“Now, what next?”

Phil stopped a minute or two and considered. First, he must find out where some of the other prisoners had been housed or corralled. Then he must devise means of access into their presence without being challenged by the guards.

He decided finally that any course that he might adopt must be preceded by a little preliminary scouting at random. So he started out with this in view, advancing toward a large building which he had observed casually the evening before but had been unable to determine whether it was a church or a village hall. Perhaps some of his comrades were housed in there.

The prisoners had been lodged for the night in several sections after being fed in as many divisions from a like number of soup and stale-bread services, and Phil had not seen where any of them, aside from those in his own party, were put. Right now, however, he found himself wondering why the church-or-village-hall edifice hadn’t been selected as a way-prison for all the captured French and Americans, if indeed it had not been chosen for that purpose.

He decided to inspect this place first of all. It was next door to the house in which he had spent an eventful half-night as a prisoner of war, but there was no window in that house on the side next to the large building, so that he had been unable to observe what might have taken place near the latter structure during his imprisonment. The rear yard of the premises bordered on a bush-and-sapling wildwood tangle that extended over the hill bordering the big sandpit, and Phil advanced cautiously through this thicket to the edge about sixty feet from the rear end of the building.

There he halted and stood for several minutes surveying the faint outlines of everything perceptible. At first the scene appeared to be a sort of silhouetted picture of desertion. Not a sound reached his ears save the slight rustling of leaves in the breeze, the faint boom of cannon in the distance, and the rumbling of supply trucks on the nearest army thoroughfare, and nothing out of the ordinary in the dim objects in his immediate vicinity at first attracted his special attention.

But presently a dark form, which at first his passing notice had interested him about as much as a log of wood might have done, moved slightly. Phil started, scarcely willing to believe his eyes. If it was a guard, he was lying down. But possibly it was a dog sleeping. The boy was scarcely willing to believe this, however, although he had no good reason for his skepticism. Nevertheless, it was sustained presently in a substantial manner when the living thing sat up and looked about him a few moments. There could be no doubt now that it was a man.

Phil strained his eyes eagerly for further manifestation as to the character of the fellow not more than twenty feet away from him. Presently his sitting form seemed to waver and he lay down again so suddenly that the watcher’s irresistible first impression was that he fell.

“That’s funny,” thought the boy. “What’s the matter with him?—asleep at his post? If I had a couple of fellows with me, I think I’d tap him on the head and take his gun away from him. Why didn’t we think of something o’ the kind? I really believe that half a dozen unarmed men could turn the tables in this camp tonight by using their wits a little. These boches are as careless as can be. They seem to think that because they’re behind their own lines they’re perfectly safe and their prisoners wouldn’t dare start anything rough.”

Just then Phil was thrilled at the sight of two dimly outlined human forms stealing out of the thicket fifteen or twenty feet to his right and advancing cautiously toward the reclining figure. Then suddenly they pounced upon him, one of them evidently seizing him by the throat, for, although he struggled desperately he was unable to make an outcry.

“My goodness!” was the unvocalized exclamation of the watcher. “Who are they? Are some of the other prisoners out and attempting the very thing that just occurred to me? I’ll have to find out and take a hand in this.”

Presently it appeared that the victim of the surprise attack had been choked into unconsciousness, for his captors picked him up and carried him back into the thicket and laid him down not more than six feet from the spot where Phil stood. The latter dared not move, for fear lest he be discovered, for he was not certain yet whether he was in the presence of friends or enemies. All doubt on this score was removed the next instant, however, when he heard one of the captors address the other in tones scarcely above a whisper:

“There, Tim, our first strike was a bloomin’ good success. If we can keep this up half a dozen more times, we can go back home as chesty as a hunchback and get away with it.”