by Anthology
"With us — yes," agreed the Colonel; "and it is for us to determine what is our duty — what is best for the Federation and the Service. When that is done, we can think of what is best for our friend."
"I'll give you my opinion right away," said Barrows. "As it turned out, what Gardiner did or didn't do, while he was on the Peking mission, had no effect on the final outcome. In fact, his failure to carry out his duty was really a help to the Federation, for if he hadn't felt the necessity of redeeming himself, he wouldn't have been on hand to save St. John, and probably wouldn't have been able to help us in our raid on the Chinese government. And that wholly aside from his work with the army in southern Manchuria, which you'll admit, General, was worth something. Damn it, gentlemen, it's not fair to let a single mistake cloud a good man's whole life, if it can be helped by a little judicious forgetfulness. I'd like to know where we'd be if our slips hadn't been overlooked, not once, but several times."
"That is my view," assented the Colonel eagerly; "but unfortunately the mistake was made at a most vital moment."
"And the outcome of the Peking mission is too well known to be hushed up without good reason," supplemented St. John, shaking his head. "Damme, Barrows, if we pass the thing over too casually, we'll bring a pretty hornets' nest about our ears."
"Well," said the naval officer, looking at Colonel Villon, "you must have some solution of the difficulty. Let's hear it."
"It is this, my friends," replied the Colonel, taking from the drawer of his desk a red-bound book, on the cover of which was inscribed "International Police Regulations"; "the section of the Code which covers the act of Captain Gardiner reads thus, 'Any officer or enlisted man in the service of the International Federation who shall voluntarily and to his own knowledge give, or otherwise disclose, to an enemy of the Federation, information which will be of advantage to that enemy and prejudicial to the welfare of the Federation, shall be guilty of treason.'" The Colonel looked up from the page. "If we can prove —"
"Prove!" exclaimed St. John; "of course we can! Lookee here," he went on, becoming more and more excited as he spoke, "'Voluntarily give information' — can any one say that a man under torture gives information voluntarily? 'Prejudicial to the welfare of the Federation' — as you said yourself, Barrows, it didn't make a damned bit of difference to the cause —"
"Holy blue!" cried Villon, infected with the General's excitement; "it is as he says, our good St. John! Eh, my God, our friend is cleared!"
"It's a quibble, of course," said Barrows with a grin. "Our Judge Advocate General's department didn't foresee a circumstance of exactly this kind. Well, they say the devil can quote scripture to suit his purpose, and I guess we have an equal right."
"But there must be some report on this," St. John objected. "You've got this affair on file, haven't you, Colonel? Won't do any good, you know, for us to hush the matter up and have some bally staff officer dig it out later on."
"I have on file," Villon replied, "that a question has arisen concerning the conduct of Captain Gardiner, while detached on special duty in Peking, and a recommendation that the matter be looked into more thoroughly. And that is all. I have learned by experience that in doubtful affairs, it is often of advantage not to record too much. See now, I will report as follows, 'I have personally investigated the conduct of Captain Gardiner, and find it to be perfectly satisfactory.' That is not regular, but with my name attached, it will be sufficient. You observe that no request for a court of inquiry has been made."
"So that's settled," began St. John, rising, "I—"
"Hold on, General," interrupted Barrows; "it's far from being settled, as I see it. What are we going to do about Gardiner's record as Colonel Smith? We've got to explain his sudden disappearance, and why he turned up in Manchuria under an assumed name, to begin with."
"True enough," assented St. John, sitting down again. "Got to account for Smith somehow."
"My faith," agreed Villon, scratching his ear; "that is well thought of. But how to do it?" And he regarded his fellow-conspirators rather blankly.
"See here," suggested the Admiral at length; "can't you contrive to let the impression get around that Gardiner was really acting under your orders while he was in Manchuria? It's stretching the truth, I know, but when you come right down to it, a good deal of what he did was secret service work beyond any question."
The Colonel nodded energetically and his face cleared.
"We have a designation in our department, my friends, that covers everything. It is, 'Ordered on special secret duty.' An officer so detached is answerable to me alone. He is required to submit no reports, unless I so command. 'He need give account of his actions to no one but me. If it so appears advisable, he vanishes utterly from the knowledge of men until his service is completed. If he dies, I alone know it. No record is kept of what he does. Often, no written orders are given to him."
"I see," said Barrows. "Then you will explain Gardiner's actions by saying that the Peking business was only a part of the secret duty on which he was ordered, and though that affair leaked out, the rest he managed to keep hidden?"
"That is it, my friend. My record is then complete and satisfactory as it stands. 'Captain Gardiner, ordered on special secret duty, October 21st.' Now I will write, 'Captain Gardiner, returned from special secret duty and verbal report accepted.'"
"And no one will question it?"
"No one, my friend. Eh, there has been talk in the High Commission as to why we Intelligence officers should be superior to all others of the same rank — why we should be better paid and more highly considered. That is the entire answer, my friend. To render the service we do, we must be the pick of the forces — men who can be absolutely trusted to work for the good of the Federation, and given a free and unshackled hand, in the sure knowledge that our motives are the highest in all we do. It is for our consciences that we are paid as much as for our knowledge and cleverness. See, my friends, if I did not believe that in saving our good Captain from disgrace and in retaining in our army a brave and valuable officer I was best serving the Federation, no considerations of friendship or former regard would persuade me to consent to this subterfuge or withhold me from this hour signing an accusation and request for a court of inquiry."
"That's the attitude we'd all take, if they didn't insist on red-taping us hand and foot," said Barrows rather bitterly. "Well, I guess that settles the matter."
"Yes," agreed Villon. "The affair is now ended."
He pressed the button in his desk-top again, and stood up as Leslie appeared on the threshold of the doorway.
"Captain Gardiner," said the Intelligence Chief, "we have considered this matter of your conduct in Peking, and it is our belief that nothing further need be done. Neither we nor your conscience can absolve you from all blame; but we believe that your fault should be forgiven, and you may feel confident that you are worthy to serve the Federation in the future as you have been in the past."
Leslie could not speak, but he bowed his head in token of gratitude and the Colonel nodded with an air of great contentment.
"There's one thing more," suggested St. John, looking from one to the other; "His Excellency —"
"And Signor di Conti," added Barrows, staring at the Colonel; "they'll have to know the truth, whatever we may say to the rest of the world."
The Intelligence Chief smiled and took a paper from his desk.
"I consulted with his Excellency before I summoned you, my friends," he replied. "Eh, then, what would you have? It is to him that, sooner or later, all things must come. And here is the final authority which will uphold us in what we have done. You see that the judgment is left entirely in our hands." He handed the document to Barrows, who glanced over it and in turn passed it to St. John. "But his Excellency also said — and for this reason I know that he will give his whole approval to the decision at which we have arrived — 'Remember, when you deliberate upon this matter, that it is always better to sacrifice law to justice,
and that often the truest way to be just is to be merciful.'"
Barrows looked quickly at St. John and the Colonel, understanding the nature of the glance, beamed upon them both.
"Well," observed the Admiral at length, "I guess Colonel Smith's safely dead and buried, so let's adjourn."
He rose from his chair with an air of relief and, shaking the Colonel's hand warmly, passed out of the room, pausing on the way only to leave a brief but friendly word of congratulation with the man whose fate he had helped to decide. St. John followed the example of his superior and, when the door had closed behind them, Leslie sank into a chair and covered his face with his hands.
Colonel Villon remained quiet for an interval, leaning with folded arms against his desk and gazing through the brilliant window at the western sky, now splendid in the garment of crimson and orange, edged with pulsing sapphire, flung over it by the departed sun. Presently he said, without changing his position or apparently addressing himself to any one in particular, "I will have your rank of lieutenant-colonel confirmed in my own department. There are now vacancies which will make this possible. And I grant you leave of absence for two months, commencing with to-morrow. To-morrow, likewise, you will receive notification of where you will be stationed when you return to duty again."
He paused abruptly and contemplated for some minutes the bowed figure in the deep arm-chair. Then he crossed the room quickly, placed his hand for an instant upon the shaking shoulder of the younger officer, and silently quitted the apartment.
Chapter XXV
From Out Of Sorrow, Joy Is Born
THERE was a plentiful throng at the station, for the vacation season had just begun, and dozens of pretty girls in the prescribed white or blue of the seaside anxiously awaited the arrival of other pretty girls on the almost-due train, or more anxiously still, visitors of the more susceptible sex, who usually descended upon the settlement each Saturday morning, clad in gorgeous raiment and bearing propitiatory gifts of extravagant price, destined for the bright-eyed goddesses who came to meet them. There were self-conscious young matrons piloting chubby-legged offspring, and gathering in chattering groups at the most inopportune points they could possible select, to the angry despair of railroad employees guiding baggage-trucks, and the extreme inconvenience of any one who had any real business to transact within the station building. There was a small clique of elderly gentlemen, adorned for the most part with spurs and riding-whips, who, having nothing else to do, had trotted over from cottages to watch the train come in on the slender chance of it depositing some one whom they knew, or simply as the best means of passing away the time before the bathing hour. Added to all these, a few school and college youths, garbed in the extreme of fashion or the extreme of allowable individual license in dress and haloed with pipe and cigarette smoke, the Oldest Inhabitant, answering to the title of "Captain," and the village inebriate, filled up what vacant spaces the others might have left and lent a charm and variety to the scene observable nowhere beyond the confines of the Atlantic seaboard during the summer season.
"Eve did the wise thing when she decided not to come with us," remarked Tom Hooker, interposing a breakwater of broad back between Mabel and the surging crowd. "This would have been no place for their first meeting."
The girl nodded and absently began to finger one of the buttons on his coat.
"Tommy," she said suddenly; "do you think she's really forgiven him?"
"My dear child," returned the officer in surprise; "how should I know? Can any man read the hidden heart of a woman?"
Mabel shook her head decisively. "But you must have some opinion, Tommy," she insisted.
"She has a good deal to forgive," said Hooker thoughtfully; "but — Mabs, why do you suppose she preferred to wait for him on the beach instead of in the house, or some other place?"
Mabel lifted her head quickly, and for a long minute they looked into each other's eyes.
"Tommy," she said softly and with something of awe in her golden voice; "I wonder if there's anything that love can't forgive?"
He did not reply directly, but the swift pressure of his fingers upon her furtively-captured little hand left no doubt as to his view of the question; and Mabel smiled contentedly, and turned with him to watch for the first signs of the expected train.
It flashed into view at last, heralded by its penetrating though not unmusical whistle, and came to a halt beside the platform with much grinding of tight-clamped brakes and an all-pervading odour of heated metal, and the crowd swept forward in a body, as though it intended to carry the long line of coaches by storm.
"There he is!" cried Mabel, dancing up and down in her excitement. He had caught the flutter of her handkerchief and pushing his way rapidly through the throng, appeared before them smiling delightedly. She flew to him and kissed him frankly and openly, with an utter disregard for the surprised glances of the bystanders, and then stood aside to make room for her lover. The two men clasped hands and remained silent for a moment, and with the quick intuition of womankind, the girl perceived that she was in the presence of something unknown to her — something sacred and holy that was engendered only by the friendship of man for man.
"Where's Eve?" asked Leslie, his voice breaking the brief tension of the meeting. "Didn't she come with you?"
Mabel glanced at the streams of people eddying about them and wrinkled her little nose expressively, and Leslie understood.
"She was right," he said.
"Well," observed Captain Tommy Hooker, "I don't imagine you particularly want to prolong the anticipation, so let's get started. By the way," he added, surveying the spotless new uniform which covered the Colonel's tall frame, "is all this grandeur solely to impress us, or had you some ulterior motive in thus arraying yourself?"
Leslie laughed and made haste to explain, "I had to make a formal call on Kepplemann before I came away from New York, and it left me just barely time enough to catch the train. And as I was in something of a hurry to get here, I thought I wouldn't wait over to shift into decent clothes."
"I should think not," replied Mabel, ascending to her place in the waiting automobile; "anyway, you're lots better-looking in your uniform." And she glanced up in some surprise as her lover grinned broadly and Leslie laughed again.
"I don't see anything so funny in that remark," she observed with considerable dignity. "You'll have to sit on the floor, Tommy. The Army must have the place of honour."
"Perfectly natural thing to say, my dear," said Hooker, good-naturedly taking the place assigned to him. "And therein the humour lies, eh, Les? Any baggage?"
"Trunk," answered Leslie briefly. "I'm going to impose myself on you for a whole week, Mabs."
"Better make it two," replied the young woman, expertly avoiding a baker's cart whose single horse-power dozed contentedly in the middle of the road while his master sought refreshment; "we'll send over for your belongings this afternoon."
"You got my letter about Jim?" asked the Colonel, looking at Hooker. The naval officer nodded.
"It's the only blot on our perfect happiness," he returned, meeting Mabel's sympathetic eyes. "It's — it's too cruel — after all he'd been through."
"Oh, but it was better so," said the girl earnestly. "He would never have been happy —" She stopped abruptly and concentrated her gaze on the white highway in front of them.
"I suppose it was," assented the Colonel gravely. "It was the kindest thing fate could do for him — but — great heavens, Tommy, what wouldn't that man have been, if—"
"God only knows," said Hooker soberly; "he was a true hero, and it's sometimes seemed to me that the hardest thing about the whole business is that so few will ever know and appreciate what he really was. Just we four will be all — you and I and Eve and Mabs."
"But we'll never forget," said Mabel; "will we, Tommy?"
"I guess not," he returned. "And — well, I've always been pretty much of a heathen, but I believe he's found his reward."
"I kno
w he has," she corrected in a low voice. They were silent for a short space, while the glaring highroad swept swiftly backwards under the flying wheels of the yellow car; but presently the sailor, who could not bear to behold the joyous face of the woman he loved clouded by even the shadow of a sorrow, changed the subject by asking Leslie if the authorities had as yet assigned him to any particular place or duty.
"Why, yes — they have, and it's a fairly good one at that," answered the Colonel; "I've been made chief intelligence officer of the United States Atlantic Coast District under Kepplemann. You know the district's been enlarged to include Canada, so that means I'll practically have charge of all the eastern half of the continent."
"Fairly good!" snorted the navy man; "and what might your idea of a real good job be, now? Do you realise, my son, that you've about three times as important a post to handle as I have? And I outrank you, too! It's enough to make a man give up the Service entirely and go into the army!"
"Mustn't be jealous, Tommy," said Leslie, laughing. "Before I've been at it a month, I'll probably wish I was back in the Line again. But what have they done for you?"
"Oh, I'm satisfied. First of September I'm to be commandant of the New York airship station."
"And we've picked out the dearest little house on Staten Island," broke in Mabel. "I can hardly wait to begin housekeeping. And there's another in the same street that you and Eve can have. You'll take it, won't you Les? I know you wouldn't be so cruel as to separate a pair of loving sisters, would you? I believe we'd just pine away and die if we couldn't see each other at least once a day."
"Then of course I have no alternative," Leslie reassured her. "Luckily headquarters work doesn't keep one tied to barracks. By the way, when do you two intend to get married?"
"Soon as you and Eve are ready," replied Hooker, taking the answer upon himself. "I wanted to have it done last December, but Mabs absolutely refused to submit to the ordeal until she and Eve could go through it together."