there was no sign of life. It had been
spouting death from a machine gun but a little while before, however.

"Look out!" some one shouted. "Maybe they're playing possum!"

And so it was, for as the group advanced there was a burst of fire,
and half a dozen men went down. Ned and Bob had a vision of Jerry
crumpling up at the very entrance of the dugout, and their hearts
seemed to stop beating.

"Drive 'em out! Kill the Boches! Wipe 'em up!" yelled the survivors.

With a fierce yell, Ned tossed into the open doorway a hand grenade.
It exploded with terrific force, partly wrecking the place, and then
in rushed he and his comrades, with gleaming bayonets.

"_Kamerad! Kamerad!_" came the cowardly appeal from the Germans.

And a moment later out of the dugout where the machine gun had been
concealed came four German soldiers, all that was left alive of a
company of twenty, and of these four two were badly wounded.

Ned and Bob, seeing that the place, the last of any opposition in that
section, was captured, were about to turn back to see if Jerry was
still alive, when a second look at one of the German prisoners caused
Ned to cry:

"Nick Schmouder!"

"_Ja!_" came the answer, and then, in German, he asked:

"Who speaks my name?"

"Nick Schmouder!" said Ned again.

"Do you know this man?" asked an officer sharply.

"Yes," answered Ned. "He used to be a janitor at Boxwood Hall, a
school I attended."

And the face of Nick Schmouder showed as much wonder as did that of
Ned Slade.

CHAPTER XIX

NEWS AT LAST

"Well, well, Nick! To think of meeting you here!" exclaimed Bob.

"Don't speak to the Hun!" some one called, and then, for the first
time, Ned and Bob seemed to realize that the little man, with whom
they had been on friendly terms at college, was an enemy.

But such was the case. It was only one of many queer incidents of the
war, and more than one fighting American found among the prisoners
sent back, after he and his comrades had cleaned up a Boche nest, some
man he had known back home--a former waiter at a club, perhaps, or a
man who delivered his groceries.

"How came you here?" asked Nick Schmouder, with scarcely a trace of
German accent, as he and the other prisoners stood with upraised
hands, though one of the survivors had to drop his as he fell in a
heap because of weakness from his wounds.

"We came here to teach the Kaiser how to walk Spanish," said Bob. "I
didn't think you'd fi