The sentry who had been tripped, quite unsuspicious and blaming only the roughness of the path in the darkness, got up, grumbling, rubbed himself where he had been bruised and searched for his spiked helmet, which had fallen off.
These few seconds were salvation for the fugitives.
Before half a minute had elapsed, the sentry reached the landing-stage and saw the stretched-out bodies of his comrades. Taken by surprise, he lost another ten or twenty seconds staring around him before he caught sight of the boat on the river.
Then, and not till then, did the sentry grasp that a surprise attack had been made and that his fall on the path had been purposed and not due to an accident. Raising his rifle, he fired, but the shots flew wide.
"I heard the Germans couldn't shoot straight!" declared the hunchback, in contempt. "Now I know it's true."
Horace thought the bullets were quite close enough, and when one of them nipped the oar he was using and raised a sliver of wood from the feathered blade, he had an uncomfortable feeling inside. But, before the alarm could be widely given, the boat shot into the shadow of the western bank and reached the shore in safety.
French advance posts took the three in charge as soon as they touched land, and, when morning arrived, brought them before the ranking officer. Horace was able to give but little information, but Croquier, who had read widely of military tactics, was able to combine the various items that he had gleaned during the escape to make a report of great value and importance.
"You are sure," the officer asked him, "that, in addition to the armies of Von Kluck and Von Buelow to the north, and the Duke of Würtemberg and the Crown Prince to the south, there is another army, hurrying up between?"
"We saw it, sir," Croquier replied.