It was a time of
weakening hope, of misgivings, of confusion and frantic hurry. Men, men,
men, whether they were soldiers or not, so only that they were men! Few
know of the frenzied haste in the embarkation camp those days. Few will
ever realize how near the war came to being lost.

For Bob Haskell there was no returning consciousness and only the silent
records of the War Department could speak for him, reporting his supreme
sacrifice under a name but a part of which was his own. That he lived in
camp as his brother for at least a few hours in that time of
unquestioning rush and inevitable disorder seems probable enough. That
he fell in the fighting, under the name of Joseph Haskell, we know.

So at least the uniform which he stole was not dishonored. And since he
paid for his crime with his own life, and in the way that he preferred,
may we not follow his brother's good example and let his checkered
memory rest in peace? Joe never told his mother more than this, that it
must have been his brother who was killed in France. She never knew who
struck him down.

Another episode is not so easily explained, for it is bound up with Joe
Haskell's mental condition while he was with the scouts. That is the
episode of the windmill. About that he seemed to remember but little. No
doubt the calling of the voice which he thought was his mother's was a
pure hallucination. It was like a little flash of light in his darkness.
Yet it might have been that the peculiar sounds aroused certain
memories.

One very strange fact, however, is certain, and that is that he did find
the trinket with his mother's picture on that lonely, wind-swept tower.
The voice which had called him had not mocked and deceived him. How came
that little trinket there?

The only answer that we have to this question is the theory of Pee-wee
Harris, wearer of the stalking badge, and, as his very nickname shows,
the friend of birds. He claimed that a wren, or one of the mischievous,
pilfering birds of that group had carried the locket to its nest in the
old windmill. It is true that certain birds carry such glittering
trifles to their nests and it is well known that wrens forage in old
buildings and often build in windmills. There were a few wisps of straw
to give color to Pee-wee's ingenious theory.

But when it comes to building, Pee-wee himself is a master builder of
castles in the air.

And there you are.

CHAPTER XXXIV

SEEIN' THINGS

On