ob."

"No, you go first, old man."

"See you hanged before I do," was Dennis's blunt response, and with an
"Oh, very well," Bob Dashwood grabbed the leather sling, and, lowering
himself to the ground, was caught by Tiddler in his outstretched arms.

The other two dropped at the same moment, Dennis smothering a groan as
his head seemed to open and shut from the jar.

"It'll save time, sir, if you'll carry my pack," said Harry Hawke, with
a backward glance at the brewery. "Make a chair, Tid, and look slippy";
and before he quite knew what was happening the two privates had joined
hands, and Bob Dashwood was being carried forward at a run across that
deadly No Man's Land.

"First stop, British trench, Tiddler!" sang out the irrepressible Hawke,
as they blundered along the side of a crater. "We'd given you up as a
bad job, sir. Lord! You ought to see A Company. Don't believe there's
more than thirty of us left." And a strain of gloomy seriousness
vibrated in the speaker's voice.

"Yes, I know," said Captain Bob savagely, adding sharply, "Bear away to
the left here."

"Beg pardon, sir, but that's our trench yonder," expostulated his
bearers.

"Quite so," said Bob Dashwood. "But do you hear that?"

Under the perpetual thunder of the guns a sudden low roar came out of
the darkness at right angles to the trench for which they had been
making--the eager clamouring of hoarse voices, and many of them.

"That's the Australian Division on its way to storm that infernal
brewery, and we must stop them at any cost."

"Lumme! They'll want a bit of stopping," muttered Tiddler through his
nose. "They're more likely to stop us. Them Anzac blokes don't let much
grass grow in front of their bayonets."

"Dennis," sang out the Captain, "get on ahead and see what you can do
with them; and you, lads, put me down and go forward with my brother.
I'm only an incubus."

"No, sir," replied Harry Hawke firmly. "You ain't no nincompoop. It's
only an orficer's voice those chaps will listen to. We'll carry you
right enough."

The trench from which the Australian Division was advancing branched off
northward, and as Dennis sprinted forward to meet them he could make out
the first rush tearing across the broken ground, yelling like fiends.

Still running, he shrilled out the order to halt on his whistle again
and again, without result, and then as a hand gripped his throat, he
felt the cold barrel of a revolver clapped to his throbbing f