spot that was soft enough to cave in under the impact and let
through a horde of gray-clad Huns. And though none of the
defenders knew it, this "quiet" sector had been chosen for such a
minor blow.

The men in higher command, back there behind the hill crest, had
a belated inkling, though, of a proposed attack on the lightly
defended front trenches. For the Allied airplanes which drifted
in the upper heavens like a scattered handful of dragon-flies
were not drifting there aimlessly. They were the eyes of the
snakelike columns that crawled so blindly on the scarred brown
surface of the earth. And those "eyes" had discerned the massing
of a force behind the German line had discerned and had duly
reported it.

The attack might come in a day. It might not come in a week. But
it was coming--unless the behind-the-lines preparations were a
gigantic feint.

A quiet dawn, in the quiet trenches of the quiet sector.
Desultory artillery and somewhat less desultory sniping had
prevailed throughout the night, and at daybreak; but nothing out
of the ordinary.

Two men on listening-post had been shot; and so had an
overcurious sentry who peeped just an inch too far above a
parapet. A shell had burst in a trench, knocking the telephone
connection out of gear and half burying a squad of sleepers under
a lot of earth. Otherwise, things were drowsily dull.