"Perfectly. Did the Huns attack?" I asked.
McNab nodded. "They attacked us three days afterwards at five o'clock in the morning. It was like a nightmare. The Germans came on, evidently thinking they were on a soft job, and you can realize what a wonderful target they made for the gunners who had been waiting for 'em. Such a target that gunners dream about but never see. We had some eighteen-and-a-'arf-pounders not five hundred yards away, and they let go right into the thick of 'em. And each case shot with its four hundred bullets swept and tore their ranks. With a mighty gasp and something like a groan the Huns staggered, recovered, and with wild yells came charging on to a hundred machine guns. And all the time the shells came over at them and tore wide swathes in their closely-packed ranks. Then our boys got into 'em and swept the remaining Huns into eternity!"
"Unless this story had come from such a highly-reliable fountain-head, McNab," I murmured, after a moment or so, "I would never have believed that the whole thing was not a fabrication."
McNab removed his pot of beer on one side, and leaned across the table. I moved my chair back quickly, just missing another vigorous stab from his huge index-finger.
"The history of this war," he observed impressively, "will be interwoven with extraordinary things like this 'ere tale I have been telling you. And you may lay to it, mister, that the most extraordinary things of all will never see the light of day in the printed page."
"I can _quite_ understand that," I said pointedly; "for, although a student of military history of this war myself, I cannot recall a single reference to any of the remarkable events which occurred in the trenches during the eight months you were with your regiment over there!"
McNab regarded me for a full minute with rapidly-rising choler. Then he shifted his stare from me to an old gentleman who was warming his toes at the fire.
"The yarn I have told you is as true as the drill book, though you need not believe it if you have conscientious objections. I have been recounting real slices of history. Leastways, when I say history I may be wrong, because they will never appear in history. But they _'appened_, Mister--'appened as surely as I am sitting here with an empty pot in front o' me. An'--an'----" McNab stammered in his excitement--"if any bloke says they didn't, be jabers, I'll--I'll drink his beer!"