“ Irving mused, as he took his seat in the rear cockpit, strapped himself in, buckled about his waist, chest and shoulders the parachute harness, and waited for the pilot to start the motor that would send them away off on a wild night trip through the air over a wilder scene of human slaughter and with one of the wildest spy-plans in view that ever put thrills into the records of international secret service agents. ”

“ Tons and tons of high explosive planted under that ridge had blown it to the sky.
"No, it didn't, either," Irving mused with a smile of "altitude amusement." "It was only a flash in the pan. Not a pebble came half as high as we are, and the sky is hundreds of miles--umph! How much higher is it? My! if the world could only get up here and look at itself, I wonder if things wouldn't go a little differently. No, I'm afraid not! There'd always be somebody then trying to grab a bigger slice of the moon than he's entitled to. ”

“ Irving interpolated to himself. "My citizenship will be where it always ought to have been, and was, and is, and always will be, as long as I live--in the United States. I spoke with a double tongue and satisfied my own conscience at the end. Oh, I can see that I'm going to be some prevaricator before this adventure is finished. Really, it never occurred to me before, but a spy must have the biggest imagination on earth to be successful. However, it's a good cause, that's some consolation." ”

“ Irving replied.
"Of course, you hadn't. You'd have been too scientific for a secret service operative, wouldn't you?"
"Can't secret service people be scientific?" Irving inquired.
"What do you think about it?" asked the surgeon. "You ought to know more about it than I do. But I'll tell you what my frank and unscientific opinion in the matter is."
"What is it?"
"That government secret service is 1 per cent information and 99 per cent bluff."
"That's a little strong on the side of the bluff," said the spy, smiling. ”

“ Any little insignificant item of information may be worth a good deal to us at any time. That's one secret of the great value of the German spy system. Now I'll leave you with this budget of communications and let you work it out with your own intelligence. That's one way we have of finding out what a man is worth."
Irving longed to ask him how he protected such an intricate system of concentrated information from leaks that might be of value to the enemy, but wisely refrained. ”

“ Could it be possible? Yes, no, yes, no--back and forth the contradictions swung. But one thing was certain; Irving recalled it distinctly: In the maze of configurations of "distorted cubes" were myriads of dots and dashes, dots and dashes. What could they mean? If the theory which forced itself upon him was correct there was only one reasonable solution of the whole mystery.
The boy in the dugout could scarcely contain his excitement as the seemingly logical explanation of the mystery "dotted and dashed" itself into a position of settled conviction in his mind. ”

“ We must remember that we are fighting a common enemy and it is ridiculous for us to be fighting one another. We ought rather to be helping one another."
"That's an excellent idea," Tourtelle declared. "Now what would you say if I should ask you to do something for me? Would you resent it?"
"I couldn't very well, after the principle I just laid down," Irving answered with the shadow of a smile; "provided it were reasonable," he added.
"Oh, I don't see how there's anything unreasonable in it," the officer replied quickly. "The only thing is, you may think it a very odd request, freakish perhaps. ”

“ The catalog expert then spoke first.
"Where do you eat?" he asked.
"Oh, any place," Irving replied. "I've been in two or three restaurants around here. There's a good one down in the next block."
"That suits me," said Strauss.
They walked along in silence half a square, and then the boy's mysterious companion put to him the most inquisitive query that the spy had listened to from this man since he became acquainted with him:
"When do you expect to go back to America?"
"Good!" Irving said to himself. "Sounds as if he's going to open up. Maybe I'll get something out of him after all." ”

“ Next day the mystery of the window-telegraph spy bothered him a good deal, even more than it did immediately after the fellow had "dotted and dashed" his message on the pane of glass.
"I wonder who he was?" he repeated many times. "I wonder if he's somebody I'm in close touch with every day?"
The suggestion caused him to watch narrowly every person in the office with whom he did business for the German government. But the more he watched, the more unsatisfactory the situation became. ”

“ If anybody had observed the precipitation with which Irving dived down the hatchway of U-31 a moment or two after he recognized the "cubist art spy," there is no doubt that the observer would have been impressed with the mystery of the proceeding. As it was, all of his boche companions on the outer deck were too much interested in seeking an explanation of the "kamerad" cry from the midst of a boatload of enemy soldiers and sailors to give attention to anything less than the explosion of a bomb on their own vessel. ”

“ It might brand me as a freak, if not something worse."
"I don't blame you," returned the colonel, but as he spoke a peculiar shrewdness lighted his eyes, causing the boy to wonder a little. Then he added: "Still, it might be possible for one to submit to such nonsense if thereby he might advance a great and worthy cause."
"Sure, that's quite possible," Irving agreed; "but I don't see how Tourtelle, or Hessenburg, can claim any such motive."
"No, but if he had done it for his own country, the British empire, to advance the cause of human freedom, what then?" ”

“ Tourtelle continued, noting the effect of his suggestion. "He wanted to know why I wished to save the arm, and I replied that it was for two reasons: first, because I thought it would make an excellent souvenir; second, because it was tattooed in a very artistic manner and I don't want to lose the art. I'm of an artistic temperament, and it would break my heart more to lose that bit of tattooing on my arm than to lose the arm and keep the art."
"I think I get you," said Irving with a smile. "You want me to put the arm in alcohol and preserve it, tattooing and all?" ”

“ But they made it finally, up the side of the hill, if indeed any hill remained, and into the crater--Irving could see an altered condition following the trinitrotoluol explosions, and concluded that there must be a long, a very long, crater--miles of it--in the place of Vimy Ridge. They were cheering like mad--Irving knew it, though he could not hear a voice. Yes, into the crater they went, a myriad of insects, or wee animals,--they had possession of it--the enemy seemed not to offer any resistance. They were whipped, thoroughly--they knew it. ”

“ Irving reflected a little apprehensively. "In spite of the way everything fits into everything else as logically as can be, the whole account is bound to sound a good deal like a fairy story. Sometimes I feel like giving it up and casting the whole affair out of my mind, but--but--I can't. Now, that idea that made me burst out like a 'nut,' as that soldier called me, fits in just as pat as can be with all he rest. It looks, it looks, yes, sir, it looks just as if Tourtelle was trying to surrender out in No Man's Land the other night when we were scouting there together. ”

“ I overheard a little of a conversation not intended for my ears, and from that I got the notion, or perhaps it's only a suspicion, that the message contains the British naval or aeronautical wireless code."
"At any rate, it's of great importance," suggested Lieut. Osborne.
"Oh, there's no doubt about that," Tourtelle, or Hessenburg, assured.
"Are you an artist?" was the inquisitor's next question.
"Yes, I am; that is, I was an art student, and the story I told Ellis about making a hit with a cubist painting is true. That's what started the scheme of tattooing a picture message on my arm." ”

“ If you give us some valuable information that could not have been obtained otherwise, it stands to reason--doesn't it?--that we'd forget that you'd been a spy, particularly so if the value of your information was greater than your menace as a spy. ”

“ In fact, not an enemy plane arose in the air to oppose the attacking squadron until the leading flyers were directly over No Man's Land, brilliantly illuminated with the fireworks of battle, and then something happened that must have thrilled every aviator who witnessed it, accustomed though he was almost daily to thrills that make the life of a soldier on land or a Jackie of the navy seem like a tame existence in comparison. ”

“ Irving's sentiments, however, were of much different nature. He was thoroughly disgusted with his own "string of falsehoods," as he characterized the stories he had told to the intelligence attache and the brigadier general.
"I know very well that a spy is a personified fib, pure and simple," he told himself with a reflective compression of his lips. "I don't think it's any worse than that, and I don't think the stories I told were any worse than fibs. A spy is just a misrepresentation walking around on two feet. ”

“ Irving was by nature a very observing youth. His instructor was something more than a mere bird-man, for he had studied aviation as a mathematical, as well as a physical, science. He showed the boy how to figure out the rate of falling after being given the diameter of a standard-made parachute and the weight of the aeronaut.
The parachute with which the young spy-student got his experience as a diver from the sky was one of several supplied for experimental work following reports that the enemy had perfected a similar device which had proved successful as a life saver in air battles. ”

“ One of the faces was turned well toward Private Ellis, who could hardly smother an exclamation of astonishment as he recognized him.
It was Lieut. Tourtelle!
"What in the world does he think he's doing?" Irving questioned to himself. "He doesn't seem to be very anxious to protect himself. He hasn't a pistol, knife or bomb in his hand." ”

“ He passed several times near the expert's desk, but the latter pored more diligently than ever over his work. Once Irving caught his eye and attempted to pass him a look of intelligent meaning, but Strauss turned away quickly, and Irving left the building without saying good-by to one of the occupants.
"A very cold-blooded business," he told himself. "My! I'm glad to be out of there. I'm afraid I'm not built along cold enough lines for a spy even in behalf of a great and meritorious cause. That fellow Strauss is an ideal spy. He must be the best any nation ever produced. ”

“ The fellow, an infantry lieutenant, about 30 years old, was a cold-eyed, emotionless individual and about as cruelly boastful Prussian as one would care to meet. There was no fate too frightful for an English soldier in his opinion, and all other Allies fighting on the side of the British ought to be reduced to vassalage and forced to pay tribute to the House of Hohenzollern. ”

“ They'll see there's something wrong, dead sure. I'm proving myself a mighty poor spy, and ought to have stayed in the Canadian trenches. Of course, I must expect to run into the most dangerous situations and depend on my wits, bluff, and nerve--yes NERVE--to get me out. What if I am under suspicion? If they have no goods on me, I'm safe enough so long as I don't convict myself by a guilty manner. I must be mistaken in my suspicion that they have found something wrong in that cubist art message. ”

“ Then Irving had another session with Col. Evans, who gave him his final instructions.
"I haven't given you much of an idea yet what we want you to find out for us at Berlin, or wherever you can get the information," said the commander of the regiment. "We know, of course, that there is an extensive enemy spy organization in both Canada and the United States, and while we are able to get a few of those fellows now and then, still they're pretty smart as a rule, and we feel that we have only scratched the surface. We want their names, or the name of every leader of consequence among them. ”

“ There's a lot of difference between sitting still and dreaming how you love your father's fatherland before he emigrated, and plotting in the midst of your fellow countrymen to help a lot of tyrants whom you've never seen on the other side o' the world. ”

“ Undoubtedly his spectacular method of transit from the Canadian to the German lines helped materially to boost along his growing reputation, but it would also be unfair to put too much emphasis on this feat of daring and skill. Irving really deserved much credit for innate ability.
In his efforts to create a general feeling of satisfaction and confidence in order to ward off any suspicions which might arise regarding his purpose and motives, the young spy did a good many things that almost caused in him a rebellious boiling over of patriotic sentiment. ”

“ STUDYING TO BE A SPY
An hour later Lieut. Osborne arrived at the colonel's headquarters, and he and Private Ellis started at once for the field hospital. There they found Hessenburg, alias Tourtelle, much improved physically, but not a little nervous regarding his own rather precarious prospects. Instead of being an officer helping to direct, in his small way, the battle against the autocratic presumption of a great military power, he was something more than an ordinary prisoner of war--a trapped spy, who had conspired with others for the downfall of his own country. ”