by John Blaine
There was nothing about the silent countryside, as he tramped along an excellent road, to make him think of war. The fields about him seemed to be planted less with grain; they were very largely used for pasture, and he saw a good many horses. He remembered now that this was the great horse breeding district of Germany. Here there were great estates with many acres of rolling land on which great numbers of horses were bred. It was here, he knew, that the German army, needing great numbers of horses every year, found its mounts.
"They'll need more than ever now," he thought to himself. "If there's really to be war, I suppose they'll take every horse that's able to work at all, whether it's a good looking beast or not. Poor horses! They don't have much chance, I guess."
He thought of the Cossacks he had seen in Russia, wiry, small men, in the main, mounted on shaggy, strong, little horses, no bigger in reality than ponies. He had heard of the prowess of the Cossacks, of course. They had fought well in the past in a good many wars. But somehow it seemed rather absurd to match them, with their undersized horses, against magnificent specimens of men and horseflesh such as the German cavalry. He had passed a squadron of Uhlans, near Virballen, outlined against the sky. They had been grim and business-like in appearance. But then the Cossacks were that, too, though in an entirely different way.
"I wish I had someone along!" he thought, at last.
That was when the dawn was beginning to break. Off to the east the sun was beginning to rise, and in the grey half light before full day there was something stark and gaunt about the country. Before him smoke was rising, probably from a village. But that sign of human habitation, that certain indication that people were near, somehow only made him feel lonelier than he had been in the starlit darkness of the night. This would be good enough fun, if only one of his many friends back home were along-Jack French, or Steve Vedder. It was with them that he had shared such adventures in the past. And yet not just such adventures, either. This was more real than anything his adventures as a Boy Scout had brought him, though he belonged to a patrol that got in a lot of outdoor work, and that camped out every summer in a practical way.
Being alone took some of the zest out of what had seemed, once Lieutenant Ernst's loan had saved him from his most pressing worry, likely to be a bully adventure. Now it seemed rather flat and stale. But that was partly because having tramped all night, he was really beginning to be tired. So he went on to the village, and there he found a little inn, where he got a good breakfast and a bed, in which, as soon as he had eaten his meal, he was sound asleep.
Few men were about the village when he went in. He had noticed, however, the curious little throng, early as it was, about a bulletin ominously headed, "Kriegzustand!" That meant mobilization and war. The men had answered the call already, all except those who were too old to spring to arms at once. Some of the older ones, he knew, would be called out, too, for garrison duty, so that younger men might go to the front.
In his sleep he had many dreams, but the most insistent one was made up of the tramp of heavy feet and the blowing of bugles and the rattling of horses' feet. And this wasn't a dream at all, for when he awoke it was to find a soldier shaking him roughly by the shoulders, and ordering him to get up. And outside were all the sounds of his dream. The sun was high for he had been asleep for several hours. So he got up willingly enough, and hurried his dressing because he remembered what Ernst had told him. Then he followed the soldier downstairs, and found himself the prisoner in an impromptu sort of court-martial.
Really, it wasn't as bad as that. Considering that he had no passports and nothing, in fact, to show who he was, and that no responsible person could vouch for him, he was very lucky. It was because he was a boy, and obviously an American boy, that he got off so easily. For after he had answered a few questions, a major explained the situation to him very punctiliously.
"You must be detained here for two or three days," said the major. "This is an important concentration district, and many things will happen that no foreigner can be allowed to see. We believe absolutely that you are not unfriendly, and that you have no intention of reporting anything you might chance to learn to an enemy. But in time of war we may not take any risks, and you will, therefore, be required to remain in this village under observation.
"Within the village limits you will be as free as if you were at home, in your own country. You will not be allowed to pass them, however, and if you try to do so a sentry will shoot you. As soon as certain movements are completed, you will be at liberty to pass on, on your way to Koenigsberg. I will add to Lieutenant Ernst's advice. When you reach Koenigsberg, after you have reported yourself to the police, wait there until a train can take you to Berlin. It will mean only a few days of waiting, for at Koenigsberg there are already many refugees, and the authorities want to get them to Berlin as soon as the movements of troop trains allow the railway to be reopened for passenger traffic."
Fred agreed to all this. There was nothing else for him to do, for one thing, and, for another, he was by no means unwilling to see whatever there might be to be seen here. He could guess by this time that without any design he had stumbled on a spot that was reckoned rather important by the Germans, for the time being at least, and he had heard enough about the wonderful efficiency of the German army to be anxious to see that mighty machine in the act of getting ready to move.
He did see a good deal, as a matter of fact, that day and the next. It was on the famous Saturday night of the first of August that he had left Virballen. Sunday brought news of a clash with France, far away on the western border, and of the German invasion of Belgium. Monday brought word of a definite declaration of war between Germany and France, and of the growing danger that England, too, might be involved.
And all of Sunday and all of Monday supplies of all sorts poured through the little village in an unceasing stream. Motor cars and trucks were to be seen in abundance, and Fred caught his first glimpse, which was not to be his last, of the wonderful German field kitchens, in the mighty ovens of which huge loaves of bread were being baked even while the whole clumsy looking apparatus was on the move. But it only looked clumsy. Like everything else about the German army, this was a practical and efficient, well tried device.
Then suddenly, early on Tuesday, he was told that he was free to go, or would be by nightfall. And that day all signs of the German army, save a small force of Uhlans, vanished from the village. That evening, refreshed and ready for the road again, Fred set out. And that same evening, though he did not know it until the next day, England entered the war against Germany. CHAPTER III
A STRANGE MEETING
As he walked west Fred noticed, even in the night, a change in the country. It was not that he passed once in a while a solitary soldier guarding a culvert, as he neared a railway, or a patrol, with its twinkling fire, watching this spot or that that needed special guarding. That was part of war, the part of war that he had been able to foresee. It wasn't anything due to the war that made an impression on his mind so much as a sort of thickening of the country. Though he had traveled so short a distance from the Russian border, there seemed to be more people about.
Great houses, rising on high ground, with small, contented looking villages nestling, as it were, under their protection, were frequent. He was, as a matter of fact, in a country of great aristocratic landholders, the great nobles of Prussia, the men who are the real rulers of the country, under the Prussian King, who is also the German Kaiser. And in many of these great houses lights were burning, even after midnight, when all signs of life in the villages had ceased. The country was stirring, and there was more of it to stir. Now from time to time he heard the throbbing hum of an automobile motor. Only one or two of these passed him, going in either direction, on the road along which he was traveling. But there were parallel roads, and he could hear the throbbing motors on these, and often see the pointing shafts of light from their lights, searching out the road before them as they sped along.
Fred knew enough of Germany to understand something of what he saw and heard. It was from these great houses that a great many officers were contributed to the army. These young men had no real career before them from their birth, almost, except in the army. So it was easy to guess why the lights were burning in those mansions, and why there was anxiety among them, and why the throbbing motor cars were humming over the roads.
If Germany were beaten back in the beginning, if the task she had undertaken proved too heavy, this was the province that was sure to feel the first brunt of invasion. Behind him, to the east, Fred knew were the great masses of Russia, moving slowly, but with a terrible, always increasing force. No wonder these people were stirring, were sending out all their men to drive back the huge power that lay so near them, a constant menace!
But now, though he did not know it, Fred was approaching real danger for the first time. Many of the motors he saw and heard were going west. Though he could not guess it, they were carrying women and children away from the old houses that were too much exposed, too directly in the path of a possible invasion for the helpless ones to be left in them when the men had gone to fight. All Germany had to be defended. It happened to be the part of East Prussia to bear invasion, if it came to that.
And so the people of the great houses were making their migration. The men went to their regiments; the women to Berlin, and to the great fortresses that lay nearer than Berlin-Koenigsberg, Danzig, Thorn. This was historic country that Fred was traversing, the same country that had trembled beneath the thundering march of Napoleon's grand army more than a hundred years before, when the great Emperor had launched the mad adventure against Russia that had sealed his fate.
But he didn't think of these things, except of Napoleon, as he trudged along. Once more he traveled through the night. Once more, as the first signs of morning came, he began to feel tired, and, despite the food he had carried with him which he had stopped to eat about midnight, he was hungry. And, as had been the case on the night of his tramp from Virballen, the first rays of the rising sun showed him a village. It was in a hollow, and above it the ground rose sharply to a large house, evidently very old, built of a grey stone that had been weathered by the winds and rains of centuries. It was a very old house, and strangely out of tune, it seemed to Fred, with the country though not with the times. It was so old that it showed some traces of fortification, and Fred knew how long it was since private houses had been built with any view to defence. It was a survivor of the days when this whole region had been an outpost of civilization against hordes of barbarian invaders.
One curious thing he noticed at once about the great house. No flag was flying from it, though it boasted a sort of turret from which a flag might well have been flung out to the wind. All the other big houses he had seen had had flags out and the absence of a standard here seemed significant, somehow.
When he entered the village he found that there was no inn. He saw the usual notice of mobilization and the proclamation of war, but the people were not stirring yet. He had to wait for some time before he found a house where people were up. They looked at him curiously, but grudgingly consented to give him breakfast. There was an old man, and another who was younger, but crippled. And this cripple was the one who seemed most puzzled by Fred's appearance in the place. He surveyed him closely and twice Fred caught him whispering, evidently about him.
Then the cripple slipped away and came back, just as Fred was finishing his meal, with a pompous looking, superannuated policeman, recalled to duty since the younger men had all gone to war. This man asked many questions which Fred answered.
"You are American?" asked the policeman, finally. "You are sure you are not English?"
All at once the truth came over Fred. They thought he was English! Then England must have entered the war! They would think that he was an enemy, perhaps a spy! Yet, though he knew now the cause of the suspicious looks, the mutterings, he couldn't utter a word in his defence. He hadn't been formally accused of anything.
"Yes, I'm an American," he said, quietly. "I'm not English. I've no English blood in me."
He had intended to try to get a place to sleep in the village, but now he decided that it would be better to get away as soon as he could. If there had been soldiers about, or any really responsible police officials, he would not have been at all disturbed. But these people were nervous and ignorant; the best men of the place had gone, the ones most likely to have a good understanding. So he paid his little reckoning, and started to walk on.
They followed him as he started. As soon as he was in the open road again, a new idea came to him. Why not try the great house on the hill? There certainly someone would know the difference between an American and an Englishman. He was very tired. He knew that, even if he went on, he would have to stop at some village sooner or later. And if he was suspected here, he would be at the next place.
And so, trying to ignore the little crowd that was following him, he turned off and began climbing toward the mansion above the village.
It was like a signal. From behind him there rose a dull murmur. A lad not much older than himself raced up and stood threateningly in his path.
"If you are an American and honest, why are you going there?" asked this boy, a peasant, and rather stupid in his appearance.
"None of your business!" said Fred, aroused. He didn't think that the advice of his friend Lieutenant Ernst to answer questions covered this.
"You can't go there. There are spies enough there already!" cried the other.
And then without any warning, he lunged forward and tried to grapple with Fred.
That aroused all the primitive fight in Fred. He met the attack joyously for wrestling was something he understood very well. And in a moment he had pinned the peasant boy, strong as he was, to the earth.
But he had got rid of one opponent only to have a dozen others spring up. There was a throng about him as he shook himself free, a throng that closed in, shouting, cursing. For a moment things looked serious. Fred now understood these people thought he was a spy. And he could guess that it would go hard with him if he didn't get away. He forgot everything but that, and he fought hard and well to make good his escape. But they were too many for him. Try as he would, he couldn't get clear, although he put up a fight that must have been a tremendous surprise to his assailants. In the end, though, they got him down, with cries of triumph.
And then there came a sudden diversion from outside the mob. Down the road from the great house, shrieking a warning, came a flying motor car. Its siren sounded quick, angry blasts, and the mob, terrified, broke and scattered to get out of the way of the car. Fred, stupefied, didn't run. He had to jump quickly to one side to get out of the car's path. Then he saw that it was slowing down, and that it was driven by a boy of his own age. This boy leaned toward him.
"I'm going to turn and go back. Jump aboard as I come by-I won't be going very fast!" he cried.
Fred didn't stop to argue or to wonder why this stranger had come to his aid in such a sensational and timely fashion. Instead, he gathered himself together and, as the car swung about and passed him, leaped in. As he grasped the seat, the driver shot the car forward and it went roaring up the hill, pursued by a chorus of angry cries from the crowd, utterly balked of its prey.
"That was a close call for you!" said the driver, in German.
But something in his tone made Fred look at him sharply. And then part of the mystery was solved. For the driver was not a German at all, but plainly and unmistakably a Russian.
"Yes-but how-why-?"
"Wait! Don't talk now!" said the driver. "Wait till we're inside. We'll be all right there, and I've got a few questions I'd like to ask, too."
There was no more danger from the mob of villagers, however. The speed of the car, even on the steep grade, was too great to give pursuers on foot a chance, and so its driver was able, in a few moments, to drive it through great open gates into a huge courtyard.
"Now who are
you?" he asked. "And why were those people attacking you?"
"They thought I was English," said Fred. "I suppose England must have declared war on Germany, too."
"She has. Aren't you English, then?"
"No, I'm American. My name's Fred Waring. You're a Russian, aren't you?"
"Yes. My name's Boris Suvaroff. This is a summer place my father owns here. He's away. I'm glad of that, because the Germans would have taken him prisoner if he'd been here."
For just a moment neither seemed to catch the other's name. Then the Russian boy spoke.
"Fred Waring-an American?" he said. "I-is it possible? I've got a cousin called Waring in America! My father's first cousin married an American of that name years and years ago."
"She was a Suvaroff-my mother," said Fred, but he spoke stiffly. "Her family here disowned her-"
"Some of them-only some of them," said Boris. "Are you really my cousin? My father wrote to your mother long ago-but he got no answer! He has often told me of her. He was very fond of her! Are you really my cousin?"
"I guess I am!" said Fred. "I'm glad to know that some of you will own me! My uncle Mikail had me arrested when I went to see him in Petersburg!"
And then while they learned about one another, the two of them forgot the war and the danger in which they stood. CHAPTER IV
COUSINS
"So you have seen Mikail Suvaroff!" said Boris. He shook his head. "We have seen little of him in the last few years. He and my father do not agree. Mikail is on the side of the men about the Czar who want no changes, who want to see the people crushed and kept down. My father wants a new Russia, with all the people happier and stronger."
"Then I should think they wouldn't agree," said Fred, heartily. "Mikail is like the Russians one reads about, dark and mysterious, and always sending people to Siberia and that sort of thing."
"It isn't as bad as that, of course," said Boris, with a laugh. "Russia isn't like other countries, but we're not such barbarians as some people try to make out. Still, of course, there are a lot of things that ought to be changed. Russia has been apart from the rest of the world because she's so big and independent. That's why there are two parties, the conservatives and the liberals. My father is all for the Czar, but he wants the Czar to govern through the men the people elect to the Duma. After this war-well, we shall see! There will be many changes, I think. You see, this time it is all Russia that fights. Against Japan we were not united. It is the Russian people who have made this war."
