Further conversation developed the fact that the old man had worked in a silk mill in America for many years and had returned to Alsace and this humble place of his birth only after both of his sons, who like himself were weavers, had been forced into the German service. "If I do not come back and claim my home, it is gone," he said. So he had returned and was working the old hand loom with his aged fingers, here in the place of his birth. He was greatly interested in the boys' story and gave them freely of his poor store of food which they ate with a relish. Apparently he was not under the cloud of suspicion or perhaps his age and humble condition and the obscurity and remoteness of his dwelling gave him a certain immunity. In any event, he carried his loathing of the Germans with a fine independence. "In America," he said, "ze people do not know about ziss--ziss beast. Here we _know_. Here in little Mernon our women must work to make ze road down to ze river. Why is zere needed a road to ze river? Why is zere needed ze new road above Basel? To bring back so many prisoners--wounded? Bah! Ziss is what zey _say_. Lies! I have been a soldier. Eighty-two years I am old. And much I have travelled. So can I see. What you say in Amerique--make two and two together--yess? Zere will be tramping of soldiers over zese roads to invade little Switzerland. Am I right? If it is necessaire--yess! _Necessaire!_ Faugh!" This was the first open statement the boys had heard as to the new roads, all of which converged suspiciously in the direction of the Swiss frontier. They were for bringing home German wounded; they were to facilitate internal communication; they were for this, that and the other useful and innocent purpose, but they all ran toward the Swiss border or to some highway which ran thither. "Ziss is ze last card they have to play--to stab little Switzerland in ze back and break through," the old man said. "In ze south runs a road from ze trench line across to ze Rhine. Near zere I have an old comrade--Blondel. Togezzer we fight side by side, like brothers. When ze boat comes, many times he comes to see me. Ze last time he come he tell me how ze new road goes past his house--all women and young girls working. It comes from ziss other road zat goes from ze trenches over to ze Rhine. South it goes--you see?" he added shrewdly. "So now if you are so clevaire to see a fleur-de-lis where none is intentioned, so zen you can tell, maybe, why will zey build a road zat goes south?" Tom, fascinated by the old man's sagacity and vehemence, only shook his head. "Ah, you are not so clevaire to suspect! Ziss is Amerique! Nevaire will she suspect." Tom did not altogether like this reference to Uncle Sam's gullibility, but he contented himself with believing that it was meant as a thing of the past. "They can't flim-flam us now," Archer ventured. "Flam-flim--no," the old man said, with great fervor.