"Unfortunately we can't start troops," replied the captain, "until the orders come. There are as yet no orders, and may not be."
"Then I must get under way alone," almost moaned Darrin. "You, too, Prescott, if you can get leave by 'phone from your commander."
"You can't get an auto," replied Captain Foster. "You'll have to walk, or go in saddle. Either course will take you nearly all of the night."
"But one of your boats, sir?" cried Prescott.
"You're an officer, Prescott, and you must realize that I can't legally release one of my boats from the duty here without an order or permission."
"And all the time Belle and Laura may be trying to hide from a blood-thirsty mob!" gasped Darrin in a frenzy.
"You stay here, Dick," broke in Greg Holmes. "I'll run to the nearest 'phone, get Captain Cortland at the other end of the wire, explain the situation to him and get leave to absent ourselves."
"But even at the best it will take hours to reach Holmesville," muttered Prescott, through blanched lips. "Oh, Dave, Dave, this is awful!"
"We'll get there, somehow—at least I will," muttered Ensign Darrin, in a quivering voice. "If you don't get leave within ten minutes, Dick, I'm going to start alone and try to run all the way to Holmesville. Captain Foster, you'll loan me a revolver and two boxes of cartridges, won't you?"
"Certainly," replied Foster, going into his tent and coming out with the articles named.