“After all, what business is it of yours?  Who are you, anyway?  If you are French you can do nothing.  If you are Swiss take me to the nearest poste.”

“Who were those two men?” repeated Recklow.

“Ask them.”

“No; I think I’ll take you back to France.”

The girl became silent at that but her attitude defied him.  Even when he snapped an automatic handcuff over one wrist she smiled incredulously.

But the jeering expression on her dark, handsome features altered when they approached the Swiss wire.  And when Recklow produced a pair of heavy wire-cutters all defiance died out in her face.

“Make a sound and I’ll simply shoot you,” he whispered.

“W-what is it you want with me?” she asked in a ghost of a voice.

“The truth.”

“I told it.”

“You did not.  You are German.”

“Believe what you like, but I am on neutral territory.  Let me go.”

“You are German!  For God’s sake admit it or we’ll be too late!”

“What?”

“Admit it, I say.  Do you want those two Americans to get away?”

“What—­Americans?” stammered the girl.  “I d-don’t know what you mean—­”

Recklow laughed under his breath, unlocked the handcuffs.

“Echt Deutsch,” he whispered in German—­“and zero-two-six.  A good hint to you!”

“Waidman’s Heil!” said the girl faintly.  “O God! what a fright you gave me....  There’s a man at Delle—­we were warned—­Seventy is his number, Recklow—­a devil Yankee—­”

“A swine! a fathead, sleeping all day in his garden, too drunk to open despatches!” sneered Recklow.

“We were warned against him,” she insisted.  Recklow laughed his contempt of Recklow and spat upon the dead leaves.

“Stupid one, what then is closest to the Yankee heart?  I was sent here to buy this terrible devil Yankee, Recklow.  That is how one deals with Yankees.  With dollars.”

“Is that why you are here?”

“And to watch for McKay and the young woman with him!”

“The Erith woman!”

“That is her barbarous name, I believe.  What is your number?”

“Four-two-four.  Oh, what a fright you gave me.  What is your name?”

“That is against regulations.”

“I know.  What is it, all the same....  Mine is Helsa Kampf.”

“Mine is Johann Wolkcer.”

“Wolkcer?  Is it Polish?”

“God knows where we Germans had our origin. ...  Who are your companions, Fraulein?”

“An Irish-American.  Jim Macniff, and a British revolutionist, Harry Skelton.  Others await us on Mount Terrible—­Germans in Swiss uniforms.”

“You’d better keep an eye on Macniff and Skelton,” grumbled Recklow.

“No; they’re to be trusted.  We nearly caught McKay and the Erith girl in Scotland; they killed four of our people and hurt two others....  Listen, comrade Wolkcer, if a trodden path ascends Mount Terrible, as Skelton pretended, you and I had better look for it.  Can you find your way back to where we crossed the wire?  The dry bed of the torrent was to have guided us.”