she believed everything Mike Hallo told her. And I wasn't old enough to know anything about it. So he got away with it all right, and went home. But then we began to find things out. We found that the business hadn't been losing money at all, and that he hadn't really sold it. He had another crook running it, and sending him all the profits, only the law couldn't do anything about that, because there'd been a sort of fake sale, and they said this other man had bought it legally. Do you see how that could be, sir?"

"Yes, very easily. I'd have to know more about the facts to understand it properly, but I can understand that it's possible."

"I thought you would, sir. Well, that was how it was. We knew he'd cheated us. A lawyer that was a friend of my dad's said he thought Mike Hallo would still be away ahead of the game, even if he paid my mother a hundred thousand dollars, or perhaps a hundred and fifty thousand! And we—why, my mother's got about five hundred a year left to look after herself and my little sister, and we used to have ever so much when dad was alive! So I just came over here to find Mike and try to make him come through."

"Good for you!" exclaimed the consul, carried away for the moment. But then he frowned thoughtfully. "Look here, Dick, I believe your story, right through. You're not the sort of boy that would get things twisted. But if you couldn't make Hallo disgorge in New York, how can you hope to do it here, where he has all sorts of influence—pull, as you call it? And how did you get here, anyway? It costs money to travel from New York to Semlin."

"I had a good job, and saved up my money, sir. And then I worked my way across the ocean as a steward. I'd studied languages a good deal, too, and I got another job then, traveling with a rich family that wanted to have someone to buy tickets and tell how much things cost in the shops, so that they wouldn't get cheated. I came as far as Buda-Pesth with them, and then they paid my way to Belgrade so that I could reserve rooms for them there. You see, I can talk German and Magyar and Servian and Russian, as well as French and English and Italian."

"For heaven's sake!" said the consul, in amazement. "My boy, I'm not so sure that you won't be able to give Hallo a bad time, after all! You must have a gift of tongues. I don't know half the languages you do, and I'm supposed to, too, in my work."

"Oh, I've always been pretty good at languages, sir. And if you like to know how to talk other languages, you can find people that speak them all in New York. I know a little Turkish, too—not so very much, but enough to get along. And I forgot about the Greek."

The consul roared with laughter.

"By George!" he said. "I'll back you to make it hot for Hallo!" But then he grew more serious. "I don't know, though," he went on. "You're in hard luck, Dick. In ordinary times I think you'd have a good chance. But these aren't ordinary times. Come here!"

He led the way to the window. From it they could see the broad Danube, the great, sluggish river that was wending its slow way to the Black Sea, and the narrower, cleaner Save, directly before them, which flowed into the bigger stream here and lost its own identity. Across the Save was a steel bridge, over which a train was now running. And at the other end of the bridge was a city of white houses, with minarets and spires, and on top of a high, flat topped hill stood an old, white fortress.

"Look there, above the bridge," he said. "Do you see that monitor?"

"Yes, sir. And there are two more out in the Danube."

"Exactly! Well, at any moment those monitors may begin bombarding Belgrade, the capital of Servia. I don't know at what moment war will break out, but I know that it won't be delayed very long."

"It won't be much of a war, will it, sir?" asked Dick. "Servia's too small to have a chance with Austria-Hungary, I thought."

"Maybe. But you must remember that Servia has just been through two great wars. She smashed the Turks in her great battles with them, and then she smashed the Bulgarians, who had beaten the Turks too, and were supposed to have the most efficient army of its size in all Europe. You see, the Servian army has been doing a lot of fighting in these last few years. Every man in it is a veteran, and knows just what war is. A man like that is worth more than one who has to get used to the idea of a campaign, and has never been under fire. And—maybe Austria wouldn't have to fight Servia alone."

Dick stared at him.

"Maybe Russia will help Servia. I think she will. Then all of Europe will get into the war, sooner or later. If Austria has to fight Russia on the other side, she won't be able to spare her whole army or anything like it to fight Servia. And three hundred thousand Servians won't be beaten by that many Austrians, I can tell you!"

"Well, but I don't see what that's got to do with Hallo, after all, sir. He's not a soldier, is he?"

"No. He's past the age of military service. But this is what it will mean, Dick. In time of war ordinary affairs can't be attended to the way they are in times of peace. Even legal, admitted debts, that a man is perfectly willing to pay, can't be collected. Special laws and rules are made, just for war. It would make it much easier for Hallo to dodge you. And he has a pull, as you say."

"Yes, but so have you, haven't you, sir?"

"I hope so," said the consul, with a smile. "Of a different sort from his, too. But I'm afraid it isn't the sort that can help you very much just now, Dick. Still, we'd better do what we can. You want to stay here. Have you got a passport? It would simplify matters for you."

"No, sir. They told me at home I didn't need it."

"That's what they are always saying," said the consul, looking annoyed. "They never seem to understand, at home, that Europe isn't just like America. Here war is likely to break out at any moment, and then a passport is a necessity. It's been that way for years. Still, I suppose you've got some sort of proof that you're an American citizen? Your birth certificate or something of the sort?"

"No, sir, I'm afraid I haven't. I haven't got anything except my Boy Scout certificate."

"Let me see that."

Dick produced, rather proudly, the pocket card that showed him to be a first-class scout, a member of a star patrol of a good New York troop, and recorded his many honor badges.

"This is fine," said the consul, returning it. "But it doesn't prove that you're an American, my boy."

Dick looked at him in dismay.

"But you believe that I am, don't you, sir?"

"I certainly do! There isn't a boy of any other country in the world that could have come here as you have done! But what I believe doesn't count. If Hallo is trying to have you expelled, I'd have to be able to prove definitely that you were an American, instead of just saying that I believed it. In ordinary times—but, as I've told you already, these aren't ordinary times. And I know a little something about this Hallo. I've had trouble with him myself."

"You have, sir?"

"Yes. He exports things to America, and it's part of my duty to certify to values and so on, for the customs. I've thought once or twice that he was trying to cheat. I'm sure of this—that his pull is mighty strong. But I tell you what I'll do. I'll cable for proofs of your identity. Your scoutmaster should be able to get them. We'll hope Hallo won't hurry too much. Now be off, but come back at six, and we'll have dinner together."

CHAPTER II

A SURPRISING OFFER

Plucky and self-reliant as Dick Warner really was, he felt a good deal better when he emerged from Consul Denniston's office than when he had been trying to get by the barrier of clerks fifteen minutes earlier. Then he had been a good many thousand miles from home, and not only friendless in a strange and alien country, but possessed of a determined and unscrupulous enemy