CHAPTER XXV

GIRAFFE HAS A NARROW ESCAPE

Thad had no hesitation about turning into the side road. It seemed a pretty decent route and, indeed, as he happened to know, there were few poor roads anywhere in France.

“We’ve got a whole lot to learn about the way to make decent roads,” Giraffe admitted as they started on. “America can boast of some things but in others she’s away behind.”

“Who cares, now that we’re getting right along?” sang out Bumpus, apparently quite convinced that their troubles were ended.

They had not gone half a mile when Thad showed signs of uneasiness.

“Something bothers me about this engine, and I’m afraid I’ll have to stop and take a look at it,” he announced.

“Well!” exploded Bumpus, “I’m glad the walking is good today, because I’m commencing to believe we’ll have to come down to shank’s mare before we’re through with this thing.”

Allan and Thad were soon busily engaged in looking over the motor. As it was in some ways different from any with which the boys were familiar they had to do considerable guessing as to what caused the trouble.

“About how long will you be held here, Thad, if you could make a guess?” asked Giraffe. “I want to know, because to tell you the truth I’ve got a caved-in feeling right now, and nothing’d please me better than to pick up a bite for the crowd. We passed a couple of small houses back there, and I saw some women and old men working in the market gardens. They all stopped work and stared at us when we whizzed past; but then mebbe I could coax the housewives to hand over some grub if I shoved a few francs before them.”

“Oh! well, we may be here all of fifteen minutes,” said Thad, without looking up from his work. “Don’t stay longer than that, Giraffe.”

“Good luck to you, old sport,” called out Bumpus, who had remained in his seat this time; “and say, remember we’re your chums, three of us, all told.”

Giraffe trotted off. The others kept busily at work, and Thad presently announced that he believed he had solved the riddle. It was a simple thing that had gone wrong, which could be remedied by the tightening of a bolt. This he proved to the complete satisfaction of Allan.

“Now if only Giraffe hadn’t let that appetite of his get the better of him, we could get away in a hurry!” suggested Bumpus, loftily, as though such a thing as getting hungry might be accounted a capital crime on certain occasions.

“Hark! what’s all that row back there?” exclaimed Thad, just then.

A pretty lively chorus of shouts had broken out. This gave the boys a feeling of uneasiness, because their comrade had vanished in that quarter only a few minutes before.

“It’s around the bend, Thad!” cried Bumpus, standing up on the seat the better to see; “and they’re coming this way too, in a big hurry! Oh! my stars! just hear how they whoop it up, men, women and children all shouting and shrieking. Whatever could poor Giraffe have done to get them so crazy mad?”

“I don’t know,” snapped Thad, “but we’ll soon glimpse what’s going on. There he is just around the curve of the road, and running like a deer at that!”

“And he hasn’t got a bit of grub with him, either,” added Bumpus, quick to discover this fact. “See him gallop, will you? Giraffe can cover the ground like a rabbit, once he starts out to try.”

“Well, he’s got good reason for wanting to hit the pace up this time, it seems,” Allan hastened to remark.

They all realized that he spoke the truth, for just then in the rear of the wildly fleeing Giraffe appeared a band of natives in full chase. There were a couple of pretty agile old men in blue blouses, and wooden sabots that clattered as they came on at headlong speed. Then there were at least five women, furiously angry in the bargain, for they waved their hands, and shrieked all sorts of things, in French, of course, so the boys failed to grasp their meaning. Besides, a number of partly-grown boys and girls tried to outstrip the older ones.

It was a small edition of a mob, such as the boys had often seen portrayed on the screen at a motion picture show. Giraffe evidently had no intention of allowing them to overtake him, for he was doing his prettiest to keep his lead.

Some of the pursuers waved hoes, while others had clubs, or possibly another type of native garden tool, showing that they had been at work in the fields when this sudden fit of anger seized hold of them.

Thad hastened to get the engine started. Had that failed just at this critical time it must have gone hard with them, for those peasants would not listen to reason.

Then he and Allan took their places. All was ready for the arrival of Giraffe, who as he ran was trying to shout something to them. It must have been sweet music in his ears to catch the sound of the motor working, and realize that an avenue of escape was opened up to him; for Giraffe could not have had much liking for all those hoes and sickles and clubs.

His long legs got him over the ground in ample time. As he arrived at the side of the car Giraffe stopped and shook his fist toward the oncoming mob, which action caused another outburst of frantic shrieking.

Bumpus leaned over, and gripping the attenuated scout, actually dragged him a board. Safety first was one of the stout boy’s favorite mottoes; and with all those angry natives on the run in their direction he did not believe in taking unnecessary chances.

As the car started off with a rush Allan looking back saw the mob waving their various weapons menacingly. They seemed very much disappointed because of missing a chance to beat Giraffe up; but that worthy, standing in the car, continued to make derisive gestures at them as long as they were in sight.

“But whatever did you do to them, to get their dander up so bad, Giraffe?” asked Bumpus, after the other had calmed down enough to resume his seat.

“Not a thing,” snapped the tall scout, vigorously. “I waved to ’em as I drew near the houses. They seemed to be clustered in a bunch as if they’d been talking over something. Then one woman pointed at me, and say, if the whole pack didn’t make a break in my direction. Well, I thought at first I’d stand and try to explain; but when I saw those curved sickles and those big hoes swinging through the air, and heard how they whooped it up, why, I guessed it’d be a heap healthier for a fellow of my size in a different atmosphere. So I ran.”

“I should say you did,” Bumpus told him, admiringly; “why, Giraffe, you just _flew_, that’s what you did. I warrant you only hit the high places right along. But what do you suppose they had against you to make ’em act like wild hyenas?”

Giraffe was not the fellow to try and hide behind excuses when he had made a mess of things. In this case, however, he expressed himself most emphatically.

“I tell you I never did a single thing to that bunch of crazy people!” he went on to say loudly, so that the others could all hear him. “I hadn’t a chance to, for you see they started at me before I got close enough to speak. I was just waving my hand to ’em, social-like, when one woman gave a screech, and then they commenced to make Rome howl. Wow! they’re certainly a queer lot, these French peasants. I’d like to know what there is about my looks to make ’em so hopping mad. I knew I was homely, like Abe Lincoln, but I didn’t think it’d get me into such a peck of trouble as all that.”

“There must have been a reason for it,” said Thad over his shoulder; “though we may never find it out. Those people are as a rule friendly to strangers, and willing to accommodate. Something queer has happened to upset them, I should say.”

“Well, I’ll never be happy till I learn what it was,” asserted the aggrieved Giraffe, “if I’d been one of the Greeks they tell you to beware of, bearing gifts, they couldn’t have acted worse. Yes, there must have been a reason. And what hurts me worst of all is that I’m still as hungry as ever.”

They continued to speculate with regard to the strange thing that had happened, but none of them could hit upon any plausible cause. Later on they happened to hear something that gave Giraffe a clue upon which he worked assiduously.

Many wild stories were in circulation at that time when the German armies were threatening Paris again. One of the most extravagant of these was to the effect that some monster German airships had set out for the French capital, intending to drop bombs, and create a reign of terror back of the French lines, so as to cause Joffre to give way.

It may have been that some gossipy neighbor had just been telling them a wonderful story about certain daring vandals who had been lowered from these gigantic Teuton dirigibles, with orders to terrorize the whole country by starting fires and creating a panic. Just then they saw Giraffe running toward them, waving his arms in a strange way. It was like setting a match to a train of powder. They saw in this stranger one of the hated and feared German monsters of whom mothers had been talking for many years when children had to be subdued. And inspired by a mad desire to capture or destroy the stranger, who had evidently left the car, and run back so as to set fire to their houses, they had started toward Giraffe with all that hostile outbreak.

It seemed a rather “fishy” explanation taken in all, even Giraffe was bound to admit; and yet not altogether impossible. In those black days when the invaders were rushing toward Paris many stories just as improbable found ready listeners, and were fully believed by the credulous peasants.

They were all pleased when they could no longer catch that angry chorus of cries and hoots. As for Giraffe, he shuddered a little to contemplate what might have happened had he ever allowed those excited peasants to surround him, unable to speak their language as he was. Going hungry might be bad enough, but it was not a circumstance to being man-handled by a mob.

“I wonder what next?” Bumpus was saying. “It seems that we just have to work our way along as we go. Didn’t I say the last lap was always the hardest of all to cover? We’re got time for a whole lot more adventures before we enter Paris.”

“I’m looking to see some sign of that much traveled highway ahead of us,” Giraffe mentioned a few minutes later. “Seems to me we had ought to be nearly across country by this time. When we get out from behind those trees I calculate we’ll be able to glimpse something worth while.”

Once again was Giraffe correct. No sooner had they cleared the obstruction to their view than they discovered the road in question. It stood out in plain sight, and there were as usual quite a number of vehicles passing back and forth in regular procession. Everybody seemed more or less excited. From this fact Giraffe expressed the belief that the news of the great French victory must have been passed along, so that it was already common property. Men called out to one another, and in their voluble French fashion cried, “Vive la France! vive Joffre!”

“Well,” said Giraffe, “we’re coming to the road, all right, but there’s another little trouble imp laying for us at the corner. If you look sharp you can see some men in army blue standing there; and they’ve already got their eyes on this fine car. It wouldn’t surprise me much if they wanted to take the same away from us, Thad. Bumpus, you said you could walk it, if you had to; so I advise you to get ready for business. There, that means for us to haul up; and that man in the lead looks savage enough to bite your head off, Bumpus; so be careful what you say!”