CHAPTER XV.
CHASING A JACK-O'-LANTERN.
"I wish you could tell me we were nearly at that old village, Rob. Seemsto me we've been trudging along for hours, and I own up to feeling justa little bit tired."
Tubby had a beseeching way about him that was hard to resist; and so Robreally felt sorry that he could give him no joyful news.
"I would like to be able to tell in the worst way, Tubby," he told him,"but you see we're making this turn only on hearsay. None of us knows asingle thing about it. There must be some sort of a place ahead of us,because several times I've heard dogs barking, and I even thought Icould hear people calling."
"It's all right, Tubby," chimed in Merritt, "because there's a light,yes,--two, three of the same kind. We'll soon be there, and I hope we'llfind some sort of a bunk, even if we have to drop in the hay."
"That's what I say," the fat scout declared energetically, bracing up,now that it seemed the haven might be in sight. "I could sleep standingup, I believe, if only you braced me on the sides."
"I believe you," remarked Merritt; and Tubby hardly knew whether heought to demand an explanation of that insinuation or not; he finallyconcluded to change the subject.
They soon found they had arrived at another of those frequent littleBelgian hamlets where, in the past, thrift had held sway, but which wererapidly becoming demoralized under the pressure of the war fever. Mostof the men were serving the colors, of course, those remaining being thevery aged or crippled, the women, and always the flocks of children.
"Seems to me they're carrying on kind of queer here, as if somethingmight be going on," Merritt hazarded while they were approaching theborder of the place.
"Gingersnaps and popguns!" exclaimed Tubby, "I hope there isn't a bunchof those terrible Uhlans in town, smashing things, and threatening toburn every house unless the wine and the ransom money are brought out!"
"Let's go slow till we can make sure about that," suggested Rob.
Their recent unpleasant experience was so fresh in their minds that theydid not care to have it duplicated. The next time they might not be sofortunate about escaping from a burning inn, or avoiding capture at thehands of raiding Uhlans.
"I don't seem to glimpse any cavalrymen around, do you, Rob?" Merrittquestioned, as they hovered on the outskirts of the place, ready to meltaway in the darkness should any peril arise.
"No, and it's safe for us to push on," the patrol leader announced.
"But there are a raft of people around," ventured the cautious Tubby,who had been closely observing each and every soul, as though hesuspected that crafty Uhlans might be hidden under peasants' garb, orin the clothes of the stout Belgian dames.
"Well, a lot of them are fugitives, the same as those we've been seeingon the roads all day long," Rob explained. "Some of them have beenburned out of house and home; but in the main they're people who havebelieved all these awful fairy stories about the terrible Germans, andthink that if they stay they'll be eaten up."
"This place must have escaped a visit from the Germans so far," Merrittsuggested, "and they are coming to believe it's a lucky town, whichwould account for so many stopping here in their rush to get away."
"That's bad!" muttered Tubby.
"Why is it?" demanded Merritt.
"All the spare beds will be taken, you see," explained the otherdejectedly, "and those who come late, like we are doing, must sit up allnight, or else sleep in the dog kennel or the pigsty or the barn. Well,I said before and I mean it, if I can have some hay under me to keep mybones from the floor, I won't complain, or make a single kick. I'measily satisfied, you all know."
"That must be the village inn, over yonder, Rob," Merritt remarked,pointing as he spoke. "Judging from the crowd in front we've got a poorshow to get beds for to-night."
"Everybody stares at us as if they thought we might be some kind of wildanimal," Tubby complained.
"Well, I can see that they've had some sort of circus here latelybecause the showbills are still posted on the fences," Merritt observedwith a chuckle, "and can you blame them for thinking that the side showshave bust up, with the freaks hiking all through the country, unable toride on the railroads, which are all taken over by the Government tohaul cannon, horses and soldiers? I'll pass for the Living Skeleton,while you could stand for the Fat Boy, Tubby!"
Tubby was so used to having his friends joke at him on account of hischubby build that as a rule he let such reminders pass by withoutshowing any ill feeling. In this instance he hardly noticed what Merrittwas saying, because so many other events were happening around them.
Being satisfied at last that they were in no apparent danger fromconcealed Uhlans, Tubby felt his spirits rise once more.
At the inn Rob entered into a brief conversation with the proprietor. Asthis worthy knew very little French, and Rob next to nothing of Flemish,the "confab," as Tubby called it, had to be conducted mostly through aseries of shrugs and gestures.
"What luck, Rob?" asked Tubby, when the other chum turned to them again.
"He's cram full of sleepers to-night, and couldn't give us even a cot,"explained Rob. "When I said we'd put up with the hay, he gave me tounderstand we could pick out any place found unoccupied."
"Gee whiz! 'unoccupied,' you said, didn't you, Rob?" cried Tubbyhastily. "Now, does that mean the place is apt to be _swarming_ withthese peasant women and children, and shall we have to listen to babiesbawling all night long, not to speak of roosters crowing, dogs barking,horses neighing, pigs grunting and cows mooing?"
"'Beggars should never be choosers,' they say," Merritt warned him.
"And, after all, let's hope it won't be quite so bad as all that," saidRob.
They sought the stable. It was in the rear of the inn, and a ratherdecent looking structure in the bargain.
"Why, this isn't half bad," admitted Tubby, as they entered and foundthat the kind proprietor of the house had hung up a lighted lantern, bymeans of which it was possible for the boys to see the stack of hay.
"It smells like a sweet new crop," Rob remarked, glad to find somethingto commend when surrounded by such dismal prospects.
"And so far as I can see we're the only barn guests," Tubby announcedjubilantly as he started to burrow in the hay.
He had hardly made much progress before he came backing out in a hurry.
"There's a great big dog sleeping in there!" he declared excitedly.
"What makes you think so?" asked Rob, who could hardly believe itpossible.
"I tell you he tried to bite me," urged Tubby, holding up one finger ofhis right hand, and on which a tiny speck of blood was visible.
"Shucks! you only stuck it on a thorn, that's all!" protested theunbelieving Merritt, "and I'll prove it by crawling in the same hole."
"Look out, now!" warned Tubby, anxious, and yet with some eagerness, forhe hoped to have his words proved in a fashion even Merritt could notdoubt.
Immediately there was more or less excitement in the hay; and then camethe unmistakable scolding of a setting hen. Merritt backed out,laughing.
"There's your ferocious bulldog!" he told Tubby; "but we'll leave oldBiddy to her eggs, and try another place. Plenty of room in this hotelwithout chucking the other guests out of their nests."
After a while they made themselves comfortable. Tubby, before turningin, had prowled around a little. He told the others that as a true scouthe was only taking an inventory of his surroundings, so that if thereshould happen to come a sudden midnight alarm he at least would knowwhat to do in order to lead the way out of the barn by a rear exit.
"Smart boy, Tubby," Merritt told him, when he heard him say this; and italways pleased the fat scout to receive a word of praise, possiblybecause the occasions when he deserved any were few and far between.
They lay in the sweet hay, and talked in low tones. No one else seemedto be pushed so hard for a place to sleep as to come to the barn, forwhich all of the chums professed to be very grateful.
In the cou
rse of the conversation, which had more or less bearing ontheir strange mission abroad, the subject of the precious paper came tothe front. Perhaps it was Merritt himself who mentioned it, because thematter was frequently in his thoughts, and he seemed to be growing moreand more anxious, the nearer they drew to the place where he anticipatedfinding Steven Meredith.
"You've never really told us who this man is, Merritt, and how he comesto be wandering around the world with a paper belonging to yourgrandfather hidden away under the lining of the case containing hisfield-glasses," Rob remarked while Tubby, who had just been yawning, satup and seemed to be wide awake again.
"That's a fact, Merritt," he chimed in. "If you don't object, why, we'dlike to be told."
"The fact of the matter is," replied Merritt, "I don't know a great dealmore than you do, come to think of it. Grandfather Crawford comes fromold Scotch stock, so he's a canny sort of an old gentleman. No use of mytelling you about the way he treated my father when he was a young manand married against the wishes of his parents, because that you alreadyknow. It's about the paper, also of Steven Meredith you're curious tohear?"
"Yes, go along, please," begged Tubby.
"The paper is a little scrap, he told me, on which are marked certaindirections as how to find a certain rich gold mine out in our Southwestcountry. Grandfather has one-half his paper, and the other half islodged in the cover of that field-glass case--if the man is stillcarrying it with him."
"That gets more and more queer, I must say," grumbled Tubby, looking asthough he could not untangle the knot that was presented to him.
"Yes, if anybody had told it to me," admitted Merritt, "I'd have made upmy mind right away he was trying to pull the wool over my eyes with asilly yarn. And yet there was Grandfather Crawford just as sober as youever saw anyone, and vouching for every word of it as true."
"Well, how on earth did the half of the map or the directions happen toget in that field-glass case, without Steven Meredith, who carries thesame, knowing a thing about it?" asked Rob.
"This deposit was discovered by an old miner who never worked it, buthad samples of wonderfully rich ore, which he showed my grandfather atthe time he was rescued by my relative from being tortured by a coupleof halfbreeds who wanted to get the miner's secret. He gave grandfatherthe half of the map, and directions he had on his person, and told himwhere he would find the other half."
"Now it's beginning to look understandable," Tubby admitted. "The oldminer did that so if anybody got hold of him they wouldn't be able tolocate the secret mine--wasn't that it, Merritt?"
"Just what he had in mind," the other told him, "and of course theinjuries received in the fight carried the miner off eventually, leavingmy grandfather as his sole heir, if he could only lay hands on the otherhalf of that valuable little paper, for neither portion alone made anysense.
"Gee! this is getting real interesting--if true!" ventured Tubby.
"Oh! it's a straight yarn, never fear," retorted Merritt without anytrace of ill feeling, however, for no one ever could quarrel with Tubby."And just about here is where this man Steven Meredith, as he callshimself, breaks into the story. The old miner had told my grandfatherthat for security he kept the other half of the chart, and thedirections how to find the treasure, hidden in the lining of the caseholding a pair of field-glasses that he had carried for years, as theywere of a special make and considered extra fine."
"And when your esteemed relative came to make a hunt for the saidglasses," remarked Tubby, anxious to show that he was following thenarrative closely, "why of course he found that Steve had got away withthem--is that the stuff, Merritt?"
"Great head, Tubby," chuckled the other, as if amused at this unexpectedsmartness on the part of the stout boy. "You've said it, after afashion; for that was what really happened. The glasses were supposed,along with other things owned by the old miner, to be in the charge ofan old and invalid sister in a small town. To that place my grandfatherwent, armed with a paper which would give him possession of the traps ofthe dead man, including the case with the glasses. And that was where hecame up against a staggering disappointment.
"It seemed that this sister of the miner was a little queer in her head.When a visitor chanced to examine the glasses, and offered her a prettyfine sum for them, she, not knowing how her brother valued them becauseof their association with his prospecting life, thought it a goodchance to dispose of some useless property.
"And so the wonderful half of the chart was gone. My grandfather tookenough interest in the matter to learn that a man by the name of StevenMeredith possessed the glasses. He even started a search for him,thinking that he might be able to buy the glasses back, so as to satisfyhis mind about the worth of the chart.
"Later on he learned that some valuable ore had been struck in theregion where the secret mine of the dead prospector was said to belocated. This kept making him take more and more interest in the findingof Steven and the lost paper. He became absorbed in the hunt, and in theend had three men on the track.
"They traced Meredith across the ocean. All sorts of strange rumors cameback as to what he really was. Once it was even said that he wassecretly in the pay of the German Government. Anyway, he went to Berlin,and was known to meet with certain men high up in the Secret Servicethere.
"Just a little while ago my grandfather received positive word from oneof his agents that Steven Meredith was stationed in a Belgian town,though what his business there could be was a mystery. This little townwas an obscure one near Brussels, where he could keep in the background.Its name is Sempst; and that's where we are headed now."
"But just explain one queer thing, won't you, please, Merritt?" askedTubby.
"I know what you're going to say," replied the other. "Of course you'rewondering why my relative didn't wire his agent about the glasses, andoffer him a good sum to get them, with the case. Well, the fact is hedidn't have as much faith in his agents as all that."
"You mean that if the man knew he valued the article so much he wouldbegin to smell a rat, and perhaps examine the lining of the casehimself, after he had managed to steal or buy the glasses?" suggestedRob.
"That's what he had in mind," Merritt continued. "So he hardly knew whatto do, or whom to trust, until I asked him to send me, and let me haveyou along. They didn't like the idea of us boys starting over here whenthings were so upset; but grandfather believes Boy Scouts can do almostanything. So it came about. And in a nutshell that's the strange story."
"Gee! you'd think it a page from the _Arabian Nights_," Tubby declared."But queer things can happen to-day just as much as ever. I only hopethat if we do manage to rake in that old field-glass case, and the paperis still nestling underneath the lining, it doesn't turn out to be apipe dream--something that old miner just hatched up to make himselffeel he was as rich as a Vanderbilt."
"We'll have to chance that," said Rob. "Our part of the business will bedone when we carry the case back to Merritt's grandfather. It's up tohim for the rest. But don't you think we'd better try and get to sleep,for it's growing late?"
They determined that this was a wise suggestion, and shortly afterwardnot only Tubby and Merritt, but Rob as well had lost all realization oftrouble and stress in sound slumber.
The night passed, and with the coming of dawn the boys were astir.Nothing had apparently happened during the night to disturb them.
In the morning hens were beginning to cackle, and cows to low, as theboys awoke and crawled from the hay. A few minutes later, at a nearbypump, they washed the last bit of drowsiness from their eyes; afterwhich they began to think, from the pleasant odors in the air, that itwas nearly time for breakfast.
"I dreamed about that grand paper hunt you told us about, Merritt,"Tubby announced, as with his chums he sauntered over to the inn to seewhat chance there was for getting something to eat. "And talk to meabout your will-o'-the-wisps, or what they call jack-o'-lanterns, suchas flit around graveyards or damp places nights, that certainly did beatthe record. Lots o
f times I was just stretching out my hand to grab itwhen I'd hear a laugh, and Steve, he'd snatch the old field-glass caseaway. I woke up still on the trail, and as set as ever to win out."
"Let's hope that will prove to be the case with us," ventured Robcheerily.
They found that they were to be given breakfast; and as all of the boyshad a ferocious appetite they soon did justice to the meal set beforethem.
It was while they were finishing that they suddenly became aware of thefact that something along the line of a battle had broken out not agreat ways off. The first intimation they had of this was thedeep-throated sound of a heavy gun. It made them jump; and the entirevillage seemed to become aroused at once, as people began to run thisway and that, chattering like magpies, some of their faces turning whitewith apprehension of what was to come.
They had heard of the fate of Louvain, and dreaded the hour when theGerman army should come sweeping with irresistible force across thatsection of the country.
Quick on the heels of that opening gun came other sounds--the long rollof rifle firing in volleys, and the faint cheers of charging men. Theboys even fancied they could hear amidst all the confusion the loudsinging that was said to mark the advance of the German legions as theywent into battle chanting the "Watch on the Rhine." Rob could wellbelieve it, for he knew singing was to the Teuton mind what the bagpipesmeant to Scotch Highlanders, or cheers to American boys in khaki.
It was evident that the gallant little Belgian army, determined toresist to the uttermost the passage of the Germans across theirterritory in the direction of Antwerp and Ghent, had again given battleto overwhelming numbers.
Of course the boys had rushed out of the inn and immediately sought thebest position from which they could see something of what was going on.Many of the villagers were clustered there, gazing with deepest concernat the section where the smoke of battle was beginning to spread like apall over the country.
"Oh! what is that up there, and heading this way?" Tubby suddenlyexclaimed.
No sooner had Rob turned his gaze aloft than he was able to give thedesired information.
"That is one of the famous German Zeppelins, hovering over thebattlefield," he told Tubby.