s retirement in the Caucasus--what
became of this other soldier?"

"That I cannot say. I fancy, judging from what I know of Nicholas
Nicholaivitch, that he did not waste this man. I should hazard the guess
that he passed him on to another commander--perhaps to Alexieff--perhaps
to Brussilov."

"Do you know anything more about General Makailoff?" The Kentuckian
sought to clothe his question in the casual tone of ordinary interest,
but as he lighted a cigar his fingers held a tremour.

Ivangoroff shook his head.

"Of course there was mess-table talk--but that is always the gauziest
myth. Perhaps you know the fable that is told in all European armies of
the ghost general?"

"No, I've never heard it."

"The story runs that there is a certain man of extraordinary military
genius--genius of the first class--who is not so much a soldier of
fortune as a super-soldier. In peace times no army knows him. No
government owns him. He disappears as does the storm petrel when the sea
is quiet. But when the tempest breaks and the need arises for a leader
beyond small leaders--then, under a new name each time, this
ghost-commander reappears. You see, they make the story a good one. Mess
tables have embellished and elaborated it with much retelling over their
wine glasses. It is even said that the mystery man fights on the
righteous side and brings victory." The Russian lighted a fresh
cigarette and naively observed, "When we fought Japan, however, he was
reported to be against us, guiding the hand of Kuroki. When Savoff
defeated the Turks, it was rumoured that he sat in the Bulgar's
councils. Now"--Ivangoroff laughed--"now it is whispered in Petrograd
and Moscow that he laid his sword at the service of the Grand Duke
Nicholas and stands shoulder to shoulder with the men he fought in
Manchuria."

The _raconteur_ glanced at his wrist watch and rose hastily.

"I have overstayed my time," he declared. "It is hard for me to leave
one who suffers me to talk--even when I talk of moonshine gossip like
this."

But when he had gone, Boone sat for a long while unmoving, and before he
went to his bed that night he had resolved, so soon as his duties freed
him long enough, to undertake a journey to Russia.

CHAPTER XLVI

The snow that had lain along the Appalachian slopes had felt the first
breath of thawing breezes in March, 1917. Here and there, in a
sun-touched hollow, dry twigs grew less brittle and the hint of buds
gave t