Rosenlaube and Mitchell. It's your turn to go out on listening
post to-night, sergeant. Twelve sharp, stay three hours, go as far
as you can, come back and report, take Mitchell or Rosenlaube with
you. Captain's orders."

The sergeant saluted again, and the two men looked at each other.

"Why not both of us, sir?" said Mitchell.

The lieutenant regarded him with some surprise. Listening post is
not a detail passionately desired by the men. It is always dirty,
frequently dangerous, generally obscure, and often fatal. Hence
there is no keen competition for it.

"Two is the usual number for a listening post," said Barker Bunn
thoughtfully. "But there is no regulation about it, and the captain
did not specify any number. Well, yes, I suppose you can all three
go, if you are set on it. In fact, I give the order to that effect."

"Thank you, sir," said Rosenlaube and Mitchell. Phipps-Herrick,
feeling that the strict etiquette of the preliminaries had been
fully observed and the time to be human had come, held out a box
of "Fierce Fairies."

"Have a cigarette, Bunn, and take a chair, do. Time for a little
talk this quiet night? Tell us what's doing up above."

"Nothing particular," said Barker Bunn, lighting and relaxing. "But
the old man has a hunch that the Fritzies are grubbing a mine--a
corker--to get our goat. Hence this business of ears forward.