pucai068

@@@@@ Hearn stood up, climbed over the ledge, and began to walk across the open field toward the foliage that covered the entrance to the passBehind him and to his left and right, he could hear the footsteps of the squadAutomatically he held his rifle at his side, both hands gripping the stockThe field was a hundred yards long, and perhaps thirty yards wide, bordered by the cliffs on one side and the valley of tall grass on the otherIt sloped downward slightly over a run of scattered small rocksThe sun beat on it fiercely, refracting brightly from the stones and the barrels of their riflesThe silence was intense again, laving itself in layers of somnolence Hearn could feel the impact of each step on the sore bruised ball of his foot, but it seemed to exist at a great distance from his body; he knew remotely that his hands were slippery on the gunThe tension banked itself in his chest only to flare forth at any unexpected sound, anyone kicking a stone or scuffling his feetHe swallowed, looked behind him for a moment at the squad of menHis senses were exceptionally alertBehind everything, he had a suppressed joy and excitement Some of the foliage in the grove seemed to moveHe halted abruptly, and stared across the fifty yards which separated themSeeing nothing, he waved his hand forward again, and they continued to advance BEE-YOWWWWW! The shot ricocheted off a rock and went singing into the distanceSuddenly, terrifyingly, the grove crackled with gunfire, and the men in the field withered before it like a wheat prairie in a squallHearn dropped to the ground behind a rock, looked behind him to see the rest of the men crawling for cover, squirming and cursing and shouting at each otherThe rifle fire continued, steady and vicious, mounting in crescendo with the parched snapping sound of wood in a forest fireThe bullets chirruped by in the soft buzzing sound of insects on the wing, or glanced off a rock and went screaming through the air with the tortured howl of metal ripping apartBEE-YOWWWWWW! BEEE-YOWWWWWWW! TEE-YOOOOOOOOONG! The men in the field flopped behind their rocks, quivered helpless, afraid to raise their headsBehind them, back of the rock ledge, after a pause, Croft and his squad had begun to fire into the grove at the other end of the fieldThe walls of the cliff refracted the sound, bounced it back into the valley, where it rushed about in disorder, the echoes overlapping like conflicting ripples in a brookA wash of sound beat over the men, almost deafening them Hearn lay prone behind a rock, his limbs twitching, sweat running into his eye