By day and night the French aircraft and the anti-aircraft guns were ready to fight off enemy airplanes. During the first weeks of Ruth Fielding’s sojourn in the town there were two warnings of German air raids at night. A deliberate attempt more than once had been made to bomb the Red Cross hospital.
Ruth was frightened. The first alarm came after she was in bed. She dressed hurriedly and ran down into the nearest ward. But there was no bustle there. The ringing of the church bells and the blowing of the alarm siren had not disturbed the patients here, and she saw Miss Simone, the night nurse, quietly going about her duties as though there was no stir outside.
Ruth remembered Charlie Bragg’s statement of the case: “If they get you they get you, and that’s all there is to it!” And she was ashamed to show fear in the presence of the nurse.
The French drove off the raider that time. The second time the German dropped bombs in the town, but nobody was hurt, and he did not manage to drop the bombs near the hospital. Ruth was glad that she felt less panic in this second raid than before.
Thinking of Charlie Bragg must have brought that young man to see her. He came to the hospital on his rest day; and then later appeared driving his ambulance and asked her to ride.
The red cross she wore gave authority for Ruth’s presence in the ambulance, and nobody questioned their object in driving through the back roads and lanes beyond Clair.
The country here was not torn up by marmite holes, or the chasms made by the Big Berthas. Such a lovely, quiet country as it was! Were it not for the steady grumbling of the guns Ruth Fielding could scarcely have believed that there was such a thing as war.
But it was not likely that Ruth would ride much with Charlie Bragg for the mere pleasure of it. The young fellow drove at top speed at all times, whether the road was smooth or rutted.
“Really, I can’t help it, Miss Ruth,” he declared. “Got the habit. We fellows want always to get as far as we can with our loads before something breaks down, or a shell gets us.
“By the way, seen anything of the werwolf again?”