“Tie one end to the triggers of the fixed Tommy guns,” he said. “Then reel off a good length, about seventy-five feet, and cut it. Get lengths of cord on each Tommy gun. Keep up our own fire with the Reisings. Give ’em a burst once in a while so they’ll know we’re still here.”

The men carried out the order quickly, as Dick kept glancing back at the men in the water. All were on their way across now, and the first man was reaching the stretch where he might be seen by any Germans on the dam wall.

“I don’t think they’ve got any men there, though,” Dick told himself. “Don’t see why they should. They know the dam isn’t blown up yet, which was their main worry, and they know they’ve got us trapped back here. Of course, they may be ordered back to the pass to help the main force attacked by our Rangers. But the frontal attack should be started on the Pass by this time, and it might be all over before they could get there.”

He was pleased to see the first man duck under the water and swim the last ten feet without being seen. And he smiled to see him come up in the shelter of a rock on the opposite point of land.

“Good going,” he said to himself. “He couldn’t have been seen even if the Jerries were looking that way.”

But his smile vanished as a roaring blast shook the earth beneath him. Instinctively he hugged the earth, and felt gravel, rocks, and dirt rain down on him from above.

“First mortar shell,” he spoke to the others. “Landed just on the other side of the crest. Come on, give ’em a good burst. Get those cords in your hands and let’s go.”

Before the burst of fire from the Americans ended there was another roar—this time behind them. Dick whirled to see the radio, which had been left on the shore, rise into the air and spread into a hundred pieces along with rocks and earth. Crouching low, he ran down the slope to the shore, with Max and Lefty and Bert immediately behind him. At the shore line he turned, grabbed two of the cords which were hooked to the Tommy guns wedged in the rocks. He gave them a gentle pull, and the others did the same with their cords. The gun chattered from the ledge above them, and they knew the Germans would not try to rush the crest. They’d wait for the mortars to do the trick. As the four Americans slid into the water, still holding their cords, they saw a shell dig a mighty hole in the rocky earth just behind the crest, where they had been not one minute before.

“There go two of the Tommy guns!” Dick said. By this time they were up to their chests in the water.

“One last burst before we swim,” he commanded tersely. He pulled on his two cords. One was limp—attached to one of the guns that had been blown up by the last mortar shell. But the other tugged the trigger, and he heard the stuttering fire it gave forth, along with the other guns that were still functioning.

“Swim for it—and fast!” Dick shouted to his companions.

They heard another roar behind them, then another in quick order, then a third. By this time they were swimming swiftly toward the other point, and it was not far away.

“Don’t bother to go under,” Dick muttered between strokes. “We don’t care if they do see us now.”

His clothes felt heavy, like lead weights holding him back. In trunks he could have made the distance in a minute; now each forward push was short. But suddenly he felt his feet strike the bottom, and he pushed forward rapidly up the point of land.

There were no more bursts of shells behind them as they ran for the woods. But just as they plunged into the thick tangle of trees, the chatter of machine guns blazed behind them and the zing of shells filled the air. Bert fell to the ground and Max went down beside him. With a quick motion he rolled Bert and himself behind a boulder. There Dick crept up to them.

“Go ahead!” Bert said. “They got me in the leg. They’ll be swarming over that stretch of water in a minute.”

“Oh, no, they won’t!” Dick said. “Remember—we’re all picked swimmers. And we dropped our guns. They’ll come after us only if they can keep their guns, and I don’t think they can manage it with ’em.”

Machine-gun bullets still spattered around them intermittently, and they could hear the angry, bellowed orders of a German officer across the water behind them.

“He’s telling ’em to cross over,” Max said. “He’s telling ’em we’ve got no guns and to go ahead after us!”

“Well, I’ve got the answer for that,” Dick grinned. He reached inside his shirt and pulled out a waterproof pouch. Ripping it open he extracted a service automatic, dry as a bone. Heading around the rock as he hugged the ground, he wriggled forward about ten feet in the underbrush. There, peering through the branches of a bush, he saw the Germans on the opposite point. Standing on the crest was the officer, still bellowing orders to his men, who moved slowly forward toward the water. They didn’t like the idea of making that crossing.

Dick steadied his right arm on the ground, aimed the automatic carefully, and squeezed the trigger. The German officer’s angry words were cut short. He looked startled and dismayed, as if someone had played an unfair trick on him. His hand went to his chest, he looked around him for a second, and then toppled forward from the ridge, rolling to the shore below. The German soldiers looked at his body a moment, then turned and scrambled back up the little hill as if death itself were chasing them. In two seconds they were all on the other side of the hill. Dick grinned and ran back behind the rock where Bert and Max waited for him. A tentative machine-gun burst followed him, but he was safe behind the rock.

“I don’t think they’ll come across now,” he said. “I got the officer, the one who was telling them we had no guns. At least they won’t be coming for a little while, until another officer makes them do it. Come on! Up you go, Bert!”

Max and Dick lifted Bert and carried him rapidly forward through the trees. Fifty feet further along they found the rest of their men, and Dick counted them quickly. Yes—they were all there.

“Jimmy,” he said to one of the men, “you take over with Max to carry Bert here. The others will spell you once in a while. I’ve got to go ahead to find that old aqueduct. Follow me!”

He led the way briskly through the trees, and the men, still dripping from their swim, followed him without a word. They climbed the sloping hill for a quarter of a mile, then cut down sharply toward the shore of the reservoir again. They could see the placid water through the trees ahead when Dick stopped them.

“Wait here while I have one quick look,” he said. “Put Bert down, and give him first aid—but fast. Then two others take him when we’re ready to go again.”

The sergeant moved forward to the water’s edge swiftly. In a moment he stood on a huge pile of old rocks which stretched like a wall along one edge of the man-made lake for a distance of about sixty feet. Here was the old dam from the days of the Romans, and stretching away from the wall was the arching aqueduct, spanning a narrow but deep chasm.

“Still standing, all right,” he said to himself. “But not too strong. Those pillars look pretty crumbly, but we’ll have to chance it. Spread out—then there won’t be much weight at one time.”

He hurried back to his men in the shelter of the trees.

“How you feeling, Bert?” he asked.

“Okay, Sarge,” the big soldier replied, but Dick could see the pain behind his smile. “Sorry to cause so much trouble this way. Don’t let me hold you up.”

“Rot! You’re not holding anybody up,” Dick said. “Let’s get going. Spread out about ten feet apart going over the old aqueduct up ahead. It may not be too strong, but we’ve got to chance it. If it’s stood all these centuries it can stand another half hour for us.”

Dick motioned Max to lead the way, and he stayed behind. Max stepped from the trees, on to the old stone wall and then to the aqueduct. He marched across it at a steady swift pace, and another man started off behind him after he had gone about ten paces. Dick watched carefully. There were three men on the ancient structure—now four. Max was only about ten feet from the other end.

“He’s across!” Dick exclaimed, as Max turned at the other end and waved both arms with a smile. “Okay, let Bert and his two carriers go next.”

The wounded man and his companions stepped on the aqueduct. Their pace was slower than that of the others, and everyone watched without a word as they made their way slowly forward. It seemed to Dick that he must be holding his breath.

There was almost a cheer from the men as the wounded soldier and his two carriers made the other side of the gully. Then the remaining men, with Dick at the end, followed quickly, without any concern about the old aqueduct.

On the other side, Dick explained briefly the course they would have to follow to get back to their own men. It was a roundabout circle over two ridges of hills, and across one stream that had to be forded. But they felt sure they would meet no enemy forces on the way, as their path covered wild country off the main routes.

The going was slow because the men all felt a letdown after their forced marches of the day. Now they felt safe, sure that they had eluded any pursuing force that might come after them.

“As a matter of fact,” Max said to Lefty, “I don’t think anybody’s following us. Those boys at the dam must’ve got word of the battle down in the Pass. They’re probably heading back down there now. I hope they’re too late.”

“This was a pretty good shindig, wasn’t it?” Lefty commented. “First time we’ve really had something of what we wanted. We really did a paratrooper’s job today.”

“Yes—pretty good, pretty good,” Max replied, with a sigh. “But I didn’t get my forty Nazis. I figure I only got about eleven myself.”

“No—you got to look at it this way, Max,” Lefty said. “What we did up here made it possible for our boys down in the Pass to wipe out a few thousand. So really you got a lot more than forty.”

Max smiled. “I like the way you put it,” he said. “But I want to do it personally.”

They had a quick meal before climbing another hill, digging food out of their ration cans. When they went on again, Max was walking beside Dick Donnelly.

“Pretty smart operation, Dick,” Max said. “You really handled it swell all the way through.”

“Thanks, Max,” the sergeant replied. “But I was lucky that we were able to get away so soon and didn’t have to pin those German forces down for another hour or so. We couldn’t have got out if we had had to do that.”

“No, but you were prepared for every break we did get, and you took full advantage of it,” Max said. “That’s what counts. Why they don’t make you a general is more than I can see.”

Dick laughed. “Wait till I get us back to our forces safely before you congratulate me,” he said. “I hope I’m taking you in the right direction.”

But Max had no doubts. Dick obviously knew where he was going. And even though the group of men went more and more slowly as the afternoon wore on, it was from nothing but weariness. They knew they would get back to their headquarters under Dick’s guidance.

But it was late—almost sunset, when they saw ahead of them the crest of the hill on the other side of which was the ledge where they had landed that morning.

The last pull up that hill was a tough one, and the men grunted as their feet slipped on the rocks. When they were halfway up, they were spotted by an American at the crest, who gave a whoop of pleasure at what he saw. In a moment, others were scurrying over the crest of the hill and running down the slope toward the weary soldiers of Dick Donnelly’s gang. Among the first to reach them was Lieutenant Scotti.