He spoke with truth, for on all sides the big guns were now beginning to bark, and a general engagement might be precipitated.
Some of the Americans snatched guns from the now cowed Germans, and prodded them back along the trench with the points of the bayonets. Others held hand grenades or automatic pistols ready, and the order to retreat was given.
Half a dozen Hun prisoners had been captured, but at a price, for when the lieutenant, hurrying his men back across No Man’s Land, began to look over his party, he found three were missing. They had either been killed or wounded, or were left prisoners in the trenches.
“Are you there, boys?” asked Jerry again, of his chums, and he received reassuring answers from both.
“Hurt?” was his next inquiry, as they raced across the stretch, stopping every time there was 106 a burst of star shells, and crouching down, making their prisoners do the same, to take shelter in some shell holes, some half-filled with water and others containing dead bodies.
“I’m all right,” Bob answered. “Only a bit scratched by some Hun’s bayonet, I guess.”
“A bullet or a bayonet touched me in the side,” came from Ned. “It’s bleeding a bit, but not much. I’m all right.”
Some of the others who were able to come back were not so fortunate, however, and two died later of wounds received in that night raid.
But the main party succeeded in getting back to the American lines, and hurried through the opening in the barbed wire, where a relief or a rescue party, whichever might be required, was in waiting.
“Good work!” commended the captain to his lieutenant. “And you got some prisoners?”