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rssssssmmmmmmmmmmm
i
And he thought again of the girl in
Boston.
"Halt! Who goes there?"
At once he was the alert, keen sol
dier again. The man who iiad come
with the corporal to relieve him gave
the countersign. Scovell went through
the formula of the relief drearily.
Then he accompanied the noncom.
back to the trenches.
Ten minutes later he was standing
in the presence of the general in
command. And he poured out his
story of treachery and sudden death.
He told the general everything in
the broken French that the boy had
acquired during his short term in
France. At the end, without asking
for his life, he handed him the docu
ments. The general pressed a bell upon the
little camp table and directed the or
derly who appeared to summon the
colonel of the Ninth. A few minutes
afterward the two men were poring
over the document, head to head, and
Scovell was entirely forgotten.
He waited. Death meant not much,
and life well, he had long since re
signed the prospects of a long life.
But to be kept waiting for the death
order was unnerving. He waited.
Xiong afterward, as it seemed, the
general raised his head and looked at
him with an inscrutable expression in
his eyes.
"Private Scovell, you say that a
shell burst near you when you were
on sentry duty and killed a group of
officers whom you had not observ
ed?" he asked.
"No, sir, I "
"Whom you would undoubtedly
have challenged a moment later," tne
general continued.
Scovell's heart leaped. At last he
understood. The general was delib
erately misunderstanding him. He
meant, then, to find an excuse as a
reward for his discovery of the paper.
"Yes, sir," he stammered.
The general clapped him on the
shoulder. "You have done well," he
said, "Those officers whom you ob
served were German spies; this doc
ument is a complete description of
our defense, and would undoubtedly
in time have reached the hostile
headquarters and resulted seriously
for us. Your act shall not be forgot
ten, Corporal Scovell."
And, in the midst of his bewilder
ment, Scovell's mind went back with
hope to the girl of Boston not ne
cessarily of living to see her again,
but at least of dying with an untar
nished name.
(Copyright by W. G. Chapman.)
o o
POSTMASTER AIDS CHILDREN IN
ART OF SENDING MAIL
s .AmwiiLmxas
COLIW M.5ELPH.
St. Louis, Mo. Colin M. Selph of
St. Louis is the first postmaster in
the United States to take advantage
of the offer of Uncle Sam to allow
the postmasters to give instruction
to school children in the art of ad
dressing and sending mail. Fifteen
of the St. Louis schools have sent
their pupils on a tour of the big post-,
office, where competent guides have,
conducted them through the building
and advised them on the importance
of plainly addressing mail, putting a
return address in the upper left-hand
corner and affixing the right amount"
of postage.