pany was to hold, they found a wallow, more like a dump heap
than a trench. The men who had taken the position were almost too
weak to stand. All their officers had been killed, and a sergeant
was in command. He apologized for the condition of the loop.

"Sorry to leave such a mess for you to clean up, sir, but we got
it bad in here. He's been shelling us every night since we drove
him out. I couldn't ask the men to do anything but hold on."

"That's all right. You beat it, with your boys, quick! My men
will hand you out some grub as you go back."

The battered defenders of the Boar's Head stumbled past them
through the darkness into the communication. When the last man
had filed out, the Colonel sent for Barclay Owens. Claude and
David tried to feel their way about and get some idea of the
condition the place was in. The stench was the worst they had yet
encountered, but it was less disgusting than the flies; when they
inadvertently touched a dead body, clouds of wet, buzzing flies
flew up into their faces, into their eyes and nostrils. Under
their feet the earth worked and moved as if boa constrictors were
wriggling down there soft bodies, lightly covered. When they had
found their way up to the Snout they came upon a pile of corpses,
a dozen or more, thrown one on top of another like sacks of
flour, faintly discernible in the darkness. While the two
officers stood there, rumbling, squirting sounds began to come
from this heap, first from one body, then from another--gases,
swelling in the liquefying entrails of the dead men. They seemed
to be complaining to one another; glup, glup, glup.

The boys went back to the Colonel, who was standing at the mouth
of the communication, and told him there was nothing much to
report, except that the burying squad was needed badly.

"I expect!" The Colonel shook his head. When Barclay Owens
arrived, he asked him what could be done here before daybreak.
The doughty engineer felt his way about as Claude and Gerhardt
had done; they heard him coughing, and beating off the flies. But
when he came back he seemed rather cheered than discouraged.

"Give me a gang to get the casualties out, and with plenty of
quick-lime and concrete I can make this loop all right in four
hours, sir," he declared.

"I've brought plenty of lime, but where'll you get your
concrete?"

"The Hun left about fifty sacks of it in the cellar, under your
Headquarters. I can do better, of course, if I have a