers to be speedy. But still McDermott slept.