CHAPTER

I Shells and Minnenwerfer

II Irving's Idea

III In No Man's Land

IV "Kamerad!"

V The Turtle Is Wounded

VI A Little History

VII Tourtelle Apologizes

VIII Cubist Art

IX Bob's Letter

X Dots and Dashes

XI Irving Tells the Sergeant

XII Quizzing a Spy

XIII Tourtelle Admits

XIV Tourtelle's Story

XV Irving an Orderly

XVI A Startling Announcement

XVII Parachute Practice

XVIII Studying to Be a Spy

XIX Last Preparations

XX "Second Looie Ellis"

XXI The Blowing Up of Vimy Ridge

XXII Behind the German Lines

XXIII Off for Berlin

XXIV In Berlin

XXV The Reading of the Cryptogram

XXVI Followed

XXVII The Spy's Decision

XXVIII Making Progress with the Baron

XXIX Orders for Money and Clothes

XXX Before Breakfast

XXXI At Work in the Spy Office

XXXII A Startling Recognition

XXXIII A Surprising Offer

XXXIV Skin Grafting

XXXV The Tapping on the Window

XXXVI A Revelation

XXXVII The Submarines

XXXVIII "Kamerad!" Again

XXXIX "Accidents Will Happen"

*Over There with the Canadians

at

Vimy Ridge*

*CHAPTER I*

*SHELLS AND MINNENWERFER*

"Look out! There she comes."

These words were whispered, for it would have been a serious military

offense if the speaker had lifted his voice to a resonant tone in

addressing his companion. Both were in khaki uniform, and had helmets

on their heads. They had been crouching in a camouflaged pit out in No

Man's Land in the Vimy Ridge sector of the western battle front in

Prance.

It was dusk of evening, a mist-laden dusk, quite as serviceable for

secret movements as the darkness under a clear sky. One could not see

an object as large as a man twenty yards away because of the fog.

All day it had been raining, just a slow drizzle, but nevertheless, a

good deal of water had fallen, and the chief characteristic of the

trenches was mud. "Second Looie" George Tourtelle and Private Irving

Ellis had been sent out through the communication trench to the

listening post, in which they were crouched when Irving whispered the

words "Look out! There she comes!"

There was really no need of his offering any such warning to his

companion, for the latter could hear the whistle of the approaching

shell just as well as he, but there was also no call for the punishment

that the second lieutenant administered. The shell passed harmlessly

over their heads and exploded behind the front line trenches of the

Canadian company, of which the occupants of the spy pit were members,

and almost simultaneously with the explosion, Lieut. Tourtelle struck

Irving a sharp blow in the face with the back of his hand.

"There!" he said viciously, with apparently no effort to subdue the tone

of his voice in accord with the strict precautionary rules of such

positions. "See that you keep your thoughts to yourself hereafter or

I'll send you back to report to the captain."

Irving was astonished, as well as angered at this treatment. He was

sure there was no call even for a reprimand, whereas the officer had

spoken in tones quite loud enough for the enemy to hear fifty, or

possibly a hundred, yards away. In fact, he was sure that if the "second

looie" had any reflection in him at all, he must have experienced a

thrill of apprehension very soon afterward lest the sound of his voice

had been heard by some of his superior officers in the front trenches.

If so, an inquiry into its meaning most certainly would follow.

Of course,-Irving resented the uncalled-for exhibition of brutality just

exhibited by Lieut. Tourtelle, but he had too much military sense to

show his resentment by look or act. Instead, he decided to take his

punishment and the accompanying rebuke as provocative of a little

self-discipline and to profit from the experience, in spite of the

injustice that went with it.

"I never did like that fellow from the first day I met him," Private

Ellis told himself, grinding his teeth with rage under the first impulse

of revenge. "Now I know him to be the very sort I thought he was.

Nobody but a coward would do what he did. He knows he'd never dare to

meet me on even terms. I'd clean him up so thoroughly there wouldn't be

anything for a minnenwerfer to smell if one came along and dropped onto

the spot where he ought to be. Goodness! there's one now."

The "minnie" referred to in Irving's soliloquy lighted right in the

communication trench not more than 200 feet from the outlook pit in

which the officer and the private were stationed. The explosion threw up

a mass of earth, several bucketfuls of which came down into the pit as

if from a giant pepper-box. One stone about the size of two fists

struck Irving on his left shoulder, and for several minutes the boy

feared some of the bones were broken or the joint dislocated.

But it proved to be only a bruiser and presently the young soldier was

using his arm confidently, although with considerable pain. In the

excitement that followed almost immediately after the explosion of this

shell, he forgot the injury, although under ordinary circumstances,

every movement of his left arm must have been more or less painful.

There was no shriek of warning preceding the next explosion fifty feet

to the right, such as had called forth the whispered "look out" from

Private Ellis that was rebuked with a blow of the hand and an equally

unmilitary reprimand from the second lieutenant. But it was much more

mighty in force and sound. It tore up the ground almost, it seemed, to

the very edge of the pit in which the outpost was located. Strange

enough, too, not nearly as much of the upheaved earth fell back into the

pit as had fallen there after the explosion of the first shell. Irving

felt that he knew the reason.

"That was a minnie dead sure," he told himself with a shudder. "I like

the others much better. You know when they're coming and maybe can

dodge 'em. But a minnie never gives any warning. They've spotted this

outpost and the next one'll probably wipe us out. We'll never know what

hit us."

Evidently something of this sort was going on in the mind of Lieut.

Tourtelle, for suddenly he darted back through the communication trench

toward the front line.

"That's funny," Irving muttered under his breath. "He's ducked without

giving any order to me. What'll I do--stick? I feel like sticking just

to show him that I'm made of different stuff. But no, I guess I hadn't

better. He's just mean enough to report that he ordered me back, but I

disobeyed his order."

*CHAPTER II*

*IRVING'S IDEA*

Private Ellis had not been back in the front line trench long before he

had good cause to congratulate himself for resisting the temptation to

offer himself as an example of bravery in the face of the cowardly

actions of the second lieutenant. A second minnenwerfer dropped

unannounced right into the pit they had just left and the size of the

bowl-shaped listening post was increased many times.

"Now, if I were an officer and in position to make suggestions, I'd

advise that that pit be remanned in about half an hour," Irving mused.

"The boches, no doubt, have a report of the success of their last shot,

and will naturally assume that the place has been put out of commission

as a lookout, and the occupants reduced to their original elements. I

believe that hole in the ground is just as serviceable as it ever was to

play peek-a-boo at Heinie."

Lieut. Tourtelle was in the trench within a few feet of Irving and the

latter would have made an effort to get the proposition to him if it had

not been for the experience he had had with the insufferable nature of

the officer in the listening pit.

"I wish it weren't against orders to whisper in the front trenches--that

is, when you have something of importance to communicate to the

higher-up," the boy continued to himself. "I'd really like to go out

there and try it again."

At this moment someone took hold of his arm--the sore one, as the pain

in his shoulder reminded him--and gave it a pull. This was as much as

to say, "Follow me." He obeyed, and soon reached the communication

trench that connected the first and second line trenches. His leader, a

first lieutenant named Osborne, led the way through this trench back to

the second line. During the passage, Irving became conscious of the

fact that others were following along behind. What was up, young Ellis

wondered. It was not time for him to be relieved, for he had been in

the trenches only about fifteen hours.

He was not long kept in doubt. Immediately on their arrival at the

second line, Lieut. Osborne gathered them together--one officer and five

privates--and gave the following instructions in low tones:

"I want you boys to go out beyond the barbed wire and see what you can

find out. Remember your stock instructions. Don't get into any fights.

If you meet anybody, retreat. We want to find the location of any

patrols of theirs out in No Man's Land. Look out for evidences of their

work laying mines, repairing barbed wire, sinking listening pits, or

anything of the sort. Then get back as soon as possible, keeping your

bearings and the locations of your discoveries well in mind. If any

'very lights' go up, you must lie or stand still, or remain unwaveringly

in your positions and attitudes until they go out, unless the light is

directly between you and our trenches. In that case, you must duck and

make the best of your way back under a hail of bullets, for you'll be

seen. You will be armed only with pistols, hand grenades, and trench

knives. Use the bombs or pistols only to save yourselves from death or

capture. Remember it is information we want from you, not scalps. You

will be under charge of Second Lieutenant Tourtelle."

Irving's heart went "way down" in his hob-nailed shoes at this latter

announcement. He had had no idea who his companions during this patrol

excursion were to be, for the night had fallen heavy and it was

difficult for those in the group to recognize identities in one

another's dimly silhouetted forms. The last information handed to them

was almost enough to cause Private Ellis to do something desperate. As a

substitute for the impulse he did the thing that had been uppermost in

his mind most of the time since he left the listening post out in No

Man's Land.

"Lieutenant," he said; "may I offer a suggestion which, it seems to me,

would be of service to us right now?"

"Certainly, Ellis," the officer responded encouragingly. "What is it?"

"It seems to me that that pit that was increased to the size of a small

volcano crater since Lieut. Tourtelle and I left it could be used with

almost perfect safety now," the boy said eagerly. "The boches won't be

expecting anybody to use it now. They, no doubt, think they've settled

the question of its usefulness for all time to come. Now, if you'd send

a couple of machine guns out there with some men to operate them, we

could report back at that point to them and they could do quick

execution. After they'd done their work, they could run back to our

front line and the boches 'u'd have a merry time dropping some more

minnies into an empty bowl."

Lieut. Osborne was quick to see the value of the suggestion.

"That's a good idea, Ellis," he said in tone of hearty approval, "and

I'm going to do that very thing. Lieut. Tourtelle, see that these men

are supplied with pistols, grenades and trench knives, or persuasion

sticks, as they prefer, while I get the machine gunners."

*CHAPTER III*

*IN NO MAN'S LAND*

Private Ellis felt fully compensated for the treatment he had received

from the second lieutenant by the recognition and adoption of his

suggestion to utilize the "minnenwerfered listening pit" for the purpose

for which it was originally intended. Fully an hour had elapsed since

this pit had been converted into a miniature crater, and not another

explosion had taken place in the vicinity. It seemed, indeed, that he

had not erred in his surmise that the enemy had checked up the results

of their firing and concluded that any more shells dropped at this point

would be a waste of ammunition.

But Irving was not without misgiving as the party started out through

the communication trench for their patrolling and machine gun battery

headquarters out in No Man's Land. The fact that Lieut. Tourtelle had

been put in command of this expedition dampened his spirits and caused

him to fear disaster. He fought hard against this apprehension. It had

been too dark for him to discern from the "second looie's" countenance

how that officer received the adoption of Private Ellis' suggestion, but

he was certain it was not accepted with the best of grace. He could

well picture in his mind a darkening of the countenance of "the turtle,"

a clenching of his hands, and a dogged sullenness of demeanor as the

ill-natured officer contemplated the favor shown the boy whom he

evidently hated for no good reason whatever.

Irving renamed the second lieutenant "the turtle" in a kind of

subconscious way. It was not done with malice aforethought. The term

just came to his mind, like a flash, and was inspired, no doubt, by the

contemptible conduct of the "shave-tail," as flippant military fancy has

dubbed the "second looie," and by the play of idea suggested in the

spelling of his name.

The communication trench was partly a tunnel. From the front line as far

as the barbed-wire entanglements it was just a plain trench, seven or

eight feet deep. Then it became a subterranean passage with about two

feet of earth overhead, continuing thus until beyond the wire belt, when

it opened overhead again. When the patrol reached the spot where the

first "minnie" exploded, they found it necessary to proceed with special

caution, for the passage was blocked there on both sides of the crater

with heaps of earth. However, they managed to pass this place safely,

and presently were in the listening pit that had recently been very much

increased in capacity with minnenwerfer aid.

A period of waiting and listening followed the arrival at this "crater."

Not a word was uttered, not even a whisper. Everybody gave the keenest

attention of which his senses were capable to everything that offered

stimulation to eye or ear. However, their careful looking and listening

was unrewarded with aught save what appeared to be the most unwarlike

silence and inactivity in the immediate vicinity. Now and then in the

distance could be heard the thunder of heavy cannon or the nasty

spit-snap of machine guns.

Conditions appearing to be satisfactory, Lieut. Tourtelle gave the

agreed signal, which consisted of placing one hand on the left shoulder

of each of the scouts, and the latter climbed up over the sloping

embankment at several points in the big cup and crept cautiously out

over No Man's Land.

By this time the fog had lifted, and stars were beginning to peep out

through rifts in the cloud-swept sky. Added to the muddiness of the

ground, the chill of the atmosphere rendered life in this sector

exceedingly uncomfortable.

Each member of this patrol went alone out over the rising slope of land

that lay between the front line trenches of the Canadians and the common

enemy of the Allies. They either crouched low or crawled on all fours.

Each scout was assigned to a section of the territory as clearly defined

as possible in order that there might be no crossing of paths or

mistaking one another for members of a boche patrol.

Irving took a course to the right, advancing with a cautious, low

crouch. His instructions were to proceed about 100 yards along a line

parallel to the trenches and then advance toward the enemy line to see

what he could discover.

He proceeded the distance stipulated southward as nearly as he could

estimate over a half-mud and half-sod surface and then found himself

close to a thicket of low bushes, the extent of which he knew to be not

very great, for he had observed this feature of the terrain in the

daylight. He decided that he ought to examine these bushes carefully,

but realized that he must not take much time for the investigation, as

each member of the patrol had been limited to half an hour in which to

gather material for his report.

Private Ellis, therefore, decided to make a detour around the bushes,

listening meanwhile for any sound of moving bodies among the leaves and

twigs. The detection of such sounds would be ample reason for sweeping

the patch with machine gun bullets.

He made almost the entire circuit without detecting the faintest noise

that could command the respect of his suspicion, and was about to turn

around and creep back toward the enemy lines, when a bunch of "very

lights," fired from boche pistols, threw their brilliance over the

scene. The unwelcome illumination was prolonged in a manner that Irving

had not witnessed before. The lights floated down slowly, being

suspended in the air by small parachute arrangements that opened out

with the increasing resistance of the air.

But something else startled the boy even more than these lights.

Instinctively he remained stock still in the crouching position in which

the illumination caught him. But right in front of him, not more than

twenty feet away were the figures of two soldiers. They were standing

erect and facing each other. One of the faces was turned well toward

Private Ellis, who could hardly smother an exclamation of astonishment

as he recognized him.

It was Lieut. Tourtelle!

"What in the world does he think he's doing?" Irving questioned to

himself. "He doesn't seem to be very anxious to protect himself. He

hasn't a pistol, knife or bomb in his hand."

The lights went out, and presently a new cause for wonder came to the

ears of the crouching boy.

"Kamerad!"

Could he believe his senses? No, he wouldn't. It came to him very

clearly, that utterance, from the spot where Lieut. Tourtelle stood. And

yet, this was impossible. It must surely have been the enemy soldier

who uttered the word of friendly greeting.

*CHAPTER IV*

*"KAMERAD!"*

"That's a piece of boche treachery as sure as I'm a Yank fighting with

the Canadians," was Irving's speedy conclusion after witnessing the

scene exposed by the lights and hearing the salute which he decided must

have come from the enemy scout. "That's the way they work it! They're

noted for treachery of that very sort."

"Kamerad!"

The salute was repeated, scarcely above a whisper, but clear enough for

Irving to hear it distinctly. And with the utterance of that word

another thrill of apprehension, doubt, confusion, electrified the mind

and body of the listening scout, who had not been discovered by

Tourtelle and the boches when the lights illuminated the field,

undoubtedly, because he happened to be crouching close to a bush large

enough to cast a shadow about him.

"My!" exclaimed the boy under his breath; "I'd 'ave sworn that word came

from the very spot where Tourtelle was standing. They can't 'ave

changed positions so quickly. And yet, I must be mistaken. Common

sense tells me it must 'ave been the boche who gave that salute. I

wonder what's the matter with my hearing.

"But I'll have to go to that miserable 'shave-tail's' rescue if the

other fellow plays a trick on him. I think I'll get close and see

what's going on."

Irving crept cautiously toward the spot where he had seen the second

lieutenant when the lights blazed forth. The distance was so short that

he fancied he ought to have been able to see both the officer and the

enemy scout from his position near the bush. The boche, unless he had

moved since the lights went out, was a similar distance away from the

watcher and about twenty-five feet to Private Ellis' right.

In a few seconds Irving reached approximately the spot where he had seen

Lieut. Tourtelle, when the "very lights" illuminated the vicinity, and

was surprised and just a little worried on failing to find him still

there. Then he began to look around him to see if his eyes could not

pierce the surrounding darkness far enough to discover the form of the

officer. His search was interrupted by another startling incident.

Something struck the calf of his right leg a rather severe blow, and the

boy gripped his trench-knife in one hand and his pistol in the other,

ready to defend himself if attacked. Nothing further of disturbing

nature followed immediately, and Irving stooped down to examine the

object that had struck him. It was a short, stout club of the kind

known in No Man's Land as a "persuader stick," which can be used

effectively, like a policeman's billy, in the dark.

"Who in the world threw that?--not the boche, surely," the boy muttered.

"It's like the one I've seen in 'the turtle's' possession; but what

could he want to throw it back here for?"

"Kamerad!"

"There it goes again," buzzed through Irving's head. "I don't believe

it's a trap set for me, but maybe it is for the 'looie,' and he may be

just fool enough to fall for it. I owe it to--to--Uncle Sam to save

him, if I can, though I'm afraid Uncle Sam 'u'd be better off without

'im."

Private Ellis put his knife and pistol away, gripped his club, and

advanced toward the spot whence the last "kamerad" seemed to have come.

As he moved ahead slowly he became conscious gradually that a dark

object stood before him a few yards away. Would he be able to determine

whether it was friend or foe? He was in doubt on this question and

determined to exercise the greatest care and caution.

He moved around in a semi-circular path to the other side of the object

that had attracted his attention. But he had scarcely done this when

the presence of another and similar obstruction to his vision caused him

to stop and remain motionless.

This object was moving slowly and with seeming caution toward the other

one. His attitude and manner were not clear because of the darkness, so

that Irving could not interpret his purpose from any such indication.

"Kamerad!"

This time there could be no mistake from whom of the two scouts the

salute came. It was from the one who apparently had thrown his

"persuader stick" away, the one who was nearer the spot where he had

seen Lieut. Tourtelle during the illumination.

"What's he doing--surrendering?"

Irving might have suspected that the officer in charge of this patrol

was working a "boche trick" on a boche if it had not been for the fact

that he had thrown his stick away. But this act made it appear that a

panic had seized him and he was signaling his desire to surrender

because he feared to enter into mortal combat with the enemy scout.

"Why doesn't he retreat if he's afraid to fight?" Irving wondered. "He

could do that with perfect grace, for he's under orders not to fight

unless he has to. But he seems to be advancing right toward Heinie

without any reason for doing it. Maybe he's going to shove a pistol in

that fellow's face, but it looks to me more as if he's lost 'is senses

from fright. Anyway, I'm goin' to help 'im just for the sake of Uncle

Sam. I'll hit that boche a tap on the head that'll make 'im see the

Star Spangled Banner."

The boy with the club quickened his steps silently, for he was skilled

with the "moccasin tread" even on hobnails. Moreover, the softness of

the wet earth was in his favor. In about a minute he had stolen around

behind the boche, who was advancing cautiously toward the "kamerad

saluter."

He was morally certain that the soldier now within ten feet of him was

an enemy, but he resolved to be very careful lest he attack one of his

own comrades. So he continued to approach with the utmost caution,

hoping to identify the fellow by an inspection of his uniform. In the

darkness this was an exceedingly difficult thing to do, for there is a

general similarity in the make of the uniforms of soldiers of most

nations, so that when silhouetted they differ very little to any but a

keenly observing expert.

But Irving was not forced to depend alone upon his vision in the

darkness of the night to verify his identification of the two patrol

scouts. There was another salute in low tone, and this time an answer

was given.

"Kamerad!"

"Was willst du, hund?"

Crack!

The "persuader stick" in the hand of the Yank swung with sharp impact

against the head of the boche just under his helmet. The

"Canadian-hund" hater dropped in his tracks.

*CHAPTER V*

*"THE TURTLE" IS WOUNDED*

The next instant Lieut. Tourtelle turned and scuttled away as fast as he

could scuttle. Irving's first impulse was to follow him, but he checked

it.

However, knowing well the pyramid fashion in which boche patrols work in

No Man's Land, the boy governed his next actions with caution that took

this into consideration. The man he had just put hors de combat may

have been the "apex" of such a "pyramid," which is a very treacherous

sort of trap. It is the game of the "apex" to retreat and induce a lone

enemy scout to follow him if possible. A short distance on toward the

boche trenches, perhaps twenty or thirty feet apart, the distance

depending upon the darkness of the night, are two more Heinies, who

close in behind like a pair of pincers as the intended victim passes the

line of their positions. Still a little farther on are two other

soldiers, the "cornerstones" of the "pyramid," who also close in upon

the victim just as the attack is made. His capture is inevitable.

Irving did not purpose to be caught in any such trap; so he moved away

twenty or thirty feet from the scene of his victorious exploit and

waited and watched for developments.

They were not long coming. Apparently the Yank's suspicion of a

"pyramid trick" was not in error. Apparently also the other component

parts of the man-trap had heard the crack of Private Ellis's club on the

head of the "apex" of the "pyramid," for they soon were gathered around

the unconscious form of their comrade and muttering a torrent of "hund

curses."

"Gee! I must get back in a hustle and we'll get those Huns," was

Irving's next thought. "No doubt they'll carry that fellow to their

trench, and necessarily they'll go pretty slow."

He scuttled back to the listening pit even more rapidly, if possible,

than "the turtle" had scuttled, and soon was with his comrade scouts.

"Is everybody here?" he asked in a whisper.

"Yes, you're the last one out," Lieut. Tourtelle replied in, Irving

fancied, a sneering tone.

"Then sweep that section right over there"--indicating with his right

hand. "There are several boches 200 yards in that direction carrying in

a comrade that I cracked on the head."

The other scouts had returned with information of interest to the

machine gunners, and presently the "typewriters" were rattling away with

a hail of steel-jacketed messages. Cries and groans from several

quarters of the arc swept by the guns indicated the effectiveness of the

firing. Irving was rewarded for his evening's work by hearing several

evidences of hits from the neighborhood of the scene of his adventure.

After the firing, there was a quick retreat to the Canadian front line.

They got back before the Heinies were able to collect their wits and

concentrate an answering fire upon the pit which undoubtedly they

thought they had recently converted into a combined shambles and tomb.

This last statement is true, but misleading. The patrol did not get back

without some punishment. One machine gun of the enemy got busy just

before the scouts leaped back into their trench. Again we are

misleading. One of the returning scouts did not leap into the

trench--he fell. It was Lieut. Tourtelle.

Irving sprang to his aid, lifting the officer to his feet and supporting

him thus. But his efforts were of little use. The wounded man had

fainted.

Another soldier offered assistance, and together they carried him to a

lighted dugout. There speedy first-aid remedies brought the wounded

soldier back to consciousness, but it was evident that he was severely

injured.

A telephone call in the dugout soon brought a team of stretcher bearers,

and in a short time Lieut. Tourtelle was being conveyed to a Red Cross

ambulance.

Next day Irving's left shoulder was so sore that he was unable to use

the arm. He tried to conceal his embarrassment, but it was observed by

Sergt. MacDonald, who reported it to Lieut. Osborne. Then followed an

examination, which proved that the young American's shoulder was

discolored and swollen as a result of the wound he received following

the explosion of minnenwerfer No. 1 near the listening pit early in the

evening, and he was ordered behind the lines for treatment.

*CHAPTER VI*

*A LITTLE HISTORY*

Irving was not confined to an invalid's couch at the hospital behind the

Canadian lines. His left arm was put in a sling and his shoulder

bandaged in hot cloths, frequently changed. It was found that the stone

that struck him had strained and bruised the muscles and ligaments

severely, so that the subsequent use of the arm had brought about a

condition resembling results of a bad sprain.

He was in the hospital a little over a week, and although he was not

subjected to any of the heroic treatment that is administered to many of

the wounded, yet the exciting thrills that had filled his short

experience in trench and No Man's Land with "lots of pep and pepper" had

a very fitting sequel in his hospital sojourn, very much unlike the

usual wearisome wait of the wounded.

As we have intimated, Private Irving Ellis was an American of the United

States brand. His home was in Buffalo, N.Y. His father was a ship

captain employed by a company that operated a line of passenger and

freight steamers on the Great Lakes. As a result the boy grew up a

"fresh water tar." He worked with his father on the latter's boat most

of the time during the summer vacations after he reached his teens.

The steamer of which Mr. Ellis had charge touched at several Canadian as

well as United States ports. In one of these lived an uncle of

Irving's, John Douglas, and the latter's family.

Mr. Ellis had married a Scotch Canadian bride, and as both families

lived near Lake Erie, there was frequent visiting between them back and

forth across the mid-water line.

As a result, Irving's best chum of his schoolboy days was his cousin,

Bob Douglas. They were about the same age, and both were fond of life

on the lake. Bob also was given work under Mr. Ellis's command in the

summer when he became old enough to be of service on board.

Soon after England declared war against Germany, Canada began the

organization of an army to aid her mother country in the great fight,

and Bob was one of the first to enlist. On the day of his enlistment he

wrote a long letter full of fiery patriotism to his cousin over in the

United States, and perhaps you can imagine the sensation this

communication created in the family of the steamboat captain.

But no, you can't, for the big sensation was not immediate. Of course,

there was a good deal of excitement among Irving's brothers and

sisters--two boys and two girls, all younger than he. Cousin Bob was a

real hero in their minds, and Irving envied him. The violation of the

Belgian treaty, the storming of Liege and the invasion of France across

the Belgian frontier were still fresh in the minds of the people

everywhere. The "scrap of paper" was still waving like a red flag in

the face of popular demand for the inviolability of international honor.

Well, two days later, Irving electrified the family circle at the

breakfast table with the announcement that he wished to enlist. Nobody

protested; nobody approved. In fact, Mr. Ellis had paved the way for

his oldest son's wish by expressing the opinion that the United States

would be drawn into the war before it was over. Even the younger

children were so imbued with a sense of the seriousness of the great

struggle as a result of things they had heard father, mother, and older

brother say, that they just looked awed when Irving's announcement came.

Mr. and Mrs. Ellis had too good sense of the logic of things to start an

argument to dissuade their son from his unexpected desire. They rather

decided upon a plan of silence, which put an end to discussion of the

war in their household. The radical change that suddenly transformed

the family conversations was almost grewsome in its emptiness; the

substitution of silence for talk frequently became embarrassing. But

there was one thing that did not stop; that was the arrival of letters

from Bob. They came almost with every mail, and Irving devoured them

eagerly.

At last the boy was able to stand the embarrassing silence no longer,

for the desire to take part in the great struggle against the hosts of a

hated military power was growing every day. Mr. and Mrs. Ellis saw the

inevitable coming. They knew that they would not forbid their son to

enlist when once they were convinced of his deep-seated desire to do so.

They could sacrifice their son for a great cause just as well as for

country.

"Father, mother, I want to go," the boy said one day.

It was an isolated statement, that would have been Greek to one not

intimately familiar with the campaign of silence that had preceded. The

consent was given in silence and the subject was not discussed again

until Irving began to make preparations for his departure.

He went to Canada and enlisted. Partly through a deliberately planned

purpose and partly by good fortune, he was able to get into the regiment

with which his cousin was training and a few months later was aboard a

transport on a zig-zag, submarine-dodging course for England. After

their arrival in France, Irving because of his training in certain

technical lines was put in the engineering service, but shortly before

the occurrence of the events already related herein, he succeeded in

getting a transfer back to his regiment on the plea that he wished to do

some real fighting.

Then for the first time he learned that his cousin had been severely

wounded and sent back to Canada incapacitated for further service

several months before. This information came in a letter from Bob

written at home. Two weeks later, while Irving was in the hospital

recovering from the injury he received in the listening pit in No Man's

Land, another letter came from his cousin, communicating a seemingly

innocent but strange bit of news which was destined to have an important

bearing on Private Ellis's future experiences as a soldier.

*CHAPTER VII*

*TOURTELLE APOLOGIZES*

But something remarkable and of great importance, affecting Irving's

soldier career, took place between the time when he entered the hospital

and the time when he received the second letter from his cousin at home.

The deep significance of the event did not develop at once, but the

novelty of the thing kept the attention of interest upon it until the

real meaning was uncovered. From that time on the young American

soldier's war experiences were a succession of thrills, surprises, and

dangerously interesting work.

The field hospital to which he was taken consisted in part of a group of

farm buildings that might have served as the nucleus of a village a

short distance behind the rear battle line. Everything was slow and

uninteresting to him during his first two days at this place. Then came

the first incident in the chain of events that was to mean so much to

Private Ellis as an American fighter in France.

He received a message from one of the guards patrolling the grounds that

a wounded officer in one of the buildings wished to see him. No

explanation as to why he had been sent for was given by the bearer of

the message. The head nurse of the building would direct him to the man

who wished to see him, he was informed.

Wondering a little who the officer could be and what was the nature of

his interest in him, Irving hastened to answer the call. He was

conducted by a nurse upstairs in a former rural residence and into a

small room, little larger than a closet and occupied by a single patient

on an army cot.

On the way he ran over, in his mind, the list of officers with whom he

could claim anything in the nature of a personal acquaintance and found

it very small. Moreover, he had not known that any of these had been

wounded. In this review of acquaintances of both commissioned and

non-commissioned rank, however, he missed one who should not have been

disregarded, although their intimacy had been of anything but friendly

nature. This officer he found lying on the cot in the little room which

he now entered. It was Second Lieut. Tourtelle.

The surprise became almost startling when Irving saw the face of the

"shavetail" brighten up with a look of apparent eagerness as he

recognized the caller. The nurse withdrew immediately and the American

soldier was left alone with his strange "comrade enemy" of No Man's

Land.

"Hello, Ellis," the "second looie" greeted, extending his right hand to

his visitor and making an effort to smile pleasantly. "I sent for you

because I wanted to have a talk with you. Sit down on the edge of the

cot. Sorry there's no chair here, but I'm not the housekeeper."

This latter "breath of levity" didn't sound bad at all, and Irving began

to have a vague suspicion that there might be an intelligent side to the

nature of this young officer who had behaved so brutally toward him.

However, he indicated that he preferred to stand and waited patiently

for Tourtelle to continue.

"I called you to ask you to do me a favor," the wounded officer

continued; "but first I want to apologize for the way I treated you. I

won't attempt to explain why I did it because I don't know. But I acted

like a bum scoundrel and ought to have been reported for it. The fact

that you made no complaint against me shows that you're a real man and

makes me feel ashamed of myself."

Irving was rather embarrassed by this unexpected speech on the part of

his supposed "comrade-enemy." He could not well reject the profession

of humility, and yet he was uncertain just how to take it. Lieut.

Tourtelle apparently desired to convey the impression that he was

suffering from pangs of deep regret, but although the "pangs" twisted

the muscles of his countenance the visitor was unable to convince

himself as to the depth of the patient's mental suffering.

"I hope you will forgive me, Ellis," the injured soldier said after a

few moments' silence. "I had a spell of very bad temper that night and

have regretted nay actions ever since. If there's anything I can do to

make it right, I'll do it."

This seemed to be as much as any reasonable person could ask under the

circumstances; so Irving replied:

"I'm sure I don't bear you any ill will under the circumstances,

lieutenant. I admit I was pretty much offended by what you did, but I'm

sure, after what you've just said, I can let bygones be bygones. We

must remember that we are fighting a common enemy and it is ridiculous

for us to be fighting one another. We ought rather to be helping one

another."

"That's an excellent idea," Tourtelle declared. "Now what would you say

if I should ask you to do something for me? Would you resent it?"

"I couldn't very well, after the principle I just laid down," Irving

answered with the shadow of a smile; "provided it were reasonable," he

added.

"Oh, I don't see how there's anything unreasonable in it," the officer

replied quickly. "The only thing is, you may think it a very odd

request, freakish perhaps. But I think I can explain it satisfactorily.

First, let me enlist your sympathy a little by informing you that my

wound is more severe than was thought at first. I'm going to lose my

left arm. One of the doctors told me today that it would have to be

amputated between the elbow and the shoulder."

"That's too bad," Irving said with evidence of fellow feeling for the

second lieutenant. "If there were anything I could do to save your arm

for you I'd surely do it. But what's the matter?"

"A bad compound fracture and gangrene. The doctor said he'd have to cut

it off today or my whole system might be poisoned. But here's the favor

I want you to do for me:

"When the doctor told me my arm would have to be cut off, I asked him if

it would be possible to save the limb, so I could take it back home with

me."

Irving interrupted this statement with a start of surprise.

"That's what the doctor did when I suggested the idea to him," Tourtelle

continued, noting the effect of his suggestion. "He wanted to know why

I wished to save the arm, and I replied that it was for two reasons:

first, because I thought it would make an excellent souvenir; second,

because it was tattooed in a very artistic manner and I don't want to

lose the art. I'm of an artistic temperament, and it would break my

heart more to lose that bit of tattooing on my arm than to lose the arm

and keep the art."

"I think I get you," said Irving with a smile. "You want me to put the

arm in alcohol and preserve it, tattooing and all?"

"That's a clever inference, but not quite to the point," Tourtelle

commented without much change of expression on his face. "The doctor

offered a substitute suggestion, and that's what I'm going to put to you

now."

The patient paused a moment or two, and Irving waited expectantly for

the next development in the strange narrative of novel events.

*CHAPTER VIII*

*CUBIST ART*

"Yes, I am of an artistic temperament," Lieut. Tourtelle continued in a

sort of dreamy way, which tended rather to give his audience-of-one "the

creeps" than to "soften his soul," as art is supposed to do.

"If he's an artist, he ought to be painting kaisers, crown princes,

Hindenburgs, and Ludendorfs with horns on their heads and arrow-tipped

tails," he thought grimly. "But maybe he means it all right. Perhaps

he really believes he has artistic temperament, but hasn't sized himself

up right. A few years ago I thought I could write poetry, but found I

couldn't even write an acceptable advertisement in verse for sentimental

candy or floating soap. I'll humor 'im a while and see what's on 'is

mind."

Tourtelle's mind was wandering now, either with a purpose in view or

because of a real genius delusion. He rambled along thus:

"I made a study of art ever since I was old enough to daub with a little

box of colors and a paint brush. When I was old enough to attempt

something better than a smear, I went to an art school and there made

quite a hit with the professors with some of my novel ideas. Then when

that craze of the cubists and the futurists swept the country a few

years ago, I took it up and made quite a hit with some of my paintings.

One painting in particular, a cubist production representing a basket of

eggs spilling down a stairway, was regarded as a student masterpiece.

The praise I received over that work intoxicated me, I guess, for I

caused a copy of it to be tattooed on my arm by a fellow student.

"Well, the original was lost and I had only the copy on my arm. So, you

see, I became very fond of that copy, as the original was acknowledged

to be worthy of exhibition along with masterpieces of well known

painters. By the way, you remember something of that cubist craze a few

years ago, don't you?"

"Yes," Irving replied, "I remember something about it. There was a good

deal about it in the magazines. I suppose I recall it because it was so

perfectly crazy. Those artists seemed to take great delight in making a

human being look as if he had gone through a threshing machine and

afterwards raided a hornet's nest."

"You've got the idea exactly--I mean the layman's idea," said the

self-styled cubist enthusiastically. "And I don't blame you, in a way.

But if you could only have got an artist's view of the idea, you'd look

at life a good deal differently. But that's neither here nor there.

Oh, yes, it is, too--I forgot myself on the moment. It's here--on my

arm--and I want to save it. Now, this is what the doctor told me to do.

He told me to peel off the skin where the tattooing is, as soon as the

arm is sawed off. That is, he didn't tell me to do it myself, for I'd

be in no condition to perform such an operation on my amputated limb.

He meant that's the way it should be done. But I don't believe he'd

ever look after the job himself. He'd cut the arm off while I'm under

the influence of ether, and that 'u'd be the last I'd ever see of it,

including the miniature copy of my painting.

"So I decided to get somebody else to look after the matter, and that's

what I called you here for. It isn't much of a job. All you have to do

is to cut the skin around the tattooing and peel it off, then pack it in

salt to preserve it. The doctor said it would peel off easily and that

salt packing would keep the skin and the tattooed colors in good

condition. The nurse got me a little box and some salt, so everything

is ready as soon as the doctor comes along with his saw."

"When is he coming?" Irving inquired.

"Sometimes this afternoon, he said," Tourtelle replied. "What do you

think about it, Ellis? Will you do me the favor?"

"Sure," the private answered with a smile. "I'm sorry you're going to

lose your arm, but I'll take care of your cubist art for you with

pleasure. I'm really very curious to see what it looks like."

"I'd roll up my sleeve and show you, but I'm afraid I'd hurt my arm,"

the "second looie" said in response.

"Oh, no," Irving returned hurriedly, "I wouldn't have you do that for

anything. But I'll kind o' hang around until the surgeon comes. If I'm

not here right on the dot, the nurse'll be able to find me without much

trouble."

*CHAPTER IX*

*BOB'S LETTER*

Irving almost forgot that there had ever been any difficulty between him

and Lieut. Tourtelle in contemplation of the novel service he had

promised to perform. Perhaps his remembrance of that trouble had been

smothered by his curiosity as to the character of this tattooed copy of

a "Basket of Eggs Spilling Down Stairs."

The surgeon came at 3 o'clock in the afternoon and got busy at once.

However, before administering the ether, he acknowledged an introduction

to Private Ellis and promised to "skin the tattoo off the arm" after the

amputation and turn it over to its delegated caretaker.

Irving was permitted to be present during the operation. He watched

with a good deal of curiosity for a first vision of the cubist art on

the patient's arm, and was not at all disappointed. It surely was a

clever piece of work, from the point of view of a votary of this sort of

art. This was the conclusion of all who saw the operation, and it was

the general subject of conversation until the arm was removed.

The surgeon took more interest in the subject now than he had taken at

any time previously. This doubtless was due to the special preparations

made by the patient for the preservation of the tattooed skin. While

the ether was being administered by a nurse, he bared the wounded arm

and examined the "copy of quaint art" with interest.

"What does he call this picture?" the "military sawbones" asked as he

gazed at the seemingly unmethodical arrangement of distorted "cubes" of

all sorts of shapes and angles.

The patient was not yet unconscious, although the nurse was dropping

ether into the mask covering his mouth and nose. In a low dreamy voice

he answered the question thus:

"It's 'The Basket of Eggs Spilling Down Stairs.'"

The surgeon and the two attending nurses laughed at this answer.

"His mind is wandering under the anaesthetic," said the surgeon.

"No, it isn't," Irving interposed. "He told you the same thing he told

me. You see, he's a cubist. That's his idea of art. That tattooing on

his arm is a copy of a picture painted by him when he was a student in

an art school. That's the story he told me this morning."

The expression on the surgeon's face went through a motion-picture

metamorphosis while the boy onlooker was making his statement. First it

indicated a kind of professional resentment at the contradiction; then

followed a wave of incredulity, succeeded by an enigmatical smirk. As

he cast a glance of still-smirking amusement at young Ellis, the latter

interpreted it to mean that he questioned the sanity of the patient.

"If I were to perform this operation in the manner that cubists execute

their art, he'd probably want to sue me for malpractice," said the

scientific man as he finished preparation for the use of the knife.

The operation was quickly performed, and the surgeon obligingly peeled

off the portion of skin containing the cubist tattooing and handed it to

Irving. The latter proceeded at once to pack it in the box of salt

provided for the purpose, and said to the nurse in charge:

"I'll lay it here on the bed beside his pillow, so that he'll find it

when he wakes up. Will you please call his attention to it?"

The nurse promised to do as requested, and Irving left the building and

heard nothing more of the incident for several days. At last his

shoulder recovered from its lameness and he was ordered back to the

front.

Before returning to the trenches, however, he received a letter from his

cousin, Bob, that stirred in him a thrill of excitement that no

sensational activities of battle could have aroused. The affair thus

revealed over a distance of thousands of miles confronted Irving with

what seemed at first a most remarkable coincidence. But the boy was

unable to accept it as such without first making an inquiry about

certain suspicious circumstances. He suspected at once that something

was doing that ought to be laid before army officials for investigation.

"I'm getting along first rate, Irving," Bob wrote. "My wounds have all

healed. I was pretty badly shot to pieces. One of the bones of my left

leg was pretty much shattered. They thought, at first they'd have to

amputate the limb, but it was saved, thank goodness, although the knee

will always be stiff. I had half a dozen shell and machine gun wounds

in my body, too, though fortunately all of them were well removed from

vital spots. But, although these injuries were as bad as one would care

to receive, all of them together were not nearly as dangerous or

uncomfortable as the dose of gas I got. Believe me, Irving, I don't

want any more of that. If you want my opinion of it, I'll tell you I

think it's more cruel than submarine warfare where they sink passenger

ships without warning. The doctors thought for a while that I was going

to have the 'con,' but I'm about over the effects of my dose now."

"Well, while I was convalescing, I had to have some amusement--I mean

after I was able to be up and around, but hardly strong enough to shovel

snow. Say, we've had some awful heavy snow storms this winter. Regular

blizzards, with snow over your shoetops when you're standing on your

head. That's snowing some, isn't it?

"Well, about the time I was able to get around without doing myself any

harm--the gas effects kept me pretty weak quite a while,--I went up to

Toronto to visit some friends. I was invited up there by one of the

boys who was gassed at the same time I was. He and others had organized

a 'Gas club,' consisting of fellows who had been gassed in the war.

Grewsome idea, wasn't it? But it took famously. They wanted me to

join, and I went up there and was initiated.

"Well, while I was up there, I saw considerable outdoor life. Several

of us went hunting on snowshoes one day, and that capped the climax of

my physical exertions. I ought to have been more careful, for I was not

strong enough yet for such life. Well, I became ill on the way, and the

boys got me to a hospital in the outskirts of the city and a physician

examined me. The doctor said there was nothing serious the matter with

me, only over-exertion in my weakened condition, so I did not notify

father and mother.

"Two days later the doctor said I was in good enough condition to leave

the hospital, but advised me to go straight home and not try any more

such vigorous exercise until I was in condition to return to the

trenches. This was in the evening, and I decided to remain in the

hospital until morning. I was sitting up when the doctor called, and

after he left I went out into the hall to find a telephone to call up my

friend and tell him of my plan to return home next day.

"The building is an old brick structure that undoubtedly would have been

condemned for hospital purposes if the interior woodwork had not been of

the best material and well put together. However, the layout was

decidedly old-fashioned and confusing to one accustomed to modern

architecture. Anyway, I got lost, so to speak, in the hall while trying

to find my way to the stairway.

"I found a stairway, but soon realized that it was not the one I wanted,

and was about to turn back, when something caught my attention and held

it for several minutes. I was on a kind of half-floor landing before an

entrance into a low rear addition, and from that position found myself

gazing into a laboratory in which something very strange was going on.

Three men were in the room, one of them little more than a boy and in

the khaki uniform of a soldier; the other two in civilian clothes. In

the upper half of the door were two glass panels, through which I could

see very clearly, and the transom over the door was swung partly open.

"There was something peculiar about the two older men which almost

fascinated me. Both had a decidedly foreign look. One was

smooth-shaven, except for a heavy kaiser mustache; the other, the older

of these two, wore a full beard.

"The young fellow in khaki was seated on a chair, with his left arm

bared above the elbow, resting on a table. The other two men were

working over the arm in a most studious manner. Over them was a

brilliant calcium light which illuminated their work. I could see the

arm very plainly and it took me only a minute or two to determine what

the two older men were doing to it.

"They were tattooing the arm, and a most remarkable kind of tattooing it

was. They were extremely careful with their work and progressed slowly.

Judging from the care they took and the slowness with which they

progressed, they must have worked on that arm several days. Also,

spread out before them, was a small sheet of white paper, to which they

referred frequently.

"It is hard to describe to you the appearance of the result of their

work, but I'll send you a copy of the original they were working from

and explain how I got it. I think you'll agree with me that it looks

more like a piece of kindergarten patchwork than anything else

imaginable.

"While I was gazing in a kind of fascination at the strange scene, the

man with the kaiser mustache turned suddenly and saw me. His next

movement was just as sudden and much more astonishing. He sprang to the

door, flung it open, and before I could realize what was taking place he

had seized me by the arm and was dragging me into the laboratory. I

struggled to prevent him from getting me inside, but, because of my

weakened condition, was unsuccessful. My next impulse was to cry out

for help, but the situation seemed to me so ridiculous that I decided I

would only make myself look foolish by so doing. This hospital was

surely a highly respectable institution, I reasoned, and the

misunderstanding of which I was a victim would soon be cleared up.

Perhaps these men thought I was a spying meddler bent on some malicious

mischief.

"After they got me inside--for the other men sprang to my captor's

assistance--they closed and locked the door, also the transom, and began

to quiz me as to what I was doing out in the hall. I was too sore at

their treatment of me to give an explanation and demanded what they

meant by their actions. I saw that they were very uneasy about

something and that made me bolder. It soon dawned upon me that they had

been doing something that they wanted to keep secret. That resolved me

to get back at them with interest, and while they were busy with their

excited demands, I got my wits together to devise some sort of trick

that would show them it wasn't quite so easy to browbeat me as they

seemed to imagine.

"All three of them huddled together right in front of me and rained

questions at me excitedly. This suited me first rate as soon as I had

decided what to do. I wasn't afraid of any desperate violence on their

part; the place was too public for that. I retreated slowly to the

table at which they had been working and leaned back resting my hands on

it. They never caught on to what I was up to, but pressed close to me

with their excited questions. I met these with noncommittal replies,

and at the same time got one hand closer and closer to the mysterious

slip of paper on the table. It was not more than six inches long and

three wide, and I figured that if I could get one hand on it I might

crumple it in my fist without their observing what I was doing. After I

had been dragged into the room, I saw the young fellow hurriedly draw

down the sleeve of his shirt over the tattooed portion of his forearm.

He seemed so nervous while doing this that my suspicion of something

wrong became very acute; and yet, the mystery could hardly have been

more baffling.

"Well, I got my hand on the paper and crumpled it in my fist, and they

never got onto my trick, at least, not until I got out of that room and

away from them. I was now ready to answer their questions. I told them

I was a patient in the hospital and was just trying to find my way to

the office and started down the wrong stairway--that was all there was

to it. I then demanded that they release me at once or I would make

serious trouble for them. They asked me my name, and I told them. Then

the bearded man left the laboratory, and I presume he went to the office

to make inquiry about me, for he came back in a few minutes and reported

that he guessed I was all right. But they held a whispered conversation

in German--I caught enough of their words to be sure of that--and then

told me I might go. But before the door was unlocked, the bearded man

apologized, as nearly as I can remember, in the following words:

"I hope you will forgive our rough conduct, but we are engaged in very

important government work, and when we saw you looking through the glass

at us and apparently listening to our conversation, we presumed you were

a German spy. You have satisfied us that you are all right, and we

recommend that, as you love your country and wish to aid us to win the

war, you keep this affair strictly to yourself."

"I was astonished and more confused than ever. That statement convicted

them of something on the face of it, but of what I could not conjecture.

The idea that a responsible secret agent of the government should make

such a speech as that under any circumstances was simply ridiculous. I

was mighty sure they were not doing work for the government. They were

trying to cover something up, but what I could make no rational guess.

"I decided not to remain in the hospital any longer than it would take

to get my few belongings together and pay my bill. I was afraid they

would discover the loss of the paper I had stolen. Well, I got out of

that place so rapidly that I had everybody staring at me who beheld my

movements.

"I went to a hotel, but I am dead sure I was followed. In the morning

when I went down to breakfast I was conscious of being watched. I

telephoned to my friend, but while in the booth I glanced about with

apparent unconcern and caught one of my shadowers looking in my

direction over the top of a newspaper from a seat in the hotel lobby. I

met my friend, but said nothing to him about my adventure. I wanted to

get back home as soon as possible. I wasn't in condition physically to

undergo any great strain.

"At last I was on the train and speeding toward home, but hadn't covered

more than half of the journey when I discovered that one of my shadowers

was making the journey with me. He got off when I got off and for

several days had a room in one of our local hotels. I talked the matter

over with father and we came to the conclusion that I had fallen into a

nest of the kaiser's spies. We examined the paper I had taken from the

table in the laboratory of the Toronto hospital and I made a copy of it.

Then we went to the chief of police and I told nay story to him. He

said the matter ought to be taken up with government officials and asked

me to let him show the mysterious paper in my possession to them. I had

expected this, and gave him the paper.

"A few days later I read in a newspaper that the hospital had been

raided by government agents. Also, I saw nothing more of the fellow who

had followed me from Toronto after I made my report to the chief of

police.

"Now, what do you think of all this? Isn't it some adventure? I'm

sending to you, just for your amusement, a copy of the drawing on the

paper that I stole from the hospital laboratory. Can you make anything

out of it? It may afford you some diversion during long, dreary watches

in camp, trench or dugout."

*CHAPTER X*

*DOTS AND DASHES*

Not more than a minute after reading this letter and examining the slip

of paper that accompanied it, Irving said to himself:

"This drawing is very similar to the cubist tattooing on the arm of

Lieut. Tourtelle."

He studied over the matter a little more and then added:

"I believe that both were made from the same copy, or original."

A little more puzzling over the problem caused him to supplement thus:

"It looks very much as if Tourtelle and the soldier who bared his arm

over the table in the hospital laboratory are one and the same person."

The suggestion startled the boy as a realization of the logical sequence

flashed in his mind.

"Gee whillikens!" he exclaimed. "That means that his story about being

an art student and about the tattooing of that picture on his arm by one

of his fellow students is a fake. But why should he have faked it? Why

wouldn't the truth have served his purpose just as well?"

Irving was at battalion headquarters, awaiting orders, which were

expected to come after sundown, to move forward into the trenches. While

reading the letter he was seated on the log of a tree that had been

literally uprooted by a concentrated shell fire at this point a week or

two before. Nobody else was interested in what he was doing and he was

too much preoccupied to feel much interest in anybody right now except

the mysterious Lieut. Tourtelle and his equally mysterious "amputation

souvenir."

"Now," continued the boy, resuming his reasoning soliloquy, "if he told

me a fake story about being an art student and having one of his fellow

students copy one of his pictures on his arm, what was the motive? He

wanted to deceive me, of course, but why? I'll have to leave that

question unanswered for the present, I'm afraid. If I could get at his

real reason for wanting that picture tattooed on his arm, I might feel

some encouragement in trying to get at his motive in deceiving me.

There's no doubt the picture on his arm is practically the same as the

copy on this paper. I shouldn't wonder if they were the same size,

drawn with precisely the same dimensions. Supposed to represent a

basket of eggs spilling down stairs. What a ridiculous title. I'm sure

I'd have hard work picking out the basket and the smashed eggs. It

looks to me almost as if someone had pinned this paper up on a wall and

fired a lot of eggs at it--and hit it, too, every crack. After all,

it's the best title to a cubist art picture I ever heard of. I remember

our teacher gave us a talk about that kind of art and showed us some

copies of cubist paintings in magazines at the time when everybody was

gossiping--yes, that's the word--about cubist art. And we surely had a

lot of fun over it.

"Tourtelle told me that another student tattooed that picture on his

arm. Bob's description of the scene in the hospital laboratory makes

that 'second looie' look very much like a liar. I take it from this

letter that both of those men were pretty well advanced in years. Art

students as a rule are younger people. Moreover, students wouldn't act

so strangely just because they suspected somebody of secretly watching

them at their work. Then, again, Bob says the government raided that

hospital. What for? Enemy agents, of course; there could be no other

reason. And this raid followed Bob's report of his experience to the

police. Plain as daylight. And yet, what possible connection can there

be between enemy spies and cubist art? I give it up."

Irving would have liked to make a report of some kind concerning the web

of strange events that clung in confusing tangle to the mystery of the

ridiculous tattooing recently peeled from the amputated arm of Lieut.

Tourtelle, but the more he studied over the matter, the more probable it

appeared to him that such action on his part would be unwise. His

conclusions must of necessity be exceedingly vague. He could not figure

out a motive in any way explaining the apparently eccentric ideas and

actions of the "hobby ridden second lieutenant." Yes, that phrase

characterized Tourtelle exactly when the spy suspicion contained in

Bob's letter was dismissed, and undoubtedly the average officer, unless

he be of a very suspicious nature, would take that view of it.

"I'd be laughed at if I made a report of this affair without being able

to place my finger on anything more definite than I seem to be able to

single out now," he concluded. "So I guess I'll have to keep this thing

to myself or else whittle my wits to a sharper point than I have been

able to whittle them thus far."

About an hour after nightfall Irving returned to the front line trenches

together with seventy-five or a hundred other soldiers who constituted a

relief shift, to take the place of a like number of tried and

muscle-cramped boys whose capacity for efficient service was in need of

recuperation. The sector was quiet on this occasion and the relief

exchange was effected without notable incident. In fact, conditions

were such that it was considered safe to permit most of the soldiers to

sleep under ground of sentries here and there along the trenches and in

listening posts out in No Man's Land.

But Irving did not "sleep a wink," although general conditions were

favorable for sleep in the dugout where he wrapped himself in a blanket

and attempted to follow the reposeful example of half a dozen comrades

with little on their minds save the ordinary routine of bloody battle in

the past and prospect of much more fight and blood in the future. No

mystery racked their minds, and they rested peacefully enough. With

Private Ellis, however, it was different, and in a very few minutes

after he lay down a plausible solution of the puzzle that had been

teasing him for several hours popped into his brain with startling

suddenness and rendered sleep about as impossible to him as peaceful

surrender was to outraged Belgium.

After the excitement of the first thrill was over, Irving was unable to

trace the process by which he arrived at his conclusion. After all,

"process" is too slow a word to use in this relation. "The first thing

he knew," his mind had jumped from the rough pen sketch of the cubist

art drawing in his pocket to the tattooed copy as he had seen it on

Tourtelle's arm. A moment later he found himself almost weirdly

interested in the recollection of a marked difference in these two

copies which had not impressed him before.

Then came a new thrill of eagerness, followed by incredulity, then

eagerness and incredulity battling for supremacy, over a suspicion that

would not be downed in spite of its almost laughable character. Could

it be possible? Yes, no, yes, no--back and forth the contradictions

swung. But one thing was certain; Irving recalled it distinctly: In the

maze of configurations of "distorted cubes" were myriads of dots and

dashes, dots and dashes. What could they mean? If the theory which

forced itself upon him was correct there was only one reasonable

solution of the whole mystery.

The boy in the dugout could scarcely contain his excitement as the

seemingly logical explanation of the mystery "dotted and dashed" itself

into a position of settled conviction in his mind.

*CHAPTER XI*

*IRVING TELLS THE SERGEANT*

"Dots and dashes, dots and dashes, dots and dashes," kept running

through Irving's mind.

He took Bob's letter from his pocket and drew from the envelope the

paper containing his cousin's copy of "The Basket of Eggs Spilling Down

Stairs."

"Bob drew this in a hurry, or at least he had no appreciation of the

value of minute details which, I believe, are more important than a

thousand baskets of eggs," the young soldier mused as he gazed at the

cleverly drawn, but rather inaccurate, copy in the light of the trench

lamp. "He disregarded most of those clots and dashes, except in a few

places, thinking, I suppose, that continuous lines would do just as

well. And he was right so far as the picture is concerned. In fact, I

believe those dots and dashes that were on Tourtelle's arm detracted

from the art of the artist, if I may pose as an art critic; but for the

purpose intended they are absolutely essential.

"Now, I wish I could get hold of an officer who would listen to me and

maybe I could start an investigation that would result in something

worth while. But Sergt. Wilson, who messes in here, is out with some

other men in a listening post and I'm sure it would be better to

approach the lieutenant through him. That means I've got to wait here

probably until morning before I can get this great weight of

responsibility off my mind."

And that was exactly what he did. He lay there thinking over and over

again the events of his own and his cousin's adventures concerning

Lieut. Tourtelle. There was no use of his attempting to slumber, and it

was not long before he gave up the idea entirely. However, he was in no

great need of sleep, inasmuch as he had almost reveled in the luxury of

rest ever since he was ordered to the field hospital for treatment of

his shoulder.

Through all the rest of the night, Irving continued to review and

analyze the strange case of "freak art." And perhaps it was fortunate

that he had ample opportunity to do this, for it is quite possible that

otherwise he would not have had certain important points sufficiently in

mind to make a strong and convincing case when at last he found

opportunity to make his report.

"It seems to me those dots and dashes explain Tourtelle's anxiety to

keep that tattooing on his arm," the boy mused. "Now, if he's a spy, he

was putting over just a clever 'con game' when he sent for me and begged

my forgiveness and then asked me to do him a favor. After all, I've got

to admit that that fellow is pretty smooth. No, I don't think he

overdid it at all. I did think it a little strange when he followed his

plea for forgiveness with a request that I do him a favor. But the

favor was so simple, although unusual enough, goodness knows, and there

appeared to be so little opportunity for him to trick me into something

I wouldn't like to do, that it seemed foolish for me to hesitate. It

looks now as if he tricked not only me, but the surgeon and nurses, too.

I wonder what that surgeon would say if he knew that a spy had made

clever use of him to prevent a very deep enemy plot from going to pieces

at a time when the bottom was about to drop out of it. He'd be a lot

sorer, I bet, than he was when I contradicted him after he said

Tourtelle's mind was wandering under the anaesthetic.

"'A Basket of Eggs Spilling Down Stairs'--that's some name for a

painting. I wonder what's behind it. Now, it's just possible that that

name's written somewhere in cipher in the picture, and maybe a key goes

with it and that key applied to the name will produce the message he's

carrying to the enemy. I suppose he'll watch his opportunity and--

"My goodness!"

Irving uttered this exclamation aloud and the sound of his voice awoke

one of the sleepers in the dugout, who asked what was the matter. The

soliloquist replied "nothing," that he had merely startled himself with

a "bright idea," whereupon the awakened soldier grumbled, "You're a

nut," and rolled over and went to sleep again.

"I wonder if the sergeant will call me a nut, too, when I tell him my

story," Irving reflected a little apprehensively. "In spite of the way

everything fits into everything else as logically as can be, the whole

account is bound to sound a good deal like a fairy story. Sometimes I

feel like giving it up and casting the whole affair out of my mind,

but--but--I can't. Now, that idea that made me burst out like a 'nut,'

as that soldier called me, fits in just as pat as can be with all he

rest. It looks, it looks, yes, sir, it looks just as if Tourtelle was

trying to surrender out in No Man's Land the other night when we were

scouting there together. I don't know how I can prove it, but it's

plain enough to me, unless my whole theory falls down, and I don't see

how it can."

At last, shortly before the break of day, reliefs were sent to the

various sentry posts, and Sergt. Wilson returned to the dugout with

several other men. Irving seized the first available opportunity to

tell the "non com" that he had some important information that he wished

to "get off his mind," and they withdrew to one side of the underground

room to talk the matter over.

In a few minutes Private Ellis had Sergt. Wilson interested by his

simple, direct method of presenting his subject. In fifteen minutes,

the boy had finished his narrative and turned over his cousin's letter

to the officer to read. The latter pored with intense interest over not

only the epistle but the accompanying copy of the mysterious "Basket of

Eggs Spilling Down Stairs." Presently he said:

"You've got something very important here, Ellis. I'm going to see

Lieut. Osborne right away. I think you had better come along. Unless

I'm badly mistaken this matter will get to the major in a very short

time and something important will be doing."

The sergeant climbed up out of the dugout into the trench, and Irving

followed, and soon they were making their way to another similar

excavation which was the headquarters of Lieut. Osborne.

*CHAPTER XII*

*QUIZZING A SPY*

Sergt. Wilson's prediction that Private Ellis's spy story would go to

the major of the battalion was more than realized. Affairs moved

rapidly from the time when the non-commissioned officer got a clear idea

of the importance of the situation. He and Irving made a rapid transit

from their trench cave to the dugout where Lieut. Osborne was stationed,

and there the story was repeated. The lieutenant was interested at once

and took the matter up with the captain. The latter instructed the

lieutenant to remain at the telephone until he could communicate with

his superior officers.

There followed a wait of rather nervous expectancy for Irving. It

really was not more than half an hour, although it seemed much longer to

the young soldier who made the original complaint. At last, however,

came a ring of the muffled telephone bell, and Lieut. Osborne lifted the

receiver to his ear. He listened a minute or two, then hung up the

receiver and said:

"Ellis, you and I are ordered to proceed to the hospital and confront

this young spy of yours with the fact that we have the goods on him.

The captain communicated with the major, and the major with the colonel;

so, you see, your story has gone up to the head of the regiment. Sergt.

Wilson, I am going to leave you here in my place while I'm gone. I hope

to be back before nightfall. If I'm delayed longer than I expect to be,

I'll communicate with you by 'phone. Ellis, we'll start at once. The

colonel has ordered an automobile to be ready to meet us at the nearest

relief station back of the lines. Come on."

In a few minutes the officer and the private were racing through the

nearest communication trench, which was deep, sinuous and well

camouflaged, on past the second and third lines to the relief station

just beyond a small inn covered with a growth of trees and a thicket of

tall bushes. The promised automobile was waiting for them, and they

were soon speeding away toward the field hospital which, in the last

hour, as a result of Private Ellis's story, had become a center of very

serious interest in a strange admixture of an elaborate spy system and

"high art."

Lieut. Osborne and his companion were both apprehensive lest they find

the second lieutenant in condition so weakened that it would be

inadvisable to subject him to the strain of a "third degree." They

discussed this possibility on the way, and the officer decided that he

would broach the subject gently in order to avoid the danger of

defeating their purpose through a physical and mental collapse of the

patient.

But Lieut. Tourtelle proved to have withstood the shock of the operation

much better than might have been expected. They found him looking

really bright and vigorous. Apparently he had had the best of care and

had rested well. Nevertheless, Lieut. Osborne called a nurse aside and

asked her to administer a stimulant to him, as he had important business

with the patient under instructions from the commander of the regiment.

The nurse did as requested without arousing any suspicion in the "cubist

art spy."

"This is quite a surprise to receive a visit from a superior officer

under such circumstances, and I'm sure it's very much appreciated,"

Tourtelle remarked after he had answered several questions put by Lieut.

Osborne regarding his condition and the attention he was receiving.

"The occasion fully warrants our coming to see you," the superior

officer replied in a purposely peculiar tone of voice. Tourtelle

noticed it and looked inquiringly at Lieut. Osborne.

"Private Ellis told me about that art souvenir that was peeled off your

arm and I have come to see it," continued the leader of the "visiting

expedition."

Tourtelle shot a furtive, searching glance at each of his callers.

These glances did not escape the observation of either the officer or

the private, for both were looking for evidence of this sort; but they

were well on their guard and did not betray, by the slightest

expression, any evidence of what was going on in their minds.

"Of course you have it here," Lieut. Osborne continued in tone of

assurance. "Ellis tells me he laid it by the side of your pillow and

asked the nurse to call your attention to it after you came out from the

effects of the anaesthetic."

Plainly enough Tourtelle was struggling within himself over something,

and his visitors did not have much trouble convincing themselves what it

was. But finally he settled the problem tentatively in favor of the

evident inevitable and replied:

"Yes, of course, I have it here, only I hate to unpack it; but if your

curiosity over a freak idea is uncontrollable, I must submit. I'm very

jealous over that affair, because the average person is utterly

incapable of appreciating it and would only laugh at me."

"Oh, you needn't be afraid of our doing anything of the kind," returned

the lieutenant reassuringly. "We're deeply interested, both of us."

"You must be profoundly interested if you can leave your places at the

battle front just to inspect a sample of what most people would call

freak art. You didn't call a truce and sign an armistice just for this,

did you?"

The lieutenant realized by this time, as Irving had realized before,

that he was dealing with a young fellow of no puny intelligence.

Tourtelle, although signifying willingness to do as requested, was

evidently fencing with weapons of jest and banter, intended to be

accepted as conversational pleasantry. He made no motion as yet to

produce the box containing the tattooed section of skin packed in salt.

"No," the visiting officer replied quietly; "but I'm sure you won't

disappoint me after I've gone to the trouble to get permission from the

colonel to come here and see that remarkable curiosity that Ellis says

you possess. Where is it?--under your pillow?"

Lieut. Osborne made a move as if to reach under the pillow. The patient

made no motion to object; he maintained a passiveness of manner which

the inspecting officer accepted as an admission as to the whereabouts of

the article of interest. The next moment the box was produced from its

"hiding place," for Irving and the lieutenant were certain that when

Tourtelle put it under the pillow his purpose was primarily to conceal

it from inquisitive eyes.

The officer opened the box and poured the contents out on a paper lying

on the floor. Then he picked out the "cubist parchment" and gazed at it

with deep interest.

"By the way, Lieut. Tourtelle," he said after an inspection lasting a

minute or two, "would you mind telling me what these dots and dashes

mean in this work of art? They look to me like letters of the Morse

telegraph code."

As he spoke he looked sharply at the soldier on the cot, whose face in

an instant became an interesting study of struggling effort to appear

calm and curious and only superficially concerned. Irving realized,

however, that Lieut. Osborne was getting down to business without any

preliminary foolishness.

*CHAPTER XIII*

*TOURTELLE ADMITS*

"Nonsense," replied Tourtelle, with remarkable calmness, after what must

have been a desperate effort at self-control. "Nothing of the kind. I

drew the original picture and I don't know the first thing about

telegraphy."

"But it's here," Lieut. Osborne insisted. "I've had a course in wireless

and can read the code like a book. Let me read some of it to

you--'h-e-f-c-k-a-w-r-t-m-c-a-a-b-l'--and so on, all around every one of

these cubes."

"Is that so?" exclaimed the patient, rising slightly on his remaining

elbow, but falling back. "Let me see it. I never noticed that. Bickett

must have put one over on me if you're right. Bickett was the student

who tattooed the picture on my arm."

"Where was that tattooing done?" asked Lieut. Osborne.

"In our room in Montreal," replied Tourtelle, without hesitation. "He

and I roomed together and attended art school."

"You're sure it wasn't in a laboratory of a hospital in Toronto?" was

the inquisitor's next query.

This was too much for the bedridden "second looie." He opened his mouth

as if to speak, but his jaw dropped and remained in its lowered position

half a minute as if paralyzed. At last, however, he managed to find his

voice again, but it came with a succession of stammers.

"Wh--wh--why," he said, with a brave enough effort to transform

confusion into astonishment. "Wh--wh--what do you mean? I--I don't

understand you. You talk like a sphinx. I hope you're not questioning

my word. I can't understand what your motive can be. But maybe you're

making sport of me. If I told you that I was born in--in New Brunswick,

would you try to make out it was in Saskatchewan?"

"Not unless the fellow who was seized out in the hall and dragged into

the laboratory should appear suddenly and contradict your statement,"

the investigating officer answered. "By the way, did you know the

hospital was raided by government agents a few days after the tattooing

operation?"

By this time, Tourtelle, who must have realized the gravity of the

situation, had summoned all the nerve needed to provide him with a bold

front to meet the emergency. He just sat and stared blankly at his

visitors.

"Why don't you answer?" Lieut. Osborne demanded.

"Because I haven't the faintest idea what you're driving at," Tourtelle

replied, with well assumed mystification. "But I'm sure of one thing,

or rather one of two things, and that is that either somebody has put

you on a very bum steer, or you have got things very badly twisted.

You'll have to straighten matters out some way or else stop this line of

questioning, for I don't know how to answer you except by denying

absolutely more than half you say."

"Now, see here, Tourtelle," returned the visiting officer severely;

"this camouflage of yours has gone far enough. I came here to get from

you an admission of the main truth and some additional information. I

already have all the proof needed to convict you of being a spy. Unless

you do what I ask you to do, undoubtedly you will be courtmartialed and

shot. Now, the question is, do you want to save yourself from such a

fate?"

"That is a grave accusation," Tourtelle answered icily. "At any rate,

I'll listen to the evidence you have against me. Suppose you tell me

what it is."

"It's right here in this," Lieut. Osborne replied, unhesitatingly,

holding up the section of skin containing the tattooed outlines of

strange art. "You have here a message of secret information for someone

on the other side of the Rhine. I want to know whom it is for and the

substance of the message."

"But how do you figure that I could get it into the hands for whom it is

intended, admitting for the sake of argument that you are correct in

your inference?" the soldier on the bed inquired.

"By surrendering to our enemy at the first opportunity," was the answer.

"That's what you tried to do out in No Man's Land the night you were

wounded."

This was a new startler for the wounded spy, as was evident from the

expression on his countenance. After a few moments of undoubtedly

painful meditation, he continued:

"Again, just for the sake of argument, how could I be certain that you

would keep your word after promising to save my life if I acted

according to your instruction?"

"All you have is my word for it and your own common sense. If you give

us some valuable information that could not have been obtained

otherwise, it stands to reason--doesn't it?--that we'd forget that you'd

been a spy, particularly so if the value of your information was greater

than your menace as a spy."

"All right, I'll admit I'm a spy," said Tourtelle, a little doggedly;

"but I'm not going to tell you anything until I have more authoritative

assurance that I'll not be courtmartialed."

"I don't mean to assure you that you won't be courtmartialed," Lieut.

Osborne answered, hastily. "I mean that I will intercede for you.

Moreover, there is no evidence that can be produced against you except

through Private Ellis and me. We have the information, and will either

produce it or keep it under cover as we see fit."

"But suppose I really have no information of great value; suppose I'm

merely a bearer of a cipher message, which I can't read and don't even

know the person to whom it is addressed--what then?"

"I don't ask anything impossible," the inquisitor replied. "All I want

is a straight-forward story from you, with all details. If you keep

anything back or lie to me, I'm very likely to find it out, and then

you'll fare worse than if you refused point blank to enter into an

agreement with me."

"All right," said Tourtelle, "I suppose I may as well give in, for you

seem to have some real information, although I can't understand where or

how you got it. Anyway, here's my story:

*CHAPTER XIV*

*TOURTELLE'S STORY*

"I must first tell you who I am," Lieut. Tourtelle began, after some

moments' deliberation. Ordinarily his countenance was almost

expressionless, for he belonged to a certain type of pulseless-souled

humanity that talks little with the face, except through that orifice

where the tongue wig-wags the signals of the mind. But on this

occasion, he looked not only serious, but seriously concerned over his

predicament. Before he got farther with his introduction, however,

Lieut. Osborne interrupted him with this warning:

"I want to urge you, Tourtelle, to be very careful to tell the truth and

the whole truth, because you are surely going to get yourself into

trouble if you don't. We know a good deal more than I have told you,

and I promise you that I have some information on which I can catch you

if you tell me any lies."

"You needn't be afraid of my lying to you," the spy returned quickly;

"for, to tell the truth, I'm sick of this whole business. I wish I'd

never got into it, and if I succeed in getting out with a whole skin,

I'll admit I'm glad you caught me.

"I've done a whole lot of thinking since I agreed to put this thing over

or try to put it over. There's a lot of difference between sitting

still and dreaming how you love your father's fatherland before he

emigrated, and plotting in the midst of your fellow countrymen to help a

lot of tyrants whom you've never seen on the other side o' the world. I

didn't think of that until I got up to my neck in this business and

found it almost impossible to get out.

"You see, my father was an Austrian, and my mother was from

Alsace-Lorraine. Both of them died when I was five or six years old and

I was adopted by a brother of my father, also an Austrian, of course.

By the way, my name is not Tourtelle and never was. That was just a bit

of camouflage, so that I might pass as being of French descent. My real

name is Hessenburg. My uncle was most bitterly anti-British in this

war, and is yet. He was a man of considerable means and position in the

business world, was a member of the board of directors of that hospital

in Toronto where my arm was tattooed. Yes, that hospital was a hotbed

of spies, and I'm glad they raided it.

"I wasn't taken into the confidence of the high-ups in the spy

organization in Canada, but I know it was a big one. I suppose they

thought I was too young to be trusted with any more information than was

necessary to make me useful. And for that reason, you see, they did not

translate to me the message that was tattooed on my arm, and they didn't

give me the key to work out the cipher. Besides, I'm no telegrapher.

You'll understand, therefore, that they didn't pick much of an expert to

carry their message."

"Didn't you know that there were telegraphic characters in that picture

on your arm?" asked Lieut. Osborne.

"Yes, or rather I suspected it pretty strongly," was the reply.

"And you don't know what the message is?"

"No, I don't."

"Haven't you any idea?"

"Well, yes, I have an idea, but it's pretty vague. I overheard a little

of a conversation not intended for my ears, and from that I got the

notion, or perhaps it's only a suspicion, that the message contains the

British naval or aeronautical wireless code."

"At any rate, it's of great importance," suggested Lieut. Osborne.

"Oh, there's no doubt about that," Tourtelle, or Hessenburg, assured.

"Are you an artist?" was the inquisitor's next question.

"Yes, I am; that is, I was an art student, and the story I told Ellis

about making a hit with a cubist painting is true. That's what started

the scheme of tattooing a picture message on my arm."

"Who suggested it?"

"One of the fellows who did the work. He was something of an artist as

well as a chemist.

"The fellow with whiskers?"

"Yes," replied the spy. "I see you have had a pretty thorough report of

that affair."

"We have. Did you know that the boy who was seized in the hall and

dragged into the laboratory left with the pen-and-ink sketch of your

painting crumpled up in his hand?"

"No. Is that what became of it? One of the men suggested that he must

have stolen it, but I didn't think he was right."

"Did you know they put detectives on his track?"

"No. Did they?"

"That's what they did. And that is probably the reason why the hospital

was raided a few days later. If they hadn't followed him, the boy

probably would have passed the matter up and dismissed it from his mind.

But he became restlessly curious and reported the affair to the police."

"Hm!" Tourtelle grunted at this elucidation.

"Do you mean for me to understand that you have no idea whom this

message is for?" asked Lieut. Osborne, indicating the section of skin

illuminated with cubist art.

"That's exactly what I mean," the cubist spy replied.

"But what were you supposed to do after you got over into Germany?"

"Seek out an army officer and tell him my story. Any officer, I was

told, would know at once what to do with me."

"Do you speak German?"

"Not much, nor Austrian, either. I studied German at school and learned

enough to be able to make myself understood on the other side of the

Rhine."

"Come on, Ellis," said Lieut. Osborne, rising suddenly. "We've got all

we want now. I'll report to the colonel and probably in a day or two

Tourtelle will hear from us again. I'm going to take this cubist

souvenir with me."

In the course of the conversation he had repacked the section of

tattooed skin in the salt, and as he arose to leave he put the box in

one of his overcoat pockets. Irving followed him out of the building,

and soon they were speeding back over the road by which they had reached

the field hospital.

*CHAPTER XV*

*IRVING AN ORDERLY*

"We will go direct to Col. Evans' headquarters," Lieut. Osborne

announced shortly after the return trip had been begun. "He asked me to

report back to him as soon as possible."

The trip was soon made. The colonel's headquarters were less than a

mile behind the rear line trenches, and the road to this point was in

fairly good condition.

Irving felt a deep interest in this visit aside from the bearing it had

on the matter under investigation. He had never seen a colonel's

headquarters and was curious to know what appearance such a place might

present.

He was not greatly surprised to find it a dugout, although he had not

pictured it such in his mind. The first suggestion that had offered

itself to him was that the head of the regiment probably had stationed

himself in the palatial residence or chateau of some wealthy fugitive

civilian. However, when the truth appeared to him with the most

commonplace simplicity, he decided that it was the very thing that he

ought to have expected.

The dugout was a two-room affair in the side of a hill on the outskirts

of a small village. The hill was covered with fruit trees and berry

vines, affording an excellent camouflage. One of the rooms was occupied

by the colonel and the other by his orderlies. The walls and roof were

of concrete, thick enough to resist heavy bombing from the air. Other

attaches of this headquarters were housed in several homes of the

otherwise deserted village.

The commander of the regiment received the visitors in his elaborately

furnished living room, bedroom and dining room. Lieut. Osborne began at

once a rapid account of the interview he had had with Second Lieut.

Tourtelle, or Hessenburg. The colonel listened attentively, every now

and then casting a sharp and sometimes lingering glance at Private

Ellis, who had all he could do to suppress the anxious eagerness he felt

relative to impending developments. Naturally, as he had rather

dubiously offered the original information that led up to the partial

disclosure of extensive spy activities, he felt as if his whole future

depended upon the full success of the investigation.

Lieut. Osborne opened the box containing the tattooed message and took

it out of its salt packing. Col. Evans examined it curiously while the

reporting officer explained all he knew about it, calling attention to

the telegraphic dots and dashes running around the numerous "cubes."

"We ought to get somebody who is skilled in cryptographic work busy on

this at once," said the colonel. "I've been in communication with the

brigadier general's headquarters and suggested that to them, and now

that I have this in my possession, I'm going to urge it stronger. I'll

get them on the wire again."

They were seated at a table at one side of the room, and as he spoke,

the regiment commander cranked the telephone box at his right and lifted

the receiver to his ear. The conversation was short, for the

intelligence department at the brigade headquarters had been busy on the

colonel's suggestion and already had found an expert qualified to probe

the mystery of the cubist cryptogram. He would start at once for the

regimental headquarters.

"Just wait here till our cryptologist arrives," said the colonel, after

reporting the result of his conversation over the telephone; "and maybe

he'll be able to clear up matters so that we may begin to see bottom."

The expert, Lieut. Gibbons, attached to the divisional commander's

intelligence staff, arrived half an hour later, and the spy story had to

be told all over again for his benefit, while he examined curiously the

"freak-art camouflaged message."

"I may be able to work this out in a few hours, and then again, it may

take several days," he said. "I'd better take it with me back to

headquarters and work on it there and report back results as soon as I

get them."

The colonel assented to this and the expert prepared to depart with the

cubist cryptogram in his possession. Then the regimental commander

turned to the officer and the private and said:

"Lieutenant, you will return to your company. I will call on you when I

wish to communicate with you again on this matter. Private Ellis, you

will remain here. I can use another orderly, and, besides, I'd like to

have you close at hand in case of further developments in this spy

investigation. By the way, can you operate a motorcycle?"

"Yes, sir," Irving replied.

"Good. You can be useful at once. I have some papers that I want

delivered to the brigadier general. You may follow Lieut. Gibbons'

automobile and learn the way. He goes past the brigadier general's

headquarters."

A motorcycle was soon produced and Irving, after a hurried examination

of it, announced that he understood it thoroughly. A minute later he

was in the saddle and "lickety-chugging" along after the intelligence

official's automobile.

And meanwhile there was buzzing in his brain this new wonder with eager

expectation:

"What was the real purpose of Col. Evans in keeping him at

headquarters"? Was that officer likely to have further army detective

work for him to do?

Already he was beginning to feel like a government secret service man,

and he longed to be of further service to his country and the cause of

world freedom in this romantic line.

He little dreamed how far beyond the scope of his saner imagination his

patriotic longing was to be realized.

*CHAPTER XVI*

*A STARTLING ANNOUNCEMENT*

Three days later Col. Evans summoned Irving into his dugout office and

said to him: "Well, the cubist cryptogram has been read."

The officer smiled with a kind of grim exultation as he spoke. Then he

added:

"And it contained very important information."

"I'm glad of it," the boy answered simply, although he felt almost as if

he would burst with a "hurrah!" that threatened to explode within him.

"Of course you are," the commander concurred. "And I suppose you'd like

to know what's in it."

"Naturally," Irving replied; "but I doubt very much if you are going to

tell me."

"Why?"

"Because, in the first place, it's none of my business as a private;

and, secondly, I presume it is information of a character that the war

department wishes to keep secret."

"Right you are, Ellis. That's the main reason I put the matter up to

you. I wanted to find out what you thought of it. But there's another

reason why you shouldn't know the contents of that message, and I'll

tell you that later. Meanwhile, I have another important matter that I

want to quiz you on. Do you want to go back to the trenches?"

"I'm perfectly willing to go back if that is the best thing I can do,"

Irving answered readily. "But I'll say this, that if there's any other

place where I can be of greater service, I prefer to be sent there.

It's a question of service pure and simple with me. Naturally, I have

my selfish preferences, but I manage to suppress them."

"Have you any idea where you could be of greater service than in the

trenches?" asked the colonel.

"I'll answer your question in this way: I'm sure that the time I spent

helping to run down a dangerous spy was put to much better purpose than

it would have been if spent in the trenches, although I think I did some

good work out in No Man's Land in front of the trenches. But, of

course, there's no more of that kind of work left for me to do."

"Are you sure about that?"

Irving looked curiously at the putter of this question, considered a

moment or two, and then replied:

"No, I'm not; but I don't know of anything more."

"Suppose some more of that kind of work should be found, would you like

to do it?"

"Surely."

"Irrespective of the size of the task or the danger?"

"I don't know how I could find anything much more dangerous than that

skirmish in No Man's Land," Irving replied slowly. "The other part of

your question I don't wish to answer rashly. Tell me the task, and I'll

tell you if it's too big for me."

"That's the very answer I wanted you to make," said the colonel, almost

eagerly. "Now, suppose we should ask you to go over into Germany on an

important spy mission, how would that strike you?"

This was something Irving was not looking for, and he was so astonished

that he did not answer for several moments. Then he said:

"It would strike me all right."

"Suppose you were given a credential that would effect admittance for

you into high official circles--would you go there and attempt to obtain

information that might be available, because of your credential?"

"Yes, sir," Irving replied firmly.

"What do you think of that stunt of tattooing a message in the form of a

freak art production on the arm of Lieut. Tourtelle?"

Irving smiled.

"Of course," he said, "it was clever and under ordinary circumstances

ought to have been successful; but I'd rather not go through life with a

thing like that on my arm. It might brand me as a freak, if not

something worse."

"I don't blame you," returned the colonel, but as he spoke a peculiar

shrewdness lighted his eyes, causing the boy to wonder a little. Then he

added: "Still, it might be possible for one to submit to such nonsense

if thereby he might advance a great and worthy cause."

"Sure, that's quite possible," Irving agreed; "but I don't see how

Tourtelle, or Hessenburg, can claim any such motive."

"No, but if he had done it for his own country, the British empire, to

advance the cause of human freedom, what then?"

"Well, in spite of the ridiculous appearance of the picture on his arm,

I'd say he ought to be proud to keep it there. I would. I think I'd be

proud to show it. It would be something to show and tell about

to--to--my great-great-grandchildren when I got old, you see," Irving

finished with a really illuminating smile.

"I think I've quizzed you far enough on this subject," Col. Evans

announced at this point, throwing off the manner of vagueness that had

hitherto characterized a good deal of his conversation, and speaking

with unmistakable directness. "I'm now going to ask you to consent to

have that cubist picture tattooed on your arm."

Irving looked in astonishment at the commanding officer of the regiment,

being scarcely able to believe his ears. Surely the proposition was

nonsensical. And, yet, this was no occasion for nonsense. But the

boy's wondering conjectures were interrupted by the officer, who was

adding to his last announcement.

"After the art work on your arm is finished," he said, "I'm going to

send you into Germany to find out some things we want to know."

"Yes?" Irving responded, with a rising inflection that carried with it a

suggestion of an interrogation.

"Yes," the officer continued; "I want you to take the place of the spy

whose tattooed arm had to be amputated."

*CHAPTER XVII*

*PARACHUTE PRACTICE*

Private Ellis looked hard into vacancy and thought just as hard for half

a minute; then he said:

"I get you, I think, Col. Evans, all except one point; and that, I

suppose, would come to me all right if I knew the contents of that

tattooed message."

"No, you wouldn't," the colonel returned quickly. "It wouldn't do you a

bit of good."

"I'd know whether it's important," Irving insisted.

"I can tell you that much," was the officer's reassurance; "and then

you're no better off. It's of vast importance and would be of

incalculable value to our enemies if it fell into their hands."

"Then there's only one explanation of your proposition," Irving

concluded. "You will change the dots and dashes so that they will

convey information different from that originally intended."

"Good!" exclaimed the colonel. "You'll do all right. Are you willing

to undertake it?"

"I am," said Irving.

"Very well. So far so good. Now I'm going to test your nerve some

more. Look out, for this is going to be a corker. If you drop, you'll

drop hard."

"I'm waiting," said the boy, with a kind of gritty grin.

"All right. Would you dare make a descent with a parachute from an

altitude of several thousand feet?"

This was a tester, indeed. Irving knew it the instant the last word of

the question left the colonel's lips, but he did not flinch.

"Of course, I ought to have some preparation for such a feat," he

replied. "I've never been up in an aeroplane."

"To be sure," Col. Evans agreed, with a vigorous nod. "You'll get all

the schooling necessary. You'll start out on the venture well equipped.

I'm going to send you to the aviation field near brigade headquarters,

and there you'll learn to do your umbrella stunt. Then you'll come back

here and go through some more preliminaries. The work of a spy, you

see, is just as much of a science as the handling of an army."

That ended the interview, and an hour or two later Irving started in an

automobile for the aviation field with a note from the colonel to the

flying commander. There he was placed under an expert, and his

schooling in the art of dropping from lofty heights began.

Private Ellis did not clearly understand just how all this program was

to be carried out, but he had no doubt that Col. Evans had a complete

plan in mind and that the missing details would fit in well with what

had already been revealed to him. So he went about his new work

confident that the outlook for success was good.

His training at the aviation field lasted a week. During that time he

made half a dozen descents by parachute from various altitudes. The last

descent was from a height of 3,000 feet. By this time the experience

had become almost as commonplace a thriller as coasting on a long

toboggan slide or "dipping the dips" at an up-to-date amusement park.

He had never dreamed that descending with a parachute could become so

matter-of-course a performance.

"I understand now how circus people can look on their death-defying

stunts without being awe-struck with their own daring," he mused after

he had floated down the fourth time at the rate of three-and-a-half feet

a second. "Just think of it: a good swift sprinter would run a hundred

yards in about one-third the time that I take to fall thirty-five feet.

This is quite a revelation of physical science to me."

Irving was by nature a very observing youth. His instructor was

something more than a mere bird-man, for he had studied aviation as a

mathematical, as well as a physical, science. He showed the boy how to

figure out the rate of falling after being given the diameter of a

standard-made parachute and the weight of the aeronaut.

The parachute with which the young spy-student got his experience as a

diver from the sky was one of several supplied for experimental work

following reports that the enemy had perfected a similar device which

had proved successful as a life saver in air battles. But the

experiments of Allied aviators had not proved sufficiently successful to

warrant providing all air fighters with "high-dive umbrellas." Descents

could be made with reasonable assurance of safety from aeroplanes flying

in good order, but if a pilot lost control of his machine the chances

were small that he or his companion gunner or bomb dropper would be able

to leap free from the struts and other framework with a parachute.

Irving would have liked to learn to pilot an aeroplane, but there was

not time enough for him to take up that study. Indeed, before half the

week had elapsed he decided he could like no occupation better than that

of an aviator. He saw several expeditions start out to meet the enemy at

the front, and also saw them return, followed by the announcement on two

occasions that several of the British and Canadian flyers who had gone

out to meet the foe, full of confidence in their own prowess, would

return no more. They had been either shot down or forced to descend

within the enemy's lines.

Nothing was said at the aviation field regarding the reason for the

training that was being given to Private Ellis. No questions were asked

and Irving did not volunteer any information. At last the instructor

stated to the boy that he had completed his course and had learned his

lessons well, and that he was now at liberty to seek further directions

from the colonel. He accordingly returned to the latter's dugout.

Col. Evans asked him a number of questions, and then said:

"I want you to return to the field hospital and get some more

information from that spy, Tourtelle, or Hessenburg. And in getting

your information, remember that you are to impersonate him on the other

side of the Rhine. Now, this is going to be a test of your

spy-intelligence. Let's see how well equipped you can return here after

your next interview with him. Do you get me, or must I give you some

tips?"

"Don't give me any tips, but let me show you what I can do," Irving

replied. "If I fall down on this mission, you'll know I'm not the

fellow for the job."

"All right," said the colonel. "I've telephoned for Lieut. Osborne to

come here and accompany you again. But this time, remember, you are to

do the quizzing, and the lieutenant is to report to me how efficiently

you went at it."

"I'm glad to be put on my own responsibility, sir, before I drop down

from the clouds into the midst of the enemy," the boy said grimly.

*CHAPTER XVIII*

*STUDYING TO BE A SPY*

An hour later Lieut. Osborne arrived at the colonel's headquarters, and

he and Private Ellis started at once for the field hospital. There they

found Hessenburg, alias Tourtelle, much improved physically, but not a

little nervous regarding his own rather precarious prospects. Instead

of being an officer helping to direct, in his small way, the battle

against the autocratic presumption of a great military power, he was

something more than an ordinary prisoner of war--a trapped spy, who had

conspired with others for the downfall of his own country. With

seemingly genuine repentance, he exhibited much eagerness to give all

the information possible in order to induce leniency for himself from a

court-martial.

"I am instructed by Col. Evans to make this statement to you as coming

from him," Irving announced early in the interview: "He desires all the

information you can give him regarding your program that was to have

been followed if you had succeeded in making your way beyond the enemy

lines. He has certain plans in view, the success of which will depend

largely on the correctness of your information. If you should misinform

him, through us, those plans undoubtedly would fail. Moreover, if any

enemy spy should get a tip through you or anybody else, that the

information supplied by you was being used to attain important ends,

those ends probably would never be reached.

"What we must have from you, therefore, is the truth, and the whole

truth. To insure his receiving this, Col. Evans has asked me to inform

you that the only thing that can save you is the success of his plan.

If the plan fails, he will assume that the blame is yours and you will

be shot."

Irving paused a moment, and Hessenburg seized the opportunity offered to

interpose thus:

"You mean to say that he will have me shot for something for which I'm

not the least responsible?"

"Not at all," Irving replied. "You will be shot for being a spy, which

has already been proved against you. But if you're careful to tell us

the truth, even though I don't cover some of it with my questions, your

chances to escape that penalty are good."

"I understand," said the spy. "Fire away. I'll do the best I can."

The three were seated about a small table in a small room selected for

the purpose. The door was closed. Irving drew a note-book and pencil

from his pockets and prepared to jot down reminders of the information

received by him.

"First," he said, "we'll all talk in low tones to prevent, if possible,

anybody's overhearing us. Now, begin by telling me what was the extent

of your acquaintance with spies in Canada and their system of

operations."

"My acquaintance with those people and their affairs was very limited,"

Hessenburg replied. "I can't even say that my uncle was, or is, a spy,

although it would be natural to suspect him. Government agents watched

him pretty closely, and it's possible that he didn't actually do

anything that would call for his arrest. But I'm pretty certain he knew

a good deal more than I did. I think he knew all about my affair and

approved of it. To tell the truth, I believe that it was through him

that the spy organization learned that my sympathies were treasonable

and decided to approach me on the subject of making a spy agent out of

me.

"It was the man with whiskers at the hospital who first broached the

subject to me: You seem to have a pretty complete report of that affair.

That man was a physician, and I got acquainted with him while making

business trips to the hospital for my uncle. He learned that I was an

art student, and one thing led to another, until he knew I wanted

England and France to be defeated and was willing to do anything I could

secretly to bring that about. After that it didn't take him long to

persuade me to be the bearer of a tattooed message on my arm into

Germany. The other fellow who helped tattoo the message was the artist,

an architectural draftsman with considerable skill at free-hand

drawing."

"What are their names?" asked Irving.

"Dr. Adolph Marks and Jacob L. Voltz."

"What is your uncle's name?"

"Ferdinand J. Hessenburg."

"What does the 'J' stand for?"

"Johan."

Irving put a long string of questions of this kind, and thus obtained

much detailed information regarding the spy and his family connections

and home surroundings, also concerning the art school he attended in

Toronto. He made copious notes of the answers, so that the process of

questioning the confessed enemy agent was necessarily much slower than

it otherwise would have been.

"I'm up against one difficulty that I'd like to clear away," the

inquisitor mused in the course of his examination of the wounded "second

looie"; "and that is the fact that this fellow is an artist and I am

not. Suppose when I get over in Berlin, some wise fellow, full of

information from Canada, should ask me to paint a cubist picture. What

would I do? I must find out if there's any danger of my being asked to

do anything of that sort to test my identity."

He continued his questioning thus:

"Did those two men who tattooed that picture on your arm know that you

were an art student?"

"Oh, sure," Hessenburg replied. "That's how they happened to suggest

the art method of conveying the message."

"And how about your credentials, your identification when you got into

Germany? How were the German officials to know who you were, that you

weren't a fake?"

"By the message itself."

"You think your instructors believed that was enough?"

"Yes, they said so. We had that question up for discussion. I raised

it myself."

"How did you raise it?"

"I wanted them to get word to Berlin by another route to look out for

me, but they said that would involve a danger that they were trying to

avoid by the tattoo method. If they tried to get a wireless code

message to Berlin, it might be intercepted and deciphered, and then a

thorough search would be made for me."

Irving was much relieved by this statement. There was no reason to

suspect Hessenburg of trying to deceive him in this regard. The spy

could have no grounds to suspect that his inquisitor was planning to

take his place and carry an altered copy of the cubist message to the

war lords of the enemy.

"I guess I'm safe enough in that regard," he told himself. Then he

added aloud:

"You think they have no information regarding you in Berlin?"

"Yes--I don't see why they should. I was informed that the contents of

the message would be all the credential I'd need, that it would make me

so popular among the high-ups that I could have anything I asked for."

"But they wouldn't tell you what was in the message?"

"I didn't ask. I knew better. The plan we were working on was directly

opposed to my knowing the information I was to carry."

The quizzing of Hessenburg continued half an hour longer, and Irving and

the lieutenant started back for the colonel's headquarters.

"Did I omit any questions I should have asked?" the spy-student inquired

after they had ridden a short distance.

"You did fine," Lieut. Osborne replied. "I couldn't think of another

question that I would have asked."

*CHAPTER XIX*

*LAST PREPARATIONS*

The next move in Irving's program of preparation for spy work in Germany

had to do with the tattooing of an altered copy of the cubist art

message on his arm. The alterations were made by the cryptologist who

had deciphered the original message. He made the changes after

consulting with intelligence officials, who prepared a system of dots

and dashes that ostensibly conveyed valuable information. This

"information," however, was not only misleading, but it was of such

character that the deception could hardly be discovered before the lapse

of months and possibly a year or more.

By the time the spy-student had "completed his course of study" the

material, instruments, and artist were ready for the pictorial

operation. The instruments had been supplied by a surgeon, the artist

had been discovered after a search by telephone communication with the

various official headquarters of the regiment, and the material, some

pure aniline dye, had been found in a moving laboratory, or automobile

chemical outfit, maintained for surgical, sanitation, pure food, and

pure water purposes for the army.

The artist, aided by a surgeon, and the dye and some sharp-pointed

needles, did the work. It was a long and tedious task, and many rests

were required for the users of the dye-dipped needles in order to keep

their nerves steady and their judgment sure in the delicate workmanship.

After it was finished, the boy compared it with the salt-preserved

original, and decided that the result could hardly have been more

satisfactory for the desired purpose.

Then Irving had another session with Col. Evans, who gave him his final

instructions.

"I haven't given you much of an idea yet what we want you to find out

for us at Berlin, or wherever you can get the information," said the

commander of the regiment. "We know, of course, that there is an

extensive enemy spy organization in both Canada and the United States,

and while we are able to get a few of those fellows now and then, still

they're pretty smart as a rule, and we feel that we have only scratched

the surface. We want their names, or the name of every leader of

consequence among them. That's what we're sending you into Germany for.

You must realize, therefore, that the mission on which you are being

sent is one of no small consequence. The highest officers in the army

have been acquainted with the plan and not only concurred in it, but

offered suggestions for its improvement and perfection.

"You have learned from Hessenburg what you are to do when you land on

German soil. You will probably be taken to Berlin or some important

German military point, and there your message will be read. You will be

a hero in the minds of the highest commanders and will undoubtedly be

granted any favor you ask. My suggestion is that you ask to be assigned

for study to qualify you for the most confidential and important work in

the enemy secret service. Tell them you wish to return to America as a

leader in the work and call their attention to the fact that, as you

have become pretty thoroughly Americanized, or Canadianized, and lost

most of the foreign appearance and accent of your father, you can pass

successfully as a loyal citizen of the dominion. Then work your way

into the confidence of those who are directing the spy system of our

enemies and get at their records. Get the names of all the leaders you

can find. You may be able to do this openly, for your own information

when you return to take up more important work in Canada and the United

States. Give special attention to the spy activities in the United

States, for we want to show that the pro-German agents in that country

are violating its policy of neutrality.

"Now, let me tell you frankly why we have selected you for this work in

spite of your youth. Any man,--I won't call you a boy, for from now on

you must be a man in every sense of the word,--any man who can put

together the twos and twos you summed up after your experience with

Hessenburg, or Tourtelle, and after reading your cousin's letter, is a

natural-born investigator. The average person would have been confused

by that evidence; he would not have had the nerve to form the

conclusions you formed. I'm not saying this to flatter you. If you feel

in the least flattered, you had better say so at once, and give up the

whole scheme, for there is great danger of your failing and being shot.

Let me tell you why:

"The man who has one second's time to entertain a conceited or

self-conscious thought, devotes just that much time to the undermining

of his own strength. Get me?"

"Absolutely," Irving replied. "I've told myself that many times,

although not in those words."

"Now," continued the colonel, "I believe you told me that you had

studied German at school?"

"Yes, I had one year of it."

"And Hessenburg said he knew only a little of the language?"

"Yes."

"Does he know any Austrian?"

"No. His uncle and his father, although Austrians by birth, lived

mostly in Germany until they emigrated."

"Good. You will not be under suspicion because of your ignorance of the

German language. Still, it would be well for you to be able to make

yourself understood and to understand others from the moment you get

into that country. So I'm going to put you under an instructor for a

few days."

In accord with this announcement, Private Ellis talked nothing but

German for a week with an orderly of German parentage who had enlisted

with the Canadian army to help "get the kaiser." By the end of that

time he felt as if he could hold his own, conversationally, at anything

from a kaffee klatsch to a Berliner royal turnverein, and announced that

he was ready to make his "high dive" into the land of the enemy.

*CHAPTER XX*

*"SECOND LOOIE ELLIS"*