Somewheres in France, April 16.
Friend Al: Well old pal don’t be supprised if I write you the next time from Paris. I have got a date to see Capt. Seeley tomorrow and Lieut. Mather fixed it up for me to see him but I had to convince the lieut. that it wasn’t no monkey business because they’s always a whole lot of riffs and raffs asking Capt. Seeley can they have a word with him and what they want is to borry his knife to pair their finger nails.
But I guess he won’t be sorry he seen me Al not when I show him the stuff I have got on this bird and he will probably shake me by the hand and say “Well Keefe Uncle Sam is proud of you but you are waisting your time here and I will be sorry to loose you but it looks like you belong in other fields.” And he will wire a telegram to the gen. staff reccomending me to go to Paris.
I guess I all ready told you some of the stuff I have got on this bird but I have not told you all because the best one didn’t only happen last night. Well on acct. of I and Alcock being friends he has kind of been keeping a eye pealed on Shaffer to help me out and he found a letter last night that Shaffer had wrote and this time it was the whole letter with the address and everything and who do you suppose it was to? Well Al it was to Van Hindenburg himself and I have got it right here where I can keep a eye on it and believe me it’s worth watching and I wished I could send it to you so you could see for yourself what kind of a bird we are dealing with. But that’s impossible Al but they’s nothing to keep me from copping it off.
Well the letter is wrote in German and to show you what a foxy bird he is he wrote it out in printing so as if it got found by somebody they couldn’t prove he wrote it because when words is wrote out in printing it looks just the same who ever wrote it and you can’t tell. But he wasn’t foxy enough to not sign G. S. down to the bottom of it and that stands for his name George Shaffer and he is the only G. S. in the Co. so it looks like we had him up in a tree. Here is what the letter says:
Field Marshall Van Hindenburg, ℅ Die Vierten Dachshunds, Deutscher Armee, Flanders.
500,000 U.S. Soldaten schon in Frankreich doch. In Lauterbach habe Ich mein Strumpf verloren und ohne Strumpf gehe Ich nicht heim. xxxxxxx G. S.
Notice them x marks again Al like in the other letter and the other letter was probably to Van Hindenburg to and I only wished I knew what the x marks means but maybe some of the birds that’s all ready in the intelligents dept. can figure it out. But they’s no mystery about the rest of it Al because Alcock understands German and he translated it out what the German words means and here is what it means:
500,000 United States soldiers in France all ready yet. Will advise you when to attack on this front.
How is that Al for a fine trader and spy to tell the gen. of the German army how many soldiers we got over here and to not attack till Shaffer says the word and he was probably going to say it wile we was all asleep or something. But thanks to me Al he will be the one that is asleep and it will be some sleep Al and it will make old Rip and Winkle look like they had the colic and when the boys finds out what I done for them I guess they won’t be nothing to good for me. But it will be to late for them to show their appreciations because I won’t be here no more and the boys probably won’t see me again till its all over and we are back in the old U.S. because Alcock was talking to a bird that’s in the int. dept. and he says 1 of their dutys was to keep away from everybody and not leave them know who you are. Because of course if word got out that you was a spy chaser the spys wouldn’t hardly run up and kiss you on the st. but they would duck when they seen you and you would have as much chance to catch them as though you was trolling for wales with a grass hopper.
And from this bird’s dope that Alcock was talking to I will half to leave off my uniform and wear plain close and maybe wear false whiskers and etc. so as people who see me the 1st time I will look different to them the
