ounded moaned incessantly; some sat up
in the straw, heads turned also towards the dim, gray plain.

"It's an attack," said Grahame, coolly. "Marche, we're in for it
now!"

After a moment, he added, "What did I tell you? Look there!"

Out on the plain, where the mist was clearing along the edge of a
belt of trees, something was moving.

"What is it?" asked Lorraine, in a scarcely audible voice.

Before Grahame could speak a tumult of cries and groans burst out
along the line of wagons; a bugle clanged furiously; the
teamsters shouted and pointed with their whips.

Out of the shadow of the grove two glittering double lines of
horsemen trotted, halted, formed, extended right and left, and
trotted on again. To the right another darker and more compact
square of horsemen broke into a gallop, swinging a thicket of
lances above their heads, from which fluttered a mass of black
and white pennons.

"Cuirassiers and Uhlans!" muttered Grahame, under his breath. He
stood up in his seat; Jack rose also, straining his eyes, but
Lorraine hid her face in her hands and crouched in the chaise,
her head buried in the cushions.

The silence was enervating; even the horses turned their gentle
eyes wonderingly to that line of steel and lances; even the
wounded, tremulous, haggard, held their breath between clenched
teeth and stiff, swollen lips.

"Nom de Dieu! Serrez les rangs, tas de bleus!" yelled an officer,
riding along the edge of the road, revolver in one hand, naked
sabre flashing in the other.

A dozen artillerymen were pushing a mitrailleuse up behind the
overturned wagon. It stuck in the ditch.

"A nous, la ligne!" they shouted, dragging at the wheels until a
handful of fantassins ran out and pulled the little death machine
into place.

"Du calme! Du calme! Ne tirez pas trop vite, menagez vos
cartouches! Tenez ferme, mes enfants!" said an old officer,
dismounting and walking coolly out beyond the line of trees.

"Oui! oui! comptez sur nous! Vive le Colonel!" shouted the
soldiers, shaking their chassepots in the air.

On came the long lines, distinct now--the blue and yellow of the
Uhlans, the white and scarlet of the cuirassiers, plain against
the gray trees and grayer pastures. Suddenly a level sheet of
flame played around the stalled wagons; the smoke gushed out
over the dark ground; the air split with the crash of rifles. In
the uproar bugles blew furiously and the harsh German cavalry
trumpets, peal on pea