scatter a few
Boches over the earth and what have you? A German world colored Prussian
blue. Come closer, ma'am'selle." He put out nervous hands and drew her
down so he could whisper his words. "And the cure, ma'am'selle, the cure?
Ah, moi, Monsieur Satan, knows it."

They spent the rest of the day in discussing the killing qualities of
shells, grenades, bombs; the stabbing qualities of bayonets, daggers,
swords; the exploding properties of dynamite, nitroglycerin, TNT, and
others. As they talked Monsieur Satan sucked in his breath exultantly and
hissed between his teeth, "_Zigouille, toujours zigouille!_" while his
hand stabbed and twisted into the air.

Another day and he had taken Sheila entirely into his confidence. "I have
my mind made. You shall hear the cure, ma'am'selle, for you and I will be
partners. A Boche world can be cured but the one way--destroyed,
completely destroyed," and he laughed uproariously. Then his eyes
narrowed; he was all cunning and intensity, a beast of prey crouched for
the spring. "Ah, but we must whisper; there are spies everywhere. The men
in the wards are all spies pretending they are French wounded; and the
doctors are spies. Oh, the Boches are damnably clever, but we will be more
damnable--we will outwit them. We will blow them into a million atoms.
They will make good fertilizer for French vineyards in a hundred years. Eh
bien?"

So Sheila became partner in evolving the most colossal crime the world had
ever known. Everything played into her hands and gave credence to her
deceptions. The great cases that came by night packed with dressings were
to Monsieur Satan air-bombs with propellers. They were to be set loose on
the day appointed in such millions that the air would be charged with
them, the sun blotted out; and they would drop in exploding masses over
the earth, exterminating humanity.

"They shall be like the hordes of locusts that nearly destroyed
Egypt--only these shall destroy. And how every one shall run in terror!
You will see, ma'am'selle. It will be a good sight." And Monsieur Satan
rubbed his hands in keen anticipation.

The tanks of oxygen placed on motor-trucks, the gasoline-tanks, were
nothing else than a deadly gas. The partners had concocted it out of the
strangest compounds, unshed-tears, heart-agony, fear-in-the-night,
snipers' barks, and moonshine. Monsieur Satan chuckled over the formula
and said he would swear not a living soul could withstand a single