"What are they waiting for?" muttered Tom peevishly. "Are they getting cold feet? Or are they waiting for another gang of hoboes to join them before they care to tackle us?" "It isn't that," Frank answered. "They may be planning new tactics. Their others didn't work very well." "I believe they're going away," cried Billy, as he saw the crowd dispersing. "Guess again," returned Frank. "They're doing what I've been afraid all along they'd try to do. They're spreading out so as to surround us on all sides. They didn't have men enough to do that at first, but they've got them now." A few minutes more and they saw that Frank was right. The men were describing a wide circle, with the evident intention of attacking the Army Boys from all sides at once. "That means that they'll drive us out into the open," said Frank. "We can't be on both sides of a tree at once. Half of them at least can take pot shots at us without our having any shelter." "It's good dope from their point of view," remarked Tom. "We'd better start in to discourage it right away. They think they're out of range, but I'm going to try to prove to them that they're mistaken." His eye ran along his rifle barrel, and after taking unusually careful aim he fired. One of the Germans threw up his hands and fell. "A long shot, but I got him," remarked Tom with satisfaction. "Some shot," said Bart approvingly. The immediate result was a widening of the circle as the others tried to get back further out of range. But the circle kept forming just the same, and in a quarter of an hour it was completed. Then it began contracting, the foe taking advantage of every hill and every tree to get nearer. Occasionally they would send over some scattering shots, but in the main they held their fire until they should get into closer quarters. The Army Boys in the meantime had been working feverishly. The trees were no longer to be relied on, with enemies at the back as well as at the front. So they dug furiously into the snow, until they had heaped it high enough all around them to form a circular trench. When they had finished, the top of the trench was on a level with their eyes, so that their bodies were sheltered. But they had to lift their heads above it as often as they sighted and fired their rifles, and they risked getting a bullet every time they did it.