Facing the German Foe | Page 5

was
a park-like space, a garden, really. In this garden were several tennis

courts, with plenty of space, also, for nurses and children. There are
many such squares in London, and they help to make the British capital
a delightful place in which to live.
As he went in, Harry saw a lot of the younger men who lived in the
square playing tennis. It was still broad daylight, although, at home,
dusk would have fallen. But this was England at the end of July and the
beginning of August, and the light of day would hold until ten o'clock
or thereabout.
That was one of the things that had helped to reconcile Harry to living
in England. He loved the long evenings and the chance they gave to get
plenty of sport and exercise after school hours. The school that he and
Dick attended was not far away; they went to it each day. A great many
of the boys boarded at the school, but there were plenty who, like Dick
and Harry, did not. But school was over now, for the time. The summer
holidays had just begun.
At the table there was much talk of the war that was in the air. But Mr.
Fleming did not even yet believe that war was sure.
"They'll patch it up," he said, confidently. "They can't be so mad as to
set the whole world ablaze over a little scrap like the trouble between
Austria and Servia."
"Would it affect your business, dear?" asked Mrs. Fleming. "If there
really should be war, I mean?"
"I don't think so," said he. "I might have to make a flying trip home, but
I'd be back. Come on--time for us to go. What are you going to do, boy?
Going over to Grenfel's, aren't you?"
"Yes, father," said Harry.
"All right. Get home early. Good-night!"
A good many of the boys were already there when Dick and Harry
reached Grenfel's house. The troop--the Forty-second, of London--was

a comparatively small one, having only three patrols. But nearly all of
them were present, and the scoutmaster took them out into his garden.
"I'm going to change the order a bit," he said, gravely. "I want to do
some talking, and then I expect to answer questions. Boys, Germany
has declared war on Russia. There are reports already of fighting on the
border between France and Germany. And there seems to be an idea
that the Germans are certain to strike at France through Belgium. I may
not be here very long--I may have to turn over the troop to another
scoutmaster. So I want to have a long talk to-night."
There was a dismayed chorus.
"What? You going away, sir? Why?"
But Harry did not join. He saw the quiet blaze in John Grenfel's eyes,
and he thought he knew.
"I've volunteered for foreign service already," Grenfel explained. "I
saw a little fighting in the Boer war, you know. And I may be useful.
So I thought I'd get my application in directly. If I go, I'll probably go
quietly and quickly. And there may be no other chance for me to say
good-bye."
"Then you think England will be drawn in, sir?" asked Leslie Franklin,
leader of the patrol to which Dick and Harry belonged, the Royal
Blues.
"I'm afraid so," said Grenfel, grimly. "There's just a chance still, but
that's all--the ghost of a chance, you might call it. I think it might be as
well if I explained a little of what's back of all this trouble. Want to
listen? If you do, I'll try. And if I'm not making myself clear, ask all the
questions you like."
There was a chorus of assent. Grenfel sat in the middle, the scouts
ranged about him in a circle.
"In the first place," he began, "this Servian business is only an excuse.

I'm not defending the Servians--I'm taking no sides between Servia and
Austria. Here in England we don't care about that, because we know
that if that hadn't started the war, something else would have been
found.
"England wants peace. And it seems that, every so often, she has to
fight for it. It was so when the Duke of Marlborough won his battles at
Blenheim and Ramillies and Malplaquet. Then France was the
strongest nation in Europe. And she tried to crush the others and
dominate everything. If she had, she would have been strong enough,
after her victories, to fight us over here--to invade England. So we went
into that war, more than two hundred years ago, not because we hated
France, but to make a real peace possible. And it lasted a long time.
"Then, after the French revolution, there was Napoleon. Again France,
under him, was the strongest nation in Europe. He