that morning, although
John saw the double line of trenches blazing now and then with fire,
and, at intervals, the heavy batteries on either side sent a stated
number of shells at the enemy.

Seen from a height the opposing trenches appeared to be almost together,
and the fire of the hostile marksmen blended into the same line of
light. But John did not look at them long. He had seen so much of foul
trenches for weary months that it was a pleasure to let the eye fill
with something else.

He looked instead at the high hills which were fast coming near, and
although covered with snow, with trees bare of leaves, they were a
glorious sight, an intense relief to him after all that monotony of
narrow mud walls. He knew that trenches or other earthworks ran among
the hills also, but the nature of the ground compelled breaks, and it
would be easier anyhow to pass through a forest or a ravine.

"Where do you wish me to put you down?" asked Delaunois.

"At some place in those low mountains there, where the German lines are
furthest from ours."

"I think I know such a point. You won't mind my speaking of you as a
spy, Mr. Jean Castel of America, will you?"

"Not at all, because that's what I am."

"Then don't take too big a risk. It hasn't been long since you were a
boy, and I don't like to think of one so young being executed as a spy."

"I don't intend to be."

"It's likely that I may see Philip Lannes before long. I go westward in
two or three days and I shall find a chance to visit him in the
hospital. If I see him what shall I tell him about a young man whom we
both know, one John Scott, an American?"

"You tell him that his sister, Mademoiselle Julie Lannes, came to the
village of Chastel to meet him, in accordance with his written request,
and while she was waiting for him with her servants, Antoine and Suzanne
Picard, not knowing that he had been wounded since the writing of his
letter, she was kidnapped and carried into Germany with the Picards by
Prince Karl of Auersperg. Prince Karl is in love with her and intends to
force her into a morganatic marriage. Otherwise she is safe. The
American, John Scott, in addition to his duties as a spy for France, a
country that he loves and admires, intends, if human endeavor can
achieve it, to rescue Mademoiselle Lannes and bring her back to Paris."

Delaunois took one hand from the steering rudder and turned glistening
eyes upon John.

"It's a knightly adventure," h