e over yonder."

"Hello!" exclaimed Jack, plucking up some fresh interest, "have you
located one of those remains of a building, then? I was coming to
believe there wasn't so much as a broken wall left standing for a space
of five square miles, so complete has been the destruction. But I see
what you mean, Tom."

They walked ahead again, and approached the ruined farmhouse. It had
been riddled through and through by shot and shell. Three-fourths of the
original building lay in piles, the stones heaped up as they had fallen.

"Queer, isn't it, that the kitchen part escaped the smashing fire, and
still stands," observed Jack. "I warrant you this is the only part of a
building left around here. Tom, would our spy be likely to take up his
headquarters in such a place as this, do you think?"

"I don't know," came the answer. "We can soon find out."

"He might feel desperate enough to open fire on us," suggested Jack,
though he did not shrink or hold back when Tom advanced; for Jack Parmly
did not have a drop of cowardly blood in his veins.

Tom turned and waved his hand as though beckoning to others who might be
coming after them. He even called out in his best French, as if there
were a dozen back of him, that there was a possibility of securing at
least a drink of cold water at the old-fashioned well with a sweep that
stood near the kitchen of the ruined farmhouse.

"Good idea, Tom!" commented the other, chuckling with amusement. "If he
gets the notion in his head that we are legion he won't be so apt to
blaze away at us, knowing it would mean a short shrift for him. He may
prefer to play the poor French peasant part, and try to pull the wool
over our eyes."

Presently they arrived at the door. It was hanging from one hinge, and
the entire place presented a vivid picture of the utter desolation cruel
war always brings in its train.

Tom's first act before entering was to look down at the ground just
before the door. Some intuition told him that if the place had been
recently occupied they would possibly find some evidences of the fact in
the earth.

"See there, Jack!" he suddenly exclaimed, as he pointed down close to
his feet. "Fresh tracks, and made by a man's shoes in the bargain!"

"Some one has been in here for a fact, Tom, and I wouldn't be afraid to
wager he saw us coming and cleared out in a hurry. He could have skirted
those bushes, and got clear easy enough. Do you think it could have been
the same c