as no answer
except the distant rumble of the heavy artillery fire. He repeated the
call several times. Here and there to the north of them occasional
rockets went up from either line, but their brief light divulged nothing
in the way of encouragement.

"It's not doing you any good to sit here without attention," said Slim
at last. "Here is your revolver right alongside you. I will be back
within half an hour. I am going to scout around for help."

"But don't take any chances for me," Tom Rawle warned him. "I guess I
could crawl back to camp, at that."

"No, you couldn't," Slim declared, "and mind you don't try it. I'll be
back for you in a very short time."

He disappeared in the direction that the rest of the party had taken,
leaving Rawle there to await his return. Half an hour later he managed
to find the spot again, but without the aid he had gone to get. Not a
trace of the others had he been able to find.

But that was not the worst of it. Tom Rawle, helpless for all his big
body and physical strength, lay stretched out upon the ground
unconscious, a pool of blood by his side!

Slim put his water flask to the wounded man's lips and tried to rouse
him, but without avail.

"_Whip-poor-will-l-l_," whistled Slim. "_Whip-poor-will-l-l._" But the
sound was lost somewhere in the denseness of the night, and there was
not even an echo for response.

Slim was growing desperate. At any time they might be discovered by an
enemy scouting party, and then they would either be bullets' victims or
prisoners of war. Yet he knew that he could not hope to carry Tom Rawle
back to the American lines. Rawle's dead weight would have been a
difficult burden for a man of twice Slim's strength, and he knew it.

What should he do? Unnecessary delay might cost the other man's life.
Already his wound had caused him to lose consciousness.

As he turned the thing over in his mind there came faintly, ever so
faintly, to him from far, far to the south, as though but a breath of
wind, the familiar "_Whip-poor-will_."

"_Whip-poor-will-l-l_," shrilled back Slim.

He waited, but there was no answer. It was as though a whip-poor-will
itself was mocking his plight.

"_Whip-poor-will-l-l_," Slim whistled again, and thrice, but each time
there was nothing but the grim silence for reply.

"Tom," he whispered into Rawle's ear, gently shaking the wounded man.
"Tom, can you get up? I'll help you back. We can make it somehow
together."

Bu