Produced by Ralph Zimmerman, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
Army Boys on German Soil
[Illustration: "One move and I'll blow your brains out," he
snapped.]
ARMY BOYS ON GERMAN SOIL
Our Doughboys Quelling the Mobs
BY
HOMER RANDALL
AUTHOR OF "ARMY BOYS IN FRANCE," "ARMY BOYS ON THE FIRING LINE,"
"ARMY BOYS MARCHING INTO GERMANY," ETC.
ARMY BOYS ON GERMAN SOIL
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I THE FLASH FROM THE GUNS
II WRAPPED IN MYSTERY
III CAUGHT IN A STORM
IV THE RUINED CASTLE
V CONSPIRATORS
VI THE BAFFLED PLOTTERS
VII A CLOSE CALL
VIII JUST IN TIME
IX THE COLONEL'S WARNING
X FROM THE SKY
XI MARSHAL FOCH AND GENERAL PERSHING
XII TORN FROM MOORINGS
XIII GERMAN RIOTING
XIV ON THE TRAIL
XV A BARE CHANCE
XVI RAISING THE TRAP DOOR
XVII A PERILOUS SITUATION
XVIII THE CRITICAL MOMENT
XIX TURNING THE TABLES
XX THE CLAWS OF THE HUNS
XXI SQUARING ACCOUNTS
XXII WILL THE GERMANS SIGN?
XXIII ON THE VERGE OF DISCOVERY
XXIV THE DEADLY PHIAL
XXV THE TREATY SIGNED
ARMY BOYS ON GERMAN SOIL
CHAPTER I
THE FLASH FROM THE GUNS
"I tell you, Bart, I don't like the looks of things," remarked
Frank Sheldon to his chum, Bart Raymond, as the two stood on a
corner in the German city of Coblenz on the Rhine.
"What's on your mind?" inquired Bart, as he drew the collar of his
raincoat more snugly around his neck and turned his back to the
sleet-laden wind that was fairly blowing a gale. "I don't see
anything to get stirred up about except this abominable weather.
It's all I can do to keep my feet."
"It is a pretty tough night to be out on patrol duty," agreed
Frank. "But it wasn't that I was thinking about. It's the way
these Huns have been acting lately."
"Are you thinking of that sergeant of ours that was found stabbed
to death the other night?" asked Bart, with quickened interest.
"Not so much that," replied Frank, "although that's one of the
things that shows the way the wind is blowing. But it's the surly
way the whole population is acting. Haven't you noticed it?"
"There certainly is a difference," admitted Bart. "Everything was
peaches and cream when we first came. The people fairly fell over
themselves in trying to tell us how glad they were to have the
Americans here instead of the French and English. Now they're
getting chesty again. A couple of fellows passed me a little while
ago who looked at me as if they'd like to slip a knife into me if
they dared."
"They hate us all right," declared Frank. "It makes them sore as
the mischief to have Americans keeping the watch on the Rhine.
They're mad enough to bite nails every time they're reminded of
it."
"And that's pretty often," laughed Bart, "for they can't go out
into the street without seeing an American uniform somewhere.
We've got this old town pretty well policed, and if any trouble
starts we'll put it down in a jiffy."
"Well, trouble's coming all right," prophesied Frank. "There are
lots of new faces in the city, fellows who seem to have come from
the outside. You know Germany's being ripped up the back
everywhere by mobs, and the red flag is flying in Berlin. I have a
hunch that these outsiders have come to start the same thing
here."
"If they do they'll get more than they bargained for," said Bart
grimly. "They'll find they're monkeying with a buzz saw. What our
fellows would do to them would be a sin and a shame. But here come
Tom and Billy, if I'm any sort of a guesser."
"Right you are," replied Frank, as he descried two uniformed
figures approaching, their heads bent away from the icy gale which
was increasing in fury as the night wore on.
"Hello, fellows," was the greeting that came from one of the
newcomers, as they came into the flickering light of the street
lamp, near which Frank Sheldon and Bart Raymond were standing.
"This is a dandy night to be out patrolling--I don't think."
"A good night for ducks, Tom," replied Frank with a laugh.
"For polar bears, if you ask me," put in Billy Waldon, Tom's
companion, as he shook the drops from his raincoat. "How would it
be to be back in the barracks just now lapping up a smoking hot
cup of coffee? Oh, boy!"
"It wouldn't be bad--" Bart was beginning, when suddenly a rifle
cracked and a bullet whizzed by so close that it nearly grazed Tom
Bradford's ear.
"Shelter, fellows!" shouted Frank, as he leaped for an adjacent
hallway.
His companions followed him quickly, and crouching in the hall,
they peered out into the darkness to see if they could detect the
whereabouts of the would-be assassin.
But everything was quiet except for the roaring of the gale, and
the street seemed to be empty.
"Might as well look for a needle in a haystack," muttered Tom
Bradford. "We don't even know the direction from which the shot
came. You can bet that skunk made tracks as soon as he fired."
"It was a mighty close call for you, Tom," remarked Billy. "A half
inch closer and you would have been a goner."
"It would have been hard luck to have been laid out now after
having come through that Argonne fighting alive," grumbled Tom.
"I'd just like to have my hands right now on the cowardly Heinie
who tried to snuff me out."
"Don't you see, Bart, that I was right when I told you that
trouble was brewing?" remarked Frank.
"I guess you were, old man."
"It's because we've been too confoundedly easy with these
fellows," snorted Billy wrathfully. "We've gone on the theory that
if we treated 'em white and gave 'em a square deal they'd
appreciate it and behave themselves. We might have known better."
"The French and English know these ginks better than we do, and
they've put the boots into them from the start," growled Tom.
"There's been no namby-pamby dealing with the Huns in the bridge-
heads where they've held control. They've made the Boches walk
Spanish. If they didn't uncover when the flag went by, they
knocked their hats off for them. They know that the only argument
that a Hun understands is force, and they've gone on that theory
right along. And as a consequence the Heinies don't dare to peep
in the districts where the French and English run things. We ought
to take a leaf from their books and do the same."
"That's our good-natured American way of doing things," said Bart.
"But we're due to stiffen up a bit now. We're not going to stand
for attempts to murder in cold blood--"
He was interrupted by an exclamation from Frank.
"Quiet, fellows," he adjured in a low voice.
"See anything?" whispered Bart, who was nearest him.
"I thought I caught a glimpse of a fellow stealing into that alley
half-way down the block," returned Frank. "And there goes another
one," he added, with a trace of excitement in his voice.
"I was looking that way and I didn't see anything," murmured Billy
Waldon rather incredulously.
"I'd bank on Frank," returned Bart. "He has the best eyes of any
of us. They're regular telescopes."
"There goes another!" exclaimed Frank tensely. "There's something
doing there, sure as guns!"
"I know that alley," said Tom Bradford. "I've often looked into it
when I passed it on my beat. But it's a blind alley and doesn't
lead to any thing. It ends at a brick wall."
"All the better chance to bag them," replied Frank. "We'll wait
just a minute longer to see If any one else goes in, and then
we'll go down and nip the whole bunch. It's against regulations
for them to be on the streets at this hour, and you can bet
they're up to no good."
"I only hope the fellow's among them that fired that shot,"
murmured Tom vengefully.
They waited a moment or two longer, but Frank Sheldon's eyes
detected no other skulking figure and he gave the word to move.
"Have your clubs and pistols ready, but don't use the guns unless
you have to," he ordered, for when the Army Boys were together the
leadership by common consent devolved on Frank. "I guess the clubs
will do the business if it comes to any resistance on their part."
"Fists would be enough," muttered Tom, as with the others he
prepared to follow their leader.
Like so many ghosts they drifted out of the hallway, and, moving
in the shadow of the houses, though in the rain and darkness that
seemed almost unnecessary, they stealthily approached the entrance
to the alley.
It was in one of the poorer sections of the town, and the dwelling
houses were interspersed with factories and coal yards. On each
side of the alley stood the wall of a factory, three stories in
height. No light came from any window, and the alley itself was as
dark as pitch.
"Bart and I will stand on this side, and you two fellows take the
other side," whispered Frank, when they reached the mouth of the
alley. "Keep right on your toes and be ready to nab those fellows
when they come out."
The others did as directed and all waited, tense with expectation,
their clubs ready for instant service if resistance should be
offered.
The rain kept pouring down in torrents, and as it fell, a glaze
formed on the sidewalks, so that it was with difficulty that the
Army Boys kept their feet.
They were eager to bring the matter to a head, and the waiting in
drenching rain wore on their patience.
"Could they have possibly gone out some other way, leaving us here
to hold the bag?" queried Bart Raymond, after five minutes had
passed without result.
"I don't think so," returned Frank. "I'm dead sure there isn't any
way to get out except the way they went in. They're in there
holding a pow-wow of some kind."
Ten minutes more passed, and by that time even Frank had begun to
have doubts. Tom slipped over to him from the other side of the
alley.
"For the love of Mike! let's get a move on and go into the alley
and smoke them out," he whispered. "We can get them there just as
well as here."
"Just five minutes more," Frank replied. "They may hear us going
in and be on their guard, while if we nab them here we'll catch
them unawares. But if they're not out in that time, we'll go in
and round them up."
At the end of the stipulated time Frank gave the signal.
"Creep in as softly as you can," he admonished his comrades.
"Spread across so that they can't slip between us. They've got to
be somewhere between us and that brick wall at the back."
Moving with all the caution that their experience as scouts had
taught them in their frequent incursions into No Man's Land during
the war, the four Army Boys crept noiselessly into the darkness of
the alley.
Ten, twenty, thirty feet, and still no sign of their quarry. They
must be close to them now.
On they went, wonder gradually giving way to doubt, until with a
muttered exclamation Frank came plump up against the wall that
marked the alley's end.
"Stung!" he murmured in profound disgust.
His comrades gathered close about him.
"That's one on us," muttered Tom.
"We're done good and proper," agreed Billy.
"Are you dead sure that you saw them come in?" queried Bart of
Frank.
"I know I did," replied Frank, who although puzzled was not shaken
in his conviction.
"They must have been ghosts then," gibed Tom. "Nothing else could
have vanished through a brick wall."
Frank drew his flashlight from his pocket and flashed it about.
There was no one to be seen.
"That wall is perfectly blank," he murmured in perplexity. "Thirty
feet high if it's an inch. There isn't an opening in it anywhere."
"Could they have got into the windows of the building on either
side?" suggested Bart.
Frank swept the flashlight on the walls of the factories.
"Not a chance," he affirmed. "All these windows are protected with
iron bars and nothing could get between them. Those fellows seem
to have just melted away."
At that instant a report rang out, and the flashlight was knocked
from his hand by a bullet.
"Down, fellows!" he shouted, setting the example, and the next
moment all four were lying flat on the ground.
They were just in time, for there was a crackling of guns, and
other bullets sped over their heads.
"After them, boys!" yelled Frank, leaping to his feet. "They're at
the mouth of the alley. I saw the flash from their guns."
He sped for the street with his comrades close upon his heels,
their pistols drawn and ready for instant use.