herr, don't they? Maybe those
soldierrs ought to be fighting, but saving a person comes firrst. You've
hearrd about giving all you have to the Red Cross. All _we_ got is the
_chance_ to get away. We've got morre chance than we had when we
starrted, 'cause you'rre a good scout----"

"I don't claim----"

"Shut up," said Archer; "so it's like saving up ourr chances and adding
to 'em, till now we're 'most in Switzerland and we got a good big chance
saved up. I'll tell you what I'm going to do with mine--I'm going to
give it to the Red Cross--_kind of_--as you'd say. If that girrl is
worrkin' on that road and I can find herr, I'm goin' to. If I get
pinched, all right. So it ain't a question of what _we'rre_ goin' to do;
it's a question of: Are _you_ with me? You're always tellin' when yourr
thoughts come to you. Well, I got that one just before I dived for the
glass. So that's the way I'm going to invest _my_ chance, 'cause I
haven't got anything else to give.... I heard in prison about the
Liberty Bond buttons they give you to wearr back home. I'd like to have
one of those blamed things to wearr for a souveneerr."

Tom Slade had stood silent throughout this harangue, and now he laughed
a little awkwardly. "It's better than investing money," he said, "and
what I'm laughing at--kind of," he added with infinite relief and
satisfaction showing through the emotion he was trying to repress; "what
I'm laughing at is how you're always thinking about souvenirs."

* * * * *

So it was decided that their little joint store, their savings, as one
might say--their standing capital of _chance_ which they had improved
and added to--should be invested in the hazardous business of rescuing a
daughter of France from her German captors. It was _giving_ with a
vengeance.

It is a pity that there was no button to signalize this kind of a
contribution.

CHAPTER XXIX

CAMOUFLAGE

They turned westward now in a direction which Tom thought would bring
them about opposite the Alsatian town of Norne. A day's journey took
them out of the forest proper into a rocky region of sparse vegetation
from which they could see the river winding ribbonlike in the distance.
Beyond it in the flat Alsatian country lay a considerable city which,
from what old Melotte had told them, they believed to be Mulhausen.

"Norne is a little to the south of that and closer to the river," said
Tom.

They picked their way alo