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pursuers would wear them down and inevitably come up with them.
    Two hundred yards further on Charlton stumbled and fell, pitching into a deep ditch. Gregory’s wound was paining him again, badly now, and his breath was rasping in his lungs, but he still had all his wits about him. Pulling up just in time he prevented himself from plunging after the airman.
    With curses and groans Charlton regained his feet. Gulping for breath they clambered up the further bank of the ditch together to find themselves on a road. It was very dark but ahead of them lay a deeper blackness and on the far side of the road they both stumbled into tree-trunks. They had reached the wood.
    Under the branches the blackness was absolutely pitch-dark and, as they blundered on, they were constantly running into trees or bramble bushes. The next few moments were a positive nightmare. Behind them they could hear the staccato orders of the officer who was urging his men after them and the guttural cries of the Germans keeping in touch with one another. Their pursuers were already crossing the ditch and coming up on to theroad, yet owing to the density of the wood and their inability to see even a few inches ahead of them the fugitives seemed to have made practically no progress. They were barely twenty yards inside the wood, still panting from their long run, bruised by collisions with trees unseen in the darkness and their hands torn by strands of bramble which clutched at them from every side, when the torches of the soldiers began to flicker upon the trees that lined the roadside.
    As they struggled on, sweating and panting, the twigs under their feet seemed to snap with reports like the crackle of musketry and they both felt convinced that the noise would give away their position. One of the soldiers started to shoot again and bullets whined away to their left but on a sharp order from the officer the firing ceased. He did not want his men endangered by their own bullets, which might ricochet off the tree-trunks.
    Gasping, bleeding, bruised, almost exhausted, Gregory and Charlton blundered desperately forward, keeping in touch with each other by the noise they were compelled to make in forcing their way through the unseen undergrowth. Gradually the sounds of the pursuit faded in the distance and at last they could hear only the noise of their feet thrashing against the brambles. Instinctively they halted.
    â€œWhat did I tell you?” chuckled Gregory, after he had had a chance to get his breath. “You were so certain that they’d catch us but we’re still free.”
    â€œFor how long, though?” Charlton muttered gloomily. “I expect they’re on their way back to their comfortable beds by now but they’ll be out here again first thing in the morning. What’s the sense in spending a night in this filthy wood only to be captured tomorrow?”
    â€œWe’re better off here than we should be in the cells of the local Gestapo. As for tomorrow, we’ll see. If only I were fit we’d put a dozen miles between ourselves and this wood before morning. The devil of it is that this wound of mine makes it impossible for me to go much further.”
    â€œIs it hurting much?”
    â€œYes; like hell!” Gregory was leaning against a tree and he drew a hand wearily over his eyes. “If we’d had to run another half-mile I should have fainted again, I think. As it is, I’m about all-in.”
    â€œWe’d better shake down here for the night, then.”
    â€œI suppose we must, although I’m damned if I like it. We’re still much too near that road for comfort. I’m good for a lasteffort but I don’t think we’d better risk trying to get deeper into this wood in the darkness, otherwise we may move round in a circle and walk right out of it again. Let’s look about for a spot that’s clear of these accursed blackberry bushes.”
    Charlton got out his lighter and