On leaving the room, carrying the stuff with us and going down stairs, we saw a box against the wall and I heard a funny noise from it as if it contained something alive. I pulled it out and found it full of pigeons. "Who owns these?" I asked.
"An Algerian soldier left them there," he answered.
We then examined the cellar and entire basement, but found nothing further. We took the old fellow over to the gendarme who immediately took charge of him, and returned to the battery where we imparted the news of our find. It was the consensus of opinion that the spy was the farmer himself, and that the Algerian uniform was a blind. We were chatting away, discussing the matter, when the shells commenced flying as thick as peas in a pod; so swift and smashing was the fusillade that for awhile I thought hell's gate had opened wide. In less than no time one of our guns was knocked out and, getting a "Stand to!" we replied as fast as our legs and arms and heads would work.
The excellent quality of the work that Fritz did here made the fellows unanimous that his information came from the farmer. Presently the duel cooled down and we resumed our chat.
About a hundred yards off from the farmhouse where we had found the heliograph and Algerian uniform, was a windmill of the kind commonly seen in the farmhouses of the country, with large wings, and it happened that while firing, one of the boys, Boxer, noticed that the mill was going around in an irregular fashion,—going first one way and then another, and then stopping, and he called our attention to it and we all noticed it, and almost simultaneously with our observation of the mill, four shells came over, knocking another of our guns into uselessness and wiping out the crew, and after we got "Stand down!" and had cleaned up, Boxer suggested that we go over and see what was in the windmill.
Together we went, going first to the house, and found the children crying with fright; some of them tried to tell us something, but we couldn't make out what they were saying. We crossed over to the windmill and a phenomenon indeed met our eyes,—the wheel was turning in the opposite direction from that in which the wind was blowing. We started up the steps and—Ping! Ping! and Boxer fell with an oath and a bullet in his leg. I assisted him to the farmhouse and then scooted over and communicated with the O.C. I also informed a French battery that had been terrifically shelled.
In the meantime a stretcher had been sent for, and Boxer was brought back to the dressing station, where he had his wound dressed, which luckily turned out to be slight.
That night I was filled full of the spirit of adventure and I wanted to visit the windmill again. I got a pal to go with me and endeavored to make it, but the flares were steadily burning and the snipers were so busy we had to lie low. Again I went to the French battery and told the officer commanding of my suspicions about the windmill. A smile of intelligence and gratefulness lighted up his fine face. "Monsieur, we shall see what we shall see," and he ordered a shell into the heart of the structure, bringing it down in splinters. Then we made for the ruins and found the body of a man dressed in an Algerian uniform; I looked him over carefully; he was the artist I had met in the farmhouse at our former station.
There remained still the case of the old man in whose house we had discovered the heliograph and the pigeons. And the gendarmes were again sent for and the Belgian farmer was haled before the officer. With white face and streaming eyes he told the French Captain of the gendarmes that this man had come to him and told him that if he didn't permit him to go into his home, he would instantly signal for the shells and he and his family and buildings would be blown to eternity. The old man was permitted to go, as the French officer was satisfied he was sincere, but that he was utterly powerless to prevent the spy carrying out his plans.
In conversation with us later, the farmer told us that the Algerian had brought pigeons with him; that he had written notes, put them in the little cup fastened to the bird's foot and sent some of them off, the others remaining in the box when the Algerian went upstairs. "I could hear the bricks falling, but he called to us not to come upstairs," went on the old man. "Shortly afterwards a man dressed in the uniform of a British soldier came, and he too went upstairs; he was carrying a bag. When he came in he asked if I wanted coffee and I answered 'No.' When he came in the Algerian called down to send him up, and he too went up. Presently the British soldier left and a few minutes afterwards your battery started firing. Then out ran the Algerian, saying he was going to the windmill and warned all of us on pain of losing our lives, not to come near the mill. That is the last I saw of him, Messieurs, until this evening when I see his dead body.