. But
a fourth man, who had stood beside them, came striding out to meet me,
and I confronted Mr. John Van Blarcom face to face.

Officers fresh from the trenches have told me that one can lose through
sheer accustomedness all horror at the grim sights of warfare, all
consciousness of ear-splitting noises, all interest in gas and shrapnel
and bursting shells. In the same way one can lose all capacity for
astonishment, I suppose. I don't think I manifested much surprise at
this unexpected meeting; and I heard myself remarking quite coolly that
there had been a mistake, that I had been told downstairs that a friend
of mine was here.

"That's right, Mr. Bayne," cut in Van Blarcom shortly. "I've been a
friend of yours clear through, and I'm acting as one now. Just a minute,
sir, please!"

He had shut the door between ourselves and the officers, and now he
was drawing the shutters close. Coming back into the room, he seated
himself, and motioned me toward a chair, which I didn't take. His
authoritative manner was, I must say, not unimpressive. And he knew
how to arrange a rather crude stage-setting; the room, with all air and
sound excluded, seemed tense and breathless; the one dim candle on the
table lent a certain solemnity to the scene.

"Look here, Mr. Bayne," he began bluffly, "last time you spoke to me
you told me to--Well, we'll let bygones by bygones; I guess you remember
what you said. You don't like me, and I'm not wasting any love on you;
as far as you're personally concerned, I'd just as soon see you hang!
But I've got to think of the United States. I'm in the service, and it
doesn't do her any good to have her citizens get in bad with France."

Standing there, gazing at him with an air of bored inquiry, behind my
mask of indifference I racked my brain. What did he want of me? What
did he want of Miss Falconer? What was he doing in this military galley?
Hopeless queries, without the key to the puzzle!

"Well?" I said.

"I don't ask you," he went on crisply, "what you're doing here--"

"You had better not!" I snapped. "What tomfoolery is this? Do you think
you are a police officer heckling a crook? And why should you ask me
such a question any more than I should ask you?"

He grinned meaningly.

"Well," he commented, "there might be reasons. I'm here on business,
with papers in order, and three French officers to answer for me; but
you're a kind of a funny person to make a bee-line for a place like
Bl