The Khaki Boys over the Top Part 30

"Good water! Good water!" was all the reply that came from poor Maxwell.

"He's out of his head," said Bob.

"We'd better send a doctor if we can find one, or get him to a hospital," suggested Roger.

"You go see if you can find any stretcher bearers, or a doctor or anyone like that," suggested Jimmy to Franz and Iggy. "We'll stay with him. Or Bob and I will. You'd better go report to the captain where we are, Roger. He might think we've deserted."

Bob and Jimmy, left with Maxwell, made him as comfortable as they could, was.h.i.+ng his face and giving him more water to drink. But he answered none of their questions, murmuring only about the cool water.

He was in a delirium of fever.

Of course Jimmy did not ask about the missing money. It would have been useless at this time. But, naturally, he wondered if the sergeant knew where it was.

Franz and Iggy came back with a doctor who, after a brief examination, said the sergeant was suffering from bad treatment and lack of food and water more than anything else. He did not seem to be wounded, but, of course, there might be some internal hurt which did not show at the first examination.

"Hospital's the place for him," decided the doctor. "Ill have him sent back with the first batch of wounded."

And so poor Maxwell was rescued from the oblivion of "missing," and again put on his company's rolls. But the mystery about him was not solved, and over it Jimmy and his chums wondered much.

"Well, things have certainly turned out queerly!" remarked Jimmy, when he and his chums were back once more in their "holes," eating their emergency rations, and wondering when the real "chow" would come up.

"To thing of finding Max like that!"

"That place was held by the Germans before we rushed them back,"

declared Bob. "They might have kept him a prisoner."

"That's very possible," admitted Jimmy. "I'd like to know the whole story, but we'll have to wait."

"And a long time, I'm afraid," added Roger.

"Why, do you think Max will die?" asked Franz.

"No, but this fight has only just started. We've got to go forward, and land knows when we'll ever get back where we can see Max again."

"Oh, well, it isn't as hopeless as it was at first," remarked Jimmy.

"I'm not worrying about the thousand dollars--only I'd like to know what he did with it."

As Roger had said, the fighting was not over. Before an order came to turn the "holes" into trenches, another advance was ordered, so that the Germans might be driven, if possible, from the vicinity of the hills dominating the valley in which was located the hut where Maxwell had been found.

"Forward!" came the battle cry again, and once more our heroes joined the advance.

This time, however, the fighting was not quite so fierce. The Germans had had a taste of the kind of medicine dealt out by the Americans, and the Huns had no liking for it.

True, they did not give up without a struggle, and many a poor lad went to his death, or came back from the front with a leg or arm missing, as a result of the renewal of hostilities. But it had to be.

It would not have been safe to allow the Germans to have a chance to get back the dominating hills won at such cost.

And there the storm of blood and steel was renewed with fiercer energy, until at last, just as night was settling down, the German flank was turned, and they began to retreat in what ultimately was a rout.

"A glorious victory! A glorious victory!" was shouted from all sides in the American ranks.

It was not the end of the war, by any means, but a dangerous salient had been wiped out, and the American line was straightened, so that now the fighting could go along on more even terms.

"Oh, but I am tired!" sighed Jimmy, as he flung himself full length down on the ground when the signal came to cease firing.

"I'm all in, too," added Bob.

"But we're none of us hurt to any extent," said Franz, binding up a place on his leg where a bit of shrapnel had grazed him. "Won't even get a wound stripe for this," he said, grimly.

It was next morning, when the supply wagons had come up with more substantial food, and hot rations, that the good news circulated around.

"We're due for a rest billet! Hurray!"

"And then I'll have a chance to see about Sergeant Maxwell!" exclaimed Jimmy.

That same day, following the one of such fierce fighting, the battalion in which Jimmy and his chums served was ordered to the rear.

They would have a week's rest before going into the terrible game again.

Jimmy's first action, once he had been relieved from active duty for the time being, was to seek out the hospital whither Sergeant Maxwell had been removed. He went alone, for he did not want to excite the patient by taking in too many chums, should it prove that the man who had held the five thousand francs was in a dangerous physical or mental condition.

But, to Jimmy's relief, the doctor's and nurse's reports were favorable. It was more a case of exhaustion than anything else, though the sergeant had been wounded.

"Did he tell where he had been ever since he has been missing?" asked Jimmy of a hospital attendant before going in himself to see his friend.

"Well he remembered some of it. It seems he was captured while out on a listening post one night, and taken away a prisoner. Instead of sending him to a camp, as the Huns do with most of our poor chaps they get, the Boches kept the sergeant with them, taking him from place to place. It was their idea, I believe, to either force him to desert and join them, or use him as a decoy--or perhaps make him a spy.

"Anyhow they kept him with them, and once he was struck and wounded by a beast of a German officer. After that they neglected him and he got terribly run down, though his wound healed. Then, just before the last big fight--the one you say you were in--the sergeant was held a prisoner in the hut where you found him. He was in a bad way and I suppose the Germans thought he'd die when they left him--which they did when our boys knocked the spots off 'em, if you'll excuse my slang."

"Oh, I'll excuse it all right!" laughed Jimmy. "It isn't any too strong."

"Well, I guess you may see the sergeant now," said the orderly. "Only don't talk to him too much. He doesn't like to dwell on what happened to him. They must have treated him worse than they would a beast!"

"It's awful!" declared Jimmy. "But they'll be made to pay for it! No, I won't tax him with any talk of the past. I just want to see if he knows me and remembers a certain matter."

"Oh, he'll know you all right," returned the orderly. "As a matter of fact, he has been asking for you."

"That's a good sign!" thought Jimmy.

Sergeant Maxwell held out a wan hand to his friend. "I can't begin to thank you for what you and the other boys did for me," he said, weakly.

"If you hadn't discovered me in that lonely hut I wouldn't be alive now."

"Oh, maybe someone else would have found you," said Jimmy, cheerfully.

"But we're glad we did."

"I've been wis.h.i.+ng you'd come in," went on the sick sergeant. "There's something that's been worrying me. It's about that five thousand francs you gave me to keep for you."

"Well, don't worry about it," and Jimmy tried to keep his voice up to the cheerful mark. "Have you got it?"

"No," said the sergeant, "I haven't. But--"

He paused to take a drink of water, and Jimmy's feelings went down to about the zero position.