AN INVESTMENT
Often, in the grim, bloody days to come, they thought of the little
Swiss toymaker up there among his windmills and Noah's arks, and of his
laugh at their expense. A merry little gnome he was, the very spirit of
the Black Forest.
Their last sight of him marked almost the end of their wanderings. For
another day's tramping through the solemn depths brought them to a
little community, a tiny forest village, made up of just such cottages
and people, and they made a detour to avoid it, only to run plunk into
another miniature industrial centre which they also "side-stepped,"
though indeed the iron fist seemed not to be very tightly closed upon
these primitive knights of the jack-knife and chisel; and they saw no
dreaded sign of authority.
Still they did not wish to be reckless and when they sought food and
shelter it was at a sequestered cottage several miles from the nearest
habitation. Here Tom showed his button but the old man (they saw no
young men) seemed not to know what it meant, although he gave them food,
apparently believing them to be German soldiers.
Tom believed that they must have journeyed fifty or sixty miles
southward, verging away from the river so as to keep within the depths
of the forest, and he realized that the time had come for them to
consider just what course they were going to pursue.
"If we're going to try to find her," he said rather hesitatingly, "we
ought to hit it west so's we can take a pike across the river. But if we
keep straight south we'll strike the river after it bends, if that old
weaver knew what he was talking about, and when we cross it we'll be in
Switzerland. We'll do whatever you say. Going straight south would be
easier and safer," he added, with his usual blunt honesty; "and if we
cross back into Alsace we'll have to go past houses and people and we'll
be taking chances.--I admit it's like things in a book--I mean rescuing
girls," he said, with his characteristic awkward frankness, "and maybe
some people would say it was crazy, kind of----" What he meant was
_romantic_, but he didn't exactly know how to say that. "As long as
we've been lucky so far maybe we ought to get across the frontier and
over to France as quick as we can. I s'pose that's where we
belong--most of all----"
"Is that what you think?" said Archer.
"I ain't sayin' what I think, but----"
"Well, then, I'll say what _I_ think," retorted Archer. "You're always
telling about thoughts you've had. I don't claim I'm as good as you arre
at having thoughts, but if therre's a soldierr wounded they send two or
three soldierrs to carry the stretcherr, don't they? Maybe those
soldierrs ought to be fighting, but saving a person comes firrst. You've
hearrd about giving all you have to the Red Cross. All _we_ got is the
_chance_ to get away. We've got morre chance than we had when we
starrted, 'cause you'rre a good scout----"
"I don't claim----"
"Shut up," said Archer; "so it's like saving up ourr chances and adding
to 'em, till now we're 'most in Switzerland and we got a good big chance
saved up. I'll tell you what I'm going to do with mine--I'm going to
give it to the Red Cross--_kind of_--as you'd say. If that girrl is
worrkin' on that road and I can find herr, I'm goin' to. If I get
pinched, all right. So it ain't a question of what _we'rre_ goin' to do;
it's a question of: Are _you_ with me? You're always tellin' when yourr
thoughts come to you. Well, I got that one just before I dived for the
glass. So that's the way I'm going to invest _my_ chance, 'cause I
haven't got anything else to give.... I heard in prison about the
Liberty Bond buttons they give you to wearr back home. I'd like to have
one of those blamed things to wearr for a souveneerr."
Tom Slade had stood silent throughout this harangue, and now he laughed
a little awkwardly. "It's better than investing money," he said, "and
what I'm laughing at--kind of," he added with infinite relief and
satisfaction showing through the emotion he was trying to repress; "what
I'm laughing at is how you're always thinking about souvenirs."
* * * * *
So it was decided that their little joint store, their savings, as one
might say--their standing capital of _chance_ which they had improved
and added to--should be invested in the hazardous business of rescuing a
daughter of France from her German captors. It was _giving_ with a
vengeance.
It is a pity that there was no button to signalize this kind of a
contribution.