CHAPTER XX A Turn in the Tide
Weeks had passed since that train had thundered along the rails into Germany, carrying its truck-loads of British prisoners. It was ages since the brilliant and powerful Nobby had wrenched up the flooring of the truck and had thereby discovered an opening, which might or might not lead to liberty, and it seemed a positively endless period since Bill had been swung out by hands and feet, since Jim had thrown off the couplings, since the moment when this gallant little band had escaped from their captors and had plunged towards the west, where lay friends and safety.
But consider the difficulties before them. That part of Germany was not so thickly populated that movement of a band of men was out of the question; across the Rhine Germans swarmed—German soldiers—while farther west, in the invaded French territory, the movement of a mouse was almost likely to be noted.
"It's got to be a slow game," Bill said, when after their first night's journey they lay down in a wood, hungry and feeling desolate. "Of course we may have unusual luck, but there's little doubt that we shall have to go quietly and very secretly. Let's sleep, boys, then we'll forage for food, after that—well, leave it."
"Aye, leave it," laughed Nobby—laughed uproariously, for this gallant fellow was in the highest spirits. "As for taking time and all that, what's it matter, so long as we do get back one of these days? Seems to me, slow but sure—the pace of a tortoise—is the thing we're out for. But food! crikey, ain't I hungry!"
"Aye!" gasped another of the band, a lusty eater like Nobby himself. "But there'll be food round about, and we'll take it—eh, Bill?—eh, Sergeant Bill?—sorry, Sergeant!"
Bill laughed. Yet it was a sign of the times. These comrades of his were becoming a little careful how they addressed him. Perhaps the feeling of discipline had something to do with it, and perhaps it was the fact that they recognized in Bill a born commander, the sort of young man of which our officers are made, and let us say at once we include the officers of all the Allies.
Then they lay down, and presently all were asleep, nearly all indeed slept heavily till the early morning. Sounds of someone approaching, and the sudden appearance of a cow and a calf with a soldier behind them, threw the band into a commotion. The men seized the sticks with which they had armed themselves, Larry dashed towards a tree; then the soldier laughed.
"My! Ain't I frightened the whole lot o' you," he shouted. "A-feared of Nobby and a couple of cows a-walkin' into the camp, and lookin' as though you'd like to chuck 'em out, when I'm bringing food, too."
The gallant Nobby, for he it was, hurled two fowls in amongst his comrades. "Didn't know I was a sort of gamekeeper in peace times, did yer? I'd almost forgotten it meself, for them days seems a long way off; but I chanced to wake at the first streak of dawn, and went off to see what was around us. This 'ere cow and calf was mighty handy. Right down below there's a settlement, and I happed on a convenient Hun residence. What's this—eh? Why, bless me soul!—it's bread! My, I am surprised! Believe me, when I saw that in the larder of a house—a farmhouse, you know—I felt like leaving it for the Huns. Then I thought of you chaps, and I guessed it 'ud do you more good than it 'ud do any German. Sit up, boys. Here's milk and meat and bread for to-day; to-morrow, if we can't move off, we can kill the calf, and there'll be more meat for a week perhaps; after that—well, we'll be able to look round by then, eh? What about some breakfast?"
"What abaht it?" one of the band sang out, while the rest were convulsed with laughter or ran forward to congratulate the gallant Nobby.
Indeed his was a find—a valuable find as it proved. For it so happened that though the band had managed to escape to a part of the country which was sparsely populated, their escape was noised abroad, and search-parties were sent in all directions.
"Only they don't seem to have thought of these woods," said Larry, as he and Bill watched from the fringe of the cover in which they had taken shelter. "I guess they think we've made along the railway. Waal now, the longer we stick here without moving into the open the better, for then we'll throw them off the scent. Nobby's calf will be useful. Mebbe we'll take to the cow yet, but it'll want some killing, seeing that we've only sticks and knives with us."
Yet another early-morning jaunt on the part of Nobby, with Bill in company, secured a couple of old rifles and revolvers, beside more bread; and thus armed, and with plenty of food, the band settled themselves in the wood for two weeks till the search-parties had returned and the matter had blown over. Then they issued forth, and little by little, sometimes gaining a dozen miles in one night, sometimes lying up in a friendly wood for a week or more, now and then half starved—for provisions were short throughout the whole of Germany—and again well fed—for they did not hesitate to take fowls and calves when they came across them—the band gained France, and finally filtered through the German lines to the spot we have indicated.
The journey had taken weeks—those eventful weeks during which the Kaiser, careless of the losses he incurred, had thrown his hordes against the Allies, had thrown to win, and so far at least had failed to achieve his object. But now the moment for the last throw had arrived. Germans, massed in that salient which stretched to the Marne, were about to make a desperate push—a last push for Paris. Guns were ready; every device of war was there to slaughter the Allies; the All-Highest, himself less arrogant than of yore, less certain of success, was himself present; the hour had come for Germany to strike a final blow for victory.
And strike she did, driving a reckless path over the Marne River in the neighbourhood of Château Thierry and to the east of that pleasant provincial town, while her forces swept to the west, pushing the Allied line backward. It was a critical time for British and French and American troops, and the Entente generally; for the rush carried the Germans to within some thirty miles of Paris, and further success would have thrown a road to that city wide open, with, no doubt, disastrous results to the defenders of human liberty. But the Allies, though taken in some measure by surprise, were by no means found wanting. Unity of command on the part of Germany and Austria and their Allies had, during almost four long years of warfare, given enormous advantage to the troops controlled nominally by the Kaiser: one brain and one man, in fact, commanded the situation, striking blows here, following them up swiftly, supporting a threatened spot, and massing effects where the Allied line appeared weakest. But the Allies themselves had not failed to see the vital importance of this unity of command. It had taken time; it had required many conferences; there had been much discussion before a decision was reached; but Mr. Lloyd George, the Premier of England, Monsieur Clemenceau, France's able leader, and Mr. Wilson, the President of the United States, and all the prominent leaders had come forward and insisted upon this one condition.
Thus, just prior to this final German rush, the whole of the Allied armies in France and Italy had been placed under the command of General Foch, the hero of the Marne fighting in 1914. This unity of command placed in his hands a power not hitherto wielded by any single one of the Allied forces. It allowed him to mass his reserves, to control the movements of all the troops, and permitted of his disposing of his forces so that within a few days the enemy rush was successfully held up, and almost at once a counter-attack, similar almost to that of the Sixth French Army in 1914, which was cast upon the right flank of Von Kluck's army, but a little north of the part where that army operated, was hurled against the flank of this dangerous German irruption.
A few lines and we may dismiss further mention of the fighting. French and British, aye, and Americans in much force, took part in that brilliant counter-offensive. They smashed in the German flank, they drove deep into the Tardenois, they sent the enemy fleeing back from the Marne and its wrecked villages and towns, till his back was against the Aisne, and until the Vesle alone divided the combatants. That single dramatic movement smashed the hopes of the German people, and wrecked for ever the already severely damaged prestige of the once arrogant Crown Prince of Prussia.
We will carry the tale a short stage further. The fighting in this neighbourhood was scarce ended, and the fifth year of the war but just commenced, when on the 8th August, the Fourth British Army, with a French army acting in combination with it, suddenly advanced upon the Germans between Albert and Montdidier, and assisted by numerous small tanks, called "whippets"—more speedy and more efficacious than the big tanks first used in 1916—drove a huge hole or salient into the German position, capturing hundreds of guns and a vast number of prisoners. Since then fighting has extended north and south, and all along the line the invader—the ravager of France and Belgium—has been driven back reeling before our blows. The tide has turned without a doubt. The Allies march irresistibly on to final victory.
Thus was the fifth year of this awful contest inaugurated. It brought success to the Allies, it found their numbers increasing daily by the influx of American troops, and, significant too, it discovered those American troops to be stanch and sturdy fighters, fresh to the country, keen to destroy the power of the Kaiser.
As for Bill and his friends, that sudden irruption of the Germans over the Marne swamped the hovels in which they were lying, swamped, too, the shattered dwelling in which Heinrich Hilker and Alphonse lay in waiting. It drove both parties in fact to the cellars, and thence into the subterranean passages which joined them. There, late one morning, it brought the two parties face to face; though, to be sure, Heinrich and Alphonse were as yet unaware of the presence of Bill and his party.
"It's a noise! It's someone around!" said Nobby, when the party had sat in the dark cellar for perhaps a couple of hours listening to the roar of guns above, and sometimes hearing voices. "Always them Germans! Ain't that a German voice yahring away? Listen!"
"Sure!" said Larry; "German, and not so far away. It'll be Fritz searching these dug-outs, these cellars. Boys, is it your wish that Fritz should come down here and take you into the open? Have you come all this way, right along here to within almost speaking distance of your mates, just to be hiked out by a few Fritzes?"
Bill stopped him.
"There's a row going on," he said; "it's men fighting, and not many of 'em—two or three at the most, I should say. Stay here, you boys. Let's get along, Jim and Larry and Nobby; we'll come back and report in a few minutes."
They crept along the passage, full of cobwebs and dirt and debris, and pitch dark at first, till they had traversed perhaps a hundred yards, passing here and there the entrances to other cellars; for bear in mind they were in the country of the vine-growers of France, and huge cellars are required to store the wines produced by the vineyards which cluster along the sides of the Marne valley. Then a gleam of light lit the passage, and pushing on they came in time, after many twists and turns, to another cellar, from which issued now the voices of men engaged in a strenuous struggle. Creeping in, they found themselves in a large cellar of brick, on the floor of which two men rolled hither and thither, locked in a firm embrace, breathing heavily, sometimes shouting at one another. Their figures were fully lit up by an opening above, which gave light and ventilation to the cellar, and which presently allowed Bill and his friends to take in every atom of their surroundings.
"Two poilus fighting! and——" gasped Larry.
"And talking German!" said Nobby. "German!—listen to 'em!"
Bill clutched Jim by the arm. "Jingo! that one with his head close to the ground, it's—— I'd swear it!"
Jim took a firm hold of his young friend, for standing there at the entrance, peering into the cellar, he had at first not obtained so good a view of the combatants. But now for a moment the two men, locked in one another's arms, ceased their struggles to gain breath for a continuance of the conflict. Then it was that he obtained a full view of the face of the man who lay nearest the ground. It was Heinrich Hilker; no French uniform could disguise the scoundrel. But the other—no, he did not know him.
"It's—gee!—it's Heinrich the spy caught by a Frenchman," he muttered.
"A Frenchman! not it!" came bluntly from Nobby. "He's a-talkin' German now. It's two spies in the midst of a ruction."
As for Bill, Jim could feel him straining forward already, and heard his breath coming in deep gasps, and knew well that his young friend had recognized the wretch so near him who had been the cause of his father's death. A little more and Bill would have torn himself from Jim's grip and hurled himself upon the spy; but Alphonse intervened—Alphonse, now crazier than ever, Alphonse driven to desperation by the thought and the knowledge that Heinrich had hoodwinked him, and had dragged him here to the Marne only to dispose of him.
It was but ten minutes ago that he had suddenly detected Heinrich in the act of lifting a heavy stick with which to brain him, and thereupon Alphonse had cast himself upon the traitor. For those ten minutes the two had been locked in a deadly struggle, but now, as Bill and his friends looked on, it ended. For with a superhuman effort the madman suddenly freed his hands and gripped Heinrich by the neck. He lifted him upward, and then suddenly dashed him back, breaking his head upon the brick-lined floor as though it were an egg shell.
"And so—and so you are dead!—wretch! villain! spy!" Alphonse gasped, his rusty voice echoing in the cellar. "You, who enticed me to agree to your plans to lead you safely through the American lines so as to join our comrades. Ha! You—you were to slay me, and then, free of me, were to join the Germans, forgetting the reward I was to have, forgetting Paris and the loot to be obtained there. Well, you are dead—dead, you dog!"
The huge form of the pseudo-Frenchman was erected to its full height—the huge, bony frame standing out gaunt in the rays descending from the skylight above, the hands clenched, the blue uniform of a poilu skin-tight upon him—for there was never found a Frenchman requiring such a suit of clothes as Alphonse needed—he stood there leering, grinding his teeth, staring at the dead man. He kicked the inanimate body, and then, turning, glared up at the skylight, while Bill and his friends, horrified by the scene of which they had been the silent witnesses, crouched backwards into the passage which had led them to it, moved back from the entrance, waiting there, wondering what they should do.
It was then, within a few seconds, as Alphonse made ready to depart, his crazy mind still fixed upon looting some house in Paris, that there came a terrific crash above. Clouds of dust and bits of brick and dirt were projected into the passage, and then there was an appalling detonation, which shook these subterranean workings, which dislodged blocks and stones from the roof of the gallery, and which brought the roof of the cellar in upon Alphonse and the dead body of Heinrich, the German spy—the roof and the mass of wrecked dwellings above it. Indeed it was only by a miracle that Bill and his friends escaped destruction. They crept off through the dust-clouds to their comrades, and there sat down, moody at first, and then telling their story curtly, for it had moved them deeply. An hour later the sounds of conflict waned, and soon afterwards, peering up from the cellar which sheltered them, they found the Germans in rapid retreat and Allied troops approaching.
"It's an American lot!" shouted Bill at the top of his voice.
"Sure!" gurgled Larry, and Jim was certain that the diminutive little fellow's legs positively shook. Perspiration was dropping from his forehead, and though Larry made every effort to appear nonchalant as of yore, and tipped his helmet farther forward, and even searched involuntarily, by force of habit, for that long-departed stump of cigar, yet he could not deceive Jim. Larry was upset—greatly so. The sight of those Americans had set him shaking, while it brought tears to Jim's own eyes. And then, who should suddenly accost the party? It was Dan—magnificent Dan—a true type of American manhood. Do you wonder that they fell upon each other, gripping hands? If they had been Frenchmen they would have embraced each other; as it was, even the stoical Nobby was gulping as Dan took his huge hand and shook it forcibly.
"Fine, fine!" was all that gallant soldier could say. "Fine! I'm glad to meet you."
No need to trace their movements further, and no need to say that within two weeks Nobby and his friends had been transferred to the British force, while Larry and Jim, and Bill too, by special arrangement, were attached to that American division in which Dan served. They are in France as we write. Shoulder to shoulder with those comrades of theirs they are opposing the most ruthless enemy that has ever threatened the liberties of mankind; shoulder to shoulder they will go through the work till the war is finished, till the Kaiser and his myrmidons are vanquished. They have seen much, these gallant men. They will see more before the war is done—when they have served longer under Foch's command.
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN
By Blackie & Son, Limited, Glasgow