Chapter VI: Part 6

At the sight before her the old woman grew frantic with unexpected strength. She suddenly jerked loose from me, and before I could prevent her, ran with all the agility of fear and jumped overboard. Others flung their bodies pell-mell on the heads of those already in it. Some, in their frenzy, missed the mark at which they aimed themselves and fell into the sea. To make the horror complete, the boat now stuck at one end, tilted downward, and spilled all its occupants into the sea, ninety or a hundred at once. They seized each other. Some swam. Others floundered and sank almost immediately, dragging each other down. Some drowned themselves even with lifebelts on, not knowing how to hold their heads out of the water.

I tried to speak with the passengers still on deck. It was useless. Everybody was talking in his own particular dialect. Then I realized the predicament I myself was in--an utter foreigner, whom they would sacrifice in an instant for one of their own nationality. Perhaps if only I had some of my jewelry I might be able to bribe my way to safety in some such crisis.

III--"THE DEAD WERE LYING ON DECK"

I made my way back to my cabin again. There were people dead and dying on the deck. I saw one man who had started to run up the gangway to the officer's deck come plunging down again. He had been struck in the back of the head. Somehow or other, I just felt that my time had not yet come. This conviction enabled me to keep my wits about me.

In my cabin I flung up the top of my steamer trunk. As I was searching for my valuables my chambermaid appeared in the doorway; half a dozen times I had met her rushing frantically and aimlessly up and down.

"Oh, madame, madame--we shall all be killed, we're all going to get killed!"

"Maria," I advised as quietly and soothingly as I could, still stooping over my trunk; "don't be so mad, get a lifebelt on, and get up out of here."

Before she could speak again she was a dead woman. A shot carried away the port-hole and sheared off the top of her head. It finished its course by exploding at the other side of the ship. If I had not been stooping over at the time I would not have lived to write this story.

I snatched up my little jewel-basket with a few favorite trinkets in it. I put on my cap and sweater. When I got up on deck I saw the submarine carefully circumnavigating its victims and deliberately shooting toward us at all angles. I ran along the deck. The sea was full of deck rails, parts of doors, and other wreckage, and dotted with human beings, some dead, others alive, and screaming for help. There was another boat in front that tilted and dumped out its frantic load into the sea. Peering over the side of the ship, I saw a boat that had already been lowered to the water's edge. In it I recognized the two ship's doctors, and two of the seamen. There was also an officer in the boat, Carlo Lamberti, the chief engineer. He sat at the helm. I called out to them to take me in.

"Jump!" they shouted back.

I threw my basket down. I had a good twenty-foot drop. I have always been a good swimmer. Furthermore, I saw that if I jumped into the boat, crowded with people, sails, water-barrels, and pails for bailing, I might cause it to capsize. So I told them to push the boat away and then they could pick me up out of the water.

I escaped with a ducking.

An immigrant girl who followed me flung herself down wildly and broke both her legs on the side of the ship.

We were powerless to save any more. The ship might at any moment receive the final torpedo from the submarine. The sailors rowed madly to get out of danger.

Then the torpedo was discharged. It whizzed across the ship, drawing a tail behind it like a comet. It plunged beneath the _Ancona_ as if guided by a diabolical intelligence of its own. There followed a terrific explosion. Huge jets of thick black smoke shot up, with showers of débris. Our boat rocked and swayed in the roughened water. The _Ancona_ lurched to the left, righted herself, shivered a moment--then her bow shot high in the air like a struggling, death-stricken animal. She went under, drawing a huge, funnel-like vortex after her.

The Captain and some officers were the last to drop astern, in a small boat. Passengers were still to be seen, clinging forward, like ants on driftwood, as the ship was drawn down. There were many people wounded, so that they could not get off unaided. They were left to die.

The sea now looked absolutely empty, swept smooth. The ship had drawn everything down with it. The fog undulating upward, the submarine was seen lying in full view, as if in quiet Teutonic contemplation of what it had done. Then it moved off, and was soon merged into the waste of sea and fog. We felt a great relief when it had departed.

IV--SURVIVORS DRIFTING ON THE OCEAN

All that afternoon our six surviving boats drifted within sight of each other. When darkness fell large yellow lanterns were lit, and from time to time Bengal lights flared and fell. It looked like a regatta held on the River Styx, in Hell. The sailors had exhausted themselves rowing, so the improvised sails were set. The boat-loads of survivors had run the gamut of every emotion. They were now mere stocks of insensibility, numb, dumb, and inert.

At six in the afternoon a boat just behind us began sending us signals of distress. The men had taken off their shirts and were waving them to us on oars. Our sailors objected to turning back, saying that both boats would be sunk if we tried to relieve them. But Carlo Lamberti, the chief engineer, with a quiet look in his blue eyes, with a rather careless, engaging smile, which was habitual to him all the time, presented his revolver--and we went back to see what was wrong.

We found that the boat had been struck by a shell and was leaking badly. True enough, most of the people in it tried to make an immediate stampede into our boat. But again Lamberti presented his eloquent pistol and his quiet smile, and with order and precision we took aboard the wounded, the women, and children. Then the leaky craft was tied to our stern and the men left were easily able to keep it afloat by bailing.

"We'll save you, or go down with you!" Lamberti reassured them. This chief engineer was the only man who showed signal bravery.

One of the first of the wounded rescued from the leaky boat was my former companion, the Marquis Serra Cassano. He did not wish to join in the incipient stampede. With four toes of his foot shot away, he rose limpingly to assist the other wounded into our boat first, before he himself came in. Then with an air of pathetic aristocracy he seated himself by me, and wanted to know if any one had a cigaret to spare. We had four cigarets on the boat. The men took turns puffing them.

A frantic mother had dropped her baby in the water. I jumped out and rescued it. Later on, she got separated from it, and I had it in my charge for several days--but that is not in the present story.

We kept close watch on each other's boats till nightfall. As the other five would appear and disappear, we would be alternately cheered and frightened.

It must have been nearly midnight when one of our sailors cried out that he saw a ship's light. But for a long while nothing appeared but thin threads of light that filtered through the fog. After some discussion as to whether it might not be an enemy craft, we approached the direction of the light, till it burst on us in a powerful, searching blaze. And we discerned the other boats converging toward it, mere moving yellow splurges in the gloom.

The ship that was rescuing us was a French mine layer, the _Pluton_. It was hellish-looking, as it beetled over us, but none the less it looked like heaven, too!

And now our boat-loads of survivors were close together, and suddenly everybody grew voluble and chatty. We shouted across the water to each other. I even heard a voice singing. We were saved! We were saved!

THE STRATEGY OF SISTER MADELEINE

_The Story of a French Captain's Escape from the Germans_

_Told by himself, and translated by G. Frederic Lees_

Few men who have succeeded in slipping through the clutching
fingers of the Mailed Fist have such a moving record of adventure
to their credit as Captain X----, who here relates his remarkable
experiences. There is the true Stevensonian flavor in some of
the episodes narrated; and at the same time the story has real
historical value, since it opens with a graphic account of the
Battle of Charleroi, which has not yet been described by the French
Staff, or by any of the unofficial historians of the war. The
officer's name is suppressed in deference to his own request when
he related his experiences in the _Wide World Magazine_.

I--MY EXPERIENCES AT THE BATTLE OF CHARLEROI

In relating my adventures, extending over more than fifteen months, I cannot do better than begin with the starting-point of the whole affair--the Battle of Charleroi. To describe the events which grouped themselves around August 22nd, 23rd, 24th, and 25th, 1914, seems like telling old news, but, as a matter of fact, the gigantic struggle named after the Belgian town of ironworks and mines has yet to be recorded. The French Staff has published nothing, unofficial historians--eager to be the first to place their researches before the public--have only given general and often erroneous descriptions of the advance of Von Kluck, Von Buelow, and Von Hausen against Sir John French's forces on the Condé-Mons-Binche line and the Fifth French Army holding the line of the Sambre, and the newspaper accounts are sometimes contradictory.

I am not going to weary you with military technicalities; we will leave questions of strategy and tactics alone and direct our attention to the battlefield as seen from two points of view: that of myself, an officer in the French Army, and that of an inhabitant of Charleroi, with whom I was later thrown into contact, and by whose observations, made from the roof of his house, I was fortunate in benefiting.

Picture to yourself the sinuous Sambre, flowing in its deep bed through the densely-populated suburbs of Charleroi and the southern end of this formerly fortified town. The town itself, imprisoned by its walls, is but a small place of some thirty thousand inhabitants, but the population is swelled to five hundred thousand by the contiguous suburbs of Montigny, Couillet, Marcinelle, Gilly, Châtelet, Marchiennes, Roux, Jumet, Gosselies, and others which cluster around the ancient nucleus and stretch principally northwards. To fight a battle on such a ground as this was impossible, so the German forces, descending from the north and the east in unknown hundreds of thousands, determined to make for the open-wooded country which lies beyond the southern suburbs of the town. Two tremendous obstacles stood in their way--the closely-packed houses of the suburbs and the strongly-held river. The inhabitants soon learnt to their cost how the first of these was to be overcome. Suddenly, shortly after the appearance of the advance-guard of the German army, violent explosions were heard, accompanied by the pop! pop! pop! of machine-guns and the discharge of musketry. The Huns were blasting a broad way through the suburbs, setting fire to the houses, and--under pretense that they were being fired upon by civilians--shooting the people down in their houses and in the streets. Right through the quarters of Gosselies and Jumet they penetrated; then branched off to the right and left, one band of incendiaries reaching the river through Marchiennes, the other cutting its way through the town and reaching the bridge which connects Montigny and Couillet. These two points were where the enemy first succeeded in crossing the Sambre. Later, when we had begun our retreat southwards, owing to pressure from Von Hausen's army massed in the Northern Ardennes, they crossed at two other places, east of Charleroi. Thus, on Sunday, August 23rd, the preliminaries of the great battle were carried out.

South of the river the ground rises gently until it reaches the wooded heights in the neighbourhood of Beaumont, Thuillies, Nalinnes, and Somzée. I was stationed at the first of these places--a little village on high ground, with a commanding view of the green countryside. Who would have thought, but for the deafening roar of cannon, the incessant rattle of the machine-guns, the occasional whir of an aeroplane overhead, and the puffs and rings of white smoke high in air, that we were looking on a battlefield? How empty it was! We could see from the flashes of the carefully-hidden guns whence death was springing; but in the early stages of the struggle only small bodies of the enemy, whose greenish-grey uniforms mingled well with the verdure, were from time to time visible. At night, however, it was different. The red glare of burning villages and farms, set on fire by shells, lit up the sky and provided a terrifying spectacle, night after night, for the anxious watchers of Charleroi.

II--"WE MOWED THEM DOWN WITH MACHINE GUNS"

As the Germans advanced and the battle raged from morning to night, it became more and more evident that we were hopelessly outnumbered. Possessing an advantage, however, in being on high ground, it was clear that we could hold out for a considerable length of time and make the enemy pay dearly for every yard of ground we had to give away. When once the greenish-grey uniforms began to appear in any considerable number, they came on in solid masses, which we mowed down, time after time, by rifle and machine-gun fire and by showers of shrapnel from our "75's." But others quickly filled their places, and thus the human tide advanced, until at last the order had to be given for the retreat. This was on August 25th, by which date, after the enemy had been obliged to suspend operations for twenty-four hours to collect the wounded, they had lost over forty thousand men.

_Ah! les gredins!_ how well they deserved their fate for the shooting down of peaceful citizens in Charleroi and the unspeakable crimes committed in the communes on the wooded heights of Loverval, Acoz, Montigny-le-Tilleul, and Somzée! With what satisfaction our small detachments, hidden in the woods, let the German scouts pass on in order to open fire at close quarters on the masses of troops which followed! They paid, then, for the outrages perpetrated by the Uhlans. You ask for an instance. Here is one which was related to me by my friend of Charleroi--he who viewed the battle from his house-top, and afterwards explored the battlefield to come face to face with this grim picture. A typical instance of Teutonic cruelty, I give it in his own words: "A little way out of the village of Somzée was a small farm inhabited by a young household, including three small children. Honest, courageous, and economical folk, they had toiled season after season to pay by annual instalments for their property, which they had agreed to purchase some eight years ago. The last payment had just been made; the children were growing up; the little family was happy. But the German monsters came. In a few minutes this hardly-earned happiness was shattered. The Boches seized everything--the few cows, the dearly-loved horse. They set fire to the farm, shot the farmer, and drove before them, into the distance, the poor widow with her four weeping and terrified children. What a sinister picture it makes! It was at the close of a splendid August day. The little isolated farm is burning. A few yards from the door the dead man is lying on his back. On the side of the hill which descends to the main road are the silhouettes of the Uhlans disappearing in the gathering darkness of night. Tongues of flame on the horizon mark places where similar dramas had been enacted."

"Now, then, boys, let them have it hot. Pick off the gunners one by one. Marcel, Gustave, François, do you keep an eye on the officers. _Ah, les gredins!_ we'll teach them!"

It was the day after the battle of Charleroi, and whilst our troops were retiring in good order, my men and I, after the fashion of many other small detachments, were holding a German battery in check. So near were we to the enemy that we could hear the harsh, guttural commands of the artillery officers--so different from the tone of _camaraderie_ we adopt towards our men in the truly democratic army of France--and could see them, though indistinctly, urging on their men to the attack. From our trenches on a wooded knoll on the outskirts of Beaumont, we kept up a steady fire on those who were serving the guns, around which the Boches, falling like flies, quickly began to accumulate in heaps. Fresh men incessantly replaced those who had fallen, who at last lay in such numbers that the officers, in order to make room for the gunners, had the dead dragged away to the rear by the feet. Company after company of men fell in this way until the German officers, who had either been shot or had decided to withdraw, could be heard no more. A lull occurred. Bringing my glasses to bear on the battery, I could see no sign of life save the convulsive movements of a few of the prostrate men around the guns.

"It looks as though they had had enough," said I, to my friend Marcel, a private who comes from the same place as myself--Loctudy, in Brittany. "I wonder if we could capture those guns?"

Before he had time to answer a hurricane of bullets came from a hidden machine-gun, and one of them found its billet. My poor friend, shot through the head, fell into my arms. We laid him gently down, thinking of the sad news that would have to be broken to a sorrowing mother at home, and then, anger mingling with regret in our hearts, once more directed our attention to the invisible enemy, in whose direction we hastened to send our compliments in the form of a stream of _prunes_. Overhead we could hear the humming of one of our aeroplanes, and through an opening in the tree-tops momentarily caught sight of it as it moved over the German lines, reconnoitering. Rings of smoke from bursting shrapnel broke far beneath it. Its mission over, it moved swiftly back to our lines, and within ten minutes Marcel and many other brave fellows were avenged. Our "75's" got the range of the battery in front of us with marvellous exactitude, and for five minutes poured upon it such a rain of shells as to make it seem impossible that anything could live within a distance of a hundred yards. The dead around the guns were scattered like chaff in a high wind. A great silence followed that series of violent explosions. For five minutes, in accordance with orders, the men were busy cutting steps with their entrenching tools in our trench, so as to spring out of it quickly and proceed to capture the guns. Caution prompted another five minutes' wait, during which there was not a sign of life before us.

"Now, then, _mes gars!_ time's up," I cried, as loud as prudence would allow. "Fix bayonets! Out of the trench as nimbly as you can. Take cover, when in the open, as much as possible. Are you ready? Forward, for the sake of France!"

III--"DEAD ON THE FIELD OF HONOUR"

We advanced towards the guns at the _pas de gymnastique_ and reached them without mishap. Some were too shattered by the recent bombardment to be of any further use, but others were still intact, and these, as it was difficult if not impossible for us to get them away in a retreat over a hilly wooded country, we determined to destroy. Ordering some of my men to do what was necessary, and as rapidly as possible, the others and I kept a sharp look-out. The enemy gave not a sign of life. The fuses having been attached to the breeches of the guns and lit, we began to retire whither we had come, but had hardly gone more than fifty yards, and heard the successive explosions of the guns blowing up, when, on looking over my shoulder, I saw a body of Germans emerge at a run from a coppice about two hundred yards to our right, and heard them open fire upon us. At the same time I felt a sharp, burning pain in my side; a curious sensation of intense weakness filled my being; and, with a vision of men falling to the ground with extended arms, I, too, bowed down, unconscious, to Mother Earth.

That night, as I afterwards learnt, I was posted as "dead on the field of honour." After eleven hours of oblivion, I came to myself in a German ambulance. My first impression on recovering consciousness was that of hearing the gruff, peremptory voice of a German Herr Doktor at my bedside; my second, when he had passed on to another sufferer, that of seeing a sweet French face bending over me.

"Where am I?" I asked.

"Hush! the doctor says you must speak as little as possible," replied the nurse, in a French which I at once detected to be that of an educated person. "I will tell you all that you need know for the present. You are in our little ambulance at Erquelinnes, on the frontier between Belgium and France--a German ambulance. But fear not"--this in a lower voice--"my country is France, and I am not without influence, or I should not be here. Your wound, though serious, will get well in time. Only you must be _sage_, and obey me. There, now! _Cela suffit!_ Try to get a little more sleep; the more rest you have the better."

It needed but the invitation, the sound of her soothing voice, like that of a tender mother speaking to her child, and especially those singularly calming words: "Fear not--my country is France," which seemed to wrap me within the protective folds of the tricolour, to send me back once more into that state of semi-unconsciousness which appears to transport one to the borderline between life and death. Loss of blood during those many hours while I had lain forgotten on the battlefield had, indeed, brought me to so weak a condition that, as my benefactress told me later, the doctor had hardly expected to pull me through. My wound was one of those which have been encountered so often in this war; it exhibited the curious vagaries of which bullets are capable. The projectile entered my right side, travelled along a downward, curved path, and, avoiding any of the vital organs, came out at the other side. A millimetre to right or left, and it might have either killed or paralyzed me. As it was, the injury and loss of blood were serious, and could only be repaired by many weeks of immobility, coupled with skilled medical aid (and I must do the Herr Doktor the justice of recognizing that he was highly capable) and the devoted attention of my nurse. Ah! kindly benefactress of the ambulance of Erquelinnes, know, should you ever read my words, that I can never thank you enough for all you did for me. To have shown my gratitude too openly amidst the surroundings where your lot was cast--under what circumstances I have often tried to imagine--would have betrayed you. But, knowing how one French heart can understand another without the passing of words, I doubt not that you have long since comprehended the gratitude of the soldier of the Republic whom you befriended and saved.

IV--ON THE ARM OF SISTER MADELEINE

A month in bed brought me the period when I was declared out of danger, and was allowed to sit up in a chair near a window overlooking a little garden bright with hollyhocks and sunflowers. Then came the day when, leaning on the arm of Sister Madeleine--the name under which, she said, I was to know her--I took my first walk and descended into that garden, to lie there for the best hours of the day on a _chaise longue_, conversing with her, or, when she was occupied with other wounded, reading and reflecting. It was Sister Madeleine who told me of passing events. But, oh! how discreetly she broke the news of the triumphant march of the German armies southward to Dinant and westward to Maubeuge! It required no great psychological insight on my part to detect where her sympathies lay. Her looks when, the wind being favourable, the faint sound of cannon reached us, the tone of her voice when France was named, her significant reticence on certain occasions, told me much more than actual words. One of these occasions stands out in my mind with particular prominence, owing to my having read in her words a warning, and conceived for the first time the idea of escape.

"The Herr Doktor is immensely pleased with the progress you are making, Captain X----," said Sister Madeleine, rising from my side to pluck some Michaelmas daisies from an adjoining border. "He says you may be allowed soon to take a little gentle exercise in the garden, and do a little gardening, too, if you are a flower-lover, as I doubt not. Are you inclined that way?"

"I shall be delighted to turn my hand to weeding and planting," I replied. "The garden indeed needs attention!"

"_N'est ce pas?_ Poor Jean, our gardener, now with the French colours, would be heartbroken if only he could see the wilderness his little earthly paradise has become. How grateful he will be to you when he returns--if he ever should return after this dreadful war--and finds that someone has been tending his beloved chrysanthemums and dahlias. When the mobilization order reached him he was in the midst of potting slips of geranium in the tool and potting shed yonder"--motioning to a little wooden construction at the end of the garden--"and everything there is just as he left it. A heap of withered slips lies side by side with rows of empty flower-pots, whilst in a corner I saw his working-clothes, which he hastily changed before he came to the house to wish us good-bye and passed into the unknown."

"I must try to prove myself to be a worthy successor to the brave fellow," I said. "Don't you think, Sister Madeleine, that in one respect--my unkempt appearance--I shall not make a bad substitute?"

Walking back to me with her bouquet, she gave me a critical look and laughed. Certainly, no one at home would have recognized me as I now was, with my long beard and moustache and uncut hair. All at once her face became serious, and, without replying to my question, she said:--

"There is no reason why you should not start to-morrow. But don't do too much to begin with. Though I should like to have you here much longer, it would grieve me if that were the result of a relapse. You must get back your strength by degrees. And I fear you will need every ounce of it in the future. No; do rather too little than too much. I have no wish to hear that the Kommandatur at Charleroi, who, I understand, is showing great severity just now towards French prisoners, should decide that you have recovered sufficiently to be included in the next batch to be sent into Germany."

And with these significant words Sister Madeleine left me, to carry her flowers to the bedsides of her other patients, and, possibly, to allow me to reflect.

Was it not clear that, indirectly, she had indicated a means of escape? A feeling of quasi-loyalty towards those who had enabled her to nurse one of her countrymen back to health and strength prevented her from bluntly saying: "There is a tool-shed, in which you will find a suit of old clothes; disguise yourself in them and flee." But her meaning was plain. The key to freedom had been placed in my hands, and it was for me to use it.

V--"I PLAN TO ESCAPE DISGUISED AS THE GARDENER"

I began pottering about the hollyhocks and sunflowers and dahlias the very next morning, taking care to alternate my spells of gardening with fairly lengthy rests, on the principle laid down by Sister Madeleine. Not that they were altogether unnecessary in my still weak state. However, my strength returned with remarkable rapidity, after the first week of this light work, and every additional day found me more fit to carry out my plan, the details of which I had ample opportunity of working out. The garden was surrounded by a high wall of irregular construction, thus affording a foothold to a skilful climber, whose task could be made still easier if he chose--as I had determined to do--that portion of the enclosure which was masked by the tool-shed, between the back of which and the wall was a space of about a foot and a half, providing an additional support for one's body. My resemblance to Jean, the gardener, had, by the by, become more and more perfect, thanks to work with spade and hoe, and perhaps, at times, owing to rather too close contact with the soil. That it would be perfection itself when I had donned his garb, at the close of an afternoon's work just before turning-in time, I felt convinced.

There was another thing of which I was certain: that Sister Madeleine instinctively knew the day and hour I had fixed for my flight. For she was so unusually silent on that day in the last week of October, when, according to my calculations, there would be no moon until late in the night, she was so serious in her mien, and she left me with such suddenness after advising me to come in, "now that the sun had set and the evenings were getting chilly," that I felt sure she comprehended.

"Thank you, Sister Madeleine," I replied; and I could not refrain from adding, in the hope that she would grasp my double meaning: "You have _always_ given me such good advice. I shall never forget your kindness. But before coming in I must put away my tools."

Without daring to look her in the face, I turned down the path in the direction of the tool-shed. Five minutes later I left it, dressed in the gardener's earth-stained clothes, passed like a shadow to the rear of the building, and was over the wall in a trice.

I found myself in a field, and having not the slightest idea regarding the geography of Erquelinnes, went straight ahead at full speed. A quarter of an hour's steeplechasing across ditches and other natural obstacles brought me to a high road, and confronted me with the dilemma as to which way to turn. Without losing a moment's time, for I pictured the hue and cry my disappearance would soon be causing, I made off to the left. _Fausse route!_ In five minutes I came within sight of the lights of the first house of a village, undoubtedly Erquelinnes itself. With a vague idea at the back of my head of gaining the Franco-Belgian frontier, and--avoiding all small places, where curiosity is most rife--reaching Maubeuge, where I might find an asylum among my own people until an opportunity presented itself of getting back to the French lines, I struck off to the right, once more across open country. The dark cloak of night had now fallen, making my progress necessarily slow. On and on I crept in the darkness. How long I continued I cannot say, but it must have been for several hours, for a great weariness suddenly came over me and impelled me to seek sleep. What was apparently a small wood lay in my path at that moment. Groping my way from bole to bole, I divined, rather than saw, a dry and sheltered spot under the trees, and, throwing myself down, quickly fell asleep, amidst the calling of the night-jars.

VII--"HANDS UP--OR I SHOOT"

I cannot tell you how long I slumbered--probably until two or three o'clock in the morning. But I was awakened by the sound of the snapping of dry twigs and muffled voices. I sprang to my feet and listened. Nearer and nearer came the stealthy footsteps. I retired as cautiously as I could; but though I trod ever so lightly, it was impossible to avoid the crackling of dead wood, which seemed to my hypersensitive ears like so many pistol-shots. Even the thumping of my heart appeared audible. One curious thing, however, I noticed: whenever, after a noisy retreat, I stopped to listen, there was a corresponding stoppage and a long silence on the part of my pursuers. But, thought I, was it at all certain they _were_ in pursuit? Would they not, in that case, have come on with a rush? "Suppose I crouch down and run the risk of them passing without seeing me?" I thought. Whilst I was reflecting; with my back to what was apparently a fairly large tree, those who were advancing, emboldened by the silence which had intervened, came on with hastened steps, and got so near that I could hear their heavy breathing. I stepped quickly behind my tree, but too late to serve my purpose, for the next moment a stern voice rapped out an oath almost in my ear and a flash of light from an electric torch struck me full in the face.

"Hands up, or I shoot!" said the voice. "Who are you?"

"A Frenchman," I replied, obeying the command and deciding, on the spur of the moment, that one who spoke to me in my native tongue could hardly be an enemy. "And in need of help."

"Good thing you're not a _Pruscot_, mate, or you'd have been a goner. In need of help, are you? So are we. Aren't we, _mes vieuz_?"

This last remark was addressed to the speaker's two companions, whose indistinct forms I could now make out.

"Very well," continued the speaker, slipping the revolver with which he had covered me into his pocket, "I take it to be a bargain. One good service deserves another. You help us with some of these parcels, and we'll help _you_. I'm not going to ask you too many questions, and we don't expect you to be over inquisitive about _our_ business. _C'est compris?_ But if we're to get there and back before light we must be off. Come on!"

Taking two of the heavy packages which they were transporting, I followed them. In a flash, I saw that I had fallen in with a party of smugglers, who still continued to ply their calling in the neighbourhood of Erquelinnes and other villages on the frontier between Belgium and France. Men of nondescript nationality, though hating the Teuton with all the ardour of a Frenchman or a Belgian, and ready, if a favourable opportunity offered, to rid the world of every Boche who fell into their power, they made it their business to be on friendly terms with the Prussian officers who were in authority on the frontier. Many favours, in the early months of the war, could they obtain from them, in return for a discreetly-offered gift, such as a box of cigars, or a pound or two of tobacco. When taking any important consignment of goods to and fro between their dépôts on the road from Maubeuge to Charleroi, they had, of course, to resort to the traditional methods of their calling; and it was whilst on one of these nocturnal expeditions that I had encountered them.

VIII--THE FORGED PAPERS--TO SAFETY

They were rough individuals, but loyal to their word. Feeling that I could not be in safer company, I threw in my lot with theirs for nearly a fortnight, hiding by day in the cottage of their leader, on the outskirts of a village "somewhere in France," but not far from Erquelinnes, and assisting them at night in carrying their goods along the little-known paths which intersect the Franco-Belgian frontier. Bit by bit I told mine host my tale. He was touched as much as you could expect a hardened smuggler to be, swore eternal friendship over an excellent bottle of wine, and promised that on the very next day he would bring me a surprise.

He was as good as his word. Out of his pocket he drew a paper--a duly-signed and stamped pass, obtained from the Prussian officer at the frontier village of ----, authorizing the bearer to cross into Belgium without let or hindrance. He did more than this: he gave me the name and address of a confederate at Charleroi, who would furnish me with the means of effecting my escape _viâ_ Holland.

I crossed the frontier, wheeling a barrow belonging to a friendly peasant, who went daily to a bit of land he possessed on Belgian territory.

My twenty-mile walk to Charleroi, and a stay of a week in that city, were uneventful. On leaving, my smuggler's friend gave me a useful introduction to a person in Brussels, whence, with a little borrowed money in my pocket, I set off, towards the end of November. The train was still running the four miles between Charleroi and Gosselies. The thirteen miles to Nivelles I covered on foot; the eighteen miles past Waterloo and over ground every yard of which recalled memories of Napoleon and the closing scenes of the Hundred Days I traversed by train again.

The long sojourn which I was destined to make in Brussels was uneventful compared to my late experiences. There I obtained papers certifying that I was a Belgian commercial traveller, but discretion, you will readily understand, forbids me going into details. Oh, no; I did not put those forged papers to too severe a test by use. As much as possible, I sought to remain hidden in the terrorized city, and to slip out of it for Malines and the villages near the Dutch frontier, without showing my _papiers_ any more than was absolutely necessary.

The frontier between Belgium and Holland is of so serrated a nature that at the time of which I am speaking it was comparatively easy for a hunted man like myself to cross into neutral territory. To do so now would be almost impossible, so well do the Germans guard the irregular line, the configuration of which is such that it is difficult, in places, to tell whether you are in Holland or in Belgium. Fortunately, I had come into contact with a person who was expert in getting young Belgians across the frontier into Holland, and he agreed to help me.

Here, again, I cannot--on account of those who risked their lives in befriending me--go into too many details. Suffice it to say, that on the evening of my escape from the frontier village of A---- I was instructed to walk to a certain milestone, where I should find a man with a red muffler, sitting on a heap of stones.

There, sure enough, I found him--an elderly man with his hands folded over the top of his stick, his chin resting on his hands, and his eyes gazing innocently into the gathering dusk.

As I passed him I uttered the word "Belgica," which I had been told to pronounce, and keep on, without once turning my head.

Very soon I heard his footsteps and the tap, tap of his stick. He overtook me with alert step, and on reaching me, said: "Follow me."

We shot off from the main road into a small winding pathway, which we followed for some fifty yards. Then, suddenly stopping, the man in the red muffler exclaimed: "Holland!"

No word ever before sounded to me so sweet as that. Overcome by the thought that once more I was standing on free ground--that I had but to follow the pathway on which I stood to reach a Dutch village--and that the journey thence to a port and my beloved France _viâ_ England, was but a question of time, I remained for a few seconds lost in reverie. At last, mastering my emotion, I prepared to set off before darkness completely enveloped the wild landscape which surrounded me. Before putting my best foot foremost, however, I was seized with a desire to thank the man who had guided me there, so I turned half-round to press his hand. To my surprise, however, I found that he had disappeared, and that only the gleam of his red muffler marked his progress down the path.

TALES OF THE SPIES AND THEIR DANGEROUS MISSIONS

_Revelations of Methods and Daring Adventures_

_Told by Secret Service Men of Several Countries_

It is estimated that more than a hundred thousand spies and agents
have been in the service of the various countries during the War.
Several thousand have been captured and several hundred have been
executed. The German spy system in the United States alone was a
powerful organization at the beginning of the war. But the American
Secret Service, one of the greatest organizations of its kind in
existence, thwarted their plots, interned them in large numbers,
and drove such men as Boy-Ed and von Papen from our shores. The
interception of the Zimmerman note to Mexico, the revelations of
the Swedish duplicity in Argentine, the discovery of Bolo, the
French financier, the plots in India--and hundreds of others have
been exposed by the genius of the United Secret Service. Most of
these stories cannot be told until long after the War, but a few of
them, gathered from American and European sources, are told here.

I--HOW THE SPIES WORK IN EUROPE

The extraordinary ingenuity shown by spies in securing the plans of other countries' fortifications has been amply illustrated in the war, although, of course, we know but a little part of what the spies have accomplished.

A woman was caught at the French frontier seeking to enter Switzerland and presumably intending to return to Germany or Austria. She was thoroughly searched by a matron, as is customary in such cases, but nothing was found.

Certain actions of hers, however, had given rise to serious suspicions, and one of the cleverest officers of the French Secret Service was detailed to examine her. He applied several tests to her. He finally obtained what he wanted by seating her, in an undraped condition, tied to a chair, before a warm fire.

"Brutes, you are going to burn me alive!" she shrieked as she was forced into a chair.

"Be calm, madame," said the officer. "We only want to admire your beautiful back."

There appeared on the ample back of this fair-haired lady an elaborate design. To the experienced eye of the officer it represented a plan of one of the most important French fortresses. The number of guns, their sizes and positions were shown. The angles, sallies and extent of the fortifications were clearly indicated. The weak spots in the defense were made clear. This fortress had been entirely made over since the outbreak of the war, and it was of vital importance to the Germans to know its present arrangements.

A German spy in France, evidently a man with military knowledge, had obtained access to the fortress, but there was but slight chance of his getting home with his knowledge. He had, therefore, used the young woman as an innocent looking agent.

The master spy had traced the plans on her back with sulphate of copper. This liquid leaves no mark on the skin under normal conditions, but when exposed to considerable heat it shows up dark blue. For further secrecy, it is stated, the plan of the fortress was concealed within another design in the manner described by General Sir Robert Baden-Powell. He carried with him an illustrated book on butterflies and from this he made what would appear to be specimens of butterflies seen in the surrounding country. Then when he had obtained the details of a fortress he drew them in among the complicated markings on the wings of the butterfly. There they would escape notice by any but the most expert "spy trappers."

Miss Sari Petrass, the beautiful Hungarian dancer, who was for some time a great favorite in London, is reported to have been shot in Budapest as a spy. She is supposed to have been engaged in gathering military information in her native country for the benefit of England, where she made her greatest artistic success.

When war began, the actress was starring in "The Marriage Market," a Hungarian operetta, at Daly's Theatre in London. She immediately returned to Budapest, but instead of continuing on the stage began a round of social activities.

She wrote letters to the British army authorities, it is charged, which were sent by way of Switzerland in the in the care of young Austrian officers, who had been beguiled by her charms. It is said she was betrayed by one of her dupes in a fit of jealousy. Although an actress, she had a high social position and was a niece of the Countess Ilka Kinsky, one of the most prominent members of the Austro-Hungarian nobility.

Miss Petrass, according to the report which reached her friends in Cleveland, Ohio, was put to death immediately her acts were discovered. When taken to the place of execution she fainted and was unconscious when shot. The announcement of her execution was the first news her family had of the charges against her.

The method of concealing plans of fortifications on the skin of a spy, already referred to, has been employed with many variations. In time of war or when suspicion of spies is very keen, it is likely to be very useful. Then, again, women are usually called upon to carry this kind of information, because they are less subject to suspicion and watchfulness.

Tattooing plans on a woman's skin has often been resorted to in past wars, but the anti-spy officers are now so keen that this way is no longer reliable. Various forms of writing on the skin, which only become visible under certain conditions, have, therefore, been tried. One form of this has already been mentioned. Plans and messages are also written in nitrate of silver, which becomes visible and black on exposure to sunlight. The writing is also done with phosphorus, so that it is only visible in the dark, but that lasts a few hours only.

Women have shown extraordinary ingenuity in carrying information during the present war. One wore a large pair of pearl earrings, which, when examined, proved to be stuffed with long messages. Another had a little woolly pet dog, whose tail was found to be artificial and filled with military plans. Another carried a message scratched on the plate of her false teeth.

When it has been found impossible for a human spy to reach a fortress, birds have been employed. Carrier pigeons are fitted with miniature cameras fastened across their breasts by exceedingly fine wires. These are fitted with a time lock which ensures their exposure at a certain time.

The pigeons are released by spies at a place from which they will be sure to fly over the fortress on their way home. A pigeon flies in circles on its journey, and it is certain that during part of its flight over the fortress the camera shutter will be released. A series of pictures taken in this way will give a very complete plan of the defenses to the enemy.

Although immediate execution follows the discovery of a spy or perhaps even the suspicion of espionage, thousands of persons are found willing to undertake the work during this war. It has been truly said that the highest form of heroism is to undertake spy duty for one's country. Nothing can be more awful than the fate of the spy caught and executed amid the hate and fear of the thousands who surround him. Many photographs sent from the seat of war show how the European armies make the death of the spy terrible.

The Germans are universally admitted to be more skilful spies than the British, and yet Gen. Baden-Powell performed some remarkable spying tricks. He tells how he got into a new German dockyard and made observations under the nose of several policemen:

"Inside a great, high wall lay a dockyard, in which, it was rumored, a new power house was being erected, and possibly a dry dock was in course of preparation.

"The scaffolding of the new house towered above me, and a ladder led upward on to it. Up this I went like a lamplighter, keeping one eye on the corner of the building lest I should be followed.

"Presently I found a short ladder leading from my platform to the stage below, but it did not go to the ground. Peering quietly over the scaffolding, I saw my friend the policeman below, still at fault. I blessed my stars that he was no tracker, and therefore had not seen my footmarks leading to the foot of the ladder.

"Then I proceeded to take note of my surroundings and to gather information. Judging from the design of the building, its great chimneys, etc., I was actually on the new power-house. From my post I had an excellent view over the dockyard, and within one hundred feet of me were the excavation works of the new dock, whose dimensions I could easily estimate.

"All these duties (of espionage) are subdivided among agents of every grade, from Ambassadors and their attachés downward. Naval and military officers are sent to carry out special investigations by all countries, and paid detectives are stationed in likely centres to gather information."

The General further says that the military information that a country voluntarily gives to a foreign attaché is usually of little value, and therefore he must take secret means to inform himself.--(Told in _New York American_.)

II--STORY OF MLLE. MATA HARI, DUTCH-JAVANESE DANCER

The story of Mata Hari, the beautiful dancing girl, who as a German spy discovered the information about the British "tanks" before they arrived at the Battle of the Somme, is one of the most romantic of the War. She was found guilty of espionage and condemned to death by a military court martial presided over by Col. Sempron.

"Accused did wilfully and maliciously, and against the interest of la Patrie, communicate information of military value to the enemy concerning our offensive of the summer of 1916," read the verdict that sent her to a cell in Saint Lazare Prison awaiting the dawn which means her death.

"Eye-of-the-Morning" is English for the Javanese pet name "Mata-Hari"--the stage name of Mme. Marguerite Gertrude Zelle Macleod, first known in Paris, and latterly all over Europe, as a dancer whose specialty was the representing of Far-Eastern legends and fables according to the terpsichorean art....

One of the most important and spectacular events of the only Allied offensive of 1916 was the appearance in action of the newest engine of war--the so-called tank. As with any innovation, the success of the tank depended largely on the element of surprise attaching to its debut. Therefore, the strictest secrecy marked the planning, the construction, and the shipment of tanks to the Somme, where they first went into action. But of course a certain number of people in England and in France knew about the tanks--or "creme-de-menthes" as they were first called in Paris because each one is named like a ship and one called after the famous green liqueur. It took a good many months to construct the first fleet, and a good many weeks to train the first crews to stand the jerky, rolling, pitching, lumbering gait of the mobile forts. During that period the circle of people "in the know" increased, and Mata-Hari was one of those who heard about the curious landships.

Where Mata-Hari obtained her first tip on the tanks has not yet been disclosed. And that is one reason why the "memoirs" which she is writing in her cell at Saint Lazare prison are being awaited with fear and anxiety by at least one person, and with the liveliest interest by the world at large.

It is rumored that a Deputy inadvertently gave her the first information about tanks. And the rumor is strengthened by the fact that Mata-Hari had plenty of coal for her apartment during the fuel famine in winter. That in itself is proof enough to everybody of her intimacy with some high official, as few people short of Deputies had influence enough to obtain a hundredweight of coal during the bitter months of January, February and March.