Tom Slade with the Boys Over There

by Percy Keese Fitzhugh

[A] The lake on the shore of which Temple Camp was situated.

He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to ease the pain in his head and collect his scattered senses. Evidently, he was alone in this dank place, for there was no sign of occupancy nor any sound but the light patter of rain without, for the storm had spent its fury and subsided into a steady drizzle.

He dragged himself to his feet, and though his knee was stiff he was glad to discover that he was not incapable of walking. He believed he was not feverish now and that his headache was caused by shock and bruising rather than by illness. Perhaps, he thought, he was not so badly off after all. Except for Archer....

Limping to the doorway he peered cautiously out. The sky was dull and hazy and a steady, drizzling rain fell. There is something about a drear, rainy day which "gets" one, if he has but a makeshift shelter; and this bleak, gray morning carried poor Tom's mind back with a rush to rainy days at his beloved Temple Camp when scouts were wont to gather in tent and cabin for yarns.

He now saw that he was on a little rocky islet in the middle of the river and that the structure which had sheltered him was a small tower, very much like a lighthouse except that it was not surmounted by a light, having instead that rough turret coping familiar in medieval architecture. Far off, through the haze, he could distinguish, close to the shore, a gray castle with turrets, which from his compass he knew to be on the Baden side. He thought he could make out a road close to the shore, and other houses, and he wished that he had the spy-glass so that he might study this locality which he hoped to pass through.

Of course, he no longer cherished any hope of finding Florette Leteur; Archer's chiding words still lingered in his mind, and, moreover, without the glass he could do nothing for he certainly would never have thought of entering Norne without first "piking" it from a safe vantage point.

There was nothing to do now but nurse his swollen knee and rest, in the hope that by night he would be able to swim to the Baden shore and get into the hills. Never before had he so longed for the forest.

"If it wasn't for—for him being lost," he told himself, as he limped back into the tower, "I wouldn't be so bad off. There's nobody lives here, that's sure. Maybe fishermen come here, but nobody'll come today, I'll bet."

After all, luck had not been unqualifiedly against him, he thought. Here he was in an isolated spot in the wide river. What was the purpose of this little tower on its pile of rocks he could not imagine, but it was fast going to ruin and save for the rotting fishing seine there was no sign of human occupancy.

If only Archer were there it would not be half bad. But the thought of his companion's loss sickened him and robbed the lonely spot of such aspect of security as it might otherwise have had for him. Still, he must go on, he must reach the boys in France, and fight for Archer too, now—Archer, whom his own blundering had consigned to death in these treacherous waters....