Shortly afterwards the two boys said good-bye to their host and his
wife, and started out to find headquarters in Ypres. They quickly
discovered that the badly battered town was full of marching soldiers,
and all the other things that go hand in hand with modern war, even to
a number of armored cars which sped past them on the road, exciting the
wonder of Amos greatly.
“Why, just see how they’ve managed to build up that metal shield around
the men aboard, Jack! They seem to be safe from ordinary bullets
fired by a machine gun. There were two Maxims aboard that last car, I
noticed.”
“Yes,” added the other, deeply interested, “fighting today begins to
take on some of the old-time ways. You’d almost think of Roman chariots
to see those cars flying along the road, only the galloping horses
have been displaced by a power a hundred times more powerful. But there
must have been some pretty warm engagements around this town, if the
battered walls can tell the story.”
“Huh! it doesn’t look to me worth the powder that’s been wasted,”
remarked Amos. “Why should both Germans and the Allies want to get and
hold possession of Ypres, I’d like to know? Thousands must have fallen
here, because everywhere you look you see those mounds where the dead
have been buried.”
“They consider it a place of strategic importance, which is the only
explanation I can give you,” Jack observed. “Perhaps it’s what we’d
call a railway center over in the States. Then the only good road
leading to Dunkirk and the Channel runs out from Ypres; and you know
the Kaiser is dead set on getting his army where he can throw those
shells over on to the shore of England. That mania with him has cost
pretty much all this terrible slaughter.”
Amos shook his head as though his feelings overpowered him. He must
have been thinking that human life was held pretty cheaply when it
could be thus thrown away for a freak idea, a pet object of revenge
that in the end could not amount to much so far as ending the war was
concerned.
Of course, the two boys aroused considerable curiosity. It was only
natural that this should be so. Dozens of the soldiers, humming
_Tipperary_ as they strode past in ranks, usually heading toward the
fighting zone, waved a hand toward them in friendly greeting; and the
chums invariably gave an answering salute.
“I guess they think we’re English boys,” suggested Amos, when this had
happened a number of times. “They know from our looks, and the fact of
our being here, we can never be German anyhow.”
“Now, I’m of the opinion they glimpse that little flag in your
buttonhole,” ventured Jack, quickly. “It tells them who and what we
are. While the United States is trying hard to be neutral in this big
war, and treat both sides alike, still, as Germany can’t get any war
supplies and the Allies do, on account of their controlling the Seven
Seas, these British must look on us as near-allies. Besides, if they
ever read the papers printed on our side of the water they’d know
that the biggest part of the American nation believes in their cause,
and prays that in the end militarism will be knocked out, with a new
Germany to rise on the ruins of the old.”
That might sound like pretty strong talk coming from a boy; but then
Jack was wise beyond his years. Besides, he had looked upon strange
sights since coming abroad. Education develops rapidly under such
conditions.
“I should say Headquarters might lie over in that direction, Jack?”
suggested Amos, pointing as he spoke. “I notice that in most cases the
troops come from that way, which would tell the story, you know.”
“Good idea, Amos, and one that does your Boy Scout training credit.
According to my mind it’s just as you say, and we’ll see if we can get
an interview with the general commanding this district. He must be
a mighty busy man, and only for that magical letter of introduction
we’re carrying around with us I’m afraid our chances of seeing him and
getting a little confab would be next to nothing. But when he looks on
that signature K. of K. there’s little he can refuse us.”
“Yes,” added Amos, grinning happily, “that was a master stroke on your
part, asking dad to give us a letter to his old friend and comrade,
General Kitchener, after you learned how close they had once been in
South Africa or Egypt long ago. When I see their eyebrows go up, and
that look come on their faces, it makes me think of a talisman such as
they used of old. I can imagine Ali Baba saying the magical words ‘open
sesame’ before the rock wall that always swung open to the signal.
We’ve got the same wonderful magnet in our well-worn letter signed by
the Minister of War over in London.”
Moving steadily along they quickly found themselves getting among
crowds of civilians and soldiers who filled the streets of the little
old Belgian town, now a ruined place.
“What are they all staring up at, I wonder?” remarked Amos. “It must
be some of those rash pilots driving German Taubes are circling around
again, trying to locate hidden batteries of the Allies. Oh! Jack, look
there, that’s a Zeppelin I do believe.”
Jack had already decided this for himself. Away up among the fleecy
clouds of the early morning they could see what looked like a bulky
cigar-shaped object that was speeding along its course. It was too high
for any anti-air craft gun to hope to reach it. Possibly Allied birdmen
would presently be sent aloft to try and engage the enemy, or failing
that chase him off.
All at once there arose a shout that was taken up by a thousand excited
voices. The entire crowd started to sway and break. Men dashed for any
sort of shelter that came most convenient. Others threw themselves flat
upon their faces, believing in their sudden panic they would be in far
less danger if they hugged the ground closely.
Jack had himself detected some object falling from aloft. It might
have been a cast-off sandbag, but in these perilous war times one
must expect something more destructive than this. He too would have
followed the example of those close by and dropped flat, only that he
saw the falling object was bound to miss the spot where he and his chum
stood by a big margin. In fact, it would drop outside the town, as the
hostile airship was at too high an altitude for the marksman to aim
with any reasonable certainty of success.
Instantly there came a terrific boom. Jack and Amos felt the ground
tremble under them with the concussion, and they did not need to be
told it had been a most destructive bomb that had been dropped from the
swiftly moving Zeppelin.
[Illustration: Instantly there came a terrific boom.--_Page 249._]
Almost immediately afterwards came a second shock, with the same quiver
of the racked earth following the explosion. When even a third made the
atmosphere seem to be surcharged with thunder Amos sank to his knees
and pulled at the legs of his companion.
“Drop down, Jack,” he called, almost frantically. “How do we know but
what the very next bomb will be close by? We don’t want to be torn into
fragments if we can help it, do we?”
“It’s all over, I reckon, by now,” Jack assured him. “The Zeppelin
seems to have passed well over us; and besides there’s a whole flock of
Allied aeroplanes rising like birds to give chase. This wreck of a town
has had another close call, I take it. Those bombs were terrible ones,
and must have been meant for a purpose.”
“What do you think the Germans were after? I don’t suppose now they
knew for a minute Jack Maxfield and Amos Turner had come to town?”
Of course Jack understood that his chum was only saying this in a
spirit of sport.
“They’re after bigger game than two American boys this time, Amos,” he
said.
“Then you think they meant to catch somebody high up in authority; is
that it?” demanded the other.
“It has probably become known through some of those secret channels
by which the Germans learn so much that the British have their
headquarters established somewhere in Ypres just now, even if it is
shifted often to confuse them. And because the fighting line has been
pushed so far away they can’t send shells in here they’ve resorted to
another means for trying to give the British a scare.”
“The crowd’s pushing over to view what happened,” remarked Amos; “shall
we go, too, and find out what a bomb dropped by a Zeppelin can do?”
“I’d like to say I’d seen the effect of such a thing,” returned Jack.
“We’re not in such a rushing hurry but what we can afford the little
time it’ll be likely to take; so come along, Amos.”
Together then they joined the throng that was hurrying toward the
quarter where that last terrible air bomb had exploded on striking the
earth.
“What great luck that it fell in an open place, and never a human being
was injured, seems like!” exclaimed Amos, gaping at the tremendous
hole in the ground, with the earth thrown in every direction for a
distance of many yards.
“If a monster meteor, hissing hot, had fallen here it couldn’t have
smashed things worse than that!” Jack declared. “From the way things
are thrown around I’d say if that bomb ever struck a house the people
inside would never know what had happened.”
“Then they shot it down at haphazard, or else knew in what part of the
town Headquarters lay, and aimed to hit the same?” suggested Amos.
A soldier in khaki overheard them and started a conversation. Doubtless
he was more or less curious to know who and what they were, and why
they had the run of the British camps when so many spies were known to
be prowling around. He seemed to eye them more or less suspiciously,
especially when Jack made no effort to enter into explanations, not
caring to take every ordinary Tommy into his confidence.
In the end this happened to bring them into new difficulties, for
the soldier must have immediately gone about voicing his suspicions,
because about the time Jack said they had seen enough and had better
be going Amos noticed that quite a number of soldiers started to
cluster around them, nor did they show any intention of opening up to
let the two boys pass.
Angry looks were being bent on the lads. Amos was indignant, but Jack
could easily understand what a little thing in these days of bitter
warfare can cause the seeds of suspicion to be sown, making the harvest
quick and unpleasant.
Just then an officer came bustling up, followed by another bunch of
Tommies, and Jack understood what had happened when he saw in their
midst the very same tall man in khaki who had tried to pry into their
affairs.
“There they are, Captain!”
“German spies they must be!” called out another voice.
“Ten to one they signalled to that same airship where to drop the bally
old bombs!” cried a third soldier, angrily.
Loud outcries attested to the ugly temper of the gathering crowd.
There could be no telling to what ends that mob might go, sooner or
later. Despite the fact that they were amenable to military orders they
might get beyond the control of authority, and start to wreak summary
vengeance upon the boys, neither of whom showed any signs of being
alarmed.
“Captain,” said Jack, quietly, though he had to raise his voice so as
to be heard above the rising clamor, “we are just what we say, American
boys. We have made our way into Ypres in order to see your commanding
officer. It is foolish for any one to connect us with that German
Zeppelin, when we were in just as much danger as the rest. Please take
us to Headquarters without any delay. We have something to show the
general; and after he has seen it you will find that he’ll extend the
honors of the camp to us.”
The captain must have known that if he held back much longer the
excited men were apt to get out of bonds, and do something that would
not be according to military discipline; so he evidently determined
to follow the advice of the boy who seemed to be able to retain his
presence of mind, regardless of the overhanging difficulties.