Grace Harlowe with the American Army on the Rhine

“Remember what I told you, Boucher,” interjected the general. “I think you will agree with my expressed estimate of Mrs. Gray’s ability. I may say, Mrs. Gray,” he added, turning to the Overton girl, “that we have wondered about Doctor Klein, and that Miss Marshall has been working on his case, but without results beyond mere suspicion. Before the army reached the Rhine our operatives here reported their suspicions of him. That was the reason you were billeted in his house. I told Captain Boucher that if there was the slightest basis for our suspicions, you would discover that basis. We decided that nothing should be said to you of those suspicions. I wished to prove to the captain that my estimate of your ability was not influenced by the fact that you saved my life in the Argonne. We therefore gave you the opportunity to demonstrate, and you did.”

“That was what I referred to when I told you you would be surprised when you had set yourself straight on the matter of the doctor,” spoke up Captain Boucher. “You doubted Miss Marshall too, and with very good reason. That shows what a clever worker she is. You and she will compare notes to-morrow. But this that you tell me about Schuster and von Blum is a blow between the eyes. I never even considered such a possibility. It should be some satisfaction to you to know that you have turned up two of the most dangerous agents in the enemy service. It surely is a source of satisfaction to us. I suppose we should have Mrs. Smythe dismissed to-morrow, General? Why not recommend that Mrs. Gray take charge as supervisor in her place?”

“I had hoped to get home soon, sir,” answered Grace, after a slight hesitancy.

“Take it until some one else is selected,” urged the general. “How about those two spies, Captain?”

“We will arrest them at once.”

“If I may offer a suggestion, gentlemen, I would urge that it be done with a speed that will not permit either to do away with evidence that may be in their possession. It might be wise for you to have your men enter the doctor’s house through our quarters, which will give access to the hall. Once in the hall, the doors of the doctor’s apartment, and that occupied by Mrs. Smythe, should be burst in without warning. The doctor sleeps in the rear room next to ours, and the maid occupies the corresponding room in Mrs. Smythe’s quarters. If you wish I will accompany you.”

“You two ladies will remain here, Mrs. Gray!” commanded the general. “You have done quite enough for one night. Then again, there may be shooting, and you might get hurt. You see we cannot afford to lose you just yet.”

“It would not be the first time I had been under fire, sir,” replied “Captain” Grace in a mild voice.

“Then, too, for obvious reasons, we do not wish you to appear in the case. The doctor may have surmised that you have had something to do with it, but that will be the extent of his knowledge of your participation. Boucher, get your men and go after those people.”

Grace and Elfreda occupied General Gordon’s quarters for the rest of the night, and were weary enough to sleep the night through without even once turning over. In the early morning they were summoned to Captain Boucher’s office, where they were informed that the doctor had been taken only after a fight in which two soldiers were wounded – that both he and the woman were being held for trial, and that considerable documentary evidence had been found in a secret receptacle in the doctor’s cellar.

“We shall hope to accomplish something by using his cellar telephone late this evening,” added the Intelligence officer.

“What about Mrs. Smythe?” questioned Grace.

“She undoubtedly will be recalled to-day. The woman may consider herself fortunate that she too is not under arrest.”

“I’m sorry,” murmured Grace. “Do you not think, Captain, that, with the lesson she has learned, Mrs. Smythe may more clearly see her error and do better?”

“No!” exploded Captain Boucher. “Besides, there is no place for a woman with her lack of brains in this army. You ought to have the Congressional Medal, but we of the Intelligence Service not only work in the dark, but must be content to be retiring heroes destined to blush unseen in the shadows, while the other fellows are the objects of the world’s acclaim. Your house is under guard, but you are at liberty to return there and make yourselves at home. It has been decided to keep a guard there so long as you ladies occupy the house. Mrs. Smythe has been removed to other lodgings. It will not be necessary for you to see her, and I prefer that you do not report for duty until after her departure. Thank you. You are a clever woman, Mrs. Gray. General Gordon will see to it that you have proper recognition in reports.”

Both German spies were tried within a few days before a military tribunal and sentenced to prison. Grace took charge of the welfare work on the second day after their arrest, Mrs. Smythe then being well on her way toward Brest, whence she was booked for passage to America, a disgraced and unhappy woman, but the Overton girl found no joy in the downfall of her enemy. Rather was she deeply depressed over it, and wished that she might have been able to do something to soften the blow, but the supervisor had made that impossible.

Grace’s mind, however, was at once filled with other affairs, and especially in what her husband wrote to her. He was writing from Paris, which city he was leaving that very day, he having been ordered to Russia on military duty.

Now that Tom Gray had left Europe, Grace began to long for home, but it was a little more than a month later that “Captain” Grace finally severed her connection with the army and bidding good-bye to her friends, entrained for Paris. She and most of the Overton Unit, including Yvonne and the yellow cat, sailed for America and Home, early in the following week.

Grace had passed through experiences on the western front such as few women could boast of; she had won honors, she had made friends in high places, but it was the same Grace Harlowe, gentle, sweet, lovable, unsullied by the scenes through which she had passed, that was returning to the “House Behind the World,” where she hoped to spend many happy, peaceful years with her much loved husband and her new-found daughter Yvonne.

The further adventures of Grace and the splendid girls of the Overton College Unit will be found in a following volume, entitled, “Grace Harlowe’s Overland Riders on the Old Apache Trail.”

THE END