into the zigzag communication trenches up to the front, the fire-trench.
Then, very cautiously, over the top into No Man's Land. It was nervous
work, for at any second they might discover us and open fire. It suited
us all to be as quiet as human men could be, and when once in a while a
star-shell, a Very light, was sent up from the German lines we froze in
our tracks till the white glare died out.

"The party had been digging for perhaps an hour when hell broke loose.
They'd seen us. All about was a storm of machine-gun and rifle bullets,
and we dropped on our faces, the diggers in their trench--pretty shallow
it was. As for the covering party, we simply took our medicine. And
then the shrapnel joined the music. Word was passed to get back to the
trenches, and we started promptly. We stooped low as we ran over No
Man's Land, but there were plenty of casualties. I got mine in the foot,
but not the wound which rung in this--" Thornton nodded his head at the
crutches with a smile. "It was from a bit of shrapnel just as I made the
trench, and as I fell in I caught at the sand bags and whirled about
facing out over No Man's Land; as I whirled I saw, close by, Beauramé's
face in a shaft of light. I don't know why I made conversation at that
moment--I did. I said:

"When did you get back?"

And his answer came as if clicked on a typewriter. "Me, I stayed, _Mon
Capitaine_. It had an air too dangerous, out there."

I stared in a white rage. You'll imagine--one of my men to dare tell me
that! And at that second, simultaneously, came the flare of a shell star
and a shout of a man struck down, and I knew the voice--John Dudley. He
was out there, the tail end of the party, wounded. I saw him as he