Stewart ventured to raise his head and look about him; then, with a gasp, he threw off the weight, caught up his companion and staggered to his feet. Yes; it was a body which had fallen upon him. It rolled slowly over on its back as he arose, and he saw a ghastly wound between the eyes.
“They have been repulsed!” he panted. “Wave the handkerchief!” With his heart straining in his throat, he clambered out of the ditch and staggered on. “Don’t look!” he added, for the road was strewn with horrors. “Don’t look!”
She gazed up at him, smiling calmly.
“I shall look only at you, my lover!” she said, softly, and Stewart tightened his grip and held her close!
There was the barricade, with cheering men atop it, exposing themselves with utter recklessness to the bullets which still whistled from right and left. Stewart felt his knees trembling. Could he reach it? Could he lift his foot over this entanglement? Could he possibly step across this body?
Suddenly he felt his burden lifted from him and a strong arm thrown about his shoulders.
“Friends!” he gasped. “We’re friends!”
Then he heard the girl’s clear voice speaking in rapid French, and men’s voices answering eagerly. The mist cleared a little from before his eyes, and he found that the arm about his shoulders belonged to a stocky Belgian soldier who was leading him past one end of the barricade, close behind another who bore the girl in his arms.
At the other side an officer stopped them.
“Who are you?” he asked in French. “From where do you come?”