Behind them a slow firing had commenced to mount in volume.

The lieutenant lifted his visor and thrust through the crowd which was huddled in the outer chamber. He raised his hand in the honored signal to follow him and plunged off along a corridor. The pavement was very uneven, broken up by roots. Here and there steel beams in the roof had rusted through and let down piles of rubble. About a hundred and twenty yards up the line they passed a barrack in which tier upon tier of collapsed bunks still held the skeletons of men who had been caught by the direct hit of a shell. Above, on another level, the twisted and corrosion-congealed remains of big guns stood like prehistoric monsters, forgotten by time.

From observation slots along the way, sheets of light came through, flicking along the passing column.

"I didn't know any of these were left," said Malcolm in an awed voice. "I'd heard about them being used once—How many dead there are here!"

"Fortress fever, mutinies—Toward the last the pioneers had a trick of lowering gas grenades through the observation slots from above."

Malcolm tripped over a sprawled human framework and a shaft of light caught in the gold of medals as they tinkled down through the ribs. He hurried on after the lieutenant.

There were whispers about them as the few surviving rats hid from them, rats once bold enough to attack a sleeping man and tear out his eyes before he could awake.

The column moved quietly. Long ago they had discarded the last of their hobnails, for these had a habit of scraping against stones and giving a maneuver away. They kept no step or order of march, for each, as an individual, had his own concern, his own method of caring for himself, and so they strung out far. Even though it had been years since such a fortress had been garrisoned by any of them, they instinctively took precaution against direct hits on the tunnel roof above them.

The tunnel dipped and, for a little way, they sloshed knee-deep in water. Shaggy Corporal Carstone, in charge of the machine-gun company, clucked like a mother hen as he got his precious charges over the rough places; for while water could do no harm, the tanks were so worn and thin that one stumble might put them out of action, filled as they were with their full weight of air.

Now and then the lieutenant struck his flint to find a chalk mark on the 

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