the first, failed to produce results.

The adjutant, Capt. Long, then sent for Peter. This officer was not much more than five feet high, despite the name of his fathers, and was built in proportion. It tickled the humor of the men to see such a little fellow chase ten hundred bigger fellows round from morning until night.

"You are to go upriver and find out why Private Hammond has not returned to duty," said the captain.

"Yes, sir," said Peter.

"Inform me by wire," continued the captain. "Use your brains. I am sending you alone, because I want to give Hammond a chance for the sake of his brother overseas. Here are your pass, your railway warrant and a chit for the paymaster. That's all, Corp. Starkley."

Peter saluted and retired. He reached Fredericton that night and the home village of Jim Hammond by noon of the next day. He went straight to the store, where Mr. Hammond greeted him with astonishment. Peter saw no sign of Jim.

"I didn't expect to see you back so soon," said Mr. Hammond.

"I got a chance, so I took it," replied Peter. "How's all the family?"

The storekeeper smiled. "The womenfolk are well," he said.

Peter saw that he had come suddenly to the point where he must exercise all the tact he possessed. He felt keenly embarrassed.

"Did you get a telegram?" he asked.

"No. Did you wire us you were coming?"

"Not that, exactly. You see, it was like this, Mr. Hammond: when Jim didn't get back the day he was due the adjutant sent you a wire, and when he didn't get an answer he sent another—and when you didn't reply to that he detailed me to come along and see what was wrong."

The storekeeper stared at him. "I never got any telegram. Jim came home on two weeks' furlough, and he has five days of it left. You and your adjutant must be crazy."

"Two weeks," repeated Peter. "It was six days he got."

"Six days! Are you sure of that, Peter Starkley?"

"As sure as that's my name, Mr. Hammond. And the adjutant sent you two telegrams, asking why Jim didn't return to duty when his pass was up—and he didn't get any answer. If you didn't get one or other of those telegrams, then there is something wrong somewhere."

Mr. Hammond's face clouded. "I didn't get any wire, Peter—and Jim went away day before yesterday, to visit some friends," he said.

They eyed each other in silence for a little while; both were bitterly embarrassed, and the storekeeper was numbed with shame.

"I'll go for him," he said. "If I fetch him to you here, will you promise to—to keep the truth of it quiet, Peter—from his mother and sister and the folk about here?"

"I'll do the best I can," promised the corporal, "but not for Jim's sake, mind you, Mr. Hammond. Capt. Long is for giving him a chance because of his brother, Pat, over on Salisbury Plain—and that's why he sent me alone, instead of sending a sergeant with an escort."

"I'll go fetch him, Peter," said the other, in a shaking voice. "You go along to Beaver Dam and come back to-morrow—to see Vivia. When Jim and I turn up you meet him just like it was by chance. Keep your mouth shut, Peter. Not a word to a living soul about his only having six days. He's not well, and that's the truth."

A dull anger was awake in Peter by this time.

"Something the matter with his feet," he said and left the store.

Here he was, told to be tactful by Capt. Long and to keep his mouth shut by Mr. Hammond, all on account of a sulky, lazy, bad-tempered fellow who had been a disgrace to the battalion since the day he joined it. And not a word about stopping for dinner!

He crossed the road to the hotel, made arrangements to be driven out to Beaver Dam and then ate a lonely dinner. He thought of Vivia Hammond only a few yards away from him, yet unconscious of his proximity—and he wanted to punch the head of her brother Jim. He drove away from the hotel up the long hill without venturing a glance at the windows of the big white house on the other side of the road.

The family at Beaver Dam accepted his visit without question. No mention was made of Jim Hammond that night. Peter was up and out early the next morning, lending a hand with the feeding and milking.

After breakfast he and Dick went over to his own place to have a look at his house and barns.

"Frank Sacobie came home last week," said Dick. "He's been out to see us twice. He wants to enlist in your outfit, but I am trying to hold him off till next year so's we can go over together."

"You babies had better keep your bibs on a few years longer," said Peter. "I guess there will be lots of time for all of you to fight in this war without forcing yourselves under glass."

They rounded a spur of spruces and saw Sacobie approaching on snowshoes across the white meadows. He had grown taller and deeper in the chest since Peter had last seen him. The greeting was cordial but not wordy. Sacobie turned and accompanied them.

"I see Jim Hammond yesterday, out Pike Settlement way," he said.

"That so?" returned Peter, trying to seem uninterested.

"No uniform on, neither, and drinkin' some," continued Sacobie. "Says he's got his discharge from that outfit because it ain't reckoned as first-class and has been asked to be an officer in another outfit."

Then Peter forgot his instructions. Jim Hammond too good for the 26th battalion! Jim Hammond offered a commission! His indignant heart sent his blood racing through him.

"He's a liar!" he cried. "Yes, and a deserter, too, by thunder!"

Dick was astonished, but Frank Sacobie received the information calmly, without so much as a flicker of the eyelids.

"I think that all the time I listen to him," he said. "I figger to get his job, anyway, if he lie or tell the truth. I go down to-morrow, Peter, and you tell the colonel how I make a darn sight better soldier than Jim Hammond."

Peter gripped the others each by an arm.

"I shouldn't have said that," he cautioned them. "Forget it! You boys have got to keep it under your hats, but I guess it's up to me to take a jog out Pike Settlement way. If you boys say a word about it, you get in wrong with me and you get me in wrong with a whole heap of folks."

They turned and went back to Beaver Dam. There they hitched the mares to the big red pung and stowed in their blankets and half a bag of oats.

"I can't tell you where I'm going or what for, but only that it is a military duty," said Peter in answer to the questions of the family.

He took Dick and Frank Sacobie with him. Once they got beyond the outskirts of the home settlement they found heavy sledding. At noon they halted, blanketed and baited the mares, boiled the kettle and lunched. The wide, white roadway before them, winding between walls of green-black spruces and gray maples, was marked with only the tracks of one