CHAPTER EIGHT

_Escape!_

Somewhere in the distance a church clock tolled the hour of ten. Dave absently counted the strokes, and then slowly sat up on the army cot. All was pitch dark inside as well as outside. For a couple of minutes he sat perfectly still listening to the various sounds that came to him faintly. He heard the guard outside in the hallway cough and then strike a match. He heard the muffled sounds of hobnailed boots marching along in the street outside, and the clanking sound of tank and scout car tractor treads on the stones. Somewhere in the distance a whistle was blown. He heard the occasional dull boom of heavy guns, or of bombs exploding. And once a flight of planes droned by high up in the night sky.

He held his breath and listened to all those various sounds. He listened to another sound, too, A sound he could feel as well as hear. It was the pounding of his own heart. His chest ached from the pounding, and his throat and mouth were bone dry from the excitement and the suspense. For almost five hours he and Freddy had remained stretched out motionless on the cots. Every second had seemed like a minute, every minute like an hour, and every hour like an eternity. A hundred times it had been all he could do to restrain himself from leaping to his feet and shouting at the top of his voice. Anything to give release to the charged emotion pent up within him.

Four times the guard had opened the door and played the beam of his flashlight on them. The first time Colonel Stohl had been with the guard, for Dave had heard the German officer's voice. He had muttered something about "making them sing a different tune in the morning," and then had gone clumping down the stairs.

Five long hours, and now Dave couldn't stand the waiting any more. Every fiber of his entire being screamed for action. He had waited long enough to make their captors believe they were done in for the night. The guard had taken another look at them only a couple of minutes ago. It would be awhile before he looked in again. It was now, or never. It had to be!

He slipped silently off the cot and crept over to Freddy's cot. He held one hand ready to clap it over the English boy's mouth in case he woke up with a startled yell, and put his lips close to Freddy's ear.

"Freddy, wake up!" he breathed, and shook the youth gently with his other hand.

"I'm awake, Dave," came the whispered reply. "Shall we try it now?"

"Yes," Dave said. "The guard just took another look at us. He won't again for awhile. Have you been asleep?"

"Not a wink, Dave. I couldn't, possibly. Look, Dave. You don't want to change your mind and have a go at it alone? I'll understand. You might get to an American Consul before they caught you. They'll come looking, you know."

"That's out!" Dave hissed. "Pipe down! Take off your shoes. We can't risk making a single sound. That guard may have big ears. Okay, Freddy, let's go!"

Taking hold of the English youth's hand Dave led the way across the room to the window. There he let go, and took out his spoon screw driver and went to work on the one remaining screw. The instant it was out he started to pry out the frame with his fingers. It wouldn't budge. He sucked air into his aching lungs and then worked the end of the spoon into the side crack and used it as a lever. The window still didn't move, and Dave's heart sank as he felt the spoon bending under his hand. He groaned softly.

"The darn thing's stuck!" he whispered. "Swollen tight by the weather, I guess. But.... Gee!"

"What's the matter, Dave?" Freddy asked in a tight whisper.

Dave fumbled for his arm in the darkness and pressed it reassuringly.

"There's a nail, here at the bottom," he said. "I didn't see it, but I can feel it, now. Am I dumb! Hold everything while I bend it down flat. It's a thin one. Then I think the window will slide over it."

Two long minutes later Dave had the nail pressed flat on the base board of the sill. Then he applied pressure with the spoon again, and the window began to move. His face was wet with nervous sweat, and his whole body was trembling. He fought back his rising fear and nervousness and stuck doggedly to his task. Eventually he had worked the window out enough so that he could get his fingers under one corner. After that it was simple. But, as he finally pulled the whole frame clear a corner of it caught on a splintered sliver of the sill. The sliver snapped off with a sound that was as loud as a pistol shot in Dave's ears. He froze stiff, ears straining for sounds of the guard in the hallway.

There was no click of the bolt or rattling of the latch. The sliver of wood snapping had not been heard. Dave slowly released the cramped air from his lungs and gently lowered the window frame down onto the floor and to the side where they would be sure not to hit it when they climbed out the window. Then he took hold of Freddy in the dark.

"You first, because you're shorter, Freddy," he whispered. "I'll make a fireman's step with my hands. Put your foot in it and I'll boost you up. But for Pete's sake, be careful. If we make any sound we're sunk. Okay, give me your foot."

Dave crouched slightly and laced the fingers of his two hands together with the palms facing upward to form a step. Freddy put one stockinged foot on it, and one hand on Dave's shoulder to steady himself.

"Okay," he whispered.

Bracing his feet Dave slowly boosted the English youth up the wall. As soon as Freddy had half his body through the open window he released the pressure of his foot on Dave's locked hands and squirmed the rest of the way up like a snake.

"Get your feet out and then let yourself down by your hands," Dave cautioned. "The roof shouldn't be more than a few inches under your toes. But, watch out. The darn thing slants down a bit, you know."

"I'll make it, all right," Freddy said and twisted around on the sill so that he was hanging on his stomach. "Can you make it alone, though?"

"A cinch!" Dave whispered. "Don't wait for me. Sneak down the roof and drop to the ground. I'll be right behind you. Go ahead, Freddy."

Dave waited until he heard the soft thud of the English boy's feet touching the roof, then he grabbed hold of the sill with his hands and swiftly and silently hoisted his body upward. For a brief instant he sat poised on the sill grinning back into the darkened room. Then he swiveled over and lowered himself down. In almost no time he had cat-crawled down the gently sloping roof to its lip. He pressed flat on his stomach and stuck his head over the edge of the roof. Below him was nothing but a sea of inky darkness. For some crazy reason a twinge of panic shot through him.

"Freddy!" he whispered.

"Here, Dave," came the welcomed reply. "I'm on the ground and to your left. It's all clear down here. The ground's soft. Come on down."

"Here I come!" Dave said, and twisted over and let himself lightly down onto the ground.

No sooner had his feet touched than Freddy had a hand on his arm.

"Well, that's the first part!" the English youth breathed excitedly. "Now, what's the next move?"

"Our shoes," Dave said and pulled the other down onto the ground. "Then we head straight up that hill, there, and keep going north."

"North?" Freddy said in a puzzled whisper. "Why not west toward the Belgian lines? We want to get there as fast as we can. I got a good look at that map, Dave. I think this town, here, is called Estalle. And...."

Freddy cut off his words and both boys froze back against the rear wall of the building as a shaft of yellow light suddenly cut the darkness of night. Dave's heart rose up to clog in his throat as he waited with fear in his heart for the shaft of light to sweep over to reveal them in its glow.

Then suddenly truth dawned and he was almost overcome with an insane, crazy desire to burst out with hysterical laughter. His taut nerves twanged like plucked fiddle strings and his whole body seemed to melt with relief. A light had suddenly been turned on in the building against which they crouched, and the shaft of light had simply been the inside light flooding out through a rear window. When it didn't move where it struck the bottom of the hill slope a dozen yards or so away Dave realized the truth. And so did Freddy a moment later.

"Good grief, that scared me!" the English boy breathed.

"We'll talk later," Dave said. "Right now we're making tracks away from here. Got your shoes on?"

"Yes," Freddy replied. "You lead, Dave. I'll stick right at your heels. Mind your step, though."

"You're telling me!" Dave grunted and started creeping along the rear of the building to the right.

When he reached the corner he stopped and cautiously peered around it. Luck was with him. He had half expected to find himself looking down an alley to the street out in front. But it wasn't an alley. It was just a small court that connected with the next building. A high fence at the front blocked off a view of the street. He couldn't see the street, but the point was that when they started up the hill slope no passing soldiers in the street could see them and give chase if for no other reason than curiosity.

"Stick close, Freddy!" Dave whispered over his shoulder. "First stop is the top of the hill. Here we go!"

Bent over low Dave turned sharp left and went scuttling across some thirty feet of bare ground, and then into the scrub brush that fringed the base of the hill. Hands out in front of him to prevent barging straight into a tree, he started up the slope as fast as caution would permit. By the time he was half way up his breath was coming in sobbing gasps, and his legs felt like two withered sticks that might snap in two at most any second.

He gritted his teeth and called upon every ounce of strength in his strong young body. It was mighty hard going. From the prison room window the hill slope had looked not at all steep, but now climbing up it in the dark, dodging around tree trunks and jutting rocks, it seemed almost to rise right straight up in front of him. Every so often he half twisted around to make sure Freddy was still with him. And each time that was exactly the case. Freddy was right there at his heels, puffing and panting, but sticking like glue.

The English youth's courage and stick-to-itiveness made Dave doggedly refuse to permit himself to rest even for a moment. Freddy wasn't complaining, and if Freddy could take it then he could, too. Freddy might be younger, and a bit shorter, and weigh less, but there was no difference in the quality of his fighting spirit, or of the courage in his heart. And so Dave kept on climbing upward, and upward through the black night until finally ... and it seemed as though a thousand years had passed by ... he finally reached the crest. He staggered along the flat crest for a few yards and then sank wearily down on the soft earth. Freddy dropped down beside him, and for a long time there was no sound between them save the sounds of their labored breathing.

Eventually, Dave pushed himself up to a sitting position, wiped his dripping face on the sleeve of his shirt, and let out a long sigh.

"Gee, am I out of condition for track!" he breathed. "That was plenty tough. I thought we'd never make it. You okay, Freddy?"

The English youth groaned softly as he sat up.

"I guess so," he murmured and sucked in great gulps of cool night air. "But I certainly hope we don't have to do that often. You can't see very much from here, can you? I guess they're not taking chances on showing many lights in case our bombers come over. I'd like very much to see a big bomb drop on that Colonel Stohl, though. He deserves one!"

Dave chuckled and instantly felt much better. Freddy might be dead on his feet, but he still had the old fight.

"Two, one for me," he said and stared down at the town.

In all there were not more than two dozen lights showing, and at least half of them were the shaded lights of army cars and trucks moving along the one main street of the town. If there were others they were blotted out by the trees.

"About that map, Freddy," Dave said presently in a low voice. "I think this is Estalle, myself, but that's not much of a help. I mean, I couldn't figure how far we are from the Belgian lines. I guess it can't be very far, though. They only started the invasion yesterday morning, so they can't have gone very deep into the country."

"I don't agree with that, Dave," Freddy said. "The German blitzkrieg in Poland made as much as eighty and ninety miles in a day. Besides, my father taught me a lot about marking army maps. Of course I don't know what _all_ of those markings meant on the Colonel's map, but I'm pretty sure those little yellow pins represented their advanced armored scouting units."

"But good gosh, they were as far west as Brussels and Charleroi!" Dave gasped. "That's miles away. What about the Belgian frontier forts, and the forts of Liege, and such big places? Wouldn't they hold them back?"

"I don't know," Freddy said. "But I suspect the Germans are doing the same thing they did in the Polish campaign. Their light fast mobile units scoot right on past the heavily fortified centers and capture small positions in the rear. Then the bombers and the heavy attack tanks, and such, go at the big forts. It's as I heard my father say shortly after the Polish invasion. You don't have trench warfare any more. It's blitzkrieg nowadays. Lightning attack with small fast units, with the main body moving up behind and concentrating on main points of defense. And don't forget Hitler's air force, Dave. It cleared the way for him in Poland, and in Denmark, and Norway. They're probably doing the same against the Belgians. At least until the British stop them. And we'll jolly well stop them, don't worry."

"Gee, you talk like a regular military expert," Dave said in admiration. "I guess your Dad taught you a lot. War certainly isn't what it used to be, I guess. But, look, there were some blue pins on that map, and beside each one was a date. I saw dates a week and two weeks from now. And there were blue pins all the way across Belgium to the English Channel. I ... Holy smokes! It just struck me. The yellow pins show where the Germans are today, and the blue pins mark places they expect to capture on certain days! Could that be true, do you think?"

"Yes, I do," Freddy said. "I'm pretty sure, Dave, that we've seen something the Allied High Command would give a million pounds to see. Five million, or more! That was an Intelligence map of the whole German plan of invasion, Dave. I'm sure of it!"

"My gosh, then let's get going!" Dave cried, and leaped to his feet. "We've got to get through to Allied High Command, wherever it is. We can't show them the map, but between us we should be able to remember enough about it to help them plenty. We...."

A wild yell from down at the base of the hill, and three pistol shots in rapid succession, cut off Dave's words like a knife. He shot a quick look down the hill and saw a cluster of lights suddenly spring into being. He wasn't sure but he felt pretty certain they were from the building where he and Freddy had been held prisoners.

A second later when more shots and more shouting drifted up to him, he was sure. The guard had probably taken another look, and found out they had escaped. Now the alarm was being given. Bitter anger for wasting time talking flashed through him and was gone. He reached down quickly and pulled Freddy up onto his feet.

"They've discovered our escape!" he cried. "We've got to start moving, and fast. Stick close to me. We'll still head north."

"But why north?" Freddy protested. "We should go west if we want to reach the Belgian outposts as soon as possible, and get them to take us to Allied G.H.Q., Dave!"

"No, north!" Dave said. "They'll guess we're trying to get to the Belgians, you see? So they'll start hunting toward the west, and sending word ahead. If we go north we'll be fooling them for awhile ... I hope. Anyway, it's our best bet. See? There go a couple of their cars racing down the road toward the west. Come on!"