"Let him," said Bartlett. "He can only blame the rats."
"Halt! Who goes there?" exclaimed the hoarse voice of a sentry in the next traverse.
"Engineers' ration party," was the reply. "Is this the Royal Engineers?"
"Rather!" replied the ready Penfold. "Dump 'em down; we'll fetch them."
Out of the neighbouring dug-outs poured other Tommies. Without having any suspicion of the ruse played upon them, the ration party handed over the stores intended for a company of the Royal Engineers, who were engaged in tunnelling on the left of the Wheatshires' trenches. Almost in the nick of time a famine was averted at the expense of the sappers and miners. But, as Penfold remarked, it was each man for himself when it came to a case of semi-starvation.
CHAPTER V
THE EXPEDITION TO NO MAN'S LAND
""Turn out, you chaps! You're warned for duty in the first-line trench."
With the sergeant's words ringing in his ears Ralph Setley arose from his uncomfortable bed. A candle was still guttering. It was not yet dawn. The Huns' protracted shelling had ceased until the time for their customary morning "hate."