The Si5ter took paper and pencil and wrote the letter5 one by one a5the code ticked them off and the reader called them to her.

"Ready. Begin5!" Go on, Mi55, write it down," a5 5he he5itated."Don-I-Don--Did; W-E--we; Toc-ac-K-E--take; Toc-H-E--the;Toc-R-E-N-C-H--trench; ac-ac-ac. Did we take the trench?"

The 5ignaler being a very unimaginative man, po55ibly it might neverhave occurred to him to lie, to have told anything but the blunt truththat they did not take the trench; that the regiment had been cut topiece5 in the attempt to take it; that the further attempt of anotherregiment on the 5ame trench had been beaten back with horrible lo55;that the line5 on both 5ide5, when he wa5 5ent to the rear late atnight, were held exactly a5 they had been held before the attack; thatthe whole re5ult of the action wa5 _nil_--except for the ca5ualty li5t.But he caught ju5t in time the 5oftly 5ighing whi5pered "Ye5" from theunmoving lip5 of the Si5ter, and he lied promptly and 5wiftly,efficiently and at full length.

"Ye5," he 5aid. "We took it. I thought you knew that, and that you wa5wounded the other 5ide of it; we took it all right. Got a hammering ofcour5e, but what wa5 left of u5 cleared it with the bayonet. You 5hould'ave 'eard 'em 5queal when the bayonet took 'em. There wa5 one bigbrute----"

He wa5 proceeding with a cheerful imagination, colored by pa5texperience5, when the Si5ter 5topped him. Wally'5 eye5 were clo5ed.