Patrol work, mostly at night, continued to be my chief duty. On one occasion I lost my bearings, and presently found myself almost upon one of the boche listening posts. "So long as I have come thus far, I will edge in and take a chance," I said to myself. I knew it would be almost as dangerous to go back as to go forward, for at any moment a man might crane his neck above the parapet, see me moving, and fire. Then there was the momentary chance that a star bomb would light the heavens and all the earth between the lines, in which case a thousand rifles would begin sputtering at everything that moved or seemed to be alive. Each second I expected it to come. My nerves felt as if they were drawn taut--taut as the barbed wire which the boches string so tight that if it is cut in the night it will twang like the string of a violin. But the quick shot in the night did not come, and I wriggled forward through the wire. I was almost at the edge of the parapet of the listening post. I heard voices whispering in German. Some one was scrambling up over the parapet. How was I to get away? I could not, so I lay on my belly and buried my face in the earth--the earth which should be wholesome and life giving, but which stunk with unspeakable things. Three heads appeared above the parapet. Shoulders followed, and cautiously a patrol of three men wriggled out from the listening post and then separated. One of them, in getting out, slipped, and I could hear him "strafing" under his breath, as he vanished into the night. Another head thrust itself above the parapet. I was sure a pair of eyes were staring at me, though I could not see them in the dark. Once more I lay as if dead. "What's the difference?" I thought; in a few moments, probably, I would be, and then I should not mind the sight or the odour of what was around me. The man in the listening post reached down for something at his feet. I was sure that he was going to hurl a grenade in my direction. Something came hurtling through the air. I sunk my teeth into my lip to keep from crying out, and wondered how the explosion would feel--whether there was any anguish in being torn to bits instantaneously. The dark object plumped onto the ground at my side and bumped against my ribs. How long it took for it to explode! Then I knew it was only a stone. I continued to lie as still as one dead.