I got on my feet. With the heavy clasp-knife bought in Hanover I lopped off the branches just over our heads and stretched an awning of oilsilks three feet above the ground, attempting ineffectually to make them shed the water over the edge of the shelter, instead of letting it accumulate on us. For a time it was all right; then the rain ceased.
By now the light showed that we had camped far too near the road for proper concealment. But the awning had found approval in the eyes of my friends, and I felt such pride in the contrivance that I hesitated to advise moving camp farther into the thicket. Instead, I set to work to camouflage it with a screen of branches and young trees, which I cut off and stuck in the ground. I got myself much wetter by doing all this than if I had taken things quietly. So did Tynsdale, who was infected by my passion for work.
When a cart creaked along the road, its wheels plainly visible from our hiding-place, we resolved to move. In the heart of the thicket the trees were much smaller—only a little taller than ourselves—and more widely spaced. This and the open sky above us gave us a sensation of freedom and fresh air. I constructed another shelter. Occasional showers during the morning filled the sagging places of the awning with water, and this we drank in spite of the bitter taste imparted to it by the oiled fabric.
Sleep, even in the intervals between the showers, was almost out of the question. With the day, thousands of mosquitoes had come to life among the grasses covering the ground. They rose in clouds wherever we went, and attacked the rash beings who unexpectedly had penetrated into their fastness. Soon our hands and faces were red and swollen with their bites.
About noon the last clouds disappeared. The sun began to pour down from a deep blue sky, its rays falling hot and scorching into the windless space between the trees. We divested ourselves of our wet upper garments, and spread them on the firs around us to dry in the sun.
The only sounds that came to us were the occasional tooting of a tug on the river Ems, now not more than three miles to the west. The rarer and nearer shriek of a railway engine on a line parallel to its bank interrupted every now and again the zzzz-ping, zzzz-ping, of the hovering mosquitoes. A dog barked near by. A slow cart rolled and creaked past the copse.
The road in front of the thicket was converging toward the railway, which it met three to four miles to the north of us at the village and station of Kluse, a little more than two miles to the east of Steinbild and the river Ems. Two and a half miles to the north of this last village a wood was indicated on the map. This was our next objective.
From information received, we supposed the Ems to be strongly guarded by sentries and patrols. The five-mile-wide ribbon of country between its western bank and the Dutch frontier was Sperrgebiet (closed territory). Nobody was allowed to enter it except by special military permit. A day’s observation from the shelter of the forest was to show us how best to cross the river—whether we could swim it, with or without luggage, and if necessary, to permit the construction of a small raft to ferry the latter across. Perhaps we could steal a boat!
Near the station of Kluse we intended to cross the railway line, sneak through the village, and then walk across-country to the river and the forest.
Dusk found us behind some bushes by the deserted roadside, awaiting the night.