ce being that there was here and there a
vacant chair.

Chester recovered consciousness fully alert to what was going on about
him. He took in the situation at a glance, and a grim smile lighted up
his face as his eyes fell upon the vacant chairs.

"Looks like I had done a fair job, at any rate," he told himself.

His gaze turned toward the chief's platform. The chief was there, but his
head was swathed in bandages.

"Too bad I missed him!" Chester muttered. "He is evidently the
ring-leader, and to have downed him would have been the proper thing."

Any further reflections the lad might have had were interrupted by the
booming voice of the chief, who now rose to his feet.

"Prisoner, stand up!" he commanded.

Chester arose from the chair in which he had been seated. His arms were
bound behind him and his feet had been tied together; still he found that
he could stand.

"Prisoner," continued the chief, "your name!"

"Chester Crawford," was the lad's firm reply.

"And what are you doing in Belgium in these troublous days?"

"I am attached to the staff of the Belgian commander at Liege," was the
boy's prompt response.

"But what are you doing in Louvain?"

"I came here with dispatches."

"So? And yet you are not a Belgian, I take it; nor yet, French. What,
then? An Englishman?"

"No; I am an American," said Chester proudly.

"An American! Then how comes it that you are fighting for the enemies
of Germany?"

"I am proud to be fighting for what I consider the right," said
Chester simply.

"The right!" exclaimed the chief, in a loud voice. "Well, you shall soon
see that you would have been better off had you stayed on the other side
of the Atlantic."

Chester did not reply.

"Do you know what we are going to do with you?" continued the chief.

"No, and I don't care," was the lad's reply.

"We are going to kill you," said the chief calmly. "But first you will
be given a hearing. We do not put even our enemies to death without a
fair trial."

Chester laughed mockingly.

"A fair trial by such as you?" he exclaimed. "That is a joke. But go
ahead with the farce, and let's have it over with as soon as possible."

The reply was a subdued growl.

"Why are you here, in this room?" he demanded, at length.

"To learn the details of a plot that would deliver Louvain into the hands
of its enemies," replied Chester calmly.

"How did you learn our rendezvous?"

"By listening to the conversation of two