A Young Hero Part 5

"Not so tired as I was last night. Why do you ask?"

"Because we must not sleep in a wood to-night; we must walk on till we come to some farm and ask for a lodging there."

"No, no," cried the boy, quickly, "the man will drive us away. I would rather sleep under the trees."

"We must risk being driven away, boy." And just at dusk, where all was strange to them both, they approached another lonely cottage-like place, with barn and sheds and cattle near, Phil shrinking but taking heart as he found that a woman was the only person in sight.

"Who are you? What do you want?" she said, scanning them suspiciously.

"Travellers," replied the Doctor, "trying to get where there is no war."

"Ah!" cried the woman, quickly. "Yes. It is too dreadful; and you with that brave little man tramping like that. Soldiers--hundreds, thousands, have been by here to-day."

"French or English?" cried Phil, excitedly.

"I could not tell," said the woman, smiling, and patting the little fellow's cheek. "Yours?" she added, to the Doctor, "or are you his grandfather?"

"No; he is my little pupil. I am his teacher."

"And you are going away from the war because of him?"

"Yes," said the Doctor, simply. "Will you give us a bed to sleep in, or clean straw in one of your sheds, with supper? I will pay you."

"Pay me!" said the woman, angrily. "What would my good man say if I took money for doing that?"

"Your husband?"

"Yes; he had to leave me to go and fight."

Phil drew a deep breath, for the woman's words seemed to go through him.

She spoke in French, and he expected that she would look upon them directly as enemies and drive them from the door. The next minute he felt that the time had come, for she turned to him and said:

"But you do not speak like one of us, little one. You are not French?"

Phil drew himself up, and his face looked white and then flushed deeply red, as he gazed bravely in the woman's face, the Doctor watching him the while with his forehead wrinkled, as if he had grown ten years older as he stood.

"What will my pupil say?" he muttered to himself.

It was bravely spoken.

"No, I am English," he said.

"Ah!" said the woman, softly. "Why are you here? Who are your people-- your father?"

It was hard, but Phil felt that he must speak out; and he did it bravely, suffering agony as soon as he had spoken, for the woman looked at him in silence.

A few minutes later Phil was sitting back watching the woman blowing up the fire to heat some of the evening's milk and fry fresh eggs for her visitors, joining them in a hearty meal and laughing, too, the end, as after struggling hard to keep his eyes open, Phil let his head sink slowly down upon the table--fast asleep, too much worn out to feel when the Doctor lifted him out to follow their hostess into the next room, where a clean bed was given up to them. For when the Doctor declined and said he was sure it was the woman's, she told him it was her own and that she would do with it as she pleased.

CHAPTER FIVE.

The sun was high when Phil woke next morning, to find the weary Doctor sleeping still; but he started up at a touch, and hearing them about, their hostess came and tapped at the door to say that breakfast was ready, and later on when they stepped out she looked sadly at them, for she had news.

"I woke at daylight," she said. "There were guns firing, and the fighting has been going on ever since. Quick! Come and eat your breakfast and go. It is not safe for that little fellow to be staying here."

Phil had no appet.i.te to finish that breakfast. Before it was half done he had started to his feet, to run to the door, full of dread for his father, for one after the other came the reports of heavy guns in the distance, and from much nearer the rattle of musketry, telling that instead of leaving the terrible encounters far behind, either they had marched right amongst it or the opposing armies had suddenly turned in their direction.

There was no time to waste. The Doctor pressed money upon their kind hostess, but she refused it angrily, and hurried them from the house.

"Go that way!" she said, pointing towards where the sky looked light and clear, for away behind the house clouds were rising like to those in a storm; but they were clouds of smoke slowly gathering above a city miles away, and the gloom increased.

But Phil's hostess had not let him go away empty-handed.

"You'll want something to eat by and by," she said, and then the little fellow looked at her wonderingly, her parting word sounded to his English ears so strange, for she said "adieu" and not "good-bye."

"Walk fast, boy," said the Doctor, almost harshly; "we must rest by and by."

They hurried on for quite two hours, and then, hot and weary, the old man suffering as hardly as the boy, they slackened their pace, and once more making for a patch of woodland, rested for a while in the shade.

But not for long.

"I can't hear the guns now," whispered Phil, after a long silence.

"No," said the Doctor, "I have not heard a sound for quite half-an-hour."

"But where are we going now?"

The Doctor smiled sadly and shook his head.

"Where fate leads us, Phil," he said; "anywhere to be out of this terrible work."

He had hardly spoken before the crash of many guns made them start to their feet, Phil beginning to run out in the open in his sudden alarm, but only to turn back directly and catch at the Doctor's hand.

"Ah!" cried the old man, drawing him in amongst the trees; "that was running into fresh danger. Look!"

Phil was already looking at a line of men who seemed to have suddenly started out of the ground a hundred yards away.

At the same moment the Doctor threw himself down amongst the thick growth, dragging his companion with him.

"Lie close," he whispered, and it was well that they were both lying flat, for there was a flash of light, a long line of smoke, and in response to a sharp pattering sound a little shower of twigs and leaves came dropping around.

This was answered by firing evidently from the other side of the wood again and again, the reports each time sounding more and more distant, while as Phil lay flat upon his face he could hear trampling and the sounds of men hurrying among the trees right past them, two coming so near that the boy wondered that they were not seen.

"Don't speak, my boy," whispered the Doctor, as he held Phil's hand, though the words were not needed, for the boy's attention was so taken up by the exciting events that surrounded him that he was all eyes and ears for the next thing that should happen.

For the soldiers that pa.s.sed on, firing as they went, seemed to receive a check, and were driven back, filling the wood with smoke, which hung low and seemed to cling to the lower branches of the trees. But the men recovered their ground and pa.s.sed on once more, the firing growing more distant.

"Now," said the Doctor, at last, "let's try again, boy."