Chapter XIX: Rabbit's Foot for Luck

FOR an hour the Russians in front of the rocky rise, where Schneider and Henri stood sentinel over the prostrate Austrian officer, had maintained an ominous silence.

Not a shot had been fired in the mentioned time, and no opportunity had been afforded the champion stone roller to make another ten-strike in repulsing attack.

"You can put it in your pipe and smoke it that this brooding over there means no good to us."

While Henri was not addicted to the pipe, he accepted the figure of speech, and fully agreed with his companion that the calm had sinister portent.

"The minute is about ripe," he volunteered, "for us to make ourselves scarce."

That Schneider was in accord with the proposition had evidence in the action of removing his boots. To cross a cavity that lowered two hundred feet or more on the unstable and untried support of a fallen pine warranted every precaution. There could be no crawling for the venturesome bricktop. He had human freight to carry on his back.

"Sorry to disturb you, captain," he apologized to the invalid soldier, "but it has to be done."

Henri, keeping watch at the front, sounded a note of alarm:

"Quick! I see what they're doing--it's a spread, and a three-cornered charge--they've stolen to the bushes right and left, and the firing gang in the middle is prepared to pot us if we show head or hand!"

Schneider bent to the task of lifting Schwimmer, the latter groaning at the movement.

Henri, balanced by Schneider's boots thonged over one shoulder and the knapsack swinging from the other, made a dash for the slender bridge. He had determined to first essay the perilous passage, and test the solidity required to bear the fourfold weight that would follow.

A single misstep, and for the error maker there yawned a pit of death, a mangling on jagged rocks lashed by the ice-laden rush of a brawling mountain stream.

But, sure-footed as the native chamois, with never a falter nor a backward look, the boy made the crossing, backed against the mound of upturned earth in which the roots of the fallen pine were imbedded, and fixed apprehensive eyes upon the burdened Schneider bravely and steadily advancing over the shaking bridge. Once the boy fancied that, with the earth clods tumbling from the mound behind, the whole structure was about to give, and he instinctively reached out for what would have been a vain endeavor to prevent the threatened disaster.

A moment later, with mingled sighs of exertion and relief, the man and boy clasped hands--on solid ground once more. The wounded officer had not realized other than that he suffered by the necessary lifting of his nerve-racked body.

Hardly a second, though, for the silent congratulation. On the level the defenders had just quitted in such thrilling manner swarmed Russian pursuers, seeking with fierce activity those who had conducted baffling resistance for several hours.

"Hear them yell," said Henri in suppressed tone.

"It's a sound better for the distance."

As Schneider made this comment he set shoulder against the root-threaded mound that anchored the fallen pine. With cracking of straining sinew the powerful pusher put every ounce of his wonderful strength into the effort of dislodgment. Thrice he failed, and then, with a tearing, grinding give, the mass loosened; another heave, and, as the perspiring giant threw himself backward, just escaping the void, the great trunk left its moorings and crashed with a tremendous shower of soil and stone into the abyss.

Schneider in a jiffy, and breathing like a porpoise, dragged on his boots, again picked up the feebly remonstrating captain, and led Henri a merry chase around a rocky bend into the bush-grown level tabled between this and the next mountainous range.

Finally halting, and now beyond hearing of the whoops of the discomfited Russians, apprised of the escape of their prey by the crashing fall of the old pine, Schneider indulged in a cheer on his own account.

"Tough sledding, my boy, but a clean pair of heels to the gentlemen with the sheepskin overcoats. I don't know what's coming next, yet we can count on a 'next' coming."

Henri had to put in a sad word, owing to the depletion of the food store--the knapsack contained less than two days' rations for one man.

The eyes of the two aviators met in meaning glance--meaning that the remaining food should all be reserved for the ailing soldier, now sleeping quietly in his blanket roll.

Many a time in the hours of weary tramping did the aviators tighten their belts, but without a single utterance of complaint or bemoaning of sad fate. To the gnawings of hunger happily were not added the torments of thirst. Snow and ice served that desire.

The rations were sparingly fed to the invalid, who, unsuspicious of the sacrifice of his slowly starving companions, appeared to be gaining a measure of strength. He expressed sorrow that he must so burden Schneider in the march, noting that the latter had begun to occasionally stumble and stagger under the load.

"Don't you bother a bit, captain," as often assured the valiant aviator, "we will run into a friendly camp before long, and you will be in fighting trim before the moon changes again."

On the quiet to Henri, however, the big fellow confided that rest hours must lengthen if he had to fare much farther as a carrier.

He had discovered that in one of his revolvers there were still two cartridges that had not been exploded, and this find was due to the intention of throwing away these weapons as useless and cumbersome and a lucky farewell inspection of the long-possessed arms.

Schneider was a famous shot, with these same pistols had won several trophies, and, too, in war service had with them seldom failed to stop an antagonist lusting for his own life.

"Two bullets and three human lives at stake," he mused, weighing the revolver in his right hand, and aiming it at some imaginary living target. Several times during the day both Henri and himself had noted hare tracks in the snow, and Schneider even talked in a hopeful way of rigging up some sort of trap in the night. While the boy was inclined to be doubtful as to their possible success as trappers, under the circumstances, he did not spoil sport, in the mind of his companion, by adverse argument.

Now there was something tangible in the anticipation that Schneider might stalk and shoot a rabbit, and so hearten the weakened wayfarers to renew the battle for existence. They were beginning to lag with every additional mile traversed.

"Here is a good place to rest," announced Henri, whose sharp eyes had marked the mouth of a cave among the bushes covering the sides of the ridge, along which line the footsore travelers had been continuously plodding for an hour or more.

"We can't stop too quick to suit me," said Schneider, easing his living burden to the ground.

The cave was shallow, but ample in dimensions for the three invaders, clean and dry, and containing a quantity of dried moss.

Comfortably placing the invalid, Schneider dropped like a log in his tracks. He was completely exhausted, and knew no more of discomfort or the waking world until roused by Henri vigorously tugging at his coat sleeve. "There's game in sight," excitedly whispered the boy, "bring your revolver; crawl, and don't make any noise!"

The suddenly awakened sleeper rubbed his eyes, and, comprehending what was wanted, instantly produced the trusty shooting iron, and as quickly crawled to the mouth of the cave. Henri pointed a trembling hand to the little clearing a few yards below them.

Several hares, pure white, were hopping about, scratching and burrowing in the brown loam, there free of snow.

Schneider had for a second an attack of nerves, similar to that fever in the amateur Nimrod when first blundering upon the wallow of a buck deer.

Henri gave the shaking marksman a poke in the ribs.

"Shoot, old scout, or give me the gun!"

By the poke and the hissed demand, Schneider was himself again.

He drew bead on the nearest hare, and with the puff of smoke from the revolver muzzle the little animal made a frantic leap, ending in a complete somersault and an inert heap of fur. Another whiplike crack--and over went a second rabbit, stopped on the first jump to cover.

"Another cartridge or two and I would have potted the lot," boasted Schneider, "but even a pair of them is a mighty big draw for us."

Henri missed these remarks, for he was Johnny-on-the-spot to retrieve the game.

The pistol practice had startled Captain Schwimmer from a doze, and he was under impression that his friends were fighting off another attack by the Russians. The captain had begun to take notice of and interest in what was going on about him.

Raising himself on his elbows, he saw the result of the shooting match in the pair of plump bunnies swinging across Henri's shoulder when the boy capered into the cave.

It occurred to the captain to inspect the knapsack upon which his head had been pillowed. "Is this all the food in the camp?" he questioned, handling the few scraps in the sack.

Henri nodded in the affirmative, taken unawares by the quick query.

"And I have been eating my fill regularly on this march, have I not?"

"I hope you have not been hungry, captain," evaded Henri, realizing that the officer was putting two and two together.

"I see it all now," exclaimed the invalid, "you two have starved yourselves that I might live."

"Shucks, captain, don't put it that way: the rations were yours in the first place, and, besides, look at the glorious feast we're all going to have."

Henri's attempt to lightly pass the soldier's revolt against the self-denial practiced by Schneider and himself resulted only in the invalid turning face downward on the nearly empty knapsack, his emotion shown by convulsive movement between the shoulders.

Schneider, wise unto himself, had kept out of the discussion, and had practically contributed to the settlement of the hunger question by neatly skinning and cleaning the hare meat.

A hasty fire of dried moss and twigs and Schneider's big knife utilized as a spit raised a savory odor in the cave, and the picking of one set of bones that evening helped a lot to revive courage and hope. The captain, "by the doctor's orders," was compelled to accept his share.

The other hare made the breakfast for the third day out. Schneider alleged that he had a hunch that this rabbit business had turned the scale of luck, and to insure the belief he carefully pocketed the left hind foot of one of the animals.

During the morning the pedestrians, rested and fed, moved in fine style for the first few miles, Schneider stoutly holding to the efficacy of a rabbit's foot as a luck producer.

At the foot of the summit finally cutting off the level over which the party had been so long traveling, it was in order to do some climbing.

"It will give us a chance to look around," cheerfully observed Henri, "and which chance isn't coming to us down here."

Halfway up the height the boy was again heard from. He insisted that he had seen a flock of eagles in the western sky.

"Eagles your foot," bantered Schneider; "whoever saw a flock of eagles?"

"Wild geese, then," insisted Henri.

"How many did you see?" quizzed Schneider.

"Five or six, maybe."

"Guess again," laughed the big fellow; "geese would be lonesome if that was all in a flight."

"Have it any way you please; I suppose you will be claiming next that I am suffering with liver spots."

Henri was a bit nettled that Schneider did not take seriously his sky story.

About twenty minutes later, Henri called another halt. "Now, old scout," he cried triumphantly, "just look up for yourself and say what you would call 'em."

Schneider, shading his eyes under a hand, scanned the blue expanse above. "By the great hornspoon," he almost shouted, "I believe they're aëroplanes!"

Henri was more than willing to be convinced that such was the fact.

"What do you think about it, captain?"

Schwimmer had from the first joined in the sky-gazing contest.

"I think our friend Schneider has solved the problem. I never saw a real bird with exactly that motion."

The blots on the sky were increasing in size.

"It's a sure thing," hurrahed Henri, "and they're circling for a landing!"

"Perhaps they're Russians," mildly suggested the captain.

"Not while I'm carrying this rabbit's foot," firmly asserted Schneider.