"
"Yes, yes! What of it?"
"Eh? He had those papers--those simply invaluable papers! And he was
alarmed by two Belgian boys in Boy Scout uniform--thought they were
soldiers coming to arrest him! He took to his heels and naturally,
being boys, they followed! He dropped his papers going over a fence!
When he missed them he went back. But he found no trace of them. He
is sure that the two boys got them."
"Donnerwetter! That's a bad business, Froebel! I fear for our friend
Ridder! The intelligence department will not be altogether pleased by
this. But what if the boys have them? Is there a chance, do you
think, that they will understand them?"
"Who knows? Some devil might lead them to take them to a Belgian
officer! However--even so, there is this much of good about it. There
is no time for them to do anything. They can't get at our gun
platforms. If they had a week! But you say General von Emmich is
already on the march? That means that war has been declared?"
"No, only that it has begun," said Poertner, with a smile. "It is no
longer the fashion to declare war formally---unless the enemy is like
Russia with us--so far away that we can't strike first. No. The
modern way is to begin fighting and let the other side declare war. So
they seem to take the aggressive."
"I see," said Froebel. "Well, at any rate, it is the time I am
thinking of.
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