Tom of the Raiders | Page 6

the excitement of his departure Tom had forgotten that he must eat, but, with a half-hour to spare before starting for the meeting place, he returned to the store and stuffed his pockets with food. Then, with a hunk of cold meat in one hand and a slice of bread in the other, he walked down the village road, eating his supper as he went. Near the edge of the village he saw two men ahead of him, and he wondered if they too were members of the expedition. They stopped, leaning against a fence, and eyed him as he went by.
Dusk came, and then darkness. The sky was overcast, but occasionally the moonlight flashed through a break in the clouds, showing the road before him. Walking was difficult, for the half-dried mud was slippery, and the broad wheels of wagons had made deep ruts. Several times he stumbled, and once he wrenched his ankle. He made his way more carefully after that, sometimes feeling out the ground with the toes of his boots before he placed his weight forward. The thought of being disabled before he had really started on the adventure, of going back to camp to commiserate with Bert over sprained ankles, filled him with dread. The deepest ruts turned away from the main road to a farm house: a dog barked, and Tom hurried forward. Several hundred yards further along the road, he thought he saw a man who moved behind a tree and hid. He did not stop to investigate.
Tom paused for a moment at the fork of the road; then went forward breathlessly. Between the bushes which lined the edge of the fork stood several tall trees, with their trunks lost in black, ragged undergrowth. In the darkness he made out a trail. Again he paused, straining for the slightest sound. As he took a step forward he heard someone say:
"Hello, there!"
He stopped short. "Hello," he gasped; then, when he had overcome his surprise, "Where are you?"
"Just four feet ahead of you."
"Who are you?"
"Brown, Company F, Twenty-first Ohio."
"Oh,"--this with relief in his voice--"I'm Burns, Company B, of the Second. Are there any others here?" He went forward and they tried to make out each other's faces in the dark.
"No. There was to be a third man with us, Andrews said," answered Brown. "He hasn't come yet."
"And who's Andrews?" asked Tom.
Brown laughed. "Why, he's the man who's leading us. The one who's going to take us in."
"I didn't know," answered Tom. "They didn't tell me much--except that I was going. That was enough."
"That's about as much as most of the men know," remarked Brown. "Knight and I were the only ones who talked with Andrews. We are the engineers."
"The engineers?" asked Tom. "What sort of engineers?" He heard Brown chuckle.
"Well, they _didn't_ tell you much, did they? Locomotive engineers, of course. We're going to steal a railroad train."
"Steal a railroad train!" exclaimed Tom.
"Yep! That's what we're going to do."
Tom gave a low whistle.
Brown continued: "We're going to take a train on the Georgia State Railroad. Knight and I are to run it, and the rest of you...."
From down the road came a mumble of voices. Brown clutched Tom's arm and they listened. "That's them!" exclaimed Brown in a whisper.
One man of the approaching group stepped off the road into the fork, while the others waited.
"Brown," he called.
"Right here, sir." Brown stepped forward, and Tom followed.
"How many are with you?" asked the man.
"Just one--Burns. The third hasn't come yet."
"How are you, Burns? I'm Andrews." He groped for Tom's hand in the darkness, shook it. "I wonder where the other man is. Well, it makes no difference. We won't wait for him. Come on."
They followed him, out to where the others were standing.
"This way, men," said Andrews, starting up the road on the left. Brown and Tom fell in beside him. "The rest of you straggle out so that you can get off the road quickly if anyone comes." Then, to Brown and Tom: "Perhaps he's lost, or perhaps he's changed his mind. Three others weren't where I told them to be, but we'll get along just as well without them. I arranged it this way so that if any of you did decide at the last minute that you didn't want to go...." He did not finish the sentence. Presently he said: "I want no men who aren't anxious to be with me."
Tom could not see Andrews' face, but he liked his calm, pleasant voice. Conversation stopped, except for Brown's remark, "It looks like rain," and Andrews' answering, "Hm-m-m." For several minutes they plodded along the road, hidden even from the intermittent light of the moon by the trees that grew beside the road.
"Here we are," said Andrews presently. They stopped and waited for the others;