“I beg pardon?”

  “Ought to have a blue carnation too—” he said.

  “Oh! That isn’t possible, I’m afraid. But it is a good suggestion. After this I’ll put a tiny bow of blue ribbon with them.”

  She smiled at Jimmie Brooks again and walked on down the street. Jimmie knew that young women usually did not wear flowers in just that manner. Why only two carnations, and why were they pinned to the lapel of her coat? Was there any connection between the red and white carnations and the card that had dropped on his hat and bore the words “Red and white”?

  “I’ll be looking for a clue in the gutter next!” Brooks muttered to himself in huge disgust. “If we don’t solve this little mystery pretty soon I’ll be a candidate for a sanatorium!”

  A hand fell upon his shoulder. He whirled around to face a city detective he knew.

  “What’s the idea, Jimmie,” the detective asked, “going around assaulting young women these days? I saw you. Why didn’t you knock her down and walk over her—and be done with it? Or is it just a way you have of making an acquaintance?”

  “Accident! Was thinking!” Jimmie explained.

  “Don’t try to flirt with that young beauty, Jimmie. That girl hasn’t any time to waste. Some beauty, eh? And she’s a mighty good girl. Supports a mother and kid brother.”

  “Works, eh?”

  “You bet she does! Gets about a hundred and twenty-five a month at that. She is private secretary to Hamlin, traffic manager for the X.

  Z. and Y.” “She—what?” Brooks asked. “Private secretary to Hamlin. Got more brains than he has, I guess. Plucky little girl! Sends her brother to school and keeps her mother in a dandy little flat.”

  “Must be a good girl,” Brooks admitted. “See you again, Joe. I’m in a hurry now.”

  “On your way?” the detective said, laughing; and they separated.

  Jimmie Brooks was thinking in earnest now. Private secretary to Hamlin, traffic director of the railroad that moved the troops! And she wore red and white carnations!

  II.

  It was about seven o’clock that evening when Jimmie Brooks entered the little café again—this time for dinner.

  He had spent an afternoon of futile endeavor. He had made a nuisance of himself around the railroad offices, and had discovered nothing worthy of notice. He had met the young woman again, had learned that her name was Betty Burns, and had apologized for about the tenth time for the collision of the noon hour.

  Across the street from the little café was a drug store, and in its window an electric display sign alternately flashed a red and white light. Jimmie Brooks started when he saw it; and then told himself that he was all sorts of a fool. That sign had been there for a year, at least, and probably for longer than that. He had watched it scores of times while sitting in the little café and waiting for food to be carried to him. There was nothing particularly attractive about the sign, except perhaps to a stranger.

  It appeared that the waiter was unusually slow to-night, and Brooks spent the time watching the street. He was sitting in his usual place, near the cashier’s cage, but she was busy checking up accounts and Brooks did not bother her with conversation.

  And then he saw the professor again. Kenderdine passed before the window and turned in at the entrance of the building. And almost at the same moment Brooks saw Hamlin, traffic manager.

  Brooks suddenly was alert. Hamlin was across the street. At this hour the man should have been in his pretentious home eating his dinner. The traffic manager stopped before the drug-store and inspected some Kodak supplies in the window. Presently he entered the store.

  Brooks saw him engage the proprietor, Baker, in conversation. It appeared that the two men were well acquainted. Two or three customers who were in the store completed their purchases and left. Baker and Hamlin walked toward the rear end of the establishment, where the store owner took down something from a shelf, wrapped it up, handed it to the traffic manager and rang up the sale on the cash-register.

  Nothing particularly suspicious in that, Brooks thought. Yet he continued to watch even after his dinner had been placed before him. And suddenly he saw Hamlin walk around behind the prescription-case.

  Brooks ate dinner leisurely, yet watching the drug-store continually meanwhile. Half an hour passed and Hamlin did not emerge.

  Something seemed to attract Brooks’s attention to the electric display light again. And then he forgot his dessert and bent forward in his chair, watching intently.

  For the electric sign was not working in the usual manner. There came no longer alternate flashes of red and white. At times there would be several red flashes in succession, then several white ones, and now and then a pause when the sign flashed neither red nor white.

  “Ah! A little more red and white—without the blue!” Brooks muttered. “I’ll just make little note of this!”

  Pencil and note-book came from his pocket. The sign across the street was dark for a time, and then the flashes began again. If it was a message, Jimmie Brooks had lost a considerable part of it, but perhaps he could catch enough yet to give him an inkling of its import.

  He wrote rapidly in the note-book, making a check for a red flash and a cross for a white one, in indicating the pauses. This is what he got:

  Red, red, red. Red. Red, red, red, white. Red. White, red, white, white. Red, red. Red, white, red, red. Red. Red, red, red, red, red. Red, white, red, red. Red, white. White, red. White, red, red. White. Red, white, white. Red. Red, white, red. red. Red, red, red, white. Red. White. White, white, white. White, red. Red, red. White, white, red. Red, red, red, red. White.

  Jimmie Brooks scarcely spoke to the cashier when he paid his check, which surprised that young woman considerably. He hurried up the street to his rooms, dashed to the desk, sat down before it, and contemplated the note¬book.

  After a quarter of an hour of thought, Brooks reached for a United States Army signal-book. He turned to the Morse code. An attempt to make sense of the red and white syllables he had written failed. Here and there would be a letter that ruined what otherwise might have been a perfectly good word.

  Then be turned to the Continental code. There is a small difference between the two codes, but Brooks found enough to make a message where there had been nonsense before. Three minutes later Brooks closed the signal-book and got up from the desk.

  At last he had it. From those peculiar flashes of red and white in the window of the drug-store he had deciphered in the Continental code a message of five words. The red represented a dot and the white a dash. It read:

  Seven Mile Island twelve to-night.

  Jimmie Brooks felt a thrill as he read the message, and he fumed because of the part of it that he had lost. He knew Seven Mile Island well. It was down the river from the sea about the distance that gave it its name. There were only two ways of reaching it, by water direct and by taking a trolley-car to a way station and crossing from there in a rowboat.

  The island itself was very small. Near the south end of it, about a hundred yards from the river and practically hidden from view by a thick growth of large trees, stood an old cabin. Formerly it had been occupied by an old fisherman. But it had been vacant now for several years, the doors and the windows had been removed, and the floor was rotten with age.

  Brooks thought for a time of the island as he knew it, and then read the message again. A clock near by struck the hour of nine. On the street below newsboys were crying extras. He could hear the words:

  “Another troop-train wrecked! Extra!”

  Brooks set his lips in a thin, straight line, put the note-took and message in his pocket, and went out. Seven Mile Island at midnight, eh? Well, he’d be there! Possibly there was nothing to it, since he had not got the first part of the message, but he would have to find out.

  Before a newspaper office he glanced at the bulletin-board. The troop-train had plunged through a bridge that had had a span blown out a few minutes before, a message stated. Young men in the khaki of their country had met death there, and others had suffered injuries.

  “Like to get my hands on the throat of the fiend that did that!” an aged man near Jimmie was muttering. “They don’t give the boys a chance! It’s worse than shootin’ them from the dark! Why don’t the government do something?”

  That was the key-note—the government should do something about it. The public trusted the government. No matter how difficult the task, the public expected the government to protect its soldiers from such fiendish work as this. And Jimmie Brooks was a part of the government!

  He glanced over the other bulletins, and then went on down the street. He boarded a trolley-car and set on the rear end in the semidarkness and smoked. The car carried him through the retail district, through the residence section, and out along the broad river.

  He could see lights twinkling on moored ships. He saw river packets going toward the city. Now and then, as the car stopped at way stations, he could hear the wash of the water upon the shore. And always he heard the old man’s question: “Why don’t the government do something?”

  He left the car at the proper station and walked down toward the river. Heavy clouds obscured the moon and stars; and a drizzle of rain was falling. It was a perfect night, Brooks thought, for plots and plotters.

  He used his electric torch when he reached the edge of the water, and presently discovered an old skiff pulled up on the ground. Two splintered oars were near it, wedged between two rocks. That suited Jimmie Brooks perfectly; he didn’t want to attract attention by communicating with some fisherman and renting a boat. Jimmie Brooks seized the craft.

  Slowly and carefully he rowed across the turbulent river, flinching now and then because the rusty oar-locks squeaked, stopping now and then to listen. He reached the island, and landed a couple of hundred yards above the old cabin, pulled the boat out of the water, and hid it among the tall weeds that lined the shore. Then he crept through the weeds and thick brush, and made his way toward the distant shack.

  III

  In former days a path had run from the cabin to a tiny dock, but now the path was almost overgrown with weeds and brush. The dock was still there, but half the boards in its flooring had rotted away.

  Brooks investigated the path carefully, and decided that it had been used recently. He listened for a time in the vicinity of the cabin, and, convinced that no one was there, entered and flashed the torch. The cabin had been swept and the walls partially cleaned. In one corner of it was an old table, and a couple of boxes that were used as chairs. The cabin, it was evident, had been used within the last few days.

  Brooks was not certain that those who visited Seven Mile Island this night would go to the cabin. So he made his way down to the river again and prepared to hide in the brush near the dock in case any one came. It was only eleven o’clock; he had an hour to wait.

  To his ears came the faint squeaking of oar-locks. Nearer came the sound, until Brooks was assured that a boat was approaching the island. Crouching in the brush, he waited, wishing that the moon would come from behind the clouds to shed some light on the river. He had only the sound of the squeaking oar-locks by which to tell in what direction the boat was being moved.

  Across the river a trolley car rounded a curve. For an instant its headlight was reflected on the surface of the water, making a path of brilliance toward the island, cresting the tiny waves with golden light. In this glow, for just a moment, Brooks saw a rowboat. A girl was at the oars.

  Then the light was whirled away, and the surface of the stream was in darkness again. The squeaking of the oar-locks had stopped. Brooks imagined that the girl at the oars had been frightened when the streak of light revealed her.

  Presently he heard the squeaking again and he could make out that the boat was being rowed slowly toward the island. It did not approach the little dock. Thirty yards to one side it was landed and drawn up on the beach. Brooks was within twenty feet of the girl when she left the edge of the water and started through the weeds toward the cabin.

  He had guessed that the girl was Betty Burns, Hamlin’s secretary. He wondered at her being mixed up in such a business, and told himself that promised reward supplied the answer. The girl had worked hard; she had a mother and brother to support. Perhaps Hamlin, or somebody else, had whispered that money could be obtained easily, and that it would purchase many things that had been denied her.

  Brooks liked to think that the girl did not realize just what she was doing, or that she was an innocent girl in the hands of scoundrels. But she was there, at almost midnight, and alone. Brooks decided to watch, her for a time before making his presence known.

  She made little noise as she walked slowly toward the cabin, and Jimmie Brooks made less. She found the path in time, and followed that, stopping now and then as though to listen. Once she flashed a pocket-torch, and Brooks was almost discovered.

  He expected her to enter the cabin, and wait for the person who was to come at midnight, and he was somewhat surprised when she went to one side of it and crouched down in the brush. Her attitude told Jimmie Brooks that, like himself, she was there to watch and overhear—for what purpose, he could not guess.

  She made not a particle of noise now, and Brooks was afraid to leave her then and return to the dock, afraid that his departure would not be silent, and that she would become aware of his presence. For almost half an hour they remained within thirty feet of each other, neither moving.

  Then there came from the river the soft purring of a motor-boat. The purring stopped; and a little later a man slipped up the pathway. He went directly to the cabin, flashed a torch, and then lighted a candle.

  “He’s got his nerve with him!” Brooks growled to himself. “I wish that girl would make a move. I want to get nearer and take a look at the latest arrival.”

  His wish was granted immediately. The girl stole out to the path and hurried along it. Jimmie Brooks could not see her, but he could bear her light footsteps. He did not know just what to expect. Perhaps, after all, Miss Betty Burns had a rendezvous with the man in the cabin, and had been awaiting his arrival in the brush as a matter of precaution.

  But the girl did not enter the cabin. Brooks saw her walk through the faint streak of light the candle made and approach one of the open windows. She peered inside, and Brooks got a fleeting view of her face. It was Betty Burns. And after she had glanced through the window, she stepped back to the brush and crouched at the edge of it again.

  Brooks crept forward silently and attained a position where he could look through the doorway and into the cabin. The man sitting on one of the boxes beside the table was Hamlin, the traffic manager. One glance Brooks gave him and then slipped away again. Experience told him there would be no satisfactory result if he invaded that cabin now and demanded what Hamlin was doing there. He had no conclusive evidence, merely a mass of conjectures. And such an action would probably mean that the man for whom the flashing light message had been intended would scent trouble and fail to appear. It was Brooks’s part to wait and observe.

  In the brush again he made his way silently, and foot by foot, toward Betty Burns. There was some wind now, and the brush and trees rattled considerably, enough to cover the sounds of his approach. When he was so close that he could hear her breathing, he stopped. He could see nothing, but he sensed that he could touch her by extending an arm at its full length.

  He listened for the sound of another boat’s approach, but heard nothing. Over across the river, some clock struck the hour of twelve, and Jimmie Brooks counted the soft strokes. Then he heard a man’s steps on the twigs which covered the path.

  The latest arrival went directly to the cabin and stopped at the door. Brooks saw him plainly; he was Professor Kenderdine, who had a suite of rooms above the little café.

  “Fool!” he heard Kenderdine hiss, “Why the light?”

  “Oh, I say, Kenderdine—”

  “And no names! Must you always be a fool?”

  “I’m new at this business,” Hamlin said.

  “A baby could tell that, my friend.”

  “And I don’t like it!”

  “But you like the money, eh? You play at buying stock and being a lamb, and your wife goes into society, and your railroad salary will not stretch, eh? And so, when a certain old professor comes along and offers some easy money—”

  “No need to go into details!” Hamlin snapped. “Let’s get down to business.”

  “You must be careful how you flash word for me to meet you here,” Kenderdine said. “I was half-minded not to come tonight. We cannot risk a meeting every few minutes. It is money, I suppose?”

  “Yes.”

  “You have it coming to you, of course, and I stand ready to pay it. But we must be careful, my friend. There is not a breath of suspicion now blowing upon either of us. If that breath comes—puff! Jail—or worse!”

  “Well, don’t talk about it!”

  “It is not a pleasant prospect, eh? Remember that—and use some precautions. Have you some more information for me this evening—some that you did not flash from the little drug-store window-lamp?”

  “Yes. Three sections start Tuesday, the first at noon, one at one and one at two o’clock.”

  “Um! Noon, eh? That will mean that we must do our work some miles from here.”

  “I’ll let you know if the trains are to be held up during the afternoon. There may be some change in plans. The government men are frantic.”

  “Do you dislike this work, my friend?” Kenderdine asked.

  “Do you?” Hamlin countered.

  “Ah! I am working for my country; you are working against yours! There is a world of difference.”

  “In other words, you may buy me, but you do not respect me.”

  “Can one respect a traitor?”

  “You are but a spy!”

  “Which is much better than being a traitor, though death is the lot of both—if caught. But such talk gets us nowhere, sir. Each of us has his aims and must deal with his own conscience. You want money? Very good! I have another five thousand with me to-night.”