IN THE OLD LORRAINE CHATEAU
What Jack said in his cautious fashion puzzled Tom. For the life of him
he could not understand what had arisen, calling for any unusual display
of generalship. Surely Jack should have been equal to the task of
getting Bessie down from the window, even if he had to make use of
knotted bed-clothes in lieu of a rope.
Still he had asked Tom to come up, and there was nothing to do but grant
his request. "Complications," Jack said, had arisen. That was a
suggestive word, and to Tom's mind seemed to hint at further mystery.
Accordingly he proceeded to imitate the example of his comrade. Jack had
shown the way, and all his chum had to do was to follow. As Tom was also
an all-around athlete, accustomed to much climbing from small boyhood,
after nuts and birds' nests and all such things as take lads into tall
trees, he found but little trouble in making the ascent.
When he drew himself alongside Jack, the other gave a sigh of relief.
"Whee! I'm glad you've come, I tell you, Tom," he said. "It was getting
too big a job for me to tackle."
"What's happened, Jack?" asked the late arrival on the stone ledge under
the window of the upper room.
"First, here's Bessie, Tom," Jack went on. "She wants to shake hands
with you. Since we parted, when the steamer was docked, the poor girl
has been having all sorts of trouble; and she's glad as can be to see us
both again; aren't you, Bessie?"
Tom, feeling a small, trembling hand groping for his, immediately
grasped it, and gave a squeeze that must have carried conviction to the
heart of the girl.
"Oh, I'm shivering like everything!" she murmured, adding quickly: "But
not with fear. It's because my prayers have been answered, and help has
come at last, when everything looked so awfully dark--and I'm so very,
very hungry."
"Hungry!" repeated Tom, starting, it seemed such a very strange word for
the girl to use, even though they were in Germany, where all food he
knew must be getting exceedingly scarce.
"Yes, what do you think, that rotten bounder of a spy is half starving
the poor girl! He ought to be tarred and feathered, that's what!"
growled the indignant Jack.
"Not so loud," warned Tom. "Some one may hear you, Jack. But tell me
what you've learned."
"Why, first of all, Tom, it was Bessie who wrote that warning message I
had, and attached it to that little balloon, hoping the favorable breeze
would carry it over the front to the French lines. So that mystery is
explained. Then, Tom, there are _two_ we've got to take out of this
place, instead of just one, as we thought."
"I don't get you!" Tom ejaculated. "What do you mean by two?"
"It's a story in itself, I guess," whispered Jack. "I don't wholly
understand it myself. But it seems that Bessie's mother didn't drown
after all when the _Lusitania_ went down, as Potzfeldt reported she
did."
"You surprise me, Jack! How could that be?" demanded the other youth,
thrilled by the startling information.
"Oh, that slick rascal managed it somehow," came the soft if indignant
reply. "We'll learn more about it later on. He was picked up by a
fishing boat. The lady was temporarily out of her mind, so he gave it
out later that she had gone down. How he ever got her over here in
Germany beats me. But he managed to do it it seems. And she's been kept
a prisoner in this old chateau of his ever since!"
"But what was his object?" asked the amazed Tom.
"It had a heap to do with finances," Jack told him. "While he held a
paper that gave him charge over her daughter over in America, and a part
of the big Gleason fortune also, there were valuable papers he had been
unable to get his greedy hands on. She absolutely refused to tell him
where they were hidden. As a last resort what did the wretch do but go
all the way back to America."
"You mean to fetch his ward across with him, Jack?"
"Yes, just to use Bessie as a lever to compel her mother to give up
those valuable papers. I always said, you remember, Tom, that man was
hugging some secret to his heart. And so he was."
"He's been treating Bessie badly then, half starving her, I think you
said?" continued Tom.
"Just what he has, poor girl," growled his chum, savagely. "It's an
awful thing to be hungry! I don't see how any one can stand it. But he
hasn't broken the spirit of either of them yet, though Bessie's getting
so weak she finds herself crying every now and then, just as we heard
her. And it was that which brought us over to find out what it meant.
But Tom, tell her we mean to stand by, and see that both her mother and
herself are taken to a place of safety."
This Tom readily did, though as yet he could hardly understand just how
their promise could be fulfilled. One they might manage to take aloft
with them, by crowding, but the Caudron was not capable of seating four;
nor would it be safe to carry a couple of inexperienced passengers along
with themselves.
"But we're losing valuable time," he observed. "The sooner we get in
touch with Mrs. Gleason the better. There's a whole lot to be done
before we can say we're on the safe side of the fence."
"Then first of all we'd better climb inside the room, hadn't we?"
suggested Jack.
In answer Tom proceeded to get one leg over the sill, and then pass his
entire body across. Jack quickly followed. In the semi-darkness, for the
moon gave a dim light, they clustered there, and continued to map out
their immediate plans in whispers that could not have been heard a dozen
feet distant.
It appeared that Bessie knew where her mother was confined, though both
doors were fastened on the outside to prevent their having
communication. But the girl had found a way. Night after night she was
accustomed to slipping from her window, when everything was quiet below
and the lights all out, making her way along that narrow coping, or
ledge, and tapping softly at the window of her mother's room.
They would remain together until toward morning, when the girl made it a
practice to return by the same perilous route.
On this particular night it had seemed as though the lights below would
never go out. Carl Potzfeldt, the master spy, expecting important news
and a messenger from the headquarters of the Crown Prince, had been
waiting up until long after midnight in order to fullfil the important
duties entrusted to him.
Jack suggested that he creep along that coping and inform the lady of
the golden chance for escape that had arrived. But as she would hardly
be able to return by the same way, it seemed as though some other scheme
must be considered.
Bessie herself had a brilliant thought bordering on an inspiration.
"Listen, and I will tell you," she said at this juncture. "All the time
I have been here my one thought has been of escape. I dreamed nothing
else save getting my poor mother away from the clutches of that coward
who had hypnotized her in the past, and made her believe he was a good
man as well as her cousin from Alsace-Lorraine. And I know of a way it
can be done."
"Tell us your plan, please," begged Jack; though he would be sorry to
learn that the honor of releasing Bessie's imprisoned mother was not to
fall to his share in the undertaking.
"There is another window. It opens upon a hallway; and I can get through
it, because I've tried it more than once. But the proper time hadn't
come, for how were we to flee from this awful country? Wait for me here,
both of you. I shall be able to open her barred door, and then my own.
And it is better that I carry her the good news than some one who would
be a stranger to my mother, however much I have told her about you."
Tom saw that her plan was the best, after all. He himself had been a
little afraid that if Jack came tapping at the window of Mrs. Gleason's
room she might take the alarm, thinking it but another twist to the
odious schemes of Potzfeldt, and perhaps shrieking out in terror, which
would cause an alarm, and ruin everything.
Bessie climbed nimbly out of the window, showing how accustomed she was
to such athletic exercises. Jack held on to her to the last, and his
whispers were all of an entreating character, as he begged her to be
very careful, and not slip in her excitement.
Now she was gone, and the two air service boys, left by themselves in
that room of the old Lorraine chateau, counted the seconds and the
minutes until they should hear a gentle signal at the door, to signify
that Bessie and her mother were there, about to enter.
Jack walked softly up and down, like a velvet-footed tiger in its cage.
He was so worked up by the excitement of the occasion that Tom did not
have the heart to ask him to stop his movements, though he certainly
would have done so had not the other been keeping on his tiptoes all the
while.
What a remarkable turn their venture into the country back of the
enemy's lines had taken! And what astounding discoveries they had made
in the bargain!
Jack was getting more and more impatient. Several times did he pause at
the door, to lay his ear close to the heavy panel, and listen. He
wondered what could be keeping Bessie. Surely she had had ample time to
open the door of her mother's room and explain everything to the lady.
In his excitement he pictured all sorts of fresh trouble as having
befallen the girl. What if by accident she had run across the master
German spy in the corridor? But then, in such a case, Bessie surely
would have screamed in order to warn her two friends that they were in
danger of being discovered, should Potzfeldt and some of his assistants
burst into the room.
Of course Jack had magnified things wonderfully. Less than half the time
had elapsed than he thought had passed when there came a soft scratching
on the door to notify them Bessie was there. They next heard a slight
creaking sound, and then the soft closing of the door.
"Bessie, is it you?" asked the eager Jack, softly.
A reply in the affirmative followed.
"And here is mother with me," added the girl, a note of joy in her
voice, even though she spoke in a whisper.
So they came together. In the semi-darkness the boys could not see what
Bessie's mother looked like. They did note, however, that she was small
of stature; and this fact pleased Tom very much indeed. For already he
had figured out just how the rescue must be carried out, since there
seemed to be no other way.
His plans would entail some sacrifice on Jack's part, and also more or
less exposure to peril; but then Tom knew his chum too well to imagine
he would hesitate even a moment when called upon to take this additional
burden on his shoulders.
Both of them squeezed the trembling hand of the woman, and as best they
were able assured her that they meant to carry both Bessie and herself
to a place of safety, provided they were courageous enough to trust
themselves to the care of two air pilots.