this time he was moving more rapidly, though striving to make
no noise in moving. Suddenly he came to a road and stopped, gasping.

"I don't want anything as public as this," Dick told himself.
"Troops use roads. However, as I've reached the road, and want
to get as far from the train as possible, I believe I'll take
a look from the other side of the road. There may be a field
there better suited to my needs."

Directly opposite, at the other edge of the road, two tree trunks
reared themselves close together, looking tall and gaunt against
the white of the fog. After listening a moment Dick started to
cross the road to them.

Just as he reached the trunks he saw something move around the
further one, and drew back quickly. It was well that he did so,
for the moving thing was a man armed with an axe which he had
swung high and now tried to bring down relentlessly on Prescott's
head.

But Dick's arms shot up, his hands catching the haft and wrenching
the ugly weapon away from its wielder.

"No, you don't!" Dick muttered in English, taking another step
backward from the wild-looking old peasant who had attempted to
brain him.

"But a thousand pardons, monsieur!" cried the old man hoarsely
in French, and now shaking from head to foot. "I did not see
well in the fog, and I mistook you for a German. You are a British
soldier!"

"An American soldier," Dick replied in the same tongue.

"Then, had I killed you, grief would have killed me, too, as it
has already sent my wits scattering. For I am a Frenchman and
hate only Germans."

"Is this a safe place to stand and discuss the Germans?" asked
Dick mildly, in a voice barely above a whisper. "This road-----"

"No, no! It is not safe here," protested the peasant. "Soldiers
and wagons move over this road. That was why I was here. I hoped
to find some German soldier alone, to leap on him and kill him---and
I thought you a German until after I had swung at you. Heaven
is good, and I have not to reproach myself for having struck at
the American uniform. But you are in danger here. You are-----"

"An escaped prisoner," Dick supplied in a whisper. "I have just
escaped from the Germans."

"If you are quick then, they shall not find you," promised the
old man, seizing Dick by the arm. "Come! I can guide you even
through this fog."

There was something so sincere about the old peasant, despite
his wildness, that Prescott went with him without objection.