"On that beet-field over there, fifteen hundred yards to the right?"
"Yes, sir."
The artillery-captain, who had been listening to the conversation, made a jest in his turn:
"While you are about it, corporal, as you have already given me the distance and I know the direction more or less, couldn't you give it to me exactly, so that I may lay my guns right and smash the German batteries?"
"That will be a longer job, sir, and much more difficult," said Paul. "Still, I'll try. If you don't mind examining the horizon, at eleven o'clock precisely, towards the frontier, I'll let off a signal."
"I don't know, sir. Three rockets, I expect."
"But your signal will be no use unless you send it off immediately above the enemy's position."
"Just so, sir."
"And, to do that, you'll have to know it."