They kept along the precipitous brink, searching for a place to descend and at last scrambled down and into the shallow stream.
"Didn't I tell you so?" said Tom, laying a twig in the water and watching it as best he could in the dim light. "What's on the east of Alsace, anyway?"
"Another parrt of Gerrmany—Baden," Archer answered.
"I was wondering where this stream goes," Tom said; "let's walk along in it a little way and go up at a different place. They can't track you in the water."
"I bet you could," said Archer admiringly.
"Let's have a drink and give me a couple of those chicory roots, and I'll show you something," Tom said.
From each chicory root he cut a plug such as one cuts to test the flavor of a watermelon. Then he soaked the roots in the stream. "The inside's softer than the outside," he said, "and it holds the water." After a few moments he replaced the plugs. "Even tomorrow," he added, "they'll be fresh and cool and they'll quench your thirst. Carrots are best but we haven't got any carrots."
About fifty yards down stream they turned out of it and scrambled up a less abrupt hillside and into an area of more or less orderly forest.
"Maybe it's the Black Forest," said Archer; "anyway it's black enough. Look around and you'll probably see some toys—jumping-jacks and things. 'Most all the toys like that arre made in the Black Forest."
"Not here," said Tom; "we won't find anybody in here."