“Goody!” Tillie clapped her hands. “I’m going to be a lady spy!” “Yes sir!” Peggy broke in with her high, piping voice. “We’ll both be spies. You be Louise, and I’ll be Charlotte!” “Wait and see!” the story teller warned. “Let me tell you the story. Then you may not want to be a spy at all!” “Oh, yes we will!” Tillie insisted. “Aunt Alice (they called her aunt) do we have a spy right here on our farm?” The child’s voice was low, mysterious. “Hush!” Alice warned. “Don’t dare to breathe a word about that.” “Tillie!” The younger child’s voice rose sharply, “Let her tell the story!” And so, while the children lay back among the cushions, Alice told the story of Louise and Charlotte. “They had lived in France.” Her voice was low and mellow. “Then had come the terrible German soldiers. Louise fled before them. Charlotte hid in a cellar. “Louise was very bright. She had been a teacher. She could speak French, German and Belgian. “A great soldier asked her to be a spy. This frightened her nearly out of her wits. But she said ‘all right. I will do it.’ “One dark night a great giant of a man named Alphonse, who had been a smuggler and was a friend of her country, took her hand and said: ‘We will go.’” “Wh—where did they go?” Tillie was growing excited. “They went to the border.” Alice smiled. “At the border there was a very high barbed wire fence. You couldn’t go over it. If you tried to go under it you might touch an electric wire that would sound an alarm. Then you would be shot. If you tripped on something it might set off a mine, and you’d be blown to bits.” “And wa—was—” Tillie got no further. Her sister’s fingers were on her lips. “Alphonse knew all about these things,” Alice went on. “He made a hole under the fence. The earth was very loose. He had gone under before. They got across safely. Then they were in the land where German soldiers were. And, just when they were breathing easy, a blinding white light swept along the barbed wire fence. It was searching for them.” “And—did—” “Alphonse and Louise dropped flat and lay there hiding their faces in the damp earth. The sweeping searchlight came and went, came and went, then came to go away for good.” “Oh—oo!” Peggy breathed. “They didn’t get them.” Just then Tillie sat straight up. “Aunt Alice!” she cried. “We _do_ have a spy on our farm. I saw his face at the window. I really did, just now.” At that same instant the dog Flash growled softly. Visibly shaken, Alice managed to regain her poise. “Shish!” was all she said. Then she went on with her story.