ront of them and cautiously raised his head above the ridge.
Next instant he ducked to escape a rain of bullets that scattered the
sand about them like a mist.

"That was foolish," said Patsy reprovingly. "You might have been
killed."

"No such luck," he muttered in reply, but the girl could see that he
trembled slightly with nervousness. Neither realized at the time the
fatal folly of the act, for they were unaware that the Germans were
seeking just such a clew to direct them where to drop their shells.

"It's getting rather lonely here, and there are a couple of vacant
hollows in front of us," remarked the doctor. "Suppose we move over to
one of those, a little nearer the soldiers?"

Patsy approved the proposition, so they gathered up their supplies and
moved along the hollow to where a passage had been cut through. They had
gone barely a hundred yards when a screech, like a buzz-saw when it
strikes a nail, sounded overhead. Looking up they saw a black disk
hurtling through the air, to drop almost where they had been standing a
moment before. There was a terrific explosion that sent debris to their
very feet.

"After this we'll be careful how we expose ourselves," said the doctor
gravely. "They have got our range in a hurry. Here comes another; we'd
better get away quickly."

They progressed perhaps half a mile, without coming upon any soldiers,
when at the brow of a hill slightly higher than the rest, they became
aware of unwonted activity. A trench had been dug along the ridge, with
great pits here and there to serve as bomb-proof shelters. Every time a
head projected above the ridge, a storm of bullets showed that the enemy
was well within rifle range. In fact, it was to dislodge the Germans
that the present intrenchments were being made; machine guns would be
mounted as soon as positions had been prepared.

The German bullets had already taken their toll. In the little valley a
poor Belgian pressed his hand against a bad wound in his side, while
another was nursing an arm roughly bandaged by his fellows in the
trenches. First aid made the two comfortable for the time being at least
and the men were directed toward the ambulance. As they left, the man
with the wounded arm pointed down the narrow valley to where a deep
ravine cut through. "We were driven from there," he said. "The big guns
dropped shells on us and killed many; there are many wounded beyond--but
you cannot cross the ravine. We lost ten in doi