Well, so far he had escaped.  Heaven knew how he had managed it; he only knew that the last two years had been as long as fifty, and he seemed to have been living since the beginning of the world.  But here he was, and actually keeping step with a storming party.  He kept his eyes on Dave’s long lean back immediately in front and trudged on, divided between an insane desire to know of what Dave was thinking, and an equally insane wonder what Dave’s body might be worth to him as cover.

What was the silly word capering in his head?  “Mill-clappers.”  Why on earth “Mill-clappers?” It put him in mind of home:  but he had no silly tender thoughts to waste on home, or the folks there.  He had never written to them.  If they should happen on the copy of the Gazette—­and the chances were hundred to one against it—­the name of Nathaniel Varcoe among the killed or wounded would mean nothing to them.  He tramped on, chewing his fancy, and extracted this from it:  “A man with never a friend at home hasn’t even an excuse to be a coward, curse it!”

Suddenly the column halted, in a bank of fog through which his ear caught the lazy ripple of water.  He woke up with a start.  The fog was all about them.

“What’s this?” he demanded aloud; then, with a catch of his breath, “Mines?”

“Eh, be quiet,” said Teddy Butson at his elbow; “listen to yonder.”  And the word was hardly out when an explosion split the sky and was followed by peal after peal of musketry.  Nat had a swift vision of a high black wall against a background of flame, and then night came down again as you might close a shutter.  But the musketry continued.  “That will be at the breaches,” Dave flung the words over his left shoulder.  Then followed another flash and another explosion.  This time, however, the light, though less vivid than the first flash, did not vanish.  While he wondered at this Nat saw first of all the rim of the moon through the slant of an embrasure, and then Teddy’s pale but cheerful face.

The head of the column had been halted a few yards only from a breastwork, with a stockade above it and a chevaux de frise on top of all.  As far as knowledge of his whereabouts went, Nat might have been east, west, north or south of Badajos, or somewhere in another planet.  But the past two years had somehow taught him to divine that behind this ugly obstruction lay a covered way with a guard house.  And sure enough the men, keeping dead silence now, could hear the French soldiers chatting in that unseen guard house and laughing.

“Now’s the time.”  Nat heard the word passed back by the young engineer officer who had crept forward to reconnoitre:  and then an order given in Portuguese.

“Ay, bring up the ladders, you greasers, and let’s put it through.”  This from Teddy Butson chafing by Nat’s side.