There was not a single shot fired at them as they crept on, and in the end they found themselves at the spot where the big seaplane lay.
As they could go forward no further in that way, orders were given for a charge, and the two boys, still crouching there, were thrilled to see the dozen men in khaki start across the open ground on the run, each one dodging as he saw best in order to take as little chances of being hit as possible.
“Why, look at that, Frank!” cried Billy. “Not a single shot has been fired at them! What do you think the Germans are up to? Are they waiting to mow them down in a heap? Hey, isn’t that a white flag waving from the old mill? Why, honest, now, I do believe they mean to throw up the sponge, and surrender. Let’s start forward ourselves, Frank.”
“Wait and see,” cautioned the other. “After the soldiers have gone inside will be time enough for us to hurry up.”
“Well, there they go right now, Frank!” cried the other. “Please come on, for I’m dying to know what it all means. It isn’t like Germans to give up that way without a hard fight.”
When they arrived at the windmill the mystery was soon explained. The terrible garrison consisted of just a single old man, and he was not a German at all, but a French peasant who had lost all he possessed when the Kaiser’s army went through this part of France earlier in the war. His mind had given way under the strain, and filled with the idea that his old mill was a fort he had stationed himself in it with his gun, ready to repel the invaders of the sacred French soil.
When the strange seaplane fell he had conceived the idea that it was some sort of monster which he ought to slay, and so he had taken several pot-shots at the great drab wings which he could just see from his lookout.
Luckily, however, the old peasant, crazy though he might be, knew British soldiers’ uniforms, for the Tommies had been very good to him during the month they were in the neighborhood pushing the enemy back. So he had put up that white flag as soon as he recognized the khaki uniforms of those who were advancing on the run.
“Shucks!” Billy was heard to say. “That’s the way things sometimes drop from the sublime to the ridiculous. Here we were picturing a squad of desperate Prussians cooped up in this windmill base ready to sell their lives dearly, and it proves to be a silly old peasant who is out of his mind.”
“Well, it’s a tragedy, just the same,” Frank told him. “Think of what this Jean Bart has suffered, seeing all his possessions destroyed, and perhaps his entire family wiped out. The Captain tells me there was some trouble with the natives here when the German army went through, and some reckless shooting. But now we can get busy on the seaplane. Call our chum Pudge, will you, Billy?”