her
four should divide this duty, allowing Frank, who had driven the truck
over the entire trip, a full night's sleep.

So the night passed, with the lads taking turns at the lonely vigil. The
snow continued, the wind increased almost to a gale, and the temperature
dropped still lower.

Fully eight inches of snow lay upon the ground when gray daylight came
and Slim, the last man on watch, awakened the others. The storm was
diminishing, but still they could see only a few yards distant from the
tractor.

"Guess I'll warm up chopping some wood," said Joe, as he took an axe and
left the others still dressing.

In half an hour he had brought in enough to cook the breakfast and last
half the day, and while Slim acted as cook, Jerry started out to fell
more saplings.

Before noon the clouds broke, the sun came out, and its reflection from
the pure white glistening snow was almost blinding.

"A snowball fight," suggested Jerry, and the others took up the idea as
a boon to dispel the monotony of their isolation.

With the lieutenant "umpiring" from the little wireless room of the
tractor, Joe and Frank "stood" Jerry and Slim, and from a distance of a
hundred feet apart the battle began.

One of Frank's well-aimed missiles caught Slim squarely in the mouth,
just as he was calling out some challenging remark, and from the window
of his post Lieutenant Mackinson laughingly shouted: "Strike one!"

Slim, spitting and blowing out the icy pastry, gathered all his
strength to hurl a ball back at Frank. But he "wound up," as baseball
pitchers call that curving swinging of the arm just before the ball is
thrown, with such vigor that he lost his balance. His feet went up into
the air and he came down ker-plunk! but the snowball left his hand with
what proved to be unerring aim.

Joe, letting out a howl of laughter at Slim's accident, caught the
tightly packed wad of snow right in the ear. He turned his back to the
"enemy," and, leaning forward, began pounding the other side of his head
to dislodge the snow.

Of a sudden he straightened up, uttering an exclamation of surprise.

"Lieutenant!" he shouted. "Look here!"

The lieutenant jumped out of the tractor, and the others followed him on
the run to where Joe and Frank were gazing off down into the opposite
valley.

Two, perhaps three, miles away, a winding, twisting line of black
against the snow was pushing its way laboriously around the mountain
base.

"Germans!" ex