"Seems to have been a frost, Max," grumbled Dale discontentedly. "All our trouble and brain-fag gone for nothing."
"I thought so at first, Dale, but I'm not so sure now. See that light haze yonder? It may be the fires have caught all right but are burning out for lack of draught. Let's hope they've done a bit of damage anyhow!"
"H'm!" grunted Dale in a tone of discouragement.
"Besides," Max went on, "this is only a small affair. The next real attack will come in a day or two, and I hope there will be no failure there."
"No," replied Dale, brightening up, "if that comes off we shall have done something worth doing. Schenk will be ready to tear his hair, and we shall have to look out for ourselves."
"Well, so we will. We shall deserve a rest, and we will retire into obscurity for a season and recuperate. Another ramble in the Ardennes would suit us well."
"Especially with a little shooting thrown in—Uhlans, I mean," replied Dale facetiously.
"There will be plenty of scouting, if not shooting, if all the tales we hear of those gentlemen be true."
"Aye—but see, Max, how that smoky haze is getting thicker! The pile must be alight all right after all."
The light fleecy smoke which hovered over the great stack certainly seemed denser than it was, and a slight smell of burning was in the air. The other workmen had also noticed it, and hazarded conjectures as to whence it came, but none of them got very near the mark. All day the smoke increased, until, by the time the men ceased work, it lay like a thick fog all about the neighbourhood.