“Yes, I suppose that’s why I have such a fatherly feeling for him.”

“That, or because you brought him in from sure death.  We’re always attached to anyone we save.”

“I mean to have him exchanged and sent back to his mother in Austria.  He’s bound to have a mother there and she’ll thank me though she may never see me.  I wish these pleasant Austrians had more sense.”

Kratzek opened his eyes and looked blankly at the two young men.  He strove to rise, but fell back with a low sigh of pain.  Then he closed his eyes, but John saw the muscles of his face working.

“He’s trying to remember,” whispered Carstairs.

Memory came back to Kratzek in a few moments, and he opened his eyes again.

“I was saved by somebody last night and I think it was you,” he said, looking at John.  “I want to say to you that I am very grateful.  I do not wish to appear boastful, but I have relatives in both the Austrian and German armies who are very powerful—­ours is both a North German and South German house, and East German, too.”

“That is, it’s wohlgeboren and hochwohlgeboren,” said Wharton, who appeared at that moment.

“Yes,” said the Austrian boy, smiling faintly.  “I am highborn and very highborn, although it’s not my fault.  You, I take it, by your accent, are American and these things, of course, don’t count with you.”

“I don’t know, they seem to count pretty heavily with some of our women, if you can judge by the newspapers.”

“Who are these men of whom you speak?” asked John.

“The chief is Prince Karl of Auersperg, who is not far from your front.  I betray no military secret when I say that.  I shall send word to him that you have saved my life, and, if you should fall a prisoner into German hands, he will do as much for you as you have done for me.”

The Austrian boy did not notice the quick glances exchanged by the three, and he went on: 

“Prince Karl of Auersperg is a general of ability, and owing to that and his very high birth, he has great influence with both emperors.  You have nothing to fear from our brave Germans if you should fall into their hands, but I beg you in any event, to get word to the prince and to give him my name.”

“I’ll do it,” replied John, but he soothed his conscience by telling himself that it was a white lie.  If he should be captured for the third time Prince Karl of Auersperg was the last one whom he wanted to know of it.  Neither was he pleased to hear that this medieval baron was again so near, although he did not realize why until later.

“We’ve talked enough now,” said John, “and I’ll see that food is sent you.  Then it’s off with you to the hospital.  It’s a French hospital, but they’ll treat a German shoulder just as they would one of their own.”

The life in the vast honeycomb of trenches was awakening fast.  Two million men perhaps, devoted to the task of killing one another, crept from their burrows and stood up.  Along the whole line almost of twenty score miles snow had fallen, but the rifles and cannon were firing already, spasmodic sharpshooting at some points, and fierce little battles at others.