A New Standpoint
To Max and his chum these were days charged high with excitement. Their
day's toil in the shops over, they raced away to the points where the
most exciting events were to be seen. They were witnesses of most that
went forward, and actually lent a hand in the rounding-up, from among
the civil population of the city, of the band of armed Germans who
attempted to assassinate the commandant of the fortress, General Leman.
The entry of the Germans was to both of them a fearful blow. They knew
little of military matters, and vaguely believed that the town and forts
were strong enough to stand a regular siege. And yet on the third day
after the attack the town had fallen! As they watched the young German
troops marching into the town they could not help feeling deeply
disappointed and discouraged.
"I wish now that you had gone home, Dale," remarked Max in a gloomy
voice as they slowly made their way towards the works. "Now that the
place has fallen you can do no good here. And as you are not a native
you may be taken for a spy and shot off-hand."
"Shut up, Max! We've agreed to go through this business together, and
there's an end of it. Liege is lost, but the war's still on, and it will
be hard if we can't find some way of giving our side a shove forward."
"Aye to that, Dale. Well, if you don't mind being here in a conquered
town I'm jolly glad to have you. Now, I suppose we can still go on
helping to cast shells--why no, Dale! We simply can't do any more of
that work; it's absolutely useless."
"Of course it is. You may be sure the Germans won't let shells be sent
away from Liege except to Germany. Your works had better get on with the
other work. Shells are out of the question."
"I must see Schenk about this," replied Max thoughtfully. "It needs
thinking out what work--if any at all--we can do without helping the
Germans. It's an awkward business, but I have no doubt Schenk can see
daylight through it."
"I should think so, but--hallo! What's that?"
Dale stopped suddenly, and stood gazing down a side street, the end of
which they were just about to cross. A sudden burst of screams and
shouts, quite startling in its intensity, assailed their ears, and made
them look and look with a feeling of foreboding new to them. At the far
end of the street they could see a group of men in the grey-green
uniform surging to and fro before a house from which the screams seemed
to issue.
"The Germans--doing the same dirty work as they did at Vise!" gasped
Max, turning away his head and clenching his fists in his pockets. "I
hardly know how to keep from rushing down there, utterly useless though
it is."
"It is women they are ill-treating--how can we walk away?" cried Dale in
acute distress. "Let us go down, and if we cannot fight, let us beg them
to desist. Perhaps if we offered them money----?"
"Useless," muttered Max, though he stopped and gazed down the road in
irresolution. "And yet how _can_ we pass by, Dale?" he went on with a
groan. "I know I shall always call myself a coward if I do nothing.
Let's walk a little closer, and see if we can do anything."
Dale eagerly agreed, and they walked quickly down the road towards the
group of soldiers and their victims. As they drew nearer, and could see
something of what was happening, their anger increased, until they were
almost ready to throw themselves upon the soldiers and oppose their
bayonets with their bare fists.
The house before which the outrage was taking place seemed, for some
reason, to have been singled out from the others which lined both sides
of the street, possibly because the head of the house was well known as
an opponent of the Germans or because of some act of hostility committed
against the soldiers. At any rate, an elderly man, evidently dragged
from the house, had been tied to the front railings, and was being
subjected to treatment so cruel that it almost amounted to torture.
The womenfolk of the house had apparently rushed out and endeavoured to
intervene, but had been forcibly held back, and were at that moment
being subjected to brutal indignities that angered Max and Dale even
more than the cold-blooded cruelty to the man himself.
The two had arrived within some forty yards of the scene, and were still
pressing on as though drawn by a magnet, although neither knew what he
was going to do, when one of the soldiers drew the attention of his
fellows to the two young men advancing towards them. At the same time he
picked up his rifle, took quick aim, and discharged it directly at them.
The bullet whizzed between them, and, on the impulse, Max seized Dale by
the arm and dragged him through the open doorway of the nearest house. A
roar of laughter from the soldiers at their rapid exit followed them,
and made the anger of one at least of them burn with a still fiercer
resentment.
"Right through and out at the back," cried Max in urgent tones, and the
two passed through the house, which appeared to be deserted, and found
themselves in an open space intersected only by low garden fences.
Max laid his hand on his friend's arm. "I am going to move quietly along
until I reach the back of the house where those curs are at work," he
said in a hard, suppressed voice. "I must do something, but do not you
come, Dale. There is no need for you----"
"I am already in it, I tell you," almost shouted Dale as he impatiently
shook him off. "It's as much my affair as yours. Come on."
The two made their way rapidly but cautiously along until they reached
the house they sought. The doors were open at the back, and the shouts
and screams were almost as audible there as at the front.
"We have no weapons; let us arm ourselves with these," cried Max,
pointing to some blocks of ornamental quartz bordering a little fernery.
Even in the midst of his excitement it struck Max how strangely the
orderliness of the tiny, well-kept garden seemed to contrast with the
deeds of violence being committed outside.
Rapidly but quietly the two lads filled hands and pockets with the heavy
missiles. Then they crept inside the house and up the stairs to the
floor above. The house was quite empty, for all within had rushed or
been dragged to the scene in front.
The bedroom windows were wide open, and the instant they entered both
lads began with one impulse to hurl with all their strength the great
stones upon the German soldiery below. They were both wild with rage at
what they had witnessed, and utterly reckless what fate might ultimately
be theirs, so long as they could inflict some punishment upon the
cowardly wrongdoers.
[Illustration: BOTH LADS BEGAN TO HURL THE GREAT STONES UPON THE GERMAN
SOLDIERY]
The soldiers, completely taken aback by this sudden rain of missiles
almost from the skies, immediately scattered to the opposite side of the
road and took refuge in the gardens there. Not one of them had his rifle
to hand, for their arms had been stacked against the wall of the house
they were attacking, and even the man who had fired at Max and Dale had
put down his rifle once more. Thus, for the moment, the soldiers were
impotent, and Max shouted rapidly in the Walloon dialect to the women
below to release the man tied to the railings and escape through the
house.
With a promptitude that was wholly admirable, one of the women drew a
pair of scissors from her pocket and cut the cords that bound the man to
the fence. With a cry of joy the poor fellow staggered to his feet. But,
stiffened by his bonds or exhausted by the cruel treatment he had
received, he could barely stand, and had to be half supported and half
dragged by two of the women back into the house.
"Tell them to be off, Dale," cried Max rapidly. "I will hold back these
men for a minute. Take them right through into the street beyond and get
them out of sight. I will follow in a moment."
Dale obeyed, and under his guidance the whole party made their way
rapidly through the house, into the gardens, and through the houses
opposite into the road beyond. At the disappearance of their prey the
soldiers set up a howl of rage, and made a concerted rush for their
weapons. But Max redoubled his efforts, and, his supply of quartz
exhausted, rained down upon them jugs, mirrors, pictures, and everything
movable he could lay hands upon, holding them in check for a few
precious moments. Then, after one final fling, he bolted from the room
into the bedroom at the back and leapt out of the window. Landing in a
flower-bed unhurt, he rushed without a pause at the low garden fence in
front of him, cleared it at a bound, and dashed through the house
opposite in the wake of Dale and the fugitive people.
Meanwhile, out in the roadway, the soldiers had seized their weapons,
and, hardly knowing what to expect, poured two or three volleys into the
empty house. Then they cautiously reconnoitred, and by the time they had
come to the conclusion that the house was indeed empty, the fugitives
were completely beyond their reach. Characteristically enough, they
vented their rage and disappointment on the inanimate objects within
their reach. The crash of furniture soon rose above their shouts of
fury, and in the end smoke rolled from the windows and poured upwards to
the sky as a silent witness to the new spirit that had come to dominate
the land.
Max and Dale hurried the people they had rescued away from the scene of
the outbreak, and would not allow them to slacken speed until they had
put a mile of streets between them and their savage foes. It was then,
Max judged, high time to find a haven of refuge of some sort, for, with
one exception, the women were half crazed with fear and the man quite
exhausted with ill-usage. Any German soldiers or spies who passed them
could hardly fail to remark that they were fugitives, and they would
soon find themselves in as bad a case as before. Questioning a woman who
still retained a show of self-possession, Max learned that they had
friends in another part of the town, and towards their house he promptly
directed their retreat.
Without further misadventure they reached the house they sought, and Max
and Dale saw their charges safely inside the door. Then they hurried
away, for it was obviously dangerous both for them and for the fugitives
to be in one another's company a moment longer than necessary. Thanks
were not thought of; the rescued were not ungrateful but were altogether
too upset for expression, and the rescuers were only thankful to have
been of use, without a thought of anything else.
"By George, Max, how I did enjoy that!" cried Dale with enthusiasm, as
they turned their steps once more towards the works. "I feel an inch
taller, and can face the world as an honest man."
"Aye, Jack, I feel like that too. How should we have felt had we let
that business go on unchecked?"
"And it has done a bit of good, too, I imagine. Those cowardly Germans
will not forget that rain of quartz in a hurry, and may leave the poor
folk alone another time."
"I am not so sure. But the question is, what are we going to do now? We
cannot go on casting shells which will be certain to be seized by the
Germans. If we make railway material it will only be used to convey
soldiers into the field against our men. No. I must see Schenk, and get
him to close all branches of the works that might be of use to the
enemy. That is the only thing to be done. Then I shall try to get
through to join the Belgian army."
"And I too, Max. I will join with you. We have started on this business
together and we will finish it together."