“I tell you,” Frederic was saying,—­his voice was calmer but determined,—­“we’ve got to get these people to a doctor.  It’s too heartless.  I will not leave them here.”

“And betray us at the last moment, when our plans are all ready,” snarled old Otto.

“There is less danger if we bundle them into the car and take them with us than if we leave them here,” protested Frederic.  “Two bodies right here at the entrance would be fine, nicht wahr?”

His last remark appealed to old Otto.

“That is so,” he muttered.  “It is not safe.  We must hide the bodies, both of them, yes?”

The bodies!  Jane decided that Dean must have been killed and that they thought that she, too, was dead.  As she strove to open her eyes she could hear Frederic protesting.

“It’s inhuman,” he cried.  “They both are hurt, but perhaps still alive.  We must take them to a hospital.”

“And endanger all our plans,” stormed old Otto.  “Throw them into the woods.”

“We’ll do nothing of the sort,” Frederic insisted, his voice becoming unusually stern and severe.  “I’m going to get both of these people to a doctor at once, I tell you.”

With effort Jane opened her eyes and looked cautiously about.  Where was Thomas Dean?  How badly had he been hurt?  The Hoffs’ automobile was slowly backing up.  As she looked old Otto sprang out of it and righted the motorcycle.  As he did so Jane saw the body of Dean lying senseless beneath it, but to him the old German paid no attention.  He was examining the motorcycle and still sputtering that the swine should be left to rot.

“We are going to take them with us in the car,” directed Frederic in a voice of authority.  “I command it.”

At the word old Otto’s mutterings ceased, though he shot a black look at the younger man.

“This machine,” he suggested, “it is not hurt.  I will take it and do our work.  There is haste.  You remain with the car.  Do what you will with these people.”

“Go then,” said his nephew curtly.  “You can take the train at the first station and make time.”

As the old man mounted the motorcycle and sped away Frederic sprang from the car, and approaching the spot where Dean’s body lay, began making an examination of his injuries.

“Scalp wound, perhaps fractured skull, broken arm,” Jane heard him saying aloud to himself.  She noted curiously that as soon as he was left to himself he began speaking in English.

He left Dean and approached her.  As he came nearer she closed her eyes again, trying to plan some course of action.  Her head was throbbing so that she found it impossible to think.  She felt toward young Hoff a warmth of gratitude for not having gone off and left them helpless as his uncle had insisted.  Even though he was an enemy of her country, a man to be hated, a spy, she could not help being glad for his presence there.  What would she have done without him, with Dean lying there injured and helpless on this lonely mountain road?