New-Yorker bore himself with outward calm. But in the gray
dawn he looked haggard and drawn. Older! That flashed through Dorn's
mind. A single night had contained years, more than years. Others of the
squad had subtly changed. Dixon gave him a penetrating look, as if he
wore a mask, under which was a face of betrayal, of contrast to that
soldier bearing, of youth that was gone forever.

CHAPTER XXVIII

The squad of men to which Dorn belonged had to be on the lookout
continually for an attack that was inevitable. The Germans were feeling
out the line, probably to verify spy news of the United States troops
taking over a sector. They had not, however, made sure of this fact.

The gas-shells came over regularly, making life for the men a kind of
suffocation most of the time. And the great shells that blew enormous
holes in front and in back of their position never allowed a relaxation
from strain. Drawn and haggard grew the faces that had been so clean-cut
and brown and fresh.

* * * * *

One evening at mess, when the sector appeared quiet enough to permit of
rest, Rogers was talking to some comrades before the door of the dugout.

"It sure got my goat, that little promenade of ours last night over into
No Man's Land," he said. "We had orders to slip out and halt a German
patrol that was supposed to be stealing over to our line. We crawled on
our bellies, looking and listening every minute. If that isn't the
limit! My heart was in my mouth. I couldn't breathe. And for the first
moments, if I'd run into a Hun, I'd had no more strength than a rabbit.
But all seemed clear. It was not a bright night--sort of opaque and
gloomy--shadows everywhere. There wasn't any patrol coming. But Corporal
Owens thought he heard men farther on working with wire. We crawled some
more. And we must have got pretty close to the enemy lines--in fact, we
had--when up shot one of those damned calcium flares. We all burrowed
into the ground. I was paralyzed. It got as light as noon--strange
greenish-white flare. It magnified. Flat as I lay, I saw the German
embankments not fifty yards away. I made sure we were goners. Slowly the
light burned out. Then that machine-gun you all heard began to rattle.
Something queer about the way every shot of a machine-gun bites the air.
We heard the bullets, low down, right over us. Say, boys, I'd almost
rather be hit and have it done with!... We began to crawl back. I wanted