“Ge-wounded,” said the prisoner, making signs to help his meaning. Under his guidance and with the pistol close to his ear all the time, they pulled aside some of the coats and found a man lying in a bunk hidden behind them. His head was tied up in a soaking bandage, the rough pillow was wet with blood, and by all the signs he was pretty badly hit. The Lieutenant needed no more than a glance to see the man was past being dangerous, so, after making the prisoner give him a drink from a water-bottle, they went round the walls, and found it recessed all the way round with empty bunks. “What a blazing ass I was not to hunt round,” said the Lieutenant, puffing another sigh of relief as they finished the jumpy business of pulling aside coat after coat, and never knowing whether the movement of any one of them was going to bring a muzzle-close shot from the blackness behind. “We must get out of this, though. It’s growing late, and the Battery will be wondering and thinking we’ve got pipped on the way back.” “What about these things, sir?” said the Signaller, pointing to the helmets and equipment they had hauled down. “Right,” said the Lieutenant; “I’m certainly not going without a souvenir of this entertainment. And I don’t see why Brother Fritz oughtn’t to make himself useful. Here, spread that big ground-sheet———” So it came about that an hour after a procession tramped back through the lines of the infantry and on to the gun lines—one German, with a huge ground-sheet, gathered at the corners and bulging with souvenirs, slung over his shoulder, the Lieutenant close behind him with an automatic at the ready, and the Signaller, wearing a huge grin, and with a few spare helmets slung to his haversack strap. “I thought I’d fetch him right along,” the Lieutenant explained a little later to the O.C. Battery. “Seeing the Battery’s never had a prisoner to its own cheek, I thought one might please ’em. And, besides, I wanted him to lug the loot along. I’ve got full outfits for the mess this time, helmets and rifles and bayonets and all sorts.” The Battery _were_ pleased. The Gunners don’t often have the chance to take prisoners, and this one enjoyed all the popularity of a complete novelty. He was taken to the men’s dug-out, and fed with a full assignment of rations, from bacon and tea to jam and cheese, while the men in turn cross-questioned him by the aid of an English-French-German phrase-book unearthed by some studious gunner. And when he departed under escort to be handed over and join the other prisoners, the Battery watched him go with complete regret. “To tell the truth, sir,” the Sergeant-Major remarked to the Lieutenant, “the men would like to have kept him as a sort of Battery Souvenir—kind of a cross between a mascot and a maid-of-all-work. Y’see, it’s not often—in fact, I don’t know that we’re not the first Field Battery in this war to bring in a prisoner wi’ arms, kit, and equipment complete.”