!Tention Part 32

"Can't you recollect, comrade?"

Pen was silent for a few moments, and then: "Yes," he said softly, "I understand now. I was hurt. Why, it's morning! I haven't been to sleep all the night, have I?"

"Yes, comrade, and,"--Punch hesitated for a moment, and then with an effort--"so have I."

"I am glad of it," sighed Pen.

Then he winced, for he had made an effort to rise, but sank back again, feeling faint.

"Help me, Punch," he said.

"Whatcher want?"

"To sit up with my back against the tree."

Punch hesitated, and then obeyed.

"Ah, that's better," sighed Pen. "I am not much hurt."

"Oh yes, you are," said Punch, shaking his head.

"Nonsense! I recollect all about it now. Can you get me some water?"

"I'll try," was the reply; "but can you really sit up like that?"

"Yes, of course. We shall be able to go on again soon."

"Wha-at!" cried Punch. "Oh yes, I dare say! You can't go on. But I know what I am going to do. If the French are gone I am going to hunt round till I find one of them cottages. There must be one somewhere about, because I just started some goats. And look there! Why, of course there must be some people living near here." And the boy pointed to a dozen or so of pigs busily rooting about amongst the dead leaves of the forest, evidently searching for chestnuts and last year's acorns shed by the evergreen oaks.

"Now, look here," continued the boy. "Soon as I am sure that you can sit up and wait, I am just off to look out for some place where I can carry you."

"I can sit up," replied Pen. "I have got a nasty wound that will take some time to heal; but it's nothing to mind, Punch, for it's the sort of thing that will get well without a doctor. But you must find shelter or beg shelter for us till I can tramp again."

"But I can carry yer, comrade."

"A little way perhaps. There, don't stop to talk. Go and do the best you can."

"But is it safe to leave you?" protested Punch.

"Yes; there is nothing to mind, unless some of the French fellows find me."

"That does it, then," said Punch st.u.r.dily. "I sha'n't go."

"You must, I tell you."

"I don't care; I ain't going to leave you."

"Do you want me to starve, or perish with cold in the night."

"Course I don't!"

"Then do as I tell you."

"But suppose the French come?"

"Well, if they do we must chance it; but if you are careful in going and coming I don't think they will find me; and I don't suppose you will be long."

"That I won't," cried the boy confidently. "Here goes, then--I am to do it?"

"Yes."

"Then here's off."

"No, don't do that," cried Pen.

"Why not? Hadn't I better take the muskets?"

"No. You are more likely to get help for me if you go without arms; and, besides, Punch," added Pen, with a faint smile, "I might want the muskets to defend myself against the wolves."

"All right," replied the boy, replacing the two clumsy French pieces by his comrade's side. "Keep up your spirits, old chap; I won't be long."

The next minute the boy had plunged into the thicket-like outskirts of the forest, where he stopped short to look back and mentally mark the great chestnut-tree.

"I shall know that," he said, "from ever so far off. It is easy to 'member by the trunk, which goes up twisted like a screw. Now then, which way had I better go?"

Punch had a look round as far as the density of the foliage would allow him, and then gave his head a scratch.

"Oh dear!" he muttered, "who's to know which way to go? It's regular blind-man's buff. How many horses has your father got? Shut your eyes, comrade. Now then. Three! What colour? Black, white, and grey. Turn round three times and catch who you may."

The boy, with his eyes tightly closed and his arms spread out on either side, turned round the three times of the game, and then opened his eyes and strode right away.

"There can't be no better way than chancing it," he said. "But hold hard! Where's my tree?"

He was standing close to a beautifully shaped ilex, and for a few moments he could not make out the great spiral-barked chestnut, till, just as he began to fancy that he had lost his way at once, he caught sight of its glossy bronzed leaves behind the greyish green ilex.

"That's all right," he said. "Now then, here's luck."

It was a bitter fight with grim giant despair as the boy tramped on, and time after time, faint with hunger, suffering from misery, he was about to throw himself down upon the earth, utterly broken in spirit, but he fought on bravely.

"I never saw such a country!" he muttered. "There ought to be plenty of towns and villages and people, but it's all desert and stones and scrubby trees. Any one would think that you couldn't walk anywhere without finding something to eat, and there's nothing but the goats and pigs, and as soon as they catch sight of you away they go."

Over and over again he climbed hillsides to reach spots where he could look down, in the full expectation of seeing some village or cl.u.s.ter of huts. But it was all the same, there was nothing to be seen; till, growing alarmed lest he should find that he had lost touch with his landmarks, he began to retrace his steps in utter despair, but only to drop down on his knees at last and bury his face in his hands, to give way to the emotion that for a few moments he could not master.

"There," he muttered, recovering himself, "I could not help it, but there was no one to see. Just like a silly great gal. It is being hungry, I suppose, and weak with my wound; and, my word, it does sting!

But there's some one at last!"

The boy looked sharply round.