These suggestions were communicated to the other escaped prisoners and were received with such favor that they were observed carefully in the selection of quarters not only for the following day, but for all the succeeding days that they remained in hiding behind the enemy’s lines. And these succeeding days were more than they at first reckoned on. They had no way of knowing that the Marines had saved the day at Chateau Thierry as well as at Belleau Wood, but there was not an American in this company of escaped prisoners who did not firmly believe that the advance of the enemy was cut short the instant the Yanks got into the front line.
And so as they advanced day by day, or night by night, nearer to the enemy’s lines, sometimes a mile, sometimes two or three miles, sometimes half a mile, they expected at any moment to discover evidence of a rapid boche retreat. However, more than five weeks elapsed before the hoped-for evidence of Allied victory appeared; after which events moved so rapidly that Phil felt like comparing his existence to life on the tail of a comet flying through space.
CHAPTER XXXI
PHIL’S STRATEGY
Again we find Phil and Tim within easy gun-roar of the battle line. But this time they are on the “other side of No Man’s Land.” And the roar is becoming louder and louder. Early one morning it burst forth with great volume. The hiding refugees had not realized they were so near the fighting front until this noisy evidence of proximity burst upon them.
There had been comparative quiet for several weeks. The boches had made their grand effort to break through the French line in the vicinity of Chateau Thierry. At this place it had seemed as if they were about to effect their purpose until two divisions of American Marines were brought up to relieve the French. Then the enemy was forced to a standstill, beyond which he was unable thereafter to advance a foot.
Of all this the fugitives knew nothing, and their knowledge of succeeding developments was quite as limited, save for the indications of sound or silence from the battle area. When finally the unmistakable evidence of another big battle reached their ears, they were quartered in several buildings in the business section of a town a few miles from the boche rear lines. They had selected these buildings with a view to their special serviceability because of facilities for concealment, intercommunication and defense or escape in case of attack.
There was no need of a crier to announce the long awaited event when finally it came. Everybody was on the alert almost in an instant. All day the roar of battle continued without abatement, but the hidden fugitives had no way to determine how it was going. At dusk several scouts were sent on ahead to reconnoiter, but they were unable to obtain any information of definite character except that, it appeared, the enemy had launched a new drive against the Allies in the “great bend.”
The battle continued with unabating fury the next day and the next and the next. Finally two French soldiers, who said they were well acquainted with the vicinity and who spoke German fluently, donned enemy uniforms that they had taken from the bodies of slain boches, and set out under cover of the darkness to learn what was the situation.
“The battle of Chateau Thierry is being fought and it is being won by American Marines,” they reported on their return after several hours’ absence.
“Marines!” was the exclamation uttered by every American that received this message. They had not known that two divisions of fellow Sea Soldiers had stopped the enemy advance on Paris at this point more than a month before and, backed up with reinforcements, were now given the task of driving back the enemy in a sector where other veteran allied troops had failed.