ding that of the manufacturer's son, who had thought that
war would be beneficial as a deterrent to strikes and an impetus to
industry, lying with his head on his arm, his neck twisted, and the
whites of his eyes idled skyward. In a spasm of sickening realization of
how impossible it was for those who had not run back to survive between
two lines of fire, they heard a shot from the ground at their feet and
beheld the runt of the company in the act of making war single-handed.
It was a miracle! It was like the dead coming to life!

"Peterkin?"

"Yes, Peterkin!"

"With a whole skin!"

Probably it was a great mistake for him to have a whole skin, thought
Peterkin. He scrambled to his feet and kept pace with the others, hoping
that he would be overlooked in the ranks.

"I'm so glad! Dear little Peterkin!" said Hugo Mallin, who was at
Peterkin's side.

His knowledge of Hugo's gentle nature convinced Peterkin that Hugo was
trying to soften the forthcoming reprimand.

When their feet at last actually stood on the knoll which had dealt
death to their ranks and they saw the brown figures of the enemy that
had driven them back in full flight, the men of the 128th felt the
thrill of triumph won in the face of bullets. This is a thrill by
itself, primitive and masculine, that calls the imagination of men to
war for war's sake. Pilzer, the butcher's son, wanted to kill for the
sheer joy and revenge of killing. He rejoiced in the dead and the blood
spots that, as clearly as the trench itself, marked the line that
Dellarme's men had occupied along the crest of the knoll. It pleased him
to use one of the bodies as a rest for his rifle, while he laid his
sight in ecstasy on the large target of two men of the last section who
were bringing off one of the wounded, and he swore when they got away.

"But there's another out there all alone!" he cried. "Better say your
prayers, for I'm going to get you," he whispered; though, as we know,
Stransky was not hit.

Peterkin had been doing his best to make amends for past errors by
present enthusiasm of application. He fired no less earnestly than the
butcher's son. Now that Eugene Aronson was dead, Pilzer had become
Peterkin's chief patron and guide. He would be doing right if he did
what that brave Pilzer did, he was thinking, while he was conscious of
Fracasse's eyes boring into his back. With the others, but no more
expeditiously, however frightened, he fell back to cover from the b