CHAPTER XXXIIMR. BOA AGAIN
It was one of the most rapid motion-picture affairs ever staged in real or cinematic life. What film enthusiast would not have given every other opportunity he might hope for in after years for this one?
The Yanks and the poilus poured out of those buildings like an army—at least so it must have seemed to their astonished foes. All of them were armed with rifles, most of which had been picked up on the battlefield, and were well drilled and officered, for Phil had looked after this important factor while they were in hiding.
Far more rapidly than the narrative can be told, they charged in squads, routing out stronghold after stronghold, gun nest after gun nest. The boches did not know what to make of it, and their panic grew like a prairie fire. They had no way to tell how many they had to face or from what source they had sprung. The situation was almost ghostly in its aspect of mystery. Consternation presently seized the entire enemy force in this section and thehelter-skelter race that followed in a mad effort to escape from something like a phantom foe sprung suddenly out of the ground was laughable in spite of the carnage with which it was associated.
Near the end of the fight Phil found himself face to face with a ponderous antagonist whom he was not slow to recognize. He cornered the fellow in a street from which exit was blocked, or greatly impeded, by heaps of debris. Mr. Boche then turned, at bay, with clubbed gun, missed his swing, the weapon flew out of his hands and Phil had the late commander of the “underwear squad” of Belleau Wood at his mercy. It was “Mr. Boaconstrictor” of the large girth, “Count Topoff,” the so-called “general in disguise,” who wore the insignia of a Prussian second lieutenant.
“You’d better surrender,” Phil advised with a grim grin. “My bayonet maybe wouldn’t reach clear through you, and your royal family would be forever disgraced.”
Undoubtedly Phil would have succeeded in making a prisoner of his antagonist if one of those fortunes, or misfortunes, of war that always are beyond the control of even the most heroic had not intervened. A pillar-like remnant of a brick wall about fifteen feet away, probably shaken by some flying missile of thefight, toppled over, and a shower of masonry struck Phil on the head.
If it had not been for the helmet he had picked up several days before and preserved for such an occasion as this, he probably would have been seriously, if not fatally, injured. But in spite of the protection, the shock was sufficient to knock him over. Still he was not utterly incapacitated for further action, and he staggered to his feet, gripping his gun and attempting to recover his battling equilibrium.
But he was dazed, and his every effort was a wavering struggle. He saw his recent antagonist bearing down upon him and tried his best to steel himself for the meeting, but although armed and his assailant unarmed, his chances were hopeless. He was like a drunken man attempting to stab a piece of cheese with a table-fork.
“Mr. Boa,” the titled boche, brushed the bayonet aside like a reed in his path and gripped the boy’s left arm with his powerful right hand. In spite of his odd proportions, the fellow evidently had his share of physical strength. Phil tried to twist himself loose, but his efforts were of no avail. He must recover from the effects of the shock of the fallen masonry before he could hope to resist an assailant of half his ordinary strength.
“Count Topoff” held the boy with one hand, and with the other wrenched away his gun. This was rendered the more easy of performance by a feeling of nausea that seized Phil and took away most of his remaining strength.
“Methinks that we have met before this time.”
If Phil had not been in his present condition of physical weakness, undoubtedly he would have observed with interest this evidence of a knowledge of English on the part of his captor. But it did occur to him with a sort of hazy giddiness that undoubtedly the fellow had understood his comment on the insufficient length of a bayonet to reach through the diameter of his girth. He was in just the condition of mind on the moment to face death with a sense of sickly humor.
“I suppose he’ll be taking a short cut measurement of my girth with a bayonet pretty soon if I don’t come to pretty quick,” was one of the ideas that whirled through the boy’s mind like a buzz-saw. “But he’s disposed to play with me a little, I take it from the kind of English he uses. Or is it because he got his knowledge of English by the study of stilted poetry at Heidelberg?”
“You played a nice trick on me and some of my comrades at Belleau Wood, didn’t you?”the boche of odd proportions continued. “Now what do you think I ought to do with you?”
“You ought to be very careful what you do,” Phil replied with a fair degree of energy, for the nausea was leaving him, although a severe headache was setting in. “Remember that you are surrounded now by my friends and if you take advantage of your temporary power over me, they’ll see to it that I’m fully avenged.”
“Oh, that isn’t bothering me,” returned “Count Topoff” with a wave of disgust. “What I’m thinking about is this: I can kill you very easily right now with your own bayonet. But suppose I spare your life—will you help me to escape?”
“How can I help you escape?” Phil inquired wonderingly. “I wouldn’t have charge of you as a prisoner. I don’t want to promise to help you, and then fall down on my promise.”
“Oh, I’ll figure out a way, never fear,” was the “count’s” answer. “All I want is your promise—but, hello, maybe I won’t need your help if I can hail this passing ship. Come on, I’m going to kidnap you on a tank.”
Before this speech was finished, Phil had observed the source of his captor’s new interest. It was indeed a tank, a very large one, of a design known to be peculiar to boche construction.It came crunching, rattle-blasting, “caterpillaring” along right toward them.
Topoff led his prisoner directly in front of the huge engine of war and stood there waving one hand as if signaling it to stop. Phil hardly expected the hail to receive any response, even though it came from a “kamerad” who was easily recognized by his uniform, but it did. The tank stopped within a few feet of them, a side door was thrown open and a man called out something in German to Phil’s captor.
The prisoner did not understand what was said, but it was evident that the man in the tank recognized Topoff. Presently the latter said to his prisoner:
“Go in there, quick, or I’ll run this bayonet through you. Hurry up now; I won’t stand any fooling. My opportunity to escape and take you along has arrived. Get in quick.”
Phil obeyed and the ponderous boche followed into the ponderous machine. A moment or two later the tank was in motion again.