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Escape of a Princess Pat, The

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<h3>CHAPTER XVII</h3> <h4 class="sc">What Happened in the Wood</h4> <div class="block2">Weather Bad but Hopes High—Primitive Dressmaking—The Woman at the Farm—The Zeppelin—The Fight in the Wood. </div> The only roads we habitually used were side ones, and especially did we avoid any with telegraph wires which might be used against us. It was a flat and swampy country, full of mist, and the nights were few in which it did not rain. And we were always very wet and very cold. The latter was worse than the lack of food. Sometimes we struggled for hours at a time, knee-deep in desolate stretches of mist-covered morasses which gave no promise of firm footing but which often dropped us in to the waist instead. In addition, the country was cut up by numerous small ditches, six to eight feet wide, which along toward morning presented so much of an effort in the jumping that we usually plunged into the water by preference. Our feet were adding to our misery by this time. On one occasion, as we dragged ourselves out of the water, two dogs came rushing at us and then followed, yelping. It was nearly daylight and a woman came down to see what was going on. We remained motionless near a hedge. She failed to see us, which was perhaps good luck for both her and us. The diary for that period reads: "August 28th: Rain worse than ever. Not a piece of our clothes dry and too much water to lie down. Good going last night. Cover in a wood outside village. Good. Meals: Nix. Ought to reach the Hustre river to-night. In good spirits." "August 29th: Rain stopped and a bit of sun came out. Feeling much more cheerful. Just had a shave and clean-up. Going last night very bad. Swamps and canals. Had to leave our course. Feet feeling better. Meals for the day: turnips, peas and green apples. Did not reach the river. All's well. No complaints." That shave was a terrible torture. "August thirtieth: Rain, thunder and lightning most of last night. Got a bit of shelter in a cowshed in a field. We are wet and cold as usual, with no sun to dry. Fair cover in a small wood. Going good last night. Haven't struck the Hustre yet. Meals: green apples and brambles. Feet pretty sore. Made a needle out of wood and did a bit of sewing. Best of health." We had been ploughing through the mist, confused by it and the numerous hedges, when at the side of a small field we had run into this cowshed, a tumbledown affair of sods, caved in at the sides and partly covered by a thatched roof. We built up the side from which the wind came the worst, hung a rotting canvas we found at the other end and then snuggled up together to exchange warmth. The mist had scarcely lifted when we heard a slight noise. We looked up. A woman was at the entrance to our hovel, looking down full at us. She turned and walked away. We rose, still dazed with sleep, and found that we were quite close to a farmhouse which owing to the mist we had failed to observe before, and from which our visitor had evidently observed the result of our building operations. "She saw us," I said, and we regretted not having seized her. She appeared to be signalling. A good-sized wood lay well up ahead. "Come on," I said. "Let's beat it. We can handle a few of 'em better than the whole mob." We could see the farm labourers gathering in a knot. The rain came on just then and perhaps assisted in dampening their ardour. At any rate they did not follow us into the wood. We spent rather an uneasy time though, when, late that day, some men approached our hiding place in a clump of bushes and for half an hour shot their fowling pieces off all around where we lay. They did not seem to be after us; more likely they were hunters. The same thing had happened in a lesser degree several times before. None the less it was very uncomfortable to have the buckshot rattling all around us in the bushes where we lay and we felt much better when they had gone. As for the wooden needle: That was of course the result of our necessity. It was a long thorn—first, a punch in the cloth and like as not a stab in the finger in the bargain, then a withdrawal of the crude needle and a careful threading of the hole with our coarse string, after the fashion of a clumsy shoemaker. Some sewing! Some needlewoman! The green apples and the berries which we got here proved a most welcome change in our diet. "August thirty-first: Not much rain but very cold. Too dark to travel last night. No stars out to go by. Crossed the river this morning, at last. Good cover in bushes. Feet are badly peeled. Hope for better luck to-night. Meals: apples and turnips. Cold and rain are putting us in bad state. But still confident." We were daily growing weaker and prayed only that our strength would last to put us over the border. "September first: No rain and a little sun. Feeling much better. Going last night much the best we have had. Good cover in a thicket. Will soon be going over the same country we did last time we escaped. Meals: peas and beans. Still in good health." "September second: No rain, but cold out of the sun. Pretty fair going last night. Feet still sore. Cover on straw stack in middle of field. Warmer than the woods. Zeppelin just passed overhead going north. Meals: turnips, carrots, apples and peas." "September third: Fine weather. Good going last night. Feet still pretty bad. Had to cut my boots. Fine cover in the wood. Meals: baked potatoes. Feel fuller." This was our first cooked meal and the pleasure it gave us was beyond all words. We lit it under cover of night so that by the time day had come there was nothing but glowing coals in which the potatoes roasted while we slept. My feet were badly swollen by this time so that I was faint with the pain of them. The Zeppelin, strange though it was under the circumstances, was only a small incident in many others of vaster importance which were happening daily to us but it was flying so low that we deemed it best not to move until it had passed. We wondered if it were going to England, and envied it. "September fourth: More rain. Hard going half the night. Crossed large peat bog and wet to the waist. Very cold. Cover in wood. None too good. Got scared out of our first cover. Meals: Milk, apples and peas. Feet not so sore. Still raining and cold. We should soon be at the River Ems." On the evening of this day we walked out to the edge of the wood we were in and stood there sizing up the near-by village. It was about seven o'clock and wanted about an hour to darkness and our usual time for hitting the trail. Without any warning, a burly farmer confronted us. He was as badly startled as we were. Our remnants of painted uniforms and our ragged, soaked and generally filthy condition no doubt added to our terrible appearance. We had long since lost our caps and our hair was matted like a dog's. The German was armed with a double-barreled shotgun, and at his heels a powerful-looking dog showed his teeth to us, so that I marked the red of his tongue. If he raised the alarm we were done for. We still had our cudgels. I do not know whose was the offensive. But I do know that the three of us came together with one accord in a wild and terrible medley of oaths in two languages and of murderous blows that beat like flails at the threshing. Simmons and I struggled for the gun which he tried so hard to turn on us, the dog meanwhile sinking its teeth deep in our unprotected legs and leaping vainly at our throats; while we felt with clutching fingers for his master's, intent only that he should not shout. In those mad moments there sped through our brains the reel of that whole horrid film of fifteen months' torture of mind and body; the pale, blood-covered faces of our murdered comrades of the regiment, the cries of the patient Russians behind the trees, and our own slow and deadly starvation and planned mistreatment. All these, and God only knows what else, should be ours again if we should be recaptured. We were near to Holland. In fancy and by contrast we saw the fair English fields and the rolling beauty that is Ontario's; we heard the good English tongue and beheld the dear faces of our own folk. We bore that farmer no ill will. And his dog was to the last a very faithful animal, as our clothes and limbs bore true witness. We had no ropes. And we were two very desperate men, badly put upon. We dropped his gun in the bushes, together with the body of his dog; and passed on. It had not been fired and we had no desire to have the charge of carrying firearms added to the others against us if, in spite of all, we should be so unfortunate as to be recaptured. <hr /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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