"To be perfectly frank, I don't," said Jimmy. "I think the situation is just this--but let's go get washed up a bit, and then we can eat and talk. I'm as dry as a bone, and this--well this place isn't just the most inviting," and he could not repress a shudder as he looked at the death and devastation all about them. The bodies of the killed Germans were sprawled in all positions, some even resting on the guns. Then, too, there were bodies of the companions of the five Brothers. As Jimmy said, it was no place to eat and talk.
They found where the mill stream came down the flume to turn the wheel, and there they washed and drank, and then, finding a room where the miller had evidently lived, they sat down to make what meal they could. And as they ate the Germans advanced down the hills to occupy the valley in which was located the old red mill.
"Now let's hear your opinion, Blazes," called Bob.
They all seemed instinctively to turn to Jimmy as a leader now. Nor was this the first time.
"Well, I think we've seen the last of some Germans and the first of others," he began.
"It may turn out to be before we get through with it," was Jimmy's grim reply. "But here's the situation as I see it. You know we started, some days ago, to drive back the Huns. To a certain extent we succeeded. Then came a lull, and that ended when they launched an attack to-day--an attack with the gas as a preface.
"We did our best then, and I guess we must have rolled back part of a wing of one of the German divisions. But our particular sector was halted, and we seem to have gone on too far, or else the others got orders to retreat, and we didn't, and here we are.
"Now I think the two German machine-gun crews that were in this mill were probably what was left of the force our boys succeeded in wiping out. They had orders to stay as long as possible to delay our advance, and they stayed--got to give 'em that credit.
"But we just had to wipe 'em out, and we did. That's to our credit. This seems to be the last of some not very large German force that started the game this morning. And now comes a much larger force," and he indicated the Hun hordes rolling down the slopes. "It was probably the knowledge of the advance of this big body of troops that caused the retreat, or halt, of our main force. We're probably waiting for reserves, or we may be playing a deeper game--to get the Huns in this valley and clean 'em up.