"No!" protested Lathrop. "I don't want to be turned over. I've got a
much better plan. YOU don't want to be bothered with a prisoner. I don't
want to be a prisoner. As you say, I am better dead. You can't shoot
a prisoner, but if he tries to escape you can. I'll try to escape. You
shoot me. Then I return to my own army, and report myself dead. That
ends your difficulty and saves me from a court-martial. They can't
court-martial a corpse."

The face of the sergeant flashed with relief and satisfaction. In his
anxiety to rid himself of his prisoner, he lifted the bicycle into the
road and held it in readiness.

"You're all right!" he said, heartily. "You can make your getaway as
quick as you like."

But to the conspiracy Miss Farrar refused to lend herself.

"How do you know," she demanded, "that he will keep his promise? He
may not go back to his own army. He can be just as dead on my lawn as
anywhere else!"

Lathrop shook his head at her sadly.

"How you wrong me!" he protested. "How dare you doubt the promise of a
dying man? These are really my last words, and I wish I could think of
something to say suited to the occasion, but the presence of strangers
prevents."

He mounted his bicycle. "'If I had a thousand lives to give,'" he
quoted with fervor, "'I'd give them all to--'" he hesitated, and smiled