.

Seconds clicked by to add up to minutes, and minutes ticked by to add up
to an hour. Then eventually it was two hours, then three, then four. And
still the guns hammered and snarled and pounded away at their distant
objectives. It seemed as though it would never end. Try as they did to
steel themselves against the perpetual thunder, and the constant shaking
and heaving of the earth under them, it was right there with them every
second of the time. Their eardrums ached, and seemed ready to snap
apart. They tore off little pieces of their shirts and used them as
plugs to stuff in their ears. That helped some, but it made speech
between them impossible.

Roaring, barking thunder all morning, and all afternoon. But along
toward evening it died down considerably. And when the shadows of night
started creeping up it ceased altogether. The two boys crawled forward
and up the bomb-made rock steps and peered through the crack between the
stones. The hopes that had been born in them when the guns stopped
seemed to explode in their brains. The guns were not being hooked onto
the tractors. Nor were the swarms of troops climbing into the long lines
of motorized Panzer trucks. On the contrary, mess wagons were being
rolled forward, and flare lights were being set about all over the
place. Even as Dave and Freddy crouched there watching with sinking
spirits two flare lights sputtered into being directly above their
heads. With sudden terror gripping their hearts they scuttled back deep
into their hiding place.

"No soap, I guess," Dave said bitterly. "We'd stick out like a couple of
sore thumbs. What do you think, Freddy?"

"The same as you," the English youth said unhappily. "We'd be fools to
budge an inch. I most certainly wish we had blankets. These are the
hardest rocks I ever felt."

"You said it," Dave muttered and ran his hand over the hard surface that
was unquestionably going to serve as his bed for another night of
terror. "Maybe, though, they'll pull out before dawn. Or maybe in the
morning, for sure."

If the gods of war heard Dave Dawson's words they must have laughed loud
and with fiendish glee, for they knew how false his hopes were. The
Germans did not leave during the night. Nor did they leave in the
morning. As soon as it was dawn they started their devastating
bombardment again. And for another whole day the boys huddled together
in their hiding place and struggled with every bit of their will power
to st