John Blaine - The Boy Scouts In Russia

"I-do not know," said Boris.

Fred had to strain his ears to catch what Boris said. Boris was weak and exhausted, and Fred was glad that the German officer seemed kindly and disposed to be humane.

"You do not know? How is that? You were in the car with them, weren't you?"

"I was in the car, but I do not know what happened after the accident. I was thrown out-and I did not know anything until you roused me just now."

"But what were you doing in the car, then? Who were those officers? Where were they going?"

"I do not know. I know only that I was walking along the road, because all the people had been sent away from their homes, when the car stopped, and a man told me to get in and sit low, so that I should not be seen. Then we drove very fast and after a while there was a crash, and I was thrown out."

"Can you walk?"

The German's tone had changed somewhat. It was anxious now, and puzzled.

"I-don't know," said Boris. "There is a pain in my leg-here, right above the ankle. Ouch!"

Fred saw the German officer slip his hand down over the spot to which Boris pointed, and his touch dragged the exclamation of pain from Boris.

"You can't walk, that's certain!" said the German. "You've got pluck, boy! There's a nasty break there. You need a surgeon! Well, I'll have to do what I can for you until we can find one. Can you stand a little more pain? Niehoff, give me your emergency kit. You have the splints? So! I shall see what I can do."

He was busy for a moment. Then with a sergeant, evidently his second in command, he withdrew to be out of Boris's hearing. But as it chanced, his movement brought him to a point where it was easier than ever for Fred to hear everything he said.

"There is something deuced queer about this business!" said the officer. "I think this boy is telling the truth, but we saw two officers in the front seat of that car. That much was certain. They were not ground into powder in the accident, you know. If they had been killed, there would be something left of them. They got out all right-that's evident. And they made themselves scarce. They must have known we would come, and if they have gone so quickly, it is because they did not want us to see them at close quarters."

"Spies, you think?" asked the sergeant.

"Evidently! But how they got here I'd hate to guess! They came from a quarter where we are in complete control. Yet they stole one of our cars, and a couple of uniform coats and helmets, at least!"

"We can look further for them," said the sergeant.

"Yes-and one might look a long time in a haystack before one found a needle! However, let the men spread out along the road and see what they can find. Give the order!"

Fred sighed with relief. He had been right in his decision to stay where he was, as he understood fully when he saw the soldiers go off down the road, looking for some trace of the passing of the two imaginary officers. Meanwhile the officer went back to Boris.

"We'll take this lad back with us," he said to the sergeant. "He needs attention, and I prefer to give someone in higher authority a chance to talk to him. This is a very mysterious affair, all around. It is too much for my brain!"

"And for mine, too!" grumbled the sergeant. "If I had my way, we would have orders to shoot all suspicious characters first and find out whether they deserved it or not afterward. I thought we should stop that automobile when we saw it coming."

"And I did not," said the officer, sharply.

The sergeant said nothing more.

Soon the men returned from their fruitless search. Then a litter was improvised and Boris was placed upon it and taken away. Fred had been very fearful for it had seemed more than likely to him that a sentry would be left to watch the wreck. If that had been done, it would have complicated his position, because he could scarcely have hoped to get out of his shelter without making some noise. But this was a precaution that apparently did not suggest itself to the Germans.

And so, as soon as they were well out of hearing, Fred scrambled out, leaving his dangerous coats and helmets behind, and began trudging boldly along the road. He did not know the character of the wooded section through which the road now ran, and it seemed to him that he would be safer in the road than if he tried to walk under cover.

Fred was very tired. And, now that the excitement was fading, he was beginning to realize that he had not escaped entirely scatheless from the wreck of the car. Every bone and muscle in his body was sore and aching, and he wondered how many black and blue spots he would find when he got a chance to look for them.

By Ivan's reckoning, he had something like two miles to go to reach the Russian outposts. He was now in a sort of No Man's Land that lay between the two armies. And, indeed, before long, he saw fires twinkling ahead-the fires of the Russians. That was as he came to the crossroad of which Boris had spoken. It seemed that his troubles must be nearly over. And just then he heard a clatter of hoofs and saw, riding up the crossroad toward him, a troop of German Uhlans. He began running. But they had seen him and gave chase. He dared not stop. On he ran, hoping that the Russians were nearer than their fires. CHAPTER XVII

AN OLD ENEMY

Suddenly over Fred's head there was a peculiar whistling. He had never heard that sound before, but somehow he knew by instinct what it was. He was under fire! Behind him were the shots, but the firing was wild and at random. He plunged into the bushes now, for to do so was to choose the lesser of two evils. He was fairly safe, so sheltered from the bullets, since if they could not see him, the Uhlans would not be likely to fire at him at all. And while it was certain that they could follow him in and catch him if he stayed in the brush, he would delay them at least, and the Russians were so near that they might hear the firing and come up.

That came about even sooner than he had thought possible. He stopped, panting. The Uhlans were close on his trail by this time, and he heard them coming up. But then came a sudden shouting of orders, and, a moment later, a furious fusillade that was answered from the Russian side. Over the rattle of the firing, too, came a sound he remembered well, though he had heard it only once before-the yelling of charging Cossacks. For the second time the wild Russian horsemen had come to his rescue in the nick of time!

But this time there was more of a fight, since the two little bodies of horsemen were far more evenly matched than had been the case when General Suvaroff had led his daring raid behind the German lines in the effort to capture von Hindenburg. For five minutes the fighting was fast and furious. Fred could hear the clash of steel against steel and the spiteful spitting of revolvers and automatic pistols. Then the wild Russian shout of victory arose, and he heard sounds of galloping fast dying away. Even though he could see nothing, he knew which side had won.

"Thank Heaven!" he said to himself. "I wonder if they couldn't chase them and raid the culvert. There aren't so many troops there! Then we could surely get Boris away from them."

But the first thing to do, of course, was to come out of his cover and make himself known to his rescuers. There was a certain risk in even that simple procedure, and Fred was not so carried away by the excitement of the fight as to forget it. There was more than a chance that if he broke out, the Russians would mistake him for some German who had tried to escape by taking refuge in the brush, and that they would shoot without waiting to make sure. But he had to take the chance, and he minimized the risk as much as he could by tying his white handkerchief to a stick and carrying it before him as he pushed his way into the ditch.

He waved this as he emerged. At first no one saw him. Then a Cossack spied him and sent his horse straight at him. Fred leaped aside as he saw that the man meant to ride him down, and, shouting, waved his white flag. He dodged the first assault, but the Cossack spun his pony around in little more than his own length, and waving his dangerous lance, came at him again. He shouted again, and waved his white flag harder than ever. That would not have saved him, however, but just as the Cossack lunged and Fred threw himself down, sure that he would either be speared or trampled by the horse, an officer dashed up and struck up the lance with his sword.

"Don't you see the white flag?" he roared. "We do not kill men who surrender!"

"They say that the Germans are hanging every Cossack they capture," said the man, sullenly.

"Never mind what they say!" said the officer. "Hello! That man is not a soldier at all!"

"Neither soldier nor German!" cried Fred in Russian, springing up. "Those Uhlans were chasing me! I have just escaped from the German lines. I did not think that I should fare as badly among my friends as among the enemy!"

"Nor shall you, friend!" said the Russian officer with a laugh. "So you are a Russian? Well, you look as if you might be anything!"

"I'm afraid I do," said Fred, a bit ruefully. He could imagine, even though he could not see himself, that the Russian was quite right. He was caked with dirt. In the fall from the automobile, as he had discovered while he was walking away from the wreck, he had sustained a nasty cut over the eye, which, though it was not painful, had bled a good deal. And this had made his appearance even worse than it had been before. His clothes were torn, too.

"Who are you, and where do you come from?" asked the Russian.

In a few words Fred told his story. When he said that he had left Boris Suvaroff a prisoner at the culvert, with a broken leg, the officer started.

"Can't you go after him?" Fred pleaded. "They have very few men there. You could sweep them away."

"Not with this force. And I should not dare to go so far without special orders," said the officer. "We could not charge the culvert, and, approaching it from this side, we should have to ride uphill. But I am sure that when those in command know your story, a force will be sent to rescue Prince Boris. Come with us now. I will get you a horse if you are able to ride. The Uhlans left some behind!"

Fred could ride, and said so. And in a few minutes he was riding toward the fires that twinkled before them, side by side with the Russian officer, who was anxious to know all that Fred could tell him.

"That was splendid!" he cried enthusiastically when he heard how Fred had discovered the real purpose of the Germans by his ruse in pretending to be deaf and dumb. "And it means, too, that we will get some real work to do here in this quarter. I thought at first that the army in the north would get all the fighting. We have been sitting here for nearly a week, doing nothing. This is the first skirmish we have had, for our orders are not to bring on an action, but only to prevent the enemy from coming toward us if they show any sign of attacking."

"If what I have heard is true, there will be an advance from this quarter soon," said Fred. "If the Germans are to be outflanked, it must be by the troops here. And that ought to mean as much fighting as anyone could hope to get."

"That is what we are looking for," said the officer. "But you-you will be glad of a rest for a time, I should think!"

"I want to get my cousin back," said Fred. "It was hard to leave him."

"It was the only thing to do. You saved his life as well as your own by going. And one who saves a Suvaroff does a fine thing for Russia in these days-if this Boris is like the rest of the breed."

"Oh, we have never known!" said Fred, suddenly remembering. "Did General Suvaroff get back safely after he failed to catch General von Hindenburg?"

"He did! He had less than a thousand men, and he rode for sixty miles or more through a whole German army! He was intercepted but when he found a German brigade lined up in his path, instead of trying to circle around it, and so giving the Germans time to surround him, he cut right through it!" answered the officer, smiling.

"That was splendid!"

"I don't think the war will show anything better!" said the Russian, with enthusiasm. "He charged before the Germans knew that he was fairly upon them, and the whole fight lasted less than ten minutes. Then our fellows were through and riding for our lines. And the best of it was that not more than fifty of our saddles were emptied. The Germans are wonderful fighters, I believe. We shall have a hard time beating them. But they fight too much by rule. A German cavalry commander would have been brave enough to try to do that, but he would not have tried because he would have known that it was an unsound plan."

"I wish Boris knew that his father was safe," said Fred, a little sadly. "He has been worried, although he has said nothing."

"Eh-he might have known it! Yes, he got back safely enough. As to whether he is safe now, that is another matter. He is in the thick of the fighting around Gumbinnen, and he is not one of those generals who stay in the rear. He is like Skobeleff. Have you heard of him?"

"He commanded at Plevna, against the Turks?"

"And in a good many other battles! Skobeleff, though he was in command of the whole army, would insist always on being in the thick of the fighting himself. He wore his white coat, and he rode a white horse. So he was always to be seen by his own men and by the enemy. Perhaps he was wrong, but soldiers will fight better for a general who shares their perils. Skobeleff used to do impossible things, because he believed that nothing was impossible that brave men made up their minds to do."

Fred thought of Russian generals in the war with Japan who might have changed the whole course of that conflict had they had such ideas. But he said nothing of this. Russian soldiers were mindful of that disastrous war, he thought. And Fred had an idea that before this far greater struggle was over, the world would have been forced to forget the failures of Manchuria. Men who fought as he had seen Russians do were not going to be beaten again.

Fred was mounted now on a big, rawboned horse that had lost its Uhlan rider. He was so tired that he was swaying in his saddle, and the Russian noticed this.

"Keep awake a little longer," he said, cheerily. "We haven't very much further to go. In half an hour, I think, you can be in a real bed, with sheets and blankets."

"I don't need anything like that," said Fred, rousing himself and smiling. "I think I could sleep on a board that was studded with nails! And I know that they could fight a battle all around me to-night without waking me up when I once get to sleep."

"I'd like to let you stop here-we are within our lines now-but I know the staff will want to see you and ask a few questions. And you have done so much already for Russia that I believe you will want to do that much more before you rest."

"Oh, a few minutes more or less won't make any difference!" said Fred. He yawned hugely. "As long as I'm awake, I can make myself stay awake. If I once let go, though, I promise you I'll be hard to rouse!"

There were more Russians about here than Fred had supposed. It was plain that since Ivan had had any information as to the conditions here, re-enforcements had been brought up, for it was not through outposts that they were riding, but through a large body of troops. Tents stretched in all directions and fires were numerous, dotting the fields like stars. There were no woods here; it was open country again. To the left Fred caught a glimpse of the silver sheen of a river reflecting the starlight.