The Human Boy and the War

by Eden Phillpotts

"Be hopeful. Fate may be on our side, and it's not the weather for a tarpaulin coat, anyway."

Then the spy came in, and though I was not able to see him, Cornwallis, by a lucky chance, got a buttonhole of the coat level with his eye, and saw the fearful spectacle of the spy.

He was a dreadful object, with wickedness fairly stamped on him, so Cornwallis said afterwards. He was a big man with humpbacked shoulders and a cocoanut-like head, far too small for his body and legs. He was grey, and had a shaggy beard and a wide mouth that showed his teeth. These were broken and black. His nose was flat and small, and his eyes rolled in his head as he looked round his hut. They were black and ferocious to a most savage extent. He kept making a snorting sound, which was his manner of breathing. He wore dirty white trousers and a jersey, and upon his feet were dirty canvas shoes. He had no hat, and he didn't look the sort of person that Fate would be interested in. But you never know. He suspected nothing, and had not seen us come in, which was the great fear in my mind.

The creature did not stop long, yet long enough to give himself away for ever as a spy, for he took one of the green tins of petrol, and then, saying some English swear words to himself of the worst kind, went out and slammed the door behind him. We nearly shouted with joy, but a moment later our joy was changed into the most terrible sorrow, because the spy fastened the door behind him. We heard a chain rattle and a padlock click, so there we were, entirely at the mercy of a creature evidently quite dead to pity in every way. This was, of course, Fate again, as Cornwallis pointed out.

There was a window about a foot square high up in the roof of the hut, and when the spy shut the door and locked us in, everything became dark excepting for the light from this narrow window. Therefore, when we were sure our enemy had gone, and there was not a sound outside, I got on to a table, and Cornwallis climbed on my back, from which he was able to look out through the window. Luckily it faced the sea, and Cornwallis reported that the sea had come a great deal nearer, and that the spy was only about fifty yards off. He stood on a sort of pier of rocks, and was pulling in a rope to which was attached a small motor-boat.

Then naturally I wanted to get on Cornwallis's shoulders, but he told me not to move for a moment. Then he said that the spy had got into the boat and was evidently going to sea. And then he said he had gone.

I next climbed on to Cornwallis, and so proved the truth of his words, for I distinctly saw the motor-boat speed off with the spy in it. I also saw that the tide had come in, and soon it was actually beating against the rocks twenty-five feet or so below us.

When the motor-boat had disappeared in a westerly direction, Cornwallis and me got down off the table and considered what we ought to do.

"The first thing is to make every possible effort to escape at any cost," I said. But he said that he had already thought of that, and felt pretty certain it was beyond our power. The window seemed the only hopeful place; but it was made not to open, and the glass was thick, and Cornwallis said we couldn't have got through the hole, even if there had been no glass. But I said:

"It is well known, Cornwallis, that if a man can get his head through a hole, he can get his body through."