[Illustration: TOM TURNED ON HIS SEARCHLIGHT AND SAW A GERMAN SOLDIER, HATLESS AND COATLESS. Frontispiece (Page 8)]

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TOM SLADEMOTORCYCLE DISPATCH-BEARER

BY PERCY K. FITZHUGH

AUTHOR OFTOM SLADE, BOY SCOUT, TOM SLADE AT TEMPLE CAMP, TOM SLADE ON THE RIVER, TOM SLADE WITH THE COLORS, ETC. 

ILLUSTRATED BY R. EMMETT OWEN

PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROVAL OF THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA

GROSSET & DUNLAPPUBLISHERS :: NEW YORK. 

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Copyright, 1918, byGROSSET & DUNLAP

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

Preface vii I. For Service as Required 1 II. Aid and Comfort to the Enemy 8 III. The Old Compass 14 IV. The Old Familiar Faces 20 V. Getting Ready 25 VI. Over the Top 36 VII. A Shot 45 VIII. In the Woods 50 IX. The Mysterious Fugitive 57 X. The Jersey Snipe 62 XI. On Guard 68 XII. What's In a Name? 73 XIII. The Fountains of Destruction 79 XIV. Tom Uses His First Bullet 84 XV. The Gun Pit 89 XVI. Prisoners 97 XVII. Shades of Archibald Archer 105 XVIII. The Big Coup 111 XIX. Tom is Questioned 119 XX. The Major's Papers 127 XXI. The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere 133 XXII. "Uncle Sam" 140 XXIII. Up a Tree 150 XXIV. "To Him That Overcometh" 156 XXV. "What You Have to Do--" 162 XXVI. A Surprise 169 XXVII. Smoke and Fire 175 XXVIII. "Made in Germany" 184 XXIX. "Now You See It, Now You Don't" 194 XXX. He Disappears 205

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PREFACE

It was good advice that Rudyard Kipling gave his "young British soldier"in regard to the latter's rifle:

 "She's human as you are--you treat her as sich And she'll fight for the young British soldier. "

Tommy Atkins' rifle was by no means the first inanimate or dumb thing toprove human and to deserve human treatment. Animals of all sorts havebeen given this quality. Jack London's dog, in _The Call of the Wild_, has human interest. So has the immortal _Black Beauty_. 

But we are not concerned with animals now. Kipling's ocean liner hashuman interest--a soul. I need not tell you that a boat is human. Itsevery erratic quality of crankiness, its veritable heroism under stress, its temperament (if you like that word) makes it very human indeed. Thatis why a man will often let his boat rot rather than sell it. 

This is not true of all inanimate things. It depends. I have never heardof a steam roller or a poison gas bomb being beloved by anybody. Ishould not care to associate with a hand grenade. It is a matter oftaste; I dare say I could learn to love a British tank, but I couldnever make a friend and confidante of a balloon. An aeroplane mightprove a good pal--we shall have to see. 

Davy Crockett actually made a friend and confidante of his famous gun, _Betsy_. And _Betsy_ is known in history. It is said that the gun crewson armed liners have found this human quality in their guns, and many ofthese have been given names--_Billy Sunday_, _Teddy Roosevelt_, etc. 

I need not tell you that a camp-fire is human and that trees are human. 

The pioneers of old, pressing into the dim wilderness, christened theirold flintlocks and talked to them as a man may talk to a man. Thewoodsman's axe was "deare and greatly beloved, " we are told. 

The hard-pressed Indian warrior knelt in the forest and besought thatlife-long comrade, his bow, not to desert or fail him. King Philip keptin his quiver a favorite arrow which he never used because it hadearned retirement by saving his own life. 

What Paul Revere may have said to his horse in that stirring midnightride we do not know. But may we not suppose that he urged his trustysteed forward with resolute and inspiring words about the gloriouserrand they were upon?

Perhaps the lonely ringer of the immortal bell up in the Old Southsteeple muttered some urgent word of incentive to that iron clanger asit beat against its ringing wall of brass. 

So I have made _Uncle Sam_, the motorcycle, the friend and companion of_Tom Slade_. I have withheld none of their confidences--or triflingdifferences. I dare say they were both weary and impatient at times. 

If he is not companionable to you, then so much the worse for you andfor our story. But he was the friend, the inseparable associate andco-patriot of _Tom Slade, the Dispatch Rider_. 

You will not like him any the less because of the noise he made intrudging up a hill, or because his mud-guard was broken off, or his tirewounded in the great cause, or his polished headlight knocked into a tincan. You will not ridicule the old splint of a shingle which was boundwith such surgical nicety among his rusting spokes. If you do, then youare the kind of a boy who would laugh at a wounded soldier and you hadbetter not read this book. 

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TOM SLADE

MOTORCYCLE DISPATCH-BEARER

CHAPTER I

FOR SERVICE AS REQUIRED

Swiftly and silently along the moonlit road sped the dispatch-rider. Outof the East he had come, where the battle line runs between bluemountains and the country is quiet and peaceful, and the boys in khakilong for action and think wistfully of Picardy and Flanders. He was alucky young fellow, this dispatch-rider, and all the boys had told himso. 

"We'll miss you, Thatchy, " they had said. 

And "Thatchy" had answered characteristically, "I'm sorry, too, kind of, in a way. "

His name was not Thatchy, but they had called him so because his thickshock of light hair, which persisted in falling down over his foreheadand ears, had not a little the appearance of the thatched roofs on theFrench peasant's cottages. He, with a loquacious young companion, hadblown into the Toul sector from no one seemed to know exactly where, more than that he had originally been a ship's boy, had been in a Germanprison camp, and had escaped through Alsace and reached the Americanforces after a perilous journey. 

Lately he had been running back and forth on his motorcycle between thelines and points south in a region which had not been defiled by theinvader, but now he was going far into the West "for service asrequired. "

That was what the slip of paper from headquarters had said, and he didnot speculate as to what those services would be, but he knew that theywould not be exactly holding Sunday-School picnics in the neighborhoodof Montdidier. Billy Brownway, machine gunner, had assured Thatchy thatundoubtedly he was wanted to represent the messenger service on the WarCouncil at Versailles. But Thatchy did not mind that kind of talk. 

West of Revigny, he crossed the old trench line, and came into the areawhich the Blond Beast had crossed and devastated in the first year ofthe war. Planks lay across the empty trenches and as he rode over firstthe French and then the enemy ditches, he looked down and could see inthe moonlight some of the ghastly trophies of war. Somehow they affectedhim more than had the fresher results of combat which he had seen evenin the quiet sector he had left. 

Silently he sped along the thirty-mile stretch from Revigny to Châlons, where a little group of French children pressed about him when he pausedfor gasoline. 

"Yankee!" they called, chattering at him and meddling with his machine. 

"Le cheveu!" one brazen youngster shouted, running his hand through hisown hair by way of demonstrating Thatchy's most conspicuouscharacteristic. 

Thatchy poked him good-humoredly. "La route, est-belle bonne?" he asked. 

The child nodded enthusiastically, while the others broke out laughingat Thatchy's queer French, and poured a verbal torrent at him by way ofexplaining that the road to the South would take him through Vertus andMontmirail, while the one to the north led to Epernay. 

"I'll bump my nose into the salient if I take that one, " he said moreto himself than to them, but one little fellow, catching the word_salient_ took a chance on _nose_ and jumped up and down in joyousabandon, calling, "Bump le nez--le _salient_!" apparently in keenappreciation of the absurdity of the rider's phrase. 

He rode away with a clamoring chorus behind him and he heard one brazenyoungster boldly mimicking his manner of asking if the roads were good. These children lived in tumble-down houses which were all but ruins, andplayed in shell holes as if these cruel, ragged gaps in the earth hadbeen made by the kind Boche for their especial entertainment. 

A mile or two west of Châlons the rider crossed the historic Marne on amakeshift bridge built from the materials of a ruined house and theremnants of the former span. 

On he sped, along the quiet, moonlit road, through the little village ofThibie, past many a quaint old heavily-roofed brick cottage, over thestream at Chaintrix and into Vertus, and along the straight, evenstretch of road for Montmirail. Not so long ago he might have gone fromChâlons in a bee-line from Montdidier, but the big, ugly salient stuckout like a huge snout now, as if it were sniffing in longinganticipation at that tempting morsel, Paris; so he must circle around itand then turn almost straight north. 

At La Ferte, among the hills, he paused at a crossroads and, alightingfrom his machine, stood watching as a long, silent procession of wagonspassed by in the quiet night, moving southward. He knew now what itmeant to go into the West. One after another they passed in deathlikestillness, the Red Cross upon the side of each plainly visible in themoonlight. As he paused, the rider could hear the thunder of great gunsin the north. Many stretchers, borne by men afoot, followed the wagonsand he could hear the groans of those who tossed restlessly upon them. 

"Look out for shell holes, " he heard someone say. So there wereAmericans in the fighting, he thought. 

He ran along the edge of the hills now on the fifteen-mile stretch toMeaux, where he intended to follow the road northward through Senlis andacross the old trenches near Clermont. He could hear the booming all thewhile, but it seemed weary and spent, like a runner who has slackenedhis pace and begun to pant. 

At Meaux he crossed the path of another silent cavalcade of stretchersand ambulances and wounded soldiers who were being supported as theylimped along. They spoke in French and one voice came out of anambulance, seeming hollow and far off, as though from a grave. Then camea lot of German prisoners tramping along, some sullen and some with afine air of bravado sneering at their guards. 

The rider knew where he was going and how to get there and he did notventure any inquiries either as to his way or what had been going on. 

Happenings in Flanders and Picardy are known in America before they areknown to the boys in Alsace. He knew there was fighting in the West andthat Fritz had poked a big bulge into the French line, for his superiorshad given him a road map with the bulge pencilled upon it so that hemight go around it and not bump his nose into it, as he had said. But hehad not expected to see such obvious signs of fighting and it made himrealize that at last he was getting into the war with a vengeance. 

Instead of following the road leading northwest out of Meaux, he tookthe one leading northeast up through Villers-Cotterets, intending to runalong the edge of the forest to Campiegne and then verge westward tothe billet villages northwest of Montdidier, where he was to report. 

This route brought him within ten miles of the west arm of the salient, but the way was quiet and there was no sign of the fighting as he rodealong in the woody solitude. It reminded him of his home far back inAmerica and of the woods where he and his scout companions had campedand hiked and followed the peaceful pursuits of stalking and trailing. 

He was thinking of home as he rode leisurely along the winding forestroad, when suddenly he was startled by a rustling sound among the trees. 

"Who goes there?" he demanded in pursuance of his general instructionsfor such an emergency, at the same time drawing his pistol. "Halt!"

He was the scout again now, keen, observant. But there was no answer tohis challenge and he narrowed his eyes to mere slits, peering into thetree-studded solitude, waiting. 

Then suddenly, close by him he heard that unmistakable sound, theclanking of a chain, and accompanying it a voice saying, "Kamerad. "

CHAPTER TWO

AID AND COMFORT TO THE ENEMY

Tom Slade, dispatch-rider, knew well enough what _kamerad_ meant. He hadlearned at least that much of German warfare and German honor, even inthe quiet Toul sector. He knew that the German olive branch waspoisoned; that German treachery was a fine art--a part of the Germanefficiency. Had not Private Coleburn, whom Tom knew well, listened tothat kindly uttered word and been stabbed with a Prussian bayonet in thedarkness of No Man's Land?

"Stand up, " said Tom. "Nobody can talk to _me_ crouching down likethat. "

"Ach!" said the voice in the unmistakable tone of pain. "Vot goot--see!"

Tom turned on his searchlight and saw crawling toward him a Germansoldier, hatless and coatless, whose white face seemed all the more paleand ghastly for the smear of blood upon it. He was quite without arms, in proof of which he raised his open hands and slapped his sides andhips. As he did so a long piece of heavy chain, which was manacled tohis wrist clanged and rattled. 

"Ach!" he said, shaking his head as if in agony. 

"Put your hands down. All right, " said Tom. "Can you speak English?"

"Kamerad, " he repeated and shrugged his shoulders as if that wereenough. 

"You escape?" said Tom, trying to make himself understood. "How did youget back of the French lines?"

"Shot broke--yach, " the man said, his face lapsing again into a hopelessexpression of suffering. 

"All right, " said Tom, simply. "Comrade--I say it too. All right?"

The soldier's face showed unmistakable relief through his suffering. 

"Let's see what's the matter, " Tom said, though he knew the other onlyvaguely understood him. Turning the wheel so as the better to focus thelight upon the man, he saw that he had been wounded in the foot, whichwas shoeless and bleeding freely, but that the chief cause of hissuffering was the raw condition of his wrist where the manacleencircled it and the heavy chain pulled. It seemed to Tom as if thiscruel sore might have been caused by the chain dragging behind him andperhaps catching on the ground as he fled. 

"The French didn't put that on?" he queried, rather puzzled. 

The soldier shook his head. "Herr General, " said he. 

"Not the Americans?"

"Herr General--gun. "

Then suddenly there flashed into Tom's mind something he had heard aboutGerman artillerymen being chained to their guns. So that was it. Andsome French gunner, or an American maybe, had unconsciously set thispoor wretch free by smashing his chain with a shell. 

"You're in the French lines, " Tom said. "Did you mean to come here?You're a prisoner. "

"Ach, diss iss petter, " the man said, only half understanding. 

"Yes, I guess it is, " said Tom. "I'll bind your foot up and then I'lltake that chain off if I can and bind your wrist. Then we'll have tofind the nearest dressing station. I suppose you got lost in thisforest. I been in the German forest myself, " he added; "it'sfine--better than this. I got to admit they've got fine lakes there. "

Whether he said this by way of comforting the stranger--though he knewthe man understood but little of it--or just out of the blunt honestywhich refused to twist everything German into a thing of evil, it wouldbe hard to say. He had about him that quality of candor which could notbe shaken even by righteous enmity. 

Tearing two strips from his shirt, he used the narrower one to make atourniquet, which he tied above the man's ankle. 

"If you haven't got poison in it, it won't be so bad, " he said. "NowI'll take off that chain. "

He raised his machine upon its rest so that the power wheel was free ofthe ground. Then, to the wounded Boche's puzzled surprise, he removedthe tire and fumbling in his little tool kit he took out a piece ofemery cloth which he used for cleaning his plugs and platinum contactpoints, and bent it over the edge of the rim, binding it to the spokeswith the length of insulated wire which he always carried. It was acrude and makeshift contrivance at best, but at last he succeeded, bydint of much bending and winding and tying of the pliable copper wireamong the spokes of the wheel, in fastening the emery cloth over thefairly sharp rim so that it stayed in place when he started his powerand in about two revolutions it cut a piece of wire with which he testedthe power of his improvised mechanical file. 

"Often I sharpened a jackknife that way on the fly-wheel of a motorboat, " he said. The Boche did not understand him, but he was quick tosee the possibilities of this whirling hacksaw and he seemed toacknowledge, with as much grace as a German may, the Yankee ingenuity ofhis liberator. 

"Give me your wrist, " said Tom, reaching for it; "I won't hurt it anymore than I have to; here--here's a good scheme. "

He carefully stuffed his handkerchief around under the metal band whichencircled the soldier's wrist and having thus formed a cushion toreceive the pressure and protect the raw flesh, he closed his switchagain and gently subjected the manacle to the revolving wheel, holdingit upon the edge of the concave tire bed. 

If the emery cloth had extended all the way around the wheel he couldhave taken the manacle off in less time than it had taken Kaiser Bill tolock it on, for the contrivance rivalled a buzzsaw. As it was, he hadto stop every minute or two to rearrange the worn emery cloth and bindit in place anew. But for all that he succeeded in less than fifteenminutes in working a furrow almost through the metal band so that alittle careful manipulating and squeezing and pressing of it enabled himto break it and force it open. 

"There you are, " he said, removing the handkerchief so as to get abetter look at the cruel sore beneath; "didn't hurt much, did it? That'swhat Uncle Sam's trying to do for all the rest of you fellers--only youhaven't got sense enough to know it. "

CHAPTER THREE

THE OLD COMPASS

Tom took the limping Boche, his first war prisoner, to the Red Crossstation at Vivieres where they had knives and scissors and bandages andantiseptics, but nothing with which to remove Prussian manacles, and allthe king's horses and all the king's men and the willing, kindly nursesthere could have done little for the poor Boche if Tom Slade, aliasThatchy, had not administered his own particular kind of first aid. 

The French doctors sent him forth with unstinted praise which he onlyhalf understood, and as he sped along the road for Compiegne he wonderedwho could have been the allied gunner who at long range had cut Fritzieloose from the piece of artillery to which he had been chained. 

"That feller and I did a good job anyway, " he thought. 

At Compiegne the whole town was in a ferment as he passed through. Hundreds of refugees with mule carts and wheelbarrows laden with theirhousehold goods, were leaving the town in anticipation of the Germanadvance. They made a mournful procession as they passed out of the townalong the south road with babies crying and children clamoring about theclumsy, overladen vehicles. He saw many boys in khaki here and there andit cheered and inspired him to know that his country was represented inthe fighting. He had to pause in the street to let a company of thempass by on their way northward to the trench line and it did his heartgood to hear their cheery laughter and typical American banter. 

"Got any cigarettes, kiddo?" one called. 

"Where you going--north?" asked another. 

"To the billets west of Montdidier, " Tom answered. "I'm for new service. I came from Toul sector. "

"Good-_night_! That's Sleepy Hollow over there. "

From Compiegne he followed the road across the Aronde and up throughMery and Tricot into Le Cardonnois. The roads were full of Americans andas he passed a little company of them he called, "How far is ----?" naming the village of his destination. 

"About two miles, " one of them answered; "straight north. "

"Tell 'em to give 'em Hell, " another called. 

This laconic utterance was the first intimation which Tom had thatanything special was brewing in the neighborhood, and he answered withcharacteristic literalness, "All right, I will. "

The road northward from Le Cardonnois was through a hilly country, wherethere were few houses. About half a mile farther on he reached thejunction of another road which appeared also to lead northward, vergingslightly in an easterly direction. He had made so many turns that he wasa little puzzled as to which was the true north road, so he stopped andtook out the trusty little compass which he always carried, and held itin the glare of his headlight, thinking to verify his course. Undoubtedly the westward road was the one leading to his destination foras he walked a little way along the other road he found that it bentstill more to the eastward and he believed that it must reach the Frenchfront after another mile or two. 

As he looked again at the cheap, tin-encased compass he smiled a littleruefully, for it reminded him of Archibald Archer, with whom he hadescaped from the prison camp in Germany and made his perilous flightthrough the Black Forest into Switzerland and to the American forcesnear Toul. 

Archibald Archer! Where, in all that war-scourged country, was ArchibaldArcher now, Tom wondered. No doubt, chatting familiarly with generalsand field marshals somewhere, in blithe disregard of dignity andauthority; for he was a brazen youngster and an indefatigable souvenirhunter. 

So vivid were Tom's thoughts of Archer that, being off his machine, hesat down by the roadside to eat the rations which his anxiety to reachhis destination had deterred him from eating before. 

"That's just like him, " he thought, holding the compass out so that itcaught the subdued rays of his dimmed headlight; "always marking thingsup, or whittling his initials or looking for souvenirs. "

The particular specimen of Archer's handiwork which opened this train ofreminiscence was part and parcel of the mischievous habit whichapparently had begun very early in his career, when he renovated thehabiliments of the heroes and statesmen in his school geography bypencilling high hats and sunbonnets on their honored heads and givingthem flowing moustaches and frock coats. 

In the prison camp from which they had escaped he had carved hisinitials on fence and shack, but his masterpiece was the conversion ofthe N on this same glassless compass into a very presentable S (thoughturned sideways) and the S into a very presentable N. 

The occasion of his doing this was a singular experience the two boyshad had in their flight through Germany when, after being carried acrossa lake on a floating island while asleep, they had swum back andretraced their steps northward supposing that they were still goingsouth. 

"Either we're wrong or the compass is wrong, Slady, " the bewilderedArcher had said, and he had forthwith altered the compass points beforethey discovered the explanation of their singular experience. 

After reaching the American forces Archer had gone forth to moreadventures and new glories in the transportation department, the line ofhis activities being between Paris and the coast, and Tom had seen himno more. He had given the compass to Tom as a "souvenir, " and Tom, whose sober nature had found much entertainment in Archer'ssprightliness, had cherished it as such. It was useful sometimes, too, though he had to be careful always to remember that it was the "wrongway round. "

"He'll turn up like a bad penny some day, " he thought now, smiling alittle. "He said he'd bring me the clock from a Paris cathedral for asouvenir, and he'd change the twelve to twenty-two on it. "

He remembered that he had asked Archer _what_ cathedral in Paris, andArcher had answered, "The Cathedral de la Plaster of Paris. "

"He's a sketch, " thought Tom. 

CHAPTER FOUR

THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES

"That's the way it is, " thought Tom, "you get to know fellers and like'em, and then you get separated and you don't see 'em any more. "

Perhaps he was the least bit homesick, coming into this new sector whereall were strangers to him. In any event, as he sat there finishing hismeal he fell to thinking of the past and of the "fellers" he had known. He had known a good many for despite his soberness there was somethingabout him which people liked. Most of his friends had taken delight injollying him and he was one of those boys who are always being nicknamedwherever they go. Over in the Toul sector they "joshed" and "kidded" himfrom morning till night but woe be to you if you had sought to harm him!

He had been sorry, in a way, to leave the Toul sector, just as he hadbeen sorry to leave Bridgeboro when he got his first job on a ship. "That's one thing fellers can't understand, " he thought, "how you can besorry about a thing and glad too. Girls understand better--I'll say thatmuch for 'em, even though I--even though they never had much use forme----"

He fell to thinking of the scout troop of which he had been a memberaway back in America, of Mr. Ellsworth, the scoutmaster, who had liftedhim out of the gutter, and of Roy Blakeley who was always fooling, andPeewee Harris. Peewee must be quite a boy by now--not a tenderfootletany more, as Roy had called him. 

And then there was Rossie Bent who worked in the bank and who had runaway the night before Registration Day, hoping to escape militaryservice. Tom fell to thinking of him and of how he had traced him up toa lonely mountain top and made him go back and register just in time toescape disgrace and punishment. 

"He thought he was a coward till he got the uniform on, " he thought. "That's what makes the difference. I bet he's one of the bravestsoldiers over here now. Funny if I should meet him. I always liked himanyway, even when people said he was conceited. Maybe he had a right tobe. If girls liked me as much as they did him maybe _I'd_ be conceited. Anyway, I'd like to see him again, that's one sure thing. "

When he had finished his meal he felt of his tires, gave his grease cupa turn, mounted his machine and was off to the north for whateverawaited him there, whether it be death or glory or just hard work; andto new friends whom he would meet and part with, who doubtless would"josh" him and make fun of his hair and tell him extravagant yarns andbelittle and discredit his soberly and simply told "adventures, " and yetwho would like him nevertheless. 

"That's the funny thing about some fellers, " he thought, "you never cantell whether they like you or not. Rossie used to say girls were hard tounderstand, but, gee, I think fellers are harder!"

Swiftly and silently along the moonlit road he sped, the dispatch-riderwho had come from the blue hills of Alsace across the war-scorched areainto the din and fire and stenching suffocation and red-running streamsof Picardy "for service as required. " Two miles behind the strainingline he rode and parallel with it, straight northward, keeping his keen, steady eyes fixed upon the road for shell holes. Over to the east hecould hear the thundering boom of artillery and once the air just abovehim seemed to buzz as if some mammoth wasp had passed. But he rodesteadily, easily, without a tremor. 

When he dismounted in front of headquarters at the little village of hisdestination his stolid face was grimy from his long ride and the dust ofthe blue Alsatian mountains mingled with the dust of devastated Franceupon his khaki uniform (which was proper and fitting) and his rebellioushair was streaky and matted and sprawled down over his frowningforehead. 

A little group of soldiers gathered about him after he had given hispaper to the commanding officer, for he had come a long way and theyknew the nature of his present service if he did not. They watched himrather curiously, for it was not customary to bring a dispatch-riderfrom such a distance when there were others available in theneighborhood. He was the second sensation of that memorable night, forscarcely two hours before General Pershing himself had arrived and hewas at that very minute in conference with other officers in the littlered brick cottage. Even as the group of soldiers clustered about therider, officers hurried in and out with maps, and one young fellow, anaviator apparently, suddenly emerged and hurried away. 

"What's going to be doing?" Tom asked, taking notice of all theseactivities and speaking in his dull way. 

Evidently the boys had already taken his measure and formulated theirpolicy, for one answered, "Peace has been declared and they're trying to decide whether we'dbetter take Berlin or have it sent C. O. D. "

"A soldier I met a couple of miles back, " said Tom, "told me to tell youto give 'em Hell. "

It was characteristic of him that although he never used profanity hedelivered the soldier's message exactly as it had been given him. 

CHAPTER FIVE

GETTING READY

Tom wheeled his machine over to a long brick cottage which stood flushwith the road and attended to it with the same care and affection as aman might show a favorite horse. Then he sat down with several others ona long stone bench and waited. 

There was something in the very air which told him that importantmatters were impending and though he believed that they had not expectedhim to arrive just at this time he wondered whether he might not beutilized now that he was here. So he sat quietly where he was, observantof everything, but asking no questions. 

There was a continuous stream of officers entering and emerging from theheadquarters opposite and twice within half an hour companies ofsoldiers were brought into formation and passed silently away along thedark road. 

"You'll be in Germany in a couple of hours, " called a private sittingalongside Tom as some of them passed. 

"Cantigny isn't Germany, " another said. 

"Sure it is, " retorted a third; "all the land they hold is German soil. Call us up when you get a chance, " he added in a louder tone to thereceding ranks. 

"Is Cantigny near here?" Tom asked. 

"Just across the ditches. "

"Are we going to try to take it?"

"_Try_ to? We're going to wrap it up and bring it home. "

Tom was going to ask the soldier if he thought there would be any chancefor _him_, though he knew well enough that his business was behind thelines and that the most he could hope for was to carry the good news (ifsuch it proved to be) still farther back, away from the fighting. 

"This is going to be the first offensive of your old Uncle Samuel and ifwe don't get the whole front page in the New York papers we'll bepeeved, " Tom's neighbor condescended to inform him. 

Whatever Uncle Samuel was up to he was certainly very busy about it andvery quiet. On the little village green which the cottage faced groupsof officers talked earnestly. 

An enormous spool on wheels, which in the darkness seemed a mile high, was rolled silently from somewhere or other, the wheels staked and boundto the ground, and braces were erected against it. Very little sound wasmade and there were no lights save in the houses, which seemed all to beswarming with soldiers. Not a civilian was to be seen. Several soldierswalked away from the big wheel and it moved around slowly like one ofthose gigantic passenger-carrying wheels in an amusement resort. 

Presently some one remarked that Collie was in and there was a hurryingaway--toward the rear of the village, as it seemed to Tom. 

"Who's Collie?" he ventured to ask. 

"Collie? Oh, he's the Stormy Petrel; he's been piking around over theFritzies' heads, I s'pose. "

Evidently Collie, or the Stormy Petrel, was an aviator who had alightedsomewhere about the village with some sort of a report. 

"Collie can't see in the daylight, " his neighbor added; "he and theJersey Snipe have got Fritzie vexed. You going to run between here andthe coast?"

"I don't know what I'm going to do, " said Tom. "I don't suppose I'll goover the top, I'd like to go to Cantigny. "

"Never mind, they'll bring it back to you. Did you know the old gent ishere?"

"Pershing?"

"Yup. Going to run the show himself. "

"Are you going?"

"Not as far as I know. I was in the orchestra--front row--last week. Gota touch of trench fever. "

"D'you mean the front line trenches?" Tom asked. 

"Yup. Oh, look at Bricky!" he added suddenly. "You carrying wire, Bricky? There's a target for a sniper for you--hair as red as----"

"Just stick around at the other end of it, " interrupted "Bricky" as hepassed, "and listen to what you hear. "

"Here come the tanks, " said Tom's neighbor, "and there's the JerseySnipe perched on the one over at the other end. Good-_night_, Fritzie!"

The whole scene reminded Tom vaguely of the hasty, quiet picking up anddeparture of the circus in the night which, as a little boy, he had satup to watch. There were the tanks, half a dozen of them (and he knewthere were more elsewhere), covered with soldiers and waiting in thedarkness like elephants. Troops were constantly departing, for the fronttrenches he supposed. 

Though he had never yet been before the lines, his experience as a riderand his close touch with the fighting men had given him a pretty goodmilitary sense in the matter of geography--that is, he understood nowwithout being told the geographical relation of one place to another inthe immediate neighborhood. Dispatch-riders acquire this sort of extrasense very quickly and they come to have a knowledge of the lay of theland infinitely more accurate than that of the average private soldier. 

Tom knew that this village, which was now the scene of hurriedpreparation and mysterious comings and goings, was directly behind thetrench area. He knew that somewhere back of the village was theartillery, and he believed that the village of Cantigny stood in thesame relation to the German trenches that this billet village stood tothe Allied trenches; that is, that it was just behind the German linesand that the German artillery was still farther back. He had heardenough talk about trench warfare to know how the Americans intended toconduct this operation. 

But he had never seen an offensive in preparation, either large orsmall, for there had been no American offensives--only raids, and ofcourse he had not participated in these. It seemed to him that now, atlast, he was drawn to the very threshold of active warfare only to becompelled to sit silent and gaze upon a scene every detail of whicharoused his longing for action. The hurried consultation of officers, the rapid falling in line in the darkness, the clear brisk words ofcommand, the quick mechanical response, the departure of one group afteranother, the thought of that aviator alighting behind the village, thesight of the great, ugly tanks and the big spool aroused his patriotismand his craving for adventure as nothing else had in all the months ofhis service. He was nearer to the trenches than ever before. 

"If you're riding to Clermont, " he heard a soldier say, apparently tohim, "you'd better take the south road; turn out when you get to Airian. The other's full of shell holes from the old trench line. "

"Best way is to go down through Estrees and follow the road back acrossthe old trench line, " said another. 

Tom listened absently. He knew he could find the best way, that was hisbusiness, but he did not want to go to Clermont. It seemed to him thathe was always going away from the war while others were going toward it. While these boys were rushing forward he would be rushing backward. Thatwas always the way. 

"There's a lot of skeletons in those old trenches. You can follow theditches almost down to Paris. "

"They won't send him farther than Creil, " another said. "The wires areup all the way from Creil down. "

"You never can tell whether they'll stay up or not--not with thisseventy-five mile bean-shooter Fritzie's playing with. Ever been toParis, kid?"

"No, but I s'pose I'll be sent there now--maybe, " Tom answered. 

"They'll keep you moving up this way, all right. You were picked forthis sector--d'you know that?"

"I don't know why. "

"Don't get rattled easy--that's what I heard. "

This was gratifying if it was true. Tom had not known why he had beensent so far and he had wondered. 

Presently a Signal Corps captain came out of Headquarters, spoke brieflywith two officers who were near the big wire spool, and then turnedtoward the bench on which Tom was sitting. His neighbors arose andsaluted and he did the same. 

"Never been under fire, I suppose?" said the captain, addressing Tom tohis great surprise. 

"Not before the lines, I haven't. The machine I had before this one wasknocked all out of shape by a shell. I was riding from Toul to----"

"All right, " interrupted the captain somewhat impatiently. Tom was usedto being interrupted in the midst of his sometimes rambling answers. Hecould never learn the good military rule of being brief and explicit. "How do you feel about going over the top? You don't have to. "

"It's just what I was thinking about, " said Tom eagerly. "If you'd bewilling, I'd like to. "

"Of course you'd be under fire. Care to volunteer? Emergency work. "

"Often I wished----"

"Care to volunteer?"

"Yes, sir, I do. "

"All right; go inside and get some sleep. They'll wake you up in aboutan hour. Machine in good shape?"

This was nothing less than an insult. "I always keep it in good shape, "said Tom. "I got extra----"

"All right. Go in and get some sleep; you haven't got long. The wireboys will take care of you. "

He strode away and began to talk hurriedly with another man who showedhim some papers and Tom watched him as one in a trance. 

"Now you're in for it, kiddo, " he heard some one say. 

"R. I. P. For yours, " volunteered another. 

Tom knew well enough what R. I. P. Meant. Often in his lonely nightrides through the towns close to the fighting he had seen it on rowafter row of rough, carved wooden crosses. 

"There won't be much _resting in peace_ to-night. How about it, Toulsector?"

"I didn't feel very sleepy, anyway, " said Tom. 

He slept upon one of the makeshift straw bunks on the stone floor of thecellar under the cottage. With the first streak of dawn he arose andwent quietly out and sat on a powder keg under a small window, toreseveral pages out of his pocket blank-book and using his knee for adesk, wrote:

 "DEAR MARGARET:

 "Maybe you'll be surprised, kind of, to get a letter from me. And maybe you won't like me calling you Margaret. I told Roy to show you my letters, cause I knew he'd be going into Temple Camp office on account of the troop getting ready to go to Camp and I knew he'd see you. I'd like to be going up to camp with them, and I'd kind of like to be back in the office, too. I remember how I used to be scared of you and you said you must be worse than the Germans 'cause I wasn't afraid of them. I hope you're working there yet and I'd like to see Mr. Burton, too. 

 "I was going to write to Roy but I decided I'd send a letter to you because whenever something is going to happen the fellows write letters home and leave them to be mailed in case they don't get back. So if you get this you'll know I'm killed. Most of them write to girls or their mothers, and as long as I haven't got any mother I thought I'd write to you. Because maybe you'd like to hear I'm killed more than anybody. I mean maybe you'd be more interested. 

 "I'm going to go over the top with this regiment. I got sent way over to this sector for special service. A fellow told me he heard it was because I got a level head. I can't tell you where I am, but this morning we're going to take a town. I didn't have to go, 'cause I'm a non-com. , but I volunteered. I don't know what I'll have to do. 

 "I ain't exactly scared, but it kind of makes me think about home and all like that. I often wished I'd meet Roscoe Bent over here. Maybe he wrote to you. I bet everybody likes him wherever he is over here. It's funny how I got to thinking about you last night. I'll--there goes the bugle, so I can't write any more. Anyway, you won't get it unless I'm killed. Maybe you won't like my writing, but every fellow writes to a girl the last thing. It seems kind of lonely if you can't write to a girl. 

 "Your friend, "TOM SLADE. "

CHAPTER SIX

OVER THE TOP

The first haze of dawn was not dispelled when the artillery began tothunder and Tom knew that the big job was on. Stolid as he was and usedto the roar of the great guns, he made hasty work of his breakfast forhe was nervous and anxious to be on the move. 

Most of the troops that were to go seemed to have gone already. Hejoined the two signal corps men, one of whom carried the wire and theother a telephone apparatus, and as they moved along the road othersignal corps men picked up the wire behind them at intervals, carryingit along. 

Tom was as proud of his machine as a general could be of his horse, andhe wheeled it along beside him, keeping pace with the slow advance ofhis companions, his heart beating high. 

"If you have to come back with any message, you'll rememberHeadquarters, won't you?" one asked him. 

"I always remember Headquarters, " said Tom. 

"And don't get rattled. "

"I never get rattled. "

"Watch the roads carefully as we go, so you can get back all right. Noise don't bother you?"

"No, I'm used to artillery--I mean the noise, " said Tom. 

"You probably won't have much to do unless in an emergency. If Fritziecuts the wire or it should get tangled and we couldn't reach the airmenquick enough you'd have to beat it back. There's two roads out ofCantigny. Remember to take the south one. We're attacking on a milefront. If you took----"

"If I have to come back, " said Tom, "I'll come the same way. You needn'tworry. "

His advisor felt sufficiently squelched. And indeed, he had no cause toworry. The Powers that Be had sent Thatchy into the West where thebattle line was changing every day and roads were being made anddestroyed and given new directions; where the highway which took one toHeadquarters one day led into the lair of the Hun on the next, and allthe land was topsy-turvy and changing like the designs in akaleidoscope--for the very good reason that Thatchy invariably reachedhis destination and could be depended upon to come back, through all thechaos, as a cat returns to her home. The prison camps in Germany werenot without Allied dispatch-riders who had become "rattled" and hadblundered into the enemy's arms, but Thatchy had a kind of uncanny extrasense, a bump of locality, if you will, and that is why they had senthim into this geographical tangle where maps became out of date as fastas they were made. 

The sun was not yet up when they reached a wider road running crosswaysto the one out of the village and here many troops were waiting as farup and down the road as Tom could see. A narrow ditch led away from theopposite side of the road through the fields beyond, and looking up anddown the road he could see that there were other ditches like it. 

The tanks were already lumbering and waddling across the fields, for allthe world like great clumsy mud turtles, with soldiers perched upon themas if they were having a straw ride. Before Tom and his companionsentered the nearest ditch he could see crowds of soldiers disappearinginto other ditches far up the road. 

[Illustration: SHOWING WHERE THE AMERICANS WERE BILLETED: CANTIGNY, WHICH THEY CAPTURED AND THE ROUTE TAKEN BY TOM AND THE CARRIERS. ARROWSSHOW THE AREA OF ATTACK. ]

The fields above them were covered with shell holes, a little cemeteryflanked one side of the zigzag way, and the big dugouts of the reserveswere everywhere in this backyard of the trench area. Out of narrow, crooked side avenues soldiers poured into the communication trench whichthe wire carriers were following, falling in ahead of them. 

"We'll get into the road after the boys go over and then you'll havemore room for your machine. Close quarters, hey?" Tom's nearestcompanion said. 

When they reached the second-line trench the boys were leaving it, byhundreds as it seemed to Tom, and crowding through the crookedcommunication trenches. The wire carriers followed on, holding up thewire at intervals. Once when Tom peeped over the edge of thecommunication trench he saw the tanks waddling along to right and left, rearing up and bowing as they crossed the trench, like clumsy, trainedhippopotamuses. And all the while the artillery was booming withcontinuous, deafening roar. 

Tom did not see the first of the boys to go over the top for they wereover by the time he reached the second-line trench, but as he passedalong the fire trench toward the road he could see them crowding over, and when he reached the road the barbed wire entanglements lay flat inmany places, the boys picking their way across the fallen meshes, theclumsy tanks waddling on ahead, across No Man's Land. As far as Tomcould see along the line in either direction this shell-torn area wasbeing crossed by hundreds of boys in khaki holding fixed bayonets, somegoing ahead of the tanks and some perching on them. 

Above him the whole district seemed to be in pandemonium, men shoutingand their voices drowned by the thunder of artillery. 

His first real sight of the attack was when he clambered out of thetrench where it crossed the road and faced the flattened meshes ofbarbed wire with its splintered supporting poles all tangled in it. Never was there such a wreck. 

"All right, " he shouted down. "It's as flat as a pancake--careful withthe machine--lift the back wheel--that's right!"

He could hardly hear his own voice for the noise, and the very earthseemed to shake under the heavy barrage fire which protected them. Inone sweeping, hasty glance he saw scores of figures in khaki runninglike mad and disappearing into the enemy trenches beyond. 

"Do you mean to let the wire rest on this?" he asked, as his machine waslifted up and the first of the wire carriers came scrambling up afterit; "it might get short-circuited. "

"We'll run it over the poles, only hurry, " the men answered. 

They were evidently the very last of the advancing force, and even asTom looked across the shell-torn area of No Man's Land, he could see themen picking their way over the flattened entanglements and pouring intothe enemy trenches. The tanks had already crossed these and were rearingand waddling along, irresistible yet ridiculous, like so many heroic mudturtles going forth to glory. Here and there Tom could see the gray-cladform of a German clambering out of the trenches and rushing pell-mell tothe rear. 

But it was no time to stand and look. Hurriedly they disentangled acouple of the supporting poles, laying them so that the telephone wirepassed over them free of the barbed meshes and Tom, mounting hismachine, started at top speed along the road across No Man's Land, dragging the wire after him. Scarcely had he started when he heard thatwasplike whizzing close to him--once, twice, and then a sharp metallicsound as a bullet hit some part of his machine. He looked back to seeif the wire carriers were following, but there was not a sign of any ofthem except his companion who carried the apparatus, and just as Tomlooked this man twirled around like a top, staggered, and fell. 

The last of the Americans were picking their way across the tangle offallen wire before the German fire trench. He could see them now andagain amid dense clouds of smoke as they scrambled over the enemysandbags and disappeared. 

On he sped at top speed, not daring to look around again. He could feelthat the wire was dragging and he wondered where its supporters couldbe; but he opened his cut-out to get every last bit of power and sped onwith the accumulating train of wire becoming a dead weight behind him. 

Now, far ahead, he could see gray-coated figures scrambling franticallyout of the first line trench, and he thought that the Americans musthave carried the attack successfully that far, in any event. Again camethat whizzing sound close to him, and still again a sharp metallic ringas another bullet struck his machine. For a moment he feared least atire had been punctured, but when neither collapsed he took freshcourage and sped on. 

The drag on the wire was lessening the speed of his machine now andjerking dangerously at intervals. But he thought of what one of thosesoldiers had said banteringly to another--_Stick around at the other endof it and listen to what you hear_, and he was resolved that if limitedhorse power and unlimited will power could get this wire to those braveboys who were surging and battling in the trenches ahead of him, coulddrag it to them wherever they went, for the glorious message theyintended to send back across it, it should be done. 

There was not another soul visible on that road now nor in theshell-torn area of No Man's Land through which it ran. But the lonerider forged ahead, zig-zagging his course to escape the bullets of thatunseen sharpshooter and because it seemed to free the dragging, catchingwire, affording him little spurts of unobstructed speed. 

Then suddenly the wire caught fast, and his machine stopped and strainedlike a restive horse, the power wheel racing furiously. Hurriedly helooked behind him where the sinuous wire lay along the road, farback--as far as he could see, across the trampled entanglements andtrenches. Where were the others who were to help carry it over? Killed?

Alone in the open area of No Man's Land, Tom Slade paused for an instantto think. What should he do?

Suddenly there appeared out of a shell hole not twenty feet ahead of hima helmeted figure. It rose up grimly, uncannily, like a dragon out ofthe sea, and levelled a rifle straight at him. So that was the lair ofthe sharpshooter!

Tom was not afraid. He knew that he had been facing death and he was notafraid of what he had been facing. He knew that the sharpshooter had himat last. Neither he nor the wire were going to bear any message back. 

"Anyway, I'm glad I wrote that letter, " he muttered. 

[Illustration: TOM WAS SURPRISED TO FIND HIMSELF UNINJURED, WHILE THEBOCHE COLLAPSED INTO HIS SHELL HOLE. ]

CHAPTER SEVEN

A SHOT

Then, clear and crisp against the sound of the great guns far off, therewas the sharp crack of a rifle and Tom was surprised to find himselfstill standing by his machine uninjured, while the Boche collapsed backinto his shell hole like a jack-in-the-box. 

He did not pause to think now. Leaving his machine, he rushed pell-mellback to the barbed wire entanglement where the line was caught, disengaged it and ran forward again to his wheel. Shells were burstingall about him, but as he mounted he could see two figures emerge, oneafter the other, from the American trench where it crossed the road, andtake up the burden of wire. He could feel the relief as he mounted androde forward and it lightened his heart as well as his load. What hadhappened to delay the carriers he did not know. Perhaps those whofollowed him now were new ones and his former companions lay dead orwounded within their own lines. What he thought of most of all was hisextraordinary escape from the Boche sharpshooter and he wondered who andwhere his deliverer could be. 

He avoided looking into the shell hole as he passed it and soon hereached the enemy entanglements which the tanks had flattened. Even theflat meshes had been cleared from the road and here several regularswaited to help him. They were covered with dirt and looked as if theyhad seen action. 

"Bully for you, kid!" one of them said, slapping Tom on the shoulder. 

"You're all right, Towhead!"

"Lift the machine, " said Tom; "they always put broken glass in theroads. I thought maybe they'd punctured my tire out there. "

"They came near puncturing _you_, all right! What's your name?"

"Thatchy is mostly what I get called. My motorcycle is named _UncleSam_. Did you win yet?"

For answer they laughed and slapped him on the shoulder and repeated, "You're all right, kid!"

"Looks as if Snipy must have had his eye on you, huh?" one of themobserved. 

"Who's Snipy?" Tom asked. 

"Oh, that's mostly what _he_ gets called, " said someone, mimicking Tom'sown phrase. "His rifle's named _Tommy_. He's probably up in a treesomewheres out there. "

"He's a good shot, " said Tom simply. "I'd like to see him. "

"Nobody ever sees him--they _feel_ him, " said another. 

"He must have been somewhere, " said Tom. 

"Oh, he was _somewhere_ all right, " several laughed. 

A couple of the Signal Corps men jumped out of the trench near by andgreeted Tom heartily, praising him as the others had done, all of whichhe took with his usual stolidness. Already, though of course he did notknow it, he was becoming somewhat of a character. 

"You've got Paul Revere and Phil Sheridan beat a mile, " one of the boyssaid. 

"I don't know much about Sheridan, " said Tom, "but I always liked PaulRevere. "

He did not seem to understand why they laughed and clapped him on theshoulder and said, "You'll do, kiddo. "

But it was necessary to keep moving, for the other carriers were comingalong. The little group passed up the road, Tom pushing his wheel andanswering their questions briefly and soberly as he always did. Plankshad been laid across the German trenches where they intersected the roadand as they passed over them Tom looked down upon many a gruesome sightwhich evidenced the surprise by the Americans and their undoubtedvictory. Not a live German was to be seen, nor a dead American either, but here and there a fallen gray-coat lay sprawled in the crookedtopsy-turvy ditch. He could see the Red Cross stretcher-bearers passingin and out of the communication trenches and already a number of boys ingrimy khaki were engaged in repairing the trenches where the tanks hadcaved them in. In the second line trench lay several wounded Americansand Tom was surprised to see one of these propped up smoking a cigarettewhile the surgeons bandaged his head until it looked like a great whiteball. Out of the huge bandage a white face grinned up as the littlegroup passed across on the planks and seeing the men to be wirecarriers, the wounded soldier called, "Tell 'em we're here. "

"Ever hear of Paul Revere?" one of the Signal men called back cheerily. And he rumpled Tom's hair to indicate whom he meant. 

Thus it was that Thatchy acquired the new nickname by which he was to beknown far and wide in the country back of the lines and in the billetvillages where he was to sit, his trusty motorcycle close at hand, waiting for messages and standing no end of jollying. Some of the moreresourceful wits in khaki even parodied the famous poem for his benefit, but he didn't care. He would have matched _Uncle Sam_ against PaulRevere's gallant steed any day, and they could jolly him and "kid" himas their mood prompted, but woe be to the person who touched hisfaithful machine save in his watchful presence. Even General Pershingwould not have been permitted to do that. 

CHAPTER EIGHT

IN THE WOODS

Beyond the enemy second line trench the road led straight into Cantignyand Tom could see the houses in the distance. Continuous firing was tobe heard there and he supposed that the Germans, routed from theirtrenches, were making a stand in the village and in the high groundbeyond it. 

"They'll be able to 'phone back, won't they?" he asked anxiously. 

"They sure will, " one of the men answered. 

"It ain't that I don't want to ride back, " Tom explained, "but afeller's waiting on the other end of this wire, 'cause I heard somebodytell him to, and I wouldn't want him to be disappointed. "

"He won't be disappointed. "

The road, as well as the open country east and west of it, was strewnwith German dead and wounded, among whom Tom saw one or two figures inkhaki. The Red Cross was busy here, many stretchers being borne uptoward the village where dressing stations were already beingestablished. Then suddenly Tom beheld a sight which sent a thrillthrough him. Far along the road, in the first glare of the rising sun, flew the Stars and Stripes above a little cottage within the confines ofthe village. 

"Headquarters, " one of his companions said, laconically. 

"Does it mean we've won?" Tom asked. 

"Not exactly yet, " the other answered, "but as long as the flag's upthey probably won't bother to take it down, " and he looked at Tom in aqueer way. "There's cleaning up to do yet, kid, " he added. 

As they approached the village the hand-to-hand fighting was nearing itsend, and the Germans were withdrawing into the woods beyond where theyhad many machine gun nests which it would be the final work of theAmericans to smoke out. But Tom saw a little of that kind of warfarewhich is fought in streets, from house to house, and in shaded villagegreens. Singly and in little groups the Americans sought out, killing, capturing and pursuing the diminishing horde of Germans. Two of these, running frantically with apparently no definite purpose, surrendered toTom's group and he thought they seemed actually relieved. 

At last they reached the little cottage where the flag flew and werereceived by the weary, but elated, men in charge. 

"All over but the shouting, " someone said; "we're finishing up backthere in the woods. "

The telephone apparatus was fastened to a tree and Tom heard the wordsof the speaker as he tried to get into communication with the villagewhich lay back across that shell-torn, trench-crossed area which theyhad traversed. At last he heard those thrilling words which carried muchfarther than the length of the sinuous wire:

"Hello, this is Cantigny. "

And he knew that whatever yet remained to be done, the first realoffensive operation of the Americans was successful and he was proud tofeel that he had played his little part in it. 

He was given leave until three o'clock in the afternoon and, leaving_Uncle Sam_ at the little makeshift headquarters, he went about the townfor a sight of the "clean-up. "

Farther back in the woods he could still hear the shooting where theAmericans were searching out machine gun nests and the boom of artillerycontinued, but although an occasional shell fell in the town, the placewas quiet and even peaceful by comparison with the bloody clamor of anhour before. 

It seemed strange that he, Tom Slade, should be strolling about thisquaint, war-scarred village, which but a little while before hadbelonged to the Germans. Here and there in the streets he met sentinelsand occasionally an airplane sailed overhead. How he envied the men inthose airplanes!

He glanced in through broken windows at the interiors of simple abodeswhich the bestial Huns had devastated. It thrilled him that the boysfrom America had dragged and driven the enemy out of these homes andwould dig their protecting trenches around the other side of thisstricken village, like a great embracing arm. It stirred him to thinkthat it was now within the refuge of the American lines and that thearrogant Prussian officers could no longer defile those low, rafteredrooms. 

He inquired of a sentinel where he could get some gasoline which hewould need later. 

"There's a supply station along that road, " the man said; "just beyondthe clearing. "

Tom turned in that direction. The road took him out of the village andthrough a little clump of woods to a clearing where several Americanswere guarding a couple of big gasoline tanks--part of the spoils of war. He lingered for a few minutes and then strolled on toward the edge ofthe denser wood beyond where the firing, though less frequent, couldstill be heard. 

He intended to go just far enough into this wood for a glimpse of theforest shade which his scouting had taught him to love, and then toreturn to headquarters for his machine. 

Crossing a plank bridge across a narrow stream, he paused in the edge ofthe woods and listened to the firing which still occurred at intervalsin the higher ground beyond. He knew that the fighting there was of theold-fashioned sort, from behind protecting trees and wooded hillocks, something like the good old fights of Indians and buckskin scouts awayhome in the wild west of America. And he could not repress his impulseto venture farther into the solitude. 

[Illustration: TOM SLIPPED BEHIND A TREE AND WATCHED THE MAN WHO PAUSEDLIKE A STARTLED ANIMAL. ]

The stream which he had crossed had evidently its source in the moredensely wooded hills beyond and he followed it on its narrowing way uptoward the locality where the fighting seemed now to be going on. Once agroup of khaki-clad figures passed stealthily among the trees, intentupon some quest. The sight of their rifles reminded Tom that he washimself in danger, but he reflected that he was in no greater dangerthan they and that he had with him the small arm which all messengerscarried. 

A little farther on he espied an American concealed behind a tree, whonodded his head perfunctorily as Tom passed, seeming to discourage anyspoken greeting. 

The path of the stream led into an area of thick undergrowth coveringthe side of a gentle slope where the water tumbled down in little falls. He must be approaching very near to the source, he thought, for thestream was becoming a mere trickle, picking its way around rockyobstacles in a very jungle of thick underbrush. 

Suddenly he stopped at a slight rustling sound very near him. 

It was the familiar sound which he had so often heard away back in theAdirondack woods, of some startled creature scurrying to shelter. 

He was the scout again now, standing motionless and silent--keenlywaiting. Then, to his amazement, a clump of bushes almost at his feetstirred slightly. He waited still, watching, his heart in his mouth. Could it have been the breeze? But there was no breeze. 

Startled, but discreetly motionless, he fixed his eyes upon the leafyclump, still waiting. Presently it stirred again, very perceptibly now, then moved, clumsily and uncannily, and with a slight rustling of itsleaves, along the bank of the stream!

CHAPTER NINE

THE MYSTERIOUS FUGITIVE

Suddenly the thing stopped, and its whole bulk was shaken verynoticeably. Then a head emerged from it and before Tom could realizewhat had happened a German soldier was fully revealed, brushing theleaves and dirt from his gray coat as he stole cautiously along the edgeof the stream, peering anxiously about him and pausing now and again tolisten. 

He was already some distance from Tom, whom apparently he had notdiscovered, and his stealthy movements suggested that he was either inthe act of escaping or was bent upon some secret business of importance. 

Without a sound Tom slipped behind a tree and watched the man who pausedlike a startled animal at every few steps, watching and listening. 

Tom knew that, notwithstanding his non-combatant status, he was quitejustified in drawing his pistol upon this fleeing Boche, but before hehad realized this the figure had gone too far to afford him much hope ofsuccess with the small weapon which he was not accustomed to. Moreover, just because he _was_ a "non-com" he balked at using it. If he shouldmiss, he thought, the man might turn upon him and with a surer aim layhim low. 

But there was one thing in which Tom Slade felt himself to be the equalof any German that lived, and that was stalking. Here, in the deepwoods, among these protecting trees, he felt at home, and the lure ofscouting was upon him now. No one could lose him; no one could get awayfrom him. And a bird in the air would make no more noise than he!

Swiftly, silently, he slipped from one tree to another, his keen eyealways fixed upon the fleeting figure and his ears alert to learn if, perchance, the Boche was being pursued. Not a sound could he hear exceptthat of the distant shooting. 

It occurred to him that the precaution of camouflaging might be usefulto him also, and he silently disposed one of the leafy boughs which theGerman had left diagonally across his breast with the fork over hisshoulder so that it formed a sort of adjustable screen, more portableand less clumsy than the leafy mound which had covered the Boche. 

With this he stole along, sometimes hiding behind trees, sometimescrouching among the rocks along the bank, and keeping at an evendistance from the man. His method with its personal dexterity waseloquent of the American scout, just as the Boche, under his mound offoliage, had been typical of the German who depends largely upon_device_ and little upon personal skill and dexterity. 

The scout from Temple Camp had his ruses, too, for once when the German, startled by a fancied sound, seemed about to look behind him, Tomdexterously hurled a stone far to the left of his quarry, which divertedthe man's attention to that direction and kept it there while Tom, gliding this way and that and raising or lowering his scant disguise, crept after him. 

They were now in an isolated spot and the distant firing seemed fartherand farther away. The stream, reduced to a mere trickle, worked its waydown among rocks and the German followed its course closely. What he wasabout in this sequestered jungle Tom could not imagine, unless, indeed, he was fleeing from his own masters. But surely open surrender to theAmericans would have been safer than that, and Tom remembered howreadily those other German soldiers had rushed into the arms of himselfand his companions. 

Moreover, the more overgrown the brook became and the more involved itspath, the more the hurrying German seemed bent upon following it andinstead of finding any measure of relief from anxiety in this isolatedplace, he appeared more anxious than ever and peered carefully about himat every few steps. 

At length, to Tom's astonishment, he stepped across the brook and feltof a clump of bush which grew on the bank. Could he have expected tofind another camouflaged figure, Tom wondered?

Whatever he was after, he apparently thought he had reached hisdestination for he now moved hurriedly about, feeling the single bushesand moving among the larger clumps as if in quest of something. After afew moments he paused as if perplexed and moved farther up the stream. And Tom, who had been crouching behind a bush at a safe distance, creptsilently to another one, greatly puzzled but watching him closely. 

Selecting another spot, the Boche moved about among the bushes asbefore, carefully examining each one which stood by itself. Tom expectedevery minute to see some grim, gray-coated figure step out of his leafyretreat to join his comrade, but why such a person should wait to bediscovered Tom could not comprehend, for he must have heard and probablyseen this beating through the bushes. 

An especially symmetrical bush stood on the brink of the stream andafter poking about this as usual, the German stood upon tiptoe, apparently looking down into it, then kneeled at its base while Tomwatched from his hiding-place. 

Suddenly a sharp report rang out and the German jumped to his feet, clutched frantically at the brush which seemed to furnish a substantialsupport, then reeled away and fell headlong into the brook, where he laymotionless. 

The heedless current, adapting itself readily to this grim obstruction, bubbled gaily around the gray, crumpled form, accelerating its cheeryprogress in the narrow path and showing little glints of red in itscrystal, dancing ripples. 

CHAPTER TEN

THE JERSEY SNIPE

Tom hurried to the prostrate figure and saw that the German was quitedead. There was no other sign of human presence and not a sound to beheard but the rippling of the clear water at his feet. 

For a few moments he stood, surprised and silent, listening. Then hefancied that he heard a rustling in the bushes some distance away and helooked in that direction, standing motionless, alert for the slighteststir. 

Suddenly there emerged out of the undergrowth a hundred or more feetdistant a strange looking figure clad in a dull shade of green with agreen skull cap and a green scarf, like a scout scarf, loosely thrownabout his neck. Even the rifle which he carried jauntily over hisshoulder was green in color, so that he seemed to Tom to have thatgeneral hue which things assume when seen through green spectacles. Hewas lithe and agile, gliding through the bushes as if he were a part ofthem, and he came straight toward Tom, with a nimbleness which almostrivalled that of a squirrel. 

There was something about his jaunty, light step which puzzled Tom andhe narrowed his eyes, watching the approaching figure closely. Thestranger removed a cigarette from his mouth to enable him the better tolay his finger upon his lips, imposing silence, and as he did so themovement of his hand and his way of holding the cigarette somehow causedTom to stare. 

Then his puzzled scrutiny gave way to an expression of blank amazement, as again the figure raised his finger to his lips to anticipate anyimpulse of Tom's to call. Nor did Tom violate this caution until thestranger was within a dozen feet or so. 

"Roscoe--Bent!" he ejaculated. "Don't you know me? I'm Tom Slade. "

"Well--I'll--be----" Roscoe began, then broke off, holding Tom at arm'slength and looking at him incredulously. "Tom Slade--_I'llbe--jiggered_!"

"I kinder knew it was you, " said Tom in his impassive way, "as soon as Isaw you take that cigarette out of your mouth, 'cause you do it such aswell way, kind of, " he added, ingenuously; "just like the way you usedto when you sat on the window-sill in Temple Camp office and jolliedMargaret Ellison. Maybe you don't remember. "

Still Roscoe held him at arm's length, smiling all over his handsome, vivacious face. Then he removed one of his hands from Tom's shoulder andgave him a push in the chest in the old way. 

"It's the same old Tom Slade, I'll be---- And with the front of yourbelt away around at the side, as usual. This is better than taking ahundred prisoners. How are you and how'd you get here, you sober oldtow-head, you?" and he gripped Tom's hand with impulsive vehemence. "This sure does beat all! I might have known if I found you at all itwould be in the woods, you old pathfinder!" and he gave Tom anothershove, then rapped him on the shoulder and slipped his hand around hisneck in a way all his own. 

"I--I like to hear you talk that way, " said Tom, with that queerdullness which Roscoe liked; "it reminds me of old times. "

"Kind of?" prompted Roscoe, laughing. "Is our friend here dead?"

"Yes, he's very dead, " said Tom soberly, "but I think there are othersaround in the bushes. "

"There are some enemies there, " said Roscoe, "but we won't kill them. Contemptible murderers!" he muttered, as he hauled the dead Boche out ofthe stream. "I'll pick you off one by one, as fast as you come up here, you gang of back-stabbers! Look here, " he added. 

"I got to admit you can do it, " said Tom with frank admiration. 

Roscoe pulled away the shrubbery where the German had been kneeling whenhe was struck and there was revealed a great hogshead, larger, Tomthought, than any he had ever seen. 

"That's the kind of weapons they fight with, " Roscoe said, disgustedly. "Look here, " he added, pulling the foliage away still more. "Don't touchit. See? It leads down from another one. It's poison. "

Tom, staring, understood well enough now, and he peered into the bushesabout him in amazement as he heard Roscoe say, "Arsenic, the sneaky beasts. "

"See what he was going to do?" he added, startling Tom out of his silentwondering. "There's half a dozen or more of these hogsheads in thosebushes. As fast as this one empties it fills up again from another thatstands higher. There's a whole nest of them here. See how the pipe fromthis one leads into the stream?"

"What's the wire for?" said Tom. 

"Oh, that's so's they can open this little cock here, see? Start thething going. Don't pull away the camouflage. There may be another chapup here in a little while, to see what's the matter. _Tommy'll_ takecare of them all right, won't you, _Tommy_?"

"Do you mean me?" Tom asked. 

"I mean your namesake here, " Roscoe said, slapping his rifle. "I namedit after you, you old glum head. Remember how you told me a fellercouldn't aim straight, _kind of_" (he mimicked Tom's tone). "You said afeller couldn't aim straight, _kind of_, if he smoked cigarettes. "

"I got to admit I was wrong, " said Tom. 

"You bet you have! Jingoes, it's good to hear you talk!" Roscoe laughed. "How in the world did you get here, anyway?"

"I'll tell you all about it, " said Tom, "only first tell me, are you thefeller they call the Jersey Snipe?"

"Snipy, for short, " said Roscoe. 

"Then maybe you saved my life already, " said Tom, "out in No Man'sLand. "

"Were you the kid on that wheel?" Roscoe asked, surprised. 

"Yes, and I always knew you'd make a good soldier. I told everybody so. "

"_Kind of?_ Tommy, old boy, don't forget it was _you_ made me asoldier, " Roscoe said soberly. "Come on back to my perch with me, " headded, "and tell me all about your adventures. This is better thantaking Berlin. There's only one person in this little old world I'drather meet in a lonely place, and that's the Kaiser. Come on--quietnow. "

"You don't think you can show _me_ how to stalk, do you?" said Tom. 

CHAPTER ELEVEN

ON GUARD

"You see it was this way, " said Roscoe after hie had scrambled withamazing agility up to his "perch" in a tree several hundred feet distantbut in full view of the stream. Tom had climbed up after him and waslooking with curious pleasure at the little kit of rations and otherpersonal paraphernalia which hung from neighboring branches. "How do youlike my private camp? Got Temple Camp beat, hey?" he broke off in thaterratic way of his. "All the comforts of home. Come on, get into yourcamouflage. "

"You don't seem the same as when you used to come up to our office fromthe bank downstairs--that's one sure thing, " said Tom, pulling theleaves about him. 

"You thought all I was good for was to jolly Margaret Ellison, huh?"

"I see now that you didn't only save my life but lots of other fellers', too, " said Tom. "Go on, you started to tell me about it. "

It was very pleasant and cosy up there in the sniper's perch whereRoscoe had gathered the thinner branches about him, forming a littleleafy lair, in which his agile figure and his quick glances aboutreminded Tom for all the world of a squirrel. He could hardly believethat this watchful, dexterous creature, peering cautiously out of hisromantic retreat, was the same Roscoe Bent who used to make fun of thescouts and sneak upstairs to smoke cigarettes in the Temple Camp office;who thought as much of his spotless high collar then as he seemed tothink of his rifle now. 

"I got to thank you because you named it after me, " said Tom. 

"And I _got to thank you_ that you gave me the chance to get it to nameafter you, Tommy. Well, you see it was this way, " Roscoe went on in ahalf whisper; "there were half a dozen of us over here in the woods andwe'd just cleaned out a machine gun nest when we saw this miniatureforest moving along. I thought it was a decorated moving van. "

"That's the trouble with them, " agreed Tom; "they're no good in thewoods; they're clumsy. They're punk scouts. "

"Scouts!" Roscoe chuckled. "If we had to fight this gang of cut-throatsand murderers in the woods where old What's-his-name--Custer--had tofight the Indians, take it from me, we'd have them wiped up in a month. That fellow's idea of camouflaging was to bury himself under a couple oftons of green stuff and then move the whole business along like a clumsyold Zeppelin. I can camouflage myself with a branch with ten leaves onit by studying the light. "

"Anybody can see you've learned something about scouting--that's onesure thing, " said Tom proudly. 

"_One sure thing!_" Roscoe laughed inaudibly. "It's the same old TommySlade. Well, I was just going to bean this geezer when my officer toldme I'd better follow him. "

"I was following him, too, " said Tom; "stalking is the word you ought touse. "

"Captain thought he might be up to something special. So Ifollowed--_stalked_--how's that?"

"All right. "

"So I stalked him and when I saw he was following the stream I made adetour and waited for him right here. You see what he was up to? Waydown in Cantigny they could turn a switch and start this blamed poison, half a dozen hogsheads of it, flowing into the stream. They waited tillthey lost the town before they turned the switch, and they probablythought they could poison us Americans by wholesale. Maybe they had somereason to think the blamed thing hadn't worked, and sent this fellow up. I beaned him just as he was going to turn the stop-cock. "

"Maybe you saved a whole lot of lives, hey?" said Tom proudly. 

Roscoe shrugged his shoulder in that careless way he had. "I'll be gladto meet any more that come along, " he said. 

It was well that Tom Slade's first sight of deliberate killing was inconnection with so despicable a proceeding as the wholesale poisoning ofa stream. He could feel no pity for the man who, fleeing from those whofought cleanly and like men instead of beasts, had sought to pour thispotent liquid of anguish and death into the running crystal water. Suchacts, it seemed to him, were quite removed from the sphere of honorable, manly fighting. 

As a scout he had learned that it was wrong even to bathe in a streamwhence drinking water was obtained, and at camp he had alwaysscrupulously observed this good rule. He felt that it was cowardly todefile the waters of a brook. It was not a "mailed fist" at all whichcould do such things, but a fist dripping with poison. 

And Tom Slade felt no qualm, as otherwise he might have felt, at hidingthere waiting for new victims. He was proud and thrilled to see hisfriend, secreted in his perch, keen-eyed and alert, guarding alone thecrystal purity of this laughing, life-giving brook, as it hurried alongits pebbly bed and tumbled in little gushing falls and wound cheerilyaround the rocks, bearing its grateful refreshment to the weary, thirstyboys who were holding the neighboring village. 

"I used to think I wouldn't like to be a sniper, " he said, "but now itseems different. I saw two fellers in the village and one had a bandageon his arm and the other one who was talking to him--I heard him say along drink of water would go good--and--I--kind of--now----"

The Jersey Snipe winked at Tom and patted his rifle as a man might pat afavorite dog. 

"It's good fresh water, " said he. 

CHAPTER TWELVE

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

In Tom's visions of the great war there had been no picture of thesniper, that single remnant of romantic and adventurous warfare, in allthe roar and clangor of the horrible modern fighting apparatus. 

He had seen American boys herded onto great ships by thousands; and, marching and eating and drilling in thousands, they had seemed like agreat machine. He knew the murderous submarine, the aeroplane with itsear-splitting whir, the big clumsy Zeppelin; and he had handled gasmasks and grenades and poison gas bombs. 

But in his thoughts of the war and all these diabolical agents ofwholesale death there had been no visions of the quiet, stealthy figure, inconspicuous in the counterfeiting hues of tree and rock, stealingsilently away with his trusty rifle and his week's rations for a lonelyvigil in some sequestered spot. 

There was the same attraction about this freelance warfare which theremight have been about a privateer in contrast with a flotilla of moderndreadnaughts and frantic chasers, and it reminded him of Daniel Boone, and Kit Carson, and Davy Crockett, and other redoubtable scouts of oldwho did not depend on stenching suffocation and the poisoning ofstreams. It was odd that he had never known much about the sniper, thatone instrumentality of the war who seems to have been able to preserve aromantic identity in all the bloody _mélée_ of the mighty conflict. 

For Tom had been a scout and the arts of stealth and concealment andnature's resourceful disguises had been his. He had thought of thesniper as of one whose shooting is done peculiarly in cold blood, and hewas surprised and pleased to find his friend in this romantic and noblerôle of holding back, single-handed, as it were, these vile agents ofagonizing death. 

Arsenic! Tom knew from his memorized list of poison antidotes that ifone drinks arsenic he will be seized with agony unspeakable and die inslow and utter torture. The more he thought about it, the more the cold, steady eye of the unseen sniper and his felling shot seemed noble andheroic. 

Almost unconsciously he reached out and patted the rifle also as if itwere some trusted living thing--an ally. 

"Did you really mean you named it after me--honest?" he asked. 

Roscoe laughed again silently. "See?" he whispered, holding it across, and Tom could distinguish the crudely engraved letters, TOMMY. 

"--Because I never had anything named after me, " he said in his simple, dull way. "There's a place on the lake up at Temple Camp that thefellers named after Roy Blakeley--Blakeley Isle. And there's a newpavilion up there that's named after Mr. Ellsworth, our scoutmaster. AndMr. Temple's got lots of things--orphan asylums and gymnasiums andbuildings and things--named after _him_. I always thought it must befine. I ain't that kind--sort of--that fellers name things after, " headded, with a blunt simplicity that went to Roscoe's heart; and he heldthe rifle, as the sniper started to take it back, his eyes still fixedupon the rough scratches which formed his own name. "In Bridgeborothere was a place in Barrell Alley, " he went on, apparently withoutfeeling, "where my father fell down one night when he was--when he'd hadtoo much to drink, and after that everybody down there called it Slade'sHole. When I got in with the scouts, I didn't like it--kind of----"

Roscoe looked straight at Tom with a look as sure and steady as hisrifle. "Slade's Hole isn't known outside of Barrell Alley, Tom, " he saidimpressively, although in the same cautious undertone, "but _Tom Slade_is known from one end of this sector to the other. "

"Thatchy's what they called me in Toul sector, 'cause my hair's alwaysmussed up, I s'pose, and----"

"The first time I ever saw you to really know you, Tom, your hair wasall mussed up--and I hope it'll always stay that way. That was when youcame up there in the woods and made me promise to go back and register. "

"I knew you'd go back 'cause----"

"I went back with bells on, and here I am. And here's _Tom Slade_ that'sstuck by me through this war. It's named _Tom Slade_ because it makesgood--see? Look here, I'll show you something else--you old hickorynut, you. See that, " he added, pulling a small object from somewhere inhis clothing. 

Tom stared. "It's the Distinguished Service Cross, " he said, his longingeyes fixed upon it. 

"That's what it is. The old gent handed me that--if anybody should askyou. "

Tom smiled, remembering Roscoe's familiar way of speaking of thedignified Mr. Temple, and of "Old Man" Burton, and "Pop" this and that. 

"General Pershing?"

"The same. You've heard of him, haven't you? Very muchly, huh?"

"Why don't you wear it?" Tom asked. 

"Why? Well, I'll tell you why. When your friend, Thatchy, followed me onthat crazy trip of mine he borrowed some money for railroad fare, didn'the? And he had a Gold Cross that he used to get the money, huh? So Imade up my mind that this little old souvenir from Uncle Samuel wouldn'thang on my distinguished breast till I got back and paid Tom Slade whatI owed him and made sure that he'd got his own Cross safely back and waswearing it again. Do you get me?"

"I got my Cross back, " said Tom, "and it's home. So you can put that on. You got to tell me how you got it, too. I always knew you'd make asuccess. "

"It was _Tommy Slade_ helped me to it, as usual. I beaned nine Germansout in No Man's Land, and got away slightly wounded--I stubbed my toe. Old Pop Clemenceau gave me a kiss and the old gent slipped me this forgood luck, " Roscoe said, pinning on the Cross to please Tom. "WhenClemmy saw the name on the rifle, he asked what it meant and I told himit was named after a pal of mine back home in the U. S. A. --Tom Slade. Little I knew you were waltzing around the war zone on that thing ofyours. I almost laughed in his face when he said, 'M'soo Tommee shouldbe proud. '"

So the Premier of France had spoken the name of Tom Slade, whose fatherhad had a mud hole in Barrell Alley named after him. 

"I _am_ proud, " he stammered; "that's one sure thing. I'm proud onaccount of you--I am. "

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE FOUNTAINS OF DESTRUCTION

As Tom had the balance of the day to himself he cherished but onethought--that of remaining with Roscoe as long as his leave wouldpermit. If he had been in the woods up at Temple Camp, away back home inhis beloved Catskills, he could hardly have felt more at home than hefelt perched in this tree near the headwaters of the running stream; andto have Roscoe Bent crouching there beside him was more than his fondestdreams of doing his bit had pictured. 

At short intervals they could hear firing, sometimes voices in thedistance, and occasionally the boom of artillery, but except for thesereminders of the fighting the scene was of that sort which Tom loved. Itwas there, while the sniper, all unseen, guarded the source of thestream, his keen eye alert for any stealthy approach, that Tom told himin hushed tones the story of his own experiences; how he had been aship's boy on a transport, and had been taken aboard the German U-boatthat had torpedoed her and held in a German prison camp, from which heand Archer had escaped and made their way through the Black Forest andacross the Swiss border. 

"Some kid!" commented Roscoe, admiringly; "the world ain't big enoughfor you, Tommy. If you were just back from Mars I don't believe you'd beexcited about it. "

"Why should I be?" said literal Tom. "It was only because the feller Iwas with was born lucky; he always said so. "

"Oh, yes, of course, " said Roscoe sarcastically. "_I_ say he was mightylucky to be with _you_. Feel like eating?"

It was delightful to Tom sitting there in their leafy concealment, waiting for any other hapless German emissaries who might come, bent onthe murderous defilement of that crystal brook, and eating of therations which Roscoe never failed to have with him. 

"You're kind of like a pioneer, " he said, "going off where there isn'tanybody. They have to trust you to do what you think best a lot, Iguess, don't they? A feller said they often hear you but they never seeyou. I saw you riding on one of the tanks, but I didn't know it was you. Funny, wasn't it?"

"I usually hook a ride. The tanks get on my nerves, though, they're soslow. "

"You're like a squirrel, " said Tom admiringly. 

"Well, you're like a bulldog, " said Roscoe. "Still got the same oldscowl on your face, haven't you? So they kid you a lot, do they?"

"I don't mind it. "

So they talked, in half whispers, always scanning the woods about them, until after some time their vigil was rewarded by the sight of threegray-coated, helmeted figures coming up the bank of the stream. Theymade no pretence of concealment, evidently believing themselves to besafe here in the forest. Roscoe had hauled the body of the dead Germanunder the thick brush so that it might not furnish a warning to othervisitors, and now he brought his rifle into position and touching hisfinger to his lips by way of caution he fixed his steady eye on theapproaching trio. 

One of these was a tremendous man and, from his uniform and arrogantbearing, evidently an officer. The other two were plain, ordinary"Fritzies. " Tom believed that they had come to this spot by somecircuitous route, bent upon the act which their comrade and themechanism had failed to accomplish. He watched them in suspense, glancing occasionally at Roscoe. 

The German officer evidently knew the ground for he went straight to thebush where the hogshead stood concealed, and beckoned to his twounderlings. Tom, not daring to stir, looked expectantly at Roscoe, whoserifle was aimed and resting across a convenient branch before him. Thesniper's intent profile was a study. Tom wondered why he did not fire. He saw one of the Boches approach the officer, who evidently would notdeign to stoop, and kneel at the foot of the bush. Then the crisp, echoing report of Roscoe's rifle rang out, and on the instant theofficer and the remaining soldier disappeared behind the leaf-coveredhogshead. Tom was aware of the one German lying beside the bush, starkand motionless, and of Roscoe jerking his head and screwing up his mouthin a sort of spontaneous vexation. Then he looked suddenly at Tom andwinked unmirthfully with a kind of worried annoyance. 

"Think they can hit us from there? Think they know where we are?" Tomasked in the faintest whisper. 

"'Tisn't that, " Roscoe whispered back. "Look at that flat stone underthe bush there. Shh! I couldn't get him in the right light before. Shh!"

Narrowing his eyes, Tom scanned the earth at the foot of the bush andwas just able to discern a little band of black upon a gray stone there. It was evidently a wet spot on the dusty stone and for a second hethought it was blood; then the staggering truth dawned upon him that inshooting the Hun in the very act of letting loose the murderous liquidRoscoe had shot a hole in the hogshead and the potent poison was flowingout rapidly and down into the stream. 

And just in that moment there flashed into Tom's mind the picture ofthat weary, perspiring boy in khaki down in captured Cantigny, who hadmopped his forehead, saying, "A drink of water would go good now. "

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

TOM USES HIS FIRST BULLET

It had been a pet saying of Tom's scoutmaster back in America that youshould _wait long enough to make up your mind and not one secondlonger_. 

Tom knew that the pressure of liquid above that fatal bullet hole nearthe bottom of the hogshead was great enough to send the poison fairlypouring out. He could not see this death-dealing stream, for it washidden in the bush, but he knew that it would continue to pour forthuntil several of these great receptacles had been emptied and therunning brook with its refreshing coolness had become an instrument offrightful death. 

Safe behind the protecting bulk of the hogshead crouched the twosurviving Germans, while Roscoe, covering the spot, kept his eyesriveted upon it for the first rash move of either of the pair. Andmeanwhile the poison poured out of the very bulwark that shielded themand into the swift-running stream. 

"I don't think they've got us spotted, " Tom whispered, moving cautiouslytoward the trunk of the tree; "the private had a rifle, didn't he?"

"What are you going to do?" Roscoe breathed. 

"Stop up that hole. Give me a bullet, will you?"

"You're taking a big chance, Tom. "

"I ain't thinking about that. Give me a bullet. All _you_ got to do iskeep those two covered. "

With a silent dexterity which seemed singularly out of keeping with hisrather heavy build, Tom shinnied down the side of the tree farthest fromthe brook, and lying almost prone upon the ground began wriggling hisway through the sparse brush, quickening his progress now and againwhenever the diverting roar of distant artillery or the closer report ofrifles and machine guns enabled him to advance with less caution. 

In a few minutes he reached the stream, apparently undiscovered, whensuddenly he was startled by another rifle report, close at hand, and helay flat, breathing in suspense. 

It was simply that one of that pair had made the mistake so often madein the trenches of raising his head, and had paid the penalty. 

Tom was just cautiously crossing the brook when he became aware of afrantic scramble in the bush and saw the German private rushingpell-mell through the thick undergrowth beyond, hiding himself in it asbest he might and apparently trying to keep the bush-enshrouded hogsheadbetween himself and the tree where the sniper was. Evidently he haddiscovered Roscoe's perch and, there being now no restraining authority, had decided on flight. It had been the officer's battle, not his, and heabandoned it as soon as the officer was shot. It was typical of theGerman system and of the total lack of individual spirit and resource ofthe poor wretches who fight for Kaiser Bill's glory. 

Reaching the bush, Tom pulled away the leafy covering and saw that thepoisonous liquid was pouring out of a clean bullet hole as he hadsuspected. He hurriedly wrapped a bit of the gauze bandage which healways carried around the bullet Roscoe had given him and forced it intothe hole, wedging it tight with a rock. Then he waved his hand in thedirection of the tree to let Roscoe know that all was well. 

Tom Slade had used his first bullet and it had saved hundreds of lives. 

"They're both dead, " he said, as Roscoe came quickly through theunderbrush in the gathering dusk. "Did the officer put his head up?"

"Mm-mm, " said Roscoe, examining the two victims. 

"You always kill, don't you?" said Tom. 

"I have to, Tommy. You see, I'm all alone, mostly, " Roscoe added as hefumbled in the dead officer's clothing. "There are no surgeons or nursesin reach. I don't have stretcher-bearers following _me_ around and itisn't often that even a Hun will surrender, fair and square, to one man. I've seen too much of this '_kamarad_' business. I can't afford to takechances, Tommy. But I don't put nicks in my rifle butt like some of themdo. I don't want to know how many I beaned after it's all over. We killto save--that's the idea you want to get into your head, Tommy boy. "

"I know it, " said Tom. 

The officer had no papers of any importance and since it was gettingdark and Tom must report at headquarters, they discussed the possibilityof upsetting these murderous hogsheads, and putting an end to thedanger. Evidently the woods were not yet wholly cleared of the enemy whomight still seek to make use of these agents of destruction. 

"There may be stragglers in the woods even to-morrow, " Roscoe said. 

"S'pose we dig a little trench running away from the brook and then turnon the cock and let the stuff flow off?" suggested Tom. 

The idea seemed a good one and they fell to, hewing out a ditch with acouple of sticks. It was a very crude piece of engineering, as Roscoeobserved, and they were embarrassed in their work by the gatheringdarkness, but at length they succeeded, by dint of jabbing and plowingand lifting the earth out in handfuls, in excavating a little gullythrough the rising bank so that the liquid would flow off and down therocky decline beyond at a safe distance from the stream. 

For upwards of an hour they remained close by, until the hogsheads hadrun dry, and then they set out through the woods for the capturedvillage. 

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE GUN PIT

"I think the best way to get into the village, " said Roscoe, "is tofollow the edge of the wood around. That'll bring us to the by-path thatruns into the main road. They've got the woods pretty well cleared outover that way. There's a road a little north of here and I think theGermans have withdrawn across that. What do you say?"

"You know more about it than I do, " said Tom. "I followed the brook up. It's pretty bad in some places. "

"There's only two of us, " said Roscoe, "and you've no rifle. Safetyfirst. "

"I suppose there's a lot of places they could hide along the brook; thebrush is pretty thick all the way up, " Tom added. 

Roscoe whistled softly in indecision. "I like the open better, " said he. 

"I guess so, " Tom agreed, "when there's only two of us. "

"There's three of us, though, " said Roscoe, "and _Tommy_ here likes theopen better. I'd toss up a coin only with these blamed French coins youcan't tell which is heads and which is tails. "

Roscoe was right about the Germans having withdrawn beyond the roadnorth of the woods. Whether he was right about its being safer to goaround the edge of the forest remained to be determined. 

This wood, in which they had passed the day, extended north of thevillage (see map) and thinned out upon the eastern side so that onefollowing the eastern edge would emerge from the wood a little east ofthe main settlement. Here was the by-path which Roscoe had mentioned, and which led down into the main road. 

Running east and west across the northern extremity of the woods was aroad, and the Germans, driven first from their trenches, then out of thevillage, and then out of the woods, were establishing their lines northof this road. 

If the boys had followed the brook down they would have reached thevillage by a much shorter course, but Roscoe preferred the open countrywhere they could keep a better lookout. Whether his decision was a wiseone, we shall see. 

[Illustration: SHOWING PATH TAKEN BY TOM AND ROSCOE THROUGH THE WOODS]

Leaving the scene of their "complete annihilation of the crack poisondivision, " as Roscoe said, they followed the ragged edge of the woodswhere it thinned out to the north, verging around with it until theywere headed in a southerly direction. 

"There's a house on that path, " said Roscoe, "and we ought to be able tosee a light there pretty soon. "

"There's a little piece of woods ahead of us, " said Tom; "when we getpast that we'll see it, I guess. We'll cut through there, hey?"

"Wait a minute, " said Roscoe, pausing and peering about in the halfdarkness. "I'm all twisted. There's the house now. "

He pointed to a dim light in the opposite direction to that which theyhad taken. 

"That's north, " said Tom in his usual dull manner. 

"You're mistaken, my boy. What makes you think it's north?"

"I didn't say I thought so, " said Tom. "I said it _is_. "

Roscoe laughed. "Same old Tom, " he said. "But how do you know it'snorth?"

"You remember that mountain up in the Catskills?" Tom said. "The firsttime I ever went to the top of that mountain was in the middle of thenight. I never make that kind of mistakes. I know because I just know. "

Roscoe laughed again and looked rather dubiously at the light in thedistance. Then he shook his head, unconvinced. 

"We've been winding in and out along the edge of this woods, " said Tom, "so that you're kind of mixed up, that's all. It's always those littleturns that throw people out, just like it's a choppy sea that upsets aboat; it ain't the big waves. I used to get rattled like that myself, but I don't any more. "

Roscoe drew his lips tight and shook his head skeptically. "I can'tunderstand about that light, " he said. 

"I always told you you made a mistake not to be a scout when you wereyounger, " said Tom in that impassive tone which seemed utterly free ofthe spirit of criticism and which always amused Roscoe, "'cause then youwouldn't bother about the light but you'd look at the stars. Those aresure. "

Roscoe looked up at the sky and back at Tom, and perhaps he found a kindof reassurance in that stolid face. "All right, Tommy, " said he, "whatyou say, goes. Come ahead. "

"That light is probably on the road the Germans retreated across, " saidTom, as they picked their way along. His unerring instinct left himentirely free from the doubts which Roscoe could not altogether dismiss. "I don't say there ain't a light on the path you're talking about, butif we followed this one we'd probably get captured. I was seven monthsin a German prison. I don't know how you'd like it, but I didn't. "

Roscoe laughed silently at Tom's dry way of putting it. "All right, Tommy, boy, " he said. "Have it your own way. "

"You ought to be satisfied the way you can shoot, " said Tom, by way ofreconciling Roscoe to his leadership. 

"All right, Tommy. Maybe you've got the bump of locality. When we getpast that little arm of the woods just ahead we ought to see the rightlight then, huh?"

"_Spur_ is the right name for it, not _arm_, " said Tom. "You might aswell say it right. "

"The pleasure is mine, " laughed Roscoe; "Tommy, you're as good as acircus. "

They made their way in a southeasterly direction, following the edge ofthe woods, with the open country to the north and east of them. Presently they reached the "spur, " as Tom called it, which seemed toconsist of a little "cape" of woods, as one might say, sticking outeastward. They could shorten their path a trifle by cutting throughhere, and this they did, Roscoe (notwithstanding Tom's stolidself-confidence) watching anxiously for the light which this spur hadprobably concealed, and which would assure them that they were headingsouthward toward the path which led into Cantigny village. 

Once, twice, in their passage through this little clump of woods Tompaused, examining the trees and ground, picking up small branches andlooking at their ends, and throwing them away again. 

"Funny how those branches got broken off, " he said. 

Roscoe answered with a touch of annoyance, the first he had shown sincetheir meeting in the woods. 

"I'm not worrying about those twigs, " he said; "I don't see that lightand I think we're headed wrong. "

"They're not twigs, " said Tom literally; "they're branches, and they'rebroken off. "

"Any fool could tell the reason for that, " said Roscoe, ratherscornfully. "It's the artillery fire. "

Tom said nothing, but he did not accept Roscoe's theory. He believedthat some one had been through here before them and that the brancheshad been broken off by human hands; and but for the fact that Roscoe hadlet him have his own way in the matter of direction he would havesuggested that they make a detour around this woody spur. However, hecontented himself by saying in his impassive way, "I know when branchesare broken off. "

"Well, what are we going to do now?" Roscoe demanded, stopping short andspeaking with undisguised impatience. "You can see far beyond thosetrees now and you can see there's no light. They'll have us nailed upona couple of crosses to-morrow. I don't intend to be tortured on accountof the Boy Scouts of America. "

He used the name as being synonymous with bungling and silly notions andstar-gazing, and it hit Tom in a dangerous spot. He answered with a kindof proud independence which he seldom showed. 

"I didn't say there'd be a light. Just because there's a house itdoesn't mean there's got to be a light. I said the light we saw was inthe north, and it's got nothing to do with the Boy Scouts. You wouldn'tlet me point your rifle for you, would you? They sent me to this sector'cause I don't get lost and I don't get rattled. You said that about theScouts just because you're mad. I'm not hunting for any light. I'm goingback to Cantigny and I know where I'm at. You can come if you want to oryou can go and get caught by the Germans if you want to. I went ahundred miles through Germany and they didn't catch _me_--'cause Ialways know where I'm at. "

He went on for a few steps, Roscoe, after the first shock of surprise, following silently behind him. He saw Tom stumble, struggle to regainhis balance, heard a crunching sound, and then, to his consternation, saw him sink down and disappear before his very eyes. 

In the same instant he was aware of a figure which was not Tom'sscrambling up out of the dark, leaf-covered hollow and of the muzzle ofa rifle pointed straight at him. 

Evidently Tom Slade had not known "where he was at" at all. 

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

PRISONERS

Apparently some of the enemy had not yet withdrawn to the north, for inless than five seconds Roscoe was surrounded by a group of Germansoldiers, among whom towered a huge officer with an eye so fierce andpiercing that it was apparent even in the half darkness. He sported amoustache more aggressively terrible than that of Kaiser Bill himselfand his demeanor was such as to make that of a roaring lion seem like adocile lamb by comparison. An Iron Cross depended from a heavy chainabout his bull neck and his portly breast was so covered with the junkof rank and commemoration that it seemed like one of those boards fromwhich street hawkers sell badges at a public celebration. 

Poor Tom, who had been hauled out of the hole, stood dogged and sullenin the clutch of a Boche soldier, and Roscoe, even in his surprise atthis singular turn of affairs, bestowed a look of withering scorn uponhim. 

"I knew those branches were _broken_ off, " Tom muttered, as if inanswer. "They're using them for camouflage. It's got nothing to do withthe other thing about which way we were going. "

But Roscoe only looked at him with a sneer. 

Wherever the wrong and right lay as to their direction, they had runplunk into a machine-gun nest and Roscoe Bent, with all his diabolicalskill of aim, could not afford his fine indulgence of sneering, for asan active combatant, which Tom was not, he should have known that thesenests were more likely to be found at the wood's edge than anywhereelse, where they could command the open country. The little spur ofwoods afforded, indeed, an ideal spot for secreting a machine gun, whence a clear range might be had both north and south. 

If Tom had not been a little afraid of Roscoe he would have acted on thegood scout warning of the broken branches and made a detour in time toescape this dreadful plight. And the vain regret that he had not done sorankled in his breast now. The pit was completely surrounded and almostcovered with branches, so that no part of the guns and their tripodswhich rose out of it was discoverable, at least to Roscoe. 

"Vell, you go home, huh?" the officer demanded, with a grim touch ofhumor. 

Roscoe was about to answer, but Tom took the words out of his mouth. 

"We got lost and we got rattled, " he said, with a frank confession whichsurprised Roscoe; "we thought we were headed south. "

The sniper bestowed another angrily contemptuous look upon him, but Tomappeared not to notice it. 

"Vell, we rattle you some more--vat?" the officer said, without verymuch meaning. His voice was enough to rattle any captive, but Tom wasnot easily disconcerted, and instead of cowering under this martialferocity and the scorning looks of his friend, he glanced about him inhis frowning, lowering way as if the surroundings interested him morethan his captors. But he said nothing. 

"You English--no?" the officer demanded. 

"We're Americans, " said Roscoe, regaining his self-possession. 

"Ach! Diss iss good for you. If you are English, ve kill you! You havekamerads--vere?"

"There's only the two of us, " said Roscoe. Tom seemed willing enough tolet his companion do the talking, and indeed Roscoe, now that he hadrecovered his poise, seemed altogether the fitter of the two to be thespokesman. "We got rattled, as this kid says. " "If we'd followed thatlight we wouldn't have happened in on you. We hope we don't intrude, " headded sarcastically. 

The officer glanced at the tiny light in the distance, then at one ofthe soldiers, then at another, then poured forth a gutteral torrent atthem all. Then he peered suspiciously into the darkness. 

"For treachery, ve kill, " he said. 

"I told you there are only two of us, " said Roscoe simply. 

"Ach, two! Two millions, you mean! Vat? Ach!" he added, with adeprecating wave of his hands. "Vy not _billions_, huh?"

Roscoe gathered that he was sneering skeptically about the number ofAmericans reported to be in France. 

"Ve know just how many, " the officer added; "vell, vat you got, huh?"

At this two of the Boches proceeded to search the captives, neither ofwhom had anything of value or importance about them, and handed thebooty to the officer. 

"Vat is diss, huh?" he said, looking at a small object in his hand. 

Tom's answer nearly knocked Roscoe off his feet. 

"It's a compass, " said he. 

So Tom had had a compass with him all the time they had been discussingwhich was the right direction to take! Why he had not brought it out toprove the accuracy of his own contention Roscoe could not comprehend. 

"A compass, huh. Vy you not use it?"

"Because I was sure I was right, " said Tom. 

"Always sure you are right, you Yankees! Vat?"

"Nothing, " said Tom. 

The officer examined the trifling haul as well as he could in thedarkness, then began talking in German to one of his men. And meanwhileTom watched him in evident suspense, and Roscoe, unmollified, cast atTom a look of sneering disgust for his bungling error--a look whichseemed to include the whole brotherhood of scouts. 

Finally the officer turned upon Roscoe with his characteristic martialferocity. 

"How long you in France?" he demanded. 

"Oh, about a year or so. "

"Vat ship you come on?"

"I don't know the name of it. "

"You come to Havre, vat?"

"I didn't notice the port. "

"Huh! You are not so--vide-avake, huh?"

"Absent-minded, yes, " said Roscoe. 

The officer paused, glaring at Roscoe, and Tom could not help envyinghis friend's easy and self-possessed air. 

"You know the _Texas Pioneer_?" the officer shot out in that short, imperious tone of demand which is the only way in which a German knowshow to ask a question. 

"Never met him, " said Roscoe. 

"A ship!" thundered the officer. 

"Oh, a ship. No, I've never been introduced. "

"She come to Havre--vat?"

"That'll be nice, " said Roscoe. 

"You never hear of dis ship, huh?"

"No, there are so many, you know. "

"To bring billions, yes!" the officer said ironically. 

"That's the idea. "

Pause. 

"You hear about more doctors coming--no? Soon?"

"Sorry I can't oblige you, " said Roscoe. 

The officer paused a moment, glaring at him and Tom felt veryunimportant and insignificant. 

"Vell, anyway, you haf good muscle, huh?" the officer finally observed;then, turning to his subordinates, he held forth in German until itappeared to Tom that he and Roscoe were to carry the machine gun to theenemy line. 

To Tom, under whose sullen, lowering manner, was a keenness ofobservation sometimes almost uncanny, it seemed that these men were notthe regular crew which had been stationed here, but had themselvessomehow chanced upon the deserted nest in the course of their withdrawalfrom the village. 

For one thing, it seemed to him that this imperious officer was apersonage of high rank, who would not ordinarily have been stationed inone of these machine gun pits. And for another thing, there wassomething (he could not tell exactly what) about the general demeanor oftheir captors, their way of removing the gun and their apparentunfamiliarity with the spot, which made him think that they had stumbledinto it in the course of their wanderings just as he and Roscoe haddone. They talked in German and he could not understand them, but henoticed particularly; that the two who went into the pit to gather themore valuable portion of the paraphernalia appeared not to be familiarwith the place, and he thought that the officer inquired of them whetherthere were two or more guns. 

When he lifted his share of the burden, Roscoe noticed how he watchedthe officer with a kind of apprehension, almost terror, in his furtiveglance, and kept his eyes upon him as they started away in the darkness. 

Roscoe was in a mood to think ill of Tom, whom he considered thebungling, stubborn author of their predicament. It pleased him now tobelieve that Tom was afraid and losing his nerve. He remembered that hehad said they would be crucified as a result of Tom's pin-headed error. And he was rather glad to believe that Tom was thinking of that now. 

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

SHADES OF ARCHIBALD ARCHER

After a minute the officer paused and consulted with one of his men;then another was summoned to the confab, the three of them reminding Tomof a newspaper picture he had seen of the Kaiser standing in a fieldwith two officers and gazing fiercely at a map. 

One of the soldiers waved a hand toward the distance, while Tom watchedsharply. And Roscoe, who accepted their predicament with a kind ofreckless bravado, sneered slightly at Tom's evident apprehension. 

Then the officer produced something, holding it in his hand while theothers peered over his shoulder. And Tom watched them with loweringbrows, breathing hurriedly. No one knew it, but in that little pause TomSlade lived a whole life of nervous suspense. It was not, however, thenervousness and suspense which his friend thought. 

Then, as if unable to control his impulse, he moved slightly as thoughto start in the direction which he and Roscoe had been following. It wasonly a slight movement, made in obedience to an overwhelming desire, andas if he would incline his captors' thoughts in that direction. Roscoe, who held his burden jointly with Tom, felt this impatient impulsecommunicated to him and he took it as a confession from Tom that he hadmade the fatal error of mistaking their way before. And he moved atrifle, too, in the direction where he knew the German lines had beenestablished, muttering scornfully at Tom, "You know where you're headedfor now, all right. It's what I said right along. "

"I admit I know, " said Tom dully. 

No doubt it was the compass which was the main agent in deciding theofficer as to their route, but he and his men moved, even as Tom did, asif to make an end of needless parleying. 

As they tramped along, following the edge of the wood, a tiny lightappeared ahead of them, far in the distance, like a volunteer beacon, and Roscoe, turning, a trifle puzzled, tried to discover the otherlight, which had now diminished to a mere speck. Now and again theofficer paused and glanced at that trifling prize of war, Tom's littleglassless, tin-encased compass. But Tom Slade of Temple Camp, Scout ofthe Circle and the Five Points, winner of the Acorn and the Indianhead, looked up from time to time at the quiet, trustful stars. 

So they made their way along, following a fairly straight course, andverging away from the wood's edge, heading toward the distant light. Twoof the Germans went ahead with fixed bayonets, scouring the underbrush, and the others escorted Tom and Roscoe, who carried all of the burden. 

The officer strode midway between the advance guard and the escortingparty, pausing now and again as if to make sure of his ground andoccasionally consulting the compass. Once he looked up at the sky andthen Tom fairly trembled. He might have saved himself this worry, however, for Herr Officer recognized no friends nor allies in thatpeaceful, gold-studded heaven. 

"It was an unlucky day for me I ran into you over here, " Roscoemuttered, yielding to his very worst mood. 

Tom said nothing. 

"We won't even have the satisfaction of dying in action now. "

No answer. 

"After almost a year of watching my step I come to this just because Itook _your_ word. Believe _me_, I deserve to hang. I don't even get onthe casualty list, on account of you. You see what we're both up againstnow, through that bump of locality you're so proud of. Edwards' Grove[1]is where _you_ belong. I'm not blaming you, though--I'm blaming myselffor listening to a dispatch kid!"

The Germans, not understanding, paid no attention, and Roscoe went on, reminding Tom of the old, flippant, cheaply cynical Roscoe, who hadstolen his employer's time to smoke cigarettes in the Temple Campoffice, trying to arouse the stenographer's mirth by ridiculing the BoyScouts. 

"I'm not thinking about what you're saying, " he said bluntly, after a fewminutes. "I'm remembering how you saved my life and named your gun afterme. "

"Hey, Fritzie, have they got any Boy Scouts in Germany?" Roscoe asked, ignoring Tom, but speaking apparently at him. The nearest Boche gave aglowering look at the word _Fritzie_, but otherwise paid no attention. 

"We were on our way to German headquarters, anyway, " Roscoe added, addressing himself indifferently to the soldiers, "but we're glad ofyour company. The more, the merrier. Young Daniel Boone here was leadingthe way. "

The Germans, of course, did not understand, but Tom felt ashamed of hiscompanion's cynical bravado. The insults to himself he did not mind. Histhoughts were fixed on something else. 

On they went, into a marshy area where Tom looked more apprehensively atthe officer than before, as if he feared the character of the groundmight arouse the suspicion of his captors. But they passed through herewithout pause or question and soon were near enough to the flickeringlight to see that it burned in a house. 

Again Roscoe looked perplexedly behind him, but the light there was notvisible at all now. Again the officer stopped and, as Tom watched himfearfully, he glanced about and then looked again at the compass. 

For one brief moment the huge figure stood there, outlined in thedarkness as if doubting. And Tom, looking impassive and dogged, held hisbreath in an agony of suspense. 

It was nothing and they moved on again, Roscoe, in complete repudiationof his better self, indulging his sullen anger and making Tom and theScouts (as if they had anything to do with it) the victims of hiscutting shafts. 

And still again the big, medal-bespangled officer paused to look at thecompass, glanced, suspiciously, Tom thought, at the faint shadow of aroad ahead of them, and moved on, his medals clanging and chinking inunison with his martial stride. 

And Tom Slade of Temple Camp, Scout of the Circle and the Five Points, winner of the Acorn and the Indianhead, glanced up from time to time atthe quiet, trustful stars. 

If he thought of any human being then, it was not of Roscoe Bent (not_this_ Roscoe Bent, in any event), but of a certain young friend faraway, he did not know where. And he thanked Archibald Archer, vandalthough he was, for, one idle, foolish thing that he had done. 

[1] The woods near Bridgeboro, in America, where Tom and the Scouts hadhiked and camped. 

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

THE BIG COUP

No one knew, no one ever would know, of the anxiety and suspense whichTom Slade experienced in that fateful march through the country aboveCantigny. Every uncertain pause of that huge officer, and every halfinquiring turn of his head sent a shock of chill misgiving through poorTom and he trudged along under the weight of his burden, hearing theflippant and bitter jibes of Roscoe as if in a trance. 

At last, having crossed a large field, they fell into a well-worn path, and here Tom experienced his moment of keenest anxiety, for the officerpaused as if in momentary recognition of the spot. For a second heseemed a bit perplexed, then strode on. Still again he paused within afew yards of the little house where the light had appeared. 

But it was too late. About this house a dozen or more figures moved inthe darkness. Their style of dress was not distinguishable, but TomSlade called aloud to them, "Here's some prisoners we brought youback. "

In an instant they were surrounded by Americans and Tom thought that hisnative tongue had never sounded so good before. 

"Hello, Snipy, " some one said. 

But Roscoe Bent was too astonished to answer. In a kind of trance he sawthe big Prussian officer start back, heard him utter some terrificGerman expletive, beheld the others of the party herded together, andwas aware of the young American captain giving orders. In a daze helooked at Tom's stolid face, then at the Prussian officer, who seemedtoo stunned to say anything after his first startled outburst. He sawtwo boys in khaki approaching with lanterns and in the dim light ofthese he could distinguish a dozen or so khaki-clad figures perchedalong a fence. 

"Where are we at, anyway?" he finally managed to ask. 

"Just inside the village, " one of the Americans answered. 

"What village?"

"Coney Island on the subway, " one of the boys on the fence called. 

"Cantigny, " some one nearer to him said. "You made a good haul. "

"Well--I'll--be----" Roscoe began. 

Tom Slade said nothing. Like a trusty pilot leaving his ship he strolledover and vaulted up on the fence beside the boys who, having taken thevillage, were now making themselves comfortable in it. His firstquestion showed his thoughtfulness. 

"Is the brook water all right?"

"Sure. Thirsty?"

"No, I only wanted to make sure it was all right. There were some bighogsheads of poison up in the woods where the brook starts and the otherfeller killed three Germans who tried to empty them in the stream. Bymistake he shot a hole in one of the hogsheads and I thought maybe someof the stuff got into the water. But I guess it didn't. "

It was characteristic of Tom that he did not mention his own part in thebusiness. 

"I drank about a quart of it around noontime, " said a young sergeant, "and I'm here yet. "

"It's good and cool, " observed another. 

"What's the matter with Snipy, anyway?" a private asked, laughing. "Somebody been spinning him around?"

"He just got mixed up, kind of, that's all, " Tom said. 

_That was all. _

There was much excitement in and about the little cottage on the edge ofthe village. Up the narrow path, from headquarters below, came otherAmericans, officers as Tom could see, who disappeared inside the house. Presently, the German prisoners, all except the big officer, came out, sullen in captivity, poor losers as Germans always are, and marched awaytoward the centre of the village, under escort. 

"They thought they were taking us to the German lines, " said Tom simply. 

Roscoe, having recovered somewhat from his surprise and feeling deeplychagrined, walked over and stood in front of Tom. 

"Why didn't you show me that compass, Tom?" he asked. 

"Because it was wrong, just like you were, " Tom answered frankly, butwithout any trace of resentment. "If I'd showed it to you you'd havethought it proved you were right. It was marked, crazy like, by thatfeller I told you about. I knew all the time we were coming toCantigny. "

There was a moment of silence, then Roscoe, his voice full of feeling, said simply, "Tom Slade, you're a wonder. "

"Hear that, Paul Revere?" one of the soldiers said jokingly. "Praisefrom the Jersey Snipe means something. "

"No, it don't either, " Roscoe muttered in self-distrust. "You've savedme from a Hun prison camp and while you were doing it you had to listento me--Gee! I feel like kicking myself, " he broke off. 

"I ain't blaming you, " said Tom, in his expressionless way. "If I'd hadmy way we'd have made a detour when I saw those broken branches, 'causeI knew it meant people were there, and then we wouldn't have got thosefellers as prisoners, at all. So they got to thank you more than me. "

This was queer reasoning, indeed, but it was Tom Slade all over. 

"Me!" said Roscoe, "that's the limit. Tom, you're the same old hickorynut. Forgive me, old man, if you can. "

"I don't have to, " said Tom. 

Roscoe stood there staring at him, thrilled with honest admiration andstung by humiliation. 

And as the little group, augmented by other soldiers who strolled overto hear of this extraordinary affair first hand, grew into something ofa crowd, Tom, alias Thatchy, alias Paul Revere, alias Towhead, sat uponthe fence, answering questions and telling of his great coup with a dullunconcern which left them all gaping. 

"As soon as I made up my mind they didn't belong there, " he said, "Idecided they weren't sure of their own way, kind of. If the big manhadn't taken the compass away from me, I'd have given it to him anyway. It had the N changed into an S and the S into an N. I think he kind ofthought the other way was right, but when he saw the compass, thatsettled him. All the time I was looking at the Big Dipper, 'cause I knewnobody ever tampered with that. I noticed he never even looked up, butonce, and then I was scared. When we got to the marsh, I was scared, too, 'cause I thought maybe he'd know about the low land being south ofthe woods. I was scared all the time, as you might say, but mostly whenhe turned his head and seemed kind of uncertain-like. It ain't so muchany credit to me as it is to Archer--the feller that changed theletters. Anyway, I ain't mad, that's sure, " he added, evidentlyintending this for Roscoe. "Everybody gets mistaken sometimes. "

"You're one bully old trump, Tom, " said Roscoe shamefacedly. 

"So now you see how it was, " Tom concluded. "I couldn't get rattled aslong as I could see the Big Dipper up there in the sky. "

For a few moments there was silence, save for the low whistling of oneof the soldiers. 

"You're all right, kiddo, " he broke off to say. 

Then one of the others turned suddenly, giving Tom a cordial rap on theshoulder which almost made him lose his balance. "Well, as long as we'vegot the Big Dipper, " said he, "and as long as the water's pure, whatd'you say we all go and have a drink--in honor of Paul Revere?"

So it was that presently Tom and Roscoe found themselves sitting aloneupon the fence in the darkness. Neither spoke. In the distance theycould hear the muffled boom of some isolated field-piece, belching forthits challenge in the night. High overhead there was a whirring, buzzingsound as a shadow glided through the sky where the stars shonepeacefully. A company of boys in khaki, carrying intrenching implements, passed by, greeting them cheerily as they trudged back from doing theirturn in digging the new trench line which would embrace Cantigny. 

Cantigny!

"I'm glad we took the town, that's one sure thing, " Tom said. 

"It's the first good whack we've given them, " agreed Roscoe. 

Again there was silence. In the little house across the road a lightburned. Little did Tom Slade know what was going on there, and what itwould mean to him. And still the American boys guarding this approachdown into the town, moved to and fro, to and fro, in the darkness. 

"Tom, " said Roscoe, "I was a fool again, just like I was before, backhome in America. Will you try to forget it, old man?" he added. 

"There ain't anything to forget, " said Tom, "I got to be thankful Ifound you; that's the only thing I'm thinking about and--and--that wedidn't let the Germans get us. If you like a feller you don't mind aboutwhat he says. Do you think I forget you named that rifle after me? Justbecause--because you didn't know about trusting to the stars, --Iwouldn't be mad at you----"

Roscoe did not answer. 

CHAPTER NINETEEN

TOM IS QUESTIONED

When it became known in the captured village (as it did immediately)that the tall prisoner whom Tom Slade had brought in, was none otherthan the famous Major Johann Slauberstrauffn von Piffinhoeffer, excitement ran high in the neighborhood, and the towheaded youngdispatch-rider from the Toul sector was hardly less of a celebrity thanthe terrible Prussian himself. "Paul Revere" and his compass became thesubjects of much mirth, touched, as usual, with a kind of banteringevidence of genuine liking. 

In face of all this, Tom bestowed all the credit on Roscoe (it would behard to say why), and on Archibald Archer and the Big Dipper. 

"Now that we've got the Big Dipper with us we ought to be able to pushright through to Berlin, " observed one young corporal. "They sayEdison's got some new kind of a wrinkle up his sleeve, but believe me, if he's got anything to beat Paul Revere's compass, he's a winner!"

"Old Piff nearly threw a fit, I heard, when he found out that he wascaptured by a kid in the messenger service, " another added. 

"They may pull a big stroke with Mars, the god of war, " still anothersaid, "but we've got the Big Dipper on our side. "

Indeed, some of them nicknamed Tom the Big Dipper, but he did not mindfor, as he said soberly, he had "always liked the Big Dipper, anyway. "

As the next day passed the importance of Tom's coup became known amongthe troops stationed in the village and was the prime topic with thosewho were digging the new trench line northeast of the town. Indeed, aside from the particular reasons which were presently to appear, thecapture of Major von Piffinhoeffer was a "stunt" of the first orderwhich proved particularly humiliating to German dignity. That he shouldhave been captured at all was remarkable. That he should have beenhoodwinked and brought in by a young dispatch-rider was a matter ofcrushing mortification to him, and must have been no less so to theGerman high command. 

Who but Major von Piffinhoeffer had first suggested the use of thepoisoned bandage in the treatment of English prisoners' wounds? Who butMajor von Piffinhoeffer had devised the very scheme of contaminatingstreams, which Tom and Roscoe had discovered? Who but Major vonPiffinhoeffer had invented the famous "circle code" which had so longpuzzled and baffled Uncle Sam's Secret Service agents? Who but Major vonPiffinhoeffer had first suggested putting cholera germs in riflebullets, and tuberculosis germs in American cigarettes?

A soldier of the highest distinction was Major von Piffinhoeffer, ofHeidelberg University, whose decorative junk had come direct from thegrateful junkers, and whose famous eight-volume work on "Principles ofModern Torture" was a text-book in the realm. A warrior of mettle wasMajor von Piffinhoeffer, who deserved a more glorious fate than to becaptured by an American dispatch-rider!

But Tom Slade was not vain and it is doubtful if his stolid face, crowned by his shock of rebellious hair, would have shown the slightestsymptom of excitement if he had captured Hindenburg, or the Kaiserhimself. 

In the morning he rode down to Chepoix with some dispatches and in theafternoon to St. Justen-Chaussee. He was kept busy all day. When hereturned to Cantigny, a little before dark, he was told to remain atheadquarters, and for a while he feared that he was going to becourt-martialled for overstaying his leave. 

When he was at last admitted into the presence of the commandingofficer, he shifted from one foot to the other, feeling ill at ease ashe always did in the presence of officialdom. The officer sat at a heavytable which had evidently been the kitchen table of the French peasantpeople who had originally occupied the poor cottage. Signs of pettyGerman devastation were all about the humble, low-ceiled place, and theyseemed to evidence a more loathsome brutality even than did the blightedcountry which Tom had ridden through. 

Apparently everything which could show an arrogant contempt of thesimple family life which had reigned there had been done. There was akind of childish spitefulness in the sword thrusts through the fewpictures which hung on the walls. The German genius for destruction andwanton vandalism was evident in broken knick-knacks and mottoes of hateand bloody vengeance scrawled upon floor and wall. 

It did Tom's heart good to see the resolute, capable American officerssitting there attending to their business in quiet disregard of allthese silly, vulgar signs of impotent hate and baffled power. 

"When you first met these Germans, " the officer asked, "did the bigfellow have anything to say?"

"He asked us some questions, " said Tom. 

"Yes? Now what did he ask you?" the officer encouraged, as he reachedout and took a couple of papers pinned together, which lay among otherson the table. 

"He seemed to be interested in transports, kind of, and the number ofAmericans there are here. "

"Hmm. Did he mention any particular ship--do you remember?" the officerasked, glancing at the paper. 

"Yes, he did. _Texas Pioneer_. I don't remember whether it was Texan orTexas. "

"Oh, yes, " said the officer. 

"We didn't tell him anything, " said Tom. 

"No, of course not. "

The officer sat whistling for a few seconds, and scrutinizing thepapers. 

"Do you remember the color of the officer's eyes?" he suddenly asked. 

"It was only in the dark we saw him. "

"Yes, surely. So you didn't get a very good look at him. "

"I saw he had a nose shaped like a carrot, kind of, " said Tomingenuously. 

Both of the officers smiled. 

"I mean the big end of it, " said Tom soberly. 

The two men glanced at each other and laughed outright. Tom did notquite appreciate what they were laughing at but it encouraged him togreater boldness, and shifting from one foot to the other, he said, "The thing I noticed specially was how his mouth went sideways when hetalked, so one side of it seemed to slant the same as his moustache, like, and the other didn't. "

The officers smiled at each other again, but the one quizzing Tom lookedat him shrewdly and seemed interested. 

"I mean the two ends of his moustache that stuck up like theKaiser's----"

"Oh, yes. "

"I mean they didn't slant the same when he talked. One was crooked. "

Again the officers smiled and the one who had been speaking saidthoughtfully, "I see. "

Tom shifted back to his other foot while the officer seemed to ruminate. 

"He had a breed mark, too, " Tom volunteered. 

"A what?"

"Breed mark--it's different from a species mark, " he added naively. 

The officer looked at him rather curiously. "And what do you call abreed mark?" he asked. 

Tom looked at the other man who seemed also to be watching him closely. He shifted from one foot to the other and said, "It's a scout sign. A man named Jeb Rushmore told me about it. Alltrappers know about it. It was his ear, how it stuck out, like. "

He shifted to the other foot. 

"Yes, go on. "

"Nothing, only that's what a breed sign is. If Jeb Rushmore saw a bearand afterwards way off he saw another bear he could tell if the firstbear was its grandmother--most always he could. 

"Hmm. I see, " said the officer, plainly interested and watching Tomcuriously. "And that's what a breed sign is, eh?"

"Yes, sir. Eyes ain't breed signs, but ears are. Feet are, too, anddifferent ways of walking are, but ears are the best of all--that's onesure thing. "

"And you mean that relationships can be determined by these breedsigns?"

"I don't mean people just looking like each other, " Tom explained, "'cause any way animals don't look like each other in the face. But yougot to go by breed signs. Knuckles are good signs, too. "

"Well, well, " said the officer, "that's very fine, and news to me. "

"Maybe you were never a scout, " said Tom naively. 

"So that if you saw your Prussian major's brother or son somewhere, where you had reason to think he would be, you'd know him--you'drecognize him?"

Tom hesitated and shifted again. It was getting pretty deep for him. 

CHAPTER TWENTY

THE MAJOR'S PAPERS

It was perfectly evident that the officer's purpose in sending for Tom, whatever that was, was considerably affected by the boy's own remarks, and he now, after pondering a few moments, handed Tom the two paperswhich he had been holding. 

"Just glance that over and then I'll talk to you, " he said. 

Tom felt very important, indeed, and somewhat perturbed as well, forthough he had carried many dispatches it had never been his lot to knowtheir purport. 

"If you know the importance and seriousness of what I am thinking ofletting you do, " the officer said, "perhaps it will help you to be verycareful and thorough. "

"Yes, sir, " said Tom, awkwardly. 

"All right, just glance that over. "

The two papers were clipped together, and as Tom looked at the one ontop he saw that it was soiled and creased and written in German. Theother was evidently a translation of it. It seemed to be a letter thefirst part of which was missing, and this is what Tom read:

 "but, as you say, everything for the Fatherland. If you receive this let them know that I'll have my arms crossed and to be careful before they shoot. If you don't get this I'll just have to take my chance. The other way isn't worth trying. As for the code key, that will be safe enough--they'll never find it. If it wasn't for the ---- English service ---- (worn and undecipherable) ---- as far as that's concerned. As far as I can ascertain we'll go on the T. P. There was some inquiry about my close relationship to you, but nothing serious. All you have to do is cheer when they play the S. S. B. Over here. It isn't known if Schmitter had the key to this when they caught him because he died on Ellis Island. But it's being abandoned to be on the safe side. I have notice from H. Not to use it after sending this letter. If we can get the new one in your hands before ---- (text undecipherable) ---- in time so it can be used through Mexico. 

 "I'll have much information to communicate verbally in T. And A. Matters, but will bring nothing in ---- ---- form but key and credentials. The idea is L. 's--you remember him at Heidelberg, I dare say. I brought him back once for holiday. Met him through Handel, the fellow who was troubled with cataract. V. Has furnished funds. So don't fail to have them watch out. 

 "To the day, "A. P. "

"So you see some one is probably coming over on the _Texas Pioneer_, "said the officer, as he took the papers from bewildered Tom, "and we'dlike to get hold of that fellow. The only trouble is we don't know whohe is. "

It was quite half a minute before Tom could get a grip on himself, sodark and mysterious had seemed this extraordinary communication. And itwas not until afterward, when he was alone and not handicapped by hispresent embarrassment, that certain puzzling things about it becameclear to him. At present he depended wholly upon what his superior toldhim and thought of nothing else. 

"That was taken from your tall friend, " said the officer, "and it means, if it means anything, that somebody or other closely related to him iscoming over to France on the _Texas Pioneer_. From his mention of thename to you I take it that is what T. P. Means. 

"Now, my boy, we want to get hold of this fellow--he's a spy. Apparently, he won't have anything incriminating about him. Myimpression is that he's in the army and hopes to get himself captured byhis friends. Yet he may desert and take a chance of getting into Germanythrough Holland. About the only clew there is, is the intimation thathe's related to the prisoner. He may look like him. We've been trying toget in communication with Dieppe, where this transport is expected todock to-morrow, but the wires seem to be shot into a tangle again. 

"Do you think you could make Dieppe before morning--eighty to ninetymiles?"

"Yes, sir. The first twenty or so will be bad on account of shell holes, I heard they threw as far as Forges. "

"Hmm, " said the officer, drumming with his fingers. "We'll leave allthat to you. The thing is to get there before morning. "

"I know they never let anybody ashore before daylight, " said Tom, "because I worked on a transport. "

"Very well. Now we'll see if the general and others hereabouts have beenoverrating you. You've two things to do. One is to get to Dieppe beforeto-morrow morning. That's imperative. The other is to assist theauthorities there to identify the writer of this letter if you can. Ofcourse, you'll not concern yourself with anything else in the letter. Ilet you read it partly because of your very commendable bringing in ofthis important captive and partly because I want you to know how seriousand important are the matters involved. I was rather impressed with whatyou said about--er--breed marks. "

"Yes, sir. "

"And I believe you're thoughtful and careful. You've ridden by night agood deal, I understand. "

"Yes, sir. "

"So. Now you are to ride at once to Breteuil, a little east of here, where they're holding this prisoner. You'll deliver a note I shall giveyou to Colonel Wallace, and he'll see to it that you have a look at theman, in a sufficiently good light. Don't be afraid to observe himclosely. And whatever acuteness you may have in this way, let yourcountry have the benefit of it. "

"Yes, sir. "

"It may be that some striking likeness will enable you to recognize thisstranger. Possibly your special knowledge will be helpful. In any case, when you reach Dieppe, present these papers, with the letter which Ishall give you, to the quartermaster there, and he will turn you over tothe Secret Service men. Do whatever they tell you and help them in everyway you can. I shall mention that you've seen the prisoner and observedhim closely. They may have means of discovery and identification which Iknow nothing of, but don't be afraid to offer your help. Too much won'tbe expected of you in that way, but it's imperative that you reachDieppe before morning. The roads are pretty bad, I know that. Think youcan do it?"

"What you got to do, you can do, " said Tom simply. 

It was a favorite saying of the same Jeb Rushmore, scout and woodsman, who had told Tom about breed marks, and how they differed from merepoints of resemblance. And it made him think about Jeb Rushmore. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE MIDNIGHT RIDE OF PAUL REVERE

Swiftly and silently along the dark road sped the dispatch-rider who hadcome out of the East, from the far-off Toul sector, _for service asrequired_. All the way across bleeding, devastated France he hadtravelled, and having paused, as it were, to help in the little job atCantigny, he was now speeding through the darkness toward the coast withas important a message as he had ever carried. 

A little while before, as time is reckoned, he had been a Boy Scout inAmerica and had thought it was something to hike from New York to theCatskills. Since then, he had been on a torpedoed transport, had beencarried in a submarine to Germany, had escaped through that war-mad landand made his way to France, whose scarred and disordered territory hehad crossed almost from one end to the other, and was now headed foralmost the very point where he had first landed. Yet he was onlyeighteen, and no one whom he met seemed to think that his experienceshad been remarkable. For in a world where all are having extraordinaryexperiences, those of one particular person are hardly matter forcomment. 

At Breteuil Tom had another look at "Major Piff, " who bent his terrible, scornful gaze upon him, making poor Tom feel like an insignificant worm. But the imperious Prussian's stare netted him not half so much in thematter of valuable data as Tom derived from his rather timid scrutiny. Yet he would almost have preferred to face the muzzle of a field-piecerather than wither beneath that arrogant, contemptuous glare. 

It was close on to midnight when he reached Hardivillers, passing beyondthe point of the Huns' farthest advance, and sped along the straightroad for Marseille-en-Froissy, where he was to leave a relay packet forParis. From there he intended to run down to Gournay and then northwestalong the highway to the coast. He thought he had plenty of time. 

At Gournay they told him that some American engineers were repairing thebridge at Saumont, which had been damaged by floods, but that he mightgain the north road to the coast by going back as far as Songeons andfollowing the path along the upper Therain River, which would take himto Aumale, and bring him into the Neufchatel road. 

He lost perhaps two hours in doing this, partly by reason of the extradistance and partly by reason of the muddy, and in some placessubmerged, path along the Therain. The stream, ordinarily hardly morethan a creek, was so swollen that he had to run his machine through averitable swamp in places, and anything approaching speed was out of thequestion. So difficult was his progress, what with running off theflooded road and into the stream bed, and also from his wheels stickingin the mud, that he began to fear that he was losing too much time inthis discouraging business. 

But there was nothing to do but go forward, and he struggled on, sometimes wheeling his machine, sometimes riding it, until at last itsank almost wheel deep in muddy water and he had to lose another halfhour in cleaning out his carbureter. He feared that it might givetrouble even then, but the machine labored along when the mud was nottoo deep, and at last, after almost superhuman effort, he and _UncleSam_ emerged, dirty and dripping, out of a region where he could almosthave made as good progress with a boat, into Aumale, where he stoppedlong enough to clean the grit out of his engine parts. 

It was now nearly four o'clock in the morning, and his instructions wereto reach Dieppe not later than five. He knew, from his own experience, that transports always discharge their thronging human cargoes early inthe morning, and that every minute after five o'clock would increase thelikelihood of his finding the soldiers already gone ashore and separatedfor the journeys to their various destinations. To reach Dieppe afterthe departure of the soldiers was simply unthinkable to Tom. Whateverexcuse there might have been to the authorities for his failure, thatalso he could not allow to enter his thoughts. He had been trusted to dosomething and he was going to do it. 

Perhaps it was this dogged resolve which deterred him from doingsomething which he had thought of doing; that is, acquainting theauthorities at Aumale with his plight and letting them wire on toDieppe. Surely the wires between Aumale and the coast must be working, but suppose----

Suppose the Germans should demolish those wires with a random shot fromsome great gun such as the monster which had bombarded Paris at adistance of seventy miles. Such a random shot might demolish Tom Slade, too, but he did not think of that. What he thought of chiefly was theinglorious rôle he would play if, after shifting his responsibility, heshould go riding into Dieppe only to find that the faithful dots anddashes had done his work for him. Then again, suppose the wires shouldbe tapped--there were spies everywhere, he knew that. 

Whatever might have been the part of wisdom and caution, he was wellpast Aumale before he allowed himself to realize that he was takingrather a big chance. If there were floods in one place there might befloods in another, but----

He banished the thought from his mind. Tom Slade, motorcycledispatch-bearer, had always regarded the villages he rushed through witha kind of patronizing condescension. His business had always beenbetween some headquarters or other and some point of destination, andbetween these points he had no interest. He and _Uncle Sam_ had alittle pride in these matters. French children with clattering woodenshoes had clustered about him when he paused, old wives had called, "_Vive l'Amerique!_" from windows and, like the post-boy of old, he hadenjoyed the prestige which was his. Should he, Tom Slade, surrender orask for help in one of these mere incidental places along his line oftravel?

_What you got to do, you do_, he had said, and you cannot do it by goinghalf way and then letting some one else do the rest. He had read the_Message to Garcia_ (as what scout has not), and did that bullymessenger--whatever his name was--turn back because the Cuban jungle wastoo much for him? _He delivered the message to Garcia_, that was thepoint. There were swamps, and dank, tangled, poisonous vines, andvenomous snakes, and the sickening breath of fever. _But he deliveredthe message to Garcia. _

It was sixty miles, Tom knew, from Aumale to Dieppe by the road. And hemust reach Dieppe not later than five o'clock. The road was a good road, if it held nothing unexpected. The map showed it to be a good road, andas far west as this there was small danger from shell holes. 

Fifty miles, and one hour!

Swiftly along the dark road sped the dispatch-rider who had come fromthe far-off blue hills of Alsace across the war-scorched area ofnorthern France into the din and fire and stenching suffocation andred-running streams of Picardy _for service as required_. Past St. Preyhe rushed; past Thiueloy, and into Mortemer, and on to the hilly regionwhere the Eualine flows between its hilly banks. He was in and out of LaTois in half a minute. 

When he passed through Neufchatel several poilus, lounging at thestation, hailed him cheerily in French, but he paid no heed, and theystood gaping, seeing his bent form and head thrust forward with itsshock of tow hair flying all about. 

Twenty miles, and half an hour!

Through St. Authon he sped, raising a cloud of dust, his keen eyesrivetted upon the road ahead, and down into the valley where a tributaryof the Bethune winds its troubled way--past Le Farge, past tiny, picturesque Loix, into an area of 'lowland where an isolated cottageseemed like a lonely spectre of the night as he passed, on throughMernoy to the crossing at Chabris, and then----

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

"UNCLE SAM"

Tom Slade stood looking with consternation at the scene before him. Histrusty motorcycle which had borne him so far stood beside him, and as hesteadied it, it seemed as if this mute companion and co-patriot which hehad come to love, were sharing his utter dismay. Almost at his very feetrushed a boisterous torrent, melting the packed earth of the road likewax in a tropic sunshine, and carrying its devastating work of erosionto the very spot where he stood. 

In a kind of cold despair, he stooped, reached for a board which laynear, and retreating a little, stood upon it, watching the surging waterin its heedless career. This one board was all that was left of thebridge over which Tom Slade and _Uncle Sam_ were to have rushed in theirrace with the dawn. Already the first glimmering of gray was discerniblein the sky behind him, and Tom looked at _Uncle Sam_ as if for councilin his dilemma. The dawn would not require any bridge to get across. 

"We're checked in our grand drive, kind of, " he said, with a patheticdisappointment which his odd way of putting it did not disguise. "We'rechecked, that's all, just like the Germans were--kind of. "

He knelt and let down the rest of his machine so that it might standunaided, as if he would be considerate of those mud-covered, wearywheels. 

And meanwhile the minutes passed. 

"Anyway, you did _your_ part, " he muttered. And then, "If you only couldswim. "

It was evident that the recent rains had swollen the stream whichordinarily flowed in the narrow bed between slanting shores so that therushing water filled the whole space between the declivities and waseven flooding the two ends of road which had been connected by a bridge. An old ramshackle house, which Tom thought might once have been aboathouse, stood near, the water lapping its underpinning. Close by itwas a buoyed mooring float six or eight feet square, bobbing in therushing water. One of the four air-tight barrels which supported it hadcaught in the mud and kept the buoyant, raft-like platform from beingcarried downstream in the rush of water. 

Holding his flashlight to his watch Tom saw that it was nearly fifteenminutes past four and he believed that about forty miles of road layahead of him. Slowly, silently, the first pale tint of gray in the skybehind him took on a more substantial hue, revealing the gaunt, blackoutlines of trees and painting the sun-dried, ragged shingles on thelittle house a dull silvery color. 

"Anyway, you stood by me and it ain't your fault, " Tom muttereddisconsolately. He turned the handle bar this way and that, so that_Uncle Sam's_ one big eye peered uncannily across the flooded stream andflickered up the road upon the other side, which wound up the hillsideand away into the country beyond. The big, peering eye seemed to looklongingly upon that road. 

Then Tom was seized with a kind of frantic rebellion against fate--thesame futile passion which causes a convict to wrench madly at the barsof his cell. The glimpse of that illuminated stretch of road across theflooded stream drove him to distraction. Baffled, powerless, his wontedstolidness left him, and he cast his eyes here and there with a sort ofchallenge born of despair and desperation. 

Slowly, gently, the hazy dawn stole over the sky and the roof of driedand ragged shingles seemed as if it were covered with gray dust. Presently the light would flicker upon those black, mad waters and laughat Tom from the other side. 

And meanwhile the minutes passed. 

He believed that he could swim the torrent and make a landing eventhough the rush of water carried him somewhat downstream. But what about_Uncle Sam_? He turned off the searchlight and still _Uncle Sam_ wasclearly visible now, standing, waiting. He could count the spokes in thewheels. 

The spokes in the wheels--_the spokes_. With a sudden inspiration bornof despair, Tom looked at that low, shingled roof. He could see itfairly well now. The gray dawn had almost caught up with him. 

And meanwhile the minutes passed!

In a frantic burst of energy he took a running jump, caught the edge ofthe roof and swung himself upon it. In the thin haze his form wasoutlined there, his shock of light hair jerking this way and that, ashe tore off one shingle after another, and threw them to the ground. Hewas racing now, as he had not raced before, and there was upon hissquare, homely face that look of uncompromising resolution which thesoldier wears as he goes over the top with his bayonet fixed. 

Leaping to the ground again he gathered up some half a dozen shingles, selecting them with as much care as his desperate haste would permit. Then he hurriedly opened the leather tool case on his machine andtumbled the contents about until he found the roll of insulated wirewhich he always carried. 

His next work was to split one of the shingles over his knee so that hehad a strip of wood about two inches wide. It took him but so manyseconds to jab four or five holes through this, and adjusting it betweentwo slopes of the power wheel so that it stood crossways and wasre-enforced by the spokes themselves, he proceeded to bind it in placewith the wire. Then he moved the wheel gently around, and found that theprojecting edge of wooden strip knocked against the mud-guard. Hesitating not a second he pulled and bent and twisted the mud-guard, wrenching it off. The wheel revolved freely now. The spokes werebeginning to shine in the brightening light. 

And meanwhile the seconds passed!

It was the work of hardly a minute to bind three other narrow strips ofshingle among the spokes so that they stood more or less crossways. There was no time to place and fasten more, but these, at equalintervals, forming a sort of cross within the wheel, were quitesufficient, Tom thought, for his purpose. It was necessary to shave theedges of the shingles somewhat, after they were in place, so that theywould not chafe against the axle-bars. But this was also the hurriedwork of a few seconds, and then Tom moved his machine to the old mooringfloat and lifted it upon the bobbing platform. 

He must work with the feverish speed of desperation for the float washeld by no better anchor than one of its supporting barrels embedded inthe mud. If he placed his weight or that of _Uncle Sam_ upon the side ofthe float already in the water the weight would probably release themud-held barrel and the float, with himself and _Uncle Sam_ upon it, would be carried willy-nilly upon the impetuous waters. 

And meanwhile---- How plainly he could distinguish the trees now, andthe pale stars stealing away into the obscurity of the brighteningheavens. 

With all the strength that he could muster he wrenched a board from thecentre of the platform, and moving his arm about in the opening felt therushing water beneath. 

The buoyancy of the air-tight barrels, one of which was lodged undereach corner of the float, was such that with Tom and his machine uponthe planks the whole platform would float six or eight inches free ofthe water. To pole or row this unwieldy raft in such a flood would havebeen quite out of the question, and even in carrying out the plan whichTom now thought furnished his only hope, he knew that the sole chance ofsuccess lay in starting right. If the float, through premature orunskilful starting, should get headed downstream, there would be no hopeof counteracting its impetus. 

Lifting his machine, he lowered it carefully into the opening left bythe torn-off plank, until the pedals rested upon the planks on eitherside and the power wheel was partially submerged. So far, so good. 

In less than a minute now he would either succeed or fail. It wasnecessary first to alter the position of the float slightly so that theopening left by the plank pointed across and slightly upstream. He hadoften noticed how the pilot of a ferryboat directs his craft above orbelow the point of landing to counteract the rising or ebbing tide, andthis was his intention now; but to neutralize the force of the waterwith another force not subject to direction or adjustment involved arather nice calculation. 

Very cautiously he waded out upon the precipitous, submerged bank andbrought the float into position. This done, he acted with lightningrapidity. Leaping upon the freed float before it had time to swingaround, he raised his machine, started it, and lowering the power wheelinto the opening, steadied the machine as best he could. It was notpossible to let it hang upon its pedals for he must hold it at a steepangle, and it required all his strength to manage its clumsy, furiouslyvibrating bulk. 

But the effects of his makeshift paddle-wheel were pronounced andinstantaneous. His own weight and that of the machine sufficientlysubmerged the racing power wheel so that the rough paddles plowed thewater, sending the float diagonally across the flooded stream withtremendous force. He was even able, by inclining the upper end of themachine to right or left, to guide his clumsy craft, which responded tothis live rudder with surprising promptness. 

In the rapid crossing this rough ferryboat lost rather more than Tom hadthought it would lose from the rush of water and it brought him close tothe opposite shore at a point some fifty feet beyond the road, but hehad been able to maintain its direction at least to the extent ofheading shoreward and preventing the buoyant float from fatal swirling, which would have meant loss of control altogether. 

Perhaps it was better that his point of landing was some distance belowthe road, where he was able to grasp at an overhanging tree with onehand while shutting his power off and holding fast to his machine withthe other. A landing would have been difficult anywhere else. 

Even now he was in the precarious position of sitting upon a limb in arather complicated network of small branches and foliage, hanging ontohis motorcycle for dear life, while the buoyant float went swirling andbobbing down the flood. 

It had taken him perhaps five minutes to prepare for his crossing andabout thirty seconds to cross. But his strategic position was far fromsatisfactory. And already the more substantial light of the morningrevealed the gray road winding ribbon-like away into the distance, thefirst glints of sunlight falling upon its bordering rocks and trees asif to taunt and mock him. 

And meanwhile the minutes passed. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

UP A TREE

In military parlance, Tom had advanced only to be caught in a pocket. There he sat, astride a large limb, hanging onto the heavy machine, which depended below him just free of the water. He had, withdifficulty, moved his painful grip upon a part of the machine'smechanism and succeeded in clutching the edge of the forward wheel. Thisdid not cut his hands so much, but the weight was unbearable in hisembarrassed attitude. 

Indeed, it was not so much his strength, which was remarkable, thatenabled him to keep his hold upon this depending dead weight, as it wassheer desperation. It seemed to be pulling his arms out of theirsockets, and his shoulders ached incessantly. At the risk of losing hisbalance altogether he sought relief by the continual shifting of hisposition but he knew that the strain was too great for him and that hemust let go presently. 

It seemed like a mockery that he should have gained the shore only to becaught in this predicament, and to see his trusty machine go tumblinginto the water beyond all hope of present recovery, simply because hecould not hang on to it. 

Well, then, he _would_ hang on to it. He would hang on to it thoughevery muscle of his body throbbed, though his arms were dragged out, andthough he collapsed and fell from that limb himself in the last anguishof the aching strain. He and _Uncle Sam_, having failed, would go downtogether. 

And meanwhile the minutes passed and _Uncle Sam_ and Tom were reflected, inverted, in the water where the spreading light was now flickering. Howstrange and grotesque they looked, upside down and clinging to eachother for dear life and wriggling in the ripples of rushing water. _Uncle Sam_ seemed to be holding _him_ up. It was all the same--theywere partners. 

He noticed in the water something which he had not noticed before--thereflection of a short, thick, broken branch projecting from the heavylimb he was straddling. He glanced about and found that it was behindhim. His stooping attitude, necessitated by the tremendous drag on hisarms, prevented him even from looking freely behind him, and in tryingto do so he nearly fell. The strain he was suffering was so great thatthe least move caused him pain. 

But by looking into the water he was able to see that this little stubof a limb might serve as a hook on which the machine might be hung if hecould clear away the leafy twigs which grew from it, and if he couldsucceed in raising the cycle and slipping the wheel over it. That wouldnot end his predicament but it would save the machine, relieve him for afew moments, and give him time to think. 

_For a few moments!_ They were fleeting by--the moments. 

There is a strength born of desperation--a strength of will which isconjured into physical power in the last extremity. It is when thefrantic, baffled spirit calls aloud to rally every failing muscle andweakening nerve. It is then that the lips tighten and the eyes become assteel, as the last reserves waiting in the entrenchments of the soul aresummoned up to re-enforce the losing cause. 

And there in that tree, on the brink of the heedless, rushing waterswhich crossed the highroad to Dieppe was going to be fought out one ofthe most desperate battles of the whole war. There, in the mocking lightof the paling dawn, Tom Slade, his big mouth set like a vice, and withevery last reserve he could command, was going to make his last cast ofthe dice--let go, give up--or, _hold on_. 

_Let go!_ Of all the inglorious forms of defeat or surrender! _To letgo!_ To be struck down, to be taken prisoner, to be----

But to _let go_! The bulldog, the snapping turtle, seemed like veryheroes now. 

"He always said I had a good muscle--he liked to feel it, " he muttered. "And besides, _she_ said she guessed I was strong. "

He was thinking of Margaret Ellison, away back in America, and of RoscoeBent, as he had known him there. When he muttered again there was abeseeching pathos in his voice which would have pierced the heart ofanyone who could have seen him struggling still against fate, in thisall but hopeless predicament. 

But no one saw him except the sun who was raising his head above thehorizon as a soldier steals a cautious look over the trench parapet. 

There would be no report of this affair. 

He lowered his chest to the limb, wound his legs around it and for asecond lay there while he tightened and set his legs, as one willtighten a belt against some impending strain. Not another fraction of aninch could he have tightened those encircling legs. 

And now the fateful second was come. It had to come quickly for hisstrength was ebbing. There is a pretty dependable rule that if you canjust manage to lift a weight with both hands, you can just about _budge_it with one hand. Tom had tried this at Temple Camp with a visitingscout's baggage chest. With both hands he had been barely able to liftit by its strap. With one hand he had been able to _budge_ it for thefraction of a second. But there had been no overmastering incentive--andno reserves called up out of the depths of his soul. 

He could feel his breast palpitating against the limb, drawn tightagainst it by the dead weight. Yet he could not put his desperatepurpose to the test. 

And so a second--two, three, seconds--were wasted. 

"I won't let go, " he muttered through his teeth. "I wish I could wipethe sweat off my hand. " Then, as if his dogged resolution were notenough, he added, almost appealingly, "Don't _you_ drop and--and go backon me. "

_Uncle Sam_ only swung a little in the breeze and wriggled like an eelin the watery mirror. 

Slowly Tom loosened his perspiring left hand, not daring to withdraw it. The act seemed to communicate an extra strain to every part of his body. Of all the fateful moments of his life, this seemed to be the mosttense. Then, in an impulse of desperation, he drew his left hand away. 

"I won't--let--go, " he muttered. 

The muscles on his taut right arm stood out like cords. His forearmthrobbed with an indescribable, pulling pain. There was a feeling ofdull soreness in his shoulder blade. His perspiring hand closed tighteraround the wheel's rim and he could feel his pulse pounding. His fingerstingled as if they had been asleep. Then his hand slipped a little. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

"TO HIM THAT OVERCOMETH"

Whether merely from the change of an eighth of an inch or so in its holdupon the rim, or because his palm fitted better around the slightalteration of curve, Tom was conscious of the slightest measure ofrelief. 

As quickly as he dared (for he knew that any sudden move would befatal), he reached behind him with his left arm and, groping for thestub of limb, tore away from it the twigs which he knew would form anobstacle to placing the wheel rim with its network of spokes over thisshort projection. 

The dead soreness of his straining shoulder blade ran down his arm, which throbbed painfully. His twitching, struggling fingers, strainingagainst the weight which was forcing them open, clutched the rim. Theywere burning and yet seemed numb. Oh, if he could only wipe his palm andthat rim with a dry handkerchief! He tightened his slipping fingersagain and again. The muscles of his arm smarted as from a blow. Hetightened his lips--and that seemed to help. 

Carefully, though his aching breast pounded against the limb, he broughtback his left hand, cautiously rubbed it against his khaki shirt, thenencircled it about the rim. For a moment the weight seemed manageablylight in the quick relief he felt. 

Availing himself of the slight measure of refreshment he raised themachine a trifle, a trifle more, squirmed about to get in betterposition, bent, strained, got the bulky thing past his clutching legs, exerted every muscle of chest and abdomen, which now could assume someshare of the strain, and by a superhuman effort of litheness anddexterity and all the overwhelming power of physical strength andfrenzied resolution, he succeeded in slipping the wheel rim over thestubby projection behind him. 

If he had been running for ten miles he could not have been moreexhausted. His breast heaved with every spasmodic breath he drew. Hisshoulder blades throbbed like an aching tooth. His dripping palm wasutterly numb. For a few brief, precious seconds he sat upon the limbwith a sense of unutterable relief, and mopped his beaded forehead. Andthe sun's full, round face smiled approvingly upon him. 

Meanwhile the minutes flew. 

Hurrying now, he scrambled down the tree trunk where he had a better andless discouraging view of the situation. He saw that _Uncle Sam_ hungabout five feet from the brink and just clear of the water. If the bankon this side was less precipitous than on the other there would be someprospect of rescuing his machine without serious damage. He could affordto let it get wet provided the carburetor and magneto were not submergedand the gas tank----

_The gas tank. _ That thought stabbed him. Could the gasoline have flowedout of the tank while the machine was hanging up and down? That wouldbring the supply hole, with its perforated screw-cover, underneath. 

He waded cautiously into the water and found to his infinite relief thatthe submerged bank formed a gentle slope. He could not go far enough tolift his machine, but he could reach to wiggle it off its hook and thenguide it, in some measure, enough to ease its fall and keep itsdamageable parts clear of the water. At least he believed he could. Inany event, he had no alternative choice and time was flying. After whathe had already done he felt he could do anything. Success, howeverwearying and exhausting, gives one a certain working capital ofstrength, and having succeeded so far he would not now fail. His successin crossing had given him that working capital of resolution andincentive whence came his superhuman strength and overmastering resolvein that lonely tree. And he would not fail now. 

Yet he could not bring himself to look at his watch. He was willing toventure a guess, from the sun, as to what time it was, but he could notclinch the knowledge by a look at the cruel, uncompromising littleglass-faced autocrat in his pocket. He preferred to work in the lessdisheartening element of uncertainty. He did not want to know the hard, cold truth--not till he was moving. 

Here now was the need of nice calculating, and Tom eyed the shore andthe tree and the machine with the appraising glance of a wrestler eyeinghis opponent. He broke several branches from the tree, laying them so asto form a kind of springy, leafy mound close to the brink. Thenstanding knee-deep he wiggled the wheel's rim very cautiously out to theend of its hanger, so that it just balanced there. 

One more grand drive, one more effort of unyielding strength andaccurate dexterity and--_he would be upon the road_. 

The thought acted as a stimulant. Lodging one hand under the seat of themachine and the other upon a stout bar of the mechanism which he thoughtwould afford him just the play and swing he needed, he joggled the wheeloff its hanger, and with a wide sweep, in which he skillfully minimizedthe heavy weight, he swung the machine onto the springy bed which he hadmade to receive it. 

Then, as the comrade of a wounded soldier may bend over him, he kneltdown beside his companion upon the makeshift, leafy couch. 

"Are you all right?" he asked in the agitation of his triumphant effort. 

_Uncle Sam_ did not answer. 

He stood the machine upright and lowered the rest so that it could standunaided; and he tore away the remnant of mud-guard which _Uncle Sam_ hadsacrificed in his role of combination engine and paddle-wheel. 

"You've got the wires all tangled up in your spokes, " Tom said; "youlook like a--a wreck. What do you want with those old sticks ofshingles? How are you off for gas--you--you old tramp?"

_Uncle Sam_ did not answer. 

"Anyway, you're all right, " Tom panted; "only my arm is worse than yourold mud-guard. We're a pair of---- Can't you speak?" he added breathingthe deadly fatigue he felt and putting his foot upon the pedal. "What--do--you--say? Huh?"

And then _Uncle Sam_ answered. 

"Tk-tk-tk-tk-tk-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r---- Never mind your arm. Comeahead--hurry, " he seemed to say. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

"WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO--"

Swiftly along the sun-flecked road sped the dispatch-rider. In themellow freshness of the new day he rode, and the whir of his machine inits lightning flight mingled with the cheery songs of the birds, whoseearly morning chorus heartened and encouraged him. There was a balm inthe fragrant atmosphere of the cool, gray morning which entered the soulof Tom Slade and whispered to him, _There is no such word as fail. _

Out of the night he had come, out of travail, and brain-rackingperplexity and torturing effort, crossing rushing waters and matchinghis splendid strength and towering will against obstacles, against fate, against everything. 

As he held the handle-bar of _Uncle Sam_ in that continuous handshakewhich they knew so well, his right arm felt numb and sore, and hiswhole body ached. _Uncle Sam's_ big, leering glass eye was smashed, hismud-guard wrenched off, and dried mud was upon his wheels. His rider'suniform was torn and water-soaked, his face black with grime. They madea good pair. 

Never a glance to right or left did the rider give, nor so much as aperfunctory nod to the few early risers who paused to stare at him as hesped by. In the little hamlet of Persan an old Frenchman sitting on arustic seat before the village inn, removed his pipe from his mouth longenough to call, "_La côte?_"

But never a word did the rider answer. Children, who, following the goodexample of the early bird, were already abroad, scurried out of his way, making a great clatter in their wooden shoes, and gaping until he passedbeyond their sight. 

Over the bridge at Soignois he rushed, making its ramshackle planksrattle and throw up a cloud of dust from between the vibrating seams. Out of this cloud he emerged like a gray spectre, body bent, head low, gaze fixed and intense, leaving a pandemonium of dust and subsidingechoes behind him. 

At Virneu an old housewife threw open her blinds and seeing the dustykhaki of the rider, summoned her brood, who waved the tricolor from thecasement, laughing and calling, "_Vive l'Amerique!_"

Their cheery voices and fraternal patriotism did cause Tom to turn hishead and call, "_Merci. Vive la France!_"

And they answered again with a torrent of French. 

The morning was well established as he passed through Chuisson, and aclock upon a romantic, medieval-looking little tower told him that itlacked but ten minutes of five o'clock. 

A feeling of doubt, almost of despair, seized upon him and he called inthat impatient surliness which springs from tense anxiety, asking an oldman how far it was to Dieppe. 

The man shrugged his shoulders and shook his head in polite confessionthat he did not understand English. 

In his anxiety it irritated Tom. "What _do_ you know?" he muttered. 

Out of Chuisson he labored up a long hill, and though _Uncle Sam_ madeno more concession to it than to slacken his unprecedented rate ofspeed the merest trifle, the difference communicated itself to Tom atonce and it seemed, by contrast, as if they were creeping. On and up_Uncle Sam_ went, plying his way sturdily, making a great noise and aterrific odor--dogged, determined and irresistible. 

But the rider stirred impatiently. Would they ever, _ever_, reach thetop? And when they should, there would be another hamlet in a valley, another bridge, more stupid people who could not speak English, morevillages, more bends in the road, still other villages, andthen--another hill. 

It seemed to Tom that he had been travelling for ten years and thatthere was to be no end of it. Ride, ride, ride--it brought him nowhere. His right arm which had borne that tremendous strain, was throbbing sothat he let go the handle-bar from time to time in the hope of relief. Itwas the pain of acute tiredness, for which there could be no relief butrest. Just to throw himself down and rest! Oh, if he could only lay thatweary, aching arm across some soft pillow and leave it there--just leaveit there. Let it hang, bend it, hold it above him, lay it on _UncleSam's_ staunch, unfeeling arm of steel, he could not, _could_ not, getit rested. 

The palm of his hand tingled with a kind of irritating feeling likechilblains, and he must be continually removing one or other hand fromthe bar so that he could reach one with the other. It did not help himkeep his poise. If he could only scratch his right hand once and be donewith it! But it annoyed him like a fly. 

Up, up, up, they went, and passed a quaint, old, thatch-roofed house. Crazy place to build a house! And the people in it--probably all theycould do was to shrug their shoulders in that stupid way when asked aquestion in English. 

He was losing his morale--was this dispatch-rider. 

But near the top of the hill he regained it somewhat. Perhaps he couldmake up for this lost time in some straight, level reach of road beyond. 

Up, up, up, plowed _Uncle Sam_, one lonely splinter of shingle stillbound within his spokes, and his poor, dented headlight bereft of itsdignity. 

"I've an idea the road turns north about a mile down, " Tom said tohimself, "and runs around through----"

The words stopped upon his lips as _Uncle Sam_, still laboring upward, reached level ground, and as if to answer Tom out of his ownuncomplaining and stouter courage, showed him a sight which sent hisfaltering hope skyward and started his heart bounding. 

For there below them lay the vast and endless background of the sea, throwing every intervening detail of the landscape into insignificance. There it was, steel blue in the brightening sunlight and glimmering hereand there in changing white, where perhaps some treacherous rock or barlay just submerged. And upon it, looking infinitesimal in the limitlessexpanse, was something solid with a column of black smoke rising andwinding away from it and dissolving in the clear, morning air. 

"There you are!" said Tom, patting _Uncle Sam_ patronizingly in a swiftchange of mood. "See there? That's the Atlantic Ocean--that is. _Now_will you hurry? That's a ship coming in--see? I bet it's a whopper, too. Do you know what--what's off beyond there?" he fairly panted in hisexcitement; "do you? You old French hobo, you? _America!_ That's where_I_ came from. _Now_ will you hurry? That's Dieppe, where the white[2]is and those steeples, see? And way across there on the other side isAmerica!"

For _Uncle Sam_, notwithstanding his name, was a French motorcycle andhad never seen America. 

[2] Dieppe's famous beach. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

A SURPRISE

Down the hill coasted _Uncle Sam_, bearing his rider furiously onward. Afence along the wayside seemed like a very entanglement of stakes andpickets. Then it was gone. A house loomed up in view, grew larger, andwas gone. A cow that was grazing in a field languidly raised her head, blinked her eyes, and stood as if uncertain whether she had really seensomething pass or not. 

They were in the valley now and the sea was no longer discernible. Onthey rushed with a fine disdain for poor little Charos, whose villagesteeple appeared and disappeared like a flash of lightning. The road wasbroad and level and _Uncle Sam_ sped along amid a cloud of dust, thebordering trees and houses flying away behind like dried leaves in ahurricane. The rider's hair was fluttering like a victorious emblem, hiseyes fixed with a wild intensity. 

"We'd get arrested for this in America, " he muttered; "we--we shouldworry. "

It was little _Uncle Sam_ cared for the traffic laws of America. 

Around the outskirts of Teurley they swept and into the broad highwaylike a pair of demons, and a muleteer, seeing discretion to be thebetter part of valor, drove his team well to the side--far enough, even, to escape any devilish contamination which this unearthly apparitionmight diffuse. 

They had reached a broad highway, one of those noble roads whichNapoleon had made. They could not go wrong now. They passed a luxuriouschateau, then a great hotel where people haled them in French. Then theypassed an army auto truck loaded with mattresses, with the bully oldinitials U. S. A. On its side. Two boys in khaki were on the seat. 

"Is the _Texas Pioneer_ in?" Tom yelled. 

"What?" one of them called back. 

"He's deaf or something, " muttered Tom; "we--should worry. "

On they sped till the road merged into a street lined with shops, wherechildren in wooden shoes and men in blouses shuffled about. Tom thoughthe had never seen people so slow in his life. 

[Illustration: DOWN THE HILL COASTED UNCLE SAM BEARING TOM FURIOUSLYONWARD. ]

Now, indeed, he must make some concession to the throngs moving back andforth, and he slackened his speed, but only slightly. 

"Dieppe?" he called. 

"Dieppe, " came the laughing answer from a passer-by, who was evidentlyamused at Tom's pronunciation. 

"Where's the wharves?"

Again that polite shrug of the shoulders. 

He took a chance with another passer-by, who nodded and pointed down anarrow street with dull brown houses tumbling all over each other, as itseemed to Tom. It was the familiar, old-world architecture of the Frenchcoast towns, which he had seen in Brest and St. Nazaire, as if all thehouses had become suddenly frightened and huddled together like panickysheep. 

More leisurely now, but quickly still, rode the dispatch-rider throughthis narrow, surging way which had all the earmarks of theshore--damp-smelling barrels, brass lanterns, dilapidated ships'figureheads, cosy but uncleanly drinking places, and sailors. 

And of all the sights save one which Tom Slade ever beheld, the onewhich most gladdened his heart was a neat new sign outside a stonebuilding, Office of United States Quartermaster. 

Several American army wagons were backed up against the building andhalf a dozen khaki-clad boys lounged about. There was much coming andgoing, but it is a part of the dispatch-rider's prestige to haveimmediate admittance anywhere, and Tom stopped before this building andwas immediately surrounded by a flattering representation of militaryand civilian life, both French and American. 

To these he paid not the slightest heed, but carefully lowered _UncleSam's_ rest so that his weary companion might stand alone. 

"You old tramp, " he said in an undertone; "stay here and take it easy. Keep away, " he added curtly to a curious private who was venturing a tooclose inspection of _Uncle Sam's_ honorable wounds. 

"What's the matter--run into something?" he asked. 

"No, I didn't, " said Tom, starting toward the building. 

Suddenly he stopped short, staring. 

A man in civilian clothes sat tilted back in one of several chairsbeside the door. He wore a little black moustache and because his headwas pressed against the brick wall behind him, his hat was pushedforward giving him a rakish look which was rather heightened by anunlighted cigar sticking up out of the corner of his mouth like a pieceof field artillery. 

He might have been a travelling salesman waiting for his samples on theveranda of a country hotel and he had about him a kind of sophisticatedlook as if he took a sort of blasé pleasure in watching the world goround. His feet rested upon the rung of his tilted chair, forming hisknees into a sort of desk upon which lay a French newspaper. The tiltingof his knees, the tilting of his chair, the tilting of his hat and therakish tilt of his cigar, gave him the appearance of greatself-sufficiency, as if, away down in his soul, he knew what he wasthere for, and cared not a whit whether anyone else did or not. 

Tom Slade paused on the lower step and stared. Then with a slowlydawning smile supplanting his look of astonishment, he ejaculated, "M-i-s-t-e-r _C-o-n-n-e_!"

The man made not the slightest change in his attitude except to smilethe while he worked his cigar over to the other corner of his mouth. Then he cocked his head slightly sideways. 

"H'lo, Tommy, " said he. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

SMOKE AND FIRE

Mr. Carleton Conne, of the United States Secret Service, had come overfrom Liverpool _via_ Dover on a blind quest after an elusive spy. Therehad been a sort of undercurrent of rumor, with many extravaganttrappings, that a mysterious agent of the Kaiser was on his way toEurope with secrets of a most important character. Some stories had itthat he was intimately related to Bloody Bill himself; others that hegloried in a kinship with Ludendorf, while still other versionsrepresented him as holding Mexico in the palm of his hand. Dark storiesfloated about and no one knew just where they originated. 

One sprightly form this story took, which had been whispered in New Yorkand then in Liverpool, was that a certain young lady (identity unknown)had talked with a soldier (identity unknown) in the Grand CentralStation in New York, and that the soldier had told her that at hiscantonment (cantonment not identified) there was a man in a specialbranch of the service (branch not mentioned) who was a cousin or abrother or a nephew or a son or something or other to a German generalor statesman or something or other, and that he had got into theAmerican army by a pretty narrow squeak. There seemed to be a unanimityof opinion in the lower strata of Uncle Sam's official family inLiverpool that the soldier who had talked with the young lady was comingover on the transport _Manchester_ and it was assumed (no one seemed toknow exactly why) that the mysterious and sinister personage would beupon the same ship. 

But no soldier had been found upon the _Manchester_ who showed by hisappearance that he had chatted with a young lady. Perhaps several ofthem had done that. It is a way soldiers have. 

As for the arch spy or propagandist, he did not come forward andintroduce himself as such, and though a few selected suspects of Germanantecedents were searched and catechised by Mr. Conne and others, no onewas held. 

And there you are. 

Rumors of this kind are always in circulation and the Secret Servicepeople run them down as a matter of precaution. But though you can run arumor down and stab it through and through you cannot kill it. It nowappeared that this German agent had sailed from Mexico and would land atBrest--with a message to some French statesman. Also it appeared that hehad stolen a secret from Edison and would land at Dieppe. It had alsobeen reported that someone had attempted to blow up the loaded transport_Texas Pioneer_ on her way over. 

And so Mr. Carleton Conne, of the American Secret Service, quiet, observant, uncommunicative, never too sanguine and never too skeptical, had strolled on to the _Channel Queen_, lighted his cigar, and was nowtilted back in his chair outside the Quartermaster's office in Dieppe, not at all excited and waiting for the _Texas Pioneer_ to dock. 

He had done this because he believed that where there is a great deal ofsmoke there is apt to be a little fire. He was never ruffled, neverdisappointed. 

Tom's acquaintance with Mr. Conne had begun on the transport on which hehad worked as a steward's boy, and where his observant qualities andstolid soberness had attracted and amused the detective. 

"I never thought I'd see you here, " said Tom, his face lighting up to anunusual degree. "I'm a dispatch-rider now. I just rode from Cantigny. Igot a letter for the Quartermaster, but anyway he's got to turn me overto the Secret Service (Mr. Conne regarded him with whimsical attentionas he stumbled on), because there's a plot and somebody--a spy--kindof----"

"A spy, kind of, eh?"

"And I hope the _Texas Pioneer_ didn't land yet, that's one sure thing. "

"It's one sure thing that she'll dock in about fifteen minutes, Tommy, "said Mr. Conne rising. "Come inside and deliver your message. What's thematter with your machine? Been trying to wipe out the Germans alone andunaided, like the hero in a story book?"

Tom followed him in, clumsily telling the story of his exciting journey;"talking in chunks, " as he usually did and leaving many gaps to befilled in by the listener. 

"I'm glad I found you here, anyway, " he finished, as if that were theonly part that really counted; "'cause now I feel as if I can tellabout an idea I've got. I'd of been scared to tell it to anybody else. Iain't exactly got it yet, " he added, "but maybe I can help even betterthan they thought, 'cause as I was ridin' along I had a kind of anidea----"

"Yes?"

"Kind of. Did you ever notice how you get fool ideas when there's asteady noise going on?"

"So?" said Mr. Conne, as he led the way along a hall. 

"It was the noise of my machine. "

"How about the smell, Tommy?" Mr. Conne asked, glancing around with thatpleasant, funny look which Tom had known so well. 

"You don't get ideas from smells, " he answered soberly. 

In the Quartermaster's office he waited on a bench while Mr. Conne andseveral other men, two in uniform and two that he thought might beSecret Service men, talked in undertones. If he had been a hero in abook, to use Mr. Conne's phrase, these officials would doubtless havebeen assembled about him listening to his tale, but as it was he wasleft quite out of the conference until, near its end, he was summoned totell of his capture of Major von Piffinhoeffer and asked if he thoughthe could identify a close relation of that high and mighty personagesimply by seeing him pass as a total stranger. 

Tom thought he might "by a special way, " and explained his knowledge ofbreed marks and specie marks. He added, in his stolid way, that he hadanother idea, too. But they did not ask him what that was. One of theparty, a naval officer, expressed surprise that he had ridden all theway from Cantigny and asked him if it were not true that part of theroad was made impassible by floods. Tom answered that there were floodsbut that they were not impassible "if you knew how. " The officer said hesupposed Tom knew how, and Tom regarded this as a compliment. 

Soon, to his relief, Mr. Conne took all the papers in the case and leftthe room, beckoning Tom to follow him. Another man in civilian clotheshurried away and Tom thought he might be going to the dock. It seemed tohim that his rather doubtful ability to find a needle in a haystack hadnot made much of an impression upon these officials, and he wonderedruefully what Mr. Conne thought. He saw that his arrival with thepapers had produced an enlivening effect among the officials, but itseemed that he himself was not taken very seriously. Well, in any event, he had made the trip, he had beaten the ship, delivered the message toGarcia. 

"I got to go down and turn my grease cup before I forget it, " he said, as they came out on the little stone portico again. 

Several soldiers who were soon to see more harrowing sights than abunged-up motorcycle, were gathered about _Uncle Sam_, gaping at him andcommenting upon his disfigurements. Big U. S. A. Auto trucks werepassing by. A squad of German prisoners, of lowering and sullen aspect, marched by with wheelbarrows full of gray blankets. They were keepingperfect step, through sheer force of habit. Another dispatch-rider (a"local") passed by, casting a curious eye at _Uncle Sam_. A French childwho sat upon the step had one of his wooden shoes full of smoky, usedbullets, which he seemed greatly to prize. Several "flivver" ambulancesstood across the way, new and roughly made, destined for the front. American naval and military officers were all about. 

"We haven't got much time to spare, Tommy, " said Mr. Conne, resuminghis former seat and glancing at his watch. 

"It's only a second. I just got to turn the grease cup. "

He hurried down past the child, who called him "M'sieu Yankee, " andelbowed his way through the group of soldiers who were standing about_Uncle Sam_. 

"Your timer bar's bent, " one of them volunteered. 

Tom did not answer, but knelt and turned the grease cup, then wiped thenickel surfaces, bent and dented though they were, with a piece ofcotton waste. Then he felt of his tires. Then he adjusted the positionof the handle-bar more to his liking and as he did so the poor, dented, glassless searchlight bobbed over sideways as if to look at the middleof the street. Tom said something which was not audible to the curiousonlookers. Perhaps _Uncle Sam_ heard. 

The local rider came jogging around the corner on his way back. Hismachine was American-made and a medley of nickel and polished brass. Ashe made the turn his polished searchlight, with a tiny flag perchedjauntily upon it, seemed to be looking straight at _Uncle Sam_. And_Uncle Sam's_ green-besprinkled, [3] glassless eye seemed to be leeringwith a kind of sophisticated look at the passing machine. It was thekind of look which the Chicago Limited might give to the five-thirtysuburban starting with its load of New York commuters for East Orange, New Jersey. 

[3] The effect of water on brass is to produce a greenish, superficialerosion. 

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

"MADE IN GERMANY"

"Now, Tommy, let's hear your idea, " said Mr. Conne, indulgently, as heworked his cigar from one corner of his mouth to the other. "I findthere's generally a little fire where there's a good deal of smoke. There's somebody or other, as you say, but the trouble is we don't knowwho he is. We think maybe he looks like someone you've seen. We think hemay have a patent ear. " He looked at Tom sideways and Tom could not helplaughing. Then he looked at the mysterious letter with a funny, ruminating look. 

"What can we--you--do?" Tom ventured to ask, feeling somewhat squelched. 

Mr. Conne screwed up his mouth with a dubious look. "Search everybody onboard, two or three thousand, quiz a few, that's about all. It'll take along time and probably reveal nothing. Family resemblances are all rightwhen you know both members, Tommy, but out in the big world--Well, let's look this over again, " he added, taking up the letter. 

Tom knew that he was not being consulted. He had a feeling that hissuggestion about breed marks and personal resemblances was not beingtaken seriously. He was glad that he had not put his foot too far in bytelling of his other precious idea. But he was proud of Mr. Conne'scompanionable attitude toward him. He was proud to be the friend of sucha man. He was delighted at the thought of participation in this matter. He knew Mr. Conne liked him and had at least a good enough opinion ofhim to adopt the appearance of conferring with him. Mr. Conne's ratherwhimsical attitude toward this conference did not lessen his pride. 

"Let's see now, " said the detective. "This thing evidently went throughHolland in code. It's a rendering. "

It was easy for Tom to believe that Mr. Conne was re-reading the letterjust to himself--or to himself and Tom. 

"Let's see now--_but, as you say, everything for the Fatherland. If youreceive this, let them know that I'll have my arms crossed and to becareful before they shoot_. I wish he'd cross his arms when he comesashore. He's evidently planning to get himself captured. _If you don'tget this I'll just have to take my chance. The other way isn't worthtrying. _ Hmm! Probably thought of deserting at the wharf and gettinginto Holland or Belgium. No, that wouldn't be worth trying. _As for thecode key, that'll be safe enough--they'll never find it. _ Hmm! _If itwasn't for the_--what's all this--_the English swine_. Humph! They fightpretty good for swine, don't they, Tommy? _As far as I can ascertain, we'll go on the T. P. _ We know that much, anyway, thanks to you, Tommy. "(Tom felt highly elated. ) "_There was some inquiry about my closerelationship to you, but nothing serious. All you have to do is to cheerwhen they play the S. S. B. Over here_. Humph! That's worth knowing. _Itisn't known if Schmitter had the key to this when they caught him_----

"He didn't, " said Mr. Conne dryly; "I was the one who caughthim. --_because he died on Ellis Island. But it's being abandoned to beon the safe side_. Safety first, hey? _I have notice from H. Not to useit after sending this letter. If we can get the new one in your handsbefore_--Seems to be blotted out--_in time so it can be used throughMexico. I'll have much information to communicate verbally in T. And A. Matters, but will bring nothing in ---- ---- form but key andcredentials_. He means actual, concealed or disguised form, I s'pose. _The idea is L. 's. _ I suppose he means the manner of concealing the keyand credentials. "

"Yes, " said Tom rather excitedly. 

Mr. Conne glanced at him, joggled his cigar, and went on, "_You remember him at Heidelberg, I dare say. I brought him back oncefor holiday. Met him through Handel, who was troubled with cataract. V. Has furnished funds. So don't fall to have them watch out. _"

"Hmm!" concluded Mr. Conne ruminatively. "You see what they're up to. Wecaught Schmitter in Philadelphia. They think maybe Schmitter had the keyof a code with him. So they're changing the code and sending the key toit across with this somebody or other. That's about the size of it. He'sgot a lot of information, too, in his head, where we can't get at it. "

"But his credentials will have to be something that can be seen, won'tthey?" Tom ventured to ask. 

"Prob'ly. You see, he means to desert or get captured. It's a long wayround, but about the best one--for him. Think of that snake wearingUncle Sam's uniform!"

"It makes me mad, too--kind of, " said Tom. 

"So he's probably got some secret means of identification about him, andprobably the new code key in actual form--somewhere else than just inhis head. Then there'd be a chance of getting it across even if he fell. We'll give him an acid bath and look in his shoes if we can find him. The whole thing hangs on a pretty thin thread. They used to haveinvisible writing on their backs till we started the acid bath. "

He whistled reflectively for a few moments, while Tom struggled tomuster the courage to say something that he wished to say. 

"Could I tell you about that other idea of mine?" he blurted finally. 

"You sure can, Tommy. That's about all we're likely to get--ideas. " Andhe glanced at Tom again with that funny, sideways look. "Shoot, my boy. "

"It's only this, " said Tom, still not without some trepidation, "andmaybe you'll say it's no good. You told me once not to be thinking ofthings that's none of my business. "

"Uncle Sam's business is our business now, Tommy boy. "

"Well, then, it's just this, and I was thinking about it while I wasriding just after I started away from Cantigny. Mostly I was thinkingabout it after I took that last special look at old Piff----"

Mr. Conne chuckled. "I see, " he said encouragingly. 

"Whoever that feller is, " said Tom, "there's one thing sure. If he'scomin' as a soldier he won't get to the front very soon, 'cause they'remostly the drafted fellers that are comin' now and they have to go intraining over here. I know, 'cause I've seen lots of 'em in billets. "

"Hmm, " said Mr. Conne. 

"So if the feller expects to go to the front and get captured prettysoon, prob'ly he's in a special unit. Maybe I might be all wrong aboutit--some fellers used to call me Bullhead, " he added by way of shavinghis boldness down a little. 

But Mr. Conne, with hat tilted far down over his forehead and cigar atan outrageously rakish angle, was looking straight ahead of him, at aFrench flag across the way. 

"Go on, " he said crisply. 

"Anyway, I'm sure the feller wouldn't be an engineer, 'cause mostlythey're behind the lines. So I thought maybe he'd be a surgeon----"

Mr. Conne was whistling, almost inaudibly, his eyes fixed upon theflagpole opposite. "He was educated at Heidelberg, " said he. 

"I didn't think of that, " said Tom. 

"It's where he met L. "

Tom said nothing. His line of reasoning seemed to be lifted quietly awayfrom him. Mr. Conne was turning the kaleidoscope and showing him newdesigns. "He took L. Home for the holidays, " he quietly observed. "OldPiff and the boys. "

"I--I didn't think of that, " said Tom, rather crestfallen. 

"You didn't ride fast enough and make enough noise, " Mr. Conne said. Hiseyes were still fixed on the fluttering tricolor and he whistled verylow. Then he rubbed his lip with his tongue and aimed his cigar inanother direction. 

"They were studying medicine there, I guess, " he mused. 

"That's just what my idea's about, " said Tom. "It ain't an idea exactly, either, " he added, "but it's kind of come to me sudden-like. You knowwhat a _hunch_ is, don't you? There's something there about somebodyhaving a cataract, and that's something the matter with your eyes; Mr. Temple had one. So maybe that feller L. That he met again is an eyedoctor. Long before the war started they told Mr. Temple maybe he oughtto go to Berlin to see the eye specialists there--'cause they're sofine. So maybe the spy is a surgeon and L. Is an eye doctor. It says howhe met him again on account of somebody having a cataract. And he saidthe way of bringing the code key was L. 's idea. I read about a dentistthat had a piece of paper with writing on it rolled up in his tooth. Hewas a spy. So that made me think maybe L. 's idea had something to dowith eyes or glasses, as you might say. "

"Hmm! Go on. Anything else?"

"But, anyway, that ain't the idea I had. In Temple Camp there was ascout that had a little pocket looking-glass and you couldn't seeanything on it but your own reflection. But all you had to do was tobreathe on it and there was a picture--all mountains and a castle, like. Then it would fade away again right away. Roy Blakeley wanted to swaphis scout knife for it, but the feller wouldn't do it. On the back of itit said _Made in Germany_. It just came to me sudden-like that maybethat was L. 's idea and they'd have it on a pair of spectacles. Maybeit's a kind of crazy idea, but----"

He looked doubtfully at Mr. Conne, who still sat tilted back, hat almosthiding his face, cigar sticking out from under it like a camouflagedfield-piece. He was whistling very quietly, "_Oh, boy, where do we gofrom here?_" He had whistled that same tune more than a year before whenhe was waiting for a glimpse of "Dr. Curry, " spy and bomb plotter, aboard the vessel on which Tom was working at that time. He had whistledit as he escorted the "doctor" down the companionway. How well Tomremembered!

"Come on, Tommy, " he said, jumping suddenly to his feet. 

Tom followed. But Mr. Conne did not speak; he was still busy with thetune. Only now he was singing the words. There was something portentousin the careless way he sang them. It took Tom back to the days when itwas the battle hymn of the transport:

 "And when we meet a pretty girl, we whisper in her ear, Oh, Boy! Oh, Joy! Where do we go from here?"

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

"NOW YOU SEE IT, NOW YOU DON'T"

The big transport _Texas Pioneer_ came slowly about in obedience to herstraining ropes and rubbed her mammoth side against the long wharf. Upand down, this way and that, slanting-wise and curved, drab and gray andwhite and red, the grotesque design upon her towering freeboard shonelike a distorted rainbow in the sunlight. Out of the night she had come, stealing silently through the haunts where murder lurks, and the samedancing rays which had run ahead of the dispatch-rider and turned tomock him, had gilded her mighty prow as if to say, "Behold, I havereached you first. "

At her rail crowded hundreds of boys in khaki, demanding in English andatrocious French to know where they were. 

"Are we in France?" one called. 

"Where's the Boiderberlong, anyway?" another shouted, the famousParisian boulevard evidently being his only means of identifyingFrance. 

"Is that Napoleon's tomb?" another demanded, pointing to a little roundbuilding. 

"Look at the pile of hams, " shouted another gazing over the rail at astack of that delectable. "Maybe we're in _Hamburg_!"

"This is Dippy, " his neighbor corrected him. 

"You mean Deppy, " another said. 

And so on and so on. There seemed to be hundreds of them, thousands ofthem, and all on a gigantic picnic. 

"Which is the quickest way to Berlin?" one called, addressing the throngimpartially. 

"Second turn to your left. "

Some of these boys would settle down in France and make it their long, final home, under little wooden crosses. But they did not seem to thinkof that. 

At the foot of the gangplank stood the dispatch-rider and the man withthe cigar. Several other men, evidently of their party, stood near by. Mr. Conne's head was cocked sideways and he scanned the gangway with aleisurely, self-assured look. Tom was shaking all over--the victim ofsuppressed excitement. He had been less excited on that memorablemorning when he had "done his bit" at Cantigny. 

It seemed to be in the air that something unusual was likely to happen. Workers, passing with their wheelbarrows and hand trucks, slackenedtheir pace and dallied as long as they dared, near the gangplank. Theywere quickly moved along. Tom shifted from one foot to the other, waiting. Mr. Conne worked his cigar over to the opposite corner of hismouth and observed to an American officer that the day was going to bewarm. Then he glanced up and smiled pleasantly at the boys crowding atthe rail. He might have been waiting on a street corner for a car. 

"Not nervous, are you?" he smiled at Tom. 

"Not exactly, " said Tom, with his usual candor; "but it seems as ifnothing can happen at all, now that we're here. It seems different, thinking up things when you're riding along the road--kind of. "

"Uh huh. "

Presently the soldiers began coming down the gangplank. 

"You watch for resemblances and I'll do the rest, " said Mr. Conne in alow tone. "Give yourself the benefit of every doubt. Know what I mean?"

"Yes--I do. "

"I can't help you there. "

Tom felt a certain compunction at scrutinizing these fine, Americanfellows as they came down with their kits--hearty, boisterous, open-hearted. He felt that it was unworthy of him to suspect any of thislaughing, bantering army, of crime--and such a crime! Treason! In thehope of catching one he must scrutinize them all, and in his generousheart it seemed to put a stigma on them all. He hoped he wouldn't seeanyone who looked like Major von Piffinhoeffer. Then he hoped he would. Then he wondered if he would dare to look at him after---- And supposehe should be mistaken. He did not like this sort of work at all now thathe was face to face with it. He would rather be off with _Uncle Sam_, riding along the French roads, with the French children calling to him. For the first time in his life he was nervous and afraid--not of beingcaught but of catching someone; of the danger of suspecting and beingmistaken. 

Mr. Conne, who never missed anything, noticed his perturbation andpatted him on the shoulder saying, "All kinds of work have to be done, Tommy. "

Tom tried to smile back at him. 

Down the long gangplank they came, one after another, pushing eachother, tripping each other--joking, laughing. Among them came a youngprivate, wearing glasses, who was singing, "Good-bye, Broadway. Hello, France!"

He was startled out of his careless merriment by a tap on the shoulderfrom Mr. Conne, and almost before Tom realized what had happened, he wasstanding blinking at one of the other Secret Service men who was handinghim back his glasses. 

"All right, my boy, " said Mr. Conne pleasantly, which seemed to wipe outany indignity the young man might have felt. 

Tom looked up the gangplank as they surged down, holding the rail tosteady them on the steep incline. Nobody seemed to have noticed what hadhappened. 

"Keep your mind on _your_ part, Tommy, " said Mr. Conne warningly. 

Tom saw that of all those in sight only one wore glasses--a black-hairedyouth who kept his hands on the shoulders of the man before him. Tommade up his mind that he, in any event, would not detain this fellow onthe ground of anything in his appearance, nor any of the others now insight. He was drawn aside by Mr. Conne, however, and became the objectof attention of the other Secret Service men. 

Tom kept his eyes riveted upon the gangplank. One, two, more, wearingglasses, came in view, were stopped, examined, and passed on. After thatperhaps a hundred passed down and away, none of them with glasses, andall of them he scrutinized carefully. Now another, with neatly adjustedrimless glasses, came down. He had a clean-cut, professional look. Tomdid not take his eyes off the descending column for a second, but heheard Mr. Conne say pleasantly, "Just a minute. "

He was glad when he was conscious of this fine-looking young Americanpassing on. 

So it went. 

There were some whom poor Tom might have been inclined to stop by way ofprecaution for no better reason than that they had a rough-and-readylook--hard fellows. He was glad--_half_ glad--when Mr. Conne, forreasons of his own, detained one, then another, of these, though theywore no glasses. And he felt like apologizing to them for his momentarysuspicion, as he saw them pause surprised, answer frankly and honestlyand pass on. 

Then came a young officer, immaculately attired, his leather leggingsshining, his uniform fitting him as if he had been moulded into it. Hewore little rimless eye-glasses. He might lead a raiding party for allthat; but he was a bit pompous and very self-conscious. Tom was rathergratified to see him hailed aside. 

Nothing. 

Down they came, holding both rails and lifting their feet to swing, likeschool boys--hundreds of them, thousands of them, it seemed. Tom watchedthem all keenly as they passed out like an endless ribbon from amagician's hat. There seemed to be no end of them. 

There came now a fellow whom he watched closely. He had blond hair andblue eyes, but no glasses. He looked something like--something like--oh, who? Fritzie Schmitt, whom he used to know in Bridgeboro. No, hedidn't--not so much. 

But his blond hair and blue eyes did not escape Mr. Conne. 

Nothing. 

"Watching, Tommy?"

"Yes, sir. "

A hundred more, two hundred, and then a young sergeant with glasses. 

While this young man was undergoing his ordeal (whatever it was, for Tomkept his eyes riveted on the gangway), there appeared the tall figure ofa lieutenant. Tom thought he was of the medical corps, but he was notcertain. He seemed to be looking down at Mr. Conne's little group, witha fierce, piercing stare. He wore horned spectacles of goodlycircumference and as Tom's eyes followed the thick, left wing of these, he saw that it embraced an ear which stood out prominently. Both the earand the piercing eagle gaze set him all agog. 

Should he speak? The lieutenant was gazing steadfastly down at Mr. Conneand coming nearer with every step. Of course, Mr. Conne would stop himanyway, but---- To mention that piercing stare and that ear after theman had been stopped for the more tangible reason--there would be notriumph in that. 

Tom's hand trembled like a leaf and his voice was unsteady as he turnedto Mr. Conne, and said. 

"This one coming down--the one that's looking at you--he looks like--andI notice----"

"Put your hands down, my man, " called Mr. Conne peremptorily, at thesame time leaping with the agility of a panther up past the descendingthrong. "I'll take those. "

But Tom Slade had spoken first. He did not know whether Mr. Conne'ssudden dash had been prompted by his words or not. He saw him lift theheavy spectacles off the man's ears and with beating heart watched himas he came down alongside the lieutenant. 

"Going to throw them away, eh?" he heard Mr. Conne say. 

Evidently the man, seeing another's glasses examined, had tried toremove his own before he reached the place of inspection. Mr. Conne, whosaw everything, had seen this. But Tom had spoken before Mr. Conne movedand he was satisfied. 

"All right, Tommy, " said Mr. Conne in his easy way. "You beat me to it. "

Tom hardly knew what took place in the next few moments. He saw Mr. Conne breathe upon the glasses, was conscious of soldiers slackeningtheir pace to see and hear what was going on, and of their beingordered forward. He saw the two men who were with Mr. Conne standingbeside the tall lieutenant, who seemed bewildered. He noticed (it isfunny how one notices these little things amid such great things) thelittle ring of red upon the lieutenant's nose where the glasses had sat. 

"There you are, see?" he heard Mr. Conne say quietly, breathing heavilyupon the glasses and holding them up to the light, for the benefit ofhis colleagues. "B L--two dots--X--see--Plain as day. See there, Tommy!"

He breathed upon them again and held them quickly up so that Tom couldsee. 

"Yes, sir, " Tom stammered, somewhat perturbed at such officialattention. 

"Look in the other one, too, Tommy--now--quick!"

"Oh, yes, " said Tom as the strange figures die away. He felt very proud, and not a little uncomfortable at being drawn into the centre of things. And he did not feel slighted as he saw Mr. Conne and the captivelieutenant, and the other officials whom he did not know, start awaythoughtless of anything else in the stress of the extraordinary affair. He followed because he did not know what else to do, and he supposedthey wished him to follow. Outside the wharf he got _Uncle Sam_ andwheeled him along at a respectful distance behind these high officials. So he had one companion. Several times Mr. Conne looked back at him andsmiled. And once he said in that funny way of his, "All right, Tommy?"

"Yes, sir, " Tom answered, trudging along. He had been greatly agitated, but his wonted stolidness was returning now. Probably he felt morecomfortable and at home coming along behind with _Uncle Sam_ than hewould have felt in the midst of this group where the vilest treasonwalked baffled, but unashamed, in the uniform of Uncle Sam. 

Once Mr. Conne turned to see if Tom were following. His cigar was stuckup in the corner; of his mouth as usual and he gave Tom a whimsicallook. 

"You hit the Piff family at both ends, didn't you, Tommy. "

"Y-yes, sir, " said Tom. 

CHAPTER THIRTY

HE DISAPPEARS

Swiftly and silently along the quiet, winding road sped thedispatch-rider. Away from the ocean he was hurrying, where the greatships were coming in, each a fulfilment and a challenge; away fromscenes of debarkation where Uncle Sam was pouring his endless wealth ofcourage and determination into bleeding, suffering, gallant France. 

Past the big hotel he went, past the pleasant villa, through village andhamlet, and farther and farther into the East, bound for the littlecorner of the big salient whence he had come. 

He bore with him a packet and some letters. One was to be left atNeufchatel; others at Breteuil. There was one in particular forCantigny. His name was mentioned in it, but he did not know that. Henever concerned himself with the contents of his papers. 

So he sped along, thinking how he would get a new headlight for _UncleSam_ and a new mud-guard. He thought the people back at Cantigny wouldwonder what had happened to his machine. He had no thought of tellingthem. There was nothing to tell. 

Swiftly and silently along the road he sped, the dispatch-rider who hadcome from the blue hills of Alsace, all the way across poor, devastatedFrance. The rays of the dying sun fell upon the handle-bar of _UncleSam_, which the rider held in the steady, fraternal handshake that theyknew so well. Back from the coast they sped, those two, along thewinding road which lay on hill and in valley, bathed in the mellow glowof the first twilight. Swiftly and silently they sped. Hills rose andfell, the fair panorama of the lowlands with its quaint old houses hereand there opened before them. And so they journeyed on into the din andfire and stenching suffocation and red-running streams of Picardy andFlanders--for service as required. 

(END)

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