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Title: The movie boys under Uncle Sam
Or, Taking pictures for the army
Author: Victor Appleton
Release date: November 8, 2025 [eBook #77191]
Language: English
Original publication: Garden City: Garden City Publishing Company, Inc, 1919
Credits: Aaron Adrignola, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MOVIE BOYS UNDER UNCLE SAM ***
The Movie Boys
Under Uncle Sam
OR
Taking Pictures for the Army
BY
VICTOR APPLETON
_Author of “The Movie Boys in the Jungle,” “The
Movie Boys Under Fire,” “The Movie
Boys and the Flood,” etc._
[Illustration]
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
GARDEN CITY PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC.
1926
THE FAMOUS MOVIE BOYS
SERIES
BY
VICTOR APPLETON
_See back of book for list of titles_
COPYRIGHT, 1919, 1926, BY
GARDEN CITY PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I DANGEROUS WORK 1
II TO THE RESCUE 10
III A NARROW ESCAPE 23
IV DECEIVING THE ENEMY 33
V CHEATING THE EYE 41
VI DEATH FROM THE SKY 52
VII CHARGING WITH THE TANKS 61
VIII A CLOSE CALL 70
IX AN EXCITING STRUGGLE 79
X CHRISTOPHER CUTLER PIPER TURNS UP 86
XI THE STORM BREAKS 95
XII THE LOST FILMS 103
XIII A TEST OF PLUCK 112
XIV SURPRISING THE ENEMY 118
XV A NIGHT OF JOLLITY 126
XVI THE TRAIL OF THE HUN 136
XVII WRECK AND RUIN 144
XVIII SWEEPING THROUGH THE SKY 152
XIX THE FALLING PLANE 158
XX SURROUNDED BY FOES 168
XXI PRISONERS OF THE HUNS 175
XXII THE STRUGGLE IN THE CAPTAIN’S ROOM 181
XXIII A PERILOUS SITUATION 193
XXIV PUTTING IT OVER 200
XXV THE LOST FILMS--CONCLUSION 205
THE MOVIE BOYS UNDER UNCLE SAM
CHAPTER I
DANGEROUS WORK
“This sure is hot work!” exclaimed Blake Stewart, as he rose to his
feet and brushed off his clothes.
“That’s what,” agreed his friend and partner, Joe Duncan, who likewise
had thrown himself to the ground when a shell had landed and burst
within a few yards of him. “I’ve barked my shins so often that I’ll
have a case of housemaid’s knee if this keeps up.”
“My eardrums got a dose when that last shell exploded,” remarked their
lanky understudy and assistant, Charlie Anderson. “But we’re still
alive and kicking and that’s something.”
“Especially kicking,” grinned Blake, as he turned once more to the
faithful camera with which the group were taking moving pictures of
a German bombardment. “Lucky that some of that shrapnel didn’t smash
this.”
“It might be good dope to get into a little safer position,” suggested
Joe. “Those Huns are switching their fire over this way, and we’ve
had more shells drop around here in the last five minutes than we had
before all the morning. Let’s shift to that shell hole over to the
left.”
Blake cast an eye in the direction indicated.
“It might be a little safer,” he admitted, “but I’m afraid that part of
the action would be shut off by that clump of trees. Better stick it
out here a little while longer. We haven’t had such a chance for a long
time and I hate to lose it.”
“All right,” agreed Joe cheerfully, for, like his partner, he was game,
and would have gone through fire and water to get a good picture.
“A fellow ought to have as many lives as a cat when he sets put to do
this kind of work,” grumbled Charlie.
“Quit your grouching,” laughed Blake. “You know you wouldn’t miss this
for a farm. Think of the sensation this picture will make when it’s
shown. Some day you’ll be sitting in a darkened theater seeing this
thing unreeled, and you’ll pat yourself on the back and say proudly: ‘I
helped to take that picture.’”
“Maybe,” assented Charlie grudgingly. “And then again when these are
shown, I may be lying in a nice little box six feet under ground.”
“Well, you’ll be over all your troubles then,” Blake was beginning to
say, when Joe Duncan interrupted.
“Look at that!” he cried excitedly. “I could see the shell leaving the
gun that time!”
“Easy there,” returned Blake. “Your eyesight isn’t quite as good as
all that, Joe. What you saw was the bunch of wadding that followed the
shell. The film got it anyway, and it looks enough like a shell to
make most people believe it is one. But we’ll put the right caption on
it, for there isn’t going to be any fake in this series of films. It’s
going to be the real thing.”
“Right you are,” agreed Joe. “We sure don’t need any faking in pictures
like these. All the reels have to do is to tell the story just as it
is, and they’ll make a tremendous hit.”
It was a hot day in early September, and the position of the sun
indicated that it was almost noon. Ordinarily the boys would have had
some shelter from the fierce rays that beat down upon them, for they
were standing just within the edge of what nature had meant to be a
forest, and at this early stage of autumn the trees would have been in
full foliage.
But it was a forest no longer. Shot and shell had ploughed through
it until every vestige of twig and leaf had been torn away. Even the
bark had been stripped from the trunks, and the trees stood there in
ghastly whiteness, like so many ghosts watching over a valley of the
dead.
And there were plenty of dead to watch over, for all that morning
there had been fierce fighting and the ground was thickly covered with
motionless figures.
The American forces for some days past had been in hot pursuit of the
Germans, who were making their way back to the Rhine. But that day the
enemy had made a stand and put up a bitter resistance. They had taken
up their position at the top of a hill, and there they had planted
their artillery, which all the morning had been searching the American
lines in a tremendous cannonade.
The Yankee guns had replied with a fire equally intense, and it was
this spirited artillery duel that the young moving picture operators
had been fixing on their films.
Suddenly there was a lull in the action and the boys looked at each
other inquiringly.
“Seems to be a slowing down,” commented Joe.
“And about time,” grunted Charlie. “I didn’t know there were as many
shells in the world as they’ve been firing this morning.”
“It isn’t because they’re out of ammunition, you can bet,” remarked
Blake. “Not on our side, anyway. Trust Uncle Sam to keep his boys well
supplied. We do things in millions in this war.”
“Right you are in that!” ejaculated Charlie Anderson vehemently.
“Perhaps they’ve slowed down to cool off the guns,” suggested Joe.
“I should think they’d be red hot by this time,” Charlie observed. “And
maybe those gunners aren’t doing some sweating! They’re stripped to the
waist.”
“I think the real reason is that there’s something else in the wind,”
said Blake. “Perhaps our boys are going to charge. They may figure out
that by this time the artillery fire has beaten down the enemy’s wires
so that our men can go up and clean out the trenches.”
“Good guess, old man!” cried Joe, as a long file of khaki-clad soldiers
emerged from the American lines and started up the hill. “There they go
now. Great! Bully boys! Oh, how I wish I were with them!”
“Now the guns are opening up again!” exclaimed Blake. “They’re laying
down a barrage in front of the boys.”
It was a sight that might well have stirred the pulse of anyone not
dead to all emotion. Up the hill, wave upon wave, went the American
boys, over the shell-ploughed ground, clambering over the trunks of
fallen trees, skirting the edge of open craters, sometimes stumbling,
but always advancing. Before them went a wall of fire laid down by
their own gunners to screen their advance.
But now the enemy’s guns opened up again with redoubled fury. Lanes
were made in the charging lines. Men threw up their hands and fell
until the ground was dotted with crumpled figures. Their places were
taken at once by others, and the long lines went on and on until they
burst like a storm upon the enemy’s trenches at the crest of the hill.
Then there was fighting such as the boys had not yet seen in the war.
The Germans, forced from their trenches, came out into the open in
swarms, and their gray uniforms mingled in a terrific struggle with the
khaki of the American troops. The guns stopped, as each side was afraid
of firing into its own men. It became a fierce, hand-to-hand contest.
There was little rifle fire also, for the men had resorted to the
bayonet, jabbing, hacking, stabbing, at times using the gun butt as
well as the point. Against the sky line on the ridge the view from
below was perfect, and the boys were fairly dancing with excitement as
the film clicked off the story of the fight.
“Our fellows will win!” cried Blake. “The Huns can’t stand before our
bayonets. When it comes to hand-to-hand fighting it’s all over with
Fritz.”
“That’s right,” agreed Joe. “There’s no one in the world that can stand
before our boys at close quarters.”
“The Boches are bringing up reinforcements though,” said Charlie
anxiously. “Look at that bunch in gray coming down on their flank.”
“But there goes a new wave of our fellows up the hill,” put in Joe
excitedly. “They’ll even it up all right.”
It was not to be an easy victory, however, for the Germans fought with
the fury of desperation. It was a critical point in their line of
defence, and they had been ordered to hold it at any cost. Crack troops
that had been held in reserve were hurried up to meet the American
onslaught. But the Yankee boys’ blood was up and they were not to be
denied.
For half an hour the fight continued, and then a rousing cheer ran
along the American lines. The ridge was taken, the trenches were
cleared, and the beaten enemy had fallen back to his second line of
defense.
“Hurrah!” yelled Blake wildly. “I knew they’d do it.”
“They’re the stuff!” shouted Joe. “Oh, boy, how they did put it over
them!”
“And these are the greenhorns they said were going to break and run as
soon as they caught sight of a Prussian uniform,” exulted Charlie.
“They run all right,” grinned Blake, “but you’ll notice they run toward
the Huns instead of away from them. It’s Fritz who’s getting exercise
in running toward the Rhine.”
“We hear a lot of German arms,
But, oh, those German legs!”
chanted Joe.
“There go the guns again!” exclaimed Blake.
Now that the hand-to-hand fighting was over, the German artillery had
again opened up, and a perfect hail of shot and shell tore over the
ridge that the Americans had captured and down the slope into the
further lines.
“Look there!” exclaimed Joe suddenly, as he pointed to a spot halfway
up the hill.
The others looked in the direction he indicated and saw a wounded
soldier trying to crawl back toward them.
“Poor fellow,” broke out Charlie sympathetically. “He seems to be
pretty badly hurt, and the shells are falling all around him. But the
ambulances will be along pretty soon.”
“Ambulances nothing!” cried Blake. “Charlie, you stay here and take
care of this film. I’m going out to bring that fellow in. What do you
say, Joe? Are you game?”
“Am I?” replied Joe. “That’s my middle name. I’m with you, old man.
Come along.”
A moment later, with their blood on fire, the chums were on their way
up that hill of death.
CHAPTER II
TO THE RESCUE
It was a perilous adventure on which the moving picture boys had
entered.
The German fire had increased in intensity, and now was sweeping the
woods with a perfect hail of destruction. Great shells were exploding
with thunderous roars, digging deep craters in the ground and sending
their missiles of death far and wide.
The boys knew that they were taking their lives in their hands by
venturing over that ground, but the appeal made to them by that wounded
figure was too strong for them to resist.
Moving swiftly, yet taking advantage of every shattered stump and
protecting rock as they advanced, they soon reached the injured soldier.
He saw them coming, and his face lighted up with gratitude as he
attempted to smile.
“Go back!” he gasped. “I guess they’ve done for me, but what’s the use
of you boys getting killed?”
“That’s all right, old fellow,” answered Blake, as he deftly slipped
his arms around the man’s shoulders. “Here, Joe, you take his feet and
we’ll try to get him into that nearest shell hole. We can give him
first aid there, and every minute counts.”
Joe did as his comrade directed, and they hurried the man to a deep
crater a little way down the hill. The shell that made it had heaped up
the dirt in the direction of the enemy, so that the edge overhung and
formed something like a shallow cave.
Under this projecting edge they laid their burden. There they were
comparatively safe unless a shell should chance to drop right into the
hole itself.
Blake quickly got out the surgical kit he always carried and brought
forth a roll of bandage. Joe, in the meantime, had been going over the
wounded man with his hands to see how badly he was hurt. A bullet had
ploughed through his scalp and blood had flowed freely from the gash,
but the boys, who in their various adventures had become fairly expert,
recognized that this was not a serious injury. It was only when Joe
felt the man’s left leg that he detected at once that it was broken.
“That’s where the Huns got me,” groaned the sufferer. “I guess I’ll go
on one leg now for the rest of my life.”
“Nothing like that,” said Blake cheerfully, for to him it seemed like
a simple fracture. “You’ll be trotting around as well as ever in six
weeks from now. Hand me some of those pieces of wood over there, Joe,
and we’ll make a splint.”
The bottom of the shell hole was covered with twigs and branches which
had been torn from the near-by trees by the bombardment, and they
soon improvised a rough splint, creditable enough for amateurs, that
held the broken bone in place. The man’s face went white during the
operation.
Blake unstrapped his water bottle and washed out the ragged wound in
the scalp. Then he bound it up with a surgical bandage.
“There you are,” he said briskly, when his task was finished and they
had placed the patient in as comfortable a position as the narrow
limits of the space permitted. “Now, just as soon as the ambulance
comes down the line, we’ll get you off to the hospital and they’ll
finish the job.”
“It must have been mighty tough, dragging that broken leg along,” said
Joe sympathetically.
“It wasn’t any fun,” agreed the soldier. “It was all-fired good of you
fellows to come after me. Another shell would likely have got me by
this time if you hadn’t. But you boys were taking an awful chance. What
regiment do you belong to?”
“We just don’t belong,” replied Blake with a smile. “We’re doing
special work for the War Department in taking moving pictures of
the fighting. My friend here is named Joe Duncan. My name is Blake
Stewart.”
“And mine is Tom Wentworth,” said the wounded man. “So you’re the
moving picture boys,” he continued, his eyes brightening with interest.
“I’ve heard about you from some of the others. They said you were as
plucky as they make ’em, and I’ve found out that’s true.”
“Oh, everybody here is taking risks,” said Blake modestly. “Look at
yourself, for instance. You got closer to the line of fire than we did.”
“It was pretty hot,” admitted Wentworth, “but I don’t know that it was
any worse than it was at Belleau Wood and Chateau-Thierry.”
“Were you there?” asked Joe eagerly, for he always felt a special
thrill when he heard the names of those places where the American
troops had covered themselves with glory.
“Very much there,” replied Wentworth with a faint smile. “So much there
that I thought I’d always stay there, under the ground if not on top of
it.”
“That was some scrap!” exclaimed Blake enthusiastically. “Two green
American regiments fighting six crack Prussian divisions and putting it
all over them.”
“It was lively work,” grinned Wentworth. “I remember when we first went
in. We met the French coming back and their officers told ours that
orders had been given to retreat. ‘Go back,’ they said, ‘the enemy’s
too strong.’ Our old colonel looked at them. ‘Go back?’ he blurted out.
‘Thunder! We’ve just got here.’”
The boys laughed.
“That’s real American talk,” chuckled Blake.
“American as she is spoke,” added Joe.
“You must have got some mighty good pictures this morning,” went on
Wentworth with interest, though a twinge in his broken leg contorted
his features as he spoke.
“You bet we did,” answered Blake enthusiastically. “Wasn’t it great
the way that bunch of doughboys went up the hill? Say, we’ll have the
people holding on to the arms of their seats when they see that film in
the States.”
“I knew the boys would take that crest if they could only get to the
top before the shells swept them away,” said Wentworth. “When it comes
to hack and stab, the Heinies aren’t in it with our boys. The cold
steel makes them squeal. They’re all right in a crowd, but we’ve got
their goat when it’s man to man.”
The shelling had died down somewhat while they were talking, and Joe,
who had thrust his head cautiously above the edge of the crater, gave a
sudden exclamation.
“Hullo!” he cried. “The whole regiment’s on the move! They’re swarming
out of the trenches like bees out of a hive. They must have ordered a
general advance.”
“We mustn’t miss that!” exclaimed Blake. “We’ve got to go along with
them. But first we’ll have to see that this man gets to the hospital.”
“Don’t bother about me,” said the wounded soldier. “You’ve done plenty
for me as it is. Our ambulances will be along soon and pick me up. You
boys just go along.”
“Not on your life, we won’t,” replied Blake. “The pictures can wait.”
“Here come some stretcher-bearers now,” observed Joe.
He jumped out of the hole, waving his hands to attract attention. A
group of men with litters came hurriedly toward him.
“Lend a hand here, fellows!” cried Joe. “We’ve got one of the boys here
with a messed-up head and a broken leg.”
It was but the work of a moment for willing hands to lift Tom Wentworth
out of the hole and arrange him comfortably.
“I’ll never forget the way you boys risked your life to save mine,” he
said gratefully, as the men grasped the handles of the stretcher and
prepared to start off with him.
“Nothing at all, old man,” answered Blake heartily.
“All in the day’s work,” smiled Joe.
“And now for a quick sneak back to the camera,” Blake remarked, when
the bearers with their burden had gone. “I hope that Charlie has been
right on the job. It’ll be too bad if he’s missed any of this fighting.”
“Let’s hope a bullet hasn’t keeled him over while we’ve been away,”
said Joe with some anxiety.
“Nothing like that,” answered Blake, as his quick eye caught sight of
their assistant.
“But he’s turning the crank with his left hand,” cried Joe in alarm. “I
wonder if anything could have happened to his right.”
They broke into a run.
Charlie saw them coming and a look of relief came into his eyes.
“So you’re back again safe and sound,” he cried. “I was afraid that
perhaps a shell had dropped into the hole and knocked you out.”
“We’re all right,” ejaculated Joe. “But how about yourself? Why are you
working left-handed? Did you get hurt?”
For answer, Charlie held up his right hand that was smeared with blood.
“Only a scratch,” he said. “A bullet grazed the back of my hand. Didn’t
break any bones, but I bled like a stuck pig. Didn’t have time to bind
it up or I’d have missed some of the picture, so I just kept plugging
along with the good old left.”
“Give me the crank,” commanded Blake, at the same time taking it from
his associate. “Joe, bind that hand up for him. Your nerve is all
right, Charlie, but I’d rather lose the picture than have you neglect
yourself. How about it, Joe? Is it a bad wound?”
“No, I guess not,” replied Joe, as he fixed a bandage around the
injured hand while Charlie involuntarily winced. “But it must hurt a
lot. Charlie will have to be a southpaw for a while, but that’s all.”
“I’m mighty glad it’s no worse,” said Blake in a tone of relief. “I’d
have felt partly responsible if it were, since I skipped the job and
left it to Charlie.”
“Say, it was the best thing you ever did,” broke in Charlie
enthusiastically. “I caught the whole action while you were making your
way toward that fellow and believe me it’s some sweet film. It’ll make
the chills go up and down the people’s spines when they get a squint at
it.”
“Well, now let’s be hiking along,” remarked Blake, as Joe completed his
work. “The regiment’s on the move and all the rest of the fighting will
be done on the other side of the hill. We’ll have a splendid view of it
there, too, so get a move on.”
They gathered up the camera and the tripod and hurried along in a line
parallel with the advancing troops.
The long slope was dotted now with stretcher parties hunting out the
wounded, in order that they might be taken to the first-aid dressing
stations, which were established in bomb-proof shelters a little way
back of the lines. Prisoners, too, were met coming back in swarms,
sullen and dejected for the most part, though on the faces of some
there was a look of relief that the ordeal of battle was over. Some
of the more slightly wounded had their arms about the necks of their
comrades for support as they staggered along.
Most of them seemed to be holding onto their trousers with both hands,
and Joe remarked on the strangeness of this.
“There’s a reason,” grinned Blake. “One of the fellows was telling
me about it last night. It seems that when they take a big raft of
prisoners like this the first thing they do when they round them up is
to cut their suspenders. Then they can’t run away, for their trousers
would slip down and trip them up. They’re so busy holding them up that
they don’t have time to think of anything else and it only takes a few
men to guard them.”
“Good idea,” laughed Joe. “It takes away from their dignity, but it
does the trick.”
The boys soon reached the top of the hill, and as they surmounted the
crest a simultaneous gasp came from all three at the sight that met
their eyes.
And while they are standing there, with their eyes shining and their
hearts beating like trip-hammers, it may be well for the sake of those
who have not read the preceding volumes of this series to tell who the
boys were, and sketch something of their lives and exploits up to the
time this story opens.
Blake Stewart and Joe Duncan were bright, stalwart American youths,
whose early years had been spent in the country. They were working
on adjacent farms when they came in contact with a moving picture
company that was staging some film scenes in the vicinity. They became
fascinated with the work, for which they seemed to be peculiarly
adapted, and the manager of the company, a Mr. Hadley, took a great
liking to the boys and gave them a place in his organization. They were
quick and ambitious and eager to learn, and it was not long before
they developed into skilled operators. Their experiences in New York
while they were learning the ins and outs of the business are told in
the first volume of the series, entitled: “The Movie Boys on Call”; or
“Filming the Perils of a Great City.”
Mr. Hadley soon learned that there was no danger so great as to daunt
the boys while in pursuit of a picture, and he was able to branch out
in a line of work from which many of his rivals shrank because of the
peril involved. The boys took pictures of the cowboys and Indians and
took big risks in filming a wreck off the Pacific Coast. They had many
hairbreadth escapes later on in jungle scenes with wild animals and in
regions where floods and volcanoes threatened them with death from one
day to the next. Few adventures were more fraught with peril than their
going down with a submarine, described in the eighth volume of the
series.
While they had been having these experiences, the United States had
been goaded into war with Germany because of the intolerable outrages
on her citizens. Blake and Joe were ardent patriots, and they eagerly
accepted a proposition to visit the battlefront in France and take
pictures of American war-like activities for the benefit of the
government. The difficulties they met in getting into the fighting
zone, their narrow escape from a submarine, the way they met and
checkmated the intrigues of a German spy, are told in the volume
preceding this, entitled: “The Movie Boys Under Fire”; or “The Search
for the Stolen Film.”
Now with their faithful assistant, Charlie Anderson--known familiarly
as “Mac,” a shortening of his nickname “Macaroni,” because of his long
and lanky shape, they had reached the very forefront of the American
army which had started on its victorious drive against the Germans.
As the boys reached the top of the hill, they saw coming toward them a
tremendous mass of gray-clad figures on the double quick. The Germans,
desperate at the loss of the hill, had hurried up reinforcements and
organized a fierce counter-attack in the resolve to sweep the Americans
from the hill. On came the ranks, wave upon wave, from as far back as
the boys could see.
“Gee whiz!” cried Joe. “It looks as though we were going to be attacked
by the whole German army!”
“Quick!” exclaimed Blake. “Set up that tripod and get the machine
going. We never had a chance like this, and we may never have it again.
Hustle now.”
On came the ranks as relentless as fate. The American guns had been
signaled, and they opened up a devastating fire that tore great holes
in the close-formed lines. But they closed up at once like water in the
wake of a ship and kept coming.
The camera now had been set up, and Joe was turning the crank with
apparent calm, although he had never been the prey to such intense
excitement.
Then, like a tidal wave, the Germans struck the American lines!
The impact was tremendous, but the Americans were ready for them and
the attack beat against granite.
Back and forth the lines swayed like two great anacondas in mortal
combat. Men went down in heaps and the survivors fought over their
bodies. The lines broke up into struggling groups where resort was had
to the bayonet and gun butt. It was a battle to the death.
The boys had found a position a little to the right of the line,
where they commanded a view of the greater part of the fighting, and
Blake had just relieved Joe at the crank, when suddenly there was a
tremendous explosion, the earth beneath them opened, and tons of earth
and rock went hurtling toward the sky.
A great blackness came down on the moving picture boys like a blow and
for a time they knew no more.
CHAPTER III
A NARROW ESCAPE
How long his unconsciousness lasted Blake never knew.
When at last he came to himself, there was a roaring in his ears and a
shimmer of dancing green lights before his eyes. His brain was reeling
and his head ached horribly.
For a few moments he lay perfectly still, trying to figure out where he
was and what had happened to him. Gradually he pieced events together.
First he remembered that he had been at the foot of the long slope that
the Americans had stormed. Then he thought of Wentworth and the broken
leg that he had helped to bandage. There his recollection stopped for a
time, while his dizzy brain tried to recall the rest that tantalizingly
eluded him.
“Wentworth, Wentworth,” he kept repeating to himself, fearful that if
he lost that clue he could go no further.
Then it all came back to him like a flash--the climb up the hill, the
ranks of gray coming on to the attack, the shock when the two forces
met, and then the terrific explosion that had seemed like the knell of
doom and the end of the world.
He tried to rise, but felt as though a ton were resting on his legs. He
felt of his arms and chest, and was relieved to find that though they
were bruised and sore no bones seemed to be broken.
He raised his voice in a shout, but the sound was muffled and there was
no answering echo. He tried again with the same result. Then a great
fear came to him that made the sweat start from every pore of his body.
He was buried alive!
He had read of such things, heard of them, knew that they had happened.
Once in a nightmare he had dreamed of it, and he remembered now the
way he had struggled until he had awakened to find the blessed light
streaming through the window and realized that it was only a hideous
dream.
But he was not dreaming now. It was all too surely a reality. He was
shut out from the light of day, from the sight of men, held as though
by a vise in what might prove to be his tomb.
But it would not do to give way to gloomy imaginings. While there was
life there was hope. By a mighty effort he took a grip on himself, and
tried to control his dizzy brain so that he could think.
How had this thing come about? Had the explosion of a monster shell dug
a crater and engulfed him in the thrown-up earth? Had an ammunition
dump blown up?
He turned these thoughts over in his mind, only to dismiss them as
inadequate. No, it was something far more formidable than either of
these that had caused that tremendous upheaval of the earth.
Could it have been a mine? This seemed more probable. The Germans might
have mined the hill with the idea of blowing it up if the Americans
should gain possession of it. But if this was so, why had they waited
until their own men were on it, engaged in deadly struggle with the
enemy? Still that might have been due to a mistake in the timing.
But from these conjectures he brought himself up with a jerk. How this
had happened did not after all matter in the least. The dreadful fact
was that he was somewhere under ground and face to face with death.
His hand came in contact with his water bottle and he was rejoiced to
find that it was nearly full. He took a long draught and cooled his hot
lips and parched throat.
Although his legs were pinioned, he was able to move his arms and body
without much difficulty. Loose dirt in plenty was lying on him, but not
in a solid mass. Some timbers must have arched over him and protected
him from being crushed. But who knew at what moment these might give
way and let tons of earth and rock down upon him.
Hark! What was that? A sound, far away and faint, and yet a sound, came
to him. Would it come again?
He held his breath, and his heart almost seemed to stop beating while
he listened.
Again the sound came and this time it did not cease so quickly.
Gradually it developed into a series of tappings that seemed to be
coming nearer.
A gleam of hope shot into Blake’s tortured brain. Somebody, perhaps,
was taking steps toward rescue. He knew that if Joe and Charlie were
still in the land of the living they would work their hands off to get
to him.
But, in the meantime, the air was getting terribly close. He breathed
with more and more difficulty. His lungs were laboring and his brain,
which had cleared somewhat, again began to whirl.
It could not be long, a matter of minutes at the most in that confined
place, that he would be able to breathe at all.
He half twisted his body around so as to bring his face closer to the
earth where what little air remained was cooler and fresher than the
air above.
Would help never come? Or if it came would it come too late to do him
any good?
He had been close to death more than once in his adventurous career,
but that had been for the most part in the open where he could fight
and have a chance for his life. But to die helpless and alone in this
coffin of earth where all he could do was to hope and wait was too
horrible for words.
He was gasping now, opening his mouth as widely as possible to draw the
vitiated air that tasted like copper into his starved lungs. There was
a choking feeling in his throat. He felt that consciousness was leaving
him and he fought desperately to retain it.
Then suddenly a pick was thrust through the roof of his living grave,
and there came an inrush of cool, sweet air that Blake drank in with
great gulps as though it were so much nectar.
He could hear a confused murmur of voices now, growing more and more
distinct as the vigorous and repeated strokes of the pick enlarged the
hole and light as well as air rushed in.
He thought he could distinguish Joe’s voice, but he was not sure. He
tried to shout himself, but it was only after a third effort that he
could force his voice to utter a sound.
Then a face appeared at the hole.
“Hello!” shouted a voice that he now knew was Joe’s. “Is anyone there?
Are you there, Blake?”
“I’m here,” Blake managed to get out in little more than a whisper.
But Joe’s quick ear heard it.
“Glory hallelujah!” he shouted. “Charlie, come here, quick! I’ve found
him.”
Then he turned again to the aperture and asked anxiously:
“Are you hurt, old man?”
“I guess not,” replied Blake. “No bones broken as far as I can find
out. Can’t speak for my legs, though, for they’re pinned down by
something that feels as though it weighs a ton.”
“We’ll get you out in a jiffy,” cried Joe cheerfully, and reinforced
by Charlie and a number of soldiers who ran to help, the hole was soon
enlarged so that Joe could drop down beside his friend. Great care
was necessary to avoid dislodging rocks or timbers that might come
crashing down with serious results. But at last the work was done, the
weight that rested on Blake’s legs was removed, and a score of willing
hands were at his service to lift him out of the hole and lay him on a
stretcher that had been brought.
“Thank God that you’re alive!” exclaimed Joe with a tremble in his
voice, and Charlie echoed him.
“Oh, I’m worth a dozen dead men yet,” answered Blake with a queer
little smile. “I guess I won’t need this stretcher either, if you
fellows will just rub these legs of mine until there’s some feeling in
them.”
They rubbed his legs vigorously until gradually feeling returned to
them, and he was able, with their support, to rise to his feet and lean
against the side of a gun.
“And now tell me about yourselves,” he said to his friends when in
answer to their eager questions he had narrated his own experience.
“Oh, we had luck,” replied Joe. “We went flying into a heap of bushes
and got off with only a few scratches. But the shock made us woozy for
a while, and all we could do was to sit looking at each other like a
pair of boobs. Then we got to hunting round for you and I tell you
what, old boy, we went nearly crazy when we couldn’t see anything of
you. We were like a couple of wild men. A bunch of the soldiers helped
us dig and, as luck would have it, we hit upon the right place.”
“It was bully of you,” said Blake gratefully, “and you sure did come
just in the nick of time. I knew you’d be moving heaven and earth to
get at me if you could, but, of course, I didn’t know but what you
might be in the same fix as I was. How did the whole thing happen,
anyway? Was it a mine?”
“That’s what,” replied Joe. “The Heinies had mined the hill, but by
some mistake on their part they didn’t set it off as soon as they meant
to. The consequence was that they killed more of their own men than
they did of ours, though a good many of our poor fellows went West,
too. But it didn’t do the Huns any good, for our boys licked them good
and proper, and they’re chasing them now.”
“That’s fine and dandy!” exclaimed Blake, as he looked down the hill
where he could see the Germans in disorderly retreat. “I wish they’d
chase them off the map.”
“They’ll chase them back to the Rhine, anyway, before they get
through,” grinned Joe, “and that’ll do pretty well for a beginning.”
“But how about the camera?” asked Blake, as his mind came back to more
personal affairs.
“Pretty good,” Charlie answered. “The tripod was smashed, but the box
came through all right. We found it lying near us when we were trying
to get our wits back. Of course, we haven’t had time to examine it very
closely, but we can do that when we develop the film. I hope that film
hasn’t been hurt. I’d hate like the mischief to lose to-day’s work.
It’s the best chance we’ve had yet to take a big battle at close range.”
“Well, the only way to find out is to test it,” said Blake. “Let’s get
back to headquarters and put the film through its bath and see how it
comes out.”
“Are you sure you’re rested enough?” asked Joe solicitously.
“Sure thing,” replied Blake. “I’m a little shaky in the legs yet, but
that will wear off with walking. Come along.”
They passed on through groups of officers and men who were too busy to
say much, but many of whom found time for a word of congratulation to
Blake on his narrow escape, for the boys were general favorites with
all ranks.
They had soon reached their temporary quarters, which were in a little
cottage back of the lines. It was a matter of only a few minutes for
them to darken one of the rooms and arrange their developing and fixing
baths.
Then they took out their film and with fingers that trembled with
excitement put it in the developer.
“A little bit of ice, Charlie,” said Blake, as he tested the
temperature. “This water’s been standing and it’s a little too warm.”
Charlie complied, and at the end of five or six minutes they took out
the film and washed it off. Then they examined it and there was a
simultaneous exclamation of pleasure and relief as the picture showed
up strongly.
“It’s a dandy,” ejaculated Blake.
“A peach,” agreed Joe.
“All to the good,” added Charlie.
“Doesn’t need a bit of reducing or intensifying either,” exulted Blake.
“It’s just what the doctor ordered. Now we’ll give it the fixing bath,
wash it off, dry it, and wind it up.”
“Well,” observed Joe with a sigh of relief, when everything was done
and the precious film safely stowed away, “it’s been a pretty tough
day, especially for you, Blake, but we’ve got something mighty good to
show for it. The best film yet taken.”
CHAPTER IV
DECEIVING THE ENEMY
The moving picture boys slept well that night after the tremendous
strain and excitement of the day, and awoke the next morning none the
worse for their adventure, except that they were feeling a certain
soreness that vanished, however, as the morning progressed.
Blake found himself the object of congratulations from many of the
officers and men, for the news of his close call had spread rapidly.
“You just escaped by the skin of your teeth,” observed Lieutenant
Baker, a young officer with whom they had struck up a warm friendship.
“I sure did,” agreed Blake. “A few minutes more and everything would
have been all up with me.”
“Well, you were lucky to escape with your life,” said the lieutenant.
“That’s more than many of the poor fellows did.”
“Yes,” replied Blake regretfully, “Joe was telling me that a good many
of our fellows were killed by the explosion. But he said, too, that the
Heinies got it a good deal worse than we did.”
“That’s true,” confirmed Baker. “It was a sort of boomerang for the
Huns. They slipped their trolley some way and set the mine off a few
minutes too late. This German efficiency that we hear so much about
isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be.”
“It’s getting to be deficiency, I guess,” grinned Joe. “Our boys sure
gave them an awful wallop yesterday.”
“We must have captured a raft of them,” exulted Blake. “When we were
going up the hill yesterday, it looked as though there were hundreds of
the Heinies coming back as prisoners.”
“Certainly was a bunch,” grinned Charlie.
“Yes,” replied the lieutenant with a smile of satisfaction, “we killed
a good many but we captured more. They’re getting easier to take than
they used to be.”
“Right you are,” chuckled Joe. “They don’t seem to like our game. I
heard that one of them said the other day that the Americans were easy
to kill but impossible to stop.”
“Impossible is right,” declared Baker. “We’ve got them on the run now
and it’s all up with them. It’s only a matter of time before we get to
that sacred Rhine of theirs and then they’ll throw up their hands. If
they don’t we’ll just have to finish up the job and go straight through
to Berlin.”
“That’s just what I’m hoping for,” said Blake grimly. “I don’t want
them to quit too soon. That would make it too easy for them. I’d like
to see the war pushed on German soil. I want them to taste a little of
what they’ve given to France and Belgium. I want them to hear the roar
of cannon and the screaming of shells in their own cities and villages.
I want to see their roads choked with refugees fleeing for their lives.
Of course, we wouldn’t do to them what they’ve done to the French and
Belgians. We simply couldn’t. It isn’t in our nature. We couldn’t
stand up old men and little boys and shoot them down. We couldn’t kill
helpless women and babies, but I would like to see some of their cities
go up in flames and their villages turned into piles of rubbish.”
He stopped, almost breathless with the intensity of his feeling.
“Blake is getting eloquent this morning,” laughed Joe.
“Yes,” assented the lieutenant with a smile, “but he doesn’t put it a
bit too strongly. He’s only saying what civilized people all over the
world are feeling. But there isn’t a chance of anything of the kind
happening. Those fellows bluster a lot, but when it comes right to the
pinch they’ll quit like a lot of yellow dogs. They’ll make door-mats
of themselves before they’ll take a chance of having their cities and
towns devastated.”
“That’s where the French and Belgians had it all over them,” broke in
Joe. “All Belgium had to do to save her beautiful cities from ruin was
to quit at the start. But her honor wasn’t for sale. The same with the
French. They had the stuff in them to stick to the end, to fight to
the last ditch. Look at them when things seemed so dark this Spring.
Did they quit? Not a bit of it. You didn’t hear a whine or yelp out of
them. But the Heinies will quit soon enough when they find things going
against them. You mark my words and see what kind of a prophet I am.”
“I think you’re right,” said the lieutenant, “but we’ll see. The thing
that counts just now is that we’re licking them to a frazzle. You were
speaking of the prisoners we took yesterday, but we got a good many of
their guns, too. Do you care to take a look at them? We’ve got them all
parked up here back of the Second Division.”
“Sure we would,” replied Blake, and he was echoed by the others
heartily.
A few minutes’ walk brought them to a field where the captured guns had
been collected. They made an impressive showing. There were over sixty
of them, of all calibers from the lighter field-pieces to the heavier
monsters of tremendous range and power.
“So these are the fellows that were barking at us yesterday,” remarked
Blake with exultation in his tones.
“Mighty big bunch of them,” observed Joe.
“And look at the way they’re painted,” said Charlie.
“All the colors of the rainbow. They actually make your eyes ache when
you look at them,” added Joe.
“But they make your heart glad to count them,” chuckled Blake.
“Hard to keep your eyes on ’em long enough to count ’em, though, fixed
up like that,” observed Charlie Anderson.
“What’s the idea of all this gaudy stuff?” asked Joe. “We’ve been
keeping the Germans so busy that I shouldn’t think they’d have much
time for art.”
“That isn’t art,” said the lieutenant dryly. “That’s business. It’s
camouflage.”
“Oh, that’s it!” exclaimed Blake with interest. “I knew that they
camouflaged almost everything else on earth and I knew they camouflage
the position of the guns, but I didn’t know they used it on the guns
themselves.”
“They don’t as a rule,” explained the lieutenant. “When they’re holding
a position on a certain front for any length of time, they content
themselves with hiding the guns so that the aviators can’t spot them,
but since we’ve forced them out into the open they’ve had to camouflage
the guns themselves. And it does pretty well as a makeshift, too, for
it’s mighty hard to locate them, with all these spots and stripes to
deceive the eye. Now, for instance, if this,” pointing to one of the
big guns near him, “were perfectly black, you could stand a hundred
feet off with a rifle and hit it without half trying. It would be no
trick at all because it would be a plain target. But if you tried to
get a bead on this gun now with all its colors, it would make your eyes
water, and ten to one you wouldn’t come within several yards of it.”
“That camouflage is a great idea,” said Joe admiringly.
“Big time stuff,” agreed Blake.
“It certainly is,” acquiesced the lieutenant. “But this is nothing
to some of the stunts these camouflage artists pull off. You moving
picture fellows are no slouches when it comes to faking things, I’ll
admit. You can make an audience think that it sees a man jump from the
ground to the top of the Woolworth Building. But if you could see some
of the things that our boys do in the camouflage training camps it
would make you sit up and take notice.”
“They’d have to be pretty good if they put anything over on us,” said
Joe, coming to the defense of his profession.
“I’m from Missouri,” remarked Blake incredulously. “You’ll have to show
me.”
“I’ll show you all right,” laughed Baker. “I’ll tell you what I’ll
do. There’s a camouflage camp of ours only a few miles from here in
a village back of the lines. We’ll be busy here for the next day or
two, consolidating our positions and bringing up our artillery in
preparation for another advance. If I can arrange it this afternoon,
I’ll get one of the army autos and whirl you fellows over. It’s likely
enough there’ll be some orders to be sent over there and I’ll ask our
colonel to let me take them. Would you like to go?”
“What a question,” laughed Blake Stewart, eager for the trip.
“You don’t have to ask us twice,” grinned Joe.
“Don’t leave me behind, Lieutenant Baker,” pleaded Charlie.
“All right,” concluded the lieutenant. “It’s a go then. I think I can
arrange it.”
His supposition was correct, for shortly after mess he sent an orderly
to the boys asking them to come to his quarters.
They complied promptly and found him sitting in an army auto waiting
for them.
“Ready, eh?” he greeted them. “Pile in then and we’ll break all the
speed laws between here and Hoboken.”
In a twinkling they were in beside him. He took the wheel, and the big
machine at once sprang forward.
CHAPTER V
CHEATING THE EYE
“Dandy car you’ve got there,” commented Blake, as the big machine
purred along with scarcely a jar, yet so swiftly that the miles were
fairly eaten up.
“It runs like a dream,” observed Joe.
“It’s a lallapalooza,” added Macaroni.
“The old girl does move along rather lively,” agreed the lieutenant
with a touch of pride in his voice. “Everything that Uncle Sam sends
over is mighty good stuff. There’s nothing too good for the army boys.”
“Maybe the Germans wouldn’t like to get hold of a few of these,”
chuckled Blake. “I hear they’re so short of rubber now that they’ve
stopped using tires, and their old machines go clanking along like so
much scrap iron over the pavement.”
“They’ll be short of more things than rubber before we get through
with them,” remarked the lieutenant.
“Short of breath if they keep on running as they have for the last few
days,” laughed Blake.
“They’ll be good Marathon runners before our boys finish the job,”
grinned Joe.
“Look out for that shell hole, Lieutenant,” cautioned Mac.
“I see it,” responded the officer, as he deftly guided his car past the
edge of a deep crater in the center of the road. “Lucky it’s daytime
instead of night, or we might have had a spill. It’s a shame,” he
added. “These roads of Northern France were among the finest in the
world, but they’ll all be shot to pieces before this war is over.”
They had gone several miles when Blake remarked:
“That’s a pretty big patch of woodland we’re coming to, Lieutenant.
Does the road pass right through it?”
The officer seemed to be busy with one of the clutches and apparently
did not hear the question. The car kept on with unabated speed directly
toward the trees.
“Something funny about those trees, don’t you think?” Joe asked
curiously.
“In what way?” queried Blake.
“Why, there doesn’t seem to be a leaf stirring,” replied Joe, “and yet
there’s a pretty good breeze blowing down here.”
Nearer and nearer the car sped towards the woods.
“Look out, Lieutenant,” cried Mac as he reached forward to clutch the
officer’s arm. “You’re going to run right into that tree.”
Baker paid no attention and a shout of alarm rose from all three as the
machine made straight for a mighty oak.
Then suddenly the oak seemed to split apart, two sentries stood one
on either side of where the tree had been standing, and, as though by
magic, the car glided into a vast rectangular space that the boys saw
at once was one of Uncle Sam’s army training camps.
They looked at each other sheepishly, while the lieutenant broke into a
roar of laughter.
“Stung!” exclaimed Blake.
“One on us,” admitted Joe.
“I sure thought we were goners that time,” muttered Mac, a little
shamefacedly, yet with unmistakable relief for escape from what had
seemed to be imminent peril.
“You movie boys were from Missouri and wanted to be shown,” chaffed the
lieutenant good-naturedly. “Well, I’ve shown you, haven’t I?”
“We acknowledge the corn,” admitted Blake with a laugh. “Whoever
rigged up that fake curtain was a sure enough artist.”
“He’d make a dandy bunco steerer,” grinned Joe. “He’s certainly a gay
deceiver.”
“It isn’t ‘he,’ it’s ‘they,’” corrected the officer. “There’s been an
army of men at work on this curtain. You see, it stretches away for
nearly half a mile. If German batteries caught sight of that, they’d
simply think it was a patch of woods, and no matter how closely they
looked at it through their glasses they couldn’t see any one stirring
and they wouldn’t waste any shells on it.”
“And you don’t even have to knock to get in here,” laughed Blake.
“Those sentries seemed to spring from the ground.”
“They saw us coming,” explained the lieutenant, “and at the right
moment they touched a spring and the curtain rolled back on either
side.”
“It’s certainly great stuff,” commented Blake, as the moving picture
boys and their assistant looked about them with interest.
“I see you’re protected from the sky, too,” observed Joe, as he looked
up at great strips of canvas arranged at intervals over sections of the
road.
“Yes,” replied Baker, “that’s to fool the aviators. Those strips
are covered with grass so that it makes the place look just like an
ordinary field. The men who are in training here carry on their work
under those strips of canvas so that they can’t be seen from above.”
“The aviators or somebody got that horse though,” said Charlie, as he
pointed to where a horse was lying stiff and stark by the side of the
road.
“Poor old brute,” murmured Joe Duncan, sympathetically.
“I should think they’d get him out of the way as soon as possible,”
said Blake, sniffing the air. “It’s pretty hot weather to leave him
lying around.”
As he spoke, a soldier emerged from the body of the horse, stood up to
his full height of six feet or more, stretched himself, yawned, and
then as he caught sight of the lieutenant came smartly at salute.
The boys hardly dared to look at Baker, who was shaking with inward
laughter.
“What a bunch of come-ons we are,” groaned Blake.
“I’m going to keep my mouth shut after this,” asseverated Joe.
“And your nose, too, when you come near dead horses,” joked the
lieutenant. “But come close now and let’s have a look at this defunct
animal.”
The boys examined the dummy horse with some chagrin but great
curiosity. It was an exact reproduction of what a dead horse would
appear to be. The body was swelled beyond the normal size, the head
hung limp, and two of the legs extended stiffly into the air. It was
made of hide stretched over a framework of bamboo.
“See how light it is,” said the officer.
Joe and Blake put their hands beneath it and lifted it easily into the
air.
“That makes it easy to transport,” explained Baker. “The camouflage
corps can rig up one of these in a few minutes. Then it can be slipped
out at night anywhere in No Man’s Land not far from the German lines.
There’s a scout inside it with a rifle and a pair of field glasses and
he can find out most of what the enemy’s doing or planning to do. To
the Germans it’s only one dead horse among many, and they don’t tumble
to it. Get inside, Larkin,” he directed, turning to the young soldier,
“and show us just how the thing is worked.”
With a grin the man obeyed, slipping into the large cavity and
arranging himself comfortably upon his side.
“Now come around to this side of the horse,” said the lieutenant to the
boys.
They did as directed and saw the wicked-looking muzzle of Larkin’s
rifle pointed toward them through a hole in the hide.
“There he is,” said Baker with a laugh, “all ready for business. As
snug and comfortable as you please.”
“Pretty cramped though,” remarked Blake. “He hasn’t room enough to
change his mind.”
“No,” admitted the lieutenant, “he hasn’t all the comforts of home,
but still he does well enough, and that repeating rifle of his would
certainly give the Huns a surprise party if they came prowling around
too near. Only the other day, one of our boys in a contraption like
this wiped out an entire German patrol of half a dozen men. The Heinies
didn’t know where the bullets were coming from. But come along now and
we’ll see some things these fakirs are doing.
“Look at that tree,” he said, after they had walked a little further.
“Do you see anything strange about it?”
“I don’t know about trees,” said Blake suspiciously. “Since you fooled
us when you were running into that fake oak tree back there I’ve grown
distrustful.”
“Oh, this is a real tree,” laughed the lieutenant. “I give you my word
for that. But look at it closely. Anyone in it?”
“Not a soul,” declared Joe promptly.
“Wouldn’t want to bet on it, would you?” asked Baker.
“I wouldn’t bet on anything in this dump,” said Joe emphatically. “I
wouldn’t even bet that I’m alive.”
“Well,” said the lieutenant, “there is a man there, just as big and
tall a man as any of us four, and he isn’t hiding behind the trunk or
any branch of it either. You’re looking at him right now and you don’t
see him.”
The boys rubbed their eyes and looked more closely. It was not a
thickly branched tree, the sun was streaming through it, and they
were sure they could see every inch of it that was toward them. And
Lieutenant Baker had assured them that the man was not on the further
side of the tree.
“Well. I’ll put you out of your misery,” laughed the lieutenant. “Just
fix your eyes on the trunk about two-thirds of the way up. Notice
anything unusual up there?”
“Seems to me it’s a little thicker there,” pronounced Blake.
“Bulges out a bit,” observed Joe.
“Seems to me to be a little crinkly like a caterpillar,” commented
Charlie.
The lieutenant gave a whistle and then the resemblance to a caterpillar
became more pronounced as the whole trunk seemed to crinkle into
successive waves until the foot of the tree was reached. Then with a
quick motion a part of the bark seemed to detach itself from the tree
and to come directly toward them.
“That’s all right, Thompson,” said the officer. “Open up.”
A flap fell from the head of the figure and they saw the face of a man,
rather red from exertion, but wearing a broad smile.
“A little comedy I had staged for your benefit,” laughed the
lieutenant. “I’d phoned over to them that we were coming and gave them
a tip to let us see what they could do in the way of tree climbing.
Come a little closer, Thompson, and let’s have a look at you. Or
rather, back up against the tree and show us how those stripes of yours
harmonize with the bark.”
The man did as directed and they crowded around him.
It was astonishing to see how perfect was the harmony between the
markings of the tree and the garb the man wore. The tree had gray and
white marks, and these were duplicated perfectly in the man’s costume.
At the distance of a few rods it was most difficult to detect the
difference.
“We use these for sniping,” observed the lieutenant. “On a settled
portion of the front we have perhaps twenty, fifty or a hundred of
these men, stationed in tall trees that command almost the entire
space of No Man’s Land in that particular section. Even their rifles
are striped in the same way so as to make no contrast against the
background of the tree. The men are crack shots and they’ve saved many
a Heinie the trouble of taking the long hike back to the Rhine.”
“Well,” remarked Blake, taking a long breath, “this would be no place
for a man with delirium tremens.”
“I’d be a candidate for a padded cell myself if I stayed here long
enough,” affirmed Joe.
“I’m going to hold tight onto my plate at chow to-night,” said Mac,
“or I’ll expect to see it vanish out of my hand. I’ve lost confidence
in everything. Is this solid ground I’m walking on, or is that
camouflaged, too?”
“We haven’t got quite as far as that yet,” replied Lieutenant Baker
with a laugh.
For the next hour the moving picture boys sauntered about the camp,
finding new marvels at every step. Concrete observation posts that
seemed to be mere inequalities in the ground, waving ferns and
grasses from which protruded the muzzles of fourteen-inch guns,
innocent-looking roadways that really were yawning pits covered lightly
with rushes and sods that gave way at the slightest pressure, wooden
guns, dummy tanks and a host of other cunning appliances designed to
bewilder and mystify the enemy.
“Well,” said Blake, when at length they had reluctantly torn themselves
away and were seated once more in the army car, “I have a new respect
for the art of camouflage. I didn’t dream that they’d carried it to
such an extent.”
“Yes,” put in Mac, “it isn’t only the doughboys with bullets that are
winning this war. The artists, too, are doing their bit in beating the
Huns.”
“For my part,” said Joe, as the lieutenant threw in the clutch and the
car started, “it seems to me like a page from the Arabian Nights. All
we need now is a genii coming out of the neck of a bottle and the thing
would be complete.”
CHAPTER VI
DEATH FROM THE SKY
A few nights later, Blake was aroused from sleep by an unusual
commotion. Noise was common enough on that active section of the front,
where the artillery seldom ceased its growling even through the night.
His first impulse was to turn over and go to sleep again, for he
had had an unusually trying day. But there was something insistent,
ominous, strange about this tumult that finally forced its way fully
into his consciousness.
He opened his eyes and looked toward the little window of the room
in the cottage where he and his friends were billeted. A red glare
streamed through the pane, and he was wide awake at once.
Springing from his bed, he rushed to the window and looked out. Flames
were leaping high into the air from the direction in which the Red
Cross hospital lay. Great billows of smoke rose skyward, and as his
eyes followed them he saw a descending object which a moment later was
followed by a tremendous explosion.
He rushed to where his friends lay sleeping.
“Get up, fellows,” he shouted. “Joe! Charlie! get up, quick!”
They sat up in bed, looking at him stupidly, as they rubbed their eyes.
“What’s the matter?” mumbled Joe.
Blake seized him by the shoulder and gave him a vigorous shake.
“Wake up!” he cried. “Come out of your trance! The hospital’s on fire!
The Huns are raiding it!”
Both Joe and Charlie were awake enough now. They leaped out of bed and
tumbled into their clothes.
“The hospital!” exclaimed Joe, as he slipped on his coat. “But that’s
marked with the Red Cross and it’s lighted up at night. I don’t see how
the Huns could make any mistake about that.”
Blake laughed bitterly.
“You poor innocent,” he cried. “As if that wasn’t simply an invitation
to those fellows. There’s nothing sacred to that breed. But hustle
now. We may be able to do something to help. And Charlie, you bring
the camera along and come after us. I don’t know that we’ll have any
time to take pictures, but if we do I’d like to be able to show the
people of the United States just what kind of people it is that they’re
fighting.”
The two darted out of the room, leaving Charlie to follow, and ran as
fast as they could in the direction of the hospital, about half a mile
away.
A faint hope still lingered that it might be some other building. But
this was dissipated, as, at a turn of the road, they came in full view
of the blazing structure.
The hospital base consisted of a large number of one-story buildings,
spread out over a space of several acres. Some were open-air pavilions
where convalescents had their quarters, others were designed for
serious cases, while those of a central group were used for surgical
operations. Upon the roofs of these had been painted gigantic red
crosses, plainly visible to aviators by day and still more visible at
night, when brilliantly illuminated.
The night was clear, the stars were out and a mistake by aviators was
absolutely impossible.
The Allies had acted on the theory that they were dealing with a
civilized nation, although every month that the war progressed was
teaching them how utterly they had been mistaken.
The central building, that of the surgical operations, was in flames,
while some of the other buildings near by had also caught fire. It was
plain at a glance that the main building was doomed.
A gasp of horror went up from the boys.
“There were hundreds of poor wounded fellows in that building!” panted
Joe as he ran.
“Yes,” gritted Blake through his teeth. “Oh, those beasts!” he
muttered, as he shook his fist toward the sky.
The whole camp had been roused by this time and thousands had rushed to
the rescue. So many there were that were eager to help that they would
have gotten in each other’s way, had not the officers taken command of
the situation and drawn a cordon around the place, while a sufficient
force of men was detailed to do the rescue work.
The scene was heart-rending. Men without legs and arms, utterly
helpless, were brought out on stretchers. Some had been actually on the
operating table when the raid took place, and doctors and Red Cross
nurses ran along beside them, trying to staunch the blood from their
wounds that had not yet been sewn up. The bombs were still raining
down, and even as the boys looked, a bomb exploded in the midst of a
party of doctors and nurses, blowing them and their helpless burdens to
pieces.
Joe was white to the lips and Blake was trembling with rage and pity.
They wanted to rush in and help, but were prevented by the military
guards.
Just then, Blake felt a touch on his arm. He turned and found Charlie
standing panting beside him.
“I tried to get here sooner,” Charlie gasped, as he laid down the
camera and tripod, “but these things were pretty heavy and you beat me
to it.”
“Quick!” said Blake. “Set it up, Charlie. If we can’t do anything else
we can put on record this picture of the hideous way the Germans are
carrying on war.”
“That’s right,” said a voice, and they looked up to find Lieutenant
Baker close beside them.
“These flames will give you light enough,” said the lieutenant. “Get
the whole thing in your film, the wounded men, the slaughtered doctors
and nurses, everything.”
The tripod was hastily planted, the camera placed and the film began to
register.
The American commanders were not content with merely rescuing the
victims of this barbarity. Allied planes were hastily manned and winged
their way upward in pursuit of the raiders. Searchlights swung great
arcs across the sky, seeking out the location of the attacking planes.
Anti-aircraft guns from batteries all over the camp were sending their
missiles upward on the chance of disabling some of the unseen foes.
Suddenly a shout went up as one of the searchlights steadied itself on
two planes engaged in combat, a thousand feet or more up in the sky.
They wheeled about each other, jockeying for position, turning, diving,
soaring, while the whir of their motors and the crackling of their
machine guns could be faintly heard from below.
For some minutes this continued, and then one of the machines gave a
sudden lunge toward the earth. The searchlight held it as it came down,
and the spectators scarcely ventured to breathe as they watched its
descent.
When half the distance had been covered, the pilot regained some
measure of control and attempted to attain a higher altitude. But the
plane was too badly crippled and the attempt was useless. It came lower
and lower in great sweeping spirals, and a shout went up as it was seen
that it bore German markings.
The crowd scattered to give it space for landing, but the moment it
touched the ground they rushed toward it. It was a German bombing
machine and had carried a crew of four men. Two of these had already
paid the penalty, having been killed by some of the stream of
machine-gun bullets rained upon them. The commander and his observer
seemed to be unwounded, but their faces whitened as the crowd rushed in
upon them.
A dozen hands reached in and tore them roughly from their seats and a
roar went up from the throng.
“Lynch them!”
“Kill the beasts!”
“Put a bullet into them!”
“Throw them into the flames!”
“Tear them to pieces!”
It would have gone hard with them, but just at that moment a captain
with a detachment of men forced himself through the crowd and took
possession of the prisoners.
The crowd fell back reluctantly, still growling ominously, but they
were soldiers first of all and military discipline prevailed.
Unmeasured relief came into the captives’ eyes, together with something
of defiance and arrogance as they saw themselves rescued from the wrath
of the throng.
The captain looked them over grimly. From head to foot and foot to
head again his eyes traveled with an unutterable contempt that would
have blistered anyone susceptible of shame. Even the Huns fidgeted and
reddened at last as that relentless gaze bored through them.
“Why did you drop your bombs on this hospital?” asked the captain in a
voice that was like chilled steel.
“I didn’t know it was a hospital,” replied the aviator in passable
English, but his eyes fell as he said it.
“Didn’t you see the Red Crosses marked plainly on it?” pursued his
interrogator.
“No,” answered the prisoner sullenly. “Anyway,” he continued, with a
flaring up of his habitual arrogance, “it had no right to be located so
close to the lines.”
Again the captain’s look of biting contempt.
“I knew you were a brute,” said the captain. “Now I know that you are a
liar, too. Take them to headquarters,” he directed, turning to his men.
“This is a matter for the general.”
The guards closed about the prisoners and forced a way through the
crowd with them. They cowered as the threats and growls of the thwarted
spectators were showered upon them. But no actual violence was offered
and they soon disappeared from view.
“The hounds!” growled Joe. “They ought to have a brace of bullets put
through their hearts.”
“Too easy,” muttered Blake. “They ought to be made to die by inches.”
“And we treat those fellows as prisoners of war,” said Charlie
bitterly. “They’re simply pirates and butchers. To bomb a hospital,
killing helpless wounded men, women nurses!” he concluded savagely.
“They’re doing the same thing on the sea,” said Blake. “They take a
special delight in sinking hospital ships. Only the other day, a
hundred and twenty-three wounded men strapped to cots were drowned.
Think of the _Warilda_, the _Llandovery Castle_, the long list of
them, all plainly marked and lighted so that their character couldn’t
possibly be mistaken.”
“They think they’re getting away with it and that when the war is
over it will all be forgotten,” said Joe, “but that’s where they make
their mistake. The Allies are keeping tab on the men who order these
things to be done, and when Germany is beaten to her knees they’re
going to demand that these men be given up to be tried and executed if
convicted. They’ll find that there’s a God in heaven yet.”
“Well, let’s hope so,” said Blake. “And if the fellows who engineered
this raid are ever hung, I’d give ten years of my life to be able to
give the signal.”
CHAPTER VII
CHARGING WITH THE TANKS
“What’s that you’re fooling with?” asked Blake, as he came one morning
shortly afterward to where Joe and Charlie were examining with great
curiosity a weapon that they had picked out from a number that had been
captured from the Germans.
For answer, Joe turned it in his friend’s direction and the latter
jumped hastily aside as he saw a wicked-looking muzzle threatening him.
“For the love of Pete! be careful with that thing,” Blake expostulated.
“I don’t want any of that ‘didn’t know it was loaded’ business in mine.
What name does that murderous thing go by, anyway?”
“I don’t wonder it gives you a shock,” laughed Joe, as he obeyed his
friend’s injunction. “It’s what they call an anti-tank gun. It’s a new
thing the Heinies have conjured up to get the better of the tanks. Come
and take a look at it.”
Blake did so. The weapon was after the rifle type, but very much larger
and heavier, so much so in fact that it was more than a man could
easily handle and had to be operated on a swivel that enabled it to be
turned in any direction.
“They say it can send a bullet through a tank at the distance of a
mile,” explained Joe.
“I can readily believe it,” answered Blake. “Gee, it’s more like a
piece of artillery than a rifle.”
“I’d hate to be standing in front of the muzzle when it was fired,”
observed Macaroni.
“The result would be something like that the darky spoke of when he was
looking at the death chair in a State prison in company with a friend,”
laughed Blake. “The friend looked at the chair and said:
“‘Am dat where de prisoner sits?’
“‘It sho’ am,’ replied the other.
“‘An’ den de sheriff turns on de ’lectricity?’
“‘Yes.’
“‘An’ what happens den?’
“‘Ruin,’ replied the other, ‘jess ruin.’”
The boys laughed.
“The tanks have sure got the Germans’ goat,” remarked Blake. “Ever
since the English started using them, the Heinies have been figuring up
some way to stop them. First they got up some tanks of their own, but
they were so big and unwieldy that they didn’t do any good. The British
tanks ran circles around them. Then Fritz built solid concrete pillars
in all the roads where he thought the tanks would be coming along,
but that didn’t bother the tanks at all. They just left the roads and
meandered through the woods. If a tree was in their way it was so much
the worse for the tree. The tanks didn’t mind a little thing like that.
Oh, I tell you, they’re great stuff.”
“I don’t wonder the Heinies ran like sheep when they first saw them
used,” commented Charlie, “and I don’t blame them much either. To be
wakened out of your sleep and run out of your tent and then to see
those great monsters coming at you through the mists would be enough to
make any man beat it while the going was good.”
“The old car of Juggernaut wasn’t in it with the tanks,” observed Joe.
“By the way,” said Blake, “I think we’ll have a chance to see the tanks
in action very soon and get some great pictures, too.”
“What makes you think so?” asked Joe eagerly.
“Well,” said Blake, “you must have noticed what a lot of them are
gathering on this part of the front. For the last few days I’ve been
seeing them wherever I looked. Then, too, the fellows in charge of
them have been working like beavers getting them in shape. And only
yesterday I heard some officers talking about the strong entrenchments
the Germans have been building back of the present lines. So, taking
everything together, I have a hunch that they’re getting ready to send
the tanks in advance to clear a way for the artillery.”
“There’s a big Jumbo of a tank in that little side road,” suggested
Joe. “Let’s walk down that way and take a look at it.”
His friends were perfectly willing, and they were soon standing beside
one of the gray monsters that was having some slight repairs done to
it by one of its crew. He was a bright, merry-eyed fellow and was
perfectly willing to talk about his gigantic pet, in which he evidently
took great pride. He showed them the machine guns mounted on all four
sides of the tank in addition to one three-inch field-piece.
“Regular cave you have in there,” remarked Blake, as he looked into the
yawning interior. “How big a crew do you carry?”
“From six to eight men besides the operator,” replied the man.
“Sometimes we have as many as ten. We lost three men the last time
we went out,” he added with a shade of sadness in his tone. “But the
Heinies lost a good many more,” he added, brightening up.
“What are those birds you have in that cage?” asked Blake, pointing to
a wicker cage where, in the dim light in the interior of the tank, he
saw some feathered creatures.
“Carrier pigeons,” answered the man.
“Carrier pigeons!” echoed Joe in surprise. “What use do you find for
them in a tank?”
“Lots,” was the answer. “Once in a while we get stuck in the mire or in
a trench and at times we get upset. Then we’ve got to have other tanks
come to help us out of the fix. Perhaps the Boches are all around us
and we’d sure get potted if one of us stepped out. In such a case, we
send one of the birds with a message to headquarters and help is sent
in a jiffy.”
“Great stuff,” said Joe. “But what are you doing with those white mice
in that basket? What is this, anyway, a menagerie?”
The tank man laughed, as he picked one of the tiny creatures up and
smoothed it.
“They’re for the gas,” he explained. “You see when a gas attack is
loosed the gas comes on so gradually that humans wouldn’t notice it
until it was too late. But the mice detect it instantly and begin to
squeal. Then we put on our masks in a hurry and throw a covering over
the basket that protects the mice.”
“So even mice are in the war,” observed Blake, with a laugh.
“Very much in it,” was the smiling reply. “They use them, too, in
submarines. The air in there is very close and some of the chemicals
are deadly. If one of the pipes springs a leak, the mice give warning
and the crew gets busy right away.”
“Well,” said Joe, “I’m learning a lot about this war that I never knew
before.”
“We were just saying a little while ago that it looked as though the
tanks were going into action soon,” remarked Blake. “What about it?”
The man looked mysterious.
“It’s against orders for me to say anything,” he replied, “but I
shouldn’t be surprised if there would be something doing before long.
You said you were taking moving pictures, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Blake.
“Well then, you just get your films ready and stick around,” advised
their new acquaintance.
Two days later, Blake and Joe were summoned to the quarters of their
commanding officer.
“There’s going to be an advance by our troops to-morrow morning,” he
announced. “The tanks are going ahead of them, and as you haven’t had
much chance to see them in action it may be a good opportunity to get
some pictures of them for the War Department. You can make arrangements
to be up in the front and close beside them. It will be ticklish and
dangerous work, but I’ve learned by this time that that doesn’t worry
you much.”
“We’ve been pretty lucky so far, sir,” answered Blake, “and I guess our
luck will hold.”
The next morning before dawn, they had been assigned their place up in
the front ranks. Through the gloom they could see a multitude of dark
shapes lined up at intervals that they knew were the tanks. Silence
reigned in the ranks of the men who were standing in their trenches
awaiting the command to go over the top, for it was hoped that the
attack would take the enemy by surprise.
Slowly the darkness grew less dense as the dawn crept up the sky. Then,
at a given signal, the artillery opened up with a tremendous roar that
shook the earth, a barrage of fire was laid down and the ponderous
tanks plunged forward. On they went, followed by the men who scrambled
out of the trenches. On, still on, gathering momentum as they went,
until with a terrific grinding and crashing they struck the barbed-wire
entanglements of the enemy.
They crumpled them up as though they were so much thread, and through
the gaps they made the soldiers poured like a flood. Men fell by the
score, for the enemy was replying now, and a storm of shot and shell
tore its way through the American ranks. But they closed up at once and
like a tidal wave swept forward.
It was light enough now for the moving picture boys to get fairly good
pictures, though they knew that they would have to intensify them later
on. But it was getting brighter every minute and they worked away
feverishly. They had had a good view of that first great onset of the
tanks crashing through, but after that the infantry had got in the
way and the tanks were lost sight of. But they knew that the breaking
through was only the first step in the activities of the tanks, and
they were desperately anxious to see them in the actual fighting.
“Come along, fellows,” said Blake. “Let’s follow them up. We’ve had
plenty of pictures of infantry actions, but to-day it’s the tanks we
want to see. Let’s get a move on.”
They picked up the camera and tripod and followed in the wake of the
charging troops. They stumbled over dead bodies and skirted the edge
of shell holes, while bullets whistled past them and shells exploded
so near them as to cover them with dirt. But they were so on fire with
excitement that they paid no attention to these messengers of wounds
and death, and in a little while had worked their way through the lines
to a point where they could once more have the tanks in full view.
“Look at them spitting fire!” exclaimed Joe breathlessly, as they
dropped into a shell hole that offered them some slight measure of
protection and set up their camera so that it just peered above the
edge of the crater.
The tanks were dashing here, there and everywhere, scattering enemy
groups, smashing pill boxes, straddling trenches, which they raked
throughout their length with a withering fire from their machine guns,
charging batteries whose crews scattered in consternation as the
monsters bore down upon the guns.
“Quick!” panted Blake in mad excitement, as with trembling fingers they
started the film to registering. “Don’t let’s lose a bit of this. It’s
the greatest chance of our lives. It will make the finest film we’ve
yet secured.”
CHAPTER VIII
A CLOSE CALL
Like two gigantic wrestlers locked together, the two armies swayed from
side to side, fighting with the utmost desperation. The Germans were
using some of their best divisions, and although the attack had taken
them somewhat by surprise, they had rallied and were hurrying up dense
ranks to reinforce those who had been holding the first line.
They themselves had a few tanks on this portion of the front, and these
were hurried into action at once. But it soon became apparent that they
could not hold their own with those that the Americans were using. In
the usual German way, they had relied too much on size and they had
overdone it. The tanks were monstrous but they were too unwieldy and
too slow. Nor were they managed with the skill that was displayed by
the Americans.
“Our fellows make theirs look like thirty cents,” said Joe, as one by
one the German tanks were put out of action.
“There goes one of ours though!” exclaimed Mac. “See, it’s tumbling
into that trench.”
“It isn’t falling in, you boob!” exclaimed Joe. “It’s going in of its
own accord. It means to clean out the trench. See, the Germans are
scrambling out of it already and running like rabbits.”
“They show good judgment,” remarked Blake grimly. “Listen to the rattle
of the tank’s machine guns! I have a hunch that trench is an unhealthy
place for Heinies just about now.”
“Let’s creep forward and take a look at it,” said Joe. “What do you
say, Blake? Are you game?”
“I don’t take a dare,” answered Blake. “Sure, I’ll go. Mac, you keep at
that crank till we get back.”
Macaroni grumbled a little under his breath, but obeyed, and the moving
picture boys, taking advantage of what shelter they could find, hurried
toward the trench which was only a few yards away.
Through the smoke that hung like a cloud over it, they saw the tank,
having fulfilled its errand, go lumbering along the bottom and commence
to climb the slope of the farther side.
Right in front of it lay a wounded German officer, whom the boys could
see by his uniform was a major. He saw the tank approaching him and
tried to crawl out of its way, but was unable to and fell back with a
groan.
The boys were horror-stricken, for they expected to see him crushed
to death beneath the tank. But someone in the tank had observed the
wounded man and the tank suddenly stopped, the door at the side opened
and two men sprang out, lifted up the wounded officer and handed him
in. The door closed and the tank resumed its climb.
The boys breathed a sigh of relief.
“There’s the American of it!” exclaimed Blake. “Our boys don’t war
against wounded men.”
“Yes,” agreed Joe. “Do you think a German tank commander would have
done the same? Perhaps he would, but I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“I think you’re right,” said Blake. “But now let’s get back to Mac.”
They crept back and reached the crater in comparative safety, much
to the relief of Charlie, who had faithfully kept the crank turning,
whenever a worth-while scene was enacted. And it had not been the
easiest matter in the world, for it had to be turned at just a certain
rate of speed and Mac was boiling like the others with the excitement
of the fighting.
The battle in that part of the field was now nearly over. The first
lines had been captured by the Americans and the enemy was retreating
to his second-line positions. He was doing it sullenly and making
occasional stands to delay the Americans until reinforcements could
come up.
“I think we’d better get on further ahead,” judged Blake, as the tide
of battle receded. “We want to keep in touch with the hottest parts of
the action and things are quieting down right here. Take the camera,
Mac, and give me the tripod and we’ll go along. This battle is making
history and I don’t want to miss a bit of it.”
There was no demur from his comrades and they hastily got their machine
in hand and hurried on after the tanks.
Soon they had caught up with some of them and saw that they were
preparing for another dash ahead. They saw the reason for it, too, in a
new division that the Germans had thrown into the fight and which was
advancing in close ranks for a counter-attack.
But the Americans did not await the shock of their onset. Their blood
was up and they started forward to meet the advancing enemy.
“There’s a beautiful scrap coming or I miss my guess,” said Blake,
as they hastily set up the camera. “Those Germans haven’t learned
their lesson yet and they’re coming after more. They’re gluttons for
punishment.”
“They’ll get all the fight they’re looking for,” said Joe. “Get a
focus on the tanks, Mac. There they go now.”
“They seem to be on fire!” exclaimed Mac in sudden alarm. “Look at the
smoke coming from them.”
“Fire nothing!” snorted Blake. “They’re just throwing out smoke
screens. That hides our boys behind them from being seen by the enemy,
and the Heinie batteries don’t know where to aim.”
Great billows of black smoke were coming from the tanks as they
ploughed their way forward. It spread out behind them until the whole
country seemed to be enveloped in the gloom of a forest fire. And the
illusion was heightened by the tongues of flame that began now to shoot
through the smoke as the machine guns of the tanks again came in action
against the gray-clad host against which they were advancing.
“That means death to the Huns, and it means death to the pictures,
too,” said Blake, his professional instinct coming to the fore.
“We can’t see very much through that smoke,” admitted Joe. “But it
means the saving of lots of American lives, and that’s worth all the
pictures in the world.”
“Right you are,” agreed Blake heartily. “Somebody was telling me the
other day that since the tanks began to be used the Allies were only
losing one soldier where before that time they’d lost thirty-six.
There’s many a bullet rattling against the sides of the tanks that
would find a doughboy’s heart if the tank wasn’t there. See the way
the boys are following behind the tanks! They’re like so many suits of
armor.”
“Well, how about the pictures?” put in Charlie. “I might as well stop
if we’re going to stay here. I’m not registering much else than smoke.”
“On we go then,” said Blake. “Come along. We’ll be in Berlin soon if we
keep on the move.”
Once more they moved forward, but now on account of the smoke the going
was more difficult than before. There was hardly any breeze stirring,
and the smoke, instead of drifting away, hung heavy on the field.
Before them they could see groups of men engaged in desperate combats,
while the tanks, like great bulls, plunged here and there, their
machine guns working rapidly and doing tremendous execution.
Stumbling along over the shell-torn ground, the boys sought a place
where they could command a view of the action. But this was difficult,
and while they were searching, the smoke suddenly lifted, and, to
their amazement and consternation, they saw a whole company of Germans
bearing down upon them.
There seemed no way of escape, and visions of sudden death or a German
prison loomed up before their startled eyes.
Blake looked about him with desperation.
“Here comes a tank!” he yelled. “Let’s run to meet it!”
They set off in its direction, while bullets from the pursuing Germans
whistled about their ears. The tank was coming toward them as fast as
the ponderous machine could travel, although to the boys it seemed to
be crawling. But its bullets were swift, if its pace was comparatively
slow, and it soon opened fire on the boys’ pursuers, who were beginning
to waver as they saw the huge monster bearing down upon them.
The moving picture boys were almost breathless from running, but they
just managed to get on the further side of the tank as a volley of
bullets rattled against the side of it.
“Safe for the time, anyway,” gasped Blake, as he sank down on the
ground, still holding in his arms the box of precious films that in all
the excitement he had not forgotten to bring along.
“No, we’re not!” cried Joe. “Here comes a German aeroplane with its
guns all going like mad.”
They looked in the direction he indicated, and saw a big plane swooping
down toward them with sheets of flame spouting from the four guns that
the newest German planes carried.
“We’re goners now!” exclaimed Mac.
But just then the door in the side of the tank opened and a man leaped
out, whom, though he was covered with sweat and grime, they recognized
as their tank acquaintance of a few days before.
“Come in,” he cried. “Quick!”
They needed no urging. They bundled inside in a confused heap and the
closing of that door was the sweetest music they had ever heard.
It was not a comfortable place. They were horribly cramped for room,
for almost every foot of space was occupied by machinery or the
sweating bodies of the crew, who were busy in controlling the machine
and operating the guns. The rattling of bullets against the metal sides
sounded like a boiler factory in full blast and the lurching of the
tank made them feel seasick. But it meant life and safety and freedom,
and no haven of refuge was ever more grateful.
Gradually the tumult grew less, the bullets ceased crashing against
the sides and the crew itself desisted from firing. The battle was
evidently over, or nearly so. Before long the tank stopped, and the
door was thrown open, letting in a draught of the cool September air
that had never seemed so refreshing. The boys piled out, together with
the crew, and their relief and delight can be imagined as they saw
friendly uniforms all around them and realized that they were inside
the American lines.
The boys were full of gratitude to their rescuer, but he waved off
their thanks with a friendly grin.
“All in the day’s work,” he remarked, as he stepped into the tank to
drive it back to his quarters. “By the way, how do you think the old
girl behaved to-day?”
“Fine and dandy,” replied Blake enthusiastically.
“It saved our lives,” declared Joe.
“That aeroplane would have finished us if you hadn’t taken us in,” said
Macaroni. “What became of that aeroplane, anyway?”
“I didn’t see,” was the reply. “We might have winged it ourselves if it
had been flying a little lower, but as it was we couldn’t elevate our
guns enough to reach it. Well, so long and good luck;” and the big tank
lumbered away.
“We’ve had many a close call,” remarked Blake, after they had watched
the tank out of sight, “but if you ask me, the closest of all was the
one we had to-day.”
CHAPTER IX
AN EXCITING STRUGGLE
On a sunny morning a few days later, Blake and Joe were watching the
maneuvers of a small fighting plane high aloft in the clear sky. The
machine was one of the newest and best of the recently delivered
American planes, and great things were expected of it, although the
little wasp-like flyers had had small chance as yet to demonstrate
their worth.
This particular machine had gone up only half an hour previously, and
the boys had followed its flight with more than ordinary interest,
admiring the amazing speed with which it mounted and its quick, darting
movements as the pilot manipulated his levers.
“Looks as though that machine could deliver the goods,” remarked Blake
critically. “I’d like to see how it would act in a brush with one of
those new Boche planes.”
“You’re going to have the chance to see,” cried Joe with sudden
excitement. “Look, Blake! isn’t that a Boche plane sneaking out of the
cloud?”
“Of course it is!” exclaimed Blake, catching his friend’s excitement.
“And he’s going to attack, sure as shooting! Just look at that!” and he
jumped from one foot to the other in his agitation.
As the moving picture boys strained their eyes upward in a fascinated
gaze, they saw a large Fokker aeroplane emerge fully from a fleecy
white cloud, in which it had evidently been lurking. It appeared to
be at a higher altitude than the small American plane whose pilot was
evidently still in ignorance of the peril that threatened him.
In their excitement, the boys forgot the pilot was far beyond reach of
their voices, and they gesticulated frantically and shouted words of
advice and warning.
But now the American seemed to have become aware of his danger, for
the boys saw him take a sudden swoop and dive and then mount steadily
upward, evidently trying to climb above his enemy, and thus be in a
superior attacking position. Even at that distance, the boys could
faintly hear the staccato voices of the machine guns of the two
aeroplanes, as each one endeavored to put his adversary out of the
fight.
But the American aeroplane had been especially built to outclimb any
other machine in existence, and it well repaid the careful thought
and skill that had been expended in its make-up. Swift and straight
it flew, pointing its nose almost directly upward. The German machine
was also climbing at the best speed of which it was capable, but it
was no match for the American. Soon the boys were convinced that the
little machine had gained a superior altitude, although they knew that
a person on the ground could not judge this with any degree of accuracy.
“I guess that Yankee boy is all there,” shouted Joe, his voice higher
than usual. “Just look at him, Blake. He’s pointing downward now, and
that means that he’s higher than the Boche and giving him a dose of
machine-gun bullets. Ah-h!” he ended, and stood silent.
A thin cloud of dark smoke arose from the German aeroplane, was blown
aside by the wind, and then rose again, thick and black this time and
shot through with angry tongues of yellow-red flame.
“He’s afire!” breathed Blake, “and that means that he’s done for.”
Indeed, it seemed that the German must be doomed as his machine shot
earthward, a mass of smoke and flame streaming out behind it. But
suddenly a black speck was seen to disengage itself from the fiercely
blazing machine and throw himself out and away from the doomed plane.
“That’s better than burning to death, anyway,” muttered Blake. “It’s
what I would do myself if I were caught that way. The poor fellow will
be unconscious, anyway, by the time he touches the ground and he’ll
never know what killed him.”
Even as he spoke, however, a great white cloth swelled suddenly out
a few feet above the falling German’s head, and his descent lost
something of its speed. He still descended rapidly, but not with the
sickening rush of his former headlong flight.
“A parachute!” exclaimed Joe. “He’ll save himself after all.”
“Looks that way,” conceded Blake. “But,” he continued grimly, “while
he’ll probably save his life, it’s up to us to see that he becomes
a guest of Uncle Sam, even if an unwilling one. I should judge that
he’ll land about a quarter of a mile from here, and we want to be
Johnny-on-the-spot when he comes down.”
Joe needed no argument to convince him of the advisability of this, and
the two raced off at top speed. The German was very near the ground now
and they redoubled their efforts, and to such good purpose that they
reached the Boche almost at the instant he struck the ground. He landed
with a good deal of a bump and the boys had no trouble in making him a
prisoner, as his nerve-shattering experience had taken all the fight
out of him. They knew enough now of German cunning to take no chances,
however, and Blake quickly relieved the aviator of two heavy revolvers
that hung from a stout belt about his waist.
“Now, my aviator friend, I guess that draws your stings,” remarked
Blake. “And now, forward march, and we’ll see what they can do for you
at headquarters.”
Meanwhile the victorious American plane had descended and now skimmed
along close over their heads. It had been the intention of the airman
to make a landing and personally secure his prisoner, but when he saw
that the German was in competent hands he waved at them and shouted
something that the boys could not make out above the roar of the motor.
They waved back at him and shouted congratulations. It was doubtful
whether the aviator heard them, but he understood their meaning. He did
not descend any further, but skimmed off, mounting rapidly and soon
becoming a mere speck in the clear sky.
The German followed the plane with his eyes as long as it was well in
sight and then shook his head dolefully.
“_Ach, Himmel!_” he exclaimed, and then added in broken English: “You
vos too much for me,” and he shrugged his shoulders and fell into step
with his captors.
“You’re right we’re too much for you,” said Blake, “and it won’t be
long before all your pals and your dear old Kaiser will find it out,
too.”
The Boche scowled darkly but said nothing further, and the others
marched on in silence, the boys’ minds still busy with the memory of
that whirling, flashing duel in the clouds.
“That parachute stunt is pretty good at that, though,” conceded Joe,
voicing his thoughts. “I wouldn’t have given a plugged nickel for the
chances of our German friend when I saw that his plane was on fire.”
“Nor I,” agreed his friend. “But as it has given us the pleasure of his
congenial company I’m glad that he had it along.”
All attempts to overcome the sullen silence of their prisoner proved
fruitless, and they reached their destination without having had a
further word from him.
Once at headquarters, they turned the German over to the officers in
charge, at the same time giving a brief account of the battle in the
air and the circumstances attending the capture.
“Yes,” said one of the officers when they had finished. “Almost all of
them carry parachutes now. I’m going to send out two men to see if they
can recover the one this fellow had. They’re made of the finest kind
of material and there may be some wrinkles about them that our people
will like to study.”
He thanked the moving picture boys for the service that they had
rendered and turned the prisoner over to guards who led him away.
As the boys proceeded slowly to their quarters, they went over again
the details of the exciting event in which they had been glad to take
part.
“If we’d only had the camera handy,” remarked Joe regretfully.
“Yes,” agreed Blake, “it’s always the biggest fish that gets away. What
a crackerjack that film would have been!”
CHAPTER X
CHRISTOPHER CUTLER PIPER TURNS UP
“Gee, I’m worn to a rag!” moaned Charlie, sinking to the ground during
a lull in the work and mopping his brow. “When it comes to actual
fighting it’s all right but this steady grind gets a fellow’s goat.”
“Oh, stop your grouching,” sang out Blake cheerfully, busying himself
with the machine. “Wait till one of those playful little bombs bursts
under your nose and scatters its cunning little splinters all over the
place. Then you’ll have something to worry about.”
“On the contrary,” retorted Charlie, getting painfully to his feet, “it
seems to me that under those circumstances nothing would ever worry me
more. Hey, look here,” he added suddenly, pointing to where a small
group of persons could be seen approaching. “Isn’t there something
familiar about that whole party, especially the fellow in the middle?”
“Middle of what?” queried Blake, still busy with his machine and
somewhat impatient of the interruption.
“Oh, next week, of course,” Charlie was beginning scornfully, when Joe,
who had come up behind them unnoticed, broke in with a yell.
“Well, if here isn’t the whole moving picture crowd!” he shouted
joyfully. “And in their midst, the well-beloved face of our old pal, C.
C. Say, this is luck!”
“Luck,” repeated Macaroni dolefully, as they went to meet their
friends. “If you call meeting a wet-blanket like C. C. luck----”
“Well, for the love o’ Mike!” cried C. C. himself, catching sight of
the boys. “What ill--I mean, good--wind blew you hither?”
“After that greeting we know it’s C. C.,” grinned Blake, amid a chorus
of greetings and exclamations from Miss Lee, Miss Shay and other
members of the moving picture company. After a moment or two more of
friendly conversation, they passed on to meet Mr. Hadley, all, that is,
except Christopher Cutler Piper, _alias_ C. C., who lingered to speak
to the boys.
“Going to cheer up the boys in the trenches?” Joe demanded of the
gloomy comedian.
“Say,” protested Charlie, “haven’t the poor fellows enough to stand,
what with liquid fire and poison gas, without turning C. C. loose on
them? Have a heart!”
“Even Hun kultur couldn’t think up any worse torture than that,” agreed
Joe.
C. C. turned a grieved and protesting eye upon them.
“Say, that’s a fine reputation you’re giving me,” the gloomy comedian
protested. “Here I come in a spirit of self-sacrifice, to offer my
services to the government, only to have my best friends turn upon me
like vipers in my bosom----”
“Gee, how does it feel?” asked Blake in mock awe, while even C. C.
grudgingly vouchsafed a gloomy grin.
“But seriously,” added Blake, as they turned and made their way slowly
toward the deserted picture machine, “what did bring you to this neck
of the woods, C. C.? Last I heard of you, you were showing off to
admiring crowds on Fifth Avenue.”
“Ah, but duty called,” sighed C. C., “and I left my homeland for the
dangers of the trenches. You surmised correctly, Macaroni--I have come
to cheer up our brave fighting men.”
“Oh, gee,” groaned Charlie Anderson, but Joe interrupted him.
“What’s your line?” he inquired with interest. “Going to do a ballet,
or imitations?”
“Worse and worse and more of it,” broke in Blake, irrepressibly.
“Can’t you see it--old C. C. in a spirited imitation of the dying
codfish? Going to let us in on it, C. C.?”
“Yes, I can just see myself,” answered Mr. Piper bitterly. “The
soldiers appreciate my talents, anyway. I entertained a crowd of them
at the Y. M. C. A. last night and you should have heard the applause.
Why, it shook the whole building.”
“Don’t kid yourself, old man,” cried Joe airily. “That was a bomb that
shook the building and as for the applause--well, I’ve heard that life
in the trenches sometimes affects men that way--shell shock, you know,
and such things.”
“All right,” sighed poor C. C. resignedly. “Scoff if you will--I’m used
to it. Only some time when a bomb alights upon my devoted head and
there’s a large amount of nothingness left where I once stood, you may
be sorry. But never mind, I never expected to be appreciated.”
The comedian wandered off and then the boys lost no time in hunting up
the girls who had acted so many parts in the dramas the company had
filmed.
“Awfully glad to see you!” cried Blake.
“Best thing ever,” came from Joe.
“We’re glad, too,” cried the girls.
Quite a talk followed. In the midst of this Mr. Hadley came rushing up
in his bustling way with both hands extended in hearty greeting to the
boys. They grasped his hands with hearty liking, for their relations
with their employer had always been of the most cordial kind in the
years they had been together.
“Well, well,” said Mr. Hadley, beaming upon them both. “I’m delighted
to see you two boys again and to find that you’re safe and sound, in
spite of all you’ve been through.”
“You’re no more glad than we are to see you,” replied Blake. “But this
is a surprise. We hadn’t the least idea that you were coming to this
side of the big pond.”
“I made up my mind in a hurry,” replied Mr. Hadley, “and when I had
decided, I found that a letter wouldn’t reach you any sooner than I
would get here myself. So here I am and most of the company with me.
Got over without any trouble, though one time we did get a glimpse of a
periscope and we had a few anxious minutes.”
“Did you get all the films we sent you?” asked Blake, with whom the
thought of his profession was always present.
“Most of them,” replied the producer, “though two lots you mentioned
in your letters never arrived. Guess they went down in one of the
submarine sinkings.”
“That’s too bad,” said Joe. “How did you like those you did get?”
“They were fine and dandy,” replied Mr. Hadley with enthusiasm. “They
made a big hit with the public, and they were especially popular with
the boys in the training camps. I had a letter from the War Department,
and they spoke in the warmest way about them. But I mustn’t be giving
you boys a swelled head or you’ll be striking me for a raise in
salary,” he concluded with a laugh.
“What’s the big idea in bringing the company over?” asked Blake.
Mr. Hadley showed a slight trace of embarrassment.
“Well,” he said rather hesitatingly, “I’m a business man, but hang it
all! I’ve got some red blood in my veins just as you young cubs have,
and I thought it would be the least that I could do to bring over
some of the stars and go through the camps giving entertainments and
cheering up the boys. We’ll make a tour of the hospitals, too. You know
the girls and the comedians are not only movie actors, but most of them
have been on the regular stage, and they can sing and dance and give
skits and imitations. They were all willing and glad to come along to
do their bit.”
“That’s just bully!” cried Joe in delight.
“It will do the boys more good than medicine,” added Blake.
“We’ll hope so,” said Mr. Hadley. “If it does we’ll be fully repaid.
But now to business,” he continued, with a return of his usual brisk
manner. “I’ve just had a talk with your captain and he tells me there’s
something brewing. He’s got wind of a coming attack and he thinks it’s
going to be a heavy one. It struck me that it will be a dandy chance to
get some very stirring films. Are you game?”
“You bet!” they replied in unison, the gleam of anticipation in their
eyes.
“You’re like the war horse that sniffs the battle from afar,” laughed
their employer. “You’ve got your nerve right with you. And it will take
lots of nerve. It’s one thing to stand up to a party of Boches with
your bayonet in your hand, but you fellows may have to stand up to
them unarmed. It’s risky work,” he said hesitatingly, “but I know you
fellows won’t back out----”
“Back out!” exclaimed Joe hotly. “The only thing I want to know is why
we’re wasting time standing here.”
“Yes,” added Blake eagerly, “let’s get at them.”
“All right,” said Mr. Hadley with an admiring and satisfied glance.
“That’s the answer I expected to hear. Now then remember that you’re
going to take the best films we’ve had yet. We’ve got to get them, but
what’s just as important we’ve got to keep them. Hang on to the films
after you get them as though your lives depended on it. The Boches
would give a lot to get hold of them, but you fellows are smart enough
to double cross them. Go to it, boys, and good luck go with you.”
With a wave of the hand he left them, and the moving picture boys
quickly got their equipment ready and reported to their captains who
directed them to that part of the front where the fighting was likely
to be hot. Then with hearts aflame they dropped into the trenches
beside the grim fighting men.
These men were simply waiting,--waiting for the moment when their taut
muscles would be released, when they would burst in a trained, inspired
flood over the barrier of wood and dirt to meet and stop the hordes of
Huns approaching them.
Past these rigid, dust-stained heroes the boys went to a vantage point
from which they could take pictures of the coming battle.
Walking, stumbling, half-blinded by the smoke from bursting shells,
half-deafened by the thunder of the guns, the boys hurried on to the
appointed spot.
Here, their fingers trembling with excitement, faces burning, eyes
glowing, the boys set up the machine and made ready for the greatest
moment of their lives.
Mr. Hadley had spoken truly. It was one thing to await the onslaught of
the enemy, bayonet in hand, and quite another to stand there unarmed,
calmly taking pictures of the fight when any moment a bursting shell
might blow them into eternity.
But they had been face to face with death before and had come through
alive. Their jaws set hard and they looked calmly straight ahead. If
need be they could die like men.
CHAPTER XI
THE STORM BREAKS
“I wonder how long they’re going to keep up these fireworks?” Joe
shouted close to Blake’s ear. “If one of those shells happens to come
our way----”
“Then there’d be a few less movie operators in the world,” remarked
Blake, with an assumption of coolness and indifference that he was
quite far from feeling.
“I wonder how the world would get along without such experts as we
are,” grinned Joe.
“Say, I bet the Huns are getting ready to charge,” interrupted Charlie.
“The bombardment’s slackening up. Listen!”
Then suddenly, without warning, the deafening uproar stopped and in
its place a silence so intense that the boys could hear the beating of
their own hearts.
It was the silence that precedes the storm. The furious bombardment
had begun the work and now it was up to the infantry to finish it.
Hardly daring to breathe, the moving picture boys waited. Then fiercely
across the open space, the gray flood leaped at them. On, on they came,
while grim boys in khaki waited, bayonets poised, waited for the word
of command that would hurl them, unleashed hounds, into the fray.
Down upon them rushed the German hordes until it seemed that human
nature could stand the terrific strain no longer. Then--the tension
snapped.
Up over the sides of the trench, like an avenging fate, swarmed our
boys, yelling, shouting, racing, on, on to meet the helmeted figures in
gray, the fighting blood of their ancestors carrying them inevitably to
victory.
“Go it, you fellows, go it!” Blake was yelling, beside himself with
fierce joy--all the time automatically taking pictures.
“They can’t stop you!” Joe was yelling, equally demented.
“Get to them, give it to ’em, wallop ’em!” Macaroni added, almost
weeping in his excitement. “Gee, fellows, I wish somebody’d give me a
bayonet. I’ve got to stick one of those fat Heinie’s--Gosh, look at
’em--they’ve got ’em on the run----”
“They’re doing it! They’re doing it!” yelled Blake. “They’re pushing
them back----”
“On to Berlin!” shouted Joe, madly cranking the machine. “Only a few
hundred miles, boys, and only Germans to stop you. You can’t miss
it----”
“Now look at them,” Blake interrupted. “The Huns are breaking----”
“They’re broke,” agreed Macaroni, ungrammatically but joyfully. “Gee,
fellows, these are going to be some pictures we’re taking----”
“But we’ve got to follow ’em up,” Blake interrupted. “We can’t let them
get away from us, fellows. Think of the picture----”
“But we don’t want to take any chances with the films we’ve already
got,” cautioned Joe. “If we should lose them----”
“Never mind that,” answered Blake. “This is too good a chance to lose.
We’ll make it a case of double or quits. We’ve started this job and
let’s put it through to a finish.”
“There’s something in what Joe says, though,” put in Macaroni. “There’s
no use risking what we’ve got----”
But Blake and Joe were already out in No Man’s Land and racing after
the victorious army, and Macaroni had nothing to do but follow.
“Gee, I wish they’d leave well enough alone,” he grumbled as he ran.
It was no easy progress that they made over that wire-entangled,
shell-tortured earth, burdened with their moving picture
paraphernalia, and more than once two of the boys had to stop to rescue
a companion from a mud hole or extricate him from some barbed wire that
had fastened upon his uniform. It was like the tugging of nameless
things and shapes in a nightmare. But their blood was up and it would
have taken much more than things like these to divert them from their
purpose.
“Gee, those Germans went fast when they went,” muttered Joe, as they
struggled on foot by foot.
“Yes, by the time we catch up to them the fun will all be over,”
grumbled Macaroni. “And we’ll have collected a few hundred scratches
and several pounds of mud to show for it.”
“Oh, brace up,” said Blake cheerily. “There’s no use sounding like a
funeral when we ought to be hanging out the flags. Gee, just wait till
Mr. Hadley sees these films. The finest ever.”
“If he ever does,” gloomed Mac.
“Say, what’ll we do to it?” queried Joe, with returning good humor. “If
you don’t slip your grouch in about two minutes, Mac, we’ll put you in
a shell hole and sit on you till you’re dead.”
“Gee, I’ve been sat on all my life and I’m not dead yet,” grinned Mac.
“Go as far as you like.”
The boys answered this feeble attempt at a joke in kind, then Blake
broke in with a sudden exclamation.
“Say, fellows, it looks to me as though there were a mighty big storm
on the way,” he said, glancing up at the sky a little anxiously. “Of
course it doesn’t make much difference to us, but I’d like to have
these films stowed away in some safe place.”
“Yes,” Joe agreed worriedly, “and we don’t seem to be any nearer
our destination than when we started. I wish we could make out our
position.”
“Probably been traveling in circles,” said Macaroni, relapsing into his
former gloom. “Now, we’re lost and anything may happen to the films
before we get back in our lines again. We seem to have got into a blind
alley some way. We’ve lost touch with the rest of the bunch.”
For once the moving picture boys failed to rally him upon his gloomy
misgivings, for they themselves were a little uneasy. Evidently they
had gone further than they meant and in their struggles with the bad
going had gotten away from the direction of the main attack.
What if they were really lost and a bad storm threatening? It would be
a trying situation, and before they got through they might find that
they were inside the German lines.
Blake straightened up with sudden decision.
“There’s only one thing to do now,” he said. “We’ve got to find some
sort of shelter and wait until the storm blows over. Then it will be
comparatively easy to find our way to the Allied lines.”
“Maybe----” Mac was beginning, when Joe interrupted him.
“I felt a drop,” he cried. “Whatever we do we’ve got to do in a hurry.
Forward march!”
With no real expectation of success, they rushed from place to place,
looking for some sort of refuge. But the storm had fairly broken before
Joe uttered a cry of triumph.
“Here’s just the place!” he yelled. “Come on in, fellows--it may not be
exactly luxurious, but at least it’s dry.”
What he had found seemed to be a deserted dugout almost hidden in the
foliage of the surrounding woods. It was dirty and dark and not very
sweet-smelling, but to the boys it seemed a very haven of refuge.
“The storm can’t last very long,” said Blake as they settled themselves
to wait with what patience they could summon. “And at least we’ve still
got hold of the films.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” said Mac with increasing pessimism. “How
do we know we haven’t wandered around until we’ve gotten inside the
German lines? Then some Heinie comes snooping around, finds us and the
films--presto! Nothingness, where once were we.”
The two boys glared at the despondent Charlie.
“I say, Macaroni, old thing,” said Joe, assuming an elaborate drawl.
“You might not suppose it, but you are really wearing on my nerves; you
act like a second edition of old C. C.”
Blake chuckled, and in the darkness Macaroni allowed himself a feeble
grin.
Outside the rain came down in torrents, a slashing, drenching, ugly
rain that tested their powers of cheerfulness and made sitting still a
torture.
After a rather long interval of silence, Blake broke out impatiently:
“Gee, what an ending to a great fight like that!” “It’s all my
fault, too,” he grumbled. “If I hadn’t wanted to follow up the thing
and dragged you fellows along, we’d be eating chow now--big, juicy
mouthfuls of it----”
“Hey, cut it out, will you?” groaned Joe miserably. “It’s like burying
a man up to his neck and then putting chicken pie just beyond his
reach. Gee, I’ll eat those films if we don’t get out of this pretty
soon. My, how it pours!”
“I’m going to take a look,” added Macaroni, rising groaningly from his
cramped position. “This sort of thing can’t keep up forever.”
“It doesn’t have to,” put in Joe disconsolately. “They say it only
takes four days for a man to die of starvation.”
“It won’t be quite as bad as that, you know,” Blake reminded him. “I
guess even Mr. Hadley wouldn’t want us to go that far for the sake of
the profession. How about it?” This to Charlie as he came slowly back
from the dugout entrance.
“Not a thing in sight but rain,” he answered dismally. “And I’m getting
emptier and emptier by the minute. If it wasn’t so black outside I’d
make a dive for it and take a chance of being potted full of holes.
Anything’s better than this.”
“You’re getting worse than C. C., Macaroni,” Joe protested. “You’re
taking it for granted that we have sallied within the German lines and
will get our pass to Kingdom Come if we stick our noses into the open.
That puts us between the old Nick and the deep, deep sea.”
“Listen!” cried Blake suddenly, springing to his feet. “What’s that?”
Somewhere, close to them, came the deafening report of a cannon.
Another and another report followed, swelling to a maddening,
discordant roar.
“The Germans!” cried Blake.
“A counter-attack,” gasped Mac.
“I guess,” said Joe, slowly and grimly, “there can be no doubt but
what--we’re in for it!”
CHAPTER XII
THE LOST FILMS
The moving picture boys rushed to the mouth of the dugout and peered
out into the downpour. Now there was a great deal to be seen besides
rain.
Smoke from enemy bullets and exploding shells curled in a sinister mist
close to the ground, and now and then a star shell lit up the weird
scene luridly.
There was no doubt about it. Charlie had been right. They had, indeed,
wandered within the enemy lines and now--they were trapped!
Then simultaneously they remembered the precious films and turned
to reënter the dugout. They would make one desperate effort to get
themselves and the films back to safety----
Crash! Involuntarily they staggered back. Before their horrified eyes
the dugout was caving in!
With a yell they turned and ran, out into the storm, amid the rain
of bullets and exploding shells, out into the din and confusion of
Pandemonium.
Running, staggering, falling, on, on through an eternity of horror,
pieces of shell tearing up the ground before them in jagged, uneven
rents, bullets fanning their foreheads with a ghostly breeze, never
knowing what instant might be their last, they made their way--on, on
in the direction of the Allied lines and safety.
They had covered about half the distance when a party of Huns saw them
and with shouts of delight started in pursuit.
“It’s all up, I guess,” panted poor Macaroni, almost at the end of his
strength. “We might as well say--good-bye, fellows----”
“Save your breath,” Blake commanded curtly, at the same time slipping
an arm through the helper’s and dragging him on. “We’re not dead yet.”
On, on, through more eternities, while their breath came shorter and
shorter, hundred pound weights seemed to drag at their limbs and even
their splendid courage felt the end was near.
Then came a sharp exclamation from Joe and they turned in time to catch
him as he fell.
“Let me go, fellows!” he cried, his face drawn with pain. “I’m done
for. Save yourselves. Hurry----”
“Don’t be a fool,” rasped Blake, gathering all his strength for one
last, mighty effort and slinging Joe over his shoulder. “It’s going to
hurt you, old man, but it--can’t--be helped. How about it, Mac?”
“I’m all right,” panted Charlie, gallantly, finding new strength from
the great emergency to fight on. “Come on,--we must be--pretty near----”
The nightmare of that struggle! Blake, staggering under his heavy
burden, kept from falling again and again by Charlie’s arm--Joe,
gritting his teeth to bear the agony in his leg and make no sound--the
Germans coming nearer and nearer--almost upon them!
“It’s no use,” groaned Blake at last, the breath coming sobbingly
through his teeth. “I--can’t--go on--Mac----”
Then suddenly Macaroni began yelling like a maniac.
“Blake--they’re coming,” he panted, hysterically. “They’re coming--the
boys--in--kha-ki---- Three--cheers----”
Then, with eyes dimmed with exhaustion, Blake saw them, wave after
wave of khaki-clad boys, springing from the mist like knights of
deliverance. They were saved!
Then, in the great reaction that followed, one thought struck Blake
like a thunderbolt. They were safe--_but the films were gone_!
“Well, you’ve done it now,” commented Macaroni, as, two days later,
they made their way to the division hospital.
“Done what?” queried Blake, coming out of a gloomy reverie, wherein the
lost films were being displayed at some German headquarters amid great
rejoicing.
“Why, told C. C. about Joe’s having his leg shot up,” Macaroni
explained. “Now he’ll be coming to cheer poor Joe and we might just
as well send up an undertaker with orders to get measurements for his
casket.”
Blake laughed in spite of his despondency.
“Perhaps it was kind of thoughtless of me,” he admitted. “But if I
hadn’t told him, someone else would. Say Mac,” he added, changing the
subject suddenly, “we’ve got to get those films back some way.”
“I’ve heard that joke before,” responded Charlie, crossly. “We’ve got
about as much chance of rounding up those films as we have of capturing
the Kaiser single-handed, and you know it. Besides, they were probably
ruined when the dugout caved in.”
“I suppose so,” sighed Blake. “And I suppose there’s no use crying over
spilled milk, either--only----”
“Yes, I know,” Macaroni finished bitterly. “It was the best fight we’ve
ever seen or are ever likely to see. The light was just right--which
is nothing short of a miracle--and all that sort of thing. But what’s
the use of making our young lives miserable over it? Perhaps you
remember the little ditty that runs something like this: ‘What can’t be
cured, must be borne with’--or words to that effect?”
Blake laughed at him and felt better.
“You’re hopeless, Macaroni,” he summed up. “Anyway, I suppose when
all’s said and done, we ought to consider ourselves the most fortunate
fellows in the world for getting out of that scrape with whole necks
and enough life left in us to make a mess of.”
“You said it,” agreed Charlie with emphasis. “Do you know what I did?
Don’t laugh, because it was really a solemn occasion. The first mirror
I could get hold of after reaching civilization, I used to scan my
classic brow for signs of greying locks. Yes, I knew you’d laugh at
me,” he added, sadly, “but such things do happen you know, and that
last stretch across No Man’s Land was enough to turn your hair green.”
“And you have to hand it to Joe,” added Blake, the light of admiration
in his eyes. “We know from the condition his leg was in what he must
have suffered, and yet not a word out of him. I call that nerve!”
“You said it,” commented Charlie again. “I guess he went through more
than the two of us put together. Say,” he interrupted himself to add
excitedly, “didn’t I tell you old C. C. would be right on the job? Gee,
it’s lucky we came, or poor old Joe wouldn’t have a chance for his
life.”
“Here come the girls, too,” Blake added, as the two pretty leading
girls of the moving picture company rounded the corner. “Looks as if
Joe were going to have quite a reception.”
“Gee, now I know why he got all shot up,” Macaroni commented enviously.
“It would be almost worth it, having pretty ladies bringing you
bouquets and weeping on your shoulder. Pardon me a moment----”
“Where are you going?” queried Blake, grabbing him.
“Leggo of me,” the assistant responded, impatiently shaking off the
hand. “I’m going to find some accommodating Boche to cut me up. Want to
come? Then the girls will bring us flowers too.”
“No, thanks,” grinned Blake. “I’d rather wait and let events take their
course. They’ll probably have enough chances before we get through.”
“Hello boys!” greeted Miss Shay, as they came within hailing distance.
“I suppose Joe’s the object of interest with you as well as with us.”
“Lucky dog,” grinned Macaroni. “Some fellows just can’t help being
fortunate!”
The girls laughed and Miss Lee added suddenly:
“And here comes C. C.! Goodness, perhaps we’d better not go up just
now. So much attention may make poor Joe worse.”
“Please don’t leave us,” Blake implored. “We’re counting on you to
help keep C. C. in order. If he starts to tell Joe about all the
poor doughboys who had to lose their legs for lots less hurts than
the one he’s got, why it will be your cue to jump in with a spirited
description of the latest dance step. Don’t you get me?”
“Perfectly,” laughed the girl; and a moment later they all entered the
hospital together.
Something about the smell of drugs and the thought of all the wounded
boys who were enduring untold suffering for the sake of their country,
sobered the young folks and they entered Joe’s ward in a rather serious
frame of mind.
But when the nurse led them to the white cot upon which their own
particular patient was lying, they made a brave effort to regain their
good spirits and greet him cheerfully.
In this Joe helped them considerably. He favored them all with a
cheerful grin, looking so altogether like himself in spite of all he
had been through, that their hearts grew light again and they laughed
and chatted with him merrily.
“So you went and made a hero of yourself,” said Miss Shay, during a
lull in the conversation.
“I wasn’t any hero,” Joe disclaimed with sincere modesty. “I didn’t
get my leg shot up on purpose and it was Blake who did all the hard
work--and Mac, too, giving him a helping hand. If it hadn’t been for
them----”
“Nonsense,” broke in Blake hurriedly. “It was you that had the nerve,
being lugged along like that with your leg dangling----”
“That reminds me,” C. C. broke in lugubriously, “of a fellow----”
“Oh, Joe, have you heard the latest?” Miss Shay broke in hastily, while
C. C. looked astonished and the others grinned appreciatively. “They
say that after the war there’s going to be a reaction, and----”
“Say, what do you call this, anyway?” interrupted C. C. in high
dudgeon. “Breaking in on what a fellow is saying and never even saying
‘excuse me.’ And the rest of you grinning like Cheshire cats----”
“It’s all right, C. C.,” purred Miss Lee, stroking his coat sleeve
soothingly. “We were only trying to play the good Samaritan----”
“And I,” broke in C. C. with frigid dignity, “was trying to tell about
the fellow that had his leg amp----”
“Say, cut it out, will you?” cried Macaroni indignantly. “Haven’t you
got any sense, C. C.?”
“Oh, let him rave,” interrupted Joe good-naturedly. “The doc said my
leg had been taken in time and I’d be as good as ever in a couple of
weeks, so I sha’n’t worry. The only thing that _is_ worrying me,” he
added, while a shadow crossed his face, “is losing those films. It was
a shame.”
“It sure was,” agreed Blake. “We’ll never get any more like them. They
were the best ever!”
“Gee, they’re at it again,” sighed Macaroni. “Some way I’ll have to
rescue those films--in self defense!”
CHAPTER XIII
A TEST OF PLUCK
“I hear we’re in for another big time.”
It was three weeks after the unfortunate affair of the lost films and
the moving picture boys were beginning to recover somewhat from their
disappointment, though the hope of ultimately recovering the films
never for a moment left their minds.
Joe, too, owing to his splendid constitution and the fact that his
injury had not been as serious as they at first supposed, had recovered
in a remarkably short time and was, as he expressed it, “once more game
for anything.”
“What do you mean?” asked the latter in response to Blake’s statement.
“More work at the front?”
“Yes, if you want to call it work,” answered Blake happily. “I call it
the biggest kind of a lark.”
“Come across, will you?” requested Joe somewhat impatiently. “You have
a habit of enjoying things all by yourself. What is it this time? More
battle pictures?”
“Yes,” answered Blake, thoughtfully chewing a piece of long grass.
“Only this time our boys are going to do the attacking. Just small
raiding parties, I guess, more to get the lay of the land than anything
else. Hello, whom have we here?”
The exclamation was caused by the arrival upon the scene of Mr.
Christopher Cutler Piper, gloom producer and disperser, and Charlie.
“No one much,” said Joe disconsolately, in reply to Blake’s
exclamation. “Gee, why does something always happen to take the joy out
of life!”
“I hope you don’t mean me,” said C. C., grinning with unusual good
nature. “On the contrary, I have come for the express purpose of
putting more joy into your young lives. Glad to see you up and around
again so soon, Joe, old man,” he added, turning to the latter. “It was
more than I expected.”
“Or hoped?” added Joe, grinning.
“There you go,” C. C. was protesting, when Charlie interrupted.
“Do you know what was the main topic of conversation on the way up?” he
asked wickedly.
“No. What?” they asked together while C. C. assumed an injured air.
“How disappointed C. C. was in Joe for not doing what was expected
of him and kicking off in a nice orderly manner,” replied Macaroni,
enjoying C. C.’s discomfiture to the utmost. “He, at least, expected
him to be considerate enough to lose a couple of legs.”
“What do you think I am?” C. C. demanded indignantly.
“Something pretty bad,” responded Macaroni, unabashed.
Seeing that a separate little war of its own was about to be started,
Blake hastily intervened.
“See anything of Mr. Hadley?” he asked of Mr. Piper. “Said he’d be
along in half an hour and after an hour he still keeps himself in the
background. I wonder what’s the idea.”
“Captured by the Boches, maybe,” suggested C. C., hopefully. “I told
him he’d get his some day, prying around in places he had no business
to be.”
“There he is now,” said Charlie, as the manager came hurrying toward
them with a worried look on his face. “Gee, now I wonder what’s up. He
looks as if the war was lost.”
Mr. Hadley seemed, indeed, to be laboring under some excitement, for
while he was still some distance away he made a megaphone of his hands
and shouted his question at them.
“Are you fellows ready to start?” he wanted to know. “We’ve got just
ten minutes to get there before the party commences.”
“Get where, before what party?” Charlie was murmuring as Mr. Hadley
hurried up to them. “Some day that man will start something and then
he’ll die of heart failure. It would be just as easy to tell you what
he’s getting at first as last.”
“Well, I suppose he makes the mistake of leaving something to your
intelligence,” remarked Blake.
“_What_ a mistake,” sighed Joe.
Before the badgered Macaroni had time to answer to either of these
insults the excited Mr. Hadley was upon them and issuing orders with
the rapidity of lightning.
“Got your machine fixed, Blake--all the stuff ready? That’s right. Now
for some pictures to replace those others. Come on, a little speed,
boys. Got your nerve with you?”
As this was his usual question before they went into action, and as the
moving picture boys considered they had answered it effectively more
than once, they made no reply now, only prepared to follow the leader
with all the dispatch possible.
“I feel like the babes in the wood,” Charlie confided in a breathless
undertone, as they hurried on toward the scene of action. “I know not
where I go.”
“Doesn’t make any difference, as long as you keep going,” Blake
returned cheerfully.
“Probably all end up in a hole in the ground,” gloomed a voice close
by and they turned in surprise to find C. C. trudging on beside them.
“Gee, you here?” exclaimed Macaroni with appalling candor. “I forgot
all about you.”
“Thanks,” said C. C. bitterly. “That’s all I get for trying to be a
friend in need.”
“But we’re not in need,” countered Mac airily. “When we are we’ll send
you a telegram, so you can attend the funeral.”
“What’s the idea, anyway?” queried Joe with interest.
“Coming to catch a little Boche?” Blake added jocularly. “Put him in a
cage and send him to some nice little French girl as a souvenir?”
“Well, say,” remarked C. C. with animation. “That may not be such a
joke as it sounds, the capturing part, anyway.”
“Yes, better men than you have done it,” remarked Charlie soberly.
“They say wonders never cease.”
“How are you going to do it, C. C.?” asked Joe with a grin. “Going to
get a mouse trap and bait it with limburger?”
“Say, what do you think?” C. C. was beginning indignantly when Mr.
Hadley paused and waited impatiently for them to come up.
“This work is something like the other,” he told them, hurriedly, “only
that this time our boys are going to attack. It’s up to you to catch
the start and then follow it up to the grand finish. I’m expecting big
results.”
“But suppose our boys get the worst of it?” Charlie suggested. “Suppose
they have to retreat?”
“Then you fall back with them, of course,” said Mr. Hadley impatiently,
“and take your chance with the rest. But they won’t retreat. Now, are
you ready?”
“All ready,” they responded promptly and once more went forward with
all caution toward the trenches.
There was no chance for light badinage now, or conversation of any
sort. Silent as ghosts, the boys stole forward through the woodland.
Exactly as they had done upon that former occasion, they slipped
into the trenches and took their appointed places. C. C., exhibiting
unexpected courage, took up his stand beside them.
Then, in a silence that strained every nerve to the breaking point,
they stood and waited.
CHAPTER XIV
SURPRISING THE ENEMY
“Better beat it while the going’s good, C. C.,” muttered Blake in an
undertone. “This is apt to be a pretty frisky scrap and not much chance
for a man without a gun.”
“How about yourself?” C. C. growled in return. “I don’t see much gun
and powder in yours, yet you’re sticking.”
“But I don’t see your game,” Blake insisted. “We’re here for a purpose.
But you--I don’t see any reason for just giving your life away.”
“I’m not giving it away,” snapped the gloomy comedian. “I’m willing to
sell it though, if somebody will just give me a chance at one of those
baby-killers.”
Blake looked sharply at C. C., for there was a grimness about him that
he had never seen before.
But he ventured a last protest.
“Remember you’re a civilian, C. C.” he warned. “If you’re captured
you’re liable to be shot according to the laws of war. With us it’s
different, for we’re in a regular arm of the service. Why, even our
lieutenant would chase you out of here if he noticed you.”
“He’s too busy to notice,” said C. C. obstinately. “Anyway, I’m here
now and I’m going to see what it’s like to go over the top with the
boys. You just stick to your films and don’t waste your breath on me.”
“All right,” replied Blake, and there was a new respect in his tone
that the other had never heard before.
Then it happened--the hoarse roar of the heavy guns laying down a
barrage, Uncle Sam’s boys springing from the trenches and making their
way through barbed wire and over yawning holes, calling to each other,
urging on--ever on.
The moving picture boys hurried hard on the heels of the fighting men,
determined this time to get--and keep--the pictures, or die in the
attempt.
Suddenly, the headlong rush was halted. Almost at the first-line
trenches the Germans had sprung out to meet the charge, and the
deafening roar of hand-to-hand conflict swelled to a hideous clamor.
The boys never remembered afterward how they set up the machine and got
the pictures, in fact, they were not at all sure that it had not been a
hideous nightmare and they had dreamed it all.
At first it seemed that the attacking party was getting the worst of
it, and our boys were making ready to fall back with the rest. Then the
tide suddenly turned and the Allied troops surged forward irresistibly,
capturing the first-line trenches and sweeping on.
With a glad shout, Blake and Joe and Charlie picked up the machine and
films and started in pursuit.
“Gee, this is the life!” cried Joe in a voice hoarse from shouting.
“You bet!” yelled Blake. “These films ought to be great.”
“If we don’t lose them,” added Macaroni pessimistically.
“Guess the Rhine’s the limit now,” Joe was exulting, when they were
halted once more by a desperate counter-attack from the enemy.
Once more it seemed that the attackers must fall back beneath the
fierce onslaught, but once more sheer nerve and grit carried them on
and over almost insurmountable obstacles.
Step by step, inch by inch, the soldiers forced their way forward,
while behind them the moving picture boys were writing down indelibly
the history of achievement.
“Gee, if only somebody’d give me a gun!” screamed Macaroni, beside
himself with excitement. “I bet I could kill two Heinies while those
fellows are killing one.”
“Where’s C. C.?” yelled Blake, close in Joe’s ear.
“Don’t know,” the other answered in the same manner. “Haven’t seen him
lately. Hope the old boy hasn’t got his.”
They had not much time for conversation, for once more the boys were
sweeping forward, faster and faster as the enemy lost its grip.
“Gee!” shouted Charlie, “guess maybe you knew what you were talking
about, Joe, old man. It sure does look like the Rhine this time. Say,
wouldn’t I like to be in on the finish!”
But the Rhine was still several hundred miles away when the victorious
army was finally halted. Five miles had been covered in that brilliant
dash and everyone was hilarious.
Of course, there were many who had dropped along the way, many who
would never smile again, but they had died gaily, gloriously, for the
cause of justice and of right. Looking on their calm, young faces, who
would not rather envy than pity them?
“It’s pretty tough, just the same,” Charlie was saying soberly, as some
time later the three friends made their way toward the mess kitchen to
receive their very much-needed portion of food. “If a fellow’s got to
die, I suppose that way’s as good as any. But--this world’s a pretty
interesting place after all, and I wouldn’t much mind spending my
threescore and ten on board the old ship. I say, what have we here?”
His exclamation was caused by their sudden coming upon an excited group
of doughboys, the cause of whose excitement they could not immediately
discover.
They elbowed their way through to an inside position, however, and
there, face almost purple with indignation, hands wildly gesticulating,
who should they see but Christopher Cutler Piper, late comedian for the
picture company.
“Jumping Jehoshaphat!” murmured Joe, in astonishment.
“Who left the door open?” added Charlie, irreverently, while Blake
pointed excitedly behind C. C. to where two soldiers in ragged German
uniforms stood sullenly waiting.
“So you kept your word, did you, C. C.?” shouted Blake.
C. C., who had turned with a scowl at the interruption, seeing the
cause of it, broke into a broad, delighted grin.
“You bet I did!” he yelled, in answer to the question.
“Say, go on with your story, will you?” urged one of the doughboys
impatiently.
“You were telling us how you found these--yellow dogs,” suggested
another, scowling blackly upon the sullen prisoners.
“Yes,” agreed C. C., his face once more assuming the furious purple
of indignation. “I was telling you how these skunks--say, what do you
suppose they were doing, fellows?” he interrupted himself to glare
savagely around at his audience. “They were prowling around, sticking
their bayonets--into--wounded men--some of them so near dead they
couldn’t lift a--finger to--save themselves----”
A murmur of rage passed round the group and the boys made an ominous
movement forward, but C. C. once more claimed their attention.
“I’d found an old broken gun,” he was saying, “and I gave one Hun a
whack over the hardest part of him that made him stagger and then
I wrestled with the other till I got his dirty knife away from him
and--and here we are,” he finished rather lamely.
There were shouts of:
“Bully for old C. C.!”
“I should say that’s pretty good--landing two at once!”
“Keep it up, old man--maybe next time you’ll land a jolly little
quartette, you know!”
C. C.’s face beamed like a huge, round moon and he looked happier than
the boys had ever seen him.
As the crowd dispersed, the three chums surrounded the hero of the
occasion and nearly shook his hand off.
“Great work, C. C.!” cried Blake heartily. “I thought you were only
kidding back there, but I’ve sure learned my mistake.”
“How about some chow, eh?” Joe suggested yearningly, when the
congratulations were over.
“Yeah,” added Charlie hopefully. “Even heroes have to eat, don’t they,
C. C.?”
“Shouldn’t wonder,” responded the latter, sniffing the air hungrily.
“But I’ve got to dispose of these Heinies first,” this last with a
disdainful glance toward the prisoners that made them scowl sullenly.
“Here comes Captain Mayo now--guess I can hand them over to him.”
Captain Mayo seemed more than willing to relieve the comedian of his
charges, and after a few words of real praise and a hearty grip of the
hand that made Mr. Piper beam anew, the captain left them to their
fate--and chow--hurrying the Germans before him, with a couple of
guards.
“Get some good pictures?” queried C. C., as, with steaming plates, they
settled themselves comfortably on a convenient mound of earth, a few
minutes later.
“Yes, they ought to be pretty good,” Blake responded, his mouth full.
“We’re not going to lose them this time, either,” Joe added, patting
the box beside him affectionately. “The Heinie that gets this gets it
over my dead body, as the villain would say.”
“But they can’t be as good as those others we lost,” gloomed Blake,
while Charlie looked around for something to throw at him.
“Somebody’s always taking the joy out of life,” he sighed. “We can’t
even forget our troubles while we’re eating.”
“Well,” said C. C., warmed to rare enthusiasm by the day’s success and
the appetizing chow, “I have a hunch that those films aren’t gone for
good. I bet you that before long they’ll be turning up, large as life
and twice as natural.”
The boys stared and Charlie threw up his hands in dismay.
“Now I know the world is coming to an end,” he cried. “C. C. said
something cheerful!”
CHAPTER XV
A NIGHT OF JOLLITY
“We ought to be able to pull off a pretty good time for the fellows
to-night,” Blake remarked thoughtfully, as he and Joe, with Charlie and
C. C. bringing up the rear, sauntered slowly along the deserted country
road. “It’s a good idea, too, to give the fellows something to laugh at
and get them as far away from the trenches as we can--for one night at
least. Don’t you think so?”
“Er--what did you say?” stuttered Joe, disengaging himself with
difficulty from his somewhat gloomy thoughts and looking dazedly at his
friend.
“Say, what’s the matter with you these days?” Blake demanded
indignantly. “I think you must be in love or something.”
“Or something is right,” chuckled Joe. “No, old man, French girls
don’t hold a candle to the girls in the good old U. S. A., to my
way of thinking. Better guess again. But what were you saying?” he
added, suddenly remembering that Blake had been saying something about
something or other.
“I was just remarking,” Blake replied stiffly, “that Mr. Hadley had the
right idea when he suggested comedy stuff instead of high tragedy for
to-night.”
“Oh, for the picture show we’re going to give in the Y,” said Joe,
waxing intelligent and interested at the same time. “Well, of course,
he’s right. The boys have enough bloody stuff without having it rubbed
into their amusements.”
“We are going to give them one high-class, five-reel picture though,”
continued Blake, waxing warm in his enthusiasm, “with the classiest
little cast going----”
“My, don’t we hate ourselves,” Joe put in with a chuckle. “It ought
to make quite an effect, though,” he added, “to have the actors and
actresses in the piece come out to the footlights in person and make
their little speeches. It will be some surprise to find them on this
side of the water.”
“Quite spectacular,” agreed Blake. “It will all be fine if only C.
C. can be persuaded to postpone his famous imitation of the dying
codfish----”
At this moment C. C. himself hailed them from the rear and they waited
for him and Macaroni to come up.
“Say, what do you think this is?” C. C. was complaining querulously.
“I started out for a gentle little stroll among the lovely woodland
creatures----”
“Gee, does he mean us?” chuckled Charlie, but beyond one withering
glance, C. C. declined to notice the interruption.
“And instead of a mile or so, we wander miles----”
“You’re the only one who’s wandering, C. C.,” put in Joe, with a grin.
“And your feet aren’t doing it either.”
“Never mind, C. C.,” Blake laughed, putting a soothing hand on the
irate comedian’s arm. “Joe doesn’t mean anything by it--the heat always
does that to him. We were just wondering,” he continued, with apparent
sincerity and deep guile, “what kind of a speech you were going to hand
the boys to-night.”
“Yes,” added Joe. “Is the dying codfish dead, C. C., or is he to be
revivified for the occasion?”
“Gee, if he’s dead somebody ought to get busy and bury him,” murmured
Macaroni, at which they all grinned--except C. C.
“I regret to see,” the latter declaimed pityingly, “that you are
willing to waste time and breath on what you must know to be a purely
imaginary object. The only time I ever saw an animal of that kind,”
he continued reminiscently, “was on a fishing trip with my aged and
now defunct Uncle Abner. I suppose you might have called him a dying
codfish----”
“Who, your Uncle Abner?” queried Joe, with disarming innocence.
“No, the fish,” C. C. explained patiently.
“Tell us about it,” said Joe and Blake together, their faces
unnaturally grave.
“Well, it was on a beautiful summer day,” C. C. began thoughtfully,
his eyes on the far horizon, “when my Uncle Abner suggested that I
accompany him upon a fishing trip.”
“Methinks I heard something of the sort before,” murmured Macaroni, but
both Joe and Blake silenced him with a look.
“I must have been about ten years old at the time,” the narrator
continued thoughtfully, “and all the angling I had ever done had been
by the somewhat crude method of string and bent pin.”
“Did you ever catch anything with it?” queried Charlie with real
interest.
“Sometimes,” C. C. answered with a twinkle, yes, a real twinkle. “But
it never did me much good because I had a little sister with a very
tender heart who cried so hard whenever I happened to catch anything
that I had to throw it back to keep peace in the family.”
“Gee, I’d have thrown her in after it,” murmured Charlie indignantly,
but again a glance from the others silenced him.
“Well, to continue,” went on C. C., looking as though he were really
enjoying himself. “Uncle Abner, being an experienced fisherman, sniffed
scornfully at my prehistoric tackle and offered as a great favor to
lend me one of his lightest poles. Of course, I was flattered and had
visions of myself telling the story of my wonderful catch----”
“Which wasn’t caught,” again murmured Mac.
“To the admiring and open-mouthed youngsters,” continued C. C.
imperturbably, “who had shared my lowly fishing expeditions with the
string and bent pin. Then, too, my tender-hearted little sister had
been ordered to stay at home, much to my secret joy, and I knew that by
the time I reached home with my marvelous catch the fish would be no
longer in the land of the living, which would form a valuable argument
against restoring them to their native element, as no good could result
therefrom.”
“Really,” again put in Macaroni, and this time the others chuckled with
him.
“Well,” continued C. C., too much interested in his story to notice
the interruption, “Uncle Abner explained to me the intricate mechanism
of the rod and tackle--at least, so it seemed to me then--stationed me
securely upon a rock that jutted out over the water and with a few
last instructions, left me to my fate.”
“Yes, yes, go on,” they cried in chorus.
“Where does the dying codfish come in?” Joe added.
“I was coming to that,” Mr. Piper protested. “Give me time.”
“Cæsar had time and he conquered,” murmured Macaroni again.
“Well,” C. C. continued, “the afternoon wore on and nothing happened.
Uncle Abner was one of those scientific fishermen who act as though
you’d committed a crime if you wiggle your big toe. And as the sun
went down, my hopes of a big catch went down with it, and, not seeing
anything else to do, I went to sleep.”
“Enter the codfish,” cried Joe dramatically.
“Say,” protested C. C., this time indignant, “who’s telling this story
anyway? If you think you can do it better----”
“No, no, C. C., I was only fooling,” Joe hastened to apologize. “You
were saying you had just yielded to the blandishments of Morpheus, or
words to that effect----”
“I was saying,” Mr. Piper corrected frigidly, “that I had just fallen
asleep----”
“Oh, pardon me,” from Joe.
“When I got a nibble,” said C. C. sternly.
“Well, you don’t need to look at me,” Mac protested. “I didn’t do it.”
“What happened then, C. C.?” asked Blake hastily. “You say you felt a
nibble----”
“And such a nibble,” agreed C. C., warming to his story again. “Say,
you may not believe me, boys, but it jerked me half off that rock.”
“Gee, what was it, a whale?” cried Joe, eyeing the comedian’s rather
bulky frame unbelievingly.
“You forget,” said C. C. acidly--for C. C. loved being interrupted the
way an irate bull loves a red flag--“that at the time of my story I was
only ten years old and not as--er--shall we say--well-padded, as I am
now. And the fish was not a whale.”
“Of course it wasn’t,” agreed Macaroni happily. “Don’t be stupid, Joe.
Don’t you see? It was the dying codfish----”
“There you go, forestalling me again,” protested C. C. “A fellow has
about as much chance of telling something to you fellows----”
“Yes, yes, go on,” again urged Blake. “You woke up to find yourself
being jerked forcibly from your rocky perch----”
“It wasn’t a perch, it was a codfish,” Macaroni insisted, while they
looked for something to throw at him.
“Go ahead, C. C.,” Joe entreated placatingly. “Did you succeed in
landing this er--animal--or did it land you?”
“Neither,” C. C. replied ruefully. “Uncle Abner grabbed the line and
succeeded in bringing the fish to shore. It was a perch, not a codfish,
and if it was dying it camouflaged the fact pretty well and, say, it
was a beauty. But just as Uncle Abner gave a last turn to the reel I’ll
be darned if the fish didn’t break away, hook and all, and slide down
into the water again.”
“Gee, that was tough luck,” murmured Mac sympathetically. “So the dying
codfish--or perch--still lived on.”
“He refused to shuffle off the mortal coil,” chanted Blake.
“But shuffled off the hook instead,” finished Joe, while even C. C.
allowed himself a feeble grin.
“But say,” remarked Blake suddenly, bringing them with a start to a
realization of the present. “That sun says it waxeth late and we’ll
have to do some hustling if we expect to pull off that show to-night.”
Several hours later, the Y. M. C. A. tent was crowded with uniformed
figures, boys with eager faces, glad to get away from the horror and
nightmare of war, determined to enjoy this hour of relaxation to the
utmost.
Mr. Hadley had chosen the films himself, carefully cutting out
everything suggestive of war and making fun the keynote of the evening.
The boys shouted with glee at the clever comedy and applauded the
acting of pretty Miss Lee and Miss Shay in their stirring, five-reel
drama, with boyish enthusiasm.
“Say, don’t those girls make you think of home?” asked one doughboy
of another, his eyes shining with something deeper than admiration.
“Birdie Lee reminds me of a little girl, say Frank--I wish you could
see that little girl. She’s----” his voice broke and the other boy
stretched a hand across his shoulders.
“I know, old man,” he said, in a husky whisper. “I’ve got one like
that, too. And that mother--gosh, man, I can’t get over feeling that
I’ve seen my mother--there on the screen----”
And then before the astonished and delighted eyes of those young
soldiers the actual actors in the play appeared--the girls who had
reminded them of their sweethearts, the mother who had seemed their
mother----
There was an incredulous murmur that swelled into a roar of delight,
and the boys cheered and clapped and whistled till the place was a very
pandemonium of sound.
It was a long, long time before enough order had been restored to make
speeches possible, and then applause often drowned the voices of
the speaker while he or she waited, smiling, but with a queer little
tightening of the throat until comparative quiet reigned again.
Those boys--their bravery, their gallantry, their enthusiasm!
At last it was over and the two soldier boys who had spoken before
sauntered out with the rest, arm in arm.
“Going to turn in, Frank?” asked one.
“Soon, I guess,” the other answered. “But I’m going to write--first.
Say, old man--that little woman on the screen with the white hair and
the--the--homey look--I suppose I’m crazy, but I can’t get over the
idea that I’ve seen--my mother----”
CHAPTER XVI
THE TRAIL OF THE HUN
“I hear we’re in for a new kind of a trip, fellows,” said Blake,
hurrying up to his friends one morning a few days later.
“Nothing that will take us away from the fighting line, I hope,”
returned Joe.
“Not very far away,” answered Blake, “and not for a long time. I
got the tip from C. C. It seems that the War Department cabled or
wirelessed to the authorities here that they want a special set of
films and they think that we’re the fellows to do the job. C. C. was
present when Mr. Hadley got the message and he said--But here comes Mr.
Hadley himself and it’s dollars to doughnuts that that’s what he wants
to talk to us about.”
Mr. Hadley came up to them in his brisk way and, as usual with him,
plunged right into the subject without beating around the bush.
“Got a different job for you, boys,” he said. “I want or rather Uncle
Sam wants a set of pictures of the devastated parts of Northern
France. You see, it’s this way; Germany is going to be licked good and
proper, and not very long from now either. She’s on her last legs,
although she keeps putting up a pretty stiff bluff. But we’ve got her
going and she may crumple up any time like a bit of paper----”
“Scrap of paper,” interjected Joe with a twinkle.
“Scrap of paper is right,” resumed Mr. Hadley with a smile at the
allusion. “Now when that breakdown comes and she throws up her hands,
the Allies will have to frame a treaty of peace, and the first thing
they’ll have to do is to figure up the damages that Germany will have
to pay for all the evil she has done.”
“I hope they soak her good and plenty,” said Joe, with a stern crease
in his brow.
“They’ll do that all right,” said Mr. Hadley confidently. “But they
want to have an actual record in pictures of what she’s really done to
the towns and villages her troops have occupied or passed through. Of
course, you can’t get it all, but you can get enough to shut the mouth
of the stupid and the pro-Germans who claim that these things have
been exaggerated, that Germany isn’t as black as she has been painted
and therefore ought to be let down easy and so get out of her just
punishment. Do you get me?”
“Sure thing,” replied Blake. “The only trouble is that we’re too
late to get the worst things she’s done. We can’t get the pictures
of the little boys and old men that she lined up against the wall in
Dinant and shot down in batches. We can’t get the women and babies
who have been stabbed and bayoneted and burned to death. We can’t
get the helpless passengers in small boats that have been shelled by
submarines, the men and women drowning in icy waters while the Huns
stood on their decks and laughed at their dying agonies. We can’t get
the thousands of young girls torn from their mothers’ arms in Lille and
other cities and sent into Germany to toil for their conquerors. And if
we did get them they’d be too horrible to show. The heart of the world
would break in looking at them.”
His voice trembled with the vehemence of his emotion and his fists were
clenched so that the nails bit into the palms.
“Yes,” said Mr. Hadley soberly, “you’re right, Blake. We can’t make
Germany give back the innocent lives she’s taken and the punishment
for that must be left to God. But we can make her pay for the material
damage she has done up to the limit of her ability, and it is for
that reason that we want this series of films. They’ll be part of the
evidence. What do you say? I laid the matter before your commander and
he said that, of course, if the Department wanted it, it would be all
right. You’ll have a big army automobile for yourselves and another one
will carry supplies and a couple of soldiers who will go with you as an
escort.”
“Sure we’ll go,” replied Blake.
“You bet we will,” echoed Joe.
“Count me in,” said Charlie.
Mr. Hadley looked his gratification at their readiness.
“I warn you it will be a depressing trip,” he said. “It will be
anything but a joy ride. It will be like riding through a cemetery. It
was Attila, wasn’t it, who said that the grass never grew where his
horse’s foot had trod? Well, Attila was a Hun. Do you get me?”
“We get you,” they answered in unison.
“When are we slated to start, Mr. Hadley?” asked Blake.
“To-morrow I guess, or next day at latest,” answered Mr. Hadley. “We’ll
get the autos tuned up to-day so that they’ll be in shape for the
trip, and we’ll see that there’s plenty of all kinds of grub, for you
probably won’t be able to get any on the way for love or money. Most
of the people in the sections you go through will be half starved and
the rest will be living on charity. The Allied armies are sending them
supplies as fast as possible, but it takes time. Get a hustle on now,
boys. I’ll see that you’re supplied with films enough to last you for
the trip.”
He hurried away and the boys set to work at once to make ready. They
reported to their commander and got his formal permission for the
journey. Two men were assigned to them as an escort, clean cut, likely
looking fellows, and to their surprise and pleasure they noted that one
of them was Tom Wentworth.
“Why, how are you, Tom?” Blake greeted him heartily. “So you pulled
through all right, did you? It’s good to see you around again with two
good legs.”
“The sawbones didn’t take your leg off, eh?” queried Joe with a grin.
“No,” replied Tom with a smile. “I saved the old peg, thanks to you
fellows. The doctor said that if you hadn’t made such a good job of
that first aid I might have had to lose it. I can never thank you boys
enough for the way you risked your lives to save mine that day.”
“Oh, it’s all right,” said Blake. “Both Joe and I are only too glad
that we happened to be Johnnies-on-the-spot.”
“I hear you got a dose of trouble of your own that same day,” remarked
Tom.
“Yes,” laughed Blake, “I got buried in the mine explosion and came
near passing in my checks. But a miss is as good as a mile and I got
through all right.”
The next morning bright and early, they started off. In the first car
were Blake, Joe and Macaroni, with an army chauffeur, while Tom and his
comrade followed in the second car, or rather a combination of car and
motor truck, that carried all the supplies they were likely to need on
the journey.
All the members of the moving picture company were on hand to see them
off, although it was an unusually early hour.
C. C. was there with the rest, and his face was, if possible, even more
lugubrious than usual.
“Remember that there’s a whole lot of mines and shells there that
haven’t been exploded yet,” he cautioned. “I shouldn’t be surprised if
one of them would get the whole lot of you.”
“They haven’t got us yet, and we’ve been in a good many more risky
places,” laughed Joe.
“That’s just it,” persisted C. C. “You’re just about due for it. The
pitcher that goes to the well too often gets broken at last.”
“For goodness’ sake,” put in Nellie Shay. “Any one would think, C. C.,
that we’d gathered to attend the boys’ funeral. You’re as cheerful as a
crutch.”
“I move that C. C. be sent to talk to the German prisoners,” said
Birdie Lee mischievously. “After they’ve listened to him for a while
they’ll all commit suicide, and then the government won’t be at the
expense of feeding them.”
They all laughed, while C. C. looked at her reproachfully.
“Cheer up, C. C.,” chaffed Blake, “the worst is yet to come. Something
real good will happen some time and the shock will be too much for
you. In the meantime just feed upon gloom and that will make you feel
natural.”
“A truce to this merry jesting,” said Joe. “Here comes Mr. Hadley, and,
as usual, he’s in a tearing hurry.”
Their employer came bustling up and shook hands with them.
“All ready, I see, boys,” he said. “Well, good luck to you and bring
us back a bang-up series of films. And mind,” he cautioned them, “what
you are to get are just the unnecessary destruction and ruin that
were caused, the results merely of spite and rage, the things that
are wholly unjustified by the laws of war. If villages and churches
were destroyed in actual fighting, don’t pay any attention to them.
That’s part of the game of war and the nations have simply got to
grin and bear it. But where the destruction was wicked and needless,
cold-blooded and deliberate, get it down in the films exactly as you
find it.”
“All right,” said Blake. “I guess we’ve got your idea. And if all
we’ve heard is true, we won’t run short of subjects.”
There was a chorus of farewells and a waving of hands, as the chauffeur
threw in the clutch and the machine started off, followed by the
heavier one containing their escort and supplies.
The general plan that had been laid out for them was that they should
start from Chateau-Thierry on the Marne and follow the line of the main
German retreat since that time. So they made straight for that famous
town at a rapid rate of speed.
“Well,” remarked Blake, as he settled back in the car, “here we are at
last on the trail of the Hun.”
“Yes,” rejoined Joe, “and, believe me, it’s some trail!”
CHAPTER XVII
WRECK AND RUIN
The word had been passed by the military authorities that the moving
picture boys should be given every facility in obtaining views of
everything that came within the scope of their mission, and this
permission acted like a magic password wherever they went.
Chateau-Thierry itself was of the keenest interest to them, and
they would have liked to trace out the course of the battles there
and at Belleau Wood where the Americans had covered themselves with
imperishable glory. But their time was limited, as they had to be back
on the front lines within a week, and they kept themselves strictly to
the work they had in hand.
The Huns had been driven back so quickly and unexpectedly from the
town that they had not had time to treat it as badly as others they
had held. It would have taken more time than they had to spare to mine
and blow up the houses and public buildings. But they had revenged
themselves for that by thoroughly wrecking the inside of the houses
where they had been quartered.
“Just look at this!” exclaimed Blake as they entered a house that
had evidently been occupied by a well-to-do family. “If this isn’t a
complete job I never saw one.”
“I suppose this was a case of military necessity,” said Joe
sarcastically, as he looked at the furniture smashed to bits and a
handsome piano that had been hacked by axes.
“Military necessity!” snorted Blake.
“Even the kids’ toys haven’t been spared,” remarked Mac, as he set
up the camera to take pictures of the nursery. “Look at these Teddy
bears torn in two, the legs and arms pulled from the dolls, the doll’s
cradles smashed. Poor little kiddies!”
From room to room they went, their hearts swelling with indignation.
Bayonets had been thrust through the works of costly clocks, covers
and pages had been ripped from books and strewn about the floor,
oil paintings had been slit with knives, vases, urns, crockery and
glassware were shattered into fragments, curtains and tapestries had
been torn into ribbons, ink had been poured over rugs and carpets,
every mirror in the house had been smashed, mattresses had been cut
open and their contents scattered about the rooms. It was a scene of
utter and wanton ruin, and the boys grew hot with wrath.
“It is the same everywhere,” their French guide, who spoke passable
English, declared; and as they went from house to house they found that
he had spoken the truth.
“Gee, but it’s a relief to get out in the open air again!” exclaimed
Blake, when they had finished their work for the day. “Those sights
worked on me so that I felt as if I would cave in if I stayed there
much longer.”
“I’m glad that we’ve got it on record though,” remarked Joe. “Tell that
to people and they’d say that you were lying. But they can’t very well
get away from the evidence of the films.”
The next morning they left the city and rolled out on the country
roads. It had been one of the most beautiful sections of sunny France,
but now it had been transformed into a desert. Every horse and cow
had been killed or carried away, fences had been burned, and where
farmhouses had stood were nothing but heaps of ashes and masonry. Farm
implements had either been carried off, or when there had not been time
for that, had been broken or thrown into the flames of the houses,
where they lay in twisted shapes, a melancholy ruin.
From time to time they passed parties of refugees on the road, who had
been driven from their homes by the approach of the Germans, but now
that they had been defeated were returning again to what had been their
homes. There were wagons piled with household goods, drawn sometimes by
horses and again by men between the shafts. There were smaller vehicles
drawn by dogs, and boys trundled wheelbarrows along. Men and women and
little children trudged along beside the vehicles. Their faces were
pinched and thin and preternaturally grave, for though they were at
last returning to their homes, they had seen enough along the road to
make them fear what those homes would be when they finally reached them.
“Poor things!” said Joe with pity. “Can you imagine how they’ll feel
when they stand before the pile of ashes or of bricks that they used to
call home?”
“They’ll have to begin life all over again,” observed Blake.
“And with nothing to do it with,” said Mac. “Gee, but those sights make
you sore! Just look over there.”
He pointed to a spot a little way off the road. There stood a gaunt
chimney that was almost the only thing left of what had been a house.
On the hearth a woman was trying to heat a little water in a battered
pan that she had picked up out of the wreckage. She was not old, but
her form was emaciated, her eyes sunken, and her whole attitude one
of utter hopelessness. A baby wrapped in an old shawl was lying on the
grass near by, fretting feebly, while the mother with a few twigs that
she had gathered was feeding the scanty fire and trying to coax the
water to boil.
The sight was too much for the boys. In an instant they called to their
chauffeur to stop. The other car, close behind, slowed down, too. The
boys sprang from their car and with the help of their escort hurried
over to the woman, with their arms full of supplies that they had drawn
from their stores. Tea and coffee and bread and canned meats and jars
and condensed milk were among them.
The woman saw them coming, and at first the sight of the unfamiliar
uniforms made her shrink, and she rushed toward her baby as though to
pick it up and flee. But the kindly look in the bright, eager faces of
the newcomers reassured her, and when she saw them place the food on
the ground near her and indicate by gestures that it was meant for her
she burst into a fit of wild weeping.
While she tried to gain control of herself, the boys, to cover their
own embarrassment, crowded around the baby and made much of it. Then
when the mother was calmer, they tried to talk to her, but neither she
nor they could understand each other. But her grateful looks and the
way she raised her hands to heaven showed them that she was invoking
blessings on them.
“And to think,” said Blake, as, seated in their cars, the party was
once more speeding along the road, “that that same thing in one form or
another is happening all through Northern France and in Belgium. Her
husband was probably killed or is in the army and she comes back to
find her home gone. What will she do? What can she get to eat? Where
can she sleep?”
They found many more such calls on their help and sympathy, and they
were thankful that they had twice as much in the way of supplies as
they needed, thanks to the bountiful provision made by their employer
who had, perhaps, had this in mind when he stocked their car so
thoroughly.
They passed orchards that had once been filled with carefully
cultivated trees that every year were heavy with fruit. Every tree
had been cut down or sawn more than halfway through, so as to destroy
it forever. In cases where the despoilers had been pressed for time,
they had placed charges of dynamite in the forks of the tree and the
explosion of this had split the trunk in two.
“It wasn’t enough to abuse humanity,” remarked Joe bitterly, “they even
had to outrage nature.”
“They wanted to make France a beggar for the next fifty years,”
commented Blake savagely.
They did not dare to drink any water secured along the way, for the
wells had been contaminated and defiled. Even the dead had not been
spared, for graves had been rifled and tombstones desecrated by coarse
inscriptions.
In the towns, they found that the same remorseless devastation had been
carried on. Mills had been stripped of all their costly machinery,
which had been carried away into Germany and then the mills themselves
blown up. The sanctity of churches had not protected them. The altar
ornaments had been stolen and charges of dynamite put in the pillars of
the structures and exploded. Works of art had not been spared. Statues
in public squares had been carried away. Private houses had been
utterly looted, and even the bells and door-knobs had been stolen.
Coal mines had been flooded so that they could not be gotten in working
condition for many years to come. In a single city, ten thousand
workingmen’s houses had been razed to the ground. Everywhere it was the
same story--cold-blooded, heartless, deliberate destruction.
“Well,” said Blake a few days later, as they were nearing their old
headquarters, “I’m glad that job is done.”
“Yes,” returned Joe, “and there isn’t any money that would tempt me to
go through it again.”
“I’m glad the films gave out when they did,” added Macaroni. “I expect
to have nightmares for the next year.”
They received a hearty welcome from Mr. Hadley, who was much gratified
at the thoroughness with which they had done their work.
“You need a change now,” he said with a smile. “Perhaps you’ll be glad
to get off the ground and up into the sky.”
“What do you mean?” asked Blake and Joe in one breath.
“I’ve arranged to have you go up in an aeroplane and take views of the
enemy’s lines,” replied Mr. Hadley. “That is, of course, if you are
willing.”
“Willing is our middle name!” exclaimed Joe.
“Same here,” agreed Blake. “The Huns have done mischief enough in the
air, too, but at least we won’t be able to see the traces of it.”
CHAPTER XVIII
SWEEPING THROUGH THE SKY
The morning on which the boys were to take their aerial excursion
dawned clear and bright, being indeed, as Blake remarked, “made to
order.” The two boys had watched the weather anxiously for the last
day or two, as nobody knew better than they the necessity of clear,
sunshiny weather for the making of good pictures. But this day was all
that could be desired, and immediately after breakfast the two friends,
carrying their cameras and other essential equipment, reported at the
aeroplane hangars. Arrangements had been made to supply them with a
machine and pilot, and when they arrived they found a big bi-plane
already out, with a mechanic putting the last touches to the engine,
and a very capable looking pilot standing alongside. For lack of room
Charlie had been forced to stay behind.
“Guess you’re my two passengers, all right,” remarked the pilot, with
a smile, as Joe and Blake walked up to him. “It doesn’t take any
detective to tell that, when you have these cameras slung over your
shoulders.”
“No, they’re a dead give-away,” smiled Blake, “and they’re loaded for
some pretty exciting pictures to-day, too. We’ve taken them about every
other way there is to take pictures, and now we’re very much interested
in this method.”
“Well, it probably won’t be half as exciting as you think,” remarked
the aviator, whose name was Trent. “People who aren’t used to flying
seem to think that there is nothing but thrills to it, but, in point of
fact, after you get used to it, it’s rather monotonous than otherwise.”
“Well, I guess it isn’t very monotonous when somebody is taking pot
shots at you with an anti-aircraft gun, is it?” inquired Joe, who was
inclined to be somewhat incredulous of the airman’s statement.
“Oh, of course, circumstances alter cases,” laughed Trent, “but I’m
just speaking of ordinary patrol duty, or something along that line.
If you’d been at this game as long as I have, you’d feel the same way,
I’ll bet.”
The two friends were inclined to attribute this point of view more to
the aviator’s modesty than anything else, but before they could argue
the point, the mechanic reported “all ready,” and Trent climbed into
the pilot’s seat, at the same time indicating to the boys the places
that had been prepared for them. It did not take them long to adjust
themselves and their cameras to their satisfaction, and when this was
done, the pilot gave the word to the mechanic to crank the engine. A
quick whirl of the propeller, a few spasmodic barks from the engine,
and then a steady roar as the powerful motor “took hold.” The aeroplane
moved forward over the smooth grass, slowly at first, but with
ever-increasing speed. When they had traversed about a hundred yards,
the pilot gave a quick move to one of his controlling levers, and the
big machine lifted lightly into the air and soared upward. Without any
reflection on the courage of Blake and Joe, it may be said that they
both gripped their seats with somewhat unnecessary force, in view of
the fact that they were securely strapped in anyway, and could not by
any possibility have fallen out.
But this sensation soon wore off, and the boys began to enjoy the
novelty of the thing. The machine was mounting steadily, for the first
few minutes, but soon reached the desired height, and then flew along
parallel with the earth’s surface. They were flying in the direction
of the German lines, and in a very short time the boys decided that
they were near enough to start photographing. Accordingly, they
focused their cameras, and were soon winding the film through the
machines as unconcernedly as they had ever done on _terra firma_. It
was impossible to talk to each other or the pilot, so great was the
noise of the motor, but they had received explicit orders as to what
was expected of them, and each one of them did his task in the best
possible way.
On this first trip the pilot had been instructed not to fly over the
German lines, but, when he reached them, to take more of a parallel
course, and this he accordingly did.
It was a wonderful panorama that lay spread out below them, and the
boys were filled with the artist’s delight at having such a tremendous
view to film. Reel after reel they put through their cameras, until
their supply was at last exhausted. When this happened, Blake leaned
over until his mouth was close to the pilot’s ear, and shouted:
“All right, old man! We’ve got all we came for!”
Their airman nodded his head in token of understanding, and swept the
machine around in a great circle, banking at so steep an angle that
the boys held their breath until the machine was again upon a level
keel. Then he straightened out on a straight line for home, and in
what seemed an incredibly short space of time, was circling over the
aviation field preparatory to making a landing. Lower and lower went
the big machine, until, with hardly a jar, its rubber-tired wheels
took the earth, and in another hundred feet it had come to a standstill.
“Well,” said the aviator, looking around at them with a grin, “how did
you enjoy your ride? Get the pictures all right?”
“It was a wonderful experience,” said Blake, “like nothing else in the
world. As far as the pictures go, one can never be sure until the films
are developed. But I was so taken up with turning the crank that I
didn’t have time to really enjoy the sensation of flying,” he added.
“Well, that’s considerably different from what most of the people I’ve
taken up say,” said Trent. “As a general thing, they’re so absorbed in
wondering whether or not they’ll ever get back to the good old earth
again, that they don’t have time for anything else.”
“After you’ve been mixed up in this war awhile, you get into the habit
of doing what you set out to do, and not worrying much about the danger
that goes with it,” remarked Blake, and the aviator nodded acquiescence.
The boys then proceeded to remove their apparatus from the aeroplane,
and after taking a hearty leave of the airman, they proceeded back to
headquarters. Arrived there, they reported, and turned in their new
films to be developed.
“We’ll have more work for you along the same line,” they were informed
by their commanding officer. “Report early to-morrow morning, and I’ll
give you your instructions.”
The boys saluted, and when they got outside, compared notes as to their
sensations on their first flight.
“There’s nothing to compare it to, though,” lamented Joe at last. “When
you take a fast auto ride, or something along that line, you say it’s
just like flying, but when you have actually been up in the air, you
find that it’s like nothing else under the sun.”
“It’s still ‘just like flying,’” smiled Blake, and with this they had
to be content.
“Wonder what’s on the programme for to-morrow,” speculated Joe.
“Something seems to tell me that we’re booked for another trip through
the air.”
“Guess likely,” agreed Blake. “If those pictures we took to-day turn
out all right, it’s pretty likely they’ll want more of them.”
“Well, I guess we’re the boys to get them,” said Joe, and the two fast
friends smiled in mutual confidence and understanding.
CHAPTER XIX
THE FALLING PLANE
Bright and early the next morning Blake Stewart and Joe Duncan reported
as they had been instructed to do, and found their speculations of the
previous day justified.
“Those films you took yesterday turned out first rate,” said Merrick,
their commander. “Now, to-day, we want to get some films of territory
in the rear of the German positions. Of course, you understand this
will be a lot more dangerous work than you were doing yesterday. You
will have a rather excellent chance of getting shot down, as the
German planes in this sector are very active, and besides that they
have numerous batteries of anti-aircraft guns.” As he said this, he
looked at them keenly, but could find no signs of dismay in their
deeply-bronzed features.
“We’ve been through some pretty bad stuff, sir, and I guess you can’t
scare us away from this,” said Blake, and the officer broke into a grim
smile.
“No, I think I agree with you,” he said. “Well, then, this is what I
want you to do,” and he proceeded to give them full instructions.
“You will have the same machine at your disposal as you had yesterday,”
he concluded, “and will be accompanied by two fast fighting planes,
that will engage the enemy if you are attacked. And I want to impress
on you both the necessity of getting these pictures at any cost.”
“We’ll do our very best, sir,” stated Blake, and then, the interview
being at an end, the moving picture boys saluted and went in search of
their outfit.
It did not take them long to get ready, and in a very short time they
found themselves in the same seats they had occupied during yesterday’s
flight. The two wasp-like fighting planes that had been detailed to
convoy the heavier observation machine, were already aloft, their
motors humming as they slowly circled, waiting for the big machine to
come up.
When all was ready, Trent gave the word to the mechanician, as
formerly, and the powerful plane rose from the ground and joined its
companions aloft. When it had reached an altitude of about a thousand
feet, the battle planes flew alongside, one on each side, and a little
above, and they straightened out in a bee line for the enemy territory.
According to their orders, they were not to take any pictures
until they were actually over the enemy trenches, so they had more
opportunity than before to note what went on about them. They had time
to drink in the magnificence of the scene spread out before them, mile
after mile, as far as the eye could reach. They could also notice the
masterly way in which the pilot maneuvered his machine, going up or
down, slower or faster, by an almost imperceptible movement of his
controlling levers. They gave little thought to the dangers that lay
ahead, having learned not to cross bridges until they came to them.
All three planes were travelling fast, and it was not long before they
reached the outskirts of their own lines, and then found themselves
actually over German territory, as Joe afterward said, “with nothing
between them and Berlin but air.”
Their cameras were all ready for business, and without any delay they
started sending the new films through. As yet they had met with no
opposition from the enemy, but presently they heard a loud explosion
ahead and a little to one side, and felt the aeroplane rock as the
disturbed air buffeted it.
The aviator gave a fleeting glance behind him, to see what his
passengers were doing, but found them industriously turning the cranks
of their machines, and apparently no more minding the bombardment
that had now set in than he himself did. The German batteries were
in full swing by this time, and little white puffs of smoke were
breaking all about them. The big plane rocked and swayed, but not one
of its occupants even dreamed of giving up until their objects were
attained, and they held steadily onward. The two escorting planes were
by now high above the heavier machine, taking their altitude so as to
be ready for any Hun machines that might be lurking in the higher air
strata. Several times shrapnel bullets whistled through the wings of
the aeroplane, or spatted against the engine, but by good fortune none
of its occupants had been hit so far, nor had any vital part of the
machinery been damaged.
The boys were just starting on their last reel, when Blake, in spite
of the absorption of his task, suddenly sensed that all was not well
with their motor, which up to now had been roaring its deep-throated
song without any sign of faltering. But now there was a hesitation and
irregularity in its note that boded trouble. Blake saw the pilot lean
over, evidently doing his best to remedy matters, but apparently to no
avail. The “missing” of the engine became worse, and then the motor
suddenly stopped altogether.
“We’ll have to land!” yelled Trent, over his shoulder. “The engine’s
burnt up, and we’ve got to take ground.”
The boys felt a great sinking of the heart, for they knew that this
meant capture by the Germans, and not only of themselves, but of their
precious films. However, there was nothing else to be done, and they
nerved themselves for what was before them.
The aeroplane volplaned swiftly, the earth seeming to rise up to meet
them. Their escorting machines, of course, could do nothing to save
them, and when they saw that the big machine was making a landing, they
turned and headed back for the American lines.
The big observation plane took the ground gently, and was immediately
surrounded by gray-coated Germans. One of these, evidently an officer,
stepped forward with leveled pistol, and demanded their surrender.
Of course, there was nothing the Americans could do but accept their
fate as gracefully as possible, so they stepped out of the plane, and,
much as it went against the grain, gave themselves up as prisoners of
war. At a gesture and guttural word of command from the German officer,
they were surrounded and disarmed, and then the officer ordered a
search of the aeroplane to be made. His eyes lighted up when he saw the
cameras and films, for he guessed that here was a prize worth having.
As he lifted them from the machine, the soldiers guarding the
Americans relaxed their vigilance for a moment, in an endeavor to see
what it was that had been captured, and Blake, always on the alert, was
quick to seize the opportunity thus afforded. He noted that there was a
strip of thick woods some hundred yards from where they stood, and in
a flash it crossed his mind that if he and his companions could reach
this woods, they might make good their escape.
Stealthily he touched Joe and Trent on the arm, and glanced meaningly
toward the trees. They were not slow in grasping his meaning, and
suddenly all broke through the Germans surrounding them, and raced at
top speed for the sheltering woods.
The slow-witted Germans were taken completely by surprise, and to a
spectator it would have been comical to see their clumsy and frantic
efforts to get their rifles into position and fire. They wasted
several precious seconds, that were as the breath of life to the three
Americans, racing for their lives. They had covered almost half the
distance before the first bullets began to sing past their ears. They
crouched low, and, following Blake’s example, ran in jerky zig-zags,
disconcerting the aim of their enemies. But the little, steel-coated
bullets were singing all about them, and the line of trees still
seemed a long way off. Suddenly the aviator, Trent, gave a sharp cry,
staggered on a few steps with his own momentum, and then crumpled to
the ground.
Grief was in the boys’ hearts, but they knew that to stop would only
sacrifice their own lives, without in any way benefitting Trent, who,
indeed, had received a bullet through the head and was dead before he
struck the ground.
With a final desperate burst of speed, the two boys dashed forward,
and found themselves at last in the shelter of the friendly trees,
and for the moment hidden from their pursuers. Their position
was still a desperate one, however, for they were in the enemy’s
territory, surrounded on all sides, and totally ignorant of the extent
or direction of the woods in which they now found themselves. The
underbrush was very heavy, however, and after running a short distance
further, they buried themselves in it, and lay quiet, getting back
their wind, and listening to the angry shouts and cries of their
pursuers as they beat about in the brushwood, in a vain attempt to
locate their elusive captives. But they were soon recalled by their
officers, and at the time the boys were greatly surprised at this,
although later they found out the reason for it.
After they had recovered from their strenuous race against death,
and the sounds of pursuit had died down, Blake and Joe set out on an
exploring expedition, making, as well as they could, in the general
direction of their own lines. They went, very cautiously, stopping
often to listen for any sign of enemy life. They were not molested, but
had not been traveling in this way for much more than an hour, when
they saw light through the trees in front of them, and shortly found
that they were near the boundary of the little patch of woods, beyond
which was only open country.
They glanced at each other, and Blake remarked: “Looks as though we had
gone about as far as is good for us in this direction, doesn’t it?”
“Sure does,” assented Joe briefly. “What do you think we had better do
now?”
“It seems to me our best plan will be to skirt around the edge of this
little forest glade,” said Blake, “and get an idea of just how big it
is. If it isn’t any more extensive than I think it is just now, we are
emphatically out of luck. And think of those dandy films, gone!”
“Out of luck is right,” assented Joe. “But, at any rate, we may be able
to make a break at night, and get back to our own lines.”
“That’s about our one best bet,” agreed Blake soberly. “We’ll find out
how we stand now, and after dark we’ll see what we can do. If only we
had our films,” he added regretfully.
“I guess we can say good-bye to them,” said Joe sadly. “We’ll be mighty
lucky to get out of this alive.”
“Well, never say die,” quoted Blake, and without more words the two
comrades set out to ascertain the extent of the woods in which they
now found themselves. As Blake had anticipated, they covered less than
a square mile, and it did not take them long to ascertain this fact.
Peering out from the edges, they could see masses of German infantry
and artillery out in the open, and suddenly a thought struck Joe.
“I’ll tell you why they did not hunt for us longer!” he exclaimed.
“Their leader figured that we’d either have to come out and surrender,
or else starve in here, so he wasn’t particularly anxious to capture us
just then. He figured he had us either way.”
“Guess that’s it,” said Blake, who had little doubt that his friend was
right. “Besides, he had the films, and I suppose he was anxious to get
them to headquarters and see what they were.”
“Well, we may fool him yet,” said Joe grimly. “It’s fairly certain that
we won’t stay here to starve to death, and also pretty likely that we
won’t surrender without having a try for liberty, anyway. How about it,
old fellow?”
“Right you are!” agreed Blake heartily; “as soon as it gets dark, we’ll
make our attempt, and see what comes of it. I only wish we had Trent
along with us,” and his face saddened as he thought of the untimely end
of the gallant aviator.
Both moving picture boys realized the necessity of conserving their
strength for the ordeal that lay before them, so they hunted out a
dense growth of underbrush, and crawled in. Thus snugly hidden, they
waited for the coming of night to start their dash for freedom. From
afar off they heard the thunder of guns, knew that a big battle was in
progress, and wished that they were back where they could become part
of it. The shadows gradually lengthened, as the afternoon wore on, and
after what seemed an interminable period, the boys knew that the time
had come for them to make their venture. By this time they were both
as hungry as young wolves, but wasted little time in regretting this
condition, as they saw little prospect of remedying it just at present.
Creeping cautiously out from their brush shelter, they advanced to the
edge of the woods, and peered out.
CHAPTER XX
SURROUNDED BY FOES
The night was very cloudy and dark, which promised to favor their
escape. They strained their ears to catch any sound of a lurking enemy,
but, although there was considerable stir and bustle in the distance,
they could hear nothing near at hand that threatened any special danger.
“Guess we might as well risk it now as any other time,” whispered
Blake, and, as Joe felt the same way, they stole cautiously out.
Occasionally a few stars showed through breaks in the clouds, and the
boys knew enough of astronomy to lay a rough course by them.
They had traveled perhaps a mile in this manner, when suddenly they
heard the tramp of marching feet coming in their direction. What to do
now became an immediate and most pressing problem. Ignorant as they
were of the surroundings in which they found themselves, their only
safety seemed to be in flight, although no matter in what direction
they went, they stood in imminent danger of running into some other
party of the enemy. However, the unknown danger was preferable to
certain capture; so for the second time that day they sought safety in
flight.
They had hardly started to run, however, when they heard another body
of troops coming from almost the opposite direction. They halted, and
Joe exclaimed:
“Looks pretty much as if we were up against it hard and fast this time,
old fellow. There seem to be Huns on every side of us. Unless we can
grow wings pretty suddenly it looks as though we have exactly a one
hundred per cent. chance of getting caught.”
“It looks bad, I’ll admit,” said Blake anxiously. He strained his eyes
through the darkness, and a glow of hope shot through him as he made
out through the blackness what seemed to be the outlines of a ruined
house.
“Quick!” he whispered, “over this way, Joe. I think there’s some
shelter over here, and we may be able to lie low until they pass.”
With renewed hope, the boys made for this refuge, stumbling over the
rough ground, but progressing rapidly in spite of all obstacles. They
reached the ruins none too soon, for now the advancing Huns were almost
upon them. Blake’s eyes had not deceived him, for they found that
their objective was really a small, brick house, that had apparently
been struck by a big shell, as it was now little more than a mass of
bricks and shattered beams.
They crouched down in the ruins, and had barely settled themselves,
when the two advancing columns of German infantry met, almost opposite
their shelter. They heard the Germans stop, and exchange guttural
challenges and replies. Then the two columns resumed their march, and
the sound of their tramping feet gradually died away in the distance.
“Whew!” exclaimed Joe, “it’s lucky you saw this place, Blake. We’d have
been marching along with those fellows now, if you hadn’t.”
“Yes, or lying out there shot as spies,” replied Blake grimly. “They’re
apt to shoot first, and hold a court martial afterward.”
“If we ever get out of this mess, I’ll say we deserve every variety of
medal and cross that was ever invented.”
“I’d swap them all for a nice juicy beefsteak, just at present. I’m
just about starved, and that’s no camouflage, either.”
“You’ve got nothing on me. If we come across a German mess wagon, I’ll
make an attack on it single-handed.”
“Remember I’m in with you on that. But I think we’d better get started
again, don’t you? We’ve got a long way to go before we get back to our
own lines.”
“Right you are,” agreed Joe. “Let’s go.”
The two friends emerged from their hiding place, and, after getting
their bearings, resumed their journey. But Fate, while helping them
once, refused to do so a second time. They had traveled perhaps a mile
and a half, when suddenly, seeming to rise out of the ground in front
of them, a German sentry challenged them.
Without a word, swift and deadly as a panther, Blake sprang on the man
and gripped his throat in fingers of steel, but as the sentry crashed
to the ground, others of his comrades, who seemed to be all about, took
the alarm, and in a moment the moving picture boys found themselves
striking out at foes who outnumbered them ten to one. They made a
gallant battle, and for a few minutes held off their assailants, who
were afraid to shoot in the dark, for fear of injuring each other.
But the odds were too great, and, at length, the two Americans were
overborn by sheer weight of numbers, and pinned to the ground. The
light from an electric flashlight was thrown on their faces, and the
officer holding it gave some curt commands.
“_Amerikaner!_” he growled, as he recognized their uniforms. “Tie the
dogs tightly, for they are the very mischief at slipping through one’s
fingers. We will take them before the captain, and see what they have
to say before they are shot.”
“Cheerful beggar, isn’t he?” said Joe, who had caught the sense of this
statement. “We’re to tell them all we know before we’re set up against
a wall, Blake.”
“We’re safe enough, then,” said Blake, with a wry grin, “because I
don’t imagine we’ll tell them much, do you?”
“Silence, there!” growled the German. “Talk when you are told to, and
not else.” Then he gave some harsh commands to his men, and the whole
party, with the boys in the center, started off.
The party consisted of sixteen or eighteen men. They had been on patrol
duty, but this night had been resting in a dugout some distance in back
of the lines, when the two friends had had the misfortune to run right
into them.
Escape was practically out of the question, as their hands were
securely bound behind them, and they were surrounded by their enemies,
who watched them warily.
The party proceeded in silence for nearly an hour, and then, at a
command from the leader, halted in front of a low, wooden building,
that the boys took to be Field Headquarters. The leader exchanged a few
sentences with the sentry on guard, and then, as the door was thrown
open, he commanded the two boys, together with four of his own men,
to enter. There was nothing for it but to obey, so the boys went in,
surrounded by the four Germans, with their officer bringing up the rear.
The room was lighted by several oil lamps, and contained a large desk
and a number of chairs. At the desk was seated a burly German, wearing
the uniform of a captain. He glared balefully at the prisoners, while
their captor made his report.
“I know very well who you are,” said the captain, when the other had
finished his report and saluted. “We had report of you to-day, and were
on the lookout for you. You are the two Yankees who made us a visit
this morning with an aeroplane and some moving picture cameras, not so?”
Blake could see no object in denying this, so he admitted the fact.
The officer then questioned them concerning other pictures they had
taken, how long they had been taking them, and so forth. The boys with
their quick wits were more than a match for him, however, and gave a
quantity of choice misinformation in such a convincing and apparently
frank manner, that the German was completely fooled, and appeared to be
greatly satisfied with what they had told him when he at last brought
the interview to a close.
“Take them to the guardhouse,” he ordered Kopf, the lieutenant who
had captured them, “and see that they are well guarded. They escaped
from us once to-day. I charge you to see that they do not repeat the
performance.”
Kopf saluted stiffly, and with a sharp order to his men, turned and
left the room, followed by captives and captors.
CHAPTER XXI
PRISONERS OF THE HUNS
A short march took the moving picture boys to the guardhouse, where
they were delivered over to the officer in charge, and soon afterward,
after some further questioning, they were roughly pushed into a narrow
and not overclean cell, where they were left to their own devices.
“Well, we’re in an awful mess now,” said Joe dolefully. “The worst has
happened, and we’re hard and fast in the hands of the Huns.”
“Yes, and we’re not only prisoners, but mighty hungry prisoners,” said
Blake. “I wonder if we can’t persuade that sentry outside to bring us
grub of some kind? I’m going to try, anyway.”
The door to their cell was heavily barred, and outside a sentry, with
his clumsy German rifle over his shoulder, paced slowly to and fro.
On his next round, as he was passing their door, Blake caught his
attention, and pointed meaningly toward his mouth. But the man only
scowled at him, and with a muttered exclamation, continued on his
measured beat.
“Not much chance there, I guess,” said Blake. “Suppose we’ll have to
get along as best we can until morning.”
“I’m going to sleep, then,” declared Joe. “You know, there’s an old
saying that he who sleeps, dines.”
“All right, then,” grinned Blake, “here goes for a swell dinner,” and
he stretched his sinewy length on the floor. Joe lay down beside him,
and both boys slept the sleep of exhaustion until they were awakened
by a harsh voice speaking in German. It proved to be that of Kopf,
the officer who had effected their capture. When he saw the boys were
awake, he switched to English, and addressed them.
“Get up, you!” he commanded, “there is a journey before you. Your fate
has not yet been decided, but in the meantime you will be put to work
and made to do something useful.”
He made a gesture, and the boys, not even taking the trouble to answer
him, followed him as he turned and stalked out. He led them to another
room, and from there, after a scanty breakfast that did little toward
allaying their ravenous hunger, they were taken to the entrance, where
a big motor truck was standing. They were commanded to get into this,
which they did, and found it already occupied by some half dozen
French prisoners. After they had got in, two Germans, armed with guns
and revolvers, entered, and occupied the ends of the two parallel seats
with which the truck was equipped.
The guards had hardly taken their places, when the truck started with a
jerk, and the boys were on their way to their unknown destination.
The Americans returned the curious stares of their fellow prisoners,
and after a while Blake struck up a conversation with one of the poilus
who could speak broken English. From him the boys learned that they
were being transported to a farm, probably some distance from the
battle lines, where they would be set to work at ploughing, or any of
the work that is always to be done around a farm.
“Nice prospect, isn’t it?” said Blake, glancing quizzically at his
friend. “Plenty of work, and no wages, is what we’re going to get.”
“I’ll bet we don’t get it for very long,” said Joe, in a low tone.
“Before very long, they’ll have a couple of dead Germans lying around
the place, and we’ll be far away from there, or else you and I are
losing our grip.”
“Well, something a little out of the ordinary may happen, I suppose,”
grinned Blake, and the grin did not hide a certain steely glint in his
eyes. “I think we’ll be a lot better off, though, than if we had been
sent to a regular prison camp, anyway.”
The truck bumped and jolted along hour after hour, but stopped about
noon time, and each of the prisoners was given a chunk of coarse black
bread, and some water from a bottle carried by one of the guards.
“If they feed us this way all the time, we’ll have to make a get-away
pretty quick, or we won’t have strength enough left to do anything,”
whispered Joe to Blake. “This grub reminds me of the good old U. S.
Army chow, it’s so different.”
The truck resumed its tedious journey, and finally, just before dark,
deposited its load of weary prisoners in front of a large farmhouse.
They were taken to the kitchen, where, for the first time since the
boys had been on German territory, they ate a satisfying meal. A stolid
German farmer and his family watched the prisoners while they ate, and
exchanged guttural comments among themselves. All the time the boys
were estimating their chances of escape, but there were always two
heavily-armed guards in the room, and they had little doubt that there
were many more in the immediate neighborhood. However, they did not
despair, and resolved to keep keenly on the alert for any opportunity
that might offer.
That night the prisoners were quartered in the loft of a big barn, and
the next morning were set to work on the farm. It went sadly against
the grain, but the two friends knew that their only chance of escape
lay in doing what they were told for the present, and being ready for
any chance of escape when it might come along.
For three days they went through the monotonous routine, with nothing
to distinguish one day from another. But on the evening of the fourth
day, when they were on their way to the farmhouse for supper, they saw
an automobile stop in front of it, from which three German officers
emerged. The boys were near enough to get a good view of their faces,
and the countenance of one seemed familiar to both of them.
“I’ve seen that man before!” exclaimed Joe. “Do you recognize him,
Blake?”
“Yes, I’ve seen him somewhere recently,” said Blake. “Let’s see--why,
that’s the Boche that shoved a gun in our faces when our aeroplane
landed, and got our films!” said Blake, with suppressed excitement.
“Right you are,” replied Joe excitedly. “I wonder if, by any earthly
chance, he has still got the films?”
“That’s hard to say,” returned Blake. “But he had a big handbag with
him, and there’s just a chance that he might have them. I don’t just
see where it’s going to help us much if he has, though.”
“Well, if we could get hold of them, we could destroy them, even if we
couldn’t get back with them,” said Joe. “Anyway, it’s up to us to find
out some way if he’s got them with him.”
“One of the guards can speak a little English,” said Blake. “I was
kidding him along yesterday, and he got so he could talk to me without
looking as though he intended to run his bayonet through me the next
second. Maybe I can get a little information out of him.”
“Go to it, old fellow,” said Joe, “see if you can’t pump him while
we’re eating dinner.”
“I’ll try,” promised Blake; and the two entered the kitchen together.
CHAPTER XXII
THE STRUGGLE IN THE CAPTAIN’S ROOM
Blake took the first opportunity of questioning the German soldier
with whom he had struck up an acquaintance, and learned, to his great
delight, that the German officer, Captain Petz, did indeed have with
him several small, round boxes, which Blake had little doubt contained
the films, although on this point the soldier could tell him little.
Moreover, Blake was afraid to question him too closely, for fear of
arousing his suspicions. But he had learned enough to satisfy him. He
related jubilantly to Joe all that he had learned.
“And now,” he concluded, “if we can only make a get-away with those
films, our being captured will turn out to have been a blessing in
disguise.”
“Right you are,” agreed Joe enthusiastically. “But I wonder how our
sentry friend knew that this Captain Petz had the films?”
“Oh, it seems he had heard the noble captain boasting about it to some
of his friends, and also making the statement that ‘the Yankee pigs
will never get them now.’ So it looks to me as though it were up to us
to give the distinguished captain the jolt of his young life.”
“Wonder how long he is going to be here?” speculated Joe. “We’ll have
to act quickly, or he’ll be gone, and the films with him.”
“That’s exactly the point,” said Blake. “He is going to-morrow some
time, and expects to take the films with him and turn them in at
headquarters.”
“Great Scott!” ejaculated Joe, “that doesn’t leave us much time, does
it?”
“That’s the worst of it,” admitted Blake, with an anxious frown. “It’s
all very well for us to talk about getting away, and taking the films
with us. But the big question is: how are we going to do it? My mind
seems entirely empty of useful ideas. See if you can suggest anything.”
“The only thing I can think of to do,” said Joe slowly, “is to wait
until after dark to-night, and then see if we can’t get past the guards
and into the house. Once in, we’ll have to locate the captain’s room,
and get hold of the films, and then take our chance of getting past the
guards around the farm. I know it sounds pretty desperate, but I don’t
see what else we can do.”
“Desperate is the word, all right,” said Blake, with a wry grin, “but
if we’re ever to get away from this place, we’ve got to take big
chances, and we might as well do it to-night as some other time, I
suppose.”
In preparation for escape, the moving picture boys had already laid by
a secret supply of food, and Blake had managed to secure a rough map of
the surrounding country, so they were not entirely without resources.
They planned to elude the sentries if possible, but, in the event of
being challenged, to attack and overpower the man before he could give
the alarm. After much discussion, they decided to make their attempt as
soon as the inmates of the house had retired for the night, which was
usually between ten and eleven o’clock.
By the time they had reached this conclusion, the boys were keyed up
to a pitch of excitement that boded ill for those who might attempt to
stand between them and liberty. They were resolved to get back to their
own people, and, if possible, take the precious films with them.
After supper had been eaten, they were marched back to the barn where
they were quartered. Of course, neither one thought of going to sleep.
They were both keenly on the alert, and were impatient for the fateful
time to come. The intervening hours dragged by interminably, but at
last they heard the clocks strike ten, and knew that the time for their
attempt was close at hand. They waited for what they judged was a
half hour more, and then, at a whisper from Blake, slipped softly from
their rough beds. There was always a sentry posted at the door, but
the boys had no intention of going out by such an obvious route. They
had discovered a small skylight in the roof of the barn, and they now
climbed noiselessly up the ladder leading to the upper story of the
structure.
Everywhere was pitch blackness, but they had studied their ground well
and had little difficulty in finding their way now. They soon found
themselves at the skylight, which showed a lighter blur against the
black expanse of the barn roof. The skylight was only fastened by a
hook, it apparently never having occurred to their captors that the
prisoners might avail themselves of this route of escape.
But at any rate, the two Americans soon found themselves outside,
clinging precariously to the steeply sloping roof. They hung on with
toes and fingers, and slowly worked their way down to the edge. From
there it was a drop of almost twenty feet to the ground, but the boys
knew they were in a desperate situation, and were not in a mood to
hesitate at anything. Blake dropped first, and Joe was afraid that the
dull thud of his landing would alarm the sentry. But fortunately it did
not, and soon Joe, breathless and somewhat shaken, was standing safely
beside his friend.
“So far, so good,” whispered Blake, “and now for the house.”
The boys were just on the point of starting for the farmhouse, when a
sudden tumult in the building caused them to start back. Lights blazed
up at several of the windows, and the boys could faintly hear the hum
of voices.
“What in the world do you suppose is the matter now?” whispered Joe.
“I haven’t the least idea,” responded Blake. “But about all we can do
is lie low and see what happens.”
The two friends crouched down in the deep shadow cast by the barn,
and before long, through the silent night air, heard the sound of an
automobile approaching at high speed.
“We’ve got to find out what’s happening, that’s all there is to it,”
muttered Blake. “Let’s creep around to the front of the house, Joe, and
see what we can find out. If we keep close in the shadows, I think we
can make it without being seen.”
With hearts beating with suppressed excitement, the boys stole past the
sheltering side of the barn, and crept cautiously toward the house.
They knew that detection would mean certain death, and advanced as
cautiously and with as little noise as two cats. They escaped detection
while crossing the space between the house and the barn, and soon had
worked themselves around to the front of the farmhouse. They arrived
there just in time to see a big automobile draw up in front, and a man,
carrying a small handbag, and evidently a doctor, descend from it.
“That’s what all the excitement’s about,” whispered Blake to Joe,
“there’s somebody sick in the house, and that doctor has just answered
a hurry-up call.”
“Looks that way,” admitted Joe. “But whatever it is, it looks as though
it had put a crimp in our schemes. How are we going to do anything when
everybody is up and about?”
“On the contrary,” said Blake, who had been doing some rapid thinking,
“it may be a help instead of a hindrance. Everybody will be so excited
over this that we may be able to get what we’re after in the general
confusion, and then make our escape.”
“Possibly,” whispered Joe doubtfully. “How shall we go about it?”
“Come with me,” said Blake briefly.
He had noticed that when the doctor had been admitted to the house, the
servant had forgotten to close the front door, which now stood slightly
ajar. The front porch of the house was thickly covered with interlacing
vines, and thrusting these aside, the boys climbed over the railing and
found themselves for the moment well screened from observation. Without
any further hesitation, they made for the door, Blake slightly in the
lead. They had now gone too far to draw back, and Blake boldly slipped
inside, followed closely by Joe.
The boys found themselves in a dimly lighted hall, and as a first
precaution Blake blew out the lamp that furnished the light. Standing
in the darkness, and hardly daring to breathe, the boys could hear
muffled voices overhead, and guessed that they proceeded from the room
where the sick person lay. They had only a rough idea of where Captain
Petz’ room was, gleaned by Blake from the friendly sentry.
They knew, however, that it was on the upper floor, and so began to
mount the stairs, pausing to listen at every step. Once or twice loose
boards creaked alarmingly, but, as Blake had said, the household was so
upset that their chances of success were greater than if it had been
plunged in slumber.
It did not take the youths long to reach the head of the stairs, but
there they paused. At the head was an old-fashioned, marble-topped
table, and on this table stood a small bottle marked in German
“_Chloroform_.”
“No telling when that might come in handy,” thought Blake, and slipped
the bottle into his pocket.
The boys now saw that the sick room was the first one that opened into
the hallway, which ran almost the entire length of the upper story. If
Blake’s information was correct, the captain’s room lay at the other
end of the hall, which meant that the boys would have to pass the sick
room, the door of which was partly open, allowing a broad beam of light
to escape. The boys thus saw that they would have to pass this luminous
path to reach the captain’s room, but, as there was nothing else to be
done unless they gave up their venture altogether, they walked quickly
but quietly past the open door.
They had hardly reached the comparative obscurity beyond, when someone,
apparently a servant, rushed out, but fortunately, turned away from
the boys, and hurried to the little table. After a hurried search,
he muttered a German imprecation, and the boys knew that he must be
looking for the bottle of chloroform. They also knew, that when he did
not find it, he would in all probability return to the sick room, and
in doing so would be almost certain to see them.
“Quick, into the captain’s room!” whispered Blake.
Of course, neither of the boys knew but that the captain and possibly
some of his friends, too, might be in the room, but Blake had swiftly
weighed the chances, and had decided to risk an encounter with the
German officer, rather than almost certain detection if he and his
friend remained in the hallway. Accordingly, he turned the knob, and
pushed the door, which by good fortune proved to be unlocked, inward.
The two boys slipped in, and quickly closed and locked the door behind
them.
But now the good fortune that had seemed to accompany them so far,
appeared to have deserted them. For at a large mirror stood the German
captain, Petz, and as he heard the soft closing of the door, he whirled
with a startled exclamation. Both boys realized that they must act
quickly, or in another moment all would be lost. Quick as an attacking
tiger, Blake was across the room, and before the German could gather
his wits together sufficiently to cry out and give the alarm, he found
his throat caught in a grasp of steel. He attempted to struggle, but
quick as a flash Joe had pinioned his arms.
For a brief space the three swayed back and forth, for the German was
a large and powerful man, and if he had not been taken so entirely
by surprise, could have offered a formidable resistance. With those
merciless fingers at his throat, however, his strength ebbed quickly
away, and suddenly he grew limp, and slumped to the floor.
“Tie him up and gag him,” panted Blake. “I suppose we ought to kill
him, but I can’t do for a man in cold blood. We can rip up a couple of
sheets and make them do to tie him up.”
This was no sooner said than done, and when consciousness began to
return to Petz, he found himself securely bound and gagged.
Meanwhile, the boys had started a thorough search of the room, hoping
to find their stolen films. But, although they hunted high and low,
they could find no trace of them.
“Worst luck ever!” murmured Joe.
“Guess we’ll have to question this Boche,” said Blake, “and if he won’t
talk, we’ll see if we can’t persuade him with his own revolver, which I
see lying on the bureau.”
The pinioned officer had been following them with his eyes, and his
face was contorted into an expression of sneering disdain. Seeing this,
Blake’s eyes hardened, and he strode quickly to the dresser and, having
secured the heavy weapon, bent over the German.
“There’s paper and a fountain pen on that desk yonder,” said Blake to
Joe. “Write on it that we want to know where the films are, and that if
he doesn’t tell us mighty quick there will be a quick end to the career
of Captain Petz, of the Imperial Army.”
Joe hastily scribbled this message on a sheet of paper, and held it
where the German could read it. At the same time, Blake pressed the
cold muzzle of the revolver against Petz’ head.
But the German, who was not without a certain brute courage, only
looked at his captors with sneering malicious eyes.
“Untie one of his hands, Joe,” directed Blake, “so that he can write an
answer.”
Joe did so, and the officer took the pen that was offered him, and
in angular German script, wrote: “The films that you want have been
removed to a safe place, and I will not tell you where. You can kill me
if you like, but that will not give you your pictures.”
“The worst of it is, he knows we won’t kill him, being Americans and
not Huns,” said Blake. “If the conditions were reversed he’d wipe us
out without compunction, and he no doubt thinks we’re weak for not
finishing him off, but he knows he can count on it just the same.”
Blake had hardly finished speaking, when there came an imperative rap
on the door, and a voice said in German:
“Herr Captain, let me in! I have something to tell you of the utmost
importance.”
The speaker rattled the door impatiently, and the startled boys looked
at each other, each with the same question in his eyes. What was to be
done now?
“What is the matter?” the voice outside asked, a note of anxiety and
suspicion replacing that of impatience. “Is anything wrong? Speak
quickly, or I shall break the door down. Hans! Otto!” calling to two
of the servants, “come here, immediately.”
“We’ve got to get out of this!” whispered Blake, “and the only way is
out the window. Come along, Joe, but don’t make any noise.”
The two moving picture boys stepped swiftly to the windows, which gave
on the roof of the porch. Noiselessly they opened one sash, and in less
time than it takes to tell, were out on the sloping roof.
“Over we go, Joe,” said Blake, in a tense whisper. “It isn’t much of a
drop, and we haven’t any choice, anyhow.”
The two boys dropped almost at the same moment, landing noiselessly in
a soft flower bed. From the room that they had just quitted they could
hear the sound of blows, and knew that the threat to break down the
door was being carried into execution.
The boys picked themselves up, and ran swiftly but silently for the
road. The chance of getting the films back was gone, but the two
Americans still hoped to make good their escape.
CHAPTER XXIII
A PERILOUS SITUATION
The two moving picture boys had reached the gate, when suddenly from
behind the doctor’s automobile walked the sentry whose duty it was to
patrol part of the boundary line of the farm. Taken by surprise, the
man gaped open-mouthed for a second or two, but then swung his rifle to
his shoulder. In another second he would have fired, but that second
was not vouchsafed him. Blake still had the revolver that had formerly
belonged to Captain Petz, and, quick as a flash, he fired at the
sentry. The latter crumpled up without a sound, but the report, ringing
out on the quiet night, set all the guards on the farm into life. The
boys heard the notes of a bugle from the guardhouse, and knew that soon
an armed force would be at their heels.
“Here’s where we’ve got to do some awful sprinting!” panted Joe.
“They’ll be after us hot and heavy now! Guess our only chance is to get
to the woods and hide there until they quit looking for us.”
Blake nodded his head, for by this time the boys needed all their wind
for running. They had noted, when planning their escape, that a thick
stretch of woodland began about half a mile from the farm, and it was
toward this that they were heading. Glancing behind, Blake saw several
tiny lights bobbing down the road, and he knew that these were electric
flashlights in the hands of the German guards.
Suddenly an idea came to him, and he panted: “Over to one side of the
road, Joe, they’ll be firing pretty soon.”
“That’s so,” panted Joe.
They both crowded close to the ditch, and none too soon, for only a few
seconds later there came a fusillade from their pursuers, and the boys
could hear the whine of the steel-nosed bullets down the center of the
road. But by now they were close to the friendly shelter of the woods,
and in a short time reached the first trees. They veered off the road,
and crashed through the sparse underbrush. They penetrated the woods
for a short distance, and then stopped for a much-needed rest. On the
still night air came the shouts and cries of their pursuers, and then
they heard the sound of the motor car speeding along the road.
“Guess we got off just in time!” gasped Blake. “If they’d thought to
use that car in the first place, they could have had us long before we
could have gotten to these trees.”
“Yes, but who expects a Hun to do anything that’s intelligent?” asked
Joe, and Blake had no answer for him.
The possibility of capture was still imminent, as the boys knew that
the patch of woodland was not extensive, and that a strict search
would be inaugurated. The pursuit swept by, but had not gone far,
when the boys heard it returning. The Germans knew that the Americans
could not have gone far without being overtaken by the automobile, so
they returned and then entered the woods, beating the brush in every
direction. The boys heard them coming closer, and started to penetrate
deeper into the woods. They were going down a small hill, when suddenly
Joe slipped and fell, but was on his feet almost immediately.
“That’s funny,” he muttered, “seemed as though I stepped into a big
hole, and I just saved myself by twisting to one side.”
“Well, never mind, as long as you’re not hurt,” said Blake,
impatiently. “Let’s go.”
“Wait a minute, Blake,” said Joe excitedly, “there’s some kind of an
opening through these bushes. I’m going to investigate.”
Pressing through a thick clump of bushes, he suddenly seemed to
disappear into the earth. A moment later Blake heard his voice,
however, and then Joe reappeared in the land of the living.
“There’s a cave-in here,” he excitedly informed his friend, “and it’s
so well hidden by bushes that unless one of the Germans just happened
on it by accident, the way I did, we could hide out and they never
would find us. Come on in.”
“Good for you, old timer!” exclaimed Blake. “We’re playing in luck this
time, I guess, because there seem to be an awful lot of people in these
woods who are out after our scalps. In we go.”
He followed Joe through the dense clump of bushes, and the two boys
found themselves in as snug a hiding place as heart could wish. And
it was none too soon, for the shouts and cries of their pursuers were
drawing steadily nearer, and they could tell from the direction of the
sounds that the Germans had formed a circle and were closing in on
them. The sounds came steadily nearer, and soon, through the bushes,
the boys could see the gleams of the little electric torches carried
by the Boches, and hear them crying out earnestly in German. They were
proceeding very systematically, and the boys knew that had it not been
for Joe’s lucky discovery, they must have been captured.
The Germans were mightily puzzled at not finding their escaped
prisoners, and the in-closing circle met almost at the entrance to the
boys’ place of refuge. They had picked up enough German to understand
something of what was being said, and in spite of their peril could not
help being amused at the chagrin of the enemy.
“It is even as they say,” growled one, “these Americans are more
cunning than Satan himself. You can never tell what they may be able to
do.”
“I think the old Nick himself must have come to their assistance
to-night,” said another. “He must have flown away with them, or we
should surely have found them before this.”
“Never mind talking so much,” growled a sergeant; “we know they must
be in these woods somewhere. But we will not hunt any more to-night.
We’ll wait until daylight comes to our assistance. Meantime, I will
post guards all about this woodland, and to-morrow we shall surely find
them. Then we will shoot the Yankees like the dogs they are.”
“Maybe two could play at that game,” whispered Blake to Joe. “I could
pot him so easily right now with this automatic that it would be a
shame to take the money. He may not find us as easily as he thinks.
And, anyway,” he added, “the man that _does_ find us, if anyone does,
will be totally and entirely out of luck, I hope to tell you.”
The sergeant mustered his men, and soon took them off to the edge of
the woods, where he stationed them at regular intervals, with orders
to let no one pass. The boys, meanwhile, when they felt sure that their
pursuers had gone, at least for the present, settled down calmly to
await the coming of the morning.
As it grew lighter, enough daylight straggled in through the bushes to
enable them to see what manner of place it was that had so opportunely
come to their rescue. They found that the cave was only a small one,
barely giving them room to move about, but they were not inclined to
quarrel with its scanty dimensions.
They ate a small quantity of the food they had brought with them, and
had barely finished, when once more they heard the German soldiers
beating through the woods. But the Huns had no better success in the
daylight than they had had in the dark, and once more went away baffled.
The boys had enough food to last them several days, with the strictest
economy, but, as it turned out, they were not to need all of it. They
lay close in their cave all that day, taking turns at sleeping while
the other remained on guard. Toward evening, Blake, who was acting as
sentry at the time, heard the sound of a horse and wagon approaching.
Not more than twenty feet from the entrance to the cave ran a rough
wagon road, and it was along this that the vehicle was coming. Blake
was instantly on the alert, as he was eager to grasp at any chance of
escape that might present itself.
The wagon drew closer, and in his anxiety to get a better view, Blake
ventured to part the bushes a trifle. In a short time the wagon came
in sight. Blake then saw that it contained two men, and, as it drew
nearer, he recognized one of them. Both were dressed in the military
gray of the German Army, and the taller of the two men, who was
driving, was none other than Captain Petz, of the Imperial German Army!
CHAPTER XXIV
PUTTING IT OVER
For a moment, Blake’s heart almost stood still as a wild plan formed
itself like lightning in his brain.
There could be no doubt about the identification. It was getting
dusk, but there was still light enough to make out the man’s features
distinctly. Those features had been indelibly engraved on his memory
during the fierce struggle in the captain’s room. It was he beyond a
question.
The other man wore the uniform of a lieutenant and was slighter in
form than his colleague. He did not look as though he would be hard to
master if it came to a tussle. But the captain himself, as Blake had
learned from experience, would be hard to handle.
Blake’s first impulse was to draw the heavy revolver that he had taken
from the bureau in the captain’s room. But he dismissed this even as
he was reaching for the weapon. There were too many Germans around for
that.
His hand touched the vial of chloroform that he had in his pocket.
Instantly he beckoned to Joe.
Like a flash, his comrade was at his side.
“It’s Petz, Joe,” Blake whispered. “Follow me, but don’t make a noise.
I’ll tell you my plan as we go along. But we mustn’t let that wagon get
beyond reach.”
Like two shadows they slipped along through the woods that bordered the
road. The wagon was not moving fast, for the road was rough and cut up
with artillery fire from one of the battles that had been waged there
some time before.
It was growing darker now with every minute, and this was in the boys’
favor, as they did not have to stay so far in the woods but could run
along on the edge of it where the going was easier.
As they sped along, Blake explained in hurried whispers the plan he had
formed.
“It’s a desperate chance, I know,” he admitted, “but it’s our only
one. If we can get their uniforms we may be able to slip through their
lines. We’ll have to risk it. If the worst comes to the worst, I’ve got
the revolver. But I don’t want to use that except as a last resort.”
“All right,” said Joe, and then as breath was precious he said no more.
A few rods further on the vehicle stopped. There was a guttural
exchange of words between the two Germans. Evidently something was the
matter with the harness, for the captain’s comrade climbed down and
busied himself for a moment adjusting something near the horse’s head.
The boys crept closer until they were not more than twenty feet away.
It was pitch dark now, and the shadow of the woods was no longer
necessary for concealment.
The lieutenant climbed in again and settled himself in his seat. The
captain gathered up the reins and the horse started.
“Now,” whispered Blake.
A slight run carried them to the back of the wagon, which had just
begun to move. They caught hold of the tailboard and lightly swung
themselves up.
The captain and lieutenant had begun an animated conversation.
Blake drew the vial of chloroform from his pocket and saturated his
handkerchief. Then he passed the vial to Joe, who did the same to his.
Stealthily as cats they moved up to the front of the wagon. Then
their right arms shot out. Blake had selected the captain while the
lieutenant was left to Joe.
With their right arms they encircled the necks of the Germans and with
their left they pressed the saturated handkerchiefs against their faces.
For an instant the Germans were paralyzed by the suddenness of the
attack. Then there was a fierce reaction and they struggled desperately
to rise from their seats and turn upon their foes. But the arms of the
boys were like steel and never relaxed an inch while the stupefying
drug quickly got in its deadly work. A minute longer and the Germans
fell back limp and unconscious in the boys’ arms.
The boys laid the Huns down on the floor of the wagon and then Blake
devoted himself to quieting the horse that had been alarmed by the
commotion and was threatening to bolt. He soon had the animal under
control and then turned to Joe.
“We put that over all right, eh?” he said with exultation in his voice.
“Worked like a charm,” replied Joe. “I tell you what, Blake, there’s
no discount on that gray matter of yours. And now that we’ve got these
fellows where we want them, what comes next?”
“The first thing we have to do is to get off this road,” answered
Blake. “It seems to be a pretty lonely one, but some one may come
along any minute. I’m going to drive the horse a little way into the
woods and tie him there. It won’t do to turn him loose, for it will
be thought that some accident has happened and they’ll have searching
parties on the hunt. You keep your eyes on these fellows while I’m
driving and if you see any signs of their coming back from the land of
dreams give them another dose of the chloroform. There’s plenty left in
the bottle.”
Blake took the reins, and, driving very slowly, gradually worked his
way into the woods until he was some distance from the road. Here he
climbed down, tied the horse, and as a precaution against his neighing
fastened a strap lightly about his jaws.
Then they let down the tailboard of the wagon, lifted the captain and
lieutenant to the ground, and with feverish haste began to strip them
of their uniforms.
CHAPTER XXV
THE LOST FILMS--CONCLUSION
It was not the easiest thing in the world to handle and turn over the
heavy bodies of the Germans as they took off their clothes, and the
dense darkness added to the difficulty, but it was accomplished at last.
The boys handled the garments with distaste. They had learned to
associate their wearers with the countless atrocities that the Germans
had committed and it went against the grain to put on those hated
uniforms.
“It sure comes hard to put on these things,” growled Joe, as he
struggled into the lieutenant’s uniform which proved a tight fit.
“I know just how you feel,” said Blake. “But this is a matter of life
or death and we can’t be squeamish. Hustle now, for every minute is
worth gold.”
Their prisoners, under the rough handling that they had undergone,
began to show signs of returning consciousness and moaned and moved
about restlessly.
“A little more of that chloroform,” counseled Blake. “We can’t afford
to let them wake up yet. Just let’s get these uniforms buttoned up and
then we’ll tie their hands and feet and gag them. Then it won’t matter
how soon they wake up, if we make a good job of it.”
“We’re letting them off easy at that,” said Joe. “I know mighty well
what the Germans would do to us if they had us in the same fix. A
couple of bullets from that automatic and it would be all over with us.
They go on the principle that a dead man tells no tales.”
“That’s not only their principle but their practice,” replied Blake.
“But it isn’t in the American blood to kill an unarmed and helpless
man. I sure would like, though, to take these fellows in as prisoners.
We might be able then to get out of them what they have done with our
films.”
“Nothing doing,” said Joe. “We’ll have all we can do to get back
ourselves, let alone lugging these Heinies along as captives. And as
for their telling us anything about the films, get that out of your
mind. You know how stubborn Petz was, even when we held the revolver to
his head. I’m afraid we’ll never see those films again.”
By this time they were fully dressed and they set about securing their
prisoners. They tied their hands and feet so securely that they felt
sure they could not get free from the bonds.
“A magician would find his work cut out for him to wriggle out of these
knots,” remarked Joe with satisfaction, when they had finished. “And
now for the gags.”
“We’d better leave that till the last minute,” said Blake with some
hesitation. “They’re finding it hard to breathe now and I don’t want to
choke them to death. But we’ll make the gags and have them ready. In
the meantime, we’ll hunt through this wagon and see if we can rustle
some grub. We’re likely enough to need some before we get back to our
lines. And hand me that rug there under the seat. I’ll throw it over
these fellows to make up for their lack of clothes.”
Joe climbed into the wagon and pulled out the rug which he threw out to
his comrade. Then he felt around under the seats.
“Any grub?” questioned Blake.
“Don’t know yet,” replied Joe. “There seem to be some boxes here----
Jumping Jehoshaphat!” he cried, his voice rising to a shout. “It’s the
films, Blake! The films!”
“What?” cried Blake, his voice trembling with excitement.
“It’s the films!” repeated Joe in a slightly lower tone, caution
coming to his aid to restrain his jubilation. “I can tell by the feel
of the boxes, the weight, the size, everything! We’ve got them, Blake,
we’ve got them! Jump in and handle them yourself.”
Blake Stewart was at his chum’s side in an instant, and his sense of
touch told him at once that Joe was right.
“Both lots of them!” he exulted. “Those of the battle and those taken
from the airplane! Petz had them both! Say, he must be the one that
specially handles those things and everything that is captured goes to
him. Say, Joe, old boy, maybe we aren’t in luck!”
The two boys fairly hugged each other in their delight.
“But don’t let’s forget our prisoners!” suddenly exclaimed Blake, when
their first excitement had spent itself.
They jumped down, and they found that they were none too soon, for
Captain Petz had come from under the influence of the drug and was
trying to rise to his feet. His companion, too, the lieutenant, was
evidently awakening. There was need for quick action.
The boys easily forced the Germans down again, and adjusted the gags so
that they could not make a sound. Then they got the precious films and
were starting to leave the woods when a sudden uproar arose not far
down the road. There was the sharp crack of rifles and the rattle of
machine guns. Then, after a while, the noise seemed to come nearer and
nearer.
“They’re fighting!” cried Blake. “We must be a good deal closer to the
battle lines than ever we thought.”
“It’s a night attack!” fairly shouted Joe. “And our boys are driving
the Huns back, for the noise is coming closer! Hurry, Blake, hurry!
Let’s get close to them and we’ll be able to slip across and join our
boys.”
Blake complied. But they had not gone far before they met a company of
Germans coming back over the road in retreat, while behind them came
with a rush part of an American regiment, and in the flashes from the
rifles the boys saw the glorious uniforms that they loved.
With a welcoming shout the moving picture boys rushed toward them,
forgetting for a moment the clothing that they wore. But they were
quickly brought up standing, when one of the Americans leveled a rifle
at them and cried to them to surrender.
Up went their hands.
“_Kamerad!_” they shouted.
“Lucky you said that quick,” growled the soldier, and he motioned to
Blake Stewart and Joe Duncan to walk before him.
Just at that moment, a star shell arose and in its radiance the moving
picture boys recognized Tom Wentworth.
“Hello Tom!” said Blake, restraining his impulse to laugh.
Tom Wentworth’s face was the very picture of amazement.
“The movie boys!” he exclaimed joyously. “We all thought you were
killed or in a German prison. And here I was nearly putting a brace of
bullets in you. But how did you manage to get those uniforms?”
In a few words Blake, with many interruptions by Joe, explained the
situation.
“Well, maybe everyone won’t be glad to see you,” said Wentworth.
“They’ll fairly wring your hands off. That pal of yours has been
grieving himself to death. And here I was patting myself on the back,
thinking I had captured two German officers all by my lonesome,” he
added, with a happy grin. “But I’m gladder to have you fellows back
than I would be to capture and march into headquarters the whole German
army.”
“Well, you can have your officers all the same, though there won’t
be much glory in it,” laughed Blake, as he gave Wentworth directions
for finding the Germans in the woods, where he and Joe had left them
gagged and bound.
The attack had been on a limited scale, but had resulted in a brilliant
success, and many more prisoners than Captain Petz and his comrade were
taken back by the victorious American troops.
Wentworth had not exaggerated the welcome waiting for the boys.
Macaroni went almost crazy with delight. Mr. Hadley and the men of the
picture company mauled and pounded them until they were sore, and the
girls cried with relief and pleasure. Even C. C., for once, was all
smiles, though he could not forbear remarking that influenza was raging
in the German army and that he thought the boys would get it from the
uniforms they were wearing.
Their commander, too, was more than cordial, and everywhere they went
they met with congratulations from the soldier boys, with whom they
were great favorites.
And to their great delight, the films, which they had feared might
have been light-struck or had sustained some other damage in their
wanderings, proved to be in perfect condition and developed wonderfully.
The moving picture boys were dead tired but unspeakably happy when at
last they were in their old familiar quarters and prepared to retire
for the night. “I guess we can call it a day,” remarked Joe. “Glad to,”
responded Blake.
And now the World War is a thing of the past and many of those who were
Uncle Sam’s bitterest enemies are his warmest friends.
The Movie Boys were glad to do their duty even under fire, but they
were likewise glad when the time came to go home. And how glad they
were to see their native land again and meet a host of old friends!
And among those friends were three boys new to these pages, Frank
Durham, Randy Powell and Pep Smith. These three were in the movie
game also, but in a different way. They were running a motion picture
theatre, and what stirring times they had doing this will be told in
another volume, called “The Movie Boys’ First Showhouse”; or “Fighting
for a Foothold in Fairlands.”
And now, for the time being, let us take leave of Joe and Blake,
wishing them well.
THE END
The Movie Boys Series
_By_ VICTOR APPLETON
THE MOVIE BOYS ON CALL,
or Filming the Perils of A Great City. _Published January 2, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS IN THE WILD WEST,
or Stirring Days Among the Cowboys and Indians.
_Published January 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS AND THE WRECKERS,
or Facing the Perils of the Deep. _Published February 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS IN THE JUNGLE,
or Lively Times Among the Wild Beasts. _Published March 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS IN EARTHQUAKE LAND,
or Filming Pictures and Strange Perils. _Published April 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS AND THE FLOOD,
or Perilous Days on the Mighty Mississippi. _Published May 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS IN PERIL,
or Strenuous Days Along the Panama Canal. _Published June 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS UNDER THE SEA,
or The Treasure of the Lost Ship. _Published July 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS UNDER FIRE,
or The Search for the Stolen Film. _Published August 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS UNDER UNCLE SAM,
or Taking Pictures for the Army. _Published September 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS’ FIRST SHOWHOUSE,
or Fighting for a Foothold in Fairlands. _Published October 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS AT SEASIDE PARK,
or The Rival Photo Houses of the Boardwalk.
_Published November 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS ON BROADWAY,
or The Mystery of the Missing Cash Box. _Published December 28, 1926_
THE MOVIE BOYS’ OUTDOOR EXHIBITION,
or the Film that Solved the Mystery. _Published January 28, 1927_
THE MOVIE BOYS’ NEW IDEA,
or Getting the Best of Their Enemies. _Published February 28, 1927_
THE MOVIE BOYS AT THE BIG FAIR,
or The Greatest Film Ever Exhibited. _Published March 28, 1927_
THE MOVIE BOYS’ WAR SPECTACLE,
or The Film that Won the Prize. _Published April 28, 1927_
Garden City Publishing Co., _Inc._
Garden City New York
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.
The original text did not contain a Table of Contents; one has been
created by the transcriber for this eBook.
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