SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE
Porky and Beany sat perfectly still, staring with round, bulging
eyes at the Colonel. They did not speak. They just sat there
and thought and stared, and stared and thought again. This was
about the most stunning blow of all. They had known the mate
throughout the voyage as a silent, kindly man who had treated
them well but had not made the least impression on them otherwise.
A spy! It couldn't be! Porky was conscious of a wave of horror
as he told himself that there must be some mistake. Not the
second mate! Such a nice man, always pottering about, always
ready to answer questions, always interested in everything,
always and forever asking questions himself, wanting to know
everything about themselves and their home and their plans for
the future.
And he had been specially interested in the Colonel--where he was
going and what he was going to do.
Now that the boys, taking time to think about it, happened on
that thought, it was rather funny what an amount of interest the
old fellow had taken in trivial things concerning their beloved
Colonel. But it had gone over the boys' heads because they were
so accustomed to having every one think that the Colonel was
about the whole thing, and to hearing every one talk about him,
that the strange interest of the second mate did not raise a
question in their minds.
They had merely felt the flattered importance that they always
felt about anything and everything concerning the truly great and
simple-minded man whom they were so proud to know and to be with.
For Colonel Bright was a truly great man. They were to learn
that fact more and more as time went on, and as they saw him
tried by circumstances that could only bring out the best and
noblest in men. They saw troubled, perplexed, wounded and
distressed. It was their great good fortune to feel that there
were times when this great man really needed their boyish but
deeply loyal and loving support. It was just as well that the
future, so terrible and so bloodstained, was hidden from their
young eyes.
It is enough for this story that already the boys recognized the
gallant, simple courage and tenderness of the Colonel; enough
that all their lives they were to be strengthened and ennobled by
the example of his straightforward everyday life. When Porky and
Beany had themselves become great men, when, in their turn, boys
looked up to them with admiration and love, they learned to look
back with boundless gratitude to the fate that had led them,
through the Boy Scouts, into the friendship of Colonel Bright.
A faint inkling of this, passed through the minds of the twins as
they sat waiting for the Colonel to begin his story. And each
knew that the other felt it.
The Colonel regarded the boys with twinkling eyes.
"Sort of surprising, isn't it?" he said. "Not that this affair
would ever have come into your scheme of things at all, but for
one thing. I have got you over here, and in some ways it is
positively the worst fool thing I ever pulled off--taking the
responsibility of two kids like you, at a time like this."
"But, Colonel, please!" interrupted Porky. "Don't think I am
fresh, but just this once, while there is no one around, and no
one will know we are lacking in respect to you, sir, as a
superior, please, Colonel, let me tell you--"
"Go on," said the Colonel.
"Well," said Porky, "looks to us as though we were going to land
pretty soon, and we don't know where next nor anything about it;
but please, Colonel, just as long as you can, please let us stick
by you! We have got to; we promised Mrs. Bright; and, besides,
we don't look young, do we, Colonel? Now, honest, we don't!" He
felt of his chin. "The way it looks, we have got to shave pretty
quick, by next year anyhow. And we are tall; we are tall as you;
and we look older when we are good and dirty, and we will be that
mostly over here, I guess. And say, Colonel, we ain't afraid;
honest!"
"Oh, Lord!" groaned the Colonel. "That's the worst of it! If I
could put a little wholesome fear into your heads, I would feel
better. However, boys, I want your word of honor that you will
never make any serious move without consulting me."
"We promise!" said both boys, and Beany as an after-thought
repeated, "Not any serious in move."
"Then here is where we stand," said the Colonel, as the boys
approached closer to his chair.
"In two hours we will disembark. The harbor is clear, and it is
the first time in two weeks that any transports have been able to
come in as near as this. It is a great chance. I am glad of
this chance to tell you what the outlook is. I have been sent
over here, boys, to work directly with General Pershing. We will
be near and directly at the front all the time if our lives are
spared. I did not know this when we started. It was all in the
sealed orders that our late friend the mate was so anxious to get
into his possession. But about that later. Just what our duties
are to be I cannot tell until I have had a conference with the
General. Here is where you come in. As I understand it now, I
am to be in charge of a wing, not very many miles from
headquarters. I intend to use you as messengers. It is not a
light task. Heaven forgive me if I am the cause of bringing you
to harm! But the fact remains that as I see things, one life,
young or old, is no better than another in this great crisis. It
is up to every human being to do his or her part. Fate has led
you a long ways from home; and in spite of that coming crop of
whiskers, Porky, you are rather young. However, as I said, that
weighs nothing in the balance of necessity. Nothing! Man,
woman, child, we all must help. Man, woman, and child, we have
got to help, and now!
"I may not have another chance to talk to you privately for some
time. A few things are to be impressed on your minds. The first
is this. Take no foolish chances. Don't be foolhardy. We
cannot afford to waste our tools. And in this struggle tools are
what you are, not boys, not human beings that will feel cold, and
heat, and pain and privations; just tools. So take no chances.
"We will go right from the dock to General Pershing. I do not
know where he is. However, after I have seen him, I will know
where to place you. He will tell me if my plan for you as I have
outlined it is a good one. Rest assured that I will keep you as
near me as I possibly can.
"I have told you my first order. No chances other than the
chances of war. The second thing is to keep ourselves as clean
and as well as you possibly can. Take every safeguard that you
can possibly take. You do not want to be on the sick list the
time when I most need you. That's about all, boys. Don't forget
that I am always your friend."
The boys gulped queerly. Then Beany spoke up boldly.
"And don't you forget that we are your friends, too! I read a
piece once in a reader about a lion that was all tied up with
ropes and a mouse happened around and chewed him loose. You are
a colonel, but we are your friends just the same."
The Colonel burst out laughing. "Chew away, old fellow!" he said
when he could speak. "In the meantime let's get ready to leave."
"But, Colonel," wailed Porky, who never forgot anything and who
had an amount of curiosity that later nearly lost the Colonel one
of his "tools," "--but, Colonel, what about the mate?"
"By Jove, I forgot I promised to tell you about him! Well, two
or three times Captain Greene thought his traps looked as though
some one had been going through them, but he had everything
locked up, and special keys made. These were on him night and
day. But, you see, the mate knew a trick worth two of that. As
he had the run of everything, he simply doped the cup of coffee
the Captain always took before going to bed, and, while the man
was under the influence of the drug, he simply went through
things. Fortunately he was unable to find some papers that he
was most anxious to got hold of, and in the meantime the Captain
spoke to the ship's doctor about feeling queer and lazy in the
morning.
"Because everybody is suspicious of everything out of the beaten
track these days, the doctor took to watching things a little on
his own hook. He finally analyzed some of the coffee, and that
put him on tile right track. A smart lad, that doctor, I can
tell you! But it looked as though the mate smelled a mouse. For
days the Captain slept normally, while I commenced to get a dose
of the same medicine. I did not know what was happening in the
Captain's cabin, and no one was watching me. One night the
doctor came in just after I had had my last cigar and sat talking
to me. Blamed if I didn't go to sleep sitting bolt upright
talking to him! He laid me down on the bunk, and my cigar stub
came in for analysis. There was more dope! Fact! Things got
pretty thick along about then. No one suspected the mate, but we
suspected everybody else on the ship almost. Then little things
commenced to happen to the ship's machinery. One little thing
after another broke down. We seemed to be regular bait for
submarines. He had some way of signaling them other than the
ship's wireless. It is certain that he never got hold of that,
and he did not succeed in putting it out of commission if he
tried to do so. We don't know whether he did try or not.
"Then one night or one morning, rather, the doctor was found
unconscious just outside the Captain's door. When he came to, he
said he had felt uneasy about things, because nothing had
happened for several days, so he thought he would take a look
around. He was in his stocking feet, and just as he reached the
Captain's cabin, he saw a form ahead of him against the white
door. He approached cautiously, but could not tell whether the
person saw him or not. He did, all right. As soon as the doctor
was within striking distance, the shadow struck and down went the
doctor. He was hit with some padded weapon a glancing blow that
merely knocked him out for a few hours. If it had struck full--
well, we would have been shy one good doctor.
"When he was all right again, we put our heads together, and
decided to bait the midnight visitor with some bogus papers. Of
course we still did not have the least suspicion as to the real
source of the trouble.
"That mate was in our confidence, and was at all our
consultations. We followed clew after clew suggested by him.
And I will say they were good ones. We found part of the missing
papers sewed into the bedding roll of a soldier who happened to
be saddled with a jaw-breaking German name, the hangover from
some ancestors. We trotted him off to the brig, intending to
execute him later. Then we found a trinket belonging to the
Captain in the pocket of one of the sailors, a Swede. The idea
was, you see, to scatter our attention.
"I don't know where we would have ended if it hadn't been for a
trick of the Captain's. He told the mate, and everybody else he
could get hold of, that he had an ulcerated tooth, and was going
to take a sleeping powder. He had some powdered sugar all fixed
up. The mate was the only man in the cabin at the time, and the
Captain said all at once something came over him as though a
voice had shouted, 'Here is the man!'
"Yet not a line of the fellow's face changed. It was just sheer
intuition. When the mate left the room, the Captain got hold of
the doctor, who was the only one we were really trusting then,
and tipped him off. He in turn came to me and I did my part by
declaring loudly that I was dead tired and was going to turn in.
"Well, boys, at four this morning we caught our bird. The mate,
of all men on the ship! They caught him red-handed, as they say,
at the Captain's locker, and the doctor laid him out with a neat
little tap from a billy, and when he came to we put him through
the third degree. And we overhauled his things and found enough
information to get him a string of German crosses a yard long.
"He was meek as could be; but I know now that was because he
thought he had a good chance to got away somehow. We are near
shore; and it seems he can swim like a duck--a long-distance
champion and all that. He was so very meek about it that we were
a little careless. I know it taught me a lesson. There are only
two places where a spy is safe: in his grave, or in irons; and
he's not very safe then. He watched his chance and when he got a
second's show, he moved like a whirlwind. He knocked his guard
down and grabbed his revolver, all in one jump, shot full at
Captain Greene, missed him but winged me and killed the captain
of the Firefly, poor fellow!
"Then he made for the door with Captain Green after him; and you
know the rest."
"Gee!" said Porky.
"Sakes!" added Beany.
There was a silence. The Colonel looked at his watch. There was
a sound of tramping from above.
"They are getting the men ready to go ashore," he said. "This is
to be the last daylight disembarkation. Better go up and take a
look around, boys. It is worth seeing. Are your things all
ship-shape?"
"Yes, sir; all ready to pick up," said Porky, "Can't we do
something for you?"
"Not a thing, thank you! This arm does not even burn now. When
you see me on deck, just fall in, and don't let me have to look
for you." He smiled and dismissed them with a nod as the doctor
entered.
"Doc," he said as the young man proceeded to put a dressing on
the wounded arm, "there go two, of the most remarkable boys I
have ever known. I expect great things of them sooner or later
if their lives are spared."
And with this prophecy, which was to be fulfilled far sooner than
the Colonel dreamed, the subject was closed.
On deck the boys, with their bags beside them, watched the
orderly rush of disembarkation with the keenest delight. They
were as glad to go ashore as they had been to go aboard in that
far, fair America that they were so proud and happy to call home.
Load after load of men left the side of the great ship, and the
empty boats came dancing back from the great distant docks for
other loads. The men were all happy and excited. The air was
clear and clean as though it had just been washed, as indeed it
had by a heavy rain the night before.
Overhead a couple of great planes circled above the harbor. The
thought that they did not know where they were lent a touch of
unreality and, romance to it all. The boats full of men went
gayly off, the soldiers singing, calling, and whistling back to
their mates still on board.
"Well, we are here!" said Porky soberly.
"Yep!" answered Beany. There was a long silence. Then, "We are
here all right!" he repeated.
"Yep!" said Porky.
"I Wish we could call mom and pop up on a long distance and tell
them we are safe. It's going to be some old time before we see
them again!"
"Sure is!" agreed Porky, his face growing strangely long at the
thought. "There's one thing we got to remember. We are here,
and they were game to let us come. I didn't realize how game
they were, Beans, but they sure were game! Well, we have got to
pay them up for it, and the only way we can do it, is by first
taking the best care of ourselves that we possibly can, and then
by doing something to make them proud of us. Of course we don't
know what we can do, but something will come up, I know; and it's
up to us to do it."
"You bet we will!" said Beany solemnly. They turned again to
watch the sailors.
Colonel Bright appeared on deck just then, and the boys hurried
to his side, and stood unobtrusively behind him.
The next few hours passed in such a whirl that they were never
clearly defined in the boys' memory. Event followed event with
dizzying rapidity. Short trips on strange, camouflaged little
railroads, alternated with dashes in strange, large, unkempt
automobiles driven by haggard, desperate, cool, young fellows who
looked and were equal to any emergency. Little was said.
Occasionally they were personally conducted by one or two French
officers who talked rapidly in their own tongue to Colonel
Bright, who actually understood what they said, and fired back
remarks almost as rapid as theirs.
"Machine guns!" Beany muttered once to his brother.
As they went on, the country commenced to show devastating effect
of war. By the time darkness fell they were passing through a
torn and tumbled landscape, with here and there a ruined village.
They reached a place finally, unlighted, almost unmarked in the
darkness. The boys wondered at the cleverness of the chauffeur
as he silently rounded a corner and brought his car up to a
ruined gateway, behind which a small squat building showed dimly.
Without a word Colonel Bright went rapidly up the path, the boys
following closely behind, while the orderly carried the Colonel's
bags.
A low tap on the door and it opened, disclosing a densely dark
hall or room; the boys could not see enough to tell what it was.
As the door was closed, a flashlight was pressed, and they were
able to follow their guide across the space and through another
corridor to a heavy door. A low tap and this door was opened.
As they entered, a man rose from a desk. He was gray and
grizzled; a man whose keen face and eagle glance ware destined to
live as long as history is written or read, a man in whom America
rests her pride and hopes.
As they entered, he bent his piercing glance upon them; then,
recognizing Colonel Bright, his face was lighted with a bright
smile that suddenly wiped out its lines of care, and he stepped
forward, both hands extended in greeting.
It was General Pershing.
The boys, standing well back in the shadows of the gloomy room,
felt something catch their throats.
France... the firing line... General Pershing...
All at once, they had no doubts, no memories, no homesickness, no
regrets. France; the firing line; General Pershing!
The boys stood rigidly at attention. The room was dark; no one
saw them. It did not matter. Joy and courage and high hopes
filled their hearts.
It was the beginning of their Great Adventure.
THE END