The Khaki Boys over the Top Part 7

For a moment Jimmy could see nothing. Possibly this was because he strained his eyes too much, but of course he was looking out into a darkness so black that it seemed to swallow up everything. And there was rain, too, a misty, drizzling rain, which alone would have hampered vision. Then Jimmy closed his strained orbs, and when he opened them again his vision was nearer normal.

"Do you see it yet?" whispered Bob. "Squint along my finger."

Jimmy did so.

"You have pretty good eyes to see anything in this blackness," he was saying when he suddenly became aware of something moving out there among the holes caused by the American sh.e.l.ls.

It was more, he said afterward, as though part of the darkness itself moved rather than that he actually saw something. But it was enough to direct his attention to what Bob pointed out.

"It _is_ something," was Jimmy's cautious declaration. "And coming this way!"

There was a movement on the part of Bob, and his chum knew he was getting his rifle in readiness. Jimmy followed this example. They were on the alert.

"Don't fire until you challenge," cautioned Jimmy. "It might be one of our fellows, you know."

"One of our fellows--out there? How could it be!"

"Might have advanced too far, been wounded and have waited for darkness to crawl back to our lines. Wait a second more until we see what he's up to."

"It's a man, sure!" Bob whispered, "and he's crawling toward us on his stomach."

"Let's do the same ourselves and crawl out to meet him," suggested Jimmy. "If he has a grenade, or a bomb, and tries to throw it, we may forestall him."

"Our orders were to stay here," decided Bob, and he was a great stickler for obeying orders to the letter. Perhaps even his small newspaper experience was responsible for this.

Suddenly the silence of the darkness was broken by an unmistakable sneeze. True, the sneezer, if I may use such a term, tried to stifle the explosion, but he was not altogether successful. It was a sneeze, and nothing could disguise it.

"Did you hear--" began Bob.

And then, to the greater surprise of the two listeners, there came a muttered exclamation in _German_.

"For the love of gas masks!" breathed Jimmy. "Take aim, Bob!"

And in another moment the fire of two rifles would have been concentrated on that moving splotch of blackness, whence had come the sneeze, except that the guttural German expletive was followed by a tense whisper. And the words came in good English.

"Don't shoot, boys! I'm Schnitz!"

Bob said, afterward, that the reaction was so great that he actually had a fit of nervous shivering, and Jimmy admitted the same. They fully expected a rush of the Huns, but they had made up their minds that first they would "get" the advance guard in the shape of the man who had sneezed. And then to hear the unmistakable voice of their comrade in arms!

It was almost unbelievable, and, for a moment, both listening lads had a doubt. This might be some trick of the Germans, and "Schnitz" was a sufficiently common Teutonic name, shortened as it was. But a moment later the voice from the darkness went on in the same cautious whisper:

"Don't fire, Bob--Jimmy! If you do, you'll spoil a little surprise-party."

"Say, what does this mean!" asked Jimmy, a bit sternly, for he was suffering from a reaction.

"You're supposed to be in the dugout, or somewhere back there," said Bob, when Franz had crawled to them and had arisen to stand beside them. "What brought you out? Were you sent?"

"I sent myself," was the laconic answer. "I couldn't stand it being cooped up back there. My ankle felt a lot better, and I took French leave, as it were. I sneaked out and I crawled over toward the Hun trenches. And say, I've got some information that the K.O. will give his eye teeth to have. They're raising a little party to come over and try to get back some of the land we took from 'em this morning. The Huns are going to raid our position in half an hour."

"Are you sure?" demanded Bob, and yet he knew that Franz would not say it if it were not so.

"Well, I'm as sure as one can be of anything in this war," was the answer in a whisper, all the talk being of that calibre. "I crawled over until I could hear the sentries talking. Then I located a dugout.

The door was open and more talk floated out. I heard enough to tell me that the raid is going to be made just before daylight and on this position."

"You mean where we are?" asked Bob.

"As nearly as I can tell," answered Franz, whose knowledge of the German language had again done him and his friends such good service.

"Whew!" softly whistled Jimmy. "We'd better get word to the K.O. in a jiffy. You'll get blue streaks, though, Schnitz, for disobeying orders."

"Oh, I guess not," was the easy answer. "It'll all be forgotten in the excitement. I just had to go out. I heard where you fellows were stationed on listening post and I started out with the intention of crawling back to your position. Hit it, too; didn't I?"

"That sneeze came near causing you to be hit, and with something harder than a rubber ball," said Jimmy grimly. "Bob? you'd better go back with him and let him tell his yarn to the captain. He doesn't know the pa.s.sword, and I'll have to stay here on duty. But hurry back and let me know what the word is."

"Right-O!" a.s.sented Bob, and a moment later he and Franz were stumbling back over the rough ground, and through the rain and darkness, toward the dugout where the officer in charge of that particular sector was on duty. A captured German dugout had been taken over, and such comforts as it afforded were utilized.

Just as Franz had surmised, the import of the news he brought in wiped out his offense against orders. He told in detail what he had overheard, and quick, sharp commands were at once sent out over the telephone, for the engineers had hastily strung wires when the advanced posts had been taken by the onrushing American doughboys.

And the information Franz had secured by his bold act proved correct in every detail. The Germans, smarting under their defeat, were determined on revenge. The raiding party came over--but they found the Americans ready.

It was not a large raid, not as large as Franz, in his enthusiasm, had intimated. And it was evidently undertaken to get back the commanding position occupied by that part of the 509th to which the five Brothers were a.s.signed.

But with the advent of the foe the Americans opened such a fire from rifles, hand grenades and light artillery, while the scene was illuminated by flaring lights, that the Huns were almost completely wiped out. A number of prisoners were taken, for the Boches, once they found the tide of battle going against them, threw down their guns and cried: "_Kamerad_!"

Sharp as was the fighting, it was only a slight incident in the great war. Such skirmishes, or trench raids, were occurring all along the Western front every night. But slight as it was it took the lives of several gallant American lads, and a number were wounded. Roger Barlow received a slight flesh wound, but he refused to go back to the dressing station, insisting on getting back into the fight when his hurt had received first-aid treatment.

"The only trouble was, though," Roger said later, "that the sc.r.a.p was all over when I got back from the first-aid post. Pity you fellows couldn't have kept it going until I could join you."

"Better to have it over with sharp and sudden than drag along,"

replied Jimmy. "They killed poor Baker right in front of me," he added, naming a "bunkie" of whom he and the five Brothers were very fond. "I might just as well have received that bullet."

"Yes. It's a queer world," mused Bob. "If it hadn't been that Franz went out against orders and got information, we might all be dead now."

And this was true.

Once more silence settled down over the trenches, but it was now almost morning, and with the breaking of dawn the rain that had been a drizzle all night settled into a steady downpour.

"Not much fighting to-day," decided Roger, when the four Brothers were at breakfast together--and a cold breakfast at that, for there was no fuel to heat the coffee, though word went around that the traveling kitchens were on their way toward the trenches.

Roger was right. Each side consolidated its positions, and each seemed waiting for what the other might do. This state of affairs continued for three days, during which the rain lasted. Save for an occasional artillery duel at night, precipitated often by some nervous sentry firing his rifle, there was no actual battle.

At the first chance, when he was off duty, Jimmy secured permission to go back to their former headquarters.

"I want to find out about Iggy if I can," he said, "and also make inquiries about Sergeant Maxwell and that money I owe you fellows."

"You don't owe it to us!" declared Roger.