"Come on! Come on!" cried Bob hoarsely.
But Iggy and his comrades needed no urging. They were rushing at the Germans like human tigers. They had heard so much and seen so much of the cruelty of the Huns that each time the Sammies went into battle it was as though they were taking personal revenge on the Kaiser's troops.
Bob felt something, it was as if a great blast of air passed him. It lifted him from the earth and hurled him back, but he managed to regain his feet. Then came a terrible noise behind him—so far back that he was not harmed. But that could not be said for half a score of his comrades. A great shell exploded in their midst, and there were more than a score of casualties from it.
"Close call!" murmured Bob as he staggered on. He lost sight of Iggy in the rush, but hoped the Polish lad was following closely. Then Bob had his hands full, for he and his immediate companions encountered some German machine-gun crews, and there was hard fighting before the Boches were killed or thrown into complete disorder.
"Forward! Forward!" was the order, and well was it obeyed.
On over the German trenches went the Sammies. Now and again they were held up by the fierce firing of hidden weapons, and then squads would volunteer to clean out these frightful nests.
Bob volunteered for this perilous work more than once, and after one assault on a party of Huns entrenched in a ruined farmhouse Bob was slightly wounded. But he kept on fighting, and at last the Boches cried "Kamerad!" That is, those did who were able.
A party started back with the prisoners—about a dozen of them—while the rest of Bob's companions paused a moment to rest in the farmhouse, which was pretty well battered up.
"Well, we'd better get out of here—there's work ahead for us," said the second lieutenant who had led the assault on the machine-gun position. "Come along, boys!"
Just as they were leaving the house it seemed as if the very earth was disrupted. Bob felt himself being hurled through the air and he had a vision of the building being blown apart. The next thing he realized was that he was falling. Then came oblivion.