“The Boches sure must have known that we was right down-stairs under ’em, ’cause they started pullin’ up the old tailboards and droppin’ ’em every damn minute. Bombs, bombs, and more bombs. They dropped right in the column, knocked ruined houses into our ears, filled your eyes with dirt. Some horses, ’bout ten, got hurt so bad we had to shoot ’em. Think ’bout three men got killed while the jam lasted, but ain’t quite sure. “We moved after a while, and the planes followed us up. Got to the fork of some roads and took the one leadin’ right down to the Marne. That was just below Mont St. Pierre, a little village. There was a pontoon bridge, one of them boat things, you know—right near where we halted for the night. You can imagine how the Germans was tryin’ to pot-shot that bridge. The town was all marbles from shells hittin’ it that was aimed at the bridge. “Time we halted a big boy banged in. Hit in the woods where we was to camp for the night. _Bon_ welcome, eh? Stink? Whew! Those woods did reek—had to bury our noses in the ground to get to sleep. Well, the gas came over strong. The Heinies threw bombs down as regular as Christy Mathewson used to heave strikes across the plate—and everybody was scared as hell. “Don’t let any man ever tell you he don’t get scared at the front. He’s a damn liar if he says he don’t get scared. Ain’t that you want to run away or lose your guts in the fightin’. No, not that kind of scared stuff. It’s like this. There you are waitin’ for somethin’ to come along and take you off on some strange trip. You know it’s goin’ to hurt like hell gettin’ started, too. It’s that uncertain, don’t-know stuff that gets you. When those bombs are fallin’ and you’re in a place like we was that night, with no place to go, there’s nothin’ to do but pull a cheesecloth blanket over your head and try to _cushay_. Ain’t much fun, O. D. I had one hell of a toothache and it worried me so much I didn’t get a chance to be as scared as I should have been. Funny how a thing like a toothache can take your mind off other troubles. “Things got so bad toward five bells in the mornin’ that the C. O. decided to wake us up and move. But before we could get set to move the shellin’ let up and he says, ‘Ah, let her go, we’ll stay.’ Camouflaged the old _cheveaux_ and stuff again and hung ’round for breakfast. Course breakfast only meant a thin slice of bacon and a fistful of hardtack. The coffee had given out by that time. You might expect that the supplies could have reached us easy. But gettin’ supplies to us was like findin’ a nigger in the dark. I swear I believe we were lost durin’ most of the Château-Thierry racket. Seems that way, anyhow. For a long time after we left Mont St. Pierre the batteries never did know where the _échelons_ were and the _échelons_ didn’t know where anything was. Mules, drivers, and ration-carts used to get lost every day. That’s why we were short of _café_.