The possibility of an untoward meeting at this point kept us on edge. If somebody from Ruhleben had accidentally entered our car, we intended to take no notice of it, unless he came to the front platform. What we should havedone in that case, I do not know. Our resourcefulness was, fortunately, not put to the test.
The front platform became fairly crowded. I succeeded in manœuvering Tynsdale into a corner, and planted myself in front of him, thus cutting him off from any likelihood of being spoken to by any of the passengers. Kent could take care of himself, better perhaps than I, for he was readier with his tongue. Half-way to Berlin, in front of West End Station, Charlottenburg, where eighteen months ago my railway journey had started, the track was blocked by a car which had broken down. It took half an hour to shunt it upon a siding and clear the line. We were not pressed for time, and remained in our places, almost the only passengers who did so.
Our immediate destination was the Wilhelms Platz in Berlin. From there we had to get to the Lehrter Station. Without local knowledge ourselves, we had gathered an idea of how to do it. Kent was to be guide and acting manager, but he kept consulting me, who was well content to follow.
Broadway at the most crowded hour of the day is hardly so packed as were, that night, the far wider streets of the German capital. It seemed as if the whole population of Berlin werewandering more or less aimlessly about. Two solid streams of people moved in opposite directions on the pavements, and spilled over the curb into the roadway. In a way, this was favorable to us. Except by accident, it would have been impossible to find us. On the other hand, it made it difficult for a party of three to proceed by tram or omnibus. At every stopping-place of these public conveyances a free fight seemed to be going on for the places inside them; not the rush we are accustomed to complain about in London, but a scramble in which brute force triumphed unchecked by any trivial regard for decent manners and the rights of others.
After we had alighted and threaded our way across the Wilhelms Platz, Kent found a station of the Underground.
“Take a first-class ticket for yourself. I’ll buy two,” were his instructions, whispered in German.
I bought a third-class one. I did not want to. I was merely too funky to ask for first-class. It meant the pronunciation of an extra word. I could have spoken it as correctly as any German, but suppose there was no first-class on the Underground! They’d get suspicious! It was very silly of me. Mistake No. 1.
Naturally, the third-class was crowded. It isnot the custom in Germany to be polite to the gentler sex. I knew it as well as anybody. But when an elderly woman, looking very tired, was clinging to a strap just in front of me, I was on my feet before I knew what I was doing. She declined the proffered seat in confusion. To repair my “break,” I hastily sat down again, my ears burning. Mistake No. 2. Kent looked daggers at me from the opposite seat, and as soon as he had a chance I got my wigging.
At the Leipziger Platz the throng was thicker, if anything. There was not the faintest chance of getting into a train.
“There are some droshkies down there,” said Kent, pulling my arm to attract my attention.
“Get one!” I answered curtly.
The marvelous thing was that the driver accepted us as fares. The luggage we were carrying, and our destination, Lehrter Bahnhof, did the trick, I believe.
The drive through the Sieges Allee, past the greater atrocity of the “Iron Hindenburg,” and farther through deserted residential streets, was splendid. We lit cigarettes, and I regained my coolness. I wanted it. Grimly I reflected that two mistakes were quite enough for one day.
We found the booking-hall of the Lehrter Station crowded at eleven o’clock. Kent and I deposited our luggage and took our places in the long queue in front of the booking-office.
“What time the eleven-forty-seven for Hanover to-night?” I asked a porter who was passing me.
“Twelve-forty-seven, but to-night only.”
We had almost two hours to get through, somehow and somewhere. Not at the station, that was certain.
“Follow Tynsdale and me. Keep as far in the rear as possible, and don’t lose us,” I told Kent.
The Lehrter Station is situated in the northwestern part of Berlin. There seemed no decent cafés near at hand in which we could spend the time and get a drink. As we were very thirsty, however, we found a low-class place not very far off in which we ordered a glass of beer each. When the waitress brought the drink she told us ungraciously that the café was going to be closed in a few minutes. Hastily we emptied our glasses, glad to get out of the place with as little delay as possible. Three German privates were eyeing us from a table close to ours much too attentively for our liking.
Outside, the previous formation was resumed. Sauntering very slowly along, I led back pastthe station again, along the river Spree, then through the empty streets of a residential neighborhood, and finally, by accident, into the Friedrich Strasse with its dense throng of people. On the way I kept up a semblance of conversation with Tynsdale. I would not go into a café again, so near closing time, thinking we were safest among the crowd, which was moving quite as leisurely as we were. Tynsdale was content to follow me, and Kent had no chance of pressing his objections.
More slowly, if possible, we sauntered back to the station, where we arrived with fifty minutes to spare. Having got our luggage, we spent the time in the waiting-room and restaurant, over beer, coffee, and lemonade. German cigarettes, bought at the counter, enabled us to enjoy a soothing smoke.
“Shall we go out on the platform now?” asked Kent twenty minutes before train time.
“No; wait,” I answered. Later I explained that, since our absence was presumably known in camp by that time, and since there was a chance that passports might be inspected at a terminus, I thought it would be better if we rushed to the platform as late-comers.
If I recollect rightly, Kent was to chaperon Tynsdale as far as Hanover. At the last moment I requested that he should come into my compartment. I should have been worried about my friends if I had traveled alone in comparative security, and was sure of feeling happier with Tynsdale by my side. Rightly or wrongly, I imagined I could take care of him just as well as Kent.
The train was a stopping one, and was crowded to the last seat when we tried to board it.
“Can we get into a first-class compartment?” I asked a busy official. “There is no room in the second.”
“Third and second only on this train,” he answered, and then shoved Tynsdale and me into an already crowded carriage, from which he ejected a soldier who had a third-class ticket.
“Sit down,” I said peremptorily to Tynsdale, who obeyed. I stood in the gangway, leaning against the window. Kent disappeared into another compartment.
Then we were off, past Ruhleben camp to Spandau as the first stop. It appeared a foregone conclusion that our absence was known in camp by now. We feared that the train might be searched in Spandau. I took some comfort from its crowded state. When another crush of people packed themselves into the little standingroom left, I blessed the scarcity of trains which caused the crowding. Information has since reached me that the camp authorities did not discover our escape until roll-call the next morning.
Within the next hour the compartment emptied, until we were left alone, but for a German N.C.O., who, fat as a pig, was breathing stertorously in his sleep. Tynsdale was slumbering behind his overcoat. I followed his example for short spells, the uneasy feeling that I had something or somebody to take care of following me into confused dreams.
At the Hanover main station our luggage went into the cloak-room and we ourselves into the waiting-room and restaurant to have a cup of coffee.
I knew Hanover fairly well, and was to conduct my friends to the Eilenriede, a huge public park encircling a quarter of the town. The greater part of it is really a densely timbered forest, where we could spend the morning, or part of it, in safety. Tynsdale and I in front, Kent in the rear, we wended our way thither, as much as possible through back streets.
It was a typical September morning, promising a hot day. The life of the town was beginning to stir: people were going to work, milkmen were making their rounds, a belated farmer’s cart rattled over the cobbles now and again; from the main thoroughfares came the buzzing of trolleys and the clanging of bells.
In the park Kent closed up, and we walked abreast for a time, talking freely in German. We felt tired, and finally sat down in a secluded spot, surrounded by thick timber and undergrowth. At long intervals early-morning ramblers passed us, solitary old gentlemen, and several couples who most decidedly felt no craving for further company, and consequently took more notice of us than the old gentlemen. Near by, two women were gathering wood and loading it into dilapidated “prams.” They were usually out of sight, but we heard them all the time, breaking the dry sticks into convenient lengths.
Gradually the sun sucked up the mists, but the haze of an autumn day remained. Slanting shafts of light struck through the foliage, which sent off scintillating reflections, where it moved in a very slight breeze, while its shadows seemed to dance merrily on the ground. A full chorus of birds warbled and twittered in praise of the warmth of the waning summer. The hum of insects was in the air. A butterfly winged past at intervals, and behind our seat a colony of ants was busily engaged.
The leaves had begun to fall. They covered the ground between the trees, but the branches themselves only showed the dark-green foliage of summer.
Our surroundings moved me intensely. I had not seen in this way a green thing in seventeen months of prison life. I had not been among green trees for over three years. The seat, hard as it was, was comfortable to our tired bodies. We felt lazy, and when we had discussed the night’s events, and outlined the next move, the talk languished. We were hungry, too. Two biscuits apiece and a rather generous allowance of chocolate tasted good.
Kent told us that he had immediately found a seat in the train, the night before. His compartment had emptied sooner than ours, and he had chatted through most of the journey with his only traveling companion, a lieutenant. I do not know how many lies he told him.
At ten o’clock we walked back to the town. The heat was oppressive by now. A circuitous route, to waste time, brought us into the main street, the Georg Strasse. In an arcade I entered a shop for sporting-equipment, leavingTynsdale to wait outside with Kent, and obtained two military water-bottles and an extremely shoddy knapsack at an exorbitant price. Kent bought cigars. A strong clasp-knife was added to my equipment. At a tram-crossing I inquired from a policeman about the cars to Hainholz. I intended to repeat the trick Wallace and I had made use of ten months before, and avoid leaving from the main station. It was too early to obtain a meal in a restaurant then—about eleven o’clock—so we went into the famous Kafé Kroepke, where we sat at different tables in the order of our entrance.
On the way back from the station, carrying our luggage and walking in the usual order, I caught sight of a very detective-like individual crossing the road toward us. He fell in behind Tynsdale and me, between us and Kent. As well as I could I watched him, but we did not seem to interest him. While we stood waiting for the tram, Kent closed up, and I nearly choked with rage. I thought his instructions, “Do as we do, but keep apart,” covered everything. Now he was asking me questions. But, after all, it was only leveling up the score of the previous night againstme.
At Hainholz I went to the ticket-window and asked for two second-class tickets to Bremen.Kent had asked for one ten minutes before, and had been told to wait.
“Are you two traveling together?” asked the booking clerk.
“No, no. I’m traveling with my friend,” and I waved an uncertain hand toward Tynsdale, who looked on with an impassive face from a seat behind us.
“Do I understand you to want a pass for two, and you,” turning to Kent, who was standing beside me, “for one?”
Kent signified his assent.
“I want two tickets to Bremen. Two!” said I.
“You see,” explained the man, “I have no tickets to Bremen in stock. I’ve got to write out passes for you. It’ll save work, if two are traveling together. I can make out a joint pass for two then.” Thank heaven it was nothing else!
We rushed to the platform only just in time—and waited for half an hour for the overdue train, another one of the parliamentary variety.
Tynsdale and I got the last two seats in a compartment occupied by a well-dressed and well-groomed man, four flappers with school-maps, and a very pretty woman.
I felt much relieved when the train started. Another part of our venture had come to an end! We had now left the direct route toward Holland, the route by which the authorities would expect us to travel. Cloppenburg, which was the ultimate objective of our railway journey, lay in a straight line not so many miles to the west of us. Yet we were going to spend another seven and a half hours in getting there, and had to change the direction of our flight twice.
It was, therefore, with considerable composure that I sat listening to the chatter of the flappers and the occasional snores of the man, and watching the landscape through the window.
It stretched flat to the horizon, dancing in the heat haze. Toward four o’clock, white clouds made their appearance in the azure sky, followed presently by gray ones. When we drew into Bremen Station, where we had to wait forty minutes for another train, due to start at half-past five, a heavy shower was drumming on the glass roof.
Our traveling companions remained with us all the way. About half an hour before we reached our destination, the pretty lady next to me began to make ready for her arrival. Her hair, an abundance of it, required a lot of patting and pulling about, which did not alter its appearance in any way to the male eye. She sat forward in her seat, and with her back straight and her arms raised, she assumed the captivating pose of a woman putting the last deft touches to her toilet. Although anxious not to appear rude, I tried to lose none of her movements, which were the more charming to me as I had not seen a woman of her class close to me for over three years. Her rounded, well-modeled arms and shoulders showed dimly through the thin blouse. Fortunately, she was half turning her back toward me and my companion, and we could gaze our fill.
“Wasn’t she pretty!” were Tynsdale’s first words in the station restaurant after four hours of silence.
“Wasn’t she!”
We were having a cup of coffee, sociably sitting together at the same table. I went out to buy the three tickets and have a wash. To my astonishment, there was real soap for use, not merely to look at as a curiosity, in the station lavatory. I made a remark about this extraordinary fact to the attendant, who told me quite frankly that he made it a point to have real soap, and that it was profitable for him to buy it ateighteen marks per pound in bulk. This implied illicit trading, and the outspokenness of his statement was illustrative of the general evasion of the strict trading laws and price limits.
The journey to Oldenburg, our next stopping-place, took half an hour only, but was the most trying part of our escape. We were on the main line to an important naval and air-ship center, Wilhelmshaven, and although we did not approach it within fifty miles, the fact never left my mind. Furthermore, the compartment Tynsdale and I were in was so crowded that we had at first to stand. As soon as a seat became vacant, Tynsdale slipped into it. It was next the window on the other side of the car, happily away from an inquisitive and extremely talkative individual, who, having been rebuffed by an officer and earned the hostile glare of a man in naval uniform, lapsed for a short time only into comparative silence. Before he opened his sluice-gates again, I had sat down beside Tynsdale, covertly watching the dangerous lunatic, as I called him, and sending up heartfelt prayers that my friend would stick to reading the book which he held in his hand as usual. He would not do so, however, but kept looking out of the window, giving an opportunity every time, Ifelt, for our conversational friend to open fire.
The scheduled thirty-five minutes would not come to an end. Even when my watch told me that they were past, the train still kept stopping at small stations and in the open country, and jogging on again after a short halt. My anxiety was great, but at last I had my reward when we arrived at Oldenburg.
What is it that makes one place feel “safe” and another menacing? In most cases it is difficult to explain. The comfortable assurance of security I had here, I put down to the absence of crowds in the station, and to the fact that a booking-office between the platforms permitted the purchase of new tickets without the necessity of passing through the gates with their hostile guard of soldiers. Eighteen months earlier the shutters in front of the windows of a similar intermediate office at Dortmund Station, had caused me to reflect that the authorities wanted to force all passengers to come under the scrutiny of the guard and the ever-present detectives. Now the face of the clerk on the other side of the glass appeared a good omen. We were not in Prussia, by the way, but in the Duchy of Oldenburg.
Our train was due to leave in twenty minutes from the time of our belated arrival. After ashort wait on the platform it was shunted in. We all three bundled into the same compartment, but took seats in different corners. We did not carry through very carefully this show of not belonging together, as nobody joined us. Kent bought two small baskets of fruit from a vendor who passed along the train, and we were sufficiently hungry to start munching their contents at once.
During the first part of this last stretch of an hour and a half we remained alone. Dusk was rapidly changing into total darkness. Soon it became impossible to distinguish the names of the feebly lighted stations. I checked them carefully from the open time-table beside me, lest we should alight too soon or too late.
At 8:30 we arrived at Cloppenburg. The first and probably the most dangerous part of our venture lay behind us.
My two companions had entrusted themselves to my leadership for the tramp to the frontier. My first business was to pilot them out of town from the right side, if possible, and, what was more difficult, by the most favorable road. I thought it, under the circumstances, about as hard a task as could be set me, at the very beginning. If so slight an undertaking as ours may be spoken of in military terms, I should compare it to a rearguard action and the successful withdrawal from touch with the enemy’s advance scouts.
It was a very dark night. Only occasional stars glimmered through the canopy of clouds. I knew nothing of the town, except what little information could be gleaned from a motor-map, scale 1 to 300,000. The time-table had taught us that we were to arrive at one station, and that a train was to start from another about half an hour later. A number of people were likely to change from the one to the other. To followthem, as if we were of the same mind, would give us a start off and carry us beyond the eyes of the railway officials. After that I should have to do the best I could, without the help of either a compass, which I could not consult, or the stars, which were not in evidence.
As long as we were likely to meet people the order of march was to be: I in the van, Tynsdale and Kent in the rear, as far behind as possible without losing touch.
Most of the people who had left the station with us kept on the same road, thus proving our calculation correct. We walked in their rear, I carrying the portmanteau, which rapidly grew heavy. Big trees lined the streets throughout; their shadows made it impossible to see more than a few steps ahead. I followed behind the other travelers more by sound than by sight. My companions had to keep within arm’s length of me. There seemed to be a maze of streets, and, trusting to luck, I turned into one of them. We found ourselves alone. At another corner, instinct bade me take a sharp turn to the right. Then the streets lost their character as such. Houses seemed to be irregularly dotted about on bare ground underneath towering trees. Again they drew together into a street, or a semblance of one. Here my friends closed up, and I gavethe leaden-weighted portmanteau to Kent. A furtive peep at the compass heartened me a little. It seemed as if open country appeared in front, but it was difficult to tell. Near a lamp, three girls passed us, arm in arm. Inquisitively they turned their heads.
The road ascended and curved, fields were on each side, the silhouette of a house in front; to the left, perhaps fifty yards away, the ragged outlines of a wood.
“We’re in the open,” I announced, “and on a favorable road, I think. Let’s go into that wood and pack our knapsacks. What time is it?”
“Ten minutes past nine,” answered Kent, who carried the luminous wrist-watch.
It was only a thin belt of trees in whose shelter we arranged our loads, and discarded the white collars and shirts we were wearing. From the southward came the barking of a dog and the noise of railway traffic. The dog was not far away. Whether it was because of his bark, or because of a light we saw, we sensed a house in the same direction, near enough to call for careful handling of our electric torches. It was not necessary to warn my friends. They were squatting cautiously close to the ground, never rising above a sitting posture, and screening the light with their bodies. It was I who received a mild rebuke from the very cautious Kent. I do not think my action deserved it, but I was so elated that its chastening effect was, perhaps, good. Not forgetting the fact that we had yet to pass two strongly guarded lines—the river Ems and the Dutch frontier—I felt, nevertheless, that our task was more than half accomplished.
When we had finished, I bade my friends lie down, one on each side of me, so that I might use the flashlight for a thorough scrutiny of the map. I recognized the road on our right without difficulty. It was a second-class one, and divided the angle between the two highroads. As to direction it was entirely favorable; as to safety it was preferable to a first-class highway. A brook was marked on the map as flowing across it not very far away, and this was of almost greater importance than anything else, for we had not been able to fill our water-bottles. We were thirsty, but not uncomfortably so as yet. My experiences had taught me the paramount necessity of always having sufficient water. How to get it began to occupy a great part of my thoughts from now on.
“It’s quite obvious,” I remarked.“We’ll follow this road through Vahren village. We’ll find water at about twelve o’clock. At about one-thirty we’ll turn at right angles into this road, which will lead us to water again, and then into the northern high-road.” I went in detail over the prospective night’s march. “And now,” I finished, putting map and torch into my pocket and getting up, “good luck to us! Come on. I’ll be in front till further orders.”
Once on the road, starting at a good pace, we turned our faces toward the west, toward Holland, and toward freedom.
When I recall the events of my first two escapes, I am astonished at the clearness with which every minute’s happenings are imprinted on my mind. I need only close my eyes to see the sights, hear the sounds, and, in a measure, be under the influence of the same emotions which I then experienced.
It is somewhat different with my recollections of this last escape. For the greater part they are as bright as they can be. But there are blurred patches in the pictures of my memory. A number of them seem wholly obliterated.
Soon after everything was over we wrote down the course of events. These notes and our maps are helping me now in my efforts to recall the next five days. But even at the timeof fixing our recollections with pencil and paper, while they were not yet a week old, our joint efforts proved inadequate in filling a blank of about six hours in the second night of our walk.
It was a glorious sensation to feel a road under our feet, and to have the open country about us. It was about the time of the new moon. The rain had ceased hours before, but the clouds were still obscuring the stars, and the night was exceedingly dark.
In due course the first village was indicated by a few scattered houses—the outposts, as it were. We slowed up.
A dense mass of black shadow lay in front of us. Not a light was to be seen anywhere. Slowly we advanced, until the faint outlines of a roof here and a gable there detached themselves from the overshadowing groups of enormous trees, which embowered the village completely in dimly seen masses of foliage. With stealthy steps, almost groping, we entered the blackness, which seemed to close behind us. Nothing broke the silence except the rattle of a chain once or twice, and the muffled lowing of a cow. By contrast it seemed light when we emerged into the open again.
“We ought to get to water in half an hour now. Look out for it. It’ll be a small stream. We might miss it,” I counseled. Kent was close behind me with Tynsdale.
Half an hour—three-quarters of an hour—but no water. Instead we entered another village, not marked on the map. Among the houses a road branched off to the north. I was awfully thirsty. My tongue lay heavy in my mouth.
“Let’s try to cut off that corner,” said I. “The other branch of the brook may exist in reality. I think this road will curve round to the northwest or west, and get us there quicker. It’s not marked on the map.”
My friends were always willing to follow my suggestion, and we tried it.
The road curved west, then west-by-south.
“Stop a moment! We had better go back to the old route. I don’t like this very much now.”
Again Tynsdale and Kent followed obediently.
This was the first instance of many in which I did not allow myself to be guided by my instinct, as I should have done if I had been alone. I felt so strongly my responsibility toward my friends that I disliked taking any move I could not fully explain by cold reasoning. Instinct is generally unreasonable. Besides, it does sometimes leadone astray. In our case it might compel us to walk across-country, and the cross-country stretches in this part of Germany looked forbidding on the map, being mostly marked as heather, moors, and swamps.
Having regained the former road, I discovered after a while that it was turning too much to the south. I was still musing about this when we entered a smooth, broad, first-class highway.
“Let’s rest for a spell,” I suggested.
We sat down, with our feet in the ditch, close to the trunk of one of the enormous trees lining the roadside.
“Do you know where we are?” asked Kent, after I had consulted the map and sat blinking again to accustom my eyes to the night.
“Of course I do,” I snorted irritably. “We’re on that beastly southern highway I wanted to avoid. I wish I hadn’t been such a fool as to abandon the other road. I don’t know how we got here. The map shows no connecting road down to here at all. The only damage done, as far as I can see, is that we have increased our distance from water. We can hit the by-road leading north, if we follow thechaussée. Oh, I’m thirsty! I’ll try a cigarette.” We all lit up.
Three abreast we started again.
“There’s a sign-post,” said Kent, whose eyes were exceptionally good.
“To Molbergen,” it read, pointing along a straight by-road at right angles to our direction.
“This is the one we are looking for,” I announced. “How do you feel, Tynsdale?”
“I can hardly keep my eyes open,” he made answer.
“Well, we’ll soon get water,” I said, to console him.
“I’ll walk ahead as a pace-maker,” suggested Kent.
“Good!” It appeared a splendid idea. “I’ll take the rear. Tynsdale had better follow you close, to get the benefit of your pace-making.”
Kent led with a swinging pace along the sandy, rutted road for an hour and a half. The country stretched flat on each hand, often broken by patches of forest. A telephone line on our left irritated me with the monotony of its ever-recurring, never-ending succession of poles. I had the old sensation of walking up-hill. We found no water. Then we came to the northern highway, into which we swung by a turn to the left.
By this time my tongue was sticky. I had the feeling of a crust having formed at the corners of my mouth. Neither Tynsdale nor Kent felt thirst so acutely. A little way down thechausséeI stopped.
“There is a house over there. I’ll see whether or not there’s a well. They must have a water-supply,” I remarked.
Tynsdale and Kent waited in the road at first, but soon followed me. The solitary building stood about fifty paces from it, and a well with windlass and protecting roof faced its western side. No pail was attached to the wire rope, but an old cast-iron pot lay on the ground beside the stone coping. This we tied to the end of the rope with pieces of string, and, turning the handle of the windlass cautiously, let it down. When it came up, filled with very cold, wonderful water, was there ever anything so delicious? We drank in turns, not once, but many times; then filled our water-bottles, and drank most of the remaining liquid.
We passed through another village in the course of the remaining hours. Behind it we came to a large brook, not marked on the map, which rushed gurgling underneath the stone bridge. I insisted upon another drink and a replenishment of our water-bottles.
“I can’t keep awake any longer,” complained Tynsdale a little later.
“I suppose we had better take a rest, then. Don’t you think so, Kent? We’ll just turn off the road and lie down underneath that hedge there. Only for half an hour, mind. We must find decent cover before dawn.” This was at half-past three.
We spread the oilskins as a ground-cloth and rolled ourselves into our overcoats. I wanted to keep awake, but fell asleep as promptly as the other two, not to awaken until an hour afterward.
“Get up, quick! No time to lose. Get up!” I aroused my friends. Not more than about half an hour was left us in which to find good cover. Already the air struck my cheek with the damp chill of dawn. It “smelled” morning.
We packed in haste, and hurried along the road. Once, and again, we turned into a by-road, which seemed to be leading toward a wood. But scattered trees near the horizon produce in the dark the impression of a forest, since only their outlines can be seen against the sky. We found each time that we had been lured into a fruitless quest.
The eastern horizon was graying when we came to a small spinney at a cross-roads.
“This will have to do,” I said, a little doubtfully.
Pressing toward the heart of the thicket, and using my torch to avoid stabbing branches, I discovered a noose in a bush for trapping birds. I showed it to my friends. “This doesn’t look like security, does it?”
In the densest part of the spinney we halted.
“Wait a few minutes, will you? I’ll see whether or not I can find something better near at hand.” With that I left them. I explored our immediate surroundings without success, located a house in the vicinity, and finally had some difficulty in finding my companions. When I thought I was near them I whistled softly, to be answered by Kent, not three feet away. My friends had prepared a camp, and I lay down by them on the oilskins. The two overcoats we spread over us, and the oilsilks on top. The knapsacks served as pillows, and almost in a moment we were asleep.
We woke up in full daylight, which revealed the scantiness of our cover. By merely raising our heads we could see people and vehicles pass along the roads, and the sound of voices and the creaking of wheels were at intervals very distinct all day. That it is very much more difficult to see into a thicket than from it, was a consolation with which we reassured ourselves repeatedly. I do not think the others felt any more nervous than did I, who thought we were safe as long as we kept our recumbent position. We hardly moved during the sixteen hours, I believe.
We ate our rations in two instalments and with interruptions slept a good deal. We never got as much sleep again in one day while in Germany. I doubt that we got as much until all was over.
Occasional gleams of sunshine during the morning became ever rarer as the afternoon wore on. Gray clouds threatened rain moredeterminedly as the day grew old, but a strong wind which was soughing in the branches overhead kept it off until evening, when it started with a small preparatory shower or two.
When the light began to fail, we packed up and sat about in our raincoats, talking in undertones and listening to the pat-pat-pat of occasional drops among the leaves. The roads had become deserted as darkness fell.
At 9:30 we started our second night’s progress.
Two considerations had determined my theoretical choice of route for the night. One was the desirability of keeping well to the north of an artillery practice ground on the hither side of the river Ems, the other the question of water.
In order to carry my intentions into effect, we intended to leave the first-class highway for a communication road which was to branch off in a village about an hour’s walk ahead. It was to lead in a tolerably straight line across a desolate stretch of country of no small dimensions.
Soon after our start, the drizzle of rain turned into a regular downpour which drummed noisily on oilskins and hats. A sign-post with the distance from Cloppenburg gave us our exact position, and enabled us to calculate the extentof ground covered on the previous night. We made it 28 kilometers (17½ miles).
Again we looked in vain for the brook which we had expected to find during the first hour. The water we carried was getting low, and I was anxious to have the bottles full again, and to get a good drink. In the first village we came to, the gurgling of a rain-spout was too tempting, and in spite of the protests of my friends I drank copiously and filled my bottle, whereupon they followed my example. It was just as well that they did so, for more than twenty-four hours were to elapse before we had another, and less enjoyable, opportunity of slaking our thirst with more than a mouthful at a time from our bottles, which was all we permitted ourselves between sources.
To our very circumscribed vision, the village, and all those we had passed through so far, and would have to traverse yet, were of the same type. At night their streets, ill defined among the loosely scattered farm buildings, were wrapped in impenetrable blackness, and both safe and difficult for men in our position to follow. Two steps to one side, and one’s companions were lost to sight. To distinguish between the road and a by-lane leading nowhere was frequently impossible, without the help of theswiftly stabbing, instantly extinguished cone of light from our torches.
In this and the next village we came to I would not risk taking any of the likely-looking by-roads, without some extra assurance, such as a sign-post would have given me, of finding the right turning. Sign-posts were conspicuous by their absence. During the whole night we found only two, neither of them any good for the purpose in hand, and they were the last we saw for the rest of the journey.
Consequently we continued on the first-class highway, which was easy to follow, until it joined the southern road again in the village of Werfte. This was about half-past one in the morning.
The high-road from now on continued due west through flat, monotonous, and swampy country. As fast as we could we pushed along, Kent making pace with his usual swinging gait, hour after hour. For our objective we had two small lakes, shown on the map as touching the road on its northern side. They were to supply us with water before we went into hiding. Close behind them, a single third-class road, impossible to mistake, was to start us north on the third evening on our quest for our proper latitude, and in avoidance of the northern end ofthe artillery ground, by this time not more than eight or nine miles in front of us.
The second sign-post we saw that night not long before dawn enabled us to fix our position with accuracy, but a little later we came to the conclusion that our maps had played us false again. The lakes were nowhere in sight, though we ought to have passed or reached them. Since we had left Werfte the track of the steam-tram had accompanied the road on our right, and a screen of bushes and woods had interfered with our view to the north. Now we burst through them, bent on finding a hiding-place away from the road.
“There’s the lake!” shouted Kent, pointing over the black expanse to where, like a shield of dull silver, the surface of the water glimmered three quarters of a mile to the north-northeast. It was too late to approach it then. To the north of us, a small thicket, looking as usual many times its actual size, invited us to rest. We advanced toward it over springy, heather-covered ground and across several wire fences.
On the banks of a deep ditch, scantily sheltered by bushes, young trees, some furze and heather, we made camp. It was a fairly safe place, for the reason that, as we saw later, there was no house within a third of a mile—at themoment we thought there was no dwelling within several miles—nor any tilled land.
Our resting-place on the bank of the ditch had been selected from the standpoint of concealment only. It was most uncomfortable to lie on. Before the sun had cleared the horizon, we were awake again.
The rain had ceased after midnight, and now a boisterous wind was dispersing the last clouds which hurried across the sky from the northeast, tinted rosily on their under side. The air was extraordinarily clear. Its refreshing coolness quickly drove the last cloying remnants of sleep from our brains. The sun rose. Far away, to the east, the church spire of Werfte stood sharply defined above the smudge of green which indicated the village.
I crept away from my friends during the morning to glean some information, if possible, by a look from the other side of the thicket, toward the west. The pale blue of the sky above, speckled by hurrying clouds, the flat rim of the sky-line, broken by two distant villages, the line of the road by which we had come, continuing toward the large village of Soegel, and a solitary farm, seven hundred yards away, made up the landscape. While I lay watching behind afurze bush a country cart crept across my circle of vision. Between me and the invisible road a number of cattle sounded unmelodius bells with every hasty movement of their heads.
“We needn’t look for the road to-night. It’s there, to the west,” I announced, rejoining my friends. “We can break camp early and get water as soon as dusk is setting in. After that we’ll go northwesterly across country, turn north on the road,” etc. I outlined the next night’s march. Our plans were very elaborate, but came to naught.
“All right,” my companions nodded assent. “Now have something to eat.” They were munching away at their rations. For a time we chatted in excellent spirits.
“There is a much better place to lie in just behind us. It looks safe enough,” suggested Tynsdale, worming his way back to us through the bushes after a short absence.
“Yes; let’s shift! I saw it, too,” seconded Kent.
So we shifted, and soon lay comfortably ensconced in the lee of some bushes. Here we were bothered by mosquitoes, for the air was still, but we felt warm, and managed to snatch some sleep during the remainder of the day.
At 8:30P.M.we were plodding through theheather toward the lake, which glimmered at the bottom of a shallow depression. We were licking our lips in anticipation of the drink we were going to have. Two hundred yards from the shore the ground became marshy, then a quagmire. We strung out in line abreast in order to find a firm path to the water’s edge, but had to desist in the face of impossibilities.
Rain had been threatening for the last four hours, but was still holding off, when we got on to the road, and proceeded north. We had walked steadily for an hour or so. The night was pitch-dark. Black and flat swamp-land extended all round to the indistinct horizon. Here and there the lighter streaks of ditches, full of foul, stagnant water, were ruled across the black expanse. The wires of a telephone line on our right hummed in the wind.
We were walking as best we could—I a little in front on the right, Tynsdale on the other side of the road, Kent almost treading on my heels. The ribbon of turf underneath my feet seemed fairly broad.
A sudden splash behind me caused me to stop and whirl round. A white face at my feet heaved itself, as it seemed, out of the ground, and Kent scrambled back on to the road, squirting water from every seam.
“Didyouknow you were walking within half an inch of a ditch? How is ityoudidn’t fall in?” he demanded savagely of me.
“Are you hurt?” I counter-questioned anxiously.
“Not a bit! The water was just deep enough to cover me entirely, except my knapsack. That seems dry,” he answered, feeling himself all over. “I’ve lost my hat, though.”
“Anything else?”
“No, I don’t think so. Never mind the old hat. I hardly ever wear it.”
“Come on, then! Keep moving, or you’ll catch a chill.”
After about one hour and a half, during which a number of paths had demonstrated the unreliability of our maps in this locality, none of them being marked, a cart road on our left proved too much of a temptation for me.
“Are you fellows game,” I asked, “to follow me over uncharted ground? I feel certain I can do better by compass alone, and probably save us several miles.”
“Don’t make speeches, old man; get along. We’ll follow.”
I was fortunate in being able to justify this move. Three quarters of an hour afterward we struck a highway a mile in front of the village of Spahn, our nearest objective. Pleased with myself, I announced a clear gain of about three miles. Here we took it easy for about twenty minutes, sitting in the road, with our feet in the ditch. Kent and Tynsdale had a draft from the brandy flask, and we all had something to eat.
“This is the fifth shrine we’ve seen since Monday night. I always thought northern Germany was entirely Protestant,” Kent remarked when our scouting for water at the entrance of a settlement had led us around the structure.
“We’d much prefer a well, anyway,” was our unanimous opinion.
We simply had to have water. After searching among the houses we finally found a rain-tub half full of it. It contained a fair number of insect larvæ, to judge from the tiny, soft bodies passing over our tongues while we drank, but we continued our march with heavy water-bottles.
The name of the village, in black letters on a white board, dispelled any possible doubt as to our position. A white post close to this sign elicited my angry comment:
“I’d like to know how many of these beastly poles with the direction boards missing we’ve seen so far! Do the Boches think they can make it more difficult for an invading army or something, by knocking their sign-posts to pieces?”
For the next hour and a half our way lay through dense forest. The straight, very wide clearing which served as a road was ankle-deep in sand. As it yielded and gave way under the backward pressure of our hurrying feet, it produced the nightmarish sensation of striving hopelessly in a breathless flight against a retarding force. Thousands of fireflies dotted the roadside with points of greenish light, or drew curves of phosphorescence in the air. A heavy shower urged us to assume the sweltering protection of our raincoats. Several times I checked the direction of the road at its beginning, and even borrowed Tynsdale’s compass for the purpose, as the needle of mine seemed to move sluggishly, but I noticed nothing wrong.
The next village, which we entered soon after midnight, looked quite different from what we had expected. It was of considerable size. The streets were in darkness, although electric street lamps were installed. But the yellow squares of numerous lighted windows told of many inhabitants not yet in bed. Near the church we turned into a road on our right.Among the last houses I checked the road’s direction.
“It isn’t the road we want,” was my conclusion. “Leading too directly north. We’d better go back and look for the right one. What d’you think?”
“D’you think it safe?”
“Well, we haven’t much time to spare. But the streets are dark enough. We might risk it.”
Again we passed in front of the church. In what looked like the vicarage at one side, three large windows lit the road in front. A shadow passed over the blinds. A door banged. Hurriedly we dived into the shadow farther on. The footfalls of a single man sounded behind us, ominously determined it seemed. It was too dark to see more than three or four yards, but we were sincerely glad when the sound was gradually left behind and we found ourselves in the open country on a sort of cart track.
“This isn’t the road, either. Too far west this time,” was my conclusion. “The former road is the better of the two. We’ll strike back to it across-country.”
We did so in twenty minutes’ work over fields. It soon began to tally better with thedirection on the map. Two hours through firefly infested forest saw us enter another village, as dark and as safe as any we had yet passed through. At its farther end we stopped.
“We’ve simply got to see whether we can’t get more water,” I said. “I don’t really know where we are. I expect it will be all right, but I do not know how long it will take us to find a brook. These farms must have a water-supply somewhere. Just wait at the corner here. I’ll go scouting. If anything happens to me, I’ll make enough noise to let you know of it. Then you can scoot out of the village and wait for me a reasonable time somewhere along the road.” And I left them protesting mildly.
Across a manure-littered farmyard I splashed stealthily into a sort of kitchen-garden, as it turned out. Standing there I used my flashlight once for a look round. From behind me, right over my head and in easy reach, stretched the large branch of a tree, bending under a heavy load of apples. The first I touched remained in my hand at once, which showed them to be ripe. I crammed my pockets and filled my hat. I got almost thirty. Then I joined my companions, who were getting impatient and anxious. It never occurred to me to send Tynsdale and Kent to get their quota, nor did theythink of suggesting it. I am still regretting the omission. We divided the spoils, and sank our teeth into the hard, juicy, sweet flesh of the fruit which had tempted the Mother of us all.
At the end of the village a broken sign-board lay in the ditch: “Village of Wahn, Borough of ——, District of ——,” etc. With a sinking heart I fumbled for my map.
“Form round and let’s have a look,” I said. “Here we are! I’m beastly sorry; I’ve been a fool! We took the wrong road at Spahn. That big village was Soegel, not Werpeloh, as I thought. No wonder we were puzzled. No wonder I almost got us into a hopeless mess. Fortunately we are clear now, and, but for water, better off, if anything, than on our proper route. Let’s be traveling now, and see whether we can make Kluse. It’s a little over six miles.”
The mistake was a very bitter pill for me to swallow. The fact that no harm had come of it was little consolation. One simply must not make mistakes on an escape.
Forest and swamp-land, telegraph-poles and fireflies, and drumming showers of rain, and we were, oh, so tired!
At 3:45 a very large, solitary building on our right lured me toward it in search of the precious liquid. It was an enormous sheep stable, the packed occupants of which set up a terrified bleating when the ray of my torch struck accidentally through a hole in the wall. A motion to get into the loft for a good day’s sleep was negatived on Kent’s determined opposition, as too dangerous.
Half an hour later we dragged ourselves into a thick pine copse, pitched camp in impenetrable darkness, moistened our lips with some vapid rain-water, and fell asleep.
It was still dark when I opened my eyes. A steady sound was all around me, and close at hand a more definite one: Tap-tap-tap-tap. I was only half awake.
I stretched out my hand and put it into a pool of water which had formed on the oilsilk covering us. It was raining heaven’s hardest.
Half an hour of disjointed thinking brought me to the conclusion that we had better do something. As yet the overcoats underneath the oilsilks were hardly wet. The first gray light of dawn was beginning to filter through the close-standing trees.
“Wake up! Wake up! It’s raining,” I called. “We’ll get soaked, and we don’t want to carry an extra thirty pounds of water on our backs.”
I got on my feet. With the heavy clasp-knife bought in Hanover I lopped off the branches just over our heads and stretched an awning of oilsilks three feet above the ground, attemptingineffectually to make them shed the water over the edge of the shelter, instead of letting it accumulate on us. For a time it was all right; then the rain ceased.
By now the light showed that we had camped far too near the road for proper concealment. But the awning had found approval in the eyes of my friends, and I felt such pride in the contrivance that I hesitated to advise moving camp farther into the thicket. Instead, I set to work to camouflage it with a screen of branches and young trees, which I cut off and stuck in the ground. I got myself much wetter by doing all this than if I had taken things quietly. So did Tynsdale, who was infected by my passion for work.
When a cart creaked along the road, its wheels plainly visible from our hiding-place, we resolved to move. In the heart of the thicket the trees were much smaller—only a little taller than ourselves—and more widely spaced. This and the open sky above us gave us a sensation of freedom and fresh air. I constructed another shelter. Occasional showers during the morning filled the sagging places of the awning with water, and this we drank in spite of the bitter taste imparted to it by the oiled fabric.
Sleep, even in the intervals between theshowers, was almost out of the question. With the day, thousands of mosquitoes had come to life among the grasses covering the ground. They rose in clouds wherever we went, and attacked the rash beings who unexpectedly had penetrated into their fastness. Soon our hands and faces were red and swollen with their bites.
About noon the last clouds disappeared. The sun began to pour down from a deep blue sky, its rays falling hot and scorching into the windless space between the trees. We divested ourselves of our wet upper garments, and spread them on the firs around us to dry in the sun.
The only sounds that came to us were the occasional tooting of a tug on the river Ems, now not more than three miles to the west. The rarer and nearer shriek of a railway engine on a line parallel to its bank interrupted every now and again the zzzz-ping, zzzz-ping, of the hovering mosquitoes. A dog barked near by. A slow cart rolled and creaked past the copse.
The road in front of the thicket was converging toward the railway, which it met three to four miles to the north of us at the village and station of Kluse, a little more than two miles to the east of Steinbild and the river Ems. Two and a half miles to the north of this last villagea wood was indicated on the map. This was our next objective.
From information received, we supposed the Ems to be strongly guarded by sentries and patrols. The five-mile-wide ribbon of country between its western bank and the Dutch frontier wasSperrgebiet(closed territory). Nobody was allowed to enter it except by special military permit. A day’s observation from the shelter of the forest was to show us how best to cross the river—whether we could swim it, with or without luggage, and if necessary, to permit the construction of a small raft to ferry the latter across. Perhaps we could steal a boat!
Near the station of Kluse we intended to cross the railway line, sneak through the village, and then walk across-country to the river and the forest.
Dusk found us behind some bushes by the deserted roadside, awaiting the night.
We started early, walking slowly at first, to squander time. As darkness thickened, we increased our pace. But it is difficult to speed up when one has started slowly. Perhaps the village and station were farther away than we thought. Anyhow, it seemed an age before we caught sight of the first signal-lights on the railway. As during the previous night, the road lay through perfectly flat, desolate swamp land, crossed by ditches of stagnant water. A wood accompanied us on our right for some time. The stars were occasionally obscured by drifting clouds.
Suddenly we saw a cluster of red signal-lights over the dim shape of a signal bridge, the lighted station building a hundred yards beyond, and a level crossing turning out of our road at right angles. “This is it,” I said.
We stepped across the metals. Just beyond them, a small building on our left, its windows lighted, cast a glimmer over the road. Apprehensively glancing round I passed into the deep shadow of the avenue beyond it.
A little later we were standing on a bridge in the small village. A considerable brook rushed gurgling underneath.
“When we passed that house,” Tynsdale said casually, “a large dog of the police type came after me. I was walking last, you know. The brute pushed his nose into the back of my knee and turned away without a sound!”
We had a good drink at the brook, then proceeded along the cut-up road, tree-lined and dark. In a likely spot, perhaps five hundredyards behind the village, I stopped. “Here’s where our cross-country work starts; keep close behind.”
As nearly as possible we proceeded in a northwesterly direction. The going was bad. The country was divided by wire fences, deep ditches and hedges, into small fields, most of them swampy meadows. Half the time we waded through water over the tops of our shoes. This continued for an indefinite period, and terminated when we reached a road where it curved from a northerly direction toward the southwest. Here I had what proved to be an inspiration.
I had seen the beginning of the road marked on the map farther north. On paper it terminated nowhere. Actually it was here, in a spot where it ought not to be. Its deeply rutted surface showed that it was frequently used. The village of Steinbild, to the south of us now, was obviously its destination.
I explained to my companions:“I’m as certain as I can be that this road enters Steinbild close to the water’s edge and avoids the main street. The curve seems to show that. I’d like to follow it. To lie in the woods, away from anywhere, and watch the river, may not gain us anything. In the village we may find a boat. We’ve any amount of time, anyway, and can always come back. It’ll not be so very dangerous, with due caution, if the place is as dark as the villages we have seen so far. Will you chance it and follow me?”
“We’ll follow wherever you lead,” said Kent heartily. Tynsdale’s nod I took for granted; I couldn’t see it.
In a quarter of an hour we were among scattered houses. Again, five minutes later, we stood in the shadow of tremendous trees, in such darkness that we were aware of one another’s presence only from the sound of breathing and small movements.
In front of us the mirage of a few stars danced uncertainly on the smooth surface of a fairly wide river. A fish splashed noisily while we stood listening for suspicious sounds.
We moved carefully along the river path, upstream, to the south. The trees continued in unbroken, stately procession. A barge of the large German steel type lay half-way toward midstream. A boat was tied to its stern. Something, I forget now what it was, made us go on—I have a dim recollection of a light in its cabin. Another barge, with a boat by her side, loomed up, riding high on the water and without cargo, opposite a tiny pier of earth, which endedperhaps twenty yards from the boat. In a house, some distance farther up, one lighted window winked in the night.
We were standing on the pier.
“Who’s to get that boat?” asked Tynsdale.
“Draw lots for it,” I suggested. The shortest piece of match remained in my hand. Off came my knapsack.
“Going in all standing?” inquired Kent.
“No fear; nothing like doing things comfortably. Get out that towel, will you, and be ready.”
My clothes were off. Cautiously I slipped into the water. I remember distinctly, even at this moment, that my toes gripped the sticks forming the foundation of the pier. The bank fell vertically beyond my depth. Bracing myself against the cold shock, I pushed off, to be taken into a delicious tepid embrace by the kindly river. Two long strokes. I paused to feel the current. There was none. Three more. The boat loomed above me. Shooting up, I caught the gunwale at the stern with the tip of my fingers. “Bump, bump, bump,” went the bows against the lighter’s side in feeble movement. “Bump, bump, bump.” I had drawn myself up, and clambered in. “Bump.” I stood in the bows, fumbling withthe painter, which was big enough to serve a young White Star liner for a hawser. “Bump.” The gap between lighter and boat widened as I shoved off carefully.
I grabbed at a pole lying in the bottom of the boat. The water proved too deep for punting, so I used it as a paddle, standing on a forward thwart.
The boat was an enormously clumsy affair. Tynsdale snatched at the painter when the bows touched the pier. “Get into your things, we’ll do the rest.”
“Here’s the brandy.” Kent solicitously handed me the flask. I didn’t need it, but thought I deserved a pull.
When I was dressed, I joined my friends, and we put our things into the boat. Tynsdale, who had grown up among shipping, had swung her round, so that her nose pointed downstream. We clambered in.
Kent and I were sitting in the bow when he pushed off, and started to propel us across the river in proper waterman’s style with an oar he had found in the bottom of the boat. Silently working it over the stern, he guided her round the counter of the barge, underneath the wire cable which connected the latter with the one lower down, and out into the placid stream.
Not a word was spoken after we got clear. The large bulk of the empty barge dwindled as the strip of water widened between us. The trees on the bank we had left grew smaller, a trembling line of light glimmered on the surface of the river from the winking window of the cottage. Then the other bank grew distinct and high. The boat’s nose swung upstream and touched. I am not quite sure who was ashore first, Kent or I, but I am certain I had the painter.
“Don’t let her drift,” Tynsdale whispered from his quarter-deck, when I had scrambled ashore. “Belay somewhere, if you can.” We found a post with an iron ring on top, almost embedded in the ground, and made fast. Our knapsacks were put ashore. Tynsdale left last, as befitted the captain.
“Leave her there,” he counseled. “If we let her drift and get caught, we’ll be charged with stealing her. They may not trouble to investigate if they find her here.”
Hurriedly we retired among some bushes which dotted the hollows along the river bank.
“Council of war,” I suggested in high glee. “What’s to be done now? What time, Kent?”
“Twelve-forty-five.”
“What are your opinions? Are we to try to cross the frontier to-night or not?”
“To-night, by all means to-night!” urged Tynsdale. We were all very much excited, of course.
“Time’s getting short! Wait until to-morrow night!” counseled cautious Kent.
The decision rested with me.
“Timeisgetting rather short, but we might do it. Question is, can we find cover if we don’t? It must be good, to serve its purpose in the Sperrgebiet. I think we ought to dump everything we can spare, and go forward as fast as possible. We can always alter our minds, until after we get on to the morass.”
“Good!” grunted Tynsdale.
“As you wish,” Kent gave way gracefully.
“Then hurry!” I instructed.
Feverishly we went through our impedimenta, thrust the remainder of our biscuits, escapers’ shortbread, chocolate, and such indispensable things as were not already there, into our pockets, and shoved rucksacks, overcoats, raincoats, and everything else underneath the bushes.
I knew the map too well to want to look at it long. Had we not spent days studying thestretch in front of us, often with the help of magnifying glasses?
“What time, Kent?”
“One o’clock.”
“Give me exactly half an hour.”
Relieved of about thirty pounds in weight, I set the fastest pace in my power downstream, along the river bank. I hoped to find a path there, which was to take us to the “jumping-off place” to the north of us, where I intended to get to the swamp. The path was there. The going was easy, and comparatively safe. Bushes dotted the banks and gave continuous shelter.
It cannot be denied that our procedure was risky. We took it for granted that we should not meet any sentries along the river, in spite of our information to the contrary. But slow and careful going seemed equally risky at the time. Only speed could help us across the frontier that night.
My decision in favor of trying to bring our venture to an immediate conclusion was wrong. I ought to have seen that it was more than likely that we should find cover along the river. Yet—I don’t know.
“The half-hour is over,” said Kent.
The river was flowing placidly on our right,swirling softly. Straight across from us a back-water lost itself between tall reeds. This was the spot I had hoped to reach. We filled our water-bottles and drank. Then I slid down the bank, raised here above the surrounding country, and started due west, followed by my companions. Passing a few yards of scattered bushes, with rank grass between them, I plunged into a dense thicket of oak saplings. Pushing and straining, I worked on, in order to get through what I imagined to be a narrow belt. It would not come to an end, but grew thicker instead, finally making progress impossible. In the light of the torch the small trees stood impenetrably close.