It all transpired so quickly that Jack could hardly believe his eyes. He felt as if he had been looking at a motion picture of something that had taken place in a far-off land. But he realized the horror of it all when several soldiers crawled under the barbed wire fence and picked up the three lifeless forms. Indeed, he was forced to turn away, for the whole scene became very repulsive to him. The idea of trapping human beings like rats and slaughtering them, was hideous. But the other men laughed and joked over the occurrence exactly as if they had but recently witnessed a performance at a theater.
CHAPTER XVI
A WARNING
“Hi there, Jack, is that you?” called Mr. Ryder as the lad entered the cottage.
“Yes, but what on earth are you doing here with all the rumpus down at the plant?”
“Oh, I’ve been here for the last hour or more. To tell you the truth, my boy, I did not have the heart to remain and see the outcome. I knew the trap would work; in fact, I was afraid it would work too well. How many men did they kill, Jack?” There was a note of anxiety in the engineer’s voice as he asked the question.
“Three,” replied the boy.
“Well, thank heavens it wasn’t more,” said Mr. Ryder somewhat relieved. “The riflemen would have had no compunction if the number had been thirty-three, but I have. It seems wicked and inhuman to sacrifice three lives in order to teach the beggars a lesson. It makes me very unhappy.”
Jack was glad to find that Mr. Ryder took this attitude in the matter. If the truth were known he had secretly felt a little bitter toward the engineer for concocting such a diabolical trap. But when he saw how unhappy it had made the man his bitterness turned to sympathy.