He gesticulated with his dry hand, trying to explain what had happened. There were many others in a similar plight. It was getting dark and the red wounds looked black in the darkness, and the expression in the men's eyes seemed more profound. A candle was lighted and the shadows on the wall now grew longer and looked enormous. A wounded man, in a corner of the room, had just ceased suffering. His eyes were wide open staring fixedly at the room. From the windows, the green light of the shrapnels and the red flames of the shells lit up the darkness with sudden flashes. Tiles kept falling and lumps of earth thudding against the roof. A strange heaviness weighed on everyone, numbing the brain and drying the eyes. Was it fatigue or torpor? No, it was something indescribable. Outside, the human bunch was still there. To the right could be heard the regular _tac-tac_ of a machine-gun. "Ah the animals!" cried a Zouave, shaking his fist. "We shall have them, though, just now, with the bayonet!" Shells went whizzing over the house, exploding in the coppices with a whooping noise. Then came the heavier, jerky whizz of the big "Fifteens," _Ram ... ram ... ram!_ They exploded and kept coming in threes, at regular intervals. From one minute to another the great glow might appear, the final destruction which would send all our human islet to its death. Our first line trenches were over yonder. There was the Lizerne Mill. The village was to the right. The ground looked black, the plain was lighted by the moon, so that one could see a heap of bricks which reminded one of the Mill. In October, we had seen it in all its glory, with its sails in the form of a cross. Through the cloud of dust which rose from the battle-field, lighted up by the shrapnels which kept rending the darkness, and in the midst of the wan light, the scene before us looked like a dream picture. We could see the spot we wanted to reach. With our eyes fixed on it, we went along as though hypnotised. Over there was the hill-top that had been laid waste, the accursed spot where craters had been made in every direction.