get caught," cried Mimi, with
another subsidence of enthusiasm.

"If that happen to be my destiny. Can any one experience what we have
done during these three years and not be as fatalistic as the men in the
trenches? I'd rather die before a firing squad after an attempt to save
my wretched country than live to see it set back a hundred years. But I
refuse to believe that I shall be betrayed or that I shall fail. _That_
I believe to be my destiny. For a long time the idea has been fumbling
in the back of my mind, but it lacked the current which would switch it
into my consciousness. You two have supplied the current."

Kate threw back her head and gave her merry, ringing laugh. "What
delicious irony! Germany defeated by its women! When I think of your
august papa, dear Gisela! That kulturistically typical, that naive yet
Jovian symbol of all the arrogance and conceit, the simple creed of
Kaiserism ueber alles, and will-to-rule, that hurled this colossus on
the back of Europe--"

"Quite so. You of all present know that I received the proper training
for the part I am about to play. If all goes well we women will erect a
tablet to my father's memory in the cathedral at Berlin." She leaned
down and patted the rapt face of Heloise, then scowled at Mimi. "May I
not count on you?" she asked sternly.

"May you? Well, say, what are you taking me for? I'm more afraid of you
than I am of a firing squad, and anyhow I seem to know we'll win out.
I'm going to carry a club in case I mix up with Hans. But what's your
plan?"

"This is neither the time nor place to work out a campaign. The first
move will be to train lieutenants in every State in Germany--women whom
we know either personally or through correspondence. You, Heloise, will
return to Munich at once and make out the lists. We shall have no
difficulty obtaining permits to travel all over the Empire, for it will
never enter the insanely stupid official head to doubt whatever excuse
we may choose to give. Not only are we German women and therefore sheep,
but we are Red Cross nurses.... And remember that nearly all the men who
are still in the factories are Socialists--and that women swarm in all
of those factories--"

"Marie!" cried Heloise. "How she will work! She has the confidence of
the Socialist party--both wings--wherever she is known; and she can
talk--like a torrent of liquid fire."

"And the next chapter?" asked Mrs. Prentiss curiously. "You led the
German wom