CHAPTER VIII

THE DANGEROUS CROSSING

The boys and the driver of the caisson cowered there and waited until the last fragment had fallen, either in the water or else ashore. They no longer had a way open for reaching the opposite bank of the stream, where possible safety awaited them.

“Oh! what did it, Thad?” broke in Bumpus, when he was able to find his tongue and lift his shrill voice to a shriek. “Could it have been a shell, do you think?”

Thad had his suspicions. He found it hard to believe that a bursting bomb would do all that damage. It might injure the bridge in one section and render it unfit for safe passage; but some unseen powerful force had apparently lifted the whole structure and scattered the remnants all around.

“No, I believe it was blown up by a planted mine!” he called out in reply to the question Bumpus had asked.

“By the French, do you mean, Thad?” demanded Giraffe, looking incredulous; “but why should they want to do that, when one of their own batteries was using the bridge to escape by?”

“I don’t know,” Thad went on to say hurriedly, as he looked around him; “like as not they had it fixed to destroy the bridge when the enemy came along, and after the battery got across the men in charge of the electric switch, hidden somewhere across there, thought the Germans must be in close pursuit, so they let her go.”

“And now we’re in a hole!” cried Bumpus, involuntarily ducking his head upon his fat shoulders as another shell burst not far distant.

“We’ve just got to get across, that’s all!” declared the energetic Giraffe. “If there isn’t any ford we’ll have to duck and run along the water’s edge to look for some sort of a boat, because swimming would be a tough job for Bumpus, anyhow.”

“And no matter what we decide to do,” added Allan just then, “we’d better be getting a move on in a hurry, because I can see mounted men coming away back there where the road rises a bit, and I guess they’re some of those hard-riding German cavalrymen they call Uhlans.”

All of them jumped to the ground. Even the driver knew that he could not hope to save his caisson with its contents, and, like the discreet soldier that he was, he immediately commenced to throw the ammunition into the stream. If France might not have the benefit of those shells, he meant to keep her enemies from profiting through his misfortune, even though he lingered so long that he put his own life in peril.

Thad had turned an envious eye upon the stream. He saw instantly that it was of considerable dimensions, far too wide to be crossed without a boat of some sort. It had the looks of a deep river in the bargain, which fact would prevent such a thing as their wading to the opposite bank.

On both sides bushes grew, together with scrubby willows. At a pinch, possibly, the boys might manage to find some sort of shelter amidst these; but if anything of a hunt was inaugurated by the German cavalrymen they must be routed out in short order. And perhaps the very fact of their being in the company of the obliging French caisson driver might cause the Uhlans to consider them foes.

Thad did not like to think of what might follow. Sometimes rough-riding Uhlans act first and investigate afterward. Plainly, then, it was much to their advantage to get across that stream one way or another, if it could be managed.

“Look for a boat, fellows!” was what he snapped out with his characteristic energy; “above, below, no matter where you can find one. It’s our best move, for we ought to get across here, you know!”

His words gave the others the clue. They commenced using their eyes, following the short up and down, and carefully scrutinizing every yard of the bank. Never before in all their existence had a boat seemed such a desirable commodity as just then; new or old, big or small, round-bottom or flat, little they cared if only it would accommodate four boys and hold water long enough for them to urge it to the opposite bank before the dreaded Uhlans arrived.

Of course Giraffe had the advantage of his three chums in such a rivalry. That eagle eye of his was without its peer among the members of the Silver Fox Patrol, and it did not fail its owner now.

“Thad, I see one!” he whooped joyously. “Come on, everybody, follow me. It’s close by, in the bargain. I only hope and pray it isn’t a knocked-out affair with a big hole punched in the bottom, that’s what.”

“And—some—oars handy, too!” gasped Bumpus, already a little short of breath after all that riotous jolting while riding on the bouncing caisson.

While they were racing toward the spot the determined Frenchman was continuing to carry the contents of the abandoned caisson toward the water. He had to go a little distance each time, and this must have bothered him, for possibly he could not manage to empty the reservoir before the Uhlans arrived, which fact would break his heart.

Meanwhile, Giraffe, being the lightest of foot and most eager, had managed to reach the spot where the boat lay, partly visible in the weeds and rushes. Bumpus, trailing in the rear, listened with his heart almost in his throat, for he knew that the tall scout would immediately announce the condition of his find. Nor was he mistaken in the least with regard to this, for Giraffe had let out a whoop that had a ring of exultation in it.

“It’s all right, boys!” he shouted, “and here’s an oar and a push-pole all handy in the bargain. Now let’s get the old thing afloat!”

There was certainly no time to lose. Those hard-riding Uhlans must be bearing down on the spot with a swoop and apt to arrive within shooting distance before the boys could manage to make the opposite side of the stream.

Thad and Allan swooped down, and with Giraffe handling at least half the burden, they made a combined rush for the border of the river. Little did they care that their feet got wet, or that they stepped in almost to their knees in the endeavor to launch the boat.

With a great splash it dropped and floated! Giraffe was in the act of turning so as to speed back after the oar and pole when he discovered Bumpus tottering along, bearing them under his arm, while with the other hand he clutched his grip, as though he did not mean to let that get away from him if he could help it.

“Bully for you, Bumpus; you’re the goods, and a whole yard wide!” yelped the excited Giraffe, as he convoyed the fat chum to the end of the boat and almost lifted him aboard.

They embarked in a regular scramble. It was no time for ceremony. The danger was too menacing to allow of anything but actions based on intuition rather than careful figuring.

Thad seized the oar and commenced using it with desperate energy. Giraffe refused to relinquish the push-pole, although Allan had held out his hand for the same and gave every evidence of being ready to devote his surplus energy to the task of finding the bottom of the river.

So they were actually off at last, and perhaps the whole effort took much less time than it has required to tell it. Whether the Uhlans were getting close or not could only be guessed, because the low bank of the river prevented them from seeing this fact for themselves.

Bumpus lay in the stern, just as he had fallen into the craft. Once Giraffe called out sharply to the stout comrade and asked him to “trim the boat” a little by rolling more to the right, which, of course, Bumpus only too willingly did. He was ever an obliging boy and ready to accommodate his friends on all occasions. Besides, Bumpus realized that he was having the easy end of the game, just lying there and letting the others do all the work.

Allan was in the bow and had his face turned toward the shore from which they had just started. Hence he was in a position to see all that went on there.

“Tell us when you glimpse ’em, Allan!” wheezed Giraffe between furious pushes with his pole, while Thad kept pace by rapid urgings with the oar, which he was of course using in the nature of a paddle, since it is impossible to row with only half a pair.

“Can’t see yet awhile, on account of that bank,” Allan called out; “but I seem to _hear_ something like the pounding of horses’ hoofs, now that the shells have about stopped coming!”

Just then his attention was taken up with something else. The excited Frenchman at the caisson had changed his mind evidently. He saw that he could never empty the ammunition cart of all its contents before the coming of the cavalrymen, and apparently a new scheme had struck him.

Even as Allan glanced that way he saw the horses running down along the stream as though they had been cut free from the caisson by a sharp knife and then jabbed with the same pointed blade more or less painfully in order to cause them to dash off. And there was the driver unwinding something that looked like a thick black cord, backing away from the stranded ammunition chest at the same time.

Allan guessed what was in the wind. He did not need any one to tell him that it was a fuse the driver handled, and that he meant to lay a trap so as to blow up the caisson with its valuable contents before suffering it to fall into the hands of the enemy.

Well, that was no affair of the boys, so long as they were not struck by any fragment of the exploding ammunition depot. Allan felt a further touch of sincere admiration for the valiant French driver and then turned his attention to their own condition, which was getting rather desperate, it seemed.

Despite all that Thad could do with his paddle, supplemented by the energetic use of the push-pole in the hands of Giraffe, also working like a hero, the boat did not move along as fast as they would have liked. It was a clumsy, flat-bottom contraption and never built for speed. Water was oozing in through a number of small cracks, and while this did not threaten them with immediate disaster, at the same time every gallon that the boat took in added so much to the weight and delayed their progress a fraction of time.

Then Allan sighted the oncoming Uhlans. The spectacle did not add to his hopes, for he could see that they were scores in number, and that those in the lead promised to actually reach the shore of the stream before the boat, at their present rate of progress, could ever attain the opposite bank.

Allan shivered to think what would happen. His feelings grew even more intense when he discovered, as he did just then, that some of the hard riders were already reaching back for the guns they carried alongside their thighs. He knew from this that they would commence firing in short order. There was no time for any explanations, and even throwing up their arms in token of surrender might not count for anything.

What could be done? Allan was at his wits’ ends to know. His heart seemed to be in his throat as he surveyed the galloping soldiers, and then, twisting his head around, contemplated the shore haven, still some little distance away.

Suddenly the water splashed up in a little jet not five feet on one side of the clumsy boat. Bumpus gave a squeal.

“Oh! they’re shooting at us, as sure as anything!” he exclaimed in dismay.

Allan knew this even before the other called out, for had he not seen the little puff of smoke break out of the oncoming squad of Uhlans? Others would also be following suit just as soon as they found a chance, he knew very well.

Only one thing favored them, and this was the fact that it is a most difficult feat for any one mounted on a madly running horse to do accurate shooting, no matter how much he may have practiced. Still, if a number of the men started to give them a volley there must always be a chance of a bullet striking home. Besides, at the present rate of advance the cavalrymen would be on the very brink of the river by the time the boys reached the other shore, and then what could save them?

Allan wondered whether it would be of any use for them to jump overboard and dive. They might manage to make the bank, but only to be picked off by the Uhlan marksmen a minute later.

It was while he was worrying in this fashion that there came a quick explosion close by that gave them all a rude shock, followed by minor crashes, plainly the discharge of shells. The desperate driver had fired his fuse and blown up the caisson with its contents.

Although there was considerable splashing in the water around them, as certain portions of the wrecked wagon fell in the river, in some way or other the inmates of the boat escaped injury. Allan believed they were partly protected by the jutting foundation of the destroyed bridge, which fortunately came between the exploding ammunition wagon and the boat.

Still Giraffe and Thad strove to reach the further bank, though just what they could do to save themselves after that had been accomplished was a conundrum for every one. Bumpus was turning his head to look behind now, consumed by a terrible curiosity that seemed to gnaw into his very vitals. He stared at the oncoming riders and wondered whether the next volley they might fire would bring disaster to himself and comrades. He could see that they were dead in earnest, and that while this fighting spirit moved them they were not inclined to show mercy to those they believed to be their enemies.

Bumpus could not tear his eyes away from the terrible spectacle. Those galloping soldiers began to assume gigantic appearance to his wondering and horrified eyes. And then, even as he looked again, he heard a loud roaring sound as if other caissons had taken up the challenge and were also exploding in one, two, three order.

To his amazement he suddenly realized that the leading Uhlans had vanished in a cloud of smoke—men and horses seemed to have been enveloped in destruction, and those behind, panic-stricken, were driving their animals this way and that, wild to get off the road. But Allan knew what it meant, and that the French battery had taken up a position where the gunners could command the bridgehead!