Rat-a-tat-tat!

"Bang! rat-tat-tat! whack!" sounded from the schoolhouse, and the faces of the younger children paled.

But even as they talked there came the harsh, importunate rat-tat-tat of an irregular volley from among the rocks, and the high, keening whistle of bullets over their heads.

CHAPTER II THE RESCUE The rat-tat-tat of gunfire suddenly ceased.

"Tat-tat-tat-tat."

"Tat-tat-tat-tat."

"Tat-tat-tat-tat."

[THE WOODPECKER'S knock is heard: Rat-tat-tat.]

[Rat-tat-tat, from the WOODPECKER.] Come in!

Where's the knocker?" He felt for it in the darkness and gave a thundering rat-tat-tat at the door.

You must imagine snow waist-deep, the heights furrowed with trenches, the frosty balsam stillness split with screaming shells and shrapnel and the rat-tat-tat of machine guns; imagine yourself floundering upward with winter overcoat, blanket, pack, rifle, and cartridge-beltany one who has snow-shoed in mountains in midwinter can fancy what fighting meant in a place like this.

Very faint at first were the birr of wheels and the tat-tat-tat of the horses' feet.

Very faint at first were the birr of wheels and the tat-tat-tat of the horses' feet.

He was just conscious of Courtenay shouting something about "Get back," of his being thrust violently back into the wide trench, of two or three figures crowding in after him, cursing and staggering and shooting back into the Frying Pan, of Courtenay's voice shouting again to "Stand clear," of a knot of men scrambling and heaving at something, and then of a deafening "Rat-tat-tat-tat," and the streaming flashes of a machine-gun.

He was just conscious of Courtenay shouting something about "Get back," of his being thrust violently back into the wide trench, of two or three figures crowding in after him, cursing and staggering and shooting back into the Frying Pan, of Courtenay's voice shouting again to "Stand clear," of a knot of men scrambling and heaving at something, and then of a deafening "Rat-tat-tat-tat," and the streaming flashes of a machine-gun.

Bullets were kicking up little spurts of dust about us; bullets were tang-tanging through the trees and clipping off twigs, which fell down upon our heads; the rat-tat-tat of the German musketry was answered by the angry snarl of the Belgian machine-guns; in a field near by the bodies of two recently killed cuirassiers lay sprawled grotesquely.

Rat-tatrat-tatrat-tat-tat-tat!

Rat-tatrat-tatrat-tat-tat-tat!

"Tr-r-r-at-tat-tat!" rattled another bird from over the river bank.

"I have often thought" The sentence was never completed, being interrupted by a thundering rat-tat-tat at the front door, followed by a pealing at the bell, which indicated that the visitor was manfully following the printed injunction to "Ring also."

* Rat-tat-tat at the door next afternoon, and little Pansy ran to open it, expecting to see the postman, but the knocking was only a bit of Tom's fun.

Seas, even when calmest, were to become terrible, and men's heart-beats, a bit sluggish with the fatty degeneration of a sluggard peace, to quicken and then to throb with the rat-a-tat-tat, the rat-a-tat-tat of the most peremptory, the most reverberating call to arms in the history of the world.

In June, 1917, Leon Kantor, answering that rat-a-tat-tat, enlisted.

So wrapt was he in these unhappy self-communings, that he did not hear a vigorous "rat-tat-tat" on the door of the little back parlor.

Some time had thus elapsed when my combative propensities were suddenly aroused by the loud dash of a carriage to the door, and the peremptory rat-tat-tat which followed.