Adventure Magazine Cover, June 20, 1925 — page 30: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

12 Adventure where we was at in this. —— hole.” “Can’t you tell by the ambulances?” asked Nell. “Naw. They might be goin’ up empty. They run both ways. But trucks usually only run one way this time o’ night, and that’s up to the front. If I'd only had sense I’d have looked when they was splat- terin’ mud on us, but I was too busy hang- ing on to the guy ahead.” _ After a while there was a halt. The halt was signalled by each man running his nose against the rifle or pack of the man in iront, at the same time doing his best to climb up the back of his legs. The men stated their feelings with some energy of expression, but finding after a minute or so that his was a real halt, and not just a check in the march to allow traffic to clear up, sat down in the mud and listened to the rain pattering on their steel helmets. “T begin to think I could sleep,’ said Nell to the man next him. “I spent the last twofnights in a box car with about forty other birds and the sleeping quarters were poor. What do they do to you if you ease off your pack and forget to put it on again?” “T wouldn’t,” said the other man, whose voice showed him to be Spagett. ‘We all got new stuff issued us an’ when we get back to billets they’ll have a show- down, an’ any one that’s shy, finds it on the payroll.” Nell sighed. The pack was intolerably heavy. when he walked and the straps were cutting his arms off. In addition, he had a belt full of ammunition, an item that was not the lightest of all he had on him. He wondered how Goodrich’s boil was. Off in the woods there was a short, sharp sound, a kind of crack, like.a bat meeting a ball for a home run. The resting column woke to instant comment. °Sa G.I. can!” “‘Ain’t either. We’re outta range!” “Was that a shell? By , it sounded like one!” The sound occurred again, prefaced by a short whistle. “Boy,” said Spagett, “‘they done us dirt! Those are shells as sure as I’m sittin’ in this mud! Rest billets, ——! We’re goin’ up again.” “Do you really think so?” cried Nell. “Honest to —— now!” It bumped the back of his legs “Huh!” grunted Spagett. “TI seen enough of ’em. You won't be so crazy about goin’ to the front this time tomorrow night, that. is, if you ain’t pushin’ up daisies by then.’ ‘THE column moved forward a few yards and halted again, per- haps to get away from the shells. There was bitter discus- sion on all sides. The noise was a shell bursting. The noise was no such thing, but men unloading lum- ber for barracks. The column was already under fire, and there had been casualties at the head of it. The column was out of range, for they had just passed a cross roads where they had lost the road coming up ten days before. The officers were lost and were going back to the front instead of away from it. Another short forward stretch and an- other halt. This was prolonged and Nell tried to lie down and get a bit of sleep, first cautioning Spagett to awaken him when the column went forward again. This Spagett agreed to do, provided he was awake him- self. : The next thing Nell heard was the clang of a bell and a wild cry. He sat up at once, knowing from the stiffness of his limbs that he had been asleep. “°S that?” cried the men. alarm?” “Gas alert!’ was passed sternly up and down the column, and the men who had been carrying their masks under their arms put them at the alert position, that is, strapped to their chests, and waited with beating hearts for another alarm, or the smell of gas in the air. . ‘Curran,’ said the corporal sternly. ‘Was that you made that noise?” “Tt fell outta my pack,” said Curran plaintively. “All right. A week in the kitchen for you when we get to billets. I told you to leave that —— thing behind.” ““What’s this?’”’ asked Nell. ‘‘Aw, this dizzy Curran’s got one o’ those vases they make outa a 75 shell. The order is out that we ain’t to do it no more and that all that kinda stuff is to be turned in, but Curran’s hangin’ on to that vase like grim death. He says he’s goin’ to send it home to his girl. Hey, here comes some troops!” There was the sound of a -column “That a gas COMIGDIOOKSEEO