of shame made the thinker's cheeks burn the next moment, he had,
in his annoyance, stretched out his left hand to reach dodge's shoulder
and give him a violent shake. But half-way he checked the progress of
his hand; for, sotting aside the danger of waking a sleeper and making
him start and utter some ejaculation, which might betray them to a
lurking enemy, he recalled the fact that a touch was to be the signal to
announce the coming of the enemy.

The next moment, as his hand lay upon the snow where he had let it fall,
another hand was laid upon it, and his fingers were gripped by a set of
fingers which held it fast and gave it a firm, steady pressure, to which
he warmly responded, his heart beating fast, and a genial glow of
satisfaction running through him in his penitence for misjudging his
faithful companion.

Then the hand that grasped his was snatched away, and he lay listening
and gazing in every direction that he could command for the danger just
signalled to him by Gedge. Nothing to right or left, and he dared not
stir to look back over the snow. Nothing in front, not a sign of any
one near; and in his excitement he began to wonder whether his companion
had made a mistake in his over-eagerness, for the silence was more
oppressive than ever.

"What was that?"

A spasm shot through the listener, making every nerve and muscle tense
as steel; his breath came thick and fast, and the dull, heavy throb,
throb of his heart sounded loudly in his brain--so loudly that he held
his breath and would have checked the pulsations if he could.

There was no doubt now: the enemy was close at hand, and Bracy's fingers
closed over the hilt of his bayonet with a tremendous grip, for he felt
that his revolver would be useless in that terrible darkness, and he
shrank from wasting a shot.

He could see nothing, but there was the danger just in front in the snow
of those thirty yards which lay between them and the rocks. That danger
was represented to the listeners in imagination by the figure--two
figures--of the white-coated enemy, crawling slowly as huge worms might,
have progressed over the snow. At times they were perfectly still, but
ever and again there was the extremely gentle, crackling sound of the
icy grains rubbing together with a soft, rustling sound, no more than a
snake would have made passing along a dusty track.

Bracy strained his eyes, but he could see nothing. He could not tell
whether the two enemies