The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields Part 5

"Eet could be done, Messieurs!" allowed the guide, who was even more alarmed, it seemed, than Tubby himself, since the prospect of falling into the hands of the dreaded Uhlan raiders began to a.s.sume greater proportions, now that the peril no longer lay in the dim distance, but was close at hand.

"Then let's hurry and see what it looks like under the bridge," advised Rob.

Just as they figured, it proved easy enough to lead their horses down the bank, which was covered with gra.s.s and growing weeds, for since the war began all really unnecessary work on roads and railways had been stopped. And those horses would have willingly gone anywhere if there only seemed a prospect that they might rest a spell, for they seemed tired all of the time.

"Listen to them shouting, will you?" Tubby complained as they were going down amidst the bushes that promised to screen them from the party on the other side of the little stream across which the ma.s.sive bridge had been built.

"I'm afraid they must have seen us," Merritt said, "and that will mean they'll soon be across the bridge again to find out what we're doing, and who we are. What's the program, Rob?"

"We must act as though our only object in coming down here was to water our horses," replied the patrol leader; this idea having possibly come into his mind as he noticed the way his mount put its ears forward, and commenced to whinny--as horses invariably do when they scent water, and are thirsty.

"Come on, here, what's ailing you, Dobbin?" demanded Tubby, jerking at the reins when his animal displayed an inclination to hold back.

"He acts kind of queer, doesn't he?" Merritt said when, after considerable fussing, Tubby managed to coax his horse to once more advance, though the animal seemed to be snorting, and trembling. "If we were on the cattle range right now I'd be half inclined to think he smelled a rattler near by."

"My stars! I hope they don't have such pests over here in Belgium!"

exclaimed Tubby, beginning to himself show immediate signs of nervousness.

"Not the least danger," declared Rob. "But, all the same, my horse seems trying to hold back, just as yours did, Tubby."

"They're sure a cantankerous lot all through!" grumbled the fat scout, looking carefully where he expected to plant his foot next; for, in spite of Rob's a.s.surance, he was not quite so certain that the undergrowth beneath the bridge might not harbor some poisonous reptile which might strike unexpectedly.

"They're still keeping up that shouting!" announced Merritt, listening.

"Which I take it is a queer thing for them to do. If they're German raiders why don't they come across and interview us, I wonder? I thought I saw uniforms among the bunch. How about that, Rob?"

"The sun was in my eyes, and I couldn't say for certain," acknowledged the one spoken to, jerking at the bridle of his horse.

"One thing is sure," said Tubby, "the horses are not at all thirsty; else there's some thing they don't like about this place down here."

All of them were really puzzled by the strange actions of their horses.

It was no longer simply Tubby's mount that acted so contrary, but the other three also.

"Guess my nag got cold feet about something; and it's catching as the measles," Tubby announced, as he shook his head in the manner of one who finds himself with too hard a nut to crack.

"Well, that water looks cool and clear," said Merritt, "and I think I could enjoy a few swallows myself, if the horses won't."

"Sure it ain't poisoned, are you, Merritt?" queried Tubby dubiously.

"Oh! get that crazy notion out of your poor head, Tubby. Germans don't make war that way. They face the music, and stand up before the guns.

What makes you look at me like that, Rob?" and Merritt as he asked this question stopped short, for he had been in the act of putting his threat into deeds, and getting down beside the stream to take a drink.

"I smell it too, Rob!" exclaimed Tubby just then. "And, oh! let me tell you it's a rank odor. Isn't it in this country they make all that Limburger cheese; or over the border in Holland? Well, if you asked me I'd say it was something like that."

"Smells more like burnt powder to me!" snapped Rob, showing visible signs of increasing excitement.

With that he commenced looking hurriedly around. Perhaps a sudden tremendous suspicion may have flashed into his mind, and he was seeking to justify it by making some sort of discovery.

The gully was of considerable width, as has been said before, though just at that time in the late summer the stream that flowed through it did not appear to be of any great depth, and could be easily forded.

There were bushes and gra.s.s and weeds growing all about, besides stray stones that may have fallen there when the solid masonry of the really fine bridge had been constructed years before.

Although he turned his eyes in this quarter and that, Rob failed to see anything that looked at all suspicious. Still that peculiar odor continued to strike his sense of smell, stronger than before, if anything.

"Must be something burning, fellows!" announced Tubby, as he held a hand up so that he could close his nose with thumb and finger against the offensive odor.

The guide had meanwhile thrown himself down at the brink of the stream and proceeded to drink his fill. Evidently he had no fear concerning the quality of the water. Typhoid germs were unknown to his lexicon; and so long as water looked fairly clear it suited him.

He was getting on his feet again as Tubby made that last remark. His horse had been pulling more violently than ever at the rein, and the Belgian started to say something uncomplimentary to the animal in Flemish.

Rob had stopped examining the sh.o.r.e upon which they were standing. He turned his gaze across the stream to the opposite bank, for his scout training told him that since the breeze came from that quarter he would be apt to learn the cause of the odor, so like burnt powder, if he followed it up.

The others heard Rob give a half suppressed shout, as though he had made a sudden and startling discovery.

"Oh! what is it?" cried Tubby, straining to keep his horse from trying to start up the ascent again.

"Across the river, over there under the arch of the bridge, don't you see that little curl of blue-white rising?" exclaimed Rob. "Watch it and you'll find that it is creeping along over the ground. Come, we've got to get up out of this in a hurry! Turn your horses, and let them help to drag you up! Quick, everybody; not a second to lose, I tell you!"

Tubby no longer tried to hold his horse back; on the contrary, he even urged the animal to climb the grade in frantic haste. He did not know what it all meant, but Rob acted as though there must be some terrible danger threatening them; and Tubby was no fool.

With cries and shouts they urged the animals to ascend. Several times a horse would slip, and come near falling headlong backward; then it was the one who held the reins found it necessary to encourage the struggling beast with word and act, so that the horse might regain his footing.

Tubby, chancing to glimpse Rob's face about the time they drew near the top was horrified to see how very white it seemed. Then more than ever did he realize that it must be something dreadful that had threatened them.

"Rob, tell us what it was all about?" Tubby managed to gasp, when, having reached the road again, they were hurrying back as rapidly as they could go, the horses helping to drag them along.

"Just this," Rob told him briefly. "They've fixed a mine there under the bridge, so as to blow it up; and we've had the narrowest escape of our lives!"

CHAPTER VI.

GETTING NEAR THE WAR ZONE.

"Hold on to your horses, everybody!" called out Merritt, as he looked back toward the bridge from which they had now managed to press quite a little distance.

Merritt somehow did not seem to be very much astonished at what Rob had said. It might be he himself had entertained suspicions along those same lines.

They had heard that the determined Belgians were engaged in throwing all the obstacles possible in the way of an advance in force on the part of the invaders. If only cavalry were to be dealt with, the defenders of the soil had faith in their ability to take care of all that could be sent against them; but it was known to be a fact that the artillery arm was what the Germans meant to depend on more than anything else in this war for conquest.

If bridges and culverts were destroyed in every direction before the enemy could take possession of the roads, it would be next to impossible to move the great siege guns until some sort of strong temporary structure had been built in place of the stone and steel fabrics that were blown up.

And so, for days, there had been reports drifting in to Antwerp that certain bridges had been marked for destruction. Those who sallied forth in armored cars to speed over the country, and play havoc with their Maxim guns, found it necessary to revise their map of the district every night so as to conform to the new changes that had been wrought.

It was hardly ten seconds after Merritt told them to keep a firm grip on the bridles of their horses that the boys on looking back saw the bridge suddenly rear itself in the air. Then came a terrifying boom that made the very ground under their feet quiver; and, in a moment later, in place of the fine bridge lay a horrible gap, from which smoke and dust was arising in sickening clouds.

Tubby was as white as a sheet. The others could hear the big sigh with which he drew in a gulp of air.