Part 9 (2/2)

_The time-piece Tom was carrying was an alarm clock!_

CHAPTER IX

THE CONFESSION

To poor Tom that ringing was the crack of doom.

The world seemed to end for him then and there. The first surprise had paralyzed him. Then he rolled upon the betraying clock, tried to crush it, strangle it, press it into the earth. But it kept on remorselessly until the alarm ran down.

The Germans had been almost as startled at first as Tom himself. But they hesitated only for a moment. There could be no mistaking where that insistent buzzing was coming from. There was a rush for the thicket, and the next moment Tom was hauled out and stood upon his feet among his captors.

It took only a glance to tell them that Tom was an American. His face as well as his uniform betrayed that fact. Amid a hubbub of excited exclamations he was taken before their leader.

But this time the officer was not able to talk English and there was no interpreter at hand, so that Tom for the present was spared the ordeal of questioning.

The fateful clock was pa.s.sed around among the men with jest and laughter. It was a good joke to them, but Tom was in no mood to see the humor of the situation. To him it meant that all his strivings had come to naught.

Why had he not noticed that the clock was of the alarm variety and that the alarm had been set? He promised that he would never forgive himself for that.

A number of men were counted off to take Tom to the local prison camp, while the rest of the party went on with their expedition.

The journey was long, but it was not attended by the rough treatment that would ordinarily have been meted out to the prisoner. The men were glad, for one thing, that they were relieved from going on the special duty for which the party had been formed. Then, too, Tom's misadventure had given them a hearty laugh, and laughs were something to be prized in their arduous life.

After reaching the camp, Tom was taken before an officer for examination. But the officer was busy and preoccupied, and the questioning was largely a matter of form. Tom was vague or dense as the case demanded, and the impatient officer curtly ordered him to be thrust in with the other prisoners and promptly proceeded to forget him.

Tom pa.s.sed through several stages of emotion when he was left to himself. First he moped, and then he raged. Then, as the comical side of the situation forced itself even upon his misery, he laughed.

A proverb says that ”the man is not wholly lost who can laugh at his own misfortunes.” Tom laughed and immediately felt better. His natural buoyancy rea.s.serted itself. But he had imbibed a prejudice against alarm clocks that promised to last for the rest of his life.

The sector was a quiet one and Tom was not sent out to work under sh.e.l.l fire. For a few days he was left unmolested to the tedium of prison life, and he began with renewed zest to formulate plans for his escape.

He had a chance also to become more or less acquainted with his fellow-prisoners. There were not many and Tom reflected with satisfaction that the Americans held more German prisoners than the Huns had captured of his own countrymen.

There was a sprinkling of nationalities. There were a few American and British, but the majority were French and Belgians.

About the only French prisoner that Tom grew to know intimately was one who could speak English fairly well. This he explained was due to the fact that the man in whose employ he had been as a butler had a daughter who had married an American, and English had been much spoken in the household.

”What part of France do you come from?” asked Tom one day, when they were chatting together.

”From Auvergne,” answered the Frenchman, whose name was Martel. ”Ah,”

he continued wistfully, ”what would I not give to see the gardens and vineyards of Auvergne again! But I never will.”

”Sure you will,” said Tom cheerily. ”Brace up, Martel. You won't stay in this old hole forever.”

Martel shook his head.

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