THE BOY SCOUT PATHFINDERS

CHAPTER I
THE IRON BOX

Two members of any staff, even though they are only boys, cannot disappear as though the earth had swallowed them without a suspicion of foul play.

In the office above the chamber which had witnessed the stirring events narrated in “The Boy Scout Firefighters,” in which both Beany and Porky Potter had been actors, there had been great anxiety. When General Pershing received the report, he at once sent couriers and scouts to every station where the boys might have gone. The sentries one and all declared that the boys had not been seen outside of the building. This resulted in a combing out of every cranny that could possibly hold a boy alive or dead.

The hours dragged on. There was a continual passing to and fro for hours until at last there seemed to be absolutely nothing more to do until morning. The tired staff threw themselves into the office chairs, while the General, at the typewriter, commenced a letter. Out of respect to him, there was a complete silence in the room.

On and on clicked the typewriter while the waiting men dozed or smoked or thought of home.

“What’s that?” said one of them suddenly, listening intently.

The General stopped writing and looked at the speaker.

“What’s what?” questioned a captain, frowning.

“That tapping,” said the first speaker. “Sounds like code.”

“You have been asleep,” said the captain, grinning.

“I hear it,” said the General.

There was a general gathering up of forces, as the whole room tried to place the faint, monotonous tapping.

“The call for help!” said the first speaker triumphantly. “I knew I heard it. The code is my native language almost. It sounds as though some one was calling from below the floor.”

“Send an answer, Lieutenant Reed!” ordered the General.

The young officer obeyed, while his hearers listened breathlessly. Tap-tap went the spurred heel, dash and dot, dash and dot in many combinations.

The reply followed swiftly. The Lieutenant, rather pale, turned to the General. “It’s the boys!” he reported. “They are together, in a closed chamber,—a dungeon, I take it—right below us. They are in danger. Don’t say what. Something about spies and dynamite. Want help instantly.”

“How?” asked the General.

“There’s a secret door in the oak panel in the hall. They gave directions for opening it.”

“Go at once, six of you—you six nearest the door!” The officers designated rose.

“Rush!” said Lieutenant Reed crisply. For the moment he was in command. He alone knew how to open the panel. They hurried outside, where Reed felt swiftly but carefully in the place described by Porky. Twice he went over the heavy carving, pushing here and there unavailingly. Then without a sound the secret door opened and before any one could enter the passage that yawned in inky blackness before them, there was a rush of running feet and the two boys, carrying Beany’s coat between them, bolted into the hall. Porky made a motion for silence, and listened.

There was no sound.

“Somebody chased us!” he panted. “Somebody was close behind us in the dark!”

“Men?” asked an officer in an excited whisper.

Porky wanted to say “No, sir, rabbits!” but he knew that every one felt nervous and edgy and, besides, he did not want to be disrespectful to the officer who had spoken.

“They came in through the other door,” he said. “A door at the other end of the passage that is on the other side of the two big rooms down below there.”

“Let’s go down,” said one of the men, loosening his revolver.

“Please don’t try it!” begged Beany. “We could never get down without light and then they would have the drop on us. It’s no use now. Besides, they could go out of that outside door without the least trouble after they had shot us all up.”

“The kid is right,” said Lieutenant Reed. “He knows how the land lies down there. Come up to the General, boys, and make a report. He will tell us what he wants done.”

Sliding the panel shut, the Lieutenant called a guard and, leaving the hallway patrolled by a couple of stalwart Americans, the group surrounding the two boys entered the office and saluted the General.

General Pershing bent his serious, keen gaze on the boys, then a bright, sudden smile lighted the strong, handsome face that had grown sad and still in the troubled, anxious months at the front.

“Always up to something, boys,” he said. “Well, your friend the Colonel warned me how it would be. Now suppose you tell me all about it.”

Beany with a sigh of relief lifted his blouse and deposited it on the table. It struck the surface with a clank and as he pulled the cloth away a regular flood of gold pieces covered the papers where the General had been writing.

“Part of the story, sir,” said Beany. And then talking together, or taking turns, as the spirit moved them, the boys pieced out the account of their adventures. The part that Beany kept harking back to was the presence of the prisoners in the big room. He described carefully and accurately the appearance of the young soldier and told as well as he could about the limp, unconscious girl who had been carried out into the dark garden. Beany shuddered as he spoke.

“I am sure the girl was dead, sir. She laid there for hours, I guess, and she never moved at all, never batted an eyelash. And she was white.... I never saw anybody so white. It was as though all her blood had been drained out of her.”

“Was she wounded?” asked the General.

“She must have been, sir,” answered Beany. “I saw blood, just a little of it running down her wrist under her sleeve. She had nice clothes on, and I had a hunch all the time that I ought to know who she was; but I couldn’t tell. Wish we knew what they did with them. When it comes light, General, I can show you just where the door is. I am sure I know where it opens.”

“It is light now,” said the General, pointing to the window. Every one looked. Sure enough, the whole sky was a mass of pale gold and pink and greenish blue, as lovely and soft and joyous as though the distant rumble of the big guns was not shaking the casement as they spoke. It was light; morning had come.

The General ordered coffee and rolls and insisted on both boys eating something. They were tired and heavy eyed but excited at the thought of unraveling perhaps a little more of the mystery of the past night.

When at last the General dismissed them with a few terse orders, they sped ahead of their escort through the silent garden, fearless and curious and unconscious of the careful marksmen who followed, protecting each foot of their advance.

Beany had spoken the truth. With the sureness of a young hound he took his way through a wilderness of stones and bricks and beams and plaster through the tangled, torn old garden, and round to a spot marked by what seemed to be a clump of dense bushes like low growing lilacs. Approaching this, Beany parted the branches and peered in. Then he drew back with a cry of horror.

“Look!” he whispered.

It was indeed the ambush set over the outside entrance to the dungeons. Down in the depths of the hole that yawned under the encircling bushes something was tumbled in a pitiful, distorted heap. Eagerly a half dozen men leaped down and with careful hands straightened out the two forms lying in the bloody ooze. One after the other they were lifted to the surface.

The man was quite dead but the girl still lived, though breathing feebly.

Placing her on an improvised stretcher, a couple of the men hurried away with her to the hospital while a couple more knelt beside the dead boy and searched carefully through his torn and blood-stained clothing for papers, letters—anything that could be used as clues to his identity. There was not a scrap left to guide them. The young officer’s pockets had been turned inside out. Even the hems in his tunic and breeches had been slit and the soles had been torn from his shoes. If there had been papers of any sort secreted about him, they were gone—carried away by the ruthless hands that had slain him.

Leaving a guard beside the body, the others leaped boldly into the shallow pit and lifted the heavy bar which held the massive nail-studded oaken door. It opened inward, and Beany led the way through the passage into the chamber where he had sat bound, gagged and waiting for the relentless hands of the clock to reach the moment of his doom. He showed the device, and then, lighting the stubs of candles, they went into the inner room. The dungeons were dark as midnight, even in the clear morning light.

A careful search was made of the rooms. They stamped on the floors, rapped on the walls with pistol butts, ripped up the silken covers and the thick mattresses, but found nothing. The men finally stopped their search, and gathered in a group around the massive table. Beany, sitting on the edge of the table, jounced up and down and thought that he had never seen a piece of furniture quite so solid. He took out a penknife and tried to whittle the edge but the keen blade scarcely made an impression on the ironwood seasoned for ages. Porky, watching his brother, listened to the conversation.

“Somewhere down here there is a hiding place for papers or money, or perhaps both,” said one of the officers, a keen-faced, thoughtful man, studying the room as he could see it in the flickering light of the two candles which, now burned down to the merest stubs, afforded a dim, uncertain light.

“We have given it a pretty thorough combing over,” said another officer, frowning.

“I can’t help it,” stubbornly answered the other. “It is in just such places as this where valuable secrets are often hidden.”

“What about the dynamite?” demanded some one else. “It does not seem as though they would hide anything of any value to themselves in a spot that they were willing to blow up.”

“A bomb that size would not have wrecked this room. Did you notice the thickness of the walls?”

The talk went on while Beany whittled and pried away industriously at the table edge. He found a crack in the wood and pried his knife blade into that. The blade entered in a tantalizing manner, slipped smoothly along, then struck metal. Beany pushed. Porky, who was watching, came closer and peered down the crack. Beany pushed harder, pushed as hard as he could, and suddenly felt himself flung off the table as the big top flew up and hurled him aside.

Powerful springs had opened the two heavy slabs of oak that formed the table. Two pieces now stood open like a pair of doors and within lay a long, flat box which completely filled the space. The box was of iron, heavily barred and padlocked. Four soldiers pried it from its place and, escorted by the whole party, it was carried to General Pershing, still working at his desk.

Once more the boys had unearthed a mystery.

CHAPTER II
THE CELLAR’S SECRET

Porky and Beany were too tired to care what happened next and, taking quick advantage of a brief smile and nod of dismissal from the General, they made their way to their quarters and soon were as sound asleep as though they were lying on the softest down. They slept and slept, losing all track of time, and by the General’s orders were undisturbed. When they finally woke, really wide awake, they found that a whole day and a night had passed since the early dawn when they had staggered off to bed.

They woke at the same instant, as was their habit, and sitting bolt upright, stared unblinkingly at the young officer sitting at the window writing.

“Morning, Lieutenant,” said Porky, rubbing his eyes.

“What’s the time, sir?” said Beany, looking curiously at his wrist watch.

“Yours stopped too?” asked Porky. “Mine has. Funny!”

“Not so very funny,” said Lieutenant Parker, closing his writing tablet. “You have been asleep since yesterday morning, and I imagine the watches ran down.”

“Yesterday morning!” gasped Porky. “Why didn’t some one call us?”

“General’s orders,” said the Lieutenant. He laughed, “Gee, I wish he would order me to bed for a week. You can bet I would go!”

“Well, it makes me mad to sleep like this,” said Porky in irritation. “What all have we missed, anyhow?”

“Nothing much,” said the Lieutenant. “The biggest drive of the war is on and to-morrow General Pershing with his staff will make the trip along the front line trenches. I hope he counts me in on that.”

“You liked to be in the trenches, didn’t you?” asked Porky, stooping to lace his puttees.

“You are right I did,” said Lieutenant Parker, wrinkling his smooth young forehead. “I came over to fight, and it was just my luck to get this measly scratch on my head, and blamed if they didn’t put me here in this office doing paper work!”

“Well, you got to give your skull time to get well, haven’t you?” asked Beany. “It was cracked, wasn’t it?”

“No, just a piece scooped out of it,” said the Lieutenant in a bored tone.

The boys grinned. Lieutenant Parker was one of the best friends they had, and they had learned that nothing teased him like being quizzed about the deep, palpitating scar that creased his dark head, the truth being that he had received the wound in an encounter that had won him the coveted French war cross with the palms. Porky and Beany considered modesty in others little less than a sin. They were always so thirsty for tales of blood and glory that they could not see why any one should hesitate to tell every possible detail of any adventure. It happened, strangely enough, that they did not apply the same rule to their own conduct. To get details out of the Potter twins was, as their own father said, like drawing nails out of a green oak board, accompanied by screeches of protest. The boys had had the Lieutenant’s story, however, and they harked back to the news of the day.

“I am going on that hike,” said Porky, standing up and stamping himself comfortably into his clothes.

“So’m I,” said his brother, likewise stamping.

“Try for something else, kid,” said the Lieutenant. “You can’t get in on this. It is strictly staff.”

“Watch me!” said young Porky, the cocksure. He hurried to the door and disappeared, while Beany, a trifle slower in his dressing, roared, “Wait for me!”

A muttered response of some sort was the only satisfaction given.

Beany grinned. “He is always so sudden!” he complained, addressing the Lieutenant.

“Might as well stay here until he comes back. I never like to butt in on Porky’s talky-talks. He most generally knows what he wants to say, and he don’t need any help in getting it out of his system. I certainly hope we can go with the General. You are always yelling about that old silver plate you have on your topknot. Look at us: seems like we just can’t get into a trench. Honest Injun, I’m so sick of this old chateau—”

“I never did see such a pair!” said Lieutenant Parker. “Didn’t you have enough of an adventure the other night to last you two or three days?”

He was going on, when Porky burst into the room. He threw up his hat.

“Better, much better than I ever hoped,” he crowed.

“Hand it out!” demanded Beany anxiously.

“Why, I was going to give the General a great line of talk, and I didn’t have a chance to do a thing but salute. He was talking to a French officer and the minute he went out, the General just said, ‘All right to-day, young man?’ I said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and he said, ‘No time to talk! Report in the courtyard to-morrow morning five-thirty, field equipment, for special duty with my staff.’

“I saluted again and turned to come out, and the General said, ‘Potter, this is in the way of a reward for that little affair in the dungeons,’ and I said, ‘Thank you, sir, but the pleasure was all ours, sir,’ and he said, ‘No, not quite all; because some of the papers you unearthed WILL HELP TO TURN THE TIDE.’ How’s that, old Beans, will help to turn the tide. Gosh! you did it with your little penknife, didn’t you?”

“Well, never mind that,” said Beany, wriggling. “Don’t you know anything about this trip to-morrow?”

“Nary word,” said Porky, “but why should we worry? Main fact is clear, we are going to be among those present.”

The boys spent a restless day getting their traveling equipment in order and taking it apart again to put it together in some way they fancied would make an eighth of an inch difference in some of its dimensions. They strutted a little perhaps. It was truly a wonderful thing to go with General Pershing on a trip of that sort. They marveled at their good luck.

That good luck had hinged entirely on their ability to keep their own counsel. That desire some have to tell all they know, a lot that they guess, and a few things that they fear, did not exist in the Potter twins. They could keep a secret without being told to, and that’s some test. Whatever they overheard was safe. When they saw things that were not intended for their eyes, they ignored them, or made an effort to forget all about them. This high sense of what was honorable and right was noticed immediately by the General as well as by others whom they met daily.

So they spent the long day patting each other on the back, and wondering at their great good fortune.

They kept closely to the rooms frequented by the officers. As Porky pointed out to his brother, there was one old lady at least who was not wasting any love on them, and they didn’t want to give her a chance to turn a key on them and spoil all their fun. They had at least gained a little caution, but how very little the trip was going to show.

It was barely five next morning when Porky and Beany, like two shadows, slipped from their quarters and went silently down to the courtyard. Several automobiles stood ready, heavily guarded, and a couple of mechanics were busily tightening nuts and testing various parts of the machinery. No one spoke. The boys crossed the open space, and in accordance with an agreement made previously, sat down back to back on a ledge of the broken fountain. They were taking no risks of surprise or attack from the rear. Silently the minutes passed. The steady tramp of the sentries and the grating of metal on metal as the mechanics worked quietly on the cars made so little sound that distant noises were loud and acute.

The guns of the enemy had been silent for twelve hours. Even Porky and Beany sensed something big and terrible in the air.

“Want to bet something?” asked Porky, poking his brother with a backhand jab in the ribs.

He never found out whether Beany was game to bet or not for the door of the chateau opened and a group of officers came out. General Pershing led the group. The boys leaped to salute, the sentries stopped and presented arms. Even the mechanics straightened to their feet. There was perfect quiet, however, and five minutes later they started away full speed in the darkness. On and on they went, passing first through a country which showed very little of the effects of war. It was a sort of spur that had escaped the enemy’s assaults in the beginning of the struggle, and which, since the arrival of millions of Americans, had been lying too far behind the lines to suffer.

The sun rose: it was day. They stopped in the shelter of a dense grove and breakfasted on the provisions put up for them by the cooks back at headquarters. While they ate the drivers of the cars watched the clear morning skies for airplanes. The sandwiches and coffee, boiling hot in big thermos bottles, tasted good to the hungry boys, although they were eaten in silence, and in silence the journey was continued. Now they commenced to see signs of the frightful struggle. First great shell craters, then trees uprooted or hacked down, and village after village lying a mere mass of wreckage. There were worse things too; sad reminders that made the boys turn pale with horror.

The stop for dinner was made the occasion of a careful examination of all the parts of the cars, as any accident in the next few miles might be most dangerous and disastrous. One of the aides announced to the several groups of officers that a start would not be made under two hours so the boys wandered about, looking at the ruined landscape and picking up here and there sad little mementoes of friend and foe. Buttons, scraps of jewelry, mostly cheap rings that girls might have worn and given to their departing sweethearts. There were dozens of crushed and stained pictures too, so many that the boys did not bother to pick them up after the first dozen or so. Pinned to one picture of a chubby child was a little sock. Across the back of the picture was written, “A year old to-day. My son. Wish I could see him.”

“Gosh,” said Beany, “I sure do hope he didn’t get his! Perhaps this just fell out of his pocket.”

“Why didn’t he sign it?” demanded the practical Porky.

“Well, I suppose he didn’t have a hunch we would want his address,” said Beany. “I’m going to keep this and send it back home to one of the papers. They will be glad to copy the picture of the fat little geezer, and p’raps it will get back to his folks.”

The boys wandered on. Coming from a country rich in magnificent old maples and elms, the ruin, so cowardly and so ruthless, of the great trees seemed one of the most terrible aspects of the war. Not only were they torn by shells, but mile after mile stood dead and dying from the effects of the gas attacks of the enemy. The gas seemed to be as fatal to the trees as it was to human beings. Not only had the leaves curled up and fallen, but the trunks themselves were blackened and dead looking. It was like a country in a nightmare, everything in the way of buildings flat on the ground, literally not one stone left on another. The dead and dying trees, leafless and twisted, let the sunshine down upon it all with scarce a shadow.

The boys reached the site of what had evidently once been a fine farm. It was a total ruin. They went clambering over the loose heaped-up stones of what had once been a fine old dwelling, and sat down for a moment on a flat block that had made the broad and generous doorstep.

“Gee, this must have been an old place,” said Porky. “See the way the edge of this stone is worn—and it is granite at that.”

“Look at the size of it, too,” said Beany.

They sat studying the stone when a faint feeble wail was heard. They looked at each other, startled.

“Aw, gee, there’s a kitten shut up some place,” said Beany, jumping up. “Let’s find it.”

“Sure we will,” said Porky, “but we can’t take it along. I don’t suppose General Pershing would want to add a cat to his traveling party.”

“It sounded most dead,” said Porky. “Kitty, kitty! Here, kitty,” he called in his most persuasive voice.

Another little cry answered him and gave them the direction. “It’s the cellar,” said both boys together, and with one accord they seized a couple of stout timbers and commenced to pry away part of the wreckage in what seemed the likeliest entrance to the pitch black hollow under the bent and broken floor timbers, on which still rested masses of stone.

Suddenly, in response to their efforts, a huge stone, mate to the one they had been sitting on, tipped sidewise and slowly slid down into the darkness, followed by a shaft of light.

There was a sharp cry from below, and the boys looked at each other, a sort of horror on each face.

“That’s no kitten!” gasped Beany.

For answer Porky slid feet first in the wake of the big stone, landed on it, and stepped off into a gloomy chamber now feebly lighted from above. In a moment his eyes were accustomed to the dim light, and he stepped aside, making way for Beany, who came helter-skeltering down behind him.

What they saw was a room that had been used as a store-room for the farmhouse. By some trick of fate the falling walls, while they had made a tight prison of it, had spared the most of the shelves of provisions, and rows of preserves and tins of fruit still stood safely in their places.

A thin, emaciated figure lay in the corner on a pile of dirt over which a cloak had been spread. The sunken eyes fixed themselves on the two boys, but there was no recognition in their glassy depths. What looked like two little piles of rags were huddled close, and as the boys came nearer, the dying woman, for it was a woman and she was close to death, clutched them convulsively. The bundles stirred, and a couple of small heads were raised. Two children, tousled and covered with dirt, lifted frightened eyes and clung frantically to the prostrate figure.

Porky crossed swiftly and dropped on his knees by the dying woman. Very gently he slipped an arm under her heavy head and lifted her a little on his strong young arm.

“Get a move on!” he flung at Beany, and that young man scrambled up the pile of debris where the big stone had fallen and instantly disappeared. Porky, left alone with the woman and the two terrified children, who tried frantically to burrow out of sight under the mother’s nerveless arm, could think of nothing better to do than clasp the woman closely to him in an effort to give her some of his own heat and vitality. She seemed already stone cold.

Almost at once Beany returned with some of the officers. They came down and with tender hands lifted the sufferer out of the chilly dampness of the cellar, and laid her on a pile of coats and cushions. Some one carefully fed her a few drops of the hot coffee still left in the thermos bottles. It was very evident, however, that her moments were numbered.

One of the French officers in the party knelt beside her. Softly, tenderly, pityingly, he spoke to her in her native tongue.

The weary eyes opened, and rested on his face.

CHAPTER III
A VEXING PROBLEM

The boys, who had attained a good working knowledge of the French language, listened breathlessly. The gentle questions of the officer were easy to follow, but without pressing too close to the sad group they were unable to hear the whispered, broken replies of the woman. That the story was a sad one, one of the uncounted tragedies of the invasion of a cruel and heartless enemy, they could easily guess by the break in the French officer’s voice and the unashamed and manly tears that filled his eyes. Slowly, painfully she told her story, the two tiny children clutching her closely the while. Fainter and fainter grew the feeble voice. Porky and Beany knew instinctively that they were standing in the presence of death; not the glorious and gallant passing that the soldier finds on the battlefield, but the coming of release from a long and undeserved agony. As the little group watched, one bloodless hand reached up and drew the thin shawl away from her breast. There was a wound there; a cruel death wound that she had stanched as best she could and had covered from the eyes of the two babies. As though her story was all ended, the pitiful eyes fixed themselves on the face of the officer who held her. Rapidly he made the sign of the cross, then with his hand held high, he spoke to the dying woman. It was enough. A smile of peace lighted the worn face, one long look she bent on the two children, and turning her head as if for protection toward the blue tunic against which she rested, she closed her eyes, sighed, and was still.

Reverently laying down his burden, the officer rose to his feet. And while the group stood with bared heads, he told the story as he had just heard it.

The dead woman’s name was Marie Duval. For two hundred years her people had lived in simple ease and comfort on the well-tilled farm.

In rapid, thrilling sentences, he sketched the story of their happy, blameless lives, through Marie’s innocent childhood, her girlhood, and up to the time of her meeting with young Pierre Duval. Pierre had a good farm of his own down the valley, and there they lived in simple happiness and prosperity. Three children were born, the two little creatures crouching before them and one a little older, now dead.

When the war broke out, Pierre put on his uniform and went away. For a while, like other heroic women, she tilled the little farm until one night when a small scouting party of Huns swept down, burning and destroying all that lay in their path. She escaped with her children under cover of the darkness and made her way back to her father’s house. For a long time they escaped the tide of war, and lived on and on from day to day, the old, old father and mother and the young mother waiting for news from Pierre. It came at last.... He was dead.

“Then,” said the French officer, “then her heart seemed to die too, but she knew that she must live for the sake of the little ones. Already she could see that the agony and terror of it all was killing the aged parents. Four sons were fighting, and one by one they followed Pierre to death.

“Nearer and nearer came the German lines until one awful day a horde of heartless warriors swept over them.

“Sirs, you know the rest,” said the French officer, his fine face twitching with emotion. “It is the same old story, the old man ruthlessly tortured and killed, his old wife kept alive just long enough to see him die. The oldest grandchild was with her. He too was tortured while his mother, hidden and imprisoned in a portion of the cellar under the smoking ruins of the farmhouse, heard his childish screams of agony.

“She tried frantically to free herself from the ruins. A soldier saw her, brought the fainting child almost within reach of her hand and killed him. Then with the same weapon he made a savage thrust for her heart, but could only reach close enough to inflict a deep wound. Then making sure that she could not escape from the cellar, he rode away after his troop. She became unconscious, and for days the two little children must have lived on the vegetables stored about them. When she regained consciousness she found strength to drag herself to the shelves where the family provisions were stored. All that was not spoiled she fed to the children, but they were without water save for the rainwater that dripped down upon them. She felt herself growing steadily weaker as the untended wound grew worse. The whole neighborhood seemed abandoned, and their feeble cries brought no help. The children pined, and suffering as they were from shock, soon gave way to the cold dampness and insufficient food.

“Marie herself lived solely through her determination not to leave the two helpless babies to their fate. She prayed that they might die first, and she was glad to note their failing strength, so fearful was she of leaving them alone to a horrible, lingering death.

“She herself grew so weak that much of the time she lay almost unconscious with the little ones huddled against her. She commenced to see visions. Pierre came and comforted her and promised that she should soon be free to be with him. The little martyred son clasped her in his loving little arms, assuring her that he no longer suffered. The old mother and father sat beside her and told her to be brave and patient. But with all her courage she felt that her end was near. She could not endure much longer.”

The French officer bowed his head.

“Then came deliverance,” he said softly, “deliverance from all her pain and anguish. She has been released. She is with Pierre!”

One of the officers stepped forward and tenderly covered the still figure with his cloak. He took the younger child in his arms, but it screamed and struggled while the other one fought off the friendly hands stretched down to it. The French officer spoke to them pleadingly, but they only stared stupidly at him.

“They are almost done for,” said one of the officers. “We have got to get them away from here and right away.” He made another effort to take the older child but the little fellow fought with the fury of a little wildcat. One after another tried in vain to get hold of the terrified little fellow, who grew more and more frightened.

Porky and Beany, standing modestly in the rear of the group, watched the proceedings with growing uneasiness. Finally Porky stepped forwards, saluting as he did so.

“Will you please let us try?” he asked, and taking a worried nod from the Captain for answer, he sat down beside the dead mother, and for a long time, as it seemed to the watching group, stared idly ahead, without so much as a glance at the trembling children.

Then he turned, nodded as though he had just noticed them, and taking a cake of chocolate from his pocket, bit off a piece and then broke off a small corner for each child. It was only a taste, but as the delicious morsel melted on their tongues, they crept to Porky like a couple of starved kittens. He showed them the rest of the chocolate and hitched off a few feet. Beany came after. The children followed, and Porky broke off another small bit for each. Some one brought water from the cars for them to drink and in fifteen minutes the thing was done. Porky and Beany, each with a little skeleton in their arms, wandered well away from the spot where unaccustomed hands were awkwardly digging a grave for the dead young mother.

“This,” said Porky, as the child in his arms sagged on his shoulder and seemed to sleep, “this is the worst thing yet!”

“You bet!” said Beany dismally. “Say, did you see me cry back there? I did!”

“Well, what of it?” demanded Porky. “Didn’t everybody? I’d like to know how they could help it!”

“I wasn’t looking,” said Beany. “Oh, gosh, they didn’t have to do things like this.”

“Who, the Huns?” asked his brother. “Why, it’s all like this and a million times worse!”

“Well, I wish I was grown up,” mourned Beany. “To think we can’t do much of anything! I want to get even! I want to look some of those fellows in the face!”

“What’s your idea? Want to tell him what you think?” Porky laughed unpleasantly, as he shifted the weight of the child. “What’s worrying me now is what is going to be done with these poor little kids. Isn’t the one you have a pretty little thing? Even all the dirt and hunger can’t hide her looks. I suppose they will have to go into some asylum!”

“I don’t see why,” said Beany suddenly. “Do you remember Mom and Pop said they wished if we brought them anything from across, it would be something good and worth while? They didn’t want German helmets and junk like that. What do you suppose they would say to a couple of dandy little kids like these?”

“For the love of the board of health!” said his brother solemnly. “It’s a great thought, sonny, but do you suppose Mom wants to start in bringing up another lot of children? You know if she ever started, she would make a good job of it; you know how thorough she always is.”

“Yes, she is thorough, all right!” grinned Mom’s son. “Look at us!”

“She did the best she could with us, anyhow,” retorted Mom’s other son solemnly, “and I think, no, I know she would be tickled to death to do something as real and important as taking these two little chaps to bring up. And we could help support them if we had to, later.”

“That’s silly,” said Porky. “You know Dad has made a lot of money. And he could afford to bring up six of them if he wanted to.”

“Well, all he ever wants is what Mom wants,” said Beany.

“I guess that’s so too,” said Porky, “but perhaps some of those officers will have some other plans for them.”

He looked down at the child on his arm. Already he felt a tenderness for the starved, sickly little creature who had trusted him.

“One apiece,” he said, looking at Beany.

“One’s a girl, though,” said Beany.

Porky wanted to be fair.

“That’s so,” he said. “Well, we can draw straws to see which has to take her.”

“Straws nothing!” said Beany. “She came to me, so she is mine. Darned if I know what to do with a girl, though! Can’t teach her to play ball or marbles, and besides that she can’t be a Boy Scout.”

“Well, she can be a girl one. You know they have ’em, and if she can’t play ball she can learn to swim and dive and ride and shoot, and it will be pretty handy to have her round the house when it comes to buttons and things. Mother must get tired sewing for three of us.”

“Wonder how long it takes ’em to grow up to button size,” said Beany, studying the tiny bundle in his arms.

“Don’t know,” said Porky. He looked anxiously at his brother. His generosity in accepting the care of the little girl worried him. He had to watch Beany, who was always more than generous and self-sacrificing.

“Why can’t we both have both kids?” he asked. “I don’t want you to be stung with a girl all the time. It isn’t fair.”

“Stuck with a girl!” said Beany. “Why, Porky, I like it! I never could see why when any one has a baby, everybody says, ‘Gee, it’s a boy! Isn’t that bully?’ or else ‘Huh, it’s a girl, too bad!’ I never could see it. Course when they get our size they mostly are silly pills, but if I have a hand in bringing up this girl, why, you just watch her, that’s all! I bet when she’s fifteen she won’t look cross-eyed at a boy. I bet she knocks their blocks off! She is going to have some sense!”

“Looks as though you mean to make a scrapper of her,” laughed Porky.

“No, she has got to grow up just as much like Mom as she can.”

“Well, Mom likes boys all right,” was Porky’s reminder.

“Yes, but I bet when she was young she never googled at ’em or passed notes or accidentally sat down in the same seat with them or any of that. She isn’t that kind. You can see she isn’t.” And Beany, whose wavy hair and clear blue eyes had already caused him to suffer, nodded his head vigorously.

“Go ahead!” said Porky, “I think it’s great having an assortment, only I didn’t want you to feel as though you had the worst end of the bargain.”

“Not a bit of it!” said Beany. “Not a bit, and I’ll lend you my girl to look at or play with whenever you want.”

“Much obliged,” said Porky, “but I can’t help thinking it might be a good plan to break the news to somebody.”

“Your kidlet is asleep, so he won’t notice. Suppose you go back there and see what they are doing.”

“I can see from here,” said Porky with a slight shudder. “They are sort of boarding up a place to put the youngster’s mother. They have no way of getting a casket or even a box for her.”

“It will be fixed all right,” said Beany. “The Captain does everything all right. He will fix it just as well as ever he can. I’d like to go over and see just what they are doing.”

“Better not; you might wake the baby, and we don’t want her to see her mother again.”

“Well, anyhow, one thing is settled. The pair is ours,” said Porky with a sigh.

“They are ours if we can have them,” said his brother.

“You watch me!” said Porky grimly.

CHAPTER IV
DECIDING DESTINIES

Tired of carrying the children about, the two boys sat down on a bench beside what had once been a large barn. The destructive fire started by the invaders had apparently been checked by a heavy rainfall as the half burned structures and charred timbers testified. There was still a chance to rebuild and save enough from the wreckage to enable the owners to start their lives afresh. But alas, of those owners but two were left—the two tiny, terrified, war-racked creatures in the arms of the two Boy Scouts. While their little charges slept, the boys continued their talk in a low tone. Their arms, unaccustomed to such burdens, were tired and stiff by the time one of the officers left the distant group and approached them.

“Why don’t you lay the poor little cubs down somewhere?” he asked, looking round vainly for a fit place.

“No place to put ’em, sir,” said Porky, “and every time we start to move them, they clutch us and start to scream. As long as we sort of keep ’em hugged up tight, they sleep.”

“It’s awful—awful!” said the officer. “I wish I knew what to do with them now. There’s not an asylum of any sort, not a place fit to leave them within miles and miles, and what’s to become of them I don’t know. Every orphan asylum in France is crowded.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Porky. “We don’t intend they shall go to any asylum. Our mother has adopted them.”

“Your what?” asked the captain after a prolonged stare.

“Our mother,” repeated Porky.

“Your mother has WHAT?” said the captain. “Just repeat it all.”

“Our mother has adopted them,” said Porky patiently and distinctly. The captain pushed back his cap and stared.

“Where is your mother?” he asked.

“Home,” said Porky.

“New York state,” added Beany. “She wanted something to remember the war by, so we are going to take her these. She didn’t want any German helmets or anything of that sort. She said she didn’t want ever to be reminded of helmets, so we will take her these instead.”

“But, good heavens!” said the officer. “You ought not do anything like that! She would have to bring them up.”

“That’s all right, too,” said Porky. “Mom has had experience. She has had us, and one of these is a girl. Girls ought to be easier than boys.”

“No, she won’t mind and, anyhow, we are going to do all the hard work ourselves. Teaching them swimming and baseball and all that.”

“The girl will like that,” said the officer dryly.

“Course she will!” said Beany, looking proudly down at the future baseballess.

“It’s like this,” said Porky. “Our people always trust us, and we know it will be all right. I do hope you can fix it for us, Captain.”

“It would be a wonderful thing for those poor little orphans,” mused the Captain. “But how would you get them home?”

“That’s easy,” said Porky. “Our time is up pretty soon. You see we were only allowed a limited stay. That was the agreement when we came, and we can take the kids over with us. Won’t you please get General Pershing to fix it up for us? There will be some woman on board to tell us what they ought to eat, and when to put ’em to bed and all that.”

“It would be a wonderful thing,” said the Captain again. “If you are sure about your mother. It’s a good deal to wish off on her.”

“Feel in my left pocket,” said Porky. “Feel that letter? Now take it out and read it. It’s all right. She wouldn’t mind, and I’m proud of mother’s letters.”

The Captain drew out the letter which was much thumbed and soiled, and read:

“My own dear boys:

“It was good to hear from you both again after the long time between letters. A whole month, in which we received not so much as a post card. But something told me that you were safe and well, so I did not worry. You know, dears, I am not the worrying kind when it comes to that. Your dad, who boasts continually that he never worries over anything, does all the fussing for the whole family, but as long as he doesn’t know it, and we never tell him, why, I suppose it is all right.

“I wrote you a long letter yesterday, telling you all the news of the neighborhood, and this is only a note to acknowledge your letter at once because in my letter I said that we had not heard in a long time.

“Well, dears, it will not be very many weeks now before we will hope to see our boys again. I am counting the very days. I wonder what souvenir of the war you will bring me. It will be something I will love to have, I know, and not a horrid helmet or anything of that sort. Of course the thing I would like best you can’t possibly bring me, and that is a house full of those poor pitiful little Belgian refugees. When I think of our big house, this splendid home we have built since you went away, when I think that soon it will be finished, and we will be in it, just we four, I can scarcely bear it. So many little children homeless!

“Well, some day, boys, we must manage to do something for some of those suffering little ones. I know of no other way in which to thank God for our two boys and our many, many blessings. Your father is prospering more and more in his business, and we both feel that we must all four unite in doing for those less fortunate than we.

“However, I know I can’t hope for a couple of Belgians just at present. After the war, we will go and collect a few!

“Take care of yourselves always for the sake of the two who love you so well.

“Your always loving

“Mother.”

“Well, I declare!” said the Captain as he finished the clearly written page.

“Doesn’t that about fix it?” asked Porky triumphantly. “Of course these are French, but I guess she won’t mind that. They couldn’t be worse off in the way of parents or more destitute, no matter what they were.”

“Mother will be in her glory,” Beany cut in. “I hope they don’t get fat before we get them home.”

“I should say not! The thinner, the better as far as mother is concerned. She snaked a private right out of the camp hospital last summer and took him home. He had had pneumonia and looked like a sick sparrow. Mother fed him and nursed him and he gained seventeen pounds in three weeks.”

“Well, it does beat all!” said the Captain. “Of course, you understand there may be some reason that will make it impossible for you to take these children out of the country.”

“All I can say is, there hadn’t better be,” said Porky, thrusting out his square jaw. “Think I want to give up my kid after it came to me and I lugged it around for an hour?”

“And do you suppose I want anybody but mother and me to bring up this girl?” said Beany, awkwardly hugging the sleeping mite in his arms closer.

“Besides,” said Porky, “what about mother? It’s up to us to bring her what she likes best, and you read that letter. What she wants is orphans, and she’s got to have ’em if we steal ’em! So long as we are around, mother has got to have what she wants.”

“I should think that nearly settled it,” said the officer. He laughed but there was a queer gleam in his eyes that looked suspiciously like tears. “I am going to report this to the General now,” he said. “Of course we cannot take the children with us, and some way must be found of sending them back to headquarters. I don’t see just how it is to be done, as it would be a pity to make you go back with them when this trip is only beginning and will be a wonderful thing for you.”

“No, we hate to lose the trip,” said Porky wistfully. “I don’t suppose two other Boy Scouts in the whole world ever had such a chance and we sort of earned it.”

“Stay here,” said the Captain, “and I will be back presently.”

He walked away, and the two boys, holding the two children, sat quietly on the old bench planning in low tones for the future.

“This girl is going to be a peach,” said Beany proudly. “See the way her hair crinkles up? She is rank dirty, but you wait till mother gets her cleaned up.”

“My word!” said Porky. “She’s got to be washed before that! Why, they have to have a bath right off as soon as we get hold of a nurse or some woman who understands enough about kids to do it.”

“Yes, it’s an awful job,” said Beany. “All the soap gets in their eyes and nose, and there’s the mischief to pay. And I want an expert to wash this kid. It makes their eyes red to get soap in ’em, and I don’t want hers spoiled.”

“Wonder what their names are,” said Porky.

“Oh, they are named all right. I suppose we didn’t get ’em soon enough to attend to that, but we can call ’em what we like. Don’t you know how it is with a registered dog? Don’t you remember the two collies Skippy Fields has, one named Knocklayde King Ben and the other Nut Brown Maiden, and Skippy’s folks called ’em Benny and Nutty. I bet they each have about thirteen names apiece, but while I’m bringing her up, this girl’s going to be called Peggy.”

“And this is Bill,” said Porky without the least hesitation. “Bill. Just Bill so you can yell at him good and easy.”

They went on planning while behind them, over the soft, uneven ground the staff approached unheard and stood watching the little group.

Presently, still unheard and unnoticed by the boys, they turned away.

“And there are those,” said General Pershing solemnly, “who do not believe that a special Providence watches over children! The boys shall take those two orphans home to that good mother of theirs, if it takes an Act of Congress. You say,” he continued, talking to the French officer in his own musical tongue, “you say that poor woman said that all her people were gone?”

“All dead, all lost in this war,” answered the Frenchman.

“Well, if this was only in a movie show,” said the great General, “we would presently see a car headed for the rear, coming around that bend ahead, and we would be able to—well, I declare,” he exclaimed, as one of the officers laughed and pointed. “That’s positively too much!” as the group laughed with him.

A large car was coming along around the bend, it was headed for the rear, and in the tonneau sat a couple of nurses in their snug caps and dark capes!

The General himself halted it, and in a few words explained the situation. A couple of the officers, accompanied by the nurses, went over to the boys and at once the children, still sleeping the heavy sleep of exhaustion, were transferred to arms more accustomed to holding them, and carried back to the car. Almost before they realized it, the car was off and Porky turned to the General, saluting.

“Out with it, young man,” said the kindly General, smiling down into the eager and troubled face.

“We will get ’em back, won’t we, sir?” he asked. “They can’t work some game on us, so we will lose ’em!”

“We lost a pup that way once,” said Beany dolefully, also coming to salute.

“Well, you won’t lose your orphans,” the General promised. “I wish I could see your mother’s face when your little party appears.”

“Why, we will write you what she says if you will let us, sir,” Porky volunteered.

“She will be crazy over Bill and Peggy,” added Beany, looking fondly after the car vanishing with their new possessions.

“Beel ant Pekky!” groaned the Frenchman.

“Wee, Mussoo, we have named them already,” said Porky proudly. “We know they have some other names, kind of names, they were registered under, but that kid has to have something easy to yell at him when he makes a home run, and Beany picked on Peggy right off.”

“That about settles it,” laughed the General. “We must be off if we reach our first sector by nightfall.”

CHAPTER V
WHISPERS IN THE NIGHT

It was nine o’clock when they reached the first post of observation in their journey, an outpost on the top of a densely wooded hill where they were to remain as long as the General wished to stay. It was a splendid post of observation. A vast battle-torn valley stretched below them for miles and miles. From their vantage point they could see it brilliantly lighted at short intervals by the flares of the enemy. The flares lit the trenches—black, ragged gashes running along the earth—and beyond, where the awful desolation of No-Man’s-Land stretched, peopled only with its dead. Seen with field glasses, the plain drew near and they could see the torn surface and the tumbled groups here and there. A great battle had been fought and both sides were resting. Rest was absolutely necessary. The Allies had advanced three miles, pushing back a foe that stubbornly contested every step of the way. The Germans had brought vast numbers of reserves into action but even then the whirlwind tactics and savage rushes of their oversea foe had driven them back rod by rod.

Porky and Beany looked on and trembled with excitement. There ahead, hidden in the darkness, were the Huns. There were the barbarians who had shown a civilized world how men can slip back into worse than savagery. Wasted lands, ruined homes, orphaned and mutilated little children, butchered old people. All the unspeakable horrors of war trooped through the boys’ minds, a hideous train of ghosts, as they looked across the valley. Ahead lay the heartless and ruthless killers, wolves that had come to worry and tear the sheep, but behind in the darkness, the boys knew with a thrill, every possible mode of transportation was swiftly bringing up the reserve American troops, thousands and thousands of them; men in their prime and beardless boys grim, determined, yet light-hearted, ready to fight as only Americans can fight. Men from the farms, farms in the east where fifty well-tilled acres was a fine homestead; farmers from that great and spacious west where a man called miles of land his own. Professional men, clerks, divinity students, adventurers, all welded by this great need into a common likeness. Eager for life, yet fearlessly ready to die if need be, a mighty army was on its way, was drawing nearer and nearer to the tired troops below. Overhead an adventurous plane or two hummed in the darkness.

“And we can’t help!” said Porky mournfully. “Not a thing we can do, not a thing!”

“Oh, well, we are doing all we can,” said Beany. “I don’t just see what more we can do. We can’t help our age.”

“No, but if we are not told just where to stay, and where to go, I mean to take a little stroll around to-night,” said Porky.

The boys went over to the General, who stood looking across the valley and saluted. He looked, and gravely returned the salute.

“Good-night, boys,” he said.

“Good-night, sir,” said the boys, and then as an afterthought, “May we walk around a bit, sir?”

The General was busy studying the vast field below him as the flashes of light revealed it.

“Yes, if you don’t get lost,” he said absently, “and be on hand at eight to-morrow morning. I may be ready to go on then.”

“Yes, sir,” said both boys cheerfully. What luck! The General certainly didn’t know what he was getting himself into.

“The whole night to ourselves, and no bounds, and only we mustn’t get lost!” chuckled Porky.

“Peach pie!” murmured Beany. “Let’s be off! Where will we go first?”

“Down there,” said Porky, waving a hand widely over the valley.

“That’s where I thought. But we can’t get into any scrape on account of the General. You know he wasn’t thinking about us at all when he spoke, and, besides, there would be an awful fuss if we got into any trouble. It would be good-by to our little trip. We would be sent back quicker than they sent Bill and Peggy.”

“Who wants to get into any scrape?” said Porky. “All I want to do is to see—to see—well, to see just what I can do.”

“Well, come on,” said Beany mournfully. “I bet we are in for some fun, because when we look for things we generally find ’em.”

“What hurts me,” said Porky, “is not carrying weapons of any sort. It’s a good safe rule for the Boy Scouts, but I’d be glad of some little thing like a sling shot or a putty blower.”

“I don’t need anything,” said Beany, “I’ve got the neatest thing you ever did see.” Quite suddenly he drew something from his hip pocket and shoved it under his brother’s nose. Porky sidestepped.

“Ha!” said Beany. “It works!” He showed Porky his weapon. It was a monkey wrench from the auto tool chest. In his hand it looked like a revolver.

“Pretty neat,” said Porky. “Is there another one in the box?”

“Yes, I saw another,” said Beany. “I don’t see any harm in this. Any one might carry a monkey wrench,” and replaced it carefully in his pocket.

“Sure thing,” said Porky, making for the car, followed by his brother. “Didn’t the Reverend Hannibal Butts get up to preach one Sunday, and dig for a clean handky to wipe his face with and come up with a bunch of waste and use it before he saw what he was doing?”

“I remember that,” said Beany. “I thought I’d die! And so did everybody else. It ’most broke up the meeting.”

“Well, when you flashed that monkey wrench I thought it was a revolver sure enough. But it was only an innocent little wrench, and here is the mate to it!” He pocketed the tool, and slipping cautiously out of sight of the group of officers, they went scrambling noiselessly down the steep trail into the valley. Reaching the foot of the hill, they struck cautiously out toward the entanglements, dropping on their faces whenever a flare went up. Presently Beany, a little in the rear, pulled his brother’s leg. Porky stopped, and waited for Beany to wriggle up. He muttered, “What?” but did not turn his face. He knew too well that a face turned upwards in the darkness can be seen by an observant watcher overhead in some prowling plane.

“Men whispering over toward the right,” said Beany of the marvelous ears.

“No business for any one to be there,” said Porky, listening intently. “We are well on our side yet.”

“It’s over there on that little hillock,” said Beany positively, “and I think they are whispering in German.”

“Why, they can’t be, Bean,” said Porky. “We are away inside our lines, and we wouldn’t have men out there and, besides, they wouldn’t be whispering German or anything else. When our men are supposed to keep still, they keep still!”

“I can’t help it,” said Beany. “They are whispering in German.”

“All right,” said Porky, reluctantly turning toward the spot indicated by Beany. “We’ll go over and see what it is, and if there are any Germans holed up around here, we’ll sick on a few troops.”

They did not stand up again, but slowly and with the greatest caution approached a small hillock that stood slightly away from the steeper hills. It was not wooded enough to afford any shelter, nor was it high enough to be a good spot for a gun. For that or for some other reason, the enemy had failed to shell it.

On the side toward the Allies a pile of high boulders was tumbled. The rest was grass grown. Beany, whispering softly in his brother’s ear, insisted that the voices came from this place.

“Then they are underground,” whispered Porky in his turn.

Slowly, ever so slowly they crept up to the little hill and lay in the darkness, listening. Certainly through the grass and stones of the mound came the muffled sound of cautious voices. If they had been speaking English, it is probable that even Beany’s wizard ears would not have caught the sound. But the harsh guttural German, even when whispered, seemed to carry far.

“I don’t see how you heard ’em,” breathed Porky. “It’s hard enough to believe now. What do you suppose it all means?”

“Search me!” Beany breathed in return.

“What they doing over on our side?” wondered Porky.

“It’s a good place all right,” said Beany against his brother’s ear as they lay close to the grass.

They were silent for a while, when the unbelievable happened. It was so amazing, so stunning, that both boys at first could not believe that they heard aright. They heard a sound like a windlass or crank turning, a few clods tumbled down on them, and a voice once more whispered hoarsely three words:

“Gee, it’s hot!”

“Gee, it’s hot!” said the German voice and the simple words seemed to the astounded boys to ring across the valley! On the contrary, they were spoken in a low whisper.

Another voice replied. “He won’t like it if you speak English, you know.”

“I can’t help it,” said the first speaker. “We are two to one anyhow, and I am tired of talking that lingo. I’m a good German all right, but I wasn’t brought up to speak German and it comes hard. And this is the hottest place I ever did get in. I don’t like it. Do you know what will happen about to-morrow? I’ll tell you. We will find ourselves miles behind the Allies’ lines, and then what do you propose to do, Peter?”

“Bosh!” said the man called Peter. “You think because a handful of Americans are here that the tide has turned. Be careful what you think. I tell you no. What can a few hundred of these fellows do against the perfect, trained millions of the Fatherland?”

“You don’t know them,” said Fritz.

“Yes, I do,” said the man Peter. “Now let me tell you. For years I was in England; sent there to study those foolish bull-headed people and to create all the unrest I could. It was so easy. I saw these Americans there, crazy, loud-mouthed, boasting, always boasting. They talked fight, they told wild tales about the bad men of their west, always boasting. So I tried them. I am a big man, Fritz, and strong; I was not afraid of a little fight, me, myself. I tried them. I slurred their government, sneered at their president, laughed at their institutions. What think you? They laughed. They laughed! Quite as if I said the most kindly things. I said, ‘What I say is true, is it not?’ and they said, ‘Perhaps, but it is so funny!’ That is what they said, ‘so funny!’ They should have slain me where I stood.”

“They don’t care what you say or what the rest of the world says,” whispered Fritz. “They are too big. Their country is too big. When they fight.... Wait until you have seen them fight! They fight with grunts and gasps and bared teeth. They do not need trenches, they will go over the top with a shout. You will see, friend Peter. They are back there in the darkness now. I feel them!”

“A few of them, only a few,” said Peter. “This little castle of sod and stone is getting on your nerves, my friend. Look you! Do you think the Highest would deceive us? Never, never! There is nothing to this talk of the Americans coming over here. To be sure, they have declared war, but what of it? They are no good. They have no army. All their boasted possessions, all their harbors, all their wealth, yet they have no army. No army! That shows how inefficient they are. Never fear, my Fritz. Not a hundred thousand will reach this soil. I have it from our commanding officer himself.”

“Then here’s hoping for a quick release from this hole,” said Fritz bitterly.

“To-morrow,” said Peter; “to-morrow our hosts will sweep across this valley, and we will be with our own again.”

“Oh, I hope for some release. It’s the hardest duty I have ever been given.”

“But think how we have been able to guide our guns, talking as we can to the airplanes through the clever arrangement of our three little trees on top of our delightful little hill.” He laughed. “How clever it all is! And no one will ever suspect!” He paused again to chuckle, and Porky quite suddenly shoved a sharp elbow into Beany’s ribs.

“Well, I’m sick of it,” said Fritz still in his low, hoarse whisper, and seemed to move away from the side of the hill where he had been standing.

The boys with the greatest caution wriggled away.

“Now what do you think of that?” said Porky when they were in a position where they could talk in safety. “What do you think of that?”

“Anyhow,” said Beany, “they aren’t spies. I’m sort of fed up on spies. I can stand for most anything else.”

“No, they are not spies. I can’t make out just what their little game is. It’s important, though; you can see that. And we have got to stop it somehow.”

“That ought to be easy enough. Just go back and get the bunch and a few soldiers, and take ’em.”

“What’s the time, anyhow?” asked Porky. He answered his own question by fishing his wrist watch out of his pocket. He had put it there for fear the luminous dial might be seen.

“Only eleven,” he said. “Plenty of time.” He sat staring into the darkness. There were very few flares now, although the night was usually kept bright with them.

“Wonder why that is,” Porky said.

“Something to do with our little mud house, don’t you think so?” said Beany.

“Yes, I do,” answered his brother. “I wish I could make it out. Give us time, give us time!”

“Well, come on! I want to get some one on the job,” said Beany. “I feel fidgety.”

“Sit still,” said Porky. “I want to think.”

“What you got in your head now?” said Beany. His voice sounded anxious.

“We are going to take those men prisoners with our own little wrenches and just by our two selves.”

“Three of them?” gasped Beany.

“Three of them!” said Porky. “Come on!”

CHAPTER VI
TAKING THREE PRISONERS

“Come nothing!” said Beany slangily. “You stay right here until we can talk this thing over, and make some sort of a plan. I don’t propose to go into something we can’t get out of.”

“Well,” said Porky, “the only plan I have is so crazy that I’m sort of afraid to tell you about it. But it would certainly be sort of nifty to take those men ourselves instead of running back to the bunch for help. It would kind of put a little gilt on things and would be something to tell Bill and Peggy about when they grow up a little.”

Beany was impressed. “I hadn’t thought of that,” he said. “Looks like we haven’t much to tell them about, nothing but the submarine and the secret passage and that sort of thing.”

“And the spies back home,” added Porky. “No, we ought to wind up with something else. Beside, if I don’t get hold of a Hun or two after what we saw and heard back at the Duval farm, I don’t think I’ll ever live.”

“Well, I’m with you,” agreed Beany. “Now let’s plan. We sure have got to get a prisoner or two our own selves. What’s next?”

For twenty minutes the boys, heads close together, whispered rapidly. Then they rose and went noiselessly toward the false hillock.

The last hundred yards they crept, lying flat and motionless whenever a flare lit the sky. They were not frequent, however, and the boys made good progress. When they reached the mound, Porky, who was the best climber, crept to the top. He used the most infinite caution, and there was not a sound to betray his slow, sure progress. Gaining the top, he found what he had expected to find. A sodded opening, like a double trap door, operated from the inside, was slightly opened for air. So cleverly was it arranged with small bushes and grass growing on the trap doors, that it would have been impossible to detect it. Porky felt cautiously about the edges. Then he listened. From below came an unmistakable sound—the noise of a couple of men snoring. The sound was so muffled by the thick steel walls, the earth and stones and sod outside them, that they were able to sleep without fear of detection. Porky shook his head admiringly. He was forced to acknowledge that the ingenuity of the foe seemed to know no bounds. Again he tried the trap doors. They were balanced to a hair and moved upward at his touch. He felt in his pocket, arranged something in either hand, then swung the doors both upward.

It would be untrue to say that a flash of doubt did not pass over the reckless boy at that instant. He thought of the General and of the way in which that great man trusted them to do their part in keeping out of trouble. He had surmised that there were three men below. There was room for a dozen. He had taken it for granted that he and Beany could pull off a stunt that instead might end in their immediate death or worse. But there he was, perched on the top, the heavy trap doors swinging wide, and below in the dense darkness the sound of men snoring. Porky took time to listen. There were snores from two, that was clear, and still another man talked and muttered fretfully in his sleep. Porky could hear no others.

He took a long breath, leaned over the opening, and turned a flashlight below.

As though electrified, three big men sat up and blinked in the glare of the flashlight.

Two of the men cried, “Kamarad!” and instantly held up their hands. The third said calmly, “Thank the Lord! I surrender!” and stood up.

“Not so fast!” said Porky in his deepest tones. He fiddled with the button on his flashlight. The light wavered. Porky kept his face to the men and called back over his shoulder:

“Sergeant, something’s wrong with my flash. Send up another!”

“Yes, sir!” answered Beany as gruffly as possible from below. He waited a moment, then scrambling up passed his flash to his brother. Porky put his in his pocket, and bent the light on the men below. An ax stood in one corner with a coil of rope. In another corner was a rough table loaded with strange instruments that Porky did not understand.

“Turn out your pockets!” he commanded, and three revolvers were tossed up, one after the other.

“See that rope?” demanded Porky, pointing his flash directly at the man who had spoken English. “You tell those other fellows to tie you up quick, and tell them to make a good job of it!”

“I surrender,” said the man Fritz. “Please don’t tie me up, sir!”

“You hear!” said Porky grimly. He called back over his shoulder. “Forward ten paces, Sergeant!”

“Yes, sir,” said Beany, and Porky almost giggled as he heard his brother scuffling violently around trying to sound like a squad. But he dared not look away from the men below, who were hastily tying up the man called Fritz. They did a good job, eager to make good with the unseen and most unexpected captors. If the officer above with the boyish voice wanted Fritz tied up, tied up he would be so he could not move. When they finished, the bulky form looked like a mummy.

“Is that a door in the side?” Porky demanded of Fritz.

“Yes, sir,” said Fritz.

Porky waited a little. The worst was coming now.

“Tell those men to open that door, and step outside, and if they value their lives, to keep their hands up.”

Fritz spoke rapidly in German. What he said was, “These are Americans, you fools! The officer says to step outside, and keep your hands up. You had better do it, if you want to live. They would rather shoot than eat. I know them! Obey, no matter what they tell you.”

When he had finished, one of the men, lowering one hand and keeping the other well up in the air, pressed a long lever and a narrow door opened, dislodging a little shower of stones and earth as it moved outward.

“Vorwarts zwei!” cried Porky, making a wild stab at German.

It was understood however. Fear makes men quick, and the two walked briskly out and stood side by side. One of them had stepped through a loop of the rope, and it came trailing after him.

“Tie those men’s hands and tie them together, Sergeant,” said Porky. He watched, cold with a fright he would never have felt for himself, while Beany, keeping as much out of the light as possible, tied the men, and sawed off the end of the rope.

“Close the door!” demanded Porky.

Beany did so.

“Don’t leave me here, sir,” cried the man below suddenly. “If the Germans find that we have allowed this spot to be discovered, they will shoot me. If the enemy comes I shall be shot. I will come quietly. I am glad to surrender.”

“That’s all right,” growled Porky. “You are safe for a while. I am leaving a guard here. We want a few English-speaking prisoners, so you are quite safe for a while.”

“One of those men outside speaks English also,” cried Fritz.

“All right,” said Porky. “I advise you to keep still. Sergeant, detail a guard for this place with orders to shoot him at the first outcry.”

“Yes, sir,” said Beany. He retreated under cover of the darkness, thoughtfully going around the corner of the mound as a flare brightened the sky, and he remembered, in the nick of time, that it wouldn’t do to let the two men, carefully bound as they were, see him roaring directions at an imaginary squad. He returned in a minute and saluted, although his form was only a darker shadow in the darkness of the night.

Above, Porky closed the trap doors, and as he did so, cut the ropes by which they were opened and closed. Not even with his teeth could the trussed up prisoner below open them.

Beany had already shut the door in the side and wedged it with a broken piece of gun-carriage.

“Come with me, Sergeant,” said Porky, for the benefit of the English-speaking prisoner. “Vorwarts!”

It was a strange group that gave the password a half hour later and advanced to the General’s tent. The tent, hidden from observation by blankets and thick masses of boughs, was brightly lighted. General Pershing seemed to scorn sleep. Surrounded by his staff and a group of officers from the lines below, he sat puzzling over the reports they had made. Information was steadily leaking across. Every move they made was reported correctly. Only that very night as soon as it was definitely decided that no attack would be made, the flares from the enemy’s lines almost ceased and their guns were silenced, as though they were glad to be assured of a few hours of peace. The positions of the American guns, no matter how cleverly camouflaged, were speedily discovered and gun fire trained on them.

The thing had assumed a very serious look. Losses were piling up. The General listened in worried and puzzled silence.

It was at this moment that the flap of the tent was suddenly opened, and two Germans, their hands tightly bound, stumbled blinkingly into the light. Behind them stood the two boys. There was a moment of surprised silence broken by the older prisoner, as he accustomed his eyes to the light. He glanced about the group, then his eyes rested curiously on his captors.

A look of fury and amazement crossed his face.

“Kinder, kleine kinder!” he muttered scornfully.

The other man was silent.

General Pershing gave a sigh.

“Those twins again!” he said. The boys saluted. “Where shall we leave these, sir?” said Porky respectfully. “We left another back there.” He waved into space. Back there might have been anywhere on the continent, as far as his direction showed. “It’s sort of a queer place, sir, and we would like some one to see it, because we can’t tell what it’s all for, and we don’t know that we could make the other fellow tell. He speaks English.”

Rapidly the General gave the necessary orders. The two men were led off a short distance and placed under close guard. An escort, with a couple of captains and an expert electrician, was named for the boys, and without a question from the General, who knew how to bide his time, the little party filed out of the tent and went back down the trail.

When they were out of hearing, the General laughed and spoke.

“I often wonder,” he said, “how those two boys pass the time in their own home. I don’t mind trying to run an army, but running those twins is a bigger task than I like to tackle. I am glad they don’t know just how glad I will be to hear the story they will tell us when they get the job finished. Three prisoners, and they want an escort of officers and an electrician! Well, they are on the trail of something, I’ll be bound! I would like to question those prisoners but I won’t spoil the boys’ innocent pleasure in what they are doing. But I must say that I want one of you to keep an eye on them every second now until we return to headquarters. They are to be shipped home from there with a special passport, and I will be able to sleep better.”

“They came with General Bright, did they not?” asked a Captain.

“Yes, and when he was called to Paris, I foolishly offered to let them stay at headquarters. I thought they would play around and kill time until Bright came back. That’s what I get for overlooking their records. Things are bound to happen wherever they go.”

“All boys are like that more or less, but this is a lively pair,” said the Captain. “They seem to want to know everything. They are studying all my books on the French and English guns now, and I heard one of them say the other day that he had some good ideas on airplanes.”

“I hope he takes them home then,” said the General. “They are good youngsters, and I’ll be glad to get a receipt from their parents for them. They are perfectly obedient, and strict as any old regular about discipline, but no matter what good care we try to take of them, they are always getting into tight places.”

“Their coming over here seems a strange thing,” said one of the officers. “Sort of irregular.”

“There is a reason,” said the General. “They don’t know it themselves. They were sent across because it seemed a good thing to have a boy’s point of view for the boys over there of things over here. When I say they were sent, I do not mean that their expenses were paid. The Potters are amply able to spend money, but it was a good and patriotic thing for them to risk the lives of a fine pair like Porky and Beany. I don’t even know their real names. Not that it matters. They would make themselves felt if they were called Percy and Willie. They are that sort.”

Talk drifted to other things and time passed until a stir and footsteps outside made it evident that the expedition had returned. The door flap opened and the party filed in, the remaining prisoner in their midst.

The General glanced at him, then bent a steady, steely look on the man’s face.

“You!” he said. “A German prisoner, you—”

The man’s face lighted.

He stood erect and made an effort to salute with his bound hands.

“Yes, sir,” he said in a low tone. “If I’m to be shot, sir, won’t you let me tell you how it all happened?”

The General glanced at his wrist watch.

“It is three o’clock,” he said. He nodded toward the sergeant. “Take this man in charge. To-morrow at seven o’clock bring him to my tent and I will talk with him.”

He turned away and did not glance again at the prisoner as he was led away.

“He knew you,” said a Captain.

“He worked for me four years on my apple ranch in Oregon. The foreman wrote me that he and seven others had left suddenly soon after the beginning of the war. I think we will get some very interesting information out of that young man. In the meantime,” he turned to the two boys standing as stiffly at attention as their fagged out bodies would permit, “in the meantime, boys, can you tell your little story in half an hour? It is very late, and we have a hard day before us to-morrow.”

“It won’t take that long,” said Porky. “We just went down a little ways, inside our own lines, General, so you wouldn’t worry, and Beany, he hears things just like a cat, and there was a little hill, with these men inside, and I climbed on top and talked to them through the trap door, and Beany made believe he was a squad.”

“And Porky had two of ’em tie up that Fritz fellow,” interrupted Beany, “and made ’em come out the door, and we just made ’em think the squad was guarding the hill, and we brought ’em up here, and they came too easy. And we didn’t try to carry arms, General, we just had a couple of monkey wrenches, and say, Porky, I’ve lost mine! That chauffeur will murder me!”

“A few details missing, however,” said the General. “However, that will do for to-night. In the morning, if you like, you may be present when I see the prisoner. Good-night!”

CHAPTER VII
THE PRISONER’S STORY

Some three minutes later (so the boys thought), some one shook them awake. It was morning.

“Six o’clock!” said their tormentor, prodding them viciously. It was the driver of their car. “Say, did youse have my monkey wrench?” he demanded of both boys.

“Sure!” said Porky quickly. “Here it is!” He handed out his wrench, while Beany tried to pretend to sleep again. The chauffeur looked it over.

“Naw, that ain’t me wrench,” he declared. “Same size and shape but it ain’t me wrench!”

“Why not?” asked Porky. “One of us took your wrench last night, and if this is the same size and shape, why isn’t it the same wrench?”

“Because it ain’t,” said the man. “That ain’t got the same feel as my wrench. You can’t wish off any strange wrench on this guy! I gotta have me own wrench! If General Pershing is goin’ to let youse kids go stealin’ wrenches, I’ll—I’ll—well, you’ll see what I’ll do, discipline ner no discipline!” He glared at the boys and at the unoffending wrench.

Beany sadly allowed himself to wake up.

“I had your old wrench,” he said, “and I guess I lost it. I will buy you a new one if I can’t find it.”

“You find it!” said the man. “I don’t want no new one! I know the feel of me own tools, and no others need apply!”

He went off grumbling, and the boys, now wide awake, watched him.

“I told you how it would be,” groaned Beany. “He’ll never let up on me. Wonder where I could have dropped it. In No-Man’s-Land probably, where it would be as easy to find as a needle in a haystack, and where we can’t go anyhow, now it’s light. Look there! Oh praise be, I believe he has found it himself!”

It was so. The man suddenly pounced on an object lying on the ground, took it up, examined it with a tenderer care than would usually be bestowed on a tool, and with a scornful look turned and waved it at the watching boys. “Got it!” he called.

“Good!” said Beany affably.

“No thanks to you!” called the chauffeur. He stalked away.

“I would never let myself get so wrapped up in a little thing like that,” said Beany. He threw himself back on his bed.

“Don’t do that,” said Porky. “We are going to the General’s tent at seven, you know, to hear what the Fritz person is going to say for himself. I bet he tells the truth anyhow. If the General fixes his gimlet eye on him once, he will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”

“I would in his place,” said Beany. “It wouldn’t seem just healthy to lie to the General.” He commenced the simple process of dressing as practiced by soldiers in the field. It consisted of very brief bathing in a couple of teacups of water in a collapsible, and usually collapsing washpan, made of canvas waterproofed, and after that the simple drawing on of breeches, canvas puttees and shirt. A soldier sleeps in his underwear, but sleeping in his outer garments is very strictly forbidden, no matter how cold the weather may be.

The boys reached the General’s tent at ten minutes to seven, and although they knew that the great man had been up for a couple of hours, they sat quietly outside until their watches told off the very tick of the expected hour. Then, just as they saw the guard bringing up the prisoner, they tapped on the tent flap, and at a word of summons entered.

The General, looking as though he had never stirred since the night before, sat in his accustomed place at the head of the table, over which a number of papers were strewn. He bade the boys good morning and nodded them to seats. In another moment the prisoner entered.

For a few moments the General took no notice of the man, keeping his eyes on his papers, while the fellow shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.

Then General Pershing looked up.

“Prisoner,” he said, “it is not customary to accord a prisoner of war the sort of interview I am about to give you, but the circumstances alter this case. I want the truth, and the whole truth.”

Porky and Beany nudged each other slyly.

“I want some of the information that it is in your power to give me, and I want it straight. You know you are in my power. There is always a firing squad for men like you. But I want you to unravel this puzzle. I want you to commence when you left the ranch—yes, even before that.”

The prisoner spoke eagerly. “I will tell you the truth, sir. I am glad to be here, no matter what you do to me. And I swear to tell you the truth.” He held up his right hand, and the boys saw it tremble. They commenced to believe him. It was evident that the General did, for he nodded and the man plunged into his story.

It held the boys breathless.

“There were eight of us working for you, General, before America went into this war. Eight men of German ancestry or birth. Most of them were naturalized, but one night a man came to my house and commanded me to meet him in a certain place. He was a German officer and of course I was curious to know what he wanted. When I arrived at the meeting place I found the others there. The officer, showing credentials of his rank that we could not doubt, told us that we were wanted as interpreters. Just that, General. He explained that Germany was obliged to use all the men within her borders as fighting men, and as they were most anxious to have no misunderstanding with America, they were picking a German born, or German bred man here and there as they could without rousing suspicion. They were taking them from the farms rather than from the cities. He said that several hundred would be needed. He assured us that education was not necessary. It sounded very plausible, General, and the salary we were promised was magnificent. We all bit, General, and he took us away that very night in a couple of automobiles.”

“The foreman told me,” said the General, “that you went away in the middle of the busy season without giving warning.”

“Yes, we did, General. I am sorry, and I was sorry then, but the pay—it was a great temptation. We have been punished since. We went down through Mexico and took ship. There were five hundred men on board who were all going over to be ‘interpreters.’ And we never guessed, poor fools, that ship after ship was bearing each a like load. We never suspicioned the outcome. When we reached German soil, we were scattered, two going one place, two another, and instead of having any interpreting to do, we were outfitted as soldiers and attached to different regiments. Men kept coming day after day. I dare not say how many thousands of Germans have been taken out of the United States in this way. We were virtually prisoners. Of course to the most of us it did not matter much. After all Germany was our fatherland before America adopted us. As long as we were fighting the French and English and the Russians, we did not care.

“But then, when we were already very tired, came the news that President Wilson had declared war.

“General, it is not yet believed in Germany. All of them, the highest officers, even the Emperor, on occasion, all have addressed the troops and have explained that war was declared solely for political purposes and that no troops were to be sent over sea.”

“They know now, do they not?” asked the General.

“Very few of them, General. They think that the English have adopted the American uniform as a blind.”

“What did you think, Fritz?” asked the General.

“I saw them fight, and I knew,” said Fritz simply. “I know them; I know how they fight. I told the others so. And when they came across the plain I wanted to hurrah. I suppose I will be shot as a German prisoner, but I could not help it. All my mistake was in the beginning. I would have deserted if I could have done so. Why, General, if those fellows over there behind the German lines knew the truth, a third of them would walk right over here. They are lied to again and again.”

“How is the army faring as regards food?” asked the General.

“There is not enough to feed a third of the men. All Germany is dying slowly of substitutes. Substitutes for bread, for meat, for tea, for sugar, for coffee, for milk. At first the army was fed well, at the expense of the civilians. Now all suffer together, and no man in the world works well or fights well on an empty and aching stomach.” He groaned.

“What were you doing out there in that hillock?” asked the General.

“We were well behind the German lines a few days ago,” said Fritz, “but whether they retired purposely or not, I cannot say. Since then, however, we have been kept there to communicate with the airplanes. It was possible to signal them by means of electric flashes down on the floor of our hiding place, through the open trap doors on top. Peter was in command. He took and sent the messages, and repeatedly he crept out in the night. I was never allowed to do anything, but if the Allies took the plain, and those ridges beyond it, Peter said we would all go out in American uniforms and learn what we could. We were expected to discover things too cleverly hidden from the airplanes.”

“This is interesting at least, Fritz,” said the General. “It would be still more interesting to know just how true it is that the German army in general does not know that we are seriously in the war. There are two millions of us here now, Fritz, and more coming.”

“Two millions!” echoed the astounded prisoner. “Two millions! When they learn that, the war is over. But how will they ever learn it? Your airplanes scattered leaflets along the front several times. Not where I was stationed, but I heard the order that any man who saw another stoop to pick up one of those leaflets, any man who was caught reading one was to be shot dead by the nearest soldier, who would receive the cross for doing it. I tell you, sir, they are doing everything they can to keep the army from learning that you are in the fight.”

“I wonder how true all this is,” mused the General.

Porky and Beany watched him narrowly. They were sure he had some plan, but it was clear that he wanted the prisoner to speak first.

“It is all true,” said Fritz. “General, won’t you let me earn my life, set me free for two hours—only that? And I will prove it to you.”

“You will disappear just as you did from the ranch, I suppose,” grated the General in a harsh voice. “Why should I give you any chance?”

“I don’t deserve it,” said the prisoner, “except that if my plan fails, I will certainly be shot by the Germans.”

“What do you propose?” asked the General.

“Two, perhaps three hours of freedom!” begged Fritz. “And if I can reach the German lines alive, I will return with twenty prisoners to prove to you that every man who is told that the Americans are here and are promised that they will not be shot, will follow me across.”

“They are having a skirmish now,” said the General, listening, “and a thunder storm is coming beside.” He was lost in thought. “Fritz, make good!” he said. “I release you. You are but one man, no loss to us, but you have told me a story of what amounts to kidnapping. I would like to know if this is true. Just one thing. Prove it to me by bringing twenty men back; but while you are there set the word free that the Americans have arrived. Two millions, remember, perhaps three.” He smiled. “And do not attempt to go or come until nightfall. I will remain here until midnight to-night. You are under guard until dark. You may go.” He rapped sharply on the table, the guards entered and removed the prisoner.

The General began to smoke.

“What do you think, boys? Will he come back?”

“Yes, sir,” said both boys together.

“Why?” asked the General.

“Why, he was telling the truth!” said Porky.

“They don’t look like that other times,” said Beany. “He was straight, all right.”

“He will have to prove it,” said the General grimly. “Men who leave a job without warning, no matter what the needs of the situation, do not fill me with confidence.”

“I guess he is sorry now, anyway,” said tender-hearted Beany.

“We will hope so,” said the General. “Porky, you may typewrite these letters for me, and you, Beany, may check up these lists. If you can do this properly, it will release a man for other duty.”

For two hours the two boys were too busy to know what went on in the tent. When the task was done the General dismissed them with strict orders that they were not to go more than thirty feet in any direction from his tent.

When the Germans had occupied that side of the valley, they had also used the hill as a temporary headquarters. Porky and Beany, like a pair of very restless and inquisitive hounds, went over the ground inch by inch. They could not help feeling that something good must be waiting for them within their screen of trees. The fighting miles away went on all day, and the time dragged for the boys until about three in the afternoon.

And then Porky found it—a tiny piece of wire sticking out of the ground under a root of the big tree under which they were sitting, feeling like a couple of prisoners themselves. They had never been on such close bounds before, and they didn’t like it.

Porky started to pull the wire, when Beany fell on him with a yell.

“A bomb!” he cried, flinging Porky on his back.

“My word! You have scared me to death anyhow,” said Porky.

Together they dug around the wire and followed it down and down until they almost gave up. At last, however, they had their reward, a square black tin box which they carried carefully to the General’s tent.

Even then the greatest care was taken in opening it, for fear of an infernal machine of some sort. It opened easily, however, and without harm and disclosed a mass of papers. So many that the German officer who had been in charge of them, fearing capture, had evidently buried them, thinking that with the turn of battle he could easily reclaim them from the earth.

Among the papers were several cypher keys, and one of them was found to fit the papers found by Beany in the oak table in the dungeon at the chateau back at headquarters.

Even the General was delighted, as a little study disclosed the most important plans of the coming campaign and a scheme for the expected drive, which now could be met point for point.

It was dusk before the General and his staff finished with an examination of the papers, fitting the new keys to the papers already in their possession.

Porky allowed himself to crow. “Guess we are sort of little old Handy-to-have-around!” he chortled. “Guess we get to go all the way with this distinguished mob!”

“Looks so,” said Beany, “but you never can tell.”

And they couldn’t.

CHAPTER VIII
ORDERS ARE ORDERS

Night fell dark and stormy. As soon as it was dusk Fritz begged to be released and, receiving the General’s permission, slipped away.

“I doubt if he comes back,” said the General, “but it will spread the news at least. No, it is too much to expect that a man will persuade a couple of men, to say nothing of twenty, to give themselves into the hands of an enemy they have been taught to believe is ruthless, but if he does, we will know that the conditions in the German army are worse than we dream.”

Time dragged away. The boys, still believing in Fritz, sat at the head of the only trail, watching. They almost wore their watches out looking at them, and trying them to see if they were wound. Time seemed to stand still and yet, somehow, ten o’clock came, and eleven and a quarter past. At half past the drivers prepared the cars for their silent night journey to the next sector. The tents were down, all but the screen of blankets behind which, with a closely shaded light, the General sat.

Ten minutes and the boys looked once more at the illuminated dials, and sighed.

“I’d have bet on that duck, if I was a betting man,” said Porky sadly. “I bet he meant to come.”

“Hark!” said Beany, listening.

Porky listened too. He could always hear what Beany heard, if Beany called his attention to it. A soft tramp of feet could be heard. The boys leaped to their feet. Tramp, tramp, scuffle, scuffle, up the hill in the darkness!

“They are coming!” gasped Beany.

They were.

A flash of lightning preceding the storm that had hung off all day split the sky, and in its momentary glare the boys saw a small squad of American soldiers come out into the little clearing. The boys stood aside as they passed. Another squad brought up the rear, and between them—yes, between them marched, or rather staggered, a dismal company of twenty haggard skeletons headed by Fritz!

He had kept his word. The men were evidently frightened badly and Fritz kept talking to them as they advanced. The General came out of his shelter and surveyed them by the light of his flash.

“Here they are, sir,” said Fritz. “Ask them what you like.”

The General spoke to the weary men and they replied rapidly in harsh, hoarse voices. Porky and Beany stood in an agony of curiosity, wishing that they had studied German instead of Latin in high school.

Finally the General took time to explain to the officers who did not understand.

He gave orders to have the prisoners fed, and soon the strange little company wound off down the hill again on its way to the prison camp. Fritz, as a sort of trusty, was given special privileges.

“It is quite true, gentlemen,” said the General. “The conditions in the enemy’s army are most serious. They are only half fed, poorly clothed and letters occasionally smuggled from home report a frightful state of affairs—famine, disease and intense suffering among the families of the soldiers. This alone you know will break the morale of their troops.

“And Fritz said he could have brought five hundred men as well as this twenty, but they are taught that we torture them and always shoot our prisoners sooner or later. That is why they fight so desperately.

“They think death awaits them in any case, and that death on the battlefield is far preferable to that which we will mete out to them if taken prisoners.

“Fritz assured me that he had set the ball rolling, however, the news of our millions of men in the field. This has been a surprising experience but we are already late. We must be off!”

Rapidly the party took their seats in the automobiles. The first was about to start when a motor was heard in the darkness. It was approaching, apparently from headquarters.

“Word for the General!” was the whispered word, and sure enough, the driver of the swift, low car had a letter for the General. He read it and called the boys.

“News for you, young men,” he said regretfully. “General Bright has been recalled to the States, and you are to return with him. This cuts your stay several weeks and, I regret to say, makes it impossible for you to continue with us. You are to return in this car.”

The boys, desperately disappointed, hopped out, found their field kits, and advanced to say good-by to the General.

He shook hands heartily and patted each on the shoulder.

“I shall miss you, boys,” he said. “You have certainly done your bit! Some day, when we are all back in America, I shall expect you to come and see how real apples grow on a ranch in Oregon.”

The boys thanked him. They could not say much. It was a great disappointment.

They settled back in the car which was to take them back to General Bright. They heard the other cars glide quietly and swiftly away in the distance. They too shot out at high speed.

Soberly they stared into the darkness. Their thoughts flew forward to the tiresome trip to the port of embarkation, the long ocean voyage with its deadly inaction. They had been living in confusion, danger, and uncertainty. They commenced to see before them their home, their father and mother, the familiar fellows.

“We have to get Bill and Peggy,” said Beany.

“Yep!” said Porky briefly.

They could just see their mother, with oceans of love for them and plenty for the two orphans beside.

For the first time a great wave of homesickness swept over the boys. That they were to have a pleasant, safe trip would not have interested them if they could have been told of it. They were homesick. Silently they rolled on and on in the dark. Presently Beany slipped an arm around the hunched up shoulders of his twin.

“Wish we were home now!” he said huskily.

“Gosh!” said Porky.