He had hardly spoken when the engine gave a last expiring puff, and Thad immediately turned the car into the little ditch alongside the road.
They had done this grand pushing act so often by this time that they had it all reduced to a system. Two took hold on either side, and in this way the car was urged up the balance of the rise. With but a couple of stops, so as to catch their breath, the boys managed to reach the crown of the low hill.
“Worth all it took to get here, just to enjoy that grand view!” gasped Allan.
Giraffe uttered a cry.
“Look down there to where the road crosses a river by a bridge!” he exclaimed.
“Why, there are lots of men in uniforms on the other side of the bridge, Belgian soldiers as sure as anything!” cried Allan.
“They’ve got cannon, too,” added Bumpus, staring with distended eyes, “because you c’n see the glint in the sunlight. What d’ye suppose it all means, Thad?”
As usual he had to appeal to the patrol leader for an opinion. Bumpus had never fully learned that a scout should try to figure out things for himself, and not be forever asking some one else for an explanation. But then it was so much easier doing things by proxy, and Bumpus, as every one knew, hated to exert himself more than was absolutely necessary.
“That bridge must be an important one, I should say,” Thad explained, “and the battery has had orders to guard it so that no German cavalrymen can cross.”
“And perhaps sooner or later there will be a fierce old fight take place right down there!” Giraffe was saying, half to himself, and with a touch of envy in his voice, as though he felt sorry that he could not be upon that same hill so as to watch the battle below.