The Guns of Europe

"Yes, while we were sleeping the Germans were installing a wireless outfit on the roof, and it's talking. I tell you, boys, it's talking at a great rate, and it's saying something. You mayn't have noticed it, but the château stands on a hill, with a clear sweep, and our wireless here is having a big talk with distant stations. We've been sleeping, but the Germans never sleep."

"I suppose you know what you're talking about, Wharton, and you're sure it's a wireless outfit," said John.

"It's impossible for me to be wrong. I could never mistake the sound of the wireless for anything else."

"And it's there on the roof of this château, which belongs to us by right of occupancy, chattering away to German forces elsewhere!" said Carstairs in an indignant whisper.

"It's doing a lot more than chattering," said Wharton. "They wouldn't install a wireless on the roof of a house at this time of the night, merely for a little idle summer conversation. You saw that a prince and generals came here, and undoubtedly they ordered it done."

"Whatever they're talking about," said Carstairs, "it's not likely they're talking about us, so now is our chance to slip away."

"I'm not going to leave the château just now," said Wharton.

"Then what are you going to do?"

"I'd like to see the wireless on the roof and the man who is working it."

John glanced at Wharton. The light was very dim, but he noticed a spark in Wharton's eye, and he knew that something unusual was working in the back of his head.

"I think I'd like to have a look at the roof myself," he whispered.

"If you chaps are bent on going up there," said Carstairs, "I'm bound to go with you. But we'd better keep our automatics in our hands."

They emerged from the shadow of the wall, and reached the foot of the stairway that led to the roof. The door at the top was open, as the moonlight was shining down, and Wharton boldly led the way, walking on tiptoe, his automatic in his hand. At the open door John and Carstairs crowded up by his side, and three pairs of eyes peeped out at once.

They saw two men on the roof both with their backs turned to them. One was the operator of the wireless, sitting on a camp stool, working the instrument. The other, in an officer's uniform, was dictating messages. John surmised that they were talking with a station to the eastward, where some lofty ranges of hills ran.

But Wharton was the most deeply stirred of the three. The spark in his eye was enlarging and glowing more brilliant, and a great resolve had formed in his mind.

"There's nothing that we can do here," said Carstairs. "We'd better go at once."

"We're not going," said Wharton in a fierce whisper. "I can use the wireless, and that's just the instrument on which I wish to exercise my skill. I've heard enough to know they're not talking in code."

"Wharton, you are mad!" said John.

"If so, I'm mad in a good cause. Inside of ten minutes some German general will be hearing remarkable news from this station."

"I tell you again you're mad."

"And I tell you again I'm not. I'm a crack wireless operator and this is my chance to prove it. I'm going up there. All who are afraid can turn back."

"You know that if you're resolved to go mad we'll go mad with you. What do you want us to do?"

"John, club your automatic, and hit that officer on the back of the head with it. Hit hard. Don't kill him, but you must knock him unconscious at the first blow. Carstairs and I will choke all but a spark of life out of the operator."

The three emerged from the stairway upon the flat portion of the roof where the wireless plant had been installed not more than four or five feet away. They made not the slightest sound as they stole forward, but even had they made it the two Germans were so deeply absorbed in their talk through the air that they would not have heard it.

John felt compunctions at striking an unsuspecting enemy from behind, but their desperate need put strength in his blow. The officer fell without a cry and lay motionless. At the same instant Wharton and Carstairs seized the operator by the throat, and dragged him down. He was a small spectacled man and he was only a child in the hands of two powerful youths. In a minute or two and almost without noise they bound him with strips of his own coat, and gagged him with a handkerchief. Then they stretched him out on the roof and turned to John's victim.

The man lay on his face. His helmet had fallen off and rolled some distance away, a ray of moonlight tipping the steel spike with silver. A dark red stain appeared in his hair where the pistol butt had descended.

The figure was that of a powerful man, and the set of the shoulders seemed familiar to John. He rolled him over, and disclosed the face of von Boehlen. Again he felt compunction for that blow, not because he liked the captain, but because he knew him.

"It's von Boehlen," he said, "and I hope I haven't killed him."

Carstairs inserted his hand under his head and felt of the wound.

"You haven't killed him," he said, "but you struck hard enough to make him a bitter enemy. The skull isn't fractured at all, and he'll be reviving in a few minutes. He's a powerful fellow, and we'd better truss him up as we have his friend here."

While Carstairs and Wharton were binding and gagging von Boehlen, John went to the railing about five feet in height that surrounded the central or flat part of the roof, the rest sloping away. The railing would hide what was passing there from the Uhlans below, but he wanted to take a look of precaution.

The men were riding up and down with their usual regularity and precision, watching every approach to the house, and making the ring of steel about it complete. This little wheel of the German machine was Working perfectly, guarding with invincible thoroughness against the expected, but taking no account of the unexpected. He came back to his comrades.

"All well below," he said.

Von Boehlen and the operator, the big man and the little man, were lying side by side. Von Boehlen's face was very pale, but his chest was beginning to rise and fall with some regularity. He would become conscious in three or four minutes. The operator was conscious already and he was staring at the three apparitions.

But Wharton was paying no attention to the captives. His soul fairly leaped within him as he took his seat at the instrument which was sputtering and flashing with unanswered questions.

"Is that the Château de Friant?" came the words flashing through the air.

"Yes this is the Château de Friant," replied Wharton, learning for the first time the name of the house, in which they had made themselves at home.

"Then why don't you answer? You broke off suddenly five minutes ago and we couldn't get another word from you."

"Something went wrong with the instrument, but it's all right now. Go ahead."

"Is Captain von Boehlen still there?"

"At my elbow."

"Take from his dictation the answers to the questions I ask you."

"At once, sir. He is ready to dictate."

"Have you seen anything of British troops, Captain von Boehlen?"

"I have sir. I saw them marching northward this afternoon."

"In what direction?"

"Toward Mons."

"What seemed to be their purpose?"

"To effect a junction with the main French army."

Wharton improvised rapidly. His whole soul was still alight. It had seldom been granted to one man, especially one so young as he to have two such opportunities, that of the papers, and that of the wireless, and he felt himself ready and equal to his task.