Something had got to be done, he knew; and as the top of a tall tree rose above the level of his eyes, and the doomed balloon paused with a sickening jerk, he grasped at a branch, flung himself out, and dangled there. Relieved of his weight, the balloon, almost on the point of collapsing, dragged itself free of the twigs that held it with a last effort, and floated away to drop on the other side of the wood. He could hear the excited clamour as men left the trench and ran towards it; and even in the midst of his extraordinary peril he was fired with a wild desire to escape. His manoeuvre had not been seen, and, lowering himself rapidly hand under hand, he gained the foot of the tree which had proved his salvation, torn and bleeding, but with every nerve of mind and body on the alert. "They've not got me yet!" he muttered, as he looked about him; and, crawling on hands and knees, crept under the trunk of a fallen tree half a dozen yards away, where he lay down flat on his face. The very ground beneath him seemed to shake with every discharge, and the roar of the firing was continuous. Not only were both sides flinging a terrific barrage to check the arrival of reinforcements, but half a dozen isolated actions were taking place at various points of the extended battle line. From Trones Wood to Contalmaison Villa heavy fighting was in progress, and Dennis raged inwardly that by his own fault he should have neither act nor part in any of it. Presently, as he lay with his ear to the ground, he caught another sound much nearer than that of the firing--the thud of men running in heavy boots in his vicinity; and, worming himself still deeper among the undergrowth that surrounded the fallen tree, he drew his Webley revolver and waited. About a dozen of the enemy came past the tree on either side of it, peering this way and that, and stirring such brushwood as remained with their fixed bayonets. "Pooh!" said one of them, "this is a fool's quest. What is the good of looking for a man who has got a broken neck by this time?" "What is the good of the war, I should like to know?" replied one of his companions. "For my part, I am so sick of this terrible life that I would willingly surrender." "You had better not let our captain hear you talk like that, or you will be shot, my friend," said another of them; "though I dare say, if we were honest, two-thirds of the battalion would agree with you. But it is very certain the Englishman is not here, and the sooner we get back the better." They passed on; and as the crackle of their going among the bushes died away quickly, Dennis drew a deep breath of relief. He had no idea where he was, for the whole of that rolling country was dotted with irregular patches of woodland, his map case was gone, and the balloon had drifted considerably to the east before it fell.