"No--er--not exactly," I stammered, adding, at the promptings of a sudden reckless impulse, "but I would like to ask if you knew when Lieutenant X---- over there left the Bagdad Railway for the flying service?" "He was at the head office in Frankfurt when the war began, and joined shortly afterwards," the young officer replied promptly, stepping back beside me. Then, as the somewhat surprising nature of the query burst upon him, a look of astonishment flushed his face and a pucker of suspicion drew his bushy brows together in a perturbed frown. "But may I ask--" he began. "And his brother who was with him in Aleppo--the one with the scar on his cheek and the top of one ear sliced off," I pressed; "where is he?" "Died of fever in Nishbin," again came the prompt answer. "But" (blurting it out quickly) "how do you know about them?" Being human, and therefore weak, it was not in me to enlighten him with the truth, and to add that I was merely a second-class Yankee hack writer, temporarily togged out in an R.N.V.R. uniform to regularize my position of "Keeper of the Records" of the Allied Naval Armistice Commission. No, I couldn't do that. Indeed, everything considered, I am inclined to think that I rendered a better service to the Allied cause when I squared my shoulders importantly and delivered myself oracularly of, "It is our business to know" (impressive pause) "all." My reward was worthy of the effort. "Ach, it is but true," sighed the young officer resignedly. "The English Intelligence is wonderful, as we have too often found out." "It is not bad," I admitted modestly, as I strolled over to make a note of the fact that the machine-gun mounting of one of the _Frederichafens_ had not been removed. I could see that my young friend was bursting to impart to Lieutenant X---- the fact that he was a "marked man," but it was just as well that no opportunity offered in the course of the inspection. That the ominous news had been broken at luncheon, however, I felt certain from the fact that when, missing X---- from the group of officers who saluted us from the doorway of the Casino on our departure, I cast a furtive glance at the upper windows, it surprised him in the act of withdrawing behind one of the lace curtains. I only hope he has nothing on his conscience in the way of hospital bombings and the like. If he has, it can hardly have failed to occur to him that his name is inscribed on the Allies' "black-list," and that he will have to stand trial in due course. It's a strange thing, this cropping up of half-remembered faces in new surroundings. The very next day, in the course of the visit to the Zeppelin station at Nordholz--but I will not anticipate.