ficant in the two
facts? But she said nothing regarding this suspicion to the ambulance
driver.

Instead, she came back to the subject which had occupied their minds
previous to the appearance of the white object that had crossed the
road.

"Of course, it is quite ridiculous," she said, "to think of Tommy
Cameron doing anything at all treacherous. I can imagine his doing
almost anything reckless, but always on the right side."

"Some little hero, is he?" chuckled Charlie Bragg.

"I think he is the stuff of which heroes are made--just like yourself,
Charlie Bragg."

"Oh! I say!" he objected. "Now you are getting personal."

"Then don't try to be funny with me," declared Ruth earnestly. "I have
too good an opinion of all our well-brought-up American boys--to which
class both Tom and you belong--to believe that any of them could be
made under any conditions to betray their fellows."

"Oh, as to that!" he admitted. "Nor any of our roughnecks, either.
We've got a mighty fine army over here, rank and file. Deliberately, I
doubt if any of them would give information to the Heinies. But they
do say that when the Huns capture a man, if they want information, they
don't care what they do to him to get it. The old police third degree
isn't a patch on what these Boches do."

"I am not afraid that even torture would make Tom do anything mean,"
she said, with a little sob. "But these officers back there at that
cottage must actually believe that he has gone over to the enemy."

"If Cameron is the fellow I heard about this morning," Charlie said
gloomily enough, "it is generally believed that he has been two days
beyond the lines--and he didn't _have_ to go."

"Oh! Impossible!"

"I'm repeating what I heard. This flurry during the afternoon is an
outcome of his disappearance. The German guns caught a train of
ammunition camions and smashed things up pretty badly. Many tricks
like that pulled off will make us mighty short of ammunition in this
sector. Then Heinie can come over the top and do with us just as he
pleases. Naturally, if the boys believe Cameron is at fault, they are
going to be as sore on him as a boil."

"It would be utterly impossible for Tom to do such a thing!" the girl
declared with finality.

Her assurance made the matter no less terrible. Ruth had no belief at
all in Tom's willingly giving himself up to the enemy. Had there been
a hundred witnesses to see him go, she would have deni