This time, feeling that the strap had only r.e.t.a.r.ded the attack, he hurled the whole thing at the hare, narrowly missing it, but this time scaring it so much that it disappeared in the distance at a great pace.

At about 10 p.m. we got near a village we had been making for, with the object of striking a road. This village, although nothing very important, proved to be the point of concentration of roads and tracks crossing the moor. In making a careful detour round the northern outskirts of it we suddenly came upon three men in dark clothes, standing on one of these tracks. Turning sharply to the north we made for a wood a mile or so away, and watching them carefully out of the corners of our eyes we slunk along rapidly. They did not really follow us, although they took a few paces in our direction.

Having gained the wood we made a circle through it and were able to come back to the vicinity of the village well away from the three men.

We could still see them, but then we knew where to look and they would have had to be visual marvels to see us, peeping as we were over the top of the corn, which was plentiful all round this village. At last we got on to our right road, which led us to the end of the moorland and eventually landed us in a swampy bottom cut up with d.y.k.es and small streams. Here we floundered about in a hopeless manner in the darkness. Feeling thoroughly tired and cold owing to the rain which had begun to descend an hour or so previously, we got into a cowshed and decided to have as many hot drinks, etc., as we could manage, and push ahead as soon as we could see sufficiently well to do so without wasting time. I think we had about three brews each. It was marvellous the effect this had on us. We both felt absolutely fresh again, and quite strong enough for another long stretch before sleeping.

_Sunday, 1st July._ When sufficiently light we set off, pa.s.sing a village in the daylight, the track leading out of this difficult country being easily found now, though it had eluded all our efforts during the hours of darkness.

A large hill lay before us, and we decided to go to the top of it so as to get from there a view of the country which lay before us. It was a stiff climb and we reaped our reward. A magnificent view greeted us. It was indeed a sight of the promised land, as we remarked at the time.

This hill was the last piece of high ground, or for the matter of that of any ground not dead flat, on the way to the frontier.

We could see the valley of the Ems and the funnels of a steamer which we knew must be on the river itself.

The flat country had an almost sea-like appearance, spreading as it did to a regular horizon, where the country became a misty grey line.

A twenty minutes' rest here, and on we went.

We were feeling our feet badly again now, and decided to rest on the lower slopes of the hills. On the way down we put up a fox. We had been extremely surprised all along at the scarcity of game in the wild country we had traversed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "FOX LED THEM OVER THE WORST PIECES OF BOGGY GROUND HE COULD FIND" (_page 211_).]

Beyond a few deer, our hare, a black-c.o.c.k, and a few duck which we heard in a corn-field, absolutely nothing else showed itself or gave any sign of its existence. As we had gone quietly for the greater part of the distance, it was astonishing that we should have surprised no rabbits out feeding in the early mornings.

We came to the conclusion that, from an English standpoint, there is little or no game in these parts of Germany.

At 5 a.m., finding a good thick copse of small fir-trees, we lay up for a rest. We were now about six miles from the river Ems, which again was some ten miles from the frontier. We decided that the Ems and the frontier itself should be crossed on the same night.

Therefore, in order to allow enough time for such a large programme, we must cross the Ems at the beginning of the night; this meant that the six miles which lay before us now before arriving at the river, had to be done before dark. We proposed to move forward at 5 p.m. A good rest and a large meal worked wonders on our tired bodies, and we felt fit for our last great effort by the hour selected.

Before moving off, however, we decided to make a "cache" of all our superfluous luggage, taking with us only food for twenty-four hours, with a bottle of milk each as an emergency ration, and the water-bottles. The remainder, which was not much now, we hid carefully in case we failed and had to come back for reserve food.

The bag we also left, as that stamps the escaped prisoner more than anything else. We each now had a bundle done up with a coloured handkerchief.

The wild country still stretched westwards until it gave place to a wet valley cut up into rough hay-fields and meadows of rank gra.s.s.

While walking quietly along a rough gra.s.s road here, we suddenly saw a cart with two men in it come out of a field behind a hay-stack some four hundred yards from us. Deciding that to avoid them, when they must have already seen us, would be a very suspicious act, we walked straight ahead. When level with them the old man driving shouted out something to us; we stopped and he repeated his sentence. For the life of me I couldn't make out a single word he said. He had a squeaky voice and spoke a vile patois, but it sounded like no language I had ever heard.

His third attempt to make us understand something had no more success, but Fox, who hardly knew a word of German, walked two paces towards him and shouted "Yah"! "Yah"! With that we walked off, leaving the old man and his youthful companion gaping at us.

We discussed the matter as we walked away, and both came to the conclusion that he had used the word "Landsturm." From this we made up a nice theory. We imagined that the old man had thought that we had been called up for Landsturm service, and were trudging off to the nearest town with our bundles in our hands to join up. They still stood and looked at us, and we had our beautiful theory badly smashed a minute or two later. We suddenly came to the end of the cart-track and found a ditch full of water bordered with a barbed wire fence in front of us. As they were still looking at us, we followed the ditch down for a short distance and then crossed it without hesitation, hoping to give the impression that we knew what we were about.

They drove on then, and we turned our thoughts to other matters. Some distance further on we came across a youth of about sixteen who was in charge of a flock of sheep. When we were quite close to him his dog must have done something to upset the youth's Hunnish temper, as the beast got a fearful hiding.

Blow after blow, accompanied with torrents of Hun oaths, were rained on the wretched animal's back by this child of Kultur, who was armed with a heavy stick. To interfere would have been madness on our part, so we pa.s.sed on. For the next mile we could hear the poor beast's howls.

A swampy mile or so had now to be covered, and then we got on to the edge of a fir wood, which ran down to a road and railway. These we reached and crossed safely, finding ourselves once again in farmland and a country of hedges and d.y.k.es. When we judged that we had still a mile or so to do before striking the river we halted and had our last meal, hidden under a good thick bush which const.i.tuted part of a hedge at the side of a rough track.

Setting out at 10 p.m., before it was really dusk, we followed a gra.s.s track westwards and very nearly got ourselves caught by a piece of carelessness.

CHAPTER XII

THE CROSSING OF THE RIVER

The river winds about considerably. It was into a ca.n.a.l that we suddenly walked on turning a corner of a rough track. A bridge lay right before us, with a sentry on it, who must have seen us at the same moment as we saw him. Turning back we retraced our steps, but not before we had seen two German patrols walking along the ca.n.a.l bank.

Leaving our track we got back to our previous hiding-place, intending to wait until it was quite dark before attempting to cross the river some distance to the north. Hardly had we got into our bush when a cyclist soldier pa.s.sed along the track along which we had been walking a minute or two before. This alarmed us somewhat, but we deemed it best to remain hidden till it should be darker.

While waiting we found and finished off our tin of milk, and discussed plans in a whisper. We allowed half an hour or so to elapse and then started off again; this time following a track running parallel to the river, northwards. We had done a mile or so, when, just before crossing another gra.s.s-road which led to the east, I saw the spiked helmet and rifle of a German soldier silhouetted against the sky, and moving rapidly from west to east. This turned us back, and we hoped then to be able to get eastwards across country until we could make a detour further northwards and regain the river bank.

Entering a field we got half-way across it when two horses, taking fright at something, galloped away from the far corner straight towards us. We now lay down and discussed matters. Germans were north of us, east of us, and south of us, we knew, and the river to the west of course would be guarded.

A quarter of an hour later, a weird cry, something like that of a curlew or peewit, but not exactly either, came to our ears from the north-west near the river. It was repeated from immediately north of us, and then north-east. From there the cry seemed to come from the east, moving southwards, until at a point south-east of us it was repeated time after time for two or three minutes, until taken up again further to the south, eventually ending again at the river, to our south-west.

I had heard rumours and talk about a system the Germans are supposed to have for guarding their frontiers from fugitives, while I was in prison. This system had been called a "fan" or "cordon." It now occurred to me that these bird-like cries had been all round us in a ring. It did not take much thinking to connect the Germans we had seen, the imitation cries, and our known presence in this district.

The more we thought the more certain we felt that these Germans we had seen hurrying eastwards had been sent out expressly to form a fan-like formation, in which they hoped to hold us against the river till daylight should allow them to search the ground for us. The bird-like calls would be just the thing to indicate to the commander of this formation the exact whereabouts of his men and the continuity of the cordon, without being a suspicious fact to any hapless wretch caught inside, who did not happen to know the real notes of the birds imitated.

What was to be done? Should we try and break through the cordon, northwards or eastwards, by striking across country? This plan did not commend itself to us, as we should have had to get through thick hedges and wade through d.y.k.es innumerable without making any noise at all, an impossibility on a still moon-lit night such as it was. We decided to wait till 1.30 a.m., to give them time to get sleepy. An hour's sleep in a ditch, and then do something, was our plan.

_Monday, 2nd July._ Moving westwards a little, we came to a farm close by, and got the idea of hiding somewhere in a hay-loft and waiting till the next night, when perhaps no cordon would be round us, before attempting to cross the river. The farm was quite deserted, except for the cattle and horses, etc., which we could hear in the buildings. We tried now to open the doors of the barns and sheds, without avail.

They had no locks, but open them we could not. We tried everywhere for a long time without the slightest success. At last our combined efforts forced a door open, and we got a nasty fright. A great pig galloped out past us and went off grunting into the darkness of the field. The inside of this building was no good, as it was a piggery and only held bare stalls, nearly all of which were already populated.

A cart of the kind used to convey pigs to market next attracted Fox, and he got into it to try it as a hiding place.

It was by no means a good place, as, although the cart was an ancient one and the farm people would probably not require it, the possible arrival of dogs with the men who would undoubtedly turn up in the morning to see to the animals in the farm, would lead to a nerve-racking experience, if not to actual capture.

While Fox reposed at the bottom of the cart I searched round for water, so as to fill the bottles against our possible stay of eighteen hours in the cart. There were two pumps in the yard, but both were broken.

I could find no water anywhere. The whole farm was a mystery which we never solved.

Returning to the pig-cart I was told by Fox that it would never do, as he had already got cramp after only ten minutes in it. He got out and we noticed then that it was threatening to become light.

Deciding to risk all we left the farm, making for the river in the hopes of avoiding the Germans. Our marvellous luck again came to the rescue. From the farm ran a narrow path which we had not noticed before. This we took, and after going only a short distance along it suddenly struck the bank of the river proper long before we expected to do anything of the kind.

This path was so small and unimportant that it must have been overlooked and considered too unimportant to require guarding, as we saw no Germans thereabouts.

It did not take us long, now that we were on the bank of the river, to get on to a point of land jutting out into it, and taking cover in the long gra.s.s and bushes there.

The Ems flowed sluggishly at this point, and appeared to be about a hundred yards across.

We had made up our minds to leave all the not absolutely essential articles of clothing, etc., behind us here, and tie the things we must take with us to the tops of our heads and then swim.

Knowing that anyone found moving about the frontier line is a suspicious character to German frontier guards, and therefore asked to show his papers, although he might be in civilian clothes, I left my long coat of cotton stuff behind, preferring to rely on my old khaki coat which I wore underneath to make me less visible.

Fox had made the suggestion of the tying our clothes to our heads scheme, and I thought he knew all about it, so had not asked anything more about it. Now, taking our boots and coats off, we tied them into bundles, and Fox got his safely on to the top of his head and took to the water at once.