rtially
cross their track, which soldiers were already busy clearing away.
Without an instant's pause, the driver wheeled his car off the 'pave',
crashed through the broken treetops, and continued on his way.

Barry looked upon the huge trunk with amazement.

"Did a single shell break that tree off like that?" he asked.

"You bet," was the reply, "and all these you see along here. It's
the great transport road for our front line, and the boches shell it
regularly. Here comes one now," he added, casually.

There was a soft woolly "whoof" far away, a high, thin whine, as from a
vicious insect overhead, with every fractional second coming nearer and
yet nearer, ever deepening in tone, ever increasing in volume, until,
like an express train, with an overwhelming sense of speed and power,
and with an appalling roar, it crashed upon them. In the field on their
left, there leaped fifty yards into the air a huge mass of earth and
smoke. Then a stunning detonation.

Insensibly Barry and Cameron both crouched down in the car, but the
driver held his wheel, without the apparent quiver of a muscle.

"There'll be three more, presently, I guess," he said, putting on full
speed.

His guess proved right. Again that distant woolly "whoof," the
long-drawn whine, deepening to a scream, the appalling roar and crash,
and a second shell fell in the road behind them.

"Two," said the driver coolly. "There will be a couple more."

Again and yet again, each time the terror growing deeper in their souls,
came the two other shells, but they fell far behind.

"Oh, Fritzie," remonstrated the driver, "that's rotten bad work. You'll
have to do better than that."

Again and again, in groups of four, the shells came roaring in, but the
car had passed out of that particular zone of danger, and sped safely on
its way.

"Do you have this sort of thing every night?" enquired Barry.

"Oh, no," cheerfully replied the driver. "Fritzie makes a lot better
practice than that, at times. Do you see this?" He put his finger upon
a triangular hole a few inches above his head. "I got that last week.
We don't mind so much going up, but it's rather annoying when you're
bringing down your load of wounded."

As they approached Ypres, the road became more and more congested, until
at length they had to thread their way between two continuous streams
of traffic up and down, consisting of marching battalions, transports,
artillery wagons, ambulances, with n