for us to prowl around in the snow somewhere."

Happily, the message released them from further duty that night and bade
them seek rest. Young Kratzek was lying in John's bed and was sleeping.
He looked so young and so pale that the heart of his captor and rescuer
was moved to pity. Light-headed the Austrians might be, but no one could
deny them valor.

Just beyond the niche was another and smaller one, seldom used, owing to
its extreme narrowness, but John decided that he could sleep in it. At
any rate, if he fell off he would land in six or eight inches of soft
snow.

The flakes were still coming down heavily. It was the biggest snow that
he had yet seen in Europe and he believed that it would fall all night.
They had plenty of blankets and spreading two on the shelf which was no
broader than himself he lay down and put two more over him.

He was in a pleasant mental glow, because he had saved young Kratzek,
forgetting the rest who lay out there under the snow. All his instincts
were for mercy and gentleness, but like others, he was being hardened by
war, or at least he was made forgetful. Resting in the earthen side of a
trench, the horrors of the battle passed out of his mind. The white
gloom was so heavy there that he could not see the other wall four feet
away, and the falling flakes almost grazed his face as they passed, but
he had a marvelous sense of comfort and ease, even of luxury. The
caveman had fared no better, often worse, because he had no blankets,
and John drew a deep sigh of content.

A gun thundered somewhere far back in the German lines, and a gun also