Four would certainly be fired on.
I wanted to go. It was not a matter of courage. I had simply,
parrot-fashion, mimicked the attitude of mind of the officers. One
after another I had seen men go into danger with a shrug of the
shoulders.
"If it comes it comes!" they said, and went on. So I, too, had become
a fatalist. If I was to be shot it would happen, if I had to buy a
rifle and try to clean it myself to fulfil my destiny.
So they let me go. I went farther than they expected, as it turned
out. There was a great deal of indignation and relief when it was
over. But that is later on.
A very tall Belgian officer took me in charge. It was necessary to
work through a barbed-wire barricade, twisting and turning through its
mazes. The moonlight helped. It was at once a comfort and an anxiety,
for it seemed to me that my khaki-coloured suit gleamed in it. The
Belgian officers in their dark blue were less conspicuous. I thought
they had an unfair advantage of me, and that it was idiotic of the
British to wear and advocate anything so absurd as khaki. My cape
ballooned like a sail in the wind. I felt at least double my ordinary
size, and that even a sniper with a squint could hardly miss me. And,
by way of comfort, I had one last instruction before I started:
"If a _fusee_ goes up, stand perfectly still.
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