Often I have seen hostile scouts searching the obvious bits of cover,
but they did not find _me_ there; and, like the elephant hunter among
the fern trees, or a boar in a cotton crop, so a boy in the currant
bushes is invisible to the enemy, while he can watch every move of the
enemy's legs.
This I found of value when I came to be pursued by mounted military
police, who suspected me of being a spy at some manoeuvres abroad.
After a rare chase I scrambled over a wall and dropped into an orchard
of low fruit trees. Here squatting in a ditch, I watched the legs of
the gendarmes' horses while they quartered the plantation, and when
they drew away from me I crept to the bank of a deep water channel
which formed one of the boundaries of the enclosure. Here I found
a small plank bridge by which I could cross, but before doing so I
loosened the near end, and passed over, dragging the plank after me.
On the far side the country was open, and before I had gone far the
gendarmes spied me, and after a hurried consultation, dashed off at
a gallop for the nearest bridge, half a mile away. I promptly turned
back, replaced my bridge and recrossed the stream, throwing the plank
into the river, and made my way past the village to the next station
down the line while the horsemen were still hunting for me in the
wrong place.
Another secret that one picked up at the game of Hide-and-Seek was,
if possible, to get above the level of the hunter's eye, and to
"freeze"--that is, to sit tight without a movement, and, although not
in actual concealment, you are very apt to escape notice by so doing.
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