After a brief resting spell the lines were reformed and the fighting was resumed. The space between the second and the third lines was a wide one, and the country was hilly, with numerous lanes and ravines. These were being held in greater or less force by enemy troops posted in advantageous positions supported by machine guns, while beyond them their big guns kept up a heavy fire to prevent the Allied advance.
To clean these up and get ready for an attack upon the third line was a work of hours, as every foot of advance was bitterly contested by the Germans, who had now recovered from their surprise and fought desperately to stem the tide that had overwhelmed their first position.
There were two or three villages in the fighting zone and one town of considerable size. Not that it was a town now in any real sense of the word. What had once been houses were now mere pitiful heaps of wood and stone and mortar, and their inhabitants had long since been dispossessed or slain. It stood gaunt and desolate and forbidding in its mute protest against the pitiless storm of war to which it had fallen a victim.
In cleaning out a particularly obnoxious nest of machine gun positions Frank and his friends had been kept busy until nearly noon. But at last the guns were silenced and the crews wiped out or captured.
The boys started to regain their main force, but the country was unfamiliar and they took a turning in the road which led toward the German lines instead of toward their own.
"Gee!" remarked Tom as they trudged along, "maybe I'm not tired. My feet feel as though they weighed a ton."
"Perhaps they do," gibed Billy unfeelingly. "Considering the size of them, I should say a ton was just about right."
"I notice your hoofs are not so small," retorted Tom. "But how much longer is this hike going to take?"
"Search me," responded Frank. "To tell the truth, I'm twisted up about the direction. Seems to me we ought to strike some of our troops soon."
"It would be funny if we walked straight into the German lines," observed Billy.