They slid down softly and alighted on the grass. Lannes' triumph was complete, and his wonderful eyes sparkled.
"The best I've done yet," he said, "but not the best I will do. John, what time is it?"
"Half-past five."
"With our long evenings that makes considerable daylight yet. Suppose you take your automatic, and examine the woods a little. I'd go with you, but I'm afraid to leave the Arrow here alone. Leave the glasses with me though."
John, after regaining his land legs, walked away among the woods, which evidently had been tended with care like a park, bearing little resemblance, as he somewhat scornfully reminded himself to the mighty forests of his own country. Still, these Europeans, he reflected were doing the best they could.
The region was hilly and he soon lost sight of Lannes, but he threshed up the wood, thoroughly. There was no sign of occupancy. He did not know whether it lay in Germany or France, but it was evident that all the foresters were gone. A clear brook ran through a corner of it, and he knelt and drank. Then he went back to Lannes who was sitting placidly beside the Arrow.
"Nothing doing," said John in the terse phrase of his own country. "At imminent risk from the huge wild animals that inhabit it I've searched all this vast forest of yours. I've forded a river three feet wide, and six inches deep, I've climbed steep mountains, twenty feet high, I've gone to the uttermost rim of the forest, a full half-mile away on every side, and I beg to report to you, General, that the wilderness contains no human being, not a sign of any save ourselves. Strain my eyes as I would I could not find man anywhere."
Lannes smiled.
"You've done well as far as you've gone," he said.
"I could go no farther."