“Ah,” said the other with an air of deep mystery; “that remark demonstrates one of the great failings of you Americans. You can’t understand the superior intelligence of the race you are foolishly trying to whip. But you are going to wake up before long.”
“What is going to wake us up?” Phil inquired curiously. His curiosity, however, was directed more at the personal puzzle in “the count” than the information “the count” might be able to communicate.
“Water,” replied the “war prophet.”
Phil looked at his captor a little more keenly, wondering if, after all, this supposed relative of the kaiser were not a little off in his “turret.”
“Maybe he thinks he has an anti-tank gun in his head and has just fired an explosive bullet into me,” the boy mused. “My! what a wise squint he has in his eyes.”
“How is water going to wake us up?” Phil asked after a few moments’ silent contemplation of the strange fellow on the box beside him.
“How?” repeated the latter, looking his prisoner hard in the face. “Don’t you know what’ll wake a sleeping man up quicker than anything else?”
“No,” replied Phil calmly, but with a well-mimicked open-mouthed ingenuousness. “What will wake a sleeping man up quicker than anything else?”
“Throw a pail of water on him,” said Topoff.
“Well?” Phil queried with sustained simple-mindedness.