CHAPTER XIV.
A WONDERFUL RESCUE.
"BLAMED if I oughtn't to be treated for the simples."
Schneider was, indeed, a dejected figure at the foot of the long ladderin this inky well, the only point of light being a porthole sort ofwindow, set high in one of the four stone walls.
"We're all of the same name as chumps," echoed Billy.
The situation certainly had serious aspect to the prisoners. While theyhad considerable confidence in the trailing ability of Roque, here wasa case with about every chance in the world against successful tracing.
An isolated farmhouse, far from the beaten track, not even in presentline of military operations, and confinement practically in a granitetomb, from which no wail of distress could possibly be heard outside.
What fate the Cossacks had fixed for them was merely a matter ofdreadful surmise.
"Slow starvation," was Henri's unhappy guess.
"Penned up in this den until we go mad," was the blood-chilling view ofSchneider.
"Say, you fellows give me the creeps."
Billy wanted his troubles one at a time.
The next one was all too near.
While feeling his way around the rocky walls, Schneider settled in histracks as though he had been shot.
"Don't you hear water splashing?" For confirmation he stared blankly atthe boys who had not as yet strayed away from the ladder.
"Are you starting your madhouse already?" demanded Billy.
"But there is water running near," insisted Schneider. "Come over here,if you don't believe it."
As if to humor their friend, the boys joined him.
Sure enough, the lapping sound was plainly audible at this point.
Further ahead in the dim recesses of the cellar the sound was ofdripping, a steady patter like rain.
"Maybe they have pulled a sluice between here and the river," suggestedHenri.
"The fiends," muttered Schneider.
"Gee!" exclaimed Billy, starting back from a forward step or two, "thefloor is filling!"
Stealing along, inch by inch, the water spread throughout the cellar.
The prisoners retreated to the foot of the ladder and sought perches onthe rungs. In case of full flood they could stave off drowning for atime by climbing higher. It was the only way.
"It's a pretty tight place we're in, old man, but not for the firsttime, and, mind you, we have always pulled out somehow."
Billy was ever ready to pass a cheering word to his chum when cheeringwords were most needed.
Schneider's nerve was again in the ascendant, he having sufficientlyabused his lack of horse sense in being so easily led into such a trap.
"If I had hold of a good steel pike for a bit of an hour, there isnothing like a few planks that would keep us down here."
"Yes, or a couple of axes, or a stick of dynamite, or an electrictorch, and so forth," bantered Billy.
While Schneider and Billy were word sparring to keep up their spirits,Henri noticed that the water on the cellar floor had pooled in thesunken spots, indicating that the pressure from without, for the timebeing, had largely subsided.
"No need for life belts yet," he cried, "the river isn't going to comethrough."
"And, thanks to that blessed streak of light," Billy pointing to thebull's-eye window, "we're able to see that you are right. So much for astarter."
"We'll beat you yet."
Schneider shook his fist at some invisible foe on the other side of theceiling.
When, however, the first flush of encouragement at the fading of theflood had dimmed, it seemed a small matter about which to rejoice.The situation appeared as hopeless as before to the imprisonedaviators. With the coming of night the one diamond in the sable settingvanished--no ray of light to slightly relieve a condition now ofabsolute blindness.
"Oh, for one more glorious chance to meet those dastards in the open,"groaned Schneider, who again was overwhelmed with keen regret that hehad surrendered at all in the first place. But then he had no idea ofsuch a dungeon as this, and, too, he had feared to provoke instantdeath for his young comrades.
In the coming dismal hours the troubled trio, deserting their ladderperches, stretched their aching bones upon the slimy floor, and passedthe night in uneasy slumber.
Henri was the first to awaken, and as a morning exercise essayed toreach the little window by working hand and toe as a means of scalingthe rough surface of the wall. As he clung for a fleeting moment toa protruding stone his chief discovery through the aperture was thatoutside it was raining in torrents.
Perhaps not much satisfaction in return for sadly torn fingernails andconsiderable waste of already waning energy, yet it was some assurancethat they were not intended victims of a drowning plot of man'sconception.
"It's not the river that is feeding this drip," announced the climberto his companions in misery, "it's raining like fury and the watercoming in here is the gutter fall through these rocks."
"A bally lot of moisture," growled Schneider, splashing ankle-deepacross the cellar to inspect a swinging shelf which had just caught hiseye.
He reached up, and presently turned, holding at arm's length a mouldysailcloth bag.
"Hidden treasure," whooped Billy. "Bring it nearer the light,Schneider."
The treasure proved to be meal of some sort in a fair state ofpreservation. A tasting test demonstrated that here was something thatwould at least dull the gnawing pains of hunger, when mixed with water,of which latter there was more than a plenty.
"We might make a fire out of the shelf," suggested Henri, "and turnthis stuff into hot cakes. I've got a few matches in my pocket."
"I see a picture of the fire you could make down here," exclaimedBilly. "But what's the matter with trying it out on the trap door? Burnour way out."
The speaker had taken on an air of excitement at the prospect.
Alas! The matches in Henri's possession had been carried on hissleeping side, the side all night in contact with the slimy floor.There was not a strike in one of them.
Schneider, inveterate smoker that he was, remembered that his pipe,tobacco and match-case were all in the pocket of his great coat, ofwhich the Cossacks had divested him after capture.
So in silence the unfortunate three mouthed the soaked meal, bitterlydisappointed that they could not realize upon Billy's brilliant idea.
From bad to worse, they did realize, and soon, upon a much lessdesirable development. The rain had no stop this time to reduce thewater flow into the cellar. In restoring the meal sack to the shelf forsafekeeping, Schneider's long boots were wetted to the knees, and therewas nothing to do but mount the ladder, and stay there.
To save a fall when napping, the prisoners lengthened their belts andbuckled themselves each to a rung above the one upon which he sat.
"While you were wishing awhile ago, Schneider, why didn't you wish fora boat?"
"You'd joke on the way to the scaffold, young man," said the subduedfirebrand, fixing a reproachful look on Billy.
"Never say die," retorted the irrepressible youth.
Another wearing night, and in Schneider's next trip for the meal baghis hip boots were none too long in the matter of preventing his takingon a cargo of water.
But this third day of desperate contemplation was destined to bemarked by an incident which resulted in the lifting of the weightof gloom--and the herald of light and liberation from an apparentlyhopeless imprisonment was four-footed.
A few lines now in backward trend, to tell about the ambulance dogs,as many as a thousand, renowned for their excellent service for theGermans in both the eastern and western theaters of war. Each ofthe sanitary companies has attached to it four of these dogs, theGerman shepherd breed, marvelously trained and fitted for work onthe battlefield, commanding everywhere eloquent tribute for theirremarkable performances in finding the wounded and their acute scent onany trail.
Stanislaws had long completed his packing of the biplanes, and many atime and
oft had impatiently paced Commissary Square, as many timesgoing to the military road upon which he had last seen his aviationcomrades riding joyously away. "'Stanny' was in a stew," as Billy wouldhave put it, and he was not averse to letting anyone about him know it.
When night came word was passed from patrol to patrol, and back again,and no definite report of the missing aviators.
An observer was secured from among the young officers in the camp, andStanislaws himself piloted one of the biplanes on the return journey tothe fortress.
Roque was immediately advised of the mysterious disappearance of histhree followers, and promptly indulged in some very emphatic commentsnot appropriate for parlor use.
"You must fly again in an hour," he raged, "and I'll be with you."
Stanislaws, though weary and nerve-strained through the exertions ofthe long flight just concluded and by the weight of anxiety, would notlisten to the offer of brother aviators to relieve him of the addedexertion of repeating such a journey without rest.
"I'm going back with him," he stoutly maintained--and he did.
At headquarters Roque took advantage of the first glimpse of daylightto institute work of inquiry, in which practice he was conceded tobe without equal. But to no avail. The furthest outpost had seen theriders pass, and, fully satisfied with their credentials, had paid nofurther attention to their movements.
Somewhere out on the boundless plain, alive or dead, were the three soearnestly and expertly sought for.
"It's a hard nut to crack," Roque stated to a group of officers, "butI have opened just such hulls before, and I am not ready yet to pleadinefficiency."
"Perhaps they have fallen into the hands of the enemy," said one of theofficers.
"I can hardly believe that an old campaigner like Schneider would runinto the lines of the foe with his eyes open. If suddenly attacked bylurking prowlers, I'll warrant we'll find some sign, for I know the mantoo well to believe he would be taken without a struggle and somebodybiting the dust."
Roque had evidently not figured on Schneider's present handicap in theshape of the boys, forcing discretion ahead of valor.
Then the winning thought flashed into the mind of the secret agent--putthe ambulance dogs on the trail!
The reminder was the approach of one of the sanitary officers. Thelatter, when he was told of the situation, at first presented adoubtful front.
"The heavy rains out there," said he, indicating the plain by asweeping movement, "have drowned the scent, even if we had a good leadfrom this point; but," he concluded, noting the disappointment in theface of Roque, "I do not mind making a try for it. Here, Blitz."
The splendid animal bounded to the side of his master, liftingexpressive eyes, and indulging in a series of short barks, showingreadiness to serve in the best dog language.
Hasten, dog, there is sore need for aid in a dark place of yonder seaof mud!
Schneider, Billy and Henri had not ventured from the ladder since theearly move after the meal-bag, which the first named had decided tokeep within reach, and save further wading to the shelf. The flood onthe floor showed no sign of receding--indeed, the trio had twice beencompelled within the hour to climb a little higher to escape the splashat their feet.
Schneider, anything for diversion, pounded on the trapdoor until hisknuckles were a bleeding mass, shouting until he was hoarse.
"What's the use?" he dully questioned, settling again into an attitudeof sullen indifference.
The boys set up a duet, but with discord so apparent, even tothemselves, that they quit the singing attempt as a matter ofself-defense.
This noise had hardly ceased, when Schneider poked his head around theladder support on the side of the light, with a hand hollowed behindhis ear.
"Jumping jingo; listen!"
They all heard at once the snuffing of a dog, and with the sight of itsblack head stuck into the bull's-eye window, Billy dropped into theflood, breast deep, and struck out for the wall, up which he swarmed,regardless of scrape or strain.
He had seen the ambulance dogs in camp, and knew of the breed andtheir doings. Holding onto the narrow ledge like grim death with onehand, he used the other and his teeth in tearing out the scarlet liningfrom his cap, which he twisted around the dog's collar band. Blitz--forBlitz it was--whined his receipt for the red token, backed from theaperture, and padded away like the wind.
Two hours later the trap was lifted, and the exhausted survivors ofthis desperate adventure were hauled into daylight, joyfully greetedby a goodly company, including Roque. Stanislaws, sanitary officers,pioneers, and last, but not least, Blitz, tugging at the line by whichhe led the rescue party to the scene of his original discovery.