<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII<br/> <span class="cheaderfont">HOW BOB WAS CAPTURED AS A SPY</span></h2>
<p>“Now,” said Buck with a grin, “we are
about to get down to something that hasn’t been
printed forty times in the newspapers.”</p>
<p>Bob could not help getting a little huffy at
that.</p>
<p>“You’d be a mighty poor newspaper man,”
he said, “if you hadn’t heard something about
all of those things by this time. But of course if
you don’t want to hear the rest of this, why all
right.”</p>
<p>“Shut up, Buck,” said Ned, himself smothering
a smile, for Bob was really funny when he
flared up in this way. “Go on with your story,
Bob, please. Of course we’re interested. You
were just going to tell us about what really
happened when you finally determined to take
matters into your own hands and go to the front,
whether the German authorities wanted you to
or not.”</p>
<p>Somewhat mollified, Bob continued his
narrative:</p>
<p><span class="pagenum">[143]</span></p>
<p>“I happened to be in Malines at the time and
the point where the heaviest fighting was going
on was in the Yser River district, a considerable
distance to the south. Nothing but military
trains were running between the two points and
naturally I wouldn’t have been permitted to take
one of them. My only remaining course was to
buy a horse and to take my chances of getting
there alone. It took me four days to buy that
horse and then I had to pay about four times
what he was worth, owing to the fact that the
cavalry had long before appropriated every
sound animal in the country.</p>
<p>“This noble charger of mine was wind-broken
and wall-eyed, those probably being the only reasons
why he had not been commandeered previously.
He was such an awful looking object
that I hated to be seen riding on him, but beggars
can’t be choosers and I had to make the
best of it.</p>
<p>“While staying there in Malines I had struck
up quite a friendly acquaintanceship with several
young officers, one of whom—Hoffmansthal by
name—was good enough to volunteer his services
in securing a passport for me from the commandant.
There was all sorts of red tape to be
gone through before I finally got it, and when I<span class="pagenum">[144]</span>
did I found out that it was made out in the
name of ‘Philip Maestrich, citizen of Malines,
and by trade a silversmith.’ The papers went
on to say that I had been given official permission
to travel to Namur, not far from where the
fighting was, to the bedside of my sick wife.
My friend, Lieutenant Hoffmansthal, explained
that he could never have got the passport for me
except by this subterfuge.</p>
<p>“So I set out on my wobbly old mare and as
far as Corbais all went well. From there on
every patrol guarding the roads stopped me and
acknowledged the passport with extreme ill-grace.
I took to avoiding the main hotels in the
towns and slept in all sorts of unpleasant places—sometimes
even under a haystack out in the
open fields.</p>
<p>“Near Wasseige I found all of the roads
blockaded with reinforcements marching to the
front, and, rather than risk detection by them,
I made a wide détour to the east, turning south
again somewhere in the neighborhood of Villers
le Temple. That night a dreadful rainstorm
drove me to take shelter in a peasant’s cottage,
and he, while I slept, galloped on a plough-horse
to the nearest German outposts and won
a reward for declaring me a spy.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum">[145]</span></p>
<p>“I was jerked roughly out of bed by a big,
red-bearded Uhlan captain, my saddlebags were
searched and even the linings cut out to discover
the presence of secret papers. There they
found my <cite>Herald</cite> credentials, which said that
my name was Robert Russell and not ‘Philip
Maestrich.’ That was enough with the blockhead
who had arrested me, and, all puffed up
with his capture, he sent me with a special detail
of men to Combret. Later I was transferred from
one camp to another until a hospital train happened
along bound for Muhlbruck. They bundled
me aboard this for trial by ferocious old
General Haberkampf, whose field headquarters
were located at our destination.</p>
<p>“Never will I forget the ghastly horrors of
that five-hour ride on that hospital train. The
engine barely crawled along, bumping over rails
which the Belgians had torn up in the early
days of the war, and which had subsequently
been re-laid by the Germans. Every railway
coach was packed to suffocation with wounded,
some of them so frightfully mangled as to
appear scarcely human any longer.</p>
<p>“Groans and piteous cries for water or more
air echoed in my ears both day and night. Each
morning we stopped to put out three or four<span class="pagenum">[146]</span>
poor fellows who had died overnight. Some
were delirious with pain and would scream, sing
or curse frantically, defying the Red Cross
nurses to come near them. The smell of blood,
ether and arnica made the air sickening. I
myself was wholly unnerved by it, but my
soldier guards maintained the appearance of
stolid indifference. Perhaps they had become
used to seeing such suffering as that.</p>
<p>“Finally we arrived in Muhlbruck. I was
completely fagged out by then, and really scarcely
cared whether they shot me or not. My brain
was numb with the horrors with which I had
been surrounded. I couldn’t think, let alone
invent a story that would plausibly account for
my traveling about under an assumed name.</p>
<p>“When they hauled me up before old General
Haberkampf, he hardly gave me a chance to
defend myself. He is a soldier of the old, hard
school of the Emperor Wilhelm I—the sort of
fellow who makes militarism his god.</p>
<p>“‘In other words,’ he growled at me, ‘you
confess that you are not the person whose passport
you use, and that you have for some time
past been penetrating our lines under false
colors. You now say that you are an American
newspaper man, yet you know that war correspondents<span class="pagenum">[147]</span>
have been officially ordered out of the
war zone. How do I know but that you are
lying to me as you already have to all of my
officers between here and Malines? You are a
spy!’</p>
<p>“I tried to bring him into a reasonable frame
of mind, but that is a hard thing to do with a
man whose army is being daily beaten further
back. He would not listen to me.</p>
<p>“Then they took me to a foul prison where
I stayed for three weeks with about fifty other
wretched men—some of them Frenchmen who
had been captured in battle; a couple of them
peasants who had been caught looting dead
bodies on the battle field; and three or four
common malefactors. We were treated well
enough there, but sanitary conditions were
unspeakable, and, really, the news of yesterday
that my case was at last to come up for final
decision, struck me as an actual relief.</p>
<p>“Long before this I had given up all hopes
of ever escaping and I expected to be condemned.
My trial was a mere form. All the way down
that road to the place of execution this morning
I kept thinking about you boys, wondering what
you were doing and if you would have tried to
rescue me had you heard of my plight.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum">[148]</span></p>
<p>“All of the adventures and happy times we
ever had together in the past recurred to me
vividly. Good old pals! How I wanted to see
you just once more before I died!</p>
<p>“When they backed me up against that wall,
I closed my eyes, expecting to hear the death
volley ring out at any moment. Then I suddenly
felt something tugging and slashing at my
wrists, the hard ropes fell away, and I turned,
half-dazed, to find Buck shoving two big revolvers
into my hands, with word that you other
boys were near with the <em>Flyer</em>.</p>
<p>“You know the rest of the story, and I can’t
say anything more except that words don’t suffice
to express my opinion of the perfectly bully
way you have acted towards me.”</p>
<p>“Land! Land!” shouted Ned just then. “I
can see the trees down below!”</p>
<hr class="chap" />
<p><span class="pagenum">[149]</span></p>
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