Henri had to put in a sad word, owing to the depletion of the food store—the knapsack contained less than two days' rations for one man.
The eyes of the two aviators met in meaning glance—meaning that the remaining food should all be reserved for the ailing soldier, now sleeping quietly in his blanket roll.
Many a time in the hours of weary tramping did the aviators tighten their belts, but without a single utterance of complaint or bemoaning of sad fate. To the gnawings of hunger happily were not added the torments of thirst. Snow and ice served that desire.
The rations were sparingly fed to the invalid, who, unsuspicious of the sacrifice of his slowly starving companions, appeared to be gaining a measure of strength. He expressed sorrow that he must so burden Schneider in the march, noting that the latter had begun to occasionally stumble and stagger under the load.
"Don't you bother a bit, captain," as often assured the valiant aviator, "we will run into a friendly camp before long, and you will be in fighting trim before the moon changes again."
On the quiet to Henri, however, the big fellow confided that rest hours must lengthen if he had to fare much farther as a carrier.
He had discovered that in one of his revolvers there were still two cartridges that had not been exploded, and this find was due to the intention of throwing away these weapons as useless and cumbersome and a lucky farewell inspection of the long-possessed arms.
Schneider was a famous shot, with these same pistols had won several trophies, and, too, in war service had with them seldom failed to stop an antagonist lusting for his own life.
"Two bullets and three human lives at stake," he mused, weighing the revolver in his right hand, and aiming it at some imaginary living target. Several times during the day both Henri and himself had noted hare tracks in the snow, and Schneider even talked in a hopeful way of rigging up some sort of trap in the night. While the boy was inclined to be doubtful as to their possible success as trappers, under the circumstances, he did not spoil sport, in the mind of his companion, by adverse argument.
Now there was something tangible in the anticipation that Schneider might stalk and shoot a rabbit, and so hearten the weakened wayfarers to renew the battle for existence. They were beginning to lag with every additional mile traversed.