mmandeered for the job owing to the departure of all
the local police for the war. He was clearly more interested in
trying to find out something of _his_ relations in some remote
village in America, which he said was named after them, than in my
business.

I returned to pay the 100 pounds and deliver the photographs, and
now that I had been officially "policed" was received with great
cordiality and pressed to spend the evening.

Father, mother, grown-up daughters and brother-in-law all assured
me that it was not owing to my personal appearance that I had been
so coldly received, but that war is war and law is law and that
everything must be done as the authorities decree.

Cigars and cigarettes were showered upon me and my glass was never
allowed to be empty of Rhine wine. Good food was set before me and
the stock generously replenished whenever necessary. It will be
remembered that I had come unexpectedly and that I was not being
entertained in a wealthy home, and this at a time when the only
counter-attack on Germany's success in the Balkans was an increased
amount of stories that she was starving.

Evidently the Schultzs and the Schmidts were not taking all the
credit for Germany's position to themselves. They pointed with
pride to a picture of the Emperor adorning one wall and then smiled
with satisfaction as they indicated the portrait of von Hindenburg
on the wall opposite. One of the daughters wore a huge silver
medallion of the same renowned general on her neck. After nearly a
year and a half of war these bard-working Germans were proud of
their leaders and had absolute faith in them.

But this family had felt the war. One son had just been wounded,
they knew not how severely, in France. If some unknown English,
soldier on the Yser had raised his rifle just a hairbreadth higher
the other son would be sleeping in the blood-soaked soil of
Flanders instead of doing garrison duty in Hanover while recovering
from a bullet which had passed through his head just under the eyes.

CHAPTER II

WHEN SKIES WERE BLUE

There was one more passenger, making three, in our first-class
compartment in the all-day express train from Cologne to Berlin
after it left Hanover. He was a naval officer of about forty-five,
clean-cut, alert, clearly an intelligent man. His manner was
proud, but not objectionably so.

The same might be said of the manner of the major who had sat
opposite me since the train left