"How many would be alive at this same time to-morrow night?"
Slowly the seconds and minutes ticked themselves away. Silently the soldiers in the trenches made ready. And behind the lines preparations to support the advance, after the way was prepared for it by shells from the big guns, were going on.
Silently groups of alert men gathered behind their officers in the traverses. The sentinels stood on the firing step, ready and waiting. Short ladders were placed here and there to facilitate the fighters in getting out of the sunken protections.
Bob noted the illuminated minute hand of his watch creeping on toward the XII.
"Sixty seconds more," he murmured. He glanced over toward Iggy. In the faint dawn he could see his Polish chum standing with his rifle, ready to leap from the trench.
Then, suddenly, like a burst of thunder from a clear sky, the American barrage started, and after a sufficient time had elapsed the whistles sounded.
"Over the top!"
The old, familiar, but always thrilling call. "Over the top!"
Out of the trenches leaped Bob, Iggy and their comrades. On toward the German lines they rushed, the half-darkness of the dawn now illuminated with the flashes from the big guns.
The Germans were not long in replying. They were not taken by surprise, and soon a rain of H. E. shells, as well as shrapnel, began to deluge the American positions. But through this storm of missiles the gallant lads of the 509th Infantry leaped forward. They yelled and shouted, but they, each one, only heard his own voice, so great was the din of the guns.