“We’ll set all the machinery we have to work to find one, sir,” Bouchard replied.

“Another thing, we may dismiss any idea that they are concealing either artillery or dirigibles or planes that we do not know of,” continued Westerling.  “That is a figment of our apprehensions.  The fact that we find no truth in the rumors proves that there is none.  Such things are too important to be concealed by one army from another.”

“Lanstron certainly cannot carry them in his pockets,” remarked Turcas.  “Still, we must be sure,” he added thoughtfully, more to himself than to Westerling, who had already turned his attention to a document which Turcas had laid on the desk.

“A recommendation by the surgeon-in-chief,” said Turcas, “for a new method of prompt segregation of ghastly cases among the wounded.  I have put it in the form of an order.  If reserves coming into action see men badly lacerated by shell fire it is bound to make them self-conscious and affect morale.”

“Yes,” Westerling agreed.  “If moving pictures of the horrors of Port Arthur were to be shown in our barracks before a war, it would hardly encourage martial enthusiasm.  I shall look this over and then have it issued.  It will not be necessary to wait on action of the staff in council.”

Turcas and Bouchard exchanged another glance.  They had fresh evidence of Westerling’s tendency to concentrate authority in himself.

“The 128th Regiment has been ordered to South La Tir, but no order yet given for the 132d, whose place it takes,” Turcas went on.

“Let it remain for the present!” Westerling replied.

After they had withdrawn, the look that passed between Turcas and Bouchard was a pointed question.  The 132d to remain at South La Tir!  Was there something more than “newspaper talk” in this latest diplomatic crisis between the Grays and the Browns?  Westerling alone was in the confidence of the premier of late.  Any exchange of ideas between the two subordinates would be fruitless surmise and against the very instinct of staff secrecy, where every man knew only his work and asked about no one else’s.

Westerling ran through the papers that Turcas had prepared for him.  If Turcas had written the order for the wounded, Westerling knew that it was properly done.  Having cleared his desk into the hands of his executive clerk, he looked at the clock.  It had barely turned four.  He picked up the final staff report of observations on the late Balkan campaign, just printed in book form, glanced at it and laid it aside.  Already he knew the few lessons afforded by this war “done on the cheap,” with limited equipment and over bad roads.  No dirigibles had been used and few planes.  It was no criterion, except in the effect of the fire of the new pattern guns, for the conflict of vast masses of highly trained men against vast masses of highly trained men, with rapid transportation over good roads, complete equipment, thorough organization, backed by generous resources, in the cataclysm of two great European powers.