“Pace your distance,” the officer ordered his men.
They retreated for about thirty paces, the corporal counting gruffly: “Hup! hup! hup!” as they marched.
It was at that instant that Buck Stewart darted around the corner of the old wall with a sharp knife in his hands. He was at Bob’s side and in a trice had slashed the rope free of his hands. The blindfold followed in less time than it takes to tell it.
Just then the firing squad reached their appointed position and wheeled machine-like about. They saw in a flash their prisoner about to escape.
“Donnerwetter!” roared the corporal, brandishing his sword. “Fire, men! Shoot them down!”
The roar of a dozen German muskets crashed out just as the boys turned the corner of the wall. The bullets shattered the masonry in a cloud of flying debris. Buck shoved two big revolvers into Bob’s hands as they dashed behind the wall.
“Stand guard there at the other end of the wall, Bob,” he shouted. “I’ll take care of this end.”
The Rescue of Bob Russell.
Then, before the Germans had scarcely recovered from their surprise, each boy was peppering away at them in deadly fashion from opposite ends of the protecting masonry. Their first fusillade brought down three groaning soldiers, one of them the corporal. The rest made for cover, the nearest shelter—the tumbled masonry of the church itself.