Part 34

The censor's suspicious mind, always on the alert for something unusual, saw that this message could easily be a code, which would mean to the man receiving it, "Sailed, 13 transports with 15,000 troops."

It was too probable to be an accident, thought the censor, and he decided to watch Mendez & Co. A few days later two more transports sailed, and Mendez filed three more cables, each containing the number 2, with other figures. The censor promptly put the detectives on the trail.

The merciless grasp of the Secret Service, which always "gets" its man, then settled about Mendez. The Spaniard could make no move, day or night, that was not immediately known to the Service.

In the dead of an autumn night, two agents opened the door of Mendez' office with a master key, and searched his desk. One man ran over all the papers, reading them rapidly in a low voice, while his companion, an expert stenographer, took down the words with lightning speed. This done, they placed a dictagraph in the inner office, working quickly and well. With a final glance around, they left, having completed the work in a remarkably short time.

The next day Mendez' telephone was tapped. Then his secretary left, and the new one he hired was a Secret Service agent. The Spaniard never guessed it, for the secretary brought the most trustworthy references. Every time Mendez held a meeting of his group of German agents and talked of how to send information to Germany, the secretary heard all they said, and at once reported it to his chief. Every time Mendez telephoned, a Secret Service agent listened to what he said. Every time he had a conference in his office, if the secretary by chance was not there, the dictagraph made a record of the conversation, and the Service knew about it.

Naturally such careful watching won in the end. Mendez, who had caught the German habit of believing that no one was so clever as himself, did not dream of the net that was being woven around him, and went on filing his cable messages which, of course, were not sent. All the information obtained by the Secret Service was sifted, arranged, and confirmed, and Mendez was arrested. With his departure, his whole following was helpless, and settled back to swear at the United States for its tyranny. The patient Secret Service had scored again.

So it went. For every German spy or would-be spy in America, there was an agent of the Secret Service, equally resourceful, and more likely to succeed, because, no matter how clumsy his adversary seemed, he never made the mistake of underrating him. "Stupid Yankees," von Papen had called us, while he went about his plotting with child-like faith in his skill at hiding. "Stupid Germans," the Secret Service might have retorted, as it skillfully uncovered all his plotting and sent him back to his Kaiser, where his stupidity was more appreciated.

But it took many months of patient, unceasing work, and far the greatest part of it was dull, hard, steady grind. Rarely was there any excitement for the industrious government agents, and more rarely was there any glory, for the work had to be kept secret. Trailing, watching, studying, thinking, always putting two and two together and often finding that they made five instead of four; through day and night, through sun and storm, the officers whose duty it was to catch the spy before he could harm America worked steadily on.

That is why America won at home just as she won abroad. Had not the silent army in the United States fought so unceasingly and so skillfully, the army in France would have been paralyzed. When you think of the Great Victory, remember those quiet, unknown men and women at home who did so much to help win it, and give full credit to the Secret Service.

ROGER WILLIAM RIIS.

AT THE FRONT

What one soldier writes, millions have experienced.

At first the waiting for orders; the wonder of how to adapt one's nature to the conditions that lay ahead. The fear of being afraid. Many times in that last week in London, which now seems so far away, I did aimless, meaningless things that I had done before; wondering if I should ever do them again. Visiting old scenes of happy days, trying, as it were, to conjure up old associations, for fear the chance might not come again. Strange, perhaps, but many of the things I do are strange, and only those who know me best would understand. My good-by to you--and the curtain rose on the first act of the drama that I have been privileged to watch, with every now and then a "walking on" part. The first act was one of absorbing interest, learning the characters of the play, and my mind was filled with wonder at the plot as day by day it unfolded before me. I have tried to write of all the wonders of the Base; its organization and the mastery of an Empire to serve its ideal in its hour of need. The second curtain rose on the trenches, and it is my impressions of this life, rather than of its details, that I would now write. The first and greatest is the way the average man has surmounted the impossible, has brought, as it were, a power to strike that word from his vocabulary. Living in conditions which in previous years would have caused his death, he has maintained his vitality of mind and body. Healthy amid the pestilence of decaying death, of chill from nights spent sometimes waist deep in water; or chattering with cold as misty morning finds him saturated with its clammy cold. Facing death from bullet, shell, and gas, and all the ingenuity that devilish manhood can devise, yet remaining the same cheery, lively animal, wondering when it all will cease. A new spirit of unselfishness has entered the race, or perchance the old selfishness bred by years of peace has died, leaving a cleaner, nobler feeling in its place. Men who before cheated their neighbors, grasping to themselves all that came their way, have learned instinctively to share their little all. The message from Mars, "Halves, partner," has become the general spirit; and yet some say that there is no finer side to war! As for the officers, as a rule, no words for them can be too fine. For they have learned at once to be the leaders and the servants of their men, tiring themselves out for others' comforts. And the men know it; from them can come no class hatred in future years. If danger lies in that direction it must surely come from those who have stayed at home.

For myself, I am slowly learning my lesson; learning that death, which seems so near one, seldom shakes one by the hand. Learning to look over the "top" to encourage those whose duty makes them do so. Learning to walk out with a wiring party to "No Man's Land," or to set a patrol along its way. Learning to share the risks that others run so as to win the confidence of my men.

Now let me say a word of the demoralizing effects of dugouts: Often it takes a conscious effort to leave its safety or to stay away from it for the dangers of level ground, and this is what all officers must learn; for men can have no confidence in one who, ordering them out, stays underground himself. I am learning, but, oh! so slowly, for mine is not a nature that is really shaped for war. A vivid imagination is here a handicap, and it is those who have little or none who make the best soldiers. At last the "finished and finite clod" has come into his own. Stolid, in a danger he hardly realizes, he remains at his post, while the other, perchance shaking in every limb, has double the battle to fight. My pencil wanders on and I hardly seem to know what I write. Confused thoughts and half-formed impressions crowd through my brain, and from the chaos some reach the paper. What kind of reading do they make? I wonder.

* * * * * *

I'm awfully tired, but this may well be my last undisturbed night this week, and I know how much letters must mean to you waiting and waiting for news in England. All afternoon I've been wandering about the front line, exploring, and learning to find my way about that desolate waste of devastation representing recently captured ground. One waded knee high amid tangled undergrowth dotted with three-foot stakes, and learned from the map that this was a wood. One looked for a railway, where only a buried bar of twisted metal could be found. One road we could not find at all, so battered was the countryside; and so after five and a half hours' wandering, we returned to a dinner of soup, steak, stewed fruit, and cocoa. Today I noticed for the first time the wonderful variety of insect life in the trenches; flies and beetles of gorgeous and varied color showing against the vivid white of the fresh-cut chalk. Past a famous mining village which for two years has been swept by shell fire, now British, now German, until nothing save the village Crucifix remains unbattered; iron, brick, and concrete, twisted by the awful destructive power of high explosives. Graves dating back to October, 1915, and up to the present time, lie scattered here and there, but each with the name of the fallen one well marked on it, waiting to be claimed when Peace shall come. As I walked the old lines flashed into my head--

"And though you be done to the death, what then, If you battled the best you could? If you played your part in the world of men, Why, the critics will call it good! Death comes with a crawl, or comes with a pounce, And whether he's slow or spry, It isn't the fact that you're dead that counts, But only, how did you die?"

Strange! but nowhere did I see a German grave other than those with the inscription in English, "A German Soldier killed in action." Dead Germans have I seen, but never a German grave.

There seems to be no bird life here, beyond a rare covey of partridges well behind the line, or a solitary lark searching for summer. One misses--oh, so much!--the cheeky chirp of the sparrow or the note of the thrush. We found a stray terrier about yesterday and have adopted it, but I don't think it will go into the front line: there's enough human suffering, without adding innocent canine victims that cannot understand. Here let me say a word for the horses and mules, exposed to dangers and terror (for mules actually come into the trenches to within 200 yards of the line), patiently doing their work, often terrified, often mutilated and never understanding why they have been taken from their peaceful life to the struggle and hardship of war. Much has been written, much is being done, but how few realize it from their point of view. The men are wonderful, their cheerfulness, their ability to work is nothing short of marvelous; but for the others, the animals, their patient slavery is more wonderful, still.

Coming over the ridge tonight I saw the distant hills against the after-glow of sunset; the moment was quiet, as one often finds it so; for those few seconds no guns were firing, no shells bursting, and not even the distant "ping" of a rifle was to be heard. It seemed so English, just as though we were on one of our September holidays in the car, looking towards the north hill country that I love so much. Then suddenly the guns started, and we were at war again. There is one of those strange feelings of expectation in the air tonight, as though there were great things pending, and yet all is normal as far as we know. Who knows, perhaps the end is not as far as we believe. A few more days of trial and we shall have earned our next rest.

I go to my so-called bed, to try and snatch a few short hours' sleep, lulled by the music of the guns that have started their nightly hate.

My love to you. Keep smiling.

* * * * * *

Picture if you can a flight of twenty-four steps leading into the darkness of the underground. At the foot of this a room, if room it can be called, some thirteen feet by ten by seven high, the walls of tree trunks and railway sleepers, the roof of corrugated iron resting on railway lines; from this hang stalactites of rust, and large and loathsome insects creep about; above lives a colony of rats: such is our living-room, damp with a dampness that reaches one's bones and makes all things clammy to the touch. A couple of tables, a chair, and some boxes, such is our dining-room suite. From this a long, narrow, low passage leads to the kitchen, signalers' and 'phone room, officers' bunks and office. By day and night one stumbles among sleeping soldiers off duty, tired enough to find sleep on the boarded floor. My bed,--a couple of boards and some sand-bags,--is four feet from the ground, too narrow for safety, and yet I sleep. Men who previously grumbled at an eight-hour day, now do eighteen hours for seven days a week--such is war, and such is the spirit in which they take it.

Outside--or rather up above--a cold drizzle adds to the general discomfort, "pineapples" drop promiscuously about, but one can hear them coming, save when barrages are about, and the roar of gun and bursting shell drowns all else. One nearly got me this morning. I just ducked in time as it burst on the parapet behind where I was standing--a splinter caught my tin hat, but bounded off. In spite of all, this has been a cheery day. One learns to laugh at Fritz's efforts to kill one, and at the appalling waste of money he spends in misplaced shells; one laughs still more when they fall in his own lines from his own guns, and frantic cries of distress and protest, in the form of colored rockets, fill the air. LIFE, even with all its letters capitals, has its humors. Dire rumors of the postponement of our longed-for rest--but what is rumor, after all?

Half of another weary night has passed. I took a morning in bed (five hours, only disturbed twice) and so raised my sleep average to nearly four hours a day.

How unreal it seems to be writing with a loaded revolver by one's paper, and a respirator on one's chest. I bet the Huns are sorry that they ever invented gas. You make too much of what I did on Monday, it was nothing wonderful, and had I had time to think, I should probably have funked it. Instinct and training and the excitement of the moment--that is all, just my duty. I did see a brave act that morning, and one that required real pluck, not excitement. I must see a specialist about the injury as soon as I can get an appointment. Still smiling.