Tom and George Harper were in a squad chosen immediately to go forward as scouts on the enemy’s eastern wing to endeavor to ascertain the exact strength there, and, if possible, to learn the location of the machine gun nests from which the Boche were adding to the havoc wrought by their artillery further back. Their work was most hazardous. Only the most cautious advance could obscure their movements from dozens of snipers hidden in the thick foliage of the trees. Most of the tanks either had been crippled by the shell fire or had been ordered to a safer distance back, and only the best strategy could bring the infantry into a position where it could storm and take the woods. Under the leadership of a sergeant the scouts crept forward. They attempted to make a detour, but there was no cover of darkness to obscure them; there was but a scattering growth of scraggly weeds and upturned rocks, and when but a short distance on their mission a fusilade of bullets that tore up the ground directly before them gave them ample notice that they were not unnoticed—in fact were about to be the especial targets of German marksmanship. Tom tumbled into the shell hole nearest him, and he saw Harper do the same only a few feet away. But as Tom rolled himself into his place of safety he landed upon something cushiony and soft. His landing also was accompanied by an angry grunt. It came from directly beneath him. In a flash Tom had turned and at the same time maneuvered himself to his hands and knees. He was directly astraddle a fat German. The American lad took in the situation in a glance. The Boche was bleeding from a wound in the left hand, but otherwise, so far as Tom could see, he was uninjured. But if he had deliberately flopped into that hole to avoid further fighting and surrender himself in safety to the advancing American troops, at least he had not forgotten the characteristic treachery of his training, for apparently he felt it would be a good piece of work first to deprive the United States of one more fighting man. He already had his revolver in his hand when Tom managed to turn around, and with a quick upward jerk he sought to bring it into range. But Tom Walton had not been the champion wrestler at Brighton for nothing, nor had he forgotten any of the jiujutsu movements which made him the peer of any of his pals in any rough-and-tumble contest. With a quick upward movement of his right hand he gave the German’s arm a twist which made the shot a harmless one as he pulled the trigger. At the same moment he brought his knee down in the man’s stomach with a force that jolted the breath almost completely out of him. But the German was a powerful man, despite his excess flesh, and as he made a grab for Tom’s arm he also partly rolled over in a way to endanger the younger man’s balance. Again he tried to bring the gun into play, but with a forward dive Tom took the only desperate course open to him and sunk his teeth deep into the Hun’s wrist.