Not far away and almost directly in front of me one of those yellow-breasted starling birds was trying his song with considerable success.
“How far away are they?” I inquired in the softest possible of whispers of the nearer-most of the hole's tenants.
“Right there in those little trees,” he answered. “I ain't never been able to see any of them—they're purty smart about keepin' themselves out of sight—but there's times, 'specially toward night, when we kin hear 'em plain enough talking amongst themselves and movin' round over there. It's quiet as a graveyard now, but for a while this mornin' one of their sharpshooters got busy right over there in front of where you're lookin' now.”
Involuntarily I drew my head down into my shoulders. The youth alongside laughed a noiseless laugh.
“Oh, you needn't worry,” he said in my ear; “there ain't a chancet for him to see us; we're too well hid. At that, I think he must've suspected that this here lump of dirt was a shelter for our folks because twicet this mornin' he took a shot this way. One of his bullets lodged somewhere in the sods over your head but the other one hit that bush there. See where it cut the little twig off.”
I peered where he indicated and made out a ragged stump almost within arm's reach of me, where a willow sprout had been shorn away. The sap was oozing from the top like blood from a fresh wound. My instructor went on:
“But after the second shot he quit. One of our fellers back behind us a piece took a crack at him and either he got him or else the Heinie found things gettin' too warm for him and pulled his freight back into them deep woods further up the hill. So it's been nice and quiet ever since.”
The captain wormed into the burrow, filling it until it would hold no more.
“Is this your first close-up peep at No Man's Land?” he inquired in as small a voice as his vocal cords could make.
Before I could answer the private put in: