"Now wouldn't ut give one a quare shtart, that?" remarked Sergeant O'Hagan, sotto voce.
"Um-m," said the Captain thoughtfully. "I think Mr. Hamilton had better have a look round."
A few minutes later, having invaded the privacy of "Whortleberry Villa," he was relentlessly prodding a bundle of waterproofs.
"Come on, young fella!" he exclaimed when the bundle showed signs of life; "bombin' party forward. Brother Bosch is playin' the piccolo just outside Fosse 19."
The Subaltern scrambled out of his wraps and, with incredible dispatch, gathered together the Davids of his section. "All guaranteed," so he boasted, "to hit the cocoanut every time."
Accoutred with their infernal machines, the little band of hope passed along the trench as silently as a party of Fenimore Cooper's North-American Indians.
"Yes, they're at home right enough," muttered the Subaltern, after a cramped interval of breathless attention, "and fairly asking for it."
He proceeded to make his dispositions with the skill and assurance of an old hand. He was nearly nineteen.
"We're going to stalk 'em this time," he whispered to the men; "you keep on crawling till I say 'Go!' Then drop it on them quick."
He slid over the parapet like an eel and disappeared into the night. In a few moments the sentry was alone in the trench. His state of mind was, from sheer excitement, almost insupportable.