An hour later Dick and Chippy found themselves in the presence of the officer in charge of the works at the fort. The prisoner had been handed over into safe keeping, and the sergeant and the two boys had been ordered to report to the colonel himself. They were shown into a large bare room where a tall man was seated at a great table covered with papers. He stood up, as they went in and saluted, and posted himself in front of the fire. 'Well, Sergeant Lake,' he said. 'What's all this about?' 'I believe, sir, I've got a spy; at least, these boys had him. I only helped to bring him in.' So spoke the modest sergeant. 'Ah, yes, a spy;' and the colonel nodded, as if he had been expecting a spy for weeks, and perhaps he had. 'But this is rather an odd thing to get hold of a spy in this fashion. Let me hear all about it.' 'I can tell you little or nothing, sir,' replied Sergeant Lake. 'I didn't wait to hear all their story. The boys told me enough, though, for me to bring him in.' 'Well,' said the colonel, 'suppose I have the story from one of you boys?' Dick and Chippy looked at each other, and the latter mumbled: 'You tell 'em. Yer can manage it a lot better 'n me. I shan't, anyhow. Goo on.' Thus adjured by his brother scout, Dick told the whole story from the moment he saw the startled rabbit until they had run upon the sergeant in their headlong flight. Then Chippy handed over the boot, which underwent the most careful examination at the hands of the colonel. The latter spread out on the table the tiny sheets of paper from the cavity, and studied them long and earnestly. To his trained eyes those marks meant things which the boys had, as was only natural, failed to grasp. He had sat down at the table to examine the papers, and Dick, Chippy, and the sergeant were standing on the opposite side. At last the colonel leaned back in his chair, and looked at the boys and tapped the papers with his forefinger. 'Oh yes,' he said, 'you've nabbed a spy, and no mistake about it, my brave lads. I feel, personally, that you've done me an immense service, for I should have been simply wild to think that my plans were as good as pigeon-holed in some foreign intelligence office. But, after all, that's only my personal feeling. You've done your country an immense service, and that's a much bigger thing still. Unfortunately, it can never be publicly recognised: this affair must remain a profound secret; and men, you know, have received medals and open honour for smaller things than you have done to-day.' 'We don't trouble at all about that, sir,' said Dick quietly. 'We're not out for what we can get for ourselves: we're boy scouts.' 'I beg your pardon,' said the colonel. 'I beg your pardon. Of course, you're boy scouts, and that puts you on a different footing at once. You look at the thing from a real soldier's point of view--all for his side, and nothing for himself. That's it, isn't it?'