"Their national bird," said the same airman who had expressed a desire to shoot it.
"How could an American eagle get here?" inquired another man.
"By way of Asia, probably."
"By gad! A long flight!"
Dresslin nodded: "An omen, perhaps, that we may also have to face the Yankee on our Eastern front."
"The swine!" growled several.
Von Dresslin assented absently to the epithet. But his thoughts were busy elsewhere, his mind preoccupied by a theory which, Hunlike, he, for the last ten days, had been slowly, doggedly, methodically developing.
It was this: Assuming that the bird really was an American eagle, the problem presented itself very clearly—from where had it come? This answered itself; it came from America, its habitat.
Which answer, of course, suggested a second problem; HOW did it arrive?
Several theories presented themselves: