little engine and
cars rolled slowly up to what served for a station, there came to their
ears dull boomings.

"Thunder?" asked Joe, for the day was hot and sultry.

"Guns at the front," remarked a French officer, who had been detailed to
be their guide the last part of the journey.

"At the front at last! Hurrah!" cried Joe.

"Perhaps you will not feel like cheering when you have been here a week
or two," said the French officer.

"Sure we will!" declared Charlie. "We can do something now besides look
at London chimney pots. We can get action!"

As the boys looked about on the beautiful little French village where
they were to be quartered for some time, it was hard to realize that, a
few miles away, men were engaged in deadly strife, that guns were
booming, killing and maiming, and that soon they might be looking on the
tangled barbed-wire defense of No Man's Land.

But the dull booming, now and then rising to a higher note, told them
the grim truth.

They were at the war front at last!

CHAPTER XVI

THE FIRING LINE

"Hello! Where are you fellows from?"

It was rather a sharp challenge, yet not unfriendly, that greeted Blake,
Joe and Charlie, as they were walking from the house where they had been
billeted, through the quaint street of the still more quaint French
village. "Where are you from?"

"New York," answered Blake, as he turned to observe a tall,
good-natured-looking United States infantryman regarding him and his two
chums.

"New York, eh? I thought so! I'm from that burg myself, when I'm at
home. Shake, boys! You're a sight for sore eyes. Not that I've got 'em,
but some of the fellows have--and worse. From New York! That's mighty
good! Shake again!"

And they did shake hands all around once more.

"My name's Drew--Sam Drew," announced the private. "I'm one of the
doughboys that came over first with Pershing. Are you newspaper
fellows?"

"No. Moving picture," answered Blake.

"You don't say so! That's great! Shake again. When are you going to give
a show?"

"Oh, we're not that kind," explained Joe. "We're here to take army
films."

"Oh, shucks!" cried Private Drew. "I thought we were to see something
new. The boys here are just aching for something new. There's a picture
show here, but the machine's busted and nobody can fix it. We had a few
reels run off, but that's all. Say, we're 'most dead from what these
French fellows call _ong we_, though o-n-g-w-e ain't the way yo