“Oh, no, ma’am!” he declared. “Oh, yes, this road has been bombarded more than once. Don’t you notice how crooked it is? We turn out for the shell holes and make a new road, that’s all. But there’s no danger.”
“But aren’t you frightened at all—ever?” murmured the girl of the Red Mill.
“What is there to be afraid of?” asked the boy, whom his family called “Bubby.” “If they get you they get you, and that’s all there is to it.
“We have to stop here and put the lights out,” he added, seeing a gaunt post beside the road on which was a half-obliterated sign.
“If you have to do that it must be perilous,” declared Ruth.
“No. It’s just an order. Maybe they’ve forgotten to take the sign down. But I don’t want to be stopped by one of these old territorials—or even by one of our own military police. You don’t know when you’re likely to run into one of them. Or maybe it’s a marine. Those are the boys, believe me! They’re on the job first and always.”
“But this time you boys who came to France to run automobiles got ahead of even the marine corps,” laughed Ruth. “Oh! What’s that?”
They were then traveling a very dark bit of road. Right across the gloomy way and just ahead of the machine something white dashed past. It seemed to cross the road in two or three great leaps and then sailed over the hedge on the left into a field.
“Did you see it?” asked Charlie Bragg, and there was a queer shake in his voice.
“Why, what is it? There it goes—all white!” and the excited girl pointed across the field, half standing up in the rocking car to do so.