Part 11 (2/2)

How to withdraw out of the very jaws of this peril was now the question.

He feared that Archer might make an incautious move and end all hope of escape.

Tom watched the solitary figure through the heavy darkness. And he marvelled, as he had marvelled before, at the machine-like perfection of these minions of the Iron Hand. Even in the face of their awful danger and amid the solemnity of the black night, the odd thought came to him that this stiff form turning about like a faithful and tireless weatherc.o.c.k to peer into the darkness roundabout, might be indeed a huge carved toy fresh from the quaint handworkers of the Black Forest.

As he gazed he was sure that this lonely watcher danced a step or two.

No laughter or sign of merriment accompanied the grim jig, but he was sure that the solitary German tripped, ever so lightly, with a kind of stiff grace. Then the freshening breeze blew Tom's rebellious hair down over his eyes, and as he brushed it aside he saw the German indeed dancing--there was no doubt of it.

Suddenly a cold shudder ran through him and he stepped out from his concealment as he realized that this uncanny figure was not standing but _hanging_ just clear of the ground.

CHAPTER XIII

THE PRIZE SAUSAGE

”Come on out, Archy,” said Tom with a recklessness which struck terror to poor Archer's very soul. ”He won't hurt you--he's dead.”

”D-e-a-d!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Archer.

”Sure--he's hanging there.”

”And all the time I wanted to sneeze,” said Archer, laughing in his reaction from fear. ”Ebe-nee-zerr, but I had a good scarre!”

Going over to the tree, they saw the ghastly truth. A man wearing a garment something like a Russian blouse, but of the field-gray military shade of the Germans (as well as the boys could make out by the aid of a lighted match) was hanging by his garment which had caught in a low spreading branch of the tree. His feet were just clear of the ground and as the breeze blew he swayed this way and that, the gathering strain upon his garment behind the neck throwing his limp head forward and giving his shoulders a hunched appearance, quite in the manner of the clog dancer. The German emblem was blazoned upon his blouse and superimposed in s.h.i.+ning metal upon the front of his fatigue cap. Even as they paused before him he seemed to bow perfunctorily as if bidding them a ghastly welcome.

Tom's scout instinct impelled him instantly to fall upon the ground in search of enlightening footprints, but there were none and this puzzled him greatly. He felt sure that the man had not been strangled, but had been killed by impact with some heavier branch higher up in the tree; but he must have made footprints before he climbed the tree, and----

Suddenly he jumped to his feet, remembering what he had thought to be a guardhouse. It lay a hundred or more feet beyond the dangling body and as they neared it it lost its sentinel-station aspect altogether.

”Well--what--do you--know about that?” said Archer.

”It's an observation balloon, I'll bet,” said Tom. ”A Boche sausage!

Look for another man before you do anything else--there's always two. If he's around anywhere we might get into trouble yet.”

It was a wise thought and characteristic of Tom, but the other man was quite beyond human aid. He lay, mangled out of all semblance to a human being, amid the tangled wreckage of the car.

The fat cigar-shaped envelope of the balloon stood almost upright, and though it looked not the least like a police telephone station now, it was easy to see how, from a distance in the dim light, it might have suggested a little round domed building.

”How do you s'pose it happened?” Archer asked.

”I don't know,” said Tom. ”It's an observation balloon, that's sure.

Maybe it was on its way back from the lines to somewhere or other. Hurry up, let's see what there is; it'll be daylight in two or three hours and we don't want to be hanging around here. They might send a rescue party or something like that, if they know about it.”

”Morre likely they don't,” said Archer.

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