without mishap and lay on the ground above. Here they were at least in
the open, and if death came to them they would not be slaughtered like
rats in a trap.

The corporal consulted his radio watch and found that it wanted but two
hours to dawn.

"Not much time left, boys," he murmured. "And unless we get back to our
lines before daylight, we'll stand a good chance of losing the number of
our mess. But if we don't do anything else, we've done a pretty fair
night's work. The finding of this dummy trench will put a crimp in the
Heinies' plans. I'd like to have some prisoners to take along just for
luck but all we've bagged is that sentry."

"Perhaps we haven't even got him," suggested Frank. "Some of his
comrades may have found him by this time."

"Not likely," replied Bart. "He couldn't make a noise, and as we left
him outside the wire they wouldn't be likely to stumble over him."

"All the same, we'd better get a hustle on," replied the corporal, and
they started on their homeward journey as stealthily as they had come.

They had some difficulty in finding the breach in the wire through which
they had entered, but at last they succeeded and wormed their way out.
Then they felt around for the sentry and found him in the place they had
left him. He had returned to consciousness, for when the corporal risked
a ray of his flashlight on the upturned face, they could see that his
eyes were open and looking at them intelligently.