Presently they were out of the shell hole and had turned themselves toward their own lines. Although the scouting party had started out together, the men had been ordered to return singly or in couples to the American lines, using their own discretion as to the length of time they remained out.
Now began the ticklish task of crawling safely back to their own trenches. The nearer they came to the center of No Man's Land the greater grew their danger. Jimmy knew that Schnitzel's desire to reach the American trenches quickly meant that he had learned something of decided importance.
Coming to a shell hole a little over halfway across the danger land, Schnitzel pulled him into it. One side of this crater projected over, forming a little cave underneath it. Into this, as far back as he could go, Schnitzel piloted Jimmy.
"Listen," he breathed. "I've got to tell you this in case anything should happen to me before we get back. The Boches are going to try another raid at four o'clock. They're going to open fire at two o'clock. One of their crack Prussian regiments has just come into the fire trench. No matter what our guns do, they're coming over, several waves of them. They're going to use extra batteries of their biggest guns to smash our defenses. They're after prisoners to torture. I heard 'em brag what they're going to do to the dogs of Americans. Now I'm going to get out of here and beat it for our lines. Wait what you think to be ten minutes, and then follow me. One of us surely will get back with the word. Good-bye, Blazes. If I don't see you again I'd like you to remember what I say now: 'You're the whitest guy I ever knew and I love you!'"
"You're the bravest old sport I ever knew, and I'm all there with the reciprocity stuff," Jimmy whispered tensely.
The two bunkies gripped each other's hands hard in the darkness. Then Schnitzel began to crawl away and out of the crater.
Directly he had gone, Jimmy crouched in the little cave, his ears straining to catch any sound that might proclaim disaster to his bunkie. Save for the occasional hiss of an ascending star shell, he could distinguish not even the faintest noise of a suspicious nature.
Waiting until he judged the ten minutes to have expired, he began his own perilous exit from the shell crater. He knew that the cave itself lay toward the German trenches. Crawling out of it he must continue straight ahead. The open side of the crater was toward the American lines. He could only hope that Schnitzel had also remembered this.
Climbing out of the hole, he decided upon a brave but reckless course of action. Getting to his feet he started for his own trenches, running lightly on his tiptoes. He knew that he was likely to crash headlong into a shell crater, or that a star shell might suddenly outline his upright running form with its silvery light. Still, he took a desperate chance on his fleetness of foot to reach his goal. Not for nothing had he won the hundred-yard dash at prep. school.
Luck was surely with him that night. He reached the American barbed wires without a single mishap, was challenged by a sentry, and passed on safely into the fire trench.