CHAPTER XXIV

CROSSING THE EMS

It was still dark when I opened my eyes. A steady sound was all around me, and close at hand a more definite one: Tap-tap-tap-tap. I was only half awake.

I stretched out my hand and put it into a pool of water which had formed on the oilsilk covering us. It was raining heaven’s hardest.

Half an hour of disjointed thinking brought me to the conclusion that we had better do something. As yet the overcoats underneath the oilsilks were hardly wet. The first gray light of dawn was beginning to filter through the close-standing trees.

“Wake up! Wake up! It’s raining,” I called. “We’ll get soaked, and we don’t want to carry an extra thirty pounds of water on our backs.”

I got on my feet. With the heavy clasp-knife bought in Hanover I lopped off the branches just over our heads and stretched an awning of oilsilks three feet above the ground, attempting ineffectually to make them shed the water over the edge of the shelter, instead of letting it accumulate on us. For a time it was all right; then the rain ceased.

By now the light showed that we had camped far too near the road for proper concealment. But the awning had found approval in the eyes of my friends, and I felt such pride in the contrivance that I hesitated to advise moving camp farther into the thicket. Instead, I set to work to camouflage it with a screen of branches and young trees, which I cut off and stuck in the ground. I got myself much wetter by doing all this than if I had taken things quietly. So did Tynsdale, who was infected by my passion for work.

When a cart creaked along the road, its wheels plainly visible from our hiding-place, we resolved to move. In the heart of the thicket the trees were much smaller--only a little taller than ourselves--and more widely spaced. This and the open sky above us gave us a sensation of freedom and fresh air. I constructed another shelter. Occasional showers during the morning filled the sagging places of the awning with water, and this we drank in spite of the bitter taste imparted to it by the oiled fabric.

Sleep, even in the intervals between the showers, was almost out of the question. With the day, thousands of mosquitoes had come to life among the grasses covering the ground. They rose in clouds wherever we went, and attacked the rash beings who unexpectedly had penetrated into their fastness. Soon our hands and faces were red and swollen with their bites.

About noon the last clouds disappeared. The sun began to pour down from a deep blue sky, its rays falling hot and scorching into the windless space between the trees. We divested ourselves of our wet upper garments, and spread them on the firs around us to dry in the sun.

The only sounds that came to us were the occasional tooting of a tug on the river Ems, now not more than three miles to the west. The rarer and nearer shriek of a railway engine on a line parallel to its bank interrupted every now and again the zzzz-ping, zzzz-ping, of the hovering mosquitoes. A dog barked near by. A slow cart rolled and creaked past the copse.

The road in front of the thicket was converging toward the railway, which it met three to four miles to the north of us at the village and station of Kluse, a little more than two miles to the east of Steinbild and the river Ems. Two and a half miles to the north of this last village a wood was indicated on the map. This was our next objective.

From information received, we supposed the Ems to be strongly guarded by sentries and patrols. The five-mile-wide ribbon of country between its western bank and the Dutch frontier was _Sperrgebiet_ (closed territory). Nobody was allowed to enter it except by special military permit. A day’s observation from the shelter of the forest was to show us how best to cross the river--whether we could swim it, with or without luggage, and if necessary, to permit the construction of a small raft to ferry the latter across. Perhaps we could steal a boat!

Near the station of Kluse we intended to cross the railway line, sneak through the village, and then walk across-country to the river and the forest.

Dusk found us behind some bushes by the deserted roadside, awaiting the night.

We started early, walking slowly at first, to squander time. As darkness thickened, we increased our pace. But it is difficult to speed up when one has started slowly. Perhaps the village and station were farther away than we thought. Anyhow, it seemed an age before we caught sight of the first signal-lights on the railway. As during the previous night, the road lay through perfectly flat, desolate swamp land, crossed by ditches of stagnant water. A wood accompanied us on our right for some time. The stars were occasionally obscured by drifting clouds.

Suddenly we saw a cluster of red signal-lights over the dim shape of a signal bridge, the lighted station building a hundred yards beyond, and a level crossing turning out of our road at right angles. “This is it,” I said.

We stepped across the metals. Just beyond them, a small building on our left, its windows lighted, cast a glimmer over the road. Apprehensively glancing round I passed into the deep shadow of the avenue beyond it.

A little later we were standing on a bridge in the small village. A considerable brook rushed gurgling underneath.

“When we passed that house,” Tynsdale said casually, “a large dog of the police type came after me. I was walking last, you know. The brute pushed his nose into the back of my knee and turned away without a sound!”

We had a good drink at the brook, then proceeded along the cut-up road, tree-lined and dark. In a likely spot, perhaps five hundred yards behind the village, I stopped. “Here’s where our cross-country work starts; keep close behind.”

As nearly as possible we proceeded in a northwesterly direction. The going was bad. The country was divided by wire fences, deep ditches and hedges, into small fields, most of them swampy meadows. Half the time we waded through water over the tops of our shoes. This continued for an indefinite period, and terminated when we reached a road where it curved from a northerly direction toward the southwest. Here I had what proved to be an inspiration.

I had seen the beginning of the road marked on the map farther north. On paper it terminated nowhere. Actually it was here, in a spot where it ought not to be. Its deeply rutted surface showed that it was frequently used. The village of Steinbild, to the south of us now, was obviously its destination.

I explained to my companions: “I’m as certain as I can be that this road enters Steinbild close to the water’s edge and avoids the main street. The curve seems to show that. I’d like to follow it. To lie in the woods, away from anywhere, and watch the river, may not gain us anything. In the village we may find a boat. We’ve any amount of time, anyway, and can always come back. It’ll not be so very dangerous, with due caution, if the place is as dark as the villages we have seen so far. Will you chance it and follow me?”

“We’ll follow wherever you lead,” said Kent heartily. Tynsdale’s nod I took for granted; I couldn’t see it.

In a quarter of an hour we were among scattered houses. Again, five minutes later, we stood in the shadow of tremendous trees, in such darkness that we were aware of one another’s presence only from the sound of breathing and small movements.

In front of us the mirage of a few stars danced uncertainly on the smooth surface of a fairly wide river. A fish splashed noisily while we stood listening for suspicious sounds.

We moved carefully along the river path, upstream, to the south. The trees continued in unbroken, stately procession. A barge of the large German steel type lay half-way toward midstream. A boat was tied to its stern. Something, I forget now what it was, made us go on--I have a dim recollection of a light in its cabin. Another barge, with a boat by her side, loomed up, riding high on the water and without cargo, opposite a tiny pier of earth, which ended perhaps twenty yards from the boat. In a house, some distance farther up, one lighted window winked in the night.

We were standing on the pier.

“Who’s to get that boat?” asked Tynsdale.

“Draw lots for it,” I suggested. The shortest piece of match remained in my hand. Off came my knapsack.

“Going in all standing?” inquired Kent.

“No fear; nothing like doing things comfortably. Get out that towel, will you, and be ready.”

My clothes were off. Cautiously I slipped into the water. I remember distinctly, even at this moment, that my toes gripped the sticks forming the foundation of the pier. The bank fell vertically beyond my depth. Bracing myself against the cold shock, I pushed off, to be taken into a delicious tepid embrace by the kindly river. Two long strokes. I paused to feel the current. There was none. Three more. The boat loomed above me. Shooting up, I caught the gunwale at the stern with the tip of my fingers. “Bump, bump, bump,” went the bows against the lighter’s side in feeble movement. “Bump, bump, bump.” I had drawn myself up, and clambered in. “Bump.” I stood in the bows, fumbling with the painter, which was big enough to serve a young White Star liner for a hawser. “Bump.” The gap between lighter and boat widened as I shoved off carefully.

I grabbed at a pole lying in the bottom of the boat. The water proved too deep for punting, so I used it as a paddle, standing on a forward thwart.

The boat was an enormously clumsy affair. Tynsdale snatched at the painter when the bows touched the pier. “Get into your things, we’ll do the rest.”

“Here’s the brandy.” Kent solicitously handed me the flask. I didn’t need it, but thought I deserved a pull.

When I was dressed, I joined my friends, and we put our things into the boat. Tynsdale, who had grown up among shipping, had swung her round, so that her nose pointed downstream. We clambered in.

Kent and I were sitting in the bow when he pushed off, and started to propel us across the river in proper waterman’s style with an oar he had found in the bottom of the boat. Silently working it over the stern, he guided her round the counter of the barge, underneath the wire cable which connected the latter with the one lower down, and out into the placid stream.

Not a word was spoken after we got clear. The large bulk of the empty barge dwindled as the strip of water widened between us. The trees on the bank we had left grew smaller, a trembling line of light glimmered on the surface of the river from the winking window of the cottage. Then the other bank grew distinct and high. The boat’s nose swung upstream and touched. I am not quite sure who was ashore first, Kent or I, but I am certain I had the painter.

“Don’t let her drift,” Tynsdale whispered from his quarter-deck, when I had scrambled ashore. “Belay somewhere, if you can.” We found a post with an iron ring on top, almost embedded in the ground, and made fast. Our knapsacks were put ashore. Tynsdale left last, as befitted the captain.

“Leave her there,” he counseled. “If we let her drift and get caught, we’ll be charged with stealing her. They may not trouble to investigate if they find her here.”

Hurriedly we retired among some bushes which dotted the hollows along the river bank.

“Council of war,” I suggested in high glee. “What’s to be done now? What time, Kent?”

“Twelve-forty-five.”

“What are your opinions? Are we to try to cross the frontier to-night or not?”

“To-night, by all means to-night!” urged Tynsdale. We were all very much excited, of course.

“Time’s getting short! Wait until to-morrow night!” counseled cautious Kent.

The decision rested with me.

“Time _is_ getting rather short, but we might do it. Question is, can we find cover if we don’t? It must be good, to serve its purpose in the Sperrgebiet. I think we ought to dump everything we can spare, and go forward as fast as possible. We can always alter our minds, until after we get on to the morass.”

“Good!” grunted Tynsdale.

“As you wish,” Kent gave way gracefully.

“Then hurry!” I instructed.

Feverishly we went through our impedimenta, thrust the remainder of our biscuits, escapers’ shortbread, chocolate, and such indispensable things as were not already there, into our pockets, and shoved rucksacks, overcoats, raincoats, and everything else underneath the bushes.

I knew the map too well to want to look at it long. Had we not spent days studying the stretch in front of us, often with the help of magnifying glasses?

“What time, Kent?”

“One o’clock.”

“Give me exactly half an hour.”

Relieved of about thirty pounds in weight, I set the fastest pace in my power downstream, along the river bank. I hoped to find a path there, which was to take us to the “jumping-off place” to the north of us, where I intended to get to the swamp. The path was there. The going was easy, and comparatively safe. Bushes dotted the banks and gave continuous shelter.

It cannot be denied that our procedure was risky. We took it for granted that we should not meet any sentries along the river, in spite of our information to the contrary. But slow and careful going seemed equally risky at the time. Only speed could help us across the frontier that night.

My decision in favor of trying to bring our venture to an immediate conclusion was wrong. I ought to have seen that it was more than likely that we should find cover along the river. Yet--I don’t know.

“The half-hour is over,” said Kent.

The river was flowing placidly on our right, swirling softly. Straight across from us a back-water lost itself between tall reeds. This was the spot I had hoped to reach. We filled our water-bottles and drank. Then I slid down the bank, raised here above the surrounding country, and started due west, followed by my companions. Passing a few yards of scattered bushes, with rank grass between them, I plunged into a dense thicket of oak saplings. Pushing and straining, I worked on, in order to get through what I imagined to be a narrow belt. It would not come to an end, but grew thicker instead, finally making progress impossible. In the light of the torch the small trees stood impenetrably close.

“Here’s our cover; no time to work round this patch, and no need to, either,” I said.

“Well, I’m glad,” commented Kent.

“I wish we hadn’t left our overcoats behind,” I reflected. “Let’s see. Four hours till daylight. We’ll be damnably cold. Let’s go fetch ’em. Heaps of time. Nothing else to do.”

Back on the river bank I tied my handkerchief to a branch, knee-high above the ground. After a careful look round, to impress the contours of the landscape on my mind, we started back.

I had not the slightest misgivings about our ability to find our knapsacks and to disappear again into our hiding-place. The hollow where we had left them? Gracious me! I could walk there blindfolded. I could draw its shape now. My cock-sureness was not at all damped by Kent’s dismal forebodings, on which he started as we approached the spot.

We found the boat, but not our luggage; we searched for it more than half an hour, quite recklessly at the last. There were thousands of apparently identical hollows. They had multiplied exceedingly during our absence. I thought I entered them all. But our luggage was lost, and stayed lost.

“No use. We’ve got to go.” I fell in with the urging of the others at last.

At about 3:30 we stretched ourselves on the dry leaves among the oak saplings and fell asleep.