of the opening into the trench-head, listening. He had already forgotten the men waiting out there for his return, for one o'clock was near and the lives of the —d Battalion now rested solely on the fighting blood of a dog-runner of Rupert Land.
Grasping a long knife in each hand, his legs set under him like steel springs, the Cree crouched at the opening for the leap, when again the flash illuminated the floor of the trench; but the light only served him the better to drive his first thrusts home as he sprang upon the Prussians.
Lunging savagely as he rose from the stabbed men, Lecroix knifed the sentry at the machine gun before the German knew the fate of his comrades, but at the same instant, from behind, a bayonet following a German oath was driven deep into the right shoulder of the frenzied Cree, crippling his arm. Brought to his knees, the Indian drove the knife in his left hand upward in a desperate thrust as another heavy body hurled itself upon him from the parapet, and the three, fighting blindly, rolled to the trench floor. But the left hand of the wounded Cree, underneath, finally wrenched free from the mêlée of arms and legs; the long knife lashed to the wrist of steel found its men, once, twice—and in the trench-head between the lines there was left no sentry to warn the Prussians in the rear of the coming of the Canadians.
Smeared with mud and blood, his right arm hanging helpless from his bayoneted shoulder, his comrades of the scouting party found Joe Lecroix with his Prussian dead. Close on their heels, the —d Bat-
