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darkening grey sky under which death coiled and screamed like a dragon,
and crushed all in its grip. How bad it was you may gauge from this: when I
flew near our base for exercise next morning I found that hardly a mile from
my nest the ground was ploughed up by shells. And even rats and field-mice
did not manage to escape: dozens of them had been slaughtered and cut to
pieces. Oh! It was terrible. I felt so melancholy. Now that Hira was dead I
was alone, and so weary!"
Ghond Goes Reconnoitring
About the first week of December, Ghond and Gay-Neck were to go on a
reconnaissance trip all by themselves The place they went to was forest not
far from Ypres, Armentieres and Hazebrouck. If you take a map of France
and draw a line from Calais south almost in a straight line, you will come
across a series of places where the British and Indian armies were situated.
Near Armentieres there are many graves of Indian Mohammedan soldiers.
There are no graves of Indian Hindu soldiers because the Hindus from times
immemorial have cremated their dead, and those that are cremated occupy
no grave. Their ashes are scattered to the winds, and no place is marked or
burdened with their memory.
To return to Ghond and Gay-Neck. They were sent to a forest near
Hazebrouck, which was behind the enemy's line, to find out the exact
location of an enormous underground ammunition dump. If found, Ghond
and the pigeon, singly or together, were to return to the British Army
Headquarters with an ex- December morning, Gay-Neck was taken on an
aeroplane. It flew about twenty miles over a forest, part of which was held
by the Indian Army and the rest by the Germans. When they had gone
beyond the German line, Gay-Neck was released. He flew all over the
woods; then having gained some knowledge of the nature of the land, he
flew back home. This was done to make sure that Gay-Neck knew his route
and had some inkling of what was expected of him.
That afternoon when the sun had gone down, which happened at about
four o'clock at this latitude ten degrees north of New York, Ghond, most
warmly dressed, with Gay-Neck under his coat, started. They went on an
ambulance as far as the second line of the Indian Army in the great forest. In
utter darkness they proceeded to the front, conducted by some members of
the Intelligence Service.
Soon they found themselves in what is called No Man's Land, but
fortunately it was covered with trees, most of which had not yet been
destroyed by shell-fire. Ghond, who did not know French or German and
whose knowledge of English was confined to three words, "yes," "no" and
"very well," was now left to find a German ammunition dump in a forest,
accompanied only by a pigeon fast asleep under his coat.
First of all he had to remind himself that he was in a country of the cold
Himalayan climate where, during the winter, trees stood bare and the ground
was covered with dry autumn leaves and frost. Since there was little foliage
on tree or sapling, concealment of himself proved not an easy task. The night
was dark, and as cold as a corpse, but since he could see in the dark better
than any living man, and because his sense of smell was as keen as the
keenest of all animals, he knew how to steer his course in No Man's Land.
Fortunately, that night the wind was from the east.
Edging his way between tree-trunks, he pushed forward as fast as possible.
His nose told him minutes before their arrival that a company of Germans
was passing his way. Like a leopard he crawled up a tree, and waited. They
never heard even the flicker of a sound. Had it been daylight they would
have found him, for his bare feet bled as he walked on the frost- stricken
ground, leaving distinct marks behind.
Once he had a very close shave. As he went up a tree and sat on a branch
to let a couple of German sentries pass below him, he heard someone
whisper from a branch into his ear. He knew at once that it was a German
sharpshooter. But he bent his head, and listened. The German said, "Guten
nacht," then stepped over and slid down the tree. No doubt he had taken
Ghond for one of his fellow-soldiers who had come to relieve him. After a
while Ghond descended to the ground and followed the footprint of that
German. Dark though it was, his bare feet could feel where the ground had
been worn down by the feet of man. No difficult task that, for him.
At last he reached a place where a lot of men were bivouacking. He had to
skirt around them softly, still pressing forward. He heard a strange noise
right at his feet. He stopped and listened. No mistake, this was a familiar
sound! He waited. The steps of an animal: Patter pat, patter-r-r! Ghond
moved towards the sound, and a suppressed growl ensued. Instead of fear,
joy gripped his heart. He who had spent nights at a time in the tiger-infested
jungles of India was not to be deterred by the growl of a wild dog. Soon
enough two red eyes greeted his vision. Ghond sniffed the air before him
carefully as he stood there, and lo! he could not detect there was the slightest
odour of man about that dog; the creature had gone wild. The dog, too, was
sniffing the air to find out what kind of being he was facing, for Ghond did
not exude the usual human odour of fear, and so the animal came forward
and rubbed against him and sniffed vigorously. Fortunately, Ghond carried
Gay-Neck above the dog's nose, and the odour of the bird's presence was
carried up by the wind, so the wild dog perceived in the man before him
nothing but a friendly fearless fellow. He wagged his tail, and whined.
Ghond, instead of patting his head with his hand, slowly put it before the
dog's eyes to see and smell. A moment of suspense followed. Was the dog
going to bite the hand? Another moment passed. Then ... the dog licked it.
He now whined with pleasure. Ghond said to himself: "So this hunter's dog
is without a master. Probably his master is dead. The poor beast has become
as wild as a wolf. He lives by preying on the food supply of the German
Army, for it is evident he had not yet eaten any human flesh. So much the
better."
Ghond whistled softly, the call of all hunters of all ages no matter in what
country. It meant "Lead" And the dog led. He skirted all the bivouacs of the
German soldiers as deftly as a stag slips by a tiger's den. After hours of
wandering, they reached their destination. There was no mistake about it;
Ghond had found the very depot not only of munitions but also of German
food supplies. His leader, the wild dog, went through a secret hole in the
ground, then after half an hour emerged with a large leg of veal between his
jaws. That it was bovine meat Ghond could tell by its odour. The dog sat
down to his dinner on the frosty ground, while the man put on his boots,
which he had carried slung over his shoulder all night long, and then looked
up and took observations. By the position of the stars he could tell where he
was. He waited there some time.
Slowly the day began to break. He took a compass from his pocket. Yes,
he felt quite sure that he could draw a map of the place. Just then the dog
jumped up and grabbed Ghond's coat with his teeth. There was no doubt in
the man's mind that the dog wanted to lead him on again. He ran ahead, and
Ghond followed as fast. Soon they reached a spot so thickly covered with
thorns and frozen vines that passage through it was possible only for an
animal. The dog crawled under a lot of sharp thorns, and disappeared.
Now Ghond drew a diagram showing the position of the stars, and the
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