They were far off---"over where the war was taking place," as Spike neatly put it--surveying at that long range the well-remembered scene; revisiting it from some remote spot where perhaps it had been said to them with flowers.
"We'd ought to tell Herman Vielhaber," said Spike.

"Herman's a Heinie, but he's a good scout at that." "Sure!" agreed Wilbur.
They found Herman alone at one of his tables staring morosely at an untouched glass of beer.

The Vielhaber establishment was already suffering under the stigma of pro-Germanism put upon it by certain of the watchful towns-people.

Judge Penniman, that hale old invalid, had even declared that Herman was a spy, and signalled each night to other spies by flapping a curtain of his lighted room above the saloon.

The judge had found believers, though it was difficult to explain just what information Herman would be signalling and why he didn't go out and tell it to his evil confederates by word of mouth.