ry, had seen two figures on the knoll. "How
kind! Thank you!" his thought spoke faster than words. No need of
range-finding! The range to every possible battery or infantry position
around La Tir was already marked on his map. He passed the word to his
guns.

The burst of their first shrapnel-shell blinded all three actors in the
scene on the crest of the knoll with its ear-splitting crack and the
force of its concussion threw Stransky down beside the sergeant.
Dellarme, as his vision cleared, had just time to see Stransky jerk his
hand up to his temple, where there was a red spot, before another shell
burst, a little to the rear. This was harmless, as a shrapnel's shower
of fragments and bullets carry forward from the point of explosion. But
the next burst in front of the line. The doctor's period of idleness was
over. One man's rifle shot up as his spine was broken by a jagged piece
of shrapnel jacket. Now there were too many shells to watch them
individually.

"It's all right--all right, men!" Dellarme called again, assuming his
cheery smile. "It takes a lot of shrapnel to kill anybody. Our batteries
will soon answer!"

His voice was unheard, yet its spirit was felt. The men knew through
their training that there was no use of dodging and that their best
protection was an accurate fire of their own.

"Shelling us, the ---- ----!" gasped Grandfather Fragini, who had
experience, if he were weak in reading and writing. "All noise and
smoke!"--as it was to a larger degree in his day.

Stransky had half risen, a new kind of savagery dawning on his features
as he regained his wits. With inverted eyes he regarded the red ends of
his fingers, held in line with the bridge of his nose. He felt of the
wound again, now that he was less dizzy. It was only a scratch and he
had been knocked down like a beef in an abattoir by an unseen enemy, on
whom he could not lay hands! He glared around as if in search of the
hidden antagonist. The sergeant had crept forward to be a steadying
influence to the men in their first trial, if need be, and the doctor
and a hospital-corps man were dragging a wounded man out of fine without
exposing their own shoulders above the crest. Stransky rolled his eyes
in and out; the tendons of his neck swelled; his jaw worked as if
crunching pebbles. Deafeningly, the shrapnel jackets continued to crack
with "ukung-s-sh--ukung-s-sh" as the swift breath of the shrapnel
missiles spread.

"Give it to 'em!