TO THE RESCUE
"Go on! Don't stop! Slam at 'em!"
It was the sharp command of the lieutenant in immediate charge of the
detachment including Jimmy Blaise and his comrades.
"Forward! Forward!" was yelled on every side.
The din continued--increased. It seemed as though there could be
nothing left whole on earth again; in all that riot of noise and
blood--as though everything must be rent to pieces.
"Are you all right!" cried Jimmy in the ear of Roger.
"Yes. Not scratched yet. How about--"
A loud explosion to one side cut off his words in a blast, but Jimmy
knew what his chum wanted to say. When there was a momentary lull he
answered:
"Iggy's gone!"
"Gone?"
"Yes. I had a glimpse of him being blown back--his face was all
red--bloody."
Roger could not repress a shudder. But there was no time for any
thoughts like these. He had a glimpse of Bob Dalton and Franz
Schnitzel stumbling toward him and Jimmy. Then came a sharp command:
"Down! Down on your faces! Everyone! They're turning loose the
machine-guns!"
The four remaining Khaki Boys fell flat, and only just in time. Over
them swept a veritable hail of machine gun bullets.
"Dig in! Dig in!" commanded the lieutenant.
Frantically with their picks and shovels the Sammies began to make
shallow ditches in which to lie. The upraised earth would offer some
protection against the forward sweeping lead, though not very much
against shrapnel which explodes in the air above and is driven
downward.
And as the four Brothers were making shallow trenches they wondered,
with sorrow in their hearts, if there was a chance that Iggy had been
left alive.
"If we stay here long enough, I'll see if I can't get permission to go
back and find out," mused Jimmy, as he frantically scraped the earth
into a sort of long mound in front of his head. They were under a hot
fire now. The American advance had been momentarily checked.
And while there is this period in the fighting may I not take
advantage of it to make my new readers acquainted with the main
characters of this story, and also tell something of the previous books
in this series?
The initial volume is called "The Khaki Boys at Camp Sterling," and in
the pages of that you meet, for the first time, Jimmy, Roger, Bob and
Iggy. To introduce them more formally I will say that Jimmy's correct
name was James Sumner Blaise, and that he was the son of wealthy
parents. He was about nineteen years old, and this was the average age
of his comrades.
Roger Barlow was an orphan, and had been working in a munition factory
when he decided to enlist. Robert Dalton had been a "cub" reporter
on a newspaper, and, like Roger, was an orphan. Though Ignace was no
orphan, possessing both father and mother and a number of sisters and
brothers, his home life was not happy, and he was really glad to join
the army.
These four lads soon became "bunkies" at Camp Sterling, where they
had their training. Later they took into their friendship one Franz
Schnitzel, who, though possessed of a German name, was, nevertheless,
a loyal "United Stateser," as Iggy called it. Franz had a hard time,
at first, convincing people of his loyalty, and once he was accused of
a black crime, but later he was proved innocent.
After having been trained at the camp, and cementing their friendship
in many ways, the "five Brothers" as they called themselves, were sent
across. In the second book of the series, "The Khaki Boys On the
Way," we find our youthful heroes sailing for France after a series of
adventures, one a startling one, at Camp Marvin. This adventure had to
do with the blowing up of a bridge, and Jimmy Blaise had a fight with
a spy--a fight that came near being Jimmy's last.
In this second book will also be found an account of the trip of the
Khaki Boys to the coast, where they boarded a transport for France. If
they expected to get across safely, as many thousands did, they were
disappointed, for they were attacked by a U-Boat. Many on board the
transport _Columbia_ perished, but the five Brothers were saved, and,
after a time spent in a rest camp in England, they crossed the channel
to France.
The third volume, called "The Khaki Boys at the Front," tells in
detail some of their exciting experiences. The quintette were given
leave to go from their camp to Paris, and in that beautiful city they
met some other friends, the Twinkle Twins, otherwise John and Gerald
Twinkleton, who had joined the aviation branch of the service. This
was natural, since their cousin, Emile Voissard, was one of the most
daring of the airmen, meriting the name "Flying Terror of France."
In that book, too, you may read of how Franz Schnitzel, by his
knowledge of the German tongue, was able to give advance notice of a
raid he overheard the Huns planning. The raid was a failure from the
German standpoint, but during it some of our Khaki Boys were wounded.
Adventure followed adventure, but in one "grand" one, as a Frenchman
would call it, Jimmy, on guard when Voissard's aëroplane was on the
ground, temporarily disabled, stood off an attack of Germans and among
others he killed Adolph von Kreitzen, known as the "tiger man." On his
head the French government had set a price of five thousand francs, or
about a thousand dollars, and of course Jimmy won this.
So now, in the opening of this present story, we find our five Khaki
Boys still together after many strenuous happenings. They had been
wounded but were now recovered and they had fought valiantly.
In the last chapter of the book immediately preceding this, if you
recall, the lads had written letters home--letters which might be
their last, they thought, for they had orders to take their places in
the front line trenches to await the zero hour. Two of the Brothers
had been separated from their chums, but all were reunited as we have
seen.
Then had come the command to go over the top, and there had followed
the fierce rush in the gray dawn of the morning--a rush punctuated by
fire, smoke and death.
"Dig in! Dig in!" commanded the lieutenant in command of the
particular squad of the 509th infantry to which our friends were
attached. "This is only a temporary check. We're laying down a curtain
of fire, and we'll go forward again in a moment!"
He had to yell to be heard above the din, but all near him understood
what he meant. The American gunners were sending over a barrage
fire--a veritable rain of bullets that would keep the Germans
from advancing, and which would also cause them to abandon their
machine-guns. It was the machine-gun fire that was, temporarily,
holding up the advance of Jimmy and his chums.
It did not take the Sammies long, working feverishly as they did, to
raise a protecting mound of earth between them and the Huns. And then,
for some reason or other, the savage fire of the Germans slacked at
the particular section of the line where our heroes were stationed.
"Are you all right, Rodge?" called Jimmy to the chum on his left.
"So far, yes. How about you?"
"Oh, I was nicked in one ear--just a scratch. It's hardly bleeding.
Can you see Bob?"
"Yes, he's got a swell place--in a shell hole, and Franz is with him.
See anything of Iggy?"
"No," answered Jimmy. "I'm afraid he's done for. If I get a chance,
I'm going back to see. Looks as if Fritz had had enough at this
sector."
"Aren't we going forward?" some one called to the lieutenant in
charge. "Come on! Lead us to the Boches!"
"Have to wait for orders," was the grim answer. "We were told to halt
here. Can't go on without orders!"
There were murmurs of disapproval at this, but the discipline was
strict.
"Anybody badly wounded?" asked the lieutenant. "If there is, now's
your chance to get some first-aid treatment. Later you can't,
perhaps."
There were one or two who were suffering badly, and these took
advantage of the lull in the fighting to apply bandages to their
hurts.
"Poor Iggy!" mused Jimmy, and then, as the lieutenant crawled near
him--for no one was standing upright--the sergeant asked:
"May I crawl back, sir, and see what happened to Corporal Pulinski?"
"Did you see anything happen to him?"
"Yes, sir. I saw him blown backward when the big shell exploded, and
he seemed to be falling toward some sort of shell crater. If we're
going to be held here long, I'd like to go to his rescue--to see if
he's still alive."
"Very well," assented the young commanding officer. "Ill take a chance
and let you." He knew of the pact of friendship existing among the
five Brothers. "Take some one with you. But crawl--don't try to walk."
"I won't, sir. May Sergeant Barlow come along?"
"Yes. But come back if we get the order to advance again."
"I will, yes, sir!"
Swinging around on his stomach, and calling to Roger, telling him
of the permission received, Jimmy Blaise started toward the rear to
rescue, if possible, the Polish lad.
"But I'm afraid we'll find him done for," confided Jimmy to Roger.
"The shell must have landed right in front of him. It made a hole as
big as a house."
"Poor Iggy!" murmured Roger.