"You've saved
me from a Hun prison camp and while you were doing it you had to listen
to me--Gee! I feel like kicking myself," he broke off.

"I ain't blaming you," said Tom, in his expressionless way. "If I'd had
my way we'd have made a detour when I saw those broken branches, 'cause
I knew it meant people were there, and then we wouldn't have got those
fellers as prisoners, at all. So they got to thank you more than me."

This was queer reasoning, indeed, but it was Tom Slade all over.

"Me!" said Roscoe, "that's the limit. Tom, you're the same old hickory
nut. Forgive me, old man, if you can."

"I don't have to," said Tom.

Roscoe stood there staring at him, thrilled with honest admiration and
stung by humiliation.

And as the little group, augmented by other soldiers who strolled over
to hear of this extraordinary affair first hand, grew into something of
a crowd, Tom, alias Thatchy, alias Paul Revere, alias Towhead, sat upon
the fence, answering questions and telling of his great coup with a dull
unconcern which left them all gaping.

"As soon as I made up my mind they didn't belong there," he said, "I
decided they weren't sure of their own way, kind of. If the big man
hadn't taken the compass away from me, I'd have given it to him anyway.
It had the N changed into an S and the S into an N. I think he kind of
thought the other way was right, but when he saw the compass, that
settled him. All the time I was looking at the Big Dipper, 'cause I knew
nobody ever tampered with that. I noticed he never even looked up, but
once, and then I was scared. When we got to the marsh, I was scared,
too, 'cause I thought maybe he'd know about the low land being south of
the woods. I was scared all the time, as you might say, but mostly when
he turned his head and seemed kind of uncertain-like. It ain't so much
any credit to me as it is to Archer--the feller that changed the
letters. Anyway, I ain't mad, that's sure," he added, evidently
intending this for Roscoe. "Everybody gets mistaken sometimes."

"You're one bully old trump, Tom," said Roscoe shamefacedly.

"So now you see how it was," Tom concluded. "I couldn't get rattled as
long as I could see the Big Dipper up there in the sky."

For a few moments there was silence, save for the low whistling of one
of the soldiers.

"You're all right, kiddo," he broke off to say.

Then one of the others turned suddenly, giving Tom a cordial rap on the
shoulder which almost