“Slow, but mebbe sure, Lieutenant.”
“I am sure it is sure. They’ll get here, Farnham.”
“And find us sitting up and waiting for a square meal.”
CHAPTER XX
Gill Performs
THE young Pennsylvania mountaineer, with his eyes, followed Don until the boy disappeared among the dense bushes; then Gill turned again to his grim duty—that of keeping the long gun out of action. The two Huns who had got away evidently had recognized that to attempt to work the piece in its present position, with enemy marksmen concealed where they could pick off the gunners, was a much too risky business.
Gill knew that these conditions would be reported at once to the nearest officer and that very soon men would be sent to hunt the mountaineer out and others to work the gun again.
Well, let them come; he would endeavor to give as good as they sent, or better, even if he were only one against many. He had about thirty cartridges left; they ought to be enough for a couple of dozen Heinies, if they didn’t crowd him too fast. And then he had his automatic; he had hardly needed so far to fire a shot from it, but he knew how to use it. Also he had his bayonet as a last resort.
Probably in the end they would get him, but it didn’t matter very much now that his buddy, Jennings, was dead. To be sure, he would love again to get back to the dear old hills of his native state and again follow the plow or the hounds. Going after raccoons, foxes, deer and bear was milder sport than this, with no danger in it, but it didn’t inflict upon one’s mind that primitive desire to destroy an enemy; it didn’t stir the blood as did this war game.