"Halt—who goes there?" went his challenge once more.
"Wot the 'ell's it got to do with you?" piped some one in the dark.
"Pass, Canadian—all's well," was the apt retort, which in itself reflects the unruly but otherwise splendid man from the Golden West.
For a time there was silence, during which [pg 247] Tamson puffed the smoke out of his dirty old cutty-pipe. Between puffs he mused on the mud and hunger of war, and occasionally switched his fancy back to where his own Mary Ann would be sitting in anxious dread. During this sort of meandering he was roused by the flashing lights of a powerful motor-car. On it came, right up to the barbed wire gate which Spud was guarding. Gripping his rifle in no uncertain fashion, he came down to the charge and bellowed out, "Halt—who goes there?"
"Staff officer, you fool—open the gate," said a muffled voice from the front of the car.
"Step oot and gie the countersign," ordered Spud.
"—— you—open the gate. I'll report you to your colonel."
"Report yer granny—gae me the countersign," persisted Spud, his whole cunning roused by the well-muffled face of this staff officer.
The officer jumped from the car. As he did so the alert sentry noted his hand behind his back. Something was wrong.
"Stand and gie the countersign."