This compelled the hunted Boche to turn again on his heel, and so he lost a portion of his previous gain. Tom took fresh heart on seeing this. Given one or two such lifts as this, and he believed he would again come to hand grips with the fellow. And with Harry close at his heels he fancied the next encounter would surely terminate badly for the Hun spy.
"Spread out some, Harry!" he managed to shout.
His object in saying this was to make it more difficult for the Boche to hold his own when necessity compelled him to veer to one side. They dodged the hangars that barred the way, running in and out of the lines with the swiftness of a hare followed by the eager hounds.
Once a waiting figure tried to bar the path of the spy, only to be promptly bowled over. Desperation nerved the arm that struck that blow.
The German knew that his chances were almost at the zero mark, and for the time being he was like a wolf at bay, ready to snap right and left and do what damage he could before yielding himself a prisoner.
Once more Tom had made a gain. The Fates were favoring him, it seemed, and with set teeth he kept up the hot chase.
Suddenly the Hun collapsed.
Tom almost fell over him as he ran on; and when Harry came up was bending above the spy, muttering to himself after the manner of a sadly disappointed person.
"What rotten luck for us, after all our work, Harry!" he complained, to the utter bewilderment of his comrade.
"I don't get your meaning, Tom!" exclaimed Harry. "This is one of the Huns, all right, and we've got him at last. What is there to kick about, I'd like to know?"
"Why, don't you understand? He's wounded!" said Tom scornfully.
"Wounded! How?" echoed the other, still groping for the truth.
"Somebody shot him in the leg!" explained Tom, in disgust. "Just as I was bound to jump him in another ten seconds! Did you ever hear of such tough luck? Took the wind right out of our sails, he did, by using his gun. If he'd put a bullet in my leg I could hardly feel madder, for a fact."
Harry, however, quickly chuckled, as though he did not look at the matter in the same way as his chum seemed to.
"Oh, well, the main thing isn't that we'd get a little glory from the capture of the Hun," he said, "but that their desperate game has been blocked. But this chap seems to be groaning as if suffering, Tom. He ought to be taken care of, Boche or not."
"Yes, that's right, Harry," added the other, for the time being crushing down his disappointment.
As some of the attendants of the aviation field came up just at that moment there was need for explanations. Among them Tom noticed one who, as he well knew, had charge of the hangars during the night.
"Lieutenant Simmons, here's a Boche spy who, with a companion, was trying to bomb the big Beresford plane. Sorry we couldn't round up both of them. This fellow has been shot, and ought to have attention. Now, Harry, if you don't mind, we'll step around to your hangar and look into the little job that brought us over here from the camp."
Tom really wished to get away from the crowd that was gathering. He had no liking for being made an object of special interest. Although always eager to attempt unusual exploits, it was only to please himself, and not because of any reward or a morbid desire to be looked on as a hero.
Harry was not quite as diffident, and might have liked to linger a bit to explain further how they had managed to discover the creeping figures, and, having their suspicions aroused, closed in on them.
"I can see you later, Lieutenant, and answer any questions you may want to ask about this stuff," he remarked, as he followed Tom away from the group.
Tom was still "huffy" as Harry called it. He seemed to feel that the ambitious marksman who had taken a pot-shot at the runner ahead had really cheated him out of half the pleasure accompanying the capture of the spy.
"I heard one big splash," Harry said, "which I take it was made by a trench grenade. Did that Boche try to knock you out, Tom?"
"Oh, he let loose with one of his sort, but it was the easiest thing going to duck under. He's got a lot to learn about flinging those little knockers underhand. It takes a baseball pitcher to do the trick right.
How about your man, Harry?"
The other gave a grunt of disgust.
"Nothing doing with that slick dodger, I tell you, Tom. He must have been a premium sprinter when at home, for the way he dodged in and out made my brain reel. I kept after him as best I could, but, shucks! he was in another class from me. And so I lost him in the shuffle. He disappeared just like a wisp of smoke in the breeze."
"But you were still running like a hare when we banged into each other, unless I'm greatly mistaken," continued Tom humorously.
"Sure I was! Trying to get a fresh glimpse of my duck. When I hit you I thought it was that Boche, and then a light fell on your face, coming from that head-lamp on a motor truck some one suddenly turned on. I reckon I'll have a beautiful lump on my forehead where I struck against a pole while running. It knocked me flat, and that was when I lost my man."
Tom now began to laugh.
"A pretty lively skirmish, all told, when you come to think of it," he observed. "I'll have to forget about that chap who was too quick on the trigger, and only add up results. One Boche spy captured, wounded; and the other gets away. But he's had his scare good and hard, and there's little danger of his giving us any more trouble."
Whatever became of the captured Boche neither of them ever knew. Perhaps he was simply taken to the hospital and treated for his wound, as so many of his fellow Huns had been; and then again did time permit and opportunity arise he might be tried by drumhead courtmartial on the serious charge of being a spy.
Having satisfied themselves with regard to the matter in dispute, the two boys later on returned once more to the camp and sought to secure some much needed sleep, fully conscious that the duties of the coming day would again sap their energies and bring them renewed chances for thrilling action.
CHAPTER XIII
THE WINNING OF THE ARGONNE
DAYS passed and each setting sun saw the Yankee boys in khaki further along the terrible trail they had set out to follow to the end. Another mile, perhaps two, of the dense Argonne Forest had been redeemed, and the stubborn foe sent reeling backward.
The end was in sight, many believed. Once they passed out of the vast stretch of woods, the pace of the retreating enemy must be accelerated, though of course he would take advantage of every ravine, abandoned farm building, destroyed hamlet and village that offered sites for machine-guns, on which Hindenburg was coming to rely more than on his Big Berthas.
They made the Yankee pay the price for it all, even though the famous Kriemhild-Stellung line was broken in the end. In addition to the heavy blanketing of woods, hills and ravines intersected the forest at intervals. These very often were knee deep in mud, through which the fighters from overseas had to wade as they pushed steadily on.
Then there were barbed wire defenses, sometimes twenty feet in height, with the hills and surrounding country villages fortified with acres of rapid-fire guns, often in vast nests, and requiring the work of batteries to blast them out of the path.
During all these days they had charged through villages, fought through morasses, forded swollen streams, bayoneted machine gunners at their posts, and used their rifles as clubs when they came to grips with the foe in the wire entanglements.
Hunger and thirst joined hands with the enemy. Gas attack followed charge, and charge succeeded gas attack. From overhead Boche planes rained bombs down upon them. Comrades fell on every hand, and the cries of the wounded rose above the shrieking of shrapnel and shell.
And day after day the young air-service boys rendered their full duty to the cause they stood for. Filled with the ardor that spurs patriots on to do astonishing feats they never shirked when the order came that sent them again and again into the air to measure wits with the Boche fliers.
Hardly a day but what there was a vacancy in the ranks of those gallant airmen who were so willingly giving their service in answer to their country's call. More than a few had been sent to the hospital from which they would only emerge, it might be, cripples for life, but doubtless thankful to have escaped even a sadder fate.
Tom and Jack, as well as Harry Leroy, had had their close calls, but somehow it seemed as though they were watched over by a kind Providence, for so far none of them had met with a serious mishap.
There were compensations, too; for after a hard day's work in the air how pleasant it was for Jack to lounge in the temporary field hut of the Red Triangle and watch Bessie's nimble fingers handing out hot coffee, sandwiches, or any of the hundred-and-one things which those industrious workers managed to have in store for the wearers of Uncle Sam's khaki, so as to make them feel that here was indeed a touch of home life, though far removed from the actual thing.
And then perhaps from time to time, when Bessie was relieved by some other worker, how delightful it was to find a chance to sit with her, sipping tea, and chatting.
Of course Jack had long ago confided to her all that had happened to him and to Tom and Harry since last they had met in Paris. If he was over modest in his descriptions, especially when speaking of his personal doings, why, Bessie had imagination, and could easily color the narrative to suit her own ideas of what was fit and proper.
This sort of thing could not keep up indefinitely, of course.
The losses which the American army was sustaining were very severe, for they never allowed themselves to be balked of their object. If they found after trying that it was impossible to secure what they were after one way, they turned around and went at it from a second, perhaps even a third angle, but what in the end they gained their objective.