“The dirty German spy. What the hell does he think he’s doin’?”
“Ought to be back at G. H. Q. with the rest of the dummies.”
The lieutenant, unable to distinguish the mumbling voices as belonging to any particular persons, vowed to himself that when the platoon was relieved and back in a rest camp, he would give them extra fatigue duty for a month.
They were coming to another woods, and within a few yards of its fringes some officers stepped out and halted them.
“All right, here you are.”
“Lieutenant, swing your men right in here and don’t let any one get out of the woods.”
The men backed in among the trees and lay down, their packs, raising their shoulders from the ground, protecting them from the moisture. They lay silent, with their rifles cradled in their arms. No one seemed to mind the wet of the grass or the chill of the air. They were all silent and rather full of fear. Time was unknown. They might have been there a year—a minute—an æon.
Just as the trees, in a clump of woods, perhaps a mile away, were beginning to come out against the sluggish sky like sharp, delicate etchings, the batteries awoke. After the first flock of shells, sounding like black, screaming spirits, were fired, the men in the woods were fully aroused and many of them were standing.
“Uh-h-h, did you hear that bunch of sandbags?”