; or it may be the wounded soldiers mentioned
the fact that we did something to help them bear up till the stretchers
arrived. No matter what happened, the innkeeper thinks a heap of us all,
and we'll not go to our hay shake-downs hungry this night!"

"Hurray!" cried Tubby joyfully, "he's certainly a good fellow, Rob, I
tell you; and I'm never going to forget him. The man who keeps my body
and soul together has my eternal gratitude."

Later on they were called in, and found that a substantial meal had been
prepared for them. Tubby was fairly ravenous, and his chums found it
necessary to warn him not to founder.

"Remember, we've got to be up and doing by three in the morning at the
latest," Rob observed, "and if you make yourself sick the whole plan
will be knocked galley-west. We might have to leave you behind, after
all."

That last threat brought Tubby to his senses.

"Why, you see," he explained, as he pushed himself away from the table
and its temptations, "I was trying to fix it so that in case we had to
go without our breakfast to-morrow I'd be in shape to stand it."

"Sometimes," mused Merritt, "I think you're trying to fix it so that you
could do without eating for a week."

When they made their way outside again it was to find that night had
fallen. In the western sky a young moon looked down pityingly on the
field which had so lately been marked by the desperate charge of the
German hosts, only to fail in their effort to break through the Belgian
intrenchments with their barbed wire defenses.

"Look, over there are hundreds of little fires flickering!" exclaimed
Tubby.

"Those are the camp fires of the Germans," Rob told him. "I want to fix
them in my mind, because we will have to make a wide detour, so as to
avoid running across any patrol on the outskirts of their camp. I hope
by the time daylight comes we can be far enough around to get off
without being seen. The worst thing is this khaki uniform business. If
only we had on ordinary clothes we might be taken for Belgian boys. But,
as it is, they'll think we're soldiers, or at the least Belgian scouts,
and they treat them as if they were regular enlisted men."

Shortly afterward they again sought the barn. The lantern once more hung
on its accustomed hook, and by its friendly gleam Rob and his two chums
were enabled to find the place where on the preceding night they had
slept so well. The wounded men happened to be removed from them by some
li