Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line; Or, The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam
They're trying to drive the Huns back so we can go on. We've got to get farther than this."

The battle was now one of longer range, the first fierceness of the infantry having spent itself. Indeed, the men were practically out of ammunition, though a reserve stock was being rushed to them under the cover of the American guns. A considerable space, corresponding to No Man's Land, separated the two lines, and over the heads of the prostrate men flew the shells of their respective batteries. So, for the time being, except for stray shooting of rifles and machine guns, the two confronting lines of infantry were comparatively safe.

It was during this lull that Bob, looking back from where he was sheltered by a little hill of earth and stones, uttered a cry. "What's the matter?" asked Jerry quickly. "Are you hit, Chunky?" "Hit? No! But look there! Fried holes! See 'em!"

For an instant both Ned and Jerry thought that Bob had been seriously hurt, and was out of his head. But they looked to where he pointed and saw a man in the uniform of the Salvation Army coming across the ground over which the Americans had recently stormed. And the intrepid noncombatant carried on either arm a big basket of a type well known to our American fighters.

"Fried holes!" cried Bob. "Fried holes! Salvation Army doughnuts, fellows! I'm going to get some!"

Just how it happened that the Salvation Army worker had ventured into that place of death none knew, and none stopped to inquire. Probably the man, in his eagerness to serve, did not realize where he was nor how he got there. Naturally he would have been denied permission to go forward during an engagement--that was no time nor place for a noncombatant. But he probably had not asked. He had made his way through a rain of lead and steel to a zone of comparative safety. And there he stood, as if bewildered, with his baskets of cheer on his arms.

And now a sudden change in the battle made the zone of comparative safety one of danger. For the range of the German guns became shorter. The muzzles were being depressed to seek out those intrepid Americans who had rushed over the first Hun trenches and were waiting to rush onward again. This must not be, thought the Huns, and so they sought them out to kill them.

So it was that as Bob spied the "fried holes" the dispenser of them gave a start as a bullet or a piece of shell flew close to his head. He was in grave danger now, and realized it. But he did not falter. He gave one backward glance, not with an idea of retreating, that is sure, but 
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