."

"Father, raise up my martyred land!
Clothe her bones with Thy magic hand;
Receive the Brand Thy angel lent,
And stanch my blood with Thy sacrament."

CONTENTS

I. FED UP
II. MAROONED
III. CUCKOO!
IV. RECONNAISSANCE
V. PARNASSUS
VI. IN FINISTERE
VII. THE AIRMAN
VIII. EN OBSERVATION
IX. L'OMBRE
X. THE GHOULS
XI. THE SEED OF DEATH
XII. FIFTY-FIFTY
XIII. MULETEERS
XIV. LA PLOO BELLE
XV. CARILLONETTE
XVI. DJACK
XVII. FRIENDSHIP
XVIII. THE AVIATOR
XIX. HONOUR
XX. LA BRABANCONNE
XXI. THE GARDENER
XXII. THE SUSPECT
XXIII. MADAM DEATH
XXIV. BUBBLES
XXV. KAMERAD
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CHAPTER I

FED UP

So this is what happened to the dozen-odd malcontents who could no longer
stand the dirty business in Europe and the dirtier politicians at home.

There was treachery in the Senate, treason in the House. A plague of liars
infested the Republic; the land was rotting with plots.

But if the authorities at Washington remained incredulous, stunned into
impotency, while the din of murder filled the world, a few mere men, fed
up on the mess, sickened while awaiting executive galvanization, and
started east to purge their souls.

They came from the four quarters of the continent, drawn to the decks of
the mule transport by a common sickness and a common necessity. Only two
among them had ever before met. They represented all sorts, classes,
degrees of education and of ignorance, drawn to a common rendezvous by
coincidental nausea incident to the temporary stupidity and poltroonery of
those supposed to represent them in the Congress of the Great Republic.

The rendezvous was a mule transport reeking with its cargo, still tied up
to the sun-scorched wharf where scores of loungers loafed and gazed up at
the rail and exchanged badinage with the supercargo.

The supercargo consisted of this dozen-odd fed-up ones--eight Americans,
three Frenchmen and one Belgian.

There was a young soldier of fortune named Carfax, recently discharged
from the Pennsylvania State Constabulary, who seemed to feel rather sure
of a commission in the British service.

Beside him, leaning on the blistering rail, stood a self-possessed young
man named Harry Stent. He had been educated abroad; his means were ample;
his time his own. He had shot all kinds of big game except a Hun, he told
another young fellow--a civil engineer--who stood at his left and whose
name was Jim Brow