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+Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Man Without a Memory
+
+Author: Arthur W. Marchmont
+
+Release Date: March 8, 2011 [EBook #35516]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Andrew Sly, Al Haines and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Frontispiece: "I used the pike with its ironshod end without scruple
+or mercy." (Chapter IX.)
+
+_The Man Without a Memory_] [_Frontispiece_]
+
+
+
+
+THE MAN WITHOUT
+
+A MEMORY
+
+
+By
+
+ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
+
+
+Author of "When I was Czar," "The Heir to the Throne," etc., etc.
+
+
+
+
+WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED
+
+LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO
+
+1919
+
+
+
+
+  POPULAR NOVELS
+  BY
+  ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
+
+  _Published by_
+  WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED,
+
+  _In various editions._
+
+  BY SNARE OF LOVE.
+  BY WIT OF WOMAN.
+  A COURIER OF FORTUNE.
+  THE HEIR TO THE THRONE.
+  AN IMPERIAL MARRIAGE.
+  IN THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM.
+  IN THE NAME OF THE PEOPLE.
+  THE LITTLE ANARCHIST.
+  THE QUEEN'S ADVOCATE.
+  UNDER THE BLACK EAGLE.
+  WHEN I WAS CZAR.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAP.
+
+      I How I Lost My Memory
+     II The First Crisis
+    III Rosa
+     IV Nessa
+      V About Spies
+     VI Rosa is Told
+    VII Baron von Gratzen
+   VIII Von Erstein
+     IX A Bread Riot
+      X Complications
+     XI The Problem of von Gratzen
+    XII "Like Old Times"
+   XIII In the Thiergarten
+    XIV Anna Hilden
+     XV A Night Attack
+    XVI A Poison Charge
+   XVII Anna Hilden Again
+  XVIII A Sinister Development
+    XIX Murder
+     XX Von Gratzen's Wiliness
+    XXI Off!
+   XXII Checkmate
+  XXIII Within a Hairsbreadth
+   XXIV Nessa's Downfall
+    XXV A Friend in Need
+   XXVI The Hue and Cry!
+  XXVII Farmer Glocken Again
+ XXVIII Recognized
+   XXIX Lieutenant Vibach
+    XXX The End
+
+
+
+
+THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+HOW I LOST MY MEMORY
+
+
+It was a glorious scrap, and Dick Gunter and I had the best of it right
+up to the last moment.
+
+We were about 6,000 feet up and a mile or so inside the German lines
+when their two machines came out to drive us away.
+
+"We'll take 'em on, Jack," shouted Dick, chortling like the rare old
+sport he was, and we began our usual manoeuvre for position. Our
+dodge was to let them believe we were novices at the game, and I messed
+about with the old bus as if we were undecided and in a deuce of a funk.
+
+They fell in, all right, and at the proper moment I swung round and
+gave Dick a chance which he promptly took, pouring in a broadside which
+sent one of the machines hurtling nose first to earth. This put the
+fear of God into the others, who tried to bolt; but we were too fast
+for them and, after a short running fight, Dick got them. The pilot
+crumpled up and down went the machine like a stone to prevent the other
+from feeling lonely.
+
+We were jubilating righteously over this, when the luck turned. A third
+machine, which, in the excitement of the scrap, we hadn't seen, swooped
+out of the clouds and gave us a broadside at close range, which messed
+us up pretty badly. We were both hit, the petrol poured out of the
+riddled tank, the engine stopped, and I realized that we could put up
+the shutters, as we were absolutely at the beggar's mercy.
+
+I was wrong, however. Dick had managed to let the other chap have a
+dose of lead, and either because we had had enough of it or his bus was
+damaged, he didn't stop to finish us off but scuttled off home to
+mother.
+
+I was hit somewhere in the shoulder, but it wasn't bad enough to
+prevent my working the controls, and I pointed for home on a long
+glissade. There was a "certain liveliness," as the communiqués say,
+during that joy ride. The Archies barked continuously as we crossed the
+lines, the shrapnel was all over us, Dick was hit again, and the poor
+old bus fairly riddled; but we got through it somehow, although my pal
+was nearly done in by the time we reached the ground.
+
+Some pretty things were said about it and we each got the M.C. I was
+very little hurt, and came out of the base hospital a week or two later
+feeling as fit as a fiddle again, but as the chief decided I had earned
+a good spell of leave, I went off to old Blighty to convalesce.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I heard of the trouble about Nessa
+Caldicott. Both my parents had died when I was a kid, and Mrs.
+Caldicott, the dearest and sweetest woman in the world, had been like a
+mother to me, had taken me into her home, and thus I had grown up with
+Nessa and her sister. Nessa and I had been to school in Germany; had
+travelled out and home together; I had spent my holidays in their home;
+and I can't remember the time when I wasn't in love with her.
+
+Mrs. Caldicott was keen that we should marry, and a year or two after I
+came back to England for good from Göttingen University we had been
+engaged. But there was a "nigger in the fence." I had plenty of money
+and preferred being a sort of "nut" to working; and Nessa didn't like
+it. She urged me to "do something and make a career for myself"; but I
+was a swollen-headed young ass, and shied at it; so at last the
+engagement was broken off until, as she put it, I "had given up the
+idea of lounging and loafing through life."
+
+She was right, of course; but like a fool I wouldn't see it; so we
+quarrelled, and she went off to Germany to stay with an old school
+friend. She was still there when the war broke out, and thus did not
+know that I had found my chance and had joined up. There was nothing
+"nutty" about the army training and work, and when I went home, of
+course, my first thoughts were of her and what she would say when she
+knew I had taken her advice.
+
+But I found poor Mrs. Caldicott in the very depth of anxiety and
+despair. Nessa had never returned from Germany, and there was nothing
+but the most disconcerting and perplexing news of her. During the first
+few months she had been able to write home that all was well with her,
+although she could not get out of the country.
+
+Then came a gap in the correspondence, followed by a short letter that
+her school friend was dead, and that she feared she would not be
+allowed to remain in the house. A month or so later another letter
+came, saying she had left Hanover to go to another friend in Berlin,
+and that her mother was not to worry, as she expected soon to be home.
+
+"And that's the last letter I've had from her, Jack, and that's three
+months ago," said Mrs. Caldicott, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
+"The only news I've had is these two odd communications."
+
+They were odd, in all truth. The first was a sentence which had
+evidently been cut out of a longer letter in Nessa's handwriting and
+pasted on a sheet of paper. "I am quite well, but cannot get away yet."
+That was all, and a very ugly-looking all too. The second was a
+postcard in a strange handwriting, like a man's fist. "Your daughter is
+well and is going to be married. She will communicate with you after
+the war."
+
+I did not let the dear old lady see what I thought of the matter, nor
+did I tell her how my months at the front and what I had seen there led
+me to put the most sinister interpretation on the affair.
+
+"I've tried every means in my power, Jack, to find Nessa," she
+declared; "but with no result at all; and it's killing me."
+
+I did what I could to reassure her, and then a somewhat harum-scarum
+idea occurred to me--that I should use my leave to go to Berlin and
+make inquiries. She wouldn't hear of it at first, because of the danger
+to me; but I showed her that there would really be very little risk, as
+I had often passed for a German, and that the only real difficulty was
+getting permission from the authorities.
+
+I set about that at once and succeeded--the result of having a friend
+at court in the War Office; but before that was settled Nessa's
+brother-in-law, Jimmy Lamb, an American manufacturer, came over on
+munitions business and wouldn't hear of my going.
+
+"See here, Jack, this is my show, not yours. For one thing I can do it
+better than you, as I'm a bit of a hustler and have a good friend, Greg
+Watson, in our Berlin Embassy. More than that, I can go safely, while
+if you were found out, you'd be shot as a spy;" and he wouldn't listen
+to my protests.
+
+But the scheme fell through at the last moment. On the very day he was
+to have started, he had a cable that his father was dying; and he had
+to catch the first boat home.
+
+"I'm real sick about it, Jack, but there's nothing else for it. I've
+booked a berth in the _Slavonic_ to-day."
+
+"Then I shall go, Jimmy. I can't bear the thought of Nessa being in
+those beggars' hands. I'm certain there's some devilment at the bottom
+of it;" and I told him a few of the items I had seen with my own eyes.
+
+"Well, what price your going in my name? Much better than the German
+stunt; and you can actually see about the business that I meant to do.
+Here are all the papers needed, my passport and ticket, a bunch of
+German notes I've picked up at a good discount, and you can see Greg
+Watson--I'll give you a letter to him--and you'll find him a white man
+right through, ready to do his durndest to help you."
+
+A few minutes clinched the job; an hour or two sufficed for all the
+preparations I needed to make for the trip; and that night I left
+Harwich for Rotterdam in a little steamer called the _Burgen_, as
+Jas. R. Lamb, an American merchant, equipped with all the credentials
+necessary to keep up my end.
+
+It was all plain sailing enough, but it didn't turn out so simple as it
+looked. There was another American on board and I kept out of his way
+at first, but when he had heard me talking to a waiter in German, he
+came sidling up and scraped acquaintance. He soon let out that he was
+as genuine an American as I was, and the best of it was that he took me
+for what he was in reality--a German.
+
+"You speak German well for--an American," he said suggestively. "You
+know Germany, perhaps?"
+
+"I was at school there and afterwards at Göttingen."
+
+He was cautious enough to test this, and I let him have some choice
+specimens of student slang which strengthened his opinion.
+
+"I was also at Göttingen. Need we pretend any longer?" and he held out
+his hand. He was very much my own build and colouring, but I hoped the
+resemblance stopped short there, for I didn't like his looks a bit.
+
+"Pretend what?" I asked as if on my guard.
+
+"That we are Americans."
+
+"You needn't, but I didn't say I wasn't one."
+
+He made a peculiar flourish with his left hand which was one of the
+membership signs of a secret society among the students, and I answered
+it. It was enough, and he let himself go then. He was a good swaggerer;
+told me that he had come from America to England, where he had been
+ferretting out every possible scrap of information, having represented
+himself as the agent of an American firm of munition makers; that he
+had sent his report to Berlin and had been summoned to go there at once
+on the strength of it; and that he was to join the Secret Service.
+
+He was so full of his self-importance and seemingly so glad to have
+some one to listen to him, that, with a very little prompting, he told
+me a whole lot about himself, and the great things he had done. He only
+stopped when he got sea-sick, and before he went below he told me his
+real name was Johann Lassen, and scribbled his address in Berlin on his
+card, so that we might meet again there.
+
+I was a little worried by the business. It might be awkward if we did
+run against one another in Berlin; but there was no need to look for
+trouble before it arrived, so I dismissed the thing and went on
+thinking out my own plan of campaign. But the affair had very
+unexpected results.
+
+We were nearing the Dutch coast and I was considering how to avoid
+Lassen on landing, when there was the very dickens of an explosion. As
+if the lid of hell itself had lifted!
+
+What happened I only learnt afterwards, for the next thing I knew was
+that I was lying in bed somewhere, with a grave-eyed nurse bending over
+me.
+
+"Herr Lassen!" Just a whisper. After a pause the name was repeated with
+slightly more solicitous emphasis.
+
+I was too weak and exhausted to reply or feel either surprise or
+curiosity at the mistake about my name; and with a sigh of utter
+weariness I closed my eyes and fell asleep. When I woke it was in the
+dead stillness of the night.
+
+I was far less exhausted and my mind was beginning to work again. I was
+lying alone in a small bare-walled room, lighted by one carefully
+shaded electric light. There were two other beds in the room, both
+unoccupied; and I was not too dazed to understand that it was a
+hospital ward. Then I remembered the nurse had addressed me as "Herr
+Lassen"; and was puzzling over the mistake when the remembrance of
+Nessa and her peril flashed across my mind and stirred a confused
+jangle of disturbing thoughts.
+
+I was still too weak to clear the tangle then, however, and fell asleep
+again, and did not wake until the morning.
+
+I was much better and the nurse was very pleased at my improvement.
+"You will soon be yourself again," she said, speaking German with a
+quaint accent. "You were so exhausted that at one time we feared you
+would not recover from the shock."
+
+"You are very good," I murmured, with a feeble smile.
+
+"Do you think you could eat some solid food? The doctor said you could
+have some when you recovered consciousness."
+
+"Where am I?" I asked after thanking her.
+
+"This is the Nazareth Hospital in Rotterdam. You were brought in by the
+fishermen who found you in the sea when the _Burgen_ went down."
+
+I did not ask any more questions then, as I wanted to think matters
+over; and during the day I succeeded in getting it all clear. The only
+point that bothered me was why I should be mistaken for Lassen; but I
+got that at last. I remembered the card he had given me and how I had
+shoved it in my pocket.
+
+But why hadn't my pocket-book with my passport and papers and all the
+rest of it been found? It had been in my jacket pocket. It looked as if
+it must have been lost. That set me thinking and no mistake. How was I
+to get on to Berlin without the passport? It looked as if I must either
+give up the search for Nessa, when every minute might be invaluable, or
+go back to England for fresh papers. That wouldn't do, as too much of
+my leave would be used up.
+
+It was the dickens of a mess, and then an idea occurred to me. Lassen
+must have gone down with the steamer, for they wouldn't take me for him
+if he had been saved. And then I soon had a plan--to drop the Jimmy
+Lamb character and continue to be Lassen as long as necessary. I might
+get across the frontier in that way, and must trust to my wits for the
+rest. There might be a bit of risk in it, but that needn't stop me; and
+then a very pretty little development suggested itself which offered a
+promise of safety even if I was found out.
+
+Why shouldn't the "shock" of which the nurse had spoken have destroyed
+my memory? The more I considered it the more promising it looked. It
+was the easiest of parts to play; I had done a lot of amateur
+theatricals; and any one could look a fool and act one.
+
+I had a first rehearsal of this stunt--as Jimmy would have called
+it--with the nurse; and the result quite came up to expectations. I
+reckoned that she would tell the doctor, and it was clear she had done
+so when he came to me next morning.
+
+He was tremendously interested in the case now, and, after telling me
+how much better I was, began to question me about the loss of the
+_Burgen_.
+
+I looked as vacant and worried as I thought necessary.
+
+"You remember being on her, don't you?"
+
+"The nurse told me so. Was I?"
+
+"Yes, of course. She struck a mine; you remember that?"
+
+I affected to try to remember, stared round the room, and then
+helplessly at him and gestured feebly.
+
+"You were picked up at sea. Does that help you?"
+
+It wasn't likely to, and I shook my head.
+
+"She came from Harwich--England, you know, and was blown up."
+
+"Harwich, England," I murmured, as if the words had no meaning for me.
+
+He muttered something in Dutch under his breath. "Does your head
+trouble you much?" and he smoothed my hair, feeling my head all over
+carefully.
+
+I looked as stupid as a sheep. "It--it----" and I frowned and gestured
+to suggest what I could not express.
+
+He looked rather grave for a second or two and then smiled
+reassuringly. "It will be all right in time, quite right. You are
+suffering from shock; but you needn't worry. No worry. That's the great
+thing. A day or so will put you all right, Herr--let's see, what's your
+name?"
+
+But I didn't bite. "Is it Lassen? The nurse said so."
+
+"Don't you know it yourself?" he asked very kindly.
+
+"No." That was true at any rate. "How did you find it out?"
+
+"From the card in your trousers' pocket. You are the only survivor from
+the _Burgen_ and had a very narrow escape. Even most of your
+clothes were blown off you. Doesn't anything I say suggest anything to
+you?"
+
+I lay as if pondering this solemnly. "It's all so--so strange," I
+muttered, putting my hand to my head. "So--so----" and I left it at
+that; and he went away, after giving me one more item of valuable
+information--that my belt which contained my money had also been saved.
+
+I played that lost memory for all it was worth and with gorgeous
+success. I became a "case" for the doctors who trotted along to
+interview me as a sort of interesting freak and held learned
+discussions over me. All this gave me such ample practice that I became
+perfect in the part.
+
+But there was a fly in the amber. As the only survivor from the
+_Burgen_ the Dutch authorities regarded me as a person of quite
+considerable importance. Officials came to visit me, pouring in regular
+broadsides of questions; and as they got no satisfaction, and the
+doctors differed about my recovering my memory, the official verdict
+was that I should remain in Rotterdam until I did recover it.
+
+This threatened complications; but I had no intention to remain, so I
+prepared to get away, sent out for a ready-made suit of clothes--ye
+gods, what a beautiful misfit!--and was going to leave the hospital to
+see what I could do at the German Embassy about a passport, when my
+luck propeller snapped and I saw myself nose-diving to the ground.
+
+A nurse brought me a card and said some one was waiting to see me in
+the doctor's room. The card told me it was a certain Herr Heinrich
+Hoffnung, 480b, Ugenplatz, Berlin!
+
+It was just rotten luck, for it meant the collapse of the Lassen show.
+The instant he clapped eyes on me he'd know I wasn't the real Simon
+Pure; and it might be the dickens of a job to get across the frontier.
+
+As I thought of Nessa and what the delay might mean to her, I was mad.
+But I couldn't shirk the meeting; so after giving him time to learn all
+about my "case" from the doctor, I went down, wondering what ill wind
+had blown the fellow to Rotterdam at such a moment, and what the
+dickens would happen when I was no longer Lassen.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE FIRST CRISIS
+
+
+As I opened the door the doctor jumped up to help me to a chair, and
+the man from Berlin gave a start of surprise and then stared at me
+keenly; but whether he recognized me or not, I couldn't decide.
+
+"You've picked up wonderfully, Herr Lassen, wonderfully!" said the
+doctor. "I declare no one would guess from your appearance what you
+have been through."
+
+"And I feel as well as I look, doctor, thanks to you and the nurses," I
+replied. "I owe my life to the doctor here," I added, turning to the
+stranger.
+
+"You are Johann Lassen?" he asked.
+
+I shrugged my shoulders. "That's what they tell me."
+
+"I told you how we know," put in the doctor, adding to me: "I have
+explained the nature of your case to Herr Hoffnung. He has come to take
+you to Berlin."
+
+It was clearly time to bring matters to a head, so I turned to the man.
+"Have I ever had the pleasure of seeing you before?" I asked, with a
+perplexed and rather bewildered look.
+
+He shook his head. "No, we have never met, but----" He paused and then
+added: "But of course it must be right."
+
+I could have shouted for joy, but I put my hand before my eyes that he
+should not see the delight in them.
+
+"You will wish to see Herr Lassen alone, of course," said the doctor.
+"You will bear in mind all that I have told you, I trust."
+
+Hoffnung crossed to the door with him and the two stood speaking
+together in low tones for a minute, giving me an opportunity to observe
+my visitor. He was rather a good-looking man of about thirty,
+well-dressed and smart, and I placed him as somebody's secretary.
+Certainly a decent sort and not too quick-witted.
+
+"First let me congratulate you on your marvellous escape, Herr Lassen,"
+he said when the doctor had gone.
+
+"It seems to have been touch and go; but----" and I gestured to suggest
+that I knew nothing about it.
+
+"The doctor tells me he quite despaired at one time of saving your
+life. But he says you are quite fit to travel. Do you agree with that?"
+
+"It's all the same to me. I feel all right."
+
+"It is rather urgent that I should return to Berlin as soon as
+possible. Do you think you could manage the journey to-day?"
+
+"I don't see why not. But--er--it's a bit awkward, you know. Are you
+sure I'm your man?"
+
+He glanced at his watch and started. "It's just possible that we could
+catch the express, and we can talk in the train; that is, if you
+haven't many preparations to make."
+
+"I haven't any. I've nothing but what I stand up in, and one place is
+as good as another to me unti----" and I sighed and gestured hopelessly.
+
+"Then I should like to go."
+
+"Can I go without any papers or anything?"
+
+"With me, certainly. I have everything necessary, and will explain on
+the journey."
+
+And go we did to my infinite satisfaction.
+
+In the cab to the station he was silent and thoughtful, and as my one
+consuming desire was to get across the frontier before anything could
+happen, I didn't worry him with any questions. It was all clear sailing
+at the station. Whoever Hoffnung might be, there was no doubt about his
+having authority. He secured a special compartment, although the train
+was crowded, and did all possible for my comfort.
+
+"That's the best of travelling officially," he said pleasantly as he
+settled himself in the seat opposite me, while the train ran out of the
+station. "Now, you asked me a question at the hospital which I did not
+answer--whether I'm sure you're Lassen. Frankly, I'm not; and the more
+I look at you the more I'm puzzled."
+
+"It's a bit awkward. I don't wish to be somebody else."
+
+"Do you feel fit to talk? The doctor warned me against worrying you;
+but there are things I should enormously like to know."
+
+"You're not half so keen as I am," I told him truthfully. "If I am
+Lassen, what am I; where do I live; have I any friends anywhere; isn't
+there any one who knows me anywhere? It's such a devil of a mess."
+
+"There's one thing certain, my friend, you're a German; and as for the
+rest you'll find plenty of people in Berlin who'll know you. The von
+Reblings, for instance. Which reminds me I have the Countess's letter;"
+he opened his despatch case and handed me a sealed envelope.
+
+But I had already told the doctors that I could not write and could not
+read handwriting, although I had fumbled out some large print. That had
+been one of the specialities of my peculiar aphasia. So I just smiled
+vacantly and shook my head. "Will you read it to me?" I asked.
+
+He agreed after some little demur, and a very charming letter it was.
+The Countess addressed me as "My dear Johann," wrote in the familiar
+thee and thou, said how anxious she and Rosa--especially Rosa, it
+seemed--had been about me; urged me to hurry to Berlin as soon as
+possible, where, of course, I should be the most welcome guest in the
+world, and signed herself "Your affectionate aunt, Olga von Rebling."
+
+"Doesn't that remind you of anything?" asked Hoffnung.
+
+"Not in the faintest. Who is Rosa?"
+
+Instead of telling me, he smiled suggestively and I smiled back. "Did
+the Countess send you to fetch me?"
+
+"Oh, no. I came officially. I'll tell you about that directly; but it
+is because of what she told us about you that I was sent. She received
+a letter from you from England saying that you were crossing in the
+_Burgen_, and when the newspapers reported the loss of the steamer
+and that you were the only survivor, she told me about it. I reported
+it at Headquarters, and--well, here I am in consequence."
+
+"And you've never seen me, or Lassen, or whoever I am, before?"
+
+"Never. I have seen a photograph of you, but it was taken some long
+time ago; and while you answer to the likeness in some respects, you
+certainly do not in others, although I can see that you may be Lassen,
+allowing for the difference of time."
+
+"Well, anyway, these von Reblings will know, thank Heaven."
+
+But he shook his head. "I'm not so sure. You see, it's a good many
+years since you were in Berlin. The family arrangement dates back many
+more years than that, moreover--since you were children."
+
+"What family arrangement?"
+
+"Your betrothal to Miss Rosa."
+
+"The devil!" I exclaimed. "Do you mean to tell me I'm engaged to marry
+this Rosa von Rebling?"
+
+"Certainly I do, and a very charming girl she is, and very rich too,"
+he replied, smiling unrestrainedly.
+
+But it cost me some effort to smile in return. It was the very deuce of
+a mix up; there were no end of bothering complications in it, and I
+leant back in my seat to try and think it out. It was quite on the
+cards, after what he had said about my photograph, that even these
+people themselves might mistake me for Lassen; and if they did, I
+should be hampered at every turn in my search for Nessa.
+
+"Is it really possible that you don't remember anything about it?" he
+asked after a long pause.
+
+"Not a thing."
+
+"The doctor hoped that the mention of them would stir your memory."
+
+I shook my head hopelessly. "It may when I see them--if I'm really
+Lassen, that is. Phew! What a kettle of fish!"
+
+We reached the frontier soon afterwards, and I breathed more freely as
+soon as I was on the right side of it. Whatever happened now, I could
+play at being a German. I recalled with immense satisfaction his
+confident assertion that whoever I might be I was certainly one of his
+countrymen; and I could gamble on it that when the von Reblings met me,
+my "case" would still continue to be interesting enough to secure my
+safety.
+
+Hoffnung had begun to study some papers from his grip and presently
+looked across at me and put a surprising question. "Do you speak
+English?" he asked in my own tongue.
+
+I had presence of mind enough to be instantly very American. "Gee,
+don't I, some."
+
+"Then you've been in America?"
+
+"Have I?" My practice with the Rotterdam people was coming in well.
+
+"Oh, yes. You went from there to England," he replied, going back to
+his own language. "Can't you remember that?"
+
+I shook my head and frowned.
+
+"Nor anything you did in England?" Another mystified shake of the head.
+"It's a pity. Don't you know that you sent a report from England of
+what you'd seen there?"
+
+A little duet followed in which he asked me a series of questions, and
+I replied each time with a shake of the head. The subject matter of
+them all was the mention of persons, places, dockyards, ships and so
+on, which had obviously been embodied in the report Lassen had sent to
+Berlin. He referred to them in a casual tone and in a way which would
+not give anything away supposing I should turn out not to be Lassen.
+
+"I'm inclined to be very sorry for all this, and fear it may affect you
+very seriously. You're not just playing at this, I hope?" he asked then
+very earnestly.
+
+"Playing at what?"
+
+"This loss of memory. I mean that you need not have the faintest
+hesitation about speaking to me; and it occurred to me that you might
+have put it all on just to avoid questions at Rotterdam."
+
+"Are you serious?"
+
+"Absolutely. It's a tremendously serious matter. It's this way. We've
+seen the _Burgen's_ manifest, of course; we know there were only
+two male cabin passengers on board, both travelling as Americans; one
+as Jas. R. Lamb, the other as Joseph Lyman. If you are Lassen, that was
+you. The other man, Lamb, as he called himself, we have good reason to
+believe was an English spy. It follows, therefore, that if you are not
+Lassen, you are the Englishman; and I need scarcely tell you that at
+such a time as this, spies find Berlin a very unhealthy place."
+
+He was a quicker-witted fellow than I had believed, but he made a
+mistake in not springing this beastly surprise on me more suddenly. His
+long preamble gave me time to get myself well in hand.
+
+"It'll be a pretty climax for me if I am the Englishman," I answered,
+laughing, and without turning a hair.
+
+"You're sure you're not?" he rapped.
+
+I tried to appear amused. "I wish I could be sure of anything."
+
+A pause followed, and then he tried another shot. "You may have noticed
+that I stared pretty hard at you this morning when you came into the
+doctor's room, and that afterwards I rather rushed you away from
+Rotterdam. I reached there yesterday morning and spent the day making
+such inquiries as I could about you. I was instructed to, of course;
+and I came to the conclusion that you were the Englishman, and I
+thought so when you came into that room. That was why I hurried you
+away; I wished to have you on this side of the frontier. It is also the
+reason why I am sorry you cannot recover your memory."
+
+I declined the opening without thanks. "I'm just as sorry as you are;
+but I suppose we can clear up the tangle at Berlin."
+
+"Oh, yes. I've wired to the von Reblings to meet our train. Of course
+you'll understand that I have some men at hand here. It is better you
+should know that," he added in an unpleasantly suggestive tone.
+
+But I only laughed. "I wish you would send one of them to get me
+something to eat."
+
+"I will, of course;" and he looked out into the corridor, beckoned some
+one and gave him the necessary order, returned to his seat and busied
+himself with the papers from his despatch case.
+
+A substantial meal for us both was brought to the compartment, and
+although very little was said as we ate it, I was conscious that a
+considerable change had come over the relations between us. His manner
+had become distinctly official, and I understood that I was virtually
+under arrest until at least we reached Berlin.
+
+Afterwards he went back to his papers, suggesting that I might like to
+sleep; so I leant back in my corner and gave myself up to my thoughts.
+
+They were anything but pleasant. He had given me a shock that was
+almost as great as the explosion on the _Burgen_. I was in the
+very devil's own mess. I had no delusions about my fate if I was held
+to be an English spy; and that would almost certainly be the case if
+the von Reblings declared I was not Lassen. That that would be their
+decision was a million to one chance. It was a sheer impossibility that
+they would be unable to recognize a relation who was actually engaged
+to the daughter; and how to meet the difficulty baffled me.
+
+I was right in the eye of the net. The fact that there had been only
+two men as cabin passengers on the _Burgen_ was like a mine sprung
+under my feet. I had reckoned on being able to recover my memory at any
+necessary moment; but this cut the ground from under me. I couldn't
+become Jimmy. That was a cert. And I certainly couldn't become any one
+else, because every lie I might tell would most surely be scrupulously
+investigated.
+
+Poor Nessa! I was a heap more troubled about her and her mother than
+about myself. Whether the von Reblings knew me or not, the result would
+be much the same to her. Tied up as the betrothed of another girl, it
+would be next to impossible in the short time at my command to do a
+thing to find Nessa. The only possibility that occurred to me was that
+if the million to one chance came off and the von Reblings didn't
+denounce me at once as a fraud, I might manage to lose myself in the
+city somehow and set to work on the search.
+
+But even in that case I should be in hourly danger of discovery; a
+state of things which would make it virtually impossible to carry on
+the search with any hope of success.
+
+How Hoffnung's people could have got on the track of my not being
+Jimmy, baffled me utterly. But they clearly had; so there was no use in
+wasting time worrying over it. I did worry over it, however, as well as
+over every other detail of the job, and continued to ask myself all
+sorts of unanswerable questions for the rest of the journey.
+
+Hoffnung looked at his watch, shovelled his papers back into their
+case, and looked across at me. "About ten minutes now only," he said.
+"Have you slept?"
+
+I all but gave myself away by blurting out the fact that I never slept
+in trains, but checked the words in time. "Dozed a bit," I said.
+
+"You look fresh and fit enough," he replied, as if the fact rather
+justified his suspicions of me, "Wonderful after what you've gone
+through. You must be as hard as nails. Military training, I suppose."
+
+Neat; but I didn't tumble in. "Have I had any?" I asked.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and squinted at me with a suggestive smile.
+Then he grew earnest. "We won't have a scene at the station. We'd
+better wait till most of the people have got away, and you'll give me
+your word of honour not to attempt to get away or anything of the sort?"
+
+"What the deuce good would that be? Of course I shan't make a fool of
+myself in any such fashion. If I'm the man you call the Englishman,
+well, I am, that's all."
+
+"You have all an Englishman's coolness."
+
+"Then perhaps I am English," I said with a shrug.
+
+"We'll hope not, at any rate;" but it was clear he was fast making up
+his mind that I was. After a pause he added: "When the crowd has
+cleared off, we'll walk together to the barrier, and my men will be
+behind us. We shall find the von Reblings there."
+
+"And if we don't?"
+
+"Oh, I'll see that you're taken care of for the night; but they'll be
+there to a certainty."
+
+I don't deny that when the train stopped at the platform and we stayed
+in the carriage while the other travellers cleared away, I had more
+than a little trouble to maintain what he had termed an Englishman's
+coolness. But my anxiety didn't show in my face.
+
+Nessa's fate as well as my own depended upon what occurred in the next
+few minutes at the barrier; and I think that if it had been practicable
+to have choked Hoffnung, and his men, into insensibility, I should have
+been sorely tempted to make the attempt.
+
+But the thought of Nessa made me keep my end up; there was nothing for
+it but to face the music; and when at last he rose to leave the
+carriage, all I did was to yawn and stretch myself and say that I
+should be jolly glad to get to bed.
+
+"What a magnificent station!" I exclaimed, stopping on the platform to
+look about me as if that was the one subject which interested me at the
+moment.
+
+Then I went on with him, my eyes fixed on a little knot of people at
+the barrier on whose words and acts my life not improbably depended.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+ROSA
+
+
+I remember a little commonplace incident in Hyde Park one bank holiday
+which made me smile at the time. Three children were scuffling and
+squabbling over the division of some sweets when the mother, a
+kindly-looking soul, came promptly and settled the matter in a somewhat
+Spartan fashion. She scolded the kids, smacked them impartially, and
+then snatched the sweets and shied them away. Loud yells followed, of
+course, and repenting her haste, she kissed and hugged her little
+brood, immediately produced a bigger bag of sweets and in this way
+pacified them all.
+
+This has nothing to do with my experience in Berlin, except to serve as
+a crude illustration of how the fates dealt with me. Just when
+Hoffnung's story had thoroughly shaken me up and prepared me to face
+the worst possible, the pendulum swung right over to my side and the
+fates handed out the bigger bag of sweets.
+
+In other words I was at once recognized as Johann Lassen by the
+Countess von Rebling.
+
+There were several circumstances to account for her mistake. For one,
+my bride that was to be was not present: I learnt the reason
+afterwards; and only her son Hans was with her, a lad who had never
+seen me. The old lady was, of course, prepared to meet me; she saw me
+in Hoffnung's company; then just as I reached the barrier the big arc
+lamps in the station almost went out for a few seconds, leaving the
+place in comparative gloom; and lastly, being a tender-hearted little
+woman, her eyes were full of tears and no doubt blurred her sight.
+
+"My poor dear Johann!" she cried, throwing her arms round my neck and
+giving way to her mingled sympathy for my sufferings and joy at seeing
+me safe and sound. Then she called to her son, and after I had been
+kissed by him, she clung to me and could not make enough of me, so that
+even Hoffnung had to be satisfied.
+
+"You are quite sure that this is your nephew, Countess?" he asked.
+
+"Sure? Of course I am. Whatever do you mean, Heinrich?" she cried in
+amazement.
+
+He explained my loss of memory; but the only effect was to increase her
+concern on my account and to make her hug me closer to her side, with
+many endearing expressions of affection and compassion.
+
+I felt an abominable hypocrite at having to allow her to mislead
+herself, but the thought of Nessa's plight made it impossible for me to
+undeceive her; and we all went to the carriage which was in waiting,
+the Countess clinging to my arm and pressing close to me.
+
+Hoffnung was very decent about it. As I was stepping into the carriage,
+he held out his hand. "I hope you will believe that I am sincere in
+saying how glad I am to find I was wrong, Herr Lassen," he said with
+what seemed like genuine cordiality; and of course I wrung his hand and
+said something appropriate.
+
+Why my arrival should have affected the dear little lady so deeply I
+did not know; but during the drive to her house she could do nothing
+but press my hand in both of hers and murmur words of delight at seeing
+me again, mingled with sympathy with my misfortunes. Again the very dim
+light in the carriage stood my friend; and by the time she reached home
+she was thoroughly convinced that I was her nephew.
+
+I had still to meet the daughter; but to my relief she was not at home.
+A meal was in readiness for me, and as I eat it, the Countess sat and
+feasted her eyes on me, noting the differences which, as she thought,
+time had effected in my looks. But these did not shake her conviction.
+
+"You are very much changed, Johann; but of course, you would be in all
+these years. It must be ten quite since you were here. But you are just
+what I expected you would be, although not so much like your father as
+I looked for," she said, and then drew attention in some detail to the
+points of difference. I learnt then that the upper part of my face,
+shape of head, forehead and eyebrows, and nose had "changed less" than
+the lower part.
+
+Then the son gave me a rather nasty jar. "You're not a bit like that
+photograph you sent over to Rosa, cousin, is he, mother? She'll jump a
+bit when she sees you."
+
+"Photograph? Did I send one?" I asked.
+
+"Don't worry Johann, Hans," said his mother, frowning at him, and he
+coloured and collapsed with a muttered "I forgot."
+
+"You did send one, dear," she said to me. "It was when you had a beard
+and moustache, and of course that hid the lower part of your face." I
+breathed a little more freely. "I think Rosa will be surprised when she
+sees you; you're so much better looking than you promised to be. I
+suppose you don't remember sending the photograph?" she asked with
+nervous wistfulness.
+
+I could truthfully say I did not; and in this way the talk proceeded
+until I obtained a really good description of myself as well as many
+details about my past. Lassen's engagement to the daughter was, as
+Hoffnung had said, the result of a family arrangement; one of those
+silly wills which left a fortune to the two on condition that they
+married. They had not seen him since he left Göttingen ten years
+before; during the whole of that time he had been out of the country;
+and was now coming back to marry his bride-elect.
+
+The kind-hearted old soul hadn't a word to say against him; but Hans
+let drop one or two remarks which led me to think I was not likely to
+receive a very cordial welcome from his sister. Anxious to know all I
+could, I pleaded great fatigue as soon as I had finished eating and
+asked to be allowed to go to bed. They both went up with me and I
+managed to keep the son while I undressed.
+
+He was rather an awkward youth, about seventeen, totally unlike his
+mother who might have sat as model for a delicate Dresden china figure.
+On the other hand he was fleshy, dark, and rather pudgy-featured; but I
+praised his figure, belauded his apparent strength, and generally
+played on his obvious vanity and wish to be considered a grown man.
+
+"We must be the best of friends, Hans," I declared heartily.
+
+He blushed with pleasure. "I should like it. You look awfully strong,
+cousin," he replied, looking at my biceps.
+
+"You'll make a far stronger man than I am." It was as welcome as jam on
+a trench crust ten days old; and I kept at it until I felt I could
+safely lead round to the subject of his sister and learn how the wind
+blew in that quarter.
+
+"Of course Rosa's a good sort in lots of ways, but she's getting so
+bossy," he declared boyishly. "She's the eldest for one thing, and
+then, you know, she's come in for old Aunt Margarita's fortune,
+and--well, she likes to run things, and I don't like it."
+
+"A man can't be expected to," I agreed with an encouraging smile.
+
+"That's just it. She thinks a fellow's never grown up. I can stand it
+from mother; but Rosa won't understand that six years' difference is
+one thing when a fellow's a kid of ten and another when he's nearly
+eighteen. I shall get my commission in another month or two, you know."
+
+I made a note of the fact that my "betrothed" was about four and twenty
+and inclined to be "bossy," and let him rattle on about the army, a
+subject of which he was very full.
+
+"Are you going to join your regiment, cousin?" he asked presently.
+
+I looked appropriately blank and gestured.
+
+"Oh, I forgot," he exclaimed, blushing again. "But can't you remember
+anything?" he asked, gathering courage for the question.
+
+I shook my head and looked worried and perplexed.
+
+"You don't mind my asking that question?"
+
+"Not a bit. Of course I want to hit on something that will wake up my
+memory."
+
+"Herr Hoffnung said something about your not wanting to go to the war
+and that you were joining the Secret Service; and Rosa was just mad
+about it. She loathes the idea; but there, I don't suppose she'll care
+so much if----" He stopped short in some confusion.
+
+"If what? Out with it, my dear fellow."
+
+"I don't think I'd better tell you. For one reason because you're----"
+and he pulled up again.
+
+"Because I've lost my memory, do you mean?"
+
+"I don't know. She's awfully funny sometimes, but I did mean that. I
+was going to say--you won't give me away to her if I tell you?"
+
+"Of course not. Aren't we two going to be the best of chums?"
+
+"Well, it's a rotten arrangement to tie up two kids to marry, like you
+two, just because of some money."
+
+I laughed. "I'm not exactly a kid now, Hans, at any rate."
+
+"Rather not; and what she'll think when she sees you I don't know."
+
+This let in a glimmer of the truth and I made a shot. "You mean she
+doesn't much fancy the family arrangement?" His face told me it was a
+bull's-eye, but he hesitated to own it. "When a man's in my state it's
+only decent for his real friends to tell him the hang of things, Hans,"
+I said as a little touch of the spur.
+
+"I daresay it's a lot of lies now that I've seen you."
+
+I tumbled to that, of course. "You mean that your sister has heard
+things which have set her against me?"
+
+He nodded. "That you have only pretended to be out of the country all
+the time and then had to run away--oh, I don't know exactly what it
+was, but it was enough for Rosa. She always takes a different view of
+everything from the rest of us."
+
+Rather good hearing. It seemed to offer a way of breaking off the
+engagement. "She wants to end things between us, you mean?"
+
+"I don't know for certain, but I know what I think. She wouldn't come
+to the station to-night for one thing, and then, well, if I was engaged
+to a girl I wouldn't have her so thick with a fellow as she is with
+Oscar Feldmann. He's always here. But don't you breathe a word that
+I've told you about this."
+
+"Not I, my dear fellow; I'm only too grateful to you. Is he in the army
+then?"
+
+"Not he, but he ought to be;" and as this turned him on to the army
+again, I listened for a minute or two and yawned, and he took the hint
+and went away, promising to see me the first thing in the morning.
+
+Things were going all right so far, and as I was really very tired, I
+put off my thinking until the next day, and went to sleep. In the
+morning I turned over the whole position in my mind and came to the
+conclusion that, for the present at any rate, there was only one
+difficulty to negotiate--that the daughter might not recognize me.
+
+Hans' description of her was anything but alluring. She was "bossy";
+inclined to oppose the others and run things on her own; she was
+already prejudiced against me as Lassen, and was probably ready to
+grasp at any excuse to break off the engagement.
+
+That suggested a very disquieting thought. If she had heard that Lassen
+and I were the only cabin passengers on the _Burgen_, that I was
+the only survivor, that there was some question about my identity and
+that I had lost my memory, it was clear that she had only to refuse to
+recognize me, to free herself from the matrimonial entanglement.
+Obviously that must be postponed if possible.
+
+In view of what her mother had said about the upper part of my face
+being most like Lassen's, it seemed a good moment to invent a bad
+face-ache, so that I could swathe my mouth and chin at our first
+meeting; and the remembrance of Lassen's rather pinched shoulders and
+stooping figure suggested the advisability of being in bed when she had
+her first inspection.
+
+Thus when Hans came to me in the morning, he found me suffering from a
+severe attack of toothache with a bandage wrapped round my face, and
+the windows carefully curtained. He was a good-natured fellow, was
+genuinely sorry and, after saying Rosa was really anxious to see me,
+although she pretended she wasn't, went off to report.
+
+Hans' report brought up the mother, full of solicitous sympathy and
+inquiries about breakfast and a suggestion that I had better stop in
+bed. I agreed, and she said that probably Rosa would come and see me
+during the morning. About an hour later all three came up together, and
+I augured well from the fact that Rosa was carrying a cup of tea.
+
+She was more like Hans than her mother; fleshy, dark, and round-faced,
+better-looking and sharper, with fine, almost black eyes, and a certain
+air of masterfulness, which showed in her brisk manner and carriage.
+She was evidently very curious to see me.
+
+She bustled up to the bedside, her eyes fixed on me searchingly, and
+her dark brows, which were rather heavy, pent and drawn together.
+
+"So you've come at last, Johann--if you are Johann, that is," she said,
+as she drew up a small table and put the tea on it.
+
+I met her look with a wan smile, turned so that she should have a good
+view of so much of my face as was visible, and held out my hand.
+"Rosa," I murmured, and waited to observe the result of her scrutiny.
+
+"Mother said you were too ill to have any breakfast, but I knew better,
+so I've brought you a cup of tea," she said, managing to suggest that
+she had brought it less because I might like it, than because the
+others had declared I shouldn't.
+
+"Thank you, Rosa, I shall relish it."
+
+"There. You see I was right, mother," she said, and I saw I had scored.
+"Are you really so bad, Johann? You always were a coward in bearing
+pain, you know."
+
+"Rosa!" protested the mother.
+
+"It's true, mother. If he knocked his little toe he always thought he'd
+have to have his whole foot cut off. And whoever heard of a man wanting
+to stay in bed for a toothache?"
+
+Better and better, this. Unintentionally I had evidently forged an
+important link in the identification; and then came something better
+still, in response to another protest from the mother.
+
+"Nonsense, mother, it's exactly what he would do," she exclaimed
+sharply, and then turned again to me. "Mother thinks you're awfully
+altered, but I don't see it. Of course I haven't seen much of your face
+yet; but she always does take these queer fancies. Can't you take that
+thing off your face?"
+
+"I think I'll drink the cup of tea," I replied, and drew the bandage
+down a little and put the cup to my lips.
+
+To my astonishment she burst out laughing and clapped her hands. "How
+silly you are, mother. Why the thing's as plain as plain. He's had his
+teeth taken out, and that accounts for the difference you made such a
+fuss about. They used to stick out like this;" and she put her fingers
+in front of her own mouth to illustrate. "Don't you remember how we
+noticed the same thing when Mrs. Hopping had it done? It's made you
+quite passable, Johann," she declared.
+
+"Is that it, Johann?" asked the mother, smiling.
+
+"Is it very noticeable?" I asked, just escaping the pitfall of
+admitting that I remembered something about it. Rosa laughed and
+nodded. The ordeal was over, and the danger point passed; and soon
+afterwards she said she wanted to speak to me alone, and asked me to
+make an effort to get up.
+
+I made the effort, laughed to myself as I cleaned my teeth that they
+should have been mistaken for false ones, and went downstairs to find
+Rosa waiting impatiently for me.
+
+"I should have thought you could put those awful clothes on in half the
+time you've taken, Johann, but you were always slow in dressing," she
+bantered; and I was quite content to be chipped for a time until she
+was ready to come to the discussion of our own affairs.
+
+"Is it true you've quite lost your memory?" she asked as Hans had done.
+
+"The Rotterdam doctors said I should recover it. But I'm afraid I
+shouldn't have known even you."
+
+"Don't you remember anything about my letters?" I shook my head. "Nor
+your own either?" Another wag of the head. "Well, do you still want to
+make me marry you?"
+
+"I don't know. You're very pretty, Rosa."
+
+"For Heaven's sake don't begin to pay me stupid compliments. I hate
+them. Hans takes good care I shan't forget my face isn't my fortune;
+and the moment a man begins to talk about my looks, I know he's
+thinking about my money. At least most of them," she qualified after a
+pause.
+
+I understood the qualification. "Then there's an exception?"
+
+She flushed slightly and was a little confused. "Yes, there is," she
+replied after a pause. "You'll have to know it some time, so you may as
+well know it now;" and she tossed her head defiantly. "I believe in
+coming straight to the point, Johann; and the question is whether you
+are still in the same mind as when you sent me that idiotic photograph,
+three months ago--the silly thing isn't a bit like you--and if you are,
+we had better face things at once."
+
+"What did I say?" I asked, frowning.
+
+"That you meant to hold me to the stupid engagement. But you can't do
+that, however much you wish. It's true that under the silly will the
+engagement can't be broken off till I'm five and twenty, unless you do
+it, but don't forget that I get half the money even if I don't marry
+you."
+
+"Is that the will? It does seem silly, as you say."
+
+"Oh, I know you believe you have the whiphand."
+
+"Indeed, I don't know anything about it." It was really delicious to be
+able to tell the simple truth.
+
+She frowned impatiently. "It's what you're thinking then," she declared
+rather snappily. I shook my head. What I really was considering was
+whether, since Lassen was at the bottom of the North Sea, I should make
+a friend of her by doing what she wished. "Well, anyhow, I want you to
+make haste and think about it all and let me know the result as soon as
+possible. I hate suspense, and things can't go on as they are," she
+continued vehemently.
+
+I had no answer ready, and with a shrug of the shoulders she turned to
+another subject. "Is it true that you've turned spy?"
+
+"Hoffnung seemed to suggest something of the sort yesterday."
+
+She tossed her head and her lip curled. "If I were a man I'd rather be
+a street sweeper; but I'm not surprised at _your_ liking it. It's
+these things in you that are so natural. Your new teeth may have
+altered your looks, but of course they haven't changed your nature."
+
+I couldn't restrain a smile; things were panning out so well: and
+before I replied the door was opened gently and the loveliest child I
+had ever seen came in. She was a delicate-featured, golden-haired
+youngster of about eleven--the replica in miniature of the
+Countess--with big sea-blue eyes which fastened on me shyly as she
+stood hesitating at the door.
+
+"What is it, Lottchen?" cried Rosa sharply. "Come in and don't stand
+fiddling with the door handle in that stupid fashion. This is Cousin
+Johann, and you needn't stand staring at him as if he would eat you."
+
+My heart went out to the kid instantly. "How do you do, Lottchen?" I
+said; and she came up, put her little hand into mine and left it there,
+as she held up her lovely face to be kissed, and then nestled close to
+me trustfully.
+
+Rosa laughed. "That's a new thing for Lottchen, I can tell you; she
+hates men as a rule."
+
+"You won't hate me, Lottchen, will you?" I said, smoothing her wondrous
+hair. She shook her head and smiled up at me and then laid her face
+against my shoulder.
+
+"Don't worry Johann. He's got a bad face-ache."
+
+"Oh, I'm sorry. Am I hurting you?" and the great blue eyes were full of
+sympathy, just as her mother's had been the previous night.
+
+"Not a bit, my dear."
+
+"Well, you must run away now, child, you'll see plenty of Johann. What
+is it you want?"
+
+"Miss Caldicott sent me to see if you're coming out with us as usual."
+
+The name seemed to strike me in the face, and a sharp cry of amazement
+was out before I could check it. It was lucky that Rosa had reminded me
+of my forgotten face-ache, and I invented a violent paroxysm of pain,
+whipped out my handkerchief and hid my face in it, to cover up my
+confusion.
+
+Was it possible that Nessa and I were in the same house, or had I gone
+clean out of my senses?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+NESSA
+
+
+It was some time before I allowed myself to recover from the little
+attack and felt equal to the task of resuming the conversation with
+Rosa. If the Miss Caldicott the child had mentioned was really
+Nessa--and it was difficult to think there would be two girls of that
+name shut up in Berlin at the same time--it was just the biggest stroke
+of luck I had ever had in my life.
+
+Indeed, all the luck seemed to be coming my way; but I should have to
+be careful how I played the magnificent cards fate had placed in my
+hand. I must certainly have Rosa on my side; and that could probably be
+done by freeing her from the engagement. It couldn't be done at once,
+however; not until I had pretended to take time to consider.
+
+I must also find out the relations between Rosa and Nessa; and must, if
+possible, manage not to have any one present when Nessa and I met for
+the first time. Not the easiest of jobs, probably; although my peculiar
+footing in the house might enable me to find a means. The risk was, of
+course, that in her amazement Nessa might give everything away.
+
+"That was a sharp spasm and no mistake," I said when I lowered the
+handkerchief at last.
+
+"Was it real, or just shamming to make us pity you?" asked Rosa
+suspiciously. "You were always good at shamming, you know."
+
+"Was I? Oh well, I'm better, so it doesn't much matter."
+
+"Did Lottchen hurt you, then? She's apt to be clumsy."
+
+"She's rather a pretty child and doesn't look clumsy."
+
+"She's the dearest little thing in the world, but it doesn't do to make
+too much of her. Every one spoils her because she's so pretty and looks
+so fragile. She isn't really delicate and can be no end of a romp, and
+is quite able to take her own part. She wants to go to school, and
+she'd have gone before if it hadn't been for the war and Nessa being
+here as her governess. You never saw anything like the way she loves
+Nessa."
+
+I wasn't caught napping this time. "Nessa? And who's Nessa?" I asked
+with a frown of perplexity.
+
+"Nessa Caldicott, an English girl who----"
+
+"An English girl here, in this house, at such a time!" I exclaimed,
+lost in amazement.
+
+"Yes, of course; in this house; and at such a time," she repeated,
+imitating my manner. "Have you any objection?"
+
+"Of course not; but----" and I gestured to suggest anything.
+
+"I wanted to talk to you about her. That's the one reason why I wasn't
+altogether sorry to hear you were in the Secret Service;" and then she
+told me that she and Nessa had been at school together, and how, when
+she found Nessa had had to leave her friends and could not get
+permission to go back to England, she had brought her home as
+Lottchen's governess. "She was in awful trouble, of course, and mother
+hated the idea of her coming to us; but I got my own way. That's about
+two months ago, and ever since we've been doing all we can to get her
+sent home."
+
+This sent Rosa up many hundreds per cent. in my estimation. "I think it
+was awfully good of you; but why can't she go home?"
+
+The question seemed to trouble her considerably. "If I tell you all
+about it, will you help us?"
+
+"I don't suppose I can do anything, but I'll try."
+
+"You may be able to find out the truth; and that will help, for we
+should know how to get to work. I think I know it, though, and I
+believe it's all the fault of a man who pesters her incessantly. He's a
+horrid beast, named Count von Erstein;" and she told me he was a
+wealthy Jew who had great influence with the Government; had tried and
+was still trying to get Nessa denounced as a spy and sent to one of the
+concentration camps; dogged her everywhere and set spies to watch her;
+had spread all manner of lying reports about her; and was intriguing in
+every possible way against her for his own infamous ends.
+
+My blood boiled as I listened to all this, but I had to smother my rage
+sufficiently to assume just a conventional amount of indignation in
+keeping with Lassen's character. "An ugly story," I muttered.
+
+"It doesn't seem to have roused you very much," she replied, her eyes
+flashing indignantly. "I should have thought it would have fired the
+blood of any ordinary man. It makes me feel that I could kill him; but
+then I'm only a woman."
+
+It was clear that my manner was Lassenly enough, so I let it pass. "I'm
+curious to see the man."
+
+"If he had his deserts, you'd see him in prison; but he's probably with
+Nessa and Lottchen now. He always hangs about near the house at this
+time, when they go for their walk. That was the meaning of the child's
+coming in just now. I generally go with them. Do you feel well enough
+to come out and see?"
+
+After a little sham hesitation I agreed, and she went off to get ready,
+leaving me able to work off some of my rage alone. It was in all truth
+an ugly story, and, what was worse, threatened to make it very
+difficult to get Nessa away. No doubt it was abominably stupid of me,
+but until that moment I had never considered the practical means of
+getting her out of Berlin.
+
+I had rushed off with the idea of finding out the truth about her in
+order to relieve her mother's anxiety, and somewhere at the back of my
+head was the idea that Jimmy's friend at the American Embassy would
+help me to do the rest.
+
+But that was knocked on the head if this beast of a Jew had sufficient
+influence with his Government to block the way. And that he had
+considerable influence, Rosa's story left no doubt. She certainly could
+not get away openly, without permission from the authorities and a
+passport and all the rest of it; and it looked like a thousand to one
+chance against any such things being forthcoming.
+
+That did not exhaust the resources of civilization, however, as the
+politicians are fond of saying; and at the worst we could try and make
+a bolt of it together, without any papers if necessary, but preferably
+with some in false names. So far as I was concerned I was ready to
+tramp it to the frontier on foot; but that wouldn't do for Nessa.
+
+At any rate we must get her out of Berlin and away from this von
+Erstein's persecution. Nessa could gabble German quite as freely as I
+could; and once away from the capital, supplied with plenty of money as
+I was fortunately, we could try our luck and trust to fate.
+
+"You've made me feel awfully strange about that fellow," I said to Rosa
+as we started from the house. "I suppose it means I'm angry. I feel I
+should like to kick the brute."
+
+"I'm glad to hear it; but kicking won't be enough. What you've got to
+do is to find means to get Nessa away."
+
+I shook my head doubtfully. "How are these things managed?"
+
+"She must have a permit to travel; that will be difficult enough: and
+to cross the frontier there must be a passport, of course. That's where
+the Count stops everything. He has dinned it into the powers that be
+that she's a spy and wants to get away to carry her information to
+England. We nearly got one; but at the last moment the whole plan
+failed."
+
+"Did Aunt Olga help, then?" I asked, hesitating how to speak of the
+Countess.
+
+"No, mother wouldn't. It was--was a friend of mine, Herr Feldmann, if
+you wish to know," she said, with a slight tinge of colour, hesitating
+over the name and laughing self-consciously as I looked down at her and
+our eyes met.
+
+"It appears to me that your English girl is lucky to have found such
+staunch friends, Rosa," I said as earnestly as I felt. "And between us
+we ought to be able to outwit this von Erstein."
+
+"I wonder if you mean that," she replied, with a searching look.
+
+"I think you'll find I do. They told me at Rotterdam that I had had a
+very near squeak of death; and whether it's that or something else, I
+don't seem to have any of the meannesses you associate with me. I am
+perfectly in earnest. Perhaps I've dropped the rest with my memory."
+
+"I hope you have, Johann, and there's certainly a sincere look in your
+eyes there never used to be. Ah! There they are," she broke off,
+pointing a little distance ahead; and I saw Nessa and the child coming
+toward us, with the man in attendance.
+
+We had turned into the Thiergarten and were in one of the larger side
+walks at the moment; the part where Nessa usually brought Lottchen,
+Rosa told me: and I had a good view of them before they saw us. Nessa
+had the child between her and von Erstein, and I was deeply concerned
+to notice how worn and troubled and harried she looked.
+
+The man was talking to her over Lottchen's head and appeared to have no
+eyes for anybody or anything except her. He was about forty, I thought;
+the ruddy-faced type of Jew, clean-shaven, square of face, rather high
+cheekbones, a very un-Jewish nose, small eyes, with bags of sensuality
+under them, a somewhat heavy jowl, with little rolls of flesh under his
+chin and on his thick neck. Not by any means a bad-looking man and very
+smartly dressed in faultlessly cut clothes which, however, did not hide
+his tendency to paunchiness. An ugly customer to get across with, was
+my verdict.
+
+I was more than a little bothered about Nessa meeting me for the first
+time in his presence, as it was extremely probable that she would give
+vent to her astonishment in a way that might start his suspicions, so I
+stepped out into full view while they were still a little distance
+away, hoping to prepare her.
+
+But there was no trouble of the sort. Lottchen caught sight of us first
+and, breaking away, rushed up to me. I stopped with her, therefore, and
+Rosa went on to the other two; and to my intense satisfaction, she held
+von Erstein in talk while Nessa, glad no doubt of the relief, came to
+us.
+
+It could not have happened more fortunately. Just before she reached us
+I managed to place the child so that she could not see Nessa, and then
+turned and raised my hat, giving her a clear view of my features.
+
+"You!" she exclaimed, starting and turning as white as death and
+trembling so violently that for an instant I thought she was going to
+faint. But I did what a look would do to caution her and turned to the
+child.
+
+"You must introduce me, Lottchen."
+
+"This is my new Cousin Johann," she said a little shyly. And the slight
+interlude gave Nessa time to pull herself together sufficiently to
+return my bow.
+
+It was a very formal bow, and the look in her eyes and the instinctive
+droop of the expressive mouth was much more suggestive of indignation
+than pleasure at seeing me. It was a great deal more like contempt or
+disgust; but by the time the others reached us she had entirely
+recovered her self-possession.
+
+My introduction to von Erstein followed, and he displayed an amount of
+cordiality at making my acquaintance, which puzzled me at the moment.
+But I was not long left in doubt. My first uneasy impression was that
+he suspected the impersonation, gathered from the smiling slyness with
+which he looked at me.
+
+As we were to cross swords it was necessary for me to probe this at
+once; and when Nessa entrenched herself securely between the two
+sisters and he showed a disposition to drop behind with me, I was glad
+of the chance.
+
+He opened the ball by speaking of my loss of memory, and I soon found
+that I was wrong about his suspecting my imposture. He professed great
+sympathy with my misfortune, throwing in a hint that it might after all
+have its compensations. "A good many of us have memories we might be
+glad to lose, Herr Lassen," he added with a laugh, but in a tone which
+reminded me of what Hans had said about my past.
+
+"I should be glad to have mine back, good or bad," I replied with a
+laugh as easy as his.
+
+"Perhaps. One never knows," he retorted meaningly. Then he switched off
+to the von Rebling family. "Most charming people; delightful; but
+unfortunately there's one little fly in the amber. You know it, of
+course?" and he nodded toward Nessa.
+
+"I only arrived late last night. What is it?"
+
+"It is a thousand pities; but these are times in which no one can
+afford to run risks, even with the highest motives. I know, of course,
+that Miss von Rebling's motives are of the highest; but we have to
+think imperially; especially in regard to this plague of spies. You
+agree with that, of course?"
+
+"Naturally; but how does that apply here?"
+
+He paused, rolling his eyes round at me with a significant shake of the
+head. "Why do you suppose that English girl there, Miss Caldicott,
+finds it so desirable to be an inmate of their house?"
+
+"Rosa told me she was Lottchen's governess."
+
+He put his forefinger to the side of his nose and winked and nodded.
+"Ostensibly--yes; but in reality--eh?"
+
+"Do you mean she's a spy?" I cried, appropriately shocked.
+
+He nodded emphatically. "I do; and I'm relying on your help in the
+matter. They may have told you that I have a great deal of interest in
+circles that would enable me to be of considerable help to you; and I
+have every wish that we two should be great friends. My influence is
+such that you may depend upon getting high in the service you wish to
+join. Very high."
+
+"I'm not likely to quarrel with any one who can help me in that way, of
+course; but you see there's a bit of a stumbling-block at present until
+I can get over this infernal loss of memory."
+
+"Oh, that'll soon come right."
+
+"So all the doctors at Rotterdam told me; but so far----" and I broke
+off with a flourish of the hands.
+
+"I think I can help you about that, too. Of course when you were known
+to be coming here I made such inquiries about you as were open to me,
+and the result made me feel sure that you would wish to be friendly
+with me;" and he leered at me in a way that left me in no doubt as to
+his sinister meaning. He thought he had me in his power.
+
+"I shall be tremendously interested to learn what you heard. So far as
+I know, I might have been born about a week ago, and it's a devilish
+unpleasant feeling."
+
+He favoured me with another leer. "Ah, you're a good deal older than
+that," he said meaningly. "I fancy I can convince you if you'll come
+and have a chat with me. Here's my address," giving me his card.
+
+"Certainly I'll come," said I readily. "You've roused my curiosity
+tremendously. What time and day?"
+
+"Come and lunch with me to-morrow. In the morning you'll be wanted in
+the Amtstrasse; Baron von Gratzen, you know. Come on to me from him. I
+can open your eyes to a thing or two; and I'm altogether mistaken if we
+can't come to understand one another thoroughly. I'll manage to refresh
+that lapsed memory of yours, Lassen, and perhaps find the real reason
+for it."
+
+"The Rotterdam people put it down to shock," I replied, as if I had not
+understood him.
+
+"Ah, the doctors don't know everything, my friend," he returned drily.
+"But I must get off. Till tomorrow, then. Don't forget;" and he
+quickened after the others, shook hands, patted Lottchen on the cheek,
+much to her disgust, and went off.
+
+A pleasant fellow, very. Evidently a strong believer in the
+knuckle-duster methods; meant to use them to force me to help him in
+his infamous scheme against Nessa, and had discovered something about
+my past which would bring me to heel. That was his ideal of friendship.
+Certainly a very pleasant fellow!
+
+That was a generous offer of his influence, too. Thinking me to be as
+big a scoundrel as himself, he was ready to betray his country by
+pushing me up the ladder of promotion if I would only help him in his
+blackguardism. A staunch patriot, too. Deutschland über alles! but von
+Erstein first!
+
+I was certainly curious to know what it was he had discovered; but my
+speculations were interrupted by Lottchen, who came back to me and took
+my hand and made me chatter to her until we reached the house.
+
+This was all right, as it saved Nessa from having to talk trivialities
+with me in Rosa's presence, gave her an opportunity of accustoming
+herself to my presence in Berlin and nerving herself for the inevitable
+deception it involved.
+
+How she would treat me I could not guess; but I was utterly unprepared
+for the attitude she did assume. She hurried into the house the instant
+we reached it and disappeared. We met at the midday dinner; but she
+steadfastly refused even to cast so much as a glance in my direction.
+
+Rosa made more than one attempt to draw her into conversation with me;
+but every effort was foiled by Nessa pretending to have to pay some
+attention to Lottchen, who sat by her. In fact, she ignored me as
+completely as if I had not been present and seized the first
+opportunity to leave the room.
+
+I had looked for any treatment rather than that; and felt more than a
+little riled and aggrieved. It was no harmless picnic, this jaunt of
+mine to Berlin; and I thought she might have taken that into
+consideration.
+
+But there was more than mere pique involved. If she meant to keep up
+this attitude, how was I to come to any understanding with her?
+
+I might as well go back to my flying--if that were possible. Itself a
+pretty stiff proposition, as Jimmy would have said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+ABOUT SPIES
+
+
+Nessa's treatment of me both offended and distressed the Countess, and
+Rosa tried to draw her attention away from it by engaging her in a
+discussion about the afternoon's arrangements. It appeared that the
+Countess always spent an hour or two on that particular day with a very
+old friend, an invalid; Rosa herself had an engagement; Hans had to
+attend some lecture or other in connection with his military studies;
+and Nessa generally took Lottchen for a drive.
+
+I would not hear of the arrangements being altered on my account,
+declaring that I should be glad of the opportunity to get some decent
+clothes.
+
+"Then there will be an empty house," declared Rosa as we rose from the
+table.
+
+There were two servants--an elderly woman, named Gretchen, and Marie, a
+younger one--in the room during the discussion; an important fact in
+the light of after events.
+
+Some letters arrived for the Countess and Rosa; and when the former
+took hers away to the drawing-room, Rosa detained me in the library to
+speak about Nessa's conduct. "I can't understand it, Johann," she said
+irritably.
+
+"Does it matter much?" I asked with a shrug.
+
+"Of course it does. How are you going to help her if she keeps up this
+ridiculous attitude? I've no patience with her."
+
+"Oh, I have. She knows about our engagement, of course, and being
+staunch to you looks on me as an enemy."
+
+"But she knew you were coming and was most anxious to see you, and even
+promised to try and bring you to reason."
+
+"Have you told her that I'm willing to help her; if I can, that is?"
+
+"No, but I'll go and tell her now, and tell her also that if she
+doesn't wish to make mother furious, she'd better take things
+differently."
+
+"Perhaps if I could have a quiet chat with her, it might do the trick,"
+I suggested casually.
+
+"Then you mustn't lose any time about it. Why not this afternoon? I can
+take Lottchen with me, and if you stop in, it could be managed easily.
+And when I come back the three of us can talk the thing over together."
+
+I agreed to this like a shot, and we went into the drawing-room, where
+her mother was still reading her letters. Rosa glanced hurriedly at
+hers, locked them in a little bureau, and hurried off to tackle Nessa.
+
+The Countess was standing by a very handsome cabinet, a drawer of which
+she had opened, and called me up to her. "Come here, Johann, I want you
+to see me put these letters away," she said to my astonishment, and,
+drawing my attention to the neatness with which her letters and papers
+were arranged, asked me to remember precisely where she put those which
+had just arrived, and to make sure that the drawer was locked. "I want
+to have a witness," she added.
+
+Then she spoke of Nessa's behaviour to me, saying how it had grieved
+and surprised her.
+
+"It is really not of the least consequence," I assured her.
+
+"But I'm sorely afraid it is, Johann, and I'm very troubled. That's one
+reason why I wished you to do that just now. I was always against her
+coming to the house, but Rosa would have her;" and then by degrees the
+reason came out.
+
+She was afraid that von Erstein's story was true, that Nessa was really
+a spy. Some one had a key to her drawer in the cabinet; she had found
+her papers disturbed more than once; she kept money in the same place,
+but none of it had ever been taken, so that it could not be the work of
+a thief; she believed that Rosa's bureau had also been tampered with;
+and as the servants were above suspicion, there seemed to be only one
+conclusion.
+
+The dear little lady was more grieved than angry about it. "I'm very
+sorry for Nessa really, Johann, but we can't have a spy in the house;
+yet I don't know how to get rid of her. But I won't open that drawer
+again until you are with me, and then we shall both know that I'm not
+making a mistake. Meanwhile, don't say anything to Rosa or any one."
+
+We went upstairs together, and she was telling me the address of Hans'
+tailor and how I was to find it, when the old servant, Gretchen, passed
+us. Rosa was waiting dressed to go out, and told me she had spoken to
+Nessa, who would come down to me in the drawing-room after the rest had
+left the house.
+
+"She baffles me, Johann. She just jumped at your offer to help her get
+away--after her conduct just now, too! But she seems to have taken a
+violent dislike to you, and even declared she wouldn't stop in the same
+house with you," she said in a tone of consternation.
+
+I passed it off with a smile and some banal remark about feminine
+inconsistency, and went downstairs to wait for Nessa. There was a
+lounge at the end of the drawing-room, a big comfortable sort of winter
+garden, with lots of big plants, and rugs and easy chairs and so on,
+and I sat down there to think over the position. I didn't smoke; a
+lucky fact in view of things.
+
+It worried me excessively that Nessa should be regarded as a spy, and I
+was puzzling over the explanation of what the Countess had told me when
+I heard the front door shut. That meant they had left the house and
+that Nessa would soon be down.
+
+But she did not come for some time, and presently I heard a movement in
+the big room, the faint click of a key being turned and then of a
+drawer being cautiously opened.
+
+The conclusion was obvious. The spy was at work, believing that I had
+gone to the tailor's and meaning to fix the thing on Nessa, should her
+little operation be discovered. So I got up noiselessly and, from the
+safe shelter of some plants, did a little spy work on my own account.
+
+It was one of the servants, of course; but I could not at first catch
+sight of her face. She was at Rosa's bureau, reading a letter, probably
+one of those which had come just before. That did not occupy more than
+a minute, and she next opened the Countess's cabinet drawer, picked out
+a couple of letters, glanced at them rapidly, just tossed them back
+carelessly, relocked the drawer, and turned to leave the room.
+
+I saw her clearly then, for she went out by a door which stood at my
+end of the room, near the big stove in the corner. It was Gretchen.
+
+It would never do to have a possible eavesdropper when Nessa and I were
+together, and, being unwilling to let the woman know she had been seen,
+I crept over to the door we all used, opened it noisily, shut it with a
+bang, and began to whistle.
+
+This had immediate results. I heard the door of the stove opened at the
+back, some logs were thrown in, and directly afterwards Gretchen came
+out, with an apology for disturbing me.
+
+"It's my work to see to the stoves, sir," she explained with a smirk.
+"And the door to our quarters is locked."
+
+"All right, Gretchen. It's getting chilly, isn't it?"
+
+"It gets cold in the evenings, sir, and my orders are to see that the
+stoves are kept going well." She was a little uneasy; and after she had
+been gone a while, I had a look at the hiding-place.
+
+It was a passage with cupboards on each side, and as the door at the
+other end was fastened, she had been compelled to return through the
+room when she had heard me. There was a bolt on my side of that door,
+and I shot it to prevent her coming back to listen while Nessa and I
+were together.
+
+I was only a minute or two in the place, but when I left it I found
+Nessa already in the drawing-room. She had caught me apparently in the
+act of playing the spy, and her look left no doubt about her opinion.
+
+I laughed. I really could not help it. It was such a preposterous
+misreading of the situation that the ludicrous absurdity of it appealed
+to me. Of course my laughter added to her indignation and also to the
+awkwardness of the meeting.
+
+"You are practising your new profession, I see. It appears to rouse
+your sense of humour," she said icily.
+
+"It would probably rouse yours also if you understood everything," I
+retorted, not at all relishing her prompt condemnation.
+
+"I don't see anything particularly humorous in your sneaking into the
+house of my friends and spying in its holes and corners."
+
+"Perhaps not, but I had a good reason," I said shortly, a bit rattled
+by her sneer.
+
+"No doubt; but I have no curiosity on such a subject. Rosa has induced
+me to see you, so I----" She got so far in the same level, cutting
+tone, evidently putting a great restraint upon herself; but she could
+not keep it up. Her eyes blazed suddenly, her cheeks flushed, and
+raising her voice in her indignation she exclaimed: "How dare you
+come----"
+
+I had to stop that, however, as the old eavesdropper might have
+followed her to the room and be on keyhole drill. "I am very glad to
+meet you, Miss Caldicott," I broke in in German loudly enough to be
+heard outside, and added in a low tone in English: "It is not safe to
+speak so loudly as you did. Come away from the door;" and I led the way
+into the conservatory.
+
+She stared at me as if I were a dangerous lunatic, but after a moment's
+pause followed me. "Say what you like now, but lower your voice," I
+said, lowering my own tone.
+
+She hesitated, but acted on the warning and returned to her former icy
+tone. "What I want to know is why you dare to come here in a false
+name, as the sham lover of my friend, and humiliate me in this way. If
+you must be a spy, haven't you enough decency to avoid blackening me by
+making me a partner in such treacherous baseness?"
+
+I met her angry look for a second, realizing that this was the reason
+for her conduct to me; and it was all I could do to prevent myself
+smiling at her injustice, although it riled me considerably.
+
+"Rather a rough judgment," I replied with a shrug, "and your manner
+doesn't smooth it out much; but as no one else can hear you now, I
+don't mind so much. I can explain----"
+
+"Explain!" she broke in scornfully.
+
+"Yes, explain. That's what I said. If you understood----"
+
+"I do understand as it is--too well," she fired in again.
+
+I really could not help smiling again, both at her words and flashing
+anger. "I must either smile or lose my temper as you have done; and
+it's better to smile."
+
+This was like petrol on the fire. "Just what I should expect of you--to
+see nothing but a joke in my indignation."
+
+"I'm not laughing at your indignation, but at your mistake. You always
+have been ready to make the worst of anything I do."
+
+"What have you ever done that was worth doing?"
+
+"Nothing much, I admit."
+
+"If you were like other men you'd be doing what they are
+doing--fighting."
+
+"Perhaps I should; but we can't all be soldiers."
+
+Her lip curled. "Men can; but even you needn't have sunk so low as to
+be a spy!"
+
+"Go on. I'm not ashamed of what I'm doing; and if you'll let me
+explain----"
+
+She stopped me again with an impatient gesture. "I need no explanation,
+thank you. Aren't you here as Johann Lassen?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Pretending to be engaged to Rosa von Rebling?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And pretending to have lost your memory?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Haven't you both spoken and acted lies to gain admission to this
+house?"
+
+"I had to, of course."
+
+"You convict yourself out of your own mouth, then?"
+
+"Apparently."
+
+"Aren't you trying to get employed in the Secret Service here?"
+
+"Looks black, doesn't it?"
+
+"Looks!" and she drew a long deep breath and repeated the word. "But
+you don't imagine for one instant that I will be a party to it!"
+
+"You are already, for that matter."
+
+"You shall leave this house at once and never set foot in it again, and
+I shall find the means to let Rosa know the disgraceful trick you have
+played."
+
+"And if I refuse?"
+
+"I'll expose you as surely as my name is Nessa Caldicott."
+
+"You know what the result would be to me?"
+
+"I neither know nor care."
+
+"Then I'll tell you. I should certainly be imprisoned and most probably
+shot."
+
+She wavered somewhat at that. "It is easy for you to avoid it by doing
+what I say--leave the house."
+
+"That's out of the question."
+
+"Do you expect me to allow you to go on imposing on the girl who has
+been my friend at a time when I was absolutely helpless? Wouldn't you
+be ashamed of me if I were to consent to such treachery? Can't you see
+what a vile degradation it would be, and that I should hate myself as
+well as you if I consented?"
+
+"No. Yes. Yes. I wish you'd ask one question at a time."
+
+"Do you expect me to smile at such insufferable flippancy as that?"
+
+"No. But it wasn't flippancy at all. I was answering your questions in
+order. You appear to think that I like being compelled to deceive Miss
+von Rebling."
+
+"How can you talk about having been compelled to do it?"
+
+"Because it happens to be the truth."
+
+"Your version of the truth, you mean?"
+
+"Exactly. My version of the truth, although you won't believe it. I was
+forced into the thing against my will by a series of coincidences which
+I found it impossible to avoid; and, as a matter of fact, I am not
+harming Miss von Rebling in the least."
+
+"Haven't you led her to believe you may break off the engagement?"
+
+"I've been considering it."
+
+"Don't you call that harming her?"
+
+"No."
+
+"How can you say that? What will happen when the real man arrives?"
+
+"Not even then."
+
+She gestured incredulously. "It's impossible," she cried. "In any case
+I insist upon her being told."
+
+I stopped to think a bit. I knew Nessa so well that I could quite
+understand her mood. Her first fierce rush of anger had spent itself,
+checked, I was sure, by my statement of the consequences to me if the
+truth were told. She had not a suspicion of the reason for my being in
+Berlin, evidently believing that I had come as a spy, and knew even
+better than I what my end would be if I were denounced; and her words
+had cut me too deeply to let me tell her the truth then--that I had
+only come on her account.
+
+At the same time I could quite appreciate how she would shrink from
+being made a partner, as she had said, and her impatience for me to
+leave the house. It was an awkward corner, but I thought I could see a
+way round it.
+
+"I'll do what you suggest," I said at length.
+
+"Go away?"
+
+"No. Tell Miss von Rebling."
+
+This alarmed her at once. "But you? What you said about the risk?" she
+protested.
+
+"Oh, never mind about me. You said you couldn't endure it; and, of
+course, nothing matters compared with that. I should have taken care to
+let her know everything as soon as I'd done what I came to do."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Your mother is very anxious about you, and when she knew I was coming
+here, naturally wanted me to find out things."
+
+"But they've had my letters, surely?"
+
+"Not a line since some time after Christmas."
+
+"Do you mean that, Jack? Oh, poor mother! I've written regularly every
+week. When Julia Wassermann died, her father, who hates the English and
+hated me because I'm English, turned me out of the house. I should have
+gone to one of these dreadful concentration camps, if it hadn't been
+for Rosa. That's why I can't bear the thought of deceiving her;
+but--I--I don't want to get you into any trouble. We--we can't tell
+her. We--we mustn't. You can go away, can't you?" and she bit her lip
+in desperate perplexity and distress.
+
+"I'm going to tell her, Nessa," I said.
+
+"But I don't wish it, Jack. I really don't. I didn't mean all the
+horrid things I said just now; I--I'm sorry. I've been just distracted."
+
+"Don't worry. Nothing very terrible is likely to come to me; and I
+quite agree that she ought to know the truth."
+
+She looked at me wonderingly. "How different you are, Jack. What has
+changed you so? You're so quiet and so--so firm. You don't look the
+same. Not a bit like you used to be in any way, manner, bearing,
+everything. I saw it the moment I came into the room."
+
+"You didn't show it. You went for me in much the same old style, you
+know," I said with a smile. "You always did think me a rotter."
+
+"Do you mean that you've risked coming here merely because of--of what
+mother told you about me."
+
+"Not very likely, is it?"
+
+"It wouldn't have been at one time, but---- You mustn't say anything to
+Rosa. You mustn't, really. You won't, Jack, will you?" and she laid her
+hand on my arm appealingly.
+
+"I must, Nessa."
+
+"No, no. I won't be the cause----"
+
+And then, just as she was clinging to my arm and urging me, she broke
+away with a sudden cry of consternation.
+
+I turned to find Rosa standing in the doorway, staring at us wide-eyed
+in amazement.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+ROSA IS TOLD
+
+
+Whether I should have yielded to Nessa and allowed myself to be
+persuaded not to tell Rosa the truth, I can't say--she always had great
+influence with me--but after we had been surprised in this fashion it
+was no longer possible to hesitate. Nessa would have been compromised
+and I suspected.
+
+I acted promptly, therefore. I crossed the room, and shut the door
+carefully, both girls watching me with expectant curiosity.
+
+"Please come into the conservatory, Miss von Rebling," I said quietly
+in English, which she spoke quite fluently. "I have something of the
+utmost importance to say to you. And we had better speak in English and
+not too loudly, please."
+
+She stared at me, desperately perplexed by my words and manner; but
+after a moment's hesitation went into the conservatory, to where Nessa
+stood in trembling agitation by the plants, and linked her arm in hers
+and kissed her.
+
+"I am going to put my life in your hands. I am not Johann Lassen. I am
+an Englishman and my name is Jack Lancaster. Nessa and I are old
+friends, and we were discussing the question of telling you when you
+came in," I said in a slow deliberate tone.
+
+She was literally astounded and could not at once grasp all that my
+words meant. She turned to Nessa as if appealing for confirmation.
+"Nessa!" she exclaimed, much too loudly to be safe.
+
+"Let me tell you why it is necessary not to speak loudly. You have a
+spy in the house: the servant I have heard you call Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed. "It will no doubt explain why Nessa's
+letters have never reached England and other things probably."
+
+Rosa's face being incapable of expressing more astonishment than she
+had already shown, she just tossed up her hands feebly, suggesting that
+the whole affair was beyond her understanding. But she was a practical,
+level-headed girl, and soon recovered her self-control.
+
+"Do you mean that you have recovered your memory?" she asked.
+
+I shook my head. "I have never lost it."
+
+She frowned ominously at this and her expression signalled suspicion.
+"Then why are you in Berlin?"
+
+Clearly she regarded me as an English spy, and there was nothing for it
+but to tell her the full reason for my presence, although I had not
+wished to let Nessa know it. "I will tell you everything, but you'd
+better sit down as it will take some time."
+
+She sat down and drew Nessa to her side, taking her hand and holding it
+all the time I spoke. "I am an officer in the English army, and was
+home on leave when I heard for the first time about Nessa;" and I told
+them all that Mrs. Caldicott said, and described the two peculiar
+communications which had reached England. Then the whole story: My
+first plan; Jimmy's intervention; how I had taken his place at the last
+moment; the blowing up of the _Burgen_; my being mistaken for
+Lassen; my feigned loss of memory; how I had been unable to get away
+from Hoffnung, and how his suspicions had forced me to continue the
+impersonation.
+
+Nessa was terribly distressed to hear of her mother's anxiety and
+grief; Rosa wept in sympathy, and they both listened to the whole story
+with rapt attention.
+
+"You will see now," I concluded, "what I meant by saying I am putting
+my life in your hands. If I am known to be an English officer, there
+will be only one construction put upon my presence here--that I am a
+spy, and I shall of course be shot. We should do the same on our side
+if one of your officers was found in England in similar circumstances.
+I give you my word, however, that my sole object is to get Nessa away
+home."
+
+Rosa looked very grave and rather frightened. "You know the
+consequences to me if I attempt to shield you?"
+
+I nodded. "I can understand they would be very serious, if it was
+discovered."
+
+Then we all sat silent for a long time, several minutes, and Nessa was
+trembling like an aspen leaf. Rosa broke the silence at last.
+
+"Where is my cousin?"
+
+"He went down in the _Burgen_. There is no doubt that I am the
+only survivor. He was below at the time of the explosion, and not even
+any of the men on deck were saved."
+
+"But if he should not have been drowned and should come here?"
+
+"Your mother and Hans, every one believes I am your cousin, and not so
+much as a breath of suspicion that you know the truth could ever be
+roused, unless of course you admitted it."
+
+This had all the effect I had hoped, and she nodded understandingly.
+"And what do you wish me to do?" she asked after another pause.
+
+"To allow matters to remain as they are until we can get Nessa away;
+but it is entirely for you to decide."
+
+She shook her head. "I--I can't decide now. I must have time to think.
+I was never so perplexed or astounded in my life."
+
+"Rosa dear!" appealed Nessa.
+
+"It is not for us to settle, Nessa," I put in; and then another long
+silence followed.
+
+"If I wait till to-morrow, say, will you use the time to escape, Mr.
+Lancaster?" asked Rosa then.
+
+"That is impossible, Miss von Rebling," I replied uncompromisingly. "I
+have come to get Nessa away, and that cannot be done in the time."
+
+That drew a smile: the first since she had arrived. She guessed how the
+land lay with me, and glanced round at Nessa, who coloured slightly. I
+believe that that little blush had more effect than anything else. She
+had the usual streak of German romance in her disposition, and the
+situation appealed to it strongly.
+
+"I wish I dared," she murmured; and I began to hope.
+
+I gave the new idea a minute to germinate, and then began to nurture it
+by suggesting how her risk would be minimized. "Let me tell you just
+what is in my mind. I will not remain in the house, and the first thing
+to-morrow will go to rooms or an hotel."
+
+"But mother?" she protested nervously.
+
+"I shall tell her of my discovery about Gretchen, and that in view of
+my connection with the Secret Service, it is essential for me to be
+absolutely secure against anything of the sort." She nodded approval.
+
+"I shall then be too busy officially to come here much, and this will
+relieve you from all the unpleasantness of open deception with her and
+others." Again she nodded.
+
+"The next thing will be to obtain the necessary papers for Nessa and me
+to leave. Have you any friends in Holland?"
+
+She started rather nervously. "Yes, several old school friends;
+but----" She paused and gestured.
+
+"My idea is that you should invent a sudden desire to go to them; say
+that one of them is dying or very ill, or something. You could not very
+well travel alone at such a time, and thus Hans would naturally go with
+you. It would be simple enough for you two to obtain permits to travel
+and passports and so on, and----"
+
+"But I should be instantly questioned and---- Oh, that would never do,"
+she interrupted, with a vigorous shake of the head.
+
+I smiled reassuringly. "I have thought of that, believe me. On the
+morning you were to start, after you had obtained your tickets,
+something would occur to make it impossible for you to go. Nessa or I
+would then get the tickets and things, and she and I would use them.
+You would not discover the loss until we had had time to cross the
+frontier, and could then give information of their loss; and as soon as
+we were safely in Holland, I would write to you a letter explaining
+everything."
+
+This lessened her uneasiness considerably. "It is possible," she
+admitted.
+
+"Such a letter from me, confessing my imposture and everything, would
+free you from the slightest taint of suspicion that you had been in any
+way a party to the scheme, and, of course, as Nessa and I should be in
+safety, I could make the confession with absolute impunity."
+
+She sat with her dark brows drawn together, considering the scheme very
+carefully, and after a long silence asked: "How long do you think it
+would take?"
+
+"Only so long as is needed to get the passports, etc."
+
+But she shook her head. "There is a difficulty--Hans. He could not
+possibly get away, even if he were willing to go; which I doubt."
+
+"Can you think of any one else?"
+
+She hesitated, glancing first at me and then at Nessa. "Do you remember
+the two Apeldoorn sisters, Nessa?"
+
+"Yes, quite well, dear."
+
+"They are Herr Feldmann's cousins," said Rosa: and then I knew what was
+coming. "One of them is going to be married and wants me to go to the
+wedding. I should have gone if it hadn't been that we heard just then
+about my Cousin Johann. Herr Feldmann and his sister are going, and I
+should have gone with them; but his sister is ill," she added, looking
+to see how I took this.
+
+"It would certainly open the way to the necessary credentials, but how
+could I get hold of his permit?"
+
+"I can't think of anything else," said Rosa as I did not answer. "But I
+think Herr Feldmann would help if I asked him," she added.
+
+"Do you mean you would tell him everything?" I asked, not at all
+relishing the suggestion.
+
+"It would be necessary, wouldn't it?"
+
+"I'd rather try to think of some other plan," I replied, and sat
+racking my wits for some alternative; without avail, however, and
+presently she got up and walked about the drawing-room.
+
+When she had left us, Nessa stirred uneasily, glanced once or twice at
+me, and then held out her hand. "I'm--I'm sorry, Jack," she whispered.
+
+"All right; don't worry;" and I just pressed her trembling fingers.
+
+"But to talk to you as I did--all the brutal things I said. I'm so--so
+ashamed."
+
+"No need. Not the faintest. You couldn't know; and you caught me in the
+very act of prying into that place there. If you hadn't fired up a bit,
+it wouldn't have been natural."
+
+"But after you'd run all this risk simply for me, you must have thought
+me a regular beast, Jack."
+
+"The fact is your mother's worry got on my nerves, and as I knew I
+could come into this beastly country without any risk to speak of, of
+course I came. That's all about it."
+
+She didn't quite like this, but I meant her to believe it had been more
+for her mother's sake than hers.
+
+"Poor mother!" she murmured, and was silent for a while. "You've joined
+the army then?" was her next question.
+
+"I'm in the Flying Corps, and your mater didn't tell me anything about
+you for fear it would get on my nerves."
+
+"Then I had something to do with your coming?" she asked, with a
+flicker of a flash in her bonny eyes.
+
+"I couldn't very well ease your mother's mind in London, could I? She
+was against the thing, but I explained there was really no risk. Of
+course there would not have been any if the steamer hadn't blown up and
+this Lassen business turned out as it has."
+
+"But it was I who made you tell Rosa?"
+
+"And probably the best thing we could have done if----" and I gestured
+toward Rosa, who was still pacing the room in troubled perplexity.
+
+I did my utmost to lead Nessa to think I took the position lightly; but
+I was in reality almost desperately anxious, and every moment of Rosa's
+indecision added to the disquieting tension of suspense. If she went
+against us, I could see nothing but a mess of trouble ahead; and I was
+only too conscious of how big the danger to her would loom in her
+German-disciplined mind. They all go in deadly fear of the authorities;
+and it was impossible to deny that, if she were discovered, it might
+mean the prospect of a spell in prison.
+
+"You haven't said yet that you forgive me, Jack," said Nessa presently.
+
+"Simply because there's nothing to forgive. I should probably have done
+just what you did," I replied with a smile.
+
+"Do you mean that anything I could have done would have made you take
+me for a spy, then? I took you for one," she said ruefully.
+
+"The only difference is that I might not have been quite so impatient,
+and have been ready to listen to your explanation. But don't let us
+worry over that. Let us think how we're going to get out of it all."
+
+"I think Rosa will help us."
+
+"But this fellow, Feldmann?"
+
+"You needn't trouble about him. He worships her, and the instant he
+knows her cousin is drowned and the way is clear for him, he'll be
+ready to--well, to do anything she wishes."
+
+"That's good hearing, anyhow, but I wish she'd look sharp and make her
+mind up."
+
+Nessa laughed gently. "You don't understand girls, Jack. Her mind was
+made up before she left us two together. She's one of the
+kindest-hearted souls in the world."
+
+But Rosa seemed in no hurry to come back to us, and before she could
+tell us her decision, the opportunity passed, for Hans came in with a
+man whom Nessa whispered to me was Feldmann himself.
+
+Rosa introduced me to him as her cousin. This set me speculating
+whether it was an indication of her intention or merely a sign that she
+had not yet decided what to do, and I was worrying over it as I
+returned his stiff and rather discourteous greeting, when Hoffnung
+followed.
+
+After a few words of general conversation Hoffnung drew me aside, and I
+had a significant proof of von Erstein's intimate acquaintance with
+official matters. He had puzzled me earlier in the day by saying that I
+had to interview a Baron von Gratzen the next morning, and Hoffnung now
+brought me the note making the appointment for eleven o'clock.
+
+"How's the memory, Lassen?"
+
+"Pretty much the same," said I, shrugging. He had evidently abandoned
+all his former suspicions, I was glad to see.
+
+"You'll find old Gratz, as we call him, a decent sort; but I'm afraid
+he may have to tell you what you won't like much."
+
+"Meaning?"
+
+"Well, a man without a memory isn't much use to the Secret Service,
+although he may be in other ways."
+
+I didn't like his tone. "But I can remember all that's passed since the
+_Burgen_."
+
+It did not draw him, however. He just laughed. "I mustn't anticipate
+him, of course; but I'll give you a tip. Be at his office on the
+stroke; he hates nothing so much as unpunctuality."
+
+With that we rejoined the rest, and again the conversation was about
+matters in which I had no interest. I studied Feldmann carefully. He
+was a handsome fellow; fair, blue-eyed, rather round-faced and weak;
+but he had a very pleasant smile which I saw often, for he smiled every
+time he looked at Rosa. But not once did he address me; and his dislike
+and hostility were plain each time he glanced in my direction.
+
+He certainly wasn't the man I would have chosen to trust; but beggars
+can't be choosers, and I had to be satisfied with the fact that both
+Rosa and Nessa herself were ready to vouch for him.
+
+Hoffnung did not stay long, and when he had gone Rosa reminded me about
+going to the tailor's, and as I was leaving the room, she said to
+Nessa: "You might show it to Johann now, dear."
+
+"Rosa has asked me to show you the portrait of your mother, Herr
+Lassen, as she hopes it may perhaps help you to remember things."
+
+"Please do," I answered eagerly, her look telling me this was merely an
+excuse; and we went to the library together.
+
+"It's all right with Rosa," she whispered then; "but only if Herr
+Feldmann is told and agrees. I am to go back and tell her what you say."
+
+"Are you quite sure of him?"
+
+"Yes, quite, in the altered circumstances. So is Rosa."
+
+"Carry on, then; and if there's anything wrong, let me know the moment
+I get back;" and off I went, not letting Nessa see how it worried me to
+have this infernal suspense kept hanging round my neck like a millstone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+BARON VON GRATZEN
+
+
+I was very curious to have a look at Berlin in war time; but as I am
+not writing a chronicle of the struggle, my impressions need not be
+laboured, except as they touched me personally.
+
+The struggle had been going on for about eighteen months when I reached
+the capital, and, except in one respect, matters were pretty much as I
+had known them. There were more soldiers about, perhaps; there seemed
+to be as much bustling activity as usual, and certainly there was
+universal confidence that the result would be a glorious victory.
+
+The one genuine surprise I had was when I came upon an unwontedly
+demonstrative crowd shouting that they were short of food. They were
+chiefly women, and a boisterous, vociferating lot they were. It was not
+so much the crowd that impressed me, however, or the row they kicked
+up, as the fact that the police didn't interfere. In my experience, a
+crowd might look for a very short shrift at the hands of the police of
+Berlin.
+
+I referred to the matter when I was at the tailor's--where, by the by,
+I succeeded in getting a very passably fitting suit and other things I
+needed--and he explained the reason. There was no real scarcity of
+food, he declared, but much grumbling at the distribution; and the
+police had had orders not to resort to drastic measures.
+
+"It will have to be stopped, however, or the trouble will grow. There
+has already been some window smashing. Imagine it, window smashing in
+our beautiful, well-organized city!" he cried, as if it were akin to
+impiety and sacrilege.
+
+"Very shocking," I agreed gravely.
+
+"If it is not put down with an iron hand, it will not be safe for a
+well-dressed person to be in the streets. My own wife and daughter,
+only yesterday, were all but mauled in the Untergasse. But the English
+will pay for it!"
+
+I cut short that subject by speaking about the business in hand; it
+wasn't prudent to talk about the war, and I took care not to give him
+an opportunity of returning to it before I left the shop.
+
+On my way back to the von Reblings' house in the Karlstrasse, I could
+think of nothing except the news I was to hear and what I should do if
+the scheme I had suggested was turned down. I could see nothing for it
+but to make a bolt almost at once, take Nessa with me, and trust to our
+wits and luck to get away.
+
+Not a hopeful job at the best, and at the worst involving no end of
+risk and danger for us both. I knew my Germany too well not to be
+painfully conscious of all that; and the knowledge made me profoundly
+uncomfortable. But I've a sanguine streak in me and am generally lucky,
+so I put off the consideration of the disagreeables until they had to
+be faced in earnest.
+
+I need not have worried, however, for I found everything running as
+sweetly as a well-oiled engine when I reached the house. I knew it
+instantly by the manner in which Feldmann greeted me.
+
+Instead of the previous sullen angry looks, he was all smiles, gripped
+my hand cordially, nearly fell on my neck, and I rather dreaded that he
+would wind up by kissing me. Rosa and Nessa were in much the same
+hilarious mood, and might have been arranging the details of a wedding
+rather than a little conspiracy against the Government.
+
+They had it all cut and dried, and my crude plan was hailed as if it
+had been a piece of the most wonderful strategy in the world.
+
+"Oscar will help us all he can," said Rosa, blushing a bit as she used
+his christian name; "and he can get the passports and everything
+without any trouble. He has his already, and suggests that we shall
+have one for Hans as well. I've seen Hans, and he has consented to go
+if he can get leave. He doesn't think he can, but agrees we had better
+get one in case. That will be for you."
+
+"Won't there be some sort of description of him on it?" I asked.
+
+"I can arrange that," declared Feldmann. "Luckily it is in my
+department. It will do for you, and, of course, he'll never see it."
+
+"I shall take charge of everything," said Rosa. "And Oscar says he can
+get everything through in three days at the latest, perhaps in two."
+
+There was a great deal of Oscar would do this and Oscar could do that,
+in it all; but everything seemed as good as the best, and I was soon in
+as high spirits as the others. It was settled that we should travel by
+the morning express, which would get us across the frontier in time for
+me to let Rosa have my confession the following day.
+
+"Oscar" wrung my hand again at parting, as if I was his dearest friend;
+declared he was not among the English haters; that he thought I had
+acted splendidly in risking so much to rescue Nessa; and that he hoped
+we should be great friends after this abominable war.
+
+My next move was to prepare for leaving the house the next day, and at
+supper I announced my determination. The Countess was very much against
+it, but afterwards I went with her alone into the drawing-room and gave
+her my "official" reasons.
+
+"I want you to open your cabinet drawer, aunt; but before you do it,
+I'll tell you that you will find some one has been to it----"
+
+"Nessa?" she broke in excitedly.
+
+"I'll tell you in a moment. You are quite right that there is some one
+in the house who is playing the spy, and, of course, you'll understand
+that if I am to join the Secret Service, it is a sheer impossibility
+for me to remain here with any one like that about the house."
+
+"They shall leave it at once, Johann."
+
+"We'll discuss that directly. You will find that the letters you so
+neatly put away here are just flung in anyhow in order to suggest that
+whoever did it was surprised and had to act in a hurry."
+
+She unlocked the drawer then with shaky fingers and there lay the
+letters as I had told her. "Nessa shall leave the house to-morrow,
+Johann," she cried immediately.
+
+"But it wasn't Miss Caldicott at all, aunt; it was Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed and went on to advise her not to take
+any open notice of the matter at all. "You know now who it is and can
+be on your guard, keeping such papers as are of no account here and
+putting others in a safer place."
+
+"But to have such a person in the house, Johann!"
+
+"She can't do any harm now; and you must remember this. You don't know
+who has put her here nor the reason. It might do much more harm than
+good if you were to make any disturbance about it. These are curious
+times, and the fact that you have an English girl in the house may be
+the reason. By sending Gretchen about her business you may only have
+some one else put here, or one of the other servants bribed or forced
+to take her place;" and I hammered away at this until I persuaded her
+to adopt the suggestion.
+
+I had a strong object in taking this line. I was sure that Gretchen was
+von Erstein's creature, and that if she remained in the house, we might
+find her very useful in putting him off the scent by letting her find
+out some false facts in case of trouble.
+
+During the night I thought carefully over our conspiracy scheme. It
+looked good; very good indeed; perhaps too good, and in the end I
+decided to prepare for a possible hitch in case the unexpected happened.
+
+I couldn't see one anywhere; but you can never be prepared for an air
+pocket, as I knew well enough; so I resolved not to be caught unawares.
+If anything went wrong on the journey, it was on the cards that we
+might be able to dodge the trouble and get away, if we were provided
+with good disguises. I worked on that idea and thought of several other
+items which would probably come in handy.
+
+I adopted the notion of turning myself into an aero mechanic and
+changing Nessa into my young assistant. There wasn't much about any
+sort of flying machine I didn't know--except Zeppelins, of course; so I
+could keep my end up all right, and could easily coach "my assistant"
+well enough to pass muster.
+
+We should have to dodge the beastly German system which makes every
+workman carry his record card about with him; but if we couldn't get
+things of the sort, we must put up a bluff--have lost them or
+something--and trust to my skill with the tools to see us through.
+
+I was off pretty early in the morning on the hunt for rooms, and almost
+immediately found a place which fitted my needs like a glove. It was a
+little furnished flat in the Falkenplatz; just a couple of rooms with a
+bathroom at the rear, the window of which opened on to the fire escape;
+an emergency exit which might be invaluable in case of need.
+
+But there was a hitch when I said I would take the place. I was asked
+for the inevitable papers to satisfy the police; and of course I had
+none. My explanation was listened to politely, but without effect; so I
+said I would obtain them, paid a deposit, and went off to buy some of
+the little items I had thought of during the night.
+
+Then I had a bit of a jar. I was coming out of a shop just as a tall,
+grey-haired, soldierly man in uniform was passing who glanced casually
+at me. The glance was followed by a start of surprise, his look became
+intent and interested, and he stopped as if to speak. Naturally I took
+no notice and walked on; but a few seconds afterwards he passed me,
+stopped a few yards ahead to look in a shop window, and as I overtook
+him, he turned to give me a very keen, penetrating stare.
+
+Of course there were heaps of people in Germany who had known me well,
+and I had discounted the risk of running against some of them. But I
+could not place him, and I was not a little relieved when he appeared
+uncertain and went off without addressing me.
+
+It was a disturbing incident and brought home to me the advisability of
+keeping indoors as much as possible during the days I was to remain in
+Berlin. The matter didn't end there, however.
+
+Remembering Hoffnung's hint about keeping my appointment with Baron von
+Gratzen punctually, I turned up a little before time, and exactly on
+the stroke of eleven was shown into his office. My astonishment may be
+guessed when he proved to be the stranger I had just met.
+
+I think that his amazement was even greater than mine, as he stared at
+the slip on which his subordinate had written my name and from it to me.
+
+"Then you are Herr Lassen?" he asked in frowning perplexity.
+
+I bowed and held out the letter he had sent me. "You sent for me, sir."
+
+He waved me to a chair and sat back lost in thought for so long that I
+began to wonder what the dickens was coming.
+
+"You came from England, didn't you?"
+
+"I believe so, sir."
+
+"And you're the man without a memory, eh? Very extraordinary; very
+extraordinary indeed. Most remarkable case. And why have you come to
+Berlin?"
+
+"Herr Hoffnung brought me. I understood he had instructions to do so."
+
+"Tell me about your experiences there."
+
+I looked as blank as a wall and shook my head.
+
+"Surely you can remember something. Let me jog your memory. I know the
+country well, you understand. Were you in London?" After another blank
+look from me, he took out a paper, glanced over it, and questioned me
+about a number of places and matters contained in it; to all of which I
+replied with either a vacant look or shake of the head.
+
+The examination lasted for some considerable time, and presently he
+pushed a sheet of paper and a pen to me, telling me to write my name. I
+had expected some such test and took hold of the pen clumsily and, with
+infinite apparent trouble, wrote the name "Johann Lassen" in big
+sprawling printed capitals.
+
+He watched me like a lynx at the job, took the paper, scanned it
+closely, and asked: "That the best you can do?"
+
+"I can read the big letters of type, sir," I replied, and I fancied
+that he had to restrain a smile.
+
+Next he folded down the paper he had been reading from and showed me a
+sentence in it. A very non-committal sentence I noticed. "You recognize
+the writing?" More head wagging from me. "You should, you know; it's
+your own handwriting;" and he put the document away, and sat thinking
+again.
+
+I'd have given something to be able to read his thoughts at that
+moment, especially when he roused himself sufficiently to favour me
+with some keen stares. I couldn't resist the unpleasant thought that he
+suspected something; but he gave no overt sign of suspicion, and his
+manner was less official than friendly. After a time something in his
+mind brought a heavy frown to his face.
+
+"Let me get the matter quite clear. You were blown up in the
+_Burgen_, found yourself in a hospital in Rotterdam with no papers
+of identification on you except a card, you remembered nothing at all
+of what had occurred, and came to Berlin with Herr Hoffnung. You know
+that there was only one other male passenger on the steamer, a Mr.
+Lamb, about whom we have some reason to be curious. Now, are you sure
+you are not that man?"
+
+"I don't know, sir. I am not sure about anything except what has
+occurred since I was at Rotterdam."
+
+"Well, when you arrived here the Countess von Rebling recognized you as
+her nephew.--Were you at Göttingen?" he asked so suddenly that I only
+escaped the trap by the skin of my teeth.
+
+"I believe so, sir."
+
+"Then, of course, there will be plenty of people there to identify you."
+
+"Naturally, sir," I managed to reply, although a chill of dismay made
+my spine tingle at the meaning smile accompanying the words.
+
+"We know, of course, that no one of the name of Lamb was ever there,"
+he said and paused again, as if to give me time to absorb all that this
+might be intended to suggest.
+
+"Do you speak English?" was the next question, put with a perfect
+accent in my own language.
+
+"Sure," I replied, with what I meant to be a very correct twang. But it
+didn't appear to impress him as much as I could have wished; and after
+regarding me curiously for a moment or two he rose, got a volume of
+Mark Twain's _Innocents Abroad_, and laid it open before me,
+asking me to try and read a passage.
+
+I looked at it earnestly and gave it up as hopeless.
+
+But he was too many for me. "Well, I'll read it to you and get you to
+repeat it after me." And he did read it and I had to repeat the words
+in such American as I could manage. "Thank you," he said as he closed
+the book and put it away again. And then another long pause followed.
+
+I recalled Hoffnung's disturbing words--that the Baron would have
+something to tell me I might not like. He had certainly made that good,
+and I was beginning to be abominably troubled about the run of things
+when he started in again.
+
+"And so you wish to join our Secret Service?" he asked with the abrupt
+shift of subject which worried me.
+
+"Herr Hoffnung told me so, but----" and I smiled vacantly.
+
+"Do you imagine that a man without a memory would be of much use to us?"
+
+"I'm afraid not, sir; but to tell the truth, I have no sort of desire
+to do it. The doctors at Rotterdam told me I should recover my memory
+in time, and if I could have a good rest and just be absolutely quiet
+for a time it is all I wish."
+
+He nodded, not unkindly, and then suddenly bent on me the keenest look
+I have ever seen in any man's eyes and asked: "Are you sure you mean
+that?"
+
+"Absolutely, sir, on my honour," meeting his eyes steadily.
+
+He held them for a moment with the same intentness, as if he would read
+my inmost thoughts, and then nodded and leant back in his seat. "I can
+understand that and believe you. I'm glad to hear it."
+
+What he meant I couldn't tell, but I felt relieved because I appeared
+to have risen in his opinion, for some reason it was impossible even to
+guess. Some minutes passed before any more was said, the longest
+silence yet. That he had evidently been running over all that had
+passed his next move showed.
+
+"I am intensely interested in your case, and quite as intensely puzzled
+about it all. Personally, I take your view--that the best thing would
+be to give you time to see if the memory comes back. But that's rather
+a point for the doctors than for me. You have done very valuable work
+for us in England and, other things turning out all right, there is no
+doubt you could do more of the same sort. But these are times when we
+can't do all we might; matters are too strenuous. Except for this loss
+of memory, you seem to be absolutely normal--doctors again; and you'd
+better see them at once;" and he rang his table bell. "If you pass them
+and, from your appearance I have no doubt you will, you will, of
+course, go to the Front."
+
+I caught my breath at this, but he did not see my consternation, as he
+had risen while speaking and went out, leaving his secretary, named von
+Welten, to remain with me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+VON ERSTEIN
+
+
+Baron von Gratzen was away some minutes; and exceedingly unpleasant
+minutes they were for me. At first I could see nothing but checkmate to
+all my plans. That the doctors would pass me as fit for service in the
+field was beyond question; and, as Germany wanted as many men as
+possible in the fighting line, I was certain to be packed off without
+any delay.
+
+But then I needed only a delay of a couple of days--the papers would be
+ready by then--and it was still possible that something might happen
+which would give me just enough time to get away. It was a devil of a
+mess, however; and it cost me no end of an effort to pull myself
+together by the time the Baron came back and himself took me to the
+doctors.
+
+They had been primed about the case, and all three of them were as
+deeply interested in me as the others had been in Rotterdam. One of
+them was a specialist in such cases, and he conducted the first part of
+the examination--that in regard to my memory. He put numberless
+questions on all sorts of subjects, endeavouring in every conceivable
+way to get me to admit that I could remember something; but I had no
+great difficulty in answering him. He appeared to lay most stress on
+everything that had occurred immediately before the explosion on the
+_Burgen_; and was still on that when the Baron came back to us,
+listened to his concluding questions and suggestions, and then took him
+out of the room.
+
+The physical examination followed. I stripped to the buff, and a very
+few minutes sufficed to satisfy them about my fitness. I was, of
+course, in the pink of condition and as hard as nails.
+
+"You must have had military training," said one of them.
+
+"That can't be so, so far as I know. I understand I've been travelling
+about the world for a long time."
+
+"I'm sure of it," was the positive verdict. "Every muscle tells the
+tale too plainly for any one to be mistaken. Just stand over there; I
+want to look at your back;" and he placed me close to the wall, and
+stepped back some distance himself.
+
+"No, perhaps not," he murmured, and just as I was chuckling at his
+blunder, he suddenly yelled at me in English, "'Shun!" with military
+abruptness. Instinctively, being for the instant quite off my guard, I
+brought my heels together and straightened up. He chuckled, and I could
+have cursed myself for an idiot in having given the show away.
+
+The doctor who had trapped me couldn't contain his delight. "I knew I
+couldn't be mistaken. You can put your clothes on," he told me, rubbing
+his hands gleefully, and after another chortle to his colleague, he
+hurried off to report the result of his experiment.
+
+I was mad at having made such a blithering ass of myself just when
+things had been going so well. The game was up, of course, and there
+was nothing for it but to face the music. It was now a toss up whether
+I should be packed off to the front or popped into prison, and it
+didn't need a Solomon to see that the odds strongly favoured the latter.
+
+The Baron and the two doctors came back in about five minutes, and the
+man who had bowled me out was laughingly rubbing it in to the
+specialist.
+
+"I can't imagine how it escaped you, Gorlitz," he said as they entered;
+and the specialist looked about as pleased as I felt.
+
+"Try it again," he growled in a half-whisper.
+
+"He may be prepared this time," was the reply in an undertone, but not
+low enough to prevent my hearing it. I couldn't get the hang of things
+for the moment; but when, after a few desultory questions, the doctor
+pretended to take some measurements and then turned me with my back to
+him again, I knew what was coming, and I thought I would do a little
+bit of pantomime of my own.
+
+They spoke together in low tones, and in the middle of it the doctor
+yelled "'Shun!" at me once more. I started, hesitated and then came to
+attention, but not nearly so smartly as before.
+
+"Just turn round," called the specialist. "Now, march across the room."
+I obeyed, and was halfway across when the doctor shouted "Halt!" I
+stopped instantly.
+
+"There you are," exclaimed the doctor. The specialist nodded, told me
+to sit down, and plied me with all sorts of questions about the army,
+appearing rather pleased than otherwise when I failed to answer them.
+
+A long pow-wow followed between the three doctors and was developing
+into a pretty hot wrangle whether my having obeyed the word of command
+was really a recurrence of memory or not, when the Baron intervened and
+I was sent back to his room with his subordinate.
+
+"You have set them a difficult problem, Herr Lassen," he said to me
+when he joined me after some ten minutes; "and given me one also. But
+it will do no harm to postpone the decision about you for a few days,
+at any rate. You have no idea how you come to know the English words of
+command?"
+
+I affected to think deeply. "Can I have been in the army there?" I
+asked, looking blankly at him.
+
+He smiled and then nodded. "Yes, you are a deserter. Your report says
+that you joined it to obtain certain information."
+
+"It's very odd, sir."
+
+"Very," he replied a little drily. "It makes it a little difficult in
+regard to a suggestion Dr. Gorlitz threw out; he's the mental
+specialist, you know. He thinks it not improbable that if you were
+placed again in the surroundings immediately preceding the shock which
+deprived you of your memory, it would greatly facilitate its recovery.
+Perhaps your only chance of doing so. But you might not care to run
+such a risk. You should understand that I wish to help you in any way I
+can," he added kindly.
+
+"I am very much obliged to you, sir. Of course it would be a risk, but
+my great wish is to get my memory back."
+
+"Does that mean you would like to go back to England?"
+
+I could scarcely believe my ears and tried to conceal my overwhelming
+delight under the cover of frowning consideration. "The risk wouldn't
+frighten me, sir."
+
+"Very well. I'll see about it. That's about as far as we can get
+to-day; but there's one thing I should tell you. There is some one in
+Berlin who knows you and declares that your loss of memory is a mere
+pretence, and that you have assumed it because of some exceedingly
+sinister business in which you were involved a year or two ago."
+
+I could smile at that sincerely. "Can you tell me his name?"
+
+He paused a moment. "There will be no harm, if you keep it to yourself;
+I don't believe the story, but then I know the man too well. It is
+Count von Erstein."
+
+"He's a scoundrel, I know that; but it may be the truth, of course."
+
+"We won't discuss him," said the Baron, rising. "I only told you to put
+you on your guard because of the genuine interest I take in you;" and
+with that he shook hands and was sending me away, when I remembered my
+difficulty that morning about papers of identification. I explained it
+to him and he sent for von Welten and instructed him to do what was
+necessary.
+
+I left the place feeling pretty much as any one would feel who had
+rubbed his back against a prison door and by the merest squeak escaped
+finding himself on the wrong side of the bars. The whole business
+baffled me. Knowing as I did so well the usual methods of German
+officialism, the Baron's treatment was incomprehensible; and rack my
+wits as I would, I could not hit on a clue to explain it.
+
+And then the luck of it! Actually to be sent back to England with
+official credentials! I could have whooped for joy! But as it was
+already passed the time I was to lunch with von Erstein, I rushed back
+to the Falkenplatz, made sure of the little flat, and then cabbed it to
+von Erstein's address.
+
+What a rotter the brute was, I reflected as I thought of the story he
+had already spread about me. He meant to make things hot for me and no
+mistake, and had lost no time in setting to work. And what a brick the
+old Count, to have given me that warning. If I had been going to stop
+in Berlin, I might have taken von Erstein's enmity seriously; but as it
+was I could afford to laugh at him, for a few days at the most would
+see both Nessa and me out of the country, if the luck only held.
+
+I was so late in reaching the Gallenstrasse, where von Erstein had his
+sumptuous flat, that he had already begun lunch. "I'd given you up,
+Lassen," he said as I entered. "Thought something might have happened
+with old Gratz to detain you. He's a downy old bird. Sit there, will
+you. Everything all right?"
+
+"Why shouldn't it be?" I knew what he meant.
+
+He turned the question off and we talked about nothing in particular
+until lunch was over, except that every now and then he shot in a
+question which might have committed me if I had not been on my guard.
+But I had been through the mill so thoroughly that morning that the
+part I was playing had grown into my bones, so to speak.
+
+"Now we can chat at our ease," he said as we settled into easy chairs.
+"Is it still your habit to smoke a cigarette before a cigar?" he asked,
+grinning, as he held the box toward me.
+
+"Was that one of my habits, then?" I countered, declining the little
+trap.
+
+"All right, you do it very well. Ought to be on the stage, on my word
+you ought," he said with a broader leer. "But now, let's get to grips.
+How do we two stand?"
+
+"About what?"
+
+"Don't fool about in that way. You know what I mean."
+
+"I shall when you tell me."
+
+"Do you want to have me for a friend or the other thing?"
+
+"I told you yesterday I wasn't likely to quarrel with any one who has
+such influence as you have."
+
+"And I told you that it would be a bad day's work for you if we did
+quarrel; and quarrel we shall if you try to beat about the bush, as
+you're doing now. I believe in plain talk; and you'd better bear that
+in mind, not only now but always."
+
+"Then let me have some plain talk now."
+
+"You shall," taking his cigar out and flicking off the ash. "I've only
+to utter a word or two and I can flick you out of my way as easily as I
+flicked that ash off. Mind that, too."
+
+I laughed. "You have a pleasant way with you, von Erstein."
+
+"I don't care a curse about pleasantness or unpleasantness. When I want
+a thing, I have it. And what I want now is that English girl at the von
+Reblings', and you'd better be careful not to get in my way about it."
+
+"How am I likely to be in your way?"
+
+"Because you're a relative of the von Reblings, my friend, and you're
+going to marry the fair Rosa, whom, by the way, I can tell you as an
+old hand you'll find a handful. But she likes the English girl and will
+try to influence you, and if I know her, as I certainly do, she'll
+succeed, if I don't stop it."
+
+"Stop it? How?"
+
+"By showing you on which side your bread has the butter. Now look here.
+I know a heap about you; quite enough to queer your pitch with the von
+Reblings and put an end to your engagement and lose you the coin on
+which you're counting. All this rot about a loss of memory is just----"
+and he waved his cigar in the air to emphasize his meaning.
+
+"What do you know about me?"
+
+"Oh, don't try that fool's game on me."
+
+"But I should be intensely interested in the story. I'm itching to know
+all about myself," I persisted, seeing how this line provoked him.
+
+"Where did you go from Göttingen, my young friend?" he asked with a
+meaning nod, as if the question would confound me.
+
+"How the devil do I know?"
+
+"You went to Hanover. You know that perfectly well."
+
+"Did I? And do I? You're getting me regularly mixed, you know." I was
+delighted to see that he was fast losing his temper.
+
+"You did. And when you were there you had a friend, who called himself
+Gossen; but was in reality a Frenchman, named Gaudet. Don't say you
+don't remember, because it will be a lie," he snarled.
+
+"That's an ugly word, von Erstein."
+
+"And the whole thing was an ugly business. He was a spy and wanted some
+secrets; you were able to find them out; and you were suddenly found to
+be in possession of a big sum of money. How did you get it?"
+
+"Honestly, I hope," I answered with intentional flippancy.
+
+"How did you get it? And how did you get the information, too? That's
+the question; and if you won't answer it, I can. But you'd better not
+force me to open my lips."
+
+"I'm beginning to get awfully interested. Like a story, isn't it?" and
+I laughed.
+
+"You'd better laugh while you can," he rapped, swearing viciously.
+
+"Of course you mean I sold the information to the Frenchman and that
+that accounts for my having that sudden money."
+
+"I not only mean it, I can prove it. Prove it, do you understand that?"
+
+I gave him another grin and shook my head. "Some one's been pulling
+your leg, von Erstein. The whole thing's just bosh."
+
+"It's no good, Lassen. I've got you here;" and he held out his hand and
+clenched it. "Here! And no wriggling humbug about loss of memory will
+help you to get out."
+
+"I must be an infernal blackguard, then."
+
+"That's the truest thing you've said since you came. It's just what you
+are; and the von Reblings ought to know it."
+
+"You haven't told me how I got that valuable information yet. I should
+like to know that."
+
+"If you'll let that lost memory of yours wake up for a second, just
+long enough to remember the name of Anna Hilden, you'll know all about
+it without a word from me." His sneering suggestive tone clearly showed
+that this was one of his trump cards, and he fixed his eyes on me,
+keenly watching for the effect.
+
+"But my memory won't oblige me by waking up, you see. Had she anything
+to do with it?"
+
+"To the devil with all your pretended innocence! You know she had, and
+that you induced her to worm it out of the man she was to have married,
+if you hadn't come in the road; just as you're trying now with me," he
+cried, scowling at me threateningly. "But you've got a man to deal with
+this time, not a woman, and the wrong sort of man too."
+
+I dropped the bantering tone and answered seriously. "Of course all you
+say may be the gospel truth, but I give you my word that I haven't the
+faintest recollection of anything you've mentioned."
+
+He laughed scornfully. "That's a lie," he growled with an oath.
+
+I had had more than enough and I got up. "If this weren't your own
+place, I'd cram that word down your throat; and the next time we meet,
+wherever it is, I'll do it," I told him.
+
+He seemed to understand that I meant it, and a change came over his
+face. "I'll take that back," he muttered. "Sit down again."
+
+I didn't sit down, but I stopped. Either he was as arrant a coward as
+such a brute was likely to be and I had scared him, or some thought had
+struck him which accounted for the change.
+
+He let his cigar drop; made a to-do in finding it, pitching it away,
+and lighting another; and it was an easy guess that all this was to
+gain time. Then he sat thinking, fiddling nervously with a very
+singular ring he wore on his middle finger. He saw me looking at it
+and, no doubt to get a little more time to think, he spoke of it.
+
+"You're looking at this," he said, holding up the hand. I nodded, and
+he drew it off and handed it me. "It's a puzzle ring I picked up in
+China," he explained, showing how it was really a little chain of rings
+which fitted very ingeniously to form a single ring.
+
+I examined it and, still to gain time, he told me to try and put it
+together. I did try and failed, and when he had thought out his
+problem, he took it back and showed me the fitting.
+
+"I'm sorry I lost my temper just now, Lassen," he said in a very
+different tone from his former angry one. "It's always a fool's game.
+But I did really believe you were shamming about your memory. What I
+told you about the Hanover business is quite true, however, and the
+fact that you don't remember it, wouldn't make an atom of difference
+with our people. But now, what about the English girl?"
+
+I hesitated a second and then resumed my seat. "I'm willing to listen
+to you," I said; and he couldn't keep the satisfaction out of his fat,
+tell-tale face. He reckoned that he had frightened me, of course.
+
+"What are you going to do about her?" was his next question.
+
+"What _you_ want to do is the point, man."
+
+"She's a spy and ought to be interned."
+
+"And why are you so keen about that? You said a little while back that
+you wanted her; how's the internment going to help you there?"
+
+"She'd be sent to Krustadt and the Commandant---- Never mind; you can
+leave the rest to me. You won't know anything."
+
+I couldn't trust myself to speak for a time, I was so furious at the
+suggestiveness of the leering brute's words and manner. But there was
+probably more to learn yet, so I choked down my rage and at last even
+forced myself to nod and smile meaningly. "And my part?" I asked.
+
+"Two things; both easy enough. Old Gratz has shoved a spoke in the
+wheel so far, curse him, and as you're in the house you can tell him
+you know I'm right that she is a spy and you can give him proofs."
+
+"Proofs?" I echoed, with a start.
+
+"I said proofs, didn't I? I'll give you some papers and you can plant
+one or two on her and give the rest to him saying you've found them in
+her room or somewhere. He'll be obliged to order a search then, and
+that'll do the trick."
+
+"Confound the thing!" I exclaimed, jumping up and wringing my fingers
+as if I'd burnt them with my cigar.
+
+"Here, take another," he said, and by the time I had lit it, I had
+myself in hand again.
+
+"But if she was caught red-handed like that, she might be shot, and
+that wouldn't help you much."
+
+"You leave that to me," he replied with a leer and a wink. "The
+question is, are you going to help me?"
+
+"I don't like it, von Erstein, and that's the truth," I said.
+
+"I didn't ask you that."
+
+"And if I do help you?"
+
+He put his fat finger to his lips. "Mum about that Hanover business."
+
+"And if I don't?"
+
+He paused, squinting hard at me. "I think you will."
+
+I affected to consider the proposal. "But why take this roundabout
+trouble to get her? If you want to marry her, why not ask her?"
+
+That touched his Teutonic sense of humour and he burst into loud and
+evidently genuine laughter. "Why didn't you marry Anna Hilden? Because
+you could get her without, wasn't it? Same here, of course."
+
+"It comes to this, then," I said after a pause. "You think you know
+that I played the traitor in that Hanover business in a way that
+renders me liable to be shot; but that you're willing to hush it up if
+I'll help to put Miss Caldicott into your power. That about it?"
+
+"Put it how you like," he growled, not relishing the bald statement.
+"But you'd better toe the line, my friend, and at once. Now, what are
+you going to do?"
+
+"I'll toe the line, von Erstein."
+
+He chuckled. "I thought you'd see wisdom," he sneered.
+
+"Not quite as you think, however. What I'm going to do is"--and I
+paused--"to give you forty-eight hours to clear out of Berlin; and if I
+find you here then, I'll not only tell the von Reblings the whole of
+your confounded scheme, but I'll tell Baron von Gratz as well. And I'm
+thundering glad you've put that card in my hands."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A BREAD RIOT
+
+
+It would be difficult for any one to appear more absolutely dumbfounded
+than von Erstein when I delivered my ultimatum and got up.
+
+That I had scared him, his chalk-white cheeks showed unmistakably,
+while the quiver of his lips, clenched hands, and the fierce light in
+his piggish little eyes testified to his rage. He jumped up instantly
+to stop my going.
+
+"Don't go, Lassen, at all events in that way. Let's talk it over," he
+clamoured. "The thing can be explained and we can come to an
+understanding."
+
+"You swine!" I growled. "Get out of the way or I shall forget I'm in
+your room and lay my hands on you."
+
+He tried not to wince, but was too much of a cur. "Look here, I'm not
+going to utter a word about that Hanover business. I swear that," he
+said as I went to the door.
+
+"You've done it already, you lying hypocrite. You know that; and so do
+I. I've heard of it, and I shall hear if you say any more. And by
+Heaven, if you dare to say another syllable about it, I'll--well, keep
+out of my way afterwards, that's all"; and I left him to judge for
+himself what I would do.
+
+I had to go. I should have mauled the brute if I'd stopped. I was mad
+with fury; and I walked off, unable for the time to think of anything
+but his disgusting cowardice and bestiality. I'm no saint, and don't
+pretend to be one; but this brute's infernal plan to get Nessa into his
+power was more than flesh and blood could stand. I believe, anyway I
+hope, I should have felt just as hot if any other girl had been
+concerned.
+
+I ramped about the streets, taking little notice where I went, and it
+was not until some of my fury had cooled that I began to consider what
+steps I ought to take. I was glad I had lost my temper and gone for
+him; but after a while it began to dawn on me that I had blundered
+badly. All I needed was to gain a few days' delay; and it would have
+been far more diplomatic if I had seemed to fall in with his plans and
+just made a few excuses to account for any inaction.
+
+But one can't always be worrying about diplomacy; and anyhow the beggar
+was thoroughly scared. Probably he'd be just as much put to it to hit
+on a new offensive as I was to decide what to do next; and whatever
+happened I wasn't going to be sorry I'd let myself go. What I was sorry
+for was that I hadn't been able to "go" with my hands instead of only
+words.
+
+It wouldn't do merely to twiddle my thumbs, however; and after a while
+it struck me that the best thing would be to get another interview with
+old Gratz and just tell him the whole pretty story. If it did no good,
+it would do no harm, and certainly it would prepare him for any other
+scheme by von Erstein to prove Nessa to be a spy.
+
+At this point some one clapped me on the shoulder. "Hallo, Cousin
+Johann, whatever are you doing in this out-of-the-way place?"
+
+It was Hans. "If it comes to that, what are you doing, young man?"
+
+"There's a shindy on in the Untergasse, and I've been watching it. A
+lot of women kicking up a row about food, or something. It looked like
+getting warm, so I thought it time to go home."
+
+"Let's go and look at it," I said directly. I had heard rumours in
+England about bread riots and rather liked the idea of seeing one for
+myself, and I recalled what the tailor had said about it.
+
+The place was close at hand; and sure enough there was a big crowd and
+a noisy one, too. Quite a couple of hundred women with a sprinkling of
+men, and as much noise as at an Irish faction fight. We stood a minute
+or two at the corner of the street when Hans caught sight of a friend,
+and asking me to wait for him, ran off.
+
+I observed that although there were police about, the tailor was right
+in saying they were not taking the usual steps to stop the row; and I
+noticed also that the crowd was growing in numbers and moving in my
+direction.
+
+Then came the sound of smashing glass, with loud shouts from the women
+who clustered round the spot where the smash had been, and I went down
+the street far enough to see that a baker's shop had been forced.
+
+The police interfered then; but it was too late, and there were too few
+of them. Moreover, the mob had tasted blood, or rather smelt food; and
+soon afterwards there was another smash; this time a provision shop.
+The crowd had been allowed to get out of hand; and I saw some of the
+police rush away, presumably to telephone for more men.
+
+I was standing in the road at that moment and had to skip aside to
+avoid an open car which came rattling down the street toward the mob.
+An old lady and a girl were in the car, and as they passed me, the
+latter stood up and called excitedly to the chauffeur to stop.
+
+If it hadn't been a German he would never have been fool enough to have
+attempted to enter the street at all; but I suppose he had been told to
+take that route, and his instinct of slavish obedience to orders did
+the rest. The result was what any one might have foreseen.
+
+He was too late to turn back, and his one chance to get through was to
+have driven bang into the crowd and trusted to luck to clear a way. As
+it was, he came to a halt on the very verge of the crowd; and in less
+time than it takes to tell it, the car was the centre of a yelping,
+hungry mob of viragos to whom the sight of rich people in a costly car
+was like a good meal spread before a lot of famished wild beasts.
+
+Worse than this, moreover, was the fact that some ruffians who had been
+hanging back began to push their way toward the car, whose occupants
+were calling for the police. They might as well have cried for the
+moon; and every cry was greeted with jeers and yells of anger from the
+women around. The trouble soon thickened.
+
+One woman more reckless than the rest started a shout to have the two
+out of the car, and herself jumped on the step, grabbed the chauffeur,
+who seemed about paralyzed with fright, lugged him off his seat, and
+the crowd hustled and jabbed and cuffed him, till he was lost in the
+throng. Then some one opened the door of the car, and made a snatch at
+the dress of the girl, who set up screaming.
+
+This was too much; so I shoved and shouldered my way through, pushed
+aside the woman who had tried to grab the girl, and urged the two
+panic-stricken ladies to come out. They hesitated, however, and a
+filthy hooligan with a long iron-shod bludgeon barked curses at me for
+a Junker and aimed a vicious blow at my head. I managed to dodge it,
+and jabbed him one in return on the mouth which sent him staggering
+back and enabled me to snatch his stick away.
+
+Armed with this, I soon cleared a space about the car and again urged
+the two frightened occupants to leave it. The girl jumped out at once
+and had to help her mother, while I kept the mob at bay, and then
+fought a sort of rearguard action in miniature.
+
+But we hadn't a dog's chance of escape. The mother was half an invalid,
+and could only move very slowly, while the women round, furious at
+being baulked of their prey and led by the brute I had hit and a couple
+of his cronies who had come up meanwhile, surged round us like a lot of
+devils gone mad.
+
+We reached the pavement, however, and as I spied a deepish doorway, I
+changed my tactics and made for it, treating some of those who stood in
+the way pretty roughly. We were able to gain the doorway all right, and
+I hustled my two charges into momentary safety behind me and told the
+girl to keep hammering at the door till some one opened it, while I
+tried to keep the crowd back.
+
+It was no picnic; but I reckoned on being able to stem the rush for the
+minute or so until some one came in reply to the girl's knocking. It
+was in our favour that the fight we had already put up had rendered
+some of those in the front of the crowd a little chary about coming too
+close; and as the doorway was very narrow and the stick I had captured
+a long one, I put it across the outside, thus forming a useful barrier,
+and was able to hold it in position by standing back at arm's length,
+and thus almost out of reach of both the hands and feet of those in
+front.
+
+To my dismay, however, no attempt was made to let us enter the house,
+although the girl had kept up an incessant knocking. The mob soon
+tumbled to this and things began to look ugly. The old lady, scared to
+death and ill, was on the verge of collapse; the daughter, almost
+equally panicky and alarmed by her mother's condition, stopped
+hammering at the door and bent over her; the crowd was getting more
+furious every moment; those at the back began to push those in front
+forward, the brute I had struck first came on with the rest, and I came
+in for some pretty hot smacks and kicks.
+
+But the little barrier of the stick kept off the worst, and, as every
+second was of vital importance, since help might come from a
+reinforcement of the police, I took the gruelling and just held on.
+
+A couple more invaluable minutes were gained in this way when another
+of the men, a dirty little red-haired beggar, more wary than the
+others, tumbled to the weak spot in my defence--my hold on the stick.
+He tried his fists on my hands first, and finding that was no good he
+whipped out a pocket knife and jabbed me with it.
+
+I loosed the right hand and dropped him with a tap on the nose which
+brought the blood in a stream and gave him something else to think
+about. But his two companions had seen his little dodge and made ready
+to flatter it with imitation, so I had to adopt other tactics.
+
+I was pretty reckless by that time, and in no mood to be man-handled by
+a set of German roughs; so I changed the barrier into a weapon of
+offence; it made a fine sort of pike with its ironshod end; and I used
+it without scruple or mercy. I drove it slap into the face of the man
+who had struck me first, then into the chest of the fellow next him,
+and lastly downed a third with a crack on the skull.
+
+That accounted for all the men and took off a lot of the edge of the
+crowd's appetite for more. They fell back a pace or two and I stepped
+in front of the archway, swung the bludgeon over my head and swore that
+I'd brain the first person, man or woman, who moved a single foot
+forward.
+
+Nobody in the front ranks seemed in any hurry to accept the invitation;
+but again those at the back, who had no knowledge of the happenings,
+began to shove forward, and slowly the people in front were pushed
+forward against their will and despite their efforts to resist the
+pressure.
+
+The result was plain. I couldn't break every head in sight, of course,
+and I was at my wit's end what to do, when a really happy thought
+occurred to me. I had a lot of small money in my pocket, whipped it
+out, and sent it scattering into the street.
+
+"If it's money you want, there it is," I shouted at the top of my lung
+power, and sent a second lot after the first.
+
+It was a truly gorgeous scheme. I yelled loud enough for nearly all to
+hear, and the flash of the coins did the rest; the pressure round the
+mouth of our shelter was relieved instantly, and both back and front
+rows joined in a fearsome scramble in the middle of the road, where I
+had been careful to shy the money. I never saw a finer scrimmage in my
+life.
+
+"We can go," I called to the couple behind me, seeing that the pavement
+was clear enough for us to get away. But the elder woman had fallen and
+was incapable of any effort whatever.
+
+"Have you any small money?" I asked the girl. "My own's all gone."
+
+She felt her own pockets and in the handbag on her mother's arm and
+gave all she could find.
+
+It was enough to keep the crowd busy for another minute or two, and I
+stepped out, and just as the people were easing off from the first
+diversion of the scramble, I yelled out that there was more to come,
+and flung the whole lot broadcast among the tossing heads, taking care
+to shy it as far down the street as possible. There was an instant rush
+for it.
+
+I slipped back into the doorway, picked up the old lady and made a dash
+for it, telling the girl to bring the stick with her and keep close to
+the houses, which by that time were all shut and barred.
+
+We managed to get some yards toward the street corner when two of the
+men who had given us trouble spied us, and, thinking that I was now
+unarmed, came rushing in pursuit, calling to a lot of the others to
+follow.
+
+They soon overtook us, and there was nothing for it but to put up
+another fight, this time without the friendly help of a doorway. I laid
+my burden on the pavement, took the stick from the girl, and turned to
+face the oncomers. The instant they saw I was still armed, they pulled
+up in surprise and hesitated. I promptly seized the moment of their
+consternation and went straight at them, clubbed the nearest and was
+making for the next when I heard a whoop behind me, suggesting an
+attack from the rear.
+
+I turned to meet it, and to my intense relief saw Hans standing by the
+two ladies. "Come on, Hans," I called, and he was by my side in a
+jiffy. We had a rough and tumble for a few seconds in which he joined
+like a brick, and then relief arrived. We heard the sound of horses,
+with the jingle of accoutrements, and the next moment a small troop of
+cavalry turned the corner of the street, and we left the rest of the
+proceedings to them. They soon scattered the mob, who fled in all
+directions except ours, and the street was quickly cleared, leaving the
+car the one conspicuous feature in the foreground.
+
+As the chauffeur was nowhere to be seen and the old lady couldn't walk,
+I sent Hans back to her and went to see if the car had been much
+damaged. It had certainly been in the wars; stripped of everything,
+even to the cushions, but the engine was all right, so I started it,
+climbed in, and backed to the spot where the ladies were.
+
+Then it flashed suddenly on me what an ass I was making of myself to
+let any one see that I knew anything about cars; but it was too late to
+make a pretence now, and I consoled myself with the reflection that
+there was no need to let the people know who I was.
+
+But there I reckoned without Hans. The mother had sufficiently
+recovered to get up, and was speaking to him when I reached them, while
+Hans and the daughter were casting sheep's eyes at each other in a
+fashion which told tales. They were evidently old friends, and a little
+bit more; and I wasn't, therefore, surprised when the mother knew me as
+Lassen, Hans' cousin.
+
+She was awfully sweet and grateful and the tears trembled in her eyes
+as she thanked me, holding my hand in both of hers, declaring that both
+she and her daughter owed me their lives, and making so much of the
+matter, that I had to chip in with a suggestion that she had better get
+home as soon as possible.
+
+"But how?" she exclaimed hopelessly. "Where's Wilhelm?"
+
+But Wilhelm, evidently the chauffeur, was nowhere to be seen; and there
+was nothing for it but to volunteer to drive the car myself.
+
+All this time friend Hans had been making the best of his opportunity
+with the daughter, who also thanked me profusely when I had helped her
+mother into the car.
+
+"Where am I to drive?" I asked as I took the wheel.
+
+"Hans knows the way," suggested the daughter, with the faintest little
+flush of confusion as she hazarded the suggestion. He grinned.
+
+"Come along then, Hans," I said; and he nipped in and told me where to
+go and which way to take.
+
+"Rather a nice little child," I said presently, chipping him; the girl
+was about sixteen, I guessed, as her hair was still down. But he
+resented the speech.
+
+"Child! She's only a year younger than I am," he exclaimed quite
+indignantly.
+
+"So that's how the wind blows, eh?"
+
+"I wish to Heaven I'd come up sooner; but I say, you did make a fight
+of it, cousin. Nita's been telling me all about it. She says they'd
+have been torn to pieces if it hadn't been for you. You're a lucky
+beggar!"
+
+"I don't take too kindly to that sort of luck, Hans, I can tell you."
+
+"I only wish it had been mine," he declared regretfully.
+
+"You did all right as it was when you came; and of course she saw you.
+Rather a pretty name--Nita."
+
+He smiled self-consciously and coloured. "But her mother didn't; if she
+had it might change her opinion and----" He didn't finish the sentence
+and exclaimed: "But I say, you do know how to handle a car!"
+
+This didn't suit me, however, so I went back to the pretty Nita. "The
+mother's against it all, eh?"
+
+"Only for the silly reason that we're too young. And I shall be an
+officer in a month or two; but the Baroness is like Rosa in that, she
+can't understand when a fellow's grown up."
+
+"It'll come all right when you've been in the army a year or two," I
+said consolingly.
+
+"A year or two," he exclaimed in some dismay.
+
+"Well, if she won't wait for you as long as that, she isn't worth
+bothering about, Hans."
+
+But he wasn't in a mood for any philosophic consolation. "But she will;
+she's said so a hundred times. There's no doubt about her; but there's
+something else; somebody else, rather."
+
+"And which are you? Number one or number two?"
+
+"Oh, I don't mean with her; but old Gratz has some one else."
+
+"And what's he got to do with it?"
+
+"Johann! Seeing that he's her father, he's got everything to do with
+it, of course."
+
+This was something like a jar in all truth. He was about the last soul
+in Berlin who ought to know that I had so far recovered my memory as to
+be able to handle the car. "Do you mean that this old lady is Baron von
+Gratzen's wife?"
+
+"Of course she is. I thought you knew it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+COMPLICATIONS
+
+
+The fact that it was Baron von Gratzen's wife and daughter whom I had
+managed to snatch from the clutches of the mob was startling, and might
+have vital consequences. But whether it would help or harm me, it was
+difficult to decide.
+
+The first impression was that it was rotten luck. By all accounts
+Lassen was far too great a coward to have faced the mob; and that fact
+alone was dangerous since it tended to emphasize the difference between
+us. More than enough had transpired in the interview with the Baron to
+show that he already suspected I was not Lassen; and this business
+might put the finishing touch to his suspicions. My handling of the
+car, moreover, might be accepted as an additional proof of the
+impersonation.
+
+There was of course another side. It was his wife and child who had
+been rescued; and if he hadn't a stone in place of a heart, he was
+bound to feel some amount of gratitude. But would that be sufficient to
+cause him to smother his suspicions?
+
+The German official is commonly a two-natured individual; showing one
+side in his private life and the other in his office. His manner to me
+that morning had been friendly enough; but that was after his
+suspicions had been quieted and he had regarded me as Lassen. What the
+effect would be when his suspicions were again roused, it was
+impossible to say.
+
+If he was like many of those I had known in the old days, he would be
+quite capable of professing and even feeling the deepest gratitude
+privately and at home, and the next minute at his office regretting,
+with tears in his eyes, that his duty compelled him to pack me off to
+gaol. That's the worst of Teutonic sentimentality. It's pretty much
+like a compass needle in an electric storm; you never know where it
+will point next.
+
+When we reached the house nothing would satisfy the Baroness but that I
+should go in so that her husband should have an opportunity of thanking
+me; and in we went. It was a relief to find that he wasn't home; but
+she would not hear of my leaving until she was satisfied that I was not
+seriously hurt, and wished to send straight off for a doctor to examine
+me.
+
+Discussion resulted as usual in a compromise, and Hans carried me off
+to the bathroom. There was nothing the matter that soap and water and a
+clothes-brush couldn't put right. I was very dirty; had a bruise or
+two, a couple of scratches on my face, and a cut on my hand where one
+of the men had jabbed at it to make me release my hold of the stick.
+
+The last looked the worst, because of the drop or two of blood smeared
+about; but it didn't amount to anything, and I was really lucky to have
+got off so lightly.
+
+While I was removing the traces of the scrap, Hans told me a good deal
+more about Nita and the position of affairs in the von Gratzen
+household, together with his impressions of Nita's father.
+
+"I think he's a regular bear, you know. He is to me; but then he
+doesn't like me any more than I do him, worse luck," he said dolefully.
+
+"Do you think the best way to get any one to like you is to begin by
+disliking him?"
+
+"I didn't begin it; but he always scowls when he finds me here, talks
+to me as if I was a kid of ten, and calls me 'Hansikin.' It makes me
+regularly sick, I can tell you. Of course he's awfully decent to his
+wife and Nita, and they both worship him; and so does he them. But he's
+always trying to make fun of me; and he's such an artful old beggar
+that I never get a chance of scoring off him. I believe he's as big a
+humbug as any in Berlin. And I'm not the only one who thinks so, too."
+
+"What you've done to-day ought to change his opinion, Hans."
+
+"That's just my rotten luck. I came up too late to do anything, and
+even the little I did do, the Baroness couldn't see."
+
+"But Nita saw it."
+
+"And a lot he'll care for what she says. He'll just grin and say I was
+a good boy, or some such rot as that, and forget it."
+
+"We'll see about that. He'll know that no boy could send a grown man
+headlong into the gutter as you did."
+
+"Did I?" he cried excitedly.
+
+The truth was that he did not; but there seemed a chance of doing him a
+good turn, so I described a little fictional incident of the sort,
+telling him that he was too excited at the moment to remember anything.
+"It was the turning point of the whole show, Hans, for if the beggar
+hadn't been downed at that very moment, they'd have got us to a cert."
+
+"Do you think Nita saw it?" he cried boyishly.
+
+"How could she, when her mother was lying all but fainting on the
+pavement? She wanted all her eyes for her."
+
+"Just my luck!" he exclaimed with a disconsolate toss of the head, as
+we went downstairs.
+
+Nita and her mother had also been using the time to repair, and both of
+them appeared to have rallied from the shock. I had to go through more
+of the thanksgiving ceremonial. Only the plea of an urgent engagement
+got me out of a most pressing invitation to remain to supper in order
+to be thanked over again by the Baron; and I had to stem the torrent of
+gratitude by bringing Hans' part into action.
+
+"It's awfully sweet of you to give me all the credit, my dear madam,
+but you're overlooking my cousin's part; and you owe quite as much to
+him. I'm afraid there would have been a very different tale to tell, if
+he had not come up when he did."
+
+"I didn't know that," she exclaimed in great surprise; and I saw Hans
+and Nita, who were snugging it together in a corner, prick up their
+ears.
+
+"I don't want to make him blush," I replied, lowering my voice, and
+repeated the fable I had told him in the bathroom, garnishing it with
+one or two more or less artistic touches.
+
+"I didn't see all that."
+
+"Unfortunately at the moment you were not able to take notice of
+anything, I'm afraid."
+
+"Nita hasn't told me about it either."
+
+"She could not have had eyes or thoughts for any one but you just then.
+It's only natural, of course."
+
+"Then I've done the boy an injustice, Herr Lassen."
+
+"Boy!" I echoed with a start. "No boy could have done what he did, and
+no man could have behaved more bravely;" with special emphasis on the
+"man."
+
+It worked all right. After a moment she called him up, repeated the
+pith of the story, and showed her gratitude in a way that made him
+blush like a girl. Then she kissed him and declared, to the profound
+delight and astonishment of them both: "That's a good-bye kiss to the
+boy, Hans. I shall never think of you as one again after this; neither
+will the Baron, I am sure. You must stop to supper and hear what he
+thinks of it."
+
+He was so overwhelmed by all this that he could scarcely stammer out
+his acceptance of the invitation, and when I was leaving he came to the
+door and couldn't say enough to thank me. He had a very hazy idea of
+all that he had really done, and it wasn't surprising that, being a
+German, he was ready to accept the story as gospel and rather to preen
+his feathers over his own prowess.
+
+Still he was a decent youngster, and his little harmless swagger was
+very intelligible. "I say, cousin," he added as he opened the door, "I
+wish you'd do me a favour and tell Rosa. She'll believe it, if you say
+it."
+
+"Of course I will. I'm taking the Karlstrasse on my way," I promised
+readily. I wanted to hear if there was any news about the progress of
+our "conspiracy." The afternoon's affair wasn't all honey, for there
+was the question of its effect on the Baron; and the sooner my back was
+turned on Berlin the better.
+
+It was old Gretchen's job to attend to the front door, and when she
+answered my ring, she told me no one was at home, and that Rosa had
+left a parcel for me. A glance showed that the paper wrapper was torn
+and that the packet had been put up clumsily as if in a great hurry by
+unskilled fingers. Gretchen had evidently been curious about the
+contents.
+
+I opened it in her presence, therefore, as there could be no harm in
+her having a second look at it, and found a quaint card-case inside,
+with some cards printed, "Johann Lassen," and a line saying she thought
+I should understand and find them useful. It was rather neat of her,
+and clearly was intended as an assurance that she meant to keep our
+secret.
+
+She came in soon afterwards and I thanked her for it. She was pleased
+that she had succeeded in making her intention clear; but she wasn't so
+pleased when she heard that old Gretchen had had a peep at the
+card-case. Nor was she at all overjoyed at the story of the afternoon's
+doings in the Untergasse. She looked mighty grave about it, indeed.
+
+"I'm not going to say I'm pleased about it, Johann," she declared. We
+had agreed that it would be better practice for us to use the Christian
+names even when alone. "It wants thinking over."
+
+"Your reason?"
+
+"Von Gratzen. You saw him this morning, didn't you?"
+
+I nodded and gave her a very brief report of what had occurred and that
+he had been quite friendly.
+
+She shook her head. "You'll have to be awfully careful with him. He
+knows, as well as I do, that my cousin is an arrant coward, and that no
+man in all Berlin would be less likely to do what you did this
+afternoon; or could have done it, in fact. The Baron's a man I could
+never understand. No one can. He does the most extraordinary things;
+he's horribly keen and shrewd; quixotic at one time and abominably
+harsh at another; although from his manner you'd think he wouldn't hurt
+a fly."
+
+"Well, let's hope he'll show his quixotic side over this, for it's too
+late to alter things;" and we were still discussing it when Feldmann
+arrived, and she asked him eagerly for news.
+
+"There's a hitch, I'm sorry to say. About Hans," he reported with a
+worried look. "His permit to travel has been refused. They won't
+release him from his training even for twenty-four hours. I did all I
+could, I assure you, Rosa."
+
+"And about the other?"
+
+"Oh, that's all right, of course. A mere matter of form; and it will be
+ready to-morrow, I expect. But one's not much use without the other."
+
+"Johann could use yours, Oscar," suggested Rosa.
+
+"Not on any account," I protested. "Herr Feldmann might get into no end
+of a mess."
+
+"It isn't that, Lassen. I'm so well known all along the line that it
+would be hopeless. You'd be spotted in a moment. I'd run the risk like
+a shot otherwise; I know how Rosa feels about it."
+
+"What can we do?" she exclaimed, turning to me.
+
+"Make the best of it. Nessa must go without me, if I can't get off; and
+there's no chance of that tomorrow. Will the papers have a definite
+date for the journey?"
+
+"I gave the date we agreed, but I dare say I could get that altered to
+allow us a margin of a day or two, perhaps a week; but then this
+wedding is the excuse; and of course that date can't be altered. But I
+could see Miss Caldicott into Holland all right."
+
+"What, with a false passport!  It's awfully good of you to offer, but
+I'm sure she wouldn't hear of it for a second. No; we must try the
+other way."
+
+"What's that?" he asked.
+
+He shook his head ominously at the mention of von Gratzen. "I know a
+lot about him, and I wouldn't put a pfennig's reliance on any hope from
+that quarter," he said emphatically. "I don't say he won't do anything,
+mind you, because one never knows what he will do next. He's one of the
+sharpest and ablest men in the country; we all admit that; but----" and
+he gestured and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Unreliable?" He nodded. "In a shifty unscrupulous way, you mean?"
+
+"Oh dear, no; not that at all," he said vigorously. "Individual. That
+is the best word. If he thinks a thing should be done, he does it
+whether it is according to official rules or not. That is not German.
+He is not thorough, as we understand the word."
+
+There remained only the other plan--that Nessa and I should get away in
+some disguise, and at a tentative suggestion about false papers,
+Feldmann laughed.
+
+"You will easily understand that when a people are subject to so many
+rules and regulations as we are, plenty of men set their wits to work
+to break them. False identification cards are as common as false coins,
+and if you knew where to go, a few marks would buy one, or a genuine
+one either, for that matter," he declared; but he made no offer to get
+them, and it was better not to press the thing farther then.
+
+I left soon afterwards. The failure to get Hans' permit and all that
+had passed about von Gratzen served to make the position more and more
+difficult and complicated. The man seemed to be an enigma even to those
+who were in constant touch with him, and it was ridiculous to imagine,
+therefore, that any one who had only seen him once should understand
+him. A close and careful review of the interview with him threw no
+light on the matter. He had been exceedingly kind and friendly; but
+there had been a moment of startling contrast. That one keen look of
+his; so sharp, intent and piercing that it had seemed almost to change
+him into a different man; and it might well be accepted as the one
+instant in which the mask had been allowed to drop.
+
+In the morning there was another incident. A curt formal summons
+arrived summoning me to his office at noon. This, after the previous
+day's job in the Untergasse! He might at least have had the decency to
+write a private note; and naturally enough the thing increased my
+uneasiness.
+
+And then, if you please, it turned out that he had named that time as
+it was the hour when he went home to lunch and wished to take me with
+him! How could one judge such a man?
+
+I put the note before him, with a word to the effect that I had thought
+it was on official business, and he laughed it away, saying he had told
+his secretary just to ask me to call.
+
+He couldn't make enough of me; kept speaking to me as "My boy," and "My
+dear boy"; smothered me with protestations of gratitude; and capped it
+all by asking me to make his house my home while I was in Berlin.
+
+That didn't appeal to me in the least. "Wouldn't it be very invidious,
+sir, if I was to go to you when I've only just left my aunt's?"
+
+"I've a good mind to use my official power to compel you, my boy," he
+returned laughingly; "but the wife shall talk to you about it. In any
+case you must promise to let us see as much of you as possible."
+
+That was easy to promise; and after a few moments we went out together.
+
+If he wasn't sincere, then he was one of the best actors in the world
+either on or off the stage.
+
+Which was he?
+
+I could find no answer to the question. Yet everything probably
+depended upon it--Nessa's fate and my freedom, and possibly even my
+life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE PROBLEM OF VON GRATZEN
+
+
+As soon as we were in the street von Gratzen linked his arm in mine.
+"It won't do you any harm to be seen in public with me," he said
+jestingly; and even in that half-bantering remark he managed to convey
+a subtle meaning.
+
+"I can understand that, sir."
+
+"And now I want to hear all about that affair yesterday."
+
+"I expect you've already heard what there is to tell."
+
+"Of course I've had my wife's and Nita's story, but I want yours. I may
+need your statement for official purposes, you see."
+
+"I would rather not have to do anything official," I replied. An
+appearance as witness in any police proceedings was unthinkable.
+
+"Don't let that worry you; I'll make it all right. But the affair was
+by far the most serious of the sort we've had, and I want all the facts
+available. That's all."
+
+He listened to my description of the scene; questioned me about the men
+in it particularly, asking if I could recognize them; and laughed
+outright at the story of the scramble for the money.
+
+"It was a stroke of genius, boy; positive genius," he declared, and
+asked me how much I had thrown away. A very German touch. I expected
+him to offer to repay me; but he spared me that and let me continue the
+story. When I came to the closing part, I made the most of Hans' share,
+declaring that if it had not been for him the result would have been
+very serious, and that he had acted like the brave man he was.
+
+It made an impression; but he did not evince anything like as much
+interest as in the other parts.
+
+"You've left out one thing, haven't you, my boy? Something that pleased
+me exceedingly and set me thinking. I mean about your being able to
+drive the car. Nita says you not only drove like an expert, but were
+able to put the engine right."
+
+Nita had much better have held her tongue, was my thought. "I was
+awfully perplexed about it myself afterwards," I replied, feeling
+deucedly uncomfortable.
+
+"You haven't had anything to do with cars since you came, have you?"
+
+"Not a thing, of course. That's what worried me. I just went up to it
+as if it was the most natural thing in the world--I didn't have to
+touch the engine, though--and got in and drove it."
+
+"You see what it means, of course. Why, that it was an instinctive
+recurrence of memory. It was most fortunate."
+
+That was a matter of opinion, however; but as we reached the house then
+no more was said about it.
+
+At lunch all the talk was on the subject of the scrap. They were full
+of it, and went over the ground again and again until one might have
+thought I had won the Iron Cross by some conspicuous act of most
+gallant bravery and resource.
+
+That was the sentimental side, and, at first, when the Baron and I were
+alone afterwards smoking in his sanctum, he grew even more
+embarrassingly flattering. "It's no good your trying to belittle the
+affair, my dear boy. If it hadn't been for you, Heaven alone knows what
+would have happened to my wife and Nita. I haven't a doubt that it
+would have killed the wife. She is not strong; she has been very ill;
+and is only just pulling round. The marvel is that she hasn't
+collapsed, as it is."
+
+I tried to protest, but he wouldn't listen to me.
+
+"I tell you my blood runs cold when I think what those devils would
+have done if they had got hold of her. I know that sort of Berliners;
+they'd have torn the clothes off her back and mauled and beaten her
+without mercy. And it was only the fortunate fact that you were present
+and acted so bravely that saved her. I shall never forget it; never;
+and if there's anything I can ever do to prove that I mean what I say,
+I shall grip the chance with both hands."
+
+"You are very kind, sir."
+
+"Don't talk in that way about kindness. I should be an ungrateful brute
+if I did not mean it. You can judge how I feel when I tell you that if
+my son had lived I would have him just like you;" and there was
+moisture in his eyes as he stretched out his hand and wrung mine
+impulsively.
+
+That he was in earnest it seemed impossible to doubt. He sat looking at
+me steadily for a while and then surprised me. He leant forward and
+fixed his eyes on mine. "I want to ask you a question. Are you sure you
+have never seen me before?"
+
+Rosa's warning flashed across my thoughts. This might be a trap; so I
+returned his look with equal steadiness and shook my head. "I don't
+recollect it, sir."
+
+"Try to think. Try hard. Look back over the years to when you were a
+boy."
+
+Of course I "tried," and equally of course failed.
+
+He dropped back in his chair with a sigh which seemed to breathe the
+essence of sincere regret, and after a moment said with almost equal
+earnestness:
+
+"You know all I have said to you; you believe it, believe that I am
+really a friend to you?"
+
+"Of course, sir. No one could speak as you have otherwise," I replied,
+smiling. It was a queer question.
+
+"Then, believing it, is there anything you would care to tell me?"
+
+What the dickens did this mean? I smothered my doubts under another
+smile and then nodded. "There is one thing, sir." His face lighted and
+he was all expectation and interest on the instant.
+
+"It's about the man you mentioned yesterday--Count von Erstein."
+
+His look changed directly. All the light and eagerness died away and he
+put his cigar back in his lips. "Oh, about him, is it? Well?" he asked,
+as if the subject didn't interest him in the slightest.
+
+But he listened carefully to the account of the interview with von
+Erstein, squinting at me curiously whenever Nessa's name was mentioned,
+and seemed sufficiently interested to put some questions about her.
+
+"An ugly story, my boy, very ugly; although I'm not much surprised,
+knowing the man. But why have you told me?"
+
+"Because I wish you to be prepared if he still tries to carry out his
+infernal scheme."
+
+He smiled. "And because you're naturally indignant, eh?"
+
+"I am. For my cousin's sake. The two are very old friends."
+
+"I see. Then it's not for the girl's own sake?"
+
+What the deuce was he driving at? His manner kept me guessing all the
+time. "Partly for her sake, of course. That sort of beastliness always
+makes me wild."
+
+"I can understand that, my boy, and am glad to hear it. Just what I
+should expect of you. Is she pretty?"
+
+"I suppose she is in an English way," I replied, shrugging.
+
+"It's not because she _is_ English that you feel like this?"
+
+"I hope I should feel much the same if she was a Hottentot, sir."
+
+"I wish all our young fellows were the same. Well, for your sake, I'll
+see that she comes to no harm. I presume, however, that you are quite
+sure she is not really a spy? Very serious, just now, you know."
+
+"My cousin is, and she has known her many years."
+
+"Then why doesn't the girl go home?"
+
+"It's her one absorbing wish, sir. She has been trying for months to
+get permission, but von Erstein has managed to stop it."
+
+He nodded once or twice and leant back in his chair thinking until he
+glanced at the clock and rose. "Time's up. I must get back. I make a
+point of being back always to the tick. It's a hobby of mine. I'll
+think over all you've told me, for I'm interested in it; far more so
+than you may imagine. I'll make an inquiry or two about this Miss
+Caldicott, and if it's all right, she shall go home. You can tell your
+cousin so. But it's a long way and a bad time for her to travel alone."
+
+"I don't think she would mind that a bit, sir."
+
+"You make a very earnest champion, my boy; but let me give you a hint.
+Don't let any one else get the same idea. I mustn't take you away with
+me now, unless you wish to make an enemy of my wife. You must stay and
+be heroized for a while. Now mind, don't fail to come to me, if you're
+in any sort of difficulty," he said.
+
+"I certainly will come, sir."
+
+As we went out into the hall and were shaking hands, he said, "By the
+way, I've had the doctor's report about you; and Gorlitz is very strong
+about our sending you to England to see if the environment would bring
+your memory back. What think you?"
+
+It was all I could manage to prevent him seeing what I did think of it
+in reality, but I stammered, "I'm quite in your hands, sir."
+
+He laughed softly and with such meaning. "Perhaps we could kill two
+birds with one stone, then. How would it do for you to take this Miss
+Caldicott there with you?" And without waiting to hear my reply he
+went, leaving me in such amazement that I could have almost shouted for
+joy.
+
+But did he mean it? Or was it just a subtle test? A trap? I was
+worrying over this when his daughter came out to fetch me in for the
+"heroizing" business.
+
+Nita was quite a pretty girl, and now that she had recovered from the
+previous day's shock and had a rich colour in her cheeks and brightly
+shining eyes, I wasn't surprised at Hans' infatuation.
+
+"I do so want to speak to you alone," she said. "I want to thank----"
+
+"My dear young lady, no one has been doing anything else since I
+entered the house. Do give me a breathing space."
+
+She laughed; and a particularly sweet merry laugh it was. "I
+understand; but this is something special; something else, I mean."
+
+"Oh! Shall I guess?"
+
+With a start and a vivid blush she dropped her eyes, fiddled nervously
+with her blouse for a moment, and then looked up and laughed again. "I
+don't mind your guessing," she challenged.
+
+"Something to do with----"
+
+She interrupted with some vigorous nods. "You did tell some taradiddles
+though. Hans didn't really do anything. I saw it all."
+
+"If he had not rushed up to me just when I called him, my dear young
+lady, none of us would have got out of the scrape as easily as we did,"
+I said seriously. It would never do for her to think small beer of her
+lover. "It was that and the way he went for the brutes that decided
+everything and sent them scuttling off."
+
+"But he didn't do anything, Herr Lassen!"
+
+"Do you mean to tell me you didn't see him knock that dark brute, the
+biggest of them I mean, head foremost into the gutter?"
+
+"Did he really?" she cried, open-eyed.
+
+"If you didn't see that, you can't have seen everything as you said."
+
+"But he told me he hadn't a chance to do a thing."
+
+"Bravo, Hans!" I exclaimed. "Just like him. You wouldn't expect him to
+spread himself and swagger about his own pluck, would you?"
+
+But all roads lead to Rome and so did this one. "He declared it was all
+your own doing, and after the way you fought before, I----"
+
+"Come along, let's go to your mother," I broke in, and linking my arm
+in hers I moved toward the drawing-room door. "Hans is one of the best;
+if he weren't, he wouldn't be so ready to give me the credit for what
+he himself did. But we can't have that, you know."
+
+She held me back a moment. "What you said about him has done wonders
+with mother; changed her right round; and we're going together to the
+von Reblings. Oh, I _do_ thank you so!" and being only a kid she
+squeezed my arm ecstatically.
+
+I had to endure a bout of "heroizing," but something came out in the
+course of it that made me put my thinking cap on afterwards. Nita
+playing chorus to her mother's praise as she repeated some of the
+pretty things von Gratzen had said to her about me.
+
+"I've never heard him speak in such a way of any one in my life
+before," she declared; "and he is so grieved about your extraordinary
+loss of memory. I think he is even rather provoked about it. He was in
+England as a young man, you know, and has made several visits there in
+later years."
+
+"I did not know that," I said, pricking up my ears.
+
+"He loves to talk of the country and the people, and, as you have just
+come from there, I am sure he is bitterly disappointed because you
+can't tell him about the things you saw and the people you met and all
+the rest of it."
+
+"It would have been very interesting to me too," I said.
+
+"You don't know how long you were there, I suppose?"
+
+I shook my head. It seemed less mean somehow to do that than to lie
+outright in words; and it answered all the purpose quite as well.
+
+"It must be a dreadful thing to lose one's memory," put in Nita.
+
+"It makes everything very difficult," I said with a shrug. It did.
+
+"And yet you can remember everything that's happened since, can't you?"
+she persisted.
+
+"Perfectly. As perfectly as if I had never had that shock."
+
+"It _is_ odd."
+
+Her mother took up the running again then. "My husband thinks you must
+have been a very long time in England," she said.
+
+"That's very interesting. Why does he?"
+
+"I don't know exactly. Of course it can only be a guess. But he
+declares you are much more like an Englishman than one of us. I fancy
+it's your reserved manner; the way he said you pronounced English to
+him; and then your knowing something of the English words of command.
+In fact he took you for an Englishman at first; and he questioned me
+ever so closely, almost cross-examined me indeed, as I told him, about
+your fighting yesterday, the way you used your fists, and so on. I was
+quite amused."
+
+My feeling was anything but amusement, however. "It's a thousand pities
+I can't tell him anything."
+
+To my surprise this seemed to make her laugh, and I thought it prudent
+to join in the laugh. But it was something else which had tickled her.
+"There was one thing he insisted upon worrying us both about. You
+remember, Nita?"
+
+"Do you mean the kicking, mother?" The latter nodded and Nita
+continued. "I thought it awfully funny, Herr Lassen, to tell the truth;
+at least I should have done if it had been any one else; but father
+always has a strong motive in such things. If he asked me one question
+he must have asked fifty, I'm sure, taking me right over every incident
+of yesterday, to find out whether in beating off those awful men you
+had ever once used your feet. I told him I was sure you hadn't; and he
+seemed to think it was a most extraordinary thing for a German to have
+used only his fists. Don't you think it silly?"
+
+"I don't know quite what to think of it," I replied truthfully.
+
+"For shame, Nita, your father is never silly," said her mother
+severely; but Nita had her own opinion about that, judging by the pout
+and shrug which the rebuke called forth.
+
+There was a moment's pause, and this offered me a chance to change the
+subject by putting a question about the war work which both were doing;
+and soon afterwards I left the house.
+
+It was clear as mud in a wineglass that von Gratzen was still undecided
+about me. That close questioning about my method of fighting was
+disquieting; so was the reference to my reserved English manner; and
+the reference to my pronunciation, especially as I had rather plumed
+myself on my American accent. It all pointed to the conclusion that my
+nationality was suspect in his opinion.
+
+He had been in England, too, and I myself knew how well he spoke the
+language. Altogether he was probably as well able to spot an Englishman
+as any one in the whole of Berlin. And yet all the while I had been
+flattering myself that he had been completely hoodwinked.
+
+At the same time no one could have shown me greater kindness. That he
+was really grateful for the previous day's affair was beyond doubt; it
+had appeared so to me anyhow; and his implied offer of help--that I
+should go to him in any trouble--made with such earnestness as to
+amount almost to insistence, all suggested an intention to be a friend.
+
+There was the reference to Nessa, again; his ready promise that she
+should be sent home "for my sake," and the startling proposal at the
+very last moment, that she should go in my charge, which had literally
+taken my breath away.
+
+What was one to think? It was a very puzzle of puzzles, especially in
+view of the unreliable vagaries of German officials in general and of
+what Rosa and the rest had said about von Gratzen in particular.
+
+What a lovely mix up it would be if his suggestion materialized and
+Nessa and I were packed off together under official protection! It
+seemed a million times too good to be even thinkable. Compared with
+such a gloriously gorgeous plan, our little conspiracy scheme seemed
+almost contemptibly mean and commonplace; scarcely worth bothering
+about for a moment. But it was best to have as many strings to the bow
+as possible, so I went to the von Reblings' to hear if Rosa had
+anything to tell me about it.
+
+Ought the others to be told of the fresh development? It seemed better
+not for the present. It was hard luck to have to keep such stunning
+news secret, but there was nothing to be gained by raising Nessa's
+hopes until they were virtually certain to be fulfilled. What would she
+think of the notion? I hoped I could guess. Being a bit of a sanguine
+ass, I started castle-building on the foundation, and by the time the
+Karlstrasse was reached, I had planned, built, and furnished a very
+noble edifice indeed.
+
+Old Gretchen opened the door as usual, and her look and start of
+surprise and general manner, suggesting something uncommonly like
+consternation, brought me down to earth and shattered my castle
+effectively.
+
+"They are not at home, sir," she declared hurriedly; and instead of
+opening the door wide, she held it so as really to block my entrance.
+Her obvious nervousness probably accounted for a step which at once
+roused suspicions.
+
+"No one at all?"
+
+"No, sir. They will not be home until late."
+
+"That's a nuisance; but I'd better speak to Miss Caldicott."
+
+"She's not in either, sir." The reply was given hesitatingly, and she
+made as if to shut the door.
+
+A smile and a casual, "Oh well, it doesn't matter," put her off her
+guard and her relief was shown in her change of look. "Can I give them
+any message, sir?" she asked. But her relief vanished and gave place to
+greater concern than ever when I pushed the door open and stepped
+inside.
+
+"That's a good idea, Gretchen; I'll write them a little note," I said,
+as I passed her in the direction of the drawing-room.
+
+She slipped before me and stood by the library. "You'll find paper and
+everything here, sir," she smirked.
+
+It looked as if she wanted to keep me from the drawing-room; and it was
+not difficult to guess that she had been disturbed at her spy work
+there. It was a bad shot, however; for during the pause there came the
+murmur of voices in the drawing-room itself.
+
+"You must be wrong, Gretchen. They must have come in without your
+knowing. I can hear them."
+
+"Oh, no, sir. The door's locked. I have orders always to keep it locked
+when the Countess is not at home;" and she held up the key in proof and
+slipped between me and the door.
+
+I started with a great appearance of alarm and pushed past her. "Then
+there's a thief in the house," I exclaimed.
+
+At that instant there was the sound of some sort of commotion in the
+drawing-room; a cry of "How dare you?" in Nessa's voice, followed by a
+sneering laugh, uncommonly like von Erstein's.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"LIKE OLD TIMES"
+
+
+I snatched the key from Gretchen, who was now very white and shaky,
+opened the drawing-room door and was going to rush in, when it occurred
+to me that if Nessa was caught off her guard, she might let out
+something.
+
+"All right, Gretchen, thank you," I said, loudly enough for Nessa to
+hear.
+
+The woman flung up her hands and bolted, and I went in as if making an
+ordinary call.
+
+Nessa had rushed into the conservatory to escape from von Erstein and
+came back as I entered, her face flushed and her eyes ablaze with
+furious indignation, while he, dumbfounded and looking as black as
+thunder, scowled at me viciously.
+
+"This man has grossly insulted me, Herr Lassen!" she cried. "Taking
+advantage of the Countess's absence, he got me here on the pretence of
+a message to be given to her, and then---- Ugh! I can't speak it;" and
+she dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+
+"I only took your advice, Lassen, and asked Miss Caldicott to marry
+me," he said sullenly. "And then she----"
+
+"Did you advise that?" broke in Nessa, starting up excitedly.
+
+That wasn't the moment to explain things, of course. Something had to
+be attended to first. I walked up to von Erstein with intentional
+deliberation, feeling a little thrill of joy at the fright in his eyes,
+put my hand on the collar of his coat, and led him towards the door. He
+was too abjectly scared to make more than the merest show of resistance.
+
+"Have you anything more to say to him?" I asked Nessa, halting when we
+reached the door.
+
+"No, no. Only send him away. Send him away," she exclaimed.
+
+I took him out into the hall and then released him. "I'm going to
+thrash you, von Erstein. Two reasons. You made your spy here lock this
+door so that you could have that girl to yourself; and yesterday you
+said things which made me itch to thrash you then."
+
+"I didn't mean----"
+
+"That'll do. Don't tell any more lies."
+
+He tried to bluster. "You'd better not strike me, Lassen; I can----"
+
+A smack on the face, given with all my strength, caused the threat to
+die stillborn and also showed the stuff he was made of. He pretended
+that the force of it knocked him down and nothing would induce him to
+get up again. So the fight ended where it began, as I couldn't hit him
+while he lay on the ground. Regretting that the one smack had been such
+a poor one, I dragged him into the hall, plopped him on to the doormat,
+and chucked him his hat, swearing that if he stopped in Berlin, the job
+would be finished in workmanlike fashion. He squirmed there long enough
+to see that no more was coming, then opened the door, paused to curse
+and threaten me, and bolted.
+
+Nessa was furious, and her first question showed that some of her anger
+was for me. Von Erstein's little shaft about my "advice" had gone home.
+"Is what that man said true? Did you advise him to ask me to marry
+him?" the emphasis strongly on the "advise."
+
+I nodded; and very naturally her lip curled.
+
+"I wouldn't have believed it possible," she exclaimed.
+
+"He told me yesterday about things and I asked him if he had asked you.
+If that's advising, I advised."
+
+"And yet you know the kind of man he is and that he has been
+persecuting me in this fashion?"
+
+"But anyhow I didn't advise you to accept him."
+
+"Jack!" she cried indignantly.
+
+"Herr Lassen's safer, and in German too."
+
+"It's almost enough to make me say I'll never speak to you again."
+
+"Worse than he is, eh?" It was really a curious thing, but we never
+seemed able to resist a chance of misunderstanding one another; and
+when she took this line, it was impossible for me to resist chipping
+her.
+
+"Did you thrash him?" she asked after a pause.
+
+"No; not an easy job in the circs."
+
+"You've developed a wise discretion," she said with a smile which
+wasn't exactly soothing.
+
+"He's a fellow with a lot of influence, you see."
+
+There was one feature about our tiffs; they generally ended all right;
+and this time she seemed to realize that we were off the lines. She
+thought a while and her manner changed. "Do you want me to believe that
+after what happened here and what I said, you just thanked him and
+shook hands? Because I don't believe it. I heard you hit him. That's
+why I asked if you'd thrashed him."
+
+"I smacked his face, as a sort of preface, but he lay down and wouldn't
+get up, so I had to cart him out to the front door. A poor show; but I
+fancy he'll give me a wide berth in the future. Would you care to tell
+me what passed?"
+
+"He sent up that woman, Gretchen, to say that he was leaving Berlin and
+that the Countess had given him a message for me about something she
+had of his. I was only too thankful to hear he was going away, and when
+I got down, she locked the door. It was all planned, of course; and he
+asked me to marry him, and when I gave him his answer, he grabbed hold
+of me and kissed me. I broke from him and rushed into the conservatory,
+intending to get out that way into the garden; but he had fastened the
+window, and when I was trying to get it open, you came, thank Heaven."
+
+"I guessed that was about the size of it."
+
+"I was never more relieved in my life."
+
+"Even though it was only me."
+
+"Yes, even though it was only you." This with a smile, however, which
+quite belied her indifferent tone.
+
+"Well, it's all right now. As a matter of fact he has found it wise to
+leave in consequence of a hint I gave him yesterday."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+"Better let it wait a while." There was nothing to be gained by telling
+her the truth. "I came to see if there is any news."
+
+"There is, unfortunately. I've received an order from the police to
+report myself to-morrow."
+
+"The deuce you have! I wonder what that means. Who signed it?"
+
+"Baron von Gratzen."
+
+I stared at her in amazement. Confound the man. Here he was cropping up
+again in this mysteriously unexpected fashion. "When did you get it?"
+
+"Only a minute or two before that man called."
+
+What on earth could it mean? It looked as if he had gone straight from
+his promise to help her to leave and then sent this. "Where have you to
+report?"
+
+"The Amtstrasse," and she handed me the paper. It came from his offices
+and was signed in his own handwriting.
+
+"I give it up. These beggars beat me every time. Only an hour or two
+back he told me that you should be sent back home," and I told her
+about that part of the interview and that he had said I could tell
+Rosa. "It's true he said something about making some inquiries about
+you, so as to be satisfied you're not a spy."
+
+"Then of course he's going to begin by questioning me himself."
+
+"Possibly, but--I get such different reports about him. You'll have to
+look out, too. He's sure to cross-examine you about me. I can't get it
+out of my head that he suspects I'm flying under the wrong flag. You'd
+better never have seen me before, mind; and whatever you do, look out
+for traps and things; and he's as artful as a cartload of monkeys at
+the game."
+
+She was tremendously excited by the news about going home. I had to
+repeat every word he had said about it, and of course she got out of me
+that he had spoken about our going home together.
+
+"Oh, wouldn't that be lovely!" she exclaimed.
+
+"To go with me?"
+
+"To go with any one, of course," she said with sudden indifference. "If
+you'd been through half that I have and had a quarter of the suspense
+I've had to endure, you'd be glad too."
+
+"I'm glad enough, as it is. I think this beastly climate is anything
+but healthy for either of us just now."
+
+"Oh, to be free once more!" she cried with a deep, deep sigh of
+longing. "Do you know that more than once I've been on the point of
+risking everything and just bolting and chancing my luck."
+
+"Which reminds me that I'd better tell you the spare wheels I've been
+thinking about, if these other tyres burst. I haven't had much chance
+of talking to you yet, you know."
+
+"We had one interview," she reminded me, her eye dancing.
+
+"We'll try to do a bit better this time. The best thing will be old von
+Gratzen's scheme, if it comes off."
+
+"We should have to be together a long time, if it does."
+
+"Rather rotten, eh? But I could bear it, I think, if you could."
+
+"I should have to, naturally."
+
+"We could discuss our old grievances, at the worst."
+
+"And at the best?" she said demurely, trying not to laugh.
+
+"Find fresh ones to jingle-jangle about. But you'll have to behave
+yourself; for I shall be a German for the first part of the trip,
+remember."
+
+"And if you don't behave yourself, I can tell people you're not one.
+You'll have to remember that, mind."
+
+"Behave myself? Meaning?"
+
+"That you're not to talk nonsense then or now; so go on to the spare
+wheels, please."
+
+"All right. The next best will be for you to use Rosa's ticket and so
+on, and travel with her Oscar."
+
+"But Rosa said you wouldn't hear of that, and you don't imagine I'm
+going to let the man run that risk for me. Any more wheels?"
+
+"One. That if the worst comes to the worst, we just disappear and
+chance the weather;" and I described my idea--to go in disguise as a
+couple of mechanics.
+
+"They're using a lot of women, but not as mechanics yet," she said.
+
+I laughed. "But you'd go as a boy, Nessa."
+
+"As a what?" she cried in amazement.
+
+"I said boy. B-o-y. Easy word."
+
+She stared at me for a moment or two as if I was mad, and then her eyes
+lit up and she burst out laughing. "Do you know why I'm laughing?"
+
+"At me, probably."
+
+"Not a bit of it. Because it's exactly the idea I had. I have the
+clothes ready for it and a set of overalls; and often and often I've
+locked myself in my room, dressed up, and rehearsed everything. You
+know how I've played a boy's part in the theatricals at home; I can
+shove my hands in my pockets and swagger along just like one. I make
+rather a good boy."
+
+"Good?"
+
+"Good enough for a boy, anyhow," she replied, laughing again.
+
+"Show me."
+
+She rose, pushed hands down as if into her trouser pockets, and walked
+up and down the room with a free stride. "Give us a fag, mate," she
+said when she reached me. "That all right?" she asked, relapsing into
+herself and sitting down again.
+
+"Rather! Ripping! Why, you managed somehow to alter the very
+expression." She had. The change was wonderful. "With a touch or two of
+make-up not a soul would spot you. But you were always a bit of a boy,
+you know. Perhaps that accounts for it."
+
+"That meant for a compliment?"
+
+"Just as you take it. You were a self-willed little beggar, anyhow. Do
+you remember how shocked your mother was that night at the Grahams,
+when you came on their little stage as a boy?"
+
+"I do, indeed. Poor mother! She must have been awfully worried by all
+this; and is still, of course. But Rosa has written to a friend in
+Switzerland and asked her to wire that I'm all right; and perhaps by
+this time she's had the message. It's horribly wicked, I suppose, but I
+declare I feel so vindictive that I could almost kill that woman
+Gretchen and von Erstein too, when I think of what they've made poor
+mother suffer by stopping my letters."
+
+"He's a low-down swine; and if I get half a chance, I'll even things up
+with him before we leave. But we don't want to talk about him now. If
+your mother's got that wire, she'll feel heaps better. Now, tell me
+what you think of my third wheel?"
+
+"Shall I tell you the truth?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+She paused and the colour crept slowly into her face, robbing it of the
+worried anxiety which had so distressed me and making her as
+bewitchingly pretty as ever in my eyes. "If you will have the truth
+I'd--I'd like the third wheel better than either of the others."
+
+"Same here; but it wouldn't be so safe. We'll have the props with us,
+however, in case of mishaps. What say you?"
+
+"Carried unanimously," she cried enthusiastically. "It would be lovely!"
+
+"You haven't changed much, then, even with all this."
+
+"Do you mean in looks?"
+
+"Not much there, even; but I meant in the tomboy business."
+
+"Ah, you don't know. I have changed. I've grown up, suddenly. It
+couldn't be otherwise," she answered very seriously. "At one time it
+looked a certainty that I should be sent to gaol, and the suspense
+was--well, almost unbearable. No one can tell what it meant to have to
+appear indifferent and confident, when I knew that any moment might be
+my last in freedom. That danger seemed to pass away, but only to give
+way to worse."
+
+"You mean this----"
+
+"Yes," she broke in with a quick nod. "I can't bear even to hear his
+name mentioned. I soon knew what his real object was; he has a friend,
+a man like himself, who is in command of one of the concentration
+camps: the one at Krustadt: and--but you can guess. There was only one
+thing for me to do, and I prepared for it. I have the poison upstairs."
+
+"Nessa!"
+
+"No woman can go through such an ordeal and come out unchanged. I
+should have made a fight for it, of course. I told Rosa, and, although
+she was horrified at first, she saw it afterwards, and then she got
+Herr Feldmann to get me an identification card as Hans Bulich, and
+helped me get the disguise. I should have gone by now, if you hadn't
+come. Oh yes, I'm changed; no one knows how much except myself."
+
+The drawn intentness of her expression at the moment showed this so
+plainly that I was too much moved to find any words to reply. But she
+rallied quickly and laughed.
+
+"And then when you came I was mad enough to believe you were a spy! I
+can't think why I was such a fool. There was no excuse; not the
+slightest; and I don't expect you ever to forgive me really."
+
+"I don't blame you. I don't, on my honour."
+
+"Well, I shall never forgive myself then. But--even now I can't help
+staring at you."
+
+"Stare away. I like it. But why?"
+
+"You're so--so utterly different."
+
+"How?"
+
+"In every way possible."
+
+"Think so. Every way?" Our eyes met and she looked down.
+
+"I wonder," she murmured under her breath; and then quickly in a louder
+tone: "Of course it's your new life. Tell me about it."
+
+We both understood; but that wasn't the time to tell her she need not
+"wonder"; so I spoke about things at the Front.
+
+"But I want your own experiences, Jack," she protested.
+
+"I'm Herr Lassen, the man without a memory."
+
+"You're just as provoking as ever. You know that I'm dying to hear
+everything, and you won't utter a word."
+
+"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It was all your doing."
+
+She crinkled her forehead in a way I knew so well. "How?"
+
+"Do you remember one day at Hendon--we were engaged then, by the
+by--how you ragged me about not having the pluck to go up and about
+cricket being so much safer a sport, and how I flung away in a huff and
+marched off and got a ticket at once and went up. That was the start."
+
+"And I remember, too, what a fright it gave me when I saw you go. I
+watched the aeroplane with my heart in my mouth all the time in a sort
+of fascinated panic lest something should go wrong."
+
+"And when I came to look for you I found you'd gone up too."
+
+"You don't suppose I meant you to crow over me, do you? And was that
+really the beginning?"
+
+"Of course. I went up lots of times afterwards and got to like it; and
+when the trouble came, naturally I saw it was my job."
+
+"Be a pal, and tell me all about what you did," she coaxed.
+
+"All in good time, but not now. We've been alone together quite long
+enough to set tongues wagging as it is. I'd better be off;" and I rose.
+
+"I suppose you're right; but it's been lovely. Like old times."
+
+"Which old times?"
+
+"Never mind. Don't be inquisitive."
+
+"All right. Well, look here. Go on with that boy part of yours. Get
+into the skin of it, and have the names of things pat on your tongue.
+One never knows what may happen. And if you could persuade Rosa to
+persuade Feldmann to do for me what he did for you, do so."
+
+"Sounds a bit mixed, doesn't it?" and she laughed with such genuine
+merriment that it did one good to hear her.
+
+"You must sort it out. So long. We'll pull it off somehow or other."
+
+"I think that's the oddest thing about you. You manage somehow to make
+me feel absolutely confident that you'll manage it. It's like a
+miracle. Only a day or two ago I was right down in the depths, and here
+I am laughing as if it were just one of our old kiddish pranks."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+IN THE THIERGARTEN
+
+
+The confidence of success which Nessa had so frankly expressed, she had
+certainly imparted to me. The fact that she had already hit on the idea
+of playing a boy's part in the attempt to escape, had obtained
+everything necessary for it, and had actually spent some time in
+rehearsing it, was a stroke of such luck, that I was more than half
+inclined to throw the other plans over and adopt that one at once.
+
+If by any means the necessary identification card could be got, the
+hope of success was strong and full of promise. Nessa could speak
+German quite as well as I could, and her accent, when she had put that
+question to me about the fag and her wonderful change of expression,
+had been done to the life.
+
+She had always been a clever character actress, and there was no doubt
+that she could keep it up in any sort of emergency. That she liked the
+idea, there was no question; and as for myself--the thought of such a
+companionship with her in such a venture pulled like a 200 h.p. engine.
+
+Her instinct was right, too, in chiming with her inclination. It was
+our best chance--failing old von Gratzen's, of course. Ever so much
+better than risking any trouble for Rosa by using her passport.
+Feldmann must be made to see that, for it might induce him to get the
+card for me.
+
+That night I went most carefully into all the details of the plan,
+trying to foresee all that might happen; and then I remembered the
+story which Gunter, my pal in the flying corps, had told me of his
+escape when engine trouble had brought him down inside the German lines.
+
+"It's only a matter of bluff, Jack," he said, "when one can jabber the
+lingo as we can, and a few simple precautions. Here's one of 'em. I
+never go up without it."
+
+"What the dickens is it?" I asked as he handed me what looked like a
+red flannel pad for his tummy.
+
+"Looks innocent, doesn't it? My 'tummy pad,' I call it. Just a
+protection against chills, eh? That's what they thought when they
+searched me. But inside the flannel there's a coil of silk cord long
+enough and strong enough to tie up a man's arms, and his legs too at
+need. It's my own notion; and since my little trip, I've added
+something more. Sewn up in the flannel there's enough put-you-to-by-by
+stuff to keep a man or two quiet for as long as necessary. If I'd had
+that, I shouldn't have had to risk knocking my guard on the head and
+choking the breath out of him."
+
+"Tell me, Dick."
+
+"Well, my chance came almost as soon as they'd got me. Of course I
+burnt the old bus and shoved my hands up, and after they'd made sure I
+wasn't armed, they just put one chap in charge of me with orders to
+take me somewhere. It was quite dark then and, pretending that I was
+beastly uncomfortable after the search, I fiddled about with my clothes
+and managed to get my cord handy. Then I picked a suitable spot, asked
+him some fool question or other, and went for him. He was only a fat
+Landsturmer and hadn't more than a few wriggles in him; but I had to
+bash him over the head to make sure--that's where I wanted the dope, of
+course. Then I changed togs with him, trussed him up with my cord and
+started off on my own. Bluff did the rest, all right."
+
+"But what did you do, old dear?"
+
+He laughed and lit another cigarette. "I marched into the first cottage
+I came to, scared the folk out of their lives, and in the name of
+Kaiser Bill commandeered clothes for a wounded prisoner. They parted
+like a lamb, and five minutes afterwards I was transformed into a
+workman."
+
+"But you'd no identification card?"
+
+This brought another quiet laugh. "I worked that all right. There are
+no asses in the world too bad to bluff if you go the right way about
+it. My way was to go to the police. I pitched a yarn that I was an aero
+mechanic and had been sent for to go hotfoot to Ellendorff, a little
+place close to the Dutch frontier where I knew there was a factory, and
+that I'd been waylaid and robbed on the road. It sounds thin as I tell
+it; but I had mucked myself up to look the part, and, above all, I had
+gone to the police, mind you; itself the best proof that I wasn't a
+wrong 'un: and I chose the middle of the night, when only one sleepy
+owl was on duty. He swallowed it all right, except that he thought I
+was drunk and at first wanted to keep me till the morning; but when I
+kicked up a fuss, told him he'd get into a devil of a row, and said
+he'd better call his boss, he thought better of it, gave me what I
+wanted and was thankful to see my back and go to sleep again. I had no
+more trouble; was stopped once or twice, but the card got me through;
+and I reached the frontier easily enough. Luck favoured me there. I ran
+across a couple of deserters, palled up with them, and--well, that's
+all."
+
+Gunter's story had made a big impression on me at the time, and in my
+old student days at Göttingen I had had quite enough experiences of the
+power of a good bluff on the average German official to know that it
+was quite feasible, so I resolved to profit by it now.
+
+I had plenty of time the next day to complete all the necessary
+preparations and added a few of my own devising. These were some "iron
+rations," in case of difficulties about our food supply; two or three
+tools, including a heavy spanner which would serve as a weapon at need;
+and a shabby suit case to hold everything.
+
+I packed everything into this, lifted a board under the lino in my
+bathroom, and hid it there, lest any one in my absence might take a
+fancy to go through my luggage.
+
+With a road map and a railway guide the route to be taken was soon
+decided. The Dutch frontier was to be the goal. It was much nearer than
+the Swiss; and as Westphalia was the region of factories, it was much
+more plausible that a couple of mechanics would travel that way, than
+in any other direction.
+
+Gunter's mention of the one at Ellendorff, a village near Lingen, and
+close to the frontier, suggested a good objective; and the rough idea
+was to make the journey in stages, so as to put people off the scent
+should suspicion be roused. It was safer than risking a trip in one of
+the through expresses, and also much easier to book from small towns
+than right through from Berlin.
+
+All this took up a lot of time, especially as it was interrupted by
+several spells of speculation about the result of Nessa's interview
+with von Gratzen. This was very important, as it would probably
+determine the method of our departure; and when my preparations were
+completed and I was carefully reconsidering them over a cigarette, some
+one knocked at the door of my flat.
+
+It was a stranger; a well-dressed, sharp-featured man and unmistakably
+a Jew. "Herr Lassen?" he asked. I nodded. "My name is Rudolff."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It would be better for me to tell you my business privately," he
+replied, with a gesture toward a couple of people passing on the stairs.
+
+I took him into my sitting-room with an extremely uncomfortable notion
+that he was from the police.
+
+"I am in a position to do you a considerable service, Herr Lassen," he
+said, squinting curiously round the room.
+
+"Who sent you to me and how did you know where to find me?"
+
+"Your arrival in the city is scarcely a secret, and I obtained your
+address from your friends in the Karlstrasse. No one sent me to you,
+sir."
+
+He wasn't from the police. That was a relief, and nothing else
+mattered. "And the service you spoke of?"
+
+"You will not be surprised to hear that a number of people wish to find
+you?"
+
+"As it's been easy for you, would it be difficult for them?"
+
+"Not so difficult as you might desire, perhaps. I say that because you
+appear somewhat to resent my visit. If that is really the case, of
+course I will go."
+
+"I don't care whether you go or stop; but if you've anything that you
+think worth telling, tell it. I'll listen. I presume you haven't come
+out of mere philanthropy, by the way."
+
+"I have not. I make no pretence of the sort. If the warning I can give
+you is worth anything, I am not so rich as to throw money away."
+
+"Out with it then." It was not only curiosity which prompted me to
+listen. It was probable that he was going to tell me some lurid
+incident of Lassen's past, and it was just as well to hear it. It was
+also quite possible that after all he might come from von Gratzen with
+the object of catching me tripping. His question suggested that.
+
+"It was at Göttingen, I believe, that you made the acquaintance of
+Adolf Gossen?"
+
+"I dare say, but I don't remember anything about it,"
+
+"Ah, of course. You are the man without a memory. I have heard of your
+misfortune," he said, with a sly suggestive glance.
+
+"And doubt it, eh? Well, suppose you get on with the story?"
+
+He took the hint, and it turned out to be about the same pretty affair
+von Erstein had made so much of. It seemed, according to my visitor,
+that some one was in prison because of it; that his friends, whose
+names he gave, were furious; that they were looking high and low for
+me; and that if I remained in Berlin they would find me and wreak their
+vengeance in any way that came handy. He declared he knew where to find
+them and they were prepared to pay for the information of my
+whereabouts.
+
+The thing was either a palpable plant or this fellow had come from von
+Erstein to try and frighten me out of the city.
+
+"Of course you mean that if I don't pay you, you will go to them?"
+
+"Not at all, sir," he cried, with a fine show of indignation. "I know
+these people to be scoundrels; they have treated me villainously; I
+have merely come to warn you. You can act upon it or not, of course.
+That is entirely a matter for you;" and to my surprise he got up
+without asking a mark for his news. "I have done all that I can do by
+coming."
+
+"I don't know anything about the affair, as I told you, but I'm very
+much obliged to you;" and I took out my pocket-book as a hint.
+
+"Pardon me, sir," he exclaimed, flourishing his hands as if the sight
+of banknotes was an abomination, and shaking his head vigorously. "I
+could not think of accepting any money after what you have said. Good
+afternoon;" and he was still gesturing at the shock of the idea when he
+left the flat.
+
+This was so extremely unnatural for a German Jew that it prompted
+suspicion. He had probably meant this pecuniary shyness as a startling
+proof of his honesty of purpose and general integrity.
+
+That wasn't the effect it produced, however. It rather served to
+confirm the previous thought that von Erstein had sent him to scare me.
+That the brute would do almost anything to see my back was a certainty,
+of course; and then an odd notion flitted across my thoughts.
+
+Whether it would be worth while to appear to tumble into the trap; go
+to him in the very dickens of a funk; make him believe my one object
+was to fly the country, in disguise, to Holland preferably; and get him
+to procure the necessary permit, etc. The possibility of hoisting him
+with his own petard looked good; and the thought of his chagrin when he
+discovered that he had helped me to take Nessa out of his clutches made
+the scheme positively alluring.
+
+That it could be done, there was little doubt, and equally none that he
+could get the necessary papers; but the price to pay for them was too
+stiff. To have anything to do with such a mongrel was unthinkable so
+long as any other course was open; so I abandoned it until every other
+means had been tried.
+
+The pressing question now was the result of Nessa's interview with von
+Gratzen, and I set off for the Karlstrasse to hear about it. This time
+the door was opened by the girl Marie; so I concluded that Gretchen had
+either bolted or been sent about her business as the result of the
+previous day's affair. Marie told me no one was at home and that Rosa
+had gone with Nessa and Lottchen to the Thiergarten.
+
+I soon found them; and Rosa played the part of the good fairy and kept
+the child with her while Nessa told me the news.
+
+"First let me tell you the good news," she said.
+
+"Do you mean that the other's bad then?"
+
+"Do have a little patience. The main thing is that Rosa has induced
+Herr Feldmann to say where we can get the things you want. Isn't that
+splendid?"
+
+"Yes, if you are able to get away with me; and that may depend on what
+passed to-day. Is it all right?"
+
+"You might as well ask me a riddle in Russian. Frankly I don't know
+what to make of it. Of course it was to see Baron von Gratzen that I
+had to go to the Amtstrasse. He seemed all right, but----" and she
+shrugged her shoulders and frowned.
+
+"That's just the impression he always leaves on me."
+
+"He was awfully kind in his manner; but it was lucky you warned me to
+be careful, for he kept popping in some question about you just when I
+wasn't expecting it, and whether I gave you away I can't say. I don't
+think I did; but then I'm not at all sure he didn't see that I was
+fencing."
+
+"What did he talk about?"
+
+"Oh, he told me first that some one had declared I was really a spy;
+asked why I had stopped so long here? Didn't I want to go home? and so
+on. Of course that was all easy enough; but I think he was only trying
+to let me get over my nervousness; for, of course, I was awfully
+nervous; and at last he said he believed my story entirely, in fact
+that he knew it was the truth; that I wasn't to worry; that I need only
+report myself once a week; that it was the merest formality; and that
+probably I should never have to do it all, as he was pretty sure I
+should be sent home before the first day for reporting arrived."
+
+"And was that all?"
+
+"Rather not; only the preface; and, mind you, he hadn't said a word
+about you up to then, not even mentioned your name."
+
+"What came next then?"
+
+"He asked me to talk about England and the English, saying that he had
+been there a lot and knew heaps of people; and then you came into the
+picture."
+
+"Did he ask about me, do you mean?"
+
+"Are you telling the story or am I?" and she rallied me with a smile
+which was good to see. She was much more like the Nessa of old times,
+was in good spirits, and had thrown off much of the worrying load of
+depression. "I don't know whether you've done it, but to-day somehow I
+can't take things seriously."
+
+"That's as it should be; but how did he bring me in?"
+
+"Well, he was either acting better than I could or he was perfectly
+sincere. What he did was to talk about people, mentioning a lot of
+names and asking me whether I knew any of them, and in the most casual
+tone in the world out popped yours."
+
+"Lassen?"
+
+"Of course not; your own, Lancaster."
+
+"Phew! That's a caution, if you like. What did you say?"
+
+She laughed softly. "I think I was one too many for him then. You see
+he'd prepared the ground in a way by mentioning people I'd never heard
+of, so I just shook my head, then pretended to think and said I wasn't
+sure that my mother had not known some Lancasters. He'd been so decent,
+that that seemed easier than just lying outright. He was eager for more
+and asked me to try and remember, as he had a very particular reason
+for being interested in them; but that looked dangerous, so I thought
+it best not to remember anything else Lancastrian."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Don't rush me. I could tell that I was over that bridge all right; but
+it was only the first. After a bit he brought up Jimmy Lamb's name, and
+I laughed and clapped my hands and said he was my brother-in-law. Why,
+what's the matter? Was that wrong?" she cried, noticing my frown.
+
+"Perhaps not, but it was Jimmy's passport I was to use, and he's
+supposed to have gone down in the _Burgen_. It won't matter,
+probably."
+
+"I'd forgotten all about that. No wonder he was interested and poured a
+volley of questions into me about him. But that was all safe enough,
+because I haven't heard a word about Jimmy since I've been here, and
+naturally couldn't tell him anything. One of them was whether Jimmy
+knew the Lancasters, by the by. And I can see why he asked it."
+
+Unpleasantly ominous, this; since it was clear he was trying to
+establish the connection between me and Jimmy. "And after that?"
+
+"Butter wouldn't have melted in his mouth. He asked me about you as
+Lassen; safe ground again: and wound up by thanking me for having
+answered his questions so frankly; declared he was quite satisfied, and
+then, as I told you, said he would use his influence to see that I went
+home."
+
+"Anything about our going together?"
+
+"Yes. He said it might not be well for me to travel alone and asked if
+there was any one who could see me to the frontier."
+
+"You didn't suggest me?" I broke in.
+
+"Really, Herr Lassen! Do you think every English girl is a fool? I
+suggested Herr Feldmann. He shook his head, murmuring something about
+his being unable to get away; and then came the only thing that really
+scared me. 'Of course you could go in the care of some of our people,
+but it would be better not, perhaps; so difficult to spare our folks
+just now;'--all that in a sort of meditative tone, and then with a
+change which in some way altered his very features, he fixed me with a
+look which seemed to pierce like red-hot gimlets into my very brain and
+read every thought in it, and asked me to suggest some one else. I
+positively shrivelled up inside, if you know what I mean; felt like a
+fish on the end of a fork thrust suddenly into a blazing fire. I don't
+know what I said or did. It must have mesmerized me, I suppose. I think
+I shook my head and stammered out that I didn't know of any one else;
+but I can't be certain. All I clearly remember is a feeling of intense
+relief when his eyes left mine, and I heard him say something about
+seeing to the matter. I never felt anything like it in my life before;
+and if I gave you away, it was then."
+
+"I've had a look from him like that and can understand how it made you
+feel. That's why I can't place the man. Hullo, look! There come his
+wife and daughter with the Countess. We'd better join up. Won't do to
+let them think we're too thick;" and we quickened up to Rosa as the
+others reached the spot, and all stood chatting. Presently Lottchen
+drew me aside from the rest, declaring that she never saw anything of
+me now, and after a moment, Nita, attracted by the child's loveliness,
+joined us.
+
+I said something or other which made them both laugh, and just as the
+others turned round and looked at us, I had the surprise of my life.
+
+A good-looking woman was passing, holding a tot of a kid by the hand;
+she glanced at me, stopped dead with a look of profound astonishment,
+paused to stare, hands clenched and pressed to her bosom, eyes wide,
+mouth agape, and every feature set as rigid as stone.
+
+"Johann!" little more than a whisper at first, and then loudly,
+"Johann!" and without more ado she rushed up, flung her arms round my
+neck, and burst into a flood of passionate sobs mingled with equally
+passionate terms of affection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+ANNA HILDEN
+
+
+"Johann! Johann! Oh, my dearest! Oh, thank God I have found you at
+last! Oh, my long lost darling!" raved the woman ecstatically, while
+her child ran up and clung to my coat, calling, "Papa! Papa!"
+
+A pleasant situation considering the circumstances and the fact that a
+number of other people, attracted by the woman's hysterics, began to
+cluster round us.
+
+Nita and Lottchen scurried back to our group; the two elder women were
+looking both scandalized and disgusted; and Nessa bent over Lottchen,
+scarcely able to conceal her laughter. Fortunately Rosa kept her head.
+
+Giving me first a look of scornful indignation, she said something to
+her mother and the whole group moved away.
+
+The woman's outburst of hysterical passion had quieted by then, and she
+just let her head rest upon my shoulder, feasting her rather fine eyes
+upon my face with languishing rapture.
+
+My first thought was that she was a lunatic; so I tried to unclasp her
+embrace. Gently at first, but then with considerable strength, for she
+resisted stoutly. Next I observed that for all her hysterical sobbing,
+her eyes were scarcely moist; a fact which put quite a different
+interpretation on the affair.
+
+"We don't want a scene here," I said.
+
+This had comparatively little effect and she tried to wrest her hands
+away and begin the embracing over again.
+
+"If we have any more of this, I shall call the police," I said sharply.
+This did the business. After a moment she grew less demonstrative,
+making a great to-do in the effort to check her agitation, and allowed
+me to lead her away.
+
+While we were shaking off the crowd there was time to study her and try
+to get a glimmer of the meaning of it all. Now that the hysterics were
+over, she appeared to be less emotional than perplexed. She kept her
+eyes on the ground, evidently thinking intently and taking no notice of
+the child at all, who was as unconcerned as if she didn't belong to the
+picture, except that once or twice she glanced up at the woman, as if
+wondering what to do and looking for a lead.
+
+A thought of the truth occurred to me and made me look more searchingly
+than ever at the woman's side face. Two things struck me at once. She
+was older than I had believed; a little make-up cunningly concealed
+some wrinkles, and a touch of rouge on the cheek helped to account for
+my mistake about her age; and closer inspection revealed some lines of
+grease paint close to her hair.
+
+I put her down then as a second-rate actress, and her over-acting in
+the embracing scene suggested corroboration. How the ordinary woman
+would behave on discovering her long lost lover or husband may be a
+question; but she certainly wouldn't shed tears which were carefully
+tearless out of the fear that they would spoil her make-up. It was
+obviously a plant.
+
+That wasn't altogether a comforting reflection, however. My loss of
+memory made it impossible to expose her, for the simple reason that any
+story she might choose to tell could not be contradicted.
+
+"Now I should like to know what all this means," I began when we were
+free from inquisitive lookers-on.
+
+"Do you pretend you don't recognize me?" she asked, turning her big
+blue eyes on me with a pathetic wistfulness.
+
+"Do you pretend that I ought to?"
+
+"Why did you desert me? Oh, how could you, Johann?" she wailed.
+
+"I don't even know what you mean."
+
+"Oh, but you must; you must. You loved me so; at least you swore you
+did, over and over again," she cried. "Oh, don't tell me you've
+forgotten me. I could bear anything but that."
+
+This suggested von Gratzen. It was just the sort of scheme which would
+appeal to such a wily old beggar to trap me into admission. "Who are
+you?" I asked.
+
+She clapped her hands to her face and looked like starting hysterics
+again. "Oh, you must know. You must. You can't have forgotten me! You
+can't!"
+
+"Perhaps your name will help me."
+
+With a very overdone theatrical gesture she stopped and stared at me
+and looked distracted.
+
+"I'm--Anna. Your Anna."
+
+"_My_ Anna? I didn't know I had one;" and she clapped her hands to
+her face again, but not quickly enough to hide her expression, which
+looked uncommonly like a smile. "And the surname?"
+
+"Hilden, of course," she said after a pause without looking up.
+
+This gave the clue. It was not von Gratzen's scheme but von Erstein's.
+I remembered our interview; his persistent attempt to test my memory;
+his story of Anna Hilden; his genuine anger when I had not recollected
+her; and then the sudden change of manner which had been so puzzling.
+
+He had put her up to play the part of the ruined maiden and had
+probably planned the melodramatic scene which had just taken place,
+knowing that, unless at the same time I gave myself away, I could not
+expose her. It was cunning, and put me in a beast of a mess. There
+seemed only one course--to prevail on the woman to admit the truth.
+
+"You can see for yourself that this has taken me entirely by surprise,"
+I said after a pause. "I had a very tough time of it a few weeks ago;
+the ship I was in was blown up and the explosion caused me to lose my
+memory entirely. What you have said may be absolutely true; although to
+me it seems impossible. What do you wish me to do?"
+
+"I want my rights," she replied, after a slight pause.
+
+"Well, we can scarcely discuss things here. Where do you live?"
+
+"In the Kammerplatz. 268g. No, I mean 286g;" making the correction in
+some confusion.
+
+Curious that she could not remember the right number; looked as if she
+had only just gone there for this special business. "Shall we go
+there?" I asked.
+
+She found the question unnecessarily embarrassing, hesitated and
+glanced at the child with a frown of perplexity. "I can't go home yet.
+I was just taking my little darling to some friends."
+
+She was certainly not a good actress, or she would never have implied
+that it was more important to take the child to some friends than to
+have an explanation with the false lover discovered after long years.
+"When then?" I asked, concluding that the child had been borrowed for
+the show and was to be returned with thanks at once.
+
+"Come there in an hour," she said after thinking. "You won't escape me
+again, for I know where to find you now," she added with a toss of the
+head.
+
+"I shall not try. Here's my address;" and I scribbled it on a card.
+"I'll turn up all right. I'm only too interested in what you've said
+and wish to know all you can tell me about it. I'll do the right thing
+by you, Anna;" and I held out my hand.
+
+She hesitated a second and then shook hands, her look showing that my
+words had impressed her favourably and also perplexed her.
+
+I spent the interval in the Thiergarten thinking over the whole
+unpleasant incident: the probable effect upon those who had witnessed
+it, and the line to take in the coming interview.
+
+It would serve one good turn at any rate. Von Gratzen would hear all
+about it from his wife and it ought to put an end to his suspicions. If
+the woman I had ruined could identify me as the result of a chance
+meeting, he could scarcely fail to regard it as a mighty strong
+corroboration of the Lassen theory.
+
+Both Rosa and Nessa would of course know that the story, even if it
+were true, had nothing to do with me, and what the Countess herself
+thought didn't amount to anything. The main point was what would happen
+if the woman stuck to it and how far she was prepared to go. That would
+probably depend upon the inducements or pressure brought to bear by von
+Erstein; and judging the man, pressure was the more likely.
+
+It would be easy enough to knock the bottom out of the scheme by
+bringing the police into it; her nervousness at the mention of them had
+shown that plainly. But that wouldn't suit me. The less the police had
+to meddle with my affairs, the better. No doubt an inquiry agent could
+soon get at the truth so far as the woman herself was concerned; and if
+she proved obdurate, that might be the best course. But obviously the
+quickest and best solution would be to get the woman herself to own up;
+and that must be the first line of attack.
+
+Her answer to my question what she wished me to do, suggested an idea.
+She wanted her "rights," as she phrased it; and clearly the
+straightforward course was to offer them. "Rights" meant marriage; and
+she was likely to feel in a deuce of a stew if I agreed to marry her.
+The farce of it was quite to my liking. To appear to force her into
+such a marriage with a man she had never seen in her life was rich, and
+at the same time good policy, as it would impress her with my honesty
+of purpose.
+
+I kept the appointment punctually and found her rather breathless and
+flurried. It was a mean little flat; had evidently been hastily got
+ready; and the number of things still littered about the room, told
+that I had arrived in the middle of her efforts to get it in order.
+
+She looked far less presentable without her hat and things. She was an
+untidy person, anything but clean, and made the mistake of trying to
+explain away the confusion and disorder in the place.
+
+"I didn't really believe you'd come, or I'd have had the place tidier.
+When any one has to struggle alone for a living in these times, there
+isn't much chance of keeping the home right."
+
+"Still I can see you've been doing your best."
+
+"I always have to," she replied with a quick, half-suspicious glance.
+
+"You have a hard struggle?"
+
+"Hard enough."
+
+"What do you do?"
+
+"Anything and everything I can, of course. It's hard work."
+
+Her hands offered no evidence of this, however. "Well, we must try to
+make things easier for you, Anna. Now let us talk it over."
+
+"I'll wash my hands first and tidy up a bit," and she went into the
+adjoining room, where I heard her moving some furniture into place.
+
+This gave an opportunity of scrutinizing the mean little sitting-room,
+and one fact was instantly apparent. There was not a single thing to
+suggest that a child had even set foot in it. On the floor close to the
+shabby sofa was a partly open leather bag; much too good and expensive
+to be in keeping with the rest, and a glance into it revealed a number
+of dressing-table fitments, also much better than a struggling working
+woman would be at all likely to own.
+
+She had forgotten this in her confusion at my arrival and presently
+came out to fetch it, still in the untidy slovenly dress. "I won't be a
+minute, now," she said.
+
+But several minutes passed before she returned, wearing now a
+well-fitting coat and skirt and cosmeticed much as she had been when we
+had met first.
+
+"I try to keep my head above water, you see," she said, to account for
+her good clothes, no doubt.
+
+I smiled approval and got to business. "First let me ask you whether
+you are absolutely certain I am the man you think."
+
+"Do you think I should have made that fuss to-day if I wasn't? Why do
+you ask such a question?"
+
+"Because I don't remember anything whatever of it, and to me you are an
+absolute stranger. Just tell me everything about it."
+
+Her story was in its essence that which von Erstein had told me,
+repeated as if she had got it up much as she would have studied her
+part in a play. She was not very perfect in it, and there were just
+those verbal slips and trips which one may hear in a badly rehearsed
+play on the first night of production. Moreover, apart from her lines
+she was hopelessly muddled and had either been very badly coached about
+details or her memory was little better than my assumed one.
+
+She judged by my looks that her story shocked me, and I sat a long time
+frowning as if lost in thought. "It seems absolutely inconceivable!" I
+exclaimed at length with a deep sigh. "Absolutely inconceivable that I
+could have treated you in this way; and only--how long ago was it?"
+
+"You came straight to Hanover from Göttingen."
+
+"What was I doing there?"
+
+"I don't know? At least, you were always so close you would never tell
+me anything."
+
+"You saw a great deal of me, of course?"
+
+"Well, naturally. I wasn't going to marry a man I never saw, I suppose."
+
+"No, no, of course not. Oh dear, to think of it all!" I put a few more
+questions which she could easily answer, and when she was growing more
+glibly at ease I asked: "And how old is the child?"
+
+"Eh? I don't know. Oh yes, I do, of course. Pops was nine last
+birthday."
+
+"Nine!" I exclaimed. I might well be astonished, for they had muddled
+this part of the thing hopelessly. The child I had seen in the
+Thiergarten wasn't a day more than six, probably younger even. "Where
+was she born?"
+
+This rattled her. "What does it matter where she was born, so long as
+she was born somewhere," she said, flushing so vividly that it showed
+under her rouge. Clearly she did not know where "our child" was
+supposed to have been born. "What does matter is what you're going to
+do about it."
+
+"There's only one thing any honourable man would think of doing, Anna.
+I shall make you my wife at once," I cried.
+
+Her amazement was a sheer delight. It was so complete that she didn't
+know what to do or say and just stared at me open-eyed. "I didn't say I
+wanted that, did I?" she stammered at length.
+
+"There's the child, Anna; and neither you nor I can afford to think of
+our own wishes;" and in proof of my moral duty in the circumstances, I
+delivered a lecture on the necessity of freeing the child from the
+stain of its birth.
+
+This gave her time to pull herself together. "Are you in earnest?" she
+asked when I finished.
+
+"I hold the strongest views in such cases. The best plan will be for me
+to arrange about the marriage at once, to-day indeed; and probably
+to-morrow or the next day we can be married."
+
+"But I----" She pulled up suddenly. It looked as if she was going to
+protest she wouldn't marry a man she'd never seen before. "I'd like to
+think about it," she substituted uneasily.
+
+"But why any need to think? You showed this afternoon how bitterly you
+resented my desertion and, unless you were play-acting, how much you
+still care for me. So why delay when I am willing? It is true that I
+can't pretend to care for you as I used, but it may all come back again
+to me. We'll hope so, at any rate."
+
+"But you're engaged to that rich cousin of yours, aren't you?"
+
+This was a good example of her slip-shod methods. As she knew that, she
+knew also where to have found me of course, so that the little
+melodramatic recognition scene in the Thiergarten had been a mere
+picturesque superfluity. I let it pass and replied gravely: "I should
+not allow that engagement to interfere with my duty to you, Anna."
+
+"You must have changed a lot, then."
+
+"I hope I have, if you're not really mistaken about my being the man
+you think. But I'll go and see about our wedding;" and I rose.
+
+"Wait a bit," she cried, flustered and perplexed. "I didn't expect you
+to--to give in quite so--quite like this," she added, laughing
+nervously. "It isn't a bit like I was led--what I expected. Do you mean
+really and truly that you're ready to marry me straight off like this?"
+
+With all the earnestness I could command I gave her the assurance. "I
+pledge you my sacred word of honour that if I've treated you as you say
+I'll marry you as soon as it can be done." A perfectly safe and sincere
+pledge.
+
+This frightened her. The affair had taken a much more serious turn than
+she had expected. "You--you've taken my breath away almost," was how
+she put it; and she sat twisting and untwisting her fingers nervously,
+not in the least seeing how to meet the unexpected difficulty. "I must
+have time to think it over," she said at length.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know; but it's--it's so sudden."
+
+"There's, the child, Anna," I reminded her again.
+
+"Oh, bother the child. I mean I'm thinking of myself." This hurriedly,
+as she turned to stare out of the window. "Do you know the sort of life
+I've been living?" she asked in a low voice without looking round.
+
+"Whatever it is, it must be my fault, and I don't care what you've been
+doing. I drove you to it. There's our child, remember."
+
+There was another long silence as she stood at the window. Her laboured
+breathing, the clenched hands, and spasmodic movements of her shoulders
+evidenced some great agitation. If it was mere acting she was a far
+better actress than she had yet shown herself. And the change in her
+looks when at last she turned to me proved her emotion to be genuine.
+
+"You're a white man right through, and I'm only dirt compared to you,"
+she cried tensely. "Look here, I've lied about that kid. She isn't
+yours, or mine either for that matter. What do you say to that?" and
+she flung her head back challengingly.
+
+"Only that I know it already, her age made it impossible. But it makes
+no difference to the wrong I did you."
+
+"Do you still mean you'd marry me?"
+
+"I mean every letter of the pledge I gave you just now, child or no
+child," I answered in the same earnest tone.
+
+"My God!" she exclaimed ecstatically, throwing her hands up wildly, and
+then bursting into tears. "And they told me you were a scoundrel!" She
+was quite overcome, dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+The tears were genuine enough, for when she looked up they had made
+little runlets in the rouge and powder.
+
+"Well?" I asked presently.
+
+"I'm not fit to be the wife of a man like you," she stammered through
+her sobs. "I'm dirt to you; just dirt. If more men were like you
+there'd be less women like me."
+
+Had the moment come to push for her confession? It looked like it; but
+it seemed cowardly to take advantage of her remorse and distress
+produced by my own trickery.
+
+"Go away now, please," she said after a long interval.
+
+"But how do we stand, Anna?"
+
+"I don't know. I can't think. I can't do anything. Only that if I'd
+known---- Oh, for Heaven's sake go away, or I shall say---- Oh, do go!"
+
+"Is there anything else you would like to tell me?"
+
+"No. Yes. I don't know. Only leave me alone now."
+
+"Then I'll come to-morrow."
+
+"No, not to-morrow. The next day. Give me time. I must have time," she
+cried wildly.
+
+I hesitated. In her present condition it would have been easy to
+frighten her into admitting everything; but somehow I couldn't bring
+myself to do it, so I left her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+A NIGHT ATTACK
+
+
+The success of my bluffing offer to marry the woman prompted some
+regret that the matter had not been pushed home to the point of
+obtaining her full confession; and it was to prove one of those
+disastrous blunders which come from decent motives.
+
+I had scarcely left her before I began to see the thing clearly. It had
+not been difficult to persuade her, but there was von Erstein. He was
+not likely to believe in any readiness to marry, and would soon be able
+to talk her round to his view. In that case I might whistle for a
+confession.
+
+All the same I had not come empty away. She had admitted the lie about
+"our child," and he couldn't talk that away. Moreover, it was still
+possible to set inquiries on foot and get the truth that way. It was
+all to the good that her impression of me was so favourable. There was
+no acting or humbug about that, and it remained to see the result. It
+was fairly certain that she would have little desire to carry the
+scheme any farther.
+
+In the meantime what were the others thinking? Nessa had laughed at the
+business in the Thiergarten; but there was more than a joke in it, even
+when one knew the truth. Both she and Rosa would be very curious to
+learn what had followed, so I went to see them at once and found them
+all talking about it.
+
+The Countess was shocked and very distressed. "It was such a scandal,
+Johann; and to happen in such a spot and with the von Gratzens there,"
+she said.
+
+"I need not tell you how sorry I am, aunt."
+
+"That wasn't Johann's fault, mother," said Rosa. "He couldn't prevent
+the woman choosing such a public place and acting as she did."
+
+"Why do you say choosing, Rosa? You don't imagine she expected to meet
+Johann there, do you? What happened after we left?" she asked me.
+
+"My impression is that she did choose the place, aunt. I had a talk
+with her and afterwards saw her at her flat."
+
+"But surely there can't be a scrap of truth in it."
+
+"How can I say? Most emphatically I don't remember her nor a thing she
+told me."
+
+"What did she tell you, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, her eyes twinkling.
+"Of course we're all anxious to hear--if you don't mind telling us,
+that is."
+
+"I don't mind in the least. It's not a nice story;" and I told them as
+shortly as possible. Nessa had to hide her face from the Countess when
+I spoke of my offer of marriage, and Rosa covered her laughter under a
+pretence of indignation.
+
+"You seem to have forgotten our engagement very easily, Johann!"
+
+"Oh no. She reminded me of it; but of course she has the first claim."
+
+"Indeed!" she cried, tossing her head.
+
+But her mother took it seriously. "I think you were right, Johann, and
+I'm thankful you had sufficient manly spirit," she declared, making me
+feel no end of a hypocrite.
+
+"And when are you to be married, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, with
+mischief in look and tone.
+
+"It is not yet definitely settled."
+
+"And your child?" chipped Rosa.
+
+"There was a mistake there. She admitted afterwards that the child is
+neither hers nor mine."
+
+"Admitted that!" exclaimed the Countess with more indignation than I
+thought she was capable of feeling. "Do you mean to tell us that she
+was brazen-faced enough to confess such a thing? She must be a regular
+baggage and you must be mad to think of marrying her! I never heard
+such a thing in all my life."
+
+"She wasn't exactly brazen-faced when she told me, Aunt Olga. I think
+she was rather affected by my offer; and as an honourable man----"
+
+"Honourable fiddlesticks, Johann! Don't talk rubbish. She's an
+impostor, nothing else; and I shall go to my lawyer in the morning and
+tell him to inform the police."
+
+Rosa came to the rescue then. "Unless you want to get Johann into
+serious trouble, you won't do that, mother. You've often worried
+because I didn't wish to marry him, and I haven't told you the real
+reason; but you had better know it now. The woman's story about the
+sale of secret information is true. You may not remember it, Johann;
+but I have a couple of letters of yours in which you more than half
+admit it, and that it was the reason why you fled the country and never
+intended to come back."
+
+"Rosa!" cried the dear old lady in deep distress. "Is that true,
+Johann?"
+
+"Unfortunately, I can't say either yes or no, Aunt Olga."
+
+"I'll get the letters," said Rosa, and she fetched them and read the
+portions out to us. "You can see it's his handwriting;" and she gave
+the letters to her mother, who glanced at them and then handed them to
+me.
+
+"I don't know the writing, of course," I said. "I don't believe I could
+even copy it. I'm in the pothook stage still." It was a small,
+curiously wriggling fist, difficult to decipher, but easily identified
+by any one who had ever seen it. And the Countess knew it well.
+
+"What had I better do, Johann?" she appealed.
+
+"I leave that to you. I hope I am incapable of anything of the sort
+now; but if I did it, I must take the consequences."
+
+"There is only one thing to do, mother; and that is, nothing. You don't
+want Johann to be shot, I suppose," said Rosa sharply.
+
+"Don't, Rosa!"
+
+"It's all very well to say don't; but that's what will happen if you
+insist on stirring this dirty water."
+
+"But you wouldn't have him marry such a woman, child!"
+
+"Perhaps he'd rather do even that than be shot," was the retort.
+
+It was cruel, but effective; and after a few more words her mother gave
+in and went away, distressed to the point of tears.
+
+"I'd rather have had you tell her the whole truth than grieve her like
+that, Rosa," I said.
+
+"Possibly, but I wouldn't. You don't know mother, and I do. It was
+necessary to frighten her or she would have spread the story broadcast.
+I'll go and make it all right presently."
+
+"Do you believe this story about your cousin?"
+
+"I know it's true, and so does Oscar. He told me the moment we heard
+Johann was coming back."
+
+"But he was coming back in spite of it," pointed out Nessa.
+
+"Because of his spy work, Nessa. He was a born spy. He wormed out a lot
+of things in America; and the Secret Service people, seeing how good he
+was at the work, sent him to England and, after what he found out
+there, told him to come home and promised to overlook the other affair.
+That'll explain why I wasn't overjoyed to see you," she added to me.
+
+I nodded. "And explain probably why von Gratzen thinks it worth while
+to send me back to England to recover my memory."
+
+"Very possibly--if he really believes you've lost it, that is. Oscar
+says its the reason, and he ought to know. He laughed at it all; but
+it's no mere laughing matter."
+
+"Better to laugh than worry," said I.
+
+"Now tell us all about your Anna," said Nessa, who refused to consider
+the thing serious.
+
+I gave them a more detailed account of the interview and answered a
+heap of questions about Anna, describing the change of front she had
+shown, the way in which she had been led to confess about the child,
+and my opinion that von Erstein was at the back of it.
+
+"I shall never forget that scene in the Thiergarten to-day," laughed
+Nessa. "You did look so thunderstruck."
+
+"Nothing to what I felt, I can tell you. I never felt such a fool in my
+life. Of course I couldn't tell whether she was in earnest or not."
+
+"Nessa laughed and was giggling about it all the way home."
+
+"I couldn't help it. It was so utterly ridiculous, Rosa. Her 'Oh, my
+long lost darling!' was just exquisite. And she did it uncommonly well."
+
+"My laughter will have to wait till we're all out of the wood," said
+Rosa; "and there's a long way to go yet."
+
+"Yours won't, will it?" Nessa asked me.
+
+"Not a bit of it. Let's laugh while we can. But now what about the
+workman's card that I need?"
+
+"Oscar's getting it," replied Rosa. "I told him to lose no time; and
+after this affair to-day, the sooner you're away, the easier I shall
+feel. It's getting on my nerves. I'd better go to mother now and calm
+her down."
+
+We rose and Nessa turned to me with a mischievous smile. "You'll have
+me at the wedding, won't you?" she rallied.
+
+"Whose?"
+
+"Why yours, of course."
+
+"Certainly. It couldn't take place without you," I replied, laughing,
+but with a look which made her rather sorry she'd chipped me.
+
+"Why not?" asked Rosa stolidly. Her humour was only Teutonic. "You
+don't expect me to be present, I hope?"
+
+"What do you say, Miss Caldicott?"
+
+"Oh, don't be ridiculous. Rosa doesn't understand such stupid jokes.
+Good-night, Herr Lassen." She spoke indifferently, but there was a
+little pressure of the hand which sent me off home feeling mighty
+pleased with myself and thinking a lot more about her than the new
+complications, and so nearly brought me to grief.
+
+It was a dark night, the streets were deserted, and I was plunging
+along castle-building on the foundation of that hand-pressure when, as
+I was taking a short cut through a square, a drunken man ran up behind,
+and lurched into me. He cursed me for getting in his way, and tried to
+close with me and, before I could shake him off, two others appeared,
+and one of them aimed a blow at my head with his stick.
+
+Luckily there was just time for me to wriggle out of the way and let
+the first man have the benefit of the blow. It caught him full on the
+head, and down he went in a heap. The other two were so astounded by
+this that they hesitated long enough to give me a chance to attack in
+my turn. I went for the ruffian who had struck at me, bashed him under
+the chin hard enough to send him staggering back tripping into the
+gutter, and was ready for number three. But there was no fight left in
+him, and he bolted.
+
+His companion in the gutter scrambled to his feet, but his stick had
+flown out of his hand in the fall, and the moment he found he had to
+deal with me alone without it, he also thought discretion safer and ran
+off after the other.
+
+I turned to have a look at the drunken brute who had started the row,
+or rather the robbery, for that seemed to be the meaning of the affair.
+The blow had seemed hard enough to crack his skull; but when I examined
+him I saw that it had not hurt him seriously. I also discovered
+something which told me I had not appreciated the true purpose of the
+attack.
+
+I recognized him at once. He was the fellow who had called on me that
+morning in the name of Rudolff.
+
+He was able to get up and walk; shakily, it is true, for he was a good
+deal dazed, and I had to hold him up on the way to my rooms, which were
+close by. The stairs were a difficulty, but we got up somehow, and a
+drink of spirits and a rest soon brought him round sufficiently to talk.
+
+"I suppose you were coming to warn me again, Rudolff, eh?" I said.
+
+He stared stupidly at me.
+
+"Don't try to fool me in that silly fashion, my friend. I know too much
+about you. So drop it, or you'll step out of this into the police
+station. You should choose companions who don't blab, you know."
+
+That made him begin to sit up and take notice. "I've been drunk,
+haven't I?"
+
+"No. Not too drunk to play the decoy, my man."
+
+"Don't understand," he mumbled, shaking his head.
+
+"All right. I haven't time to fool about with your sort. You can try
+that on the police;" and I rose and went to the telephone.
+
+"Wait a bit," he cried hurriedly. "I'll try to remember things."
+
+"Give me the nearest police station," I said into the 'phone, but
+without releasing the receiver.
+
+That was enough for him. "Don't bring them here," he said with an oath.
+"I'll tell you all I know."
+
+"I only want one thing. Who put you on to me? Tell me that and you can
+go."
+
+He tried to lie and mentioned a name at random.
+
+"You're only making a fool of yourself, Rudolff. Lies are no good to
+me. You came here this morning with a yarn which you could only have
+got from one man in Berlin, and I know all about it. You were in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and pointed me out to you know whom I mean."
+
+It proved a good shot and he squirmed uneasily, although trying a
+feeble sort of denial. "What's the use of lying?" I rapped sternly.
+
+"I don't know what you mean," he muttered.
+
+"We'll soon settle that."
+
+Taking the precaution to lock the door I turned to the telephone again
+and asked for von Erstein's number; and after some preliminaries with
+some one I took to be his servant, von Erstein answered me.
+
+"Who is it?" he asked sharply.
+
+"Johann Lassen. Hope I haven't disturbed your packing."
+
+"What do you want with me?"
+
+"Nothing; I've had quite enough of you already; but there's a friend of
+yours here and he's in a bit of difficulty."
+
+"What the devil are you driving at? Who is he?"
+
+"The man you sent here to-day."
+
+"I don't know what you mean."
+
+"Oh come, that won't do. Anyhow he does, and that's enough for me." I
+tried to pop in the suggestion of a threat.
+
+"What's his name?"
+
+"You know that without my telling you; I only know what he called
+himself. You don't send men about the place on secret errands without
+knowing their names, do you?"
+
+"Well, what does he call himself?"
+
+"Rudolff; I don't know who he is now."
+
+"I never heard of the man, and I've had enough of your tomfoolery."
+
+"Just as you like. I can deal with him, of course." I heard him swear
+sulphurously.
+
+"What does he want?" he growled after a pause.
+
+"To keep out of gaol, chiefly, I fancy."
+
+"Oh, blazes! Can't you speak plainly?"
+
+"Yes. You see that second little practical joke you fixed up for me
+to-day has missed fire; he's had a crack on the head from one of your
+mutual friends, and I've got him here. After what he told me I rang you
+up to know what you'd like to do about it. As you and I are such pals,
+it didn't seem quite friendly to give him in charge without letting you
+have a chance to tell me your side. See?"
+
+"I tell you I don't know anything about it;" angrily with an oath.
+
+"No thoroughfare that way, my beloved."
+
+There was no reply; he had apparently rung off. So I used the
+opportunity to impress friend Rudolff and lead him to understand that
+von Erstein had told me everything, and then hung up the receiver,
+paused a moment, and again pretended to call up the police station.
+
+This was too much for the man. "What are you going to do?" he asked.
+
+"My friend tells me that he had nothing to do with it, knows nothing
+about you, and that I'd better hand you over to the police."
+
+"Who were you talking to?"
+
+"Count von Erstein."
+
+"Then he's a liar," he cried furiously. "He sent me here this morning
+so that I should know you by sight, first for that business in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and then for this affair now."
+
+"Don't tell me such lies, you murderous brute. Why, not ten minutes ago
+you gave me another name. Von Erstein, indeed, my friend!"
+
+"Friend! He's no friend of yours. He's got me under his thumb for
+another thing and drove me to do both jobs by threatening to split on
+me. I can't get into the hands of the police. If you'll let me go I'll
+tell you all I know about it."
+
+I shook my head and played the unbeliever till he was nearly beside
+himself with fright, and then told him to write down the story. This
+wasn't to his liking at all, but a little gentle persuasion in the
+shape of another pretence, with the 'phone, set him to work.
+
+I walked up and down smoking while he wrote, glancing every now and
+then over his shoulder to read the result. He was not a ready penman,
+but he got the main facts clear enough for my purpose.
+
+His statement was practically what he had already told me, and he added
+some very useful details which would help to fix it on von Erstein. But
+in one respect it fell short of expectation. He knew no more about Anna
+Hilden than his employer had told him--that I had really ruined her and
+that she was looking for me.
+
+Whether he was lying or not, there were no means of deciding, and it
+seemed better not to question him too directly. The whole affair had
+shaken him up a good deal, and when he laid down the pen with a sigh he
+begged for another drink.
+
+I let him have it and he gulped it down at a draught. "What are you
+going to do with that?" he asked, pointing to the statement.
+
+"That wasn't in the bargain, friend cutthroat; but I'll promise you one
+thing, as you've seen wisdom. If I have to use it, I'll see that no
+harm comes to you, provided that you're ready to speak to the truth of
+it."
+
+He shook his head dismally over this, and while he was hesitating,
+there was a nervous knock at my outer door. It flashed into my thoughts
+that it might be Anna Hilden. I didn't want them to meet, so I shut the
+room door behind me as I went out.
+
+It was a very wild shot indeed; for the moment I pulled back the latch,
+the door was pushed wide and von Erstein came swaggering in.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A POISON CHARGE
+
+
+"Where's the fellow you called Rudolff?" he demanded truculently.
+
+My first idea was to shove him out, but it struck me that an interview
+between the two men might have interesting results, so I went back to
+the sitting-room. "Your friend's still here," I said.
+
+Rudolff wilted at the sight of his genial employer, and as they were
+now two to one, both scoundrels, and capable of any violence, it was
+best to take precautions. Thus while von Erstein was challenging the
+other man to say he knew him, I crossed to a small table drawer and put
+my revolver in my pocket, keeping my hand on it in case of necessity.
+
+The instant Rudolff knew that I had tricked him out of the confession
+he was nearly as mad as von Erstein. He couldn't well have been madder.
+
+"A bit late, eh, beloved?" I jeered. "Had to wait for a taxi? They are
+rather scarce just now."
+
+"What has this man written?"
+
+"Just a line or two about the weather and so on."
+
+"Let me see it."
+
+"He can tell you, of course."
+
+"I have a right to see it."
+
+"Naturally. You'll see it all right--some day. What he says about
+atmospheric and other kinds of pressure is----"
+
+Oaths from the two interrupted the sentence.
+
+"Give it up," from Rudolff, and "I want to see it now," from von
+Erstein, came almost in the same breath.
+
+"It pains me to disappoint such a charming pair of friends, but----" I
+shook my head. "Can't be done, beloved; out of the question."
+
+"We'll see about that;" and they exchanged glances.
+
+"Don't make asses of yourselves. One of you has a cracked pate already,
+and the other's so podgy that half a punch would put him out of action;
+so you wouldn't have a dog's chance at what I see you're thinking
+about."
+
+"What do you mean, Lassen? I'm only asking to see what this man has
+written about me," said von Erstein, trying to fool me with an
+appearance of calmness, while he took his handkerchief out of the
+pocket of his overcoat--a suspiciously bulky handkerchief which he
+handled very gingerly.
+
+"You may as well lay that thing on the table, beloved. I'm too old for
+that game."
+
+He tried to laugh and suddenly grabbed the handkerchief with his left
+hand to free the revolver it was concealing. He bungled over it, and
+before he succeeded I had him covered. "I told you to put it on the
+table. If you lift it so much as an inch, I'll put a bullet in your
+head," I cried.
+
+What a coward he was! He went as white as a sheet, tossed the weapon on
+to the table, and put up his hands as a shield. "Don't, Lassen. Don't
+do anything like that," he stammered.
+
+I laughed, picked up his revolver, and tossed mine across to him.
+"That's less dangerous for you, sweetheart; it's unloaded."
+
+Still trembling, now with more mortification than fear, however, he
+dropped into a chair and strafed me with fine Teutonic hate.
+
+I turned to his companion. "Now, get out, you. Do you hear?" for he
+hesitated, looking to his master for orders. "It'll be bad for that
+head of yours if I have to chuck you out. I'll give you one minute to
+clear." He was no stayer and slunk out in half the time; and I followed
+and shut the door after him.
+
+When I got back to the room von Erstein was on his feet also ready to
+go. "Oh, don't hurry away, beloved; this is an excellent chance for a
+pretty little love scene. Mix yourself a drink, have a cigar, and be
+your own cheerful sprightly self."
+
+The scowl which greeted this was a real gem.
+
+"What a seraphic smile! No wonder that every one loves you so and
+worships the ground you tread on."
+
+"Stop it," he growled with an oath.
+
+"Oh, you naughty darling! Did'ums," and I chucked him coyly under his
+fat double chin. His spasm of rage at this almost overpowered his
+cowardice, and he must have been within an ace of apoplexy. The blood
+rushed in a crimson flood to his flabby face, he clenched his fists and
+trembled like an aspen with the strain.
+
+"I'm going," he mumbled thickly at last.
+
+"Of course you are, darling; but presently." I stood with my back
+against the door. "I can't spare you yet. Besides, you haven't thanked
+me. Isn't my sweetheart grateful to his Popsy-wopsy?" I chided in a
+sort of Mantalini manner.
+
+"Oh, blazes! Let me go, will you?"
+
+"But think what I've saved you from, beloved. Why, if it hadn't been
+for me by this time you'd be a murderer or a thief, or both. Imagine
+it! The torments your tender conscience would be suffering! A murderer!
+My Albert!"
+
+Another spasm of impotent rage followed, and this time, instead of
+cursing he groaned aloud and dropped into a chair with his hands to his
+head.
+
+I locked the door then, putting the key in my pocket, took the
+cartridges out of his revolver, tossed it into his lap, and mixed
+myself a drink and lit a cigar. "Now we'll have our chat," I said,
+dropping the banter.
+
+He looked up and, seeing the way to the door was free, jumped from his
+seat to escape; and began cursing again on finding it locked. "Are you
+going to stop that rot?"
+
+"Yes, if you behave yourself; except for an occasional endearment, lest
+we forget how much we love one another."
+
+"What have you got to say? Be quick about it, I want to go."
+
+"Sit down and have a drink. It'll pull you together."
+
+"Not here, thank you. I don't want to be poisoned."
+
+"I didn't think of that. It's rather a good idea. I will poison you."
+He must be punished for that insult. I went into my bedroom and came
+back with a pinch of salt in a screw of paper which I opened out before
+him. Then I poured out his drink, put the salt into it, stirred it
+carefully till it had dissolved, pushed the glass across the table, and
+placed a chair close to the spot. "Now sit down and drink that."
+
+"I'll see you to the devil first," he cried, trying to bluster and
+turning as white as a sheet.
+
+I promptly took him by the collar of his coat and forced him into the
+chair and ordered him to drain the glass. His panic was pitiful. He was
+such a blithering ass that he never suspected I was only fooling; and
+was convinced I meant to kill him. The sweat of abject terror stood in
+beads on his forehead, he couldn't utter a word, and sat staring up at
+me like a paralyzed idiot.
+
+"Drink it!" I thundered in his own bullying tones which made him jump
+and twitch convulsively. He made one feeble attempt to lift the glass,
+and then with a moan dropped back in his chair in a faint.
+
+I was afraid at first that he was really dead; but his pulse was
+beating all right. It was probably just pretence; so I moved the glass
+out of his reach and left him to come round when he pleased. It was
+merely shamming, and when he thought I was far enough away, he made a
+grab to upset the glass.
+
+"I think you're the biggest fool I ever met, von Erstein, but you've
+been punished enough for your little poison suggestion. Look here;" and
+I swallowed the "poison" myself. "Not enough salt even to alter the
+taste of it, man."
+
+In a minute he was cursing quite as cheerfully as usual and looking
+just as amiable. "Well, can I go now?" he asked.
+
+"As soon as you've answered one question. Who is Anna Hilden?"
+
+"I don't know any more than I told you before."
+
+"I don't mean the right one, but the mock heroine of the Thiergarten
+scene to-day."
+
+"I don't know anything about her."
+
+Taking out my card case in which I had put Rudolff's statement, I
+unfolded the paper and laid it on the table. "Rudolff says here----"
+
+He tried to snatch the paper, but I whipped it up in time, leaving only
+the card case in his hand. "Rudolff says here that you sent him to me
+so that he should point me out to her this afternoon. Now then, who is
+she?"
+
+"I don't know anything about her," he repeated doggedly.
+
+"I'll help your memory. She admitted to me that it was a put-up job and
+that the child was neither hers nor mine. That enough for you?"
+
+But he stuck to his denial and nothing I could say moved him. The
+poison farce had apparently convinced him that his life was safe and he
+met all my threats with the same dogged answer.
+
+I had to give it up in the end. "Very well, then, I shall have to get
+the whole story out of her. The police will do it, if I can't; so that
+it's only a matter of a day or two. Do you still refuse to own up?"
+
+"I tell you I know nothing about it. Wash your own dirty linen for
+yourself," he replied.
+
+I unlocked the door and told him to go. His exit was very
+characteristic. He stepped very gingerly toward where I stood by the
+door, fearing I should strike him, paused when just a couple of yards
+away, then darted out quickly, opened the front door, shook his fist at
+me and snarled out a threat. "I'll make you pay a heavy price for all
+this, curse you," he cried and bolted down the stairs as I made a step
+after him.
+
+Except that he had been thoroughly frightened and enraged to the point
+of collapse, the interview had yielded little satisfaction. It was not
+improbable, moreover, that it had been a blunder to warn him about Anna
+Hilden. As for his threats, they were just laughable; but he might be
+able to strengthen the woman's backbone and cause her to persist in the
+story she had acted.
+
+That the whole business was faked, there was no doubt at all; and if
+she did persist, it would only be necessary to set inquiries about her
+on foot. It might be as well to do that before seeing her again, as it
+would be a big trump card to face her with some of her own life history.
+
+There was something to go on in the shape of Rudolff's statement; but
+it didn't amount to much. In all probability von Erstein would see to
+it that the man was got out of the way; and the mere paper itself could
+not carry the least weight with a soul.
+
+Reflection suggested one exception, however. Von Gratzen might take a
+different view of it, if I told him frankly the whole affair. He had
+urged me to go to him in any trouble; and if he was not a fraud, he
+could help me enormously.
+
+He would certainly want to hear from me all about the inner meaning of
+the scene his wife and daughter had witnessed, and it would be best to
+see him as soon as possible. He hated von Erstein, moreover, and might
+be glad to find something against him.
+
+The next morning there was a note from him asking me to see him at his
+office at eleven o'clock, as he had some important news for me. Not a
+mere official summons this time; and this was rather a good sign.
+
+It was to be hoped that the "important news" had to do with my leaving
+Berlin. The delay was irksome. Things were happening which threatened
+to make it more and more difficult for me to disappear without causing
+more fuss than would be healthy for either Nessa or myself. It all
+tended to force one's hand; and I began to think seriously of resorting
+to the "third wheel" Nessa and I had discussed together.
+
+Von Gratzen received me with all the usual cordiality, shook hands
+warmly, and immediately referred to the Thiergarten affair, taking the
+line which I had half expected.
+
+"My wife and Nita told me all about it, and of course it settles one
+point satisfactorily. It places beyond doubt that you are really Johann
+Lassen. Nevertheless I could wish it had been established in a less
+dramatic and embarrassing fashion for you."
+
+"It was exceedingly unpleasant, sir."
+
+"Tell me all about it."
+
+I described it from my point of view; making much of my profound
+astonishment and my inability to say whether the story was true or not.
+
+"Have you any reason to doubt it? Did you remember anything which
+enabled you, I mean?"
+
+"Not a thing. So far as I know, I never saw the woman before in all my
+life."
+
+"But she was positive?"
+
+"She embraced me and called me her 'long lost darling,' and so on."
+
+"Women are hysterical creatures, we know, and apt to make any sort of
+statement at such moments. Do you think she was really in earnest? Of
+course it's important."
+
+"Your people could judge that as well as I, sir."
+
+"True. Which would you rather it was--true or false?"
+
+"False, without a question."
+
+"Despite the fact that it establishes your identity?"
+
+"Certainly. Any man who feels as I do now must loathe to have such a
+brutal thing as that dug up out of his past."
+
+"Good. I'm glad to hear you say that." He smiled as if he was really
+glad, but there was something else behind his questions that left me
+guessing as usual.
+
+If he accepted the woman's recognition as settling the matter of my
+identification as Lassen, was it better to leave it there or risk
+unsettling him again by telling him about the subsequent interview with
+her? Rather a nice point to decide. But his next question cleared the
+course and concealment kicked the beam.
+
+"You'd like to have the matter investigated?"
+
+"Certainly," I replied promptly. Very few official inquiries would give
+him the truth, and it was thus much better to tell it myself. "I was
+going to ask your advice about it. I know that part of her story is
+false; she owned it; and I doubt all the rest;" and I described the
+interview.
+
+This appeared to both interest and amuse him, especially my instant
+offer to marry Anna; and he expressed his appreciation in the equivocal
+fashion. "It was clever, my boy; quite the best line. You must have had
+considerable experience in bluffing people;" and there was a glint in
+his keen eyes which might have meant anything. "You can act well too,
+or you'd never have dragged that confession out of her. She must have
+thought you were in earnest."
+
+"I was, sir. If she can prove that I am the man she thinks, I will
+marry her."
+
+"Good. Very good indeed. _If_ she can prove it, of course. But you
+wouldn't relish the job, eh?"
+
+"That goes without saying."
+
+"Well, we'll hope she can't. We shall soon know all about her. In the
+meantime what are you going to do?"
+
+"I can only wait and see."
+
+He laughed and rubbed his hands. "Wait and see, eh? That's the English
+Premier's phrase, isn't it? So you've picked that up, it seems."
+
+His comment made me wish I'd used a different one. "There isn't
+anything else to do, sir."
+
+"Quite so. Wait and see. Exactly. And as an honourable man you'd prefer
+to get the question settled before leaving Berlin?"
+
+The shrewd old beggar was a positive expert in sticking one in a hole.
+I didn't know what answer to make, so I just shrugged my shoulders and
+smiled vacuously.
+
+"It's rather a pity, too," he continued after a pause. "I've arranged
+that matter of your leaving; in fact I intended you to go to-day. I
+have all the necessary papers, even tickets for you and Miss
+Caldicott;" and he took them out of his desk and laid them in front of
+me, giving me one of those wily smiles of his.
+
+I could have cursed the luck. The sight of them, the knowledge that
+Nessa and I could have been out of the infernal country within a few
+hours but for this rotten thing coming in the way, so exasperated me
+that it was scarcely possible to conceal my bitter chagrin. I tried to
+hide it from him by taking the papers and looking them over.
+
+"Oh dear, I've forgotten something," he exclaimed, rising. "I'll be
+back in a moment," and he went out of the room.
+
+What a temptation that was! To have all I needed actually in my hands;
+to be left alone with them and yet not to be able to use them! I'd have
+given every shilling I had in the world to have stuffed them into my
+pocket and walked off. Did he mean me to take them? Or was it intended
+as a test? Did he guess what a temptation it was? Could I get away with
+them? He stopped out of the room long enough, and as the minutes
+passed, it was all I could do to resist it.
+
+But I stuck it; put the papers down on his desk and tried not to look
+at them. It was a touch of sheer purgatory. His first glance, when at
+length he returned, was at them, and the way he looked at me made me
+pretty certain that he could guess something of my feeling. It looked
+uncommonly as if he were disappointed to find me still in the room and
+the papers on his table.
+
+"I'm sorry to have kept you, my boy, but it couldn't be helped," he
+said as he sat down and put the temptation out of sight. "I told you in
+my letter that I had something important to tell you. I have, and
+unpleasant into the bargain. Was Count von Erstein with you last night?"
+
+"Yes, about ten o'clock."
+
+"Did you offer him some drink?"
+
+"Yes, and a cigar, but he refused both."
+
+"What was he doing there? Wait, I'll tell you first that he has made a
+charge against you that you attempted to poison him."
+
+I laughed. "Of course I didn't. It was a joke."
+
+"It may not be altogether a laughing matter; he's a dangerous man to
+joke with. Would you care to tell me about it all?"
+
+"Of course. This will explain a good deal." I put my hand in my
+waistcoat pocket for Rudolff's statement, and then for the first time
+missed the card case which Rosa had given me. The loss was of no
+consequence, however, as I had the fellow's confession. "Before I give
+it you I ought to say that I promised the man who wrote this that if he
+was prepared to swear to the truth of it, he should come to no harm."
+
+"That'll be all right," he agreed with a nod.
+
+"An attempt was made on my life last night by this fellow and two
+others at von Erstein's instigation;" and I described the affair and
+all that had occurred subsequently.
+
+"Ah, more clever bluff, eh? Upon my word I shall be expecting you to
+try it with me next," he said. Then he read over the confession
+carefully and lapsed into thought. Long and apparently anxious thought
+it was, too.
+
+"I'll stand by you, my boy. I believe your story implicitly and I know
+von Erstein. But it was a bad mistake. He has a lot of influence in
+many directions. I hope you'll hear no more of it; but it was a bad
+blunder." He paused and, in a different and lighter tone and with a
+very peculiar look and a shadow of a smile, added: "It makes me almost
+wish you had taken advantage of my absence just now to get away with
+those tickets."
+
+What on earth could one make of such a statement? If he'd given me
+another chance I'd have taken it; but he didn't. He locked the tickets
+up and sent me away, saying he would look into my affairs at once and
+send for me as soon as there was any need.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+ANNA HILDEN AGAIN
+
+
+It is difficult to describe my feelings when I left von Gratzen, but I
+think my chief thought was a bitter regret that I hadn't taken the
+tickets and chanced things, mingled with a disquieting belief that I
+was muddling matters hopelessly.
+
+Neither regret nor self-cursing were of the slightest help, however;
+and after a few minutes of impotent perplexity, I realized that
+extremely obvious fact.
+
+Something had to be done; and the question was--what?
+
+It looked as if von Gratzen would have let me have those tickets if I
+hadn't been ass enough to tell him about Anna and play the fool about
+being eager to have that affair cleared up first. He had not appeared
+to attach sufficient importance to the poison charge to refuse them on
+that account.
+
+This cleared the ground a little, therefore. Could the obstacle be
+removed in time to allow of my using them that night? Could I get the
+confession from Anna herself, this meant? It was worth trying.
+
+She had fixed the following day for me to see her; but that wasn't a
+good enough reason for my not seeing her at once. My natural eagerness
+to have the thing settled without delay would readily account for my
+disregarding her wish, and whether it did or not didn't matter two
+straws. So I set off on the errand at once.
+
+Persuasion was the first card to play, and if that failed, a threat of
+the police; but by one means or another I must have the confession to
+take to von Gratzen that afternoon. Everything now turned on getting it
+into his hands early enough for Nessa and me to catch the Dutch mail
+which left about eight that night.
+
+She had her hat on when I arrived, and resented the visit. "I said you
+were not to come until to-morrow," she said. "I can't see you now, as
+I'm just going out."
+
+"I could not wait till to-morrow. I can't bear suspense."
+
+"I've nothing to say to you, so it's no use your coming in."
+
+"But I'm in already, Anna, and I must speak to you." She tried to avoid
+me and leave the place, but I shut the door and stood with my back to
+it.
+
+"Very well. Go into the sitting-room and I'll listen."
+
+"I'll follow you," I replied drily; and with a laugh and a shrug she
+led the way to her room.
+
+"You seem almost as eager to marry me now as you were before to get out
+of it," she scoffed.
+
+It was an unpromising start, for she was in a very different mood from
+that of the previous day. "If you think a moment of all that this must
+mean to me, of my desperate anxiety to know the truth about the past
+and to see what lies ahead, you'll understand it all, Anna;" and I went
+on for a few moments in that style endeavouring to re-establish the
+former relations and work on her emotions.
+
+"I haven't had enough time to think about it," she replied. "Of course
+it takes a lot of thinking about."
+
+"Does that mean you are not sure I am the man who wronged you?"
+
+"Why should it, pray?"
+
+"Well, you said that you had been mistaken about the child."
+
+"I may have said that for a purpose. You got the soft side of me
+yesterday, and---- But I tell you I haven't made up my mind."
+
+"You haven't altered your opinion about my being an honourable man and
+wishing to do the right thing, I hope?" and I did my best to draw a
+vivid picture of my state of mind and appeal to her good nature.
+
+This appeared to have a softening effect; but not enough for the
+purpose. "Why does one day make such a difference?"
+
+"Every minute makes a difference, Anna. I am on the rack and it's
+positive torture to prolong this suspense."
+
+"I'm sorry. I am really; but I can't make up my mind. If you could do
+without me all these years, another day can't matter so much. Not that
+I can see."
+
+"If you had lost your memory, you'd understand."
+
+"But that was only a week or two ago. What of all the other time, the
+years and years you've left me to fend for myself?"
+
+"I can't account for that," I said, as if distracted.
+
+"You hadn't lost your memory all that time, however."
+
+"The shock of the explosion has utterly changed me in every way."
+
+"It was about time, I should think, judging by all I've heard and the
+way you treated me. I don't deny you're a white man enough now; but
+what if you got your memory back? It might change you into something
+very different. I have to think of that, you know. You might be mad
+enough to--to do anything; perhaps even murder me. You're not surprised
+it makes me think, are you? I don't wish to be made into an honest
+woman only to be murdered."
+
+This was altogether so different from her previous attitude, that it
+was clear some one had been coaching her; and of course it could only
+be von Erstein. "You need not fear that, Anna."
+
+"Why not? How do you know what you'd be mad enough to do if you got
+your memory back and found you'd tied yourself to me?"
+
+"There's a very simple way out of that. Even if you wish me to marry
+you, we need not live together. I should give you an allowance and you
+could go your way and I mine, if you preferred it."
+
+For some reason which beat me this seemed to appeal strongly to her.
+She sat thinking, and there was something of her previous day's emotion
+in her look as she asked: "Do you mean that?"
+
+"You little know me if you doubt it, Anna."
+
+She got up impulsively to stare out of the window as she had done
+before, and after a long pause she turned. "Look here, come to-morrow."
+
+I looked intently at her and read something in her face that gave me
+fresh hope. "Why not to-day? You have made up your mind, I can see
+that; so why not tell me now?"
+
+She shook her head. "Not to-day. To-morrow."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I can't tell you why. Don't ask me."
+
+"But I do ask you. I beg you as earnestly as I can."
+
+Another shake of the head; and she would not budge, so that it became
+necessary to try a turn of the screw.
+
+"Your reason has to do with some one else?"
+
+"What do you mean?" she flashed in surprise and some alarm.
+
+"I had a visit yesterday from a man who called himself Rudolff."
+
+"Well? What's that got to do with it?"
+
+"With two companions he tried to murder me."
+
+She caught her breath. "Is that true?"
+
+"As you see, the attempt failed and the man himself got the blow
+intended for me. I took him to my rooms afterwards and--well, here's
+his confession."
+
+Her interest was keen enough to quicken her breathing as I took out the
+paper; and her fright deepened as I read it, and she began to tremble
+violently. "As you hear, he was the man who pointed me out to you
+yesterday in the Thiergarten."
+
+For a few moments she was too overcome to speak. "What--do you--think
+it all means?" she stammered brokenly.
+
+"Do you know Count von Erstein?"
+
+Her hand went to her throat as she tried to reply, making a swallowing,
+half-choking motion. "You don't believe--that I had anything--to do
+with all that?"
+
+"Oh no, Anna. I am sure you had not. I have told the authorities----"
+
+"The police?" she broke in. It was almost a scream.
+
+"Not the police. But, of course, a man can't let any one attempt his
+life and just sit down under it. I have a very influential friend----"
+I paused intentionally.
+
+"Who is that?" came like a pistol shot.
+
+"Baron von Gratzen; and he----"
+
+"Did you tell him about me?"
+
+"He knows of it. He is greatly interested in me because this
+unfortunate affair about my treatment of you will affect all he can do
+for my future. His wife and daughter were present yesterday when you
+recognized me. Of course he questioned me all about it and declared
+that he would have the fullest investigation made at once."
+
+That seemed to break her right up. Von Gratzen's reputation caused the
+collapse. She had stiffened in alarm at the mention of his name, had
+listened with parted lips and straining features to every syllable
+about his interest in me, and when she knew that his people were going
+to take up the investigation, she was utterly overcome.
+
+With a muffled cry of despair, she fell back in her chair in a
+half-fainting condition, her hands pressed to her face, moaning
+distractedly. She remained in this state for several minutes, the
+effort to regain self-control being quite beyond her, and at length
+sprang to her feet, saying she must go out at once.
+
+"You'd better tell me everything before you go, Anna," I said. Knowing
+that she had been driven into the deception by von Erstein, I pitied
+her sincerely. She was like a wild thing in her panic, shaking her head
+and flourishing her arms hysterically.
+
+"No, no. To-morrow."
+
+"It may be too late then. I have great influence with the Baron and can
+put the matter to him in a way to help you. It will be useless to try
+that to-morrow."
+
+"Not now. Not yet. I can't. I can't. Let me go. Let me go, I say!"
+
+I persisted, however; and at length she consented to my seeing her
+again that afternoon at five o'clock. I had to be content with that,
+and as soon as we reached the street she hurried off.
+
+She was going to von Erstein of course, and I would have given
+something to be able to hear what passed. She was in deadly fear of
+him. Her manner had shown that; and considering what the man was, her
+news would probably give him an equally bad attack of nerves. He would
+not relish von Gratzen's intervention any better than she had.
+
+On the whole the interview had turned out well enough. It would have
+been better if I had been able to drag the truth out of her at once, of
+course; but I was confident that I should get it all in the afternoon.
+That would still give me time to carry the news to von Gratzen and
+satisfy him that the obstacle to my leaving was removed.
+
+The "third wheel" must none the less be in working order. Nessa must be
+prepared to leave, and I went to the Karlstrasse to see her. She was
+out with Lottchen, however, and I only saw Rosa, who was delighted to
+hear that von Gratzen had arranged for us to leave.
+
+"It's very lucky, too, because Oscar has left Berlin for a day or two
+without having been able to do anything about the other scheme. You
+won't need it now, of course."
+
+"I wish I was sure; but I'm not. Von Gratzen may still raise some
+objection; things are so mixed up. But I mean to go to-night in any
+event, with or without his permit. Rotten luck that Feldmann's away."
+
+"He was afraid you might do something like that, so he gave me the name
+of a man who can do what you want, but I wasn't to tell you about it
+unless it was absolutely necessary."
+
+"It is necessary, as you can see for yourself. Who's the man and what
+is he? I'll go to him straight off."
+
+"David Graun is the name; he lives at 250, Futtenplatz. He's a Jew; a
+very shady character, and Oscar said you'd have to be awfully careful
+how you handled him."
+
+"Where's the Futtenplatz?"
+
+"It's in a low quarter across the river;" and she told me how to find
+it. "Oscar says he bears the worst of characters and does all sorts of
+shady things under the cloak of a second-hand clothes' dealer."
+
+"He's sure that the man can get me what I want?"
+
+"Oh yes; positive, if you handle him right; but you must be awfully
+cautious. He'll ask much more at first than he expects."
+
+"He's a Jew, of course."
+
+"It isn't only that. It's his way of testing any one who goes to him.
+If you agree to pay it, you won't get anything out of him except
+promises. Oscar said I'd better tell you this to put you on your guard;
+and you mustn't let him think it's for yourself under any
+circumstances."
+
+"Do you know how much I ought to pay him?"
+
+"Only a few marks, ten or fifteen at the outside. He'll probably ask a
+hundred or even more."
+
+"I understand. But it's odd that Feldmann should know all this about
+him."
+
+She smiled. "That's what I thought, and Oscar said I might tell you the
+real reason. The fact is this Graun works with the police. He got into
+trouble once and they made things easy for him on his promise to act as
+their spy. There's a lot of this false identification card business
+done, and he reports every transaction to them, and they are able to
+watch all the people who go to him. When any one is wanted, they give
+him a description, and he just keeps the man waiting while he
+communicates with them."
+
+"That's cheerful. He'll tell them about me, then."
+
+"Oscar says you needn't worry about it. So long as any one is not known
+to be an alien or a criminal, nothing happens; but you're to be careful
+to get the things at once."
+
+"I don't quite see why."
+
+"I didn't quite understand it, either. Oscar only told me at the last
+minute just as he was hurrying away. I fancy he said something about a
+second visit being risky, lest the man should have one of the police
+there to have a look at you."
+
+"I'll be off then. Tell Nessa I'll see her as soon as possible and tell
+her everything."
+
+"Oh, I do hope you'll get away safely. If the Baron lets you have the
+permit and tickets, I'll never say another word against him as long as
+I live," she declared as we shook hands.
+
+"It will be all right one way or the other."
+
+"Yes; but if you could really travel by the mail a few hours would end
+everything. I shall be so anxious."
+
+"Of course your mother mustn't know anything about Nessa leaving."
+
+"She's in bed, after yesterday's upset. So that will be all right."
+
+"Not really ill?"
+
+"Oh, no; only a bad headache. Nessa and I are booked for a concert this
+evening, and I shall tell the servants not to sit up for us, so that
+she won't be missed till to-morrow morning; and by that time you two
+ought to be in Holland;" and with that I set off to interview the
+tricky old Jew in the Futtenplatz.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+A SINISTER DEVELOPMENT
+
+
+On the way to the Futtenplatz I made up a little fairy tale to account
+for my visit to the Jew, Graun. I didn't like the job, and what Rosa
+had told me about his relations with the police didn't make it any
+pleasanter.
+
+A very little knowledge of German police ways was enough to render it
+quite credible. It was just the sort of low cunning which would chime
+with their methods. There were plenty of people, besides aliens, who
+were anxious to get out of Berlin at such a time, and it would suit the
+authorities admirably to have this secret means of finding out who they
+were and acting accordingly.
+
+Rosa's description of the Futtenplatz was well deserved: a squalid,
+dirty place, with mean shops of the poorest sort. The Jew's second-hand
+clothes shop was one of the meanest and dirtiest, and Graun himself
+fitted thoroughly into the picture.
+
+When I entered he was bargaining with a man who wanted to sell him a
+coat, and while the transaction proceeded--while the old Jew was
+beating down the price to the last pfennig, that is--I had ample time
+to observe him.
+
+Red-haired, with red tousled beard and whiskers, pronounced Hebraic
+features, small suspicious eyes, and filthy from the top of his narrow
+forehead to the tip of his clawlike finger-nails, he was one of the
+most repulsive specimens one could wish to avoid.
+
+"What do you want?" he asked in a high-pitched rasping voice, squinting
+at me, when his customer went out, cursing him for the smallness of the
+amount he had received for the coat.
+
+I told him straight out. The remembrance of Feldmann's tips was one
+reason, and my desire not to stop one unnecessary moment in such
+unsavoury surroundings was another.
+
+He shook his head. "You've come to the wrong shop, my man. Given up all
+that sort of thing long ago. Too risky."
+
+"All right; sorry to have troubled you. Good-day," I replied casually,
+and turned to leave.
+
+He let me get to the door and then called me back. "Wait a moment. Who
+sent you here?"
+
+"No one in particular. It's pretty well known, isn't it? Good-day."
+
+"Here, wait. Come here; I know some one who might be able to do it for
+you."
+
+I didn't go back. "It isn't of the least consequence," I said with an
+airy wave of the hand. "I told the man he'd better go to the police and
+just tell them how he lost his card."
+
+"Come in here a minute;" and he shuffled off to a door at the back of
+the shop.
+
+I hesitated, took a couple of paces toward him, stopped and shook my
+head. "No. I don't want to have anything to do with it, if there's any
+risk attached to it, as you say."
+
+This worked all right. "When I said that, I thought you wanted it for
+yourself," he said slily.
+
+I burst out laughing and turned again as if to go away. "Good-day, my
+friend. That's rich and no mistake."
+
+"Here, don't be in such a hurry," he said, coming a step toward me. "If
+your friend's in any trouble, I might----"
+
+"What the devil do you mean by that?" I cried, and cursed him royally
+for the suggestion.
+
+He came up and laid his filthy claw on my sleeve. I shook it off with
+another choice epithet or two. "Come into my room a minute and we'll
+talk it over. Don't lose your temper."
+
+I allowed myself to be pacified: not too quickly, of course; and with a
+great show of reluctance allowed him to take me into his room, which
+was, if possible, filthier even than the shop and smelt vilely.
+
+"Now, tell me all about it. Of course most of those who come to me are
+in trouble of some sort or other and I have to be careful. If the
+police knew anything, well----" and he gestured to indicate the trouble
+it would mean for him.
+
+"All right, but don't try that rot with me. Either you can sell me what
+I've asked for, or you can't. So out with it. I don't care which way it
+is; and this place of yours stinks so that I don't want to stop in it
+and be suffocated."
+
+He leered as if this were rather a good joke or a compliment. "I might
+be able to manage it, but----"
+
+I broke in with an impatient oath. "I don't want any 'might be.' Can
+you or can't you? Be quick about it, too. If you can, how much?" This
+was evidently the right line with him and he grinned appreciatively.
+
+"That's the way to talk. Shall we say 150 marks?"
+
+"How much?" I cried with a regular spasm of astonishment. "Say it
+again, man."
+
+"A hundred and fifty marks."
+
+I sat back and stared at him. "Do you think I want to deal wholesale
+and set up in the business myself? I only want one, you infernal old
+humbug;" and I roared with laughter.
+
+He was accustomed to being abused and joined in the laugh, combing his
+tousled red beard with his filthy fingers. "Well, how much then?"
+
+"Oh, a couple of marks or so."
+
+He threw up his hands, gesticulating violently, as if the offer was an
+insult, appeared to work himself into a furious rage, and fumed and
+fussed and stormed, until I got up. Again he tested me; let me leave
+the room and reach the door of the shop, following with a mixture of
+lamentations and appeals to Heaven to bear witness to my lunacy.
+
+I did not so much as turn round, remembering Feldmann's caution, and I
+was all but in the street, before he changed his tone, apparently
+satisfied that I was sincere.
+
+"It's no use to part like this. Come back and talk it over again." Once
+more a similar pantomime was played; but this time I was much slower to
+give way. "It can't be done at the price. Impossible. Think of the risk
+I should----"
+
+"Then don't do it. I tell you if you mean there's any risk in the
+thing, I won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. I thought a few marks was
+all that would be necessary; but if you offered to give it me for
+nothing and there's any risk I wouldn't take it. Get that into your
+head."
+
+"Do you think I give things away?"
+
+"Not I, seeing how you cling to the dirt on you."
+
+This was also accepted as a joke and he wagged his head and winked. "It
+takes too much time to clean things; and time's money," he replied,
+with one of his repulsive leers. "But I like you. You say what you
+mean. I'll take a hundred marks from you."
+
+"Will you? You'll be cleverer than I take you for, if you do."
+
+"But there's the----" He was going to repeat about the risk, but
+checked the word as bad business; and a long chaffering began in which
+he tried to squeeze me first to seventy-five marks, then to fifty,
+coming down by tens and fives to twenty-five.
+
+He stuck at that point a long time; and lest he should think even that
+sum suspicious, I held out at the five marks to which I had increased
+my offer during the bargaining.
+
+Once more he let me all but leave the shop, and when he again called me
+back I refused to go and struck out a fresh line.
+
+"I'll tell you why I've stopped so long as it is, Graun," I said. "I've
+never met any one quite like you before, and you're a very interesting
+character. I do something at times in theatricals and you're worth
+studying; but I've had enough of you now. It's been worth a few marks
+to have such a chance as this, and, while I don't care two straws
+whether I get what brought me here or not, I'll give you five marks for
+the fun I've had," and to his consummate astonishment I put the money
+in his dirty palm. "If I were you, I'd spend it on soap or something
+that will get rid of some of this beastly stink."
+
+"You give me this?" he cried in amazement.
+
+"Yes, give it you. Good-day."
+
+It was the turning point of the conference. He clawed hold of my arm.
+"You can come and study me any time you like at the same price," he
+said with a grin. "I don't mind how often. And look here, you shall
+have the card if you'll make it ten marks."
+
+"Another five, do you mean?"
+
+"Oh, no. Oh, no. Another ten," he cried greedily.
+
+I shook my head at first and then smiled. "I tell you what I'll do.
+I'll give you the other ten, if you'll throw in another cursing and
+lamentation scene, like the last. Five for that and five for the card.
+You do it so beautifully, Graun; and it's all put on, I know."
+
+He grinned, but shook his head. "It wasn't put on."
+
+"You're a dirty, stinking, money-grabbing Jew, Graun," I cried, with
+every appearance of fierce earnestness.
+
+He seemed to take it as meant, and he did repeat the cursing scene with
+the utmost energy and wild gesticulation, to my intense amusement.
+
+"It wasn't quite so good as the first, Graun, but it's worth the money
+all the same. Here you are; get me the card. I believe you're quite a
+decent sort really and just put on this manner for business."
+
+More leers as he shuffled off, and in a minute or two later I left with
+an identification card in the name of "Johann Liebe, mechanic."
+
+Whether he would tell the police of my visit, I neither knew nor cared.
+He was obviously satisfied that things were pretty much as I had
+pretended, and the little hint that I might wish to "study" him again
+was quite likely to make him hold his tongue.
+
+I had all that I needed; the way to leave was now open; and in a very
+few hours Nessa and I would have seen the last of Berlin for many a day.
+
+The interview had taken longer than I had expected, however, and after
+snatching a hasty meal in the first decent place I came to, I hurried
+to the Karlstrasse to fix up the final arrangements for our departure.
+
+Nessa was as jubilant as I at the news of my success. "Rosa told me all
+you said and where you'd gone and that we were to go to-night. Oh,
+isn't it splendid!" she exclaimed.
+
+"You'll be ready?"
+
+"Oh, no. I shall take care to miss the train, of course. Make a point
+of it," she cried, her eyes as bright as diamonds. "I shall have a cab,
+tell every one I'm going to England and---- How can you ask such a
+silly question, Jack?"
+
+"Steady. Not that name till we're in Holland anyhow."
+
+"Do you expect me to be steady at such a time, Herr Lassen?" with mock
+emphasis on the name.
+
+"I shan't be Lassen after this, mind. This thing I've got in my pocket
+christens me Johann Liebe."
+
+She laughed. "Let me look at it. I declare I could almost kiss it," she
+exclaimed, when I showed it to her. "And now we'll be sensible. What
+are my marching orders?"
+
+"Flying orders, we call them. Well, I still hope we shall travel in
+state under Government patronage, and----"
+
+"I hope not," she broke in. "I'd much rather go on the 'third wheel,'
+you know. It would be glorious fun. I don't want to have to scrap my
+disguise and have had all my trouble for nothing."
+
+"That's all right; but the other wheel's both safer and quicker, thank
+you. All the same you'd better bring the props along in case things go
+wrong. One never knows. Do you want to bother with any luggage?"
+
+"A comb and a toothbrush, a few hairpins and a pair of scissors. That
+too much?"
+
+"Rather not; but why scissors?"
+
+"You don't want your assistant to have long hair, do you? And it might
+be injudicious to worry a barber."
+
+We both laughed. "I never thought of that. By Jove, it would be a
+beastly shame to have to cut off that lovely wig of yours." She had
+most beautiful hair of a rich dark auburn.
+
+"A thousand times better than an internment camp," she replied, sobered
+by the mere thought of it. But only for the moment; she was too wildly
+excited at the prospect of going home for anything to damp her spirits.
+"Why, I'd do it only to play the part of Hans Bulich for an hour."
+
+"Who's Hans Bulich?"
+
+"Your assistant that hopes to be, of course. You're surely not going to
+begin by forgetting essentials?"
+
+"I had forgotten for the moment."
+
+"Well, don't forget again. Shall I spell it for you?"
+
+"Don't give me any of your lip, 'Hans,'" I retorted smartly.
+
+"All right, matey, keep your hand on the brake," she replied in her
+excellent assistant's tone; and worked in a number of motor parts to
+show she had been swotting them up as I had suggested.
+
+"You'll do, boy," I said, laughing. "And now let's remember this isn't
+going to be all mere chaff," and I told her my plan. She was to be at
+the station a quarter of an hour before the train started and look out
+for me in the waiting-room. "If things go right with von Gratzen,
+that'll be the ladies' room; if not, then the third class. I'll manage
+to 'phone you in time for the necessary make-up. As for the rest, it's
+up to us to manage the best we can."
+
+"If we have to go disguised, are you going to risk the mail train then?"
+
+"There won't be any risk to speak of now that I've got this;" tapping
+my pocket. "Of course we can't go all the way because I haven't a
+passport; but we'll get as near the frontier as we can. Osnabrück,
+probably; but I'll have the tickets all right. And now I must be off."
+
+"I wish my silly heart wouldn't beat like a racing 40 h.p., but I'll
+have it in good order when we meet again."
+
+"It's a good thing I don't make it beat, eh?"
+
+"Hands off, matey," replied "Hans," but with a very un-boylike blush.
+
+"You must drop that habit, young 'un. You've got to think about other
+40 h.p.'s, you know;" and with that I went, little thinking of all that
+was to happen before we met again.
+
+I hurried to my rooms to put the final touches to my preparations; pack
+the one or two trifles I needed for the journey; make sure that no
+inquisitive eyes had discovered my hidden suit case; and have
+everything ready for instant departure.
+
+This did not take more than a few minutes, and I had just finished and
+was replacing the suit case in its hiding place, when the telephone
+rang.
+
+"Hullo?" I asked, wondering who could want to call me up.
+
+"Herr Lassen?" came in a woman's voice I did not know.
+
+"Yes. What is it?"
+
+"I'm to tell you Anna Hilden wants to see you at once."
+
+"Who is it speaking?" There was no answer, and none again when I
+repeated the question. Who could it be? And the meaning of it? It
+certainly wasn't Anna's voice, although the 'phone has a trick at times
+of changing the voice considerably.
+
+It was still nearly an hour before the time she had fixed for me to go
+to her, and I couldn't understand how she could have got hold of my
+telephone number. But she wouldn't have telephoned if it hadn't been
+urgent. It looked as if she had made up her mind at last to admit
+everything, and the sooner I had the confession the better chance there
+was of catching von Gratzen at his office. So I hurried off, was lucky
+enough to get a taxi, and reached her place within ten minutes of
+getting her message.
+
+To my surprise the door of her flat was ajar. Not perhaps an unusual
+thing, considering that she was a somewhat casual person. I pressed the
+electric bell and heard it ring all right; but she didn't come to the
+door. Probably slipped out for something, I concluded; and after a
+second ring, I pushed the door wide and went in.
+
+She was not in the sitting-room, and I was just dropping into a chair
+to wait for her, when a glance through the open door of the adjoining
+bedroom brought my heart up into my mouth, as if I'd come on an air
+pocket a thousand feet deep.
+
+She was lying asprawl on the bed in a most unnatural attitude.
+
+In a second I was in the room and knew the truth.
+
+She was dead, and the marks on her throat could only mean one thing.
+
+"Murder!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+MURDER
+
+
+Some horror-filled moments passed before I grasped the full
+significance to me of the unfortunate woman's death. I turned dizzy and
+bewildered like a drunken man, and could do nothing but just stare at
+the body, literally stupefied by the suddenness of it.
+
+It wasn't the fact of death that startled me; I had seen too many dead
+bodies at the Front to be much concerned.
+
+But I made a big effort to pull myself together. I examined her to be
+certain that she was really dead, for the body was still warm. There
+was no doubt about it. The poor thing had been choked, and the marks of
+the murderer's fingers showed on her throat.
+
+There had been a struggle in the room, and some of the wretched
+furniture had been overturned. My wits were beginning to clear by that
+time; and I was glancing about the room wondering who had been brute
+enough to commit the murder and what I had better do, when I made a
+discovery that told me everything and turned the blood in my veins icy
+cold.
+
+In examining the body I had disarranged the bedclothes slightly, and by
+the side of the neck, just where it would have fallen from the
+murderer's finger, lay a ring.
+
+Von Erstein's! The puzzle ring he had once shown and explained to me!
+It was impossible to mistake it; and there was probably not another
+ring like it in Berlin.
+
+I didn't lose my head that time; the instinct of self-preservation was
+too strong to allow of any other feeling. My one absorbing thought was
+to get away before any one could come.
+
+I darted back into the sitting-room and snatched at my hat which I had
+left on the table. In my flurry I fumbled. It fell to the floor and
+rolled under the table; and when I grabbed for it again, the quaint
+little card case which Rosa had given me lay open just beside it.
+
+Too obsessed by the desire to get out of the place, I had no other
+feeling than a faint satisfaction at finding it again; not realizing
+for an instant the full significance of the incident I pocketed the
+thing, picked up my hat and left the flat. I took care to shut the
+door; this would serve to postpone the discovery of the murder; went
+down the staircase without undue hurry, made sure there was no one to
+see me leave, walked leisurely away until I turned the first corner and
+then made off at a rapid pace.
+
+A sensation of profound relief that I was safe for a time at any rate
+was followed by some minutes of acute reaction in which I was incapable
+of consecutive thought. A mental blank from which I awoke pretty much
+as a man might wake from sleep-walking. I gazed about me unknowingly,
+and seeing the gate of a small public garden close at hand, I went in
+and sat down.
+
+I soon began to get my wits in working order and bit by bit pieced
+things together. Curiously enough, almost the first thought was about
+the comparative trifle of the card case. I remember that I took it out
+and looked at it, wondering stupidly when I could have dropped it in
+Anna's room. Then I recalled that I had missed it in the morning when
+with von Gratzen. It couldn't have been in my pocket therefore when I
+went to Anna; and in a few seconds I understood.
+
+The last time I had touched it was on the previous night when I had
+taken Rudolff's statement out of it to show von Erstein and he had
+tried to snatch the paper away and had only got the little case. I
+remembered that he had thrown it down close to him and had fiddled with
+it nervously afterwards.
+
+It was clear that he had taken it away with him and had intentionally
+left it in Anna's room to shift his villainous deed on to me. It was
+worthy of him; and it would have succeeded but for that wonderful slice
+of luck--ineffably blessed luck, indeed--by which I had found the card
+case.
+
+That helped me to piece the rest together. Panic-stricken by what I had
+told her about von Gratzen, Anna had no doubt threatened to expose
+everything; Erstein's whole scheme would be ruined the moment she
+opened her lips: and this had roused the brute in him until he had been
+driven to strangle her. The ring had slipped from his finger without
+his noticing the loss of it in his rage. Then he must have tossed my
+card case down under the table to connect me with the crime.
+
+He had obviously left the door ajar for the same reason; had probably
+rushed to the first public telephone box and called me up in a voice
+which was enough like a woman's to mislead me; and intended to send
+some one to catch me red-hot on the scene of the crime.
+
+Two points were not clear. Why no one had caught me? There had been
+ample time, supposing that he was hiding in wait for my arrival. And
+why had the murder been committed in Anna's room, seeing that she had
+gone from me to find him?
+
+One of two suggestions seemed to answer the last question. Either she
+had not found him at first and had left a sufficiently urgent message
+to make him hurry to her, or that after a first interview he had
+induced her to go home and had followed at once. The plan to kill her
+must have been in his mind then, and obviously he couldn't do it in his
+own rooms.
+
+The first question--why I had not been caught--wasn't so readily
+solved; but the ring might well account for it, if he had only
+discovered the loss of it in the interval of waiting for me. With that
+damning bit of evidence against himself, the bottom had dropped out of
+his scheme against me, and he would not dare to try and have me caught
+in the act.
+
+And now I had fortunately shut the door against him. He couldn't go
+back for the ring even if he had the pluck, which I doubted.
+
+This was another stroke of luck, indeed; and it was needed in all
+truth, for the mess was bad and black enough to need a heap of it, if I
+was to escape being charged with the murder. Such a charge would ruin
+me lock, stock and barrel. Even if I could clear myself--and that was
+almost impossible--all the truth about myself would be ferretted out,
+and it was thousands to one that I should be shot for a spy.
+
+Only one expedient occurred to me at first--to bolt. But that looked
+hopeless in the new circumstances. It would be tantamount to a
+confession of guilt; von Erstein would tell some plausible lie about
+the ring belonging to Anna; and it would be believed easily enough if
+suspicion were lifted from him by my flight; the hue and cry would be
+raised all over the country; old Graun would tell his story--that I had
+a workman's papers in the name of Liebe; and my arrest would be a
+matter of hours possibly, certainly one of days at the outside.
+
+That idea had to be set aside, therefore. Before there could be any
+thought of flight suspicion must be fastened on von Erstein. But how?
+Not by sitting on a public seat and nibbling my nails; so I got up and
+started back to the centre of things.
+
+I had completely recovered from the disturbing panicky condition which
+had so confused me in the first rush of things. I don't think I was
+even afraid. My chief feeling was that I was in the very devil's own
+mess and that I should go under, unless my own wits could save me. If
+Feldmann had been in Berlin I should have gone to him; but he wasn't,
+and it was no use wishing he had been.
+
+There was only one other man in the whole city--von Gratzen; and the
+moment that became clear and plain, I hailed a taxi and was driven
+straight to his office.
+
+He was still there, but refused to see me, sending von Welten to ask my
+business. I said that it was on personal business I wished to see his
+chief.
+
+This didn't work, however. Von Welten returned, saying the Baron was
+exceedingly busy and would I state my business in writing. This looked
+ugly; but after thinking a second, I wrote on my card: "Please see me
+for the sake of the Untergasse affair;" placed it in an envelope and
+sent it in. If anything would induce von Gratzen to have me in, that
+would.
+
+I was right. Von Welten came back smiling. "The chief will see you in a
+minute or two, Herr Lassen. I'm glad." He was an exceedingly pleasant
+fellow and stayed chatting with me until von Gratzen's bell rang and I
+was shown in.
+
+"You're giving me a lot of trouble, young man, as you can see," he
+said, pointing to a portfolio in which there appeared to be a lot of
+papers on the top of which were the coveted tickets for Nessa and me.
+"And now what about this Untergasse affair? Found anything out that's
+valuable? I can't give you many minutes."
+
+"I'm in a devil of a mess, sir, but it has nothing to do with that. I
+wrote that because I was compelled to see you."
+
+"I agree with you. You've been in one ever since you reached the city,
+it seems to me, indeed. Nothing fresh, I trust?"
+
+"There is, and the worst of all, sir. I'm in danger of being charged
+with murder."
+
+"With what?" he cried in amazement. "Phew! Well, tell me."
+
+"When I saw you this morning I gathered that the reason those tickets
+for Miss Caldicott and myself could not be used was because of the
+trouble about the woman, Anna Hilden."
+
+"True, but you yourself said you wished it cleared up first."
+
+"So on leaving here I went to see her again."
+
+"Good God, you don't mean to say you lost your head and laid hands on
+her in this awful way?" The thought of it appeared to affect him deeply.
+
+"Oh dear no, sir. I hope I'm not capable of such a thing. From what she
+said, I became certain the whole thing was a fraud and----"
+
+"So it is," he interposed, nodding. "You are right. We know all about
+the woman already. Go on."
+
+"I tried persuasion first; but that was no use, so I let her know that
+the matter was in your hands."
+
+"I hope that frightened her."
+
+"It did, sir. She was almost out of her wits and promised to tell me
+everything this afternoon. I was to call at five o'clock."
+
+"Where did you go next?" he shot in abruptly.
+
+"To the von Reblings."
+
+"To tell Miss Caldicott about these, I suppose?" holding up the tickets.
+
+"Yes. I knew she would be very anxious."
+
+He put the pinned set of tickets, etc., into the portfolio, under a
+couple of papers, and leant back, with his fingers interlocked, and
+stared at me with frowning intentness. "You're not a fool, my boy, and
+you must see that your zeal on that young lady's account is likely to
+rouse a lot of suspicion. What do the von Reblings say about it?"
+
+"They are extremely anxious that she should be allowed to go home."
+
+"Umph!" a grunt and a nod, both of which were repeated. "And where did
+you go next after leaving them?"
+
+I started and hesitated.
+
+"Are you going to tell me the whole truth? We get to know many strange
+things here, you know."
+
+"I went to see a man named Graun----"
+
+"I know you did. You were followed and he was questioned. I won't ask
+you why you got what you did from him; but don't attempt to use it. Now
+go on about this other affair. Just everything; everything, and quite
+frankly."
+
+"I will, sir. Let me get my thoughts in order again. You've taken me
+considerably by surprise." I paused a few seconds and then told him
+exactly what had occurred, from the moment of my receiving the
+telephone call, down to my discovery of von Erstein's ring under Anna's
+body.
+
+He jumped up excitedly at that. "Why didn't you tell me that first?" he
+cried. "There isn't a moment to lose. I must see about it instantly;"
+and he hurried out of the room.
+
+For the second time the tickets were within reach and I was alone in
+the room. He had apparently forgotten them in his excitement, and that
+I had only to stretch out my hand and secure them. Or had he gone out
+deliberately intending to give me the chance? He knew how eager I was
+to get away; the old Jew's tale must have shown that.
+
+I didn't hesitate this time. I whipped them out of the portfolio and
+pocketed them. Had I better bolt, or stay to face him? A mighty
+difficult question. If I ran away, he might suspect; if I stayed, there
+was a chance that he might not miss them. If they were missed, they
+wouldn't be worth a pfennig. We should certainly be stopped at the
+station; there would be a scene and Nessa would be hopelessly
+compromised. That was unthinkable.
+
+There was nothing for it, therefore, but to stay and face it out. It
+wasn't easy to do; and nothing in the world except the thought of the
+consequences to Nessa, could have glued me to my chair for the minutes
+I had still to wait for von Gratzen. It was a positive relief when the
+strain ended and he came back.
+
+He was looking very grave and stern, and there were still traces of the
+excitement he had shown when he had left me.
+
+How I watched him! The next moment would decide everything for me. He
+was thinking closely, paused with his hand to his forehead when halfway
+to the desk, nodded in response to a thought, and went on to his chair.
+I had to hold my breath, as he sat down and laid his hand on the
+portfolio. I was ready to throw up the sponge as he slightly lifted the
+top paper and toyed with it.
+
+The thought flashed through my head that the only thing left was to
+admit everything; who I was; why I had come; why I was so eager to get
+away; and then ask him to help me in return for what I had done in the
+Untergasse affair.
+
+But the moment for that hadn't come yet at all events. Whether he
+noticed the absence of the tickets it was impossible to say. He
+appeared to be entirely lost in thought; he was staring abstractedly at
+nothing; not once had I seen his eyes drop to the desk; not so much as
+a side glance came my way; but then he was such a wily old beggar that
+that might all have been pretence to mislead me.
+
+After a time that seemed hours to me, he nodded to himself again, took
+the hand from the papers to pass it across his forehead, and smiled. A
+smile of infinite meaning it was too. Then he closed the portfolio and
+put it away in a drawer.
+
+"Now tell me the rest, boy," he said, turning to look at me for the
+first time. "Hallo, you look a little done up. Room too hot? Open the
+window a bit."
+
+I jumped at the excuse to get out of range of his keen eyes for an
+instant. He might well say it was hot, for the strain had brought the
+perspiration in great beads on my forehead.
+
+"Stand there a while and get a breath of the fresh air. A thing like
+this is sure to shake you up," he added.
+
+Did he know? Was this intended to give me an opportunity of pulling
+myself together? Had he noticed everything and been thinking out some
+further subtle move in the game? Who could tell?
+
+"Better?" he asked, as I returned to my seat. "There's no hurry. I've
+put off my other matters and shall have to keep you here for an hour or
+so. I'll tell you why presently. Oh, by the way, you'd better give me
+the card you got from old Graun. It may help you if I'm able to say you
+gave it to me; and, of course, it's no use to you now."
+
+Was this his way of telling me that he knew? was the question in my
+mind as I gave it him. Then I resumed the story of the afternoon.
+
+"You brought that card case away?" he shot in when I mentioned it.
+
+"Yes. I have it here. Will you take it?"
+
+"Perhaps I'd better," he replied after a pause, and then opened the
+drawer containing the portfolio, tossed it in carelessly, and let me
+finish the rest of the story without interruption, when he once more
+lapsed into close thought.
+
+Von Welten came in before he spoke and handed him a note. "Not a second
+later than seven o'clock, mind, von Welten. Not a second, mind," he
+said when he had read the letter. "That'll do;" and we were alone again.
+
+"Now I'll tell you something in my turn," he said. "You have rendered
+us a very great service; a much greater service than you can imagine.
+You have only made one mistake, for you ought to have hurried to me as
+fast as possible from that woman's rooms; but you're evidently lucky,
+for no harm has been done."
+
+"I don't quite understand, sir," I stammered in surprise.
+
+"I'm going to explain it to you. In the first place let me tell you I
+believe absolutely that you have told me the truth--about this murder,
+I mean--perhaps not in everything else."
+
+"There is only one thing, and if you wish----"
+
+"Don't interrupt me, boy. I don't like it," he exclaimed testily. "It
+puts me out. Now about this affair. We know all about this woman, Anna
+Hilden. That isn't her name at all; but that doesn't matter now. She
+is, or was, one of von Erstein's mistresses; not the only one, by the
+way. The real Anna Hilden was another--years ago, of course--and that
+is how he knew all about that sale of the secret information to France."
+
+I had not said anything about that and he noticed my start.
+
+"You needn't be astonished. I tell you we know many things here. It is
+our business to know them. The man who betrayed us in that affair was
+von Erstein himself, and you, if you are really Lassen, were merely the
+go-between and scapegoat. But he was too cunning for us to be able to
+prove a thing against him. There are many things we think we know about
+him and can't prove, and others we don't wish to prove," he said, with
+a very meaning side glance.
+
+"I can understand that."
+
+"We'll hope you don't come under either head, my boy. Well, we've been
+waiting for von Erstein, and now, thanks to you, we've got him. This
+woman went to him to-day after you left her; she was with him a
+considerable time; she left in great agitation; and he followed later
+to the flat which had been taken for this affair of yours. That he
+murdered her, there is no doubt, after what you've told me; but it's
+got to be proved. You won't be sorry if it is, probably."
+
+"He ought to be hanged," I exclaimed impulsively.
+
+He fixed his keen eyes on me, and in an instant I saw what I had done
+and that this was one of his infernal traps.
+
+"You're either forgetting yourself, or beginning to remember things,
+aren't you?" he asked deliberately, with one of his queer inscrutable
+smiles. "It's in England that they hang murderers, you know."
+
+I could have cursed myself for the idiotic slip, as his eyes bored
+right into my brain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+VON GRATZEN'S WILINESS
+
+
+Abashed and confused by this unexpected trap, I sat cudgelling my wits
+for something to say, and at last stammered out, "I--I meant lynched,
+hanged on the nearest lamp-post, sir."
+
+It was the lamest of lame dogs; but he appeared satisfied. He leant
+back in his chair. "Oh, I see. Yes, of course. Your American
+experiences, I expect. Well, we can talk about that another time. I was
+going to say that in von Erstein we have to deal with a very cunning
+individual indeed, and I shall expect you to help us. One of the
+necessary steps may be your arrest."
+
+"Arrest!" I echoed in dismay.
+
+"I said arrest. It may be necessary. It is essential he should not
+believe that a jot of suspicion attaches to him. You'll appreciate
+that?"
+
+"I can appreciate it perhaps, but----"
+
+"Don't be alarmed. I promise you very good treatment."
+
+"But I thought you wished----" I pulled up on the brink of blurting out
+about my going to England.
+
+"No matter for the moment what I wished, my boy." I was beginning to
+hate that term of familiarity, for I knew now what it covered.
+"Everything must wait upon this now," he continued. "The arrest will
+not be made at once, however, as there is one thing you have to do
+first."
+
+This was better. If it wasn't done at once, it never would be done, I
+was resolved. "What is that?" I asked.
+
+"You must return that ring to von Erstein."
+
+"Do what?" I cried aghast. The ring was the only evidence against him!
+
+"Do try to listen carefully. You must return it to him and lead him to
+believe you brought it away from that room. Let him snatch it from you
+while you are threatening to denounce him; or give it him as the terms
+of a truce between you; anyhow you please. But mind, it must be done so
+that he is convinced no eyes but yours have seen it. That's vital."
+
+The light was beginning to break through even my thick skull then.
+
+"We have it here; our people found it exactly as you said."
+
+"Then the murder is known?"
+
+"Oh, yes; the police have it in hand by this time; but they know
+nothing about that ring. We sent two men to the place who are suspected
+of being in his pay; and they will be able to report to him that
+nothing of the sort was found on the spot. We have taken every
+precaution, of course. It has been photographed from a dozen different
+points and a replica is being made. I am waiting now for the impression
+of the mould."
+
+"It has occurred to you, of course, that he may destroy it?" I
+suggested.
+
+He shook his head. "There's no fear of that. For one thing he's much
+too proud of it; there isn't another exactly like it in all Europe,
+probably not in the whole world; for another, he looks on it as a sort
+of mascot; there's some kind of legend or other about it; and lastly,
+if you do your part well, he will feel he can keep it with absolute
+safety."
+
+The scheme was subtle enough to be worthy even of von Gratzen, and it
+increased my dread of his almost diabolical cunning. "When will you
+make him account for it?"
+
+"That depends. He's a vindictive devil and is sure to denounce you for
+the murder, the instant he thinks he can do it safely. The most
+effective moment to deal with him would be when we get him in the
+witness box, giving evidence against you. But we shall see."
+
+"And when am I to be arrested?"
+
+"As soon as he lays the information against you, unless I find on
+consideration we can avoid quite so drastic a step. It is not
+altogether impossible; but the pith of everything is that you get the
+ring back to him as soon as possible."
+
+A pleasant look-out for me--to be charged with murder of which he knew
+I was innocent in order to help him carry out plans. "You will scarcely
+expect me to be deliriously joyful at the prospect of being tried for
+my life," I said with a feeble smile.
+
+He didn't like that at all and frowned at me. "Worse than that might
+happen to you, perhaps; and in the end it would be immensely to your
+advantage," he replied with unpleasantly deliberate significance.
+
+I dropped that line like a hot coal. "I'm in your hands, sir."
+
+"I'm glad to hear you say that. Of course, as I said just now, it may
+not come to that; I have another possible plan, indeed. But the other
+part is essential. You will give me your word of honour to carry out my
+instructions faithfully?"
+
+"Yes, I give you my word of honour. Would it be sufficient if I were to
+let him have it with a letter?"
+
+"Why?" Like a pistol shot came the question and his eyes snapped.
+
+"I might bungle the personal business. I'm not much of a hand at
+acting, I'm afraid."
+
+"I see," he replied; nodding; and something uncommonly like a smile
+hovered about the corners of his mouth. "I thought you said something
+to that Jew about theatricals and your studying his character. I have
+looked on you as a particularly good actor, my boy. But let's think. It
+would depend on how you worded any letter."
+
+He considered for a while, started suddenly, nodded to himself, smiled,
+wrote hastily, and handed me the paper. "Just memorize that."
+
+"Von Erstein, you will know where I found the enclosed just as I know
+why you left what I found there. You think to ruin me. I am not the man
+you believe me to be and can prove my innocence by means of which you
+can have no conception. Enough that I tell you I have sufficiently
+recovered my memory to protect myself against your devilish malice. The
+enclosed proves I am ready to cry a truce.--Johann Lassen."
+
+What I felt as I read this under the keen piercing gaze he rivetted on
+me the whole time, no words can describe. "Well, my boy?" he asked.
+
+"I--I'll memorize it, sir," I stammered to get time to think.
+
+"Just read it out. Let me hear how it sounds."
+
+Fortunately, or intentionally, I couldn't determine which, he put his
+hand before his face as I read it in none too firm a tone. "It'll do.
+Oh, yes. The recovery of your memory seems to explain the word 'means,'
+and he'll think you are only bluffing him. He'll never dream you've
+told me all about it; and, of course, that's what I intended. You
+understand I much prefer your seeing him; but if you can't, you can
+send that letter."
+
+I began to breathe freely again. "I'll see him to-night, if possible,"
+I replied.
+
+"I'm sure you will. It's now all but seven. He generally goes to dinner
+at eight, and between now and then you ought to be able to catch him at
+his rooms. Mind, I depend on you."
+
+"You may, sir."
+
+"They ought to be ready for us now," he said; and as he rang his bell
+von Welten came in, bringing the ring, the replica and the photographs;
+and we all scrutinized them carefully.
+
+The facsimile of the ring was absolutely perfect. It was either in wax
+or some harder material and had been gilded, and as it and the original
+lay side by side on the table it was impossible to distinguish the one
+from the other.
+
+"Very good indeed. Clever work, in the time," said von Gratzen. "Of
+course he understands that the finished facsimile must be in gold and
+will take to pieces in the same way as the original."
+
+"Oh, yes. He has a number of small moulds of the individual parts.
+Would you like to see them, sir?" replied von Welten.
+
+"Not necessary at all. He knows his job. That'll do, von Welten. Leave
+the real thing with me;" and he picked it up and examined it with a
+gloating and almost satanic smile, as von Welten left the room. "At
+last!" he murmured under his breath.
+
+Then he wrapped it up and handed it to me. "You see how I trust you, my
+boy. I know you won't fail me, too. And now you had better go. Just a
+last word. As soon as you've returned that to him disappear for a time.
+Leave Berlin and go, oh anywhere; the farther the better for the time;
+and don't on any account come to me again until I send for you."
+
+Utterly mystified by all this, I ventured: "But can I go away without a
+permit?"
+
+Another of his queer inscrutable smiles greeted this. "Perhaps it would
+be better; but you haven't any too much time to spare--if you're going
+to catch von Erstein," he added as an afterthought. He rang his bell
+and wrote furiously. "Get that stamped officially at once. As quick as
+you can," he told von Welten, who hurried away. "He'll give it you as
+you go out," he said to me, rising and gripping my hand. "And now,
+good-bye, my boy--for a time at any rate. You're a good lad, and
+whatever happens, if you do what I've asked, I'll always stand by you."
+
+Von Welten met me with the permit as I left the room. "You're in luck
+to have got on the right side of the chief in this way," he said, as we
+shook hands.
+
+Were they all living enigmas? was my thought as I left the building,
+for von Welten's manner was as veiled and significant as his chief's.
+Did von Gratzen know that I had taken the tickets? Had he worded the
+letter I was to write to von Erstein in order to tell me that he knew
+my lost memory was a fraud? Did that remark, "You haven't any too much
+time to spare," refer to my having to catch the mail? He had qualified
+it by saying something about seeing von Erstein; but that had seemed to
+be just an afterthought.
+
+It was beyond me; and I was even more astounded when I read the paper
+which von Welten had given me. It was much more than a mere permit. It
+amounted to an official authority that I was travelling on business of
+State; was to go where I would and when; that all assistance was to be
+given to me; and any inquiries were to be telegraphed straight to von
+Gratzen.
+
+I was indeed lucky, as von Welten had declared. He little guessed what
+luck it was! Or did he? Was it all intended to make my path to the
+frontier clear?
+
+There was no time to puzzle about it then, however. I could write and
+ask for the reply to the riddle when Nessa and I were safely in Holland
+or home in England; what I had to do now was to get this business with
+von Erstein finished as quickly as possible.
+
+I drove to his flat; but he was not there, and I could not learn where
+to look for him. I was rather glad of this. It would be much easier to
+write the letter arranged. I went then to the Karlstrasse to tell Nessa
+that she could travel in her own character.
+
+Rosa was with her, and both were nervous at not having heard earlier
+how matters were going, for it was then more than a quarter past seven.
+
+"I've been worrying awfully," said Nessa. "Is anything wrong?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Everything's gloriously right. I've got our tickets,
+and all you've to do is to be at the station."
+
+"But what's happened?" exclaimed Rosa.
+
+"I haven't time to tell you now. I'm sorry; but I have to rush back to
+my rooms and get something.--By Jove!" I broke off in a cold sweat as
+the meaning of von Gratzen's look at my suggestion about writing dawned
+on me. I had told him before that I could neither write nor read
+writing! I had even given him a specimen of my new pothook fist! Of
+course I must keep it up, and it might take me Heaven knew how long. "I
+must go this instant," I said, and shaking hands with Rosa I rushed
+away to my rooms and set to work at once.
+
+It was a deuce of a business. Every letter had to be printed in clumsy
+fashion; my fingers were trembling under the stress of my impatience; I
+made blunders and had to begin all over again, and every lost minute
+was of vital importance.
+
+If I hadn't given my word of honour to von Gratzen I'd have wrapped the
+beastly ring up, scribbled a word or two and have left it at that. It
+was on the table by the side of the paper as I wrote, and I had just
+started on the second edition absorbed in the work, when a hand was
+stretched over my shoulder and grabbed the ring.
+
+It was von Erstein; I was never more glad to see any one in my life. I
+could have forgiven him everything for such a service.
+
+"Very good of you to leave the door open, Lassen," he said, with a
+sneering laugh. "Just going to return it to me, eh? I thought I'd
+dropped it here last night."
+
+There were still minutes enough left for me to put up a show of a
+struggle, and get in an explanation. So I grabbed hold of him, taking
+care that he should not get away and also that he kept possession of
+the ring.
+
+"I _was_ going to send it you, von Erstein. You can see I've begun
+the letter there."
+
+He stooped to read it and was puzzled. "What the devil does that mean?"
+he growled.
+
+"I'm willing to come to terms. We both know where I found it."
+
+"How do I know where you put it?"
+
+"Don't lie, man. You know very well that it was on your finger when you
+left here last night, and"--I paused for the sake of emphasis--"two
+people saw it there this morning."
+
+This hit him hard, and he winced and drew a deep breath. "Rubbish!" he
+muttered.
+
+"I've made sure about that. I've just come from your flat, remember," I
+said meaningly.
+
+"Have you been spreading that lie about me?"
+
+"Do you take me for an idiot to let any one want to ask where I found
+it?"
+
+He was satisfied, and his relief showed itself in his immediate change
+of manner. "All right, we'll bury the hatchet if you like," he said
+with a very poor attempt to hoodwink me.
+
+"You can go then;" and I moved to let him leave. I was anxious to get
+rid of him now, as it was time for me to be off to the station. I must
+have betrayed my impatience somehow, for he started, stared a moment,
+and sat down. "You're in a deuce of a hurry."
+
+"Dinner time, and I'm hungry. Clear out."
+
+"Nice room you've got here, Lassen," he answered, squinting round, and
+started again as his eyes fell on my suit case. "O-ho, that's the game,
+is it?" he chuckled. "Going to bolt? No good, my friend, no good at
+all."
+
+His fat insolent chuckle roused the devil in me. "You'd better drop
+that tone with me, von Erstein, and not interfere with my movements."
+
+"Shall we go and dine together?" he sneered. "It'll be safer, for there
+are a few inquisitive friends of mine waiting outside."
+
+I had noticed one or two men hanging round the building as I entered,
+and it wouldn't do to be shadowed. So I went out, locked the front door
+and put the key in my pocket.
+
+"What's that for?" he growled uneasily.
+
+"So that our chat shan't be disturbed. I've sampled your friends
+already, remember," I said drily.
+
+"Let me go," he cried in a dickens of a stew.
+
+"You wanted to stop, and stop you shall."
+
+To my intense joy he came for me and thus saved me from the unpleasant
+job of knocking him out in cold blood. I did it quite satisfactorily,
+and as he fell he struck his head against the corner of a writing desk
+and saved me the trouble of hitting him again.
+
+Then I collared my suit case, clambered out of the bathroom window down
+by the fire escape, and got away by a passage into a side street. A
+single glance satisfied me that none of his "friends" saw me, and I
+rushed off to the station.
+
+I reached it with only a few minutes in hand, and Nessa was waiting for
+me in the door of the waiting-room.
+
+"I was afraid you'd be late and that something had happened," she said
+nervously.
+
+"It's all right. We've plenty of time. Don't be nervy and not too
+friendly yet. There may be eyes about. We'll find a carriage at once."
+
+It was all right enough to tell her not to be nervy, but I was on pins
+and needles, wondering if my theft of the tickets had been discovered,
+whether at the last moment we should be stopped, and a hundred other
+wonderings.
+
+My eyes were all over the place as we walked to the train; and to my
+infinite dismay I caught sight of the old Jew planted close to the
+barrier through which we had to pass. That was not the worst, moreover,
+by any means. He was talking to a man who had policeman written all
+over him.
+
+And then, as if that wasn't bad enough, on the platform just beyond von
+Welten was strolling up and down smoking.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+OFF!
+
+
+The sight of the old Jew, his police companion, and von Welten knocked
+me all to pieces for the moment. We were done. That was a certainty. I
+could have bluffed the Jew, probably, with the official authority which
+von Gratzen had given me; but von Welten was what Jimmy Lamb would have
+called a very different proposition.
+
+"I think I'll have a cigarette," I said; and pulled up to light it and
+try to think what to do.
+
+"Whatever's the matter, Jack?" whispered Nessa. "Your hand shakes like
+anything and you're looking awful."
+
+"Nothing to what I'm feeling. I'm afraid it's all up. I can't tell you
+all about it now. Just shake hands with me and trot back to the
+waiting-room. If you see me stopped--wait till the train has actually
+started, of course--make a bee line back to the von Reblings. If it's
+all right, I'll beckon to you."
+
+"But if there's any trouble why should I leave you in it alone?" she
+protested, like the brick she was.
+
+"Let me be boss now. If you're with me, you may never get away at all;
+and if you're not, it may only mean a postponement. Be a good sort.
+Good-bye, Miss Caldicott;" and I held out my hand.
+
+She took it reluctantly. "I'd rather be with you," she replied with a
+glance for which I could have kissed her. Then she did as I wished.
+
+I put as bold a face on things as I could, walked quickly up to the
+barrier, putting my hand in my pocket as if for my ticket.
+
+"Good-evening, sir," said the Jew as I approached.
+
+"Hullo, you here, Graun?" very much astonished.
+
+"Herr Johann Lassen?" asked his companion.
+
+"That's my name, certainly. Who are you, and what do you want? I'm in a
+hurry to catch the train."
+
+"I'm a detective and have to ask you a few questions."
+
+"Fire 'em out, quick as you can, please."
+
+"There's no such hurry as all that. You can't go by this train. You
+paid a visit to this man to-day."
+
+"We shall be here half the night at this rate. I went to purchase an
+identification card and he sold me one in the name of Liebe."
+
+"Your object?"
+
+"That's my affair. I haven't it with me and am not going to use it."
+
+"That's your story. I don't believe it. Give it to me."
+
+"I've told you I haven't it."
+
+"Give it to me."
+
+"I would if I had it. As it is, I can't."
+
+"Give it up at once," he repeated very sharply.
+
+This looked like a deadlock and moments were flying fast. There was
+nothing for it but to try the effect of my official authority, and I
+was fingering it, when von Welten caught sight of me and hurried in our
+direction. I threw up the sponge. To produce the authority in his
+presence would be only to make bad worse, so I put it in my waistcoat
+pocket.
+
+The detective knew von Welten and saluted him.
+
+"Well, Grossbaum, what is it? How do, Herr Lassen?"
+
+"This man had a deal with Graun to-day and is travelling----"
+
+Von Welten interposed angrily. "Hold your tongue, you fool. I've always
+thought yours was the woodenest head in the force. I suppose you
+brought this disreputable old scoundrel here. Get away, both of you.
+Think yourself lucky if I don't report this last cleverness of yours.
+Be off, I say;" and the precious pair slunk away like a couple of
+whipped curs. "I'm awfully sorry about this, Herr Lassen; but why on
+earth didn't you show the fool that paper the chief gave you?"
+
+"I was going to," I stammered, utterly bewildered by the turn of
+affairs and gaping in wonder what would happen next. I was prepared for
+almost anything except what did happen.
+
+"I knew you would travel by this train and thought I'd like to be
+certain that everything was all right about the ring;" and he dropped
+his voice to a whisper.
+
+"Yes. He came to my rooms and I gave it him."
+
+"The artful devil! Of course he's planted some of the woman's things
+there. I told the chief I thought he would; and I'll see to that in the
+morning. But where's Miss Caldicott?"
+
+"Eh?" I asked stupidly.
+
+"Do you mean to say she isn't going after all?"
+
+"N-no. I mean--yes. She's over there," I stammered.
+
+"Well, she'd better be here if you wish to catch the train. There's
+only another minute and they'll start on the tick."
+
+Oh, I was surely dreaming. In a dream I beckoned to Nessa, who came
+hurrying up; in a dream von Welten was introduced and rushed us through
+the barrier to a compartment he'd already secured for us; in a dream he
+stood by the carriage door till we started, saying he thought it better
+for us to travel alone; and in a dream we shook hands out of the
+carriage window, and he waved to us as the train steamed out of the
+station.
+
+Even when we quickened up speed through the outskirts of the city, I
+had hard work to wake up from that tremendously splendid dream. But
+Nessa was very much awake and boiling over with excitement, curiosity
+and delight. "What's the matter with you, Jack? Aren't you just mad
+with joy? I am."
+
+"That's all right," I nodded.
+
+"But you look so odd."
+
+"Only intoxicated a bit."
+
+"Surely you haven't been taking some drug or other! You came along the
+platform as if you were walking in a dream."
+
+"Are you sure it isn't one? Are we really in a railway carriage?"
+
+"Of course it is, and a very comfortable one too. But whatever do you
+mean? Are you trying to frighten me or just fooling as usual?"
+
+"I don't know, but I simply can't believe it all yet."
+
+"Why? Do you understand that I'm bubbling over with curiosity? Do wake
+up and make haste and satisfy it, if you don't want to drive me out of
+my senses. Good heavens, you're on fire!" she exclaimed in alarm, as
+she wrapped her hand in her cloak and pressed it against my side
+excitedly.
+
+That roused me effectually. My waistcoat was smouldering and I plunged
+my hand into the pocket and discovered the reason. In my stupid
+absent-mindedness I had shoved the lighted end of my cigarette into the
+pocket and it had set fire to a couple of papers and singed the cloth.
+
+"Nothing to worry about," I said. But there was. When I unfolded one of
+the papers, I found that it was the authority von Gratzen had given me.
+A fair-sized hole had been charred right through the folds and the
+tinder dropped as I opened out the sheet. It was hopelessly unreadable
+and thus useless. "I didn't think I could be such a gorgeous idiot," I
+exclaimed staring fatuously at the ruin.
+
+"It's serious then?" asked Nessa, who had watched me anxiously.
+
+"Try if you can make anything out of it."
+
+She studied it and shook her head. "A word or two here and there are
+readable. That's all. What is it?"
+
+"The proof that I ought to be shut up in a lunatic asylum. But it
+_was_ something that would have taken me anywhere and everywhere
+through this beastly country and forced every one to help me."
+
+"That's delightfully intelligible," she cried, laughing. "Are you going
+to keep this up much longer, or tell me things?"
+
+"I'm going to tell you everything; but that silly ass trick of mine has
+knocked me. I'll smoke a cigarette. You don't mind?"
+
+"Providing you don't put the end in another pocket," she quizzed. "I
+thought it was agreed we were not to take things too seriously," she
+added as I lit up.
+
+"I've learnt my lesson." I had indeed. It had cost me the best safe
+conduct a man could have wished for, and if any unexpected trouble
+arose, there was now no possibility of undoing the mischief. As the
+guard passed along the corridor a little later, I decided to report the
+loss at once, and beckoned to him. "I've had an unfortunate accident,"
+I said. "I'm travelling on special State business and have burnt this
+very important paper;" and I handed it to him.
+
+He looked at it, turned it over, and shrugged his shoulders. "I'm
+afraid I can't be of much help, sir."
+
+"It is my authority signed by Count von Gratzen; you can just make out
+a part of the official seal; and you will have seen that Herr von
+Welten was on the platform when we left Berlin."
+
+"Yes, sir. He gave me orders to reserve this compartment for you,
+but----"
+
+"You can't do anything, I know; but I wish you to make a note that I
+told you of the loss. That's all."
+
+"Would you telegraph to his Excellency, sir?"
+
+"Where's the first stop?"
+
+"Not till Hanover, sir; but as it is State business and so important, I
+could stop at the next station for you to send a message, and you would
+have a reply wired to Hanover, or Osnabrück, if you are going so far."
+
+"A good idea, guard. I'm much obliged to you. I'll think about it; just
+give me a form." He took one from his pocket and went off, saying he
+would come back for the message.
+
+Nessa had listened in the greatest amazement. "Who on earth am I
+travelling with?" she cried. "Do you mean that you are able to have
+trains stopped at your mere nod?"
+
+"I'll tell you who you're travelling with in a moment, but let me think
+whether I dare send that wire." It wasn't long before I decided to risk
+it. Von Gratzen himself had suggested I should get out of the way for a
+time: even go to a distance: and would understand the importance of the
+ruined authority, since I could not return when he needed me without
+it. He would therefore wire me all I should require, pending the
+receipt of a new authority. That was all clear enough.
+
+But there was a fly in the ointment. He might have discovered the theft
+of the papers. But even in that case there wasn't very much risk, as
+the von Erstein affair was so vastly more important that he would
+hesitate before sending any instructions to get me into trouble. So I
+wrote the message and gave it to the guard, with a ten-mark tip, and
+the train was accordingly stopped for it to be despatched.
+
+Then I was ready to satisfy Nessa's acute curiosity. "Now you want to
+know who your fellow traveller is, eh? I'll tell you. He's a composite
+individual: an Englishman, a German, a State official, a spy, a thief,
+and an alleged murderer. I hope you're proud of him."
+
+"I don't care what he is if he's going to get me out of Germany. I
+needn't know him afterwards, I suppose."
+
+"If you're disrespectful and don't behave yourself I'll--I'll----"
+
+"Dock my wages, mate?" she popped in in her slangy voice.
+
+"That reminds me. There's a little thing to be done in case of
+accidents;" and I took her bag from the seat.
+
+"You don't mean to tell me you're going to keep me waiting any longer!"
+
+"I'm not going to have young Hans' clothes found in your possession;
+much too risky;" and I packed them into my suit case.
+
+"But your risk?"
+
+"There's none for me. I'm travelling on business of State and may need
+disguises of any sort. And now I'll read you the riddles; but we shall
+have to be quick about it."
+
+"If you dare to hurry over it and not tell me every little detail, I'll
+never speak to you again, Jack," she declared with great energy.
+
+"We must drop that Jack business, and speak in my language. And I have
+to be quick because it's nearly bedtime."
+
+"You don't imagine for an instant I'm getting into any sleeping berth
+to-night surely! I couldn't sleep a wink. I want to do nothing but
+talk."
+
+"All right, let it go at that;" and I began the long story. It is
+needless to say that her interest was acute. She was literally hungry
+for every detail and interrupted with innumerable questions, so that it
+took hours to tell, and I hadn't quite finished when we reached
+Hanover, where I broke off to get something for us to eat.
+
+A number of officers and soldiers were on the platform there, many of
+whom stared pretty hard at me; surprised probably to see a man of
+military age in civilian clothes. I did not take any notice of them;
+but there was a rather unpleasant incident on my return to the
+carriage. A couple of officers were in hot altercation with the guard
+because he would not allow them to enter our compartment.
+
+They grumbled, declaring there was no room anywhere else; but he stood
+his ground, and in the end they went off in just such a rage as one
+might expect Prussian officers to show.
+
+Nessa was greatly relieved to see them go, and as soon as the train
+started we commenced our meal.
+
+"I'm only a nervy idiot," she said; "for I declare I was awfully scared
+and couldn't help thinking they knew about the tickets. Do you really
+believe von Gratzen didn't know you took them?"
+
+"I'm absolutely fluster-bustered about it. Sometimes I thought he knew
+I was a fraud; sometimes that he didn't; he acted both ways, and----"
+
+"But that von Welten was at the station," she broke in.
+
+"Evidently he knew I had them, but must have thought old Gratz gave
+them to me. He said he had come to make sure I had planted the ring on
+von Erstein, all right. Otherwise, he'd have stopped us; but he
+actually asked where you were. It knocked me bang over."
+
+"I'd bet he knew all about it, and so did von Gratzen. I expect the
+truth is that after you'd saved his wife and Nita that day, he guessed
+everything and determined to give you a chance to get out of the
+country. Why, he almost told you to take them when you were with him in
+the morning. And then that authority he gave you! It's as plain as a
+pikestaff he meant that to get out of any bother on the way; and, as if
+that wasn't enough, there was von Welten at the station to see that we
+got away without any trouble."
+
+"Let's hope you're right."
+
+"Of course I am. Naturally in view of all that happened he couldn't
+give you the things openly or he might have got into a mess over it
+which couldn't be explained away. But everything else could. His plan
+about von Erstein, the brute, gave him an excellent excuse for allowing
+you to leave Berlin; in fact you can see he was clever enough to cover
+his tracks at every step. Surely that's clear enough."
+
+"It may be to you, but I gave up long ago trying to understand him, and
+if you'd seen as much of him as----"
+
+"I don't want to see him, not till after the war anyhow, although he's
+just the dearest old thing in Germany. If I ever do see him again, I
+shall want to hug him."
+
+"Hug him as much as you like, by all means; all I wish is that he won't
+hug me in the way he probably would if he got the chance. And now
+hadn't you better try forty winks?" I suggested.
+
+"What time is it?"
+
+"Nearly one o'clock."
+
+"What time shall we cross the frontier?"
+
+"About an hour after we leave Osnabrück, and we get there at half-past
+three."
+
+"Then I'll go to sleep at four o'clock. Not a moment before. I simply
+couldn't. Oh, to think that in four hours all the suspense and horrors
+of the last months will be at an end! When shall we reach home? Think
+of it, Jack! Home!"
+
+"Depends on our getting a boat. We'll go right through to Rotterdam and
+shall reach there by nine or ten to-morrow morning, say before midday
+anyhow; but we may have to wait for a boat."
+
+"I shan't mind that. We must wire to mother as soon as we're over the
+frontier. Not likely to have any bother there, are we?"
+
+"Can't think of any. We've got all the necessary papers."
+
+"How perfectly glorious! And to think that I owe it all to you."
+
+"That rather takes the cream off, doesn't it?"
+
+"Don't fish. I might say something to make you blush. I'm quite capable
+of it and not a bit responsible for what I say. I want to revel in the
+thought of it all."
+
+"State business, is it? What do I care about State business? I want a
+seat and I'm going to have one," broke in a harsh ill-tempered voice
+from the corridor.
+
+"Going to have travelling companions to Osnabrück," I said. "Some of
+those officers who got in at Hanover. Better let them come in."
+
+There was no question of letting them. The man whose voice we had heard
+came in. "We've got to sit here; there's not another seat in the
+train," he said bluntly.
+
+"By all means," I agreed. There was nothing else to do.
+
+"Come on, you fellows," he called, looking out into the corridor.
+"Plenty of room here."
+
+I stiffened as I caught a glimpse of one of his companions. He was a
+man named Freibach who had been at Göttingen with me, and both Nessa
+and I had known him in London before the war. I tried to warn Nessa,
+but it was useless; and her start as she saw him was enough to give
+everything away.
+
+Would he recognize us? If he did--what?
+
+A minute settled it and judgment went dead against us. He knew us both.
+
+"Hullo! This is a surprise if you like. How do you do, Miss Caldicott,
+and you too, Lancaster?" he exclaimed in English, and after shaking
+hands with Nessa held out his hand to me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+CHECKMATE
+
+
+I'm not a particularly blood-thirsty person, but considering the hosts
+of Freibach's countrymen who had fallen in the war, I certainly did
+bitterly regret that he had been spared.
+
+Poor Nessa! Just when she had been at the height of ecstatic delight at
+the near prospect of escape, this infernal thing had come to plunge her
+back into the abyss. It seemed to break her up.
+
+And well it might! If it had been almost any other man than Freibach it
+might have been possible to face it out. Indeed, if he had been alone,
+or had even thought what he was doing, I believe he would have been
+decent enough to hold his tongue. But his surprise had betrayed us.
+
+And that we were betrayed his companions' looks proved plainly. The man
+who had come in first looked up with a scowl as I shook Freibach's hand.
+
+"What's that, lieutenant? Do you mean to say these people are English
+and dare to try and keep us out of here with a pretence of State
+business? What's the meaning of it, and what the devil are you doing
+here?"
+
+My friend realized then the bad turn he had done us and looked the
+regret he dared not express.
+
+I put the best face on it I could. "There is no need to adopt that tone
+with me, sir----"
+
+"Isn't there? Oh! I'm accustomed to use what tone I please with you
+English. I'm Major Borsch of the 23rd Potsdam regiment; and it's my
+business to know all about you both." That he was a bully of the best
+Prussian type was evident. "What was that humbug about State business?"
+
+How I regretted that burnt authority at that moment! "This lady, Miss
+Caldicott, is on her way to England. She has been in Berlin since
+before the outbreak of the war and is returning by the order of Baron
+von Gratzen; and acting under his instructions I am escorting her to
+the frontier."
+
+He burst into loud coarse laughter which made Freibach wince. "A pretty
+tale, but not good enough for me. And who are you, pray, that you are
+detailed off as escort?" The sneer on the last word was worthy of even
+von Erstein.
+
+"I am travelling as Johann Lassen. I have all my papers here. I am on a
+special mission for Baron von Gratzen, who gave me a written authority
+for that purpose."
+
+"Did he indeed? Very nice of him. I should like to see that special
+authority. A swine of an Englishman on a special State business! What
+next, I'd like to know."
+
+It wasn't easy to keep one's temper with this sort of brute; but there
+was Nessa to be thought of. "Unfortunately I have partially burnt it."
+
+"Dear me! What a misfortune, eh?" he sneered. "Let me look at the
+precious fragments and your other papers."
+
+I handed over the burnt paper. "I have already reported the accident to
+Baron von Gratzen by telegraph." I dragged in the Baron's name as much
+as possible, for I had noticed that the mention of it had had some
+impression even on him.
+
+He scrutinized the authority and shook his head over it. "A forgery, of
+course;" and he was going to tear it up when I interposed.
+
+"I shall have to report the destruction of it to the Baron, of course,"
+I said quietly.
+
+The officer who sat next him whispered something and the paper was not
+destroyed. "And your other papers? I must see them."
+
+I did not reply, and he repeated his demand angrily. But I had taken
+his measure by this time. He had not ventured to destroy the remnant of
+the authority; and although its destruction didn't matter two straws
+either way, it mattered very much to see that he was sufficiently in
+awe of von Gratzen to abstain.
+
+"Do you want me to take them from you?" he thundered.
+
+"Do so, if you think it safe," I said in a very different tone.
+
+"Don't you dare to threaten me, you swinehound," he roared.
+
+"Go to blazes!" I answered in much the same tone. "Who the devil are
+you to come blustering in here in this way? I'm on Baron von Gratzen's
+business, not yours; I've no instructions to show his papers to any and
+every boorish clown who dares to ask for them. If you want to see them,
+telegraph to him, and when he instructs me to tell you his business
+I'll do it, and not before."
+
+I fired this at him with all my lung power and tried to look even more
+angry than I felt, and shouted him down when he tried to interrupt me
+once or twice.
+
+He cursed volubly.
+
+"If you don't behave yourself I'll have you put out of the carriage," I
+cried. "Do you imagine that Baron von Gratzen sent his confidential
+secretary to secure this compartment for me and this lady that we might
+be insulted by such a foul-mouthed brute as you? Ask your questions
+civilly, and I'll answer them; but don't imagine you can bully me."
+
+That his three companions relished all this was apparent in their
+looks; but the effect on the bully himself was a sheer delight to
+witness. He tried to bluster, but he was frightened. The sting of my
+attack was the reference to von Welten's reservation of the
+compartment, and I promptly drove it home by asking Freibach to have
+the guard called.
+
+He hesitated; the other man was his superior officer, of course, and
+looked to him. "He'll be able to confirm what I say," I added.
+
+The major nodded and nothing more passed until the guard arrived.
+
+"Who saw these people off at Berlin?"
+
+"Herr von Welten, sir, and he told me that the compartment was to be
+strictly reserved for them by Baron von Gratzen's orders. I explained
+that the train was sure to be full; but he said that under no
+conditions was I to allow any one to enter it."
+
+The major's face dropped at this. "You can go," he ordered.
+
+"Wait a minute, guard. Tell Major Borsch about the telegram."
+
+The man told his story succinctly; and it had an excellent effect upon
+the bully, and a whispered conversation followed between him and the
+man next him. I began to hope. The worst was over for the moment,
+apparently; and the next scene was likely to take place when we reached
+Osnabrück. What would happen there was on the lap of the gods.
+
+The only thing that really mattered was to contrive somehow that Nessa
+should be allowed to continue the journey, and it wasn't impossible
+that Freibach might be able to see to that. He would be willing enough,
+because he had been very kindly treated by the Caldicotts in London.
+Moreover, he had got us into this mess and was obviously distressed
+about it.
+
+The whispered conference at the other side of the carriage ended by the
+major jumping up and leaving the carriage, muttering something about
+not being able to breathe the same air with us, and then his companion
+turned to me.
+
+"You will appreciate the seriousness of the position to us, Herr
+Lassen, and that we are compelled to investigate it," he said. His tone
+was somewhat curt, but more official than offensive.
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"We are to understand that Baron von Gratzen has employed you on a
+special mission, knowing that you are an Englishman?"
+
+"I have already given you the facts, but of course I am not at liberty
+to explain to you all his Excellency's reasons. He would not have given
+me that authority otherwise."
+
+"It is unfortunately too mutilated to be intelligible."
+
+"It was couched in the widest terms. It was to notify to all concerned
+that I was to be allowed to go where I pleased and that every
+assistance was to be afforded me. You can still see a part of the
+official stamp."
+
+"It is most extraordinary. Incomprehensible."
+
+"Not if I were free to explain why it was given to me."
+
+"Who gave it you?"
+
+"Baron von Gratzen wrote it himself in my presence. If you know his
+handwriting, there is enough of it left unburnt for you to identify it."
+
+"I do not."
+
+"Again in my presence he handed it to his secretary, Herr von Welten,
+to be stamped, and von Welten gave it to me as I left the office. You
+have heard that he was at the station and himself reserved this
+compartment for Miss Caldicott and me."
+
+"That's the most remarkable thing of all."
+
+"On the contrary, it was a perfectly natural step. There was a matter I
+had to arrange before leaving, and his chief was anxious to know that
+it had been done exactly in accordance with my instructions."
+
+"What was that?"
+
+"That is a question to be put to the Baron. My lips are sealed."
+
+"And you an Englishman! It sounds incredible."
+
+"Do you suppose I should have telegraphed to Baron von Gratzen if it
+were incredible?"
+
+This worried him not a little, and he sat thinking with his hand
+pressed to his head. Not having the key to the riddle, he might well be
+baffled. "And your companion, Miss Caldicott, is going to England?"
+
+"Certainly. You have been quite courteous and I have no objection
+whatever to show you her papers;" and I took them out and handed them
+over. "You will see that they also bear the official hallmark of Baron
+von Gratzen's office."
+
+He was obviously impressed. "Both tickets are through to Rotterdam, I
+notice. Are you going to England also?"
+
+"My instructions are to see Miss Caldicott across the frontier, and to
+return to Berlin as soon as my task is finished, unless his Excellency
+sends for me sooner."
+
+It was such a lovely mixture of the truth and the other thing that it
+appeared quite flawless, and he couldn't make head or tail of it. "Of
+course you understand that you will have to remain at Osnabrück while
+this is being investigated?" he said at length, returning the tickets.
+
+"That is for you to decide, and so far as I myself am concerned it is
+not of the least consequence. But it's different with Miss Caldicott.
+It is essential that her journey should not be interrupted."
+
+Nessa started at this and spoke for the first time. "I shall not go on
+without you," she protested.
+
+"I must ask you to recall that, Miss Caldicott, if you please. I shall,
+of course, be placed under some sort of restraint until this
+gentleman----"
+
+"I am Captain Brulen," he interposed.
+
+"Until Captain Brulen has satisfied himself. His Excellency's
+instructions are that you proceed at once; and for you to remain there
+would be extremely invidious and possibly unpleasant."
+
+"I shall not go on if you're stopped," she insisted. It was like her to
+wish to stick by me in the coming trouble, but impossible, so I adopted
+an official tone.
+
+"If you persist in your refusal, Miss Caldicott, it will compel me to
+take a line I should deeply regret. My instructions _must_ be
+carried out; they were very peremptory."
+
+"I don't care what you do. I won't go on without you," she declared.
+
+"Any delay at Osnabrück will render it impossible for me to see you
+across the frontier personally, and I shall have to ask Captain Brulen
+to detail some one for the purpose, Miss Caldicott. I can, of course,
+rely upon your doing that?" I asked him.
+
+The poor man didn't know what to make of this little interlude and
+replied with a perplexed gesture.
+
+"I won't go," cried Nessa obstinately. "And if you send me as a
+prisoner, I'll come straight back. I've made up my mind absolutely."
+
+This dogged attitude was growing dangerous and it became necessary to
+explain it, so I asked the Captain to come into the corridor, and he
+complied after a slight hesitation.
+
+"I had better explain one point to you in reference to that young lady.
+Until quite recently I have been living in London--on Baron von
+Gratzen's instructions, of course. I met Miss Caldicott's friends there
+frequently; they are influential people and were extremely useful to
+know, you will understand. They have always regarded me as an
+Englishman, and at one time there was a sort of engagement between us.
+That was when your fellow officer, Lieutenant Freibach, met me. He also
+takes me for English. You will now understand her attitude just now."
+
+He swallowed it like mother's milk. "Why on earth didn't you tell us
+all this before?"
+
+"Partly because of Major Borsch's disgusting manner; but mainly for the
+reason which is on the surface, surely. It is not impossible I may
+receive a wire to go on to England. You see my meaning. Under no
+circumstances must either of them know what I have told you. You will
+now see why Miss Caldicott must go on to-night and must not be allowed
+to return. The whole of my work in London would be utterly ruined if
+she and her friends knew I was a German."
+
+"Of course. I am at liberty to tell Major Borsch this?"
+
+"Emphatically not. It is for your own ears solely. I never trust that
+type of man. Personally, all I care about is to get Miss Caldicott off
+my hands; and the sooner the better. This business about me will be
+cleared up in half an hour when we reach Osnabrück; but not in time for
+me to continue in the train, probably. There will be a wire from the
+Baron; but that may not be considered sufficient. I don't blame you in
+the least; but I shall certainly report the Major's conduct."
+
+"I can probably get Freibach to see to Miss Caldicott."
+
+"Nothing could be better. Please von Gratzen immensely," I replied,
+smiling. "And if you leave us two alone again, no doubt I could
+persuade Miss Caldicott to agree."
+
+He did this; and as soon as Nessa and I were alone I told her the
+arrangement and began the persuasion campaign.
+
+Her reception of the news was just what might have been expected. She
+was furiously indignant. Was that my opinion of her, she demanded. Did
+I think she was a German and likely to desert any one who had run all
+this risk to help her? Did I take her for a despicable coward? Was she
+so abominably mean a thing in my eyes? And a great deal more to the
+same effect.
+
+It's always best to let that sort of thing empty the petrol tank; so I
+just listened with becoming meekness which appeared to keep the engine
+running long after the tank was exhausted. Then: "And how do you think
+you can help me?" I asked smoothly.
+
+Another vigorous outburst. She didn't care about that. No one should be
+able to say she had run away in such a case; and so on.
+
+"Now do listen to me a moment. I don't think anything of the sort. It's
+splendid of you, Nessa. But----"
+
+"I can't leave you in the lurch, Jack, and I won't," she broke in.
+
+"If there was the faintest use in your stopping, I wouldn't ask you to
+go. There isn't. On the contrary, it would make matters infinitely more
+awkward. It was getting awkward just now, and that's why I took that
+man out. I've told him that you take me for an Englishman, and that
+Freibach knew us in London when we were engaged, and----"
+
+"That's true."
+
+"Yes; but he understands it differently--that I was in London as a
+German spy."
+
+"He doesn't!"
+
+"Indeed he does, and it altered his tune entirely. I said I wanted to
+get you off my hands as soon as possible----"
+
+"Is that also true?" she interposed, with such a smile.
+
+"At the present moment, yes."
+
+"Thank you. Almost enough to make me say I'll go," she cried with a
+toss of the head.
+
+"Naturally. But it is true, for this reason. When we get to Osnabrück
+there will probably be a telegram from old Gratz; these people are
+likely to want something more than that, however; and I am sure to be
+detained while they communicate with him. But he can't let me down,
+even if he guesses I've helped myself to those tickets, because I'm
+necessary to him for the von Erstein affair: a much more vital matter
+to him than the tickets. The whole thing will be cleared up and I shall
+be able to follow you home. Very likely catch you up before you leave
+Rotterdam."
+
+"Then if it's going to be so easy, why shouldn't I stop?"
+
+"For the simple reason that the papers for you are only to be used on
+this particular date, and there would be no end of a fuss in getting
+any others."
+
+"You really and truly wish me to go on?"
+
+"If you care a rap for my safety you won't hesitate another moment."
+
+She looked very troubled. "If I do, I won't go a step farther than the
+first town across the frontier, and if you don't join me soon I shall
+come back," she declared. "I shall. I'll tell every one that you've got
+into all this solely on my account and that I'm quite ready to go even
+to an internment camp."
+
+Knowing her detestation of such a thing, I could appreciate all that
+lay behind this statement. It touched me too closely for me to reply
+immediately. Thank Heaven, she wouldn't be allowed to come back; but
+there was no need to tell her so. "Let it go at that, Nessa. The first
+town you'll stop at will be Oldenzaal, and I'll come to you there.
+You're due there about five in the morning; but you won't get there by
+that time if we keep stopping in this fashion. It can't be Osnabrück
+yet; there's half an hour before we're due there. I wish they'd hurry
+up."
+
+We had stopped at some station the name of which I couldn't see and
+stuck there some minutes.
+
+"Can't be anything wrong, can there?" asked Nessa nervily.
+
+"Probably a troop train. It's all right, we're off again."
+
+But it was not a troop train that had stopped us. It was a very
+different cause, as we soon knew, for the brute of a major burst into
+our compartment flourishing a telegram and cursing me volubly.
+
+"So we've got the truth about you, Mr. Englishman, at last. You
+infernal scoundrel," he cried viciously. "You wanted a telegram from
+your friend and patron, von Gratzen, did you? Well, read that!" with
+another string of oaths.
+
+He held the message up and I did read it, with feelings which may
+perhaps be imagined although I can't describe them. It was to the guard.
+
+"Detain passengers Johann Lassen and companion. Suspected of murder.
+Acquaint police at next station and have them arrested.--Von
+Gratzen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+WITHIN A HAIRSBREADTH
+
+
+Major Borsch stood gloating over me as I read the telegram. "Well, what
+do you think of your friend the Baron, now?" he sneered.
+
+He expected me to be completely crushed, so I shook off my first
+feeling of dismay and looked up with a bland smile. "I'm much obliged
+to you for showing it to me," I replied, as if it were the merest
+trifle. I must have done it pretty well, for even Nessa, who had been
+overwhelmed by the news, was surprised and pulled herself together.
+
+"Perhaps you'll also be obliged for what will follow," he roared,
+aggravated by my coolness.
+
+"What an exceedingly unpleasant person this is," I said to Nessa. "I'm
+sorry he can't behave himself; but you must try not to let it worry
+you. I suppose he can't help it."
+
+"He doesn't worry me in the least, thank you," she replied
+contemptuously.
+
+"You hold your tongue, you baggage," he shouted, turning on her.
+
+"Major Borsch!" I cried, rising.
+
+"Sit down, you infernal swinehound! And as for you, you----"
+
+The sentence was not finished. My temper flew out of the window. If I
+was to be charged with murder, a little extra such as a smack on the
+mouth of even a major wouldn't make much difference, so I gave him one,
+and put enough behind it to knock him down.
+
+An involuntary scream from Nessa was drowned in his yells for his men;
+and two of them rushed in and seized me. He didn't get up until I was
+thus rendered helpless and then kept far enough away, pouring out a
+torrent of cursing abuse while he staunched the blood on his cut lips.
+
+Captain Brulen arrived in the middle of it, with Freibach close on his
+heels; and the bully declared I had tried to murder him in order to
+escape. It was such a palpable absurdity that Freibach turned his face
+away to smile.
+
+"This man was insulting the lady in my charge and I struck him, Captain
+Brulen," I explained. "You probably know him well enough to understand
+it is just what he would do."
+
+"It is a very grave position," he replied. "Very grave indeed."
+
+"You mean because of that telegram? Nonsense. It's a palpable forgery."
+
+The major burst out into raucous laughter. "Forgery! Forgery, is it?
+Well, forgery or no forgery, you'll answer for that attack on me.
+Search him, and if he resists knock him on the head," he ordered the
+two soldiers.
+
+"Is this man the senior officer on the train, Captain Brulen?"
+
+"Hold your insolent tongue; and, Captain Brulen, stay where you are. Do
+as I told you," he ordered the men.
+
+It would have been madness to resist. There was nothing on me of any
+consequence; and as Nessa was sitting on the suit case with her dress
+entirely covering it, nothing of importance was found, except the
+passports and our tickets. These the bully promptly pocketed.
+
+"Can I speak to you a moment, Major?" said Brulen then.
+
+"No. Mind your own business. This is my affair, not yours."
+
+"Very good, sir," and with that he and Freibach went away. Both looked
+very disturbed, although for quite different reasons, as I knew.
+
+"Take the man to the other end of the carriage; see that the two
+prisoners have no chance of speaking to each other; remain between them
+in the middle until we reach Osnabrück, and if any attempt is made to
+escape, use your bayonets. You're answerable for them."
+
+"I'm going to sleep," said Nessa as the brute was leaving the carriage;
+and she put her legs up on the seat with excellently acted unconcern.
+
+"Good idea, so will I," and I threw myself full length on the seat.
+
+"Silence," roared the brute. "If they speak, club them both," and with
+this amiable command to our guards he left us.
+
+The men would in all probability have obeyed him to the letter, so we
+prudently gave them no occasion.
+
+Except for the desire to try and reassure Nessa, there was nothing to
+be said. The disastrous telegram had ruined everything. What did it
+mean? It didn't seem possible that von Gratzen could have sent such a
+message. It was too blunt, too crude, and altogether too brutal a thing
+to fit with all I had seen of him. He was wily enough in all truth, but
+such a method was so lacking in finesse, so devoid of cunning, that I
+could not believe it had really come from him.
+
+It was possible that he had been infuriated at discovering I had stolen
+the passports; but even then he would have resorted to some far more
+adroit means of arresting me. There was another consideration, too. It
+was not in accord with his plans to denounce me as the murderer in this
+fashion. His object was not to have me accused, but to catch von
+Erstein in the web so subtly woven.
+
+At the same time it must have been sent by some one having high
+authority, because the train had been stopped in order that it might be
+delivered to the guard. The police could have done it. The detective at
+the station had probably reported my flight, and, if von Erstein had
+already accused me to them, they might resort to such a means to have
+me arrested. But in that case the message would not have been sent in
+von Gratzen's name. That killed that theory therefore.
+
+There was only one alternative suggestion--that the telegram was a
+forgery and that von Erstein had ventured to use von Gratzen's name,
+relying upon his influence to get him out of trouble for it. He had
+guessed I was going to bolt, and he would have little difficulty in
+finding out where I had gone; I might even have been followed to the
+station without knowing it; and it was just such a step as would appeal
+to his cunning vindictive nature.
+
+The truth would soon be out, as a few minutes would see us at Osnabrück
+at the pace we were rushing through the night; and until we reached
+there, nothing could be done. Despite the mysterious telegram I still
+had faith in von Gratzen's concluding assurance--"Whatever happens I'll
+stand by you, my boy."
+
+All the same it was a deplorable business, especially for Nessa; and
+that worried me desperately. We were both sure to be locked up; and
+Germany is one of those insalubrious countries where it's very
+difficult to get out of gaol when once the doors have closed on you.
+Even if the thing were explained at Osnabrück, it would be impossible
+for her to continue her journey that night; and when she would be able
+to do so, Heaven alone knew.
+
+It was such a devil of a mess that no amount of wit-racking suggested a
+way out which did not involve a heap of delay and trouble. But the knot
+was cut nevertheless, in the most unexpected fashion.
+
+We were nearing Osnabrück, running at some thirty or forty miles an
+hour, when the engine whistled furiously, and we were far enough in the
+front of the train to feel the grinding of the brakes quickly applied.
+Before they could do much to reduce the speed, however, there was a
+tremendous crash, the heavy carriage collapsed like a card house, the
+lights were extinguished, and the coach rocked a moment, seemed to rear
+right up, and then toppled over on its side.
+
+I was flung half a dozen ways at once; against the opposite side of the
+compartment, then back again and next down, so that I lay sprawling
+across the door. Something hit me a smack on the head and something
+else came floundering down on top of me, amid a shower of splintered
+glass and other fragments.
+
+The "something else" turned out to be Nessa as I discovered when I
+called out to her in deadly fear that she had been killed. Thank Heaven
+we were both unhurt, save for the few bruises and slight cuts caused by
+the shuttlecock shaking we had experienced.
+
+We owed our escape to the fact that we had been lying with our legs up.
+The result to our two guards showed that. They had been pinned down and
+lay groaning and moaning piteously in desperate agony.
+
+Nessa was too overwhelmed by the shock to be able to move for a time.
+But she was awfully brave; not a cry had escaped her lips; and although
+she was trembling so that she could scarcely speak, she assured me she
+was not hurt in the least. "I shall be all right in a moment, Jack. I'm
+not hurt. I was afraid you were killed," she stammered.
+
+It was then I found that the first something which had hit me was my
+suit case; and never was anything more welcome. There was a flask of
+brandy in it and a flash lamp, and I managed to get them both. The
+spirit soon revived us, and I flashed the light round the compartment
+and took my bearings.
+
+It was a gruesome sight. The two unfortunate soldiers were unconscious;
+fearfully injured, bleeding terribly, and in such a mess as made one
+think of the trenches. The carriage lay on its side and the corridor
+over our heads. That offered the only way of escape, and to reach it I
+had to stand on the men's bodies. By this means I succeeded in getting
+a grip on the side of the doorway opening into the corridor. I pulled
+myself up and scrambled through the opening. Everything was smashed to
+splinters; there was an ominous smell of gas; part of the train was
+already on fire, the flames lighting up the weirdly awful scene; and
+the wind was blowing them right down on our carriage. There wasn't a
+second to lose if we were not to be roasted alive.
+
+Lying at full length to get a purchase for my feet among some of the
+wreckage, I leant down to help Nessa out.
+
+She kept her head splendidly. She had presence of mind to remember the
+suit case, handed it up to me, caught my hand, and I swung her up
+beside me. It was touch and go even then, for the flames leapt the
+intervening space at that moment and a flare of gas soon set everything
+in a blaze.
+
+We had still to get off the carriage, and, although people were
+hurrying up with assistance, there was no time to wait for them.
+Crawling over the wreckage to a spot where the side of the carriage had
+been shattered, I threw the suit case out, sprang after it, and held
+out my arms, calling to Nessa to jump. She did it without a second's
+hesitation, falling right on top of me with sufficient suddenness and
+force to send us both sprawling to the ground.
+
+We were up again in a moment. Nessa laughed strangely and hysterically.
+"I'm all right, Jack," she cried breathlessly. "Mind the suit case;"
+and then clutched me convulsively and fainted.
+
+It wasn't surprising, considering that we had had so narrow a squeak
+for it, and I could estimate the effect upon her by my own general
+shakiness. What amazed me was that in such a crisis, when death had
+been a matter of seconds almost, she had seemed to think more about
+that blessed suit case than her own safety. But she told me the reason
+afterwards; and of course it was on my account.
+
+I wasn't sorry she fainted. The whole scene was so painful and
+horrible, that it was a mercy she was spared the sight and smell and
+sounds of it. Then again it helped to rally me, as I had to see to her.
+I picked her up and carried her right away to a distance where neither
+sight nor sound of the disaster was likely to be too obtrusively
+harrowing, found a shed, and gave her some brandy, and had a swig of it
+myself.
+
+She soon came round, but was much too overcome by the shock to be moved
+for a long time, or even to talk. So I let her lie where she was,
+wrapped her up in some of the clothes in the suit case, lit a
+cigarette, and set to work to think what our next move had better be.
+
+It wasn't the easiest of problems. There was no chance of getting
+across the frontier that night, for we had neither tickets nor
+passports. That bully of a major had kept them. What had happened to
+him in the smash couldn't be even guessed, of course; but whatever it
+might be, there was no recovering our papers. That was a certainty.
+
+Could any others be got? Not at Osnabrück. That telegram had been sent
+to the guard of the doomed train and, if he was alive, he would
+undoubtedly inform the police; and the instant I turned up as Lassen,
+we should both be clapped into gaol.
+
+It looked as if it would be extremely unhealthy to attempt to ask for
+any message from von Gratzen. A very aggravating poser. It was galling
+to think that a message might be waiting which would clear the road for
+us effectually, and yet be unable to go for it.
+
+There was the unpleasant contingency that it might not be there,
+moreover; in which case I should have to put my head in the lion's
+mouth, with a great probability of the jaws closing on it. A very
+awkward risk. It didn't affect me so much as Nessa. Even if the police
+held me in custody as a suspected murderer, it would only be a
+temporary trouble. But Nessa? What would happen to her it was
+impossible to foresee; so I ruled out that course.
+
+If we were to get out of the country it must be done under strictly
+unofficial patronage. Our own. The less we bothered von Gratzen or any
+one else, the better. That meant going on in our disguises; and then I
+realized how invaluable Nessa's thought of the suit case had been.
+
+It wasn't a particularly cheerful outlook; but there was one big thing
+in our favour. Our carriage had been burnt; scarcely any one had been
+on the spot at the time; certainly no one who could possibly recognize
+us; and the conclusion every one would draw was that we had perished in
+the flames. That was another virtual certainty; but in our favour.
+
+There was more than enough on the other side of the ledger, however. I
+had no identification card; Nessa was in rather a bad shape, and it
+looked as if she would have to go to bed and stop there for a time,
+whereas if we were to get away, we ought to be some miles from
+Osnabrück before daylight; and to go to any hotel or other place for
+the purpose was very much like asking for more trouble when we had
+quite sufficient already.
+
+At the same time her safety was the pivot on which everything else
+turned; it would be idiotic to try and get away, if it meant knocking
+her up permanently; and that must be the first and prime consideration.
+She lay so still and seemed so weak and done up, that it was clearly
+necessary to do something instead of merely thinking about it.
+
+"Can you make an effort, Nessa?" I whispered, bending over her.
+
+"Make an effort? Of course I can. I thought you were bowled over.
+That's why I kept quiet. I'm all right," and to my surprised relief she
+sat up at once. "What shall we do?"
+
+"I thought you were almost down and out," I exclaimed.
+
+"Because I fainted? That was the reaction, I expect. I've never done
+such a thing before that I can remember. But I'm all right again now.
+I've been thinking."
+
+"I've been doing a bit of that myself. Are you sure you're fit?" It was
+difficult to believe it after what she had gone through.
+
+"Of course I am, except for being a little shaken. It was an awful
+business while it lasted; but it's over and got us out of all that
+trouble. Of course every one will believe we were burnt alive;" and she
+shuddered. "I suppose it's an awful disaster."
+
+"Better not think of it. The last glimpse I had showed that our
+carriage and the one behind it were in flames. You can see the glare
+through the door there."
+
+"Oh, Jack! And they were crowded with people!"
+
+"We can't do anything to help, and we'd better think of ourselves," and
+to distract her thoughts from the horrors of the train wreck I told her
+the reasons against venturing into Osnabrück.
+
+"I've been thinking the same. Surely there's only one thing to do?"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"The 'third wheel', of course. It's been in my mind from the very
+moment of the collision. I don't know how it was, but that rushed into
+my head instantly; and when you weren't hurt, I could think of nothing
+but that;" and she pointed to the suit case.
+
+"It was the last word you spoke before fainting."
+
+"And the first when I came round. I was so thankful when I saw you'd
+brought it away all right. I didn't care after that. You didn't seem
+really hurt; only shaken; I knew I should be all right soon; and I felt
+a sort of certainty that the third wheel would carry us into safety.
+Hadn't we better go?"
+
+"Yes, if you feel fit to do a few miles before daylight?"
+
+"You'll soon see that, if you'll go to your own room and change and
+leave me to do the same."
+
+My "room" was the back of the shed outside, and I lost no time in
+getting off my own clothes and putting on the workman's dress over what
+my flying friend had called the "tummy pad." Then I lit up and waited,
+thinking what a plucky soul Nessa was, until she called to me.
+
+"How's this, matey?" she asked in her new character and laughed.
+
+It was a wonderful transformation indeed!  I should never have
+recognized her; and the few little scratches on her face from the
+broken glass in the collision, combined with some artistic smudges she
+had added, made her into a lifelike young workboy.
+
+"What have you done with your hair?" I exclaimed.
+
+"Just messed it up under the cap. Of course it'll have to come off; but
+we'd better not waste any time about it now, had we? We can see to it
+later in the morning."
+
+"Righto," I agreed; and we set to work to finish the other
+preparations. We had to dispose of our own clothes, of course; so we
+rolled them up tightly, put the overalls in the suit case, and were
+ready.
+
+"Now for the frontier," I said. "Let's hope the luck's with us."
+
+"Cheero, matey; if it isn't, you'll get us through somehow," she
+replied with the most plucky confidence.
+
+I loved her for that, for I knew that she understood the difficulties
+and risks that lay ahead quite as well as I did. I lost my head for a
+minute then; and just as we stood on the threshold of the dingy little
+shed, I put my arm round her, drew her quickly to me and kissed her on
+the lips.
+
+She held to me for an instant, kissed me in return, and then drew away
+quickly.
+
+"Not so much of it, matey. Do you take me for a girl? You've knocked my
+cap off, clumsy," she cried, laughing and blushing, as her glorious
+hair fell over her shoulders and down to her waist.
+
+"A fine sort of a girl you'd make, and no mistake," I replied, picking
+up the cap and giving it to her.
+
+In a few moments she had it in place again, pulled the cap down over it
+and was once more ready.
+
+"Come on, clumsy," she called, stepping out into the night.
+
+And in that way we started on the journey to the frontier.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+NESSA'S DOWNFALL
+
+
+The chief event of the hours following the railway smash was histrionic
+rather than serious, although Nessa regarded it as both humiliating and
+tragic. And tragic it might easily have been.
+
+Her courage was wonderful. Nothing could damp her spirits nor lessen
+her high confidence. She laughed at the idea of risks or danger,
+scoffed at difficulties, and made light of every obstacle as if ours
+was a mere holiday jaunt. An optimist to the very tips of her pretty
+fingers.
+
+To be Hans, the mechanic, was just a delightfully farcical joy; she
+took pride in her skill in playing the part, and was so eager to show
+me how carefully she had studied it that I hadn't the heart to be a
+candid critic and point out that it was one thing to act a part for an
+hour or two on an amateur stage or when we were by ourselves, and quite
+another to keep it for days in circumstances when even a slight trip
+might spell grave trouble.
+
+And that our situation was full of difficulties and even dangers was
+certain. She was still suffering from the inevitable shock of the
+railway smash; she was done up and sorely in need of rest; it was out
+of the question to think of seeking a lodging in Osnabrück; the best we
+could look for was to shelter in some barn or out-of-the-way shed;
+fifty miles or more lay between us and the frontier, any yard of which
+might bring some incident which would involve discovery; and even if we
+got through safely, the job of crossing the frontier would be the most
+difficult and dangerous of any.
+
+The little incident in the shed as we were leaving kept us both silent
+for a while. It was the first sign since we had met in Berlin to
+suggest the renewal of our old relations; and it was not until we
+reached a good spot for ridding ourselves of our own clothes that the
+silence was broken.
+
+We struck out to the north of the town and turned along a footpath
+which would lead us round the outskirts. This took us across a broad
+stream, and Nessa pulled up on the bridge to suggest we should sink the
+clothes. We made them into two parcels, put some heavy stones in each,
+and I sunk them under some trees which overhung the stream a little
+distance along the bank.
+
+"And when do you propose to put your thinking cap on about our plans,
+Jack?" she chipped when I rejoined her.
+
+"I'm not going to think of anything else from this minute."
+
+"Hear, hear. The 'anything else' must wait, eh?" she cried, with one of
+her bright silvery laughs.
+
+"That's not very much like a German hobbledehoy's laugh, is it?"
+
+"Righto, matey, I forgot. That was Nessa; this is Hans;" and she
+guffawed in her best Hans' manner.
+
+"Not so much of your forgetting, young 'un. This may be no mere picnic."
+
+"Keep your hair on; but I'm going to have the time of my life. By the
+way, what's your name?"
+
+"Been christened so often lately that I'm not too clear about it. You
+can call me boss."
+
+"Boss, eh? Then you expect to be master, I suppose?" with a mischievous
+meaning chuckle. "Am I to keep it up always?"
+
+"Jack's the English for it."
+
+"Anything else?" she chuckled again.
+
+"Wait till the time comes, my lad;" and she decided to drop the chaff.
+
+"And what about our plans, boss?" she asked after a pause.
+
+"I don't see anything for it but to tramp it, if you can stick it."
+
+"How far?"
+
+"The nearest road to the frontier is about thirty odd miles; but as we
+can't take that, we can put it down at fifty, say. There's no need to
+rush things, and if we can manage ten or fifteen each day, it ought to
+do the trick."
+
+"Nothing in that to hurt me, boss. I've often padded twenty or
+twenty-five in a day, looking for a job, you know. But what's waiting
+for us at the end of the tramp?"
+
+"I wish I could tell you. My rough idea is to make for a place called
+Lingen. There are two little dips in the Dutch frontier which come down
+close to it, and it looks like a fairly good jumping-off place. I'm out
+of it, if we don't run against some of the smuggling lot there, and the
+best plan I can think of is to try and join up with some of them and
+get across in that way."
+
+"Looks all right. If we can get there, that is."
+
+"Needn't worry about that, young 'un. We can tramp it at night, at the
+worst; but we're not likely to be interfered with. We can always be
+going to a job just a few miles farther on. I always thought of
+Osnabrück as the place where we might have to start our tramp, and I've
+a road map. What we want at the moment is a place where we can rest for
+an hour or two."
+
+We plodded on steadily, avoiding the roads as much as possible, until
+we had left Osnabrück well in our rear, and then Nessa pointed to a
+cottage on the fringe of a wood, which appeared to be deserted.
+
+"Looks like the very spot for us, young 'un. Stop here and I'll go and
+have a squint at it."
+
+"Look sharp about it, boss, I'm getting a bit leggy and could do with a
+doss for an hour or two."
+
+I reconnoitred the place cautiously from the back, where there was an
+untilled garden patch, and first made enough noise to rouse a dog, if
+there was one. All remained quiet; so I slipped along the garden and
+flashed my torch lamp through a broken pane of a back window. The room
+was quite bare, and I opened the window and went over the cottage.
+
+It was deserted right enough. A four-roomed shanty, dirty and
+dilapidated, but good enough for a shelter; so I fetched Nessa. "A
+rough shop, young 'un, but better than none."
+
+"Better quarters than those English swine get in the concentration
+camps, I'll bet," she said as we went up the ricketty stairs to an
+upper room.
+
+"Bare boards only. It's a good thing you can rough it."
+
+"Nothing to what our brave fellows have to put up with at the front,"
+she replied; and without more ado she lay down with the suit case as a
+pillow and was soon fast asleep.
+
+I crept out of the room, lit a pipe, and strolled round the cottage
+trying to think out a definite plan of operations. The most practical
+question was that of supplies. There would not be any serious risk of
+trouble with the police even if we kept to the main roads; and this
+would both shorten the tramp and enable us to get food at
+out-of-the-way inns.
+
+The one thing that offered difficulties was Nessa's disguise. She was
+overacting her part considerably and, what was much worse,
+involuntarily had dropped now and then into her own dear self. The boy
+business was a blunder. She must turn woman again. It would be much
+safer if she passed as my sister or even my wife, or perhaps both at
+turns, according to circumstances.
+
+She would probably kick against it a bit, considering the trouble she
+had taken and the pride and pleasure she felt in the part. But safety
+must come first. There was another consideration. If we were stopped, I
+should be asked for my identification card; and the lack of it might
+mean trouble. As my wife she wouldn't need one. I must therefore be
+re-christened and become Hans Bulich.
+
+Over a second pipe the prudence of the change became more obvious, and
+I regretted the hurry we had been in to get rid of her dress, realizing
+the difficulty of replacing it without rousing suspicion. We should
+come across plenty of places where such things could be bought; but for
+a man and a boy to buy such things were almost certain to lead to
+awkward questions, especially anywhere near the frontier.
+
+It was broad daylight before I finished wrestling with these new
+problems, and, as it was better not to run a risk of being seen about
+the cottage, I went into a little shed belonging to it, propped myself
+in a corner and dozed off. I was tired and must have slept heavily, and
+was awakened by a kick and the angry shout of a man asking what the
+devil I meant by sleeping on his premises. "Get up and be off with you,
+you lazy tramp," he said, when I rubbed my eyes and blinked at him.
+
+"I'm not a tramp, guv'nor," I protested, getting up.
+
+"Then I'm no farmer, you skulker;" and he looked like repeating the
+kick.
+
+"Steady, man, steady. Keep your temper. I'm a mechanic on my way to a
+job in Osnabrück. My boy and I lost our way in the wood yonder and came
+here to ask the road. Finding the place empty, we decided to doss it
+till daylight. My mate's only a youngster and was regularly done up."
+
+"You look dirty enough for a tramp anyhow," he growled. "I'm pestered
+with them. Got any money on you?" A rough-and-ready test of his tramp
+theory.
+
+"Hope so. More than enough to pay for this sort of bed. Times are
+pretty good with us chaps now;" and I pulled out a handful of money.
+
+His surly look cleared. "I don't want any of it. What sort of a
+mechanic do you call yourself?"
+
+"Motors and aeroplanes and that sort of thing."
+
+"The devil you are!" he exclaimed, and, after a pause: "Care to earn a
+mark or two?"
+
+"Don't mind if I do? How?"
+
+"My motor's in the lane yonder, and something's gone wrong with it. Do
+you think you could patch it up?"
+
+"I'll have a look at it for you. I'd better get what tools I have with
+me. They're with my lad."
+
+He opened the front door of the cottage and I ran up to fetch Nessa,
+fastening her hair up tightly. I told her about the farmer, and found
+him waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs. He squinted so
+curiously at Nessa that I feared he suspected her sex.
+
+"My name's Glocken," he said as we went to the car.
+
+I didn't respond to the evident invitation. "Farmer are you?"
+
+He nodded. "Got a couple. One here; the house is just over the hill
+yonder;" jerking a thumb in the direction; "and one out Lingen way."
+
+"That's where we're padding it, ain't it, boss?" asked Nessa.
+
+A nasty slip, but my fault, for I had not told her I had said I was
+going to Osnabrück. The farmer noticed it, of course. "Thought you
+spoke of a job at Osnabrück?" he said meaningly.
+
+"Did I? Must have been half asleep, I suppose. It's Lingen we're bound
+for."
+
+"No concern of mine. Here we are. Now let's see what you can do."
+
+It was a curious composite; a cross between a touring car and a
+delivery van. The seats of the tonneau had been taken out to make room
+for goods, and there was a moveable arrangement for raising the sides
+at need. There were a few swedes and a tiny truss of hay in it,
+suggesting the use to which it was put; but there was something else
+which prompted very different thoughts.
+
+"They've taken all my horses, so I have to fall back on this, to carry
+the fodder round," he said, noticing my curiosity.
+
+I nodded and threw back the bonnet to find the trouble. It was a
+splendid engine, 40 h.p. but very dirty; and the dirt had caused the
+stoppage. Half an hour would put everything right; but I tinkered and
+fussed over it, as I wished to investigate what I had noticed in the
+tonneau.
+
+The farmer watched me for a time; then talked to Nessa, who made great
+play with the Hans impersonation; and I found my chance. I was right.
+The farmer fed his cattle on very original diet; coffee, sugar, and
+cocoa seemed to be considerable ingredients, judging by the evidences I
+found under the swedes and hay. And his other farm was at Lingen! And
+Lingen was close to the Dutch frontier!
+
+If circumstantial evidence went for anything, this meant that the chief
+use of the car was for smuggling, and that the agricultural produce was
+to pull the wool over the eyes of the curious.
+
+I finished my work quickly, trying to see how to turn the knowledge to
+the best account. It looked like the chance of chances for us, for he
+might be the very man we wanted to find near the frontier.
+
+"She'll do now, farmer," I called, and started the engine to prove it.
+
+"You know your job, I see," he said, highly pleased, and gave me five
+marks, which I pocketed.
+
+"She wants cleaning badly if you don't want to have her break down in
+running to and from that farm of yours at Lingen."
+
+"No fear of that, is there?" he asked in concern.
+
+"I wouldn't answer for her any time in the state she's in."
+
+"Could you do the job for me?"
+
+"Not now; but I may have a bit of spare time when I get to Lingen. I
+reckon you pack some weight into her at times, too. Groceries tot up,
+you know. Which is our road for Lingen?"
+
+"What d'ye mean by groceries?"
+
+I gave him a smile and a wink. "No concern of mine, farmer. I never
+talk about other men's business."
+
+"I'll come along the lane and show you a short cut," he said and went
+off. "What are you two after?"
+
+"Grub," exclaimed Nessa promptly. "Ain't had a bite since yesterday
+forenoon, 'cept some berries I picked to give my belly something to
+do." It was very naturally said, but a blunder, of course.
+
+"Funny. You must have been off the track a lot," he said. "There's
+plenty of places everywhere. Which way did you come?"
+
+"It's which way we've got to go, that matters now, farmer," said I.
+
+"That's true, and here's the footpath. You strike me as the sort of man
+one could work with. Come and see me when you get to Lingen;" and he
+told me how to find the farm and offered his hand.
+
+He let us get a few yards and then called me back. "It's no concern of
+mine, but that's a delicate youngster of yours; any one would more
+likely take him for a wench than a lad, when he's off guard. Anyhow,
+come and see me at Lingen;" and without waiting for my reply, he walked
+off.
+
+"What did he want?" asked Nessa.
+
+"Spotted you for a girl."
+
+"Jack! He couldn't!" she protested indignantly.
+
+"He did;" and I used the fact as a text to urge the change I had in my
+thoughts. She did kick at it, as was to be expected; but a little later
+we had a powerful practical proof of its necessity.
+
+We turned into the first inn we came to for some breakfast, and I was
+talking to the woman of the house, a very kindly-looking motherly
+person, about it when there was a commotion outside. I ran out to find
+Nessa being rough-handled by a man who was trying to snatch her cap
+off. A word or two stopped any mischief, but it also drew the woman's
+attention very pointedly to Nessa.
+
+"You can have your breakfast in my room, if you like," she said, and,
+when I thanked her, led the way to it, and closed the door and stood
+with her back to it. "You've taken your cap off, can't the lad do the
+same?" she asked very meaningly.
+
+"Got a sore place on it, mum; 'fraid of a chill," said Nessa.
+
+"I'm good at curing places of that sort, let me have a look at it."
+
+"No, thank you, all the same, I don't take kindly to coddling," replied
+Nessa, colouring.
+
+The woman smiled. "You do it very well, my girl, but I'm a woman myself
+and know my own sex," she replied drily. Then to me: "You're an honest
+man, I'll wager, by your looks. Hadn't you better tell me what it
+means?"
+
+"She's my wife," I said. "She's English and----"
+
+"Glory be to God!" she interposed excitedly, in English, with a strong
+brogue. "If I didn't guess it the instant I clapped eyes on the both of
+ye!" and the tears welled in her eyes as she rushed to Nessa, took off
+the cap and kissed her. "Ah, ye poor Mavourneen, ye! And, saints alive,
+look at the lovely hair it is. And to think ye're from England, only I
+wish it was dear old Oireland, that I do! Whisht now, or Oi'll be
+making an ould fool of mysilf. We'd best just shpake in German. That I
+should live to see the day! And out in this divil of a hole of a place!
+It's making for the frontier ye are, of course! And it's glad that I am
+I can help ye, so I can. And it's breakfast ye want, is it? Sure I'll
+see to it; but I must dry my eyes first and get sober."
+
+She kissed Nessa again and almost kissed me also in her joy, wiped her
+eyes, looked in the glass to see that all was right and bustled out to
+see about the breakfast.
+
+"Something like a stroke of luck, this," I said; but Nessa was too cast
+down at her failure in the part to answer, so I looked out of the
+window to give her time to get over it.
+
+She rose presently and I felt her hand on my shoulder. "I'm a failure,
+Jack," she said wistfully, struggling to smile at it.
+
+"And thank Heaven for it, sweetheart."
+
+"But even that brute of a farmer found me out. I wouldn't care so much
+if it had only been this good soul."
+
+"She spotted me as English too," I reminded her.
+
+"I know. You're trying to make it easier for me; but that man didn't
+spot you, the beast!" She smiled then at her own vehemence. "Well, it's
+good-bye, Hans, I suppose," she said with a sigh.
+
+"And good riddance, too."
+
+"And yet you said I was doing it so well."
+
+"And so you were, child, for the stage, but this is different."
+
+"It's taken all the fun out of the picnic for me."
+
+"What? To be my wife?"
+
+She laughed and shook her head. "Well, there's one thing, you won't be
+the boss any longer."
+
+"We'll see about that, young 'un."
+
+"Don't, Jack. Don't ever dare to refer to this again or I'll--I'll--I
+don't know what I'll do!" she cried with a stamp of the foot. Then she
+caught sight of Han's cap. "It's that horrid thing that's the cause of
+it all;" and she picked it up and flung it from her.
+
+That was the overt act of renunciation of the part; and as she turned
+to me I put my arm round her and kissed her.
+
+"I thought there was to be no more 'anything else,'" she laughed.
+
+"Mustn't a man kiss his own wife?" I cried.
+
+"That hopes to be, Jack," she whispered.
+
+And that was Hans' funeral ceremony.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A FRIEND IN NEED
+
+
+When the woman returned to us she had quite thrown off her emotional
+outburst at our meeting, and her first words were a warning not to
+speak another word of English.
+
+"I couldn't help it at first, I was so excited; but it would ruin me if
+it was known that I'm British," she declared, and over the breakfast
+she told us her story.
+
+She was from Cork, where she had married a German baker named Fischer,
+had come to Germany a few years later, had been a widow for five years,
+and had continued to carry on the business of the inn. She was very
+curious to learn the truth about the war; and when I had satisfied her,
+we settled down to the consideration of her own affairs.
+
+We returned confidence for confidence: that Nessa and I were engaged to
+be married; how I had come from England to find her; the plight she had
+been in owing to von Erstein's persecution; that we had been in the
+train smash, and had escaped with our lives, but had lost the passports.
+
+She knew the von Erstein type of German well enough to sympathize
+deeply with Nessa and listened in tears to that part of the story.
+
+"I can help you both, and I will; but you'll have to be as cautious as
+a pair of wild birds. They're just grabbing the men into the army with
+both hands, for one thing, and they'll take you at sight, and then what
+would she do, poor thing?"
+
+"But aren't a lot of mechanics exempted?"
+
+"Do you know anything about such things really?"
+
+"Most there is to know about motors and aeroplanes."
+
+"Oh, that's better," she cried, rubbing her hands. "They're making that
+sort of thing now at a place called Ellendorf, out Lingen way; and
+they're wanting men badly. You can say you've heard of it and are on
+your road there, and it may help you through. But understand that all
+strangers about here are suspected and the police are mighty curious;
+and it's worse the closer to the frontier you get. Have you thought how
+you're to get across?"
+
+"If we're as lucky there as we have been here, it mayn't be so
+difficult. My rough idea was to join up with some of the folk who are
+smuggling things over and look for a chance to slip across."
+
+"I'd thought of that, too, and I can help you," she said, and then
+explained her plan.
+
+She declared that nearly every one near the frontier was taking a hand
+in the smuggling game and that the authorities, both police and
+military, not only winked at it, but secretly encouraged it. Lately,
+however, owing to the more drastic rounding up of men for the army,
+there had been a good deal of the slipping over which we wished to do,
+and stringent measures were being taken in consequence.
+
+"That makes it more difficult," she continued; "but my late husband's
+brother, Adolf Fischer, lives there. I'll give you a note to him and
+he'll help you."
+
+"Is he one of them?" I asked.
+
+She smiled and nodded. "He's getting rich at it and has several people
+working with him. I'll have to lie for you; but I don't mind. I'll tell
+him I know all about you and that you want to join him; but don't say a
+word about skipping over, or he'll put the police on you. He's very
+thick with them, but that needn't scare you. They won't touch one of
+his men."
+
+"We're awfully obliged to you."
+
+"I only wish I could do more. Of course, I'll find some clothes for
+you," she said to Nessa. "They'll only be rough working things; but
+then nothing else would do; and if you'll both be guided by me, you
+won't think of risking the walk to Lingen. What you'd better do is to
+stop here and rest till to-morrow morning, get away early and foot it
+to Massen; it's only a matter of four or five miles: and catch the
+train there; and it would be all the better if you were to wear
+overalls. I can get you some."
+
+"I have some already," I put in.
+
+"All the better, but whatever you do, don't carry that grip with you.
+Might as well write who you are on your back. Much better carry a tool
+or so in your hand as if you were off to a job in a hurry; and she
+might have a small market basket. She'll be your wife till ye reach
+Lingen; and don't forget that most Germans treat their wives pretty
+gruffly. There are plenty of spies about with sharp eyes for trifles of
+the sort. They might even see that you don't eat like them. I should
+have known you by it," she declared.
+
+We both laughed as we thanked her again; and soon afterwards she took
+Nessa away to see about the change of dress.
+
+We had fallen on our feet in all truth. Her help was literally
+invaluable. Every one of her suggestions was practical and opened my
+eyes to the many little difficult details and pitfalls which had never
+occurred to us when planning our escape.
+
+An hour or two later she came back saying she had left Nessa making
+some few necessary alterations in the dress and wanted to speak to me
+alone. "Just like me, I've put my foot in it with her. I told her
+what's only the truth, that you'll never be able to get over the
+frontier together, and she swears nothing shall make her go alone. You
+must talk her round or----" and she shook her head doubtfully.
+
+"That'll be all right."
+
+"Perhaps. She's just the bravest darling in the world, but my, what a
+will!" and she threw up her hands and smiled. "The frontier men will
+always wink at a woman crossing, but if they catch a man trying it they
+shoot him and done with it. Now what'll you do if she won't give in?"
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+"Well, I'll tell you. Go to that factory at Ellendorf and get a job.
+You'll both be safe there; they'll find you a cottage, and you'll have
+to wait till a chance comes to get away together. Tell my
+brother-in-law you're going there and that you can do his work from
+there. But if she sticks out, don't try anything from Lingen; he's sure
+to hear about it, and then you may look out. Don't forget that and
+think that because he speaks you fair, he's soft. He isn't. He daren't
+be, either."
+
+She went on to give me a host of details about the smuggling, and I
+took an opportunity to ask about the farmer whose car I had repaired.
+
+"Old Farmer Glocken, you mean. He's deep as a well and as dangerous as
+St. Patrick found the snakes. If he can make use of you, all right;
+he'll do it so long as it pays him; but he'd sell his own wife, poor
+wretch, for a few marks. Don't go near him."
+
+"He does a little smuggling?"
+
+"A little! He's in it up to his eyes. He could get you both across
+easily enough, if you paid him, supposing he didn't take your money
+first and then sell you. And that's as likely as not."
+
+Some one knocked at the door then and she went out, returning with a
+servant who clumped noisily after her and began to lay the cloth for
+dinner.
+
+"Be careful, Gretchen," she said sharply as the girl nearly let some
+glasses fall. She was a stoutish, rather slatternly girl, with
+particularly grimy finger nails, and a shawl over her head which
+concealed most of her face. She was very clumsy, too, and set
+everything down awkwardly with a guffaw.
+
+"What do you think of Gretchen?"
+
+I started and they both laughed. It was Nessa, of course, and she
+whipped off the shawl, clapped her hands, and turned completely round
+so that I might study her get-up.
+
+"Better than the boy, eh?" laughed Mrs. Fischer.
+
+"It's wonderful. I should have passed her in the street with that shawl
+over her head."
+
+"It's how the workgirls wear it."
+
+"Look at my boots, Jack," cried Nessa, holding up a foot. "Aren't they
+just lovely?" Great clumsy thick-soled things they were.
+
+"Her own were just danger signals. But she'll do as she is. Now, I've
+told my servants you're old friends of mine, and that you'll be here
+till to-morrow morning. You had better not go out. A day's rest and a
+long night's sleep won't hurt either of you;" and with that she hurried
+away.
+
+"Isn't she a dear old soul? She's been mothering me up there, as if she
+couldn't do enough for me, and ransacked every nook and cranny to fish
+out these things."
+
+"She's a very shrewd old party, too."
+
+"And are you proud of your wife, or sister, whichever I'm going to be?"
+
+"Which would you prefer?"
+
+"Don't be silly. Don't you think this is ripping? And she's been
+drilling me about how to behave. I think she's wonderful."
+
+"What sort of drilling was it?"
+
+"No end of things. How to eat; what to do; how to walk; always to have
+my knitting in hand; not to talk to strangers, especially women; one or
+two phrases I was to use; how to carry my market basket; a regular
+rehearsal of everything, and we're to have another this evening. Look
+at my hands;" and she held them out.
+
+"I saw your nails when you put the tray on the table."
+
+"Yes, but look how she's managed to make them coarse. We scrubbed them
+all over with bath brick and then rubbed in the dirt. They're smarting,
+as if they were chapped. And look at my hair, plastered right down on
+my head. Did you ever see such a fright as I am? And then this bunchy
+business on my hips;" and she laughed as she looked at herself in the
+glass.
+
+"That all?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. There was a regular lecture on the proper behaviour
+of working men's wives; sort of fetch and carry dogs with the tails
+always between their legs and never a wag except when the master
+condescends to give them a nod or so."
+
+"Going to do it all?"
+
+She was fingering her hair and started, glancing sharply at me in the
+glass. "Sisters don't, by any means. But I know that tone of yours. You
+mean something. What is it?"
+
+"Mrs. Fischer told me she had been giving you some hints."
+
+She paused and then turned and faced me, putting her hands behind her
+back with her head thrown well back--a pose I knew well. "I think I
+know what you mean and I'm not going to do it, Jack."
+
+"Do what?"
+
+"Innocent!  But it's no use, Jack, I won't."
+
+"Very well."
+
+"You don't mean that a bit. I know. You mean just the opposite. It's
+about my getting over the frontier alone. Isn't that it?"
+
+"She said something to me about it."
+
+"Of course. She tried all she knew to persuade me and now she's been at
+you, of course. I'm ready to listen to you; but I warn you it won't
+make a pennorth of difference."
+
+"Very well."
+
+"Oh, don't 'very well' me in that tone. You don't expect me to desert
+you when you've done all this and got into this mess solely for me, do
+you?" she cried vehemently.
+
+"We won't worry over it now; but there's just one point you might keep
+in mind. It may turn out to be necessary for my safety. What then?"
+
+Her face clouded at that. "How could that be?" she asked.
+
+"We can answer that better later on," I said with a shrug. "But if it
+should be?"
+
+"Did Mrs. Fischer say anything about that to you?"
+
+I nodded. "Said it might be easy enough for you to get over, but very
+risky for us both to try it together. Suggested that if you held out I
+had better get a berth at Ellendorf; but there's the question of my
+leave. It's nearly up, and either you or I must be able to wire
+explanations from Holland within the next day or two."
+
+"I never thought of that. What would happen?"
+
+"Possibly nothing; but it doesn't help a man to play the absentee.
+They've a nasty term for that in the army."
+
+"You always mean such a lot when you speak in that casual tone of
+yours," she exclaimed. "Of course, if my stopping meant any sort of
+trouble to you, it would be different. Nothing else would make me go.
+And if you're only saying it to force me you're--well, it's cowardly
+and you ought to be ashamed to do it."
+
+"Well, think it over, and we'll see how the cat jumps. I promise you
+this, faithfully, I won't ask you to do it if it isn't necessary."
+
+She paused and then came and laid a hand on my shoulder. "You won't ask
+me to go unless it's necessary for your sake, will you, Jack? It would
+be awful for me to feel that you were left here in danger. I know
+you're thinking all about me and not about yourself, and--oh, Jack, I
+don't believe I could bear it."
+
+"We won't worry any more about it till the time comes. I think it's
+splendid of you to want to stick it, but it's better to tell you;" and
+we let the matter drop.
+
+But Nessa did worry about it exceedingly for the rest of the day. She
+spoke very little and appeared to have lost interest in things; and
+just before she was going to bed she came with a suggestion that we
+should make at least one attempt to cross the frontier together. I
+yielded very reluctantly, as it meant the hash of a great part of our
+plans. But she was so downcast, so troubled, and pleaded with such
+wistful earnestness, that I hadn't the heart to refuse.
+
+Mrs. Fischer declared it was rank madness; that if we tried it, we
+mustn't go near her brother-in-law; and that we had better go straight
+to Ellendorf.
+
+Nessa was in much better spirits early the next morning when we bade
+good-bye to our new friend.
+
+"How are we to repay you for all this?" I asked.
+
+"It isn't money you mean, is it?" she asked, almost indignantly,
+although she was so affected at parting from us that the tears were in
+her kind motherly eyes.
+
+"No money could repay all your kindness and help."
+
+"Then don't offer it to me. Sure, it's enough that we're all of the
+same blood, and all I'll want is to know that you get home safe and
+sound. I'd like to know that," she said wistfully. "Sure my heart's
+still over there. There, be off with you, or I'll be making a fool of
+myself."
+
+"I'll write to you, Mrs. Fischer," said Nessa, kissing her.
+
+"Not on your life, child. It's in gaol I'd be in no time, the divils
+that they all are!" she exclaimed, relapsing into English.
+
+"We'll manage to let you know," I promised, shaking her hand warmly;
+and we were turning to leave the room when Nessa had a most happy
+thought.
+
+"We'll send you a sprig of shamrock, dear."
+
+The thought of it broke the dear soul up entirely. "Oh, the blessed
+darlin'!" she cried, seizing Nessa and kissing her again. "What my ould
+eyes would give for a sight of it!" and she burst into a passion of
+sobs. "Go now, go, the pair of ye, or I'll----" Sobs choked her
+utterance and she leant her head on the table, motioning us to go.
+
+Nessa touched my arm and we stole out, both of us deeply moved by the
+emotion which Nessa's offer had stirred in the heart of the lonely
+Irish exile.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+THE HUE AND CRY!
+
+
+On the walk to Massen we concocted our story. I was to be Hans Bulich
+and Nessa my sister; we were alone in the world except for an aunt in
+Holland; Nessa had recently lost her lover on the Russian front, and
+her supposed grief at this was to account for her gloomy silence; I was
+likely to be called up, and as this would leave her without friends or
+money, she was anxious to get to the aunt in Holland.
+
+They were parts easy to play, thanks to our warm-hearted Irish friend;
+we looked the characters quite well enough to pass muster. The absence
+of any luggage, my overalls and tools and a big German china pipe, and
+Nessa's market basket and knitting were shrewd little touches of
+realism which carried us through the preliminary difficulties without
+any trouble.
+
+There were several people in the carriage with us, one of whom, an old
+man who sat next me, was going as far as Lingen. The men were soon
+talking and the one subject was the food supply, which was evidently
+becoming a serious matter. I didn't pay much attention until a question
+was asked about the frontier smuggling. The matter interested them all
+keenly, and I threw in a remark now and then to draw the rest.
+
+The old fellow next me seemed to know a good deal about it, and when we
+three were left alone in the carriage he let drop a remark which showed
+he had noticed my interest in the subject, and then asked if I'd been
+at the front yet.
+
+"They think I'm more use at my trade," I replied, making play with the
+spanner in my hand.
+
+"Engineer's mechanic, may be?"
+
+I nodded. "Motors and aeroplanes and so on."
+
+"Going to Lingen, aren't you?"
+
+"Yes. How far's Ellendorf from there?"
+
+"A matter of a league or two. I hear they're making these new
+aeroplanes there. Got a job there?"
+
+"Shan't know till I get to Lingen; have another little matter to see to
+first, anyway."
+
+"A good few people have little matters to see to there, these days," he
+replied drily, with a suggestive glance out of the corner of his eye.
+"I live there, and you can take it from me that if you're any good at
+your job, there's plenty of work waiting for you."
+
+"Government work?"
+
+"If they weren't all blind, yes;" and he launched into a description of
+the extreme difficulty of getting repairs done. "Can't get so much as a
+screw driven in without one of their infernal permits. I've been to
+Osnabrück about it now trying to get a man. Might as well have asked
+for the moon!" he said disgustedly, and went on grumbling about it, at
+intervals, for the rest of the journey.
+
+When we reached Lingen he said he'd like to have a chat with me and
+suggested we should go to his shop. "Won't do you any harm to be seen
+with me, either; I'm well known; and what with escaped prisoners and
+our skulkers trying to jump the frontier, the police are pretty curious
+about strangers of your age and build especially."
+
+He was well known, as he had said. Several people nodded to him on the
+platform, and one man came after him. "Good-day, Father Fischer, can I
+have a word with you?" and they stopped to talk together.
+
+"Hear that, Nessa?" I asked excitedly. "By Jove, we're in luck if it's
+our man!" and when he rejoined us I asked him if he was Adolf Fischer.
+
+"I am. Every one in Lingen knows Adolf Fischer."
+
+"Have you a brother out Massen way?"
+
+"I had, but he drank himself to death five years or so back, poor fool.
+Why do you ask?"
+
+"I've a letter for you;" and I gave it him.
+
+He read it and pocketed it with a chuckle of pleasure. "Couldn't be
+better. Friends of Martha's are friends of mine. Come along."
+
+We had not left the station before we had a proof of our good luck. We
+were in front of him as we went out and the police sergeant at the door
+stopped us and was beginning to question me, when he intervened.
+
+"It's all right, Braun. They're friends of mine. A stroke of luck,
+too," he said with a wink, which suggested there was a mutually
+satisfactory understanding between them.
+
+We were allowed to pass at once, and he stayed talking to the sergeant
+for a couple of minutes. "Lucky you gave me that letter when you did,"
+he said when he caught us up. "They've been ordered to keep a special
+look-out for a couple such as you. But they won't worry you while
+you're with me."
+
+Ominous news in view of what had occurred just before the train smash
+outside Osnabrück, and it made me more anxious than ever to get Nessa
+safely over the frontier.
+
+"You'll bide with me, of course," he said when we reached his house, a
+flourishing grocer's store in the main street of the little town. "I
+don't have any one in the house nights. We'll have a bite of food and
+then talk things over."
+
+He was silent and thoughtful during the meal, and the trend of his
+thoughts was shown in a question he put.
+
+"There's nothing black against you, is there?"
+
+"Nothing to make me afraid to face any man in the Empire," I replied
+positively. It was the truth, if not quite as I meant him to understand
+it.
+
+"I only asked, because I have to be very careful," he said; and nothing
+more passed until we were smoking, while Nessa had resumed the knitting
+which she had kept up incessantly in the train.
+
+"Now, you'd like to tell me your story," he opened.
+
+I told him the tale we had prepared and he put a question or two which
+were easily answered.
+
+"I'm sorry for you, my lass," he said to her. "Very sorry; you're only
+one among too many thousands; and you shall get away all right. They're
+not particular about women and girls, you know," he added to me. "But
+it's different with men. Their orders are to shoot first and ask
+questions afterwards. Three were found trying to jump the frontier last
+week and were shot. Two the week before; and one of 'em was our only
+engineer. So if that's what's brought you here, I can't help you. We'd
+all the trouble we wanted over the last affair."
+
+"I'm no skulker, I assure you. If they call 'em up, I'm ready any time."
+
+"You'll give me your word to stop here then?"
+
+"Unless I have to go anywhere else. I'm pretty handy at my job, you
+know."
+
+He seemed satisfied, and then told me his plans.
+
+Nessa was to leave that night. He had a nephew in the Landwehr regiment
+at present guarding a part of the frontier, which was especially
+promising for the scheme, and we were to run out there in his car. I
+was to stay with him in Lingen, partly to help in the smuggling
+operations but largely to keep in order his and his associates' motors.
+There were a number of Lingen people in the thing, which was winked at
+by the authorities, who would not ask any questions about me if I was
+known to be in the swim.
+
+He gave me a host of details, took me out later to see the place where
+I was to work; a very well-equipped place it was, too, but with only a
+lad and a doddering old fellow as the staff: explained that they often
+lost considerably by breakdowns; and then left me to return to Nessa,
+saying that he must go and arrange about the night's venture.
+
+I found Nessa very dejected, buried in thought, with her knitting on
+her lap.
+
+"Looks good enough, eh?" I said to cheer her.
+
+It wasn't a success. She did not answer for a while. "Do you trust
+him?" she asked, looking up at length.
+
+"Why not? He was frank enough; and we should have been in a deuce of a
+mess without him. It can't be worse even if he gives us away. But he
+won't. I'm sure of that."
+
+"But about you?"
+
+"Meaning?" I knew what was coming, however.
+
+"You heard what he said about those men being shot. It brought my heart
+up in my mouth."
+
+"It's no more than we heard at Massen."
+
+"We agreed to try together, remember."
+
+"I haven't forgotten. We'll see what happens to-night."
+
+"You don't want me to go by myself? You promised, Jack."
+
+"Better one than neither of us, surely. That reminds me. You must have
+some money in case I fail;" and I offered her some notes.
+
+She shook her head and pushed them away. "I have more than enough for
+my purpose."
+
+I knew what she meant. She was resolved not to go alone, and it worried
+me considerably. It was splendidly staunch and lovable and brave, but
+none the less quixotic and a serious blunder. "You heard what that
+police sergeant had told old Fischer?"
+
+"Of course," she nodded casually, as if it didn't make the least
+difference.
+
+"You shall settle it for yourself, Nessa." There was nothing to be
+gained by trying to dissuade her then, so I left it until the moment
+for action should arrive. After my promise, it was impossible for me to
+think of going with her.
+
+Fischer came back chuckling. "We're in luck," he declared. "I met my
+nephew, Fritz, in the town just now. He'll do it all right. He'll be on
+guard at one of the roads; the very spot of all others for us; near a
+little thicket they call the Pike Wood. We're to be there about nine. I
+explained everything to him, and of course I've pledged my word that
+only your sister's going over. That's right, eh?"
+
+"Quite," I assured him.
+
+Nessa's needles stopped clicking for an instant and I heard her catch
+her breath. It augured badly for the night's enterprise; but if I had
+wished to renew the attempt to persuade her, I could not have done it,
+as we were not left alone altogether again until the time came for us
+to set out.
+
+I drove the car with Fischer at my side, and by his instructions, Nessa
+lay on the bottom of the tonneau which was constructed much like that
+of the farmer's I had mended at Osnabrück. She was hidden under a rug
+and a tarpaulin, and he told her to cover up even her head if any one
+spoke to us on the way.
+
+We had some dozen miles to run, and for the greater part of the way no
+one attempted to interfere with us. The old fellow seemed to be hugely
+pleased by the way I handled the ramshackle machine; and even more so
+when I explained the reason of some of the queer noises and jumps which
+the engine developed. "You're the man for us!" he exclaimed more than
+once.
+
+When we reached the outskirts of a village close to the frontier, he
+bent over and told Nessa to hide herself completely. "We shall be
+questioned here; but it won't matter. Go slow for a bit," he added to
+me; "and pull up at once if they order us."
+
+The village was full of soldiers, and I began to realize in earnest
+then the difficulties of our escaping without his help. We were pulled
+up twice in the village, but allowed to proceed the moment he was
+recognized and produced some authority he had.
+
+After we left the village behind us there were plenty of people, both
+men and women, all with their faces turned frontierwards. "What are all
+these doing?" I asked.
+
+"Crumb-hunters, we call 'em." Descriptive enough, too; and he told me
+they were out in all weathers to pick up any trifles from the Dutch
+side, and that passes were given to them for the purpose.
+
+"And what about the Dutch guards?"
+
+"Getting fat on it," replied Fischer, rubbing his palm and then putting
+a finger to the side of his nose. "Bleed us to a tune, too. Their
+people try to stop it; change the men often enough; but it only means
+that Peter gets a greasy palm instead of Paul. We turn off into the
+next lane on the right: it runs across the frontier; the Pike Wood's
+just there; but you'll have to stop a little short of it to turn the
+car."
+
+We ran about half a mile along the lane to the spot where I turned and
+we all got out. He led the way across a field or two, and, as we were
+rather before our time--nine o'clock--he posted us at a point in the
+thicket from which we could see the guards at the gate which marked the
+boundary on the German side, and then left us.
+
+I was beginning to get a little excited by that time, but Nessa seemed
+quite unmoved, except that she shivered once or twice, for the night
+air had a nip in it. Whether she persisted in her intention not to go
+without me, I could not say. She had heard me tell old Fischer that I
+wasn't going; but she maintained a sphinxlike silence all the time he
+was away.
+
+He went up to the guards and I could just make out their figures as he
+stood talking to them; and presently he disappeared into the darkness
+through the gate. A minute or two later some shots were fired from the
+other side of the barrier; soon afterwards a loaded wagon came dashing
+from that side, the three horses galloping at full stretch, and a man I
+took to be Fischer jumped from it.
+
+An exhibition of organization followed. A number of men sprang up from
+nowhere; the wagon was unloaded almost instantly; and they scuttled off
+into the night with cases and barrels and packages of all descriptions
+and sizes. It was done like a flash; and the wagon was galloped back
+across the frontier. It had just disappeared when an officer rode up,
+presumably to learn the cause of the firing. Just then Fischer rejoined
+us, out of breath, but hugely pleased.
+
+"A near thing," he panted. "If that officer had been a minute earlier
+he'd have commandeered the lot. He's a swinehound. You must lie doggo
+till he's gone; but it's all right. Fritz will give you the tip. You're
+to go forward the moment you hear him whistling 'The Watch on the
+Rhine.' Don't lose a second. Give him a twenty-mark note; it's for his
+two pals. And now I can't stop with you, I must see to things. I'll
+wait for you at the car."
+
+"What was that firing?" I asked as he turned away.
+
+"To fool the Dutch officers," he said over his shoulder as he went.
+
+Nessa's intention was still a riddle. She stood leaning against a tree,
+motionless as a statue and up to this point as silent. But the time had
+come when I must know what she meant to do.
+
+"You're going, Nessa?" I whispered.
+
+No answer; not even a shrug of the shoulders.
+
+"Nessa, dear, you're going?"
+
+"Are you?"
+
+"No. I gave my word. Besides I've half a notion that this is a sort of
+test. Fischer has told the men that I am not, and even if they didn't
+shoot us both, I should be ruined with him. And you can see for
+yourself there isn't one chance in a hundred of our getting through."
+
+She listened but made no reply.
+
+"We shall have that signal in a moment. That officer is riding away."
+
+A long tremulous sigh from her. "Do you wish me to go, Jack?"
+
+"Yes, most certainly. It's the luckiest chance in the world."
+
+"Is it?"
+
+"You can see it for yourself, dearest." I tried to put my arm round
+her, but she drew away.
+
+"Don't, Jack! After what you've just said."
+
+There was a pause in which we could catch the guttural tones of the
+guards and hear them stamping their feet. Precious seconds were flying
+and I was getting into a positive fever of impatience and anxiety.
+
+"I'm only thinking of you, Nessa. You know that. Do make up your mind
+to go. You must surely see that it's the one course for you. There's
+the road to England and your mother and----"
+
+"And you're to stop here in all this danger alone."
+
+My patience began to give out. "I know you're thinking of me, but I can
+get out of it all ever so much better alone. But there, if you won't,
+you won't, and there's an end of it."
+
+"You promised to make an attempt together. Have you done it?"
+
+"For Heaven's sake, Nessa, don't let us split hairs at a moment like
+this. Here's the chance of chances for you, and you may never have
+another. If you wish ever to see England again, or at all events until
+after the war's over, you'll take it."
+
+"That shows what little chance you think you have of getting away," she
+retorted, and made me wish I'd said something else.
+
+"I didn't mean anything of the sort, only that it will be infinitely
+easier for me alone."
+
+She didn't answer, and in the pause the first bars of the "Watch on the
+Rhine" were whistled in a low cautious pitch.
+
+"Come, dearest," I whispered and put my arm about her.
+
+"Oh, I can't go, Jack. I--I can't be such a coward!" she whispered,
+trembling in her agitation.
+
+"For Heaven's sake, dearest!"
+
+The whistling had ceased, but she still hesitated.
+
+After an interval, very short, the whistle came again, slightly louder.
+
+There was only one last plea I could think of. "It may cost me my life
+if you don't go, Nessa."
+
+I felt her shudder convulsively as she yielded, and clung to me for an
+instant. "I'll go. Oh, God!" she moaned piteously under her breath.
+
+I hurried her across the intervening field, and as we reached the other
+side of it, the man at the gate called to us impatiently to hurry.
+
+But Nessa stopped. "I've forgotten, Jack," she whispered. "I must have
+that money after all."
+
+I had it ready, thrust it into her hand, and helped her over the field
+gate. In her agitation she fell and dropped the notes. It was as dark
+as pitch on the ground at that spot and I had to grope with my hands to
+find them.
+
+The man called to me urgently to come at once, and I had just found
+them when we heard the sound of a horse galloping in our direction.
+
+"Back to the wood," growled the man almost fiercely. "If the captain
+noses you, you'll be shot."
+
+I lifted Nessa over the gate and we darted back to cover, as the
+officer rode up. We waited for some breathless anxious minutes for him
+to go, hoping that the signal could be repeated.
+
+But he did not go; and soon afterwards the guard was changed.
+
+The chance was gone and there was nothing for it but to return to the
+car.
+
+The failure was bitterly disappointing, but Nessa was glad, and
+laughed. "Here's the money, Jack," she said as we left the wood.
+
+I pocketed it in silence.
+
+"I suppose you're awfully angry and disappointed and all that, but I'm
+not. The only thing I regret is that I was persuaded to go."
+
+"I'm not angry about it. It's a great pity; but the only thing to do is
+to wait for another opportunity. I dare say Fischer can manage it."
+
+"You needn't look for one, if you mean me to go alone. I won't do it.
+You'll never get me to consent again; and you said I was to settle it,
+remember."
+
+"I remember," I replied.
+
+"I'm absolutely determined," she declared; but something was to happen
+that night which shook that determination to ruins.
+
+Fischer expressed great surprise at seeing her; but I explained that at
+the last moment the money had been lost and that the officer had come
+back in time to prevent Nessa's escape.
+
+The car was now loaded with some of the spoils from the wagon and Nessa
+had to ride in front with us. We made a quick run back to the town,
+where I helped in the unloading, and then with Nessa took the car to
+the place where I was to overhaul it in the morning.
+
+"I feel a thousand times more light-hearted, Jack," she said slipping
+her hand in my arm as we walked back to Fischer's shop.
+
+"That's as it should be. I was rather bearish over it, I'm afraid; but
+it was such a chance."
+
+"You won't ask me again to---- Good heavens, look, Jack, look!" she
+broke off, her voice shaken with agitation as she clutched my arm
+convulsively and pointed to a small poster outside the police station.
+
+She might well be agitated. The poster was headed:
+
+        MURDER
+  1,000 Marks Reward
+
+
+The murder was that of Anna Hilden and the reward was for my capture.
+
+Two portraits were in the middle. One an excellent reproduction of
+Nessa with the words: "Nessa Caldicott, Englishwoman," beneath it; the
+other a villainous splash drawing: "Johann Lassen, German"; who were
+"known to have left Berlin together on the night of the 23rd in the
+train which had been wrecked outside Osnabrück."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+FARMER GLOCKEN AGAIN
+
+
+This "Hue and Cry" poster alarmed Nessa intensely. Her fears were all
+on my account, however; and so far as concerned herself, she did not
+even then seem to regret that her chance to cross the frontier had been
+missed.
+
+As we hurried to Fischer's I tried to reassure her that the trouble was
+not so serious as it looked at first blush; for the reason that the
+photograph of her was so good that no one would recognize her in her
+present make-up, while mine was execrable enough to amount to a
+positive disguise. But this did not allay her agitation; and after we
+reached the house, there was no opportunity for further discussion.
+
+We both realized that the consequences might be very serious; and after
+she had gone to bed, I sat racking my wits over the perplexing problem.
+It was either von Erstein's doing or von Gratzen's; and in the end I
+put it down to von Erstein, whose influence was quite sufficient to
+enable him to stir up the police in this manner.
+
+For me there was only the risk of arrest and trial for the murder;
+hugely unpleasant, of course, but not dangerous, because von Gratzen
+knew who had killed the woman and had the proofs. It was very different
+for Nessa, however, although she had, of course, nothing to fear in
+connection with the murder charge. But she would certainly be kept in
+the country; and Heaven alone knew what the consequences would be and
+what price she might have to pay for her fatal hesitation at the
+frontier that night.
+
+I had no chance of speaking to her about it until about noon the
+following day when Fischer sent her with some lunch for me to the shed
+where I had put his car into shape again. As the "staff"--the gawky lad
+and the decrepit old man--were present, it was difficult to say much to
+her, but I managed at intervals to let her know what I thought.
+
+To my concern, however, she was determined to stay in the country.
+Instead of regretting her refusal to go, she appeared to glory in it.
+If there was to be trouble for me, she was resolved to share it,
+declaring that she could help me by confessing her part.
+
+I was still doing what I could to shake this determination and show her
+the fallacy of it, when there was another unpleasant surprise.
+
+Fischer arrived bringing the farmer Glocken whose motor I had mended at
+Osnabrück. If there was one man in all Germany I wished to avoid at
+that moment, it was certainly Glocken.
+
+"Hullo! so it's you, is it?" he exclaimed.
+
+Fischer was obviously as much astonished at the recognition as I was
+concerned. "You know Bulich, then?" he asked.
+
+Glocken paused and appeared to sense something of the position and
+answered with a cunning squint at me: "I know him for a first-class
+workman."
+
+"You're right," agreed Fischer, and then explained the object of the
+visit. Glocken was in the smuggling ring and looked after a very
+important and profitable branch--the smuggling of chemicals for
+ammunition. These were brought by aeroplane; it being deemed too risky
+to resort to the ordinary method. A consignment had arrived the
+previous evening, the pilot, a Dutchman named Vandervelt, had had an
+accident in landing, and I was wanted to put the thing right.
+
+There was no way of getting out of it, and what objection there might
+have been was more than compensated for when Fischer drew me aside and
+told me he had arranged with Glocken that if my sister would venture
+the flying trip, she could go with the Dutchman. I agreed without
+asking Nessa; and as Fischer's car was now ready for the road we drove
+away in it.
+
+Glocken sat in front with me and promptly started his questions. Very
+awkward questions some of them were too: about our former meeting; why
+I had not mentioned I knew Mrs. Fischer at the inn; why I had said I
+was coming from Osnabrück, when old Fischer had told him a very
+different story; and at last enough to show that he had seen the murder
+poster and was inclined to connect it with me.
+
+Having in this way thoroughly scared me, as he thought, he broached the
+subject of Nessa's flight and asked what it was worth, hinting that
+Vandervelt was something of a bloodsucker. I had still an ample supply
+of money; about a couple of hundred pounds, some four thousand marks;
+and being prepared to part with every pfennig to get Nessa away, it was
+a considerable relief to find that it was to be a matter of bribing.
+
+"Couple of hundred marks, enough?" I suggested.
+
+"You don't know Vandervelt, or you wouldn't offer a trifle like that,"
+he said, shaking his head.
+
+"How much then? I'm not yet a partner in Krupp's, remember."
+
+"What's it worth to you?"
+
+"Fischer was going to do it for nothing last night. He's almost as
+sorry for my sister as I am."
+
+"Vandervelt isn't Fischer," he replied drily. "Doesn't a thousand marks
+strike you as cheap?" he said with a wily significant leer. That was
+the amount of the reward!
+
+"Out of the question, Glocken. She must have something in her pocket
+when she lands; and in any case Fischer's going to arrange it in a day
+or so."
+
+"Hadn't she better be off at once? Delays are apt to be dangerous
+sometimes, you know."
+
+"Why?" I asked, turning to him.
+
+Our eyes met in a mutually intent stare, and his dropped first. "You
+know your own business," he muttered with a shrug. "But you'd better
+give the thousand, if you want her to go."
+
+It was clearly best to haggle, so I advanced to five hundred, then to
+seven hundred and fifty, and at last to a thousand, protesting it was
+an imposition. He pretended to fire up at the word; but it was only the
+preface to asking for the money to be paid at once.
+
+It was all going into his own pocket, of course; and after more words I
+agreed to give him half the amount when we reached his farm if I found
+my sister would risk the venture, and the remainder as soon as she was
+safely off.
+
+I broached the matter to Nessa as soon as we arrived, and she met it at
+first with a flat refusal. "I won't go, Jack. I thought something of
+the sort was meant when you asked me to come here. I don't care what
+happens to me. I can't go."
+
+"But I want you to care, Nessa. It's----"
+
+"Well, I don't--and I won't."
+
+"You're not afraid of the trip?"
+
+"I'm not that sort of coward, thank you," she retorted sharply.
+
+"I'm going to arrange with the pilot, Vandervelt's his name, for him to
+look after you when you land and see you to some station."
+
+"I'm not taking the least interest in all this."
+
+"You'd better book right through to Rotterdam and go to our Consulate,
+and I'll look for you there."
+
+"I'm not going, Jack."
+
+"You'd rather be clapped into an internment camp?"
+
+"I don't care for fifty internment camps. They can do what they please
+with me, but I won't be coward enough to desert you."
+
+"You can tell everything at the Consulate and----"
+
+"Is that a Home for strayed cowards?" she cried, springing up and
+stamping her foot, her eyes flashing indignantly.
+
+"No, it's the best meeting place for us and a safe refuge for quixotic
+girls."
+
+"They're welcome to it, then. I shan't disturb them. If you wish to
+make me hate you, you'll persist in all this."
+
+"I'd rather have you hate me than that you should stop here."
+
+"How can you say such a thing as that?"
+
+"Because I mean it; every syllable of it, Nessa, on my honour."
+
+This appeared to make some impression. She winced and paled slightly.
+"I've never been thought a coward before," she said after a pause, but
+without so much of the former snap.
+
+"What I do think is that if what you talk of doing is cowardice, I'd
+rather be thought a coward than anything else."
+
+"That means that you approve of it then?"
+
+"On the contrary. Don't let us get at cross purposes. I must be off to
+this job. The thing is this. If I'm alone here, I can get through
+everything without risk; and I can't if you stop. It's splendid of you
+to wish to stick it with me; but it'll be fatal to me; fatal to both of
+us, indeed."
+
+"I don't care about myself."
+
+"Then care for me. Do it for my sake."
+
+"How would my stopping hurt you?"
+
+I lost patience then. "There isn't time to go over it all again, Nessa.
+But if you persist in this, there's no use in continuing a useless
+struggle to get away. I've made the arrangement; and if you won't
+leave, I shall go straight from here to the police, tell them I'm
+Lassen, and leave them to do what they will."
+
+"You wouldn't be so mad! You're only saying it to force me to give in,"
+she exclaimed, firing again.
+
+"Call it what you like; but I shall do it. Keep that in mind when the
+time comes for you to decide;" and without waiting to give her time to
+reply I left her. It went against the grain to have to use such a
+threat, knowing that her motive was nothing but a chivalrous regard for
+me; but persuasion had failed, and matters were too serious to be over
+nice in the choice of means to convince her.
+
+There wasn't much wrong with the bus. Vandervelt, a very decent fellow,
+was a good pilot, it seemed, but not much use as a mechanic. A couple
+of hours or so sufficed for the job; but as I hoped that Nessa would be
+his passenger, I went most carefully over every part and made tests
+until I was satisfied. This occupied a considerable time, so that I had
+not finished until late in the afternoon.
+
+The arrangement was that Vandervelt should start about sunset, as that
+would give him time to reach his landing place before dark. He agreed
+readily to get Nessa to the nearest station and to see her safely off
+for Rotterdam. If all went well, she ought to reach there somewhere
+about noon the following day.
+
+He said nothing about the passage money for Nessa, and I avoided the
+subject. So long as Nessa got away, it was nothing to me whether old
+Glocken swindled his companion or not. They could settle their own
+differences; and it would have been the act of a fool to set them by
+the ears at such a moment.
+
+All I saw of the farmer tended to confirm the Irish-woman's estimate of
+him. He had blackmailed me in the matter of the payment for Nessa, and
+I had very little doubt that, having scooped in a thousand marks for
+her, he would start another attempt with me on the same lines.
+
+He watched me at work for most of the time; joined with Vandervelt in
+praising my skill; repeating with unnecessary frequency something about
+what extraordinary good luck it was for them that I had come to Lingen,
+and his hope that I should remain with them a long time.
+
+He didn't mean a word of it, of course, and for a long time left me
+guessing as to his motive for all this waste of breath. At length,
+however, it struck me that all this rot was intended to keep me
+slogging away because he was anxious about the bus and that he wished
+to have it in good shape before something was to happen which he had up
+his sleeve.
+
+He had my five hundred marks in his pocket, and, if he broke the
+contract and refused to let Nessa go at the last minute, he might be
+getting the thousand for the reward instead of only the balance of five
+hundred from me. I knocked that little dodge on the head, therefore.
+
+Waiting for a repetition of his oxish praise of my skill, I laughed and
+said: "You're right, farmer; you've got to know how to handle them.
+They're difficult enough to repair sometimes, but easy to damage. A
+blow or two with the hammer in the right spot, and I could make this
+old bus fit for nothing but the scrap heap;" and I gave him a meaning
+look and raised the hammer as if going to smash things.
+
+He tumbled to my meaning right enough and grabbed my arm. "Mind what
+you're doing, man. Do you know what that thing cost?" he cried.
+
+"Oh, yes. A good deal more than a thousand marks. I was only showing
+you how easy it would be to make it worth about as many pfennigs."
+
+He laughed uneasily and went off, grunting something I didn't catch.
+But he knew now what it would cost him to earn the police reward.
+
+Half an hour later came the confirmation of my suspicion. The police
+sergeant from Lingen, Braun, arrived and Glocken took him into the
+house and then brought him across the fields to us. I was making great
+play with the hammer when they reached us.
+
+Whether the old beggar had brought him there to arrest me, I couldn't
+tell of course, but no hint of the sort was dropped; and after a few
+questions about the bus, the two went off and I saw Braun start on his
+return to Lingen. Without me, thank goodness.
+
+It was now nearing the time for Vandervelt to start, and I had still to
+see Nessa and get her final decision. Suspecting treachery, I tested
+the engine to show Vandervelt that it was all right, and then without
+his knowledge, manipulated matters, pocketed a small bit of the engine,
+so that she wouldn't move, and went into the house to Nessa.
+
+Her mood had changed meanwhile; she was abjectly miserable and
+woebegone.
+
+"I wonder you think it worth while to come to me again," she said.
+
+"Time's nearly up, dear, and Vandervelt is getting ready."
+
+No response except a desolate gesture.
+
+"I hope you've been thinking over all I said."
+
+"I've been thinking of part of it--the last part; the cruel part."
+
+"I'm sorry you look at it in that light. It wasn't meant to be cruel,
+Nessa; but there, you know that. Have you decided?"
+
+"Have you succeeded in forcing me, you mean?"
+
+"I told you no more than the plain truth. The position's bad enough as
+it is, without anything more. For me I mean."
+
+"As if I didn't know that! And as if it isn't that which is driving me
+distracted!"
+
+"There's no time to go into things again, dear. I said it should rest
+with you to decide."
+
+"Yes, and then used threats to force me!"
+
+"I haven't threatened you, Nessa."
+
+"It doesn't matter what you call it. The change of a word doesn't
+change the act. It's what you're doing, not what you're saying, that I
+care about."
+
+"Are you going? That's what I care about."
+
+"Shall you go to the police if I don't?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Do you understand that it's just breaking my heart to go--unless you
+wish to break it?"
+
+"Will you give me a chance of mending it when we meet at Rotterdam?"
+
+She leant back in her chair, elbow on knee, and rested her chin on her
+hand. "We shan't meet there."
+
+"Nessa!"
+
+"You will never get there. I shouldn't care so much if----" She dropped
+her eyes to the floor and left the sentence unfinished.
+
+I knelt by her side and took her hand. "You must go, dearest," I urged.
+
+She flung her arms round my neck and clung to me. "Don't make me go,
+Jack! Don't, if you love me," she pleaded. "I--I can't bear the thought
+of leaving you."
+
+"It's because I do love you with all my heart that I wish you to go.
+It's the only way in which our love can ever end as we wish." I pressed
+my lips to hers. She was trembling like an aspen.
+
+"Bulich! Bulich! Are you ready?" It was the farmer's voice, and Nessa
+shuddered convulsively at the sound.
+
+"You'll do this for me, dearest?"
+
+"Oh, God, if there were only some other way!" she moaned.
+
+"There isn't, sweetheart. It's the only one in which you can really
+help me. We shall meet again in a day or two. That's all."
+
+"I shall never see you again."
+
+"You may not unless you go. You're ready?"
+
+Her grasp tightened on me and she did not answer.
+
+"Bulich! Bulich!" came Glocken's voice again, more insistently.
+
+"In a minute now," I called in reply.
+
+"How shall I ever know what happens to you?"
+
+"I'll tell you all about it myself in Rotterdam; we shall just laugh
+over it together."
+
+"Laugh!" she echoed. "I shall never laugh again. I shan't be able to
+bear the suspense, Jack. I know I shan't. I shall come back."
+
+"Well, give me a week's grace, before you do."
+
+"I may come back then?" she asked, looking up quickly.
+
+I knew that she would not be allowed to recross the frontier; but it
+seemed a case where the truth would do no good. "Yes," I said.
+
+"Promise?"
+
+"If you won't come earlier."
+
+"Oh, what a week of suspense it will be!" she moaned.
+
+"Come along, Bulich. Vandervelt's getting restless," called Glocken.
+
+"I'll go, Jack." It was no more than a whisper, but it meant so much.
+Of her own dear will she kissed me again and again with more passion
+than she had ever shown, and then made a desperate effort for
+composure. "What an end to our picnic, Jack!" she said, trying to
+smile. A brave effort, but a failure; and she began to tremble again,
+closing her eyes and clenching her hands tightly under the searching
+strain of it, and turned away.
+
+For a full minute she stood in this tense silence, until Glocken called
+again. The sound of his voice roused her, and when she faced me again,
+she had regained self-control.
+
+"I'm ready, Jack," she said steadily.
+
+I pushed some notes into her pocket.
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Money. You must have it, dearest," I said, as she seemed about to
+protest. "And now, good-bye, for a day or two."
+
+"Good-bye. Don't kiss me, or I shall break down again;" and with that
+we went down to the two men who were impatiently waiting for us.
+
+"You've been a long time," said Glocken in a surly tone. "There's
+something gone wrong with the machine."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I tried to start," said Vandervelt. "Glocken told me your sister had
+decided not to go with me."
+
+"That was a misunderstanding. I forgot I had this in my pocket;" and I
+showed them the little part I had brought away. "Rather lucky, wasn't
+it, Glocken?"
+
+He looked as if he would gladly have struck me, and muttered something
+about being sorry for the mistake.
+
+Nessa did not speak a word as we crossed the fields, dropping a pace or
+two behind us, and keeping her eyes on the ground. She could scarcely
+have been more dejected had she been on her way to the scaffold.
+
+I repeated the instructions to Vandervelt about Nessa, and again he
+promised to carry them out faithfully. When we reached the bus a minute
+or two put her in trim again, and I made a final test of the engine.
+Then I got down, helped Nessa into her place, fastened the strap round
+her, and held her hand while the Dutchman climbed to his seat.
+
+She returned the pressure with a choking sigh, but could not trust
+herself to speak.
+
+Then I shook hands with the pilot, thanked him, and at the same time
+punished the farmer for his intended treachery. "I know you'll take
+good care of my sister, Vandervelt; and don't forget I'm paying Glocken
+a thousand marks passage money. Good luck."
+
+"What's that?" he asked sharply.
+
+"You can settle with him on your next trip. You won't get in before
+dark if you stop to discuss it now."
+
+"I will," he said, with a muttered oath and a glance at the discomfited
+farmer.
+
+Then he set the engine going, we stood back, Nessa waved her hand to
+me, and they were off.
+
+I watched the bus across the field, rise, circle round on the climb up,
+point her nose frontierwards, and I strained my eyes after her until
+she entered a cloud and passed out of sight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+RECOGNIZED
+
+
+Glocken was furious at the trick I had played him. "You think yourself
+mighty smart, don't you?" he said with an oath as we went back.
+
+"One too many for you, eh?" I chuckled. Relief at Nessa's safety made
+me comparatively indifferent about everything else. The job which had
+brought me to Germany was done, and for the moment nothing else seemed
+to matter.
+
+"I'll make you smart in another sense, I promise you," he snarled.
+
+"You can't do it, Glocken, and you'd better not make a fool of
+yourself. There's a lot behind all this you don't understand. Here's
+your money;" and I gave him the balance.
+
+"Where did you get it? In Berlin--Johann Lassen?"
+
+"You don't look pretty when you snarl like that, Glocken; and if you
+believe I'm Johann Lassen, you're a braver man than I think. We're
+alone here; and if I were that man, do you think I'd let you live to
+tell the police when a tap from this spanner of mine would silence you
+for ever?"
+
+That hadn't occurred to him and he jumped away from me as if dreading
+an instant attack.
+
+"I'm not going to touch you, man; on the contrary I'm going to make it
+easy for you. I'll give you a lift into Lingen in Fischer's car and
+we'll stop at the police station, if you like. I saw your game in a
+second this morning and it suited me to play up to it. I was told you
+were a treacherous skunk, but I didn't think you were such a gorgeous
+fool. Come along and we'll have that chat with the police."
+
+He hung back, either because he was afraid to trust himself in the car
+with me or because my bluff puzzled him. It turned out to be the latter.
+
+"I don't want to do you any harm, Bulich," he muttered.
+
+"You wooden-headed ass, do you think I'd let you, if you could? Come to
+the police and tell your story; but I warn you beforehand that if you
+dare to utter a word against me like that, you're a ruined man, lock,
+stock, and barrel. Behind me in this affair is one of the most powerful
+men in the whole Empire, whose arm is long enough to reach even cunning
+Farmer Glocken, squeeze him to a jelly, and leave the remnants to rot
+in gaol. And he'll do it, Glocken, as sure as my real name isn't Hans
+Bulich, the instant I tell him the scurvy tricks you've tried with me
+to-day." I said this with all the concentrated sternness at my command,
+and it went right home and frightened him through and through.
+
+"What--what is your name, then?" he stammered.
+
+I shoved my face close to his. "Look at me, you clown, look at me well,
+and then ask it--if you dare."
+
+It was a beautiful bluff. Whether he thought he recognized some one of
+the innumerable princelings of the Empire or not, I can't say; but he
+drew back and doffed his hat, with a muttered: "I beg your pardon, sir."
+
+"That's better. Now I'm Hans Bulich again; and don't forget it," I said
+with a change of manner and tone, as I climbed into the car and
+beckoned to him to get up beside me. We ran back to Lingen in silence,
+and I pulled up just before reaching the police station. "Here you
+are," I suggested.
+
+"I'm going back by train, sir, if you please," he answered with
+delightful deference; and I took him to the railway and dismissed him
+with a last sharp caution to hold his tongue.
+
+I was well over that fence and, if the rest could be as easily
+negotiated, I should soon be after Nessa. Glocken was the only man I
+feared, because he had seen us so close to Osnabrück. The fright he had
+had would probably keep him quiet for a day or two, until he had had
+time to digest the matter; and the interval must be turned to the best
+account.
+
+Old Fischer was glad to see me, asked about the day's happenings, and
+was relieved to know that Vandervelt had been able to make the return
+trip. During the evening we discussed our plans; and after a really
+refreshing night's sleep, I went off to the shed to continue the work
+there.
+
+Fischer was so elated by his discovery of a mechanic that he brought
+several people in during the morning; members of the smuggling ring, I
+gathered, for they seemed as pleased about it as he was: chatted to
+each other and to me as they watched me at work, asked all sorts of
+silly questions about cars and engines and parts; each of them fussing
+over me like a hen with one chick.
+
+About midday I knocked off to dine with Fischer, and we were smoking a
+pipe afterwards when the police sergeant, Braun, arrived in a somewhat
+excited mood and called the old fellow out of the room.
+
+"I'd better be getting back," I said; but Braun stopped me, saying he
+had come about me.
+
+This gave me a twinge, and I passed a decidedly uncomfortable ten
+minutes while they were jawing with their heads together in the shop.
+But there was no cause for alarm, it turned out.
+
+Fischer explained it all. My fame as an aero mechanic had reached the
+ears of the proprietor of the Halbermond Hotel where an army flying man
+had arrived, and when he had inquired for a man of the sort, the
+proprietor had mentioned me, and I was ordered to go to him.
+
+Fischer didn't like the business at all, fearing that it might
+interfere with his plans; and it was this which he and Braun had been
+discussing so earnestly.
+
+"You'll have to be very careful, Bulich. If he thinks you're half as
+good a hand as you are, he's likely to want you for the army."
+
+"I'll be careful. Do you know what the job is?" I asked Braun.
+
+"Pulitz didn't know either," he said, shaking his head.
+
+"Who's Pulitz?"
+
+"The blabber who keeps the Halbermond," replied Fischer irritably. "He
+must have lost his head to say a word about you. It wouldn't matter if
+you were twenty years older; but there, he was always a fool and always
+will be, I suppose."
+
+"Who's the flying man?"
+
+"I don't know. Stranger here; just driven up in his car. If he'd been
+any one any of us knew, we might have done something."
+
+"Doesn't the Halbermond man, Pulitz, know him?"
+
+"Never set eyes on him before, and there wasn't the least need to tell
+him a word about you. But that's the fool all over, trying to curry
+favour and not a thought of the mischief he could do," grumbled Fischer.
+
+"Well, shall I chance it, and not go?"
+
+"That won't do," cried Braun. "He'd report me and have the whole town
+hunting for you. You must go, right enough."
+
+"Do the best you can to get out of it," chimed in Fischer. "Let him
+think you're no better than a clumsy fool."
+
+"All right, I'll do my best," I replied, laughing, and set out for the
+hotel.
+
+I was in two minds about the thing. It would never do to be called up
+as an ordinary ranker; but it might be another matter to go as an air
+mechanic. Enrolled in the name of Hans Bulich, I should be safe from
+the trouble which was waiting for Johann Lassen. There were other
+possibilities, moreover. If I could get hold of some valuable
+information about the German aero service and their types of new
+planes, it would go a long way with the people at home to condone any
+breakage of my leave. I had no wish to turn spy, but to be driven into
+it was a very different proposition.
+
+More than that, it was not at all improbable that when they found I did
+really know something worth knowing about a bus, I might be told off to
+take one up; and in that case, well, they wouldn't see it again, if I
+was within flying distance of the frontier.
+
+It was best to be careful, however, as Fischer had urged, and not say
+too much until I could learn what the flying man really wanted. So I
+turned into the shed before going to him, mucked myself up a bit with
+black grease, paying particular attention to my face, to avoid the
+remote but possible chance of recognition, shoved my hands in my
+pockets and slouched along to the interview.
+
+The luck was with me at the start. The porter was just going out, told
+me hurriedly where to find the officer's private room, and then ran
+off, saying he had to catch a train. He was thus the only person to see
+me enter the hotel: the importance of which fact I realized later. The
+officer was alone and had been lunching, and the array of drinks
+testified to his having done himself remarkably well. Next I recognized
+him; but he had drunk too much to remember me. He was a coarse-tongued
+bully named Vibach, who had been at Göttingen in my day, and had a
+well-deserved reputation as a blustering coward.
+
+"What the devil do you mean by keeping me like this?" he said angrily.
+"Do you suppose I've nothing to do but kick my heels waiting for scum
+like you?"
+
+"I'm very sorry, sir, but I only just heard you wished to see me," I
+replied, with appropriate servile nervousness.
+
+"I've a good mind to put you under arrest. And are you the man these
+Lingen fools think a good mechanic? You look more like a dirty street
+sweeper, coming into my presence in that filthy state."
+
+"I thought it best----"
+
+"Who the devil wants to know what you think?" he burst in, pouring out
+another bumper of wine and draining it at a draught. "Answer my
+question, can't you? Not stand there gibbering like a lunatic." There
+was scarcely a sentence without an oath to punctuate it.
+
+"I came at once without stopping to clean myself, sir."
+
+"Then some other fool must have bungled my message. I said you were to
+come immediately, and when I say a thing I mean it." Another oath for
+garnishment. "What's your clownish name, confound you?"
+
+"Hans Bulich, sir."
+
+"Do you know a plough from an aeroplane?"
+
+"Yes, sir," I answered with Teutonic stolidity.
+
+"Ever been in one?"
+
+"Not in a plough, sir."
+
+He roared an expletive at me. "Are you a fool, or trying to joke with
+me? That won't pay you, you clod."
+
+"I never joke with my betters, sir. I've been up in an aeroplane, sir."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Schipphasen, sir."
+
+"Oh, you've been there, have you? How long were you there?" It was a
+well-known training school and he began to change his opinion of me.
+
+"About a year. I have my certificates and----" I searched in my pockets
+as if to find them, and said: "I've left them at my lodging, sir."
+
+"Why the devil didn't you tell me that at first?"
+
+"You didn't ask me, sir."
+
+"What are you doing in this hole, then?"
+
+"I was going to Ellendorf, but they asked me to stay here a week or so
+to do some repairs and things."
+
+"Did they? Like their infernal insolence at a time like this. I'm on my
+way to Ellendorf now to fetch a new machine, and my fool of a mechanic
+has got drunk, or lost himself, or something. Can you take his place?"
+
+Could I not? Up with him in the bus, what couldn't I do? But I shook my
+head doubtfully. "I don't know that I could pilot----"
+
+"You wooden-headed idiot, do you suppose I want you to pilot it?" he
+roared, with a shout of laughter. "I want you as a mechanic, you fool."
+
+"I didn't know, sir. Of course I could test the plane and see that
+she's all right for you. That was part of my job at Schipphasen, sir;
+that and trial flights."
+
+"If that's the case, you ought to be in the army. Have you served?"
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Why not? You've been in the ranks, I can see that."
+
+Up to that point I had done very well, indeed; but then I tripped. "I
+was a one-year man, sir." The one-year men were a comparatively limited
+number drawn from the better class; served for only one year instead of
+three, and had either passed an examination or been at one of the
+Universities, and mixed freely with the officers.
+
+"What regiment?" was the next question.
+
+I named one at random; I think it was the 54th Hanoverians. My luck was
+clean out, for it chanced to be the same in which he himself had served.
+
+"That's devilish funny. Let's have a look at you;" and he straightened
+up a bit and stared hard at me. "I don't remember any one of your name.
+Bulich. Bulich. There was never a man of that name. I mean to know some
+more about you, my man. Now that I look closely at you, I believe I've
+seen you before. You remind me of some one. Just walk across the room."
+
+Smothering a curse at the change of luck, I obeyed and slouched across,
+overdoing it probably in my eagerness and fluster.
+
+"Stop there," he ordered. "Now face round, and come back in your proper
+walk. Don't try that game with me again. That's a little better, but a
+long way from right, as you know well. Now, who are you? Out with it
+and don't try any fool game with me."
+
+"I've come down a bit in the world, and no one knows me now by any
+other name than Hans Bulich."
+
+"I mean to know it. Out with it," he shouted.
+
+I was at my wits' end and didn't answer.
+
+"If you don't tell me you'll have to tell the police, mind. I'm going
+to bottom this. You've lied to me once, remember."
+
+Suddenly a thought occurred to me. I picked up a tumbler and made a
+peculiar motion with it--the secret sign of a Göttingen students'
+society, half-masonic, half-drinking club, of which both of us had been
+members.
+
+He laughed, swore, and held out his hand. It was part of the ritual we
+had been bound to observe by the pledge of the society. I gripped his
+hand in the approved manner.
+
+"So that's it, eh?" he said, filling his glass again and motioning me
+to fill one for myself. The ice was still of the thinnest, for in my
+time there had not been more than a dozen members, and I could see that
+he was searching his memory for my name. If he remembered, what was I
+to do? I knew what he would do--have me arrested as a spy, and then----
+There was only one possible "then" in war time.
+
+The long pause while he was thinking back gave me time to think
+forward. My life was in the balance, and it didn't take much
+consideration to decide that it was just as well to die at his hands in
+that room in an attempt to escape as to be placed against a wall with a
+firing platoon in front of me.
+
+At such a moment of crisis one thinks quickly, and under the spur of
+this one a wild idea flashed into my thoughts, and the way to carry it
+out developed almost instantly. He was a man of my own height and build
+and colouring; he was a stranger; no one had seen me enter the hotel;
+his uniform would fit me sufficiently well to pass muster; and I was
+already quite convinced that if I did not leave the place in his
+clothes, I should never do it in my own, except under arrest.
+
+After a very long pause, lasting perhaps five minutes although it
+seemed an hour to me, he started, stared at me and got up. "I can't
+remember you," he said with a nervous smile, which told me it was a
+lie. "Ring that bell for me."
+
+Fortunately I was between him and it. "What for?" I asked.
+
+He was still a coward, I was glad to notice, by his flinching movement,
+ebbing colour, and nervous licking of the lips. "I want some more
+wine," he said lamely.
+
+"Why not say you've recognized me, Vibach? You know you have, and you
+want to bring some one here. We can't have that."
+
+He did precisely what a coward would be expected to do. He lied that he
+didn't remember me at all, tried to hold me in talk about our Göttingen
+days, and when he thought I was a little off guard, made a dart for the
+door to shout for assistance.
+
+The shout died still-born. My hand was on his throat before a sound
+could escape, and I held on with a bulldog grip which choked the breath
+out of him, as he clutched at my wrists in frantic but vain efforts to
+free himself. I had twice his strength and was as hard as nails, while
+he was flabby and soft with drink and self-indulgence.
+
+He tried to make some sort of fight of it and began drumming his heels
+on the floor; so I lifted him off his feet, locked the door, plumped
+him down on a sofa and choked him until his struggles ceased and he lay
+half dead from funk and want of breath, shamming unconsciousness.
+
+Then I sat on him, shoved the sofa cushion over his face lest he should
+try to shout again, unfastened my "tummy pad," and got out my silken
+cord and the "send-you-to-by-by" powder, pushed the cushion back, and
+shook him.
+
+"It's no good shamming with me, Vibach; I've no time for it. Stop it,
+if you don't want me to knock you on the head and be done with it," I
+said.
+
+He was too thoroughly scared not to obey, and he opened his eyes and
+started whimpering and begging for mercy.
+
+"You can stop that, too, and listen to me. I don't want your blood on
+my hands; but I'll brain you as I would a rat, if you utter a single
+cry and don't do what I tell you."
+
+"For God's sake don't," he whined.
+
+"Get your uniform off, and be quick about it too."
+
+He was shaking with funk and could scarcely undo the buttons, so I
+played valet and helped him. Then I peeled my own things off and made
+him put them on while I got into his. Next, I mucked his face with the
+grease and dirt from my own face and hands and rumpled his hair, with
+the result that he looked very much the working man. His arms and legs
+I tied up securely with a length of my cord and gagged him while I
+popped the "by-by" powder into a glass of wine.
+
+He made a little fuss about drinking it, believing it was poison; but
+very little persuasion of the necessary sort overcame his scruples; and
+in a few minutes he was off, and I knew he would not wake for some
+hours.
+
+As I wasn't a thief, I went through the pockets, and was rolling his
+money and valuables and so on into a napkin, when I found a paper which
+gave me an idea.
+
+It was the army authority to the firm at Ellendorf to deliver the bus
+to him.
+
+A veritable gift from the gods! That was the short cut to freedom, and
+I made up my mind in a second to use it.
+
+The only thing remaining to do was to hide the man. There was no place
+in the room, except under the sofa, where he was likely to be seen when
+the servants came to clear the table. The door communicating with the
+next room was ajar, and a peep into it suggested possibilities. It was
+a bedroom, and I took him in, packed him inside a roomy wardrobe, laid
+the napkin of valuables by his side, locked him in, and tossed the key
+under the bed.
+
+Then I washed my hands and face and braced myself to face the next act
+in the comedy or tragedy, whichever it was to be.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+LIEUTENANT VIBACH
+
+
+The first scene was a comedy one. Vibach's car was waiting outside the
+hotel, and the soldier chauffeur would almost certainly know that I was
+not the lieutenant, and how to fool him till we were out of Lingen was
+no easy problem.
+
+Still it was no time to count risks; so I drew my cap well down,
+buttoned my overcoat as high over my face as possible, and pretended to
+be drunk.
+
+It was all ridiculously easy. Pulitz, the hotel proprietor, met me in
+the hall with obsequious servility, hoping I had enjoyed my lunch. I
+swore at him in true Vibach style, cursed the lunch, told him to give
+me the bill, swore again at the charge as an imposition, and lurched
+out hiccoughing profanity and demanding my car.
+
+Truly the gods were on my side, for it turned out that the chauffeur
+had gone to get something to eat. The car was mine; and a very
+excellent car it was. I lurched up to the wheel with the assistance of
+Pulitz, who waited on me bare-headed in obvious awe of the uniform,
+started the engine, growled out an order that the man was to wait for
+me, and still hiccoughing profanity, fumbled with the levers, and drove
+away.
+
+I laughed in my sleeve as I rattled past Fischer's shop and saw him and
+Braun at the door in earnest conversation, probably canvassing the
+reason for my lengthy absence. Braun saluted me and I lifted a hand in
+response. What would he have done had he known!
+
+I let the car rip along to Ellendorf. The sooner I reached the factory,
+the sooner I should get away--if I was to get away at all, that was. So
+far as could be judged only one really serious danger threatened
+me--that Vibach was known to the people at the factory--and even that
+might be averted, by giving another name and vamping a reason to
+explain his absence.
+
+Any one who knows the attitude of the average German civilian toward
+the army will understand the strength of the cards I held. The
+officer's uniform, an army motor, the fact that Vibach was expected,
+the possession of an official authority duly signed and stamped, all
+these were so many self-evident proofs of my good faith, thoroughly
+calculated to impose on even a sharp-witted business man. If I were
+accepted as Vibach, nothing short of some stupid blunder could cause
+the scheme to fail. There was scarcely room even for a blunder, indeed,
+for the plan seemed almost fool proof.
+
+It was nevertheless only prudent to consider what was to be done,
+should the unexpected happen. It was clearly best not to give my name
+until I was sure that Vibach was unknown, and to have a story ready to
+account for his absence. His name was in the order, and no doubt there
+would be difficulties raised about delivering the bus to any one else.
+That could be got over by saying he had told me to see that it was
+ready for him, and a little manoeuvring would probably allow of my
+going for a trial spin. They might send up a mechanic or a
+representative of the firm with me; but that would be no great matter.
+Once we were off the ground, he could be readily dealt with.
+
+I had burnt my boats now and was in too tight a corner to stick at
+anything, even violence, to win my way to escape.
+
+If even the trial trip was refused, it would still be possible to get
+away under the pretence of testing the engine. Let me be on board with
+the engine going, it would need a lot of mechanics to keep me from
+making a start.
+
+There remained the chance that even this might not be possible,
+however, and in that case the only thing to be done was to leave the
+place under a cloud of vituperative indignation and threats. For this
+possibility, it was necessary to leave the motor where I could reach it
+readily and without trouble.
+
+The opening scene was all that could be desired. The fact that I was
+expected caused me to be led at once to the managing proprietor, whose
+name was Harden; he received me with all the respect due to my uniform;
+put me at ease by expressing a regret that he had never had the
+pleasure of seeing me before, although he had heard of my prowess in
+the air; and declared that he felt honoured at making my personal
+acquaintance.
+
+I was condescendingly patronizing, thanked him a little boastfully for
+his compliment, and got to business.
+
+"You have everything ready, of course?" I asked.
+
+"Quite. I'll have the plane run out," was the reply as he rang his
+table bell and gave an order that No. 14 should be made ready for me at
+once. "Have you tried one of ours yet?" he asked as the clerk went out.
+
+"I expect so, but I'm not sure. I've been up in so many."
+
+"You've seen the specifications for the new make, of course."
+
+"I should like to glance over them again."
+
+"It will be an honour to explain the new improvements;" and he produced
+the plans and drawings and told me all about them, pointing to various
+differences and improvements, especially those which were his own
+inventions, on which he enlarged with immense self-satisfaction.
+
+I had my own reasons for studying the drawings carefully, and
+condescended to flatter him on his inventive ingenuity. All this took
+up some time and I began to be anxious to start. I suggested that I had
+better have a look at No. 14; and we went out together.
+
+She was a beauty and no mistake; but to my chagrin the men had damaged
+one of the planes slightly in getting her out of the hangar. Only a
+simple matter involving renewal of a couple of the wire supports; but
+it meant a loss of time, and I had an uneasy speculation as to what was
+happening in that hotel bedroom at Lingen.
+
+I ordered the men to be quick about the repair, and was watching them
+when some one came out to tell Harden he was wanted on the telephone.
+
+This was not on the agenda and I sensed unpleasantness. There were two
+other planes on the field close to No. 14, and I strolled over to see
+if their petrol tanks were full, under the pretence of curiosity. It
+was a case of any port in a storm.
+
+There wasn't a gallon in the two, so my curiosity died instantly. I
+returned to hurry on the work with No. 14. The men knew their job and
+had all but finished it, when Harden came out wearing a look of worried
+perplexity.
+
+"May I beg a moment with you, Lieutenant?" he asked.
+
+"Certainly. What is it? Nothing gone wrong, I hope."
+
+"That telephone call was from Lingen, from Captain Schiller; and I
+can't make head or tail of it. You will not be offended with me, I
+trust, if I tell you what he says--what I understood him to say, at
+least."
+
+"My dear Mr. Harden, I hope I am not so foolish."
+
+"Well, he appears to be under the impression that you are not here."
+
+I burst out laughing. "Poor Schiller! He's always got a bee in his
+bonnet; keeps a regular hive always on tap. I wonder what the devil has
+put that rot into his head."
+
+"From what I could gather--I trust you'll pardon my even mentioning
+it--he appears to think that you were too--well, that you had had more
+wine at the Halbermond for it to be quite safe for you to go."
+
+I cursed Schiller, whoever he might be, volubly and sincerely, for an
+interfering jackass. "I think you can settle that for yourself, Harden."
+
+"Oh yes, I told him so, but--but his reply was--was very singular. He
+said that you had had to be assisted into your car at Lingen, that it
+wasn't possible you could have thrown off the effects in the short
+time, and, in fact, that if you appeared to have done so, you could not
+be Lieutenant Vibach."
+
+More cursing of Schiller from me. "He'll have to answer for this, I can
+assure you," I exclaimed fiercely. "What did you reply?"
+
+"I explained the exceedingly awkward position in which it placed me;
+and he instructed me very peremptorily on no account to deliver No. 14
+to you, even in face of the army order. Of course I was at a loss, so I
+asked him to speak to you on the telephone."
+
+"I'd better do that," I replied readily. "There'll be the devil to pay
+if I don't turn up with it and the Colonel's told I was too drunk to go
+up. Schiller must be mad; stark, staring mad. He'll get me cashiered."
+
+"He's holding the line, if you will come to my office."
+
+It was the deuce of a crisis, and how to get over it worried me. But as
+we neared the office a thought struck me. "Look here, Harden, this must
+be met somehow. I'll get Schiller to run over here at once and we must
+be ready with proofs that I'm as sober as a judge and perfectly fit to
+take up No. 14. I understand your position entirely and don't mean you
+to be compromised in any way. I won't ask you to deliver No. 14; but I
+shall be personally obliged if you'll have the petrol tank of one of
+those planes out there filled, or any other you like, of course, and
+I'll show him whether I'm fit to take No. 14 up. Your evidence, too,
+may save me from absolute shipwreck."
+
+"I'll do it with pleasure;" and he turned back to give the orders to
+the mechanics, while I went to the telephone in his office.
+
+"Hullo!" I called.
+
+"That you, Harden?" came the reply in an excited tone.
+
+"Yes." I was likely to get more information as Harden, and tried to
+imitate his voice.
+
+"I didn't recognize your voice for the moment. You haven't parted with
+No. 14, I hope?"
+
+"No. Lieutenant Vibach's coming to speak to you."
+
+"That's all right. This is a thousand times more serious than I knew
+just now. Vibach's here."
+
+"What!" I cried.
+
+"It's true. I've seen him. He's been half-killed, drugged, and stripped
+of his uniform. He was found locked in a wardrobe of one of the
+Halbermond's bedrooms."
+
+"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, appropriately flabbergasted. "Then who's
+the man here?"
+
+"The ruffian who did it, of course. Evidently a plot to get hold of one
+of our newest planes. The ruffian has stolen Vibach's uniform so as to
+personate him."
+
+"Never heard such a thing in my life. What shall I do?"
+
+"Keep him till we can get over."
+
+"But he's armed, I expect."
+
+"He'll have Vibach's revolver, of course. You'll have to be careful.
+Perhaps the best thing will be to keep him in play. Let him think
+you're going to give him the bus, and let your men tinker with it for a
+quarter of an hour or so; I shall be with you by then; and when he
+speaks to me, I'll put him off the scent by saying I can't get over for
+an hour."
+
+"I can manage that easily. He's coming now," I said, hearing Harden's
+voice in the outer room. I paused a moment or two, shuffled my feet,
+and then spoke in my own voice. "You there, Schiller?" I asked sharply.
+
+"Yes. That you, Vibach?"
+
+"I should think it is. Look here, what the dickens is this tale you've
+been telling about me?"
+
+He repeated the pith of what he had first told Harden, explaining that
+he was quite as anxious for my safety as for that of the plane. Harden
+entered as he was speaking, told me the bus was nearly ready and that
+he wished to say a word to Schiller when I'd finished. I nodded; and as
+he could only hear my half of the conversation, of course, I dovetailed
+it in to fit the position. The result was good enough to incline me to
+put a saint's halo round the head of the man who invented the 'phone.
+
+"Of course that puts a different look on it, but you really ought to be
+more careful, Schiller. I'm as sober as a judge, man; Harden's standing
+by me now and he'll tell you the same in a minute."
+
+"He told me so; but I was bound to take notice of what I heard. We
+can't risk the life of one of our best airmen and the loss of our
+newest type of bus----"
+
+"Don't talk rot, man. I was never fitter in my life than I am at this
+moment. I've just arranged with Harden to prove that by taking up one
+of the old ones here."
+
+This woke him up. "Eh? What's that?"
+
+"Don't fool like that. Of course I'm not. Just a little spin round to
+show him that I can take charge of No. 14 all right."
+
+"You'd better not do that, Vibach."
+
+"Of course he does, man. Do you think he doesn't know enough to tell
+whether a man's drunk or sober. I can't make you out."
+
+"Wait till I come over, Vibach. I can't get away directly; but I'll be
+with you in about an hour."
+
+I laughed. "That shows which you're thinking of most, the bus or the
+pilot. But all the same I'm glad you approve the scheme. I don't
+want----"
+
+"Let me speak to Harden a moment," he burst in very sharply. "I've
+forgotten something I want to tell him."
+
+"Of course I'll be careful, you silly ass."
+
+"Did you hear what I said, Vibach?" he demanded in the tone of
+impatient authority. "Tell Harden to speak to me at once."
+
+"Has that mechanic of mine turned up?"
+
+Whoever Schiller might be, he was a hot-tempered fellow and curses
+began to be waved over the line. Intelligible enough, seeing that I had
+told him how I meant to escape.
+
+"Not, eh? Well, clap him under arrest when he does. And look here, that
+woodenhead Fritz who drove me over chose to leave the car just when I
+wanted him to bring me here. That must be dealt with too. It might have
+been most serious. Any one could have run off with the car, you know."
+
+Even this gratuitous piece of further information did not soothe him
+and more curses came along.
+
+I laughed. "I thought you'd like to know that, Schiller."
+
+The laugh provoked him beautifully and stimulated his blasphemy as he
+ordered me again to let Harden speak to him.
+
+"I can't very well do that, can I? You'll understand why."
+
+"What the devil do you mean by that?"
+
+"Think, man, think. It would stop my getting off with No. 14 in time to
+reach Schipphasen before dark, if I were to wait an hour before making
+this trial trip."
+
+"But you mustn't do anything till I come, Vibach," he growled.
+
+"Good. I thought you'd see that." I paused and added: "Of course I
+will. I've told him we're awfully obliged to him. All right, good-bye.
+Don't make it longer than an hour. The days are none too long."
+
+I made as if to hang up the receiver when Harden put out his hand to
+take it. That was according to specification; and I started as if
+remembering he wished to speak to Schiller, stumbled against a chair
+behind me, nearly fell, holding tight to the receiver, and in
+recovering myself, pulled it clean off the flex and put the 'phone out
+of action.
+
+A mouthful of apologies for my clumsiness was met by a smile from the
+good simple man whose conviction of my good faith had been assured by
+the half of the conversation he had overheard.
+
+"It is of no consequence at all. My people will put it right in a few
+minutes," he declared, little guessing what those few minutes meant to
+me. "What I had to say to Captain Schiller can quite well wait until he
+arrives," he added.
+
+"He may be a bit put out, but I'll explain that it was my fault
+entirely. He reckons to be over in about an hour," I said as we
+returned to the field; "and that will give us nice time for the little
+experimental flight--our little bit of convincing evidence, eh? He
+likes the idea, and is as much obliged to you as I am."
+
+"I am only too pleased to be of any service, I assure you. I myself
+should be quite prepared to deliver No. 14 to you; but I hope you'll
+understand my position."
+
+"Certainly, Harden, certainly. Just as clearly as I do my own. I
+shouldn't think of taking it until he comes. He's a good man to keep in
+with; a bit crochetty, but influential. It placed you in a nasty fix,
+and you couldn't do otherwise than you have."
+
+"It's a great relief to me to hear you say that, and please don't talk
+about obligation."
+
+"That's all right; but Schiller's a useful man to oblige. What sort of
+a plane is this?" I asked as we reached the men.
+
+"An old type, but quite reliable. We use it for lessons chiefly. The
+petrol tank filled, Max?" he asked the foreman.
+
+"Yes, sir; but there's something wrong with the engine; keeps missing
+fire," was the reply.
+
+Pleasant news, seeing that in about ten minutes the mysterious Schiller
+would be on the scene raising Cain!
+
+"Take long to put right, Max?" asked Harden.
+
+"Can't exactly say, sir. I can't quite get at the mischief yet."
+
+"Let's have a look at her," said Harden; and he and the man wasted five
+of the invaluable minutes over the examination.
+
+There was only one thing to do. The way out being closed, I must get
+away in the car.
+
+"It doesn't matter, Harden. After all it's not necessary, you know."
+
+"I'm afraid it would take an hour or two at least," he said, looking up
+from the engine. "I'm really most annoyed about it."
+
+"Well, I'll stroll back to my car, I've left some papers there I want;"
+and I turned away when Max made a suggestion.
+
+"There's a No. 5 over there. She's not so good as No. 2 here, but she
+could take the lieutenant up. I filled her tank in case, when I found
+No. 2 was wrong."
+
+"Why didn't you say so before, Max?" cried Harden.
+
+If he had, he would have saved me from a very nasty heart spasm. As it
+was, there would only just be time to get off safely. But it might have
+been fatal to appear in any hurry, so I strolled over casually to the
+No. 5, pretended to look her over, as if time was no sort of
+consideration, and was climbing into the fuselage when we heard the
+furious tooting of a motor horn in the distance.
+
+"Hullo, what can that be?" exclaimed Harden.
+
+"Sounds as if some one had had a breakdown and was tooting for help," I
+suggested with a smile.
+
+A few seconds later the horn sounded again; much nearer this time.
+Schiller was in a hurry and no mistake. But all this hurry wouldn't
+help him now. The bus was an old type needing the help of the mechanics
+to get moving, and Max struggled with the propeller to start her.
+
+There was a little difficulty and I held my breath. It was a matter of
+seconds now; seconds which meant life or death to me.
+
+Fortunately Max knew his job thoroughly and knew the bus also and its
+little peculiarities. He got her going, just as the horn sounded once
+more and an officer, followed by a couple of soldiers and police, came
+running round the corner of the buildings and out towards us, shouting
+furiously and waving their arms.
+
+I shoved the lever and the bus began to move.
+
+"It's Captain Schiller; he's waving to us to stop," cried Harden.
+
+It was just too late. "He'll be able to see me start," I called over my
+shoulder. "Give him my love and tell him he ought to have been here
+sooner."
+
+"What do you mean?" shouted Harden.
+
+"He'll know," I yelled. The noise of the engine probably drowned the
+words, for she was running sweetly; the bus lifted like a bird in reply
+to the touch of the controls; and I was off.
+
+Not without a cheering salute from the captain, however. I wasn't far
+away before a bullet grazed the edge of the right plane, and glancing
+round I saw his soldiers emptying their magazines in the hope of
+satisfying his loving desire to embrace me.
+
+They were tremendously busy. But it's no easy job to bring a bus down
+with a rifle bullet, and the majority of Bosches are mighty poor shots;
+so I didn't worry about it, began to climb, pointing for the frontier,
+and was soon out of range.
+
+My last glimpse earthwards showed me a little group of dots hurrying to
+and fro excitedly, like a number of disturbed ants infuriated by the
+ruin of their nest.
+
+No doubt that was about the condition of things in that Ellendorf nest.
+Rather a pity I couldn't be present, perhaps.
+
+But it didn't seem worth while to go back.
+
+I could enjoy the scene sufficiently from the air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+THE END
+
+
+I had a lovely trip in that old practice bus. She was quite a decent
+old thing and I let her rip, all out, as long as the daylight lasted.
+
+I had half expected No. 14 would have been sent up in pursuit, but I
+had too good a start to trouble about that and was a trifle
+disappointed that this was realized at Ellendorf. It would have been
+rare fun to have had a game of chivy chase over Dutch territory; quite
+good sport; but I had to travel without escort.
+
+In the language of the communiqués, there was "a certain liveliness" as
+I crossed the frontier. The Dutchies could see the German crosses on
+the planes and a couple of archies expressed their resentment at the
+trespass; but I was then too high up for anything to ruffle my
+feathers, and the storm in a teacup was soon left far behind.
+
+About dusk I went down to spy for a landing-place, spotted one near a
+railway station, and decided in its favour out of consideration for
+Harden. He had been very decent and unwittingly had done me such a
+really good turn, that it was only fair to return the bus to him.
+
+Lots of people had seen me, of course, and when I landed I had quite a
+reception at the hands of the police, some soldiers and other gapers,
+all of whom very naturally mistook me for a German officer. I was
+arrested amid much fussation and great babble of tongues and hauled off
+to the mayor of the town, after having arranged for the safe-keeping of
+the machine.
+
+He was a fat jovial little man with twinkling, merry eyes, and when I
+told him my story, he laughed over the telephone incident until the
+tears literally streamed down his cheeks and I feared he'd have an
+apoplectic fit.
+
+He was Anglophile to the finger-tips, made me consent to remain the
+night in his house, promised to see to the return of the bus, and found
+me a rig-out of clothes; but stuck when I suggested the return of
+Vibach's uniform also. He declared that nothing should induce him to
+part with such a delightful memento of the incident.
+
+I spent a jolly evening with him. He brought in a few congenial friends
+and I had to tell the story over again, to the running accompaniment of
+shouts of laughter, prodigalities of Schnapps, and comments on the
+Germans which would have meant ages of penal servitude if uttered on
+the other side of the frontier.
+
+Most of his friends turned up at the station the next day to see me off
+to Rotterdam; and the train steamed off amid a storm of cheers, waving
+of hats, and cries of good luck. Then some one started "God save the
+King," which they were all yelling at full lung power until I was out
+of hearing. I might have been His Majesty himself, judging by the
+enthusiasm; and my fellow passengers looked as if they thought I was
+some important big-wig.
+
+I reached Rotterdam late in the afternoon, got the name of Nessa's
+hotel after a little trouble at the Consulate, and was going to 'phone
+to her, when an irresistible temptation seized me.
+
+I was fearfully bucked over my lucky escape and I simply could not help
+trying a last wheeze with her as a good wind up. I hunted up a good
+barber's shop, bought a black, glossy-haired wig and a toothbrush
+moustache and imperial to match, darkened my eyebrows and made up with
+a few wrinkles and little artistic touches of the sort.
+
+It was quite a good disguise; and a pair of black cotton gloves, two
+sizes too large, and a sort of lumpy gamp umbrella helped to suggest
+the character I had in my mind. Then I scribbled on a dirty piece of
+carefully crumpled paper a note introducing myself.
+
+"You can trust the bearer, Van Heerenveen by name, a true friend in
+need to us both. Jack."
+
+I went to the hotel in the dusk and sent in the name, saying I wished
+to see her on important private business; a tip secured me the sole use
+of what was called the Reception Saloon, a dingy little room with one
+window; I dimmed the already poor light by drawing the blind half down,
+and chose my seat so that my back should be to it.
+
+I had a qualm and nearly gave the show away when I saw the trouble and
+anxiety in her dear pale face; but I checked the impulse, knowing how
+delighted she would be the instant she recognized me, and what laughs
+we should have over it together in the delicious afterwards.
+
+She was intensely puzzled by the odd figure I cut, but didn't spot the
+disguise, although she stared hard enough to see right through me. Her
+nervousness at such an unexpected visitor helped to blind her sharp
+eyes.
+
+She paused on the threshold with a start and a frown of concern and
+perplexity. "You wish to see me, sir? I could not quite catch your name
+from the servant," she said in German.
+
+"Van Heerenveen is my name, madam," I replied. I was chiefly afraid
+that my voice would betray me; so I spoke slowly, made a big mouthful
+of the name, deepened my tone and put a little husk into it, talked out
+of the side of my mouth, and rolled out in deliberate guttural
+gibberish what I intended her to take for a question in Dutch.
+
+"I do not speak Dutch, sir; only English, German, and French."
+
+I nodded slowly and made a little play with the loose finger-tips of my
+ridiculous gloves. "Will you not sit down, if you please?" I said in
+German. "Do not be alarmed, I beg you. There is no need, if you are
+Miss Nessa Caldicott."
+
+She had been holding the door half open and now closed it and sat in
+the chair I had placed in readiness, and I sat on the opposite side of
+the room at a safe distance.
+
+"I am Miss Caldicott, of course."
+
+"It is necessary for me to be quite sure of that, madam. Have I your
+permission to ask you a few questions?" The voice had passed muster all
+right, and, as she was close to the door and I so far away, her anxiety
+soon gave way to curiosity. She was absolutely puzzled.
+
+"Certainly, sir."
+
+"You have come from Germany? Is that so?"
+
+"Yes, I arrived yesterday."
+
+"May I ask for your passport, if you please?"
+
+She started. "Why? As a matter of fact I haven't one; but I am known at
+the British Consulate here. They suggested my coming to this hotel."
+
+"No passport? Umph!" I grunted with a solemn wag of the head. "Is it so
+that you came from Berlin and left there somewhat hurriedly?"
+
+"Oh, yes. I was there at the outbreak of the war and they meant to send
+me to an internment camp; I ran away."
+
+"Umph!" I grunted again, fingering my imperial with my glove
+monstrosities; a gesture which she noticed with a flickering smile.
+"Were you alone, madam?"
+
+She hesitated. "No; but I cannot say more than that." Staunch little
+beggar, she wouldn't give me away until she knew more.
+
+"You must speak frankly to me, madam. I know the person who accompanied
+you. I ask you because I must be certain who you are."
+
+She wasn't to be drawn by that. "I must know first why you come to me,"
+she said with one of her quick head gestures.
+
+"I come as a friend, madam."
+
+"Pardon me, but how am I to know that?"
+
+I pushed her hard, but nothing would induce her to give me the name.
+"Very well, I will try another course. There were certain incidents on
+the journey. You will tell me them?"
+
+"There was a collision and the train was wrecked."
+
+"But before that?"
+
+Again she jibbed and would not utter a syllable to bring me into it. It
+took all my restraint to refrain from making a dart forward to take her
+in my arms.
+
+"Well, what occurred afterwards, then? How did you leave Germany?"
+
+She thought for a second or two. "I can tell you that. I was brought
+over the frontier in an aeroplane and the pilot saw me afterwards to
+the station at Almelo, and from there I travelled here."
+
+Vandervelt had kept his word loyally. "You will tell me that man's
+name, madam?"
+
+"I cannot do that. He treated me with the greatest kindness and
+consideration and asked me not to do so."
+
+"Was the name Vandervelt, madam?"
+
+"How do you know that?" she rapped quickly.
+
+"It is enough that I do know it and that you were known to him as the
+sister of a man who called himself Hans Bulich."
+
+Her eyes widened in astonishment. "Who are you?" she asked; and I made
+sure she had begun to suspect, so intent was her stare. If the room had
+not been so gloomy she would certainly have seen through the disguise.
+
+"I am satisfied," I replied, holding my head down while I fumbled in
+one of my gloves and took out the note I had scribbled. "This is from
+Hans Bulich."
+
+Dear heart, how excited she was! She sprang up eagerly and rushed
+across as I held it up, her hands trembling and the tears of joy in her
+eyes. "Give it me, please, give it me," she cried shakily. "Is he safe?
+Is all well? Oh, Mr. Heerenveen, do--do tell me everything."
+
+"Quite safe, madam," I managed to reply, for I was fast getting as
+excited as Nessa herself.
+
+"Oh, thank God for that! Then you have seen him since I left? Where is
+he? Still in Lingen? Please don't keep me in suspense."
+
+"He is in Holland, madam. I crossed the frontier with him."
+
+"And you've come to take me to him, of course? Oh, you are indeed what
+he says, a friend. Can't we go now, this instant? I am ready. You're
+sure he's not in any trouble? Do tell me, please, at once."
+
+"He is not in trouble, but he does not wish me to take you to him,
+madam. There is something you must learn first. You know that he is
+suspected of murder; I do not wish to call him a scoundrel----"
+
+"Scoundrel indeed! I should think not," she cried, blazing with
+indignation. "He is one of the noblest----"
+
+I couldn't have her saying this sort of thing under false pretences, so
+I stopped her by waggling one of my ridiculous gloves protestingly.
+"Stay, madam, stay, I cannot hear that," I exclaimed. "I have still
+something to show you. Permit me;" and I went to the end of the room,
+stood with my back to her, and under pretence of fumbling in my
+pockets, I pulled off the moustache and imperial. "If you knew what he
+is doing at this moment, madam, you also might be tempted to call him a
+scoundrel."
+
+"Never! Never!" she exclaimed almost fiercely.
+
+"Then I must decline to take you to him at all!"
+
+"Why? In Heaven's name, why?"
+
+"Because I'm here already, of course," I replied as I whipped off my
+wig and faced round.
+
+She was petrified for a second, and then with a glad cry made a rush at
+me. "Jack! Jack! Then you are a scoun----"
+
+"Didn't I say you'd call me one?"
+
+"But I didn't; I stopped halfway. Oh, Jack, how mean of you! And I've
+been talking to you all this time and----"
+
+I stopped her halfway that time. You can guess how. And it was quite a
+long time before we could get over our rapturous excitement and settle
+down to the story of my escape.
+
+How we laughed at it all together! What lovely little interludes there
+were every now and then! What innumerable questions she had to ask,
+ferretting out every detail! How we went over it again and again! Then
+back to the first part of the journey when we had been together! How we
+laughed lightly, now that they were over, at the difficulties and risks
+which had seemed so real in the Lassen period! And how we discussed,
+with eager smiling perplexity, the still unsolved puzzles!
+
+We were just two happy kids together. The hours slipped away like magic
+and we hadn't even begun to think of our plans for getting to England,
+when a servant came in to say that the hotel was being closed for the
+night, and I had to rush off in search of a bed.
+
+I found out the next morning that a steamer was leaving in the
+afternoon and booked our passages, before going to Nessa. She was
+writing the good news to Rosa when I arrived and told me that
+Vandervelt had promised to take her letters on his next trip and post
+them in Germany, so as to dodge the censor.
+
+I thought of some to write also. One was to von Gratzen, explaining
+that I was not Lassen, but an Englishman; but not giving him my name.
+Another was to Harden, telling him that his aeroplane was being
+returned and asking him to forward an enclosure to Captain Schiller.
+
+
+"Dear Captain Schiller,--
+
+"I am the 'desperate ruffian' with whom you had that interesting chat
+over the 'phone the day before yesterday. I wish to confirm what Harden
+has probably told you, that after your first talk with him, the rest of
+the conversation was entirely with me. I am most grateful to you for
+having warned me that the affair with Lieutenant Vibach--a most
+offensive bully, by the way--was discovered sooner than I had expected.
+Naturally it increased my wish to get away and made it impossible for
+me to satisfy your eager desire to make my personal acquaintance at
+Ellendorf. That eagerness, combined possibly with your excitement and
+temper, no doubt prevented your detecting the difference in the two
+voices. Your characteristically national dulness and gullibility will
+remain an abiding joy to me. You have, however, the satisfaction of
+knowing that you stopped my bringing away the new type of aeroplane.
+But the old one served my purpose well enough, for it carried me out of
+your country and so out of your reach. We are not likely to meet again,
+unless the fortune of war should bring us together on one of the
+fronts, when I shall be pleased to tell you the name of the 'desperate
+ruffian.'"
+
+
+There was no time for more letters as we had to hurry to the Consulate
+to clear up things there to enable us to avoid trouble on landing in
+England.
+
+We had a smooth passage disturbed by neither mine nor submarine. We
+scarcely ceased chattering together the whole time, discussing two
+topics chiefly--the question of our marriage and the riddle of von
+Gratzen's conduct. The first was settled a fortnight later to our
+mutual satisfaction, and we went to Ireland on the honeymoon in order
+to send the promised sprig of shamrock to our warm-hearted Irish friend
+at Massen.
+
+The von Gratzen riddle was not solved until three months later when I
+was home on a week's leave and received a German newspaper from
+Switzerland containing a marked paragraph. Von Erstein had shot himself
+sooner than face the charge of having murdered Anna Hilden.
+
+I handed it to Nessa, who dismissed it with, "Serves him right," and
+then drew attention to some little marks and dots scattered about the
+same page. "I'm sure they mean something," she declared.
+
+I laughed at the idea and chipped her about it.
+
+But she was right and puzzled over them until she found it out. The
+marks were microscopic numbers under various words and letters, and
+when she had written them down she read out the result.
+
+"You did not deceive me. You are the image of my dear old friend, your
+father. Von G."
+
+The von Gratzen riddle was solved at last.
+
+And didn't Nessa chortle. "What did I tell you, Jack!" she cried,
+flourishing the paper triumphantly. "The old fox! He knew you all the
+time and you imagined you were so clever. Poor Jack!"
+
+I couldn't stand this, of course; so I punished her.
+
+We were still very much lovers, and you can perhaps guess the nature of
+the punishment when I tell you that it made her blush, disarranged her
+hair, and prompted the question whether I wished every one to think we
+were still honeymooning.
+
+Of course I said yes, and punished her again.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+_Printed by_ Butler & Tanner, _Frome and London._
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
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+Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
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+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
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+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
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+Title: The Man Without a Memory
+
+Author: Arthur W. Marchmont
+
+Release Date: March 8, 2011 [EBook #35516]
+
+Language: English
+
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+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY ***
+
+
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+
+Produced by Andrew Sly, Al Haines and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
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+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<BR><BR>
+
+<CENTER>
+<IMG SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="Frontispiece" BORDER="2">
+<H4>
+"I used the pike with its ironshod end without scruple<BR>
+or mercy." (Chapter IX.)
+<BR>
+<i>The Man Without a Memory</i>] [<i>Frontispiece</i>
+</H4>
+</CENTER>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t1">
+THE MAN WITHOUT
+<BR>
+A MEMORY
+</P>
+
+<BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t3">
+By
+</P>
+
+<P CLASS="t2">
+ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
+</P>
+
+<BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t4">
+Author of "When I was Czar," "The Heir to the Throne," etc., etc.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t3">
+WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED
+<BR>
+LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO
+<BR>
+1919
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t3">
+  POPULAR NOVELS<BR>
+  BY<BR>
+  ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT<BR>
+<BR>
+  <i>Published by</i><BR>
+  WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED,<BR>
+<BR>
+  <i>In various editions.</i><BR>
+<BR>
+  BY SNARE OF LOVE.<BR>
+  BY WIT OF WOMAN.<BR>
+  A COURIER OF FORTUNE.<BR>
+  THE HEIR TO THE THRONE.<BR>
+  AN IMPERIAL MARRIAGE.<BR>
+  IN THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM.<BR>
+  IN THE NAME OF THE PEOPLE.<BR>
+  THE LITTLE ANARCHIST.<BR>
+  THE QUEEN'S ADVOCATE.<BR>
+  UNDER THE BLACK EAGLE.<BR>
+  WHEN I WAS CZAR.<BR>
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t2">
+CONTENTS
+</P>
+
+<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%">
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">CHAP.</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">&nbsp;</TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap01">How I Lost My Memory</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap02">The First Crisis</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap03">Rosa</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap04">Nessa</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap05">About Spies</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap06">Rosa is Told</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap07">Baron von Gratzen</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap08">Von Erstein</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap09">A Bread Riot</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap10">Complications</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap11">The Problem of von Gratzen</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap12">"Like Old Times"</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap13">In the Thiergarten</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap14">Anna Hilden</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap15">A Night Attack</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap16">A Poison Charge</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap17">Anna Hilden Again</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap18">A Sinister Development</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap19">Murder</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap20">Von Gratzen's Wiliness</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap21">Off!</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap22">Checkmate</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap23">Within a Hairsbreadth</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap24">Nessa's Downfall</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXV&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap25">A Friend in Need</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVI&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap26">The Hue and Cry!</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap27">Farmer Glocken Again</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVIII&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap28">Recognized</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIX&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap29">Lieutenant Vibach</A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+<TR>
+<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXX&nbsp;&nbsp;</TD>
+<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top">
+<A HREF="#chap30">The End </A></TD>
+</TR>
+
+</TABLE>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<H2 ALIGN="center">
+THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY
+</H2>
+
+<BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap01"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER I
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+HOW I LOST MY MEMORY
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+It was a glorious scrap, and Dick Gunter and I had the best of it right
+up to the last moment.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were about 6,000 feet up and a mile or so inside the German lines
+when their two machines came out to drive us away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll take 'em on, Jack," shouted Dick, chortling like the rare old
+sport he was, and we began our usual man&oelig;uvre for position. Our
+dodge was to let them believe we were novices at the game, and I messed
+about with the old bus as if we were undecided and in a deuce of a funk.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They fell in, all right, and at the proper moment I swung round and
+gave Dick a chance which he promptly took, pouring in a broadside which
+sent one of the machines hurtling nose first to earth. This put the
+fear of God into the others, who tried to bolt; but we were too fast
+for them and, after a short running fight, Dick got them. The pilot
+crumpled up and down went the machine like a stone to prevent the other
+from feeling lonely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were jubilating righteously over this, when the luck turned. A third
+machine, which, in the excitement of the scrap, we hadn't seen, swooped
+out of the clouds and gave us a broadside at close range, which messed
+us up pretty badly. We were both hit, the petrol poured out of the
+riddled tank, the engine stopped, and I realized that we could put up
+the shutters, as we were absolutely at the beggar's mercy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was wrong, however. Dick had managed to let the other chap have a
+dose of lead, and either because we had had enough of it or his bus was
+damaged, he didn't stop to finish us off but scuttled off home to
+mother.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was hit somewhere in the shoulder, but it wasn't bad enough to
+prevent my working the controls, and I pointed for home on a long
+glissade. There was a "certain liveliness," as the communiqués say,
+during that joy ride. The Archies barked continuously as we crossed the
+lines, the shrapnel was all over us, Dick was hit again, and the poor
+old bus fairly riddled; but we got through it somehow, although my pal
+was nearly done in by the time we reached the ground.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Some pretty things were said about it and we each got the M.C. I was
+very little hurt, and came out of the base hospital a week or two later
+feeling as fit as a fiddle again, but as the chief decided I had earned
+a good spell of leave, I went off to old Blighty to convalesce.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then it was that for the first time I heard of the trouble about Nessa
+Caldicott. Both my parents had died when I was a kid, and Mrs.
+Caldicott, the dearest and sweetest woman in the world, had been like a
+mother to me, had taken me into her home, and thus I had grown up with
+Nessa and her sister. Nessa and I had been to school in Germany; had
+travelled out and home together; I had spent my holidays in their home;
+and I can't remember the time when I wasn't in love with her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Mrs. Caldicott was keen that we should marry, and a year or two after I
+came back to England for good from Göttingen University we had been
+engaged. But there was a "nigger in the fence." I had plenty of money
+and preferred being a sort of "nut" to working; and Nessa didn't like
+it. She urged me to "do something and make a career for myself"; but I
+was a swollen-headed young ass, and shied at it; so at last the
+engagement was broken off until, as she put it, I "had given up the
+idea of lounging and loafing through life."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was right, of course; but like a fool I wouldn't see it; so we
+quarrelled, and she went off to Germany to stay with an old school
+friend. She was still there when the war broke out, and thus did not
+know that I had found my chance and had joined up. There was nothing
+"nutty" about the army training and work, and when I went home, of
+course, my first thoughts were of her and what she would say when she
+knew I had taken her advice.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I found poor Mrs. Caldicott in the very depth of anxiety and
+despair. Nessa had never returned from Germany, and there was nothing
+but the most disconcerting and perplexing news of her. During the first
+few months she had been able to write home that all was well with her,
+although she could not get out of the country.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then came a gap in the correspondence, followed by a short letter that
+her school friend was dead, and that she feared she would not be
+allowed to remain in the house. A month or so later another letter
+came, saying she had left Hanover to go to another friend in Berlin,
+and that her mother was not to worry, as she expected soon to be home.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And that's the last letter I've had from her, Jack, and that's three
+months ago," said Mrs. Caldicott, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
+"The only news I've had is these two odd communications."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They were odd, in all truth. The first was a sentence which had
+evidently been cut out of a longer letter in Nessa's handwriting and
+pasted on a sheet of paper. "I am quite well, but cannot get away yet."
+That was all, and a very ugly-looking all too. The second was a
+postcard in a strange handwriting, like a man's fist. "Your daughter is
+well and is going to be married. She will communicate with you after
+the war."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did not let the dear old lady see what I thought of the matter, nor
+did I tell her how my months at the front and what I had seen there led
+me to put the most sinister interpretation on the affair.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've tried every means in my power, Jack, to find Nessa," she
+declared; "but with no result at all; and it's killing me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did what I could to reassure her, and then a somewhat harum-scarum
+idea occurred to me&mdash;that I should use my leave to go to Berlin and
+make inquiries. She wouldn't hear of it at first, because of the danger
+to me; but I showed her that there would really be very little risk, as
+I had often passed for a German, and that the only real difficulty was
+getting permission from the authorities.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I set about that at once and succeeded&mdash;the result of having a friend
+at court in the War Office; but before that was settled Nessa's
+brother-in-law, Jimmy Lamb, an American manufacturer, came over on
+munitions business and wouldn't hear of my going.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"See here, Jack, this is my show, not yours. For one thing I can do it
+better than you, as I'm a bit of a hustler and have a good friend, Greg
+Watson, in our Berlin Embassy. More than that, I can go safely, while
+if you were found out, you'd be shot as a spy;" and he wouldn't listen
+to my protests.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But the scheme fell through at the last moment. On the very day he was
+to have started, he had a cable that his father was dying; and he had
+to catch the first boat home.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm real sick about it, Jack, but there's nothing else for it. I've
+booked a berth in the <i>Slavonic</i> to-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I shall go, Jimmy. I can't bear the thought of Nessa being in
+those beggars' hands. I'm certain there's some devilment at the bottom
+of it;" and I told him a few of the items I had seen with my own eyes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, what price your going in my name? Much better than the German
+stunt; and you can actually see about the business that I meant to do.
+Here are all the papers needed, my passport and ticket, a bunch of
+German notes I've picked up at a good discount, and you can see Greg
+Watson&mdash;I'll give you a letter to him&mdash;and you'll find him a white man
+right through, ready to do his durndest to help you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A few minutes clinched the job; an hour or two sufficed for all the
+preparations I needed to make for the trip; and that night I left
+Harwich for Rotterdam in a little steamer called the <i>Burgen</i>, as
+Jas. R. Lamb, an American merchant, equipped with all the credentials
+necessary to keep up my end.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was all plain sailing enough, but it didn't turn out so simple as it
+looked. There was another American on board and I kept out of his way
+at first, but when he had heard me talking to a waiter in German, he
+came sidling up and scraped acquaintance. He soon let out that he was
+as genuine an American as I was, and the best of it was that he took me
+for what he was in reality&mdash;a German.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You speak German well for&mdash;an American," he said suggestively. "You
+know Germany, perhaps?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was at school there and afterwards at Göttingen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was cautious enough to test this, and I let him have some choice
+specimens of student slang which strengthened his opinion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was also at Göttingen. Need we pretend any longer?" and he held out
+his hand. He was very much my own build and colouring, but I hoped the
+resemblance stopped short there, for I didn't like his looks a bit.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pretend what?" I asked as if on my guard.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That we are Americans."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You needn't, but I didn't say I wasn't one."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He made a peculiar flourish with his left hand which was one of the
+membership signs of a secret society among the students, and I answered
+it. It was enough, and he let himself go then. He was a good swaggerer;
+told me that he had come from America to England, where he had been
+ferretting out every possible scrap of information, having represented
+himself as the agent of an American firm of munition makers; that he
+had sent his report to Berlin and had been summoned to go there at once
+on the strength of it; and that he was to join the Secret Service.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was so full of his self-importance and seemingly so glad to have
+some one to listen to him, that, with a very little prompting, he told
+me a whole lot about himself, and the great things he had done. He only
+stopped when he got sea-sick, and before he went below he told me his
+real name was Johann Lassen, and scribbled his address in Berlin on his
+card, so that we might meet again there.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was a little worried by the business. It might be awkward if we did
+run against one another in Berlin; but there was no need to look for
+trouble before it arrived, so I dismissed the thing and went on
+thinking out my own plan of campaign. But the affair had very
+unexpected results.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were nearing the Dutch coast and I was considering how to avoid
+Lassen on landing, when there was the very dickens of an explosion. As
+if the lid of hell itself had lifted!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What happened I only learnt afterwards, for the next thing I knew was
+that I was lying in bed somewhere, with a grave-eyed nurse bending over
+me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Lassen!" Just a whisper. After a pause the name was repeated with
+slightly more solicitous emphasis.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was too weak and exhausted to reply or feel either surprise or
+curiosity at the mistake about my name; and with a sigh of utter
+weariness I closed my eyes and fell asleep. When I woke it was in the
+dead stillness of the night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was far less exhausted and my mind was beginning to work again. I was
+lying alone in a small bare-walled room, lighted by one carefully
+shaded electric light. There were two other beds in the room, both
+unoccupied; and I was not too dazed to understand that it was a
+hospital ward. Then I remembered the nurse had addressed me as "Herr
+Lassen"; and was puzzling over the mistake when the remembrance of
+Nessa and her peril flashed across my mind and stirred a confused
+jangle of disturbing thoughts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was still too weak to clear the tangle then, however, and fell asleep
+again, and did not wake until the morning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was much better and the nurse was very pleased at my improvement.
+"You will soon be yourself again," she said, speaking German with a
+quaint accent. "You were so exhausted that at one time we feared you
+would not recover from the shock."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are very good," I murmured, with a feeble smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you think you could eat some solid food? The doctor said you could
+have some when you recovered consciousness."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where am I?" I asked after thanking her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This is the Nazareth Hospital in Rotterdam. You were brought in by the
+fishermen who found you in the sea when the <i>Burgen</i> went down."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did not ask any more questions then, as I wanted to think matters
+over; and during the day I succeeded in getting it all clear. The only
+point that bothered me was why I should be mistaken for Lassen; but I
+got that at last. I remembered the card he had given me and how I had
+shoved it in my pocket.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But why hadn't my pocket-book with my passport and papers and all the
+rest of it been found? It had been in my jacket pocket. It looked as if
+it must have been lost. That set me thinking and no mistake. How was I
+to get on to Berlin without the passport? It looked as if I must either
+give up the search for Nessa, when every minute might be invaluable, or
+go back to England for fresh papers. That wouldn't do, as too much of
+my leave would be used up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was the dickens of a mess, and then an idea occurred to me. Lassen
+must have gone down with the steamer, for they wouldn't take me for him
+if he had been saved. And then I soon had a plan&mdash;to drop the Jimmy
+Lamb character and continue to be Lassen as long as necessary. I might
+get across the frontier in that way, and must trust to my wits for the
+rest. There might be a bit of risk in it, but that needn't stop me; and
+then a very pretty little development suggested itself which offered a
+promise of safety even if I was found out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Why shouldn't the "shock" of which the nurse had spoken have destroyed
+my memory? The more I considered it the more promising it looked. It
+was the easiest of parts to play; I had done a lot of amateur
+theatricals; and any one could look a fool and act one.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had a first rehearsal of this stunt&mdash;as Jimmy would have called
+it&mdash;with the nurse; and the result quite came up to expectations. I
+reckoned that she would tell the doctor, and it was clear she had done
+so when he came to me next morning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was tremendously interested in the case now, and, after telling me
+how much better I was, began to question me about the loss of the
+<i>Burgen</i>.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked as vacant and worried as I thought necessary.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You remember being on her, don't you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The nurse told me so. Was I?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, of course. She struck a mine; you remember that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I affected to try to remember, stared round the room, and then
+helplessly at him and gestured feebly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You were picked up at sea. Does that help you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't likely to, and I shook my head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She came from Harwich&mdash;England, you know, and was blown up."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Harwich, England," I murmured, as if the words had no meaning for me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He muttered something in Dutch under his breath. "Does your head
+trouble you much?" and he smoothed my hair, feeling my head all over
+carefully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked as stupid as a sheep. "It&mdash;it&mdash;&mdash;" and I frowned and gestured
+to suggest what I could not express.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He looked rather grave for a second or two and then smiled
+reassuringly. "It will be all right in time, quite right. You are
+suffering from shock; but you needn't worry. No worry. That's the great
+thing. A day or so will put you all right, Herr&mdash;let's see, what's your
+name?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I didn't bite. "Is it Lassen? The nurse said so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't you know it yourself?" he asked very kindly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No." That was true at any rate. "How did you find it out?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"From the card in your trousers' pocket. You are the only survivor from
+the <i>Burgen</i> and had a very narrow escape. Even most of your
+clothes were blown off you. Doesn't anything I say suggest anything to
+you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I lay as if pondering this solemnly. "It's all so&mdash;so strange," I
+muttered, putting my hand to my head. "So&mdash;so&mdash;&mdash;" and I left it at
+that; and he went away, after giving me one more item of valuable
+information&mdash;that my belt which contained my money had also been saved.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I played that lost memory for all it was worth and with gorgeous
+success. I became a "case" for the doctors who trotted along to
+interview me as a sort of interesting freak and held learned
+discussions over me. All this gave me such ample practice that I became
+perfect in the part.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there was a fly in the amber. As the only survivor from the
+<i>Burgen</i> the Dutch authorities regarded me as a person of quite
+considerable importance. Officials came to visit me, pouring in regular
+broadsides of questions; and as they got no satisfaction, and the
+doctors differed about my recovering my memory, the official verdict
+was that I should remain in Rotterdam until I did recover it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This threatened complications; but I had no intention to remain, so I
+prepared to get away, sent out for a ready-made suit of clothes&mdash;ye
+gods, what a beautiful misfit!&mdash;and was going to leave the hospital to
+see what I could do at the German Embassy about a passport, when my
+luck propeller snapped and I saw myself nose-diving to the ground.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A nurse brought me a card and said some one was waiting to see me in
+the doctor's room. The card told me it was a certain Herr Heinrich
+Hoffnung, 480b, Ugenplatz, Berlin!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was just rotten luck, for it meant the collapse of the Lassen show.
+The instant he clapped eyes on me he'd know I wasn't the real Simon
+Pure; and it might be the dickens of a job to get across the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As I thought of Nessa and what the delay might mean to her, I was mad.
+But I couldn't shirk the meeting; so after giving him time to learn all
+about my "case" from the doctor, I went down, wondering what ill wind
+had blown the fellow to Rotterdam at such a moment, and what the
+dickens would happen when I was no longer Lassen.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap02"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER II
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+THE FIRST CRISIS
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+As I opened the door the doctor jumped up to help me to a chair, and
+the man from Berlin gave a start of surprise and then stared at me
+keenly; but whether he recognized me or not, I couldn't decide.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've picked up wonderfully, Herr Lassen, wonderfully!" said the
+doctor. "I declare no one would guess from your appearance what you
+have been through."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And I feel as well as I look, doctor, thanks to you and the nurses," I
+replied. "I owe my life to the doctor here," I added, turning to the
+stranger.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are Johann Lassen?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shrugged my shoulders. "That's what they tell me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I told you how we know," put in the doctor, adding to me: "I have
+explained the nature of your case to Herr Hoffnung. He has come to take
+you to Berlin."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was clearly time to bring matters to a head, so I turned to the man.
+"Have I ever had the pleasure of seeing you before?" I asked, with a
+perplexed and rather bewildered look.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shook his head. "No, we have never met, but&mdash;&mdash;" He paused and then
+added: "But of course it must be right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could have shouted for joy, but I put my hand before my eyes that he
+should not see the delight in them.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will wish to see Herr Lassen alone, of course," said the doctor.
+"You will bear in mind all that I have told you, I trust."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hoffnung crossed to the door with him and the two stood speaking
+together in low tones for a minute, giving me an opportunity to observe
+my visitor. He was rather a good-looking man of about thirty,
+well-dressed and smart, and I placed him as somebody's secretary.
+Certainly a decent sort and not too quick-witted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"First let me congratulate you on your marvellous escape, Herr Lassen,"
+he said when the doctor had gone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It seems to have been touch and go; but&mdash;&mdash;" and I gestured to suggest
+that I knew nothing about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The doctor tells me he quite despaired at one time of saving your
+life. But he says you are quite fit to travel. Do you agree with that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's all the same to me. I feel all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is rather urgent that I should return to Berlin as soon as
+possible. Do you think you could manage the journey to-day?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't see why not. But&mdash;er&mdash;it's a bit awkward, you know. Are you
+sure I'm your man?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He glanced at his watch and started. "It's just possible that we could
+catch the express, and we can talk in the train; that is, if you
+haven't many preparations to make."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I haven't any. I've nothing but what I stand up in, and one place is
+as good as another to me unti&mdash;&mdash;" and I sighed and gestured hopelessly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I should like to go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can I go without any papers or anything?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"With me, certainly. I have everything necessary, and will explain on
+the journey."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And go we did to my infinite satisfaction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In the cab to the station he was silent and thoughtful, and as my one
+consuming desire was to get across the frontier before anything could
+happen, I didn't worry him with any questions. It was all clear sailing
+at the station. Whoever Hoffnung might be, there was no doubt about his
+having authority. He secured a special compartment, although the train
+was crowded, and did all possible for my comfort.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's the best of travelling officially," he said pleasantly as he
+settled himself in the seat opposite me, while the train ran out of the
+station. "Now, you asked me a question at the hospital which I did not
+answer&mdash;whether I'm sure you're Lassen. Frankly, I'm not; and the more
+I look at you the more I'm puzzled."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's a bit awkward. I don't wish to be somebody else."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you feel fit to talk? The doctor warned me against worrying you;
+but there are things I should enormously like to know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're not half so keen as I am," I told him truthfully. "If I am
+Lassen, what am I; where do I live; have I any friends anywhere; isn't
+there any one who knows me anywhere? It's such a devil of a mess."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's one thing certain, my friend, you're a German; and as for the
+rest you'll find plenty of people in Berlin who'll know you. The von
+Reblings, for instance. Which reminds me I have the Countess's letter;"
+he opened his despatch case and handed me a sealed envelope.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I had already told the doctors that I could not write and could not
+read handwriting, although I had fumbled out some large print. That had
+been one of the specialities of my peculiar aphasia. So I just smiled
+vacantly and shook my head. "Will you read it to me?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He agreed after some little demur, and a very charming letter it was.
+The Countess addressed me as "My dear Johann," wrote in the familiar
+thee and thou, said how anxious she and Rosa&mdash;especially Rosa, it
+seemed&mdash;had been about me; urged me to hurry to Berlin as soon as
+possible, where, of course, I should be the most welcome guest in the
+world, and signed herself "Your affectionate aunt, Olga von Rebling."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Doesn't that remind you of anything?" asked Hoffnung.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not in the faintest. Who is Rosa?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Instead of telling me, he smiled suggestively and I smiled back. "Did
+the Countess send you to fetch me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, no. I came officially. I'll tell you about that directly; but it
+is because of what she told us about you that I was sent. She received
+a letter from you from England saying that you were crossing in the
+<i>Burgen</i>, and when the newspapers reported the loss of the steamer
+and that you were the only survivor, she told me about it. I reported
+it at Headquarters, and&mdash;well, here I am in consequence."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And you've never seen me, or Lassen, or whoever I am, before?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Never. I have seen a photograph of you, but it was taken some long
+time ago; and while you answer to the likeness in some respects, you
+certainly do not in others, although I can see that you may be Lassen,
+allowing for the difference of time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, anyway, these von Reblings will know, thank Heaven."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he shook his head. "I'm not so sure. You see, it's a good many
+years since you were in Berlin. The family arrangement dates back many
+more years than that, moreover&mdash;since you were children."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What family arrangement?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your betrothal to Miss Rosa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The devil!" I exclaimed. "Do you mean to tell me I'm engaged to marry
+this Rosa von Rebling?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly I do, and a very charming girl she is, and very rich too,"
+he replied, smiling unrestrainedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But it cost me some effort to smile in return. It was the very deuce of
+a mix up; there were no end of bothering complications in it, and I
+leant back in my seat to try and think it out. It was quite on the
+cards, after what he had said about my photograph, that even these
+people themselves might mistake me for Lassen; and if they did, I
+should be hampered at every turn in my search for Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is it really possible that you don't remember anything about it?" he
+asked after a long pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a thing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The doctor hoped that the mention of them would stir your memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head hopelessly. "It may when I see them&mdash;if I'm really
+Lassen, that is. Phew! What a kettle of fish!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We reached the frontier soon afterwards, and I breathed more freely as
+soon as I was on the right side of it. Whatever happened now, I could
+play at being a German. I recalled with immense satisfaction his
+confident assertion that whoever I might be I was certainly one of his
+countrymen; and I could gamble on it that when the von Reblings met me,
+my "case" would still continue to be interesting enough to secure my
+safety.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hoffnung had begun to study some papers from his grip and presently
+looked across at me and put a surprising question. "Do you speak
+English?" he asked in my own tongue.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had presence of mind enough to be instantly very American. "Gee,
+don't I, some."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then you've been in America?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have I?" My practice with the Rotterdam people was coming in well.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes. You went from there to England," he replied, going back to
+his own language. "Can't you remember that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head and frowned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nor anything you did in England?" Another mystified shake of the head.
+"It's a pity. Don't you know that you sent a report from England of
+what you'd seen there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A little duet followed in which he asked me a series of questions, and
+I replied each time with a shake of the head. The subject matter of
+them all was the mention of persons, places, dockyards, ships and so
+on, which had obviously been embodied in the report Lassen had sent to
+Berlin. He referred to them in a casual tone and in a way which would
+not give anything away supposing I should turn out not to be Lassen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm inclined to be very sorry for all this, and fear it may affect you
+very seriously. You're not just playing at this, I hope?" he asked then
+very earnestly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Playing at what?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This loss of memory. I mean that you need not have the faintest
+hesitation about speaking to me; and it occurred to me that you might
+have put it all on just to avoid questions at Rotterdam."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you serious?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Absolutely. It's a tremendously serious matter. It's this way. We've
+seen the <i>Burgen's</i> manifest, of course; we know there were only
+two male cabin passengers on board, both travelling as Americans; one
+as Jas. R. Lamb, the other as Joseph Lyman. If you are Lassen, that was
+you. The other man, Lamb, as he called himself, we have good reason to
+believe was an English spy. It follows, therefore, that if you are not
+Lassen, you are the Englishman; and I need scarcely tell you that at
+such a time as this, spies find Berlin a very unhealthy place."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was a quicker-witted fellow than I had believed, but he made a
+mistake in not springing this beastly surprise on me more suddenly. His
+long preamble gave me time to get myself well in hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It'll be a pretty climax for me if I am the Englishman," I answered,
+laughing, and without turning a hair.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're sure you're not?" he rapped.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I tried to appear amused. "I wish I could be sure of anything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A pause followed, and then he tried another shot. "You may have noticed
+that I stared pretty hard at you this morning when you came into the
+doctor's room, and that afterwards I rather rushed you away from
+Rotterdam. I reached there yesterday morning and spent the day making
+such inquiries as I could about you. I was instructed to, of course;
+and I came to the conclusion that you were the Englishman, and I
+thought so when you came into that room. That was why I hurried you
+away; I wished to have you on this side of the frontier. It is also the
+reason why I am sorry you cannot recover your memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I declined the opening without thanks. "I'm just as sorry as you are;
+but I suppose we can clear up the tangle at Berlin."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes. I've wired to the von Reblings to meet our train. Of course
+you'll understand that I have some men at hand here. It is better you
+should know that," he added in an unpleasantly suggestive tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I only laughed. "I wish you would send one of them to get me
+something to eat."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I will, of course;" and he looked out into the corridor, beckoned some
+one and gave him the necessary order, returned to his seat and busied
+himself with the papers from his despatch case.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A substantial meal for us both was brought to the compartment, and
+although very little was said as we ate it, I was conscious that a
+considerable change had come over the relations between us. His manner
+had become distinctly official, and I understood that I was virtually
+under arrest until at least we reached Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Afterwards he went back to his papers, suggesting that I might like to
+sleep; so I leant back in my corner and gave myself up to my thoughts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They were anything but pleasant. He had given me a shock that was
+almost as great as the explosion on the <i>Burgen</i>. I was in the
+very devil's own mess. I had no delusions about my fate if I was held
+to be an English spy; and that would almost certainly be the case if
+the von Reblings declared I was not Lassen. That that would be their
+decision was a million to one chance. It was a sheer impossibility that
+they would be unable to recognize a relation who was actually engaged
+to the daughter; and how to meet the difficulty baffled me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was right in the eye of the net. The fact that there had been only
+two men as cabin passengers on the <i>Burgen</i> was like a mine sprung
+under my feet. I had reckoned on being able to recover my memory at any
+necessary moment; but this cut the ground from under me. I couldn't
+become Jimmy. That was a cert. And I certainly couldn't become any one
+else, because every lie I might tell would most surely be scrupulously
+investigated.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Poor Nessa! I was a heap more troubled about her and her mother than
+about myself. Whether the von Reblings knew me or not, the result would
+be much the same to her. Tied up as the betrothed of another girl, it
+would be next to impossible in the short time at my command to do a
+thing to find Nessa. The only possibility that occurred to me was that
+if the million to one chance came off and the von Reblings didn't
+denounce me at once as a fraud, I might manage to lose myself in the
+city somehow and set to work on the search.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But even in that case I should be in hourly danger of discovery; a
+state of things which would make it virtually impossible to carry on
+the search with any hope of success.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+How Hoffnung's people could have got on the track of my not being
+Jimmy, baffled me utterly. But they clearly had; so there was no use in
+wasting time worrying over it. I did worry over it, however, as well as
+over every other detail of the job, and continued to ask myself all
+sorts of unanswerable questions for the rest of the journey.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hoffnung looked at his watch, shovelled his papers back into their
+case, and looked across at me. "About ten minutes now only," he said.
+"Have you slept?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I all but gave myself away by blurting out the fact that I never slept
+in trains, but checked the words in time. "Dozed a bit," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You look fresh and fit enough," he replied, as if the fact rather
+justified his suspicions of me, "Wonderful after what you've gone
+through. You must be as hard as nails. Military training, I suppose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Neat; but I didn't tumble in. "Have I had any?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shrugged his shoulders and squinted at me with a suggestive smile.
+Then he grew earnest. "We won't have a scene at the station. We'd
+better wait till most of the people have got away, and you'll give me
+your word of honour not to attempt to get away or anything of the sort?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the deuce good would that be? Of course I shan't make a fool of
+myself in any such fashion. If I'm the man you call the Englishman,
+well, I am, that's all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You have all an Englishman's coolness."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then perhaps I am English," I said with a shrug.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll hope not, at any rate;" but it was clear he was fast making up
+his mind that I was. After a pause he added: "When the crowd has
+cleared off, we'll walk together to the barrier, and my men will be
+behind us. We shall find the von Reblings there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And if we don't?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I'll see that you're taken care of for the night; but they'll be
+there to a certainty."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I don't deny that when the train stopped at the platform and we stayed
+in the carriage while the other travellers cleared away, I had more
+than a little trouble to maintain what he had termed an Englishman's
+coolness. But my anxiety didn't show in my face.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa's fate as well as my own depended upon what occurred in the next
+few minutes at the barrier; and I think that if it had been practicable
+to have choked Hoffnung, and his men, into insensibility, I should have
+been sorely tempted to make the attempt.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But the thought of Nessa made me keep my end up; there was nothing for
+it but to face the music; and when at last he rose to leave the
+carriage, all I did was to yawn and stretch myself and say that I
+should be jolly glad to get to bed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What a magnificent station!" I exclaimed, stopping on the platform to
+look about me as if that was the one subject which interested me at the
+moment.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I went on with him, my eyes fixed on a little knot of people at
+the barrier on whose words and acts my life not improbably depended.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap03"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER III
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+ROSA
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+I remember a little commonplace incident in Hyde Park one bank holiday
+which made me smile at the time. Three children were scuffling and
+squabbling over the division of some sweets when the mother, a
+kindly-looking soul, came promptly and settled the matter in a somewhat
+Spartan fashion. She scolded the kids, smacked them impartially, and
+then snatched the sweets and shied them away. Loud yells followed, of
+course, and repenting her haste, she kissed and hugged her little
+brood, immediately produced a bigger bag of sweets and in this way
+pacified them all.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This has nothing to do with my experience in Berlin, except to serve as
+a crude illustration of how the fates dealt with me. Just when
+Hoffnung's story had thoroughly shaken me up and prepared me to face
+the worst possible, the pendulum swung right over to my side and the
+fates handed out the bigger bag of sweets.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In other words I was at once recognized as Johann Lassen by the
+Countess von Rebling.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There were several circumstances to account for her mistake. For one,
+my bride that was to be was not present: I learnt the reason
+afterwards; and only her son Hans was with her, a lad who had never
+seen me. The old lady was, of course, prepared to meet me; she saw me
+in Hoffnung's company; then just as I reached the barrier the big arc
+lamps in the station almost went out for a few seconds, leaving the
+place in comparative gloom; and lastly, being a tender-hearted little
+woman, her eyes were full of tears and no doubt blurred her sight.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My poor dear Johann!" she cried, throwing her arms round my neck and
+giving way to her mingled sympathy for my sufferings and joy at seeing
+me safe and sound. Then she called to her son, and after I had been
+kissed by him, she clung to me and could not make enough of me, so that
+even Hoffnung had to be satisfied.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are quite sure that this is your nephew, Countess?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sure? Of course I am. Whatever do you mean, Heinrich?" she cried in
+amazement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He explained my loss of memory; but the only effect was to increase her
+concern on my account and to make her hug me closer to her side, with
+many endearing expressions of affection and compassion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I felt an abominable hypocrite at having to allow her to mislead
+herself, but the thought of Nessa's plight made it impossible for me to
+undeceive her; and we all went to the carriage which was in waiting,
+the Countess clinging to my arm and pressing close to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hoffnung was very decent about it. As I was stepping into the carriage,
+he held out his hand. "I hope you will believe that I am sincere in
+saying how glad I am to find I was wrong, Herr Lassen," he said with
+what seemed like genuine cordiality; and of course I wrung his hand and
+said something appropriate.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Why my arrival should have affected the dear little lady so deeply I
+did not know; but during the drive to her house she could do nothing
+but press my hand in both of hers and murmur words of delight at seeing
+me again, mingled with sympathy with my misfortunes. Again the very dim
+light in the carriage stood my friend; and by the time she reached home
+she was thoroughly convinced that I was her nephew.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had still to meet the daughter; but to my relief she was not at home.
+A meal was in readiness for me, and as I eat it, the Countess sat and
+feasted her eyes on me, noting the differences which, as she thought,
+time had effected in my looks. But these did not shake her conviction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are very much changed, Johann; but of course, you would be in all
+these years. It must be ten quite since you were here. But you are just
+what I expected you would be, although not so much like your father as
+I looked for," she said, and then drew attention in some detail to the
+points of difference. I learnt then that the upper part of my face,
+shape of head, forehead and eyebrows, and nose had "changed less" than
+the lower part.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then the son gave me a rather nasty jar. "You're not a bit like that
+photograph you sent over to Rosa, cousin, is he, mother? She'll jump a
+bit when she sees you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Photograph? Did I send one?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't worry Johann, Hans," said his mother, frowning at him, and he
+coloured and collapsed with a muttered "I forgot."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You did send one, dear," she said to me. "It was when you had a beard
+and moustache, and of course that hid the lower part of your face." I
+breathed a little more freely. "I think Rosa will be surprised when she
+sees you; you're so much better looking than you promised to be. I
+suppose you don't remember sending the photograph?" she asked with
+nervous wistfulness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could truthfully say I did not; and in this way the talk proceeded
+until I obtained a really good description of myself as well as many
+details about my past. Lassen's engagement to the daughter was, as
+Hoffnung had said, the result of a family arrangement; one of those
+silly wills which left a fortune to the two on condition that they
+married. They had not seen him since he left Göttingen ten years
+before; during the whole of that time he had been out of the country;
+and was now coming back to marry his bride-elect.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The kind-hearted old soul hadn't a word to say against him; but Hans
+let drop one or two remarks which led me to think I was not likely to
+receive a very cordial welcome from his sister. Anxious to know all I
+could, I pleaded great fatigue as soon as I had finished eating and
+asked to be allowed to go to bed. They both went up with me and I
+managed to keep the son while I undressed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was rather an awkward youth, about seventeen, totally unlike his
+mother who might have sat as model for a delicate Dresden china figure.
+On the other hand he was fleshy, dark, and rather pudgy-featured; but I
+praised his figure, belauded his apparent strength, and generally
+played on his obvious vanity and wish to be considered a grown man.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We must be the best of friends, Hans," I declared heartily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He blushed with pleasure. "I should like it. You look awfully strong,
+cousin," he replied, looking at my biceps.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll make a far stronger man than I am." It was as welcome as jam on
+a trench crust ten days old; and I kept at it until I felt I could
+safely lead round to the subject of his sister and learn how the wind
+blew in that quarter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course Rosa's a good sort in lots of ways, but she's getting so
+bossy," he declared boyishly. "She's the eldest for one thing, and
+then, you know, she's come in for old Aunt Margarita's fortune,
+and&mdash;well, she likes to run things, and I don't like it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A man can't be expected to," I agreed with an encouraging smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's just it. She thinks a fellow's never grown up. I can stand it
+from mother; but Rosa won't understand that six years' difference is
+one thing when a fellow's a kid of ten and another when he's nearly
+eighteen. I shall get my commission in another month or two, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I made a note of the fact that my "betrothed" was about four and twenty
+and inclined to be "bossy," and let him rattle on about the army, a
+subject of which he was very full.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you going to join your regiment, cousin?" he asked presently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked appropriately blank and gestured.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I forgot," he exclaimed, blushing again. "But can't you remember
+anything?" he asked, gathering courage for the question.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head and looked worried and perplexed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't mind my asking that question?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit. Of course I want to hit on something that will wake up my
+memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Hoffnung said something about your not wanting to go to the war
+and that you were joining the Secret Service; and Rosa was just mad
+about it. She loathes the idea; but there, I don't suppose she'll care
+so much if&mdash;&mdash;" He stopped short in some confusion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If what? Out with it, my dear fellow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't think I'd better tell you. For one reason because you're&mdash;&mdash;"
+and he pulled up again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I've lost my memory, do you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know. She's awfully funny sometimes, but I did mean that. I
+was going to say&mdash;you won't give me away to her if I tell you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course not. Aren't we two going to be the best of chums?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, it's a rotten arrangement to tie up two kids to marry, like you
+two, just because of some money."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "I'm not exactly a kid now, Hans, at any rate."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather not; and what she'll think when she sees you I don't know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This let in a glimmer of the truth and I made a shot. "You mean she
+doesn't much fancy the family arrangement?" His face told me it was a
+bull's-eye, but he hesitated to own it. "When a man's in my state it's
+only decent for his real friends to tell him the hang of things, Hans,"
+I said as a little touch of the spur.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I daresay it's a lot of lies now that I've seen you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I tumbled to that, of course. "You mean that your sister has heard
+things which have set her against me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He nodded. "That you have only pretended to be out of the country all
+the time and then had to run away&mdash;oh, I don't know exactly what it
+was, but it was enough for Rosa. She always takes a different view of
+everything from the rest of us."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rather good hearing. It seemed to offer a way of breaking off the
+engagement. "She wants to end things between us, you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know for certain, but I know what I think. She wouldn't come
+to the station to-night for one thing, and then, well, if I was engaged
+to a girl I wouldn't have her so thick with a fellow as she is with
+Oscar Feldmann. He's always here. But don't you breathe a word that
+I've told you about this."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not I, my dear fellow; I'm only too grateful to you. Is he in the army
+then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not he, but he ought to be;" and as this turned him on to the army
+again, I listened for a minute or two and yawned, and he took the hint
+and went away, promising to see me the first thing in the morning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Things were going all right so far, and as I was really very tired, I
+put off my thinking until the next day, and went to sleep. In the
+morning I turned over the whole position in my mind and came to the
+conclusion that, for the present at any rate, there was only one
+difficulty to negotiate&mdash;that the daughter might not recognize me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hans' description of her was anything but alluring. She was "bossy";
+inclined to oppose the others and run things on her own; she was
+already prejudiced against me as Lassen, and was probably ready to
+grasp at any excuse to break off the engagement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That suggested a very disquieting thought. If she had heard that Lassen
+and I were the only cabin passengers on the <i>Burgen</i>, that I was
+the only survivor, that there was some question about my identity and
+that I had lost my memory, it was clear that she had only to refuse to
+recognize me, to free herself from the matrimonial entanglement.
+Obviously that must be postponed if possible.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In view of what her mother had said about the upper part of my face
+being most like Lassen's, it seemed a good moment to invent a bad
+face-ache, so that I could swathe my mouth and chin at our first
+meeting; and the remembrance of Lassen's rather pinched shoulders and
+stooping figure suggested the advisability of being in bed when she had
+her first inspection.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Thus when Hans came to me in the morning, he found me suffering from a
+severe attack of toothache with a bandage wrapped round my face, and
+the windows carefully curtained. He was a good-natured fellow, was
+genuinely sorry and, after saying Rosa was really anxious to see me,
+although she pretended she wasn't, went off to report.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hans' report brought up the mother, full of solicitous sympathy and
+inquiries about breakfast and a suggestion that I had better stop in
+bed. I agreed, and she said that probably Rosa would come and see me
+during the morning. About an hour later all three came up together, and
+I augured well from the fact that Rosa was carrying a cup of tea.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was more like Hans than her mother; fleshy, dark, and round-faced,
+better-looking and sharper, with fine, almost black eyes, and a certain
+air of masterfulness, which showed in her brisk manner and carriage.
+She was evidently very curious to see me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She bustled up to the bedside, her eyes fixed on me searchingly, and
+her dark brows, which were rather heavy, pent and drawn together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So you've come at last, Johann&mdash;if you are Johann, that is," she said,
+as she drew up a small table and put the tea on it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I met her look with a wan smile, turned so that she should have a good
+view of so much of my face as was visible, and held out my hand.
+"Rosa," I murmured, and waited to observe the result of her scrutiny.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Mother said you were too ill to have any breakfast, but I knew better,
+so I've brought you a cup of tea," she said, managing to suggest that
+she had brought it less because I might like it, than because the
+others had declared I shouldn't.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Thank you, Rosa, I shall relish it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There. You see I was right, mother," she said, and I saw I had scored.
+"Are you really so bad, Johann? You always were a coward in bearing
+pain, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rosa!" protested the mother.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's true, mother. If he knocked his little toe he always thought he'd
+have to have his whole foot cut off. And whoever heard of a man wanting
+to stay in bed for a toothache?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Better and better, this. Unintentionally I had evidently forged an
+important link in the identification; and then came something better
+still, in response to another protest from the mother.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nonsense, mother, it's exactly what he would do," she exclaimed
+sharply, and then turned again to me. "Mother thinks you're awfully
+altered, but I don't see it. Of course I haven't seen much of your face
+yet; but she always does take these queer fancies. Can't you take that
+thing off your face?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think I'll drink the cup of tea," I replied, and drew the bandage
+down a little and put the cup to my lips.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my astonishment she burst out laughing and clapped her hands. "How
+silly you are, mother. Why the thing's as plain as plain. He's had his
+teeth taken out, and that accounts for the difference you made such a
+fuss about. They used to stick out like this;" and she put her fingers
+in front of her own mouth to illustrate. "Don't you remember how we
+noticed the same thing when Mrs. Hopping had it done? It's made you
+quite passable, Johann," she declared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is that it, Johann?" asked the mother, smiling.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is it very noticeable?" I asked, just escaping the pitfall of
+admitting that I remembered something about it. Rosa laughed and
+nodded. The ordeal was over, and the danger point passed; and soon
+afterwards she said she wanted to speak to me alone, and asked me to
+make an effort to get up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I made the effort, laughed to myself as I cleaned my teeth that they
+should have been mistaken for false ones, and went downstairs to find
+Rosa waiting impatiently for me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I should have thought you could put those awful clothes on in half the
+time you've taken, Johann, but you were always slow in dressing," she
+bantered; and I was quite content to be chipped for a time until she
+was ready to come to the discussion of our own affairs.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is it true you've quite lost your memory?" she asked as Hans had done.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The Rotterdam doctors said I should recover it. But I'm afraid I
+shouldn't have known even you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't you remember anything about my letters?" I shook my head. "Nor
+your own either?" Another wag of the head. "Well, do you still want to
+make me marry you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know. You're very pretty, Rosa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For Heaven's sake don't begin to pay me stupid compliments. I hate
+them. Hans takes good care I shan't forget my face isn't my fortune;
+and the moment a man begins to talk about my looks, I know he's
+thinking about my money. At least most of them," she qualified after a
+pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I understood the qualification. "Then there's an exception?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She flushed slightly and was a little confused. "Yes, there is," she
+replied after a pause. "You'll have to know it some time, so you may as
+well know it now;" and she tossed her head defiantly. "I believe in
+coming straight to the point, Johann; and the question is whether you
+are still in the same mind as when you sent me that idiotic photograph,
+three months ago&mdash;the silly thing isn't a bit like you&mdash;and if you are,
+we had better face things at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What did I say?" I asked, frowning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That you meant to hold me to the stupid engagement. But you can't do
+that, however much you wish. It's true that under the silly will the
+engagement can't be broken off till I'm five and twenty, unless you do
+it, but don't forget that I get half the money even if I don't marry
+you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is that the will? It does seem silly, as you say."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I know you believe you have the whiphand."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Indeed, I don't know anything about it." It was really delicious to be
+able to tell the simple truth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She frowned impatiently. "It's what you're thinking then," she declared
+rather snappily. I shook my head. What I really was considering was
+whether, since Lassen was at the bottom of the North Sea, I should make
+a friend of her by doing what she wished. "Well, anyhow, I want you to
+make haste and think about it all and let me know the result as soon as
+possible. I hate suspense, and things can't go on as they are," she
+continued vehemently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had no answer ready, and with a shrug of the shoulders she turned to
+another subject. "Is it true that you've turned spy?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hoffnung seemed to suggest something of the sort yesterday."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She tossed her head and her lip curled. "If I were a man I'd rather be
+a street sweeper; but I'm not surprised at <i>your</i> liking it. It's
+these things in you that are so natural. Your new teeth may have
+altered your looks, but of course they haven't changed your nature."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I couldn't restrain a smile; things were panning out so well: and
+before I replied the door was opened gently and the loveliest child I
+had ever seen came in. She was a delicate-featured, golden-haired
+youngster of about eleven&mdash;the replica in miniature of the
+Countess&mdash;with big sea-blue eyes which fastened on me shyly as she
+stood hesitating at the door.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What is it, Lottchen?" cried Rosa sharply. "Come in and don't stand
+fiddling with the door handle in that stupid fashion. This is Cousin
+Johann, and you needn't stand staring at him as if he would eat you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My heart went out to the kid instantly. "How do you do, Lottchen?" I
+said; and she came up, put her little hand into mine and left it there,
+as she held up her lovely face to be kissed, and then nestled close to
+me trustfully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa laughed. "That's a new thing for Lottchen, I can tell you; she
+hates men as a rule."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You won't hate me, Lottchen, will you?" I said, smoothing her wondrous
+hair. She shook her head and smiled up at me and then laid her face
+against my shoulder.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't worry Johann. He's got a bad face-ache."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I'm sorry. Am I hurting you?" and the great blue eyes were full of
+sympathy, just as her mother's had been the previous night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit, my dear."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, you must run away now, child, you'll see plenty of Johann. What
+is it you want?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Miss Caldicott sent me to see if you're coming out with us as usual."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The name seemed to strike me in the face, and a sharp cry of amazement
+was out before I could check it. It was lucky that Rosa had reminded me
+of my forgotten face-ache, and I invented a violent paroxysm of pain,
+whipped out my handkerchief and hid my face in it, to cover up my
+confusion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Was it possible that Nessa and I were in the same house, or had I gone
+clean out of my senses?
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap04"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER IV
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+NESSA
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+It was some time before I allowed myself to recover from the little
+attack and felt equal to the task of resuming the conversation with
+Rosa. If the Miss Caldicott the child had mentioned was really
+Nessa&mdash;and it was difficult to think there would be two girls of that
+name shut up in Berlin at the same time&mdash;it was just the biggest stroke
+of luck I had ever had in my life.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Indeed, all the luck seemed to be coming my way; but I should have to
+be careful how I played the magnificent cards fate had placed in my
+hand. I must certainly have Rosa on my side; and that could probably be
+done by freeing her from the engagement. It couldn't be done at once,
+however; not until I had pretended to take time to consider.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I must also find out the relations between Rosa and Nessa; and must, if
+possible, manage not to have any one present when Nessa and I met for
+the first time. Not the easiest of jobs, probably; although my peculiar
+footing in the house might enable me to find a means. The risk was, of
+course, that in her amazement Nessa might give everything away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That was a sharp spasm and no mistake," I said when I lowered the
+handkerchief at last.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Was it real, or just shamming to make us pity you?" asked Rosa
+suspiciously. "You were always good at shamming, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Was I? Oh well, I'm better, so it doesn't much matter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did Lottchen hurt you, then? She's apt to be clumsy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's rather a pretty child and doesn't look clumsy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's the dearest little thing in the world, but it doesn't do to make
+too much of her. Every one spoils her because she's so pretty and looks
+so fragile. She isn't really delicate and can be no end of a romp, and
+is quite able to take her own part. She wants to go to school, and
+she'd have gone before if it hadn't been for the war and Nessa being
+here as her governess. You never saw anything like the way she loves
+Nessa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I wasn't caught napping this time. "Nessa? And who's Nessa?" I asked
+with a frown of perplexity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa Caldicott, an English girl who&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"An English girl here, in this house, at such a time!" I exclaimed,
+lost in amazement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, of course; in this house; and at such a time," she repeated,
+imitating my manner. "Have you any objection?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course not; but&mdash;&mdash;" and I gestured to suggest anything.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wanted to talk to you about her. That's the one reason why I wasn't
+altogether sorry to hear you were in the Secret Service;" and then she
+told me that she and Nessa had been at school together, and how, when
+she found Nessa had had to leave her friends and could not get
+permission to go back to England, she had brought her home as
+Lottchen's governess. "She was in awful trouble, of course, and mother
+hated the idea of her coming to us; but I got my own way. That's about
+two months ago, and ever since we've been doing all we can to get her
+sent home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This sent Rosa up many hundreds per cent. in my estimation. "I think it
+was awfully good of you; but why can't she go home?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The question seemed to trouble her considerably. "If I tell you all
+about it, will you help us?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't suppose I can do anything, but I'll try."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You may be able to find out the truth; and that will help, for we
+should know how to get to work. I think I know it, though, and I
+believe it's all the fault of a man who pesters her incessantly. He's a
+horrid beast, named Count von Erstein;" and she told me he was a
+wealthy Jew who had great influence with the Government; had tried and
+was still trying to get Nessa denounced as a spy and sent to one of the
+concentration camps; dogged her everywhere and set spies to watch her;
+had spread all manner of lying reports about her; and was intriguing in
+every possible way against her for his own infamous ends.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My blood boiled as I listened to all this, but I had to smother my rage
+sufficiently to assume just a conventional amount of indignation in
+keeping with Lassen's character. "An ugly story," I muttered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It doesn't seem to have roused you very much," she replied, her eyes
+flashing indignantly. "I should have thought it would have fired the
+blood of any ordinary man. It makes me feel that I could kill him; but
+then I'm only a woman."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was clear that my manner was Lassenly enough, so I let it pass. "I'm
+curious to see the man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If he had his deserts, you'd see him in prison; but he's probably with
+Nessa and Lottchen now. He always hangs about near the house at this
+time, when they go for their walk. That was the meaning of the child's
+coming in just now. I generally go with them. Do you feel well enough
+to come out and see?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After a little sham hesitation I agreed, and she went off to get ready,
+leaving me able to work off some of my rage alone. It was in all truth
+an ugly story, and, what was worse, threatened to make it very
+difficult to get Nessa away. No doubt it was abominably stupid of me,
+but until that moment I had never considered the practical means of
+getting her out of Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had rushed off with the idea of finding out the truth about her in
+order to relieve her mother's anxiety, and somewhere at the back of my
+head was the idea that Jimmy's friend at the American Embassy would
+help me to do the rest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But that was knocked on the head if this beast of a Jew had sufficient
+influence with his Government to block the way. And that he had
+considerable influence, Rosa's story left no doubt. She certainly could
+not get away openly, without permission from the authorities and a
+passport and all the rest of it; and it looked like a thousand to one
+chance against any such things being forthcoming.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That did not exhaust the resources of civilization, however, as the
+politicians are fond of saying; and at the worst we could try and make
+a bolt of it together, without any papers if necessary, but preferably
+with some in false names. So far as I was concerned I was ready to
+tramp it to the frontier on foot; but that wouldn't do for Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At any rate we must get her out of Berlin and away from this von
+Erstein's persecution. Nessa could gabble German quite as freely as I
+could; and once away from the capital, supplied with plenty of money as
+I was fortunately, we could try our luck and trust to fate.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've made me feel awfully strange about that fellow," I said to Rosa
+as we started from the house. "I suppose it means I'm angry. I feel I
+should like to kick the brute."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm glad to hear it; but kicking won't be enough. What you've got to
+do is to find means to get Nessa away."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head doubtfully. "How are these things managed?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She must have a permit to travel; that will be difficult enough: and
+to cross the frontier there must be a passport, of course. That's where
+the Count stops everything. He has dinned it into the powers that be
+that she's a spy and wants to get away to carry her information to
+England. We nearly got one; but at the last moment the whole plan
+failed."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did Aunt Olga help, then?" I asked, hesitating how to speak of the
+Countess.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, mother wouldn't. It was&mdash;was a friend of mine, Herr Feldmann, if
+you wish to know," she said, with a slight tinge of colour, hesitating
+over the name and laughing self-consciously as I looked down at her and
+our eyes met.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It appears to me that your English girl is lucky to have found such
+staunch friends, Rosa," I said as earnestly as I felt. "And between us
+we ought to be able to outwit this von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wonder if you mean that," she replied, with a searching look.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think you'll find I do. They told me at Rotterdam that I had had a
+very near squeak of death; and whether it's that or something else, I
+don't seem to have any of the meannesses you associate with me. I am
+perfectly in earnest. Perhaps I've dropped the rest with my memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope you have, Johann, and there's certainly a sincere look in your
+eyes there never used to be. Ah! There they are," she broke off,
+pointing a little distance ahead; and I saw Nessa and the child coming
+toward us, with the man in attendance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had turned into the Thiergarten and were in one of the larger side
+walks at the moment; the part where Nessa usually brought Lottchen,
+Rosa told me: and I had a good view of them before they saw us. Nessa
+had the child between her and von Erstein, and I was deeply concerned
+to notice how worn and troubled and harried she looked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The man was talking to her over Lottchen's head and appeared to have no
+eyes for anybody or anything except her. He was about forty, I thought;
+the ruddy-faced type of Jew, clean-shaven, square of face, rather high
+cheekbones, a very un-Jewish nose, small eyes, with bags of sensuality
+under them, a somewhat heavy jowl, with little rolls of flesh under his
+chin and on his thick neck. Not by any means a bad-looking man and very
+smartly dressed in faultlessly cut clothes which, however, did not hide
+his tendency to paunchiness. An ugly customer to get across with, was
+my verdict.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was more than a little bothered about Nessa meeting me for the first
+time in his presence, as it was extremely probable that she would give
+vent to her astonishment in a way that might start his suspicions, so I
+stepped out into full view while they were still a little distance
+away, hoping to prepare her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there was no trouble of the sort. Lottchen caught sight of us first
+and, breaking away, rushed up to me. I stopped with her, therefore, and
+Rosa went on to the other two; and to my intense satisfaction, she held
+von Erstein in talk while Nessa, glad no doubt of the relief, came to
+us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It could not have happened more fortunately. Just before she reached us
+I managed to place the child so that she could not see Nessa, and then
+turned and raised my hat, giving her a clear view of my features.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You!" she exclaimed, starting and turning as white as death and
+trembling so violently that for an instant I thought she was going to
+faint. But I did what a look would do to caution her and turned to the
+child.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must introduce me, Lottchen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This is my new Cousin Johann," she said a little shyly. And the slight
+interlude gave Nessa time to pull herself together sufficiently to
+return my bow.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a very formal bow, and the look in her eyes and the instinctive
+droop of the expressive mouth was much more suggestive of indignation
+than pleasure at seeing me. It was a great deal more like contempt or
+disgust; but by the time the others reached us she had entirely
+recovered her self-possession.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My introduction to von Erstein followed, and he displayed an amount of
+cordiality at making my acquaintance, which puzzled me at the moment.
+But I was not long left in doubt. My first uneasy impression was that
+he suspected the impersonation, gathered from the smiling slyness with
+which he looked at me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As we were to cross swords it was necessary for me to probe this at
+once; and when Nessa entrenched herself securely between the two
+sisters and he showed a disposition to drop behind with me, I was glad
+of the chance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He opened the ball by speaking of my loss of memory, and I soon found
+that I was wrong about his suspecting my imposture. He professed great
+sympathy with my misfortune, throwing in a hint that it might after all
+have its compensations. "A good many of us have memories we might be
+glad to lose, Herr Lassen," he added with a laugh, but in a tone which
+reminded me of what Hans had said about my past.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I should be glad to have mine back, good or bad," I replied with a
+laugh as easy as his.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps. One never knows," he retorted meaningly. Then he switched off
+to the von Rebling family. "Most charming people; delightful; but
+unfortunately there's one little fly in the amber. You know it, of
+course?" and he nodded toward Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only arrived late last night. What is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is a thousand pities; but these are times in which no one can
+afford to run risks, even with the highest motives. I know, of course,
+that Miss von Rebling's motives are of the highest; but we have to
+think imperially; especially in regard to this plague of spies. You
+agree with that, of course?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Naturally; but how does that apply here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He paused, rolling his eyes round at me with a significant shake of the
+head. "Why do you suppose that English girl there, Miss Caldicott,
+finds it so desirable to be an inmate of their house?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rosa told me she was Lottchen's governess."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He put his forefinger to the side of his nose and winked and nodded.
+"Ostensibly&mdash;yes; but in reality&mdash;eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean she's a spy?" I cried, appropriately shocked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He nodded emphatically. "I do; and I'm relying on your help in the
+matter. They may have told you that I have a great deal of interest in
+circles that would enable me to be of considerable help to you; and I
+have every wish that we two should be great friends. My influence is
+such that you may depend upon getting high in the service you wish to
+join. Very high."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not likely to quarrel with any one who can help me in that way, of
+course; but you see there's a bit of a stumbling-block at present until
+I can get over this infernal loss of memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, that'll soon come right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So all the doctors at Rotterdam told me; but so far&mdash;&mdash;" and I broke
+off with a flourish of the hands.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think I can help you about that, too. Of course when you were known
+to be coming here I made such inquiries about you as were open to me,
+and the result made me feel sure that you would wish to be friendly
+with me;" and he leered at me in a way that left me in no doubt as to
+his sinister meaning. He thought he had me in his power.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall be tremendously interested to learn what you heard. So far as
+I know, I might have been born about a week ago, and it's a devilish
+unpleasant feeling."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He favoured me with another leer. "Ah, you're a good deal older than
+that," he said meaningly. "I fancy I can convince you if you'll come
+and have a chat with me. Here's my address," giving me his card.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly I'll come," said I readily. "You've roused my curiosity
+tremendously. What time and day?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come and lunch with me to-morrow. In the morning you'll be wanted in
+the Amtstrasse; Baron von Gratzen, you know. Come on to me from him. I
+can open your eyes to a thing or two; and I'm altogether mistaken if we
+can't come to understand one another thoroughly. I'll manage to refresh
+that lapsed memory of yours, Lassen, and perhaps find the real reason
+for it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The Rotterdam people put it down to shock," I replied, as if I had not
+understood him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Ah, the doctors don't know everything, my friend," he returned drily.
+"But I must get off. Till tomorrow, then. Don't forget;" and he
+quickened after the others, shook hands, patted Lottchen on the cheek,
+much to her disgust, and went off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A pleasant fellow, very. Evidently a strong believer in the
+knuckle-duster methods; meant to use them to force me to help him in
+his infamous scheme against Nessa, and had discovered something about
+my past which would bring me to heel. That was his ideal of friendship.
+Certainly a very pleasant fellow!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was a generous offer of his influence, too. Thinking me to be as
+big a scoundrel as himself, he was ready to betray his country by
+pushing me up the ladder of promotion if I would only help him in his
+blackguardism. A staunch patriot, too. Deutschland über alles! but von
+Erstein first!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was certainly curious to know what it was he had discovered; but my
+speculations were interrupted by Lottchen, who came back to me and took
+my hand and made me chatter to her until we reached the house.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was all right, as it saved Nessa from having to talk trivialities
+with me in Rosa's presence, gave her an opportunity of accustoming
+herself to my presence in Berlin and nerving herself for the inevitable
+deception it involved.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+How she would treat me I could not guess; but I was utterly unprepared
+for the attitude she did assume. She hurried into the house the instant
+we reached it and disappeared. We met at the midday dinner; but she
+steadfastly refused even to cast so much as a glance in my direction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa made more than one attempt to draw her into conversation with me;
+but every effort was foiled by Nessa pretending to have to pay some
+attention to Lottchen, who sat by her. In fact, she ignored me as
+completely as if I had not been present and seized the first
+opportunity to leave the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had looked for any treatment rather than that; and felt more than a
+little riled and aggrieved. It was no harmless picnic, this jaunt of
+mine to Berlin; and I thought she might have taken that into
+consideration.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there was more than mere pique involved. If she meant to keep up
+this attitude, how was I to come to any understanding with her?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I might as well go back to my flying&mdash;if that were possible. Itself a
+pretty stiff proposition, as Jimmy would have said.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap05"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER V
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+ABOUT SPIES
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Nessa's treatment of me both offended and distressed the Countess, and
+Rosa tried to draw her attention away from it by engaging her in a
+discussion about the afternoon's arrangements. It appeared that the
+Countess always spent an hour or two on that particular day with a very
+old friend, an invalid; Rosa herself had an engagement; Hans had to
+attend some lecture or other in connection with his military studies;
+and Nessa generally took Lottchen for a drive.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I would not hear of the arrangements being altered on my account,
+declaring that I should be glad of the opportunity to get some decent
+clothes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then there will be an empty house," declared Rosa as we rose from the
+table.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There were two servants&mdash;an elderly woman, named Gretchen, and Marie, a
+younger one&mdash;in the room during the discussion; an important fact in
+the light of after events.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Some letters arrived for the Countess and Rosa; and when the former
+took hers away to the drawing-room, Rosa detained me in the library to
+speak about Nessa's conduct. "I can't understand it, Johann," she said
+irritably.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Does it matter much?" I asked with a shrug.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course it does. How are you going to help her if she keeps up this
+ridiculous attitude? I've no patience with her."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I have. She knows about our engagement, of course, and being
+staunch to you looks on me as an enemy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But she knew you were coming and was most anxious to see you, and even
+promised to try and bring you to reason."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you told her that I'm willing to help her; if I can, that is?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, but I'll go and tell her now, and tell her also that if she
+doesn't wish to make mother furious, she'd better take things
+differently."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps if I could have a quiet chat with her, it might do the trick,"
+I suggested casually.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then you mustn't lose any time about it. Why not this afternoon? I can
+take Lottchen with me, and if you stop in, it could be managed easily.
+And when I come back the three of us can talk the thing over together."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I agreed to this like a shot, and we went into the drawing-room, where
+her mother was still reading her letters. Rosa glanced hurriedly at
+hers, locked them in a little bureau, and hurried off to tackle Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The Countess was standing by a very handsome cabinet, a drawer of which
+she had opened, and called me up to her. "Come here, Johann, I want you
+to see me put these letters away," she said to my astonishment, and,
+drawing my attention to the neatness with which her letters and papers
+were arranged, asked me to remember precisely where she put those which
+had just arrived, and to make sure that the drawer was locked. "I want
+to have a witness," she added.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then she spoke of Nessa's behaviour to me, saying how it had grieved
+and surprised her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is really not of the least consequence," I assured her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I'm sorely afraid it is, Johann, and I'm very troubled. That's one
+reason why I wished you to do that just now. I was always against her
+coming to the house, but Rosa would have her;" and then by degrees the
+reason came out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was afraid that von Erstein's story was true, that Nessa was really
+a spy. Some one had a key to her drawer in the cabinet; she had found
+her papers disturbed more than once; she kept money in the same place,
+but none of it had ever been taken, so that it could not be the work of
+a thief; she believed that Rosa's bureau had also been tampered with;
+and as the servants were above suspicion, there seemed to be only one
+conclusion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The dear little lady was more grieved than angry about it. "I'm very
+sorry for Nessa really, Johann, but we can't have a spy in the house;
+yet I don't know how to get rid of her. But I won't open that drawer
+again until you are with me, and then we shall both know that I'm not
+making a mistake. Meanwhile, don't say anything to Rosa or any one."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We went upstairs together, and she was telling me the address of Hans'
+tailor and how I was to find it, when the old servant, Gretchen, passed
+us. Rosa was waiting dressed to go out, and told me she had spoken to
+Nessa, who would come down to me in the drawing-room after the rest had
+left the house.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She baffles me, Johann. She just jumped at your offer to help her get
+away&mdash;after her conduct just now, too! But she seems to have taken a
+violent dislike to you, and even declared she wouldn't stop in the same
+house with you," she said in a tone of consternation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I passed it off with a smile and some banal remark about feminine
+inconsistency, and went downstairs to wait for Nessa. There was a
+lounge at the end of the drawing-room, a big comfortable sort of winter
+garden, with lots of big plants, and rugs and easy chairs and so on,
+and I sat down there to think over the position. I didn't smoke; a
+lucky fact in view of things.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It worried me excessively that Nessa should be regarded as a spy, and I
+was puzzling over the explanation of what the Countess had told me when
+I heard the front door shut. That meant they had left the house and
+that Nessa would soon be down.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But she did not come for some time, and presently I heard a movement in
+the big room, the faint click of a key being turned and then of a
+drawer being cautiously opened.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The conclusion was obvious. The spy was at work, believing that I had
+gone to the tailor's and meaning to fix the thing on Nessa, should her
+little operation be discovered. So I got up noiselessly and, from the
+safe shelter of some plants, did a little spy work on my own account.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was one of the servants, of course; but I could not at first catch
+sight of her face. She was at Rosa's bureau, reading a letter, probably
+one of those which had come just before. That did not occupy more than
+a minute, and she next opened the Countess's cabinet drawer, picked out
+a couple of letters, glanced at them rapidly, just tossed them back
+carelessly, relocked the drawer, and turned to leave the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I saw her clearly then, for she went out by a door which stood at my
+end of the room, near the big stove in the corner. It was Gretchen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It would never do to have a possible eavesdropper when Nessa and I were
+together, and, being unwilling to let the woman know she had been seen,
+I crept over to the door we all used, opened it noisily, shut it with a
+bang, and began to whistle.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This had immediate results. I heard the door of the stove opened at the
+back, some logs were thrown in, and directly afterwards Gretchen came
+out, with an apology for disturbing me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's my work to see to the stoves, sir," she explained with a smirk.
+"And the door to our quarters is locked."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, Gretchen. It's getting chilly, isn't it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It gets cold in the evenings, sir, and my orders are to see that the
+stoves are kept going well." She was a little uneasy; and after she had
+been gone a while, I had a look at the hiding-place.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a passage with cupboards on each side, and as the door at the
+other end was fastened, she had been compelled to return through the
+room when she had heard me. There was a bolt on my side of that door,
+and I shot it to prevent her coming back to listen while Nessa and I
+were together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was only a minute or two in the place, but when I left it I found
+Nessa already in the drawing-room. She had caught me apparently in the
+act of playing the spy, and her look left no doubt about her opinion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. I really could not help it. It was such a preposterous
+misreading of the situation that the ludicrous absurdity of it appealed
+to me. Of course my laughter added to her indignation and also to the
+awkwardness of the meeting.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are practising your new profession, I see. It appears to rouse
+your sense of humour," she said icily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It would probably rouse yours also if you understood everything," I
+retorted, not at all relishing her prompt condemnation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't see anything particularly humorous in your sneaking into the
+house of my friends and spying in its holes and corners."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps not, but I had a good reason," I said shortly, a bit rattled
+by her sneer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No doubt; but I have no curiosity on such a subject. Rosa has induced
+me to see you, so I&mdash;&mdash;" She got so far in the same level, cutting
+tone, evidently putting a great restraint upon herself; but she could
+not keep it up. Her eyes blazed suddenly, her cheeks flushed, and
+raising her voice in her indignation she exclaimed: "How dare you
+come&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had to stop that, however, as the old eavesdropper might have
+followed her to the room and be on keyhole drill. "I am very glad to
+meet you, Miss Caldicott," I broke in in German loudly enough to be
+heard outside, and added in a low tone in English: "It is not safe to
+speak so loudly as you did. Come away from the door;" and I led the way
+into the conservatory.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She stared at me as if I were a dangerous lunatic, but after a moment's
+pause followed me. "Say what you like now, but lower your voice," I
+said, lowering my own tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She hesitated, but acted on the warning and returned to her former icy
+tone. "What I want to know is why you dare to come here in a false
+name, as the sham lover of my friend, and humiliate me in this way. If
+you must be a spy, haven't you enough decency to avoid blackening me by
+making me a partner in such treacherous baseness?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I met her angry look for a second, realizing that this was the reason
+for her conduct to me; and it was all I could do to prevent myself
+smiling at her injustice, although it riled me considerably.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather a rough judgment," I replied with a shrug, "and your manner
+doesn't smooth it out much; but as no one else can hear you now, I
+don't mind so much. I can explain&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Explain!" she broke in scornfully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, explain. That's what I said. If you understood&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I do understand as it is&mdash;too well," she fired in again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I really could not help smiling again, both at her words and flashing
+anger. "I must either smile or lose my temper as you have done; and
+it's better to smile."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was like petrol on the fire. "Just what I should expect of you&mdash;to
+see nothing but a joke in my indignation."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not laughing at your indignation, but at your mistake. You always
+have been ready to make the worst of anything I do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What have you ever done that was worth doing?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing much, I admit."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you were like other men you'd be doing what they are
+doing&mdash;fighting."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps I should; but we can't all be soldiers."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her lip curled. "Men can; but even you needn't have sunk so low as to
+be a spy!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Go on. I'm not ashamed of what I'm doing; and if you'll let me
+explain&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She stopped me again with an impatient gesture. "I need no explanation,
+thank you. Aren't you here as Johann Lassen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pretending to be engaged to Rosa von Rebling?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And pretending to have lost your memory?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Haven't you both spoken and acted lies to gain admission to this
+house?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I had to, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You convict yourself out of your own mouth, then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Apparently."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Aren't you trying to get employed in the Secret Service here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks black, doesn't it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks!" and she drew a long deep breath and repeated the word. "But
+you don't imagine for one instant that I will be a party to it!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are already, for that matter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You shall leave this house at once and never set foot in it again, and
+I shall find the means to let Rosa know the disgraceful trick you have
+played."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And if I refuse?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll expose you as surely as my name is Nessa Caldicott."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You know what the result would be to me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I neither know nor care."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I'll tell you. I should certainly be imprisoned and most probably
+shot."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She wavered somewhat at that. "It is easy for you to avoid it by doing
+what I say&mdash;leave the house."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's out of the question."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you expect me to allow you to go on imposing on the girl who has
+been my friend at a time when I was absolutely helpless? Wouldn't you
+be ashamed of me if I were to consent to such treachery? Can't you see
+what a vile degradation it would be, and that I should hate myself as
+well as you if I consented?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Yes. Yes. I wish you'd ask one question at a time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you expect me to smile at such insufferable flippancy as that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. But it wasn't flippancy at all. I was answering your questions in
+order. You appear to think that I like being compelled to deceive Miss
+von Rebling."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How can you talk about having been compelled to do it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because it happens to be the truth."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your version of the truth, you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Exactly. My version of the truth, although you won't believe it. I was
+forced into the thing against my will by a series of coincidences which
+I found it impossible to avoid; and, as a matter of fact, I am not
+harming Miss von Rebling in the least."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Haven't you led her to believe you may break off the engagement?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've been considering it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't you call that harming her?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How can you say that? What will happen when the real man arrives?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not even then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She gestured incredulously. "It's impossible," she cried. "In any case
+I insist upon her being told."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I stopped to think a bit. I knew Nessa so well that I could quite
+understand her mood. Her first fierce rush of anger had spent itself,
+checked, I was sure, by my statement of the consequences to me if the
+truth were told. She had not a suspicion of the reason for my being in
+Berlin, evidently believing that I had come as a spy, and knew even
+better than I what my end would be if I were denounced; and her words
+had cut me too deeply to let me tell her the truth then&mdash;that I had
+only come on her account.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At the same time I could quite appreciate how she would shrink from
+being made a partner, as she had said, and her impatience for me to
+leave the house. It was an awkward corner, but I thought I could see a
+way round it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll do what you suggest," I said at length.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Go away?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Tell Miss von Rebling."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This alarmed her at once. "But you? What you said about the risk?" she
+protested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, never mind about me. You said you couldn't endure it; and, of
+course, nothing matters compared with that. I should have taken care to
+let her know everything as soon as I'd done what I came to do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What is that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your mother is very anxious about you, and when she knew I was coming
+here, naturally wanted me to find out things."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But they've had my letters, surely?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a line since some time after Christmas."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean that, Jack? Oh, poor mother! I've written regularly every
+week. When Julia Wassermann died, her father, who hates the English and
+hated me because I'm English, turned me out of the house. I should have
+gone to one of these dreadful concentration camps, if it hadn't been
+for Rosa. That's why I can't bear the thought of deceiving her;
+but&mdash;I&mdash;I don't want to get you into any trouble. We&mdash;we can't tell
+her. We&mdash;we mustn't. You can go away, can't you?" and she bit her lip
+in desperate perplexity and distress.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going to tell her, Nessa," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I don't wish it, Jack. I really don't. I didn't mean all the
+horrid things I said just now; I&mdash;I'm sorry. I've been just distracted."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't worry. Nothing very terrible is likely to come to me; and I
+quite agree that she ought to know the truth."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She looked at me wonderingly. "How different you are, Jack. What has
+changed you so? You're so quiet and so&mdash;so firm. You don't look the
+same. Not a bit like you used to be in any way, manner, bearing,
+everything. I saw it the moment I came into the room."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You didn't show it. You went for me in much the same old style, you
+know," I said with a smile. "You always did think me a rotter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean that you've risked coming here merely because of&mdash;of what
+mother told you about me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not very likely, is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It wouldn't have been at one time, but&mdash;&mdash; You mustn't say anything to
+Rosa. You mustn't, really. You won't, Jack, will you?" and she laid her
+hand on my arm appealingly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I must, Nessa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, no. I won't be the cause&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And then, just as she was clinging to my arm and urging me, she broke
+away with a sudden cry of consternation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I turned to find Rosa standing in the doorway, staring at us wide-eyed
+in amazement.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap06"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER VI
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+ROSA IS TOLD
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Whether I should have yielded to Nessa and allowed myself to be
+persuaded not to tell Rosa the truth, I can't say&mdash;she always had great
+influence with me&mdash;but after we had been surprised in this fashion it
+was no longer possible to hesitate. Nessa would have been compromised
+and I suspected.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I acted promptly, therefore. I crossed the room, and shut the door
+carefully, both girls watching me with expectant curiosity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Please come into the conservatory, Miss von Rebling," I said quietly
+in English, which she spoke quite fluently. "I have something of the
+utmost importance to say to you. And we had better speak in English and
+not too loudly, please."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She stared at me, desperately perplexed by my words and manner; but
+after a moment's hesitation went into the conservatory, to where Nessa
+stood in trembling agitation by the plants, and linked her arm in hers
+and kissed her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am going to put my life in your hands. I am not Johann Lassen. I am
+an Englishman and my name is Jack Lancaster. Nessa and I are old
+friends, and we were discussing the question of telling you when you
+came in," I said in a slow deliberate tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was literally astounded and could not at once grasp all that my
+words meant. She turned to Nessa as if appealing for confirmation.
+"Nessa!" she exclaimed, much too loudly to be safe.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me tell you why it is necessary not to speak loudly. You have a
+spy in the house: the servant I have heard you call Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed. "It will no doubt explain why Nessa's
+letters have never reached England and other things probably."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa's face being incapable of expressing more astonishment than she
+had already shown, she just tossed up her hands feebly, suggesting that
+the whole affair was beyond her understanding. But she was a practical,
+level-headed girl, and soon recovered her self-control.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean that you have recovered your memory?" she asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head. "I have never lost it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She frowned ominously at this and her expression signalled suspicion.
+"Then why are you in Berlin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Clearly she regarded me as an English spy, and there was nothing for it
+but to tell her the full reason for my presence, although I had not
+wished to let Nessa know it. "I will tell you everything, but you'd
+better sit down as it will take some time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She sat down and drew Nessa to her side, taking her hand and holding it
+all the time I spoke. "I am an officer in the English army, and was
+home on leave when I heard for the first time about Nessa;" and I told
+them all that Mrs. Caldicott said, and described the two peculiar
+communications which had reached England. Then the whole story: My
+first plan; Jimmy's intervention; how I had taken his place at the last
+moment; the blowing up of the <i>Burgen</i>; my being mistaken for
+Lassen; my feigned loss of memory; how I had been unable to get away
+from Hoffnung, and how his suspicions had forced me to continue the
+impersonation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was terribly distressed to hear of her mother's anxiety and
+grief; Rosa wept in sympathy, and they both listened to the whole story
+with rapt attention.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will see now," I concluded, "what I meant by saying I am putting
+my life in your hands. If I am known to be an English officer, there
+will be only one construction put upon my presence here&mdash;that I am a
+spy, and I shall of course be shot. We should do the same on our side
+if one of your officers was found in England in similar circumstances.
+I give you my word, however, that my sole object is to get Nessa away
+home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa looked very grave and rather frightened. "You know the
+consequences to me if I attempt to shield you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded. "I can understand they would be very serious, if it was
+discovered."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then we all sat silent for a long time, several minutes, and Nessa was
+trembling like an aspen leaf. Rosa broke the silence at last.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where is my cousin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He went down in the <i>Burgen</i>. There is no doubt that I am the
+only survivor. He was below at the time of the explosion, and not even
+any of the men on deck were saved."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But if he should not have been drowned and should come here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your mother and Hans, every one believes I am your cousin, and not so
+much as a breath of suspicion that you know the truth could ever be
+roused, unless of course you admitted it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This had all the effect I had hoped, and she nodded understandingly.
+"And what do you wish me to do?" she asked after another pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To allow matters to remain as they are until we can get Nessa away;
+but it is entirely for you to decide."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She shook her head. "I&mdash;I can't decide now. I must have time to think.
+I was never so perplexed or astounded in my life."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rosa dear!" appealed Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is not for us to settle, Nessa," I put in; and then another long
+silence followed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If I wait till to-morrow, say, will you use the time to escape, Mr.
+Lancaster?" asked Rosa then.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That is impossible, Miss von Rebling," I replied uncompromisingly. "I
+have come to get Nessa away, and that cannot be done in the time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That drew a smile: the first since she had arrived. She guessed how the
+land lay with me, and glanced round at Nessa, who coloured slightly. I
+believe that that little blush had more effect than anything else. She
+had the usual streak of German romance in her disposition, and the
+situation appealed to it strongly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish I dared," she murmured; and I began to hope.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I gave the new idea a minute to germinate, and then began to nurture it
+by suggesting how her risk would be minimized. "Let me tell you just
+what is in my mind. I will not remain in the house, and the first thing
+to-morrow will go to rooms or an hotel."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But mother?" she protested nervously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall tell her of my discovery about Gretchen, and that in view of
+my connection with the Secret Service, it is essential for me to be
+absolutely secure against anything of the sort." She nodded approval.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall then be too busy officially to come here much, and this will
+relieve you from all the unpleasantness of open deception with her and
+others." Again she nodded.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The next thing will be to obtain the necessary papers for Nessa and me
+to leave. Have you any friends in Holland?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She started rather nervously. "Yes, several old school friends;
+but&mdash;&mdash;" She paused and gestured.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My idea is that you should invent a sudden desire to go to them; say
+that one of them is dying or very ill, or something. You could not very
+well travel alone at such a time, and thus Hans would naturally go with
+you. It would be simple enough for you two to obtain permits to travel
+and passports and so on, and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I should be instantly questioned and&mdash;&mdash; Oh, that would never do,"
+she interrupted, with a vigorous shake of the head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I smiled reassuringly. "I have thought of that, believe me. On the
+morning you were to start, after you had obtained your tickets,
+something would occur to make it impossible for you to go. Nessa or I
+would then get the tickets and things, and she and I would use them.
+You would not discover the loss until we had had time to cross the
+frontier, and could then give information of their loss; and as soon as
+we were safely in Holland, I would write to you a letter explaining
+everything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This lessened her uneasiness considerably. "It is possible," she
+admitted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Such a letter from me, confessing my imposture and everything, would
+free you from the slightest taint of suspicion that you had been in any
+way a party to the scheme, and, of course, as Nessa and I should be in
+safety, I could make the confession with absolute impunity."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She sat with her dark brows drawn together, considering the scheme very
+carefully, and after a long silence asked: "How long do you think it
+would take?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only so long as is needed to get the passports, etc."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But she shook her head. "There is a difficulty&mdash;Hans. He could not
+possibly get away, even if he were willing to go; which I doubt."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can you think of any one else?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She hesitated, glancing first at me and then at Nessa. "Do you remember
+the two Apeldoorn sisters, Nessa?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, quite well, dear."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They are Herr Feldmann's cousins," said Rosa: and then I knew what was
+coming. "One of them is going to be married and wants me to go to the
+wedding. I should have gone if it hadn't been that we heard just then
+about my Cousin Johann. Herr Feldmann and his sister are going, and I
+should have gone with them; but his sister is ill," she added, looking
+to see how I took this.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It would certainly open the way to the necessary credentials, but how
+could I get hold of his permit?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't think of anything else," said Rosa as I did not answer. "But I
+think Herr Feldmann would help if I asked him," she added.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean you would tell him everything?" I asked, not at all
+relishing the suggestion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It would be necessary, wouldn't it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd rather try to think of some other plan," I replied, and sat
+racking my wits for some alternative; without avail, however, and
+presently she got up and walked about the drawing-room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When she had left us, Nessa stirred uneasily, glanced once or twice at
+me, and then held out her hand. "I'm&mdash;I'm sorry, Jack," she whispered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right; don't worry;" and I just pressed her trembling fingers.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But to talk to you as I did&mdash;all the brutal things I said. I'm so&mdash;so
+ashamed."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No need. Not the faintest. You couldn't know; and you caught me in the
+very act of prying into that place there. If you hadn't fired up a bit,
+it wouldn't have been natural."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But after you'd run all this risk simply for me, you must have thought
+me a regular beast, Jack."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The fact is your mother's worry got on my nerves, and as I knew I
+could come into this beastly country without any risk to speak of, of
+course I came. That's all about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She didn't quite like this, but I meant her to believe it had been more
+for her mother's sake than hers.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Poor mother!" she murmured, and was silent for a while. "You've joined
+the army then?" was her next question.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm in the Flying Corps, and your mater didn't tell me anything about
+you for fear it would get on my nerves."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I had something to do with your coming?" she asked, with a
+flicker of a flash in her bonny eyes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I couldn't very well ease your mother's mind in London, could I? She
+was against the thing, but I explained there was really no risk. Of
+course there would not have been any if the steamer hadn't blown up and
+this Lassen business turned out as it has."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But it was I who made you tell Rosa?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And probably the best thing we could have done if&mdash;&mdash;" and I gestured
+toward Rosa, who was still pacing the room in troubled perplexity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did my utmost to lead Nessa to think I took the position lightly; but
+I was in reality almost desperately anxious, and every moment of Rosa's
+indecision added to the disquieting tension of suspense. If she went
+against us, I could see nothing but a mess of trouble ahead; and I was
+only too conscious of how big the danger to her would loom in her
+German-disciplined mind. They all go in deadly fear of the authorities;
+and it was impossible to deny that, if she were discovered, it might
+mean the prospect of a spell in prison.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You haven't said yet that you forgive me, Jack," said Nessa presently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Simply because there's nothing to forgive. I should probably have done
+just what you did," I replied with a smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean that anything I could have done would have made you take
+me for a spy, then? I took you for one," she said ruefully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The only difference is that I might not have been quite so impatient,
+and have been ready to listen to your explanation. But don't let us
+worry over that. Let us think how we're going to get out of it all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think Rosa will help us."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But this fellow, Feldmann?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You needn't trouble about him. He worships her, and the instant he
+knows her cousin is drowned and the way is clear for him, he'll be
+ready to&mdash;well, to do anything she wishes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's good hearing, anyhow, but I wish she'd look sharp and make her
+mind up."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa laughed gently. "You don't understand girls, Jack. Her mind was
+made up before she left us two together. She's one of the
+kindest-hearted souls in the world."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But Rosa seemed in no hurry to come back to us, and before she could
+tell us her decision, the opportunity passed, for Hans came in with a
+man whom Nessa whispered to me was Feldmann himself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa introduced me to him as her cousin. This set me speculating
+whether it was an indication of her intention or merely a sign that she
+had not yet decided what to do, and I was worrying over it as I
+returned his stiff and rather discourteous greeting, when Hoffnung
+followed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After a few words of general conversation Hoffnung drew me aside, and I
+had a significant proof of von Erstein's intimate acquaintance with
+official matters. He had puzzled me earlier in the day by saying that I
+had to interview a Baron von Gratzen the next morning, and Hoffnung now
+brought me the note making the appointment for eleven o'clock.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How's the memory, Lassen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pretty much the same," said I, shrugging. He had evidently abandoned
+all his former suspicions, I was glad to see.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll find old Gratz, as we call him, a decent sort; but I'm afraid
+he may have to tell you what you won't like much."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Meaning?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, a man without a memory isn't much use to the Secret Service,
+although he may be in other ways."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't like his tone. "But I can remember all that's passed since the
+<i>Burgen</i>."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It did not draw him, however. He just laughed. "I mustn't anticipate
+him, of course; but I'll give you a tip. Be at his office on the
+stroke; he hates nothing so much as unpunctuality."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With that we rejoined the rest, and again the conversation was about
+matters in which I had no interest. I studied Feldmann carefully. He
+was a handsome fellow; fair, blue-eyed, rather round-faced and weak;
+but he had a very pleasant smile which I saw often, for he smiled every
+time he looked at Rosa. But not once did he address me; and his dislike
+and hostility were plain each time he glanced in my direction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He certainly wasn't the man I would have chosen to trust; but beggars
+can't be choosers, and I had to be satisfied with the fact that both
+Rosa and Nessa herself were ready to vouch for him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Hoffnung did not stay long, and when he had gone Rosa reminded me about
+going to the tailor's, and as I was leaving the room, she said to
+Nessa: "You might show it to Johann now, dear."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rosa has asked me to show you the portrait of your mother, Herr
+Lassen, as she hopes it may perhaps help you to remember things."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Please do," I answered eagerly, her look telling me this was merely an
+excuse; and we went to the library together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's all right with Rosa," she whispered then; "but only if Herr
+Feldmann is told and agrees. I am to go back and tell her what you say."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you quite sure of him?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, quite, in the altered circumstances. So is Rosa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Carry on, then; and if there's anything wrong, let me know the moment
+I get back;" and off I went, not letting Nessa see how it worried me to
+have this infernal suspense kept hanging round my neck like a millstone.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap07"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER VII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+BARON VON GRATZEN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+I was very curious to have a look at Berlin in war time; but as I am
+not writing a chronicle of the struggle, my impressions need not be
+laboured, except as they touched me personally.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The struggle had been going on for about eighteen months when I reached
+the capital, and, except in one respect, matters were pretty much as I
+had known them. There were more soldiers about, perhaps; there seemed
+to be as much bustling activity as usual, and certainly there was
+universal confidence that the result would be a glorious victory.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The one genuine surprise I had was when I came upon an unwontedly
+demonstrative crowd shouting that they were short of food. They were
+chiefly women, and a boisterous, vociferating lot they were. It was not
+so much the crowd that impressed me, however, or the row they kicked
+up, as the fact that the police didn't interfere. In my experience, a
+crowd might look for a very short shrift at the hands of the police of
+Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I referred to the matter when I was at the tailor's&mdash;where, by the by,
+I succeeded in getting a very passably fitting suit and other things I
+needed&mdash;and he explained the reason. There was no real scarcity of
+food, he declared, but much grumbling at the distribution; and the
+police had had orders not to resort to drastic measures.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It will have to be stopped, however, or the trouble will grow. There
+has already been some window smashing. Imagine it, window smashing in
+our beautiful, well-organized city!" he cried, as if it were akin to
+impiety and sacrilege.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very shocking," I agreed gravely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If it is not put down with an iron hand, it will not be safe for a
+well-dressed person to be in the streets. My own wife and daughter,
+only yesterday, were all but mauled in the Untergasse. But the English
+will pay for it!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I cut short that subject by speaking about the business in hand; it
+wasn't prudent to talk about the war, and I took care not to give him
+an opportunity of returning to it before I left the shop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+On my way back to the von Reblings' house in the Karlstrasse, I could
+think of nothing except the news I was to hear and what I should do if
+the scheme I had suggested was turned down. I could see nothing for it
+but to make a bolt almost at once, take Nessa with me, and trust to our
+wits and luck to get away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Not a hopeful job at the best, and at the worst involving no end of
+risk and danger for us both. I knew my Germany too well not to be
+painfully conscious of all that; and the knowledge made me profoundly
+uncomfortable. But I've a sanguine streak in me and am generally lucky,
+so I put off the consideration of the disagreeables until they had to
+be faced in earnest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I need not have worried, however, for I found everything running as
+sweetly as a well-oiled engine when I reached the house. I knew it
+instantly by the manner in which Feldmann greeted me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Instead of the previous sullen angry looks, he was all smiles, gripped
+my hand cordially, nearly fell on my neck, and I rather dreaded that he
+would wind up by kissing me. Rosa and Nessa were in much the same
+hilarious mood, and might have been arranging the details of a wedding
+rather than a little conspiracy against the Government.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They had it all cut and dried, and my crude plan was hailed as if it
+had been a piece of the most wonderful strategy in the world.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oscar will help us all he can," said Rosa, blushing a bit as she used
+his christian name; "and he can get the passports and everything
+without any trouble. He has his already, and suggests that we shall
+have one for Hans as well. I've seen Hans, and he has consented to go
+if he can get leave. He doesn't think he can, but agrees we had better
+get one in case. That will be for you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Won't there be some sort of description of him on it?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can arrange that," declared Feldmann. "Luckily it is in my
+department. It will do for you, and, of course, he'll never see it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall take charge of everything," said Rosa. "And Oscar says he can
+get everything through in three days at the latest, perhaps in two."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was a great deal of Oscar would do this and Oscar could do that,
+in it all; but everything seemed as good as the best, and I was soon in
+as high spirits as the others. It was settled that we should travel by
+the morning express, which would get us across the frontier in time for
+me to let Rosa have my confession the following day.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oscar" wrung my hand again at parting, as if I was his dearest friend;
+declared he was not among the English haters; that he thought I had
+acted splendidly in risking so much to rescue Nessa; and that he hoped
+we should be great friends after this abominable war.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My next move was to prepare for leaving the house the next day, and at
+supper I announced my determination. The Countess was very much against
+it, but afterwards I went with her alone into the drawing-room and gave
+her my "official" reasons.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I want you to open your cabinet drawer, aunt; but before you do it,
+I'll tell you that you will find some one has been to it&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa?" she broke in excitedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll tell you in a moment. You are quite right that there is some one
+in the house who is playing the spy, and, of course, you'll understand
+that if I am to join the Secret Service, it is a sheer impossibility
+for me to remain here with any one like that about the house."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They shall leave it at once, Johann."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll discuss that directly. You will find that the letters you so
+neatly put away here are just flung in anyhow in order to suggest that
+whoever did it was surprised and had to act in a hurry."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She unlocked the drawer then with shaky fingers and there lay the
+letters as I had told her. "Nessa shall leave the house to-morrow,
+Johann," she cried immediately.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But it wasn't Miss Caldicott at all, aunt; it was Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed and went on to advise her not to take
+any open notice of the matter at all. "You know now who it is and can
+be on your guard, keeping such papers as are of no account here and
+putting others in a safer place."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But to have such a person in the house, Johann!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She can't do any harm now; and you must remember this. You don't know
+who has put her here nor the reason. It might do much more harm than
+good if you were to make any disturbance about it. These are curious
+times, and the fact that you have an English girl in the house may be
+the reason. By sending Gretchen about her business you may only have
+some one else put here, or one of the other servants bribed or forced
+to take her place;" and I hammered away at this until I persuaded her
+to adopt the suggestion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had a strong object in taking this line. I was sure that Gretchen was
+von Erstein's creature, and that if she remained in the house, we might
+find her very useful in putting him off the scent by letting her find
+out some false facts in case of trouble.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+During the night I thought carefully over our conspiracy scheme. It
+looked good; very good indeed; perhaps too good, and in the end I
+decided to prepare for a possible hitch in case the unexpected happened.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I couldn't see one anywhere; but you can never be prepared for an air
+pocket, as I knew well enough; so I resolved not to be caught unawares.
+If anything went wrong on the journey, it was on the cards that we
+might be able to dodge the trouble and get away, if we were provided
+with good disguises. I worked on that idea and thought of several other
+items which would probably come in handy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I adopted the notion of turning myself into an aero mechanic and
+changing Nessa into my young assistant. There wasn't much about any
+sort of flying machine I didn't know&mdash;except Zeppelins, of course; so I
+could keep my end up all right, and could easily coach "my assistant"
+well enough to pass muster.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We should have to dodge the beastly German system which makes every
+workman carry his record card about with him; but if we couldn't get
+things of the sort, we must put up a bluff&mdash;have lost them or
+something&mdash;and trust to my skill with the tools to see us through.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was off pretty early in the morning on the hunt for rooms, and almost
+immediately found a place which fitted my needs like a glove. It was a
+little furnished flat in the Falkenplatz; just a couple of rooms with a
+bathroom at the rear, the window of which opened on to the fire escape;
+an emergency exit which might be invaluable in case of need.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there was a hitch when I said I would take the place. I was asked
+for the inevitable papers to satisfy the police; and of course I had
+none. My explanation was listened to politely, but without effect; so I
+said I would obtain them, paid a deposit, and went off to buy some of
+the little items I had thought of during the night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I had a bit of a jar. I was coming out of a shop just as a tall,
+grey-haired, soldierly man in uniform was passing who glanced casually
+at me. The glance was followed by a start of surprise, his look became
+intent and interested, and he stopped as if to speak. Naturally I took
+no notice and walked on; but a few seconds afterwards he passed me,
+stopped a few yards ahead to look in a shop window, and as I overtook
+him, he turned to give me a very keen, penetrating stare.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Of course there were heaps of people in Germany who had known me well,
+and I had discounted the risk of running against some of them. But I
+could not place him, and I was not a little relieved when he appeared
+uncertain and went off without addressing me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a disturbing incident and brought home to me the advisability of
+keeping indoors as much as possible during the days I was to remain in
+Berlin. The matter didn't end there, however.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Remembering Hoffnung's hint about keeping my appointment with Baron von
+Gratzen punctually, I turned up a little before time, and exactly on
+the stroke of eleven was shown into his office. My astonishment may be
+guessed when he proved to be the stranger I had just met.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I think that his amazement was even greater than mine, as he stared at
+the slip on which his subordinate had written my name and from it to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then you are Herr Lassen?" he asked in frowning perplexity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I bowed and held out the letter he had sent me. "You sent for me, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He waved me to a chair and sat back lost in thought for so long that I
+began to wonder what the dickens was coming.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You came from England, didn't you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I believe so, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And you're the man without a memory, eh? Very extraordinary; very
+extraordinary indeed. Most remarkable case. And why have you come to
+Berlin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Hoffnung brought me. I understood he had instructions to do so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Tell me about your experiences there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked as blank as a wall and shook my head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Surely you can remember something. Let me jog your memory. I know the
+country well, you understand. Were you in London?" After another blank
+look from me, he took out a paper, glanced over it, and questioned me
+about a number of places and matters contained in it; to all of which I
+replied with either a vacant look or shake of the head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The examination lasted for some considerable time, and presently he
+pushed a sheet of paper and a pen to me, telling me to write my name. I
+had expected some such test and took hold of the pen clumsily and, with
+infinite apparent trouble, wrote the name "Johann Lassen" in big
+sprawling printed capitals.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He watched me like a lynx at the job, took the paper, scanned it
+closely, and asked: "That the best you can do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can read the big letters of type, sir," I replied, and I fancied
+that he had to restrain a smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Next he folded down the paper he had been reading from and showed me a
+sentence in it. A very non-committal sentence I noticed. "You recognize
+the writing?" More head wagging from me. "You should, you know; it's
+your own handwriting;" and he put the document away, and sat thinking
+again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I'd have given something to be able to read his thoughts at that
+moment, especially when he roused himself sufficiently to favour me
+with some keen stares. I couldn't resist the unpleasant thought that he
+suspected something; but he gave no overt sign of suspicion, and his
+manner was less official than friendly. After a time something in his
+mind brought a heavy frown to his face.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me get the matter quite clear. You were blown up in the
+<i>Burgen</i>, found yourself in a hospital in Rotterdam with no papers
+of identification on you except a card, you remembered nothing at all
+of what had occurred, and came to Berlin with Herr Hoffnung. You know
+that there was only one other male passenger on the steamer, a Mr.
+Lamb, about whom we have some reason to be curious. Now, are you sure
+you are not that man?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know, sir. I am not sure about anything except what has
+occurred since I was at Rotterdam."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, when you arrived here the Countess von Rebling recognized you as
+her nephew.&mdash;Were you at Göttingen?" he asked so suddenly that I only
+escaped the trap by the skin of my teeth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I believe so, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then, of course, there will be plenty of people there to identify you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Naturally, sir," I managed to reply, although a chill of dismay made
+my spine tingle at the meaning smile accompanying the words.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We know, of course, that no one of the name of Lamb was ever there,"
+he said and paused again, as if to give me time to absorb all that this
+might be intended to suggest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you speak English?" was the next question, put with a perfect
+accent in my own language.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sure," I replied, with what I meant to be a very correct twang. But it
+didn't appear to impress him as much as I could have wished; and after
+regarding me curiously for a moment or two he rose, got a volume of
+Mark Twain's <i>Innocents Abroad</i>, and laid it open before me,
+asking me to try and read a passage.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked at it earnestly and gave it up as hopeless.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he was too many for me. "Well, I'll read it to you and get you to
+repeat it after me." And he did read it and I had to repeat the words
+in such American as I could manage. "Thank you," he said as he closed
+the book and put it away again. And then another long pause followed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I recalled Hoffnung's disturbing words&mdash;that the Baron would have
+something to tell me I might not like. He had certainly made that good,
+and I was beginning to be abominably troubled about the run of things
+when he started in again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And so you wish to join our Secret Service?" he asked with the abrupt
+shift of subject which worried me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Hoffnung told me so, but&mdash;&mdash;" and I smiled vacantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you imagine that a man without a memory would be of much use to us?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm afraid not, sir; but to tell the truth, I have no sort of desire
+to do it. The doctors at Rotterdam told me I should recover my memory
+in time, and if I could have a good rest and just be absolutely quiet
+for a time it is all I wish."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He nodded, not unkindly, and then suddenly bent on me the keenest look
+I have ever seen in any man's eyes and asked: "Are you sure you mean
+that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Absolutely, sir, on my honour," meeting his eyes steadily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He held them for a moment with the same intentness, as if he would read
+my inmost thoughts, and then nodded and leant back in his seat. "I can
+understand that and believe you. I'm glad to hear it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What he meant I couldn't tell, but I felt relieved because I appeared
+to have risen in his opinion, for some reason it was impossible even to
+guess. Some minutes passed before any more was said, the longest
+silence yet. That he had evidently been running over all that had
+passed his next move showed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am intensely interested in your case, and quite as intensely puzzled
+about it all. Personally, I take your view&mdash;that the best thing would
+be to give you time to see if the memory comes back. But that's rather
+a point for the doctors than for me. You have done very valuable work
+for us in England and, other things turning out all right, there is no
+doubt you could do more of the same sort. But these are times when we
+can't do all we might; matters are too strenuous. Except for this loss
+of memory, you seem to be absolutely normal&mdash;doctors again; and you'd
+better see them at once;" and he rang his table bell. "If you pass them
+and, from your appearance I have no doubt you will, you will, of
+course, go to the Front."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I caught my breath at this, but he did not see my consternation, as he
+had risen while speaking and went out, leaving his secretary, named von
+Welten, to remain with me.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap08"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER VIII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+VON ERSTEIN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Baron von Gratzen was away some minutes; and exceedingly unpleasant
+minutes they were for me. At first I could see nothing but checkmate to
+all my plans. That the doctors would pass me as fit for service in the
+field was beyond question; and, as Germany wanted as many men as
+possible in the fighting line, I was certain to be packed off without
+any delay.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But then I needed only a delay of a couple of days&mdash;the papers would be
+ready by then&mdash;and it was still possible that something might happen
+which would give me just enough time to get away. It was a devil of a
+mess, however; and it cost me no end of an effort to pull myself
+together by the time the Baron came back and himself took me to the
+doctors.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They had been primed about the case, and all three of them were as
+deeply interested in me as the others had been in Rotterdam. One of
+them was a specialist in such cases, and he conducted the first part of
+the examination&mdash;that in regard to my memory. He put numberless
+questions on all sorts of subjects, endeavouring in every conceivable
+way to get me to admit that I could remember something; but I had no
+great difficulty in answering him. He appeared to lay most stress on
+everything that had occurred immediately before the explosion on the
+<i>Burgen</i>; and was still on that when the Baron came back to us,
+listened to his concluding questions and suggestions, and then took him
+out of the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The physical examination followed. I stripped to the buff, and a very
+few minutes sufficed to satisfy them about my fitness. I was, of
+course, in the pink of condition and as hard as nails.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must have had military training," said one of them.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That can't be so, so far as I know. I understand I've been travelling
+about the world for a long time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sure of it," was the positive verdict. "Every muscle tells the
+tale too plainly for any one to be mistaken. Just stand over there; I
+want to look at your back;" and he placed me close to the wall, and
+stepped back some distance himself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, perhaps not," he murmured, and just as I was chuckling at his
+blunder, he suddenly yelled at me in English, "'Shun!" with military
+abruptness. Instinctively, being for the instant quite off my guard, I
+brought my heels together and straightened up. He chuckled, and I could
+have cursed myself for an idiot in having given the show away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The doctor who had trapped me couldn't contain his delight. "I knew I
+couldn't be mistaken. You can put your clothes on," he told me, rubbing
+his hands gleefully, and after another chortle to his colleague, he
+hurried off to report the result of his experiment.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was mad at having made such a blithering ass of myself just when
+things had been going so well. The game was up, of course, and there
+was nothing for it but to face the music. It was now a toss up whether
+I should be packed off to the front or popped into prison, and it
+didn't need a Solomon to see that the odds strongly favoured the latter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The Baron and the two doctors came back in about five minutes, and the
+man who had bowled me out was laughingly rubbing it in to the
+specialist.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't imagine how it escaped you, Gorlitz," he said as they entered;
+and the specialist looked about as pleased as I felt.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Try it again," he growled in a half-whisper.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He may be prepared this time," was the reply in an undertone, but not
+low enough to prevent my hearing it. I couldn't get the hang of things
+for the moment; but when, after a few desultory questions, the doctor
+pretended to take some measurements and then turned me with my back to
+him again, I knew what was coming, and I thought I would do a little
+bit of pantomime of my own.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They spoke together in low tones, and in the middle of it the doctor
+yelled "'Shun!" at me once more. I started, hesitated and then came to
+attention, but not nearly so smartly as before.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just turn round," called the specialist. "Now, march across the room."
+I obeyed, and was halfway across when the doctor shouted "Halt!" I
+stopped instantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There you are," exclaimed the doctor. The specialist nodded, told me
+to sit down, and plied me with all sorts of questions about the army,
+appearing rather pleased than otherwise when I failed to answer them.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A long pow-wow followed between the three doctors and was developing
+into a pretty hot wrangle whether my having obeyed the word of command
+was really a recurrence of memory or not, when the Baron intervened and
+I was sent back to his room with his subordinate.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You have set them a difficult problem, Herr Lassen," he said to me
+when he joined me after some ten minutes; "and given me one also. But
+it will do no harm to postpone the decision about you for a few days,
+at any rate. You have no idea how you come to know the English words of
+command?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I affected to think deeply. "Can I have been in the army there?" I
+asked, looking blankly at him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He smiled and then nodded. "Yes, you are a deserter. Your report says
+that you joined it to obtain certain information."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's very odd, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very," he replied a little drily. "It makes it a little difficult in
+regard to a suggestion Dr. Gorlitz threw out; he's the mental
+specialist, you know. He thinks it not improbable that if you were
+placed again in the surroundings immediately preceding the shock which
+deprived you of your memory, it would greatly facilitate its recovery.
+Perhaps your only chance of doing so. But you might not care to run
+such a risk. You should understand that I wish to help you in any way I
+can," he added kindly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am very much obliged to you, sir. Of course it would be a risk, but
+my great wish is to get my memory back."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Does that mean you would like to go back to England?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could scarcely believe my ears and tried to conceal my overwhelming
+delight under the cover of frowning consideration. "The risk wouldn't
+frighten me, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very well. I'll see about it. That's about as far as we can get
+to-day; but there's one thing I should tell you. There is some one in
+Berlin who knows you and declares that your loss of memory is a mere
+pretence, and that you have assumed it because of some exceedingly
+sinister business in which you were involved a year or two ago."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could smile at that sincerely. "Can you tell me his name?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He paused a moment. "There will be no harm, if you keep it to yourself;
+I don't believe the story, but then I know the man too well. It is
+Count von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's a scoundrel, I know that; but it may be the truth, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We won't discuss him," said the Baron, rising. "I only told you to put
+you on your guard because of the genuine interest I take in you;" and
+with that he shook hands and was sending me away, when I remembered my
+difficulty that morning about papers of identification. I explained it
+to him and he sent for von Welten and instructed him to do what was
+necessary.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I left the place feeling pretty much as any one would feel who had
+rubbed his back against a prison door and by the merest squeak escaped
+finding himself on the wrong side of the bars. The whole business
+baffled me. Knowing as I did so well the usual methods of German
+officialism, the Baron's treatment was incomprehensible; and rack my
+wits as I would, I could not hit on a clue to explain it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And then the luck of it! Actually to be sent back to England with
+official credentials! I could have whooped for joy! But as it was
+already passed the time I was to lunch with von Erstein, I rushed back
+to the Falkenplatz, made sure of the little flat, and then cabbed it to
+von Erstein's address.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What a rotter the brute was, I reflected as I thought of the story he
+had already spread about me. He meant to make things hot for me and no
+mistake, and had lost no time in setting to work. And what a brick the
+old Count, to have given me that warning. If I had been going to stop
+in Berlin, I might have taken von Erstein's enmity seriously; but as it
+was I could afford to laugh at him, for a few days at the most would
+see both Nessa and me out of the country, if the luck only held.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was so late in reaching the Gallenstrasse, where von Erstein had his
+sumptuous flat, that he had already begun lunch. "I'd given you up,
+Lassen," he said as I entered. "Thought something might have happened
+with old Gratz to detain you. He's a downy old bird. Sit there, will
+you. Everything all right?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why shouldn't it be?" I knew what he meant.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He turned the question off and we talked about nothing in particular
+until lunch was over, except that every now and then he shot in a
+question which might have committed me if I had not been on my guard.
+But I had been through the mill so thoroughly that morning that the
+part I was playing had grown into my bones, so to speak.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now we can chat at our ease," he said as we settled into easy chairs.
+"Is it still your habit to smoke a cigarette before a cigar?" he asked,
+grinning, as he held the box toward me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Was that one of my habits, then?" I countered, declining the little
+trap.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, you do it very well. Ought to be on the stage, on my word
+you ought," he said with a broader leer. "But now, let's get to grips.
+How do we two stand?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"About what?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't fool about in that way. You know what I mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall when you tell me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you want to have me for a friend or the other thing?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I told you yesterday I wasn't likely to quarrel with any one who has
+such influence as you have."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And I told you that it would be a bad day's work for you if we did
+quarrel; and quarrel we shall if you try to beat about the bush, as
+you're doing now. I believe in plain talk; and you'd better bear that
+in mind, not only now but always."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then let me have some plain talk now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You shall," taking his cigar out and flicking off the ash. "I've only
+to utter a word or two and I can flick you out of my way as easily as I
+flicked that ash off. Mind that, too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "You have a pleasant way with you, von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care a curse about pleasantness or unpleasantness. When I want
+a thing, I have it. And what I want now is that English girl at the von
+Reblings', and you'd better be careful not to get in my way about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How am I likely to be in your way?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because you're a relative of the von Reblings, my friend, and you're
+going to marry the fair Rosa, whom, by the way, I can tell you as an
+old hand you'll find a handful. But she likes the English girl and will
+try to influence you, and if I know her, as I certainly do, she'll
+succeed, if I don't stop it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Stop it? How?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"By showing you on which side your bread has the butter. Now look here.
+I know a heap about you; quite enough to queer your pitch with the von
+Reblings and put an end to your engagement and lose you the coin on
+which you're counting. All this rot about a loss of memory is just&mdash;&mdash;"
+and he waved his cigar in the air to emphasize his meaning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you know about me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, don't try that fool's game on me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I should be intensely interested in the story. I'm itching to know
+all about myself," I persisted, seeing how this line provoked him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where did you go from Göttingen, my young friend?" he asked with a
+meaning nod, as if the question would confound me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How the devil do I know?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You went to Hanover. You know that perfectly well."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did I? And do I? You're getting me regularly mixed, you know." I was
+delighted to see that he was fast losing his temper.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You did. And when you were there you had a friend, who called himself
+Gossen; but was in reality a Frenchman, named Gaudet. Don't say you
+don't remember, because it will be a lie," he snarled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's an ugly word, von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And the whole thing was an ugly business. He was a spy and wanted some
+secrets; you were able to find them out; and you were suddenly found to
+be in possession of a big sum of money. How did you get it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Honestly, I hope," I answered with intentional flippancy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How did you get it? And how did you get the information, too? That's
+the question; and if you won't answer it, I can. But you'd better not
+force me to open my lips."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm beginning to get awfully interested. Like a story, isn't it?" and
+I laughed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd better laugh while you can," he rapped, swearing viciously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course you mean I sold the information to the Frenchman and that
+that accounts for my having that sudden money."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I not only mean it, I can prove it. Prove it, do you understand that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I gave him another grin and shook my head. "Some one's been pulling
+your leg, von Erstein. The whole thing's just bosh."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's no good, Lassen. I've got you here;" and he held out his hand and
+clenched it. "Here! And no wriggling humbug about loss of memory will
+help you to get out."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I must be an infernal blackguard, then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's the truest thing you've said since you came. It's just what you
+are; and the von Reblings ought to know it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You haven't told me how I got that valuable information yet. I should
+like to know that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you'll let that lost memory of yours wake up for a second, just
+long enough to remember the name of Anna Hilden, you'll know all about
+it without a word from me." His sneering suggestive tone clearly showed
+that this was one of his trump cards, and he fixed his eyes on me,
+keenly watching for the effect.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But my memory won't oblige me by waking up, you see. Had she anything
+to do with it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To the devil with all your pretended innocence! You know she had, and
+that you induced her to worm it out of the man she was to have married,
+if you hadn't come in the road; just as you're trying now with me," he
+cried, scowling at me threateningly. "But you've got a man to deal with
+this time, not a woman, and the wrong sort of man too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I dropped the bantering tone and answered seriously. "Of course all you
+say may be the gospel truth, but I give you my word that I haven't the
+faintest recollection of anything you've mentioned."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed scornfully. "That's a lie," he growled with an oath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had had more than enough and I got up. "If this weren't your own
+place, I'd cram that word down your throat; and the next time we meet,
+wherever it is, I'll do it," I told him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He seemed to understand that I meant it, and a change came over his
+face. "I'll take that back," he muttered. "Sit down again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't sit down, but I stopped. Either he was as arrant a coward as
+such a brute was likely to be and I had scared him, or some thought had
+struck him which accounted for the change.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He let his cigar drop; made a to-do in finding it, pitching it away,
+and lighting another; and it was an easy guess that all this was to
+gain time. Then he sat thinking, fiddling nervously with a very
+singular ring he wore on his middle finger. He saw me looking at it
+and, no doubt to get a little more time to think, he spoke of it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're looking at this," he said, holding up the hand. I nodded, and
+he drew it off and handed it me. "It's a puzzle ring I picked up in
+China," he explained, showing how it was really a little chain of rings
+which fitted very ingeniously to form a single ring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I examined it and, still to gain time, he told me to try and put it
+together. I did try and failed, and when he had thought out his
+problem, he took it back and showed me the fitting.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sorry I lost my temper just now, Lassen," he said in a very
+different tone from his former angry one. "It's always a fool's game.
+But I did really believe you were shamming about your memory. What I
+told you about the Hanover business is quite true, however, and the
+fact that you don't remember it, wouldn't make an atom of difference
+with our people. But now, what about the English girl?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I hesitated a second and then resumed my seat. "I'm willing to listen
+to you," I said; and he couldn't keep the satisfaction out of his fat,
+tell-tale face. He reckoned that he had frightened me, of course.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What are you going to do about her?" was his next question.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What <i>you</i> want to do is the point, man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's a spy and ought to be interned."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And why are you so keen about that? You said a little while back that
+you wanted her; how's the internment going to help you there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She'd be sent to Krustadt and the Commandant&mdash;&mdash; Never mind; you can
+leave the rest to me. You won't know anything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I couldn't trust myself to speak for a time, I was so furious at the
+suggestiveness of the leering brute's words and manner. But there was
+probably more to learn yet, so I choked down my rage and at last even
+forced myself to nod and smile meaningly. "And my part?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Two things; both easy enough. Old Gratz has shoved a spoke in the
+wheel so far, curse him, and as you're in the house you can tell him
+you know I'm right that she is a spy and you can give him proofs."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Proofs?" I echoed, with a start.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I said proofs, didn't I? I'll give you some papers and you can plant
+one or two on her and give the rest to him saying you've found them in
+her room or somewhere. He'll be obliged to order a search then, and
+that'll do the trick."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Confound the thing!" I exclaimed, jumping up and wringing my fingers
+as if I'd burnt them with my cigar.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Here, take another," he said, and by the time I had lit it, I had
+myself in hand again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But if she was caught red-handed like that, she might be shot, and
+that wouldn't help you much."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You leave that to me," he replied with a leer and a wink. "The
+question is, are you going to help me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't like it, von Erstein, and that's the truth," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't ask you that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And if I do help you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He put his fat finger to his lips. "Mum about that Hanover business."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And if I don't?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He paused, squinting hard at me. "I think you will."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I affected to consider the proposal. "But why take this roundabout
+trouble to get her? If you want to marry her, why not ask her?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That touched his Teutonic sense of humour and he burst into loud and
+evidently genuine laughter. "Why didn't you marry Anna Hilden? Because
+you could get her without, wasn't it? Same here, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It comes to this, then," I said after a pause. "You think you know
+that I played the traitor in that Hanover business in a way that
+renders me liable to be shot; but that you're willing to hush it up if
+I'll help to put Miss Caldicott into your power. That about it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Put it how you like," he growled, not relishing the bald statement.
+"But you'd better toe the line, my friend, and at once. Now, what are
+you going to do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll toe the line, von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He chuckled. "I thought you'd see wisdom," he sneered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not quite as you think, however. What I'm going to do is"&mdash;and I
+paused&mdash;"to give you forty-eight hours to clear out of Berlin; and if I
+find you here then, I'll not only tell the von Reblings the whole of
+your confounded scheme, but I'll tell Baron von Gratz as well. And I'm
+thundering glad you've put that card in my hands."
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap09"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER IX
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+A BREAD RIOT
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+It would be difficult for any one to appear more absolutely dumbfounded
+than von Erstein when I delivered my ultimatum and got up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That I had scared him, his chalk-white cheeks showed unmistakably,
+while the quiver of his lips, clenched hands, and the fierce light in
+his piggish little eyes testified to his rage. He jumped up instantly
+to stop my going.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't go, Lassen, at all events in that way. Let's talk it over," he
+clamoured. "The thing can be explained and we can come to an
+understanding."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You swine!" I growled. "Get out of the way or I shall forget I'm in
+your room and lay my hands on you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried not to wince, but was too much of a cur. "Look here, I'm not
+going to utter a word about that Hanover business. I swear that," he
+said as I went to the door.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've done it already, you lying hypocrite. You know that; and so do
+I. I've heard of it, and I shall hear if you say any more. And by
+Heaven, if you dare to say another syllable about it, I'll&mdash;well, keep
+out of my way afterwards, that's all"; and I left him to judge for
+himself what I would do.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had to go. I should have mauled the brute if I'd stopped. I was mad
+with fury; and I walked off, unable for the time to think of anything
+but his disgusting cowardice and bestiality. I'm no saint, and don't
+pretend to be one; but this brute's infernal plan to get Nessa into his
+power was more than flesh and blood could stand. I believe, anyway I
+hope, I should have felt just as hot if any other girl had been
+concerned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I ramped about the streets, taking little notice where I went, and it
+was not until some of my fury had cooled that I began to consider what
+steps I ought to take. I was glad I had lost my temper and gone for
+him; but after a while it began to dawn on me that I had blundered
+badly. All I needed was to gain a few days' delay; and it would have
+been far more diplomatic if I had seemed to fall in with his plans and
+just made a few excuses to account for any inaction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But one can't always be worrying about diplomacy; and anyhow the beggar
+was thoroughly scared. Probably he'd be just as much put to it to hit
+on a new offensive as I was to decide what to do next; and whatever
+happened I wasn't going to be sorry I'd let myself go. What I was sorry
+for was that I hadn't been able to "go" with my hands instead of only
+words.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wouldn't do merely to twiddle my thumbs, however; and after a while
+it struck me that the best thing would be to get another interview with
+old Gratz and just tell him the whole pretty story. If it did no good,
+it would do no harm, and certainly it would prepare him for any other
+scheme by von Erstein to prove Nessa to be a spy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At this point some one clapped me on the shoulder. "Hallo, Cousin
+Johann, whatever are you doing in this out-of-the-way place?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was Hans. "If it comes to that, what are you doing, young man?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's a shindy on in the Untergasse, and I've been watching it. A
+lot of women kicking up a row about food, or something. It looked like
+getting warm, so I thought it time to go home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let's go and look at it," I said directly. I had heard rumours in
+England about bread riots and rather liked the idea of seeing one for
+myself, and I recalled what the tailor had said about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The place was close at hand; and sure enough there was a big crowd and
+a noisy one, too. Quite a couple of hundred women with a sprinkling of
+men, and as much noise as at an Irish faction fight. We stood a minute
+or two at the corner of the street when Hans caught sight of a friend,
+and asking me to wait for him, ran off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I observed that although there were police about, the tailor was right
+in saying they were not taking the usual steps to stop the row; and I
+noticed also that the crowd was growing in numbers and moving in my
+direction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then came the sound of smashing glass, with loud shouts from the women
+who clustered round the spot where the smash had been, and I went down
+the street far enough to see that a baker's shop had been forced.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The police interfered then; but it was too late, and there were too few
+of them. Moreover, the mob had tasted blood, or rather smelt food; and
+soon afterwards there was another smash; this time a provision shop.
+The crowd had been allowed to get out of hand; and I saw some of the
+police rush away, presumably to telephone for more men.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was standing in the road at that moment and had to skip aside to
+avoid an open car which came rattling down the street toward the mob.
+An old lady and a girl were in the car, and as they passed me, the
+latter stood up and called excitedly to the chauffeur to stop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If it hadn't been a German he would never have been fool enough to have
+attempted to enter the street at all; but I suppose he had been told to
+take that route, and his instinct of slavish obedience to orders did
+the rest. The result was what any one might have foreseen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was too late to turn back, and his one chance to get through was to
+have driven bang into the crowd and trusted to luck to clear a way. As
+it was, he came to a halt on the very verge of the crowd; and in less
+time than it takes to tell it, the car was the centre of a yelping,
+hungry mob of viragos to whom the sight of rich people in a costly car
+was like a good meal spread before a lot of famished wild beasts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Worse than this, moreover, was the fact that some ruffians who had been
+hanging back began to push their way toward the car, whose occupants
+were calling for the police. They might as well have cried for the
+moon; and every cry was greeted with jeers and yells of anger from the
+women around. The trouble soon thickened.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+One woman more reckless than the rest started a shout to have the two
+out of the car, and herself jumped on the step, grabbed the chauffeur,
+who seemed about paralyzed with fright, lugged him off his seat, and
+the crowd hustled and jabbed and cuffed him, till he was lost in the
+throng. Then some one opened the door of the car, and made a snatch at
+the dress of the girl, who set up screaming.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was too much; so I shoved and shouldered my way through, pushed
+aside the woman who had tried to grab the girl, and urged the two
+panic-stricken ladies to come out. They hesitated, however, and a
+filthy hooligan with a long iron-shod bludgeon barked curses at me for
+a Junker and aimed a vicious blow at my head. I managed to dodge it,
+and jabbed him one in return on the mouth which sent him staggering
+back and enabled me to snatch his stick away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Armed with this, I soon cleared a space about the car and again urged
+the two frightened occupants to leave it. The girl jumped out at once
+and had to help her mother, while I kept the mob at bay, and then
+fought a sort of rearguard action in miniature.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But we hadn't a dog's chance of escape. The mother was half an invalid,
+and could only move very slowly, while the women round, furious at
+being baulked of their prey and led by the brute I had hit and a couple
+of his cronies who had come up meanwhile, surged round us like a lot of
+devils gone mad.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We reached the pavement, however, and as I spied a deepish doorway, I
+changed my tactics and made for it, treating some of those who stood in
+the way pretty roughly. We were able to gain the doorway all right, and
+I hustled my two charges into momentary safety behind me and told the
+girl to keep hammering at the door till some one opened it, while I
+tried to keep the crowd back.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was no picnic; but I reckoned on being able to stem the rush for the
+minute or so until some one came in reply to the girl's knocking. It
+was in our favour that the fight we had already put up had rendered
+some of those in the front of the crowd a little chary about coming too
+close; and as the doorway was very narrow and the stick I had captured
+a long one, I put it across the outside, thus forming a useful barrier,
+and was able to hold it in position by standing back at arm's length,
+and thus almost out of reach of both the hands and feet of those in
+front.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my dismay, however, no attempt was made to let us enter the house,
+although the girl had kept up an incessant knocking. The mob soon
+tumbled to this and things began to look ugly. The old lady, scared to
+death and ill, was on the verge of collapse; the daughter, almost
+equally panicky and alarmed by her mother's condition, stopped
+hammering at the door and bent over her; the crowd was getting more
+furious every moment; those at the back began to push those in front
+forward, the brute I had struck first came on with the rest, and I came
+in for some pretty hot smacks and kicks.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But the little barrier of the stick kept off the worst, and, as every
+second was of vital importance, since help might come from a
+reinforcement of the police, I took the gruelling and just held on.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A couple more invaluable minutes were gained in this way when another
+of the men, a dirty little red-haired beggar, more wary than the
+others, tumbled to the weak spot in my defence&mdash;my hold on the stick.
+He tried his fists on my hands first, and finding that was no good he
+whipped out a pocket knife and jabbed me with it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I loosed the right hand and dropped him with a tap on the nose which
+brought the blood in a stream and gave him something else to think
+about. But his two companions had seen his little dodge and made ready
+to flatter it with imitation, so I had to adopt other tactics.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was pretty reckless by that time, and in no mood to be man-handled by
+a set of German roughs; so I changed the barrier into a weapon of
+offence; it made a fine sort of pike with its ironshod end; and I used
+it without scruple or mercy. I drove it slap into the face of the man
+who had struck me first, then into the chest of the fellow next him,
+and lastly downed a third with a crack on the skull.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That accounted for all the men and took off a lot of the edge of the
+crowd's appetite for more. They fell back a pace or two and I stepped
+in front of the archway, swung the bludgeon over my head and swore that
+I'd brain the first person, man or woman, who moved a single foot
+forward.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nobody in the front ranks seemed in any hurry to accept the invitation;
+but again those at the back, who had no knowledge of the happenings,
+began to shove forward, and slowly the people in front were pushed
+forward against their will and despite their efforts to resist the
+pressure.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The result was plain. I couldn't break every head in sight, of course,
+and I was at my wit's end what to do, when a really happy thought
+occurred to me. I had a lot of small money in my pocket, whipped it
+out, and sent it scattering into the street.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If it's money you want, there it is," I shouted at the top of my lung
+power, and sent a second lot after the first.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a truly gorgeous scheme. I yelled loud enough for nearly all to
+hear, and the flash of the coins did the rest; the pressure round the
+mouth of our shelter was relieved instantly, and both back and front
+rows joined in a fearsome scramble in the middle of the road, where I
+had been careful to shy the money. I never saw a finer scrimmage in my
+life.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We can go," I called to the couple behind me, seeing that the pavement
+was clear enough for us to get away. But the elder woman had fallen and
+was incapable of any effort whatever.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you any small money?" I asked the girl. "My own's all gone."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She felt her own pockets and in the handbag on her mother's arm and
+gave all she could find.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was enough to keep the crowd busy for another minute or two, and I
+stepped out, and just as the people were easing off from the first
+diversion of the scramble, I yelled out that there was more to come,
+and flung the whole lot broadcast among the tossing heads, taking care
+to shy it as far down the street as possible. There was an instant rush
+for it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I slipped back into the doorway, picked up the old lady and made a dash
+for it, telling the girl to bring the stick with her and keep close to
+the houses, which by that time were all shut and barred.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We managed to get some yards toward the street corner when two of the
+men who had given us trouble spied us, and, thinking that I was now
+unarmed, came rushing in pursuit, calling to a lot of the others to
+follow.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They soon overtook us, and there was nothing for it but to put up
+another fight, this time without the friendly help of a doorway. I laid
+my burden on the pavement, took the stick from the girl, and turned to
+face the oncomers. The instant they saw I was still armed, they pulled
+up in surprise and hesitated. I promptly seized the moment of their
+consternation and went straight at them, clubbed the nearest and was
+making for the next when I heard a whoop behind me, suggesting an
+attack from the rear.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I turned to meet it, and to my intense relief saw Hans standing by the
+two ladies. "Come on, Hans," I called, and he was by my side in a
+jiffy. We had a rough and tumble for a few seconds in which he joined
+like a brick, and then relief arrived. We heard the sound of horses,
+with the jingle of accoutrements, and the next moment a small troop of
+cavalry turned the corner of the street, and we left the rest of the
+proceedings to them. They soon scattered the mob, who fled in all
+directions except ours, and the street was quickly cleared, leaving the
+car the one conspicuous feature in the foreground.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As the chauffeur was nowhere to be seen and the old lady couldn't walk,
+I sent Hans back to her and went to see if the car had been much
+damaged. It had certainly been in the wars; stripped of everything,
+even to the cushions, but the engine was all right, so I started it,
+climbed in, and backed to the spot where the ladies were.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then it flashed suddenly on me what an ass I was making of myself to
+let any one see that I knew anything about cars; but it was too late to
+make a pretence now, and I consoled myself with the reflection that
+there was no need to let the people know who I was.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there I reckoned without Hans. The mother had sufficiently
+recovered to get up, and was speaking to him when I reached them, while
+Hans and the daughter were casting sheep's eyes at each other in a
+fashion which told tales. They were evidently old friends, and a little
+bit more; and I wasn't, therefore, surprised when the mother knew me as
+Lassen, Hans' cousin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was awfully sweet and grateful and the tears trembled in her eyes
+as she thanked me, holding my hand in both of hers, declaring that both
+she and her daughter owed me their lives, and making so much of the
+matter, that I had to chip in with a suggestion that she had better get
+home as soon as possible.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But how?" she exclaimed hopelessly. "Where's Wilhelm?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But Wilhelm, evidently the chauffeur, was nowhere to be seen; and there
+was nothing for it but to volunteer to drive the car myself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+All this time friend Hans had been making the best of his opportunity
+with the daughter, who also thanked me profusely when I had helped her
+mother into the car.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where am I to drive?" I asked as I took the wheel.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hans knows the way," suggested the daughter, with the faintest little
+flush of confusion as she hazarded the suggestion. He grinned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come along then, Hans," I said; and he nipped in and told me where to
+go and which way to take.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather a nice little child," I said presently, chipping him; the girl
+was about sixteen, I guessed, as her hair was still down. But he
+resented the speech.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Child! She's only a year younger than I am," he exclaimed quite
+indignantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So that's how the wind blows, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish to Heaven I'd come up sooner; but I say, you did make a fight
+of it, cousin. Nita's been telling me all about it. She says they'd
+have been torn to pieces if it hadn't been for you. You're a lucky
+beggar!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't take too kindly to that sort of luck, Hans, I can tell you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only wish it had been mine," he declared regretfully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You did all right as it was when you came; and of course she saw you.
+Rather a pretty name&mdash;Nita."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He smiled self-consciously and coloured. "But her mother didn't; if she
+had it might change her opinion and&mdash;&mdash;" He didn't finish the sentence
+and exclaimed: "But I say, you do know how to handle a car!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This didn't suit me, however, so I went back to the pretty Nita. "The
+mother's against it all, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only for the silly reason that we're too young. And I shall be an
+officer in a month or two; but the Baroness is like Rosa in that, she
+can't understand when a fellow's grown up."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It'll come all right when you've been in the army a year or two," I
+said consolingly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A year or two," he exclaimed in some dismay.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, if she won't wait for you as long as that, she isn't worth
+bothering about, Hans."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he wasn't in a mood for any philosophic consolation. "But she will;
+she's said so a hundred times. There's no doubt about her; but there's
+something else; somebody else, rather."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And which are you? Number one or number two?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I don't mean with her; but old Gratz has some one else."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And what's he got to do with it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Johann! Seeing that he's her father, he's got everything to do with
+it, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was something like a jar in all truth. He was about the last soul
+in Berlin who ought to know that I had so far recovered my memory as to
+be able to handle the car. "Do you mean that this old lady is Baron von
+Gratzen's wife?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course she is. I thought you knew it."
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap10"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER X
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+COMPLICATIONS
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The fact that it was Baron von Gratzen's wife and daughter whom I had
+managed to snatch from the clutches of the mob was startling, and might
+have vital consequences. But whether it would help or harm me, it was
+difficult to decide.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The first impression was that it was rotten luck. By all accounts
+Lassen was far too great a coward to have faced the mob; and that fact
+alone was dangerous since it tended to emphasize the difference between
+us. More than enough had transpired in the interview with the Baron to
+show that he already suspected I was not Lassen; and this business
+might put the finishing touch to his suspicions. My handling of the
+car, moreover, might be accepted as an additional proof of the
+impersonation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was of course another side. It was his wife and child who had
+been rescued; and if he hadn't a stone in place of a heart, he was
+bound to feel some amount of gratitude. But would that be sufficient to
+cause him to smother his suspicions?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The German official is commonly a two-natured individual; showing one
+side in his private life and the other in his office. His manner to me
+that morning had been friendly enough; but that was after his
+suspicions had been quieted and he had regarded me as Lassen. What the
+effect would be when his suspicions were again roused, it was
+impossible to say.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If he was like many of those I had known in the old days, he would be
+quite capable of professing and even feeling the deepest gratitude
+privately and at home, and the next minute at his office regretting,
+with tears in his eyes, that his duty compelled him to pack me off to
+gaol. That's the worst of Teutonic sentimentality. It's pretty much
+like a compass needle in an electric storm; you never know where it
+will point next.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When we reached the house nothing would satisfy the Baroness but that I
+should go in so that her husband should have an opportunity of thanking
+me; and in we went. It was a relief to find that he wasn't home; but
+she would not hear of my leaving until she was satisfied that I was not
+seriously hurt, and wished to send straight off for a doctor to examine
+me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Discussion resulted as usual in a compromise, and Hans carried me off
+to the bathroom. There was nothing the matter that soap and water and a
+clothes-brush couldn't put right. I was very dirty; had a bruise or
+two, a couple of scratches on my face, and a cut on my hand where one
+of the men had jabbed at it to make me release my hold of the stick.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The last looked the worst, because of the drop or two of blood smeared
+about; but it didn't amount to anything, and I was really lucky to have
+got off so lightly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+While I was removing the traces of the scrap, Hans told me a good deal
+more about Nita and the position of affairs in the von Gratzen
+household, together with his impressions of Nita's father.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think he's a regular bear, you know. He is to me; but then he
+doesn't like me any more than I do him, worse luck," he said dolefully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you think the best way to get any one to like you is to begin by
+disliking him?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't begin it; but he always scowls when he finds me here, talks
+to me as if I was a kid of ten, and calls me 'Hansikin.' It makes me
+regularly sick, I can tell you. Of course he's awfully decent to his
+wife and Nita, and they both worship him; and so does he them. But he's
+always trying to make fun of me; and he's such an artful old beggar
+that I never get a chance of scoring off him. I believe he's as big a
+humbug as any in Berlin. And I'm not the only one who thinks so, too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What you've done to-day ought to change his opinion, Hans."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's just my rotten luck. I came up too late to do anything, and
+even the little I did do, the Baroness couldn't see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But Nita saw it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And a lot he'll care for what she says. He'll just grin and say I was
+a good boy, or some such rot as that, and forget it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll see about that. He'll know that no boy could send a grown man
+headlong into the gutter as you did."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did I?" he cried excitedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The truth was that he did not; but there seemed a chance of doing him a
+good turn, so I described a little fictional incident of the sort,
+telling him that he was too excited at the moment to remember anything.
+"It was the turning point of the whole show, Hans, for if the beggar
+hadn't been downed at that very moment, they'd have got us to a cert."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you think Nita saw it?" he cried boyishly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How could she, when her mother was lying all but fainting on the
+pavement? She wanted all her eyes for her."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just my luck!" he exclaimed with a disconsolate toss of the head, as
+we went downstairs.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nita and her mother had also been using the time to repair, and both of
+them appeared to have rallied from the shock. I had to go through more
+of the thanksgiving ceremonial. Only the plea of an urgent engagement
+got me out of a most pressing invitation to remain to supper in order
+to be thanked over again by the Baron; and I had to stem the torrent of
+gratitude by bringing Hans' part into action.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's awfully sweet of you to give me all the credit, my dear madam,
+but you're overlooking my cousin's part; and you owe quite as much to
+him. I'm afraid there would have been a very different tale to tell, if
+he had not come up when he did."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't know that," she exclaimed in great surprise; and I saw Hans
+and Nita, who were snugging it together in a corner, prick up their
+ears.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't want to make him blush," I replied, lowering my voice, and
+repeated the fable I had told him in the bathroom, garnishing it with
+one or two more or less artistic touches.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't see all that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Unfortunately at the moment you were not able to take notice of
+anything, I'm afraid."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nita hasn't told me about it either."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She could not have had eyes or thoughts for any one but you just then.
+It's only natural, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I've done the boy an injustice, Herr Lassen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Boy!" I echoed with a start. "No boy could have done what he did, and
+no man could have behaved more bravely;" with special emphasis on the
+"man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It worked all right. After a moment she called him up, repeated the
+pith of the story, and showed her gratitude in a way that made him
+blush like a girl. Then she kissed him and declared, to the profound
+delight and astonishment of them both: "That's a good-bye kiss to the
+boy, Hans. I shall never think of you as one again after this; neither
+will the Baron, I am sure. You must stop to supper and hear what he
+thinks of it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was so overwhelmed by all this that he could scarcely stammer out
+his acceptance of the invitation, and when I was leaving he came to the
+door and couldn't say enough to thank me. He had a very hazy idea of
+all that he had really done, and it wasn't surprising that, being a
+German, he was ready to accept the story as gospel and rather to preen
+his feathers over his own prowess.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Still he was a decent youngster, and his little harmless swagger was
+very intelligible. "I say, cousin," he added as he opened the door, "I
+wish you'd do me a favour and tell Rosa. She'll believe it, if you say
+it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course I will. I'm taking the Karlstrasse on my way," I promised
+readily. I wanted to hear if there was any news about the progress of
+our "conspiracy." The afternoon's affair wasn't all honey, for there
+was the question of its effect on the Baron; and the sooner my back was
+turned on Berlin the better.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was old Gretchen's job to attend to the front door, and when she
+answered my ring, she told me no one was at home, and that Rosa had
+left a parcel for me. A glance showed that the paper wrapper was torn
+and that the packet had been put up clumsily as if in a great hurry by
+unskilled fingers. Gretchen had evidently been curious about the
+contents.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I opened it in her presence, therefore, as there could be no harm in
+her having a second look at it, and found a quaint card-case inside,
+with some cards printed, "Johann Lassen," and a line saying she thought
+I should understand and find them useful. It was rather neat of her,
+and clearly was intended as an assurance that she meant to keep our
+secret.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She came in soon afterwards and I thanked her for it. She was pleased
+that she had succeeded in making her intention clear; but she wasn't so
+pleased when she heard that old Gretchen had had a peep at the
+card-case. Nor was she at all overjoyed at the story of the afternoon's
+doings in the Untergasse. She looked mighty grave about it, indeed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not going to say I'm pleased about it, Johann," she declared. We
+had agreed that it would be better practice for us to use the Christian
+names even when alone. "It wants thinking over."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your reason?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Von Gratzen. You saw him this morning, didn't you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded and gave her a very brief report of what had occurred and that
+he had been quite friendly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She shook her head. "You'll have to be awfully careful with him. He
+knows, as well as I do, that my cousin is an arrant coward, and that no
+man in all Berlin would be less likely to do what you did this
+afternoon; or could have done it, in fact. The Baron's a man I could
+never understand. No one can. He does the most extraordinary things;
+he's horribly keen and shrewd; quixotic at one time and abominably
+harsh at another; although from his manner you'd think he wouldn't hurt
+a fly."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, let's hope he'll show his quixotic side over this, for it's too
+late to alter things;" and we were still discussing it when Feldmann
+arrived, and she asked him eagerly for news.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's a hitch, I'm sorry to say. About Hans," he reported with a
+worried look. "His permit to travel has been refused. They won't
+release him from his training even for twenty-four hours. I did all I
+could, I assure you, Rosa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And about the other?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, that's all right, of course. A mere matter of form; and it will be
+ready to-morrow, I expect. But one's not much use without the other."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Johann could use yours, Oscar," suggested Rosa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not on any account," I protested. "Herr Feldmann might get into no end
+of a mess."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It isn't that, Lassen. I'm so well known all along the line that it
+would be hopeless. You'd be spotted in a moment. I'd run the risk like
+a shot otherwise; I know how Rosa feels about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What can we do?" she exclaimed, turning to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Make the best of it. Nessa must go without me, if I can't get off; and
+there's no chance of that tomorrow. Will the papers have a definite
+date for the journey?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I gave the date we agreed, but I dare say I could get that altered to
+allow us a margin of a day or two, perhaps a week; but then this
+wedding is the excuse; and of course that date can't be altered. But I
+could see Miss Caldicott into Holland all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What, with a false passport!  It's awfully good of you to offer, but
+I'm sure she wouldn't hear of it for a second. No; we must try the
+other way."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's that?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shook his head ominously at the mention of von Gratzen. "I know a
+lot about him, and I wouldn't put a pfennig's reliance on any hope from
+that quarter," he said emphatically. "I don't say he won't do anything,
+mind you, because one never knows what he will do next. He's one of the
+sharpest and ablest men in the country; we all admit that; but&mdash;&mdash;" and
+he gestured and shrugged his shoulders.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Unreliable?" He nodded. "In a shifty unscrupulous way, you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh dear, no; not that at all," he said vigorously. "Individual. That
+is the best word. If he thinks a thing should be done, he does it
+whether it is according to official rules or not. That is not German.
+He is not thorough, as we understand the word."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There remained only the other plan&mdash;that Nessa and I should get away in
+some disguise, and at a tentative suggestion about false papers,
+Feldmann laughed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will easily understand that when a people are subject to so many
+rules and regulations as we are, plenty of men set their wits to work
+to break them. False identification cards are as common as false coins,
+and if you knew where to go, a few marks would buy one, or a genuine
+one either, for that matter," he declared; but he made no offer to get
+them, and it was better not to press the thing farther then.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I left soon afterwards. The failure to get Hans' permit and all that
+had passed about von Gratzen served to make the position more and more
+difficult and complicated. The man seemed to be an enigma even to those
+who were in constant touch with him, and it was ridiculous to imagine,
+therefore, that any one who had only seen him once should understand
+him. A close and careful review of the interview with him threw no
+light on the matter. He had been exceedingly kind and friendly; but
+there had been a moment of startling contrast. That one keen look of
+his; so sharp, intent and piercing that it had seemed almost to change
+him into a different man; and it might well be accepted as the one
+instant in which the mask had been allowed to drop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In the morning there was another incident. A curt formal summons
+arrived summoning me to his office at noon. This, after the previous
+day's job in the Untergasse! He might at least have had the decency to
+write a private note; and naturally enough the thing increased my
+uneasiness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And then, if you please, it turned out that he had named that time as
+it was the hour when he went home to lunch and wished to take me with
+him! How could one judge such a man?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I put the note before him, with a word to the effect that I had thought
+it was on official business, and he laughed it away, saying he had told
+his secretary just to ask me to call.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He couldn't make enough of me; kept speaking to me as "My boy," and "My
+dear boy"; smothered me with protestations of gratitude; and capped it
+all by asking me to make his house my home while I was in Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That didn't appeal to me in the least. "Wouldn't it be very invidious,
+sir, if I was to go to you when I've only just left my aunt's?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've a good mind to use my official power to compel you, my boy," he
+returned laughingly; "but the wife shall talk to you about it. In any
+case you must promise to let us see as much of you as possible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was easy to promise; and after a few moments we went out together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If he wasn't sincere, then he was one of the best actors in the world
+either on or off the stage.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Which was he?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could find no answer to the question. Yet everything probably
+depended upon it&mdash;Nessa's fate and my freedom, and possibly even my
+life.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap11"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XI
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+THE PROBLEM OF VON GRATZEN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+As soon as we were in the street von Gratzen linked his arm in mine.
+"It won't do you any harm to be seen in public with me," he said
+jestingly; and even in that half-bantering remark he managed to convey
+a subtle meaning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can understand that, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And now I want to hear all about that affair yesterday."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I expect you've already heard what there is to tell."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course I've had my wife's and Nita's story, but I want yours. I may
+need your statement for official purposes, you see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I would rather not have to do anything official," I replied. An
+appearance as witness in any police proceedings was unthinkable.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't let that worry you; I'll make it all right. But the affair was
+by far the most serious of the sort we've had, and I want all the facts
+available. That's all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He listened to my description of the scene; questioned me about the men
+in it particularly, asking if I could recognize them; and laughed
+outright at the story of the scramble for the money.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was a stroke of genius, boy; positive genius," he declared, and
+asked me how much I had thrown away. A very German touch. I expected
+him to offer to repay me; but he spared me that and let me continue the
+story. When I came to the closing part, I made the most of Hans' share,
+declaring that if it had not been for him the result would have been
+very serious, and that he had acted like the brave man he was.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It made an impression; but he did not evince anything like as much
+interest as in the other parts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've left out one thing, haven't you, my boy? Something that pleased
+me exceedingly and set me thinking. I mean about your being able to
+drive the car. Nita says you not only drove like an expert, but were
+able to put the engine right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nita had much better have held her tongue, was my thought. "I was
+awfully perplexed about it myself afterwards," I replied, feeling
+deucedly uncomfortable.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You haven't had anything to do with cars since you came, have you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a thing, of course. That's what worried me. I just went up to it
+as if it was the most natural thing in the world&mdash;I didn't have to
+touch the engine, though&mdash;and got in and drove it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You see what it means, of course. Why, that it was an instinctive
+recurrence of memory. It was most fortunate."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was a matter of opinion, however; but as we reached the house then
+no more was said about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At lunch all the talk was on the subject of the scrap. They were full
+of it, and went over the ground again and again until one might have
+thought I had won the Iron Cross by some conspicuous act of most
+gallant bravery and resource.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was the sentimental side, and, at first, when the Baron and I were
+alone afterwards smoking in his sanctum, he grew even more
+embarrassingly flattering. "It's no good your trying to belittle the
+affair, my dear boy. If it hadn't been for you, Heaven alone knows what
+would have happened to my wife and Nita. I haven't a doubt that it
+would have killed the wife. She is not strong; she has been very ill;
+and is only just pulling round. The marvel is that she hasn't
+collapsed, as it is."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I tried to protest, but he wouldn't listen to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I tell you my blood runs cold when I think what those devils would
+have done if they had got hold of her. I know that sort of Berliners;
+they'd have torn the clothes off her back and mauled and beaten her
+without mercy. And it was only the fortunate fact that you were present
+and acted so bravely that saved her. I shall never forget it; never;
+and if there's anything I can ever do to prove that I mean what I say,
+I shall grip the chance with both hands."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You are very kind, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't talk in that way about kindness. I should be an ungrateful brute
+if I did not mean it. You can judge how I feel when I tell you that if
+my son had lived I would have him just like you;" and there was
+moisture in his eyes as he stretched out his hand and wrung mine
+impulsively.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That he was in earnest it seemed impossible to doubt. He sat looking at
+me steadily for a while and then surprised me. He leant forward and
+fixed his eyes on mine. "I want to ask you a question. Are you sure you
+have never seen me before?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa's warning flashed across my thoughts. This might be a trap; so I
+returned his look with equal steadiness and shook my head. "I don't
+recollect it, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Try to think. Try hard. Look back over the years to when you were a
+boy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Of course I "tried," and equally of course failed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He dropped back in his chair with a sigh which seemed to breathe the
+essence of sincere regret, and after a moment said with almost equal
+earnestness:
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You know all I have said to you; you believe it, believe that I am
+really a friend to you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course, sir. No one could speak as you have otherwise," I replied,
+smiling. It was a queer question.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then, believing it, is there anything you would care to tell me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What the dickens did this mean? I smothered my doubts under another
+smile and then nodded. "There is one thing, sir." His face lighted and
+he was all expectation and interest on the instant.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's about the man you mentioned yesterday&mdash;Count von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His look changed directly. All the light and eagerness died away and he
+put his cigar back in his lips. "Oh, about him, is it? Well?" he asked,
+as if the subject didn't interest him in the slightest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he listened carefully to the account of the interview with von
+Erstein, squinting at me curiously whenever Nessa's name was mentioned,
+and seemed sufficiently interested to put some questions about her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"An ugly story, my boy, very ugly; although I'm not much surprised,
+knowing the man. But why have you told me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I wish you to be prepared if he still tries to carry out his
+infernal scheme."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He smiled. "And because you're naturally indignant, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am. For my cousin's sake. The two are very old friends."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I see. Then it's not for the girl's own sake?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What the deuce was he driving at? His manner kept me guessing all the
+time. "Partly for her sake, of course. That sort of beastliness always
+makes me wild."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can understand that, my boy, and am glad to hear it. Just what I
+should expect of you. Is she pretty?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I suppose she is in an English way," I replied, shrugging.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's not because she <i>is</i> English that you feel like this?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope I should feel much the same if she was a Hottentot, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish all our young fellows were the same. Well, for your sake, I'll
+see that she comes to no harm. I presume, however, that you are quite
+sure she is not really a spy? Very serious, just now, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My cousin is, and she has known her many years."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then why doesn't the girl go home?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's her one absorbing wish, sir. She has been trying for months to
+get permission, but von Erstein has managed to stop it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He nodded once or twice and leant back in his chair thinking until he
+glanced at the clock and rose. "Time's up. I must get back. I make a
+point of being back always to the tick. It's a hobby of mine. I'll
+think over all you've told me, for I'm interested in it; far more so
+than you may imagine. I'll make an inquiry or two about this Miss
+Caldicott, and if it's all right, she shall go home. You can tell your
+cousin so. But it's a long way and a bad time for her to travel alone."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't think she would mind that a bit, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You make a very earnest champion, my boy; but let me give you a hint.
+Don't let any one else get the same idea. I mustn't take you away with
+me now, unless you wish to make an enemy of my wife. You must stay and
+be heroized for a while. Now mind, don't fail to come to me, if you're
+in any sort of difficulty," he said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I certainly will come, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As we went out into the hall and were shaking hands, he said, "By the
+way, I've had the doctor's report about you; and Gorlitz is very strong
+about our sending you to England to see if the environment would bring
+your memory back. What think you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was all I could manage to prevent him seeing what I did think of it
+in reality, but I stammered, "I'm quite in your hands, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed softly and with such meaning. "Perhaps we could kill two
+birds with one stone, then. How would it do for you to take this Miss
+Caldicott there with you?" And without waiting to hear my reply he
+went, leaving me in such amazement that I could have almost shouted for
+joy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But did he mean it? Or was it just a subtle test? A trap? I was
+worrying over this when his daughter came out to fetch me in for the
+"heroizing" business.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nita was quite a pretty girl, and now that she had recovered from the
+previous day's shock and had a rich colour in her cheeks and brightly
+shining eyes, I wasn't surprised at Hans' infatuation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I do so want to speak to you alone," she said. "I want to thank&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My dear young lady, no one has been doing anything else since I
+entered the house. Do give me a breathing space."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She laughed; and a particularly sweet merry laugh it was. "I
+understand; but this is something special; something else, I mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh! Shall I guess?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With a start and a vivid blush she dropped her eyes, fiddled nervously
+with her blouse for a moment, and then looked up and laughed again. "I
+don't mind your guessing," she challenged.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Something to do with&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She interrupted with some vigorous nods. "You did tell some taradiddles
+though. Hans didn't really do anything. I saw it all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If he had not rushed up to me just when I called him, my dear young
+lady, none of us would have got out of the scrape as easily as we did,"
+I said seriously. It would never do for her to think small beer of her
+lover. "It was that and the way he went for the brutes that decided
+everything and sent them scuttling off."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But he didn't do anything, Herr Lassen!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean to tell me you didn't see him knock that dark brute, the
+biggest of them I mean, head foremost into the gutter?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did he really?" she cried, open-eyed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you didn't see that, you can't have seen everything as you said."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But he told me he hadn't a chance to do a thing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Bravo, Hans!" I exclaimed. "Just like him. You wouldn't expect him to
+spread himself and swagger about his own pluck, would you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But all roads lead to Rome and so did this one. "He declared it was all
+your own doing, and after the way you fought before, I&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come along, let's go to your mother," I broke in, and linking my arm
+in hers I moved toward the drawing-room door. "Hans is one of the best;
+if he weren't, he wouldn't be so ready to give me the credit for what
+he himself did. But we can't have that, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She held me back a moment. "What you said about him has done wonders
+with mother; changed her right round; and we're going together to the
+von Reblings. Oh, I <i>do</i> thank you so!" and being only a kid she
+squeezed my arm ecstatically.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had to endure a bout of "heroizing," but something came out in the
+course of it that made me put my thinking cap on afterwards. Nita
+playing chorus to her mother's praise as she repeated some of the
+pretty things von Gratzen had said to her about me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've never heard him speak in such a way of any one in my life
+before," she declared; "and he is so grieved about your extraordinary
+loss of memory. I think he is even rather provoked about it. He was in
+England as a young man, you know, and has made several visits there in
+later years."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I did not know that," I said, pricking up my ears.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He loves to talk of the country and the people, and, as you have just
+come from there, I am sure he is bitterly disappointed because you
+can't tell him about the things you saw and the people you met and all
+the rest of it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It would have been very interesting to me too," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't know how long you were there, I suppose?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head. It seemed less mean somehow to do that than to lie
+outright in words; and it answered all the purpose quite as well.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It must be a dreadful thing to lose one's memory," put in Nita.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It makes everything very difficult," I said with a shrug. It did.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And yet you can remember everything that's happened since, can't you?"
+she persisted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perfectly. As perfectly as if I had never had that shock."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It <i>is</i> odd."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her mother took up the running again then. "My husband thinks you must
+have been a very long time in England," she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's very interesting. Why does he?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know exactly. Of course it can only be a guess. But he
+declares you are much more like an Englishman than one of us. I fancy
+it's your reserved manner; the way he said you pronounced English to
+him; and then your knowing something of the English words of command.
+In fact he took you for an Englishman at first; and he questioned me
+ever so closely, almost cross-examined me indeed, as I told him, about
+your fighting yesterday, the way you used your fists, and so on. I was
+quite amused."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My feeling was anything but amusement, however. "It's a thousand pities
+I can't tell him anything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my surprise this seemed to make her laugh, and I thought it prudent
+to join in the laugh. But it was something else which had tickled her.
+"There was one thing he insisted upon worrying us both about. You
+remember, Nita?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean the kicking, mother?" The latter nodded and Nita
+continued. "I thought it awfully funny, Herr Lassen, to tell the truth;
+at least I should have done if it had been any one else; but father
+always has a strong motive in such things. If he asked me one question
+he must have asked fifty, I'm sure, taking me right over every incident
+of yesterday, to find out whether in beating off those awful men you
+had ever once used your feet. I told him I was sure you hadn't; and he
+seemed to think it was a most extraordinary thing for a German to have
+used only his fists. Don't you think it silly?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know quite what to think of it," I replied truthfully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For shame, Nita, your father is never silly," said her mother
+severely; but Nita had her own opinion about that, judging by the pout
+and shrug which the rebuke called forth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was a moment's pause, and this offered me a chance to change the
+subject by putting a question about the war work which both were doing;
+and soon afterwards I left the house.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was clear as mud in a wineglass that von Gratzen was still undecided
+about me. That close questioning about my method of fighting was
+disquieting; so was the reference to my reserved English manner; and
+the reference to my pronunciation, especially as I had rather plumed
+myself on my American accent. It all pointed to the conclusion that my
+nationality was suspect in his opinion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He had been in England, too, and I myself knew how well he spoke the
+language. Altogether he was probably as well able to spot an Englishman
+as any one in the whole of Berlin. And yet all the while I had been
+flattering myself that he had been completely hoodwinked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At the same time no one could have shown me greater kindness. That he
+was really grateful for the previous day's affair was beyond doubt; it
+had appeared so to me anyhow; and his implied offer of help&mdash;that I
+should go to him in any trouble&mdash;made with such earnestness as to
+amount almost to insistence, all suggested an intention to be a friend.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was the reference to Nessa, again; his ready promise that she
+should be sent home "for my sake," and the startling proposal at the
+very last moment, that she should go in my charge, which had literally
+taken my breath away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What was one to think? It was a very puzzle of puzzles, especially in
+view of the unreliable vagaries of German officials in general and of
+what Rosa and the rest had said about von Gratzen in particular.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What a lovely mix up it would be if his suggestion materialized and
+Nessa and I were packed off together under official protection! It
+seemed a million times too good to be even thinkable. Compared with
+such a gloriously gorgeous plan, our little conspiracy scheme seemed
+almost contemptibly mean and commonplace; scarcely worth bothering
+about for a moment. But it was best to have as many strings to the bow
+as possible, so I went to the von Reblings' to hear if Rosa had
+anything to tell me about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Ought the others to be told of the fresh development? It seemed better
+not for the present. It was hard luck to have to keep such stunning
+news secret, but there was nothing to be gained by raising Nessa's
+hopes until they were virtually certain to be fulfilled. What would she
+think of the notion? I hoped I could guess. Being a bit of a sanguine
+ass, I started castle-building on the foundation, and by the time the
+Karlstrasse was reached, I had planned, built, and furnished a very
+noble edifice indeed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Old Gretchen opened the door as usual, and her look and start of
+surprise and general manner, suggesting something uncommonly like
+consternation, brought me down to earth and shattered my castle
+effectively.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They are not at home, sir," she declared hurriedly; and instead of
+opening the door wide, she held it so as really to block my entrance.
+Her obvious nervousness probably accounted for a step which at once
+roused suspicions.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No one at all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, sir. They will not be home until late."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's a nuisance; but I'd better speak to Miss Caldicott."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's not in either, sir." The reply was given hesitatingly, and she
+made as if to shut the door.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A smile and a casual, "Oh well, it doesn't matter," put her off her
+guard and her relief was shown in her change of look. "Can I give them
+any message, sir?" she asked. But her relief vanished and gave place to
+greater concern than ever when I pushed the door open and stepped
+inside.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's a good idea, Gretchen; I'll write them a little note," I said,
+as I passed her in the direction of the drawing-room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She slipped before me and stood by the library. "You'll find paper and
+everything here, sir," she smirked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It looked as if she wanted to keep me from the drawing-room; and it was
+not difficult to guess that she had been disturbed at her spy work
+there. It was a bad shot, however; for during the pause there came the
+murmur of voices in the drawing-room itself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must be wrong, Gretchen. They must have come in without your
+knowing. I can hear them."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, no, sir. The door's locked. I have orders always to keep it locked
+when the Countess is not at home;" and she held up the key in proof and
+slipped between me and the door.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I started with a great appearance of alarm and pushed past her. "Then
+there's a thief in the house," I exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At that instant there was the sound of some sort of commotion in the
+drawing-room; a cry of "How dare you?" in Nessa's voice, followed by a
+sneering laugh, uncommonly like von Erstein's.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap12"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+"LIKE OLD TIMES"
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+I snatched the key from Gretchen, who was now very white and shaky,
+opened the drawing-room door and was going to rush in, when it occurred
+to me that if Nessa was caught off her guard, she might let out
+something.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, Gretchen, thank you," I said, loudly enough for Nessa to
+hear.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The woman flung up her hands and bolted, and I went in as if making an
+ordinary call.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa had rushed into the conservatory to escape from von Erstein and
+came back as I entered, her face flushed and her eyes ablaze with
+furious indignation, while he, dumbfounded and looking as black as
+thunder, scowled at me viciously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This man has grossly insulted me, Herr Lassen!" she cried. "Taking
+advantage of the Countess's absence, he got me here on the pretence of
+a message to be given to her, and then&mdash;&mdash; Ugh! I can't speak it;" and
+she dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only took your advice, Lassen, and asked Miss Caldicott to marry
+me," he said sullenly. "And then she&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did you advise that?" broke in Nessa, starting up excitedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That wasn't the moment to explain things, of course. Something had to
+be attended to first. I walked up to von Erstein with intentional
+deliberation, feeling a little thrill of joy at the fright in his eyes,
+put my hand on the collar of his coat, and led him towards the door. He
+was too abjectly scared to make more than the merest show of resistance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you anything more to say to him?" I asked Nessa, halting when we
+reached the door.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, no. Only send him away. Send him away," she exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I took him out into the hall and then released him. "I'm going to
+thrash you, von Erstein. Two reasons. You made your spy here lock this
+door so that you could have that girl to yourself; and yesterday you
+said things which made me itch to thrash you then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't mean&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That'll do. Don't tell any more lies."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried to bluster. "You'd better not strike me, Lassen; I can&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A smack on the face, given with all my strength, caused the threat to
+die stillborn and also showed the stuff he was made of. He pretended
+that the force of it knocked him down and nothing would induce him to
+get up again. So the fight ended where it began, as I couldn't hit him
+while he lay on the ground. Regretting that the one smack had been such
+a poor one, I dragged him into the hall, plopped him on to the doormat,
+and chucked him his hat, swearing that if he stopped in Berlin, the job
+would be finished in workmanlike fashion. He squirmed there long enough
+to see that no more was coming, then opened the door, paused to curse
+and threaten me, and bolted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was furious, and her first question showed that some of her anger
+was for me. Von Erstein's little shaft about my "advice" had gone home.
+"Is what that man said true? Did you advise him to ask me to marry
+him?" the emphasis strongly on the "advise."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded; and very naturally her lip curled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wouldn't have believed it possible," she exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He told me yesterday about things and I asked him if he had asked you.
+If that's advising, I advised."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And yet you know the kind of man he is and that he has been
+persecuting me in this fashion?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But anyhow I didn't advise you to accept him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Jack!" she cried indignantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Lassen's safer, and in German too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's almost enough to make me say I'll never speak to you again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Worse than he is, eh?" It was really a curious thing, but we never
+seemed able to resist a chance of misunderstanding one another; and
+when she took this line, it was impossible for me to resist chipping
+her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did you thrash him?" she asked after a pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No; not an easy job in the circs."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've developed a wise discretion," she said with a smile which
+wasn't exactly soothing.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's a fellow with a lot of influence, you see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was one feature about our tiffs; they generally ended all right;
+and this time she seemed to realize that we were off the lines. She
+thought a while and her manner changed. "Do you want me to believe that
+after what happened here and what I said, you just thanked him and
+shook hands? Because I don't believe it. I heard you hit him. That's
+why I asked if you'd thrashed him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I smacked his face, as a sort of preface, but he lay down and wouldn't
+get up, so I had to cart him out to the front door. A poor show; but I
+fancy he'll give me a wide berth in the future. Would you care to tell
+me what passed?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He sent up that woman, Gretchen, to say that he was leaving Berlin and
+that the Countess had given him a message for me about something she
+had of his. I was only too thankful to hear he was going away, and when
+I got down, she locked the door. It was all planned, of course; and he
+asked me to marry him, and when I gave him his answer, he grabbed hold
+of me and kissed me. I broke from him and rushed into the conservatory,
+intending to get out that way into the garden; but he had fastened the
+window, and when I was trying to get it open, you came, thank Heaven."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I guessed that was about the size of it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was never more relieved in my life."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Even though it was only me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, even though it was only you." This with a smile, however, which
+quite belied her indifferent tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, it's all right now. As a matter of fact he has found it wise to
+leave in consequence of a hint I gave him yesterday."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Tell me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better let it wait a while." There was nothing to be gained by telling
+her the truth. "I came to see if there is any news."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There is, unfortunately. I've received an order from the police to
+report myself to-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The deuce you have! I wonder what that means. Who signed it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Baron von Gratzen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I stared at her in amazement. Confound the man. Here he was cropping up
+again in this mysteriously unexpected fashion. "When did you get it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only a minute or two before that man called."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What on earth could it mean? It looked as if he had gone straight from
+his promise to help her to leave and then sent this. "Where have you to
+report?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The Amtstrasse," and she handed me the paper. It came from his offices
+and was signed in his own handwriting.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I give it up. These beggars beat me every time. Only an hour or two
+back he told me that you should be sent back home," and I told her
+about that part of the interview and that he had said I could tell
+Rosa. "It's true he said something about making some inquiries about
+you, so as to be satisfied you're not a spy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then of course he's going to begin by questioning me himself."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Possibly, but&mdash;I get such different reports about him. You'll have to
+look out, too. He's sure to cross-examine you about me. I can't get it
+out of my head that he suspects I'm flying under the wrong flag. You'd
+better never have seen me before, mind; and whatever you do, look out
+for traps and things; and he's as artful as a cartload of monkeys at
+the game."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was tremendously excited by the news about going home. I had to
+repeat every word he had said about it, and of course she got out of me
+that he had spoken about our going home together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, wouldn't that be lovely!" she exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To go with me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To go with any one, of course," she said with sudden indifference. "If
+you'd been through half that I have and had a quarter of the suspense
+I've had to endure, you'd be glad too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm glad enough, as it is. I think this beastly climate is anything
+but healthy for either of us just now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, to be free once more!" she cried with a deep, deep sigh of
+longing. "Do you know that more than once I've been on the point of
+risking everything and just bolting and chancing my luck."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Which reminds me that I'd better tell you the spare wheels I've been
+thinking about, if these other tyres burst. I haven't had much chance
+of talking to you yet, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We had one interview," she reminded me, her eye dancing.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll try to do a bit better this time. The best thing will be old von
+Gratzen's scheme, if it comes off."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We should have to be together a long time, if it does."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather rotten, eh? But I could bear it, I think, if you could."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I should have to, naturally."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We could discuss our old grievances, at the worst."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And at the best?" she said demurely, trying not to laugh.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Find fresh ones to jingle-jangle about. But you'll have to behave
+yourself; for I shall be a German for the first part of the trip,
+remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And if you don't behave yourself, I can tell people you're not one.
+You'll have to remember that, mind."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Behave myself? Meaning?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That you're not to talk nonsense then or now; so go on to the spare
+wheels, please."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right. The next best will be for you to use Rosa's ticket and so
+on, and travel with her Oscar."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But Rosa said you wouldn't hear of that, and you don't imagine I'm
+going to let the man run that risk for me. Any more wheels?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"One. That if the worst comes to the worst, we just disappear and
+chance the weather;" and I described my idea&mdash;to go in disguise as a
+couple of mechanics.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They're using a lot of women, but not as mechanics yet," she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "But you'd go as a boy, Nessa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As a what?" she cried in amazement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I said boy. B-o-y. Easy word."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She stared at me for a moment or two as if I was mad, and then her eyes
+lit up and she burst out laughing. "Do you know why I'm laughing?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"At me, probably."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit of it. Because it's exactly the idea I had. I have the
+clothes ready for it and a set of overalls; and often and often I've
+locked myself in my room, dressed up, and rehearsed everything. You
+know how I've played a boy's part in the theatricals at home; I can
+shove my hands in my pockets and swagger along just like one. I make
+rather a good boy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good enough for a boy, anyhow," she replied, laughing again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Show me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She rose, pushed hands down as if into her trouser pockets, and walked
+up and down the room with a free stride. "Give us a fag, mate," she
+said when she reached me. "That all right?" she asked, relapsing into
+herself and sitting down again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather! Ripping! Why, you managed somehow to alter the very
+expression." She had. The change was wonderful. "With a touch or two of
+make-up not a soul would spot you. But you were always a bit of a boy,
+you know. Perhaps that accounts for it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That meant for a compliment?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just as you take it. You were a self-willed little beggar, anyhow. Do
+you remember how shocked your mother was that night at the Grahams,
+when you came on their little stage as a boy?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I do, indeed. Poor mother! She must have been awfully worried by all
+this; and is still, of course. But Rosa has written to a friend in
+Switzerland and asked her to wire that I'm all right; and perhaps by
+this time she's had the message. It's horribly wicked, I suppose, but I
+declare I feel so vindictive that I could almost kill that woman
+Gretchen and von Erstein too, when I think of what they've made poor
+mother suffer by stopping my letters."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's a low-down swine; and if I get half a chance, I'll even things up
+with him before we leave. But we don't want to talk about him now. If
+your mother's got that wire, she'll feel heaps better. Now, tell me
+what you think of my third wheel?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Shall I tell you the truth?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She paused and the colour crept slowly into her face, robbing it of the
+worried anxiety which had so distressed me and making her as
+bewitchingly pretty as ever in my eyes. "If you will have the truth
+I'd&mdash;I'd like the third wheel better than either of the others."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Same here; but it wouldn't be so safe. We'll have the props with us,
+however, in case of mishaps. What say you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Carried unanimously," she cried enthusiastically. "It would be lovely!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You haven't changed much, then, even with all this."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean in looks?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not much there, even; but I meant in the tomboy business."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Ah, you don't know. I have changed. I've grown up, suddenly. It
+couldn't be otherwise," she answered very seriously. "At one time it
+looked a certainty that I should be sent to gaol, and the suspense
+was&mdash;well, almost unbearable. No one can tell what it meant to have to
+appear indifferent and confident, when I knew that any moment might be
+my last in freedom. That danger seemed to pass away, but only to give
+way to worse."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You mean this&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes," she broke in with a quick nod. "I can't bear even to hear his
+name mentioned. I soon knew what his real object was; he has a friend,
+a man like himself, who is in command of one of the concentration
+camps: the one at Krustadt: and&mdash;but you can guess. There was only one
+thing for me to do, and I prepared for it. I have the poison upstairs."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No woman can go through such an ordeal and come out unchanged. I
+should have made a fight for it, of course. I told Rosa, and, although
+she was horrified at first, she saw it afterwards, and then she got
+Herr Feldmann to get me an identification card as Hans Bulich, and
+helped me get the disguise. I should have gone by now, if you hadn't
+come. Oh yes, I'm changed; no one knows how much except myself."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The drawn intentness of her expression at the moment showed this so
+plainly that I was too much moved to find any words to reply. But she
+rallied quickly and laughed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And then when you came I was mad enough to believe you were a spy! I
+can't think why I was such a fool. There was no excuse; not the
+slightest; and I don't expect you ever to forgive me really."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't blame you. I don't, on my honour."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, I shall never forgive myself then. But&mdash;even now I can't help
+staring at you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Stare away. I like it. But why?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're so&mdash;so utterly different."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"In every way possible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Think so. Every way?" Our eyes met and she looked down.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wonder," she murmured under her breath; and then quickly in a louder
+tone: "Of course it's your new life. Tell me about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We both understood; but that wasn't the time to tell her she need not
+"wonder"; so I spoke about things at the Front.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I want your own experiences, Jack," she protested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm Herr Lassen, the man without a memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're just as provoking as ever. You know that I'm dying to hear
+everything, and you won't utter a word."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It was all your doing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She crinkled her forehead in a way I knew so well. "How?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you remember one day at Hendon&mdash;we were engaged then, by the
+by&mdash;how you ragged me about not having the pluck to go up and about
+cricket being so much safer a sport, and how I flung away in a huff and
+marched off and got a ticket at once and went up. That was the start."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And I remember, too, what a fright it gave me when I saw you go. I
+watched the aeroplane with my heart in my mouth all the time in a sort
+of fascinated panic lest something should go wrong."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And when I came to look for you I found you'd gone up too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't suppose I meant you to crow over me, do you? And was that
+really the beginning?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course. I went up lots of times afterwards and got to like it; and
+when the trouble came, naturally I saw it was my job."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Be a pal, and tell me all about what you did," she coaxed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All in good time, but not now. We've been alone together quite long
+enough to set tongues wagging as it is. I'd better be off;" and I rose.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I suppose you're right; but it's been lovely. Like old times."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Which old times?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Never mind. Don't be inquisitive."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right. Well, look here. Go on with that boy part of yours. Get
+into the skin of it, and have the names of things pat on your tongue.
+One never knows what may happen. And if you could persuade Rosa to
+persuade Feldmann to do for me what he did for you, do so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sounds a bit mixed, doesn't it?" and she laughed with such genuine
+merriment that it did one good to hear her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must sort it out. So long. We'll pull it off somehow or other."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think that's the oddest thing about you. You manage somehow to make
+me feel absolutely confident that you'll manage it. It's like a
+miracle. Only a day or two ago I was right down in the depths, and here
+I am laughing as if it were just one of our old kiddish pranks."
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap13"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XIII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+IN THE THIERGARTEN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The confidence of success which Nessa had so frankly expressed, she had
+certainly imparted to me. The fact that she had already hit on the idea
+of playing a boy's part in the attempt to escape, had obtained
+everything necessary for it, and had actually spent some time in
+rehearsing it, was a stroke of such luck, that I was more than half
+inclined to throw the other plans over and adopt that one at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If by any means the necessary identification card could be got, the
+hope of success was strong and full of promise. Nessa could speak
+German quite as well as I could, and her accent, when she had put that
+question to me about the fag and her wonderful change of expression,
+had been done to the life.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She had always been a clever character actress, and there was no doubt
+that she could keep it up in any sort of emergency. That she liked the
+idea, there was no question; and as for myself&mdash;the thought of such a
+companionship with her in such a venture pulled like a 200 h.p. engine.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her instinct was right, too, in chiming with her inclination. It was
+our best chance&mdash;failing old von Gratzen's, of course. Ever so much
+better than risking any trouble for Rosa by using her passport.
+Feldmann must be made to see that, for it might induce him to get the
+card for me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That night I went most carefully into all the details of the plan,
+trying to foresee all that might happen; and then I remembered the
+story which Gunter, my pal in the flying corps, had told me of his
+escape when engine trouble had brought him down inside the German lines.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's only a matter of bluff, Jack," he said, "when one can jabber the
+lingo as we can, and a few simple precautions. Here's one of 'em. I
+never go up without it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the dickens is it?" I asked as he handed me what looked like a
+red flannel pad for his tummy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks innocent, doesn't it? My 'tummy pad,' I call it. Just a
+protection against chills, eh? That's what they thought when they
+searched me. But inside the flannel there's a coil of silk cord long
+enough and strong enough to tie up a man's arms, and his legs too at
+need. It's my own notion; and since my little trip, I've added
+something more. Sewn up in the flannel there's enough put-you-to-by-by
+stuff to keep a man or two quiet for as long as necessary. If I'd had
+that, I shouldn't have had to risk knocking my guard on the head and
+choking the breath out of him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Tell me, Dick."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, my chance came almost as soon as they'd got me. Of course I
+burnt the old bus and shoved my hands up, and after they'd made sure I
+wasn't armed, they just put one chap in charge of me with orders to
+take me somewhere. It was quite dark then and, pretending that I was
+beastly uncomfortable after the search, I fiddled about with my clothes
+and managed to get my cord handy. Then I picked a suitable spot, asked
+him some fool question or other, and went for him. He was only a fat
+Landsturmer and hadn't more than a few wriggles in him; but I had to
+bash him over the head to make sure&mdash;that's where I wanted the dope, of
+course. Then I changed togs with him, trussed him up with my cord and
+started off on my own. Bluff did the rest, all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But what did you do, old dear?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed and lit another cigarette. "I marched into the first cottage
+I came to, scared the folk out of their lives, and in the name of
+Kaiser Bill commandeered clothes for a wounded prisoner. They parted
+like a lamb, and five minutes afterwards I was transformed into a
+workman."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But you'd no identification card?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This brought another quiet laugh. "I worked that all right. There are
+no asses in the world too bad to bluff if you go the right way about
+it. My way was to go to the police. I pitched a yarn that I was an aero
+mechanic and had been sent for to go hotfoot to Ellendorff, a little
+place close to the Dutch frontier where I knew there was a factory, and
+that I'd been waylaid and robbed on the road. It sounds thin as I tell
+it; but I had mucked myself up to look the part, and, above all, I had
+gone to the police, mind you; itself the best proof that I wasn't a
+wrong 'un: and I chose the middle of the night, when only one sleepy
+owl was on duty. He swallowed it all right, except that he thought I
+was drunk and at first wanted to keep me till the morning; but when I
+kicked up a fuss, told him he'd get into a devil of a row, and said
+he'd better call his boss, he thought better of it, gave me what I
+wanted and was thankful to see my back and go to sleep again. I had no
+more trouble; was stopped once or twice, but the card got me through;
+and I reached the frontier easily enough. Luck favoured me there. I ran
+across a couple of deserters, palled up with them, and&mdash;well, that's
+all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Gunter's story had made a big impression on me at the time, and in my
+old student days at Göttingen I had had quite enough experiences of the
+power of a good bluff on the average German official to know that it
+was quite feasible, so I resolved to profit by it now.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had plenty of time the next day to complete all the necessary
+preparations and added a few of my own devising. These were some "iron
+rations," in case of difficulties about our food supply; two or three
+tools, including a heavy spanner which would serve as a weapon at need;
+and a shabby suit case to hold everything.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I packed everything into this, lifted a board under the lino in my
+bathroom, and hid it there, lest any one in my absence might take a
+fancy to go through my luggage.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With a road map and a railway guide the route to be taken was soon
+decided. The Dutch frontier was to be the goal. It was much nearer than
+the Swiss; and as Westphalia was the region of factories, it was much
+more plausible that a couple of mechanics would travel that way, than
+in any other direction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Gunter's mention of the one at Ellendorff, a village near Lingen, and
+close to the frontier, suggested a good objective; and the rough idea
+was to make the journey in stages, so as to put people off the scent
+should suspicion be roused. It was safer than risking a trip in one of
+the through expresses, and also much easier to book from small towns
+than right through from Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+All this took up a lot of time, especially as it was interrupted by
+several spells of speculation about the result of Nessa's interview
+with von Gratzen. This was very important, as it would probably
+determine the method of our departure; and when my preparations were
+completed and I was carefully reconsidering them over a cigarette, some
+one knocked at the door of my flat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a stranger; a well-dressed, sharp-featured man and unmistakably
+a Jew. "Herr Lassen?" he asked. I nodded. "My name is Rudolff."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It would be better for me to tell you my business privately," he
+replied, with a gesture toward a couple of people passing on the stairs.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I took him into my sitting-room with an extremely uncomfortable notion
+that he was from the police.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am in a position to do you a considerable service, Herr Lassen," he
+said, squinting curiously round the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who sent you to me and how did you know where to find me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your arrival in the city is scarcely a secret, and I obtained your
+address from your friends in the Karlstrasse. No one sent me to you,
+sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He wasn't from the police. That was a relief, and nothing else
+mattered. "And the service you spoke of?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will not be surprised to hear that a number of people wish to find
+you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As it's been easy for you, would it be difficult for them?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not so difficult as you might desire, perhaps. I say that because you
+appear somewhat to resent my visit. If that is really the case, of
+course I will go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care whether you go or stop; but if you've anything that you
+think worth telling, tell it. I'll listen. I presume you haven't come
+out of mere philanthropy, by the way."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I have not. I make no pretence of the sort. If the warning I can give
+you is worth anything, I am not so rich as to throw money away."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Out with it then." It was not only curiosity which prompted me to
+listen. It was probable that he was going to tell me some lurid
+incident of Lassen's past, and it was just as well to hear it. It was
+also quite possible that after all he might come from von Gratzen with
+the object of catching me tripping. His question suggested that.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was at Göttingen, I believe, that you made the acquaintance of
+Adolf Gossen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I dare say, but I don't remember anything about it,"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Ah, of course. You are the man without a memory. I have heard of your
+misfortune," he said, with a sly suggestive glance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And doubt it, eh? Well, suppose you get on with the story?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He took the hint, and it turned out to be about the same pretty affair
+von Erstein had made so much of. It seemed, according to my visitor,
+that some one was in prison because of it; that his friends, whose
+names he gave, were furious; that they were looking high and low for
+me; and that if I remained in Berlin they would find me and wreak their
+vengeance in any way that came handy. He declared he knew where to find
+them and they were prepared to pay for the information of my
+whereabouts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The thing was either a palpable plant or this fellow had come from von
+Erstein to try and frighten me out of the city.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course you mean that if I don't pay you, you will go to them?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not at all, sir," he cried, with a fine show of indignation. "I know
+these people to be scoundrels; they have treated me villainously; I
+have merely come to warn you. You can act upon it or not, of course.
+That is entirely a matter for you;" and to my surprise he got up
+without asking a mark for his news. "I have done all that I can do by
+coming."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know anything about the affair, as I told you, but I'm very
+much obliged to you;" and I took out my pocket-book as a hint.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pardon me, sir," he exclaimed, flourishing his hands as if the sight
+of banknotes was an abomination, and shaking his head vigorously. "I
+could not think of accepting any money after what you have said. Good
+afternoon;" and he was still gesturing at the shock of the idea when he
+left the flat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was so extremely unnatural for a German Jew that it prompted
+suspicion. He had probably meant this pecuniary shyness as a startling
+proof of his honesty of purpose and general integrity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That wasn't the effect it produced, however. It rather served to
+confirm the previous thought that von Erstein had sent him to scare me.
+That the brute would do almost anything to see my back was a certainty,
+of course; and then an odd notion flitted across my thoughts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Whether it would be worth while to appear to tumble into the trap; go
+to him in the very dickens of a funk; make him believe my one object
+was to fly the country, in disguise, to Holland preferably; and get him
+to procure the necessary permit, etc. The possibility of hoisting him
+with his own petard looked good; and the thought of his chagrin when he
+discovered that he had helped me to take Nessa out of his clutches made
+the scheme positively alluring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That it could be done, there was little doubt, and equally none that he
+could get the necessary papers; but the price to pay for them was too
+stiff. To have anything to do with such a mongrel was unthinkable so
+long as any other course was open; so I abandoned it until every other
+means had been tried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The pressing question now was the result of Nessa's interview with von
+Gratzen, and I set off for the Karlstrasse to hear about it. This time
+the door was opened by the girl Marie; so I concluded that Gretchen had
+either bolted or been sent about her business as the result of the
+previous day's affair. Marie told me no one was at home and that Rosa
+had gone with Nessa and Lottchen to the Thiergarten.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I soon found them; and Rosa played the part of the good fairy and kept
+the child with her while Nessa told me the news.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"First let me tell you the good news," she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean that the other's bad then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do have a little patience. The main thing is that Rosa has induced
+Herr Feldmann to say where we can get the things you want. Isn't that
+splendid?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, if you are able to get away with me; and that may depend on what
+passed to-day. Is it all right?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You might as well ask me a riddle in Russian. Frankly I don't know
+what to make of it. Of course it was to see Baron von Gratzen that I
+had to go to the Amtstrasse. He seemed all right, but&mdash;&mdash;" and she
+shrugged her shoulders and frowned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's just the impression he always leaves on me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He was awfully kind in his manner; but it was lucky you warned me to
+be careful, for he kept popping in some question about you just when I
+wasn't expecting it, and whether I gave you away I can't say. I don't
+think I did; but then I'm not at all sure he didn't see that I was
+fencing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What did he talk about?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, he told me first that some one had declared I was really a spy;
+asked why I had stopped so long here? Didn't I want to go home? and so
+on. Of course that was all easy enough; but I think he was only trying
+to let me get over my nervousness; for, of course, I was awfully
+nervous; and at last he said he believed my story entirely, in fact
+that he knew it was the truth; that I wasn't to worry; that I need only
+report myself once a week; that it was the merest formality; and that
+probably I should never have to do it all, as he was pretty sure I
+should be sent home before the first day for reporting arrived."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And was that all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather not; only the preface; and, mind you, he hadn't said a word
+about you up to then, not even mentioned your name."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What came next then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He asked me to talk about England and the English, saying that he had
+been there a lot and knew heaps of people; and then you came into the
+picture."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did he ask about me, do you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you telling the story or am I?" and she rallied me with a smile
+which was good to see. She was much more like the Nessa of old times,
+was in good spirits, and had thrown off much of the worrying load of
+depression. "I don't know whether you've done it, but to-day somehow I
+can't take things seriously."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's as it should be; but how did he bring me in?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, he was either acting better than I could or he was perfectly
+sincere. What he did was to talk about people, mentioning a lot of
+names and asking me whether I knew any of them, and in the most casual
+tone in the world out popped yours."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Lassen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course not; your own, Lancaster."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Phew! That's a caution, if you like. What did you say?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She laughed softly. "I think I was one too many for him then. You see
+he'd prepared the ground in a way by mentioning people I'd never heard
+of, so I just shook my head, then pretended to think and said I wasn't
+sure that my mother had not known some Lancasters. He'd been so decent,
+that that seemed easier than just lying outright. He was eager for more
+and asked me to try and remember, as he had a very particular reason
+for being interested in them; but that looked dangerous, so I thought
+it best not to remember anything else Lancastrian."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't rush me. I could tell that I was over that bridge all right; but
+it was only the first. After a bit he brought up Jimmy Lamb's name, and
+I laughed and clapped my hands and said he was my brother-in-law. Why,
+what's the matter? Was that wrong?" she cried, noticing my frown.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps not, but it was Jimmy's passport I was to use, and he's
+supposed to have gone down in the <i>Burgen</i>. It won't matter,
+probably."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd forgotten all about that. No wonder he was interested and poured a
+volley of questions into me about him. But that was all safe enough,
+because I haven't heard a word about Jimmy since I've been here, and
+naturally couldn't tell him anything. One of them was whether Jimmy
+knew the Lancasters, by the by. And I can see why he asked it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Unpleasantly ominous, this; since it was clear he was trying to
+establish the connection between me and Jimmy. "And after that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Butter wouldn't have melted in his mouth. He asked me about you as
+Lassen; safe ground again: and wound up by thanking me for having
+answered his questions so frankly; declared he was quite satisfied, and
+then, as I told you, said he would use his influence to see that I went
+home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Anything about our going together?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. He said it might not be well for me to travel alone and asked if
+there was any one who could see me to the frontier."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You didn't suggest me?" I broke in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Really, Herr Lassen! Do you think every English girl is a fool? I
+suggested Herr Feldmann. He shook his head, murmuring something about
+his being unable to get away; and then came the only thing that really
+scared me. 'Of course you could go in the care of some of our people,
+but it would be better not, perhaps; so difficult to spare our folks
+just now;'&mdash;all that in a sort of meditative tone, and then with a
+change which in some way altered his very features, he fixed me with a
+look which seemed to pierce like red-hot gimlets into my very brain and
+read every thought in it, and asked me to suggest some one else. I
+positively shrivelled up inside, if you know what I mean; felt like a
+fish on the end of a fork thrust suddenly into a blazing fire. I don't
+know what I said or did. It must have mesmerized me, I suppose. I think
+I shook my head and stammered out that I didn't know of any one else;
+but I can't be certain. All I clearly remember is a feeling of intense
+relief when his eyes left mine, and I heard him say something about
+seeing to the matter. I never felt anything like it in my life before;
+and if I gave you away, it was then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've had a look from him like that and can understand how it made you
+feel. That's why I can't place the man. Hullo, look! There come his
+wife and daughter with the Countess. We'd better join up. Won't do to
+let them think we're too thick;" and we quickened up to Rosa as the
+others reached the spot, and all stood chatting. Presently Lottchen
+drew me aside from the rest, declaring that she never saw anything of
+me now, and after a moment, Nita, attracted by the child's loveliness,
+joined us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I said something or other which made them both laugh, and just as the
+others turned round and looked at us, I had the surprise of my life.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A good-looking woman was passing, holding a tot of a kid by the hand;
+she glanced at me, stopped dead with a look of profound astonishment,
+paused to stare, hands clenched and pressed to her bosom, eyes wide,
+mouth agape, and every feature set as rigid as stone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Johann!" little more than a whisper at first, and then loudly,
+"Johann!" and without more ado she rushed up, flung her arms round my
+neck, and burst into a flood of passionate sobs mingled with equally
+passionate terms of affection.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap14"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XIV
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+ANNA HILDEN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+"Johann! Johann! Oh, my dearest! Oh, thank God I have found you at
+last! Oh, my long lost darling!" raved the woman ecstatically, while
+her child ran up and clung to my coat, calling, "Papa! Papa!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A pleasant situation considering the circumstances and the fact that a
+number of other people, attracted by the woman's hysterics, began to
+cluster round us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nita and Lottchen scurried back to our group; the two elder women were
+looking both scandalized and disgusted; and Nessa bent over Lottchen,
+scarcely able to conceal her laughter. Fortunately Rosa kept her head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Giving me first a look of scornful indignation, she said something to
+her mother and the whole group moved away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The woman's outburst of hysterical passion had quieted by then, and she
+just let her head rest upon my shoulder, feasting her rather fine eyes
+upon my face with languishing rapture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My first thought was that she was a lunatic; so I tried to unclasp her
+embrace. Gently at first, but then with considerable strength, for she
+resisted stoutly. Next I observed that for all her hysterical sobbing,
+her eyes were scarcely moist; a fact which put quite a different
+interpretation on the affair.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We don't want a scene here," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This had comparatively little effect and she tried to wrest her hands
+away and begin the embracing over again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If we have any more of this, I shall call the police," I said sharply.
+This did the business. After a moment she grew less demonstrative,
+making a great to-do in the effort to check her agitation, and allowed
+me to lead her away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+While we were shaking off the crowd there was time to study her and try
+to get a glimmer of the meaning of it all. Now that the hysterics were
+over, she appeared to be less emotional than perplexed. She kept her
+eyes on the ground, evidently thinking intently and taking no notice of
+the child at all, who was as unconcerned as if she didn't belong to the
+picture, except that once or twice she glanced up at the woman, as if
+wondering what to do and looking for a lead.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A thought of the truth occurred to me and made me look more searchingly
+than ever at the woman's side face. Two things struck me at once. She
+was older than I had believed; a little make-up cunningly concealed
+some wrinkles, and a touch of rouge on the cheek helped to account for
+my mistake about her age; and closer inspection revealed some lines of
+grease paint close to her hair.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I put her down then as a second-rate actress, and her over-acting in
+the embracing scene suggested corroboration. How the ordinary woman
+would behave on discovering her long lost lover or husband may be a
+question; but she certainly wouldn't shed tears which were carefully
+tearless out of the fear that they would spoil her make-up. It was
+obviously a plant.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That wasn't altogether a comforting reflection, however. My loss of
+memory made it impossible to expose her, for the simple reason that any
+story she might choose to tell could not be contradicted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now I should like to know what all this means," I began when we were
+free from inquisitive lookers-on.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you pretend you don't recognize me?" she asked, turning her big
+blue eyes on me with a pathetic wistfulness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you pretend that I ought to?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why did you desert me? Oh, how could you, Johann?" she wailed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't even know what you mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, but you must; you must. You loved me so; at least you swore you
+did, over and over again," she cried. "Oh, don't tell me you've
+forgotten me. I could bear anything but that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This suggested von Gratzen. It was just the sort of scheme which would
+appeal to such a wily old beggar to trap me into admission. "Who are
+you?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She clapped her hands to her face and looked like starting hysterics
+again. "Oh, you must know. You must. You can't have forgotten me! You
+can't!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps your name will help me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With a very overdone theatrical gesture she stopped and stared at me
+and looked distracted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm&mdash;Anna. Your Anna."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"<i>My</i> Anna? I didn't know I had one;" and she clapped her hands to
+her face again, but not quickly enough to hide her expression, which
+looked uncommonly like a smile. "And the surname?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hilden, of course," she said after a pause without looking up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This gave the clue. It was not von Gratzen's scheme but von Erstein's.
+I remembered our interview; his persistent attempt to test my memory;
+his story of Anna Hilden; his genuine anger when I had not recollected
+her; and then the sudden change of manner which had been so puzzling.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He had put her up to play the part of the ruined maiden and had
+probably planned the melodramatic scene which had just taken place,
+knowing that, unless at the same time I gave myself away, I could not
+expose her. It was cunning, and put me in a beast of a mess. There
+seemed only one course&mdash;to prevail on the woman to admit the truth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can see for yourself that this has taken me entirely by surprise,"
+I said after a pause. "I had a very tough time of it a few weeks ago;
+the ship I was in was blown up and the explosion caused me to lose my
+memory entirely. What you have said may be absolutely true; although to
+me it seems impossible. What do you wish me to do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I want my rights," she replied, after a slight pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, we can scarcely discuss things here. Where do you live?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"In the Kammerplatz. 268g. No, I mean 286g;" making the correction in
+some confusion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Curious that she could not remember the right number; looked as if she
+had only just gone there for this special business. "Shall we go
+there?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She found the question unnecessarily embarrassing, hesitated and
+glanced at the child with a frown of perplexity. "I can't go home yet.
+I was just taking my little darling to some friends."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was certainly not a good actress, or she would never have implied
+that it was more important to take the child to some friends than to
+have an explanation with the false lover discovered after long years.
+"When then?" I asked, concluding that the child had been borrowed for
+the show and was to be returned with thanks at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come there in an hour," she said after thinking. "You won't escape me
+again, for I know where to find you now," she added with a toss of the
+head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall not try. Here's my address;" and I scribbled it on a card.
+"I'll turn up all right. I'm only too interested in what you've said
+and wish to know all you can tell me about it. I'll do the right thing
+by you, Anna;" and I held out my hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She hesitated a second and then shook hands, her look showing that my
+words had impressed her favourably and also perplexed her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I spent the interval in the Thiergarten thinking over the whole
+unpleasant incident: the probable effect upon those who had witnessed
+it, and the line to take in the coming interview.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It would serve one good turn at any rate. Von Gratzen would hear all
+about it from his wife and it ought to put an end to his suspicions. If
+the woman I had ruined could identify me as the result of a chance
+meeting, he could scarcely fail to regard it as a mighty strong
+corroboration of the Lassen theory.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Both Rosa and Nessa would of course know that the story, even if it
+were true, had nothing to do with me, and what the Countess herself
+thought didn't amount to anything. The main point was what would happen
+if the woman stuck to it and how far she was prepared to go. That would
+probably depend upon the inducements or pressure brought to bear by von
+Erstein; and judging the man, pressure was the more likely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It would be easy enough to knock the bottom out of the scheme by
+bringing the police into it; her nervousness at the mention of them had
+shown that plainly. But that wouldn't suit me. The less the police had
+to meddle with my affairs, the better. No doubt an inquiry agent could
+soon get at the truth so far as the woman herself was concerned; and if
+she proved obdurate, that might be the best course. But obviously the
+quickest and best solution would be to get the woman herself to own up;
+and that must be the first line of attack.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her answer to my question what she wished me to do, suggested an idea.
+She wanted her "rights," as she phrased it; and clearly the
+straightforward course was to offer them. "Rights" meant marriage; and
+she was likely to feel in a deuce of a stew if I agreed to marry her.
+The farce of it was quite to my liking. To appear to force her into
+such a marriage with a man she had never seen in her life was rich, and
+at the same time good policy, as it would impress her with my honesty
+of purpose.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I kept the appointment punctually and found her rather breathless and
+flurried. It was a mean little flat; had evidently been hastily got
+ready; and the number of things still littered about the room, told
+that I had arrived in the middle of her efforts to get it in order.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She looked far less presentable without her hat and things. She was an
+untidy person, anything but clean, and made the mistake of trying to
+explain away the confusion and disorder in the place.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't really believe you'd come, or I'd have had the place tidier.
+When any one has to struggle alone for a living in these times, there
+isn't much chance of keeping the home right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Still I can see you've been doing your best."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I always have to," she replied with a quick, half-suspicious glance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You have a hard struggle?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hard enough."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Anything and everything I can, of course. It's hard work."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her hands offered no evidence of this, however. "Well, we must try to
+make things easier for you, Anna. Now let us talk it over."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll wash my hands first and tidy up a bit," and she went into the
+adjoining room, where I heard her moving some furniture into place.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This gave an opportunity of scrutinizing the mean little sitting-room,
+and one fact was instantly apparent. There was not a single thing to
+suggest that a child had even set foot in it. On the floor close to the
+shabby sofa was a partly open leather bag; much too good and expensive
+to be in keeping with the rest, and a glance into it revealed a number
+of dressing-table fitments, also much better than a struggling working
+woman would be at all likely to own.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She had forgotten this in her confusion at my arrival and presently
+came out to fetch it, still in the untidy slovenly dress. "I won't be a
+minute, now," she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But several minutes passed before she returned, wearing now a
+well-fitting coat and skirt and cosmeticed much as she had been when we
+had met first.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I try to keep my head above water, you see," she said, to account for
+her good clothes, no doubt.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I smiled approval and got to business. "First let me ask you whether
+you are absolutely certain I am the man you think."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you think I should have made that fuss to-day if I wasn't? Why do
+you ask such a question?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I don't remember anything whatever of it, and to me you are an
+absolute stranger. Just tell me everything about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her story was in its essence that which von Erstein had told me,
+repeated as if she had got it up much as she would have studied her
+part in a play. She was not very perfect in it, and there were just
+those verbal slips and trips which one may hear in a badly rehearsed
+play on the first night of production. Moreover, apart from her lines
+she was hopelessly muddled and had either been very badly coached about
+details or her memory was little better than my assumed one.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She judged by my looks that her story shocked me, and I sat a long time
+frowning as if lost in thought. "It seems absolutely inconceivable!" I
+exclaimed at length with a deep sigh. "Absolutely inconceivable that I
+could have treated you in this way; and only&mdash;how long ago was it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You came straight to Hanover from Göttingen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What was I doing there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know? At least, you were always so close you would never tell
+me anything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You saw a great deal of me, of course?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, naturally. I wasn't going to marry a man I never saw, I suppose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, no, of course not. Oh dear, to think of it all!" I put a few more
+questions which she could easily answer, and when she was growing more
+glibly at ease I asked: "And how old is the child?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Eh? I don't know. Oh yes, I do, of course. Pops was nine last
+birthday."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nine!" I exclaimed. I might well be astonished, for they had muddled
+this part of the thing hopelessly. The child I had seen in the
+Thiergarten wasn't a day more than six, probably younger even. "Where
+was she born?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This rattled her. "What does it matter where she was born, so long as
+she was born somewhere," she said, flushing so vividly that it showed
+under her rouge. Clearly she did not know where "our child" was
+supposed to have been born. "What does matter is what you're going to
+do about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's only one thing any honourable man would think of doing, Anna.
+I shall make you my wife at once," I cried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her amazement was a sheer delight. It was so complete that she didn't
+know what to do or say and just stared at me open-eyed. "I didn't say I
+wanted that, did I?" she stammered at length.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's the child, Anna; and neither you nor I can afford to think of
+our own wishes;" and in proof of my moral duty in the circumstances, I
+delivered a lecture on the necessity of freeing the child from the
+stain of its birth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This gave her time to pull herself together. "Are you in earnest?" she
+asked when I finished.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hold the strongest views in such cases. The best plan will be for me
+to arrange about the marriage at once, to-day indeed; and probably
+to-morrow or the next day we can be married."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I&mdash;&mdash;" She pulled up suddenly. It looked as if she was going to
+protest she wouldn't marry a man she'd never seen before. "I'd like to
+think about it," she substituted uneasily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But why any need to think? You showed this afternoon how bitterly you
+resented my desertion and, unless you were play-acting, how much you
+still care for me. So why delay when I am willing? It is true that I
+can't pretend to care for you as I used, but it may all come back again
+to me. We'll hope so, at any rate."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But you're engaged to that rich cousin of yours, aren't you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was a good example of her slip-shod methods. As she knew that, she
+knew also where to have found me of course, so that the little
+melodramatic recognition scene in the Thiergarten had been a mere
+picturesque superfluity. I let it pass and replied gravely: "I should
+not allow that engagement to interfere with my duty to you, Anna."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must have changed a lot, then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope I have, if you're not really mistaken about my being the man
+you think. But I'll go and see about our wedding;" and I rose.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Wait a bit," she cried, flustered and perplexed. "I didn't expect you
+to&mdash;to give in quite so&mdash;quite like this," she added, laughing
+nervously. "It isn't a bit like I was led&mdash;what I expected. Do you mean
+really and truly that you're ready to marry me straight off like this?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With all the earnestness I could command I gave her the assurance. "I
+pledge you my sacred word of honour that if I've treated you as you say
+I'll marry you as soon as it can be done." A perfectly safe and sincere
+pledge.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This frightened her. The affair had taken a much more serious turn than
+she had expected. "You&mdash;you've taken my breath away almost," was how
+she put it; and she sat twisting and untwisting her fingers nervously,
+not in the least seeing how to meet the unexpected difficulty. "I must
+have time to think it over," she said at length.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I don't know; but it's&mdash;it's so sudden."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's, the child, Anna," I reminded her again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, bother the child. I mean I'm thinking of myself." This hurriedly,
+as she turned to stare out of the window. "Do you know the sort of life
+I've been living?" she asked in a low voice without looking round.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Whatever it is, it must be my fault, and I don't care what you've been
+doing. I drove you to it. There's our child, remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was another long silence as she stood at the window. Her laboured
+breathing, the clenched hands, and spasmodic movements of her shoulders
+evidenced some great agitation. If it was mere acting she was a far
+better actress than she had yet shown herself. And the change in her
+looks when at last she turned to me proved her emotion to be genuine.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're a white man right through, and I'm only dirt compared to you,"
+she cried tensely. "Look here, I've lied about that kid. She isn't
+yours, or mine either for that matter. What do you say to that?" and
+she flung her head back challengingly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only that I know it already, her age made it impossible. But it makes
+no difference to the wrong I did you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you still mean you'd marry me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I mean every letter of the pledge I gave you just now, child or no
+child," I answered in the same earnest tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My God!" she exclaimed ecstatically, throwing her hands up wildly, and
+then bursting into tears. "And they told me you were a scoundrel!" She
+was quite overcome, dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+The tears were genuine enough, for when she looked up they had made
+little runlets in the rouge and powder.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well?" I asked presently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not fit to be the wife of a man like you," she stammered through
+her sobs. "I'm dirt to you; just dirt. If more men were like you
+there'd be less women like me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Had the moment come to push for her confession? It looked like it; but
+it seemed cowardly to take advantage of her remorse and distress
+produced by my own trickery.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Go away now, please," she said after a long interval.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But how do we stand, Anna?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know. I can't think. I can't do anything. Only that if I'd
+known&mdash;&mdash; Oh, for Heaven's sake go away, or I shall say&mdash;&mdash; Oh, do go!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is there anything else you would like to tell me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Yes. I don't know. Only leave me alone now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I'll come to-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, not to-morrow. The next day. Give me time. I must have time," she
+cried wildly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I hesitated. In her present condition it would have been easy to
+frighten her into admitting everything; but somehow I couldn't bring
+myself to do it, so I left her.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap15"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XV
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+A NIGHT ATTACK
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The success of my bluffing offer to marry the woman prompted some
+regret that the matter had not been pushed home to the point of
+obtaining her full confession; and it was to prove one of those
+disastrous blunders which come from decent motives.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had scarcely left her before I began to see the thing clearly. It had
+not been difficult to persuade her, but there was von Erstein. He was
+not likely to believe in any readiness to marry, and would soon be able
+to talk her round to his view. In that case I might whistle for a
+confession.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+All the same I had not come empty away. She had admitted the lie about
+"our child," and he couldn't talk that away. Moreover, it was still
+possible to set inquiries on foot and get the truth that way. It was
+all to the good that her impression of me was so favourable. There was
+no acting or humbug about that, and it remained to see the result. It
+was fairly certain that she would have little desire to carry the
+scheme any farther.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In the meantime what were the others thinking? Nessa had laughed at the
+business in the Thiergarten; but there was more than a joke in it, even
+when one knew the truth. Both she and Rosa would be very curious to
+learn what had followed, so I went to see them at once and found them
+all talking about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The Countess was shocked and very distressed. "It was such a scandal,
+Johann; and to happen in such a spot and with the von Gratzens there,"
+she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I need not tell you how sorry I am, aunt."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That wasn't Johann's fault, mother," said Rosa. "He couldn't prevent
+the woman choosing such a public place and acting as she did."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why do you say choosing, Rosa? You don't imagine she expected to meet
+Johann there, do you? What happened after we left?" she asked me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My impression is that she did choose the place, aunt. I had a talk
+with her and afterwards saw her at her flat."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But surely there can't be a scrap of truth in it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How can I say? Most emphatically I don't remember her nor a thing she
+told me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What did she tell you, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, her eyes twinkling.
+"Of course we're all anxious to hear&mdash;if you don't mind telling us,
+that is."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't mind in the least. It's not a nice story;" and I told them as
+shortly as possible. Nessa had to hide her face from the Countess when
+I spoke of my offer of marriage, and Rosa covered her laughter under a
+pretence of indignation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You seem to have forgotten our engagement very easily, Johann!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh no. She reminded me of it; but of course she has the first claim."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Indeed!" she cried, tossing her head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But her mother took it seriously. "I think you were right, Johann, and
+I'm thankful you had sufficient manly spirit," she declared, making me
+feel no end of a hypocrite.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And when are you to be married, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, with
+mischief in look and tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is not yet definitely settled."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And your child?" chipped Rosa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There was a mistake there. She admitted afterwards that the child is
+neither hers nor mine."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Admitted that!" exclaimed the Countess with more indignation than I
+thought she was capable of feeling. "Do you mean to tell us that she
+was brazen-faced enough to confess such a thing? She must be a regular
+baggage and you must be mad to think of marrying her! I never heard
+such a thing in all my life."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She wasn't exactly brazen-faced when she told me, Aunt Olga. I think
+she was rather affected by my offer; and as an honourable man&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Honourable fiddlesticks, Johann! Don't talk rubbish. She's an
+impostor, nothing else; and I shall go to my lawyer in the morning and
+tell him to inform the police."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa came to the rescue then. "Unless you want to get Johann into
+serious trouble, you won't do that, mother. You've often worried
+because I didn't wish to marry him, and I haven't told you the real
+reason; but you had better know it now. The woman's story about the
+sale of secret information is true. You may not remember it, Johann;
+but I have a couple of letters of yours in which you more than half
+admit it, and that it was the reason why you fled the country and never
+intended to come back."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rosa!" cried the dear old lady in deep distress. "Is that true,
+Johann?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Unfortunately, I can't say either yes or no, Aunt Olga."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll get the letters," said Rosa, and she fetched them and read the
+portions out to us. "You can see it's his handwriting;" and she gave
+the letters to her mother, who glanced at them and then handed them to
+me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know the writing, of course," I said. "I don't believe I could
+even copy it. I'm in the pothook stage still." It was a small,
+curiously wriggling fist, difficult to decipher, but easily identified
+by any one who had ever seen it. And the Countess knew it well.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What had I better do, Johann?" she appealed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I leave that to you. I hope I am incapable of anything of the sort
+now; but if I did it, I must take the consequences."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There is only one thing to do, mother; and that is, nothing. You don't
+want Johann to be shot, I suppose," said Rosa sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't, Rosa!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's all very well to say don't; but that's what will happen if you
+insist on stirring this dirty water."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But you wouldn't have him marry such a woman, child!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps he'd rather do even that than be shot," was the retort.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was cruel, but effective; and after a few more words her mother gave
+in and went away, distressed to the point of tears.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd rather have had you tell her the whole truth than grieve her like
+that, Rosa," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Possibly, but I wouldn't. You don't know mother, and I do. It was
+necessary to frighten her or she would have spread the story broadcast.
+I'll go and make it all right presently."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you believe this story about your cousin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I know it's true, and so does Oscar. He told me the moment we heard
+Johann was coming back."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But he was coming back in spite of it," pointed out Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because of his spy work, Nessa. He was a born spy. He wormed out a lot
+of things in America; and the Secret Service people, seeing how good he
+was at the work, sent him to England and, after what he found out
+there, told him to come home and promised to overlook the other affair.
+That'll explain why I wasn't overjoyed to see you," she added to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded. "And explain probably why von Gratzen thinks it worth while
+to send me back to England to recover my memory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very possibly&mdash;if he really believes you've lost it, that is. Oscar
+says its the reason, and he ought to know. He laughed at it all; but
+it's no mere laughing matter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better to laugh than worry," said I.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now tell us all about your Anna," said Nessa, who refused to consider
+the thing serious.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I gave them a more detailed account of the interview and answered a
+heap of questions about Anna, describing the change of front she had
+shown, the way in which she had been led to confess about the child,
+and my opinion that von Erstein was at the back of it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall never forget that scene in the Thiergarten to-day," laughed
+Nessa. "You did look so thunderstruck."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing to what I felt, I can tell you. I never felt such a fool in my
+life. Of course I couldn't tell whether she was in earnest or not."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa laughed and was giggling about it all the way home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I couldn't help it. It was so utterly ridiculous, Rosa. Her 'Oh, my
+long lost darling!' was just exquisite. And she did it uncommonly well."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My laughter will have to wait till we're all out of the wood," said
+Rosa; "and there's a long way to go yet."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yours won't, will it?" Nessa asked me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit of it. Let's laugh while we can. But now what about the
+workman's card that I need?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oscar's getting it," replied Rosa. "I told him to lose no time; and
+after this affair to-day, the sooner you're away, the easier I shall
+feel. It's getting on my nerves. I'd better go to mother now and calm
+her down."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We rose and Nessa turned to me with a mischievous smile. "You'll have
+me at the wedding, won't you?" she rallied.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Whose?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why yours, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly. It couldn't take place without you," I replied, laughing,
+but with a look which made her rather sorry she'd chipped me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why not?" asked Rosa stolidly. Her humour was only Teutonic. "You
+don't expect me to be present, I hope?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you say, Miss Caldicott?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, don't be ridiculous. Rosa doesn't understand such stupid jokes.
+Good-night, Herr Lassen." She spoke indifferently, but there was a
+little pressure of the hand which sent me off home feeling mighty
+pleased with myself and thinking a lot more about her than the new
+complications, and so nearly brought me to grief.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a dark night, the streets were deserted, and I was plunging
+along castle-building on the foundation of that hand-pressure when, as
+I was taking a short cut through a square, a drunken man ran up behind,
+and lurched into me. He cursed me for getting in his way, and tried to
+close with me and, before I could shake him off, two others appeared,
+and one of them aimed a blow at my head with his stick.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Luckily there was just time for me to wriggle out of the way and let
+the first man have the benefit of the blow. It caught him full on the
+head, and down he went in a heap. The other two were so astounded by
+this that they hesitated long enough to give me a chance to attack in
+my turn. I went for the ruffian who had struck at me, bashed him under
+the chin hard enough to send him staggering back tripping into the
+gutter, and was ready for number three. But there was no fight left in
+him, and he bolted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His companion in the gutter scrambled to his feet, but his stick had
+flown out of his hand in the fall, and the moment he found he had to
+deal with me alone without it, he also thought discretion safer and ran
+off after the other.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I turned to have a look at the drunken brute who had started the row,
+or rather the robbery, for that seemed to be the meaning of the affair.
+The blow had seemed hard enough to crack his skull; but when I examined
+him I saw that it had not hurt him seriously. I also discovered
+something which told me I had not appreciated the true purpose of the
+attack.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I recognized him at once. He was the fellow who had called on me that
+morning in the name of Rudolff.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was able to get up and walk; shakily, it is true, for he was a good
+deal dazed, and I had to hold him up on the way to my rooms, which were
+close by. The stairs were a difficulty, but we got up somehow, and a
+drink of spirits and a rest soon brought him round sufficiently to talk.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I suppose you were coming to warn me again, Rudolff, eh?" I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He stared stupidly at me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't try to fool me in that silly fashion, my friend. I know too much
+about you. So drop it, or you'll step out of this into the police
+station. You should choose companions who don't blab, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That made him begin to sit up and take notice. "I've been drunk,
+haven't I?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Not too drunk to play the decoy, my man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't understand," he mumbled, shaking his head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right. I haven't time to fool about with your sort. You can try
+that on the police;" and I rose and went to the telephone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Wait a bit," he cried hurriedly. "I'll try to remember things."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Give me the nearest police station," I said into the 'phone, but
+without releasing the receiver.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was enough for him. "Don't bring them here," he said with an oath.
+"I'll tell you all I know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only want one thing. Who put you on to me? Tell me that and you can
+go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried to lie and mentioned a name at random.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're only making a fool of yourself, Rudolff. Lies are no good to
+me. You came here this morning with a yarn which you could only have
+got from one man in Berlin, and I know all about it. You were in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and pointed me out to you know whom I mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It proved a good shot and he squirmed uneasily, although trying a
+feeble sort of denial. "What's the use of lying?" I rapped sternly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know what you mean," he muttered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll soon settle that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Taking the precaution to lock the door I turned to the telephone again
+and asked for von Erstein's number; and after some preliminaries with
+some one I took to be his servant, von Erstein answered me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who is it?" he asked sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Johann Lassen. Hope I haven't disturbed your packing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you want with me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing; I've had quite enough of you already; but there's a friend of
+yours here and he's in a bit of difficulty."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the devil are you driving at? Who is he?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The man you sent here to-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know what you mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh come, that won't do. Anyhow he does, and that's enough for me." I
+tried to pop in the suggestion of a threat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's his name?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You know that without my telling you; I only know what he called
+himself. You don't send men about the place on secret errands without
+knowing their names, do you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, what does he call himself?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rudolff; I don't know who he is now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I never heard of the man, and I've had enough of your tomfoolery."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just as you like. I can deal with him, of course." I heard him swear
+sulphurously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What does he want?" he growled after a pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To keep out of gaol, chiefly, I fancy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, blazes! Can't you speak plainly?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. You see that second little practical joke you fixed up for me
+to-day has missed fire; he's had a crack on the head from one of your
+mutual friends, and I've got him here. After what he told me I rang you
+up to know what you'd like to do about it. As you and I are such pals,
+it didn't seem quite friendly to give him in charge without letting you
+have a chance to tell me your side. See?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I tell you I don't know anything about it;" angrily with an oath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No thoroughfare that way, my beloved."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was no reply; he had apparently rung off. So I used the
+opportunity to impress friend Rudolff and lead him to understand that
+von Erstein had told me everything, and then hung up the receiver,
+paused a moment, and again pretended to call up the police station.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was too much for the man. "What are you going to do?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My friend tells me that he had nothing to do with it, knows nothing
+about you, and that I'd better hand you over to the police."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who were you talking to?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Count von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then he's a liar," he cried furiously. "He sent me here this morning
+so that I should know you by sight, first for that business in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and then for this affair now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't tell me such lies, you murderous brute. Why, not ten minutes ago
+you gave me another name. Von Erstein, indeed, my friend!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Friend! He's no friend of yours. He's got me under his thumb for
+another thing and drove me to do both jobs by threatening to split on
+me. I can't get into the hands of the police. If you'll let me go I'll
+tell you all I know about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head and played the unbeliever till he was nearly beside
+himself with fright, and then told him to write down the story. This
+wasn't to his liking at all, but a little gentle persuasion in the
+shape of another pretence, with the 'phone, set him to work.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I walked up and down smoking while he wrote, glancing every now and
+then over his shoulder to read the result. He was not a ready penman,
+but he got the main facts clear enough for my purpose.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His statement was practically what he had already told me, and he added
+some very useful details which would help to fix it on von Erstein. But
+in one respect it fell short of expectation. He knew no more about Anna
+Hilden than his employer had told him&mdash;that I had really ruined her and
+that she was looking for me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Whether he was lying or not, there were no means of deciding, and it
+seemed better not to question him too directly. The whole affair had
+shaken him up a good deal, and when he laid down the pen with a sigh he
+begged for another drink.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I let him have it and he gulped it down at a draught. "What are you
+going to do with that?" he asked, pointing to the statement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That wasn't in the bargain, friend cutthroat; but I'll promise you one
+thing, as you've seen wisdom. If I have to use it, I'll see that no
+harm comes to you, provided that you're ready to speak to the truth of
+it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shook his head dismally over this, and while he was hesitating,
+there was a nervous knock at my outer door. It flashed into my thoughts
+that it might be Anna Hilden. I didn't want them to meet, so I shut the
+room door behind me as I went out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a very wild shot indeed; for the moment I pulled back the latch,
+the door was pushed wide and von Erstein came swaggering in.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap16"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XVI
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+A POISON CHARGE
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+"Where's the fellow you called Rudolff?" he demanded truculently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My first idea was to shove him out, but it struck me that an interview
+between the two men might have interesting results, so I went back to
+the sitting-room. "Your friend's still here," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rudolff wilted at the sight of his genial employer, and as they were
+now two to one, both scoundrels, and capable of any violence, it was
+best to take precautions. Thus while von Erstein was challenging the
+other man to say he knew him, I crossed to a small table drawer and put
+my revolver in my pocket, keeping my hand on it in case of necessity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The instant Rudolff knew that I had tricked him out of the confession
+he was nearly as mad as von Erstein. He couldn't well have been madder.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A bit late, eh, beloved?" I jeered. "Had to wait for a taxi? They are
+rather scarce just now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What has this man written?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just a line or two about the weather and so on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me see it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He can tell you, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I have a right to see it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Naturally. You'll see it all right&mdash;some day. What he says about
+atmospheric and other kinds of pressure is&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Oaths from the two interrupted the sentence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Give it up," from Rudolff, and "I want to see it now," from von
+Erstein, came almost in the same breath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It pains me to disappoint such a charming pair of friends, but&mdash;&mdash;" I
+shook my head. "Can't be done, beloved; out of the question."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll see about that;" and they exchanged glances.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't make asses of yourselves. One of you has a cracked pate already,
+and the other's so podgy that half a punch would put him out of action;
+so you wouldn't have a dog's chance at what I see you're thinking
+about."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you mean, Lassen? I'm only asking to see what this man has
+written about me," said von Erstein, trying to fool me with an
+appearance of calmness, while he took his handkerchief out of the
+pocket of his overcoat&mdash;a suspiciously bulky handkerchief which he
+handled very gingerly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You may as well lay that thing on the table, beloved. I'm too old for
+that game."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried to laugh and suddenly grabbed the handkerchief with his left
+hand to free the revolver it was concealing. He bungled over it, and
+before he succeeded I had him covered. "I told you to put it on the
+table. If you lift it so much as an inch, I'll put a bullet in your
+head," I cried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What a coward he was! He went as white as a sheet, tossed the weapon on
+to the table, and put up his hands as a shield. "Don't, Lassen. Don't
+do anything like that," he stammered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed, picked up his revolver, and tossed mine across to him.
+"That's less dangerous for you, sweetheart; it's unloaded."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Still trembling, now with more mortification than fear, however, he
+dropped into a chair and strafed me with fine Teutonic hate.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I turned to his companion. "Now, get out, you. Do you hear?" for he
+hesitated, looking to his master for orders. "It'll be bad for that
+head of yours if I have to chuck you out. I'll give you one minute to
+clear." He was no stayer and slunk out in half the time; and I followed
+and shut the door after him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When I got back to the room von Erstein was on his feet also ready to
+go. "Oh, don't hurry away, beloved; this is an excellent chance for a
+pretty little love scene. Mix yourself a drink, have a cigar, and be
+your own cheerful sprightly self."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The scowl which greeted this was a real gem.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What a seraphic smile! No wonder that every one loves you so and
+worships the ground you tread on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Stop it," he growled with an oath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, you naughty darling! Did'ums," and I chucked him coyly under his
+fat double chin. His spasm of rage at this almost overpowered his
+cowardice, and he must have been within an ace of apoplexy. The blood
+rushed in a crimson flood to his flabby face, he clenched his fists and
+trembled like an aspen with the strain.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going," he mumbled thickly at last.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course you are, darling; but presently." I stood with my back
+against the door. "I can't spare you yet. Besides, you haven't thanked
+me. Isn't my sweetheart grateful to his Popsy-wopsy?" I chided in a
+sort of Mantalini manner.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, blazes! Let me go, will you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But think what I've saved you from, beloved. Why, if it hadn't been
+for me by this time you'd be a murderer or a thief, or both. Imagine
+it! The torments your tender conscience would be suffering! A murderer!
+My Albert!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Another spasm of impotent rage followed, and this time, instead of
+cursing he groaned aloud and dropped into a chair with his hands to his
+head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I locked the door then, putting the key in my pocket, took the
+cartridges out of his revolver, tossed it into his lap, and mixed
+myself a drink and lit a cigar. "Now we'll have our chat," I said,
+dropping the banter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He looked up and, seeing the way to the door was free, jumped from his
+seat to escape; and began cursing again on finding it locked. "Are you
+going to stop that rot?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, if you behave yourself; except for an occasional endearment, lest
+we forget how much we love one another."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What have you got to say? Be quick about it, I want to go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sit down and have a drink. It'll pull you together."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not here, thank you. I don't want to be poisoned."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't think of that. It's rather a good idea. I will poison you."
+He must be punished for that insult. I went into my bedroom and came
+back with a pinch of salt in a screw of paper which I opened out before
+him. Then I poured out his drink, put the salt into it, stirred it
+carefully till it had dissolved, pushed the glass across the table, and
+placed a chair close to the spot. "Now sit down and drink that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll see you to the devil first," he cried, trying to bluster and
+turning as white as a sheet.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I promptly took him by the collar of his coat and forced him into the
+chair and ordered him to drain the glass. His panic was pitiful. He was
+such a blithering ass that he never suspected I was only fooling; and
+was convinced I meant to kill him. The sweat of abject terror stood in
+beads on his forehead, he couldn't utter a word, and sat staring up at
+me like a paralyzed idiot.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Drink it!" I thundered in his own bullying tones which made him jump
+and twitch convulsively. He made one feeble attempt to lift the glass,
+and then with a moan dropped back in his chair in a faint.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was afraid at first that he was really dead; but his pulse was
+beating all right. It was probably just pretence; so I moved the glass
+out of his reach and left him to come round when he pleased. It was
+merely shamming, and when he thought I was far enough away, he made a
+grab to upset the glass.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think you're the biggest fool I ever met, von Erstein, but you've
+been punished enough for your little poison suggestion. Look here;" and
+I swallowed the "poison" myself. "Not enough salt even to alter the
+taste of it, man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In a minute he was cursing quite as cheerfully as usual and looking
+just as amiable. "Well, can I go now?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As soon as you've answered one question. Who is Anna Hilden?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know any more than I told you before."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't mean the right one, but the mock heroine of the Thiergarten
+scene to-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know anything about her."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Taking out my card case in which I had put Rudolff's statement, I
+unfolded the paper and laid it on the table. "Rudolff says here&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried to snatch the paper, but I whipped it up in time, leaving only
+the card case in his hand. "Rudolff says here that you sent him to me
+so that he should point me out to her this afternoon. Now then, who is
+she?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know anything about her," he repeated doggedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll help your memory. She admitted to me that it was a put-up job and
+that the child was neither hers nor mine. That enough for you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he stuck to his denial and nothing I could say moved him. The
+poison farce had apparently convinced him that his life was safe and he
+met all my threats with the same dogged answer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had to give it up in the end. "Very well, then, I shall have to get
+the whole story out of her. The police will do it, if I can't; so that
+it's only a matter of a day or two. Do you still refuse to own up?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I tell you I know nothing about it. Wash your own dirty linen for
+yourself," he replied.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I unlocked the door and told him to go. His exit was very
+characteristic. He stepped very gingerly toward where I stood by the
+door, fearing I should strike him, paused when just a couple of yards
+away, then darted out quickly, opened the front door, shook his fist at
+me and snarled out a threat. "I'll make you pay a heavy price for all
+this, curse you," he cried and bolted down the stairs as I made a step
+after him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Except that he had been thoroughly frightened and enraged to the point
+of collapse, the interview had yielded little satisfaction. It was not
+improbable, moreover, that it had been a blunder to warn him about Anna
+Hilden. As for his threats, they were just laughable; but he might be
+able to strengthen the woman's backbone and cause her to persist in the
+story she had acted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That the whole business was faked, there was no doubt at all; and if
+she did persist, it would only be necessary to set inquiries about her
+on foot. It might be as well to do that before seeing her again, as it
+would be a big trump card to face her with some of her own life history.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was something to go on in the shape of Rudolff's statement; but
+it didn't amount to much. In all probability von Erstein would see to
+it that the man was got out of the way; and the mere paper itself could
+not carry the least weight with a soul.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Reflection suggested one exception, however. Von Gratzen might take a
+different view of it, if I told him frankly the whole affair. He had
+urged me to go to him in any trouble; and if he was not a fraud, he
+could help me enormously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He would certainly want to hear from me all about the inner meaning of
+the scene his wife and daughter had witnessed, and it would be best to
+see him as soon as possible. He hated von Erstein, moreover, and might
+be glad to find something against him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The next morning there was a note from him asking me to see him at his
+office at eleven o'clock, as he had some important news for me. Not a
+mere official summons this time; and this was rather a good sign.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was to be hoped that the "important news" had to do with my leaving
+Berlin. The delay was irksome. Things were happening which threatened
+to make it more and more difficult for me to disappear without causing
+more fuss than would be healthy for either Nessa or myself. It all
+tended to force one's hand; and I began to think seriously of resorting
+to the "third wheel" Nessa and I had discussed together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Von Gratzen received me with all the usual cordiality, shook hands
+warmly, and immediately referred to the Thiergarten affair, taking the
+line which I had half expected.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My wife and Nita told me all about it, and of course it settles one
+point satisfactorily. It places beyond doubt that you are really Johann
+Lassen. Nevertheless I could wish it had been established in a less
+dramatic and embarrassing fashion for you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was exceedingly unpleasant, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Tell me all about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I described it from my point of view; making much of my profound
+astonishment and my inability to say whether the story was true or not.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you any reason to doubt it? Did you remember anything which
+enabled you, I mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a thing. So far as I know, I never saw the woman before in all my
+life."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But she was positive?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She embraced me and called me her 'long lost darling,' and so on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Women are hysterical creatures, we know, and apt to make any sort of
+statement at such moments. Do you think she was really in earnest? Of
+course it's important."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your people could judge that as well as I, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"True. Which would you rather it was&mdash;true or false?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"False, without a question."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Despite the fact that it establishes your identity?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly. Any man who feels as I do now must loathe to have such a
+brutal thing as that dug up out of his past."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good. I'm glad to hear you say that." He smiled as if he was really
+glad, but there was something else behind his questions that left me
+guessing as usual.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If he accepted the woman's recognition as settling the matter of my
+identification as Lassen, was it better to leave it there or risk
+unsettling him again by telling him about the subsequent interview with
+her? Rather a nice point to decide. But his next question cleared the
+course and concealment kicked the beam.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd like to have the matter investigated?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly," I replied promptly. Very few official inquiries would give
+him the truth, and it was thus much better to tell it myself. "I was
+going to ask your advice about it. I know that part of her story is
+false; she owned it; and I doubt all the rest;" and I described the
+interview.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This appeared to both interest and amuse him, especially my instant
+offer to marry Anna; and he expressed his appreciation in the equivocal
+fashion. "It was clever, my boy; quite the best line. You must have had
+considerable experience in bluffing people;" and there was a glint in
+his keen eyes which might have meant anything. "You can act well too,
+or you'd never have dragged that confession out of her. She must have
+thought you were in earnest."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was, sir. If she can prove that I am the man she thinks, I will
+marry her."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good. Very good indeed. <i>If</i> she can prove it, of course. But you
+wouldn't relish the job, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That goes without saying."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, we'll hope she can't. We shall soon know all about her. In the
+meantime what are you going to do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can only wait and see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed and rubbed his hands. "Wait and see, eh? That's the English
+Premier's phrase, isn't it? So you've picked that up, it seems."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His comment made me wish I'd used a different one. "There isn't
+anything else to do, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Quite so. Wait and see. Exactly. And as an honourable man you'd prefer
+to get the question settled before leaving Berlin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The shrewd old beggar was a positive expert in sticking one in a hole.
+I didn't know what answer to make, so I just shrugged my shoulders and
+smiled vacuously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's rather a pity, too," he continued after a pause. "I've arranged
+that matter of your leaving; in fact I intended you to go to-day. I
+have all the necessary papers, even tickets for you and Miss
+Caldicott;" and he took them out of his desk and laid them in front of
+me, giving me one of those wily smiles of his.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could have cursed the luck. The sight of them, the knowledge that
+Nessa and I could have been out of the infernal country within a few
+hours but for this rotten thing coming in the way, so exasperated me
+that it was scarcely possible to conceal my bitter chagrin. I tried to
+hide it from him by taking the papers and looking them over.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh dear, I've forgotten something," he exclaimed, rising. "I'll be
+back in a moment," and he went out of the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What a temptation that was! To have all I needed actually in my hands;
+to be left alone with them and yet not to be able to use them! I'd have
+given every shilling I had in the world to have stuffed them into my
+pocket and walked off. Did he mean me to take them? Or was it intended
+as a test? Did he guess what a temptation it was? Could I get away with
+them? He stopped out of the room long enough, and as the minutes
+passed, it was all I could do to resist it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I stuck it; put the papers down on his desk and tried not to look
+at them. It was a touch of sheer purgatory. His first glance, when at
+length he returned, was at them, and the way he looked at me made me
+pretty certain that he could guess something of my feeling. It looked
+uncommonly as if he were disappointed to find me still in the room and
+the papers on his table.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sorry to have kept you, my boy, but it couldn't be helped," he
+said as he sat down and put the temptation out of sight. "I told you in
+my letter that I had something important to tell you. I have, and
+unpleasant into the bargain. Was Count von Erstein with you last night?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, about ten o'clock."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did you offer him some drink?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, and a cigar, but he refused both."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What was he doing there? Wait, I'll tell you first that he has made a
+charge against you that you attempted to poison him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "Of course I didn't. It was a joke."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It may not be altogether a laughing matter; he's a dangerous man to
+joke with. Would you care to tell me about it all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course. This will explain a good deal." I put my hand in my
+waistcoat pocket for Rudolff's statement, and then for the first time
+missed the card case which Rosa had given me. The loss was of no
+consequence, however, as I had the fellow's confession. "Before I give
+it you I ought to say that I promised the man who wrote this that if he
+was prepared to swear to the truth of it, he should come to no harm."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That'll be all right," he agreed with a nod.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"An attempt was made on my life last night by this fellow and two
+others at von Erstein's instigation;" and I described the affair and
+all that had occurred subsequently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Ah, more clever bluff, eh? Upon my word I shall be expecting you to
+try it with me next," he said. Then he read over the confession
+carefully and lapsed into thought. Long and apparently anxious thought
+it was, too.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll stand by you, my boy. I believe your story implicitly and I know
+von Erstein. But it was a bad mistake. He has a lot of influence in
+many directions. I hope you'll hear no more of it; but it was a bad
+blunder." He paused and, in a different and lighter tone and with a
+very peculiar look and a shadow of a smile, added: "It makes me almost
+wish you had taken advantage of my absence just now to get away with
+those tickets."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What on earth could one make of such a statement? If he'd given me
+another chance I'd have taken it; but he didn't. He locked the tickets
+up and sent me away, saying he would look into my affairs at once and
+send for me as soon as there was any need.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap17"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XVII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+ANNA HILDEN AGAIN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+It is difficult to describe my feelings when I left von Gratzen, but I
+think my chief thought was a bitter regret that I hadn't taken the
+tickets and chanced things, mingled with a disquieting belief that I
+was muddling matters hopelessly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Neither regret nor self-cursing were of the slightest help, however;
+and after a few minutes of impotent perplexity, I realized that
+extremely obvious fact.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Something had to be done; and the question was&mdash;what?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It looked as if von Gratzen would have let me have those tickets if I
+hadn't been ass enough to tell him about Anna and play the fool about
+being eager to have that affair cleared up first. He had not appeared
+to attach sufficient importance to the poison charge to refuse them on
+that account.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This cleared the ground a little, therefore. Could the obstacle be
+removed in time to allow of my using them that night? Could I get the
+confession from Anna herself, this meant? It was worth trying.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She had fixed the following day for me to see her; but that wasn't a
+good enough reason for my not seeing her at once. My natural eagerness
+to have the thing settled without delay would readily account for my
+disregarding her wish, and whether it did or not didn't matter two
+straws. So I set off on the errand at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Persuasion was the first card to play, and if that failed, a threat of
+the police; but by one means or another I must have the confession to
+take to von Gratzen that afternoon. Everything now turned on getting it
+into his hands early enough for Nessa and me to catch the Dutch mail
+which left about eight that night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She had her hat on when I arrived, and resented the visit. "I said you
+were not to come until to-morrow," she said. "I can't see you now, as
+I'm just going out."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I could not wait till to-morrow. I can't bear suspense."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've nothing to say to you, so it's no use your coming in."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I'm in already, Anna, and I must speak to you." She tried to avoid
+me and leave the place, but I shut the door and stood with my back to
+it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very well. Go into the sitting-room and I'll listen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll follow you," I replied drily; and with a laugh and a shrug she
+led the way to her room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You seem almost as eager to marry me now as you were before to get out
+of it," she scoffed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was an unpromising start, for she was in a very different mood from
+that of the previous day. "If you think a moment of all that this must
+mean to me, of my desperate anxiety to know the truth about the past
+and to see what lies ahead, you'll understand it all, Anna;" and I went
+on for a few moments in that style endeavouring to re-establish the
+former relations and work on her emotions.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I haven't had enough time to think about it," she replied. "Of course
+it takes a lot of thinking about."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Does that mean you are not sure I am the man who wronged you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why should it, pray?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, you said that you had been mistaken about the child."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I may have said that for a purpose. You got the soft side of me
+yesterday, and&mdash;&mdash; But I tell you I haven't made up my mind."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You haven't altered your opinion about my being an honourable man and
+wishing to do the right thing, I hope?" and I did my best to draw a
+vivid picture of my state of mind and appeal to her good nature.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This appeared to have a softening effect; but not enough for the
+purpose. "Why does one day make such a difference?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Every minute makes a difference, Anna. I am on the rack and it's
+positive torture to prolong this suspense."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sorry. I am really; but I can't make up my mind. If you could do
+without me all these years, another day can't matter so much. Not that
+I can see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you had lost your memory, you'd understand."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But that was only a week or two ago. What of all the other time, the
+years and years you've left me to fend for myself?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't account for that," I said, as if distracted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You hadn't lost your memory all that time, however."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The shock of the explosion has utterly changed me in every way."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was about time, I should think, judging by all I've heard and the
+way you treated me. I don't deny you're a white man enough now; but
+what if you got your memory back? It might change you into something
+very different. I have to think of that, you know. You might be mad
+enough to&mdash;to do anything; perhaps even murder me. You're not surprised
+it makes me think, are you? I don't wish to be made into an honest
+woman only to be murdered."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was altogether so different from her previous attitude, that it
+was clear some one had been coaching her; and of course it could only
+be von Erstein. "You need not fear that, Anna."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why not? How do you know what you'd be mad enough to do if you got
+your memory back and found you'd tied yourself to me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's a very simple way out of that. Even if you wish me to marry
+you, we need not live together. I should give you an allowance and you
+could go your way and I mine, if you preferred it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+For some reason which beat me this seemed to appeal strongly to her.
+She sat thinking, and there was something of her previous day's emotion
+in her look as she asked: "Do you mean that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You little know me if you doubt it, Anna."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She got up impulsively to stare out of the window as she had done
+before, and after a long pause she turned. "Look here, come to-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I looked intently at her and read something in her face that gave me
+fresh hope. "Why not to-day? You have made up your mind, I can see
+that; so why not tell me now?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She shook her head. "Not to-day. To-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't tell you why. Don't ask me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I do ask you. I beg you as earnestly as I can."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Another shake of the head; and she would not budge, so that it became
+necessary to try a turn of the screw.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your reason has to do with some one else?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you mean?" she flashed in surprise and some alarm.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I had a visit yesterday from a man who called himself Rudolff."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well? What's that got to do with it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"With two companions he tried to murder me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She caught her breath. "Is that true?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As you see, the attempt failed and the man himself got the blow
+intended for me. I took him to my rooms afterwards and&mdash;well, here's
+his confession."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her interest was keen enough to quicken her breathing as I took out the
+paper; and her fright deepened as I read it, and she began to tremble
+violently. "As you hear, he was the man who pointed me out to you
+yesterday in the Thiergarten."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+For a few moments she was too overcome to speak. "What&mdash;do you&mdash;think
+it all means?" she stammered brokenly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you know Count von Erstein?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her hand went to her throat as she tried to reply, making a swallowing,
+half-choking motion. "You don't believe&mdash;that I had anything&mdash;to do
+with all that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh no, Anna. I am sure you had not. I have told the authorities&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The police?" she broke in. It was almost a scream.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not the police. But, of course, a man can't let any one attempt his
+life and just sit down under it. I have a very influential friend&mdash;&mdash;"
+I paused intentionally.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who is that?" came like a pistol shot.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Baron von Gratzen; and he&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did you tell him about me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He knows of it. He is greatly interested in me because this
+unfortunate affair about my treatment of you will affect all he can do
+for my future. His wife and daughter were present yesterday when you
+recognized me. Of course he questioned me all about it and declared
+that he would have the fullest investigation made at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That seemed to break her right up. Von Gratzen's reputation caused the
+collapse. She had stiffened in alarm at the mention of his name, had
+listened with parted lips and straining features to every syllable
+about his interest in me, and when she knew that his people were going
+to take up the investigation, she was utterly overcome.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+With a muffled cry of despair, she fell back in her chair in a
+half-fainting condition, her hands pressed to her face, moaning
+distractedly. She remained in this state for several minutes, the
+effort to regain self-control being quite beyond her, and at length
+sprang to her feet, saying she must go out at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd better tell me everything before you go, Anna," I said. Knowing
+that she had been driven into the deception by von Erstein, I pitied
+her sincerely. She was like a wild thing in her panic, shaking her head
+and flourishing her arms hysterically.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, no. To-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It may be too late then. I have great influence with the Baron and can
+put the matter to him in a way to help you. It will be useless to try
+that to-morrow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not now. Not yet. I can't. I can't. Let me go. Let me go, I say!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I persisted, however; and at length she consented to my seeing her
+again that afternoon at five o'clock. I had to be content with that,
+and as soon as we reached the street she hurried off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was going to von Erstein of course, and I would have given
+something to be able to hear what passed. She was in deadly fear of
+him. Her manner had shown that; and considering what the man was, her
+news would probably give him an equally bad attack of nerves. He would
+not relish von Gratzen's intervention any better than she had.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+On the whole the interview had turned out well enough. It would have
+been better if I had been able to drag the truth out of her at once, of
+course; but I was confident that I should get it all in the afternoon.
+That would still give me time to carry the news to von Gratzen and
+satisfy him that the obstacle to my leaving was removed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The "third wheel" must none the less be in working order. Nessa must be
+prepared to leave, and I went to the Karlstrasse to see her. She was
+out with Lottchen, however, and I only saw Rosa, who was delighted to
+hear that von Gratzen had arranged for us to leave.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's very lucky, too, because Oscar has left Berlin for a day or two
+without having been able to do anything about the other scheme. You
+won't need it now, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish I was sure; but I'm not. Von Gratzen may still raise some
+objection; things are so mixed up. But I mean to go to-night in any
+event, with or without his permit. Rotten luck that Feldmann's away."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He was afraid you might do something like that, so he gave me the name
+of a man who can do what you want, but I wasn't to tell you about it
+unless it was absolutely necessary."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is necessary, as you can see for yourself. Who's the man and what
+is he? I'll go to him straight off."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"David Graun is the name; he lives at 250, Futtenplatz. He's a Jew; a
+very shady character, and Oscar said you'd have to be awfully careful
+how you handled him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where's the Futtenplatz?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's in a low quarter across the river;" and she told me how to find
+it. "Oscar says he bears the worst of characters and does all sorts of
+shady things under the cloak of a second-hand clothes' dealer."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's sure that the man can get me what I want?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh yes; positive, if you handle him right; but you must be awfully
+cautious. He'll ask much more at first than he expects."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's a Jew, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It isn't only that. It's his way of testing any one who goes to him.
+If you agree to pay it, you won't get anything out of him except
+promises. Oscar said I'd better tell you this to put you on your guard;
+and you mustn't let him think it's for yourself under any
+circumstances."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you know how much I ought to pay him?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only a few marks, ten or fifteen at the outside. He'll probably ask a
+hundred or even more."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I understand. But it's odd that Feldmann should know all this about
+him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She smiled. "That's what I thought, and Oscar said I might tell you the
+real reason. The fact is this Graun works with the police. He got into
+trouble once and they made things easy for him on his promise to act as
+their spy. There's a lot of this false identification card business
+done, and he reports every transaction to them, and they are able to
+watch all the people who go to him. When any one is wanted, they give
+him a description, and he just keeps the man waiting while he
+communicates with them."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's cheerful. He'll tell them about me, then."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oscar says you needn't worry about it. So long as any one is not known
+to be an alien or a criminal, nothing happens; but you're to be careful
+to get the things at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't quite see why."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't quite understand it, either. Oscar only told me at the last
+minute just as he was hurrying away. I fancy he said something about a
+second visit being risky, lest the man should have one of the police
+there to have a look at you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll be off then. Tell Nessa I'll see her as soon as possible and tell
+her everything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I do hope you'll get away safely. If the Baron lets you have the
+permit and tickets, I'll never say another word against him as long as
+I live," she declared as we shook hands.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It will be all right one way or the other."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes; but if you could really travel by the mail a few hours would end
+everything. I shall be so anxious."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course your mother mustn't know anything about Nessa leaving."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's in bed, after yesterday's upset. So that will be all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not really ill?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, no; only a bad headache. Nessa and I are booked for a concert this
+evening, and I shall tell the servants not to sit up for us, so that
+she won't be missed till to-morrow morning; and by that time you two
+ought to be in Holland;" and with that I set off to interview the
+tricky old Jew in the Futtenplatz.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap18"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XVIII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+A SINISTER DEVELOPMENT
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+On the way to the Futtenplatz I made up a little fairy tale to account
+for my visit to the Jew, Graun. I didn't like the job, and what Rosa
+had told me about his relations with the police didn't make it any
+pleasanter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A very little knowledge of German police ways was enough to render it
+quite credible. It was just the sort of low cunning which would chime
+with their methods. There were plenty of people, besides aliens, who
+were anxious to get out of Berlin at such a time, and it would suit the
+authorities admirably to have this secret means of finding out who they
+were and acting accordingly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa's description of the Futtenplatz was well deserved: a squalid,
+dirty place, with mean shops of the poorest sort. The Jew's second-hand
+clothes shop was one of the meanest and dirtiest, and Graun himself
+fitted thoroughly into the picture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When I entered he was bargaining with a man who wanted to sell him a
+coat, and while the transaction proceeded&mdash;while the old Jew was
+beating down the price to the last pfennig, that is&mdash;I had ample time
+to observe him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Red-haired, with red tousled beard and whiskers, pronounced Hebraic
+features, small suspicious eyes, and filthy from the top of his narrow
+forehead to the tip of his clawlike finger-nails, he was one of the
+most repulsive specimens one could wish to avoid.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you want?" he asked in a high-pitched rasping voice, squinting
+at me, when his customer went out, cursing him for the smallness of the
+amount he had received for the coat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I told him straight out. The remembrance of Feldmann's tips was one
+reason, and my desire not to stop one unnecessary moment in such
+unsavoury surroundings was another.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shook his head. "You've come to the wrong shop, my man. Given up all
+that sort of thing long ago. Too risky."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right; sorry to have troubled you. Good-day," I replied casually,
+and turned to leave.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He let me get to the door and then called me back. "Wait a moment. Who
+sent you here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No one in particular. It's pretty well known, isn't it? Good-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Here, wait. Come here; I know some one who might be able to do it for
+you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't go back. "It isn't of the least consequence," I said with an
+airy wave of the hand. "I told the man he'd better go to the police and
+just tell them how he lost his card."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come in here a minute;" and he shuffled off to a door at the back of
+the shop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I hesitated, took a couple of paces toward him, stopped and shook my
+head. "No. I don't want to have anything to do with it, if there's any
+risk attached to it, as you say."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This worked all right. "When I said that, I thought you wanted it for
+yourself," he said slily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I burst out laughing and turned again as if to go away. "Good-day, my
+friend. That's rich and no mistake."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Here, don't be in such a hurry," he said, coming a step toward me. "If
+your friend's in any trouble, I might&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the devil do you mean by that?" I cried, and cursed him royally
+for the suggestion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He came up and laid his filthy claw on my sleeve. I shook it off with
+another choice epithet or two. "Come into my room a minute and we'll
+talk it over. Don't lose your temper."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I allowed myself to be pacified: not too quickly, of course; and with a
+great show of reluctance allowed him to take me into his room, which
+was, if possible, filthier even than the shop and smelt vilely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now, tell me all about it. Of course most of those who come to me are
+in trouble of some sort or other and I have to be careful. If the
+police knew anything, well&mdash;&mdash;" and he gestured to indicate the trouble
+it would mean for him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, but don't try that rot with me. Either you can sell me what
+I've asked for, or you can't. So out with it. I don't care which way it
+is; and this place of yours stinks so that I don't want to stop in it
+and be suffocated."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He leered as if this were rather a good joke or a compliment. "I might
+be able to manage it, but&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I broke in with an impatient oath. "I don't want any 'might be.' Can
+you or can't you? Be quick about it, too. If you can, how much?" This
+was evidently the right line with him and he grinned appreciatively.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's the way to talk. Shall we say 150 marks?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How much?" I cried with a regular spasm of astonishment. "Say it
+again, man."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A hundred and fifty marks."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I sat back and stared at him. "Do you think I want to deal wholesale
+and set up in the business myself? I only want one, you infernal old
+humbug;" and I roared with laughter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was accustomed to being abused and joined in the laugh, combing his
+tousled red beard with his filthy fingers. "Well, how much then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, a couple of marks or so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He threw up his hands, gesticulating violently, as if the offer was an
+insult, appeared to work himself into a furious rage, and fumed and
+fussed and stormed, until I got up. Again he tested me; let me leave
+the room and reach the door of the shop, following with a mixture of
+lamentations and appeals to Heaven to bear witness to my lunacy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did not so much as turn round, remembering Feldmann's caution, and I
+was all but in the street, before he changed his tone, apparently
+satisfied that I was sincere.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's no use to part like this. Come back and talk it over again." Once
+more a similar pantomime was played; but this time I was much slower to
+give way. "It can't be done at the price. Impossible. Think of the risk
+I should&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then don't do it. I tell you if you mean there's any risk in the
+thing, I won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. I thought a few marks was
+all that would be necessary; but if you offered to give it me for
+nothing and there's any risk I wouldn't take it. Get that into your
+head."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you think I give things away?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not I, seeing how you cling to the dirt on you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was also accepted as a joke and he wagged his head and winked. "It
+takes too much time to clean things; and time's money," he replied,
+with one of his repulsive leers. "But I like you. You say what you
+mean. I'll take a hundred marks from you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Will you? You'll be cleverer than I take you for, if you do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But there's the&mdash;&mdash;" He was going to repeat about the risk, but
+checked the word as bad business; and a long chaffering began in which
+he tried to squeeze me first to seventy-five marks, then to fifty,
+coming down by tens and fives to twenty-five.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He stuck at that point a long time; and lest he should think even that
+sum suspicious, I held out at the five marks to which I had increased
+my offer during the bargaining.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Once more he let me all but leave the shop, and when he again called me
+back I refused to go and struck out a fresh line.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll tell you why I've stopped so long as it is, Graun," I said. "I've
+never met any one quite like you before, and you're a very interesting
+character. I do something at times in theatricals and you're worth
+studying; but I've had enough of you now. It's been worth a few marks
+to have such a chance as this, and, while I don't care two straws
+whether I get what brought me here or not, I'll give you five marks for
+the fun I've had," and to his consummate astonishment I put the money
+in his dirty palm. "If I were you, I'd spend it on soap or something
+that will get rid of some of this beastly stink."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You give me this?" he cried in amazement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, give it you. Good-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was the turning point of the conference. He clawed hold of my arm.
+"You can come and study me any time you like at the same price," he
+said with a grin. "I don't mind how often. And look here, you shall
+have the card if you'll make it ten marks."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Another five, do you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, no. Oh, no. Another ten," he cried greedily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shook my head at first and then smiled. "I tell you what I'll do.
+I'll give you the other ten, if you'll throw in another cursing and
+lamentation scene, like the last. Five for that and five for the card.
+You do it so beautifully, Graun; and it's all put on, I know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He grinned, but shook his head. "It wasn't put on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're a dirty, stinking, money-grabbing Jew, Graun," I cried, with
+every appearance of fierce earnestness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He seemed to take it as meant, and he did repeat the cursing scene with
+the utmost energy and wild gesticulation, to my intense amusement.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It wasn't quite so good as the first, Graun, but it's worth the money
+all the same. Here you are; get me the card. I believe you're quite a
+decent sort really and just put on this manner for business."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+More leers as he shuffled off, and in a minute or two later I left with
+an identification card in the name of "Johann Liebe, mechanic."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Whether he would tell the police of my visit, I neither knew nor cared.
+He was obviously satisfied that things were pretty much as I had
+pretended, and the little hint that I might wish to "study" him again
+was quite likely to make him hold his tongue.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had all that I needed; the way to leave was now open; and in a very
+few hours Nessa and I would have seen the last of Berlin for many a day.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The interview had taken longer than I had expected, however, and after
+snatching a hasty meal in the first decent place I came to, I hurried
+to the Karlstrasse to fix up the final arrangements for our departure.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was as jubilant as I at the news of my success. "Rosa told me all
+you said and where you'd gone and that we were to go to-night. Oh,
+isn't it splendid!" she exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll be ready?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, no. I shall take care to miss the train, of course. Make a point
+of it," she cried, her eyes as bright as diamonds. "I shall have a cab,
+tell every one I'm going to England and&mdash;&mdash; How can you ask such a
+silly question, Jack?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Steady. Not that name till we're in Holland anyhow."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you expect me to be steady at such a time, Herr Lassen?" with mock
+emphasis on the name.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shan't be Lassen after this, mind. This thing I've got in my pocket
+christens me Johann Liebe."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She laughed. "Let me look at it. I declare I could almost kiss it," she
+exclaimed, when I showed it to her. "And now we'll be sensible. What
+are my marching orders?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Flying orders, we call them. Well, I still hope we shall travel in
+state under Government patronage, and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope not," she broke in. "I'd much rather go on the 'third wheel,'
+you know. It would be glorious fun. I don't want to have to scrap my
+disguise and have had all my trouble for nothing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's all right; but the other wheel's both safer and quicker, thank
+you. All the same you'd better bring the props along in case things go
+wrong. One never knows. Do you want to bother with any luggage?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A comb and a toothbrush, a few hairpins and a pair of scissors. That
+too much?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Rather not; but why scissors?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't want your assistant to have long hair, do you? And it might
+be injudicious to worry a barber."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We both laughed. "I never thought of that. By Jove, it would be a
+beastly shame to have to cut off that lovely wig of yours." She had
+most beautiful hair of a rich dark auburn.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A thousand times better than an internment camp," she replied, sobered
+by the mere thought of it. But only for the moment; she was too wildly
+excited at the prospect of going home for anything to damp her spirits.
+"Why, I'd do it only to play the part of Hans Bulich for an hour."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who's Hans Bulich?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your assistant that hopes to be, of course. You're surely not going to
+begin by forgetting essentials?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I had forgotten for the moment."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, don't forget again. Shall I spell it for you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't give me any of your lip, 'Hans,'" I retorted smartly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, matey, keep your hand on the brake," she replied in her
+excellent assistant's tone; and worked in a number of motor parts to
+show she had been swotting them up as I had suggested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll do, boy," I said, laughing. "And now let's remember this isn't
+going to be all mere chaff," and I told her my plan. She was to be at
+the station a quarter of an hour before the train started and look out
+for me in the waiting-room. "If things go right with von Gratzen,
+that'll be the ladies' room; if not, then the third class. I'll manage
+to 'phone you in time for the necessary make-up. As for the rest, it's
+up to us to manage the best we can."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If we have to go disguised, are you going to risk the mail train then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There won't be any risk to speak of now that I've got this;" tapping
+my pocket. "Of course we can't go all the way because I haven't a
+passport; but we'll get as near the frontier as we can. Osnabrück,
+probably; but I'll have the tickets all right. And now I must be off."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish my silly heart wouldn't beat like a racing 40 h.p., but I'll
+have it in good order when we meet again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's a good thing I don't make it beat, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hands off, matey," replied "Hans," but with a very un-boylike blush.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must drop that habit, young 'un. You've got to think about other
+40 h.p.'s, you know;" and with that I went, little thinking of all that
+was to happen before we met again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I hurried to my rooms to put the final touches to my preparations; pack
+the one or two trifles I needed for the journey; make sure that no
+inquisitive eyes had discovered my hidden suit case; and have
+everything ready for instant departure.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This did not take more than a few minutes, and I had just finished and
+was replacing the suit case in its hiding place, when the telephone
+rang.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo?" I asked, wondering who could want to call me up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Lassen?" came in a woman's voice I did not know.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. What is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm to tell you Anna Hilden wants to see you at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who is it speaking?" There was no answer, and none again when I
+repeated the question. Who could it be? And the meaning of it? It
+certainly wasn't Anna's voice, although the 'phone has a trick at times
+of changing the voice considerably.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was still nearly an hour before the time she had fixed for me to go
+to her, and I couldn't understand how she could have got hold of my
+telephone number. But she wouldn't have telephoned if it hadn't been
+urgent. It looked as if she had made up her mind at last to admit
+everything, and the sooner I had the confession the better chance there
+was of catching von Gratzen at his office. So I hurried off, was lucky
+enough to get a taxi, and reached her place within ten minutes of
+getting her message.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my surprise the door of her flat was ajar. Not perhaps an unusual
+thing, considering that she was a somewhat casual person. I pressed the
+electric bell and heard it ring all right; but she didn't come to the
+door. Probably slipped out for something, I concluded; and after a
+second ring, I pushed the door wide and went in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was not in the sitting-room, and I was just dropping into a chair
+to wait for her, when a glance through the open door of the adjoining
+bedroom brought my heart up into my mouth, as if I'd come on an air
+pocket a thousand feet deep.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was lying asprawl on the bed in a most unnatural attitude.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In a second I was in the room and knew the truth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was dead, and the marks on her throat could only mean one thing.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Murder!"
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap19"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XIX
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+MURDER
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Some horror-filled moments passed before I grasped the full
+significance to me of the unfortunate woman's death. I turned dizzy and
+bewildered like a drunken man, and could do nothing but just stare at
+the body, literally stupefied by the suddenness of it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't the fact of death that startled me; I had seen too many dead
+bodies at the Front to be much concerned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But I made a big effort to pull myself together. I examined her to be
+certain that she was really dead, for the body was still warm. There
+was no doubt about it. The poor thing had been choked, and the marks of
+the murderer's fingers showed on her throat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There had been a struggle in the room, and some of the wretched
+furniture had been overturned. My wits were beginning to clear by that
+time; and I was glancing about the room wondering who had been brute
+enough to commit the murder and what I had better do, when I made a
+discovery that told me everything and turned the blood in my veins icy
+cold.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In examining the body I had disarranged the bedclothes slightly, and by
+the side of the neck, just where it would have fallen from the
+murderer's finger, lay a ring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Von Erstein's! The puzzle ring he had once shown and explained to me!
+It was impossible to mistake it; and there was probably not another
+ring like it in Berlin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't lose my head that time; the instinct of self-preservation was
+too strong to allow of any other feeling. My one absorbing thought was
+to get away before any one could come.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I darted back into the sitting-room and snatched at my hat which I had
+left on the table. In my flurry I fumbled. It fell to the floor and
+rolled under the table; and when I grabbed for it again, the quaint
+little card case which Rosa had given me lay open just beside it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Too obsessed by the desire to get out of the place, I had no other
+feeling than a faint satisfaction at finding it again; not realizing
+for an instant the full significance of the incident I pocketed the
+thing, picked up my hat and left the flat. I took care to shut the
+door; this would serve to postpone the discovery of the murder; went
+down the staircase without undue hurry, made sure there was no one to
+see me leave, walked leisurely away until I turned the first corner and
+then made off at a rapid pace.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A sensation of profound relief that I was safe for a time at any rate
+was followed by some minutes of acute reaction in which I was incapable
+of consecutive thought. A mental blank from which I awoke pretty much
+as a man might wake from sleep-walking. I gazed about me unknowingly,
+and seeing the gate of a small public garden close at hand, I went in
+and sat down.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I soon began to get my wits in working order and bit by bit pieced
+things together. Curiously enough, almost the first thought was about
+the comparative trifle of the card case. I remember that I took it out
+and looked at it, wondering stupidly when I could have dropped it in
+Anna's room. Then I recalled that I had missed it in the morning when
+with von Gratzen. It couldn't have been in my pocket therefore when I
+went to Anna; and in a few seconds I understood.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The last time I had touched it was on the previous night when I had
+taken Rudolff's statement out of it to show von Erstein and he had
+tried to snatch the paper away and had only got the little case. I
+remembered that he had thrown it down close to him and had fiddled with
+it nervously afterwards.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was clear that he had taken it away with him and had intentionally
+left it in Anna's room to shift his villainous deed on to me. It was
+worthy of him; and it would have succeeded but for that wonderful slice
+of luck&mdash;ineffably blessed luck, indeed&mdash;by which I had found the card
+case.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That helped me to piece the rest together. Panic-stricken by what I had
+told her about von Gratzen, Anna had no doubt threatened to expose
+everything; Erstein's whole scheme would be ruined the moment she
+opened her lips: and this had roused the brute in him until he had been
+driven to strangle her. The ring had slipped from his finger without
+his noticing the loss of it in his rage. Then he must have tossed my
+card case down under the table to connect me with the crime.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He had obviously left the door ajar for the same reason; had probably
+rushed to the first public telephone box and called me up in a voice
+which was enough like a woman's to mislead me; and intended to send
+some one to catch me red-hot on the scene of the crime.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Two points were not clear. Why no one had caught me? There had been
+ample time, supposing that he was hiding in wait for my arrival. And
+why had the murder been committed in Anna's room, seeing that she had
+gone from me to find him?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+One of two suggestions seemed to answer the last question. Either she
+had not found him at first and had left a sufficiently urgent message
+to make him hurry to her, or that after a first interview he had
+induced her to go home and had followed at once. The plan to kill her
+must have been in his mind then, and obviously he couldn't do it in his
+own rooms.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The first question&mdash;why I had not been caught&mdash;wasn't so readily
+solved; but the ring might well account for it, if he had only
+discovered the loss of it in the interval of waiting for me. With that
+damning bit of evidence against himself, the bottom had dropped out of
+his scheme against me, and he would not dare to try and have me caught
+in the act.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And now I had fortunately shut the door against him. He couldn't go
+back for the ring even if he had the pluck, which I doubted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was another stroke of luck, indeed; and it was needed in all
+truth, for the mess was bad and black enough to need a heap of it, if I
+was to escape being charged with the murder. Such a charge would ruin
+me lock, stock and barrel. Even if I could clear myself&mdash;and that was
+almost impossible&mdash;all the truth about myself would be ferretted out,
+and it was thousands to one that I should be shot for a spy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Only one expedient occurred to me at first&mdash;to bolt. But that looked
+hopeless in the new circumstances. It would be tantamount to a
+confession of guilt; von Erstein would tell some plausible lie about
+the ring belonging to Anna; and it would be believed easily enough if
+suspicion were lifted from him by my flight; the hue and cry would be
+raised all over the country; old Graun would tell his story&mdash;that I had
+a workman's papers in the name of Liebe; and my arrest would be a
+matter of hours possibly, certainly one of days at the outside.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That idea had to be set aside, therefore. Before there could be any
+thought of flight suspicion must be fastened on von Erstein. But how?
+Not by sitting on a public seat and nibbling my nails; so I got up and
+started back to the centre of things.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had completely recovered from the disturbing panicky condition which
+had so confused me in the first rush of things. I don't think I was
+even afraid. My chief feeling was that I was in the very devil's own
+mess and that I should go under, unless my own wits could save me. If
+Feldmann had been in Berlin I should have gone to him; but he wasn't,
+and it was no use wishing he had been.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was only one other man in the whole city&mdash;von Gratzen; and the
+moment that became clear and plain, I hailed a taxi and was driven
+straight to his office.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was still there, but refused to see me, sending von Welten to ask my
+business. I said that it was on personal business I wished to see his
+chief.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This didn't work, however. Von Welten returned, saying the Baron was
+exceedingly busy and would I state my business in writing. This looked
+ugly; but after thinking a second, I wrote on my card: "Please see me
+for the sake of the Untergasse affair;" placed it in an envelope and
+sent it in. If anything would induce von Gratzen to have me in, that
+would.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was right. Von Welten came back smiling. "The chief will see you in a
+minute or two, Herr Lassen. I'm glad." He was an exceedingly pleasant
+fellow and stayed chatting with me until von Gratzen's bell rang and I
+was shown in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're giving me a lot of trouble, young man, as you can see," he
+said, pointing to a portfolio in which there appeared to be a lot of
+papers on the top of which were the coveted tickets for Nessa and me.
+"And now what about this Untergasse affair? Found anything out that's
+valuable? I can't give you many minutes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm in a devil of a mess, sir, but it has nothing to do with that. I
+wrote that because I was compelled to see you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I agree with you. You've been in one ever since you reached the city,
+it seems to me, indeed. Nothing fresh, I trust?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There is, and the worst of all, sir. I'm in danger of being charged
+with murder."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"With what?" he cried in amazement. "Phew! Well, tell me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"When I saw you this morning I gathered that the reason those tickets
+for Miss Caldicott and myself could not be used was because of the
+trouble about the woman, Anna Hilden."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"True, but you yourself said you wished it cleared up first."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So on leaving here I went to see her again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good God, you don't mean to say you lost your head and laid hands on
+her in this awful way?" The thought of it appeared to affect him deeply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh dear no, sir. I hope I'm not capable of such a thing. From what she
+said, I became certain the whole thing was a fraud and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So it is," he interposed, nodding. "You are right. We know all about
+the woman already. Go on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I tried persuasion first; but that was no use, so I let her know that
+the matter was in your hands."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope that frightened her."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It did, sir. She was almost out of her wits and promised to tell me
+everything this afternoon. I was to call at five o'clock."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where did you go next?" he shot in abruptly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To the von Reblings."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To tell Miss Caldicott about these, I suppose?" holding up the tickets.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. I knew she would be very anxious."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He put the pinned set of tickets, etc., into the portfolio, under a
+couple of papers, and leant back, with his fingers interlocked, and
+stared at me with frowning intentness. "You're not a fool, my boy, and
+you must see that your zeal on that young lady's account is likely to
+rouse a lot of suspicion. What do the von Reblings say about it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They are extremely anxious that she should be allowed to go home."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Umph!" a grunt and a nod, both of which were repeated. "And where did
+you go next after leaving them?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I started and hesitated.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you going to tell me the whole truth? We get to know many strange
+things here, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I went to see a man named Graun&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I know you did. You were followed and he was questioned. I won't ask
+you why you got what you did from him; but don't attempt to use it. Now
+go on about this other affair. Just everything; everything, and quite
+frankly."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I will, sir. Let me get my thoughts in order again. You've taken me
+considerably by surprise." I paused a few seconds and then told him
+exactly what had occurred, from the moment of my receiving the
+telephone call, down to my discovery of von Erstein's ring under Anna's
+body.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He jumped up excitedly at that. "Why didn't you tell me that first?" he
+cried. "There isn't a moment to lose. I must see about it instantly;"
+and he hurried out of the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+For the second time the tickets were within reach and I was alone in
+the room. He had apparently forgotten them in his excitement, and that
+I had only to stretch out my hand and secure them. Or had he gone out
+deliberately intending to give me the chance? He knew how eager I was
+to get away; the old Jew's tale must have shown that.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't hesitate this time. I whipped them out of the portfolio and
+pocketed them. Had I better bolt, or stay to face him? A mighty
+difficult question. If I ran away, he might suspect; if I stayed, there
+was a chance that he might not miss them. If they were missed, they
+wouldn't be worth a pfennig. We should certainly be stopped at the
+station; there would be a scene and Nessa would be hopelessly
+compromised. That was unthinkable.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was nothing for it, therefore, but to stay and face it out. It
+wasn't easy to do; and nothing in the world except the thought of the
+consequences to Nessa, could have glued me to my chair for the minutes
+I had still to wait for von Gratzen. It was a positive relief when the
+strain ended and he came back.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was looking very grave and stern, and there were still traces of the
+excitement he had shown when he had left me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+How I watched him! The next moment would decide everything for me. He
+was thinking closely, paused with his hand to his forehead when halfway
+to the desk, nodded in response to a thought, and went on to his chair.
+I had to hold my breath, as he sat down and laid his hand on the
+portfolio. I was ready to throw up the sponge as he slightly lifted the
+top paper and toyed with it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The thought flashed through my head that the only thing left was to
+admit everything; who I was; why I had come; why I was so eager to get
+away; and then ask him to help me in return for what I had done in the
+Untergasse affair.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But the moment for that hadn't come yet at all events. Whether he
+noticed the absence of the tickets it was impossible to say. He
+appeared to be entirely lost in thought; he was staring abstractedly at
+nothing; not once had I seen his eyes drop to the desk; not so much as
+a side glance came my way; but then he was such a wily old beggar that
+that might all have been pretence to mislead me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After a time that seemed hours to me, he nodded to himself again, took
+the hand from the papers to pass it across his forehead, and smiled. A
+smile of infinite meaning it was too. Then he closed the portfolio and
+put it away in a drawer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now tell me the rest, boy," he said, turning to look at me for the
+first time. "Hallo, you look a little done up. Room too hot? Open the
+window a bit."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I jumped at the excuse to get out of range of his keen eyes for an
+instant. He might well say it was hot, for the strain had brought the
+perspiration in great beads on my forehead.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Stand there a while and get a breath of the fresh air. A thing like
+this is sure to shake you up," he added.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Did he know? Was this intended to give me an opportunity of pulling
+myself together? Had he noticed everything and been thinking out some
+further subtle move in the game? Who could tell?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better?" he asked, as I returned to my seat. "There's no hurry. I've
+put off my other matters and shall have to keep you here for an hour or
+so. I'll tell you why presently. Oh, by the way, you'd better give me
+the card you got from old Graun. It may help you if I'm able to say you
+gave it to me; and, of course, it's no use to you now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Was this his way of telling me that he knew? was the question in my
+mind as I gave it him. Then I resumed the story of the afternoon.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You brought that card case away?" he shot in when I mentioned it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. I have it here. Will you take it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps I'd better," he replied after a pause, and then opened the
+drawer containing the portfolio, tossed it in carelessly, and let me
+finish the rest of the story without interruption, when he once more
+lapsed into close thought.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Von Welten came in before he spoke and handed him a note. "Not a second
+later than seven o'clock, mind, von Welten. Not a second, mind," he
+said when he had read the letter. "That'll do;" and we were alone again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now I'll tell you something in my turn," he said. "You have rendered
+us a very great service; a much greater service than you can imagine.
+You have only made one mistake, for you ought to have hurried to me as
+fast as possible from that woman's rooms; but you're evidently lucky,
+for no harm has been done."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't quite understand, sir," I stammered in surprise.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going to explain it to you. In the first place let me tell you I
+believe absolutely that you have told me the truth&mdash;about this murder,
+I mean&mdash;perhaps not in everything else."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There is only one thing, and if you wish&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't interrupt me, boy. I don't like it," he exclaimed testily. "It
+puts me out. Now about this affair. We know all about this woman, Anna
+Hilden. That isn't her name at all; but that doesn't matter now. She
+is, or was, one of von Erstein's mistresses; not the only one, by the
+way. The real Anna Hilden was another&mdash;years ago, of course&mdash;and that
+is how he knew all about that sale of the secret information to France."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had not said anything about that and he noticed my start.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You needn't be astonished. I tell you we know many things here. It is
+our business to know them. The man who betrayed us in that affair was
+von Erstein himself, and you, if you are really Lassen, were merely the
+go-between and scapegoat. But he was too cunning for us to be able to
+prove a thing against him. There are many things we think we know about
+him and can't prove, and others we don't wish to prove," he said, with
+a very meaning side glance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can understand that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll hope you don't come under either head, my boy. Well, we've been
+waiting for von Erstein, and now, thanks to you, we've got him. This
+woman went to him to-day after you left her; she was with him a
+considerable time; she left in great agitation; and he followed later
+to the flat which had been taken for this affair of yours. That he
+murdered her, there is no doubt, after what you've told me; but it's
+got to be proved. You won't be sorry if it is, probably."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He ought to be hanged," I exclaimed impulsively.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He fixed his keen eyes on me, and in an instant I saw what I had done
+and that this was one of his infernal traps.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're either forgetting yourself, or beginning to remember things,
+aren't you?" he asked deliberately, with one of his queer inscrutable
+smiles. "It's in England that they hang murderers, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could have cursed myself for the idiotic slip, as his eyes bored
+right into my brain.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap20"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XX
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+VON GRATZEN'S WILINESS
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Abashed and confused by this unexpected trap, I sat cudgelling my wits
+for something to say, and at last stammered out, "I&mdash;I meant lynched,
+hanged on the nearest lamp-post, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was the lamest of lame dogs; but he appeared satisfied. He leant
+back in his chair. "Oh, I see. Yes, of course. Your American
+experiences, I expect. Well, we can talk about that another time. I was
+going to say that in von Erstein we have to deal with a very cunning
+individual indeed, and I shall expect you to help us. One of the
+necessary steps may be your arrest."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Arrest!" I echoed in dismay.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I said arrest. It may be necessary. It is essential he should not
+believe that a jot of suspicion attaches to him. You'll appreciate
+that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can appreciate it perhaps, but&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't be alarmed. I promise you very good treatment."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I thought you wished&mdash;&mdash;" I pulled up on the brink of blurting out
+about my going to England.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No matter for the moment what I wished, my boy." I was beginning to
+hate that term of familiarity, for I knew now what it covered.
+"Everything must wait upon this now," he continued. "The arrest will
+not be made at once, however, as there is one thing you have to do
+first."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was better. If it wasn't done at once, it never would be done, I
+was resolved. "What is that?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must return that ring to von Erstein."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do what?" I cried aghast. The ring was the only evidence against him!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do try to listen carefully. You must return it to him and lead him to
+believe you brought it away from that room. Let him snatch it from you
+while you are threatening to denounce him; or give it him as the terms
+of a truce between you; anyhow you please. But mind, it must be done so
+that he is convinced no eyes but yours have seen it. That's vital."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The light was beginning to break through even my thick skull then.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We have it here; our people found it exactly as you said."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then the murder is known?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes; the police have it in hand by this time; but they know
+nothing about that ring. We sent two men to the place who are suspected
+of being in his pay; and they will be able to report to him that
+nothing of the sort was found on the spot. We have taken every
+precaution, of course. It has been photographed from a dozen different
+points and a replica is being made. I am waiting now for the impression
+of the mould."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It has occurred to you, of course, that he may destroy it?" I
+suggested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He shook his head. "There's no fear of that. For one thing he's much
+too proud of it; there isn't another exactly like it in all Europe,
+probably not in the whole world; for another, he looks on it as a sort
+of mascot; there's some kind of legend or other about it; and lastly,
+if you do your part well, he will feel he can keep it with absolute
+safety."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The scheme was subtle enough to be worthy even of von Gratzen, and it
+increased my dread of his almost diabolical cunning. "When will you
+make him account for it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That depends. He's a vindictive devil and is sure to denounce you for
+the murder, the instant he thinks he can do it safely. The most
+effective moment to deal with him would be when we get him in the
+witness box, giving evidence against you. But we shall see."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And when am I to be arrested?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As soon as he lays the information against you, unless I find on
+consideration we can avoid quite so drastic a step. It is not
+altogether impossible; but the pith of everything is that you get the
+ring back to him as soon as possible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A pleasant look-out for me&mdash;to be charged with murder of which he knew
+I was innocent in order to help him carry out plans. "You will scarcely
+expect me to be deliriously joyful at the prospect of being tried for
+my life," I said with a feeble smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He didn't like that at all and frowned at me. "Worse than that might
+happen to you, perhaps; and in the end it would be immensely to your
+advantage," he replied with unpleasantly deliberate significance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I dropped that line like a hot coal. "I'm in your hands, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm glad to hear you say that. Of course, as I said just now, it may
+not come to that; I have another possible plan, indeed. But the other
+part is essential. You will give me your word of honour to carry out my
+instructions faithfully?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, I give you my word of honour. Would it be sufficient if I were to
+let him have it with a letter?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why?" Like a pistol shot came the question and his eyes snapped.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I might bungle the personal business. I'm not much of a hand at
+acting, I'm afraid."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I see," he replied; nodding; and something uncommonly like a smile
+hovered about the corners of his mouth. "I thought you said something
+to that Jew about theatricals and your studying his character. I have
+looked on you as a particularly good actor, my boy. But let's think. It
+would depend on how you worded any letter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He considered for a while, started suddenly, nodded to himself, smiled,
+wrote hastily, and handed me the paper. "Just memorize that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Von Erstein, you will know where I found the enclosed just as I know
+why you left what I found there. You think to ruin me. I am not the man
+you believe me to be and can prove my innocence by means of which you
+can have no conception. Enough that I tell you I have sufficiently
+recovered my memory to protect myself against your devilish malice. The
+enclosed proves I am ready to cry a truce.&mdash;<SPAN CLASS="scap">Johann Lassen</SPAN>."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+What I felt as I read this under the keen piercing gaze he rivetted on
+me the whole time, no words can describe. "Well, my boy?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I&mdash;I'll memorize it, sir," I stammered to get time to think.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just read it out. Let me hear how it sounds."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fortunately, or intentionally, I couldn't determine which, he put his
+hand before his face as I read it in none too firm a tone. "It'll do.
+Oh, yes. The recovery of your memory seems to explain the word 'means,'
+and he'll think you are only bluffing him. He'll never dream you've
+told me all about it; and, of course, that's what I intended. You
+understand I much prefer your seeing him; but if you can't, you can
+send that letter."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I began to breathe freely again. "I'll see him to-night, if possible,"
+I replied.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sure you will. It's now all but seven. He generally goes to dinner
+at eight, and between now and then you ought to be able to catch him at
+his rooms. Mind, I depend on you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You may, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They ought to be ready for us now," he said; and as he rang his bell
+von Welten came in, bringing the ring, the replica and the photographs;
+and we all scrutinized them carefully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The facsimile of the ring was absolutely perfect. It was either in wax
+or some harder material and had been gilded, and as it and the original
+lay side by side on the table it was impossible to distinguish the one
+from the other.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very good indeed. Clever work, in the time," said von Gratzen. "Of
+course he understands that the finished facsimile must be in gold and
+will take to pieces in the same way as the original."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes. He has a number of small moulds of the individual parts.
+Would you like to see them, sir?" replied von Welten.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not necessary at all. He knows his job. That'll do, von Welten. Leave
+the real thing with me;" and he picked it up and examined it with a
+gloating and almost satanic smile, as von Welten left the room. "At
+last!" he murmured under his breath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then he wrapped it up and handed it to me. "You see how I trust you, my
+boy. I know you won't fail me, too. And now you had better go. Just a
+last word. As soon as you've returned that to him disappear for a time.
+Leave Berlin and go, oh anywhere; the farther the better for the time;
+and don't on any account come to me again until I send for you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Utterly mystified by all this, I ventured: "But can I go away without a
+permit?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Another of his queer inscrutable smiles greeted this. "Perhaps it would
+be better; but you haven't any too much time to spare&mdash;if you're going
+to catch von Erstein," he added as an afterthought. He rang his bell
+and wrote furiously. "Get that stamped officially at once. As quick as
+you can," he told von Welten, who hurried away. "He'll give it you as
+you go out," he said to me, rising and gripping my hand. "And now,
+good-bye, my boy&mdash;for a time at any rate. You're a good lad, and
+whatever happens, if you do what I've asked, I'll always stand by you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Von Welten met me with the permit as I left the room. "You're in luck
+to have got on the right side of the chief in this way," he said, as we
+shook hands.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Were they all living enigmas? was my thought as I left the building,
+for von Welten's manner was as veiled and significant as his chief's.
+Did von Gratzen know that I had taken the tickets? Had he worded the
+letter I was to write to von Erstein in order to tell me that he knew
+my lost memory was a fraud? Did that remark, "You haven't any too much
+time to spare," refer to my having to catch the mail? He had qualified
+it by saying something about seeing von Erstein; but that had seemed to
+be just an afterthought.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was beyond me; and I was even more astounded when I read the paper
+which von Welten had given me. It was much more than a mere permit. It
+amounted to an official authority that I was travelling on business of
+State; was to go where I would and when; that all assistance was to be
+given to me; and any inquiries were to be telegraphed straight to von
+Gratzen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was indeed lucky, as von Welten had declared. He little guessed what
+luck it was! Or did he? Was it all intended to make my path to the
+frontier clear?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was no time to puzzle about it then, however. I could write and
+ask for the reply to the riddle when Nessa and I were safely in Holland
+or home in England; what I had to do now was to get this business with
+von Erstein finished as quickly as possible.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I drove to his flat; but he was not there, and I could not learn where
+to look for him. I was rather glad of this. It would be much easier to
+write the letter arranged. I went then to the Karlstrasse to tell Nessa
+that she could travel in her own character.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Rosa was with her, and both were nervous at not having heard earlier
+how matters were going, for it was then more than a quarter past seven.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've been worrying awfully," said Nessa. "Is anything wrong?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit of it. Everything's gloriously right. I've got our tickets,
+and all you've to do is to be at the station."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But what's happened?" exclaimed Rosa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I haven't time to tell you now. I'm sorry; but I have to rush back to
+my rooms and get something.&mdash;By Jove!" I broke off in a cold sweat as
+the meaning of von Gratzen's look at my suggestion about writing dawned
+on me. I had told him before that I could neither write nor read
+writing! I had even given him a specimen of my new pothook fist! Of
+course I must keep it up, and it might take me Heaven knew how long. "I
+must go this instant," I said, and shaking hands with Rosa I rushed
+away to my rooms and set to work at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a deuce of a business. Every letter had to be printed in clumsy
+fashion; my fingers were trembling under the stress of my impatience; I
+made blunders and had to begin all over again, and every lost minute
+was of vital importance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If I hadn't given my word of honour to von Gratzen I'd have wrapped the
+beastly ring up, scribbled a word or two and have left it at that. It
+was on the table by the side of the paper as I wrote, and I had just
+started on the second edition absorbed in the work, when a hand was
+stretched over my shoulder and grabbed the ring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was von Erstein; I was never more glad to see any one in my life. I
+could have forgiven him everything for such a service.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very good of you to leave the door open, Lassen," he said, with a
+sneering laugh. "Just going to return it to me, eh? I thought I'd
+dropped it here last night."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There were still minutes enough left for me to put up a show of a
+struggle, and get in an explanation. So I grabbed hold of him, taking
+care that he should not get away and also that he kept possession of
+the ring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I <i>was</i> going to send it you, von Erstein. You can see I've begun
+the letter there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He stooped to read it and was puzzled. "What the devil does that mean?"
+he growled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm willing to come to terms. We both know where I found it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How do I know where you put it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't lie, man. You know very well that it was on your finger when you
+left here last night, and"&mdash;I paused for the sake of emphasis&mdash;"two
+people saw it there this morning."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This hit him hard, and he winced and drew a deep breath. "Rubbish!" he
+muttered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've made sure about that. I've just come from your flat, remember," I
+said meaningly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you been spreading that lie about me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you take me for an idiot to let any one want to ask where I found
+it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was satisfied, and his relief showed itself in his immediate change
+of manner. "All right, we'll bury the hatchet if you like," he said
+with a very poor attempt to hoodwink me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can go then;" and I moved to let him leave. I was anxious to get
+rid of him now, as it was time for me to be off to the station. I must
+have betrayed my impatience somehow, for he started, stared a moment,
+and sat down. "You're in a deuce of a hurry."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Dinner time, and I'm hungry. Clear out."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nice room you've got here, Lassen," he answered, squinting round, and
+started again as his eyes fell on my suit case. "O-ho, that's the game,
+is it?" he chuckled. "Going to bolt? No good, my friend, no good at
+all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His fat insolent chuckle roused the devil in me. "You'd better drop
+that tone with me, von Erstein, and not interfere with my movements."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Shall we go and dine together?" he sneered. "It'll be safer, for there
+are a few inquisitive friends of mine waiting outside."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had noticed one or two men hanging round the building as I entered,
+and it wouldn't do to be shadowed. So I went out, locked the front door
+and put the key in my pocket.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's that for?" he growled uneasily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So that our chat shan't be disturbed. I've sampled your friends
+already, remember," I said drily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me go," he cried in a dickens of a stew.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You wanted to stop, and stop you shall."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my intense joy he came for me and thus saved me from the unpleasant
+job of knocking him out in cold blood. I did it quite satisfactorily,
+and as he fell he struck his head against the corner of a writing desk
+and saved me the trouble of hitting him again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I collared my suit case, clambered out of the bathroom window down
+by the fire escape, and got away by a passage into a side street. A
+single glance satisfied me that none of his "friends" saw me, and I
+rushed off to the station.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I reached it with only a few minutes in hand, and Nessa was waiting for
+me in the door of the waiting-room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was afraid you'd be late and that something had happened," she said
+nervously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's all right. We've plenty of time. Don't be nervy and not too
+friendly yet. There may be eyes about. We'll find a carriage at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was all right enough to tell her not to be nervy, but I was on pins
+and needles, wondering if my theft of the tickets had been discovered,
+whether at the last moment we should be stopped, and a hundred other
+wonderings.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My eyes were all over the place as we walked to the train; and to my
+infinite dismay I caught sight of the old Jew planted close to the
+barrier through which we had to pass. That was not the worst, moreover,
+by any means. He was talking to a man who had policeman written all
+over him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And then, as if that wasn't bad enough, on the platform just beyond von
+Welten was strolling up and down smoking.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap21"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXI
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+OFF!
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The sight of the old Jew, his police companion, and von Welten knocked
+me all to pieces for the moment. We were done. That was a certainty. I
+could have bluffed the Jew, probably, with the official authority which
+von Gratzen had given me; but von Welten was what Jimmy Lamb would have
+called a very different proposition.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I think I'll have a cigarette," I said; and pulled up to light it and
+try to think what to do.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Whatever's the matter, Jack?" whispered Nessa. "Your hand shakes like
+anything and you're looking awful."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing to what I'm feeling. I'm afraid it's all up. I can't tell you
+all about it now. Just shake hands with me and trot back to the
+waiting-room. If you see me stopped&mdash;wait till the train has actually
+started, of course&mdash;make a bee line back to the von Reblings. If it's
+all right, I'll beckon to you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But if there's any trouble why should I leave you in it alone?" she
+protested, like the brick she was.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me be boss now. If you're with me, you may never get away at all;
+and if you're not, it may only mean a postponement. Be a good sort.
+Good-bye, Miss Caldicott;" and I held out my hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She took it reluctantly. "I'd rather be with you," she replied with a
+glance for which I could have kissed her. Then she did as I wished.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I put as bold a face on things as I could, walked quickly up to the
+barrier, putting my hand in my pocket as if for my ticket.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good-evening, sir," said the Jew as I approached.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo, you here, Graun?" very much astonished.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr Johann Lassen?" asked his companion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's my name, certainly. Who are you, and what do you want? I'm in a
+hurry to catch the train."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm a detective and have to ask you a few questions."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Fire 'em out, quick as you can, please."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's no such hurry as all that. You can't go by this train. You
+paid a visit to this man to-day."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We shall be here half the night at this rate. I went to purchase an
+identification card and he sold me one in the name of Liebe."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Your object?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's my affair. I haven't it with me and am not going to use it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's your story. I don't believe it. Give it to me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've told you I haven't it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Give it to me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I would if I had it. As it is, I can't."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Give it up at once," he repeated very sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This looked like a deadlock and moments were flying fast. There was
+nothing for it but to try the effect of my official authority, and I
+was fingering it, when von Welten caught sight of me and hurried in our
+direction. I threw up the sponge. To produce the authority in his
+presence would be only to make bad worse, so I put it in my waistcoat
+pocket.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The detective knew von Welten and saluted him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, Grossbaum, what is it? How do, Herr Lassen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This man had a deal with Graun to-day and is travelling&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Von Welten interposed angrily. "Hold your tongue, you fool. I've always
+thought yours was the woodenest head in the force. I suppose you
+brought this disreputable old scoundrel here. Get away, both of you.
+Think yourself lucky if I don't report this last cleverness of yours.
+Be off, I say;" and the precious pair slunk away like a couple of
+whipped curs. "I'm awfully sorry about this, Herr Lassen; but why on
+earth didn't you show the fool that paper the chief gave you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was going to," I stammered, utterly bewildered by the turn of
+affairs and gaping in wonder what would happen next. I was prepared for
+almost anything except what did happen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I knew you would travel by this train and thought I'd like to be
+certain that everything was all right about the ring;" and he dropped
+his voice to a whisper.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. He came to my rooms and I gave it him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The artful devil! Of course he's planted some of the woman's things
+there. I told the chief I thought he would; and I'll see to that in the
+morning. But where's Miss Caldicott?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Eh?" I asked stupidly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you mean to say she isn't going after all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"N-no. I mean&mdash;yes. She's over there," I stammered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, she'd better be here if you wish to catch the train. There's
+only another minute and they'll start on the tick."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Oh, I was surely dreaming. In a dream I beckoned to Nessa, who came
+hurrying up; in a dream von Welten was introduced and rushed us through
+the barrier to a compartment he'd already secured for us; in a dream he
+stood by the carriage door till we started, saying he thought it better
+for us to travel alone; and in a dream we shook hands out of the
+carriage window, and he waved to us as the train steamed out of the
+station.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Even when we quickened up speed through the outskirts of the city, I
+had hard work to wake up from that tremendously splendid dream. But
+Nessa was very much awake and boiling over with excitement, curiosity
+and delight. "What's the matter with you, Jack? Aren't you just mad
+with joy? I am."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's all right," I nodded.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But you look so odd."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Only intoxicated a bit."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Surely you haven't been taking some drug or other! You came along the
+platform as if you were walking in a dream."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you sure it isn't one? Are we really in a railway carriage?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course it is, and a very comfortable one too. But whatever do you
+mean? Are you trying to frighten me or just fooling as usual?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know, but I simply can't believe it all yet."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why? Do you understand that I'm bubbling over with curiosity? Do wake
+up and make haste and satisfy it, if you don't want to drive me out of
+my senses. Good heavens, you're on fire!" she exclaimed in alarm, as
+she wrapped her hand in her cloak and pressed it against my side
+excitedly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That roused me effectually. My waistcoat was smouldering and I plunged
+my hand into the pocket and discovered the reason. In my stupid
+absent-mindedness I had shoved the lighted end of my cigarette into the
+pocket and it had set fire to a couple of papers and singed the cloth.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing to worry about," I said. But there was. When I unfolded one of
+the papers, I found that it was the authority von Gratzen had given me.
+A fair-sized hole had been charred right through the folds and the
+tinder dropped as I opened out the sheet. It was hopelessly unreadable
+and thus useless. "I didn't think I could be such a gorgeous idiot," I
+exclaimed staring fatuously at the ruin.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's serious then?" asked Nessa, who had watched me anxiously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Try if you can make anything out of it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She studied it and shook her head. "A word or two here and there are
+readable. That's all. What is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The proof that I ought to be shut up in a lunatic asylum. But it
+<i>was</i> something that would have taken me anywhere and everywhere
+through this beastly country and forced every one to help me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's delightfully intelligible," she cried, laughing. "Are you going
+to keep this up much longer, or tell me things?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going to tell you everything; but that silly ass trick of mine has
+knocked me. I'll smoke a cigarette. You don't mind?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Providing you don't put the end in another pocket," she quizzed. "I
+thought it was agreed we were not to take things too seriously," she
+added as I lit up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've learnt my lesson." I had indeed. It had cost me the best safe
+conduct a man could have wished for, and if any unexpected trouble
+arose, there was now no possibility of undoing the mischief. As the
+guard passed along the corridor a little later, I decided to report the
+loss at once, and beckoned to him. "I've had an unfortunate accident,"
+I said. "I'm travelling on special State business and have burnt this
+very important paper;" and I handed it to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He looked at it, turned it over, and shrugged his shoulders. "I'm
+afraid I can't be of much help, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is my authority signed by Count von Gratzen; you can just make out
+a part of the official seal; and you will have seen that Herr von
+Welten was on the platform when we left Berlin."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, sir. He gave me orders to reserve this compartment for you,
+but&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can't do anything, I know; but I wish you to make a note that I
+told you of the loss. That's all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Would you telegraph to his Excellency, sir?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where's the first stop?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not till Hanover, sir; but as it is State business and so important, I
+could stop at the next station for you to send a message, and you would
+have a reply wired to Hanover, or Osnabrück, if you are going so far."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A good idea, guard. I'm much obliged to you. I'll think about it; just
+give me a form." He took one from his pocket and went off, saying he
+would come back for the message.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa had listened in the greatest amazement. "Who on earth am I
+travelling with?" she cried. "Do you mean that you are able to have
+trains stopped at your mere nod?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll tell you who you're travelling with in a moment, but let me think
+whether I dare send that wire." It wasn't long before I decided to risk
+it. Von Gratzen himself had suggested I should get out of the way for a
+time: even go to a distance: and would understand the importance of the
+ruined authority, since I could not return when he needed me without
+it. He would therefore wire me all I should require, pending the
+receipt of a new authority. That was all clear enough.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But there was a fly in the ointment. He might have discovered the theft
+of the papers. But even in that case there wasn't very much risk, as
+the von Erstein affair was so vastly more important that he would
+hesitate before sending any instructions to get me into trouble. So I
+wrote the message and gave it to the guard, with a ten-mark tip, and
+the train was accordingly stopped for it to be despatched.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I was ready to satisfy Nessa's acute curiosity. "Now you want to
+know who your fellow traveller is, eh? I'll tell you. He's a composite
+individual: an Englishman, a German, a State official, a spy, a thief,
+and an alleged murderer. I hope you're proud of him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care what he is if he's going to get me out of Germany. I
+needn't know him afterwards, I suppose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you're disrespectful and don't behave yourself I'll&mdash;I'll&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Dock my wages, mate?" she popped in in her slangy voice.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That reminds me. There's a little thing to be done in case of
+accidents;" and I took her bag from the seat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't mean to tell me you're going to keep me waiting any longer!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not going to have young Hans' clothes found in your possession;
+much too risky;" and I packed them into my suit case.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But your risk?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's none for me. I'm travelling on business of State and may need
+disguises of any sort. And now I'll read you the riddles; but we shall
+have to be quick about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you dare to hurry over it and not tell me every little detail, I'll
+never speak to you again, Jack," she declared with great energy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We must drop that Jack business, and speak in my language. And I have
+to be quick because it's nearly bedtime."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't imagine for an instant I'm getting into any sleeping berth
+to-night surely! I couldn't sleep a wink. I want to do nothing but
+talk."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, let it go at that;" and I began the long story. It is
+needless to say that her interest was acute. She was literally hungry
+for every detail and interrupted with innumerable questions, so that it
+took hours to tell, and I hadn't quite finished when we reached
+Hanover, where I broke off to get something for us to eat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A number of officers and soldiers were on the platform there, many of
+whom stared pretty hard at me; surprised probably to see a man of
+military age in civilian clothes. I did not take any notice of them;
+but there was a rather unpleasant incident on my return to the
+carriage. A couple of officers were in hot altercation with the guard
+because he would not allow them to enter our compartment.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They grumbled, declaring there was no room anywhere else; but he stood
+his ground, and in the end they went off in just such a rage as one
+might expect Prussian officers to show.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was greatly relieved to see them go, and as soon as the train
+started we commenced our meal.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm only a nervy idiot," she said; "for I declare I was awfully scared
+and couldn't help thinking they knew about the tickets. Do you really
+believe von Gratzen didn't know you took them?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm absolutely fluster-bustered about it. Sometimes I thought he knew
+I was a fraud; sometimes that he didn't; he acted both ways, and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But that von Welten was at the station," she broke in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Evidently he knew I had them, but must have thought old Gratz gave
+them to me. He said he had come to make sure I had planted the ring on
+von Erstein, all right. Otherwise, he'd have stopped us; but he
+actually asked where you were. It knocked me bang over."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd bet he knew all about it, and so did von Gratzen. I expect the
+truth is that after you'd saved his wife and Nita that day, he guessed
+everything and determined to give you a chance to get out of the
+country. Why, he almost told you to take them when you were with him in
+the morning. And then that authority he gave you! It's as plain as a
+pikestaff he meant that to get out of any bother on the way; and, as if
+that wasn't enough, there was von Welten at the station to see that we
+got away without any trouble."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let's hope you're right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course I am. Naturally in view of all that happened he couldn't
+give you the things openly or he might have got into a mess over it
+which couldn't be explained away. But everything else could. His plan
+about von Erstein, the brute, gave him an excellent excuse for allowing
+you to leave Berlin; in fact you can see he was clever enough to cover
+his tracks at every step. Surely that's clear enough."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It may be to you, but I gave up long ago trying to understand him, and
+if you'd seen as much of him as&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't want to see him, not till after the war anyhow, although he's
+just the dearest old thing in Germany. If I ever do see him again, I
+shall want to hug him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hug him as much as you like, by all means; all I wish is that he won't
+hug me in the way he probably would if he got the chance. And now
+hadn't you better try forty winks?" I suggested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What time is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nearly one o'clock."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What time shall we cross the frontier?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"About an hour after we leave Osnabrück, and we get there at half-past
+three."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I'll go to sleep at four o'clock. Not a moment before. I simply
+couldn't. Oh, to think that in four hours all the suspense and horrors
+of the last months will be at an end! When shall we reach home? Think
+of it, Jack! Home!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Depends on our getting a boat. We'll go right through to Rotterdam and
+shall reach there by nine or ten to-morrow morning, say before midday
+anyhow; but we may have to wait for a boat."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shan't mind that. We must wire to mother as soon as we're over the
+frontier. Not likely to have any bother there, are we?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can't think of any. We've got all the necessary papers."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How perfectly glorious! And to think that I owe it all to you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That rather takes the cream off, doesn't it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't fish. I might say something to make you blush. I'm quite capable
+of it and not a bit responsible for what I say. I want to revel in the
+thought of it all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"State business, is it? What do I care about State business? I want a
+seat and I'm going to have one," broke in a harsh ill-tempered voice
+from the corridor.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Going to have travelling companions to Osnabrück," I said. "Some of
+those officers who got in at Hanover. Better let them come in."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was no question of letting them. The man whose voice we had heard
+came in. "We've got to sit here; there's not another seat in the
+train," he said bluntly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"By all means," I agreed. There was nothing else to do.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come on, you fellows," he called, looking out into the corridor.
+"Plenty of room here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I stiffened as I caught a glimpse of one of his companions. He was a
+man named Freibach who had been at Göttingen with me, and both Nessa
+and I had known him in London before the war. I tried to warn Nessa,
+but it was useless; and her start as she saw him was enough to give
+everything away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Would he recognize us? If he did&mdash;what?
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A minute settled it and judgment went dead against us. He knew us both.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo! This is a surprise if you like. How do you do, Miss Caldicott,
+and you too, Lancaster?" he exclaimed in English, and after shaking
+hands with Nessa held out his hand to me.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap22"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+CHECKMATE
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+I'm not a particularly blood-thirsty person, but considering the hosts
+of Freibach's countrymen who had fallen in the war, I certainly did
+bitterly regret that he had been spared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Poor Nessa! Just when she had been at the height of ecstatic delight at
+the near prospect of escape, this infernal thing had come to plunge her
+back into the abyss. It seemed to break her up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And well it might! If it had been almost any other man than Freibach it
+might have been possible to face it out. Indeed, if he had been alone,
+or had even thought what he was doing, I believe he would have been
+decent enough to hold his tongue. But his surprise had betrayed us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And that we were betrayed his companions' looks proved plainly. The man
+who had come in first looked up with a scowl as I shook Freibach's hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's that, lieutenant? Do you mean to say these people are English
+and dare to try and keep us out of here with a pretence of State
+business? What's the meaning of it, and what the devil are you doing
+here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My friend realized then the bad turn he had done us and looked the
+regret he dared not express.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I put the best face on it I could. "There is no need to adopt that tone
+with me, sir&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Isn't there? Oh! I'm accustomed to use what tone I please with you
+English. I'm Major Borsch of the 23rd Potsdam regiment; and it's my
+business to know all about you both." That he was a bully of the best
+Prussian type was evident. "What was that humbug about State business?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+How I regretted that burnt authority at that moment! "This lady, Miss
+Caldicott, is on her way to England. She has been in Berlin since
+before the outbreak of the war and is returning by the order of Baron
+von Gratzen; and acting under his instructions I am escorting her to
+the frontier."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He burst into loud coarse laughter which made Freibach wince. "A pretty
+tale, but not good enough for me. And who are you, pray, that you are
+detailed off as escort?" The sneer on the last word was worthy of even
+von Erstein.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am travelling as Johann Lassen. I have all my papers here. I am on a
+special mission for Baron von Gratzen, who gave me a written authority
+for that purpose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did he indeed? Very nice of him. I should like to see that special
+authority. A swine of an Englishman on a special State business! What
+next, I'd like to know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't easy to keep one's temper with this sort of brute; but there
+was Nessa to be thought of. "Unfortunately I have partially burnt it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Dear me! What a misfortune, eh?" he sneered. "Let me look at the
+precious fragments and your other papers."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I handed over the burnt paper. "I have already reported the accident to
+Baron von Gratzen by telegraph." I dragged in the Baron's name as much
+as possible, for I had noticed that the mention of it had had some
+impression even on him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He scrutinized the authority and shook his head over it. "A forgery, of
+course;" and he was going to tear it up when I interposed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall have to report the destruction of it to the Baron, of course,"
+I said quietly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The officer who sat next him whispered something and the paper was not
+destroyed. "And your other papers? I must see them."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I did not reply, and he repeated his demand angrily. But I had taken
+his measure by this time. He had not ventured to destroy the remnant of
+the authority; and although its destruction didn't matter two straws
+either way, it mattered very much to see that he was sufficiently in
+awe of von Gratzen to abstain.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you want me to take them from you?" he thundered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do so, if you think it safe," I said in a very different tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't you dare to threaten me, you swinehound," he roared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Go to blazes!" I answered in much the same tone. "Who the devil are
+you to come blustering in here in this way? I'm on Baron von Gratzen's
+business, not yours; I've no instructions to show his papers to any and
+every boorish clown who dares to ask for them. If you want to see them,
+telegraph to him, and when he instructs me to tell you his business
+I'll do it, and not before."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I fired this at him with all my lung power and tried to look even more
+angry than I felt, and shouted him down when he tried to interrupt me
+once or twice.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He cursed volubly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you don't behave yourself I'll have you put out of the carriage," I
+cried. "Do you imagine that Baron von Gratzen sent his confidential
+secretary to secure this compartment for me and this lady that we might
+be insulted by such a foul-mouthed brute as you? Ask your questions
+civilly, and I'll answer them; but don't imagine you can bully me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That his three companions relished all this was apparent in their
+looks; but the effect on the bully himself was a sheer delight to
+witness. He tried to bluster, but he was frightened. The sting of my
+attack was the reference to von Welten's reservation of the
+compartment, and I promptly drove it home by asking Freibach to have
+the guard called.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He hesitated; the other man was his superior officer, of course, and
+looked to him. "He'll be able to confirm what I say," I added.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The major nodded and nothing more passed until the guard arrived.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who saw these people off at Berlin?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Herr von Welten, sir, and he told me that the compartment was to be
+strictly reserved for them by Baron von Gratzen's orders. I explained
+that the train was sure to be full; but he said that under no
+conditions was I to allow any one to enter it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The major's face dropped at this. "You can go," he ordered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Wait a minute, guard. Tell Major Borsch about the telegram."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The man told his story succinctly; and it had an excellent effect upon
+the bully, and a whispered conversation followed between him and the
+man next him. I began to hope. The worst was over for the moment,
+apparently; and the next scene was likely to take place when we reached
+Osnabrück. What would happen there was on the lap of the gods.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The only thing that really mattered was to contrive somehow that Nessa
+should be allowed to continue the journey, and it wasn't impossible
+that Freibach might be able to see to that. He would be willing enough,
+because he had been very kindly treated by the Caldicotts in London.
+Moreover, he had got us into this mess and was obviously distressed
+about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The whispered conference at the other side of the carriage ended by the
+major jumping up and leaving the carriage, muttering something about
+not being able to breathe the same air with us, and then his companion
+turned to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will appreciate the seriousness of the position to us, Herr
+Lassen, and that we are compelled to investigate it," he said. His tone
+was somewhat curt, but more official than offensive.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We are to understand that Baron von Gratzen has employed you on a
+special mission, knowing that you are an Englishman?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I have already given you the facts, but of course I am not at liberty
+to explain to you all his Excellency's reasons. He would not have given
+me that authority otherwise."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is unfortunately too mutilated to be intelligible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was couched in the widest terms. It was to notify to all concerned
+that I was to be allowed to go where I pleased and that every
+assistance was to be afforded me. You can still see a part of the
+official stamp."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is most extraordinary. Incomprehensible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not if I were free to explain why it was given to me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who gave it you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Baron von Gratzen wrote it himself in my presence. If you know his
+handwriting, there is enough of it left unburnt for you to identify it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I do not."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Again in my presence he handed it to his secretary, Herr von Welten,
+to be stamped, and von Welten gave it to me as I left the office. You
+have heard that he was at the station and himself reserved this
+compartment for Miss Caldicott and me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's the most remarkable thing of all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"On the contrary, it was a perfectly natural step. There was a matter I
+had to arrange before leaving, and his chief was anxious to know that
+it had been done exactly in accordance with my instructions."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What was that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That is a question to be put to the Baron. My lips are sealed."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And you an Englishman! It sounds incredible."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you suppose I should have telegraphed to Baron von Gratzen if it
+were incredible?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This worried him not a little, and he sat thinking with his hand
+pressed to his head. Not having the key to the riddle, he might well be
+baffled. "And your companion, Miss Caldicott, is going to England?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly. You have been quite courteous and I have no objection
+whatever to show you her papers;" and I took them out and handed them
+over. "You will see that they also bear the official hallmark of Baron
+von Gratzen's office."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was obviously impressed. "Both tickets are through to Rotterdam, I
+notice. Are you going to England also?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My instructions are to see Miss Caldicott across the frontier, and to
+return to Berlin as soon as my task is finished, unless his Excellency
+sends for me sooner."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was such a lovely mixture of the truth and the other thing that it
+appeared quite flawless, and he couldn't make head or tail of it. "Of
+course you understand that you will have to remain at Osnabrück while
+this is being investigated?" he said at length, returning the tickets.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That is for you to decide, and so far as I myself am concerned it is
+not of the least consequence. But it's different with Miss Caldicott.
+It is essential that her journey should not be interrupted."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa started at this and spoke for the first time. "I shall not go on
+without you," she protested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I must ask you to recall that, Miss Caldicott, if you please. I shall,
+of course, be placed under some sort of restraint until this
+gentleman&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am Captain Brulen," he interposed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Until Captain Brulen has satisfied himself. His Excellency's
+instructions are that you proceed at once; and for you to remain there
+would be extremely invidious and possibly unpleasant."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall not go on if you're stopped," she insisted. It was like her to
+wish to stick by me in the coming trouble, but impossible, so I adopted
+an official tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you persist in your refusal, Miss Caldicott, it will compel me to
+take a line I should deeply regret. My instructions <i>must</i> be
+carried out; they were very peremptory."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care what you do. I won't go on without you," she declared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Any delay at Osnabrück will render it impossible for me to see you
+across the frontier personally, and I shall have to ask Captain Brulen
+to detail some one for the purpose, Miss Caldicott. I can, of course,
+rely upon your doing that?" I asked him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The poor man didn't know what to make of this little interlude and
+replied with a perplexed gesture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I won't go," cried Nessa obstinately. "And if you send me as a
+prisoner, I'll come straight back. I've made up my mind absolutely."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This dogged attitude was growing dangerous and it became necessary to
+explain it, so I asked the Captain to come into the corridor, and he
+complied after a slight hesitation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I had better explain one point to you in reference to that young lady.
+Until quite recently I have been living in London&mdash;on Baron von
+Gratzen's instructions, of course. I met Miss Caldicott's friends there
+frequently; they are influential people and were extremely useful to
+know, you will understand. They have always regarded me as an
+Englishman, and at one time there was a sort of engagement between us.
+That was when your fellow officer, Lieutenant Freibach, met me. He also
+takes me for English. You will now understand her attitude just now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He swallowed it like mother's milk. "Why on earth didn't you tell us
+all this before?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Partly because of Major Borsch's disgusting manner; but mainly for the
+reason which is on the surface, surely. It is not impossible I may
+receive a wire to go on to England. You see my meaning. Under no
+circumstances must either of them know what I have told you. You will
+now see why Miss Caldicott must go on to-night and must not be allowed
+to return. The whole of my work in London would be utterly ruined if
+she and her friends knew I was a German."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course. I am at liberty to tell Major Borsch this?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Emphatically not. It is for your own ears solely. I never trust that
+type of man. Personally, all I care about is to get Miss Caldicott off
+my hands; and the sooner the better. This business about me will be
+cleared up in half an hour when we reach Osnabrück; but not in time for
+me to continue in the train, probably. There will be a wire from the
+Baron; but that may not be considered sufficient. I don't blame you in
+the least; but I shall certainly report the Major's conduct."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can probably get Freibach to see to Miss Caldicott."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing could be better. Please von Gratzen immensely," I replied,
+smiling. "And if you leave us two alone again, no doubt I could
+persuade Miss Caldicott to agree."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He did this; and as soon as Nessa and I were alone I told her the
+arrangement and began the persuasion campaign.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her reception of the news was just what might have been expected. She
+was furiously indignant. Was that my opinion of her, she demanded. Did
+I think she was a German and likely to desert any one who had run all
+this risk to help her? Did I take her for a despicable coward? Was she
+so abominably mean a thing in my eyes? And a great deal more to the
+same effect.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It's always best to let that sort of thing empty the petrol tank; so I
+just listened with becoming meekness which appeared to keep the engine
+running long after the tank was exhausted. Then: "And how do you think
+you can help me?" I asked smoothly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Another vigorous outburst. She didn't care about that. No one should be
+able to say she had run away in such a case; and so on.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now do listen to me a moment. I don't think anything of the sort. It's
+splendid of you, Nessa. But&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't leave you in the lurch, Jack, and I won't," she broke in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If there was the faintest use in your stopping, I wouldn't ask you to
+go. There isn't. On the contrary, it would make matters infinitely more
+awkward. It was getting awkward just now, and that's why I took that
+man out. I've told him that you take me for an Englishman, and that
+Freibach knew us in London when we were engaged, and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's true."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes; but he understands it differently&mdash;that I was in London as a
+German spy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He doesn't!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Indeed he does, and it altered his tune entirely. I said I wanted to
+get you off my hands as soon as possible&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is that also true?" she interposed, with such a smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"At the present moment, yes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Thank you. Almost enough to make me say I'll go," she cried with a
+toss of the head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Naturally. But it is true, for this reason. When we get to Osnabrück
+there will probably be a telegram from old Gratz; these people are
+likely to want something more than that, however; and I am sure to be
+detained while they communicate with him. But he can't let me down,
+even if he guesses I've helped myself to those tickets, because I'm
+necessary to him for the von Erstein affair: a much more vital matter
+to him than the tickets. The whole thing will be cleared up and I shall
+be able to follow you home. Very likely catch you up before you leave
+Rotterdam."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then if it's going to be so easy, why shouldn't I stop?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For the simple reason that the papers for you are only to be used on
+this particular date, and there would be no end of a fuss in getting
+any others."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You really and truly wish me to go on?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you care a rap for my safety you won't hesitate another moment."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She looked very troubled. "If I do, I won't go a step farther than the
+first town across the frontier, and if you don't join me soon I shall
+come back," she declared. "I shall. I'll tell every one that you've got
+into all this solely on my account and that I'm quite ready to go even
+to an internment camp."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Knowing her detestation of such a thing, I could appreciate all that
+lay behind this statement. It touched me too closely for me to reply
+immediately. Thank Heaven, she wouldn't be allowed to come back; but
+there was no need to tell her so. "Let it go at that, Nessa. The first
+town you'll stop at will be Oldenzaal, and I'll come to you there.
+You're due there about five in the morning; but you won't get there by
+that time if we keep stopping in this fashion. It can't be Osnabrück
+yet; there's half an hour before we're due there. I wish they'd hurry
+up."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had stopped at some station the name of which I couldn't see and
+stuck there some minutes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can't be anything wrong, can there?" asked Nessa nervily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Probably a troop train. It's all right, we're off again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But it was not a troop train that had stopped us. It was a very
+different cause, as we soon knew, for the brute of a major burst into
+our compartment flourishing a telegram and cursing me volubly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So we've got the truth about you, Mr. Englishman, at last. You
+infernal scoundrel," he cried viciously. "You wanted a telegram from
+your friend and patron, von Gratzen, did you? Well, read that!" with
+another string of oaths.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He held the message up and I did read it, with feelings which may
+perhaps be imagined although I can't describe them. It was to the guard.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Detain passengers Johann Lassen and companion. Suspected of murder.
+Acquaint police at next station and have them arrested.&mdash;<SPAN CLASS="scap">Von
+Gratzen</SPAN>."
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap23"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXIII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+WITHIN A HAIRSBREADTH
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Major Borsch stood gloating over me as I read the telegram. "Well, what
+do you think of your friend the Baron, now?" he sneered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He expected me to be completely crushed, so I shook off my first
+feeling of dismay and looked up with a bland smile. "I'm much obliged
+to you for showing it to me," I replied, as if it were the merest
+trifle. I must have done it pretty well, for even Nessa, who had been
+overwhelmed by the news, was surprised and pulled herself together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps you'll also be obliged for what will follow," he roared,
+aggravated by my coolness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What an exceedingly unpleasant person this is," I said to Nessa. "I'm
+sorry he can't behave himself; but you must try not to let it worry
+you. I suppose he can't help it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He doesn't worry me in the least, thank you," she replied
+contemptuously.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You hold your tongue, you baggage," he shouted, turning on her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Major Borsch!" I cried, rising.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sit down, you infernal swinehound! And as for you, you&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The sentence was not finished. My temper flew out of the window. If I
+was to be charged with murder, a little extra such as a smack on the
+mouth of even a major wouldn't make much difference, so I gave him one,
+and put enough behind it to knock him down.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+An involuntary scream from Nessa was drowned in his yells for his men;
+and two of them rushed in and seized me. He didn't get up until I was
+thus rendered helpless and then kept far enough away, pouring out a
+torrent of cursing abuse while he staunched the blood on his cut lips.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Captain Brulen arrived in the middle of it, with Freibach close on his
+heels; and the bully declared I had tried to murder him in order to
+escape. It was such a palpable absurdity that Freibach turned his face
+away to smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"This man was insulting the lady in my charge and I struck him, Captain
+Brulen," I explained. "You probably know him well enough to understand
+it is just what he would do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is a very grave position," he replied. "Very grave indeed."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You mean because of that telegram? Nonsense. It's a palpable forgery."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The major burst out into raucous laughter. "Forgery! Forgery, is it?
+Well, forgery or no forgery, you'll answer for that attack on me.
+Search him, and if he resists knock him on the head," he ordered the
+two soldiers.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is this man the senior officer on the train, Captain Brulen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hold your insolent tongue; and, Captain Brulen, stay where you are. Do
+as I told you," he ordered the men.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It would have been madness to resist. There was nothing on me of any
+consequence; and as Nessa was sitting on the suit case with her dress
+entirely covering it, nothing of importance was found, except the
+passports and our tickets. These the bully promptly pocketed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can I speak to you a moment, Major?" said Brulen then.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Mind your own business. This is my affair, not yours."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very good, sir," and with that he and Freibach went away. Both looked
+very disturbed, although for quite different reasons, as I knew.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Take the man to the other end of the carriage; see that the two
+prisoners have no chance of speaking to each other; remain between them
+in the middle until we reach Osnabrück, and if any attempt is made to
+escape, use your bayonets. You're answerable for them."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going to sleep," said Nessa as the brute was leaving the carriage;
+and she put her legs up on the seat with excellently acted unconcern.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good idea, so will I," and I threw myself full length on the seat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Silence," roared the brute. "If they speak, club them both," and with
+this amiable command to our guards he left us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The men would in all probability have obeyed him to the letter, so we
+prudently gave them no occasion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Except for the desire to try and reassure Nessa, there was nothing to
+be said. The disastrous telegram had ruined everything. What did it
+mean? It didn't seem possible that von Gratzen could have sent such a
+message. It was too blunt, too crude, and altogether too brutal a thing
+to fit with all I had seen of him. He was wily enough in all truth, but
+such a method was so lacking in finesse, so devoid of cunning, that I
+could not believe it had really come from him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was possible that he had been infuriated at discovering I had stolen
+the passports; but even then he would have resorted to some far more
+adroit means of arresting me. There was another consideration, too. It
+was not in accord with his plans to denounce me as the murderer in this
+fashion. His object was not to have me accused, but to catch von
+Erstein in the web so subtly woven.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At the same time it must have been sent by some one having high
+authority, because the train had been stopped in order that it might be
+delivered to the guard. The police could have done it. The detective at
+the station had probably reported my flight, and, if von Erstein had
+already accused me to them, they might resort to such a means to have
+me arrested. But in that case the message would not have been sent in
+von Gratzen's name. That killed that theory therefore.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was only one alternative suggestion&mdash;that the telegram was a
+forgery and that von Erstein had ventured to use von Gratzen's name,
+relying upon his influence to get him out of trouble for it. He had
+guessed I was going to bolt, and he would have little difficulty in
+finding out where I had gone; I might even have been followed to the
+station without knowing it; and it was just such a step as would appeal
+to his cunning vindictive nature.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The truth would soon be out, as a few minutes would see us at Osnabrück
+at the pace we were rushing through the night; and until we reached
+there, nothing could be done. Despite the mysterious telegram I still
+had faith in von Gratzen's concluding assurance&mdash;"Whatever happens I'll
+stand by you, my boy."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+All the same it was a deplorable business, especially for Nessa; and
+that worried me desperately. We were both sure to be locked up; and
+Germany is one of those insalubrious countries where it's very
+difficult to get out of gaol when once the doors have closed on you.
+Even if the thing were explained at Osnabrück, it would be impossible
+for her to continue her journey that night; and when she would be able
+to do so, Heaven alone knew.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was such a devil of a mess that no amount of wit-racking suggested a
+way out which did not involve a heap of delay and trouble. But the knot
+was cut nevertheless, in the most unexpected fashion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were nearing Osnabrück, running at some thirty or forty miles an
+hour, when the engine whistled furiously, and we were far enough in the
+front of the train to feel the grinding of the brakes quickly applied.
+Before they could do much to reduce the speed, however, there was a
+tremendous crash, the heavy carriage collapsed like a card house, the
+lights were extinguished, and the coach rocked a moment, seemed to rear
+right up, and then toppled over on its side.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was flung half a dozen ways at once; against the opposite side of the
+compartment, then back again and next down, so that I lay sprawling
+across the door. Something hit me a smack on the head and something
+else came floundering down on top of me, amid a shower of splintered
+glass and other fragments.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The "something else" turned out to be Nessa as I discovered when I
+called out to her in deadly fear that she had been killed. Thank Heaven
+we were both unhurt, save for the few bruises and slight cuts caused by
+the shuttlecock shaking we had experienced.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We owed our escape to the fact that we had been lying with our legs up.
+The result to our two guards showed that. They had been pinned down and
+lay groaning and moaning piteously in desperate agony.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was too overwhelmed by the shock to be able to move for a time.
+But she was awfully brave; not a cry had escaped her lips; and although
+she was trembling so that she could scarcely speak, she assured me she
+was not hurt in the least. "I shall be all right in a moment, Jack. I'm
+not hurt. I was afraid you were killed," she stammered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was then I found that the first something which had hit me was my
+suit case; and never was anything more welcome. There was a flask of
+brandy in it and a flash lamp, and I managed to get them both. The
+spirit soon revived us, and I flashed the light round the compartment
+and took my bearings.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a gruesome sight. The two unfortunate soldiers were unconscious;
+fearfully injured, bleeding terribly, and in such a mess as made one
+think of the trenches. The carriage lay on its side and the corridor
+over our heads. That offered the only way of escape, and to reach it I
+had to stand on the men's bodies. By this means I succeeded in getting
+a grip on the side of the doorway opening into the corridor. I pulled
+myself up and scrambled through the opening. Everything was smashed to
+splinters; there was an ominous smell of gas; part of the train was
+already on fire, the flames lighting up the weirdly awful scene; and
+the wind was blowing them right down on our carriage. There wasn't a
+second to lose if we were not to be roasted alive.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Lying at full length to get a purchase for my feet among some of the
+wreckage, I leant down to help Nessa out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She kept her head splendidly. She had presence of mind to remember the
+suit case, handed it up to me, caught my hand, and I swung her up
+beside me. It was touch and go even then, for the flames leapt the
+intervening space at that moment and a flare of gas soon set everything
+in a blaze.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had still to get off the carriage, and, although people were
+hurrying up with assistance, there was no time to wait for them.
+Crawling over the wreckage to a spot where the side of the carriage had
+been shattered, I threw the suit case out, sprang after it, and held
+out my arms, calling to Nessa to jump. She did it without a second's
+hesitation, falling right on top of me with sufficient suddenness and
+force to send us both sprawling to the ground.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were up again in a moment. Nessa laughed strangely and hysterically.
+"I'm all right, Jack," she cried breathlessly. "Mind the suit case;"
+and then clutched me convulsively and fainted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't surprising, considering that we had had so narrow a squeak
+for it, and I could estimate the effect upon her by my own general
+shakiness. What amazed me was that in such a crisis, when death had
+been a matter of seconds almost, she had seemed to think more about
+that blessed suit case than her own safety. But she told me the reason
+afterwards; and of course it was on my account.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I wasn't sorry she fainted. The whole scene was so painful and
+horrible, that it was a mercy she was spared the sight and smell and
+sounds of it. Then again it helped to rally me, as I had to see to her.
+I picked her up and carried her right away to a distance where neither
+sight nor sound of the disaster was likely to be too obtrusively
+harrowing, found a shed, and gave her some brandy, and had a swig of it
+myself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She soon came round, but was much too overcome by the shock to be moved
+for a long time, or even to talk. So I let her lie where she was,
+wrapped her up in some of the clothes in the suit case, lit a
+cigarette, and set to work to think what our next move had better be.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't the easiest of problems. There was no chance of getting
+across the frontier that night, for we had neither tickets nor
+passports. That bully of a major had kept them. What had happened to
+him in the smash couldn't be even guessed, of course; but whatever it
+might be, there was no recovering our papers. That was a certainty.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Could any others be got? Not at Osnabrück. That telegram had been sent
+to the guard of the doomed train and, if he was alive, he would
+undoubtedly inform the police; and the instant I turned up as Lassen,
+we should both be clapped into gaol.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It looked as if it would be extremely unhealthy to attempt to ask for
+any message from von Gratzen. A very aggravating poser. It was galling
+to think that a message might be waiting which would clear the road for
+us effectually, and yet be unable to go for it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was the unpleasant contingency that it might not be there,
+moreover; in which case I should have to put my head in the lion's
+mouth, with a great probability of the jaws closing on it. A very
+awkward risk. It didn't affect me so much as Nessa. Even if the police
+held me in custody as a suspected murderer, it would only be a
+temporary trouble. But Nessa? What would happen to her it was
+impossible to foresee; so I ruled out that course.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If we were to get out of the country it must be done under strictly
+unofficial patronage. Our own. The less we bothered von Gratzen or any
+one else, the better. That meant going on in our disguises; and then I
+realized how invaluable Nessa's thought of the suit case had been.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't a particularly cheerful outlook; but there was one big thing
+in our favour. Our carriage had been burnt; scarcely any one had been
+on the spot at the time; certainly no one who could possibly recognize
+us; and the conclusion every one would draw was that we had perished in
+the flames. That was another virtual certainty; but in our favour.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was more than enough on the other side of the ledger, however. I
+had no identification card; Nessa was in rather a bad shape, and it
+looked as if she would have to go to bed and stop there for a time,
+whereas if we were to get away, we ought to be some miles from
+Osnabrück before daylight; and to go to any hotel or other place for
+the purpose was very much like asking for more trouble when we had
+quite sufficient already.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At the same time her safety was the pivot on which everything else
+turned; it would be idiotic to try and get away, if it meant knocking
+her up permanently; and that must be the first and prime consideration.
+She lay so still and seemed so weak and done up, that it was clearly
+necessary to do something instead of merely thinking about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can you make an effort, Nessa?" I whispered, bending over her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Make an effort? Of course I can. I thought you were bowled over.
+That's why I kept quiet. I'm all right," and to my surprised relief she
+sat up at once. "What shall we do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I thought you were almost down and out," I exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I fainted? That was the reaction, I expect. I've never done
+such a thing before that I can remember. But I'm all right again now.
+I've been thinking."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've been doing a bit of that myself. Are you sure you're fit?" It was
+difficult to believe it after what she had gone through.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course I am, except for being a little shaken. It was an awful
+business while it lasted; but it's over and got us out of all that
+trouble. Of course every one will believe we were burnt alive;" and she
+shuddered. "I suppose it's an awful disaster."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better not think of it. The last glimpse I had showed that our
+carriage and the one behind it were in flames. You can see the glare
+through the door there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, Jack! And they were crowded with people!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We can't do anything to help, and we'd better think of ourselves," and
+to distract her thoughts from the horrors of the train wreck I told her
+the reasons against venturing into Osnabrück.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've been thinking the same. Surely there's only one thing to do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The 'third wheel', of course. It's been in my mind from the very
+moment of the collision. I don't know how it was, but that rushed into
+my head instantly; and when you weren't hurt, I could think of nothing
+but that;" and she pointed to the suit case.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It was the last word you spoke before fainting."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And the first when I came round. I was so thankful when I saw you'd
+brought it away all right. I didn't care after that. You didn't seem
+really hurt; only shaken; I knew I should be all right soon; and I felt
+a sort of certainty that the third wheel would carry us into safety.
+Hadn't we better go?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, if you feel fit to do a few miles before daylight?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll soon see that, if you'll go to your own room and change and
+leave me to do the same."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My "room" was the back of the shed outside, and I lost no time in
+getting off my own clothes and putting on the workman's dress over what
+my flying friend had called the "tummy pad." Then I lit up and waited,
+thinking what a plucky soul Nessa was, until she called to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How's this, matey?" she asked in her new character and laughed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a wonderful transformation indeed!  I should never have
+recognized her; and the few little scratches on her face from the
+broken glass in the collision, combined with some artistic smudges she
+had added, made her into a lifelike young workboy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What have you done with your hair?" I exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Just messed it up under the cap. Of course it'll have to come off; but
+we'd better not waste any time about it now, had we? We can see to it
+later in the morning."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Righto," I agreed; and we set to work to finish the other
+preparations. We had to dispose of our own clothes, of course; so we
+rolled them up tightly, put the overalls in the suit case, and were
+ready.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now for the frontier," I said. "Let's hope the luck's with us."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Cheero, matey; if it isn't, you'll get us through somehow," she
+replied with the most plucky confidence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I loved her for that, for I knew that she understood the difficulties
+and risks that lay ahead quite as well as I did. I lost my head for a
+minute then; and just as we stood on the threshold of the dingy little
+shed, I put my arm round her, drew her quickly to me and kissed her on
+the lips.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She held to me for an instant, kissed me in return, and then drew away
+quickly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not so much of it, matey. Do you take me for a girl? You've knocked my
+cap off, clumsy," she cried, laughing and blushing, as her glorious
+hair fell over her shoulders and down to her waist.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A fine sort of a girl you'd make, and no mistake," I replied, picking
+up the cap and giving it to her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In a few moments she had it in place again, pulled the cap down over it
+and was once more ready.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come on, clumsy," she called, stepping out into the night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And in that way we started on the journey to the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap24"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXIV
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+NESSA'S DOWNFALL
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The chief event of the hours following the railway smash was histrionic
+rather than serious, although Nessa regarded it as both humiliating and
+tragic. And tragic it might easily have been.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her courage was wonderful. Nothing could damp her spirits nor lessen
+her high confidence. She laughed at the idea of risks or danger,
+scoffed at difficulties, and made light of every obstacle as if ours
+was a mere holiday jaunt. An optimist to the very tips of her pretty
+fingers.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To be Hans, the mechanic, was just a delightfully farcical joy; she
+took pride in her skill in playing the part, and was so eager to show
+me how carefully she had studied it that I hadn't the heart to be a
+candid critic and point out that it was one thing to act a part for an
+hour or two on an amateur stage or when we were by ourselves, and quite
+another to keep it for days in circumstances when even a slight trip
+might spell grave trouble.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And that our situation was full of difficulties and even dangers was
+certain. She was still suffering from the inevitable shock of the
+railway smash; she was done up and sorely in need of rest; it was out
+of the question to think of seeking a lodging in Osnabrück; the best we
+could look for was to shelter in some barn or out-of-the-way shed;
+fifty miles or more lay between us and the frontier, any yard of which
+might bring some incident which would involve discovery; and even if we
+got through safely, the job of crossing the frontier would be the most
+difficult and dangerous of any.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The little incident in the shed as we were leaving kept us both silent
+for a while. It was the first sign since we had met in Berlin to
+suggest the renewal of our old relations; and it was not until we
+reached a good spot for ridding ourselves of our own clothes that the
+silence was broken.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We struck out to the north of the town and turned along a footpath
+which would lead us round the outskirts. This took us across a broad
+stream, and Nessa pulled up on the bridge to suggest we should sink the
+clothes. We made them into two parcels, put some heavy stones in each,
+and I sunk them under some trees which overhung the stream a little
+distance along the bank.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And when do you propose to put your thinking cap on about our plans,
+Jack?" she chipped when I rejoined her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not going to think of anything else from this minute."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hear, hear. The 'anything else' must wait, eh?" she cried, with one of
+her bright silvery laughs.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's not very much like a German hobbledehoy's laugh, is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Righto, matey, I forgot. That was Nessa; this is Hans;" and she
+guffawed in her best Hans' manner.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not so much of your forgetting, young 'un. This may be no mere picnic."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Keep your hair on; but I'm going to have the time of my life. By the
+way, what's your name?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Been christened so often lately that I'm not too clear about it. You
+can call me boss."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Boss, eh? Then you expect to be master, I suppose?" with a mischievous
+meaning chuckle. "Am I to keep it up always?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Jack's the English for it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Anything else?" she chuckled again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Wait till the time comes, my lad;" and she decided to drop the chaff.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And what about our plans, boss?" she asked after a pause.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't see anything for it but to tramp it, if you can stick it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How far?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The nearest road to the frontier is about thirty odd miles; but as we
+can't take that, we can put it down at fifty, say. There's no need to
+rush things, and if we can manage ten or fifteen each day, it ought to
+do the trick."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing in that to hurt me, boss. I've often padded twenty or
+twenty-five in a day, looking for a job, you know. But what's waiting
+for us at the end of the tramp?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wish I could tell you. My rough idea is to make for a place called
+Lingen. There are two little dips in the Dutch frontier which come down
+close to it, and it looks like a fairly good jumping-off place. I'm out
+of it, if we don't run against some of the smuggling lot there, and the
+best plan I can think of is to try and join up with some of them and
+get across in that way."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks all right. If we can get there, that is."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Needn't worry about that, young 'un. We can tramp it at night, at the
+worst; but we're not likely to be interfered with. We can always be
+going to a job just a few miles farther on. I always thought of
+Osnabrück as the place where we might have to start our tramp, and I've
+a road map. What we want at the moment is a place where we can rest for
+an hour or two."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We plodded on steadily, avoiding the roads as much as possible, until
+we had left Osnabrück well in our rear, and then Nessa pointed to a
+cottage on the fringe of a wood, which appeared to be deserted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks like the very spot for us, young 'un. Stop here and I'll go and
+have a squint at it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Look sharp about it, boss, I'm getting a bit leggy and could do with a
+doss for an hour or two."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I reconnoitred the place cautiously from the back, where there was an
+untilled garden patch, and first made enough noise to rouse a dog, if
+there was one. All remained quiet; so I slipped along the garden and
+flashed my torch lamp through a broken pane of a back window. The room
+was quite bare, and I opened the window and went over the cottage.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was deserted right enough. A four-roomed shanty, dirty and
+dilapidated, but good enough for a shelter; so I fetched Nessa. "A
+rough shop, young 'un, but better than none."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better quarters than those English swine get in the concentration
+camps, I'll bet," she said as we went up the ricketty stairs to an
+upper room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Bare boards only. It's a good thing you can rough it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing to what our brave fellows have to put up with at the front,"
+she replied; and without more ado she lay down with the suit case as a
+pillow and was soon fast asleep.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I crept out of the room, lit a pipe, and strolled round the cottage
+trying to think out a definite plan of operations. The most practical
+question was that of supplies. There would not be any serious risk of
+trouble with the police even if we kept to the main roads; and this
+would both shorten the tramp and enable us to get food at
+out-of-the-way inns.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The one thing that offered difficulties was Nessa's disguise. She was
+overacting her part considerably and, what was much worse,
+involuntarily had dropped now and then into her own dear self. The boy
+business was a blunder. She must turn woman again. It would be much
+safer if she passed as my sister or even my wife, or perhaps both at
+turns, according to circumstances.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She would probably kick against it a bit, considering the trouble she
+had taken and the pride and pleasure she felt in the part. But safety
+must come first. There was another consideration. If we were stopped, I
+should be asked for my identification card; and the lack of it might
+mean trouble. As my wife she wouldn't need one. I must therefore be
+re-christened and become Hans Bulich.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Over a second pipe the prudence of the change became more obvious, and
+I regretted the hurry we had been in to get rid of her dress, realizing
+the difficulty of replacing it without rousing suspicion. We should
+come across plenty of places where such things could be bought; but for
+a man and a boy to buy such things were almost certain to lead to
+awkward questions, especially anywhere near the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was broad daylight before I finished wrestling with these new
+problems, and, as it was better not to run a risk of being seen about
+the cottage, I went into a little shed belonging to it, propped myself
+in a corner and dozed off. I was tired and must have slept heavily, and
+was awakened by a kick and the angry shout of a man asking what the
+devil I meant by sleeping on his premises. "Get up and be off with you,
+you lazy tramp," he said, when I rubbed my eyes and blinked at him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not a tramp, guv'nor," I protested, getting up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I'm no farmer, you skulker;" and he looked like repeating the
+kick.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Steady, man, steady. Keep your temper. I'm a mechanic on my way to a
+job in Osnabrück. My boy and I lost our way in the wood yonder and came
+here to ask the road. Finding the place empty, we decided to doss it
+till daylight. My mate's only a youngster and was regularly done up."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You look dirty enough for a tramp anyhow," he growled. "I'm pestered
+with them. Got any money on you?" A rough-and-ready test of his tramp
+theory.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hope so. More than enough to pay for this sort of bed. Times are
+pretty good with us chaps now;" and I pulled out a handful of money.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+His surly look cleared. "I don't want any of it. What sort of a
+mechanic do you call yourself?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Motors and aeroplanes and that sort of thing."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The devil you are!" he exclaimed, and, after a pause: "Care to earn a
+mark or two?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't mind if I do? How?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My motor's in the lane yonder, and something's gone wrong with it. Do
+you think you could patch it up?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll have a look at it for you. I'd better get what tools I have with
+me. They're with my lad."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He opened the front door of the cottage and I ran up to fetch Nessa,
+fastening her hair up tightly. I told her about the farmer, and found
+him waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs. He squinted so
+curiously at Nessa that I feared he suspected her sex.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My name's Glocken," he said as we went to the car.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I didn't respond to the evident invitation. "Farmer are you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He nodded. "Got a couple. One here; the house is just over the hill
+yonder;" jerking a thumb in the direction; "and one out Lingen way."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's where we're padding it, ain't it, boss?" asked Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A nasty slip, but my fault, for I had not told her I had said I was
+going to Osnabrück. The farmer noticed it, of course. "Thought you
+spoke of a job at Osnabrück?" he said meaningly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did I? Must have been half asleep, I suppose. It's Lingen we're bound
+for."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No concern of mine. Here we are. Now let's see what you can do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a curious composite; a cross between a touring car and a
+delivery van. The seats of the tonneau had been taken out to make room
+for goods, and there was a moveable arrangement for raising the sides
+at need. There were a few swedes and a tiny truss of hay in it,
+suggesting the use to which it was put; but there was something else
+which prompted very different thoughts.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They've taken all my horses, so I have to fall back on this, to carry
+the fodder round," he said, noticing my curiosity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded and threw back the bonnet to find the trouble. It was a
+splendid engine, 40 h.p. but very dirty; and the dirt had caused the
+stoppage. Half an hour would put everything right; but I tinkered and
+fussed over it, as I wished to investigate what I had noticed in the
+tonneau.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The farmer watched me for a time; then talked to Nessa, who made great
+play with the Hans impersonation; and I found my chance. I was right.
+The farmer fed his cattle on very original diet; coffee, sugar, and
+cocoa seemed to be considerable ingredients, judging by the evidences I
+found under the swedes and hay. And his other farm was at Lingen! And
+Lingen was close to the Dutch frontier!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If circumstantial evidence went for anything, this meant that the chief
+use of the car was for smuggling, and that the agricultural produce was
+to pull the wool over the eyes of the curious.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I finished my work quickly, trying to see how to turn the knowledge to
+the best account. It looked like the chance of chances for us, for he
+might be the very man we wanted to find near the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She'll do now, farmer," I called, and started the engine to prove it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You know your job, I see," he said, highly pleased, and gave me five
+marks, which I pocketed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She wants cleaning badly if you don't want to have her break down in
+running to and from that farm of yours at Lingen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No fear of that, is there?" he asked in concern.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wouldn't answer for her any time in the state she's in."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Could you do the job for me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not now; but I may have a bit of spare time when I get to Lingen. I
+reckon you pack some weight into her at times, too. Groceries tot up,
+you know. Which is our road for Lingen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What d'ye mean by groceries?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I gave him a smile and a wink. "No concern of mine, farmer. I never
+talk about other men's business."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll come along the lane and show you a short cut," he said and went
+off. "What are you two after?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Grub," exclaimed Nessa promptly. "Ain't had a bite since yesterday
+forenoon, 'cept some berries I picked to give my belly something to
+do." It was very naturally said, but a blunder, of course.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Funny. You must have been off the track a lot," he said. "There's
+plenty of places everywhere. Which way did you come?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's which way we've got to go, that matters now, farmer," said I.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's true, and here's the footpath. You strike me as the sort of man
+one could work with. Come and see me when you get to Lingen;" and he
+told me how to find the farm and offered his hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He let us get a few yards and then called me back. "It's no concern of
+mine, but that's a delicate youngster of yours; any one would more
+likely take him for a wench than a lad, when he's off guard. Anyhow,
+come and see me at Lingen;" and without waiting for my reply, he walked
+off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What did he want?" asked Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Spotted you for a girl."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Jack! He couldn't!" she protested indignantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He did;" and I used the fact as a text to urge the change I had in my
+thoughts. She did kick at it, as was to be expected; but a little later
+we had a powerful practical proof of its necessity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We turned into the first inn we came to for some breakfast, and I was
+talking to the woman of the house, a very kindly-looking motherly
+person, about it when there was a commotion outside. I ran out to find
+Nessa being rough-handled by a man who was trying to snatch her cap
+off. A word or two stopped any mischief, but it also drew the woman's
+attention very pointedly to Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can have your breakfast in my room, if you like," she said, and,
+when I thanked her, led the way to it, and closed the door and stood
+with her back to it. "You've taken your cap off, can't the lad do the
+same?" she asked very meaningly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Got a sore place on it, mum; 'fraid of a chill," said Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm good at curing places of that sort, let me have a look at it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, thank you, all the same, I don't take kindly to coddling," replied
+Nessa, colouring.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The woman smiled. "You do it very well, my girl, but I'm a woman myself
+and know my own sex," she replied drily. Then to me: "You're an honest
+man, I'll wager, by your looks. Hadn't you better tell me what it
+means?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's my wife," I said. "She's English and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Glory be to God!" she interposed excitedly, in English, with a strong
+brogue. "If I didn't guess it the instant I clapped eyes on the both of
+ye!" and the tears welled in her eyes as she rushed to Nessa, took off
+the cap and kissed her. "Ah, ye poor Mavourneen, ye! And, saints alive,
+look at the lovely hair it is. And to think ye're from England, only I
+wish it was dear old Oireland, that I do! Whisht now, or Oi'll be
+making an ould fool of mysilf. We'd best just shpake in German. That I
+should live to see the day! And out in this divil of a hole of a place!
+It's making for the frontier ye are, of course! And it's glad that I am
+I can help ye, so I can. And it's breakfast ye want, is it? Sure I'll
+see to it; but I must dry my eyes first and get sober."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She kissed Nessa again and almost kissed me also in her joy, wiped her
+eyes, looked in the glass to see that all was right and bustled out to
+see about the breakfast.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Something like a stroke of luck, this," I said; but Nessa was too cast
+down at her failure in the part to answer, so I looked out of the
+window to give her time to get over it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She rose presently and I felt her hand on my shoulder. "I'm a failure,
+Jack," she said wistfully, struggling to smile at it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And thank Heaven for it, sweetheart."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But even that brute of a farmer found me out. I wouldn't care so much
+if it had only been this good soul."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She spotted me as English too," I reminded her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I know. You're trying to make it easier for me; but that man didn't
+spot you, the beast!" She smiled then at her own vehemence. "Well, it's
+good-bye, Hans, I suppose," she said with a sigh.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And good riddance, too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And yet you said I was doing it so well."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And so you were, child, for the stage, but this is different."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's taken all the fun out of the picnic for me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What? To be my wife?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She laughed and shook her head. "Well, there's one thing, you won't be
+the boss any longer."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll see about that, young 'un."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't, Jack. Don't ever dare to refer to this again or I'll&mdash;I'll&mdash;I
+don't know what I'll do!" she cried with a stamp of the foot. Then she
+caught sight of Han's cap. "It's that horrid thing that's the cause of
+it all;" and she picked it up and flung it from her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That was the overt act of renunciation of the part; and as she turned
+to me I put my arm round her and kissed her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I thought there was to be no more 'anything else,'" she laughed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Mustn't a man kiss his own wife?" I cried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That hopes to be, Jack," she whispered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And that was Hans' funeral ceremony.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap25"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXV
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+A FRIEND IN NEED
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+When the woman returned to us she had quite thrown off her emotional
+outburst at our meeting, and her first words were a warning not to
+speak another word of English.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I couldn't help it at first, I was so excited; but it would ruin me if
+it was known that I'm British," she declared, and over the breakfast
+she told us her story.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was from Cork, where she had married a German baker named Fischer,
+had come to Germany a few years later, had been a widow for five years,
+and had continued to carry on the business of the inn. She was very
+curious to learn the truth about the war; and when I had satisfied her,
+we settled down to the consideration of her own affairs.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We returned confidence for confidence: that Nessa and I were engaged to
+be married; how I had come from England to find her; the plight she had
+been in owing to von Erstein's persecution; that we had been in the
+train smash, and had escaped with our lives, but had lost the passports.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She knew the von Erstein type of German well enough to sympathize
+deeply with Nessa and listened in tears to that part of the story.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can help you both, and I will; but you'll have to be as cautious as
+a pair of wild birds. They're just grabbing the men into the army with
+both hands, for one thing, and they'll take you at sight, and then what
+would she do, poor thing?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But aren't a lot of mechanics exempted?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you know anything about such things really?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Most there is to know about motors and aeroplanes."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, that's better," she cried, rubbing her hands. "They're making that
+sort of thing now at a place called Ellendorf, out Lingen way; and
+they're wanting men badly. You can say you've heard of it and are on
+your road there, and it may help you through. But understand that all
+strangers about here are suspected and the police are mighty curious;
+and it's worse the closer to the frontier you get. Have you thought how
+you're to get across?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If we're as lucky there as we have been here, it mayn't be so
+difficult. My rough idea was to join up with some of the folk who are
+smuggling things over and look for a chance to slip across."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd thought of that, too, and I can help you," she said, and then
+explained her plan.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She declared that nearly every one near the frontier was taking a hand
+in the smuggling game and that the authorities, both police and
+military, not only winked at it, but secretly encouraged it. Lately,
+however, owing to the more drastic rounding up of men for the army,
+there had been a good deal of the slipping over which we wished to do,
+and stringent measures were being taken in consequence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That makes it more difficult," she continued; "but my late husband's
+brother, Adolf Fischer, lives there. I'll give you a note to him and
+he'll help you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is he one of them?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She smiled and nodded. "He's getting rich at it and has several people
+working with him. I'll have to lie for you; but I don't mind. I'll tell
+him I know all about you and that you want to join him; but don't say a
+word about skipping over, or he'll put the police on you. He's very
+thick with them, but that needn't scare you. They won't touch one of
+his men."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We're awfully obliged to you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only wish I could do more. Of course, I'll find some clothes for
+you," she said to Nessa. "They'll only be rough working things; but
+then nothing else would do; and if you'll both be guided by me, you
+won't think of risking the walk to Lingen. What you'd better do is to
+stop here and rest till to-morrow morning, get away early and foot it
+to Massen; it's only a matter of four or five miles: and catch the
+train there; and it would be all the better if you were to wear
+overalls. I can get you some."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I have some already," I put in.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All the better, but whatever you do, don't carry that grip with you.
+Might as well write who you are on your back. Much better carry a tool
+or so in your hand as if you were off to a job in a hurry; and she
+might have a small market basket. She'll be your wife till ye reach
+Lingen; and don't forget that most Germans treat their wives pretty
+gruffly. There are plenty of spies about with sharp eyes for trifles of
+the sort. They might even see that you don't eat like them. I should
+have known you by it," she declared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We both laughed as we thanked her again; and soon afterwards she took
+Nessa away to see about the change of dress.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had fallen on our feet in all truth. Her help was literally
+invaluable. Every one of her suggestions was practical and opened my
+eyes to the many little difficult details and pitfalls which had never
+occurred to us when planning our escape.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+An hour or two later she came back saying she had left Nessa making
+some few necessary alterations in the dress and wanted to speak to me
+alone. "Just like me, I've put my foot in it with her. I told her
+what's only the truth, that you'll never be able to get over the
+frontier together, and she swears nothing shall make her go alone. You
+must talk her round or&mdash;&mdash;" and she shook her head doubtfully.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That'll be all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Perhaps. She's just the bravest darling in the world, but my, what a
+will!" and she threw up her hands and smiled. "The frontier men will
+always wink at a woman crossing, but if they catch a man trying it they
+shoot him and done with it. Now what'll you do if she won't give in?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, I'll tell you. Go to that factory at Ellendorf and get a job.
+You'll both be safe there; they'll find you a cottage, and you'll have
+to wait till a chance comes to get away together. Tell my
+brother-in-law you're going there and that you can do his work from
+there. But if she sticks out, don't try anything from Lingen; he's sure
+to hear about it, and then you may look out. Don't forget that and
+think that because he speaks you fair, he's soft. He isn't. He daren't
+be, either."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She went on to give me a host of details about the smuggling, and I
+took an opportunity to ask about the farmer whose car I had repaired.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Old Farmer Glocken, you mean. He's deep as a well and as dangerous as
+St. Patrick found the snakes. If he can make use of you, all right;
+he'll do it so long as it pays him; but he'd sell his own wife, poor
+wretch, for a few marks. Don't go near him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He does a little smuggling?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A little! He's in it up to his eyes. He could get you both across
+easily enough, if you paid him, supposing he didn't take your money
+first and then sell you. And that's as likely as not."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Some one knocked at the door then and she went out, returning with a
+servant who clumped noisily after her and began to lay the cloth for
+dinner.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Be careful, Gretchen," she said sharply as the girl nearly let some
+glasses fall. She was a stoutish, rather slatternly girl, with
+particularly grimy finger nails, and a shawl over her head which
+concealed most of her face. She was very clumsy, too, and set
+everything down awkwardly with a guffaw.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you think of Gretchen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I started and they both laughed. It was Nessa, of course, and she
+whipped off the shawl, clapped her hands, and turned completely round
+so that I might study her get-up.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better than the boy, eh?" laughed Mrs. Fischer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's wonderful. I should have passed her in the street with that shawl
+over her head."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's how the workgirls wear it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Look at my boots, Jack," cried Nessa, holding up a foot. "Aren't they
+just lovely?" Great clumsy thick-soled things they were.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Her own were just danger signals. But she'll do as she is. Now, I've
+told my servants you're old friends of mine, and that you'll be here
+till to-morrow morning. You had better not go out. A day's rest and a
+long night's sleep won't hurt either of you;" and with that she hurried
+away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Isn't she a dear old soul? She's been mothering me up there, as if she
+couldn't do enough for me, and ransacked every nook and cranny to fish
+out these things."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She's a very shrewd old party, too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And are you proud of your wife, or sister, whichever I'm going to be?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Which would you prefer?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't be silly. Don't you think this is ripping? And she's been
+drilling me about how to behave. I think she's wonderful."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What sort of drilling was it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No end of things. How to eat; what to do; how to walk; always to have
+my knitting in hand; not to talk to strangers, especially women; one or
+two phrases I was to use; how to carry my market basket; a regular
+rehearsal of everything, and we're to have another this evening. Look
+at my hands;" and she held them out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I saw your nails when you put the tray on the table."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, but look how she's managed to make them coarse. We scrubbed them
+all over with bath brick and then rubbed in the dirt. They're smarting,
+as if they were chapped. And look at my hair, plastered right down on
+my head. Did you ever see such a fright as I am? And then this bunchy
+business on my hips;" and she laughed as she looked at herself in the
+glass.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not a bit of it. There was a regular lecture on the proper behaviour
+of working men's wives; sort of fetch and carry dogs with the tails
+always between their legs and never a wag except when the master
+condescends to give them a nod or so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Going to do it all?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was fingering her hair and started, glancing sharply at me in the
+glass. "Sisters don't, by any means. But I know that tone of yours. You
+mean something. What is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Mrs. Fischer told me she had been giving you some hints."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She paused and then turned and faced me, putting her hands behind her
+back with her head thrown well back&mdash;a pose I knew well. "I think I
+know what you mean and I'm not going to do it, Jack."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do what?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Innocent!  But it's no use, Jack, I won't."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very well."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't mean that a bit. I know. You mean just the opposite. It's
+about my getting over the frontier alone. Isn't that it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"She said something to me about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course. She tried all she knew to persuade me and now she's been at
+you, of course. I'm ready to listen to you; but I warn you it won't
+make a pennorth of difference."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Very well."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, don't 'very well' me in that tone. You don't expect me to desert
+you when you've done all this and got into this mess solely for me, do
+you?" she cried vehemently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We won't worry over it now; but there's just one point you might keep
+in mind. It may turn out to be necessary for my safety. What then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her face clouded at that. "How could that be?" she asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We can answer that better later on," I said with a shrug. "But if it
+should be?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did Mrs. Fischer say anything about that to you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded. "Said it might be easy enough for you to get over, but very
+risky for us both to try it together. Suggested that if you held out I
+had better get a berth at Ellendorf; but there's the question of my
+leave. It's nearly up, and either you or I must be able to wire
+explanations from Holland within the next day or two."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I never thought of that. What would happen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Possibly nothing; but it doesn't help a man to play the absentee.
+They've a nasty term for that in the army."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You always mean such a lot when you speak in that casual tone of
+yours," she exclaimed. "Of course, if my stopping meant any sort of
+trouble to you, it would be different. Nothing else would make me go.
+And if you're only saying it to force me you're&mdash;well, it's cowardly
+and you ought to be ashamed to do it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, think it over, and we'll see how the cat jumps. I promise you
+this, faithfully, I won't ask you to do it if it isn't necessary."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She paused and then came and laid a hand on my shoulder. "You won't ask
+me to go unless it's necessary for your sake, will you, Jack? It would
+be awful for me to feel that you were left here in danger. I know
+you're thinking all about me and not about yourself, and&mdash;oh, Jack, I
+don't believe I could bear it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We won't worry any more about it till the time comes. I think it's
+splendid of you to want to stick it, but it's better to tell you;" and
+we let the matter drop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But Nessa did worry about it exceedingly for the rest of the day. She
+spoke very little and appeared to have lost interest in things; and
+just before she was going to bed she came with a suggestion that we
+should make at least one attempt to cross the frontier together. I
+yielded very reluctantly, as it meant the hash of a great part of our
+plans. But she was so downcast, so troubled, and pleaded with such
+wistful earnestness, that I hadn't the heart to refuse.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Mrs. Fischer declared it was rank madness; that if we tried it, we
+mustn't go near her brother-in-law; and that we had better go straight
+to Ellendorf.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was in much better spirits early the next morning when we bade
+good-bye to our new friend.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How are we to repay you for all this?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It isn't money you mean, is it?" she asked, almost indignantly,
+although she was so affected at parting from us that the tears were in
+her kind motherly eyes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No money could repay all your kindness and help."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then don't offer it to me. Sure, it's enough that we're all of the
+same blood, and all I'll want is to know that you get home safe and
+sound. I'd like to know that," she said wistfully. "Sure my heart's
+still over there. There, be off with you, or I'll be making a fool of
+myself."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll write to you, Mrs. Fischer," said Nessa, kissing her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not on your life, child. It's in gaol I'd be in no time, the divils
+that they all are!" she exclaimed, relapsing into English.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll manage to let you know," I promised, shaking her hand warmly;
+and we were turning to leave the room when Nessa had a most happy
+thought.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We'll send you a sprig of shamrock, dear."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The thought of it broke the dear soul up entirely. "Oh, the blessed
+darlin'!" she cried, seizing Nessa and kissing her again. "What my ould
+eyes would give for a sight of it!" and she burst into a passion of
+sobs. "Go now, go, the pair of ye, or I'll&mdash;&mdash;" Sobs choked her
+utterance and she leant her head on the table, motioning us to go.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa touched my arm and we stole out, both of us deeply moved by the
+emotion which Nessa's offer had stirred in the heart of the lonely
+Irish exile.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap26"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXVI
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+THE HUE AND CRY!
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+On the walk to Massen we concocted our story. I was to be Hans Bulich
+and Nessa my sister; we were alone in the world except for an aunt in
+Holland; Nessa had recently lost her lover on the Russian front, and
+her supposed grief at this was to account for her gloomy silence; I was
+likely to be called up, and as this would leave her without friends or
+money, she was anxious to get to the aunt in Holland.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They were parts easy to play, thanks to our warm-hearted Irish friend;
+we looked the characters quite well enough to pass muster. The absence
+of any luggage, my overalls and tools and a big German china pipe, and
+Nessa's market basket and knitting were shrewd little touches of
+realism which carried us through the preliminary difficulties without
+any trouble.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There were several people in the carriage with us, one of whom, an old
+man who sat next me, was going as far as Lingen. The men were soon
+talking and the one subject was the food supply, which was evidently
+becoming a serious matter. I didn't pay much attention until a question
+was asked about the frontier smuggling. The matter interested them all
+keenly, and I threw in a remark now and then to draw the rest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The old fellow next me seemed to know a good deal about it, and when we
+three were left alone in the carriage he let drop a remark which showed
+he had noticed my interest in the subject, and then asked if I'd been
+at the front yet.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They think I'm more use at my trade," I replied, making play with the
+spanner in my hand.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Engineer's mechanic, may be?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded. "Motors and aeroplanes and so on."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Going to Lingen, aren't you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. How far's Ellendorf from there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A matter of a league or two. I hear they're making these new
+aeroplanes there. Got a job there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Shan't know till I get to Lingen; have another little matter to see to
+first, anyway."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A good few people have little matters to see to there, these days," he
+replied drily, with a suggestive glance out of the corner of his eye.
+"I live there, and you can take it from me that if you're any good at
+your job, there's plenty of work waiting for you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Government work?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If they weren't all blind, yes;" and he launched into a description of
+the extreme difficulty of getting repairs done. "Can't get so much as a
+screw driven in without one of their infernal permits. I've been to
+Osnabrück about it now trying to get a man. Might as well have asked
+for the moon!" he said disgustedly, and went on grumbling about it, at
+intervals, for the rest of the journey.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When we reached Lingen he said he'd like to have a chat with me and
+suggested we should go to his shop. "Won't do you any harm to be seen
+with me, either; I'm well known; and what with escaped prisoners and
+our skulkers trying to jump the frontier, the police are pretty curious
+about strangers of your age and build especially."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was well known, as he had said. Several people nodded to him on the
+platform, and one man came after him. "Good-day, Father Fischer, can I
+have a word with you?" and they stopped to talk together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hear that, Nessa?" I asked excitedly. "By Jove, we're in luck if it's
+our man!" and when he rejoined us I asked him if he was Adolf Fischer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am. Every one in Lingen knows Adolf Fischer."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you a brother out Massen way?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I had, but he drank himself to death five years or so back, poor fool.
+Why do you ask?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've a letter for you;" and I gave it him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He read it and pocketed it with a chuckle of pleasure. "Couldn't be
+better. Friends of Martha's are friends of mine. Come along."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had not left the station before we had a proof of our good luck. We
+were in front of him as we went out and the police sergeant at the door
+stopped us and was beginning to question me, when he intervened.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's all right, Braun. They're friends of mine. A stroke of luck,
+too," he said with a wink, which suggested there was a mutually
+satisfactory understanding between them.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were allowed to pass at once, and he stayed talking to the sergeant
+for a couple of minutes. "Lucky you gave me that letter when you did,"
+he said when he caught us up. "They've been ordered to keep a special
+look-out for a couple such as you. But they won't worry you while
+you're with me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Ominous news in view of what had occurred just before the train smash
+outside Osnabrück, and it made me more anxious than ever to get Nessa
+safely over the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll bide with me, of course," he said when we reached his house, a
+flourishing grocer's store in the main street of the little town. "I
+don't have any one in the house nights. We'll have a bite of food and
+then talk things over."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was silent and thoughtful during the meal, and the trend of his
+thoughts was shown in a question he put.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's nothing black against you, is there?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nothing to make me afraid to face any man in the Empire," I replied
+positively. It was the truth, if not quite as I meant him to understand
+it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I only asked, because I have to be very careful," he said; and nothing
+more passed until we were smoking, while Nessa had resumed the knitting
+which she had kept up incessantly in the train.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Now, you'd like to tell me your story," he opened.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I told him the tale we had prepared and he put a question or two which
+were easily answered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sorry for you, my lass," he said to her. "Very sorry; you're only
+one among too many thousands; and you shall get away all right. They're
+not particular about women and girls, you know," he added to me. "But
+it's different with men. Their orders are to shoot first and ask
+questions afterwards. Three were found trying to jump the frontier last
+week and were shot. Two the week before; and one of 'em was our only
+engineer. So if that's what's brought you here, I can't help you. We'd
+all the trouble we wanted over the last affair."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm no skulker, I assure you. If they call 'em up, I'm ready any time."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll give me your word to stop here then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Unless I have to go anywhere else. I'm pretty handy at my job, you
+know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He seemed satisfied, and then told me his plans.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa was to leave that night. He had a nephew in the Landwehr regiment
+at present guarding a part of the frontier, which was especially
+promising for the scheme, and we were to run out there in his car. I
+was to stay with him in Lingen, partly to help in the smuggling
+operations but largely to keep in order his and his associates' motors.
+There were a number of Lingen people in the thing, which was winked at
+by the authorities, who would not ask any questions about me if I was
+known to be in the swim.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He gave me a host of details, took me out later to see the place where
+I was to work; a very well-equipped place it was, too, but with only a
+lad and a doddering old fellow as the staff: explained that they often
+lost considerably by breakdowns; and then left me to return to Nessa,
+saying that he must go and arrange about the night's venture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I found Nessa very dejected, buried in thought, with her knitting on
+her lap.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Looks good enough, eh?" I said to cheer her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It wasn't a success. She did not answer for a while. "Do you trust
+him?" she asked, looking up at length.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why not? He was frank enough; and we should have been in a deuce of a
+mess without him. It can't be worse even if he gives us away. But he
+won't. I'm sure of that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But about you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Meaning?" I knew what was coming, however.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You heard what he said about those men being shot. It brought my heart
+up in my mouth."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's no more than we heard at Massen."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We agreed to try together, remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I haven't forgotten. We'll see what happens to-night."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't want me to go by myself? You promised, Jack."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Better one than neither of us, surely. That reminds me. You must have
+some money in case I fail;" and I offered her some notes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She shook her head and pushed them away. "I have more than enough for
+my purpose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I knew what she meant. She was resolved not to go alone, and it worried
+me considerably. It was splendidly staunch and lovable and brave, but
+none the less quixotic and a serious blunder. "You heard what that
+police sergeant had told old Fischer?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course," she nodded casually, as if it didn't make the least
+difference.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You shall settle it for yourself, Nessa." There was nothing to be
+gained by trying to dissuade her then, so I left it until the moment
+for action should arrive. After my promise, it was impossible for me to
+think of going with her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer came back chuckling. "We're in luck," he declared. "I met my
+nephew, Fritz, in the town just now. He'll do it all right. He'll be on
+guard at one of the roads; the very spot of all others for us; near a
+little thicket they call the Pike Wood. We're to be there about nine. I
+explained everything to him, and of course I've pledged my word that
+only your sister's going over. That's right, eh?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Quite," I assured him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa's needles stopped clicking for an instant and I heard her catch
+her breath. It augured badly for the night's enterprise; but if I had
+wished to renew the attempt to persuade her, I could not have done it,
+as we were not left alone altogether again until the time came for us
+to set out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I drove the car with Fischer at my side, and by his instructions, Nessa
+lay on the bottom of the tonneau which was constructed much like that
+of the farmer's I had mended at Osnabrück. She was hidden under a rug
+and a tarpaulin, and he told her to cover up even her head if any one
+spoke to us on the way.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had some dozen miles to run, and for the greater part of the way no
+one attempted to interfere with us. The old fellow seemed to be hugely
+pleased by the way I handled the ramshackle machine; and even more so
+when I explained the reason of some of the queer noises and jumps which
+the engine developed. "You're the man for us!" he exclaimed more than
+once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+When we reached the outskirts of a village close to the frontier, he
+bent over and told Nessa to hide herself completely. "We shall be
+questioned here; but it won't matter. Go slow for a bit," he added to
+me; "and pull up at once if they order us."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The village was full of soldiers, and I began to realize in earnest
+then the difficulties of our escaping without his help. We were pulled
+up twice in the village, but allowed to proceed the moment he was
+recognized and produced some authority he had.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After we left the village behind us there were plenty of people, both
+men and women, all with their faces turned frontierwards. "What are all
+these doing?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Crumb-hunters, we call 'em." Descriptive enough, too; and he told me
+they were out in all weathers to pick up any trifles from the Dutch
+side, and that passes were given to them for the purpose.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And what about the Dutch guards?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Getting fat on it," replied Fischer, rubbing his palm and then putting
+a finger to the side of his nose. "Bleed us to a tune, too. Their
+people try to stop it; change the men often enough; but it only means
+that Peter gets a greasy palm instead of Paul. We turn off into the
+next lane on the right: it runs across the frontier; the Pike Wood's
+just there; but you'll have to stop a little short of it to turn the
+car."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We ran about half a mile along the lane to the spot where I turned and
+we all got out. He led the way across a field or two, and, as we were
+rather before our time&mdash;nine o'clock&mdash;he posted us at a point in the
+thicket from which we could see the guards at the gate which marked the
+boundary on the German side, and then left us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was beginning to get a little excited by that time, but Nessa seemed
+quite unmoved, except that she shivered once or twice, for the night
+air had a nip in it. Whether she persisted in her intention not to go
+without me, I could not say. She had heard me tell old Fischer that I
+wasn't going; but she maintained a sphinxlike silence all the time he
+was away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He went up to the guards and I could just make out their figures as he
+stood talking to them; and presently he disappeared into the darkness
+through the gate. A minute or two later some shots were fired from the
+other side of the barrier; soon afterwards a loaded wagon came dashing
+from that side, the three horses galloping at full stretch, and a man I
+took to be Fischer jumped from it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+An exhibition of organization followed. A number of men sprang up from
+nowhere; the wagon was unloaded almost instantly; and they scuttled off
+into the night with cases and barrels and packages of all descriptions
+and sizes. It was done like a flash; and the wagon was galloped back
+across the frontier. It had just disappeared when an officer rode up,
+presumably to learn the cause of the firing. Just then Fischer rejoined
+us, out of breath, but hugely pleased.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"A near thing," he panted. "If that officer had been a minute earlier
+he'd have commandeered the lot. He's a swinehound. You must lie doggo
+till he's gone; but it's all right. Fritz will give you the tip. You're
+to go forward the moment you hear him whistling 'The Watch on the
+Rhine.' Don't lose a second. Give him a twenty-mark note; it's for his
+two pals. And now I can't stop with you, I must see to things. I'll
+wait for you at the car."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What was that firing?" I asked as he turned away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"To fool the Dutch officers," he said over his shoulder as he went.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa's intention was still a riddle. She stood leaning against a tree,
+motionless as a statue and up to this point as silent. But the time had
+come when I must know what she meant to do.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're going, Nessa?" I whispered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+No answer; not even a shrug of the shoulders.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa, dear, you're going?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. I gave my word. Besides I've half a notion that this is a sort of
+test. Fischer has told the men that I am not, and even if they didn't
+shoot us both, I should be ruined with him. And you can see for
+yourself there isn't one chance in a hundred of our getting through."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She listened but made no reply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"We shall have that signal in a moment. That officer is riding away."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A long tremulous sigh from her. "Do you wish me to go, Jack?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, most certainly. It's the luckiest chance in the world."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can see it for yourself, dearest." I tried to put my arm round
+her, but she drew away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't, Jack! After what you've just said."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was a pause in which we could catch the guttural tones of the
+guards and hear them stamping their feet. Precious seconds were flying
+and I was getting into a positive fever of impatience and anxiety.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm only thinking of you, Nessa. You know that. Do make up your mind
+to go. You must surely see that it's the one course for you. There's
+the road to England and your mother and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And you're to stop here in all this danger alone."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My patience began to give out. "I know you're thinking of me, but I can
+get out of it all ever so much better alone. But there, if you won't,
+you won't, and there's an end of it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You promised to make an attempt together. Have you done it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For Heaven's sake, Nessa, don't let us split hairs at a moment like
+this. Here's the chance of chances for you, and you may never have
+another. If you wish ever to see England again, or at all events until
+after the war's over, you'll take it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That shows what little chance you think you have of getting away," she
+retorted, and made me wish I'd said something else.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't mean anything of the sort, only that it will be infinitely
+easier for me alone."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She didn't answer, and in the pause the first bars of the "Watch on the
+Rhine" were whistled in a low cautious pitch.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come, dearest," I whispered and put my arm about her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, I can't go, Jack. I&mdash;I can't be such a coward!" she whispered,
+trembling in her agitation.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For Heaven's sake, dearest!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The whistling had ceased, but she still hesitated.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After an interval, very short, the whistle came again, slightly louder.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was only one last plea I could think of. "It may cost me my life
+if you don't go, Nessa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I felt her shudder convulsively as she yielded, and clung to me for an
+instant. "I'll go. Oh, God!" she moaned piteously under her breath.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I hurried her across the intervening field, and as we reached the other
+side of it, the man at the gate called to us impatiently to hurry.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But Nessa stopped. "I've forgotten, Jack," she whispered. "I must have
+that money after all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had it ready, thrust it into her hand, and helped her over the field
+gate. In her agitation she fell and dropped the notes. It was as dark
+as pitch on the ground at that spot and I had to grope with my hands to
+find them.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The man called to me urgently to come at once, and I had just found
+them when we heard the sound of a horse galloping in our direction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Back to the wood," growled the man almost fiercely. "If the captain
+noses you, you'll be shot."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I lifted Nessa over the gate and we darted back to cover, as the
+officer rode up. We waited for some breathless anxious minutes for him
+to go, hoping that the signal could be repeated.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But he did not go; and soon afterwards the guard was changed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The chance was gone and there was nothing for it but to return to the
+car.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The failure was bitterly disappointing, but Nessa was glad, and
+laughed. "Here's the money, Jack," she said as we left the wood.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I pocketed it in silence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I suppose you're awfully angry and disappointed and all that, but I'm
+not. The only thing I regret is that I was persuaded to go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not angry about it. It's a great pity; but the only thing to do is
+to wait for another opportunity. I dare say Fischer can manage it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You needn't look for one, if you mean me to go alone. I won't do it.
+You'll never get me to consent again; and you said I was to settle it,
+remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I remember," I replied.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm absolutely determined," she declared; but something was to happen
+that night which shook that determination to ruins.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer expressed great surprise at seeing her; but I explained that at
+the last moment the money had been lost and that the officer had come
+back in time to prevent Nessa's escape.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The car was now loaded with some of the spoils from the wagon and Nessa
+had to ride in front with us. We made a quick run back to the town,
+where I helped in the unloading, and then with Nessa took the car to
+the place where I was to overhaul it in the morning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I feel a thousand times more light-hearted, Jack," she said slipping
+her hand in my arm as we walked back to Fischer's shop.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's as it should be. I was rather bearish over it, I'm afraid; but
+it was such a chance."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You won't ask me again to&mdash;&mdash; Good heavens, look, Jack, look!" she
+broke off, her voice shaken with agitation as she clutched my arm
+convulsively and pointed to a small poster outside the police station.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She might well be agitated. The poster was headed:
+</P>
+
+<P CLASS="t3">
+MURDER<BR>
+1,000 <SPAN CLASS="scap">Marks Reward</SPAN>
+</P>
+
+<BR>
+
+<P>
+The murder was that of Anna Hilden and the reward was for my capture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Two portraits were in the middle. One an excellent reproduction of
+Nessa with the words: "Nessa Caldicott, Englishwoman," beneath it; the
+other a villainous splash drawing: "Johann Lassen, German"; who were
+"known to have left Berlin together on the night of the 23rd in the
+train which had been wrecked outside Osnabrück."
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap27"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXVII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+FARMER GLOCKEN AGAIN
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+This "Hue and Cry" poster alarmed Nessa intensely. Her fears were all
+on my account, however; and so far as concerned herself, she did not
+even then seem to regret that her chance to cross the frontier had been
+missed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As we hurried to Fischer's I tried to reassure her that the trouble was
+not so serious as it looked at first blush; for the reason that the
+photograph of her was so good that no one would recognize her in her
+present make-up, while mine was execrable enough to amount to a
+positive disguise. But this did not allay her agitation; and after we
+reached the house, there was no opportunity for further discussion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We both realized that the consequences might be very serious; and after
+she had gone to bed, I sat racking my wits over the perplexing problem.
+It was either von Erstein's doing or von Gratzen's; and in the end I
+put it down to von Erstein, whose influence was quite sufficient to
+enable him to stir up the police in this manner.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+For me there was only the risk of arrest and trial for the murder;
+hugely unpleasant, of course, but not dangerous, because von Gratzen
+knew who had killed the woman and had the proofs. It was very different
+for Nessa, however, although she had, of course, nothing to fear in
+connection with the murder charge. But she would certainly be kept in
+the country; and Heaven alone knew what the consequences would be and
+what price she might have to pay for her fatal hesitation at the
+frontier that night.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had no chance of speaking to her about it until about noon the
+following day when Fischer sent her with some lunch for me to the shed
+where I had put his car into shape again. As the "staff"&mdash;the gawky lad
+and the decrepit old man&mdash;were present, it was difficult to say much to
+her, but I managed at intervals to let her know what I thought.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+To my concern, however, she was determined to stay in the country.
+Instead of regretting her refusal to go, she appeared to glory in it.
+If there was to be trouble for me, she was resolved to share it,
+declaring that she could help me by confessing her part.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was still doing what I could to shake this determination and show her
+the fallacy of it, when there was another unpleasant surprise.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer arrived bringing the farmer Glocken whose motor I had mended at
+Osnabrück. If there was one man in all Germany I wished to avoid at
+that moment, it was certainly Glocken.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo! so it's you, is it?" he exclaimed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer was obviously as much astonished at the recognition as I was
+concerned. "You know Bulich, then?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Glocken paused and appeared to sense something of the position and
+answered with a cunning squint at me: "I know him for a first-class
+workman."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're right," agreed Fischer, and then explained the object of the
+visit. Glocken was in the smuggling ring and looked after a very
+important and profitable branch&mdash;the smuggling of chemicals for
+ammunition. These were brought by aeroplane; it being deemed too risky
+to resort to the ordinary method. A consignment had arrived the
+previous evening, the pilot, a Dutchman named Vandervelt, had had an
+accident in landing, and I was wanted to put the thing right.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was no way of getting out of it, and what objection there might
+have been was more than compensated for when Fischer drew me aside and
+told me he had arranged with Glocken that if my sister would venture
+the flying trip, she could go with the Dutchman. I agreed without
+asking Nessa; and as Fischer's car was now ready for the road we drove
+away in it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Glocken sat in front with me and promptly started his questions. Very
+awkward questions some of them were too: about our former meeting; why
+I had not mentioned I knew Mrs. Fischer at the inn; why I had said I
+was coming from Osnabrück, when old Fischer had told him a very
+different story; and at last enough to show that he had seen the murder
+poster and was inclined to connect it with me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Having in this way thoroughly scared me, as he thought, he broached the
+subject of Nessa's flight and asked what it was worth, hinting that
+Vandervelt was something of a bloodsucker. I had still an ample supply
+of money; about a couple of hundred pounds, some four thousand marks;
+and being prepared to part with every pfennig to get Nessa away, it was
+a considerable relief to find that it was to be a matter of bribing.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Couple of hundred marks, enough?" I suggested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't know Vandervelt, or you wouldn't offer a trifle like that,"
+he said, shaking his head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How much then? I'm not yet a partner in Krupp's, remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's it worth to you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Fischer was going to do it for nothing last night. He's almost as
+sorry for my sister as I am."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Vandervelt isn't Fischer," he replied drily. "Doesn't a thousand marks
+strike you as cheap?" he said with a wily significant leer. That was
+the amount of the reward!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Out of the question, Glocken. She must have something in her pocket
+when she lands; and in any case Fischer's going to arrange it in a day
+or so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hadn't she better be off at once? Delays are apt to be dangerous
+sometimes, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why?" I asked, turning to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Our eyes met in a mutually intent stare, and his dropped first. "You
+know your own business," he muttered with a shrug. "But you'd better
+give the thousand, if you want her to go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was clearly best to haggle, so I advanced to five hundred, then to
+seven hundred and fifty, and at last to a thousand, protesting it was
+an imposition. He pretended to fire up at the word; but it was only the
+preface to asking for the money to be paid at once.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was all going into his own pocket, of course; and after more words I
+agreed to give him half the amount when we reached his farm if I found
+my sister would risk the venture, and the remainder as soon as she was
+safely off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I broached the matter to Nessa as soon as we arrived, and she met it at
+first with a flat refusal. "I won't go, Jack. I thought something of
+the sort was meant when you asked me to come here. I don't care what
+happens to me. I can't go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I want you to care, Nessa. It's&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, I don't&mdash;and I won't."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You're not afraid of the trip?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not that sort of coward, thank you," she retorted sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going to arrange with the pilot, Vandervelt's his name, for him to
+look after you when you land and see you to some station."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not taking the least interest in all this."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd better book right through to Rotterdam and go to our Consulate,
+and I'll look for you there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not going, Jack."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd rather be clapped into an internment camp?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care for fifty internment camps. They can do what they please
+with me, but I won't be coward enough to desert you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can tell everything at the Consulate and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Is that a Home for strayed cowards?" she cried, springing up and
+stamping her foot, her eyes flashing indignantly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, it's the best meeting place for us and a safe refuge for quixotic
+girls."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"They're welcome to it, then. I shan't disturb them. If you wish to
+make me hate you, you'll persist in all this."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd rather have you hate me than that you should stop here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How can you say such a thing as that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I mean it; every syllable of it, Nessa, on my honour."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This appeared to make some impression. She winced and paled slightly.
+"I've never been thought a coward before," she said after a pause, but
+without so much of the former snap.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What I do think is that if what you talk of doing is cowardice, I'd
+rather be thought a coward than anything else."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That means that you approve of it then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"On the contrary. Don't let us get at cross purposes. I must be off to
+this job. The thing is this. If I'm alone here, I can get through
+everything without risk; and I can't if you stop. It's splendid of you
+to wish to stick it with me; but it'll be fatal to me; fatal to both of
+us, indeed."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't care about myself."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then care for me. Do it for my sake."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How would my stopping hurt you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I lost patience then. "There isn't time to go over it all again, Nessa.
+But if you persist in this, there's no use in continuing a useless
+struggle to get away. I've made the arrangement; and if you won't
+leave, I shall go straight from here to the police, tell them I'm
+Lassen, and leave them to do what they will."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You wouldn't be so mad! You're only saying it to force me to give in,"
+she exclaimed, firing again.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Call it what you like; but I shall do it. Keep that in mind when the
+time comes for you to decide;" and without waiting to give her time to
+reply I left her. It went against the grain to have to use such a
+threat, knowing that her motive was nothing but a chivalrous regard for
+me; but persuasion had failed, and matters were too serious to be over
+nice in the choice of means to convince her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There wasn't much wrong with the bus. Vandervelt, a very decent fellow,
+was a good pilot, it seemed, but not much use as a mechanic. A couple
+of hours or so sufficed for the job; but as I hoped that Nessa would be
+his passenger, I went most carefully over every part and made tests
+until I was satisfied. This occupied a considerable time, so that I had
+not finished until late in the afternoon.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The arrangement was that Vandervelt should start about sunset, as that
+would give him time to reach his landing place before dark. He agreed
+readily to get Nessa to the nearest station and to see her safely off
+for Rotterdam. If all went well, she ought to reach there somewhere
+about noon the following day.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He said nothing about the passage money for Nessa, and I avoided the
+subject. So long as Nessa got away, it was nothing to me whether old
+Glocken swindled his companion or not. They could settle their own
+differences; and it would have been the act of a fool to set them by
+the ears at such a moment.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+All I saw of the farmer tended to confirm the Irish-woman's estimate of
+him. He had blackmailed me in the matter of the payment for Nessa, and
+I had very little doubt that, having scooped in a thousand marks for
+her, he would start another attempt with me on the same lines.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He watched me at work for most of the time; joined with Vandervelt in
+praising my skill; repeating with unnecessary frequency something about
+what extraordinary good luck it was for them that I had come to Lingen,
+and his hope that I should remain with them a long time.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He didn't mean a word of it, of course, and for a long time left me
+guessing as to his motive for all this waste of breath. At length,
+however, it struck me that all this rot was intended to keep me
+slogging away because he was anxious about the bus and that he wished
+to have it in good shape before something was to happen which he had up
+his sleeve.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He had my five hundred marks in his pocket, and, if he broke the
+contract and refused to let Nessa go at the last minute, he might be
+getting the thousand for the reward instead of only the balance of five
+hundred from me. I knocked that little dodge on the head, therefore.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Waiting for a repetition of his oxish praise of my skill, I laughed and
+said: "You're right, farmer; you've got to know how to handle them.
+They're difficult enough to repair sometimes, but easy to damage. A
+blow or two with the hammer in the right spot, and I could make this
+old bus fit for nothing but the scrap heap;" and I gave him a meaning
+look and raised the hammer as if going to smash things.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tumbled to my meaning right enough and grabbed my arm. "Mind what
+you're doing, man. Do you know what that thing cost?" he cried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes. A good deal more than a thousand marks. I was only showing
+you how easy it would be to make it worth about as many pfennigs."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed uneasily and went off, grunting something I didn't catch.
+But he knew now what it would cost him to earn the police reward.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Half an hour later came the confirmation of my suspicion. The police
+sergeant from Lingen, Braun, arrived and Glocken took him into the
+house and then brought him across the fields to us. I was making great
+play with the hammer when they reached us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Whether the old beggar had brought him there to arrest me, I couldn't
+tell of course, but no hint of the sort was dropped; and after a few
+questions about the bus, the two went off and I saw Braun start on his
+return to Lingen. Without me, thank goodness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was now nearing the time for Vandervelt to start, and I had still to
+see Nessa and get her final decision. Suspecting treachery, I tested
+the engine to show Vandervelt that it was all right, and then without
+his knowledge, manipulated matters, pocketed a small bit of the engine,
+so that she wouldn't move, and went into the house to Nessa.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her mood had changed meanwhile; she was abjectly miserable and
+woebegone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I wonder you think it worth while to come to me again," she said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Time's nearly up, dear, and Vandervelt is getting ready."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+No response except a desolate gesture.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I hope you've been thinking over all I said."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've been thinking of part of it&mdash;the last part; the cruel part."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm sorry you look at it in that light. It wasn't meant to be cruel,
+Nessa; but there, you know that. Have you decided?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Have you succeeded in forcing me, you mean?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I told you no more than the plain truth. The position's bad enough as
+it is, without anything more. For me I mean."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"As if I didn't know that! And as if it isn't that which is driving me
+distracted!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's no time to go into things again, dear. I said it should rest
+with you to decide."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, and then used threats to force me!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I haven't threatened you, Nessa."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It doesn't matter what you call it. The change of a word doesn't
+change the act. It's what you're doing, not what you're saying, that I
+care about."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Are you going? That's what I care about."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Shall you go to the police if I don't?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you understand that it's just breaking my heart to go&mdash;unless you
+wish to break it?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Will you give me a chance of mending it when we meet at Rotterdam?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She leant back in her chair, elbow on knee, and rested her chin on her
+hand. "We shan't meet there."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Nessa!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You will never get there. I shouldn't care so much if&mdash;&mdash;" She dropped
+her eyes to the floor and left the sentence unfinished.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I knelt by her side and took her hand. "You must go, dearest," I urged.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She flung her arms round my neck and clung to me. "Don't make me go,
+Jack! Don't, if you love me," she pleaded. "I&mdash;I can't bear the thought
+of leaving you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's because I do love you with all my heart that I wish you to go.
+It's the only way in which our love can ever end as we wish." I pressed
+my lips to hers. She was trembling like an aspen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Bulich! Bulich! Are you ready?" It was the farmer's voice, and Nessa
+shuddered convulsively at the sound.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll do this for me, dearest?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, God, if there were only some other way!" she moaned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There isn't, sweetheart. It's the only one in which you can really
+help me. We shall meet again in a day or two. That's all."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I shall never see you again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You may not unless you go. You're ready?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her grasp tightened on me and she did not answer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Bulich! Bulich!" came Glocken's voice again, more insistently.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"In a minute now," I called in reply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How shall I ever know what happens to you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll tell you all about it myself in Rotterdam; we shall just laugh
+over it together."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Laugh!" she echoed. "I shall never laugh again. I shan't be able to
+bear the suspense, Jack. I know I shan't. I shall come back."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, give me a week's grace, before you do."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I may come back then?" she asked, looking up quickly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I knew that she would not be allowed to recross the frontier; but it
+seemed a case where the truth would do no good. "Yes," I said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Promise?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you won't come earlier."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, what a week of suspense it will be!" she moaned.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Come along, Bulich. Vandervelt's getting restless," called Glocken.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll go, Jack." It was no more than a whisper, but it meant so much.
+Of her own dear will she kissed me again and again with more passion
+than she had ever shown, and then made a desperate effort for
+composure. "What an end to our picnic, Jack!" she said, trying to
+smile. A brave effort, but a failure; and she began to tremble again,
+closing her eyes and clenching her hands tightly under the searching
+strain of it, and turned away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+For a full minute she stood in this tense silence, until Glocken called
+again. The sound of his voice roused her, and when she faced me again,
+she had regained self-control.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm ready, Jack," she said steadily.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I pushed some notes into her pocket.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Money. You must have it, dearest," I said, as she seemed about to
+protest. "And now, good-bye, for a day or two."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good-bye. Don't kiss me, or I shall break down again;" and with that
+we went down to the two men who were impatiently waiting for us.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've been a long time," said Glocken in a surly tone. "There's
+something gone wrong with the machine."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How do you know?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I tried to start," said Vandervelt. "Glocken told me your sister had
+decided not to go with me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That was a misunderstanding. I forgot I had this in my pocket;" and I
+showed them the little part I had brought away. "Rather lucky, wasn't
+it, Glocken?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He looked as if he would gladly have struck me, and muttered something
+about being sorry for the mistake.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Nessa did not speak a word as we crossed the fields, dropping a pace or
+two behind us, and keeping her eyes on the ground. She could scarcely
+have been more dejected had she been on her way to the scaffold.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I repeated the instructions to Vandervelt about Nessa, and again he
+promised to carry them out faithfully. When we reached the bus a minute
+or two put her in trim again, and I made a final test of the engine.
+Then I got down, helped Nessa into her place, fastened the strap round
+her, and held her hand while the Dutchman climbed to his seat.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She returned the pressure with a choking sigh, but could not trust
+herself to speak.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I shook hands with the pilot, thanked him, and at the same time
+punished the farmer for his intended treachery. "I know you'll take
+good care of my sister, Vandervelt; and don't forget I'm paying Glocken
+a thousand marks passage money. Good luck."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What's that?" he asked sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can settle with him on your next trip. You won't get in before
+dark if you stop to discuss it now."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I will," he said, with a muttered oath and a glance at the discomfited
+farmer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then he set the engine going, we stood back, Nessa waved her hand to
+me, and they were off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I watched the bus across the field, rise, circle round on the climb up,
+point her nose frontierwards, and I strained my eyes after her until
+she entered a cloud and passed out of sight.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap28"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+RECOGNIZED
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+Glocken was furious at the trick I had played him. "You think yourself
+mighty smart, don't you?" he said with an oath as we went back.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"One too many for you, eh?" I chuckled. Relief at Nessa's safety made
+me comparatively indifferent about everything else. The job which had
+brought me to Germany was done, and for the moment nothing else seemed
+to matter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll make you smart in another sense, I promise you," he snarled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can't do it, Glocken, and you'd better not make a fool of
+yourself. There's a lot behind all this you don't understand. Here's
+your money;" and I gave him the balance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where did you get it? In Berlin&mdash;Johann Lassen?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You don't look pretty when you snarl like that, Glocken; and if you
+believe I'm Johann Lassen, you're a braver man than I think. We're
+alone here; and if I were that man, do you think I'd let you live to
+tell the police when a tap from this spanner of mine would silence you
+for ever?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+That hadn't occurred to him and he jumped away from me as if dreading
+an instant attack.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm not going to touch you, man; on the contrary I'm going to make it
+easy for you. I'll give you a lift into Lingen in Fischer's car and
+we'll stop at the police station, if you like. I saw your game in a
+second this morning and it suited me to play up to it. I was told you
+were a treacherous skunk, but I didn't think you were such a gorgeous
+fool. Come along and we'll have that chat with the police."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He hung back, either because he was afraid to trust himself in the car
+with me or because my bluff puzzled him. It turned out to be the latter.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't want to do you any harm, Bulich," he muttered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You wooden-headed ass, do you think I'd let you, if you could? Come to
+the police and tell your story; but I warn you beforehand that if you
+dare to utter a word against me like that, you're a ruined man, lock,
+stock, and barrel. Behind me in this affair is one of the most powerful
+men in the whole Empire, whose arm is long enough to reach even cunning
+Farmer Glocken, squeeze him to a jelly, and leave the remnants to rot
+in gaol. And he'll do it, Glocken, as sure as my real name isn't Hans
+Bulich, the instant I tell him the scurvy tricks you've tried with me
+to-day." I said this with all the concentrated sternness at my command,
+and it went right home and frightened him through and through.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What&mdash;what is your name, then?" he stammered.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shoved my face close to his. "Look at me, you clown, look at me well,
+and then ask it&mdash;if you dare."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was a beautiful bluff. Whether he thought he recognized some one of
+the innumerable princelings of the Empire or not, I can't say; but he
+drew back and doffed his hat, with a muttered: "I beg your pardon, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's better. Now I'm Hans Bulich again; and don't forget it," I said
+with a change of manner and tone, as I climbed into the car and
+beckoned to him to get up beside me. We ran back to Lingen in silence,
+and I pulled up just before reaching the police station. "Here you
+are," I suggested.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm going back by train, sir, if you please," he answered with
+delightful deference; and I took him to the railway and dismissed him
+with a last sharp caution to hold his tongue.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was well over that fence and, if the rest could be as easily
+negotiated, I should soon be after Nessa. Glocken was the only man I
+feared, because he had seen us so close to Osnabrück. The fright he had
+had would probably keep him quiet for a day or two, until he had had
+time to digest the matter; and the interval must be turned to the best
+account.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Old Fischer was glad to see me, asked about the day's happenings, and
+was relieved to know that Vandervelt had been able to make the return
+trip. During the evening we discussed our plans; and after a really
+refreshing night's sleep, I went off to the shed to continue the work
+there.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer was so elated by his discovery of a mechanic that he brought
+several people in during the morning; members of the smuggling ring, I
+gathered, for they seemed as pleased about it as he was: chatted to
+each other and to me as they watched me at work, asked all sorts of
+silly questions about cars and engines and parts; each of them fussing
+over me like a hen with one chick.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+About midday I knocked off to dine with Fischer, and we were smoking a
+pipe afterwards when the police sergeant, Braun, arrived in a somewhat
+excited mood and called the old fellow out of the room.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd better be getting back," I said; but Braun stopped me, saying he
+had come about me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This gave me a twinge, and I passed a decidedly uncomfortable ten
+minutes while they were jawing with their heads together in the shop.
+But there was no cause for alarm, it turned out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer explained it all. My fame as an aero mechanic had reached the
+ears of the proprietor of the Halbermond Hotel where an army flying man
+had arrived, and when he had inquired for a man of the sort, the
+proprietor had mentioned me, and I was ordered to go to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fischer didn't like the business at all, fearing that it might
+interfere with his plans; and it was this which he and Braun had been
+discussing so earnestly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'll have to be very careful, Bulich. If he thinks you're half as
+good a hand as you are, he's likely to want you for the army."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll be careful. Do you know what the job is?" I asked Braun.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pulitz didn't know either," he said, shaking his head.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who's Pulitz?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The blabber who keeps the Halbermond," replied Fischer irritably. "He
+must have lost his head to say a word about you. It wouldn't matter if
+you were twenty years older; but there, he was always a fool and always
+will be, I suppose."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who's the flying man?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I don't know. Stranger here; just driven up in his car. If he'd been
+any one any of us knew, we might have done something."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Doesn't the Halbermond man, Pulitz, know him?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Never set eyes on him before, and there wasn't the least need to tell
+him a word about you. But that's the fool all over, trying to curry
+favour and not a thought of the mischief he could do," grumbled Fischer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, shall I chance it, and not go?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That won't do," cried Braun. "He'd report me and have the whole town
+hunting for you. You must go, right enough."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do the best you can to get out of it," chimed in Fischer. "Let him
+think you're no better than a clumsy fool."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"All right, I'll do my best," I replied, laughing, and set out for the
+hotel.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was in two minds about the thing. It would never do to be called up
+as an ordinary ranker; but it might be another matter to go as an air
+mechanic. Enrolled in the name of Hans Bulich, I should be safe from
+the trouble which was waiting for Johann Lassen. There were other
+possibilities, moreover. If I could get hold of some valuable
+information about the German aero service and their types of new
+planes, it would go a long way with the people at home to condone any
+breakage of my leave. I had no wish to turn spy, but to be driven into
+it was a very different proposition.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+More than that, it was not at all improbable that when they found I did
+really know something worth knowing about a bus, I might be told off to
+take one up; and in that case, well, they wouldn't see it again, if I
+was within flying distance of the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was best to be careful, however, as Fischer had urged, and not say
+too much until I could learn what the flying man really wanted. So I
+turned into the shed before going to him, mucked myself up a bit with
+black grease, paying particular attention to my face, to avoid the
+remote but possible chance of recognition, shoved my hands in my
+pockets and slouched along to the interview.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The luck was with me at the start. The porter was just going out, told
+me hurriedly where to find the officer's private room, and then ran
+off, saying he had to catch a train. He was thus the only person to see
+me enter the hotel: the importance of which fact I realized later. The
+officer was alone and had been lunching, and the array of drinks
+testified to his having done himself remarkably well. Next I recognized
+him; but he had drunk too much to remember me. He was a coarse-tongued
+bully named Vibach, who had been at Göttingen in my day, and had a
+well-deserved reputation as a blustering coward.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the devil do you mean by keeping me like this?" he said angrily.
+"Do you suppose I've nothing to do but kick my heels waiting for scum
+like you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm very sorry, sir, but I only just heard you wished to see me," I
+replied, with appropriate servile nervousness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've a good mind to put you under arrest. And are you the man these
+Lingen fools think a good mechanic? You look more like a dirty street
+sweeper, coming into my presence in that filthy state."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I thought it best&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Who the devil wants to know what you think?" he burst in, pouring out
+another bumper of wine and draining it at a draught. "Answer my
+question, can't you? Not stand there gibbering like a lunatic." There
+was scarcely a sentence without an oath to punctuate it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I came at once without stopping to clean myself, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then some other fool must have bungled my message. I said you were to
+come immediately, and when I say a thing I mean it." Another oath for
+garnishment. "What's your clownish name, confound you?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hans Bulich, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Do you know a plough from an aeroplane?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, sir," I answered with Teutonic stolidity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Ever been in one?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not in a plough, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He roared an expletive at me. "Are you a fool, or trying to joke with
+me? That won't pay you, you clod."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I never joke with my betters, sir. I've been up in an aeroplane, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Where?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Schipphasen, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, you've been there, have you? How long were you there?" It was a
+well-known training school and he began to change his opinion of me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"About a year. I have my certificates and&mdash;&mdash;" I searched in my pockets
+as if to find them, and said: "I've left them at my lodging, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why the devil didn't you tell me that at first?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You didn't ask me, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What are you doing in this hole, then?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I was going to Ellendorf, but they asked me to stay here a week or so
+to do some repairs and things."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did they? Like their infernal insolence at a time like this. I'm on my
+way to Ellendorf now to fetch a new machine, and my fool of a mechanic
+has got drunk, or lost himself, or something. Can you take his place?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Could I not? Up with him in the bus, what couldn't I do? But I shook my
+head doubtfully. "I don't know that I could pilot&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You wooden-headed idiot, do you suppose I want you to pilot it?" he
+roared, with a shout of laughter. "I want you as a mechanic, you fool."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't know, sir. Of course I could test the plane and see that
+she's all right for you. That was part of my job at Schipphasen, sir;
+that and trial flights."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If that's the case, you ought to be in the army. Have you served?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why not? You've been in the ranks, I can see that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Up to that point I had done very well, indeed; but then I tripped. "I
+was a one-year man, sir." The one-year men were a comparatively limited
+number drawn from the better class; served for only one year instead of
+three, and had either passed an examination or been at one of the
+Universities, and mixed freely with the officers.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What regiment?" was the next question.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I named one at random; I think it was the 54th Hanoverians. My luck was
+clean out, for it chanced to be the same in which he himself had served.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's devilish funny. Let's have a look at you;" and he straightened
+up a bit and stared hard at me. "I don't remember any one of your name.
+Bulich. Bulich. There was never a man of that name. I mean to know some
+more about you, my man. Now that I look closely at you, I believe I've
+seen you before. You remind me of some one. Just walk across the room."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Smothering a curse at the change of luck, I obeyed and slouched across,
+overdoing it probably in my eagerness and fluster.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Stop there," he ordered. "Now face round, and come back in your proper
+walk. Don't try that game with me again. That's a little better, but a
+long way from right, as you know well. Now, who are you? Out with it
+and don't try any fool game with me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I've come down a bit in the world, and no one knows me now by any
+other name than Hans Bulich."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I mean to know it. Out with it," he shouted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was at my wits' end and didn't answer.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"If you don't tell me you'll have to tell the police, mind. I'm going
+to bottom this. You've lied to me once, remember."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Suddenly a thought occurred to me. I picked up a tumbler and made a
+peculiar motion with it&mdash;the secret sign of a Göttingen students'
+society, half-masonic, half-drinking club, of which both of us had been
+members.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He laughed, swore, and held out his hand. It was part of the ritual we
+had been bound to observe by the pledge of the society. I gripped his
+hand in the approved manner.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"So that's it, eh?" he said, filling his glass again and motioning me
+to fill one for myself. The ice was still of the thinnest, for in my
+time there had not been more than a dozen members, and I could see that
+he was searching his memory for my name. If he remembered, what was I
+to do? I knew what he would do&mdash;have me arrested as a spy, and then&mdash;&mdash;
+There was only one possible "then" in war time.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The long pause while he was thinking back gave me time to think
+forward. My life was in the balance, and it didn't take much
+consideration to decide that it was just as well to die at his hands in
+that room in an attempt to escape as to be placed against a wall with a
+firing platoon in front of me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+At such a moment of crisis one thinks quickly, and under the spur of
+this one a wild idea flashed into my thoughts, and the way to carry it
+out developed almost instantly. He was a man of my own height and build
+and colouring; he was a stranger; no one had seen me enter the hotel;
+his uniform would fit me sufficiently well to pass muster; and I was
+already quite convinced that if I did not leave the place in his
+clothes, I should never do it in my own, except under arrest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+After a very long pause, lasting perhaps five minutes although it
+seemed an hour to me, he started, stared at me and got up. "I can't
+remember you," he said with a nervous smile, which told me it was a
+lie. "Ring that bell for me."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fortunately I was between him and it. "What for?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was still a coward, I was glad to notice, by his flinching movement,
+ebbing colour, and nervous licking of the lips. "I want some more
+wine," he said lamely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why not say you've recognized me, Vibach? You know you have, and you
+want to bring some one here. We can't have that."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He did precisely what a coward would be expected to do. He lied that he
+didn't remember me at all, tried to hold me in talk about our Göttingen
+days, and when he thought I was a little off guard, made a dart for the
+door to shout for assistance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The shout died still-born. My hand was on his throat before a sound
+could escape, and I held on with a bulldog grip which choked the breath
+out of him, as he clutched at my wrists in frantic but vain efforts to
+free himself. I had twice his strength and was as hard as nails, while
+he was flabby and soft with drink and self-indulgence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He tried to make some sort of fight of it and began drumming his heels
+on the floor; so I lifted him off his feet, locked the door, plumped
+him down on a sofa and choked him until his struggles ceased and he lay
+half dead from funk and want of breath, shamming unconsciousness.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I sat on him, shoved the sofa cushion over his face lest he should
+try to shout again, unfastened my "tummy pad," and got out my silken
+cord and the "send-you-to-by-by" powder, pushed the cushion back, and
+shook him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's no good shamming with me, Vibach; I've no time for it. Stop it,
+if you don't want me to knock you on the head and be done with it," I
+said.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was too thoroughly scared not to obey, and he opened his eyes and
+started whimpering and begging for mercy.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can stop that, too, and listen to me. I don't want your blood on
+my hands; but I'll brain you as I would a rat, if you utter a single
+cry and don't do what I tell you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"For God's sake don't," he whined.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Get your uniform off, and be quick about it too."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was shaking with funk and could scarcely undo the buttons, so I
+played valet and helped him. Then I peeled my own things off and made
+him put them on while I got into his. Next, I mucked his face with the
+grease and dirt from my own face and hands and rumpled his hair, with
+the result that he looked very much the working man. His arms and legs
+I tied up securely with a length of my cord and gagged him while I
+popped the "by-by" powder into a glass of wine.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He made a little fuss about drinking it, believing it was poison; but
+very little persuasion of the necessary sort overcame his scruples; and
+in a few minutes he was off, and I knew he would not wake for some
+hours.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+As I wasn't a thief, I went through the pockets, and was rolling his
+money and valuables and so on into a napkin, when I found a paper which
+gave me an idea.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was the army authority to the firm at Ellendorf to deliver the bus
+to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A veritable gift from the gods! That was the short cut to freedom, and
+I made up my mind in a second to use it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The only thing remaining to do was to hide the man. There was no place
+in the room, except under the sofa, where he was likely to be seen when
+the servants came to clear the table. The door communicating with the
+next room was ajar, and a peep into it suggested possibilities. It was
+a bedroom, and I took him in, packed him inside a roomy wardrobe, laid
+the napkin of valuables by his side, locked him in, and tossed the key
+under the bed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Then I washed my hands and face and braced myself to face the next act
+in the comedy or tragedy, whichever it was to be.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap29"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXIX
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+LIEUTENANT VIBACH
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+The first scene was a comedy one. Vibach's car was waiting outside the
+hotel, and the soldier chauffeur would almost certainly know that I was
+not the lieutenant, and how to fool him till we were out of Lingen was
+no easy problem.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Still it was no time to count risks; so I drew my cap well down,
+buttoned my overcoat as high over my face as possible, and pretended to
+be drunk.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was all ridiculously easy. Pulitz, the hotel proprietor, met me in
+the hall with obsequious servility, hoping I had enjoyed my lunch. I
+swore at him in true Vibach style, cursed the lunch, told him to give
+me the bill, swore again at the charge as an imposition, and lurched
+out hiccoughing profanity and demanding my car.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Truly the gods were on my side, for it turned out that the chauffeur
+had gone to get something to eat. The car was mine; and a very
+excellent car it was. I lurched up to the wheel with the assistance of
+Pulitz, who waited on me bare-headed in obvious awe of the uniform,
+started the engine, growled out an order that the man was to wait for
+me, and still hiccoughing profanity, fumbled with the levers, and drove
+away.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed in my sleeve as I rattled past Fischer's shop and saw him and
+Braun at the door in earnest conversation, probably canvassing the
+reason for my lengthy absence. Braun saluted me and I lifted a hand in
+response. What would he have done had he known!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I let the car rip along to Ellendorf. The sooner I reached the factory,
+the sooner I should get away&mdash;if I was to get away at all, that was. So
+far as could be judged only one really serious danger threatened
+me&mdash;that Vibach was known to the people at the factory&mdash;and even that
+might be averted, by giving another name and vamping a reason to
+explain his absence.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Any one who knows the attitude of the average German civilian toward
+the army will understand the strength of the cards I held. The
+officer's uniform, an army motor, the fact that Vibach was expected,
+the possession of an official authority duly signed and stamped, all
+these were so many self-evident proofs of my good faith, thoroughly
+calculated to impose on even a sharp-witted business man. If I were
+accepted as Vibach, nothing short of some stupid blunder could cause
+the scheme to fail. There was scarcely room even for a blunder, indeed,
+for the plan seemed almost fool proof.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was nevertheless only prudent to consider what was to be done,
+should the unexpected happen. It was clearly best not to give my name
+until I was sure that Vibach was unknown, and to have a story ready to
+account for his absence. His name was in the order, and no doubt there
+would be difficulties raised about delivering the bus to any one else.
+That could be got over by saying he had told me to see that it was
+ready for him, and a little man&oelig;uvring would probably allow of my
+going for a trial spin. They might send up a mechanic or a
+representative of the firm with me; but that would be no great matter.
+Once we were off the ground, he could be readily dealt with.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had burnt my boats now and was in too tight a corner to stick at
+anything, even violence, to win my way to escape.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If even the trial trip was refused, it would still be possible to get
+away under the pretence of testing the engine. Let me be on board with
+the engine going, it would need a lot of mechanics to keep me from
+making a start.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There remained the chance that even this might not be possible,
+however, and in that case the only thing to be done was to leave the
+place under a cloud of vituperative indignation and threats. For this
+possibility, it was necessary to leave the motor where I could reach it
+readily and without trouble.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The opening scene was all that could be desired. The fact that I was
+expected caused me to be led at once to the managing proprietor, whose
+name was Harden; he received me with all the respect due to my uniform;
+put me at ease by expressing a regret that he had never had the
+pleasure of seeing me before, although he had heard of my prowess in
+the air; and declared that he felt honoured at making my personal
+acquaintance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was condescendingly patronizing, thanked him a little boastfully for
+his compliment, and got to business.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You have everything ready, of course?" I asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Quite. I'll have the plane run out," was the reply as he rang his
+table bell and gave an order that No. 14 should be made ready for me at
+once. "Have you tried one of ours yet?" he asked as the clerk went out.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I expect so, but I'm not sure. I've been up in so many."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You've seen the specifications for the new make, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I should like to glance over them again."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It will be an honour to explain the new improvements;" and he produced
+the plans and drawings and told me all about them, pointing to various
+differences and improvements, especially those which were his own
+inventions, on which he enlarged with immense self-satisfaction.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had my own reasons for studying the drawings carefully, and
+condescended to flatter him on his inventive ingenuity. All this took
+up some time and I began to be anxious to start. I suggested that I had
+better have a look at No. 14; and we went out together.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was a beauty and no mistake; but to my chagrin the men had damaged
+one of the planes slightly in getting her out of the hangar. Only a
+simple matter involving renewal of a couple of the wire supports; but
+it meant a loss of time, and I had an uneasy speculation as to what was
+happening in that hotel bedroom at Lingen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I ordered the men to be quick about the repair, and was watching them
+when some one came out to tell Harden he was wanted on the telephone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This was not on the agenda and I sensed unpleasantness. There were two
+other planes on the field close to No. 14, and I strolled over to see
+if their petrol tanks were full, under the pretence of curiosity. It
+was a case of any port in a storm.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There wasn't a gallon in the two, so my curiosity died instantly. I
+returned to hurry on the work with No. 14. The men knew their job and
+had all but finished it, when Harden came out wearing a look of worried
+perplexity.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"May I beg a moment with you, Lieutenant?" he asked.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly. What is it? Nothing gone wrong, I hope."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That telephone call was from Lingen, from Captain Schiller; and I
+can't make head or tail of it. You will not be offended with me, I
+trust, if I tell you what he says&mdash;what I understood him to say, at
+least."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"My dear Mr. Harden, I hope I am not so foolish."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, he appears to be under the impression that you are not here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I burst out laughing. "Poor Schiller! He's always got a bee in his
+bonnet; keeps a regular hive always on tap. I wonder what the devil has
+put that rot into his head."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"From what I could gather&mdash;I trust you'll pardon my even mentioning
+it&mdash;he appears to think that you were too&mdash;well, that you had had more
+wine at the Halbermond for it to be quite safe for you to go."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I cursed Schiller, whoever he might be, volubly and sincerely, for an
+interfering jackass. "I think you can settle that for yourself, Harden."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh yes, I told him so, but&mdash;but his reply was&mdash;was very singular. He
+said that you had had to be assisted into your car at Lingen, that it
+wasn't possible you could have thrown off the effects in the short
+time, and, in fact, that if you appeared to have done so, you could not
+be Lieutenant Vibach."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+More cursing of Schiller from me. "He'll have to answer for this, I can
+assure you," I exclaimed fiercely. "What did you reply?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I explained the exceedingly awkward position in which it placed me;
+and he instructed me very peremptorily on no account to deliver No. 14
+to you, even in face of the army order. Of course I was at a loss, so I
+asked him to speak to you on the telephone."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'd better do that," I replied readily. "There'll be the devil to pay
+if I don't turn up with it and the Colonel's told I was too drunk to go
+up. Schiller must be mad; stark, staring mad. He'll get me cashiered."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He's holding the line, if you will come to my office."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was the deuce of a crisis, and how to get over it worried me. But as
+we neared the office a thought struck me. "Look here, Harden, this must
+be met somehow. I'll get Schiller to run over here at once and we must
+be ready with proofs that I'm as sober as a judge and perfectly fit to
+take up No. 14. I understand your position entirely and don't mean you
+to be compromised in any way. I won't ask you to deliver No. 14; but I
+shall be personally obliged if you'll have the petrol tank of one of
+those planes out there filled, or any other you like, of course, and
+I'll show him whether I'm fit to take No. 14 up. Your evidence, too,
+may save me from absolute shipwreck."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'll do it with pleasure;" and he turned back to give the orders to
+the mechanics, while I went to the telephone in his office.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo!" I called.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That you, Harden?" came the reply in an excited tone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes." I was likely to get more information as Harden, and tried to
+imitate his voice.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I didn't recognize your voice for the moment. You haven't parted with
+No. 14, I hope?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No. Lieutenant Vibach's coming to speak to you."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's all right. This is a thousand times more serious than I knew
+just now. Vibach's here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"<SPAN CLASS="scap">What!</SPAN>" I cried.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's true. I've seen him. He's been half-killed, drugged, and stripped
+of his uniform. He was found locked in a wardrobe of one of the
+Halbermond's bedrooms."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, appropriately flabbergasted. "Then who's
+the man here?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"The ruffian who did it, of course. Evidently a plot to get hold of one
+of our newest planes. The ruffian has stolen Vibach's uniform so as to
+personate him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Never heard such a thing in my life. What shall I do?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Keep him till we can get over."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But he's armed, I expect."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He'll have Vibach's revolver, of course. You'll have to be careful.
+Perhaps the best thing will be to keep him in play. Let him think
+you're going to give him the bus, and let your men tinker with it for a
+quarter of an hour or so; I shall be with you by then; and when he
+speaks to me, I'll put him off the scent by saying I can't get over for
+an hour."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can manage that easily. He's coming now," I said, hearing Harden's
+voice in the outer room. I paused a moment or two, shuffled my feet,
+and then spoke in my own voice. "You there, Schiller?" I asked sharply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes. That you, Vibach?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I should think it is. Look here, what the dickens is this tale you've
+been telling about me?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He repeated the pith of what he had first told Harden, explaining that
+he was quite as anxious for my safety as for that of the plane. Harden
+entered as he was speaking, told me the bus was nearly ready and that
+he wished to say a word to Schiller when I'd finished. I nodded; and as
+he could only hear my half of the conversation, of course, I dovetailed
+it in to fit the position. The result was good enough to incline me to
+put a saint's halo round the head of the man who invented the 'phone.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course that puts a different look on it, but you really ought to be
+more careful, Schiller. I'm as sober as a judge, man; Harden's standing
+by me now and he'll tell you the same in a minute."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He told me so; but I was bound to take notice of what I heard. We
+can't risk the life of one of our best airmen and the loss of our
+newest type of bus&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't talk rot, man. I was never fitter in my life than I am at this
+moment. I've just arranged with Harden to prove that by taking up one
+of the old ones here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+This woke him up. "Eh? What's that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Don't fool like that. Of course I'm not. Just a little spin round to
+show him that I can take charge of No. 14 all right."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You'd better not do that, Vibach."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course he does, man. Do you think he doesn't know enough to tell
+whether a man's drunk or sober. I can't make you out."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Wait till I come over, Vibach. I can't get away directly; but I'll be
+with you in about an hour."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "That shows which you're thinking of most, the bus or the
+pilot. But all the same I'm glad you approve the scheme. I don't
+want&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let me speak to Harden a moment," he burst in very sharply. "I've
+forgotten something I want to tell him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Of course I'll be careful, you silly ass."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Did you hear what I said, Vibach?" he demanded in the tone of
+impatient authority. "Tell Harden to speak to me at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Has that mechanic of mine turned up?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Whoever Schiller might be, he was a hot-tempered fellow and curses
+began to be waved over the line. Intelligible enough, seeing that I had
+told him how I meant to escape.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Not, eh? Well, clap him under arrest when he does. And look here, that
+woodenhead Fritz who drove me over chose to leave the car just when I
+wanted him to bring me here. That must be dealt with too. It might have
+been most serious. Any one could have run off with the car, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Even this gratuitous piece of further information did not soothe him
+and more curses came along.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed. "I thought you'd like to know that, Schiller."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The laugh provoked him beautifully and stimulated his blasphemy as he
+ordered me again to let Harden speak to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I can't very well do that, can I? You'll understand why."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What the devil do you mean by that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Think, man, think. It would stop my getting off with No. 14 in time to
+reach Schipphasen before dark, if I were to wait an hour before making
+this trial trip."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But you mustn't do anything till I come, Vibach," he growled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Good. I thought you'd see that." I paused and added: "Of course I
+will. I've told him we're awfully obliged to him. All right, good-bye.
+Don't make it longer than an hour. The days are none too long."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I made as if to hang up the receiver when Harden put out his hand to
+take it. That was according to specification; and I started as if
+remembering he wished to speak to Schiller, stumbled against a chair
+behind me, nearly fell, holding tight to the receiver, and in
+recovering myself, pulled it clean off the flex and put the 'phone out
+of action.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A mouthful of apologies for my clumsiness was met by a smile from the
+good simple man whose conviction of my good faith had been assured by
+the half of the conversation he had overheard.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is of no consequence at all. My people will put it right in a few
+minutes," he declared, little guessing what those few minutes meant to
+me. "What I had to say to Captain Schiller can quite well wait until he
+arrives," he added.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He may be a bit put out, but I'll explain that it was my fault
+entirely. He reckons to be over in about an hour," I said as we
+returned to the field; "and that will give us nice time for the little
+experimental flight&mdash;our little bit of convincing evidence, eh? He
+likes the idea, and is as much obliged to you as I am."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am only too pleased to be of any service, I assure you. I myself
+should be quite prepared to deliver No. 14 to you; but I hope you'll
+understand my position."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly, Harden, certainly. Just as clearly as I do my own. I
+shouldn't think of taking it until he comes. He's a good man to keep in
+with; a bit crochetty, but influential. It placed you in a nasty fix,
+and you couldn't do otherwise than you have."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's a great relief to me to hear you say that, and please don't talk
+about obligation."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"That's all right; but Schiller's a useful man to oblige. What sort of
+a plane is this?" I asked as we reached the men.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"An old type, but quite reliable. We use it for lessons chiefly. The
+petrol tank filled, Max?" he asked the foreman.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, sir; but there's something wrong with the engine; keeps missing
+fire," was the reply.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Pleasant news, seeing that in about ten minutes the mysterious Schiller
+would be on the scene raising Cain!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Take long to put right, Max?" asked Harden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Can't exactly say, sir. I can't quite get at the mischief yet."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Let's have a look at her," said Harden; and he and the man wasted five
+of the invaluable minutes over the examination.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was only one thing to do. The way out being closed, I must get
+away in the car.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It doesn't matter, Harden. After all it's not necessary, you know."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I'm afraid it would take an hour or two at least," he said, looking up
+from the engine. "I'm really most annoyed about it."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, I'll stroll back to my car, I've left some papers there I want;"
+and I turned away when Max made a suggestion.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There's a No. 5 over there. She's not so good as No. 2 here, but she
+could take the lieutenant up. I filled her tank in case, when I found
+No. 2 was wrong."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why didn't you say so before, Max?" cried Harden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+If he had, he would have saved me from a very nasty heart spasm. As it
+was, there would only just be time to get off safely. But it might have
+been fatal to appear in any hurry, so I strolled over casually to the
+No. 5, pretended to look her over, as if time was no sort of
+consideration, and was climbing into the fuselage when we heard the
+furious tooting of a motor horn in the distance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Hullo, what can that be?" exclaimed Harden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Sounds as if some one had had a breakdown and was tooting for help," I
+suggested with a smile.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+A few seconds later the horn sounded again; much nearer this time.
+Schiller was in a hurry and no mistake. But all this hurry wouldn't
+help him now. The bus was an old type needing the help of the mechanics
+to get moving, and Max struggled with the propeller to start her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was a little difficulty and I held my breath. It was a matter of
+seconds now; seconds which meant life or death to me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Fortunately Max knew his job thoroughly and knew the bus also and its
+little peculiarities. He got her going, just as the horn sounded once
+more and an officer, followed by a couple of soldiers and police, came
+running round the corner of the buildings and out towards us, shouting
+furiously and waving their arms.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I shoved the lever and the bus began to move.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It's Captain Schiller; he's waving to us to stop," cried Harden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was just too late. "He'll be able to see me start," I called over my
+shoulder. "Give him my love and tell him he ought to have been here
+sooner."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"What do you mean?" shouted Harden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He'll know," I yelled. The noise of the engine probably drowned the
+words, for she was running sweetly; the bus lifted like a bird in reply
+to the touch of the controls; and I was off.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Not without a cheering salute from the captain, however. I wasn't far
+away before a bullet grazed the edge of the right plane, and glancing
+round I saw his soldiers emptying their magazines in the hope of
+satisfying his loving desire to embrace me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+They were tremendously busy. But it's no easy job to bring a bus down
+with a rifle bullet, and the majority of Bosches are mighty poor shots;
+so I didn't worry about it, began to climb, pointing for the frontier,
+and was soon out of range.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+My last glimpse earthwards showed me a little group of dots hurrying to
+and fro excitedly, like a number of disturbed ants infuriated by the
+ruin of their nest.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+No doubt that was about the condition of things in that Ellendorf nest.
+Rather a pity I couldn't be present, perhaps.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But it didn't seem worth while to go back.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I could enjoy the scene sufficiently from the air.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<A NAME="chap30"></A>
+<H3 ALIGN="center">
+CHAPTER XXX
+</H3>
+
+<H4 ALIGN="center">
+THE END
+</H4>
+
+<P>
+I had a lovely trip in that old practice bus. She was quite a decent
+old thing and I let her rip, all out, as long as the daylight lasted.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had half expected No. 14 would have been sent up in pursuit, but I
+had too good a start to trouble about that and was a trifle
+disappointed that this was realized at Ellendorf. It would have been
+rare fun to have had a game of chivy chase over Dutch territory; quite
+good sport; but I had to travel without escort.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+In the language of the communiqués, there was "a certain liveliness" as
+I crossed the frontier. The Dutchies could see the German crosses on
+the planes and a couple of archies expressed their resentment at the
+trespass; but I was then too high up for anything to ruffle my
+feathers, and the storm in a teacup was soon left far behind.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+About dusk I went down to spy for a landing-place, spotted one near a
+railway station, and decided in its favour out of consideration for
+Harden. He had been very decent and unwittingly had done me such a
+really good turn, that it was only fair to return the bus to him.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Lots of people had seen me, of course, and when I landed I had quite a
+reception at the hands of the police, some soldiers and other gapers,
+all of whom very naturally mistook me for a German officer. I was
+arrested amid much fussation and great babble of tongues and hauled off
+to the mayor of the town, after having arranged for the safe-keeping of
+the machine.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was a fat jovial little man with twinkling, merry eyes, and when I
+told him my story, he laughed over the telephone incident until the
+tears literally streamed down his cheeks and I feared he'd have an
+apoplectic fit.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+He was Anglophile to the finger-tips, made me consent to remain the
+night in his house, promised to see to the return of the bus, and found
+me a rig-out of clothes; but stuck when I suggested the return of
+Vibach's uniform also. He declared that nothing should induce him to
+part with such a delightful memento of the incident.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I spent a jolly evening with him. He brought in a few congenial friends
+and I had to tell the story over again, to the running accompaniment of
+shouts of laughter, prodigalities of Schnapps, and comments on the
+Germans which would have meant ages of penal servitude if uttered on
+the other side of the frontier.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Most of his friends turned up at the station the next day to see me off
+to Rotterdam; and the train steamed off amid a storm of cheers, waving
+of hats, and cries of good luck. Then some one started "God save the
+King," which they were all yelling at full lung power until I was out
+of hearing. I might have been His Majesty himself, judging by the
+enthusiasm; and my fellow passengers looked as if they thought I was
+some important big-wig.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I reached Rotterdam late in the afternoon, got the name of Nessa's
+hotel after a little trouble at the Consulate, and was going to 'phone
+to her, when an irresistible temptation seized me.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I was fearfully bucked over my lucky escape and I simply could not help
+trying a last wheeze with her as a good wind up. I hunted up a good
+barber's shop, bought a black, glossy-haired wig and a toothbrush
+moustache and imperial to match, darkened my eyebrows and made up with
+a few wrinkles and little artistic touches of the sort.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+It was quite a good disguise; and a pair of black cotton gloves, two
+sizes too large, and a sort of lumpy gamp umbrella helped to suggest
+the character I had in my mind. Then I scribbled on a dirty piece of
+carefully crumpled paper a note introducing myself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You can trust the bearer, Van Heerenveen by name, a true friend in
+need to us both. Jack."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I went to the hotel in the dusk and sent in the name, saying I wished
+to see her on important private business; a tip secured me the sole use
+of what was called the Reception Saloon, a dingy little room with one
+window; I dimmed the already poor light by drawing the blind half down,
+and chose my seat so that my back should be to it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I had a qualm and nearly gave the show away when I saw the trouble and
+anxiety in her dear pale face; but I checked the impulse, knowing how
+delighted she would be the instant she recognized me, and what laughs
+we should have over it together in the delicious afterwards.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was intensely puzzled by the odd figure I cut, but didn't spot the
+disguise, although she stared hard enough to see right through me. Her
+nervousness at such an unexpected visitor helped to blind her sharp
+eyes.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She paused on the threshold with a start and a frown of concern and
+perplexity. "You wish to see me, sir? I could not quite catch your name
+from the servant," she said in German.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Van Heerenveen is my name, madam," I replied. I was chiefly afraid
+that my voice would betray me; so I spoke slowly, made a big mouthful
+of the name, deepened my tone and put a little husk into it, talked out
+of the side of my mouth, and rolled out in deliberate guttural
+gibberish what I intended her to take for a question in Dutch.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I do not speak Dutch, sir; only English, German, and French."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I nodded slowly and made a little play with the loose finger-tips of my
+ridiculous gloves. "Will you not sit down, if you please?" I said in
+German. "Do not be alarmed, I beg you. There is no need, if you are
+Miss Nessa Caldicott."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She had been holding the door half open and now closed it and sat in
+the chair I had placed in readiness, and I sat on the opposite side of
+the room at a safe distance.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am Miss Caldicott, of course."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is necessary for me to be quite sure of that, madam. Have I your
+permission to ask you a few questions?" The voice had passed muster all
+right, and, as she was close to the door and I so far away, her anxiety
+soon gave way to curiosity. She was absolutely puzzled.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Certainly, sir."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You have come from Germany? Is that so?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Yes, I arrived yesterday."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"May I ask for your passport, if you please?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She started. "Why? As a matter of fact I haven't one; but I am known at
+the British Consulate here. They suggested my coming to this hotel."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"No passport? Umph!" I grunted with a solemn wag of the head. "Is it so
+that you came from Berlin and left there somewhat hurriedly?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, yes. I was there at the outbreak of the war and they meant to send
+me to an internment camp; I ran away."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Umph!" I grunted again, fingering my imperial with my glove
+monstrosities; a gesture which she noticed with a flickering smile.
+"Were you alone, madam?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She hesitated. "No; but I cannot say more than that." Staunch little
+beggar, she wouldn't give me away until she knew more.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You must speak frankly to me, madam. I know the person who accompanied
+you. I ask you because I must be certain who you are."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She wasn't to be drawn by that. "I must know first why you come to me,"
+she said with one of her quick head gestures.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I come as a friend, madam."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Pardon me, but how am I to know that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I pushed her hard, but nothing would induce her to give me the name.
+"Very well, I will try another course. There were certain incidents on
+the journey. You will tell me them?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"There was a collision and the train was wrecked."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But before that?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Again she jibbed and would not utter a syllable to bring me into it. It
+took all my restraint to refrain from making a dart forward to take her
+in my arms.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Well, what occurred afterwards, then? How did you leave Germany?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She thought for a second or two. "I can tell you that. I was brought
+over the frontier in an aeroplane and the pilot saw me afterwards to
+the station at Almelo, and from there I travelled here."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Vandervelt had kept his word loyally. "You will tell me that man's
+name, madam?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I cannot do that. He treated me with the greatest kindness and
+consideration and asked me not to do so."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Was the name Vandervelt, madam?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"How do you know that?" she rapped quickly.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"It is enough that I do know it and that you were known to him as the
+sister of a man who called himself Hans Bulich."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Her eyes widened in astonishment. "Who are you?" she asked; and I made
+sure she had begun to suspect, so intent was her stare. If the room had
+not been so gloomy she would certainly have seen through the disguise.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am satisfied," I replied, holding my head down while I fumbled in
+one of my gloves and took out the note I had scribbled. "This is from
+Hans Bulich."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Dear heart, how excited she was! She sprang up eagerly and rushed
+across as I held it up, her hands trembling and the tears of joy in her
+eyes. "Give it me, please, give it me," she cried shakily. "Is he safe?
+Is all well? Oh, Mr. Heerenveen, do&mdash;do tell me everything."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Quite safe, madam," I managed to reply, for I was fast getting as
+excited as Nessa herself.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Oh, thank God for that! Then you have seen him since I left? Where is
+he? Still in Lingen? Please don't keep me in suspense."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He is in Holland, madam. I crossed the frontier with him."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"And you've come to take me to him, of course? Oh, you are indeed what
+he says, a friend. Can't we go now, this instant? I am ready. You're
+sure he's not in any trouble? Do tell me, please, at once."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"He is not in trouble, but he does not wish me to take you to him,
+madam. There is something you must learn first. You know that he is
+suspected of murder; I do not wish to call him a scoundrel&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Scoundrel indeed! I should think not," she cried, blazing with
+indignation. "He is one of the noblest&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I couldn't have her saying this sort of thing under false pretences, so
+I stopped her by waggling one of my ridiculous gloves protestingly.
+"Stay, madam, stay, I cannot hear that," I exclaimed. "I have still
+something to show you. Permit me;" and I went to the end of the room,
+stood with my back to her, and under pretence of fumbling in my
+pockets, I pulled off the moustache and imperial. "If you knew what he
+is doing at this moment, madam, you also might be tempted to call him a
+scoundrel."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Never! Never!" she exclaimed almost fiercely.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Then I must decline to take you to him at all!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Why? In Heaven's name, why?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Because I'm here already, of course," I replied as I whipped off my
+wig and faced round.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+She was petrified for a second, and then with a glad cry made a rush at
+me. "Jack! Jack! Then you are a scoun&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"Didn't I say you'd call me one?"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"But I didn't; I stopped halfway. Oh, Jack, how mean of you! And I've
+been talking to you all this time and&mdash;&mdash;"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I stopped her halfway that time. You can guess how. And it was quite a
+long time before we could get over our rapturous excitement and settle
+down to the story of my escape.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+How we laughed at it all together! What lovely little interludes there
+were every now and then! What innumerable questions she had to ask,
+ferretting out every detail! How we went over it again and again! Then
+back to the first part of the journey when we had been together! How we
+laughed lightly, now that they were over, at the difficulties and risks
+which had seemed so real in the Lassen period! And how we discussed,
+with eager smiling perplexity, the still unsolved puzzles!
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were just two happy kids together. The hours slipped away like magic
+and we hadn't even begun to think of our plans for getting to England,
+when a servant came in to say that the hotel was being closed for the
+night, and I had to rush off in search of a bed.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I found out the next morning that a steamer was leaving in the
+afternoon and booked our passages, before going to Nessa. She was
+writing the good news to Rosa when I arrived and told me that
+Vandervelt had promised to take her letters on his next trip and post
+them in Germany, so as to dodge the censor.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I thought of some to write also. One was to von Gratzen, explaining
+that I was not Lassen, but an Englishman; but not giving him my name.
+Another was to Harden, telling him that his aeroplane was being
+returned and asking him to forward an enclosure to Captain Schiller.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"<SPAN CLASS="scap">Dear Captain Schiller</SPAN>,&mdash;
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"I am the 'desperate ruffian' with whom you had that interesting chat
+over the 'phone the day before yesterday. I wish to confirm what Harden
+has probably told you, that after your first talk with him, the rest of
+the conversation was entirely with me. I am most grateful to you for
+having warned me that the affair with Lieutenant Vibach&mdash;a most
+offensive bully, by the way&mdash;was discovered sooner than I had expected.
+Naturally it increased my wish to get away and made it impossible for
+me to satisfy your eager desire to make my personal acquaintance at
+Ellendorf. That eagerness, combined possibly with your excitement and
+temper, no doubt prevented your detecting the difference in the two
+voices. Your characteristically national dulness and gullibility will
+remain an abiding joy to me. You have, however, the satisfaction of
+knowing that you stopped my bringing away the new type of aeroplane.
+But the old one served my purpose well enough, for it carried me out of
+your country and so out of your reach. We are not likely to meet again,
+unless the fortune of war should bring us together on one of the
+fronts, when I shall be pleased to tell you the name of the 'desperate
+ruffian.'"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+</P>
+
+<P>
+There was no time for more letters as we had to hurry to the Consulate
+to clear up things there to enable us to avoid trouble on landing in
+England.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We had a smooth passage disturbed by neither mine nor submarine. We
+scarcely ceased chattering together the whole time, discussing two
+topics chiefly&mdash;the question of our marriage and the riddle of von
+Gratzen's conduct. The first was settled a fortnight later to our
+mutual satisfaction, and we went to Ireland on the honeymoon in order
+to send the promised sprig of shamrock to our warm-hearted Irish friend
+at Massen.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The von Gratzen riddle was not solved until three months later when I
+was home on a week's leave and received a German newspaper from
+Switzerland containing a marked paragraph. Von Erstein had shot himself
+sooner than face the charge of having murdered Anna Hilden.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I handed it to Nessa, who dismissed it with, "Serves him right," and
+then drew attention to some little marks and dots scattered about the
+same page. "I'm sure they mean something," she declared.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I laughed at the idea and chipped her about it.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+But she was right and puzzled over them until she found it out. The
+marks were microscopic numbers under various words and letters, and
+when she had written them down she read out the result.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+"You did not deceive me. You are the image of my dear old friend, your
+father. Von G."
+</P>
+
+<P>
+The von Gratzen riddle was solved at last.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+And didn't Nessa chortle. "What did I tell you, Jack!" she cried,
+flourishing the paper triumphantly. "The old fox! He knew you all the
+time and you imagined you were so clever. Poor Jack!"
+</P>
+
+<P>
+I couldn't stand this, of course; so I punished her.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+We were still very much lovers, and you can perhaps guess the nature of
+the punishment when I tell you that it made her blush, disarranged her
+hair, and prompted the question whether I wished every one to think we
+were still honeymooning.
+</P>
+
+<P>
+Of course I said yes, and punished her again.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="FINIS">
+THE END.
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR>
+
+<P CLASS="t4">
+<i>Printed by</i> Butler & Tanner, <i>Frome and London.</i>
+</P>
+
+<BR><BR><BR><BR>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
+
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+Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Man Without a Memory
+
+Author: Arthur W. Marchmont
+
+Release Date: March 8, 2011 [EBook #35516]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Andrew Sly, Al Haines and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Frontispiece: "I used the pike with its ironshod end without scruple
+or mercy." (Chapter IX.)
+
+_The Man Without a Memory_] [_Frontispiece_]
+
+
+
+
+THE MAN WITHOUT
+
+A MEMORY
+
+
+By
+
+ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
+
+
+Author of "When I was Czar," "The Heir to the Throne," etc., etc.
+
+
+
+
+WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED
+
+LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO
+
+1919
+
+
+
+
+  POPULAR NOVELS
+  BY
+  ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
+
+  _Published by_
+  WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED,
+
+  _In various editions._
+
+  BY SNARE OF LOVE.
+  BY WIT OF WOMAN.
+  A COURIER OF FORTUNE.
+  THE HEIR TO THE THRONE.
+  AN IMPERIAL MARRIAGE.
+  IN THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM.
+  IN THE NAME OF THE PEOPLE.
+  THE LITTLE ANARCHIST.
+  THE QUEEN'S ADVOCATE.
+  UNDER THE BLACK EAGLE.
+  WHEN I WAS CZAR.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAP.
+
+      I How I Lost My Memory
+     II The First Crisis
+    III Rosa
+     IV Nessa
+      V About Spies
+     VI Rosa is Told
+    VII Baron von Gratzen
+   VIII Von Erstein
+     IX A Bread Riot
+      X Complications
+     XI The Problem of von Gratzen
+    XII "Like Old Times"
+   XIII In the Thiergarten
+    XIV Anna Hilden
+     XV A Night Attack
+    XVI A Poison Charge
+   XVII Anna Hilden Again
+  XVIII A Sinister Development
+    XIX Murder
+     XX Von Gratzen's Wiliness
+    XXI Off!
+   XXII Checkmate
+  XXIII Within a Hairsbreadth
+   XXIV Nessa's Downfall
+    XXV A Friend in Need
+   XXVI The Hue and Cry!
+  XXVII Farmer Glocken Again
+ XXVIII Recognized
+   XXIX Lieutenant Vibach
+    XXX The End
+
+
+
+
+THE MAN WITHOUT A MEMORY
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+HOW I LOST MY MEMORY
+
+
+It was a glorious scrap, and Dick Gunter and I had the best of it right
+up to the last moment.
+
+We were about 6,000 feet up and a mile or so inside the German lines
+when their two machines came out to drive us away.
+
+"We'll take 'em on, Jack," shouted Dick, chortling like the rare old
+sport he was, and we began our usual manoeuvre for position. Our
+dodge was to let them believe we were novices at the game, and I messed
+about with the old bus as if we were undecided and in a deuce of a funk.
+
+They fell in, all right, and at the proper moment I swung round and
+gave Dick a chance which he promptly took, pouring in a broadside which
+sent one of the machines hurtling nose first to earth. This put the
+fear of God into the others, who tried to bolt; but we were too fast
+for them and, after a short running fight, Dick got them. The pilot
+crumpled up and down went the machine like a stone to prevent the other
+from feeling lonely.
+
+We were jubilating righteously over this, when the luck turned. A third
+machine, which, in the excitement of the scrap, we hadn't seen, swooped
+out of the clouds and gave us a broadside at close range, which messed
+us up pretty badly. We were both hit, the petrol poured out of the
+riddled tank, the engine stopped, and I realized that we could put up
+the shutters, as we were absolutely at the beggar's mercy.
+
+I was wrong, however. Dick had managed to let the other chap have a
+dose of lead, and either because we had had enough of it or his bus was
+damaged, he didn't stop to finish us off but scuttled off home to
+mother.
+
+I was hit somewhere in the shoulder, but it wasn't bad enough to
+prevent my working the controls, and I pointed for home on a long
+glissade. There was a "certain liveliness," as the communiques say,
+during that joy ride. The Archies barked continuously as we crossed the
+lines, the shrapnel was all over us, Dick was hit again, and the poor
+old bus fairly riddled; but we got through it somehow, although my pal
+was nearly done in by the time we reached the ground.
+
+Some pretty things were said about it and we each got the M.C. I was
+very little hurt, and came out of the base hospital a week or two later
+feeling as fit as a fiddle again, but as the chief decided I had earned
+a good spell of leave, I went off to old Blighty to convalesce.
+
+Then it was that for the first time I heard of the trouble about Nessa
+Caldicott. Both my parents had died when I was a kid, and Mrs.
+Caldicott, the dearest and sweetest woman in the world, had been like a
+mother to me, had taken me into her home, and thus I had grown up with
+Nessa and her sister. Nessa and I had been to school in Germany; had
+travelled out and home together; I had spent my holidays in their home;
+and I can't remember the time when I wasn't in love with her.
+
+Mrs. Caldicott was keen that we should marry, and a year or two after I
+came back to England for good from Goettingen University we had been
+engaged. But there was a "nigger in the fence." I had plenty of money
+and preferred being a sort of "nut" to working; and Nessa didn't like
+it. She urged me to "do something and make a career for myself"; but I
+was a swollen-headed young ass, and shied at it; so at last the
+engagement was broken off until, as she put it, I "had given up the
+idea of lounging and loafing through life."
+
+She was right, of course; but like a fool I wouldn't see it; so we
+quarrelled, and she went off to Germany to stay with an old school
+friend. She was still there when the war broke out, and thus did not
+know that I had found my chance and had joined up. There was nothing
+"nutty" about the army training and work, and when I went home, of
+course, my first thoughts were of her and what she would say when she
+knew I had taken her advice.
+
+But I found poor Mrs. Caldicott in the very depth of anxiety and
+despair. Nessa had never returned from Germany, and there was nothing
+but the most disconcerting and perplexing news of her. During the first
+few months she had been able to write home that all was well with her,
+although she could not get out of the country.
+
+Then came a gap in the correspondence, followed by a short letter that
+her school friend was dead, and that she feared she would not be
+allowed to remain in the house. A month or so later another letter
+came, saying she had left Hanover to go to another friend in Berlin,
+and that her mother was not to worry, as she expected soon to be home.
+
+"And that's the last letter I've had from her, Jack, and that's three
+months ago," said Mrs. Caldicott, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
+"The only news I've had is these two odd communications."
+
+They were odd, in all truth. The first was a sentence which had
+evidently been cut out of a longer letter in Nessa's handwriting and
+pasted on a sheet of paper. "I am quite well, but cannot get away yet."
+That was all, and a very ugly-looking all too. The second was a
+postcard in a strange handwriting, like a man's fist. "Your daughter is
+well and is going to be married. She will communicate with you after
+the war."
+
+I did not let the dear old lady see what I thought of the matter, nor
+did I tell her how my months at the front and what I had seen there led
+me to put the most sinister interpretation on the affair.
+
+"I've tried every means in my power, Jack, to find Nessa," she
+declared; "but with no result at all; and it's killing me."
+
+I did what I could to reassure her, and then a somewhat harum-scarum
+idea occurred to me--that I should use my leave to go to Berlin and
+make inquiries. She wouldn't hear of it at first, because of the danger
+to me; but I showed her that there would really be very little risk, as
+I had often passed for a German, and that the only real difficulty was
+getting permission from the authorities.
+
+I set about that at once and succeeded--the result of having a friend
+at court in the War Office; but before that was settled Nessa's
+brother-in-law, Jimmy Lamb, an American manufacturer, came over on
+munitions business and wouldn't hear of my going.
+
+"See here, Jack, this is my show, not yours. For one thing I can do it
+better than you, as I'm a bit of a hustler and have a good friend, Greg
+Watson, in our Berlin Embassy. More than that, I can go safely, while
+if you were found out, you'd be shot as a spy;" and he wouldn't listen
+to my protests.
+
+But the scheme fell through at the last moment. On the very day he was
+to have started, he had a cable that his father was dying; and he had
+to catch the first boat home.
+
+"I'm real sick about it, Jack, but there's nothing else for it. I've
+booked a berth in the _Slavonic_ to-day."
+
+"Then I shall go, Jimmy. I can't bear the thought of Nessa being in
+those beggars' hands. I'm certain there's some devilment at the bottom
+of it;" and I told him a few of the items I had seen with my own eyes.
+
+"Well, what price your going in my name? Much better than the German
+stunt; and you can actually see about the business that I meant to do.
+Here are all the papers needed, my passport and ticket, a bunch of
+German notes I've picked up at a good discount, and you can see Greg
+Watson--I'll give you a letter to him--and you'll find him a white man
+right through, ready to do his durndest to help you."
+
+A few minutes clinched the job; an hour or two sufficed for all the
+preparations I needed to make for the trip; and that night I left
+Harwich for Rotterdam in a little steamer called the _Burgen_, as
+Jas. R. Lamb, an American merchant, equipped with all the credentials
+necessary to keep up my end.
+
+It was all plain sailing enough, but it didn't turn out so simple as it
+looked. There was another American on board and I kept out of his way
+at first, but when he had heard me talking to a waiter in German, he
+came sidling up and scraped acquaintance. He soon let out that he was
+as genuine an American as I was, and the best of it was that he took me
+for what he was in reality--a German.
+
+"You speak German well for--an American," he said suggestively. "You
+know Germany, perhaps?"
+
+"I was at school there and afterwards at Goettingen."
+
+He was cautious enough to test this, and I let him have some choice
+specimens of student slang which strengthened his opinion.
+
+"I was also at Goettingen. Need we pretend any longer?" and he held out
+his hand. He was very much my own build and colouring, but I hoped the
+resemblance stopped short there, for I didn't like his looks a bit.
+
+"Pretend what?" I asked as if on my guard.
+
+"That we are Americans."
+
+"You needn't, but I didn't say I wasn't one."
+
+He made a peculiar flourish with his left hand which was one of the
+membership signs of a secret society among the students, and I answered
+it. It was enough, and he let himself go then. He was a good swaggerer;
+told me that he had come from America to England, where he had been
+ferretting out every possible scrap of information, having represented
+himself as the agent of an American firm of munition makers; that he
+had sent his report to Berlin and had been summoned to go there at once
+on the strength of it; and that he was to join the Secret Service.
+
+He was so full of his self-importance and seemingly so glad to have
+some one to listen to him, that, with a very little prompting, he told
+me a whole lot about himself, and the great things he had done. He only
+stopped when he got sea-sick, and before he went below he told me his
+real name was Johann Lassen, and scribbled his address in Berlin on his
+card, so that we might meet again there.
+
+I was a little worried by the business. It might be awkward if we did
+run against one another in Berlin; but there was no need to look for
+trouble before it arrived, so I dismissed the thing and went on
+thinking out my own plan of campaign. But the affair had very
+unexpected results.
+
+We were nearing the Dutch coast and I was considering how to avoid
+Lassen on landing, when there was the very dickens of an explosion. As
+if the lid of hell itself had lifted!
+
+What happened I only learnt afterwards, for the next thing I knew was
+that I was lying in bed somewhere, with a grave-eyed nurse bending over
+me.
+
+"Herr Lassen!" Just a whisper. After a pause the name was repeated with
+slightly more solicitous emphasis.
+
+I was too weak and exhausted to reply or feel either surprise or
+curiosity at the mistake about my name; and with a sigh of utter
+weariness I closed my eyes and fell asleep. When I woke it was in the
+dead stillness of the night.
+
+I was far less exhausted and my mind was beginning to work again. I was
+lying alone in a small bare-walled room, lighted by one carefully
+shaded electric light. There were two other beds in the room, both
+unoccupied; and I was not too dazed to understand that it was a
+hospital ward. Then I remembered the nurse had addressed me as "Herr
+Lassen"; and was puzzling over the mistake when the remembrance of
+Nessa and her peril flashed across my mind and stirred a confused
+jangle of disturbing thoughts.
+
+I was still too weak to clear the tangle then, however, and fell asleep
+again, and did not wake until the morning.
+
+I was much better and the nurse was very pleased at my improvement.
+"You will soon be yourself again," she said, speaking German with a
+quaint accent. "You were so exhausted that at one time we feared you
+would not recover from the shock."
+
+"You are very good," I murmured, with a feeble smile.
+
+"Do you think you could eat some solid food? The doctor said you could
+have some when you recovered consciousness."
+
+"Where am I?" I asked after thanking her.
+
+"This is the Nazareth Hospital in Rotterdam. You were brought in by the
+fishermen who found you in the sea when the _Burgen_ went down."
+
+I did not ask any more questions then, as I wanted to think matters
+over; and during the day I succeeded in getting it all clear. The only
+point that bothered me was why I should be mistaken for Lassen; but I
+got that at last. I remembered the card he had given me and how I had
+shoved it in my pocket.
+
+But why hadn't my pocket-book with my passport and papers and all the
+rest of it been found? It had been in my jacket pocket. It looked as if
+it must have been lost. That set me thinking and no mistake. How was I
+to get on to Berlin without the passport? It looked as if I must either
+give up the search for Nessa, when every minute might be invaluable, or
+go back to England for fresh papers. That wouldn't do, as too much of
+my leave would be used up.
+
+It was the dickens of a mess, and then an idea occurred to me. Lassen
+must have gone down with the steamer, for they wouldn't take me for him
+if he had been saved. And then I soon had a plan--to drop the Jimmy
+Lamb character and continue to be Lassen as long as necessary. I might
+get across the frontier in that way, and must trust to my wits for the
+rest. There might be a bit of risk in it, but that needn't stop me; and
+then a very pretty little development suggested itself which offered a
+promise of safety even if I was found out.
+
+Why shouldn't the "shock" of which the nurse had spoken have destroyed
+my memory? The more I considered it the more promising it looked. It
+was the easiest of parts to play; I had done a lot of amateur
+theatricals; and any one could look a fool and act one.
+
+I had a first rehearsal of this stunt--as Jimmy would have called
+it--with the nurse; and the result quite came up to expectations. I
+reckoned that she would tell the doctor, and it was clear she had done
+so when he came to me next morning.
+
+He was tremendously interested in the case now, and, after telling me
+how much better I was, began to question me about the loss of the
+_Burgen_.
+
+I looked as vacant and worried as I thought necessary.
+
+"You remember being on her, don't you?"
+
+"The nurse told me so. Was I?"
+
+"Yes, of course. She struck a mine; you remember that?"
+
+I affected to try to remember, stared round the room, and then
+helplessly at him and gestured feebly.
+
+"You were picked up at sea. Does that help you?"
+
+It wasn't likely to, and I shook my head.
+
+"She came from Harwich--England, you know, and was blown up."
+
+"Harwich, England," I murmured, as if the words had no meaning for me.
+
+He muttered something in Dutch under his breath. "Does your head
+trouble you much?" and he smoothed my hair, feeling my head all over
+carefully.
+
+I looked as stupid as a sheep. "It--it----" and I frowned and gestured
+to suggest what I could not express.
+
+He looked rather grave for a second or two and then smiled
+reassuringly. "It will be all right in time, quite right. You are
+suffering from shock; but you needn't worry. No worry. That's the great
+thing. A day or so will put you all right, Herr--let's see, what's your
+name?"
+
+But I didn't bite. "Is it Lassen? The nurse said so."
+
+"Don't you know it yourself?" he asked very kindly.
+
+"No." That was true at any rate. "How did you find it out?"
+
+"From the card in your trousers' pocket. You are the only survivor from
+the _Burgen_ and had a very narrow escape. Even most of your
+clothes were blown off you. Doesn't anything I say suggest anything to
+you?"
+
+I lay as if pondering this solemnly. "It's all so--so strange," I
+muttered, putting my hand to my head. "So--so----" and I left it at
+that; and he went away, after giving me one more item of valuable
+information--that my belt which contained my money had also been saved.
+
+I played that lost memory for all it was worth and with gorgeous
+success. I became a "case" for the doctors who trotted along to
+interview me as a sort of interesting freak and held learned
+discussions over me. All this gave me such ample practice that I became
+perfect in the part.
+
+But there was a fly in the amber. As the only survivor from the
+_Burgen_ the Dutch authorities regarded me as a person of quite
+considerable importance. Officials came to visit me, pouring in regular
+broadsides of questions; and as they got no satisfaction, and the
+doctors differed about my recovering my memory, the official verdict
+was that I should remain in Rotterdam until I did recover it.
+
+This threatened complications; but I had no intention to remain, so I
+prepared to get away, sent out for a ready-made suit of clothes--ye
+gods, what a beautiful misfit!--and was going to leave the hospital to
+see what I could do at the German Embassy about a passport, when my
+luck propeller snapped and I saw myself nose-diving to the ground.
+
+A nurse brought me a card and said some one was waiting to see me in
+the doctor's room. The card told me it was a certain Herr Heinrich
+Hoffnung, 480b, Ugenplatz, Berlin!
+
+It was just rotten luck, for it meant the collapse of the Lassen show.
+The instant he clapped eyes on me he'd know I wasn't the real Simon
+Pure; and it might be the dickens of a job to get across the frontier.
+
+As I thought of Nessa and what the delay might mean to her, I was mad.
+But I couldn't shirk the meeting; so after giving him time to learn all
+about my "case" from the doctor, I went down, wondering what ill wind
+had blown the fellow to Rotterdam at such a moment, and what the
+dickens would happen when I was no longer Lassen.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE FIRST CRISIS
+
+
+As I opened the door the doctor jumped up to help me to a chair, and
+the man from Berlin gave a start of surprise and then stared at me
+keenly; but whether he recognized me or not, I couldn't decide.
+
+"You've picked up wonderfully, Herr Lassen, wonderfully!" said the
+doctor. "I declare no one would guess from your appearance what you
+have been through."
+
+"And I feel as well as I look, doctor, thanks to you and the nurses," I
+replied. "I owe my life to the doctor here," I added, turning to the
+stranger.
+
+"You are Johann Lassen?" he asked.
+
+I shrugged my shoulders. "That's what they tell me."
+
+"I told you how we know," put in the doctor, adding to me: "I have
+explained the nature of your case to Herr Hoffnung. He has come to take
+you to Berlin."
+
+It was clearly time to bring matters to a head, so I turned to the man.
+"Have I ever had the pleasure of seeing you before?" I asked, with a
+perplexed and rather bewildered look.
+
+He shook his head. "No, we have never met, but----" He paused and then
+added: "But of course it must be right."
+
+I could have shouted for joy, but I put my hand before my eyes that he
+should not see the delight in them.
+
+"You will wish to see Herr Lassen alone, of course," said the doctor.
+"You will bear in mind all that I have told you, I trust."
+
+Hoffnung crossed to the door with him and the two stood speaking
+together in low tones for a minute, giving me an opportunity to observe
+my visitor. He was rather a good-looking man of about thirty,
+well-dressed and smart, and I placed him as somebody's secretary.
+Certainly a decent sort and not too quick-witted.
+
+"First let me congratulate you on your marvellous escape, Herr Lassen,"
+he said when the doctor had gone.
+
+"It seems to have been touch and go; but----" and I gestured to suggest
+that I knew nothing about it.
+
+"The doctor tells me he quite despaired at one time of saving your
+life. But he says you are quite fit to travel. Do you agree with that?"
+
+"It's all the same to me. I feel all right."
+
+"It is rather urgent that I should return to Berlin as soon as
+possible. Do you think you could manage the journey to-day?"
+
+"I don't see why not. But--er--it's a bit awkward, you know. Are you
+sure I'm your man?"
+
+He glanced at his watch and started. "It's just possible that we could
+catch the express, and we can talk in the train; that is, if you
+haven't many preparations to make."
+
+"I haven't any. I've nothing but what I stand up in, and one place is
+as good as another to me unti----" and I sighed and gestured hopelessly.
+
+"Then I should like to go."
+
+"Can I go without any papers or anything?"
+
+"With me, certainly. I have everything necessary, and will explain on
+the journey."
+
+And go we did to my infinite satisfaction.
+
+In the cab to the station he was silent and thoughtful, and as my one
+consuming desire was to get across the frontier before anything could
+happen, I didn't worry him with any questions. It was all clear sailing
+at the station. Whoever Hoffnung might be, there was no doubt about his
+having authority. He secured a special compartment, although the train
+was crowded, and did all possible for my comfort.
+
+"That's the best of travelling officially," he said pleasantly as he
+settled himself in the seat opposite me, while the train ran out of the
+station. "Now, you asked me a question at the hospital which I did not
+answer--whether I'm sure you're Lassen. Frankly, I'm not; and the more
+I look at you the more I'm puzzled."
+
+"It's a bit awkward. I don't wish to be somebody else."
+
+"Do you feel fit to talk? The doctor warned me against worrying you;
+but there are things I should enormously like to know."
+
+"You're not half so keen as I am," I told him truthfully. "If I am
+Lassen, what am I; where do I live; have I any friends anywhere; isn't
+there any one who knows me anywhere? It's such a devil of a mess."
+
+"There's one thing certain, my friend, you're a German; and as for the
+rest you'll find plenty of people in Berlin who'll know you. The von
+Reblings, for instance. Which reminds me I have the Countess's letter;"
+he opened his despatch case and handed me a sealed envelope.
+
+But I had already told the doctors that I could not write and could not
+read handwriting, although I had fumbled out some large print. That had
+been one of the specialities of my peculiar aphasia. So I just smiled
+vacantly and shook my head. "Will you read it to me?" I asked.
+
+He agreed after some little demur, and a very charming letter it was.
+The Countess addressed me as "My dear Johann," wrote in the familiar
+thee and thou, said how anxious she and Rosa--especially Rosa, it
+seemed--had been about me; urged me to hurry to Berlin as soon as
+possible, where, of course, I should be the most welcome guest in the
+world, and signed herself "Your affectionate aunt, Olga von Rebling."
+
+"Doesn't that remind you of anything?" asked Hoffnung.
+
+"Not in the faintest. Who is Rosa?"
+
+Instead of telling me, he smiled suggestively and I smiled back. "Did
+the Countess send you to fetch me?"
+
+"Oh, no. I came officially. I'll tell you about that directly; but it
+is because of what she told us about you that I was sent. She received
+a letter from you from England saying that you were crossing in the
+_Burgen_, and when the newspapers reported the loss of the steamer
+and that you were the only survivor, she told me about it. I reported
+it at Headquarters, and--well, here I am in consequence."
+
+"And you've never seen me, or Lassen, or whoever I am, before?"
+
+"Never. I have seen a photograph of you, but it was taken some long
+time ago; and while you answer to the likeness in some respects, you
+certainly do not in others, although I can see that you may be Lassen,
+allowing for the difference of time."
+
+"Well, anyway, these von Reblings will know, thank Heaven."
+
+But he shook his head. "I'm not so sure. You see, it's a good many
+years since you were in Berlin. The family arrangement dates back many
+more years than that, moreover--since you were children."
+
+"What family arrangement?"
+
+"Your betrothal to Miss Rosa."
+
+"The devil!" I exclaimed. "Do you mean to tell me I'm engaged to marry
+this Rosa von Rebling?"
+
+"Certainly I do, and a very charming girl she is, and very rich too,"
+he replied, smiling unrestrainedly.
+
+But it cost me some effort to smile in return. It was the very deuce of
+a mix up; there were no end of bothering complications in it, and I
+leant back in my seat to try and think it out. It was quite on the
+cards, after what he had said about my photograph, that even these
+people themselves might mistake me for Lassen; and if they did, I
+should be hampered at every turn in my search for Nessa.
+
+"Is it really possible that you don't remember anything about it?" he
+asked after a long pause.
+
+"Not a thing."
+
+"The doctor hoped that the mention of them would stir your memory."
+
+I shook my head hopelessly. "It may when I see them--if I'm really
+Lassen, that is. Phew! What a kettle of fish!"
+
+We reached the frontier soon afterwards, and I breathed more freely as
+soon as I was on the right side of it. Whatever happened now, I could
+play at being a German. I recalled with immense satisfaction his
+confident assertion that whoever I might be I was certainly one of his
+countrymen; and I could gamble on it that when the von Reblings met me,
+my "case" would still continue to be interesting enough to secure my
+safety.
+
+Hoffnung had begun to study some papers from his grip and presently
+looked across at me and put a surprising question. "Do you speak
+English?" he asked in my own tongue.
+
+I had presence of mind enough to be instantly very American. "Gee,
+don't I, some."
+
+"Then you've been in America?"
+
+"Have I?" My practice with the Rotterdam people was coming in well.
+
+"Oh, yes. You went from there to England," he replied, going back to
+his own language. "Can't you remember that?"
+
+I shook my head and frowned.
+
+"Nor anything you did in England?" Another mystified shake of the head.
+"It's a pity. Don't you know that you sent a report from England of
+what you'd seen there?"
+
+A little duet followed in which he asked me a series of questions, and
+I replied each time with a shake of the head. The subject matter of
+them all was the mention of persons, places, dockyards, ships and so
+on, which had obviously been embodied in the report Lassen had sent to
+Berlin. He referred to them in a casual tone and in a way which would
+not give anything away supposing I should turn out not to be Lassen.
+
+"I'm inclined to be very sorry for all this, and fear it may affect you
+very seriously. You're not just playing at this, I hope?" he asked then
+very earnestly.
+
+"Playing at what?"
+
+"This loss of memory. I mean that you need not have the faintest
+hesitation about speaking to me; and it occurred to me that you might
+have put it all on just to avoid questions at Rotterdam."
+
+"Are you serious?"
+
+"Absolutely. It's a tremendously serious matter. It's this way. We've
+seen the _Burgen's_ manifest, of course; we know there were only
+two male cabin passengers on board, both travelling as Americans; one
+as Jas. R. Lamb, the other as Joseph Lyman. If you are Lassen, that was
+you. The other man, Lamb, as he called himself, we have good reason to
+believe was an English spy. It follows, therefore, that if you are not
+Lassen, you are the Englishman; and I need scarcely tell you that at
+such a time as this, spies find Berlin a very unhealthy place."
+
+He was a quicker-witted fellow than I had believed, but he made a
+mistake in not springing this beastly surprise on me more suddenly. His
+long preamble gave me time to get myself well in hand.
+
+"It'll be a pretty climax for me if I am the Englishman," I answered,
+laughing, and without turning a hair.
+
+"You're sure you're not?" he rapped.
+
+I tried to appear amused. "I wish I could be sure of anything."
+
+A pause followed, and then he tried another shot. "You may have noticed
+that I stared pretty hard at you this morning when you came into the
+doctor's room, and that afterwards I rather rushed you away from
+Rotterdam. I reached there yesterday morning and spent the day making
+such inquiries as I could about you. I was instructed to, of course;
+and I came to the conclusion that you were the Englishman, and I
+thought so when you came into that room. That was why I hurried you
+away; I wished to have you on this side of the frontier. It is also the
+reason why I am sorry you cannot recover your memory."
+
+I declined the opening without thanks. "I'm just as sorry as you are;
+but I suppose we can clear up the tangle at Berlin."
+
+"Oh, yes. I've wired to the von Reblings to meet our train. Of course
+you'll understand that I have some men at hand here. It is better you
+should know that," he added in an unpleasantly suggestive tone.
+
+But I only laughed. "I wish you would send one of them to get me
+something to eat."
+
+"I will, of course;" and he looked out into the corridor, beckoned some
+one and gave him the necessary order, returned to his seat and busied
+himself with the papers from his despatch case.
+
+A substantial meal for us both was brought to the compartment, and
+although very little was said as we ate it, I was conscious that a
+considerable change had come over the relations between us. His manner
+had become distinctly official, and I understood that I was virtually
+under arrest until at least we reached Berlin.
+
+Afterwards he went back to his papers, suggesting that I might like to
+sleep; so I leant back in my corner and gave myself up to my thoughts.
+
+They were anything but pleasant. He had given me a shock that was
+almost as great as the explosion on the _Burgen_. I was in the
+very devil's own mess. I had no delusions about my fate if I was held
+to be an English spy; and that would almost certainly be the case if
+the von Reblings declared I was not Lassen. That that would be their
+decision was a million to one chance. It was a sheer impossibility that
+they would be unable to recognize a relation who was actually engaged
+to the daughter; and how to meet the difficulty baffled me.
+
+I was right in the eye of the net. The fact that there had been only
+two men as cabin passengers on the _Burgen_ was like a mine sprung
+under my feet. I had reckoned on being able to recover my memory at any
+necessary moment; but this cut the ground from under me. I couldn't
+become Jimmy. That was a cert. And I certainly couldn't become any one
+else, because every lie I might tell would most surely be scrupulously
+investigated.
+
+Poor Nessa! I was a heap more troubled about her and her mother than
+about myself. Whether the von Reblings knew me or not, the result would
+be much the same to her. Tied up as the betrothed of another girl, it
+would be next to impossible in the short time at my command to do a
+thing to find Nessa. The only possibility that occurred to me was that
+if the million to one chance came off and the von Reblings didn't
+denounce me at once as a fraud, I might manage to lose myself in the
+city somehow and set to work on the search.
+
+But even in that case I should be in hourly danger of discovery; a
+state of things which would make it virtually impossible to carry on
+the search with any hope of success.
+
+How Hoffnung's people could have got on the track of my not being
+Jimmy, baffled me utterly. But they clearly had; so there was no use in
+wasting time worrying over it. I did worry over it, however, as well as
+over every other detail of the job, and continued to ask myself all
+sorts of unanswerable questions for the rest of the journey.
+
+Hoffnung looked at his watch, shovelled his papers back into their
+case, and looked across at me. "About ten minutes now only," he said.
+"Have you slept?"
+
+I all but gave myself away by blurting out the fact that I never slept
+in trains, but checked the words in time. "Dozed a bit," I said.
+
+"You look fresh and fit enough," he replied, as if the fact rather
+justified his suspicions of me, "Wonderful after what you've gone
+through. You must be as hard as nails. Military training, I suppose."
+
+Neat; but I didn't tumble in. "Have I had any?" I asked.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and squinted at me with a suggestive smile.
+Then he grew earnest. "We won't have a scene at the station. We'd
+better wait till most of the people have got away, and you'll give me
+your word of honour not to attempt to get away or anything of the sort?"
+
+"What the deuce good would that be? Of course I shan't make a fool of
+myself in any such fashion. If I'm the man you call the Englishman,
+well, I am, that's all."
+
+"You have all an Englishman's coolness."
+
+"Then perhaps I am English," I said with a shrug.
+
+"We'll hope not, at any rate;" but it was clear he was fast making up
+his mind that I was. After a pause he added: "When the crowd has
+cleared off, we'll walk together to the barrier, and my men will be
+behind us. We shall find the von Reblings there."
+
+"And if we don't?"
+
+"Oh, I'll see that you're taken care of for the night; but they'll be
+there to a certainty."
+
+I don't deny that when the train stopped at the platform and we stayed
+in the carriage while the other travellers cleared away, I had more
+than a little trouble to maintain what he had termed an Englishman's
+coolness. But my anxiety didn't show in my face.
+
+Nessa's fate as well as my own depended upon what occurred in the next
+few minutes at the barrier; and I think that if it had been practicable
+to have choked Hoffnung, and his men, into insensibility, I should have
+been sorely tempted to make the attempt.
+
+But the thought of Nessa made me keep my end up; there was nothing for
+it but to face the music; and when at last he rose to leave the
+carriage, all I did was to yawn and stretch myself and say that I
+should be jolly glad to get to bed.
+
+"What a magnificent station!" I exclaimed, stopping on the platform to
+look about me as if that was the one subject which interested me at the
+moment.
+
+Then I went on with him, my eyes fixed on a little knot of people at
+the barrier on whose words and acts my life not improbably depended.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+ROSA
+
+
+I remember a little commonplace incident in Hyde Park one bank holiday
+which made me smile at the time. Three children were scuffling and
+squabbling over the division of some sweets when the mother, a
+kindly-looking soul, came promptly and settled the matter in a somewhat
+Spartan fashion. She scolded the kids, smacked them impartially, and
+then snatched the sweets and shied them away. Loud yells followed, of
+course, and repenting her haste, she kissed and hugged her little
+brood, immediately produced a bigger bag of sweets and in this way
+pacified them all.
+
+This has nothing to do with my experience in Berlin, except to serve as
+a crude illustration of how the fates dealt with me. Just when
+Hoffnung's story had thoroughly shaken me up and prepared me to face
+the worst possible, the pendulum swung right over to my side and the
+fates handed out the bigger bag of sweets.
+
+In other words I was at once recognized as Johann Lassen by the
+Countess von Rebling.
+
+There were several circumstances to account for her mistake. For one,
+my bride that was to be was not present: I learnt the reason
+afterwards; and only her son Hans was with her, a lad who had never
+seen me. The old lady was, of course, prepared to meet me; she saw me
+in Hoffnung's company; then just as I reached the barrier the big arc
+lamps in the station almost went out for a few seconds, leaving the
+place in comparative gloom; and lastly, being a tender-hearted little
+woman, her eyes were full of tears and no doubt blurred her sight.
+
+"My poor dear Johann!" she cried, throwing her arms round my neck and
+giving way to her mingled sympathy for my sufferings and joy at seeing
+me safe and sound. Then she called to her son, and after I had been
+kissed by him, she clung to me and could not make enough of me, so that
+even Hoffnung had to be satisfied.
+
+"You are quite sure that this is your nephew, Countess?" he asked.
+
+"Sure? Of course I am. Whatever do you mean, Heinrich?" she cried in
+amazement.
+
+He explained my loss of memory; but the only effect was to increase her
+concern on my account and to make her hug me closer to her side, with
+many endearing expressions of affection and compassion.
+
+I felt an abominable hypocrite at having to allow her to mislead
+herself, but the thought of Nessa's plight made it impossible for me to
+undeceive her; and we all went to the carriage which was in waiting,
+the Countess clinging to my arm and pressing close to me.
+
+Hoffnung was very decent about it. As I was stepping into the carriage,
+he held out his hand. "I hope you will believe that I am sincere in
+saying how glad I am to find I was wrong, Herr Lassen," he said with
+what seemed like genuine cordiality; and of course I wrung his hand and
+said something appropriate.
+
+Why my arrival should have affected the dear little lady so deeply I
+did not know; but during the drive to her house she could do nothing
+but press my hand in both of hers and murmur words of delight at seeing
+me again, mingled with sympathy with my misfortunes. Again the very dim
+light in the carriage stood my friend; and by the time she reached home
+she was thoroughly convinced that I was her nephew.
+
+I had still to meet the daughter; but to my relief she was not at home.
+A meal was in readiness for me, and as I eat it, the Countess sat and
+feasted her eyes on me, noting the differences which, as she thought,
+time had effected in my looks. But these did not shake her conviction.
+
+"You are very much changed, Johann; but of course, you would be in all
+these years. It must be ten quite since you were here. But you are just
+what I expected you would be, although not so much like your father as
+I looked for," she said, and then drew attention in some detail to the
+points of difference. I learnt then that the upper part of my face,
+shape of head, forehead and eyebrows, and nose had "changed less" than
+the lower part.
+
+Then the son gave me a rather nasty jar. "You're not a bit like that
+photograph you sent over to Rosa, cousin, is he, mother? She'll jump a
+bit when she sees you."
+
+"Photograph? Did I send one?" I asked.
+
+"Don't worry Johann, Hans," said his mother, frowning at him, and he
+coloured and collapsed with a muttered "I forgot."
+
+"You did send one, dear," she said to me. "It was when you had a beard
+and moustache, and of course that hid the lower part of your face." I
+breathed a little more freely. "I think Rosa will be surprised when she
+sees you; you're so much better looking than you promised to be. I
+suppose you don't remember sending the photograph?" she asked with
+nervous wistfulness.
+
+I could truthfully say I did not; and in this way the talk proceeded
+until I obtained a really good description of myself as well as many
+details about my past. Lassen's engagement to the daughter was, as
+Hoffnung had said, the result of a family arrangement; one of those
+silly wills which left a fortune to the two on condition that they
+married. They had not seen him since he left Goettingen ten years
+before; during the whole of that time he had been out of the country;
+and was now coming back to marry his bride-elect.
+
+The kind-hearted old soul hadn't a word to say against him; but Hans
+let drop one or two remarks which led me to think I was not likely to
+receive a very cordial welcome from his sister. Anxious to know all I
+could, I pleaded great fatigue as soon as I had finished eating and
+asked to be allowed to go to bed. They both went up with me and I
+managed to keep the son while I undressed.
+
+He was rather an awkward youth, about seventeen, totally unlike his
+mother who might have sat as model for a delicate Dresden china figure.
+On the other hand he was fleshy, dark, and rather pudgy-featured; but I
+praised his figure, belauded his apparent strength, and generally
+played on his obvious vanity and wish to be considered a grown man.
+
+"We must be the best of friends, Hans," I declared heartily.
+
+He blushed with pleasure. "I should like it. You look awfully strong,
+cousin," he replied, looking at my biceps.
+
+"You'll make a far stronger man than I am." It was as welcome as jam on
+a trench crust ten days old; and I kept at it until I felt I could
+safely lead round to the subject of his sister and learn how the wind
+blew in that quarter.
+
+"Of course Rosa's a good sort in lots of ways, but she's getting so
+bossy," he declared boyishly. "She's the eldest for one thing, and
+then, you know, she's come in for old Aunt Margarita's fortune,
+and--well, she likes to run things, and I don't like it."
+
+"A man can't be expected to," I agreed with an encouraging smile.
+
+"That's just it. She thinks a fellow's never grown up. I can stand it
+from mother; but Rosa won't understand that six years' difference is
+one thing when a fellow's a kid of ten and another when he's nearly
+eighteen. I shall get my commission in another month or two, you know."
+
+I made a note of the fact that my "betrothed" was about four and twenty
+and inclined to be "bossy," and let him rattle on about the army, a
+subject of which he was very full.
+
+"Are you going to join your regiment, cousin?" he asked presently.
+
+I looked appropriately blank and gestured.
+
+"Oh, I forgot," he exclaimed, blushing again. "But can't you remember
+anything?" he asked, gathering courage for the question.
+
+I shook my head and looked worried and perplexed.
+
+"You don't mind my asking that question?"
+
+"Not a bit. Of course I want to hit on something that will wake up my
+memory."
+
+"Herr Hoffnung said something about your not wanting to go to the war
+and that you were joining the Secret Service; and Rosa was just mad
+about it. She loathes the idea; but there, I don't suppose she'll care
+so much if----" He stopped short in some confusion.
+
+"If what? Out with it, my dear fellow."
+
+"I don't think I'd better tell you. For one reason because you're----"
+and he pulled up again.
+
+"Because I've lost my memory, do you mean?"
+
+"I don't know. She's awfully funny sometimes, but I did mean that. I
+was going to say--you won't give me away to her if I tell you?"
+
+"Of course not. Aren't we two going to be the best of chums?"
+
+"Well, it's a rotten arrangement to tie up two kids to marry, like you
+two, just because of some money."
+
+I laughed. "I'm not exactly a kid now, Hans, at any rate."
+
+"Rather not; and what she'll think when she sees you I don't know."
+
+This let in a glimmer of the truth and I made a shot. "You mean she
+doesn't much fancy the family arrangement?" His face told me it was a
+bull's-eye, but he hesitated to own it. "When a man's in my state it's
+only decent for his real friends to tell him the hang of things, Hans,"
+I said as a little touch of the spur.
+
+"I daresay it's a lot of lies now that I've seen you."
+
+I tumbled to that, of course. "You mean that your sister has heard
+things which have set her against me?"
+
+He nodded. "That you have only pretended to be out of the country all
+the time and then had to run away--oh, I don't know exactly what it
+was, but it was enough for Rosa. She always takes a different view of
+everything from the rest of us."
+
+Rather good hearing. It seemed to offer a way of breaking off the
+engagement. "She wants to end things between us, you mean?"
+
+"I don't know for certain, but I know what I think. She wouldn't come
+to the station to-night for one thing, and then, well, if I was engaged
+to a girl I wouldn't have her so thick with a fellow as she is with
+Oscar Feldmann. He's always here. But don't you breathe a word that
+I've told you about this."
+
+"Not I, my dear fellow; I'm only too grateful to you. Is he in the army
+then?"
+
+"Not he, but he ought to be;" and as this turned him on to the army
+again, I listened for a minute or two and yawned, and he took the hint
+and went away, promising to see me the first thing in the morning.
+
+Things were going all right so far, and as I was really very tired, I
+put off my thinking until the next day, and went to sleep. In the
+morning I turned over the whole position in my mind and came to the
+conclusion that, for the present at any rate, there was only one
+difficulty to negotiate--that the daughter might not recognize me.
+
+Hans' description of her was anything but alluring. She was "bossy";
+inclined to oppose the others and run things on her own; she was
+already prejudiced against me as Lassen, and was probably ready to
+grasp at any excuse to break off the engagement.
+
+That suggested a very disquieting thought. If she had heard that Lassen
+and I were the only cabin passengers on the _Burgen_, that I was
+the only survivor, that there was some question about my identity and
+that I had lost my memory, it was clear that she had only to refuse to
+recognize me, to free herself from the matrimonial entanglement.
+Obviously that must be postponed if possible.
+
+In view of what her mother had said about the upper part of my face
+being most like Lassen's, it seemed a good moment to invent a bad
+face-ache, so that I could swathe my mouth and chin at our first
+meeting; and the remembrance of Lassen's rather pinched shoulders and
+stooping figure suggested the advisability of being in bed when she had
+her first inspection.
+
+Thus when Hans came to me in the morning, he found me suffering from a
+severe attack of toothache with a bandage wrapped round my face, and
+the windows carefully curtained. He was a good-natured fellow, was
+genuinely sorry and, after saying Rosa was really anxious to see me,
+although she pretended she wasn't, went off to report.
+
+Hans' report brought up the mother, full of solicitous sympathy and
+inquiries about breakfast and a suggestion that I had better stop in
+bed. I agreed, and she said that probably Rosa would come and see me
+during the morning. About an hour later all three came up together, and
+I augured well from the fact that Rosa was carrying a cup of tea.
+
+She was more like Hans than her mother; fleshy, dark, and round-faced,
+better-looking and sharper, with fine, almost black eyes, and a certain
+air of masterfulness, which showed in her brisk manner and carriage.
+She was evidently very curious to see me.
+
+She bustled up to the bedside, her eyes fixed on me searchingly, and
+her dark brows, which were rather heavy, pent and drawn together.
+
+"So you've come at last, Johann--if you are Johann, that is," she said,
+as she drew up a small table and put the tea on it.
+
+I met her look with a wan smile, turned so that she should have a good
+view of so much of my face as was visible, and held out my hand.
+"Rosa," I murmured, and waited to observe the result of her scrutiny.
+
+"Mother said you were too ill to have any breakfast, but I knew better,
+so I've brought you a cup of tea," she said, managing to suggest that
+she had brought it less because I might like it, than because the
+others had declared I shouldn't.
+
+"Thank you, Rosa, I shall relish it."
+
+"There. You see I was right, mother," she said, and I saw I had scored.
+"Are you really so bad, Johann? You always were a coward in bearing
+pain, you know."
+
+"Rosa!" protested the mother.
+
+"It's true, mother. If he knocked his little toe he always thought he'd
+have to have his whole foot cut off. And whoever heard of a man wanting
+to stay in bed for a toothache?"
+
+Better and better, this. Unintentionally I had evidently forged an
+important link in the identification; and then came something better
+still, in response to another protest from the mother.
+
+"Nonsense, mother, it's exactly what he would do," she exclaimed
+sharply, and then turned again to me. "Mother thinks you're awfully
+altered, but I don't see it. Of course I haven't seen much of your face
+yet; but she always does take these queer fancies. Can't you take that
+thing off your face?"
+
+"I think I'll drink the cup of tea," I replied, and drew the bandage
+down a little and put the cup to my lips.
+
+To my astonishment she burst out laughing and clapped her hands. "How
+silly you are, mother. Why the thing's as plain as plain. He's had his
+teeth taken out, and that accounts for the difference you made such a
+fuss about. They used to stick out like this;" and she put her fingers
+in front of her own mouth to illustrate. "Don't you remember how we
+noticed the same thing when Mrs. Hopping had it done? It's made you
+quite passable, Johann," she declared.
+
+"Is that it, Johann?" asked the mother, smiling.
+
+"Is it very noticeable?" I asked, just escaping the pitfall of
+admitting that I remembered something about it. Rosa laughed and
+nodded. The ordeal was over, and the danger point passed; and soon
+afterwards she said she wanted to speak to me alone, and asked me to
+make an effort to get up.
+
+I made the effort, laughed to myself as I cleaned my teeth that they
+should have been mistaken for false ones, and went downstairs to find
+Rosa waiting impatiently for me.
+
+"I should have thought you could put those awful clothes on in half the
+time you've taken, Johann, but you were always slow in dressing," she
+bantered; and I was quite content to be chipped for a time until she
+was ready to come to the discussion of our own affairs.
+
+"Is it true you've quite lost your memory?" she asked as Hans had done.
+
+"The Rotterdam doctors said I should recover it. But I'm afraid I
+shouldn't have known even you."
+
+"Don't you remember anything about my letters?" I shook my head. "Nor
+your own either?" Another wag of the head. "Well, do you still want to
+make me marry you?"
+
+"I don't know. You're very pretty, Rosa."
+
+"For Heaven's sake don't begin to pay me stupid compliments. I hate
+them. Hans takes good care I shan't forget my face isn't my fortune;
+and the moment a man begins to talk about my looks, I know he's
+thinking about my money. At least most of them," she qualified after a
+pause.
+
+I understood the qualification. "Then there's an exception?"
+
+She flushed slightly and was a little confused. "Yes, there is," she
+replied after a pause. "You'll have to know it some time, so you may as
+well know it now;" and she tossed her head defiantly. "I believe in
+coming straight to the point, Johann; and the question is whether you
+are still in the same mind as when you sent me that idiotic photograph,
+three months ago--the silly thing isn't a bit like you--and if you are,
+we had better face things at once."
+
+"What did I say?" I asked, frowning.
+
+"That you meant to hold me to the stupid engagement. But you can't do
+that, however much you wish. It's true that under the silly will the
+engagement can't be broken off till I'm five and twenty, unless you do
+it, but don't forget that I get half the money even if I don't marry
+you."
+
+"Is that the will? It does seem silly, as you say."
+
+"Oh, I know you believe you have the whiphand."
+
+"Indeed, I don't know anything about it." It was really delicious to be
+able to tell the simple truth.
+
+She frowned impatiently. "It's what you're thinking then," she declared
+rather snappily. I shook my head. What I really was considering was
+whether, since Lassen was at the bottom of the North Sea, I should make
+a friend of her by doing what she wished. "Well, anyhow, I want you to
+make haste and think about it all and let me know the result as soon as
+possible. I hate suspense, and things can't go on as they are," she
+continued vehemently.
+
+I had no answer ready, and with a shrug of the shoulders she turned to
+another subject. "Is it true that you've turned spy?"
+
+"Hoffnung seemed to suggest something of the sort yesterday."
+
+She tossed her head and her lip curled. "If I were a man I'd rather be
+a street sweeper; but I'm not surprised at _your_ liking it. It's
+these things in you that are so natural. Your new teeth may have
+altered your looks, but of course they haven't changed your nature."
+
+I couldn't restrain a smile; things were panning out so well: and
+before I replied the door was opened gently and the loveliest child I
+had ever seen came in. She was a delicate-featured, golden-haired
+youngster of about eleven--the replica in miniature of the
+Countess--with big sea-blue eyes which fastened on me shyly as she
+stood hesitating at the door.
+
+"What is it, Lottchen?" cried Rosa sharply. "Come in and don't stand
+fiddling with the door handle in that stupid fashion. This is Cousin
+Johann, and you needn't stand staring at him as if he would eat you."
+
+My heart went out to the kid instantly. "How do you do, Lottchen?" I
+said; and she came up, put her little hand into mine and left it there,
+as she held up her lovely face to be kissed, and then nestled close to
+me trustfully.
+
+Rosa laughed. "That's a new thing for Lottchen, I can tell you; she
+hates men as a rule."
+
+"You won't hate me, Lottchen, will you?" I said, smoothing her wondrous
+hair. She shook her head and smiled up at me and then laid her face
+against my shoulder.
+
+"Don't worry Johann. He's got a bad face-ache."
+
+"Oh, I'm sorry. Am I hurting you?" and the great blue eyes were full of
+sympathy, just as her mother's had been the previous night.
+
+"Not a bit, my dear."
+
+"Well, you must run away now, child, you'll see plenty of Johann. What
+is it you want?"
+
+"Miss Caldicott sent me to see if you're coming out with us as usual."
+
+The name seemed to strike me in the face, and a sharp cry of amazement
+was out before I could check it. It was lucky that Rosa had reminded me
+of my forgotten face-ache, and I invented a violent paroxysm of pain,
+whipped out my handkerchief and hid my face in it, to cover up my
+confusion.
+
+Was it possible that Nessa and I were in the same house, or had I gone
+clean out of my senses?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+NESSA
+
+
+It was some time before I allowed myself to recover from the little
+attack and felt equal to the task of resuming the conversation with
+Rosa. If the Miss Caldicott the child had mentioned was really
+Nessa--and it was difficult to think there would be two girls of that
+name shut up in Berlin at the same time--it was just the biggest stroke
+of luck I had ever had in my life.
+
+Indeed, all the luck seemed to be coming my way; but I should have to
+be careful how I played the magnificent cards fate had placed in my
+hand. I must certainly have Rosa on my side; and that could probably be
+done by freeing her from the engagement. It couldn't be done at once,
+however; not until I had pretended to take time to consider.
+
+I must also find out the relations between Rosa and Nessa; and must, if
+possible, manage not to have any one present when Nessa and I met for
+the first time. Not the easiest of jobs, probably; although my peculiar
+footing in the house might enable me to find a means. The risk was, of
+course, that in her amazement Nessa might give everything away.
+
+"That was a sharp spasm and no mistake," I said when I lowered the
+handkerchief at last.
+
+"Was it real, or just shamming to make us pity you?" asked Rosa
+suspiciously. "You were always good at shamming, you know."
+
+"Was I? Oh well, I'm better, so it doesn't much matter."
+
+"Did Lottchen hurt you, then? She's apt to be clumsy."
+
+"She's rather a pretty child and doesn't look clumsy."
+
+"She's the dearest little thing in the world, but it doesn't do to make
+too much of her. Every one spoils her because she's so pretty and looks
+so fragile. She isn't really delicate and can be no end of a romp, and
+is quite able to take her own part. She wants to go to school, and
+she'd have gone before if it hadn't been for the war and Nessa being
+here as her governess. You never saw anything like the way she loves
+Nessa."
+
+I wasn't caught napping this time. "Nessa? And who's Nessa?" I asked
+with a frown of perplexity.
+
+"Nessa Caldicott, an English girl who----"
+
+"An English girl here, in this house, at such a time!" I exclaimed,
+lost in amazement.
+
+"Yes, of course; in this house; and at such a time," she repeated,
+imitating my manner. "Have you any objection?"
+
+"Of course not; but----" and I gestured to suggest anything.
+
+"I wanted to talk to you about her. That's the one reason why I wasn't
+altogether sorry to hear you were in the Secret Service;" and then she
+told me that she and Nessa had been at school together, and how, when
+she found Nessa had had to leave her friends and could not get
+permission to go back to England, she had brought her home as
+Lottchen's governess. "She was in awful trouble, of course, and mother
+hated the idea of her coming to us; but I got my own way. That's about
+two months ago, and ever since we've been doing all we can to get her
+sent home."
+
+This sent Rosa up many hundreds per cent. in my estimation. "I think it
+was awfully good of you; but why can't she go home?"
+
+The question seemed to trouble her considerably. "If I tell you all
+about it, will you help us?"
+
+"I don't suppose I can do anything, but I'll try."
+
+"You may be able to find out the truth; and that will help, for we
+should know how to get to work. I think I know it, though, and I
+believe it's all the fault of a man who pesters her incessantly. He's a
+horrid beast, named Count von Erstein;" and she told me he was a
+wealthy Jew who had great influence with the Government; had tried and
+was still trying to get Nessa denounced as a spy and sent to one of the
+concentration camps; dogged her everywhere and set spies to watch her;
+had spread all manner of lying reports about her; and was intriguing in
+every possible way against her for his own infamous ends.
+
+My blood boiled as I listened to all this, but I had to smother my rage
+sufficiently to assume just a conventional amount of indignation in
+keeping with Lassen's character. "An ugly story," I muttered.
+
+"It doesn't seem to have roused you very much," she replied, her eyes
+flashing indignantly. "I should have thought it would have fired the
+blood of any ordinary man. It makes me feel that I could kill him; but
+then I'm only a woman."
+
+It was clear that my manner was Lassenly enough, so I let it pass. "I'm
+curious to see the man."
+
+"If he had his deserts, you'd see him in prison; but he's probably with
+Nessa and Lottchen now. He always hangs about near the house at this
+time, when they go for their walk. That was the meaning of the child's
+coming in just now. I generally go with them. Do you feel well enough
+to come out and see?"
+
+After a little sham hesitation I agreed, and she went off to get ready,
+leaving me able to work off some of my rage alone. It was in all truth
+an ugly story, and, what was worse, threatened to make it very
+difficult to get Nessa away. No doubt it was abominably stupid of me,
+but until that moment I had never considered the practical means of
+getting her out of Berlin.
+
+I had rushed off with the idea of finding out the truth about her in
+order to relieve her mother's anxiety, and somewhere at the back of my
+head was the idea that Jimmy's friend at the American Embassy would
+help me to do the rest.
+
+But that was knocked on the head if this beast of a Jew had sufficient
+influence with his Government to block the way. And that he had
+considerable influence, Rosa's story left no doubt. She certainly could
+not get away openly, without permission from the authorities and a
+passport and all the rest of it; and it looked like a thousand to one
+chance against any such things being forthcoming.
+
+That did not exhaust the resources of civilization, however, as the
+politicians are fond of saying; and at the worst we could try and make
+a bolt of it together, without any papers if necessary, but preferably
+with some in false names. So far as I was concerned I was ready to
+tramp it to the frontier on foot; but that wouldn't do for Nessa.
+
+At any rate we must get her out of Berlin and away from this von
+Erstein's persecution. Nessa could gabble German quite as freely as I
+could; and once away from the capital, supplied with plenty of money as
+I was fortunately, we could try our luck and trust to fate.
+
+"You've made me feel awfully strange about that fellow," I said to Rosa
+as we started from the house. "I suppose it means I'm angry. I feel I
+should like to kick the brute."
+
+"I'm glad to hear it; but kicking won't be enough. What you've got to
+do is to find means to get Nessa away."
+
+I shook my head doubtfully. "How are these things managed?"
+
+"She must have a permit to travel; that will be difficult enough: and
+to cross the frontier there must be a passport, of course. That's where
+the Count stops everything. He has dinned it into the powers that be
+that she's a spy and wants to get away to carry her information to
+England. We nearly got one; but at the last moment the whole plan
+failed."
+
+"Did Aunt Olga help, then?" I asked, hesitating how to speak of the
+Countess.
+
+"No, mother wouldn't. It was--was a friend of mine, Herr Feldmann, if
+you wish to know," she said, with a slight tinge of colour, hesitating
+over the name and laughing self-consciously as I looked down at her and
+our eyes met.
+
+"It appears to me that your English girl is lucky to have found such
+staunch friends, Rosa," I said as earnestly as I felt. "And between us
+we ought to be able to outwit this von Erstein."
+
+"I wonder if you mean that," she replied, with a searching look.
+
+"I think you'll find I do. They told me at Rotterdam that I had had a
+very near squeak of death; and whether it's that or something else, I
+don't seem to have any of the meannesses you associate with me. I am
+perfectly in earnest. Perhaps I've dropped the rest with my memory."
+
+"I hope you have, Johann, and there's certainly a sincere look in your
+eyes there never used to be. Ah! There they are," she broke off,
+pointing a little distance ahead; and I saw Nessa and the child coming
+toward us, with the man in attendance.
+
+We had turned into the Thiergarten and were in one of the larger side
+walks at the moment; the part where Nessa usually brought Lottchen,
+Rosa told me: and I had a good view of them before they saw us. Nessa
+had the child between her and von Erstein, and I was deeply concerned
+to notice how worn and troubled and harried she looked.
+
+The man was talking to her over Lottchen's head and appeared to have no
+eyes for anybody or anything except her. He was about forty, I thought;
+the ruddy-faced type of Jew, clean-shaven, square of face, rather high
+cheekbones, a very un-Jewish nose, small eyes, with bags of sensuality
+under them, a somewhat heavy jowl, with little rolls of flesh under his
+chin and on his thick neck. Not by any means a bad-looking man and very
+smartly dressed in faultlessly cut clothes which, however, did not hide
+his tendency to paunchiness. An ugly customer to get across with, was
+my verdict.
+
+I was more than a little bothered about Nessa meeting me for the first
+time in his presence, as it was extremely probable that she would give
+vent to her astonishment in a way that might start his suspicions, so I
+stepped out into full view while they were still a little distance
+away, hoping to prepare her.
+
+But there was no trouble of the sort. Lottchen caught sight of us first
+and, breaking away, rushed up to me. I stopped with her, therefore, and
+Rosa went on to the other two; and to my intense satisfaction, she held
+von Erstein in talk while Nessa, glad no doubt of the relief, came to
+us.
+
+It could not have happened more fortunately. Just before she reached us
+I managed to place the child so that she could not see Nessa, and then
+turned and raised my hat, giving her a clear view of my features.
+
+"You!" she exclaimed, starting and turning as white as death and
+trembling so violently that for an instant I thought she was going to
+faint. But I did what a look would do to caution her and turned to the
+child.
+
+"You must introduce me, Lottchen."
+
+"This is my new Cousin Johann," she said a little shyly. And the slight
+interlude gave Nessa time to pull herself together sufficiently to
+return my bow.
+
+It was a very formal bow, and the look in her eyes and the instinctive
+droop of the expressive mouth was much more suggestive of indignation
+than pleasure at seeing me. It was a great deal more like contempt or
+disgust; but by the time the others reached us she had entirely
+recovered her self-possession.
+
+My introduction to von Erstein followed, and he displayed an amount of
+cordiality at making my acquaintance, which puzzled me at the moment.
+But I was not long left in doubt. My first uneasy impression was that
+he suspected the impersonation, gathered from the smiling slyness with
+which he looked at me.
+
+As we were to cross swords it was necessary for me to probe this at
+once; and when Nessa entrenched herself securely between the two
+sisters and he showed a disposition to drop behind with me, I was glad
+of the chance.
+
+He opened the ball by speaking of my loss of memory, and I soon found
+that I was wrong about his suspecting my imposture. He professed great
+sympathy with my misfortune, throwing in a hint that it might after all
+have its compensations. "A good many of us have memories we might be
+glad to lose, Herr Lassen," he added with a laugh, but in a tone which
+reminded me of what Hans had said about my past.
+
+"I should be glad to have mine back, good or bad," I replied with a
+laugh as easy as his.
+
+"Perhaps. One never knows," he retorted meaningly. Then he switched off
+to the von Rebling family. "Most charming people; delightful; but
+unfortunately there's one little fly in the amber. You know it, of
+course?" and he nodded toward Nessa.
+
+"I only arrived late last night. What is it?"
+
+"It is a thousand pities; but these are times in which no one can
+afford to run risks, even with the highest motives. I know, of course,
+that Miss von Rebling's motives are of the highest; but we have to
+think imperially; especially in regard to this plague of spies. You
+agree with that, of course?"
+
+"Naturally; but how does that apply here?"
+
+He paused, rolling his eyes round at me with a significant shake of the
+head. "Why do you suppose that English girl there, Miss Caldicott,
+finds it so desirable to be an inmate of their house?"
+
+"Rosa told me she was Lottchen's governess."
+
+He put his forefinger to the side of his nose and winked and nodded.
+"Ostensibly--yes; but in reality--eh?"
+
+"Do you mean she's a spy?" I cried, appropriately shocked.
+
+He nodded emphatically. "I do; and I'm relying on your help in the
+matter. They may have told you that I have a great deal of interest in
+circles that would enable me to be of considerable help to you; and I
+have every wish that we two should be great friends. My influence is
+such that you may depend upon getting high in the service you wish to
+join. Very high."
+
+"I'm not likely to quarrel with any one who can help me in that way, of
+course; but you see there's a bit of a stumbling-block at present until
+I can get over this infernal loss of memory."
+
+"Oh, that'll soon come right."
+
+"So all the doctors at Rotterdam told me; but so far----" and I broke
+off with a flourish of the hands.
+
+"I think I can help you about that, too. Of course when you were known
+to be coming here I made such inquiries about you as were open to me,
+and the result made me feel sure that you would wish to be friendly
+with me;" and he leered at me in a way that left me in no doubt as to
+his sinister meaning. He thought he had me in his power.
+
+"I shall be tremendously interested to learn what you heard. So far as
+I know, I might have been born about a week ago, and it's a devilish
+unpleasant feeling."
+
+He favoured me with another leer. "Ah, you're a good deal older than
+that," he said meaningly. "I fancy I can convince you if you'll come
+and have a chat with me. Here's my address," giving me his card.
+
+"Certainly I'll come," said I readily. "You've roused my curiosity
+tremendously. What time and day?"
+
+"Come and lunch with me to-morrow. In the morning you'll be wanted in
+the Amtstrasse; Baron von Gratzen, you know. Come on to me from him. I
+can open your eyes to a thing or two; and I'm altogether mistaken if we
+can't come to understand one another thoroughly. I'll manage to refresh
+that lapsed memory of yours, Lassen, and perhaps find the real reason
+for it."
+
+"The Rotterdam people put it down to shock," I replied, as if I had not
+understood him.
+
+"Ah, the doctors don't know everything, my friend," he returned drily.
+"But I must get off. Till tomorrow, then. Don't forget;" and he
+quickened after the others, shook hands, patted Lottchen on the cheek,
+much to her disgust, and went off.
+
+A pleasant fellow, very. Evidently a strong believer in the
+knuckle-duster methods; meant to use them to force me to help him in
+his infamous scheme against Nessa, and had discovered something about
+my past which would bring me to heel. That was his ideal of friendship.
+Certainly a very pleasant fellow!
+
+That was a generous offer of his influence, too. Thinking me to be as
+big a scoundrel as himself, he was ready to betray his country by
+pushing me up the ladder of promotion if I would only help him in his
+blackguardism. A staunch patriot, too. Deutschland ueber alles! but von
+Erstein first!
+
+I was certainly curious to know what it was he had discovered; but my
+speculations were interrupted by Lottchen, who came back to me and took
+my hand and made me chatter to her until we reached the house.
+
+This was all right, as it saved Nessa from having to talk trivialities
+with me in Rosa's presence, gave her an opportunity of accustoming
+herself to my presence in Berlin and nerving herself for the inevitable
+deception it involved.
+
+How she would treat me I could not guess; but I was utterly unprepared
+for the attitude she did assume. She hurried into the house the instant
+we reached it and disappeared. We met at the midday dinner; but she
+steadfastly refused even to cast so much as a glance in my direction.
+
+Rosa made more than one attempt to draw her into conversation with me;
+but every effort was foiled by Nessa pretending to have to pay some
+attention to Lottchen, who sat by her. In fact, she ignored me as
+completely as if I had not been present and seized the first
+opportunity to leave the room.
+
+I had looked for any treatment rather than that; and felt more than a
+little riled and aggrieved. It was no harmless picnic, this jaunt of
+mine to Berlin; and I thought she might have taken that into
+consideration.
+
+But there was more than mere pique involved. If she meant to keep up
+this attitude, how was I to come to any understanding with her?
+
+I might as well go back to my flying--if that were possible. Itself a
+pretty stiff proposition, as Jimmy would have said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+ABOUT SPIES
+
+
+Nessa's treatment of me both offended and distressed the Countess, and
+Rosa tried to draw her attention away from it by engaging her in a
+discussion about the afternoon's arrangements. It appeared that the
+Countess always spent an hour or two on that particular day with a very
+old friend, an invalid; Rosa herself had an engagement; Hans had to
+attend some lecture or other in connection with his military studies;
+and Nessa generally took Lottchen for a drive.
+
+I would not hear of the arrangements being altered on my account,
+declaring that I should be glad of the opportunity to get some decent
+clothes.
+
+"Then there will be an empty house," declared Rosa as we rose from the
+table.
+
+There were two servants--an elderly woman, named Gretchen, and Marie, a
+younger one--in the room during the discussion; an important fact in
+the light of after events.
+
+Some letters arrived for the Countess and Rosa; and when the former
+took hers away to the drawing-room, Rosa detained me in the library to
+speak about Nessa's conduct. "I can't understand it, Johann," she said
+irritably.
+
+"Does it matter much?" I asked with a shrug.
+
+"Of course it does. How are you going to help her if she keeps up this
+ridiculous attitude? I've no patience with her."
+
+"Oh, I have. She knows about our engagement, of course, and being
+staunch to you looks on me as an enemy."
+
+"But she knew you were coming and was most anxious to see you, and even
+promised to try and bring you to reason."
+
+"Have you told her that I'm willing to help her; if I can, that is?"
+
+"No, but I'll go and tell her now, and tell her also that if she
+doesn't wish to make mother furious, she'd better take things
+differently."
+
+"Perhaps if I could have a quiet chat with her, it might do the trick,"
+I suggested casually.
+
+"Then you mustn't lose any time about it. Why not this afternoon? I can
+take Lottchen with me, and if you stop in, it could be managed easily.
+And when I come back the three of us can talk the thing over together."
+
+I agreed to this like a shot, and we went into the drawing-room, where
+her mother was still reading her letters. Rosa glanced hurriedly at
+hers, locked them in a little bureau, and hurried off to tackle Nessa.
+
+The Countess was standing by a very handsome cabinet, a drawer of which
+she had opened, and called me up to her. "Come here, Johann, I want you
+to see me put these letters away," she said to my astonishment, and,
+drawing my attention to the neatness with which her letters and papers
+were arranged, asked me to remember precisely where she put those which
+had just arrived, and to make sure that the drawer was locked. "I want
+to have a witness," she added.
+
+Then she spoke of Nessa's behaviour to me, saying how it had grieved
+and surprised her.
+
+"It is really not of the least consequence," I assured her.
+
+"But I'm sorely afraid it is, Johann, and I'm very troubled. That's one
+reason why I wished you to do that just now. I was always against her
+coming to the house, but Rosa would have her;" and then by degrees the
+reason came out.
+
+She was afraid that von Erstein's story was true, that Nessa was really
+a spy. Some one had a key to her drawer in the cabinet; she had found
+her papers disturbed more than once; she kept money in the same place,
+but none of it had ever been taken, so that it could not be the work of
+a thief; she believed that Rosa's bureau had also been tampered with;
+and as the servants were above suspicion, there seemed to be only one
+conclusion.
+
+The dear little lady was more grieved than angry about it. "I'm very
+sorry for Nessa really, Johann, but we can't have a spy in the house;
+yet I don't know how to get rid of her. But I won't open that drawer
+again until you are with me, and then we shall both know that I'm not
+making a mistake. Meanwhile, don't say anything to Rosa or any one."
+
+We went upstairs together, and she was telling me the address of Hans'
+tailor and how I was to find it, when the old servant, Gretchen, passed
+us. Rosa was waiting dressed to go out, and told me she had spoken to
+Nessa, who would come down to me in the drawing-room after the rest had
+left the house.
+
+"She baffles me, Johann. She just jumped at your offer to help her get
+away--after her conduct just now, too! But she seems to have taken a
+violent dislike to you, and even declared she wouldn't stop in the same
+house with you," she said in a tone of consternation.
+
+I passed it off with a smile and some banal remark about feminine
+inconsistency, and went downstairs to wait for Nessa. There was a
+lounge at the end of the drawing-room, a big comfortable sort of winter
+garden, with lots of big plants, and rugs and easy chairs and so on,
+and I sat down there to think over the position. I didn't smoke; a
+lucky fact in view of things.
+
+It worried me excessively that Nessa should be regarded as a spy, and I
+was puzzling over the explanation of what the Countess had told me when
+I heard the front door shut. That meant they had left the house and
+that Nessa would soon be down.
+
+But she did not come for some time, and presently I heard a movement in
+the big room, the faint click of a key being turned and then of a
+drawer being cautiously opened.
+
+The conclusion was obvious. The spy was at work, believing that I had
+gone to the tailor's and meaning to fix the thing on Nessa, should her
+little operation be discovered. So I got up noiselessly and, from the
+safe shelter of some plants, did a little spy work on my own account.
+
+It was one of the servants, of course; but I could not at first catch
+sight of her face. She was at Rosa's bureau, reading a letter, probably
+one of those which had come just before. That did not occupy more than
+a minute, and she next opened the Countess's cabinet drawer, picked out
+a couple of letters, glanced at them rapidly, just tossed them back
+carelessly, relocked the drawer, and turned to leave the room.
+
+I saw her clearly then, for she went out by a door which stood at my
+end of the room, near the big stove in the corner. It was Gretchen.
+
+It would never do to have a possible eavesdropper when Nessa and I were
+together, and, being unwilling to let the woman know she had been seen,
+I crept over to the door we all used, opened it noisily, shut it with a
+bang, and began to whistle.
+
+This had immediate results. I heard the door of the stove opened at the
+back, some logs were thrown in, and directly afterwards Gretchen came
+out, with an apology for disturbing me.
+
+"It's my work to see to the stoves, sir," she explained with a smirk.
+"And the door to our quarters is locked."
+
+"All right, Gretchen. It's getting chilly, isn't it?"
+
+"It gets cold in the evenings, sir, and my orders are to see that the
+stoves are kept going well." She was a little uneasy; and after she had
+been gone a while, I had a look at the hiding-place.
+
+It was a passage with cupboards on each side, and as the door at the
+other end was fastened, she had been compelled to return through the
+room when she had heard me. There was a bolt on my side of that door,
+and I shot it to prevent her coming back to listen while Nessa and I
+were together.
+
+I was only a minute or two in the place, but when I left it I found
+Nessa already in the drawing-room. She had caught me apparently in the
+act of playing the spy, and her look left no doubt about her opinion.
+
+I laughed. I really could not help it. It was such a preposterous
+misreading of the situation that the ludicrous absurdity of it appealed
+to me. Of course my laughter added to her indignation and also to the
+awkwardness of the meeting.
+
+"You are practising your new profession, I see. It appears to rouse
+your sense of humour," she said icily.
+
+"It would probably rouse yours also if you understood everything," I
+retorted, not at all relishing her prompt condemnation.
+
+"I don't see anything particularly humorous in your sneaking into the
+house of my friends and spying in its holes and corners."
+
+"Perhaps not, but I had a good reason," I said shortly, a bit rattled
+by her sneer.
+
+"No doubt; but I have no curiosity on such a subject. Rosa has induced
+me to see you, so I----" She got so far in the same level, cutting
+tone, evidently putting a great restraint upon herself; but she could
+not keep it up. Her eyes blazed suddenly, her cheeks flushed, and
+raising her voice in her indignation she exclaimed: "How dare you
+come----"
+
+I had to stop that, however, as the old eavesdropper might have
+followed her to the room and be on keyhole drill. "I am very glad to
+meet you, Miss Caldicott," I broke in in German loudly enough to be
+heard outside, and added in a low tone in English: "It is not safe to
+speak so loudly as you did. Come away from the door;" and I led the way
+into the conservatory.
+
+She stared at me as if I were a dangerous lunatic, but after a moment's
+pause followed me. "Say what you like now, but lower your voice," I
+said, lowering my own tone.
+
+She hesitated, but acted on the warning and returned to her former icy
+tone. "What I want to know is why you dare to come here in a false
+name, as the sham lover of my friend, and humiliate me in this way. If
+you must be a spy, haven't you enough decency to avoid blackening me by
+making me a partner in such treacherous baseness?"
+
+I met her angry look for a second, realizing that this was the reason
+for her conduct to me; and it was all I could do to prevent myself
+smiling at her injustice, although it riled me considerably.
+
+"Rather a rough judgment," I replied with a shrug, "and your manner
+doesn't smooth it out much; but as no one else can hear you now, I
+don't mind so much. I can explain----"
+
+"Explain!" she broke in scornfully.
+
+"Yes, explain. That's what I said. If you understood----"
+
+"I do understand as it is--too well," she fired in again.
+
+I really could not help smiling again, both at her words and flashing
+anger. "I must either smile or lose my temper as you have done; and
+it's better to smile."
+
+This was like petrol on the fire. "Just what I should expect of you--to
+see nothing but a joke in my indignation."
+
+"I'm not laughing at your indignation, but at your mistake. You always
+have been ready to make the worst of anything I do."
+
+"What have you ever done that was worth doing?"
+
+"Nothing much, I admit."
+
+"If you were like other men you'd be doing what they are
+doing--fighting."
+
+"Perhaps I should; but we can't all be soldiers."
+
+Her lip curled. "Men can; but even you needn't have sunk so low as to
+be a spy!"
+
+"Go on. I'm not ashamed of what I'm doing; and if you'll let me
+explain----"
+
+She stopped me again with an impatient gesture. "I need no explanation,
+thank you. Aren't you here as Johann Lassen?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Pretending to be engaged to Rosa von Rebling?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And pretending to have lost your memory?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Haven't you both spoken and acted lies to gain admission to this
+house?"
+
+"I had to, of course."
+
+"You convict yourself out of your own mouth, then?"
+
+"Apparently."
+
+"Aren't you trying to get employed in the Secret Service here?"
+
+"Looks black, doesn't it?"
+
+"Looks!" and she drew a long deep breath and repeated the word. "But
+you don't imagine for one instant that I will be a party to it!"
+
+"You are already, for that matter."
+
+"You shall leave this house at once and never set foot in it again, and
+I shall find the means to let Rosa know the disgraceful trick you have
+played."
+
+"And if I refuse?"
+
+"I'll expose you as surely as my name is Nessa Caldicott."
+
+"You know what the result would be to me?"
+
+"I neither know nor care."
+
+"Then I'll tell you. I should certainly be imprisoned and most probably
+shot."
+
+She wavered somewhat at that. "It is easy for you to avoid it by doing
+what I say--leave the house."
+
+"That's out of the question."
+
+"Do you expect me to allow you to go on imposing on the girl who has
+been my friend at a time when I was absolutely helpless? Wouldn't you
+be ashamed of me if I were to consent to such treachery? Can't you see
+what a vile degradation it would be, and that I should hate myself as
+well as you if I consented?"
+
+"No. Yes. Yes. I wish you'd ask one question at a time."
+
+"Do you expect me to smile at such insufferable flippancy as that?"
+
+"No. But it wasn't flippancy at all. I was answering your questions in
+order. You appear to think that I like being compelled to deceive Miss
+von Rebling."
+
+"How can you talk about having been compelled to do it?"
+
+"Because it happens to be the truth."
+
+"Your version of the truth, you mean?"
+
+"Exactly. My version of the truth, although you won't believe it. I was
+forced into the thing against my will by a series of coincidences which
+I found it impossible to avoid; and, as a matter of fact, I am not
+harming Miss von Rebling in the least."
+
+"Haven't you led her to believe you may break off the engagement?"
+
+"I've been considering it."
+
+"Don't you call that harming her?"
+
+"No."
+
+"How can you say that? What will happen when the real man arrives?"
+
+"Not even then."
+
+She gestured incredulously. "It's impossible," she cried. "In any case
+I insist upon her being told."
+
+I stopped to think a bit. I knew Nessa so well that I could quite
+understand her mood. Her first fierce rush of anger had spent itself,
+checked, I was sure, by my statement of the consequences to me if the
+truth were told. She had not a suspicion of the reason for my being in
+Berlin, evidently believing that I had come as a spy, and knew even
+better than I what my end would be if I were denounced; and her words
+had cut me too deeply to let me tell her the truth then--that I had
+only come on her account.
+
+At the same time I could quite appreciate how she would shrink from
+being made a partner, as she had said, and her impatience for me to
+leave the house. It was an awkward corner, but I thought I could see a
+way round it.
+
+"I'll do what you suggest," I said at length.
+
+"Go away?"
+
+"No. Tell Miss von Rebling."
+
+This alarmed her at once. "But you? What you said about the risk?" she
+protested.
+
+"Oh, never mind about me. You said you couldn't endure it; and, of
+course, nothing matters compared with that. I should have taken care to
+let her know everything as soon as I'd done what I came to do."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Your mother is very anxious about you, and when she knew I was coming
+here, naturally wanted me to find out things."
+
+"But they've had my letters, surely?"
+
+"Not a line since some time after Christmas."
+
+"Do you mean that, Jack? Oh, poor mother! I've written regularly every
+week. When Julia Wassermann died, her father, who hates the English and
+hated me because I'm English, turned me out of the house. I should have
+gone to one of these dreadful concentration camps, if it hadn't been
+for Rosa. That's why I can't bear the thought of deceiving her;
+but--I--I don't want to get you into any trouble. We--we can't tell
+her. We--we mustn't. You can go away, can't you?" and she bit her lip
+in desperate perplexity and distress.
+
+"I'm going to tell her, Nessa," I said.
+
+"But I don't wish it, Jack. I really don't. I didn't mean all the
+horrid things I said just now; I--I'm sorry. I've been just distracted."
+
+"Don't worry. Nothing very terrible is likely to come to me; and I
+quite agree that she ought to know the truth."
+
+She looked at me wonderingly. "How different you are, Jack. What has
+changed you so? You're so quiet and so--so firm. You don't look the
+same. Not a bit like you used to be in any way, manner, bearing,
+everything. I saw it the moment I came into the room."
+
+"You didn't show it. You went for me in much the same old style, you
+know," I said with a smile. "You always did think me a rotter."
+
+"Do you mean that you've risked coming here merely because of--of what
+mother told you about me."
+
+"Not very likely, is it?"
+
+"It wouldn't have been at one time, but---- You mustn't say anything to
+Rosa. You mustn't, really. You won't, Jack, will you?" and she laid her
+hand on my arm appealingly.
+
+"I must, Nessa."
+
+"No, no. I won't be the cause----"
+
+And then, just as she was clinging to my arm and urging me, she broke
+away with a sudden cry of consternation.
+
+I turned to find Rosa standing in the doorway, staring at us wide-eyed
+in amazement.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+ROSA IS TOLD
+
+
+Whether I should have yielded to Nessa and allowed myself to be
+persuaded not to tell Rosa the truth, I can't say--she always had great
+influence with me--but after we had been surprised in this fashion it
+was no longer possible to hesitate. Nessa would have been compromised
+and I suspected.
+
+I acted promptly, therefore. I crossed the room, and shut the door
+carefully, both girls watching me with expectant curiosity.
+
+"Please come into the conservatory, Miss von Rebling," I said quietly
+in English, which she spoke quite fluently. "I have something of the
+utmost importance to say to you. And we had better speak in English and
+not too loudly, please."
+
+She stared at me, desperately perplexed by my words and manner; but
+after a moment's hesitation went into the conservatory, to where Nessa
+stood in trembling agitation by the plants, and linked her arm in hers
+and kissed her.
+
+"I am going to put my life in your hands. I am not Johann Lassen. I am
+an Englishman and my name is Jack Lancaster. Nessa and I are old
+friends, and we were discussing the question of telling you when you
+came in," I said in a slow deliberate tone.
+
+She was literally astounded and could not at once grasp all that my
+words meant. She turned to Nessa as if appealing for confirmation.
+"Nessa!" she exclaimed, much too loudly to be safe.
+
+"Let me tell you why it is necessary not to speak loudly. You have a
+spy in the house: the servant I have heard you call Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed. "It will no doubt explain why Nessa's
+letters have never reached England and other things probably."
+
+Rosa's face being incapable of expressing more astonishment than she
+had already shown, she just tossed up her hands feebly, suggesting that
+the whole affair was beyond her understanding. But she was a practical,
+level-headed girl, and soon recovered her self-control.
+
+"Do you mean that you have recovered your memory?" she asked.
+
+I shook my head. "I have never lost it."
+
+She frowned ominously at this and her expression signalled suspicion.
+"Then why are you in Berlin?"
+
+Clearly she regarded me as an English spy, and there was nothing for it
+but to tell her the full reason for my presence, although I had not
+wished to let Nessa know it. "I will tell you everything, but you'd
+better sit down as it will take some time."
+
+She sat down and drew Nessa to her side, taking her hand and holding it
+all the time I spoke. "I am an officer in the English army, and was
+home on leave when I heard for the first time about Nessa;" and I told
+them all that Mrs. Caldicott said, and described the two peculiar
+communications which had reached England. Then the whole story: My
+first plan; Jimmy's intervention; how I had taken his place at the last
+moment; the blowing up of the _Burgen_; my being mistaken for
+Lassen; my feigned loss of memory; how I had been unable to get away
+from Hoffnung, and how his suspicions had forced me to continue the
+impersonation.
+
+Nessa was terribly distressed to hear of her mother's anxiety and
+grief; Rosa wept in sympathy, and they both listened to the whole story
+with rapt attention.
+
+"You will see now," I concluded, "what I meant by saying I am putting
+my life in your hands. If I am known to be an English officer, there
+will be only one construction put upon my presence here--that I am a
+spy, and I shall of course be shot. We should do the same on our side
+if one of your officers was found in England in similar circumstances.
+I give you my word, however, that my sole object is to get Nessa away
+home."
+
+Rosa looked very grave and rather frightened. "You know the
+consequences to me if I attempt to shield you?"
+
+I nodded. "I can understand they would be very serious, if it was
+discovered."
+
+Then we all sat silent for a long time, several minutes, and Nessa was
+trembling like an aspen leaf. Rosa broke the silence at last.
+
+"Where is my cousin?"
+
+"He went down in the _Burgen_. There is no doubt that I am the
+only survivor. He was below at the time of the explosion, and not even
+any of the men on deck were saved."
+
+"But if he should not have been drowned and should come here?"
+
+"Your mother and Hans, every one believes I am your cousin, and not so
+much as a breath of suspicion that you know the truth could ever be
+roused, unless of course you admitted it."
+
+This had all the effect I had hoped, and she nodded understandingly.
+"And what do you wish me to do?" she asked after another pause.
+
+"To allow matters to remain as they are until we can get Nessa away;
+but it is entirely for you to decide."
+
+She shook her head. "I--I can't decide now. I must have time to think.
+I was never so perplexed or astounded in my life."
+
+"Rosa dear!" appealed Nessa.
+
+"It is not for us to settle, Nessa," I put in; and then another long
+silence followed.
+
+"If I wait till to-morrow, say, will you use the time to escape, Mr.
+Lancaster?" asked Rosa then.
+
+"That is impossible, Miss von Rebling," I replied uncompromisingly. "I
+have come to get Nessa away, and that cannot be done in the time."
+
+That drew a smile: the first since she had arrived. She guessed how the
+land lay with me, and glanced round at Nessa, who coloured slightly. I
+believe that that little blush had more effect than anything else. She
+had the usual streak of German romance in her disposition, and the
+situation appealed to it strongly.
+
+"I wish I dared," she murmured; and I began to hope.
+
+I gave the new idea a minute to germinate, and then began to nurture it
+by suggesting how her risk would be minimized. "Let me tell you just
+what is in my mind. I will not remain in the house, and the first thing
+to-morrow will go to rooms or an hotel."
+
+"But mother?" she protested nervously.
+
+"I shall tell her of my discovery about Gretchen, and that in view of
+my connection with the Secret Service, it is essential for me to be
+absolutely secure against anything of the sort." She nodded approval.
+
+"I shall then be too busy officially to come here much, and this will
+relieve you from all the unpleasantness of open deception with her and
+others." Again she nodded.
+
+"The next thing will be to obtain the necessary papers for Nessa and me
+to leave. Have you any friends in Holland?"
+
+She started rather nervously. "Yes, several old school friends;
+but----" She paused and gestured.
+
+"My idea is that you should invent a sudden desire to go to them; say
+that one of them is dying or very ill, or something. You could not very
+well travel alone at such a time, and thus Hans would naturally go with
+you. It would be simple enough for you two to obtain permits to travel
+and passports and so on, and----"
+
+"But I should be instantly questioned and---- Oh, that would never do,"
+she interrupted, with a vigorous shake of the head.
+
+I smiled reassuringly. "I have thought of that, believe me. On the
+morning you were to start, after you had obtained your tickets,
+something would occur to make it impossible for you to go. Nessa or I
+would then get the tickets and things, and she and I would use them.
+You would not discover the loss until we had had time to cross the
+frontier, and could then give information of their loss; and as soon as
+we were safely in Holland, I would write to you a letter explaining
+everything."
+
+This lessened her uneasiness considerably. "It is possible," she
+admitted.
+
+"Such a letter from me, confessing my imposture and everything, would
+free you from the slightest taint of suspicion that you had been in any
+way a party to the scheme, and, of course, as Nessa and I should be in
+safety, I could make the confession with absolute impunity."
+
+She sat with her dark brows drawn together, considering the scheme very
+carefully, and after a long silence asked: "How long do you think it
+would take?"
+
+"Only so long as is needed to get the passports, etc."
+
+But she shook her head. "There is a difficulty--Hans. He could not
+possibly get away, even if he were willing to go; which I doubt."
+
+"Can you think of any one else?"
+
+She hesitated, glancing first at me and then at Nessa. "Do you remember
+the two Apeldoorn sisters, Nessa?"
+
+"Yes, quite well, dear."
+
+"They are Herr Feldmann's cousins," said Rosa: and then I knew what was
+coming. "One of them is going to be married and wants me to go to the
+wedding. I should have gone if it hadn't been that we heard just then
+about my Cousin Johann. Herr Feldmann and his sister are going, and I
+should have gone with them; but his sister is ill," she added, looking
+to see how I took this.
+
+"It would certainly open the way to the necessary credentials, but how
+could I get hold of his permit?"
+
+"I can't think of anything else," said Rosa as I did not answer. "But I
+think Herr Feldmann would help if I asked him," she added.
+
+"Do you mean you would tell him everything?" I asked, not at all
+relishing the suggestion.
+
+"It would be necessary, wouldn't it?"
+
+"I'd rather try to think of some other plan," I replied, and sat
+racking my wits for some alternative; without avail, however, and
+presently she got up and walked about the drawing-room.
+
+When she had left us, Nessa stirred uneasily, glanced once or twice at
+me, and then held out her hand. "I'm--I'm sorry, Jack," she whispered.
+
+"All right; don't worry;" and I just pressed her trembling fingers.
+
+"But to talk to you as I did--all the brutal things I said. I'm so--so
+ashamed."
+
+"No need. Not the faintest. You couldn't know; and you caught me in the
+very act of prying into that place there. If you hadn't fired up a bit,
+it wouldn't have been natural."
+
+"But after you'd run all this risk simply for me, you must have thought
+me a regular beast, Jack."
+
+"The fact is your mother's worry got on my nerves, and as I knew I
+could come into this beastly country without any risk to speak of, of
+course I came. That's all about it."
+
+She didn't quite like this, but I meant her to believe it had been more
+for her mother's sake than hers.
+
+"Poor mother!" she murmured, and was silent for a while. "You've joined
+the army then?" was her next question.
+
+"I'm in the Flying Corps, and your mater didn't tell me anything about
+you for fear it would get on my nerves."
+
+"Then I had something to do with your coming?" she asked, with a
+flicker of a flash in her bonny eyes.
+
+"I couldn't very well ease your mother's mind in London, could I? She
+was against the thing, but I explained there was really no risk. Of
+course there would not have been any if the steamer hadn't blown up and
+this Lassen business turned out as it has."
+
+"But it was I who made you tell Rosa?"
+
+"And probably the best thing we could have done if----" and I gestured
+toward Rosa, who was still pacing the room in troubled perplexity.
+
+I did my utmost to lead Nessa to think I took the position lightly; but
+I was in reality almost desperately anxious, and every moment of Rosa's
+indecision added to the disquieting tension of suspense. If she went
+against us, I could see nothing but a mess of trouble ahead; and I was
+only too conscious of how big the danger to her would loom in her
+German-disciplined mind. They all go in deadly fear of the authorities;
+and it was impossible to deny that, if she were discovered, it might
+mean the prospect of a spell in prison.
+
+"You haven't said yet that you forgive me, Jack," said Nessa presently.
+
+"Simply because there's nothing to forgive. I should probably have done
+just what you did," I replied with a smile.
+
+"Do you mean that anything I could have done would have made you take
+me for a spy, then? I took you for one," she said ruefully.
+
+"The only difference is that I might not have been quite so impatient,
+and have been ready to listen to your explanation. But don't let us
+worry over that. Let us think how we're going to get out of it all."
+
+"I think Rosa will help us."
+
+"But this fellow, Feldmann?"
+
+"You needn't trouble about him. He worships her, and the instant he
+knows her cousin is drowned and the way is clear for him, he'll be
+ready to--well, to do anything she wishes."
+
+"That's good hearing, anyhow, but I wish she'd look sharp and make her
+mind up."
+
+Nessa laughed gently. "You don't understand girls, Jack. Her mind was
+made up before she left us two together. She's one of the
+kindest-hearted souls in the world."
+
+But Rosa seemed in no hurry to come back to us, and before she could
+tell us her decision, the opportunity passed, for Hans came in with a
+man whom Nessa whispered to me was Feldmann himself.
+
+Rosa introduced me to him as her cousin. This set me speculating
+whether it was an indication of her intention or merely a sign that she
+had not yet decided what to do, and I was worrying over it as I
+returned his stiff and rather discourteous greeting, when Hoffnung
+followed.
+
+After a few words of general conversation Hoffnung drew me aside, and I
+had a significant proof of von Erstein's intimate acquaintance with
+official matters. He had puzzled me earlier in the day by saying that I
+had to interview a Baron von Gratzen the next morning, and Hoffnung now
+brought me the note making the appointment for eleven o'clock.
+
+"How's the memory, Lassen?"
+
+"Pretty much the same," said I, shrugging. He had evidently abandoned
+all his former suspicions, I was glad to see.
+
+"You'll find old Gratz, as we call him, a decent sort; but I'm afraid
+he may have to tell you what you won't like much."
+
+"Meaning?"
+
+"Well, a man without a memory isn't much use to the Secret Service,
+although he may be in other ways."
+
+I didn't like his tone. "But I can remember all that's passed since the
+_Burgen_."
+
+It did not draw him, however. He just laughed. "I mustn't anticipate
+him, of course; but I'll give you a tip. Be at his office on the
+stroke; he hates nothing so much as unpunctuality."
+
+With that we rejoined the rest, and again the conversation was about
+matters in which I had no interest. I studied Feldmann carefully. He
+was a handsome fellow; fair, blue-eyed, rather round-faced and weak;
+but he had a very pleasant smile which I saw often, for he smiled every
+time he looked at Rosa. But not once did he address me; and his dislike
+and hostility were plain each time he glanced in my direction.
+
+He certainly wasn't the man I would have chosen to trust; but beggars
+can't be choosers, and I had to be satisfied with the fact that both
+Rosa and Nessa herself were ready to vouch for him.
+
+Hoffnung did not stay long, and when he had gone Rosa reminded me about
+going to the tailor's, and as I was leaving the room, she said to
+Nessa: "You might show it to Johann now, dear."
+
+"Rosa has asked me to show you the portrait of your mother, Herr
+Lassen, as she hopes it may perhaps help you to remember things."
+
+"Please do," I answered eagerly, her look telling me this was merely an
+excuse; and we went to the library together.
+
+"It's all right with Rosa," she whispered then; "but only if Herr
+Feldmann is told and agrees. I am to go back and tell her what you say."
+
+"Are you quite sure of him?"
+
+"Yes, quite, in the altered circumstances. So is Rosa."
+
+"Carry on, then; and if there's anything wrong, let me know the moment
+I get back;" and off I went, not letting Nessa see how it worried me to
+have this infernal suspense kept hanging round my neck like a millstone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+BARON VON GRATZEN
+
+
+I was very curious to have a look at Berlin in war time; but as I am
+not writing a chronicle of the struggle, my impressions need not be
+laboured, except as they touched me personally.
+
+The struggle had been going on for about eighteen months when I reached
+the capital, and, except in one respect, matters were pretty much as I
+had known them. There were more soldiers about, perhaps; there seemed
+to be as much bustling activity as usual, and certainly there was
+universal confidence that the result would be a glorious victory.
+
+The one genuine surprise I had was when I came upon an unwontedly
+demonstrative crowd shouting that they were short of food. They were
+chiefly women, and a boisterous, vociferating lot they were. It was not
+so much the crowd that impressed me, however, or the row they kicked
+up, as the fact that the police didn't interfere. In my experience, a
+crowd might look for a very short shrift at the hands of the police of
+Berlin.
+
+I referred to the matter when I was at the tailor's--where, by the by,
+I succeeded in getting a very passably fitting suit and other things I
+needed--and he explained the reason. There was no real scarcity of
+food, he declared, but much grumbling at the distribution; and the
+police had had orders not to resort to drastic measures.
+
+"It will have to be stopped, however, or the trouble will grow. There
+has already been some window smashing. Imagine it, window smashing in
+our beautiful, well-organized city!" he cried, as if it were akin to
+impiety and sacrilege.
+
+"Very shocking," I agreed gravely.
+
+"If it is not put down with an iron hand, it will not be safe for a
+well-dressed person to be in the streets. My own wife and daughter,
+only yesterday, were all but mauled in the Untergasse. But the English
+will pay for it!"
+
+I cut short that subject by speaking about the business in hand; it
+wasn't prudent to talk about the war, and I took care not to give him
+an opportunity of returning to it before I left the shop.
+
+On my way back to the von Reblings' house in the Karlstrasse, I could
+think of nothing except the news I was to hear and what I should do if
+the scheme I had suggested was turned down. I could see nothing for it
+but to make a bolt almost at once, take Nessa with me, and trust to our
+wits and luck to get away.
+
+Not a hopeful job at the best, and at the worst involving no end of
+risk and danger for us both. I knew my Germany too well not to be
+painfully conscious of all that; and the knowledge made me profoundly
+uncomfortable. But I've a sanguine streak in me and am generally lucky,
+so I put off the consideration of the disagreeables until they had to
+be faced in earnest.
+
+I need not have worried, however, for I found everything running as
+sweetly as a well-oiled engine when I reached the house. I knew it
+instantly by the manner in which Feldmann greeted me.
+
+Instead of the previous sullen angry looks, he was all smiles, gripped
+my hand cordially, nearly fell on my neck, and I rather dreaded that he
+would wind up by kissing me. Rosa and Nessa were in much the same
+hilarious mood, and might have been arranging the details of a wedding
+rather than a little conspiracy against the Government.
+
+They had it all cut and dried, and my crude plan was hailed as if it
+had been a piece of the most wonderful strategy in the world.
+
+"Oscar will help us all he can," said Rosa, blushing a bit as she used
+his christian name; "and he can get the passports and everything
+without any trouble. He has his already, and suggests that we shall
+have one for Hans as well. I've seen Hans, and he has consented to go
+if he can get leave. He doesn't think he can, but agrees we had better
+get one in case. That will be for you."
+
+"Won't there be some sort of description of him on it?" I asked.
+
+"I can arrange that," declared Feldmann. "Luckily it is in my
+department. It will do for you, and, of course, he'll never see it."
+
+"I shall take charge of everything," said Rosa. "And Oscar says he can
+get everything through in three days at the latest, perhaps in two."
+
+There was a great deal of Oscar would do this and Oscar could do that,
+in it all; but everything seemed as good as the best, and I was soon in
+as high spirits as the others. It was settled that we should travel by
+the morning express, which would get us across the frontier in time for
+me to let Rosa have my confession the following day.
+
+"Oscar" wrung my hand again at parting, as if I was his dearest friend;
+declared he was not among the English haters; that he thought I had
+acted splendidly in risking so much to rescue Nessa; and that he hoped
+we should be great friends after this abominable war.
+
+My next move was to prepare for leaving the house the next day, and at
+supper I announced my determination. The Countess was very much against
+it, but afterwards I went with her alone into the drawing-room and gave
+her my "official" reasons.
+
+"I want you to open your cabinet drawer, aunt; but before you do it,
+I'll tell you that you will find some one has been to it----"
+
+"Nessa?" she broke in excitedly.
+
+"I'll tell you in a moment. You are quite right that there is some one
+in the house who is playing the spy, and, of course, you'll understand
+that if I am to join the Secret Service, it is a sheer impossibility
+for me to remain here with any one like that about the house."
+
+"They shall leave it at once, Johann."
+
+"We'll discuss that directly. You will find that the letters you so
+neatly put away here are just flung in anyhow in order to suggest that
+whoever did it was surprised and had to act in a hurry."
+
+She unlocked the drawer then with shaky fingers and there lay the
+letters as I had told her. "Nessa shall leave the house to-morrow,
+Johann," she cried immediately.
+
+"But it wasn't Miss Caldicott at all, aunt; it was Gretchen;" and I
+described what I had witnessed and went on to advise her not to take
+any open notice of the matter at all. "You know now who it is and can
+be on your guard, keeping such papers as are of no account here and
+putting others in a safer place."
+
+"But to have such a person in the house, Johann!"
+
+"She can't do any harm now; and you must remember this. You don't know
+who has put her here nor the reason. It might do much more harm than
+good if you were to make any disturbance about it. These are curious
+times, and the fact that you have an English girl in the house may be
+the reason. By sending Gretchen about her business you may only have
+some one else put here, or one of the other servants bribed or forced
+to take her place;" and I hammered away at this until I persuaded her
+to adopt the suggestion.
+
+I had a strong object in taking this line. I was sure that Gretchen was
+von Erstein's creature, and that if she remained in the house, we might
+find her very useful in putting him off the scent by letting her find
+out some false facts in case of trouble.
+
+During the night I thought carefully over our conspiracy scheme. It
+looked good; very good indeed; perhaps too good, and in the end I
+decided to prepare for a possible hitch in case the unexpected happened.
+
+I couldn't see one anywhere; but you can never be prepared for an air
+pocket, as I knew well enough; so I resolved not to be caught unawares.
+If anything went wrong on the journey, it was on the cards that we
+might be able to dodge the trouble and get away, if we were provided
+with good disguises. I worked on that idea and thought of several other
+items which would probably come in handy.
+
+I adopted the notion of turning myself into an aero mechanic and
+changing Nessa into my young assistant. There wasn't much about any
+sort of flying machine I didn't know--except Zeppelins, of course; so I
+could keep my end up all right, and could easily coach "my assistant"
+well enough to pass muster.
+
+We should have to dodge the beastly German system which makes every
+workman carry his record card about with him; but if we couldn't get
+things of the sort, we must put up a bluff--have lost them or
+something--and trust to my skill with the tools to see us through.
+
+I was off pretty early in the morning on the hunt for rooms, and almost
+immediately found a place which fitted my needs like a glove. It was a
+little furnished flat in the Falkenplatz; just a couple of rooms with a
+bathroom at the rear, the window of which opened on to the fire escape;
+an emergency exit which might be invaluable in case of need.
+
+But there was a hitch when I said I would take the place. I was asked
+for the inevitable papers to satisfy the police; and of course I had
+none. My explanation was listened to politely, but without effect; so I
+said I would obtain them, paid a deposit, and went off to buy some of
+the little items I had thought of during the night.
+
+Then I had a bit of a jar. I was coming out of a shop just as a tall,
+grey-haired, soldierly man in uniform was passing who glanced casually
+at me. The glance was followed by a start of surprise, his look became
+intent and interested, and he stopped as if to speak. Naturally I took
+no notice and walked on; but a few seconds afterwards he passed me,
+stopped a few yards ahead to look in a shop window, and as I overtook
+him, he turned to give me a very keen, penetrating stare.
+
+Of course there were heaps of people in Germany who had known me well,
+and I had discounted the risk of running against some of them. But I
+could not place him, and I was not a little relieved when he appeared
+uncertain and went off without addressing me.
+
+It was a disturbing incident and brought home to me the advisability of
+keeping indoors as much as possible during the days I was to remain in
+Berlin. The matter didn't end there, however.
+
+Remembering Hoffnung's hint about keeping my appointment with Baron von
+Gratzen punctually, I turned up a little before time, and exactly on
+the stroke of eleven was shown into his office. My astonishment may be
+guessed when he proved to be the stranger I had just met.
+
+I think that his amazement was even greater than mine, as he stared at
+the slip on which his subordinate had written my name and from it to me.
+
+"Then you are Herr Lassen?" he asked in frowning perplexity.
+
+I bowed and held out the letter he had sent me. "You sent for me, sir."
+
+He waved me to a chair and sat back lost in thought for so long that I
+began to wonder what the dickens was coming.
+
+"You came from England, didn't you?"
+
+"I believe so, sir."
+
+"And you're the man without a memory, eh? Very extraordinary; very
+extraordinary indeed. Most remarkable case. And why have you come to
+Berlin?"
+
+"Herr Hoffnung brought me. I understood he had instructions to do so."
+
+"Tell me about your experiences there."
+
+I looked as blank as a wall and shook my head.
+
+"Surely you can remember something. Let me jog your memory. I know the
+country well, you understand. Were you in London?" After another blank
+look from me, he took out a paper, glanced over it, and questioned me
+about a number of places and matters contained in it; to all of which I
+replied with either a vacant look or shake of the head.
+
+The examination lasted for some considerable time, and presently he
+pushed a sheet of paper and a pen to me, telling me to write my name. I
+had expected some such test and took hold of the pen clumsily and, with
+infinite apparent trouble, wrote the name "Johann Lassen" in big
+sprawling printed capitals.
+
+He watched me like a lynx at the job, took the paper, scanned it
+closely, and asked: "That the best you can do?"
+
+"I can read the big letters of type, sir," I replied, and I fancied
+that he had to restrain a smile.
+
+Next he folded down the paper he had been reading from and showed me a
+sentence in it. A very non-committal sentence I noticed. "You recognize
+the writing?" More head wagging from me. "You should, you know; it's
+your own handwriting;" and he put the document away, and sat thinking
+again.
+
+I'd have given something to be able to read his thoughts at that
+moment, especially when he roused himself sufficiently to favour me
+with some keen stares. I couldn't resist the unpleasant thought that he
+suspected something; but he gave no overt sign of suspicion, and his
+manner was less official than friendly. After a time something in his
+mind brought a heavy frown to his face.
+
+"Let me get the matter quite clear. You were blown up in the
+_Burgen_, found yourself in a hospital in Rotterdam with no papers
+of identification on you except a card, you remembered nothing at all
+of what had occurred, and came to Berlin with Herr Hoffnung. You know
+that there was only one other male passenger on the steamer, a Mr.
+Lamb, about whom we have some reason to be curious. Now, are you sure
+you are not that man?"
+
+"I don't know, sir. I am not sure about anything except what has
+occurred since I was at Rotterdam."
+
+"Well, when you arrived here the Countess von Rebling recognized you as
+her nephew.--Were you at Goettingen?" he asked so suddenly that I only
+escaped the trap by the skin of my teeth.
+
+"I believe so, sir."
+
+"Then, of course, there will be plenty of people there to identify you."
+
+"Naturally, sir," I managed to reply, although a chill of dismay made
+my spine tingle at the meaning smile accompanying the words.
+
+"We know, of course, that no one of the name of Lamb was ever there,"
+he said and paused again, as if to give me time to absorb all that this
+might be intended to suggest.
+
+"Do you speak English?" was the next question, put with a perfect
+accent in my own language.
+
+"Sure," I replied, with what I meant to be a very correct twang. But it
+didn't appear to impress him as much as I could have wished; and after
+regarding me curiously for a moment or two he rose, got a volume of
+Mark Twain's _Innocents Abroad_, and laid it open before me,
+asking me to try and read a passage.
+
+I looked at it earnestly and gave it up as hopeless.
+
+But he was too many for me. "Well, I'll read it to you and get you to
+repeat it after me." And he did read it and I had to repeat the words
+in such American as I could manage. "Thank you," he said as he closed
+the book and put it away again. And then another long pause followed.
+
+I recalled Hoffnung's disturbing words--that the Baron would have
+something to tell me I might not like. He had certainly made that good,
+and I was beginning to be abominably troubled about the run of things
+when he started in again.
+
+"And so you wish to join our Secret Service?" he asked with the abrupt
+shift of subject which worried me.
+
+"Herr Hoffnung told me so, but----" and I smiled vacantly.
+
+"Do you imagine that a man without a memory would be of much use to us?"
+
+"I'm afraid not, sir; but to tell the truth, I have no sort of desire
+to do it. The doctors at Rotterdam told me I should recover my memory
+in time, and if I could have a good rest and just be absolutely quiet
+for a time it is all I wish."
+
+He nodded, not unkindly, and then suddenly bent on me the keenest look
+I have ever seen in any man's eyes and asked: "Are you sure you mean
+that?"
+
+"Absolutely, sir, on my honour," meeting his eyes steadily.
+
+He held them for a moment with the same intentness, as if he would read
+my inmost thoughts, and then nodded and leant back in his seat. "I can
+understand that and believe you. I'm glad to hear it."
+
+What he meant I couldn't tell, but I felt relieved because I appeared
+to have risen in his opinion, for some reason it was impossible even to
+guess. Some minutes passed before any more was said, the longest
+silence yet. That he had evidently been running over all that had
+passed his next move showed.
+
+"I am intensely interested in your case, and quite as intensely puzzled
+about it all. Personally, I take your view--that the best thing would
+be to give you time to see if the memory comes back. But that's rather
+a point for the doctors than for me. You have done very valuable work
+for us in England and, other things turning out all right, there is no
+doubt you could do more of the same sort. But these are times when we
+can't do all we might; matters are too strenuous. Except for this loss
+of memory, you seem to be absolutely normal--doctors again; and you'd
+better see them at once;" and he rang his table bell. "If you pass them
+and, from your appearance I have no doubt you will, you will, of
+course, go to the Front."
+
+I caught my breath at this, but he did not see my consternation, as he
+had risen while speaking and went out, leaving his secretary, named von
+Welten, to remain with me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+VON ERSTEIN
+
+
+Baron von Gratzen was away some minutes; and exceedingly unpleasant
+minutes they were for me. At first I could see nothing but checkmate to
+all my plans. That the doctors would pass me as fit for service in the
+field was beyond question; and, as Germany wanted as many men as
+possible in the fighting line, I was certain to be packed off without
+any delay.
+
+But then I needed only a delay of a couple of days--the papers would be
+ready by then--and it was still possible that something might happen
+which would give me just enough time to get away. It was a devil of a
+mess, however; and it cost me no end of an effort to pull myself
+together by the time the Baron came back and himself took me to the
+doctors.
+
+They had been primed about the case, and all three of them were as
+deeply interested in me as the others had been in Rotterdam. One of
+them was a specialist in such cases, and he conducted the first part of
+the examination--that in regard to my memory. He put numberless
+questions on all sorts of subjects, endeavouring in every conceivable
+way to get me to admit that I could remember something; but I had no
+great difficulty in answering him. He appeared to lay most stress on
+everything that had occurred immediately before the explosion on the
+_Burgen_; and was still on that when the Baron came back to us,
+listened to his concluding questions and suggestions, and then took him
+out of the room.
+
+The physical examination followed. I stripped to the buff, and a very
+few minutes sufficed to satisfy them about my fitness. I was, of
+course, in the pink of condition and as hard as nails.
+
+"You must have had military training," said one of them.
+
+"That can't be so, so far as I know. I understand I've been travelling
+about the world for a long time."
+
+"I'm sure of it," was the positive verdict. "Every muscle tells the
+tale too plainly for any one to be mistaken. Just stand over there; I
+want to look at your back;" and he placed me close to the wall, and
+stepped back some distance himself.
+
+"No, perhaps not," he murmured, and just as I was chuckling at his
+blunder, he suddenly yelled at me in English, "'Shun!" with military
+abruptness. Instinctively, being for the instant quite off my guard, I
+brought my heels together and straightened up. He chuckled, and I could
+have cursed myself for an idiot in having given the show away.
+
+The doctor who had trapped me couldn't contain his delight. "I knew I
+couldn't be mistaken. You can put your clothes on," he told me, rubbing
+his hands gleefully, and after another chortle to his colleague, he
+hurried off to report the result of his experiment.
+
+I was mad at having made such a blithering ass of myself just when
+things had been going so well. The game was up, of course, and there
+was nothing for it but to face the music. It was now a toss up whether
+I should be packed off to the front or popped into prison, and it
+didn't need a Solomon to see that the odds strongly favoured the latter.
+
+The Baron and the two doctors came back in about five minutes, and the
+man who had bowled me out was laughingly rubbing it in to the
+specialist.
+
+"I can't imagine how it escaped you, Gorlitz," he said as they entered;
+and the specialist looked about as pleased as I felt.
+
+"Try it again," he growled in a half-whisper.
+
+"He may be prepared this time," was the reply in an undertone, but not
+low enough to prevent my hearing it. I couldn't get the hang of things
+for the moment; but when, after a few desultory questions, the doctor
+pretended to take some measurements and then turned me with my back to
+him again, I knew what was coming, and I thought I would do a little
+bit of pantomime of my own.
+
+They spoke together in low tones, and in the middle of it the doctor
+yelled "'Shun!" at me once more. I started, hesitated and then came to
+attention, but not nearly so smartly as before.
+
+"Just turn round," called the specialist. "Now, march across the room."
+I obeyed, and was halfway across when the doctor shouted "Halt!" I
+stopped instantly.
+
+"There you are," exclaimed the doctor. The specialist nodded, told me
+to sit down, and plied me with all sorts of questions about the army,
+appearing rather pleased than otherwise when I failed to answer them.
+
+A long pow-wow followed between the three doctors and was developing
+into a pretty hot wrangle whether my having obeyed the word of command
+was really a recurrence of memory or not, when the Baron intervened and
+I was sent back to his room with his subordinate.
+
+"You have set them a difficult problem, Herr Lassen," he said to me
+when he joined me after some ten minutes; "and given me one also. But
+it will do no harm to postpone the decision about you for a few days,
+at any rate. You have no idea how you come to know the English words of
+command?"
+
+I affected to think deeply. "Can I have been in the army there?" I
+asked, looking blankly at him.
+
+He smiled and then nodded. "Yes, you are a deserter. Your report says
+that you joined it to obtain certain information."
+
+"It's very odd, sir."
+
+"Very," he replied a little drily. "It makes it a little difficult in
+regard to a suggestion Dr. Gorlitz threw out; he's the mental
+specialist, you know. He thinks it not improbable that if you were
+placed again in the surroundings immediately preceding the shock which
+deprived you of your memory, it would greatly facilitate its recovery.
+Perhaps your only chance of doing so. But you might not care to run
+such a risk. You should understand that I wish to help you in any way I
+can," he added kindly.
+
+"I am very much obliged to you, sir. Of course it would be a risk, but
+my great wish is to get my memory back."
+
+"Does that mean you would like to go back to England?"
+
+I could scarcely believe my ears and tried to conceal my overwhelming
+delight under the cover of frowning consideration. "The risk wouldn't
+frighten me, sir."
+
+"Very well. I'll see about it. That's about as far as we can get
+to-day; but there's one thing I should tell you. There is some one in
+Berlin who knows you and declares that your loss of memory is a mere
+pretence, and that you have assumed it because of some exceedingly
+sinister business in which you were involved a year or two ago."
+
+I could smile at that sincerely. "Can you tell me his name?"
+
+He paused a moment. "There will be no harm, if you keep it to yourself;
+I don't believe the story, but then I know the man too well. It is
+Count von Erstein."
+
+"He's a scoundrel, I know that; but it may be the truth, of course."
+
+"We won't discuss him," said the Baron, rising. "I only told you to put
+you on your guard because of the genuine interest I take in you;" and
+with that he shook hands and was sending me away, when I remembered my
+difficulty that morning about papers of identification. I explained it
+to him and he sent for von Welten and instructed him to do what was
+necessary.
+
+I left the place feeling pretty much as any one would feel who had
+rubbed his back against a prison door and by the merest squeak escaped
+finding himself on the wrong side of the bars. The whole business
+baffled me. Knowing as I did so well the usual methods of German
+officialism, the Baron's treatment was incomprehensible; and rack my
+wits as I would, I could not hit on a clue to explain it.
+
+And then the luck of it! Actually to be sent back to England with
+official credentials! I could have whooped for joy! But as it was
+already passed the time I was to lunch with von Erstein, I rushed back
+to the Falkenplatz, made sure of the little flat, and then cabbed it to
+von Erstein's address.
+
+What a rotter the brute was, I reflected as I thought of the story he
+had already spread about me. He meant to make things hot for me and no
+mistake, and had lost no time in setting to work. And what a brick the
+old Count, to have given me that warning. If I had been going to stop
+in Berlin, I might have taken von Erstein's enmity seriously; but as it
+was I could afford to laugh at him, for a few days at the most would
+see both Nessa and me out of the country, if the luck only held.
+
+I was so late in reaching the Gallenstrasse, where von Erstein had his
+sumptuous flat, that he had already begun lunch. "I'd given you up,
+Lassen," he said as I entered. "Thought something might have happened
+with old Gratz to detain you. He's a downy old bird. Sit there, will
+you. Everything all right?"
+
+"Why shouldn't it be?" I knew what he meant.
+
+He turned the question off and we talked about nothing in particular
+until lunch was over, except that every now and then he shot in a
+question which might have committed me if I had not been on my guard.
+But I had been through the mill so thoroughly that morning that the
+part I was playing had grown into my bones, so to speak.
+
+"Now we can chat at our ease," he said as we settled into easy chairs.
+"Is it still your habit to smoke a cigarette before a cigar?" he asked,
+grinning, as he held the box toward me.
+
+"Was that one of my habits, then?" I countered, declining the little
+trap.
+
+"All right, you do it very well. Ought to be on the stage, on my word
+you ought," he said with a broader leer. "But now, let's get to grips.
+How do we two stand?"
+
+"About what?"
+
+"Don't fool about in that way. You know what I mean."
+
+"I shall when you tell me."
+
+"Do you want to have me for a friend or the other thing?"
+
+"I told you yesterday I wasn't likely to quarrel with any one who has
+such influence as you have."
+
+"And I told you that it would be a bad day's work for you if we did
+quarrel; and quarrel we shall if you try to beat about the bush, as
+you're doing now. I believe in plain talk; and you'd better bear that
+in mind, not only now but always."
+
+"Then let me have some plain talk now."
+
+"You shall," taking his cigar out and flicking off the ash. "I've only
+to utter a word or two and I can flick you out of my way as easily as I
+flicked that ash off. Mind that, too."
+
+I laughed. "You have a pleasant way with you, von Erstein."
+
+"I don't care a curse about pleasantness or unpleasantness. When I want
+a thing, I have it. And what I want now is that English girl at the von
+Reblings', and you'd better be careful not to get in my way about it."
+
+"How am I likely to be in your way?"
+
+"Because you're a relative of the von Reblings, my friend, and you're
+going to marry the fair Rosa, whom, by the way, I can tell you as an
+old hand you'll find a handful. But she likes the English girl and will
+try to influence you, and if I know her, as I certainly do, she'll
+succeed, if I don't stop it."
+
+"Stop it? How?"
+
+"By showing you on which side your bread has the butter. Now look here.
+I know a heap about you; quite enough to queer your pitch with the von
+Reblings and put an end to your engagement and lose you the coin on
+which you're counting. All this rot about a loss of memory is just----"
+and he waved his cigar in the air to emphasize his meaning.
+
+"What do you know about me?"
+
+"Oh, don't try that fool's game on me."
+
+"But I should be intensely interested in the story. I'm itching to know
+all about myself," I persisted, seeing how this line provoked him.
+
+"Where did you go from Goettingen, my young friend?" he asked with a
+meaning nod, as if the question would confound me.
+
+"How the devil do I know?"
+
+"You went to Hanover. You know that perfectly well."
+
+"Did I? And do I? You're getting me regularly mixed, you know." I was
+delighted to see that he was fast losing his temper.
+
+"You did. And when you were there you had a friend, who called himself
+Gossen; but was in reality a Frenchman, named Gaudet. Don't say you
+don't remember, because it will be a lie," he snarled.
+
+"That's an ugly word, von Erstein."
+
+"And the whole thing was an ugly business. He was a spy and wanted some
+secrets; you were able to find them out; and you were suddenly found to
+be in possession of a big sum of money. How did you get it?"
+
+"Honestly, I hope," I answered with intentional flippancy.
+
+"How did you get it? And how did you get the information, too? That's
+the question; and if you won't answer it, I can. But you'd better not
+force me to open my lips."
+
+"I'm beginning to get awfully interested. Like a story, isn't it?" and
+I laughed.
+
+"You'd better laugh while you can," he rapped, swearing viciously.
+
+"Of course you mean I sold the information to the Frenchman and that
+that accounts for my having that sudden money."
+
+"I not only mean it, I can prove it. Prove it, do you understand that?"
+
+I gave him another grin and shook my head. "Some one's been pulling
+your leg, von Erstein. The whole thing's just bosh."
+
+"It's no good, Lassen. I've got you here;" and he held out his hand and
+clenched it. "Here! And no wriggling humbug about loss of memory will
+help you to get out."
+
+"I must be an infernal blackguard, then."
+
+"That's the truest thing you've said since you came. It's just what you
+are; and the von Reblings ought to know it."
+
+"You haven't told me how I got that valuable information yet. I should
+like to know that."
+
+"If you'll let that lost memory of yours wake up for a second, just
+long enough to remember the name of Anna Hilden, you'll know all about
+it without a word from me." His sneering suggestive tone clearly showed
+that this was one of his trump cards, and he fixed his eyes on me,
+keenly watching for the effect.
+
+"But my memory won't oblige me by waking up, you see. Had she anything
+to do with it?"
+
+"To the devil with all your pretended innocence! You know she had, and
+that you induced her to worm it out of the man she was to have married,
+if you hadn't come in the road; just as you're trying now with me," he
+cried, scowling at me threateningly. "But you've got a man to deal with
+this time, not a woman, and the wrong sort of man too."
+
+I dropped the bantering tone and answered seriously. "Of course all you
+say may be the gospel truth, but I give you my word that I haven't the
+faintest recollection of anything you've mentioned."
+
+He laughed scornfully. "That's a lie," he growled with an oath.
+
+I had had more than enough and I got up. "If this weren't your own
+place, I'd cram that word down your throat; and the next time we meet,
+wherever it is, I'll do it," I told him.
+
+He seemed to understand that I meant it, and a change came over his
+face. "I'll take that back," he muttered. "Sit down again."
+
+I didn't sit down, but I stopped. Either he was as arrant a coward as
+such a brute was likely to be and I had scared him, or some thought had
+struck him which accounted for the change.
+
+He let his cigar drop; made a to-do in finding it, pitching it away,
+and lighting another; and it was an easy guess that all this was to
+gain time. Then he sat thinking, fiddling nervously with a very
+singular ring he wore on his middle finger. He saw me looking at it
+and, no doubt to get a little more time to think, he spoke of it.
+
+"You're looking at this," he said, holding up the hand. I nodded, and
+he drew it off and handed it me. "It's a puzzle ring I picked up in
+China," he explained, showing how it was really a little chain of rings
+which fitted very ingeniously to form a single ring.
+
+I examined it and, still to gain time, he told me to try and put it
+together. I did try and failed, and when he had thought out his
+problem, he took it back and showed me the fitting.
+
+"I'm sorry I lost my temper just now, Lassen," he said in a very
+different tone from his former angry one. "It's always a fool's game.
+But I did really believe you were shamming about your memory. What I
+told you about the Hanover business is quite true, however, and the
+fact that you don't remember it, wouldn't make an atom of difference
+with our people. But now, what about the English girl?"
+
+I hesitated a second and then resumed my seat. "I'm willing to listen
+to you," I said; and he couldn't keep the satisfaction out of his fat,
+tell-tale face. He reckoned that he had frightened me, of course.
+
+"What are you going to do about her?" was his next question.
+
+"What _you_ want to do is the point, man."
+
+"She's a spy and ought to be interned."
+
+"And why are you so keen about that? You said a little while back that
+you wanted her; how's the internment going to help you there?"
+
+"She'd be sent to Krustadt and the Commandant---- Never mind; you can
+leave the rest to me. You won't know anything."
+
+I couldn't trust myself to speak for a time, I was so furious at the
+suggestiveness of the leering brute's words and manner. But there was
+probably more to learn yet, so I choked down my rage and at last even
+forced myself to nod and smile meaningly. "And my part?" I asked.
+
+"Two things; both easy enough. Old Gratz has shoved a spoke in the
+wheel so far, curse him, and as you're in the house you can tell him
+you know I'm right that she is a spy and you can give him proofs."
+
+"Proofs?" I echoed, with a start.
+
+"I said proofs, didn't I? I'll give you some papers and you can plant
+one or two on her and give the rest to him saying you've found them in
+her room or somewhere. He'll be obliged to order a search then, and
+that'll do the trick."
+
+"Confound the thing!" I exclaimed, jumping up and wringing my fingers
+as if I'd burnt them with my cigar.
+
+"Here, take another," he said, and by the time I had lit it, I had
+myself in hand again.
+
+"But if she was caught red-handed like that, she might be shot, and
+that wouldn't help you much."
+
+"You leave that to me," he replied with a leer and a wink. "The
+question is, are you going to help me?"
+
+"I don't like it, von Erstein, and that's the truth," I said.
+
+"I didn't ask you that."
+
+"And if I do help you?"
+
+He put his fat finger to his lips. "Mum about that Hanover business."
+
+"And if I don't?"
+
+He paused, squinting hard at me. "I think you will."
+
+I affected to consider the proposal. "But why take this roundabout
+trouble to get her? If you want to marry her, why not ask her?"
+
+That touched his Teutonic sense of humour and he burst into loud and
+evidently genuine laughter. "Why didn't you marry Anna Hilden? Because
+you could get her without, wasn't it? Same here, of course."
+
+"It comes to this, then," I said after a pause. "You think you know
+that I played the traitor in that Hanover business in a way that
+renders me liable to be shot; but that you're willing to hush it up if
+I'll help to put Miss Caldicott into your power. That about it?"
+
+"Put it how you like," he growled, not relishing the bald statement.
+"But you'd better toe the line, my friend, and at once. Now, what are
+you going to do?"
+
+"I'll toe the line, von Erstein."
+
+He chuckled. "I thought you'd see wisdom," he sneered.
+
+"Not quite as you think, however. What I'm going to do is"--and I
+paused--"to give you forty-eight hours to clear out of Berlin; and if I
+find you here then, I'll not only tell the von Reblings the whole of
+your confounded scheme, but I'll tell Baron von Gratz as well. And I'm
+thundering glad you've put that card in my hands."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A BREAD RIOT
+
+
+It would be difficult for any one to appear more absolutely dumbfounded
+than von Erstein when I delivered my ultimatum and got up.
+
+That I had scared him, his chalk-white cheeks showed unmistakably,
+while the quiver of his lips, clenched hands, and the fierce light in
+his piggish little eyes testified to his rage. He jumped up instantly
+to stop my going.
+
+"Don't go, Lassen, at all events in that way. Let's talk it over," he
+clamoured. "The thing can be explained and we can come to an
+understanding."
+
+"You swine!" I growled. "Get out of the way or I shall forget I'm in
+your room and lay my hands on you."
+
+He tried not to wince, but was too much of a cur. "Look here, I'm not
+going to utter a word about that Hanover business. I swear that," he
+said as I went to the door.
+
+"You've done it already, you lying hypocrite. You know that; and so do
+I. I've heard of it, and I shall hear if you say any more. And by
+Heaven, if you dare to say another syllable about it, I'll--well, keep
+out of my way afterwards, that's all"; and I left him to judge for
+himself what I would do.
+
+I had to go. I should have mauled the brute if I'd stopped. I was mad
+with fury; and I walked off, unable for the time to think of anything
+but his disgusting cowardice and bestiality. I'm no saint, and don't
+pretend to be one; but this brute's infernal plan to get Nessa into his
+power was more than flesh and blood could stand. I believe, anyway I
+hope, I should have felt just as hot if any other girl had been
+concerned.
+
+I ramped about the streets, taking little notice where I went, and it
+was not until some of my fury had cooled that I began to consider what
+steps I ought to take. I was glad I had lost my temper and gone for
+him; but after a while it began to dawn on me that I had blundered
+badly. All I needed was to gain a few days' delay; and it would have
+been far more diplomatic if I had seemed to fall in with his plans and
+just made a few excuses to account for any inaction.
+
+But one can't always be worrying about diplomacy; and anyhow the beggar
+was thoroughly scared. Probably he'd be just as much put to it to hit
+on a new offensive as I was to decide what to do next; and whatever
+happened I wasn't going to be sorry I'd let myself go. What I was sorry
+for was that I hadn't been able to "go" with my hands instead of only
+words.
+
+It wouldn't do merely to twiddle my thumbs, however; and after a while
+it struck me that the best thing would be to get another interview with
+old Gratz and just tell him the whole pretty story. If it did no good,
+it would do no harm, and certainly it would prepare him for any other
+scheme by von Erstein to prove Nessa to be a spy.
+
+At this point some one clapped me on the shoulder. "Hallo, Cousin
+Johann, whatever are you doing in this out-of-the-way place?"
+
+It was Hans. "If it comes to that, what are you doing, young man?"
+
+"There's a shindy on in the Untergasse, and I've been watching it. A
+lot of women kicking up a row about food, or something. It looked like
+getting warm, so I thought it time to go home."
+
+"Let's go and look at it," I said directly. I had heard rumours in
+England about bread riots and rather liked the idea of seeing one for
+myself, and I recalled what the tailor had said about it.
+
+The place was close at hand; and sure enough there was a big crowd and
+a noisy one, too. Quite a couple of hundred women with a sprinkling of
+men, and as much noise as at an Irish faction fight. We stood a minute
+or two at the corner of the street when Hans caught sight of a friend,
+and asking me to wait for him, ran off.
+
+I observed that although there were police about, the tailor was right
+in saying they were not taking the usual steps to stop the row; and I
+noticed also that the crowd was growing in numbers and moving in my
+direction.
+
+Then came the sound of smashing glass, with loud shouts from the women
+who clustered round the spot where the smash had been, and I went down
+the street far enough to see that a baker's shop had been forced.
+
+The police interfered then; but it was too late, and there were too few
+of them. Moreover, the mob had tasted blood, or rather smelt food; and
+soon afterwards there was another smash; this time a provision shop.
+The crowd had been allowed to get out of hand; and I saw some of the
+police rush away, presumably to telephone for more men.
+
+I was standing in the road at that moment and had to skip aside to
+avoid an open car which came rattling down the street toward the mob.
+An old lady and a girl were in the car, and as they passed me, the
+latter stood up and called excitedly to the chauffeur to stop.
+
+If it hadn't been a German he would never have been fool enough to have
+attempted to enter the street at all; but I suppose he had been told to
+take that route, and his instinct of slavish obedience to orders did
+the rest. The result was what any one might have foreseen.
+
+He was too late to turn back, and his one chance to get through was to
+have driven bang into the crowd and trusted to luck to clear a way. As
+it was, he came to a halt on the very verge of the crowd; and in less
+time than it takes to tell it, the car was the centre of a yelping,
+hungry mob of viragos to whom the sight of rich people in a costly car
+was like a good meal spread before a lot of famished wild beasts.
+
+Worse than this, moreover, was the fact that some ruffians who had been
+hanging back began to push their way toward the car, whose occupants
+were calling for the police. They might as well have cried for the
+moon; and every cry was greeted with jeers and yells of anger from the
+women around. The trouble soon thickened.
+
+One woman more reckless than the rest started a shout to have the two
+out of the car, and herself jumped on the step, grabbed the chauffeur,
+who seemed about paralyzed with fright, lugged him off his seat, and
+the crowd hustled and jabbed and cuffed him, till he was lost in the
+throng. Then some one opened the door of the car, and made a snatch at
+the dress of the girl, who set up screaming.
+
+This was too much; so I shoved and shouldered my way through, pushed
+aside the woman who had tried to grab the girl, and urged the two
+panic-stricken ladies to come out. They hesitated, however, and a
+filthy hooligan with a long iron-shod bludgeon barked curses at me for
+a Junker and aimed a vicious blow at my head. I managed to dodge it,
+and jabbed him one in return on the mouth which sent him staggering
+back and enabled me to snatch his stick away.
+
+Armed with this, I soon cleared a space about the car and again urged
+the two frightened occupants to leave it. The girl jumped out at once
+and had to help her mother, while I kept the mob at bay, and then
+fought a sort of rearguard action in miniature.
+
+But we hadn't a dog's chance of escape. The mother was half an invalid,
+and could only move very slowly, while the women round, furious at
+being baulked of their prey and led by the brute I had hit and a couple
+of his cronies who had come up meanwhile, surged round us like a lot of
+devils gone mad.
+
+We reached the pavement, however, and as I spied a deepish doorway, I
+changed my tactics and made for it, treating some of those who stood in
+the way pretty roughly. We were able to gain the doorway all right, and
+I hustled my two charges into momentary safety behind me and told the
+girl to keep hammering at the door till some one opened it, while I
+tried to keep the crowd back.
+
+It was no picnic; but I reckoned on being able to stem the rush for the
+minute or so until some one came in reply to the girl's knocking. It
+was in our favour that the fight we had already put up had rendered
+some of those in the front of the crowd a little chary about coming too
+close; and as the doorway was very narrow and the stick I had captured
+a long one, I put it across the outside, thus forming a useful barrier,
+and was able to hold it in position by standing back at arm's length,
+and thus almost out of reach of both the hands and feet of those in
+front.
+
+To my dismay, however, no attempt was made to let us enter the house,
+although the girl had kept up an incessant knocking. The mob soon
+tumbled to this and things began to look ugly. The old lady, scared to
+death and ill, was on the verge of collapse; the daughter, almost
+equally panicky and alarmed by her mother's condition, stopped
+hammering at the door and bent over her; the crowd was getting more
+furious every moment; those at the back began to push those in front
+forward, the brute I had struck first came on with the rest, and I came
+in for some pretty hot smacks and kicks.
+
+But the little barrier of the stick kept off the worst, and, as every
+second was of vital importance, since help might come from a
+reinforcement of the police, I took the gruelling and just held on.
+
+A couple more invaluable minutes were gained in this way when another
+of the men, a dirty little red-haired beggar, more wary than the
+others, tumbled to the weak spot in my defence--my hold on the stick.
+He tried his fists on my hands first, and finding that was no good he
+whipped out a pocket knife and jabbed me with it.
+
+I loosed the right hand and dropped him with a tap on the nose which
+brought the blood in a stream and gave him something else to think
+about. But his two companions had seen his little dodge and made ready
+to flatter it with imitation, so I had to adopt other tactics.
+
+I was pretty reckless by that time, and in no mood to be man-handled by
+a set of German roughs; so I changed the barrier into a weapon of
+offence; it made a fine sort of pike with its ironshod end; and I used
+it without scruple or mercy. I drove it slap into the face of the man
+who had struck me first, then into the chest of the fellow next him,
+and lastly downed a third with a crack on the skull.
+
+That accounted for all the men and took off a lot of the edge of the
+crowd's appetite for more. They fell back a pace or two and I stepped
+in front of the archway, swung the bludgeon over my head and swore that
+I'd brain the first person, man or woman, who moved a single foot
+forward.
+
+Nobody in the front ranks seemed in any hurry to accept the invitation;
+but again those at the back, who had no knowledge of the happenings,
+began to shove forward, and slowly the people in front were pushed
+forward against their will and despite their efforts to resist the
+pressure.
+
+The result was plain. I couldn't break every head in sight, of course,
+and I was at my wit's end what to do, when a really happy thought
+occurred to me. I had a lot of small money in my pocket, whipped it
+out, and sent it scattering into the street.
+
+"If it's money you want, there it is," I shouted at the top of my lung
+power, and sent a second lot after the first.
+
+It was a truly gorgeous scheme. I yelled loud enough for nearly all to
+hear, and the flash of the coins did the rest; the pressure round the
+mouth of our shelter was relieved instantly, and both back and front
+rows joined in a fearsome scramble in the middle of the road, where I
+had been careful to shy the money. I never saw a finer scrimmage in my
+life.
+
+"We can go," I called to the couple behind me, seeing that the pavement
+was clear enough for us to get away. But the elder woman had fallen and
+was incapable of any effort whatever.
+
+"Have you any small money?" I asked the girl. "My own's all gone."
+
+She felt her own pockets and in the handbag on her mother's arm and
+gave all she could find.
+
+It was enough to keep the crowd busy for another minute or two, and I
+stepped out, and just as the people were easing off from the first
+diversion of the scramble, I yelled out that there was more to come,
+and flung the whole lot broadcast among the tossing heads, taking care
+to shy it as far down the street as possible. There was an instant rush
+for it.
+
+I slipped back into the doorway, picked up the old lady and made a dash
+for it, telling the girl to bring the stick with her and keep close to
+the houses, which by that time were all shut and barred.
+
+We managed to get some yards toward the street corner when two of the
+men who had given us trouble spied us, and, thinking that I was now
+unarmed, came rushing in pursuit, calling to a lot of the others to
+follow.
+
+They soon overtook us, and there was nothing for it but to put up
+another fight, this time without the friendly help of a doorway. I laid
+my burden on the pavement, took the stick from the girl, and turned to
+face the oncomers. The instant they saw I was still armed, they pulled
+up in surprise and hesitated. I promptly seized the moment of their
+consternation and went straight at them, clubbed the nearest and was
+making for the next when I heard a whoop behind me, suggesting an
+attack from the rear.
+
+I turned to meet it, and to my intense relief saw Hans standing by the
+two ladies. "Come on, Hans," I called, and he was by my side in a
+jiffy. We had a rough and tumble for a few seconds in which he joined
+like a brick, and then relief arrived. We heard the sound of horses,
+with the jingle of accoutrements, and the next moment a small troop of
+cavalry turned the corner of the street, and we left the rest of the
+proceedings to them. They soon scattered the mob, who fled in all
+directions except ours, and the street was quickly cleared, leaving the
+car the one conspicuous feature in the foreground.
+
+As the chauffeur was nowhere to be seen and the old lady couldn't walk,
+I sent Hans back to her and went to see if the car had been much
+damaged. It had certainly been in the wars; stripped of everything,
+even to the cushions, but the engine was all right, so I started it,
+climbed in, and backed to the spot where the ladies were.
+
+Then it flashed suddenly on me what an ass I was making of myself to
+let any one see that I knew anything about cars; but it was too late to
+make a pretence now, and I consoled myself with the reflection that
+there was no need to let the people know who I was.
+
+But there I reckoned without Hans. The mother had sufficiently
+recovered to get up, and was speaking to him when I reached them, while
+Hans and the daughter were casting sheep's eyes at each other in a
+fashion which told tales. They were evidently old friends, and a little
+bit more; and I wasn't, therefore, surprised when the mother knew me as
+Lassen, Hans' cousin.
+
+She was awfully sweet and grateful and the tears trembled in her eyes
+as she thanked me, holding my hand in both of hers, declaring that both
+she and her daughter owed me their lives, and making so much of the
+matter, that I had to chip in with a suggestion that she had better get
+home as soon as possible.
+
+"But how?" she exclaimed hopelessly. "Where's Wilhelm?"
+
+But Wilhelm, evidently the chauffeur, was nowhere to be seen; and there
+was nothing for it but to volunteer to drive the car myself.
+
+All this time friend Hans had been making the best of his opportunity
+with the daughter, who also thanked me profusely when I had helped her
+mother into the car.
+
+"Where am I to drive?" I asked as I took the wheel.
+
+"Hans knows the way," suggested the daughter, with the faintest little
+flush of confusion as she hazarded the suggestion. He grinned.
+
+"Come along then, Hans," I said; and he nipped in and told me where to
+go and which way to take.
+
+"Rather a nice little child," I said presently, chipping him; the girl
+was about sixteen, I guessed, as her hair was still down. But he
+resented the speech.
+
+"Child! She's only a year younger than I am," he exclaimed quite
+indignantly.
+
+"So that's how the wind blows, eh?"
+
+"I wish to Heaven I'd come up sooner; but I say, you did make a fight
+of it, cousin. Nita's been telling me all about it. She says they'd
+have been torn to pieces if it hadn't been for you. You're a lucky
+beggar!"
+
+"I don't take too kindly to that sort of luck, Hans, I can tell you."
+
+"I only wish it had been mine," he declared regretfully.
+
+"You did all right as it was when you came; and of course she saw you.
+Rather a pretty name--Nita."
+
+He smiled self-consciously and coloured. "But her mother didn't; if she
+had it might change her opinion and----" He didn't finish the sentence
+and exclaimed: "But I say, you do know how to handle a car!"
+
+This didn't suit me, however, so I went back to the pretty Nita. "The
+mother's against it all, eh?"
+
+"Only for the silly reason that we're too young. And I shall be an
+officer in a month or two; but the Baroness is like Rosa in that, she
+can't understand when a fellow's grown up."
+
+"It'll come all right when you've been in the army a year or two," I
+said consolingly.
+
+"A year or two," he exclaimed in some dismay.
+
+"Well, if she won't wait for you as long as that, she isn't worth
+bothering about, Hans."
+
+But he wasn't in a mood for any philosophic consolation. "But she will;
+she's said so a hundred times. There's no doubt about her; but there's
+something else; somebody else, rather."
+
+"And which are you? Number one or number two?"
+
+"Oh, I don't mean with her; but old Gratz has some one else."
+
+"And what's he got to do with it?"
+
+"Johann! Seeing that he's her father, he's got everything to do with
+it, of course."
+
+This was something like a jar in all truth. He was about the last soul
+in Berlin who ought to know that I had so far recovered my memory as to
+be able to handle the car. "Do you mean that this old lady is Baron von
+Gratzen's wife?"
+
+"Of course she is. I thought you knew it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+COMPLICATIONS
+
+
+The fact that it was Baron von Gratzen's wife and daughter whom I had
+managed to snatch from the clutches of the mob was startling, and might
+have vital consequences. But whether it would help or harm me, it was
+difficult to decide.
+
+The first impression was that it was rotten luck. By all accounts
+Lassen was far too great a coward to have faced the mob; and that fact
+alone was dangerous since it tended to emphasize the difference between
+us. More than enough had transpired in the interview with the Baron to
+show that he already suspected I was not Lassen; and this business
+might put the finishing touch to his suspicions. My handling of the
+car, moreover, might be accepted as an additional proof of the
+impersonation.
+
+There was of course another side. It was his wife and child who had
+been rescued; and if he hadn't a stone in place of a heart, he was
+bound to feel some amount of gratitude. But would that be sufficient to
+cause him to smother his suspicions?
+
+The German official is commonly a two-natured individual; showing one
+side in his private life and the other in his office. His manner to me
+that morning had been friendly enough; but that was after his
+suspicions had been quieted and he had regarded me as Lassen. What the
+effect would be when his suspicions were again roused, it was
+impossible to say.
+
+If he was like many of those I had known in the old days, he would be
+quite capable of professing and even feeling the deepest gratitude
+privately and at home, and the next minute at his office regretting,
+with tears in his eyes, that his duty compelled him to pack me off to
+gaol. That's the worst of Teutonic sentimentality. It's pretty much
+like a compass needle in an electric storm; you never know where it
+will point next.
+
+When we reached the house nothing would satisfy the Baroness but that I
+should go in so that her husband should have an opportunity of thanking
+me; and in we went. It was a relief to find that he wasn't home; but
+she would not hear of my leaving until she was satisfied that I was not
+seriously hurt, and wished to send straight off for a doctor to examine
+me.
+
+Discussion resulted as usual in a compromise, and Hans carried me off
+to the bathroom. There was nothing the matter that soap and water and a
+clothes-brush couldn't put right. I was very dirty; had a bruise or
+two, a couple of scratches on my face, and a cut on my hand where one
+of the men had jabbed at it to make me release my hold of the stick.
+
+The last looked the worst, because of the drop or two of blood smeared
+about; but it didn't amount to anything, and I was really lucky to have
+got off so lightly.
+
+While I was removing the traces of the scrap, Hans told me a good deal
+more about Nita and the position of affairs in the von Gratzen
+household, together with his impressions of Nita's father.
+
+"I think he's a regular bear, you know. He is to me; but then he
+doesn't like me any more than I do him, worse luck," he said dolefully.
+
+"Do you think the best way to get any one to like you is to begin by
+disliking him?"
+
+"I didn't begin it; but he always scowls when he finds me here, talks
+to me as if I was a kid of ten, and calls me 'Hansikin.' It makes me
+regularly sick, I can tell you. Of course he's awfully decent to his
+wife and Nita, and they both worship him; and so does he them. But he's
+always trying to make fun of me; and he's such an artful old beggar
+that I never get a chance of scoring off him. I believe he's as big a
+humbug as any in Berlin. And I'm not the only one who thinks so, too."
+
+"What you've done to-day ought to change his opinion, Hans."
+
+"That's just my rotten luck. I came up too late to do anything, and
+even the little I did do, the Baroness couldn't see."
+
+"But Nita saw it."
+
+"And a lot he'll care for what she says. He'll just grin and say I was
+a good boy, or some such rot as that, and forget it."
+
+"We'll see about that. He'll know that no boy could send a grown man
+headlong into the gutter as you did."
+
+"Did I?" he cried excitedly.
+
+The truth was that he did not; but there seemed a chance of doing him a
+good turn, so I described a little fictional incident of the sort,
+telling him that he was too excited at the moment to remember anything.
+"It was the turning point of the whole show, Hans, for if the beggar
+hadn't been downed at that very moment, they'd have got us to a cert."
+
+"Do you think Nita saw it?" he cried boyishly.
+
+"How could she, when her mother was lying all but fainting on the
+pavement? She wanted all her eyes for her."
+
+"Just my luck!" he exclaimed with a disconsolate toss of the head, as
+we went downstairs.
+
+Nita and her mother had also been using the time to repair, and both of
+them appeared to have rallied from the shock. I had to go through more
+of the thanksgiving ceremonial. Only the plea of an urgent engagement
+got me out of a most pressing invitation to remain to supper in order
+to be thanked over again by the Baron; and I had to stem the torrent of
+gratitude by bringing Hans' part into action.
+
+"It's awfully sweet of you to give me all the credit, my dear madam,
+but you're overlooking my cousin's part; and you owe quite as much to
+him. I'm afraid there would have been a very different tale to tell, if
+he had not come up when he did."
+
+"I didn't know that," she exclaimed in great surprise; and I saw Hans
+and Nita, who were snugging it together in a corner, prick up their
+ears.
+
+"I don't want to make him blush," I replied, lowering my voice, and
+repeated the fable I had told him in the bathroom, garnishing it with
+one or two more or less artistic touches.
+
+"I didn't see all that."
+
+"Unfortunately at the moment you were not able to take notice of
+anything, I'm afraid."
+
+"Nita hasn't told me about it either."
+
+"She could not have had eyes or thoughts for any one but you just then.
+It's only natural, of course."
+
+"Then I've done the boy an injustice, Herr Lassen."
+
+"Boy!" I echoed with a start. "No boy could have done what he did, and
+no man could have behaved more bravely;" with special emphasis on the
+"man."
+
+It worked all right. After a moment she called him up, repeated the
+pith of the story, and showed her gratitude in a way that made him
+blush like a girl. Then she kissed him and declared, to the profound
+delight and astonishment of them both: "That's a good-bye kiss to the
+boy, Hans. I shall never think of you as one again after this; neither
+will the Baron, I am sure. You must stop to supper and hear what he
+thinks of it."
+
+He was so overwhelmed by all this that he could scarcely stammer out
+his acceptance of the invitation, and when I was leaving he came to the
+door and couldn't say enough to thank me. He had a very hazy idea of
+all that he had really done, and it wasn't surprising that, being a
+German, he was ready to accept the story as gospel and rather to preen
+his feathers over his own prowess.
+
+Still he was a decent youngster, and his little harmless swagger was
+very intelligible. "I say, cousin," he added as he opened the door, "I
+wish you'd do me a favour and tell Rosa. She'll believe it, if you say
+it."
+
+"Of course I will. I'm taking the Karlstrasse on my way," I promised
+readily. I wanted to hear if there was any news about the progress of
+our "conspiracy." The afternoon's affair wasn't all honey, for there
+was the question of its effect on the Baron; and the sooner my back was
+turned on Berlin the better.
+
+It was old Gretchen's job to attend to the front door, and when she
+answered my ring, she told me no one was at home, and that Rosa had
+left a parcel for me. A glance showed that the paper wrapper was torn
+and that the packet had been put up clumsily as if in a great hurry by
+unskilled fingers. Gretchen had evidently been curious about the
+contents.
+
+I opened it in her presence, therefore, as there could be no harm in
+her having a second look at it, and found a quaint card-case inside,
+with some cards printed, "Johann Lassen," and a line saying she thought
+I should understand and find them useful. It was rather neat of her,
+and clearly was intended as an assurance that she meant to keep our
+secret.
+
+She came in soon afterwards and I thanked her for it. She was pleased
+that she had succeeded in making her intention clear; but she wasn't so
+pleased when she heard that old Gretchen had had a peep at the
+card-case. Nor was she at all overjoyed at the story of the afternoon's
+doings in the Untergasse. She looked mighty grave about it, indeed.
+
+"I'm not going to say I'm pleased about it, Johann," she declared. We
+had agreed that it would be better practice for us to use the Christian
+names even when alone. "It wants thinking over."
+
+"Your reason?"
+
+"Von Gratzen. You saw him this morning, didn't you?"
+
+I nodded and gave her a very brief report of what had occurred and that
+he had been quite friendly.
+
+She shook her head. "You'll have to be awfully careful with him. He
+knows, as well as I do, that my cousin is an arrant coward, and that no
+man in all Berlin would be less likely to do what you did this
+afternoon; or could have done it, in fact. The Baron's a man I could
+never understand. No one can. He does the most extraordinary things;
+he's horribly keen and shrewd; quixotic at one time and abominably
+harsh at another; although from his manner you'd think he wouldn't hurt
+a fly."
+
+"Well, let's hope he'll show his quixotic side over this, for it's too
+late to alter things;" and we were still discussing it when Feldmann
+arrived, and she asked him eagerly for news.
+
+"There's a hitch, I'm sorry to say. About Hans," he reported with a
+worried look. "His permit to travel has been refused. They won't
+release him from his training even for twenty-four hours. I did all I
+could, I assure you, Rosa."
+
+"And about the other?"
+
+"Oh, that's all right, of course. A mere matter of form; and it will be
+ready to-morrow, I expect. But one's not much use without the other."
+
+"Johann could use yours, Oscar," suggested Rosa.
+
+"Not on any account," I protested. "Herr Feldmann might get into no end
+of a mess."
+
+"It isn't that, Lassen. I'm so well known all along the line that it
+would be hopeless. You'd be spotted in a moment. I'd run the risk like
+a shot otherwise; I know how Rosa feels about it."
+
+"What can we do?" she exclaimed, turning to me.
+
+"Make the best of it. Nessa must go without me, if I can't get off; and
+there's no chance of that tomorrow. Will the papers have a definite
+date for the journey?"
+
+"I gave the date we agreed, but I dare say I could get that altered to
+allow us a margin of a day or two, perhaps a week; but then this
+wedding is the excuse; and of course that date can't be altered. But I
+could see Miss Caldicott into Holland all right."
+
+"What, with a false passport!  It's awfully good of you to offer, but
+I'm sure she wouldn't hear of it for a second. No; we must try the
+other way."
+
+"What's that?" he asked.
+
+He shook his head ominously at the mention of von Gratzen. "I know a
+lot about him, and I wouldn't put a pfennig's reliance on any hope from
+that quarter," he said emphatically. "I don't say he won't do anything,
+mind you, because one never knows what he will do next. He's one of the
+sharpest and ablest men in the country; we all admit that; but----" and
+he gestured and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Unreliable?" He nodded. "In a shifty unscrupulous way, you mean?"
+
+"Oh dear, no; not that at all," he said vigorously. "Individual. That
+is the best word. If he thinks a thing should be done, he does it
+whether it is according to official rules or not. That is not German.
+He is not thorough, as we understand the word."
+
+There remained only the other plan--that Nessa and I should get away in
+some disguise, and at a tentative suggestion about false papers,
+Feldmann laughed.
+
+"You will easily understand that when a people are subject to so many
+rules and regulations as we are, plenty of men set their wits to work
+to break them. False identification cards are as common as false coins,
+and if you knew where to go, a few marks would buy one, or a genuine
+one either, for that matter," he declared; but he made no offer to get
+them, and it was better not to press the thing farther then.
+
+I left soon afterwards. The failure to get Hans' permit and all that
+had passed about von Gratzen served to make the position more and more
+difficult and complicated. The man seemed to be an enigma even to those
+who were in constant touch with him, and it was ridiculous to imagine,
+therefore, that any one who had only seen him once should understand
+him. A close and careful review of the interview with him threw no
+light on the matter. He had been exceedingly kind and friendly; but
+there had been a moment of startling contrast. That one keen look of
+his; so sharp, intent and piercing that it had seemed almost to change
+him into a different man; and it might well be accepted as the one
+instant in which the mask had been allowed to drop.
+
+In the morning there was another incident. A curt formal summons
+arrived summoning me to his office at noon. This, after the previous
+day's job in the Untergasse! He might at least have had the decency to
+write a private note; and naturally enough the thing increased my
+uneasiness.
+
+And then, if you please, it turned out that he had named that time as
+it was the hour when he went home to lunch and wished to take me with
+him! How could one judge such a man?
+
+I put the note before him, with a word to the effect that I had thought
+it was on official business, and he laughed it away, saying he had told
+his secretary just to ask me to call.
+
+He couldn't make enough of me; kept speaking to me as "My boy," and "My
+dear boy"; smothered me with protestations of gratitude; and capped it
+all by asking me to make his house my home while I was in Berlin.
+
+That didn't appeal to me in the least. "Wouldn't it be very invidious,
+sir, if I was to go to you when I've only just left my aunt's?"
+
+"I've a good mind to use my official power to compel you, my boy," he
+returned laughingly; "but the wife shall talk to you about it. In any
+case you must promise to let us see as much of you as possible."
+
+That was easy to promise; and after a few moments we went out together.
+
+If he wasn't sincere, then he was one of the best actors in the world
+either on or off the stage.
+
+Which was he?
+
+I could find no answer to the question. Yet everything probably
+depended upon it--Nessa's fate and my freedom, and possibly even my
+life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE PROBLEM OF VON GRATZEN
+
+
+As soon as we were in the street von Gratzen linked his arm in mine.
+"It won't do you any harm to be seen in public with me," he said
+jestingly; and even in that half-bantering remark he managed to convey
+a subtle meaning.
+
+"I can understand that, sir."
+
+"And now I want to hear all about that affair yesterday."
+
+"I expect you've already heard what there is to tell."
+
+"Of course I've had my wife's and Nita's story, but I want yours. I may
+need your statement for official purposes, you see."
+
+"I would rather not have to do anything official," I replied. An
+appearance as witness in any police proceedings was unthinkable.
+
+"Don't let that worry you; I'll make it all right. But the affair was
+by far the most serious of the sort we've had, and I want all the facts
+available. That's all."
+
+He listened to my description of the scene; questioned me about the men
+in it particularly, asking if I could recognize them; and laughed
+outright at the story of the scramble for the money.
+
+"It was a stroke of genius, boy; positive genius," he declared, and
+asked me how much I had thrown away. A very German touch. I expected
+him to offer to repay me; but he spared me that and let me continue the
+story. When I came to the closing part, I made the most of Hans' share,
+declaring that if it had not been for him the result would have been
+very serious, and that he had acted like the brave man he was.
+
+It made an impression; but he did not evince anything like as much
+interest as in the other parts.
+
+"You've left out one thing, haven't you, my boy? Something that pleased
+me exceedingly and set me thinking. I mean about your being able to
+drive the car. Nita says you not only drove like an expert, but were
+able to put the engine right."
+
+Nita had much better have held her tongue, was my thought. "I was
+awfully perplexed about it myself afterwards," I replied, feeling
+deucedly uncomfortable.
+
+"You haven't had anything to do with cars since you came, have you?"
+
+"Not a thing, of course. That's what worried me. I just went up to it
+as if it was the most natural thing in the world--I didn't have to
+touch the engine, though--and got in and drove it."
+
+"You see what it means, of course. Why, that it was an instinctive
+recurrence of memory. It was most fortunate."
+
+That was a matter of opinion, however; but as we reached the house then
+no more was said about it.
+
+At lunch all the talk was on the subject of the scrap. They were full
+of it, and went over the ground again and again until one might have
+thought I had won the Iron Cross by some conspicuous act of most
+gallant bravery and resource.
+
+That was the sentimental side, and, at first, when the Baron and I were
+alone afterwards smoking in his sanctum, he grew even more
+embarrassingly flattering. "It's no good your trying to belittle the
+affair, my dear boy. If it hadn't been for you, Heaven alone knows what
+would have happened to my wife and Nita. I haven't a doubt that it
+would have killed the wife. She is not strong; she has been very ill;
+and is only just pulling round. The marvel is that she hasn't
+collapsed, as it is."
+
+I tried to protest, but he wouldn't listen to me.
+
+"I tell you my blood runs cold when I think what those devils would
+have done if they had got hold of her. I know that sort of Berliners;
+they'd have torn the clothes off her back and mauled and beaten her
+without mercy. And it was only the fortunate fact that you were present
+and acted so bravely that saved her. I shall never forget it; never;
+and if there's anything I can ever do to prove that I mean what I say,
+I shall grip the chance with both hands."
+
+"You are very kind, sir."
+
+"Don't talk in that way about kindness. I should be an ungrateful brute
+if I did not mean it. You can judge how I feel when I tell you that if
+my son had lived I would have him just like you;" and there was
+moisture in his eyes as he stretched out his hand and wrung mine
+impulsively.
+
+That he was in earnest it seemed impossible to doubt. He sat looking at
+me steadily for a while and then surprised me. He leant forward and
+fixed his eyes on mine. "I want to ask you a question. Are you sure you
+have never seen me before?"
+
+Rosa's warning flashed across my thoughts. This might be a trap; so I
+returned his look with equal steadiness and shook my head. "I don't
+recollect it, sir."
+
+"Try to think. Try hard. Look back over the years to when you were a
+boy."
+
+Of course I "tried," and equally of course failed.
+
+He dropped back in his chair with a sigh which seemed to breathe the
+essence of sincere regret, and after a moment said with almost equal
+earnestness:
+
+"You know all I have said to you; you believe it, believe that I am
+really a friend to you?"
+
+"Of course, sir. No one could speak as you have otherwise," I replied,
+smiling. It was a queer question.
+
+"Then, believing it, is there anything you would care to tell me?"
+
+What the dickens did this mean? I smothered my doubts under another
+smile and then nodded. "There is one thing, sir." His face lighted and
+he was all expectation and interest on the instant.
+
+"It's about the man you mentioned yesterday--Count von Erstein."
+
+His look changed directly. All the light and eagerness died away and he
+put his cigar back in his lips. "Oh, about him, is it? Well?" he asked,
+as if the subject didn't interest him in the slightest.
+
+But he listened carefully to the account of the interview with von
+Erstein, squinting at me curiously whenever Nessa's name was mentioned,
+and seemed sufficiently interested to put some questions about her.
+
+"An ugly story, my boy, very ugly; although I'm not much surprised,
+knowing the man. But why have you told me?"
+
+"Because I wish you to be prepared if he still tries to carry out his
+infernal scheme."
+
+He smiled. "And because you're naturally indignant, eh?"
+
+"I am. For my cousin's sake. The two are very old friends."
+
+"I see. Then it's not for the girl's own sake?"
+
+What the deuce was he driving at? His manner kept me guessing all the
+time. "Partly for her sake, of course. That sort of beastliness always
+makes me wild."
+
+"I can understand that, my boy, and am glad to hear it. Just what I
+should expect of you. Is she pretty?"
+
+"I suppose she is in an English way," I replied, shrugging.
+
+"It's not because she _is_ English that you feel like this?"
+
+"I hope I should feel much the same if she was a Hottentot, sir."
+
+"I wish all our young fellows were the same. Well, for your sake, I'll
+see that she comes to no harm. I presume, however, that you are quite
+sure she is not really a spy? Very serious, just now, you know."
+
+"My cousin is, and she has known her many years."
+
+"Then why doesn't the girl go home?"
+
+"It's her one absorbing wish, sir. She has been trying for months to
+get permission, but von Erstein has managed to stop it."
+
+He nodded once or twice and leant back in his chair thinking until he
+glanced at the clock and rose. "Time's up. I must get back. I make a
+point of being back always to the tick. It's a hobby of mine. I'll
+think over all you've told me, for I'm interested in it; far more so
+than you may imagine. I'll make an inquiry or two about this Miss
+Caldicott, and if it's all right, she shall go home. You can tell your
+cousin so. But it's a long way and a bad time for her to travel alone."
+
+"I don't think she would mind that a bit, sir."
+
+"You make a very earnest champion, my boy; but let me give you a hint.
+Don't let any one else get the same idea. I mustn't take you away with
+me now, unless you wish to make an enemy of my wife. You must stay and
+be heroized for a while. Now mind, don't fail to come to me, if you're
+in any sort of difficulty," he said.
+
+"I certainly will come, sir."
+
+As we went out into the hall and were shaking hands, he said, "By the
+way, I've had the doctor's report about you; and Gorlitz is very strong
+about our sending you to England to see if the environment would bring
+your memory back. What think you?"
+
+It was all I could manage to prevent him seeing what I did think of it
+in reality, but I stammered, "I'm quite in your hands, sir."
+
+He laughed softly and with such meaning. "Perhaps we could kill two
+birds with one stone, then. How would it do for you to take this Miss
+Caldicott there with you?" And without waiting to hear my reply he
+went, leaving me in such amazement that I could have almost shouted for
+joy.
+
+But did he mean it? Or was it just a subtle test? A trap? I was
+worrying over this when his daughter came out to fetch me in for the
+"heroizing" business.
+
+Nita was quite a pretty girl, and now that she had recovered from the
+previous day's shock and had a rich colour in her cheeks and brightly
+shining eyes, I wasn't surprised at Hans' infatuation.
+
+"I do so want to speak to you alone," she said. "I want to thank----"
+
+"My dear young lady, no one has been doing anything else since I
+entered the house. Do give me a breathing space."
+
+She laughed; and a particularly sweet merry laugh it was. "I
+understand; but this is something special; something else, I mean."
+
+"Oh! Shall I guess?"
+
+With a start and a vivid blush she dropped her eyes, fiddled nervously
+with her blouse for a moment, and then looked up and laughed again. "I
+don't mind your guessing," she challenged.
+
+"Something to do with----"
+
+She interrupted with some vigorous nods. "You did tell some taradiddles
+though. Hans didn't really do anything. I saw it all."
+
+"If he had not rushed up to me just when I called him, my dear young
+lady, none of us would have got out of the scrape as easily as we did,"
+I said seriously. It would never do for her to think small beer of her
+lover. "It was that and the way he went for the brutes that decided
+everything and sent them scuttling off."
+
+"But he didn't do anything, Herr Lassen!"
+
+"Do you mean to tell me you didn't see him knock that dark brute, the
+biggest of them I mean, head foremost into the gutter?"
+
+"Did he really?" she cried, open-eyed.
+
+"If you didn't see that, you can't have seen everything as you said."
+
+"But he told me he hadn't a chance to do a thing."
+
+"Bravo, Hans!" I exclaimed. "Just like him. You wouldn't expect him to
+spread himself and swagger about his own pluck, would you?"
+
+But all roads lead to Rome and so did this one. "He declared it was all
+your own doing, and after the way you fought before, I----"
+
+"Come along, let's go to your mother," I broke in, and linking my arm
+in hers I moved toward the drawing-room door. "Hans is one of the best;
+if he weren't, he wouldn't be so ready to give me the credit for what
+he himself did. But we can't have that, you know."
+
+She held me back a moment. "What you said about him has done wonders
+with mother; changed her right round; and we're going together to the
+von Reblings. Oh, I _do_ thank you so!" and being only a kid she
+squeezed my arm ecstatically.
+
+I had to endure a bout of "heroizing," but something came out in the
+course of it that made me put my thinking cap on afterwards. Nita
+playing chorus to her mother's praise as she repeated some of the
+pretty things von Gratzen had said to her about me.
+
+"I've never heard him speak in such a way of any one in my life
+before," she declared; "and he is so grieved about your extraordinary
+loss of memory. I think he is even rather provoked about it. He was in
+England as a young man, you know, and has made several visits there in
+later years."
+
+"I did not know that," I said, pricking up my ears.
+
+"He loves to talk of the country and the people, and, as you have just
+come from there, I am sure he is bitterly disappointed because you
+can't tell him about the things you saw and the people you met and all
+the rest of it."
+
+"It would have been very interesting to me too," I said.
+
+"You don't know how long you were there, I suppose?"
+
+I shook my head. It seemed less mean somehow to do that than to lie
+outright in words; and it answered all the purpose quite as well.
+
+"It must be a dreadful thing to lose one's memory," put in Nita.
+
+"It makes everything very difficult," I said with a shrug. It did.
+
+"And yet you can remember everything that's happened since, can't you?"
+she persisted.
+
+"Perfectly. As perfectly as if I had never had that shock."
+
+"It _is_ odd."
+
+Her mother took up the running again then. "My husband thinks you must
+have been a very long time in England," she said.
+
+"That's very interesting. Why does he?"
+
+"I don't know exactly. Of course it can only be a guess. But he
+declares you are much more like an Englishman than one of us. I fancy
+it's your reserved manner; the way he said you pronounced English to
+him; and then your knowing something of the English words of command.
+In fact he took you for an Englishman at first; and he questioned me
+ever so closely, almost cross-examined me indeed, as I told him, about
+your fighting yesterday, the way you used your fists, and so on. I was
+quite amused."
+
+My feeling was anything but amusement, however. "It's a thousand pities
+I can't tell him anything."
+
+To my surprise this seemed to make her laugh, and I thought it prudent
+to join in the laugh. But it was something else which had tickled her.
+"There was one thing he insisted upon worrying us both about. You
+remember, Nita?"
+
+"Do you mean the kicking, mother?" The latter nodded and Nita
+continued. "I thought it awfully funny, Herr Lassen, to tell the truth;
+at least I should have done if it had been any one else; but father
+always has a strong motive in such things. If he asked me one question
+he must have asked fifty, I'm sure, taking me right over every incident
+of yesterday, to find out whether in beating off those awful men you
+had ever once used your feet. I told him I was sure you hadn't; and he
+seemed to think it was a most extraordinary thing for a German to have
+used only his fists. Don't you think it silly?"
+
+"I don't know quite what to think of it," I replied truthfully.
+
+"For shame, Nita, your father is never silly," said her mother
+severely; but Nita had her own opinion about that, judging by the pout
+and shrug which the rebuke called forth.
+
+There was a moment's pause, and this offered me a chance to change the
+subject by putting a question about the war work which both were doing;
+and soon afterwards I left the house.
+
+It was clear as mud in a wineglass that von Gratzen was still undecided
+about me. That close questioning about my method of fighting was
+disquieting; so was the reference to my reserved English manner; and
+the reference to my pronunciation, especially as I had rather plumed
+myself on my American accent. It all pointed to the conclusion that my
+nationality was suspect in his opinion.
+
+He had been in England, too, and I myself knew how well he spoke the
+language. Altogether he was probably as well able to spot an Englishman
+as any one in the whole of Berlin. And yet all the while I had been
+flattering myself that he had been completely hoodwinked.
+
+At the same time no one could have shown me greater kindness. That he
+was really grateful for the previous day's affair was beyond doubt; it
+had appeared so to me anyhow; and his implied offer of help--that I
+should go to him in any trouble--made with such earnestness as to
+amount almost to insistence, all suggested an intention to be a friend.
+
+There was the reference to Nessa, again; his ready promise that she
+should be sent home "for my sake," and the startling proposal at the
+very last moment, that she should go in my charge, which had literally
+taken my breath away.
+
+What was one to think? It was a very puzzle of puzzles, especially in
+view of the unreliable vagaries of German officials in general and of
+what Rosa and the rest had said about von Gratzen in particular.
+
+What a lovely mix up it would be if his suggestion materialized and
+Nessa and I were packed off together under official protection! It
+seemed a million times too good to be even thinkable. Compared with
+such a gloriously gorgeous plan, our little conspiracy scheme seemed
+almost contemptibly mean and commonplace; scarcely worth bothering
+about for a moment. But it was best to have as many strings to the bow
+as possible, so I went to the von Reblings' to hear if Rosa had
+anything to tell me about it.
+
+Ought the others to be told of the fresh development? It seemed better
+not for the present. It was hard luck to have to keep such stunning
+news secret, but there was nothing to be gained by raising Nessa's
+hopes until they were virtually certain to be fulfilled. What would she
+think of the notion? I hoped I could guess. Being a bit of a sanguine
+ass, I started castle-building on the foundation, and by the time the
+Karlstrasse was reached, I had planned, built, and furnished a very
+noble edifice indeed.
+
+Old Gretchen opened the door as usual, and her look and start of
+surprise and general manner, suggesting something uncommonly like
+consternation, brought me down to earth and shattered my castle
+effectively.
+
+"They are not at home, sir," she declared hurriedly; and instead of
+opening the door wide, she held it so as really to block my entrance.
+Her obvious nervousness probably accounted for a step which at once
+roused suspicions.
+
+"No one at all?"
+
+"No, sir. They will not be home until late."
+
+"That's a nuisance; but I'd better speak to Miss Caldicott."
+
+"She's not in either, sir." The reply was given hesitatingly, and she
+made as if to shut the door.
+
+A smile and a casual, "Oh well, it doesn't matter," put her off her
+guard and her relief was shown in her change of look. "Can I give them
+any message, sir?" she asked. But her relief vanished and gave place to
+greater concern than ever when I pushed the door open and stepped
+inside.
+
+"That's a good idea, Gretchen; I'll write them a little note," I said,
+as I passed her in the direction of the drawing-room.
+
+She slipped before me and stood by the library. "You'll find paper and
+everything here, sir," she smirked.
+
+It looked as if she wanted to keep me from the drawing-room; and it was
+not difficult to guess that she had been disturbed at her spy work
+there. It was a bad shot, however; for during the pause there came the
+murmur of voices in the drawing-room itself.
+
+"You must be wrong, Gretchen. They must have come in without your
+knowing. I can hear them."
+
+"Oh, no, sir. The door's locked. I have orders always to keep it locked
+when the Countess is not at home;" and she held up the key in proof and
+slipped between me and the door.
+
+I started with a great appearance of alarm and pushed past her. "Then
+there's a thief in the house," I exclaimed.
+
+At that instant there was the sound of some sort of commotion in the
+drawing-room; a cry of "How dare you?" in Nessa's voice, followed by a
+sneering laugh, uncommonly like von Erstein's.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"LIKE OLD TIMES"
+
+
+I snatched the key from Gretchen, who was now very white and shaky,
+opened the drawing-room door and was going to rush in, when it occurred
+to me that if Nessa was caught off her guard, she might let out
+something.
+
+"All right, Gretchen, thank you," I said, loudly enough for Nessa to
+hear.
+
+The woman flung up her hands and bolted, and I went in as if making an
+ordinary call.
+
+Nessa had rushed into the conservatory to escape from von Erstein and
+came back as I entered, her face flushed and her eyes ablaze with
+furious indignation, while he, dumbfounded and looking as black as
+thunder, scowled at me viciously.
+
+"This man has grossly insulted me, Herr Lassen!" she cried. "Taking
+advantage of the Countess's absence, he got me here on the pretence of
+a message to be given to her, and then---- Ugh! I can't speak it;" and
+she dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+
+"I only took your advice, Lassen, and asked Miss Caldicott to marry
+me," he said sullenly. "And then she----"
+
+"Did you advise that?" broke in Nessa, starting up excitedly.
+
+That wasn't the moment to explain things, of course. Something had to
+be attended to first. I walked up to von Erstein with intentional
+deliberation, feeling a little thrill of joy at the fright in his eyes,
+put my hand on the collar of his coat, and led him towards the door. He
+was too abjectly scared to make more than the merest show of resistance.
+
+"Have you anything more to say to him?" I asked Nessa, halting when we
+reached the door.
+
+"No, no. Only send him away. Send him away," she exclaimed.
+
+I took him out into the hall and then released him. "I'm going to
+thrash you, von Erstein. Two reasons. You made your spy here lock this
+door so that you could have that girl to yourself; and yesterday you
+said things which made me itch to thrash you then."
+
+"I didn't mean----"
+
+"That'll do. Don't tell any more lies."
+
+He tried to bluster. "You'd better not strike me, Lassen; I can----"
+
+A smack on the face, given with all my strength, caused the threat to
+die stillborn and also showed the stuff he was made of. He pretended
+that the force of it knocked him down and nothing would induce him to
+get up again. So the fight ended where it began, as I couldn't hit him
+while he lay on the ground. Regretting that the one smack had been such
+a poor one, I dragged him into the hall, plopped him on to the doormat,
+and chucked him his hat, swearing that if he stopped in Berlin, the job
+would be finished in workmanlike fashion. He squirmed there long enough
+to see that no more was coming, then opened the door, paused to curse
+and threaten me, and bolted.
+
+Nessa was furious, and her first question showed that some of her anger
+was for me. Von Erstein's little shaft about my "advice" had gone home.
+"Is what that man said true? Did you advise him to ask me to marry
+him?" the emphasis strongly on the "advise."
+
+I nodded; and very naturally her lip curled.
+
+"I wouldn't have believed it possible," she exclaimed.
+
+"He told me yesterday about things and I asked him if he had asked you.
+If that's advising, I advised."
+
+"And yet you know the kind of man he is and that he has been
+persecuting me in this fashion?"
+
+"But anyhow I didn't advise you to accept him."
+
+"Jack!" she cried indignantly.
+
+"Herr Lassen's safer, and in German too."
+
+"It's almost enough to make me say I'll never speak to you again."
+
+"Worse than he is, eh?" It was really a curious thing, but we never
+seemed able to resist a chance of misunderstanding one another; and
+when she took this line, it was impossible for me to resist chipping
+her.
+
+"Did you thrash him?" she asked after a pause.
+
+"No; not an easy job in the circs."
+
+"You've developed a wise discretion," she said with a smile which
+wasn't exactly soothing.
+
+"He's a fellow with a lot of influence, you see."
+
+There was one feature about our tiffs; they generally ended all right;
+and this time she seemed to realize that we were off the lines. She
+thought a while and her manner changed. "Do you want me to believe that
+after what happened here and what I said, you just thanked him and
+shook hands? Because I don't believe it. I heard you hit him. That's
+why I asked if you'd thrashed him."
+
+"I smacked his face, as a sort of preface, but he lay down and wouldn't
+get up, so I had to cart him out to the front door. A poor show; but I
+fancy he'll give me a wide berth in the future. Would you care to tell
+me what passed?"
+
+"He sent up that woman, Gretchen, to say that he was leaving Berlin and
+that the Countess had given him a message for me about something she
+had of his. I was only too thankful to hear he was going away, and when
+I got down, she locked the door. It was all planned, of course; and he
+asked me to marry him, and when I gave him his answer, he grabbed hold
+of me and kissed me. I broke from him and rushed into the conservatory,
+intending to get out that way into the garden; but he had fastened the
+window, and when I was trying to get it open, you came, thank Heaven."
+
+"I guessed that was about the size of it."
+
+"I was never more relieved in my life."
+
+"Even though it was only me."
+
+"Yes, even though it was only you." This with a smile, however, which
+quite belied her indifferent tone.
+
+"Well, it's all right now. As a matter of fact he has found it wise to
+leave in consequence of a hint I gave him yesterday."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+"Better let it wait a while." There was nothing to be gained by telling
+her the truth. "I came to see if there is any news."
+
+"There is, unfortunately. I've received an order from the police to
+report myself to-morrow."
+
+"The deuce you have! I wonder what that means. Who signed it?"
+
+"Baron von Gratzen."
+
+I stared at her in amazement. Confound the man. Here he was cropping up
+again in this mysteriously unexpected fashion. "When did you get it?"
+
+"Only a minute or two before that man called."
+
+What on earth could it mean? It looked as if he had gone straight from
+his promise to help her to leave and then sent this. "Where have you to
+report?"
+
+"The Amtstrasse," and she handed me the paper. It came from his offices
+and was signed in his own handwriting.
+
+"I give it up. These beggars beat me every time. Only an hour or two
+back he told me that you should be sent back home," and I told her
+about that part of the interview and that he had said I could tell
+Rosa. "It's true he said something about making some inquiries about
+you, so as to be satisfied you're not a spy."
+
+"Then of course he's going to begin by questioning me himself."
+
+"Possibly, but--I get such different reports about him. You'll have to
+look out, too. He's sure to cross-examine you about me. I can't get it
+out of my head that he suspects I'm flying under the wrong flag. You'd
+better never have seen me before, mind; and whatever you do, look out
+for traps and things; and he's as artful as a cartload of monkeys at
+the game."
+
+She was tremendously excited by the news about going home. I had to
+repeat every word he had said about it, and of course she got out of me
+that he had spoken about our going home together.
+
+"Oh, wouldn't that be lovely!" she exclaimed.
+
+"To go with me?"
+
+"To go with any one, of course," she said with sudden indifference. "If
+you'd been through half that I have and had a quarter of the suspense
+I've had to endure, you'd be glad too."
+
+"I'm glad enough, as it is. I think this beastly climate is anything
+but healthy for either of us just now."
+
+"Oh, to be free once more!" she cried with a deep, deep sigh of
+longing. "Do you know that more than once I've been on the point of
+risking everything and just bolting and chancing my luck."
+
+"Which reminds me that I'd better tell you the spare wheels I've been
+thinking about, if these other tyres burst. I haven't had much chance
+of talking to you yet, you know."
+
+"We had one interview," she reminded me, her eye dancing.
+
+"We'll try to do a bit better this time. The best thing will be old von
+Gratzen's scheme, if it comes off."
+
+"We should have to be together a long time, if it does."
+
+"Rather rotten, eh? But I could bear it, I think, if you could."
+
+"I should have to, naturally."
+
+"We could discuss our old grievances, at the worst."
+
+"And at the best?" she said demurely, trying not to laugh.
+
+"Find fresh ones to jingle-jangle about. But you'll have to behave
+yourself; for I shall be a German for the first part of the trip,
+remember."
+
+"And if you don't behave yourself, I can tell people you're not one.
+You'll have to remember that, mind."
+
+"Behave myself? Meaning?"
+
+"That you're not to talk nonsense then or now; so go on to the spare
+wheels, please."
+
+"All right. The next best will be for you to use Rosa's ticket and so
+on, and travel with her Oscar."
+
+"But Rosa said you wouldn't hear of that, and you don't imagine I'm
+going to let the man run that risk for me. Any more wheels?"
+
+"One. That if the worst comes to the worst, we just disappear and
+chance the weather;" and I described my idea--to go in disguise as a
+couple of mechanics.
+
+"They're using a lot of women, but not as mechanics yet," she said.
+
+I laughed. "But you'd go as a boy, Nessa."
+
+"As a what?" she cried in amazement.
+
+"I said boy. B-o-y. Easy word."
+
+She stared at me for a moment or two as if I was mad, and then her eyes
+lit up and she burst out laughing. "Do you know why I'm laughing?"
+
+"At me, probably."
+
+"Not a bit of it. Because it's exactly the idea I had. I have the
+clothes ready for it and a set of overalls; and often and often I've
+locked myself in my room, dressed up, and rehearsed everything. You
+know how I've played a boy's part in the theatricals at home; I can
+shove my hands in my pockets and swagger along just like one. I make
+rather a good boy."
+
+"Good?"
+
+"Good enough for a boy, anyhow," she replied, laughing again.
+
+"Show me."
+
+She rose, pushed hands down as if into her trouser pockets, and walked
+up and down the room with a free stride. "Give us a fag, mate," she
+said when she reached me. "That all right?" she asked, relapsing into
+herself and sitting down again.
+
+"Rather! Ripping! Why, you managed somehow to alter the very
+expression." She had. The change was wonderful. "With a touch or two of
+make-up not a soul would spot you. But you were always a bit of a boy,
+you know. Perhaps that accounts for it."
+
+"That meant for a compliment?"
+
+"Just as you take it. You were a self-willed little beggar, anyhow. Do
+you remember how shocked your mother was that night at the Grahams,
+when you came on their little stage as a boy?"
+
+"I do, indeed. Poor mother! She must have been awfully worried by all
+this; and is still, of course. But Rosa has written to a friend in
+Switzerland and asked her to wire that I'm all right; and perhaps by
+this time she's had the message. It's horribly wicked, I suppose, but I
+declare I feel so vindictive that I could almost kill that woman
+Gretchen and von Erstein too, when I think of what they've made poor
+mother suffer by stopping my letters."
+
+"He's a low-down swine; and if I get half a chance, I'll even things up
+with him before we leave. But we don't want to talk about him now. If
+your mother's got that wire, she'll feel heaps better. Now, tell me
+what you think of my third wheel?"
+
+"Shall I tell you the truth?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+She paused and the colour crept slowly into her face, robbing it of the
+worried anxiety which had so distressed me and making her as
+bewitchingly pretty as ever in my eyes. "If you will have the truth
+I'd--I'd like the third wheel better than either of the others."
+
+"Same here; but it wouldn't be so safe. We'll have the props with us,
+however, in case of mishaps. What say you?"
+
+"Carried unanimously," she cried enthusiastically. "It would be lovely!"
+
+"You haven't changed much, then, even with all this."
+
+"Do you mean in looks?"
+
+"Not much there, even; but I meant in the tomboy business."
+
+"Ah, you don't know. I have changed. I've grown up, suddenly. It
+couldn't be otherwise," she answered very seriously. "At one time it
+looked a certainty that I should be sent to gaol, and the suspense
+was--well, almost unbearable. No one can tell what it meant to have to
+appear indifferent and confident, when I knew that any moment might be
+my last in freedom. That danger seemed to pass away, but only to give
+way to worse."
+
+"You mean this----"
+
+"Yes," she broke in with a quick nod. "I can't bear even to hear his
+name mentioned. I soon knew what his real object was; he has a friend,
+a man like himself, who is in command of one of the concentration
+camps: the one at Krustadt: and--but you can guess. There was only one
+thing for me to do, and I prepared for it. I have the poison upstairs."
+
+"Nessa!"
+
+"No woman can go through such an ordeal and come out unchanged. I
+should have made a fight for it, of course. I told Rosa, and, although
+she was horrified at first, she saw it afterwards, and then she got
+Herr Feldmann to get me an identification card as Hans Bulich, and
+helped me get the disguise. I should have gone by now, if you hadn't
+come. Oh yes, I'm changed; no one knows how much except myself."
+
+The drawn intentness of her expression at the moment showed this so
+plainly that I was too much moved to find any words to reply. But she
+rallied quickly and laughed.
+
+"And then when you came I was mad enough to believe you were a spy! I
+can't think why I was such a fool. There was no excuse; not the
+slightest; and I don't expect you ever to forgive me really."
+
+"I don't blame you. I don't, on my honour."
+
+"Well, I shall never forgive myself then. But--even now I can't help
+staring at you."
+
+"Stare away. I like it. But why?"
+
+"You're so--so utterly different."
+
+"How?"
+
+"In every way possible."
+
+"Think so. Every way?" Our eyes met and she looked down.
+
+"I wonder," she murmured under her breath; and then quickly in a louder
+tone: "Of course it's your new life. Tell me about it."
+
+We both understood; but that wasn't the time to tell her she need not
+"wonder"; so I spoke about things at the Front.
+
+"But I want your own experiences, Jack," she protested.
+
+"I'm Herr Lassen, the man without a memory."
+
+"You're just as provoking as ever. You know that I'm dying to hear
+everything, and you won't utter a word."
+
+"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It was all your doing."
+
+She crinkled her forehead in a way I knew so well. "How?"
+
+"Do you remember one day at Hendon--we were engaged then, by the
+by--how you ragged me about not having the pluck to go up and about
+cricket being so much safer a sport, and how I flung away in a huff and
+marched off and got a ticket at once and went up. That was the start."
+
+"And I remember, too, what a fright it gave me when I saw you go. I
+watched the aeroplane with my heart in my mouth all the time in a sort
+of fascinated panic lest something should go wrong."
+
+"And when I came to look for you I found you'd gone up too."
+
+"You don't suppose I meant you to crow over me, do you? And was that
+really the beginning?"
+
+"Of course. I went up lots of times afterwards and got to like it; and
+when the trouble came, naturally I saw it was my job."
+
+"Be a pal, and tell me all about what you did," she coaxed.
+
+"All in good time, but not now. We've been alone together quite long
+enough to set tongues wagging as it is. I'd better be off;" and I rose.
+
+"I suppose you're right; but it's been lovely. Like old times."
+
+"Which old times?"
+
+"Never mind. Don't be inquisitive."
+
+"All right. Well, look here. Go on with that boy part of yours. Get
+into the skin of it, and have the names of things pat on your tongue.
+One never knows what may happen. And if you could persuade Rosa to
+persuade Feldmann to do for me what he did for you, do so."
+
+"Sounds a bit mixed, doesn't it?" and she laughed with such genuine
+merriment that it did one good to hear her.
+
+"You must sort it out. So long. We'll pull it off somehow or other."
+
+"I think that's the oddest thing about you. You manage somehow to make
+me feel absolutely confident that you'll manage it. It's like a
+miracle. Only a day or two ago I was right down in the depths, and here
+I am laughing as if it were just one of our old kiddish pranks."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+IN THE THIERGARTEN
+
+
+The confidence of success which Nessa had so frankly expressed, she had
+certainly imparted to me. The fact that she had already hit on the idea
+of playing a boy's part in the attempt to escape, had obtained
+everything necessary for it, and had actually spent some time in
+rehearsing it, was a stroke of such luck, that I was more than half
+inclined to throw the other plans over and adopt that one at once.
+
+If by any means the necessary identification card could be got, the
+hope of success was strong and full of promise. Nessa could speak
+German quite as well as I could, and her accent, when she had put that
+question to me about the fag and her wonderful change of expression,
+had been done to the life.
+
+She had always been a clever character actress, and there was no doubt
+that she could keep it up in any sort of emergency. That she liked the
+idea, there was no question; and as for myself--the thought of such a
+companionship with her in such a venture pulled like a 200 h.p. engine.
+
+Her instinct was right, too, in chiming with her inclination. It was
+our best chance--failing old von Gratzen's, of course. Ever so much
+better than risking any trouble for Rosa by using her passport.
+Feldmann must be made to see that, for it might induce him to get the
+card for me.
+
+That night I went most carefully into all the details of the plan,
+trying to foresee all that might happen; and then I remembered the
+story which Gunter, my pal in the flying corps, had told me of his
+escape when engine trouble had brought him down inside the German lines.
+
+"It's only a matter of bluff, Jack," he said, "when one can jabber the
+lingo as we can, and a few simple precautions. Here's one of 'em. I
+never go up without it."
+
+"What the dickens is it?" I asked as he handed me what looked like a
+red flannel pad for his tummy.
+
+"Looks innocent, doesn't it? My 'tummy pad,' I call it. Just a
+protection against chills, eh? That's what they thought when they
+searched me. But inside the flannel there's a coil of silk cord long
+enough and strong enough to tie up a man's arms, and his legs too at
+need. It's my own notion; and since my little trip, I've added
+something more. Sewn up in the flannel there's enough put-you-to-by-by
+stuff to keep a man or two quiet for as long as necessary. If I'd had
+that, I shouldn't have had to risk knocking my guard on the head and
+choking the breath out of him."
+
+"Tell me, Dick."
+
+"Well, my chance came almost as soon as they'd got me. Of course I
+burnt the old bus and shoved my hands up, and after they'd made sure I
+wasn't armed, they just put one chap in charge of me with orders to
+take me somewhere. It was quite dark then and, pretending that I was
+beastly uncomfortable after the search, I fiddled about with my clothes
+and managed to get my cord handy. Then I picked a suitable spot, asked
+him some fool question or other, and went for him. He was only a fat
+Landsturmer and hadn't more than a few wriggles in him; but I had to
+bash him over the head to make sure--that's where I wanted the dope, of
+course. Then I changed togs with him, trussed him up with my cord and
+started off on my own. Bluff did the rest, all right."
+
+"But what did you do, old dear?"
+
+He laughed and lit another cigarette. "I marched into the first cottage
+I came to, scared the folk out of their lives, and in the name of
+Kaiser Bill commandeered clothes for a wounded prisoner. They parted
+like a lamb, and five minutes afterwards I was transformed into a
+workman."
+
+"But you'd no identification card?"
+
+This brought another quiet laugh. "I worked that all right. There are
+no asses in the world too bad to bluff if you go the right way about
+it. My way was to go to the police. I pitched a yarn that I was an aero
+mechanic and had been sent for to go hotfoot to Ellendorff, a little
+place close to the Dutch frontier where I knew there was a factory, and
+that I'd been waylaid and robbed on the road. It sounds thin as I tell
+it; but I had mucked myself up to look the part, and, above all, I had
+gone to the police, mind you; itself the best proof that I wasn't a
+wrong 'un: and I chose the middle of the night, when only one sleepy
+owl was on duty. He swallowed it all right, except that he thought I
+was drunk and at first wanted to keep me till the morning; but when I
+kicked up a fuss, told him he'd get into a devil of a row, and said
+he'd better call his boss, he thought better of it, gave me what I
+wanted and was thankful to see my back and go to sleep again. I had no
+more trouble; was stopped once or twice, but the card got me through;
+and I reached the frontier easily enough. Luck favoured me there. I ran
+across a couple of deserters, palled up with them, and--well, that's
+all."
+
+Gunter's story had made a big impression on me at the time, and in my
+old student days at Goettingen I had had quite enough experiences of the
+power of a good bluff on the average German official to know that it
+was quite feasible, so I resolved to profit by it now.
+
+I had plenty of time the next day to complete all the necessary
+preparations and added a few of my own devising. These were some "iron
+rations," in case of difficulties about our food supply; two or three
+tools, including a heavy spanner which would serve as a weapon at need;
+and a shabby suit case to hold everything.
+
+I packed everything into this, lifted a board under the lino in my
+bathroom, and hid it there, lest any one in my absence might take a
+fancy to go through my luggage.
+
+With a road map and a railway guide the route to be taken was soon
+decided. The Dutch frontier was to be the goal. It was much nearer than
+the Swiss; and as Westphalia was the region of factories, it was much
+more plausible that a couple of mechanics would travel that way, than
+in any other direction.
+
+Gunter's mention of the one at Ellendorff, a village near Lingen, and
+close to the frontier, suggested a good objective; and the rough idea
+was to make the journey in stages, so as to put people off the scent
+should suspicion be roused. It was safer than risking a trip in one of
+the through expresses, and also much easier to book from small towns
+than right through from Berlin.
+
+All this took up a lot of time, especially as it was interrupted by
+several spells of speculation about the result of Nessa's interview
+with von Gratzen. This was very important, as it would probably
+determine the method of our departure; and when my preparations were
+completed and I was carefully reconsidering them over a cigarette, some
+one knocked at the door of my flat.
+
+It was a stranger; a well-dressed, sharp-featured man and unmistakably
+a Jew. "Herr Lassen?" he asked. I nodded. "My name is Rudolff."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It would be better for me to tell you my business privately," he
+replied, with a gesture toward a couple of people passing on the stairs.
+
+I took him into my sitting-room with an extremely uncomfortable notion
+that he was from the police.
+
+"I am in a position to do you a considerable service, Herr Lassen," he
+said, squinting curiously round the room.
+
+"Who sent you to me and how did you know where to find me?"
+
+"Your arrival in the city is scarcely a secret, and I obtained your
+address from your friends in the Karlstrasse. No one sent me to you,
+sir."
+
+He wasn't from the police. That was a relief, and nothing else
+mattered. "And the service you spoke of?"
+
+"You will not be surprised to hear that a number of people wish to find
+you?"
+
+"As it's been easy for you, would it be difficult for them?"
+
+"Not so difficult as you might desire, perhaps. I say that because you
+appear somewhat to resent my visit. If that is really the case, of
+course I will go."
+
+"I don't care whether you go or stop; but if you've anything that you
+think worth telling, tell it. I'll listen. I presume you haven't come
+out of mere philanthropy, by the way."
+
+"I have not. I make no pretence of the sort. If the warning I can give
+you is worth anything, I am not so rich as to throw money away."
+
+"Out with it then." It was not only curiosity which prompted me to
+listen. It was probable that he was going to tell me some lurid
+incident of Lassen's past, and it was just as well to hear it. It was
+also quite possible that after all he might come from von Gratzen with
+the object of catching me tripping. His question suggested that.
+
+"It was at Goettingen, I believe, that you made the acquaintance of
+Adolf Gossen?"
+
+"I dare say, but I don't remember anything about it,"
+
+"Ah, of course. You are the man without a memory. I have heard of your
+misfortune," he said, with a sly suggestive glance.
+
+"And doubt it, eh? Well, suppose you get on with the story?"
+
+He took the hint, and it turned out to be about the same pretty affair
+von Erstein had made so much of. It seemed, according to my visitor,
+that some one was in prison because of it; that his friends, whose
+names he gave, were furious; that they were looking high and low for
+me; and that if I remained in Berlin they would find me and wreak their
+vengeance in any way that came handy. He declared he knew where to find
+them and they were prepared to pay for the information of my
+whereabouts.
+
+The thing was either a palpable plant or this fellow had come from von
+Erstein to try and frighten me out of the city.
+
+"Of course you mean that if I don't pay you, you will go to them?"
+
+"Not at all, sir," he cried, with a fine show of indignation. "I know
+these people to be scoundrels; they have treated me villainously; I
+have merely come to warn you. You can act upon it or not, of course.
+That is entirely a matter for you;" and to my surprise he got up
+without asking a mark for his news. "I have done all that I can do by
+coming."
+
+"I don't know anything about the affair, as I told you, but I'm very
+much obliged to you;" and I took out my pocket-book as a hint.
+
+"Pardon me, sir," he exclaimed, flourishing his hands as if the sight
+of banknotes was an abomination, and shaking his head vigorously. "I
+could not think of accepting any money after what you have said. Good
+afternoon;" and he was still gesturing at the shock of the idea when he
+left the flat.
+
+This was so extremely unnatural for a German Jew that it prompted
+suspicion. He had probably meant this pecuniary shyness as a startling
+proof of his honesty of purpose and general integrity.
+
+That wasn't the effect it produced, however. It rather served to
+confirm the previous thought that von Erstein had sent him to scare me.
+That the brute would do almost anything to see my back was a certainty,
+of course; and then an odd notion flitted across my thoughts.
+
+Whether it would be worth while to appear to tumble into the trap; go
+to him in the very dickens of a funk; make him believe my one object
+was to fly the country, in disguise, to Holland preferably; and get him
+to procure the necessary permit, etc. The possibility of hoisting him
+with his own petard looked good; and the thought of his chagrin when he
+discovered that he had helped me to take Nessa out of his clutches made
+the scheme positively alluring.
+
+That it could be done, there was little doubt, and equally none that he
+could get the necessary papers; but the price to pay for them was too
+stiff. To have anything to do with such a mongrel was unthinkable so
+long as any other course was open; so I abandoned it until every other
+means had been tried.
+
+The pressing question now was the result of Nessa's interview with von
+Gratzen, and I set off for the Karlstrasse to hear about it. This time
+the door was opened by the girl Marie; so I concluded that Gretchen had
+either bolted or been sent about her business as the result of the
+previous day's affair. Marie told me no one was at home and that Rosa
+had gone with Nessa and Lottchen to the Thiergarten.
+
+I soon found them; and Rosa played the part of the good fairy and kept
+the child with her while Nessa told me the news.
+
+"First let me tell you the good news," she said.
+
+"Do you mean that the other's bad then?"
+
+"Do have a little patience. The main thing is that Rosa has induced
+Herr Feldmann to say where we can get the things you want. Isn't that
+splendid?"
+
+"Yes, if you are able to get away with me; and that may depend on what
+passed to-day. Is it all right?"
+
+"You might as well ask me a riddle in Russian. Frankly I don't know
+what to make of it. Of course it was to see Baron von Gratzen that I
+had to go to the Amtstrasse. He seemed all right, but----" and she
+shrugged her shoulders and frowned.
+
+"That's just the impression he always leaves on me."
+
+"He was awfully kind in his manner; but it was lucky you warned me to
+be careful, for he kept popping in some question about you just when I
+wasn't expecting it, and whether I gave you away I can't say. I don't
+think I did; but then I'm not at all sure he didn't see that I was
+fencing."
+
+"What did he talk about?"
+
+"Oh, he told me first that some one had declared I was really a spy;
+asked why I had stopped so long here? Didn't I want to go home? and so
+on. Of course that was all easy enough; but I think he was only trying
+to let me get over my nervousness; for, of course, I was awfully
+nervous; and at last he said he believed my story entirely, in fact
+that he knew it was the truth; that I wasn't to worry; that I need only
+report myself once a week; that it was the merest formality; and that
+probably I should never have to do it all, as he was pretty sure I
+should be sent home before the first day for reporting arrived."
+
+"And was that all?"
+
+"Rather not; only the preface; and, mind you, he hadn't said a word
+about you up to then, not even mentioned your name."
+
+"What came next then?"
+
+"He asked me to talk about England and the English, saying that he had
+been there a lot and knew heaps of people; and then you came into the
+picture."
+
+"Did he ask about me, do you mean?"
+
+"Are you telling the story or am I?" and she rallied me with a smile
+which was good to see. She was much more like the Nessa of old times,
+was in good spirits, and had thrown off much of the worrying load of
+depression. "I don't know whether you've done it, but to-day somehow I
+can't take things seriously."
+
+"That's as it should be; but how did he bring me in?"
+
+"Well, he was either acting better than I could or he was perfectly
+sincere. What he did was to talk about people, mentioning a lot of
+names and asking me whether I knew any of them, and in the most casual
+tone in the world out popped yours."
+
+"Lassen?"
+
+"Of course not; your own, Lancaster."
+
+"Phew! That's a caution, if you like. What did you say?"
+
+She laughed softly. "I think I was one too many for him then. You see
+he'd prepared the ground in a way by mentioning people I'd never heard
+of, so I just shook my head, then pretended to think and said I wasn't
+sure that my mother had not known some Lancasters. He'd been so decent,
+that that seemed easier than just lying outright. He was eager for more
+and asked me to try and remember, as he had a very particular reason
+for being interested in them; but that looked dangerous, so I thought
+it best not to remember anything else Lancastrian."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Don't rush me. I could tell that I was over that bridge all right; but
+it was only the first. After a bit he brought up Jimmy Lamb's name, and
+I laughed and clapped my hands and said he was my brother-in-law. Why,
+what's the matter? Was that wrong?" she cried, noticing my frown.
+
+"Perhaps not, but it was Jimmy's passport I was to use, and he's
+supposed to have gone down in the _Burgen_. It won't matter,
+probably."
+
+"I'd forgotten all about that. No wonder he was interested and poured a
+volley of questions into me about him. But that was all safe enough,
+because I haven't heard a word about Jimmy since I've been here, and
+naturally couldn't tell him anything. One of them was whether Jimmy
+knew the Lancasters, by the by. And I can see why he asked it."
+
+Unpleasantly ominous, this; since it was clear he was trying to
+establish the connection between me and Jimmy. "And after that?"
+
+"Butter wouldn't have melted in his mouth. He asked me about you as
+Lassen; safe ground again: and wound up by thanking me for having
+answered his questions so frankly; declared he was quite satisfied, and
+then, as I told you, said he would use his influence to see that I went
+home."
+
+"Anything about our going together?"
+
+"Yes. He said it might not be well for me to travel alone and asked if
+there was any one who could see me to the frontier."
+
+"You didn't suggest me?" I broke in.
+
+"Really, Herr Lassen! Do you think every English girl is a fool? I
+suggested Herr Feldmann. He shook his head, murmuring something about
+his being unable to get away; and then came the only thing that really
+scared me. 'Of course you could go in the care of some of our people,
+but it would be better not, perhaps; so difficult to spare our folks
+just now;'--all that in a sort of meditative tone, and then with a
+change which in some way altered his very features, he fixed me with a
+look which seemed to pierce like red-hot gimlets into my very brain and
+read every thought in it, and asked me to suggest some one else. I
+positively shrivelled up inside, if you know what I mean; felt like a
+fish on the end of a fork thrust suddenly into a blazing fire. I don't
+know what I said or did. It must have mesmerized me, I suppose. I think
+I shook my head and stammered out that I didn't know of any one else;
+but I can't be certain. All I clearly remember is a feeling of intense
+relief when his eyes left mine, and I heard him say something about
+seeing to the matter. I never felt anything like it in my life before;
+and if I gave you away, it was then."
+
+"I've had a look from him like that and can understand how it made you
+feel. That's why I can't place the man. Hullo, look! There come his
+wife and daughter with the Countess. We'd better join up. Won't do to
+let them think we're too thick;" and we quickened up to Rosa as the
+others reached the spot, and all stood chatting. Presently Lottchen
+drew me aside from the rest, declaring that she never saw anything of
+me now, and after a moment, Nita, attracted by the child's loveliness,
+joined us.
+
+I said something or other which made them both laugh, and just as the
+others turned round and looked at us, I had the surprise of my life.
+
+A good-looking woman was passing, holding a tot of a kid by the hand;
+she glanced at me, stopped dead with a look of profound astonishment,
+paused to stare, hands clenched and pressed to her bosom, eyes wide,
+mouth agape, and every feature set as rigid as stone.
+
+"Johann!" little more than a whisper at first, and then loudly,
+"Johann!" and without more ado she rushed up, flung her arms round my
+neck, and burst into a flood of passionate sobs mingled with equally
+passionate terms of affection.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+ANNA HILDEN
+
+
+"Johann! Johann! Oh, my dearest! Oh, thank God I have found you at
+last! Oh, my long lost darling!" raved the woman ecstatically, while
+her child ran up and clung to my coat, calling, "Papa! Papa!"
+
+A pleasant situation considering the circumstances and the fact that a
+number of other people, attracted by the woman's hysterics, began to
+cluster round us.
+
+Nita and Lottchen scurried back to our group; the two elder women were
+looking both scandalized and disgusted; and Nessa bent over Lottchen,
+scarcely able to conceal her laughter. Fortunately Rosa kept her head.
+
+Giving me first a look of scornful indignation, she said something to
+her mother and the whole group moved away.
+
+The woman's outburst of hysterical passion had quieted by then, and she
+just let her head rest upon my shoulder, feasting her rather fine eyes
+upon my face with languishing rapture.
+
+My first thought was that she was a lunatic; so I tried to unclasp her
+embrace. Gently at first, but then with considerable strength, for she
+resisted stoutly. Next I observed that for all her hysterical sobbing,
+her eyes were scarcely moist; a fact which put quite a different
+interpretation on the affair.
+
+"We don't want a scene here," I said.
+
+This had comparatively little effect and she tried to wrest her hands
+away and begin the embracing over again.
+
+"If we have any more of this, I shall call the police," I said sharply.
+This did the business. After a moment she grew less demonstrative,
+making a great to-do in the effort to check her agitation, and allowed
+me to lead her away.
+
+While we were shaking off the crowd there was time to study her and try
+to get a glimmer of the meaning of it all. Now that the hysterics were
+over, she appeared to be less emotional than perplexed. She kept her
+eyes on the ground, evidently thinking intently and taking no notice of
+the child at all, who was as unconcerned as if she didn't belong to the
+picture, except that once or twice she glanced up at the woman, as if
+wondering what to do and looking for a lead.
+
+A thought of the truth occurred to me and made me look more searchingly
+than ever at the woman's side face. Two things struck me at once. She
+was older than I had believed; a little make-up cunningly concealed
+some wrinkles, and a touch of rouge on the cheek helped to account for
+my mistake about her age; and closer inspection revealed some lines of
+grease paint close to her hair.
+
+I put her down then as a second-rate actress, and her over-acting in
+the embracing scene suggested corroboration. How the ordinary woman
+would behave on discovering her long lost lover or husband may be a
+question; but she certainly wouldn't shed tears which were carefully
+tearless out of the fear that they would spoil her make-up. It was
+obviously a plant.
+
+That wasn't altogether a comforting reflection, however. My loss of
+memory made it impossible to expose her, for the simple reason that any
+story she might choose to tell could not be contradicted.
+
+"Now I should like to know what all this means," I began when we were
+free from inquisitive lookers-on.
+
+"Do you pretend you don't recognize me?" she asked, turning her big
+blue eyes on me with a pathetic wistfulness.
+
+"Do you pretend that I ought to?"
+
+"Why did you desert me? Oh, how could you, Johann?" she wailed.
+
+"I don't even know what you mean."
+
+"Oh, but you must; you must. You loved me so; at least you swore you
+did, over and over again," she cried. "Oh, don't tell me you've
+forgotten me. I could bear anything but that."
+
+This suggested von Gratzen. It was just the sort of scheme which would
+appeal to such a wily old beggar to trap me into admission. "Who are
+you?" I asked.
+
+She clapped her hands to her face and looked like starting hysterics
+again. "Oh, you must know. You must. You can't have forgotten me! You
+can't!"
+
+"Perhaps your name will help me."
+
+With a very overdone theatrical gesture she stopped and stared at me
+and looked distracted.
+
+"I'm--Anna. Your Anna."
+
+"_My_ Anna? I didn't know I had one;" and she clapped her hands to
+her face again, but not quickly enough to hide her expression, which
+looked uncommonly like a smile. "And the surname?"
+
+"Hilden, of course," she said after a pause without looking up.
+
+This gave the clue. It was not von Gratzen's scheme but von Erstein's.
+I remembered our interview; his persistent attempt to test my memory;
+his story of Anna Hilden; his genuine anger when I had not recollected
+her; and then the sudden change of manner which had been so puzzling.
+
+He had put her up to play the part of the ruined maiden and had
+probably planned the melodramatic scene which had just taken place,
+knowing that, unless at the same time I gave myself away, I could not
+expose her. It was cunning, and put me in a beast of a mess. There
+seemed only one course--to prevail on the woman to admit the truth.
+
+"You can see for yourself that this has taken me entirely by surprise,"
+I said after a pause. "I had a very tough time of it a few weeks ago;
+the ship I was in was blown up and the explosion caused me to lose my
+memory entirely. What you have said may be absolutely true; although to
+me it seems impossible. What do you wish me to do?"
+
+"I want my rights," she replied, after a slight pause.
+
+"Well, we can scarcely discuss things here. Where do you live?"
+
+"In the Kammerplatz. 268g. No, I mean 286g;" making the correction in
+some confusion.
+
+Curious that she could not remember the right number; looked as if she
+had only just gone there for this special business. "Shall we go
+there?" I asked.
+
+She found the question unnecessarily embarrassing, hesitated and
+glanced at the child with a frown of perplexity. "I can't go home yet.
+I was just taking my little darling to some friends."
+
+She was certainly not a good actress, or she would never have implied
+that it was more important to take the child to some friends than to
+have an explanation with the false lover discovered after long years.
+"When then?" I asked, concluding that the child had been borrowed for
+the show and was to be returned with thanks at once.
+
+"Come there in an hour," she said after thinking. "You won't escape me
+again, for I know where to find you now," she added with a toss of the
+head.
+
+"I shall not try. Here's my address;" and I scribbled it on a card.
+"I'll turn up all right. I'm only too interested in what you've said
+and wish to know all you can tell me about it. I'll do the right thing
+by you, Anna;" and I held out my hand.
+
+She hesitated a second and then shook hands, her look showing that my
+words had impressed her favourably and also perplexed her.
+
+I spent the interval in the Thiergarten thinking over the whole
+unpleasant incident: the probable effect upon those who had witnessed
+it, and the line to take in the coming interview.
+
+It would serve one good turn at any rate. Von Gratzen would hear all
+about it from his wife and it ought to put an end to his suspicions. If
+the woman I had ruined could identify me as the result of a chance
+meeting, he could scarcely fail to regard it as a mighty strong
+corroboration of the Lassen theory.
+
+Both Rosa and Nessa would of course know that the story, even if it
+were true, had nothing to do with me, and what the Countess herself
+thought didn't amount to anything. The main point was what would happen
+if the woman stuck to it and how far she was prepared to go. That would
+probably depend upon the inducements or pressure brought to bear by von
+Erstein; and judging the man, pressure was the more likely.
+
+It would be easy enough to knock the bottom out of the scheme by
+bringing the police into it; her nervousness at the mention of them had
+shown that plainly. But that wouldn't suit me. The less the police had
+to meddle with my affairs, the better. No doubt an inquiry agent could
+soon get at the truth so far as the woman herself was concerned; and if
+she proved obdurate, that might be the best course. But obviously the
+quickest and best solution would be to get the woman herself to own up;
+and that must be the first line of attack.
+
+Her answer to my question what she wished me to do, suggested an idea.
+She wanted her "rights," as she phrased it; and clearly the
+straightforward course was to offer them. "Rights" meant marriage; and
+she was likely to feel in a deuce of a stew if I agreed to marry her.
+The farce of it was quite to my liking. To appear to force her into
+such a marriage with a man she had never seen in her life was rich, and
+at the same time good policy, as it would impress her with my honesty
+of purpose.
+
+I kept the appointment punctually and found her rather breathless and
+flurried. It was a mean little flat; had evidently been hastily got
+ready; and the number of things still littered about the room, told
+that I had arrived in the middle of her efforts to get it in order.
+
+She looked far less presentable without her hat and things. She was an
+untidy person, anything but clean, and made the mistake of trying to
+explain away the confusion and disorder in the place.
+
+"I didn't really believe you'd come, or I'd have had the place tidier.
+When any one has to struggle alone for a living in these times, there
+isn't much chance of keeping the home right."
+
+"Still I can see you've been doing your best."
+
+"I always have to," she replied with a quick, half-suspicious glance.
+
+"You have a hard struggle?"
+
+"Hard enough."
+
+"What do you do?"
+
+"Anything and everything I can, of course. It's hard work."
+
+Her hands offered no evidence of this, however. "Well, we must try to
+make things easier for you, Anna. Now let us talk it over."
+
+"I'll wash my hands first and tidy up a bit," and she went into the
+adjoining room, where I heard her moving some furniture into place.
+
+This gave an opportunity of scrutinizing the mean little sitting-room,
+and one fact was instantly apparent. There was not a single thing to
+suggest that a child had even set foot in it. On the floor close to the
+shabby sofa was a partly open leather bag; much too good and expensive
+to be in keeping with the rest, and a glance into it revealed a number
+of dressing-table fitments, also much better than a struggling working
+woman would be at all likely to own.
+
+She had forgotten this in her confusion at my arrival and presently
+came out to fetch it, still in the untidy slovenly dress. "I won't be a
+minute, now," she said.
+
+But several minutes passed before she returned, wearing now a
+well-fitting coat and skirt and cosmeticed much as she had been when we
+had met first.
+
+"I try to keep my head above water, you see," she said, to account for
+her good clothes, no doubt.
+
+I smiled approval and got to business. "First let me ask you whether
+you are absolutely certain I am the man you think."
+
+"Do you think I should have made that fuss to-day if I wasn't? Why do
+you ask such a question?"
+
+"Because I don't remember anything whatever of it, and to me you are an
+absolute stranger. Just tell me everything about it."
+
+Her story was in its essence that which von Erstein had told me,
+repeated as if she had got it up much as she would have studied her
+part in a play. She was not very perfect in it, and there were just
+those verbal slips and trips which one may hear in a badly rehearsed
+play on the first night of production. Moreover, apart from her lines
+she was hopelessly muddled and had either been very badly coached about
+details or her memory was little better than my assumed one.
+
+She judged by my looks that her story shocked me, and I sat a long time
+frowning as if lost in thought. "It seems absolutely inconceivable!" I
+exclaimed at length with a deep sigh. "Absolutely inconceivable that I
+could have treated you in this way; and only--how long ago was it?"
+
+"You came straight to Hanover from Goettingen."
+
+"What was I doing there?"
+
+"I don't know? At least, you were always so close you would never tell
+me anything."
+
+"You saw a great deal of me, of course?"
+
+"Well, naturally. I wasn't going to marry a man I never saw, I suppose."
+
+"No, no, of course not. Oh dear, to think of it all!" I put a few more
+questions which she could easily answer, and when she was growing more
+glibly at ease I asked: "And how old is the child?"
+
+"Eh? I don't know. Oh yes, I do, of course. Pops was nine last
+birthday."
+
+"Nine!" I exclaimed. I might well be astonished, for they had muddled
+this part of the thing hopelessly. The child I had seen in the
+Thiergarten wasn't a day more than six, probably younger even. "Where
+was she born?"
+
+This rattled her. "What does it matter where she was born, so long as
+she was born somewhere," she said, flushing so vividly that it showed
+under her rouge. Clearly she did not know where "our child" was
+supposed to have been born. "What does matter is what you're going to
+do about it."
+
+"There's only one thing any honourable man would think of doing, Anna.
+I shall make you my wife at once," I cried.
+
+Her amazement was a sheer delight. It was so complete that she didn't
+know what to do or say and just stared at me open-eyed. "I didn't say I
+wanted that, did I?" she stammered at length.
+
+"There's the child, Anna; and neither you nor I can afford to think of
+our own wishes;" and in proof of my moral duty in the circumstances, I
+delivered a lecture on the necessity of freeing the child from the
+stain of its birth.
+
+This gave her time to pull herself together. "Are you in earnest?" she
+asked when I finished.
+
+"I hold the strongest views in such cases. The best plan will be for me
+to arrange about the marriage at once, to-day indeed; and probably
+to-morrow or the next day we can be married."
+
+"But I----" She pulled up suddenly. It looked as if she was going to
+protest she wouldn't marry a man she'd never seen before. "I'd like to
+think about it," she substituted uneasily.
+
+"But why any need to think? You showed this afternoon how bitterly you
+resented my desertion and, unless you were play-acting, how much you
+still care for me. So why delay when I am willing? It is true that I
+can't pretend to care for you as I used, but it may all come back again
+to me. We'll hope so, at any rate."
+
+"But you're engaged to that rich cousin of yours, aren't you?"
+
+This was a good example of her slip-shod methods. As she knew that, she
+knew also where to have found me of course, so that the little
+melodramatic recognition scene in the Thiergarten had been a mere
+picturesque superfluity. I let it pass and replied gravely: "I should
+not allow that engagement to interfere with my duty to you, Anna."
+
+"You must have changed a lot, then."
+
+"I hope I have, if you're not really mistaken about my being the man
+you think. But I'll go and see about our wedding;" and I rose.
+
+"Wait a bit," she cried, flustered and perplexed. "I didn't expect you
+to--to give in quite so--quite like this," she added, laughing
+nervously. "It isn't a bit like I was led--what I expected. Do you mean
+really and truly that you're ready to marry me straight off like this?"
+
+With all the earnestness I could command I gave her the assurance. "I
+pledge you my sacred word of honour that if I've treated you as you say
+I'll marry you as soon as it can be done." A perfectly safe and sincere
+pledge.
+
+This frightened her. The affair had taken a much more serious turn than
+she had expected. "You--you've taken my breath away almost," was how
+she put it; and she sat twisting and untwisting her fingers nervously,
+not in the least seeing how to meet the unexpected difficulty. "I must
+have time to think it over," she said at length.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know; but it's--it's so sudden."
+
+"There's, the child, Anna," I reminded her again.
+
+"Oh, bother the child. I mean I'm thinking of myself." This hurriedly,
+as she turned to stare out of the window. "Do you know the sort of life
+I've been living?" she asked in a low voice without looking round.
+
+"Whatever it is, it must be my fault, and I don't care what you've been
+doing. I drove you to it. There's our child, remember."
+
+There was another long silence as she stood at the window. Her laboured
+breathing, the clenched hands, and spasmodic movements of her shoulders
+evidenced some great agitation. If it was mere acting she was a far
+better actress than she had yet shown herself. And the change in her
+looks when at last she turned to me proved her emotion to be genuine.
+
+"You're a white man right through, and I'm only dirt compared to you,"
+she cried tensely. "Look here, I've lied about that kid. She isn't
+yours, or mine either for that matter. What do you say to that?" and
+she flung her head back challengingly.
+
+"Only that I know it already, her age made it impossible. But it makes
+no difference to the wrong I did you."
+
+"Do you still mean you'd marry me?"
+
+"I mean every letter of the pledge I gave you just now, child or no
+child," I answered in the same earnest tone.
+
+"My God!" she exclaimed ecstatically, throwing her hands up wildly, and
+then bursting into tears. "And they told me you were a scoundrel!" She
+was quite overcome, dropped into a chair and hid her face in her hands.
+The tears were genuine enough, for when she looked up they had made
+little runlets in the rouge and powder.
+
+"Well?" I asked presently.
+
+"I'm not fit to be the wife of a man like you," she stammered through
+her sobs. "I'm dirt to you; just dirt. If more men were like you
+there'd be less women like me."
+
+Had the moment come to push for her confession? It looked like it; but
+it seemed cowardly to take advantage of her remorse and distress
+produced by my own trickery.
+
+"Go away now, please," she said after a long interval.
+
+"But how do we stand, Anna?"
+
+"I don't know. I can't think. I can't do anything. Only that if I'd
+known---- Oh, for Heaven's sake go away, or I shall say---- Oh, do go!"
+
+"Is there anything else you would like to tell me?"
+
+"No. Yes. I don't know. Only leave me alone now."
+
+"Then I'll come to-morrow."
+
+"No, not to-morrow. The next day. Give me time. I must have time," she
+cried wildly.
+
+I hesitated. In her present condition it would have been easy to
+frighten her into admitting everything; but somehow I couldn't bring
+myself to do it, so I left her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+A NIGHT ATTACK
+
+
+The success of my bluffing offer to marry the woman prompted some
+regret that the matter had not been pushed home to the point of
+obtaining her full confession; and it was to prove one of those
+disastrous blunders which come from decent motives.
+
+I had scarcely left her before I began to see the thing clearly. It had
+not been difficult to persuade her, but there was von Erstein. He was
+not likely to believe in any readiness to marry, and would soon be able
+to talk her round to his view. In that case I might whistle for a
+confession.
+
+All the same I had not come empty away. She had admitted the lie about
+"our child," and he couldn't talk that away. Moreover, it was still
+possible to set inquiries on foot and get the truth that way. It was
+all to the good that her impression of me was so favourable. There was
+no acting or humbug about that, and it remained to see the result. It
+was fairly certain that she would have little desire to carry the
+scheme any farther.
+
+In the meantime what were the others thinking? Nessa had laughed at the
+business in the Thiergarten; but there was more than a joke in it, even
+when one knew the truth. Both she and Rosa would be very curious to
+learn what had followed, so I went to see them at once and found them
+all talking about it.
+
+The Countess was shocked and very distressed. "It was such a scandal,
+Johann; and to happen in such a spot and with the von Gratzens there,"
+she said.
+
+"I need not tell you how sorry I am, aunt."
+
+"That wasn't Johann's fault, mother," said Rosa. "He couldn't prevent
+the woman choosing such a public place and acting as she did."
+
+"Why do you say choosing, Rosa? You don't imagine she expected to meet
+Johann there, do you? What happened after we left?" she asked me.
+
+"My impression is that she did choose the place, aunt. I had a talk
+with her and afterwards saw her at her flat."
+
+"But surely there can't be a scrap of truth in it."
+
+"How can I say? Most emphatically I don't remember her nor a thing she
+told me."
+
+"What did she tell you, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, her eyes twinkling.
+"Of course we're all anxious to hear--if you don't mind telling us,
+that is."
+
+"I don't mind in the least. It's not a nice story;" and I told them as
+shortly as possible. Nessa had to hide her face from the Countess when
+I spoke of my offer of marriage, and Rosa covered her laughter under a
+pretence of indignation.
+
+"You seem to have forgotten our engagement very easily, Johann!"
+
+"Oh no. She reminded me of it; but of course she has the first claim."
+
+"Indeed!" she cried, tossing her head.
+
+But her mother took it seriously. "I think you were right, Johann, and
+I'm thankful you had sufficient manly spirit," she declared, making me
+feel no end of a hypocrite.
+
+"And when are you to be married, Herr Lassen?" asked Nessa, with
+mischief in look and tone.
+
+"It is not yet definitely settled."
+
+"And your child?" chipped Rosa.
+
+"There was a mistake there. She admitted afterwards that the child is
+neither hers nor mine."
+
+"Admitted that!" exclaimed the Countess with more indignation than I
+thought she was capable of feeling. "Do you mean to tell us that she
+was brazen-faced enough to confess such a thing? She must be a regular
+baggage and you must be mad to think of marrying her! I never heard
+such a thing in all my life."
+
+"She wasn't exactly brazen-faced when she told me, Aunt Olga. I think
+she was rather affected by my offer; and as an honourable man----"
+
+"Honourable fiddlesticks, Johann! Don't talk rubbish. She's an
+impostor, nothing else; and I shall go to my lawyer in the morning and
+tell him to inform the police."
+
+Rosa came to the rescue then. "Unless you want to get Johann into
+serious trouble, you won't do that, mother. You've often worried
+because I didn't wish to marry him, and I haven't told you the real
+reason; but you had better know it now. The woman's story about the
+sale of secret information is true. You may not remember it, Johann;
+but I have a couple of letters of yours in which you more than half
+admit it, and that it was the reason why you fled the country and never
+intended to come back."
+
+"Rosa!" cried the dear old lady in deep distress. "Is that true,
+Johann?"
+
+"Unfortunately, I can't say either yes or no, Aunt Olga."
+
+"I'll get the letters," said Rosa, and she fetched them and read the
+portions out to us. "You can see it's his handwriting;" and she gave
+the letters to her mother, who glanced at them and then handed them to
+me.
+
+"I don't know the writing, of course," I said. "I don't believe I could
+even copy it. I'm in the pothook stage still." It was a small,
+curiously wriggling fist, difficult to decipher, but easily identified
+by any one who had ever seen it. And the Countess knew it well.
+
+"What had I better do, Johann?" she appealed.
+
+"I leave that to you. I hope I am incapable of anything of the sort
+now; but if I did it, I must take the consequences."
+
+"There is only one thing to do, mother; and that is, nothing. You don't
+want Johann to be shot, I suppose," said Rosa sharply.
+
+"Don't, Rosa!"
+
+"It's all very well to say don't; but that's what will happen if you
+insist on stirring this dirty water."
+
+"But you wouldn't have him marry such a woman, child!"
+
+"Perhaps he'd rather do even that than be shot," was the retort.
+
+It was cruel, but effective; and after a few more words her mother gave
+in and went away, distressed to the point of tears.
+
+"I'd rather have had you tell her the whole truth than grieve her like
+that, Rosa," I said.
+
+"Possibly, but I wouldn't. You don't know mother, and I do. It was
+necessary to frighten her or she would have spread the story broadcast.
+I'll go and make it all right presently."
+
+"Do you believe this story about your cousin?"
+
+"I know it's true, and so does Oscar. He told me the moment we heard
+Johann was coming back."
+
+"But he was coming back in spite of it," pointed out Nessa.
+
+"Because of his spy work, Nessa. He was a born spy. He wormed out a lot
+of things in America; and the Secret Service people, seeing how good he
+was at the work, sent him to England and, after what he found out
+there, told him to come home and promised to overlook the other affair.
+That'll explain why I wasn't overjoyed to see you," she added to me.
+
+I nodded. "And explain probably why von Gratzen thinks it worth while
+to send me back to England to recover my memory."
+
+"Very possibly--if he really believes you've lost it, that is. Oscar
+says its the reason, and he ought to know. He laughed at it all; but
+it's no mere laughing matter."
+
+"Better to laugh than worry," said I.
+
+"Now tell us all about your Anna," said Nessa, who refused to consider
+the thing serious.
+
+I gave them a more detailed account of the interview and answered a
+heap of questions about Anna, describing the change of front she had
+shown, the way in which she had been led to confess about the child,
+and my opinion that von Erstein was at the back of it.
+
+"I shall never forget that scene in the Thiergarten to-day," laughed
+Nessa. "You did look so thunderstruck."
+
+"Nothing to what I felt, I can tell you. I never felt such a fool in my
+life. Of course I couldn't tell whether she was in earnest or not."
+
+"Nessa laughed and was giggling about it all the way home."
+
+"I couldn't help it. It was so utterly ridiculous, Rosa. Her 'Oh, my
+long lost darling!' was just exquisite. And she did it uncommonly well."
+
+"My laughter will have to wait till we're all out of the wood," said
+Rosa; "and there's a long way to go yet."
+
+"Yours won't, will it?" Nessa asked me.
+
+"Not a bit of it. Let's laugh while we can. But now what about the
+workman's card that I need?"
+
+"Oscar's getting it," replied Rosa. "I told him to lose no time; and
+after this affair to-day, the sooner you're away, the easier I shall
+feel. It's getting on my nerves. I'd better go to mother now and calm
+her down."
+
+We rose and Nessa turned to me with a mischievous smile. "You'll have
+me at the wedding, won't you?" she rallied.
+
+"Whose?"
+
+"Why yours, of course."
+
+"Certainly. It couldn't take place without you," I replied, laughing,
+but with a look which made her rather sorry she'd chipped me.
+
+"Why not?" asked Rosa stolidly. Her humour was only Teutonic. "You
+don't expect me to be present, I hope?"
+
+"What do you say, Miss Caldicott?"
+
+"Oh, don't be ridiculous. Rosa doesn't understand such stupid jokes.
+Good-night, Herr Lassen." She spoke indifferently, but there was a
+little pressure of the hand which sent me off home feeling mighty
+pleased with myself and thinking a lot more about her than the new
+complications, and so nearly brought me to grief.
+
+It was a dark night, the streets were deserted, and I was plunging
+along castle-building on the foundation of that hand-pressure when, as
+I was taking a short cut through a square, a drunken man ran up behind,
+and lurched into me. He cursed me for getting in his way, and tried to
+close with me and, before I could shake him off, two others appeared,
+and one of them aimed a blow at my head with his stick.
+
+Luckily there was just time for me to wriggle out of the way and let
+the first man have the benefit of the blow. It caught him full on the
+head, and down he went in a heap. The other two were so astounded by
+this that they hesitated long enough to give me a chance to attack in
+my turn. I went for the ruffian who had struck at me, bashed him under
+the chin hard enough to send him staggering back tripping into the
+gutter, and was ready for number three. But there was no fight left in
+him, and he bolted.
+
+His companion in the gutter scrambled to his feet, but his stick had
+flown out of his hand in the fall, and the moment he found he had to
+deal with me alone without it, he also thought discretion safer and ran
+off after the other.
+
+I turned to have a look at the drunken brute who had started the row,
+or rather the robbery, for that seemed to be the meaning of the affair.
+The blow had seemed hard enough to crack his skull; but when I examined
+him I saw that it had not hurt him seriously. I also discovered
+something which told me I had not appreciated the true purpose of the
+attack.
+
+I recognized him at once. He was the fellow who had called on me that
+morning in the name of Rudolff.
+
+He was able to get up and walk; shakily, it is true, for he was a good
+deal dazed, and I had to hold him up on the way to my rooms, which were
+close by. The stairs were a difficulty, but we got up somehow, and a
+drink of spirits and a rest soon brought him round sufficiently to talk.
+
+"I suppose you were coming to warn me again, Rudolff, eh?" I said.
+
+He stared stupidly at me.
+
+"Don't try to fool me in that silly fashion, my friend. I know too much
+about you. So drop it, or you'll step out of this into the police
+station. You should choose companions who don't blab, you know."
+
+That made him begin to sit up and take notice. "I've been drunk,
+haven't I?"
+
+"No. Not too drunk to play the decoy, my man."
+
+"Don't understand," he mumbled, shaking his head.
+
+"All right. I haven't time to fool about with your sort. You can try
+that on the police;" and I rose and went to the telephone.
+
+"Wait a bit," he cried hurriedly. "I'll try to remember things."
+
+"Give me the nearest police station," I said into the 'phone, but
+without releasing the receiver.
+
+That was enough for him. "Don't bring them here," he said with an oath.
+"I'll tell you all I know."
+
+"I only want one thing. Who put you on to me? Tell me that and you can
+go."
+
+He tried to lie and mentioned a name at random.
+
+"You're only making a fool of yourself, Rudolff. Lies are no good to
+me. You came here this morning with a yarn which you could only have
+got from one man in Berlin, and I know all about it. You were in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and pointed me out to you know whom I mean."
+
+It proved a good shot and he squirmed uneasily, although trying a
+feeble sort of denial. "What's the use of lying?" I rapped sternly.
+
+"I don't know what you mean," he muttered.
+
+"We'll soon settle that."
+
+Taking the precaution to lock the door I turned to the telephone again
+and asked for von Erstein's number; and after some preliminaries with
+some one I took to be his servant, von Erstein answered me.
+
+"Who is it?" he asked sharply.
+
+"Johann Lassen. Hope I haven't disturbed your packing."
+
+"What do you want with me?"
+
+"Nothing; I've had quite enough of you already; but there's a friend of
+yours here and he's in a bit of difficulty."
+
+"What the devil are you driving at? Who is he?"
+
+"The man you sent here to-day."
+
+"I don't know what you mean."
+
+"Oh come, that won't do. Anyhow he does, and that's enough for me." I
+tried to pop in the suggestion of a threat.
+
+"What's his name?"
+
+"You know that without my telling you; I only know what he called
+himself. You don't send men about the place on secret errands without
+knowing their names, do you?"
+
+"Well, what does he call himself?"
+
+"Rudolff; I don't know who he is now."
+
+"I never heard of the man, and I've had enough of your tomfoolery."
+
+"Just as you like. I can deal with him, of course." I heard him swear
+sulphurously.
+
+"What does he want?" he growled after a pause.
+
+"To keep out of gaol, chiefly, I fancy."
+
+"Oh, blazes! Can't you speak plainly?"
+
+"Yes. You see that second little practical joke you fixed up for me
+to-day has missed fire; he's had a crack on the head from one of your
+mutual friends, and I've got him here. After what he told me I rang you
+up to know what you'd like to do about it. As you and I are such pals,
+it didn't seem quite friendly to give him in charge without letting you
+have a chance to tell me your side. See?"
+
+"I tell you I don't know anything about it;" angrily with an oath.
+
+"No thoroughfare that way, my beloved."
+
+There was no reply; he had apparently rung off. So I used the
+opportunity to impress friend Rudolff and lead him to understand that
+von Erstein had told me everything, and then hung up the receiver,
+paused a moment, and again pretended to call up the police station.
+
+This was too much for the man. "What are you going to do?" he asked.
+
+"My friend tells me that he had nothing to do with it, knows nothing
+about you, and that I'd better hand you over to the police."
+
+"Who were you talking to?"
+
+"Count von Erstein."
+
+"Then he's a liar," he cried furiously. "He sent me here this morning
+so that I should know you by sight, first for that business in the
+Thiergarten this afternoon and then for this affair now."
+
+"Don't tell me such lies, you murderous brute. Why, not ten minutes ago
+you gave me another name. Von Erstein, indeed, my friend!"
+
+"Friend! He's no friend of yours. He's got me under his thumb for
+another thing and drove me to do both jobs by threatening to split on
+me. I can't get into the hands of the police. If you'll let me go I'll
+tell you all I know about it."
+
+I shook my head and played the unbeliever till he was nearly beside
+himself with fright, and then told him to write down the story. This
+wasn't to his liking at all, but a little gentle persuasion in the
+shape of another pretence, with the 'phone, set him to work.
+
+I walked up and down smoking while he wrote, glancing every now and
+then over his shoulder to read the result. He was not a ready penman,
+but he got the main facts clear enough for my purpose.
+
+His statement was practically what he had already told me, and he added
+some very useful details which would help to fix it on von Erstein. But
+in one respect it fell short of expectation. He knew no more about Anna
+Hilden than his employer had told him--that I had really ruined her and
+that she was looking for me.
+
+Whether he was lying or not, there were no means of deciding, and it
+seemed better not to question him too directly. The whole affair had
+shaken him up a good deal, and when he laid down the pen with a sigh he
+begged for another drink.
+
+I let him have it and he gulped it down at a draught. "What are you
+going to do with that?" he asked, pointing to the statement.
+
+"That wasn't in the bargain, friend cutthroat; but I'll promise you one
+thing, as you've seen wisdom. If I have to use it, I'll see that no
+harm comes to you, provided that you're ready to speak to the truth of
+it."
+
+He shook his head dismally over this, and while he was hesitating,
+there was a nervous knock at my outer door. It flashed into my thoughts
+that it might be Anna Hilden. I didn't want them to meet, so I shut the
+room door behind me as I went out.
+
+It was a very wild shot indeed; for the moment I pulled back the latch,
+the door was pushed wide and von Erstein came swaggering in.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A POISON CHARGE
+
+
+"Where's the fellow you called Rudolff?" he demanded truculently.
+
+My first idea was to shove him out, but it struck me that an interview
+between the two men might have interesting results, so I went back to
+the sitting-room. "Your friend's still here," I said.
+
+Rudolff wilted at the sight of his genial employer, and as they were
+now two to one, both scoundrels, and capable of any violence, it was
+best to take precautions. Thus while von Erstein was challenging the
+other man to say he knew him, I crossed to a small table drawer and put
+my revolver in my pocket, keeping my hand on it in case of necessity.
+
+The instant Rudolff knew that I had tricked him out of the confession
+he was nearly as mad as von Erstein. He couldn't well have been madder.
+
+"A bit late, eh, beloved?" I jeered. "Had to wait for a taxi? They are
+rather scarce just now."
+
+"What has this man written?"
+
+"Just a line or two about the weather and so on."
+
+"Let me see it."
+
+"He can tell you, of course."
+
+"I have a right to see it."
+
+"Naturally. You'll see it all right--some day. What he says about
+atmospheric and other kinds of pressure is----"
+
+Oaths from the two interrupted the sentence.
+
+"Give it up," from Rudolff, and "I want to see it now," from von
+Erstein, came almost in the same breath.
+
+"It pains me to disappoint such a charming pair of friends, but----" I
+shook my head. "Can't be done, beloved; out of the question."
+
+"We'll see about that;" and they exchanged glances.
+
+"Don't make asses of yourselves. One of you has a cracked pate already,
+and the other's so podgy that half a punch would put him out of action;
+so you wouldn't have a dog's chance at what I see you're thinking
+about."
+
+"What do you mean, Lassen? I'm only asking to see what this man has
+written about me," said von Erstein, trying to fool me with an
+appearance of calmness, while he took his handkerchief out of the
+pocket of his overcoat--a suspiciously bulky handkerchief which he
+handled very gingerly.
+
+"You may as well lay that thing on the table, beloved. I'm too old for
+that game."
+
+He tried to laugh and suddenly grabbed the handkerchief with his left
+hand to free the revolver it was concealing. He bungled over it, and
+before he succeeded I had him covered. "I told you to put it on the
+table. If you lift it so much as an inch, I'll put a bullet in your
+head," I cried.
+
+What a coward he was! He went as white as a sheet, tossed the weapon on
+to the table, and put up his hands as a shield. "Don't, Lassen. Don't
+do anything like that," he stammered.
+
+I laughed, picked up his revolver, and tossed mine across to him.
+"That's less dangerous for you, sweetheart; it's unloaded."
+
+Still trembling, now with more mortification than fear, however, he
+dropped into a chair and strafed me with fine Teutonic hate.
+
+I turned to his companion. "Now, get out, you. Do you hear?" for he
+hesitated, looking to his master for orders. "It'll be bad for that
+head of yours if I have to chuck you out. I'll give you one minute to
+clear." He was no stayer and slunk out in half the time; and I followed
+and shut the door after him.
+
+When I got back to the room von Erstein was on his feet also ready to
+go. "Oh, don't hurry away, beloved; this is an excellent chance for a
+pretty little love scene. Mix yourself a drink, have a cigar, and be
+your own cheerful sprightly self."
+
+The scowl which greeted this was a real gem.
+
+"What a seraphic smile! No wonder that every one loves you so and
+worships the ground you tread on."
+
+"Stop it," he growled with an oath.
+
+"Oh, you naughty darling! Did'ums," and I chucked him coyly under his
+fat double chin. His spasm of rage at this almost overpowered his
+cowardice, and he must have been within an ace of apoplexy. The blood
+rushed in a crimson flood to his flabby face, he clenched his fists and
+trembled like an aspen with the strain.
+
+"I'm going," he mumbled thickly at last.
+
+"Of course you are, darling; but presently." I stood with my back
+against the door. "I can't spare you yet. Besides, you haven't thanked
+me. Isn't my sweetheart grateful to his Popsy-wopsy?" I chided in a
+sort of Mantalini manner.
+
+"Oh, blazes! Let me go, will you?"
+
+"But think what I've saved you from, beloved. Why, if it hadn't been
+for me by this time you'd be a murderer or a thief, or both. Imagine
+it! The torments your tender conscience would be suffering! A murderer!
+My Albert!"
+
+Another spasm of impotent rage followed, and this time, instead of
+cursing he groaned aloud and dropped into a chair with his hands to his
+head.
+
+I locked the door then, putting the key in my pocket, took the
+cartridges out of his revolver, tossed it into his lap, and mixed
+myself a drink and lit a cigar. "Now we'll have our chat," I said,
+dropping the banter.
+
+He looked up and, seeing the way to the door was free, jumped from his
+seat to escape; and began cursing again on finding it locked. "Are you
+going to stop that rot?"
+
+"Yes, if you behave yourself; except for an occasional endearment, lest
+we forget how much we love one another."
+
+"What have you got to say? Be quick about it, I want to go."
+
+"Sit down and have a drink. It'll pull you together."
+
+"Not here, thank you. I don't want to be poisoned."
+
+"I didn't think of that. It's rather a good idea. I will poison you."
+He must be punished for that insult. I went into my bedroom and came
+back with a pinch of salt in a screw of paper which I opened out before
+him. Then I poured out his drink, put the salt into it, stirred it
+carefully till it had dissolved, pushed the glass across the table, and
+placed a chair close to the spot. "Now sit down and drink that."
+
+"I'll see you to the devil first," he cried, trying to bluster and
+turning as white as a sheet.
+
+I promptly took him by the collar of his coat and forced him into the
+chair and ordered him to drain the glass. His panic was pitiful. He was
+such a blithering ass that he never suspected I was only fooling; and
+was convinced I meant to kill him. The sweat of abject terror stood in
+beads on his forehead, he couldn't utter a word, and sat staring up at
+me like a paralyzed idiot.
+
+"Drink it!" I thundered in his own bullying tones which made him jump
+and twitch convulsively. He made one feeble attempt to lift the glass,
+and then with a moan dropped back in his chair in a faint.
+
+I was afraid at first that he was really dead; but his pulse was
+beating all right. It was probably just pretence; so I moved the glass
+out of his reach and left him to come round when he pleased. It was
+merely shamming, and when he thought I was far enough away, he made a
+grab to upset the glass.
+
+"I think you're the biggest fool I ever met, von Erstein, but you've
+been punished enough for your little poison suggestion. Look here;" and
+I swallowed the "poison" myself. "Not enough salt even to alter the
+taste of it, man."
+
+In a minute he was cursing quite as cheerfully as usual and looking
+just as amiable. "Well, can I go now?" he asked.
+
+"As soon as you've answered one question. Who is Anna Hilden?"
+
+"I don't know any more than I told you before."
+
+"I don't mean the right one, but the mock heroine of the Thiergarten
+scene to-day."
+
+"I don't know anything about her."
+
+Taking out my card case in which I had put Rudolff's statement, I
+unfolded the paper and laid it on the table. "Rudolff says here----"
+
+He tried to snatch the paper, but I whipped it up in time, leaving only
+the card case in his hand. "Rudolff says here that you sent him to me
+so that he should point me out to her this afternoon. Now then, who is
+she?"
+
+"I don't know anything about her," he repeated doggedly.
+
+"I'll help your memory. She admitted to me that it was a put-up job and
+that the child was neither hers nor mine. That enough for you?"
+
+But he stuck to his denial and nothing I could say moved him. The
+poison farce had apparently convinced him that his life was safe and he
+met all my threats with the same dogged answer.
+
+I had to give it up in the end. "Very well, then, I shall have to get
+the whole story out of her. The police will do it, if I can't; so that
+it's only a matter of a day or two. Do you still refuse to own up?"
+
+"I tell you I know nothing about it. Wash your own dirty linen for
+yourself," he replied.
+
+I unlocked the door and told him to go. His exit was very
+characteristic. He stepped very gingerly toward where I stood by the
+door, fearing I should strike him, paused when just a couple of yards
+away, then darted out quickly, opened the front door, shook his fist at
+me and snarled out a threat. "I'll make you pay a heavy price for all
+this, curse you," he cried and bolted down the stairs as I made a step
+after him.
+
+Except that he had been thoroughly frightened and enraged to the point
+of collapse, the interview had yielded little satisfaction. It was not
+improbable, moreover, that it had been a blunder to warn him about Anna
+Hilden. As for his threats, they were just laughable; but he might be
+able to strengthen the woman's backbone and cause her to persist in the
+story she had acted.
+
+That the whole business was faked, there was no doubt at all; and if
+she did persist, it would only be necessary to set inquiries about her
+on foot. It might be as well to do that before seeing her again, as it
+would be a big trump card to face her with some of her own life history.
+
+There was something to go on in the shape of Rudolff's statement; but
+it didn't amount to much. In all probability von Erstein would see to
+it that the man was got out of the way; and the mere paper itself could
+not carry the least weight with a soul.
+
+Reflection suggested one exception, however. Von Gratzen might take a
+different view of it, if I told him frankly the whole affair. He had
+urged me to go to him in any trouble; and if he was not a fraud, he
+could help me enormously.
+
+He would certainly want to hear from me all about the inner meaning of
+the scene his wife and daughter had witnessed, and it would be best to
+see him as soon as possible. He hated von Erstein, moreover, and might
+be glad to find something against him.
+
+The next morning there was a note from him asking me to see him at his
+office at eleven o'clock, as he had some important news for me. Not a
+mere official summons this time; and this was rather a good sign.
+
+It was to be hoped that the "important news" had to do with my leaving
+Berlin. The delay was irksome. Things were happening which threatened
+to make it more and more difficult for me to disappear without causing
+more fuss than would be healthy for either Nessa or myself. It all
+tended to force one's hand; and I began to think seriously of resorting
+to the "third wheel" Nessa and I had discussed together.
+
+Von Gratzen received me with all the usual cordiality, shook hands
+warmly, and immediately referred to the Thiergarten affair, taking the
+line which I had half expected.
+
+"My wife and Nita told me all about it, and of course it settles one
+point satisfactorily. It places beyond doubt that you are really Johann
+Lassen. Nevertheless I could wish it had been established in a less
+dramatic and embarrassing fashion for you."
+
+"It was exceedingly unpleasant, sir."
+
+"Tell me all about it."
+
+I described it from my point of view; making much of my profound
+astonishment and my inability to say whether the story was true or not.
+
+"Have you any reason to doubt it? Did you remember anything which
+enabled you, I mean?"
+
+"Not a thing. So far as I know, I never saw the woman before in all my
+life."
+
+"But she was positive?"
+
+"She embraced me and called me her 'long lost darling,' and so on."
+
+"Women are hysterical creatures, we know, and apt to make any sort of
+statement at such moments. Do you think she was really in earnest? Of
+course it's important."
+
+"Your people could judge that as well as I, sir."
+
+"True. Which would you rather it was--true or false?"
+
+"False, without a question."
+
+"Despite the fact that it establishes your identity?"
+
+"Certainly. Any man who feels as I do now must loathe to have such a
+brutal thing as that dug up out of his past."
+
+"Good. I'm glad to hear you say that." He smiled as if he was really
+glad, but there was something else behind his questions that left me
+guessing as usual.
+
+If he accepted the woman's recognition as settling the matter of my
+identification as Lassen, was it better to leave it there or risk
+unsettling him again by telling him about the subsequent interview with
+her? Rather a nice point to decide. But his next question cleared the
+course and concealment kicked the beam.
+
+"You'd like to have the matter investigated?"
+
+"Certainly," I replied promptly. Very few official inquiries would give
+him the truth, and it was thus much better to tell it myself. "I was
+going to ask your advice about it. I know that part of her story is
+false; she owned it; and I doubt all the rest;" and I described the
+interview.
+
+This appeared to both interest and amuse him, especially my instant
+offer to marry Anna; and he expressed his appreciation in the equivocal
+fashion. "It was clever, my boy; quite the best line. You must have had
+considerable experience in bluffing people;" and there was a glint in
+his keen eyes which might have meant anything. "You can act well too,
+or you'd never have dragged that confession out of her. She must have
+thought you were in earnest."
+
+"I was, sir. If she can prove that I am the man she thinks, I will
+marry her."
+
+"Good. Very good indeed. _If_ she can prove it, of course. But you
+wouldn't relish the job, eh?"
+
+"That goes without saying."
+
+"Well, we'll hope she can't. We shall soon know all about her. In the
+meantime what are you going to do?"
+
+"I can only wait and see."
+
+He laughed and rubbed his hands. "Wait and see, eh? That's the English
+Premier's phrase, isn't it? So you've picked that up, it seems."
+
+His comment made me wish I'd used a different one. "There isn't
+anything else to do, sir."
+
+"Quite so. Wait and see. Exactly. And as an honourable man you'd prefer
+to get the question settled before leaving Berlin?"
+
+The shrewd old beggar was a positive expert in sticking one in a hole.
+I didn't know what answer to make, so I just shrugged my shoulders and
+smiled vacuously.
+
+"It's rather a pity, too," he continued after a pause. "I've arranged
+that matter of your leaving; in fact I intended you to go to-day. I
+have all the necessary papers, even tickets for you and Miss
+Caldicott;" and he took them out of his desk and laid them in front of
+me, giving me one of those wily smiles of his.
+
+I could have cursed the luck. The sight of them, the knowledge that
+Nessa and I could have been out of the infernal country within a few
+hours but for this rotten thing coming in the way, so exasperated me
+that it was scarcely possible to conceal my bitter chagrin. I tried to
+hide it from him by taking the papers and looking them over.
+
+"Oh dear, I've forgotten something," he exclaimed, rising. "I'll be
+back in a moment," and he went out of the room.
+
+What a temptation that was! To have all I needed actually in my hands;
+to be left alone with them and yet not to be able to use them! I'd have
+given every shilling I had in the world to have stuffed them into my
+pocket and walked off. Did he mean me to take them? Or was it intended
+as a test? Did he guess what a temptation it was? Could I get away with
+them? He stopped out of the room long enough, and as the minutes
+passed, it was all I could do to resist it.
+
+But I stuck it; put the papers down on his desk and tried not to look
+at them. It was a touch of sheer purgatory. His first glance, when at
+length he returned, was at them, and the way he looked at me made me
+pretty certain that he could guess something of my feeling. It looked
+uncommonly as if he were disappointed to find me still in the room and
+the papers on his table.
+
+"I'm sorry to have kept you, my boy, but it couldn't be helped," he
+said as he sat down and put the temptation out of sight. "I told you in
+my letter that I had something important to tell you. I have, and
+unpleasant into the bargain. Was Count von Erstein with you last night?"
+
+"Yes, about ten o'clock."
+
+"Did you offer him some drink?"
+
+"Yes, and a cigar, but he refused both."
+
+"What was he doing there? Wait, I'll tell you first that he has made a
+charge against you that you attempted to poison him."
+
+I laughed. "Of course I didn't. It was a joke."
+
+"It may not be altogether a laughing matter; he's a dangerous man to
+joke with. Would you care to tell me about it all?"
+
+"Of course. This will explain a good deal." I put my hand in my
+waistcoat pocket for Rudolff's statement, and then for the first time
+missed the card case which Rosa had given me. The loss was of no
+consequence, however, as I had the fellow's confession. "Before I give
+it you I ought to say that I promised the man who wrote this that if he
+was prepared to swear to the truth of it, he should come to no harm."
+
+"That'll be all right," he agreed with a nod.
+
+"An attempt was made on my life last night by this fellow and two
+others at von Erstein's instigation;" and I described the affair and
+all that had occurred subsequently.
+
+"Ah, more clever bluff, eh? Upon my word I shall be expecting you to
+try it with me next," he said. Then he read over the confession
+carefully and lapsed into thought. Long and apparently anxious thought
+it was, too.
+
+"I'll stand by you, my boy. I believe your story implicitly and I know
+von Erstein. But it was a bad mistake. He has a lot of influence in
+many directions. I hope you'll hear no more of it; but it was a bad
+blunder." He paused and, in a different and lighter tone and with a
+very peculiar look and a shadow of a smile, added: "It makes me almost
+wish you had taken advantage of my absence just now to get away with
+those tickets."
+
+What on earth could one make of such a statement? If he'd given me
+another chance I'd have taken it; but he didn't. He locked the tickets
+up and sent me away, saying he would look into my affairs at once and
+send for me as soon as there was any need.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+ANNA HILDEN AGAIN
+
+
+It is difficult to describe my feelings when I left von Gratzen, but I
+think my chief thought was a bitter regret that I hadn't taken the
+tickets and chanced things, mingled with a disquieting belief that I
+was muddling matters hopelessly.
+
+Neither regret nor self-cursing were of the slightest help, however;
+and after a few minutes of impotent perplexity, I realized that
+extremely obvious fact.
+
+Something had to be done; and the question was--what?
+
+It looked as if von Gratzen would have let me have those tickets if I
+hadn't been ass enough to tell him about Anna and play the fool about
+being eager to have that affair cleared up first. He had not appeared
+to attach sufficient importance to the poison charge to refuse them on
+that account.
+
+This cleared the ground a little, therefore. Could the obstacle be
+removed in time to allow of my using them that night? Could I get the
+confession from Anna herself, this meant? It was worth trying.
+
+She had fixed the following day for me to see her; but that wasn't a
+good enough reason for my not seeing her at once. My natural eagerness
+to have the thing settled without delay would readily account for my
+disregarding her wish, and whether it did or not didn't matter two
+straws. So I set off on the errand at once.
+
+Persuasion was the first card to play, and if that failed, a threat of
+the police; but by one means or another I must have the confession to
+take to von Gratzen that afternoon. Everything now turned on getting it
+into his hands early enough for Nessa and me to catch the Dutch mail
+which left about eight that night.
+
+She had her hat on when I arrived, and resented the visit. "I said you
+were not to come until to-morrow," she said. "I can't see you now, as
+I'm just going out."
+
+"I could not wait till to-morrow. I can't bear suspense."
+
+"I've nothing to say to you, so it's no use your coming in."
+
+"But I'm in already, Anna, and I must speak to you." She tried to avoid
+me and leave the place, but I shut the door and stood with my back to
+it.
+
+"Very well. Go into the sitting-room and I'll listen."
+
+"I'll follow you," I replied drily; and with a laugh and a shrug she
+led the way to her room.
+
+"You seem almost as eager to marry me now as you were before to get out
+of it," she scoffed.
+
+It was an unpromising start, for she was in a very different mood from
+that of the previous day. "If you think a moment of all that this must
+mean to me, of my desperate anxiety to know the truth about the past
+and to see what lies ahead, you'll understand it all, Anna;" and I went
+on for a few moments in that style endeavouring to re-establish the
+former relations and work on her emotions.
+
+"I haven't had enough time to think about it," she replied. "Of course
+it takes a lot of thinking about."
+
+"Does that mean you are not sure I am the man who wronged you?"
+
+"Why should it, pray?"
+
+"Well, you said that you had been mistaken about the child."
+
+"I may have said that for a purpose. You got the soft side of me
+yesterday, and---- But I tell you I haven't made up my mind."
+
+"You haven't altered your opinion about my being an honourable man and
+wishing to do the right thing, I hope?" and I did my best to draw a
+vivid picture of my state of mind and appeal to her good nature.
+
+This appeared to have a softening effect; but not enough for the
+purpose. "Why does one day make such a difference?"
+
+"Every minute makes a difference, Anna. I am on the rack and it's
+positive torture to prolong this suspense."
+
+"I'm sorry. I am really; but I can't make up my mind. If you could do
+without me all these years, another day can't matter so much. Not that
+I can see."
+
+"If you had lost your memory, you'd understand."
+
+"But that was only a week or two ago. What of all the other time, the
+years and years you've left me to fend for myself?"
+
+"I can't account for that," I said, as if distracted.
+
+"You hadn't lost your memory all that time, however."
+
+"The shock of the explosion has utterly changed me in every way."
+
+"It was about time, I should think, judging by all I've heard and the
+way you treated me. I don't deny you're a white man enough now; but
+what if you got your memory back? It might change you into something
+very different. I have to think of that, you know. You might be mad
+enough to--to do anything; perhaps even murder me. You're not surprised
+it makes me think, are you? I don't wish to be made into an honest
+woman only to be murdered."
+
+This was altogether so different from her previous attitude, that it
+was clear some one had been coaching her; and of course it could only
+be von Erstein. "You need not fear that, Anna."
+
+"Why not? How do you know what you'd be mad enough to do if you got
+your memory back and found you'd tied yourself to me?"
+
+"There's a very simple way out of that. Even if you wish me to marry
+you, we need not live together. I should give you an allowance and you
+could go your way and I mine, if you preferred it."
+
+For some reason which beat me this seemed to appeal strongly to her.
+She sat thinking, and there was something of her previous day's emotion
+in her look as she asked: "Do you mean that?"
+
+"You little know me if you doubt it, Anna."
+
+She got up impulsively to stare out of the window as she had done
+before, and after a long pause she turned. "Look here, come to-morrow."
+
+I looked intently at her and read something in her face that gave me
+fresh hope. "Why not to-day? You have made up your mind, I can see
+that; so why not tell me now?"
+
+She shook her head. "Not to-day. To-morrow."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I can't tell you why. Don't ask me."
+
+"But I do ask you. I beg you as earnestly as I can."
+
+Another shake of the head; and she would not budge, so that it became
+necessary to try a turn of the screw.
+
+"Your reason has to do with some one else?"
+
+"What do you mean?" she flashed in surprise and some alarm.
+
+"I had a visit yesterday from a man who called himself Rudolff."
+
+"Well? What's that got to do with it?"
+
+"With two companions he tried to murder me."
+
+She caught her breath. "Is that true?"
+
+"As you see, the attempt failed and the man himself got the blow
+intended for me. I took him to my rooms afterwards and--well, here's
+his confession."
+
+Her interest was keen enough to quicken her breathing as I took out the
+paper; and her fright deepened as I read it, and she began to tremble
+violently. "As you hear, he was the man who pointed me out to you
+yesterday in the Thiergarten."
+
+For a few moments she was too overcome to speak. "What--do you--think
+it all means?" she stammered brokenly.
+
+"Do you know Count von Erstein?"
+
+Her hand went to her throat as she tried to reply, making a swallowing,
+half-choking motion. "You don't believe--that I had anything--to do
+with all that?"
+
+"Oh no, Anna. I am sure you had not. I have told the authorities----"
+
+"The police?" she broke in. It was almost a scream.
+
+"Not the police. But, of course, a man can't let any one attempt his
+life and just sit down under it. I have a very influential friend----"
+I paused intentionally.
+
+"Who is that?" came like a pistol shot.
+
+"Baron von Gratzen; and he----"
+
+"Did you tell him about me?"
+
+"He knows of it. He is greatly interested in me because this
+unfortunate affair about my treatment of you will affect all he can do
+for my future. His wife and daughter were present yesterday when you
+recognized me. Of course he questioned me all about it and declared
+that he would have the fullest investigation made at once."
+
+That seemed to break her right up. Von Gratzen's reputation caused the
+collapse. She had stiffened in alarm at the mention of his name, had
+listened with parted lips and straining features to every syllable
+about his interest in me, and when she knew that his people were going
+to take up the investigation, she was utterly overcome.
+
+With a muffled cry of despair, she fell back in her chair in a
+half-fainting condition, her hands pressed to her face, moaning
+distractedly. She remained in this state for several minutes, the
+effort to regain self-control being quite beyond her, and at length
+sprang to her feet, saying she must go out at once.
+
+"You'd better tell me everything before you go, Anna," I said. Knowing
+that she had been driven into the deception by von Erstein, I pitied
+her sincerely. She was like a wild thing in her panic, shaking her head
+and flourishing her arms hysterically.
+
+"No, no. To-morrow."
+
+"It may be too late then. I have great influence with the Baron and can
+put the matter to him in a way to help you. It will be useless to try
+that to-morrow."
+
+"Not now. Not yet. I can't. I can't. Let me go. Let me go, I say!"
+
+I persisted, however; and at length she consented to my seeing her
+again that afternoon at five o'clock. I had to be content with that,
+and as soon as we reached the street she hurried off.
+
+She was going to von Erstein of course, and I would have given
+something to be able to hear what passed. She was in deadly fear of
+him. Her manner had shown that; and considering what the man was, her
+news would probably give him an equally bad attack of nerves. He would
+not relish von Gratzen's intervention any better than she had.
+
+On the whole the interview had turned out well enough. It would have
+been better if I had been able to drag the truth out of her at once, of
+course; but I was confident that I should get it all in the afternoon.
+That would still give me time to carry the news to von Gratzen and
+satisfy him that the obstacle to my leaving was removed.
+
+The "third wheel" must none the less be in working order. Nessa must be
+prepared to leave, and I went to the Karlstrasse to see her. She was
+out with Lottchen, however, and I only saw Rosa, who was delighted to
+hear that von Gratzen had arranged for us to leave.
+
+"It's very lucky, too, because Oscar has left Berlin for a day or two
+without having been able to do anything about the other scheme. You
+won't need it now, of course."
+
+"I wish I was sure; but I'm not. Von Gratzen may still raise some
+objection; things are so mixed up. But I mean to go to-night in any
+event, with or without his permit. Rotten luck that Feldmann's away."
+
+"He was afraid you might do something like that, so he gave me the name
+of a man who can do what you want, but I wasn't to tell you about it
+unless it was absolutely necessary."
+
+"It is necessary, as you can see for yourself. Who's the man and what
+is he? I'll go to him straight off."
+
+"David Graun is the name; he lives at 250, Futtenplatz. He's a Jew; a
+very shady character, and Oscar said you'd have to be awfully careful
+how you handled him."
+
+"Where's the Futtenplatz?"
+
+"It's in a low quarter across the river;" and she told me how to find
+it. "Oscar says he bears the worst of characters and does all sorts of
+shady things under the cloak of a second-hand clothes' dealer."
+
+"He's sure that the man can get me what I want?"
+
+"Oh yes; positive, if you handle him right; but you must be awfully
+cautious. He'll ask much more at first than he expects."
+
+"He's a Jew, of course."
+
+"It isn't only that. It's his way of testing any one who goes to him.
+If you agree to pay it, you won't get anything out of him except
+promises. Oscar said I'd better tell you this to put you on your guard;
+and you mustn't let him think it's for yourself under any
+circumstances."
+
+"Do you know how much I ought to pay him?"
+
+"Only a few marks, ten or fifteen at the outside. He'll probably ask a
+hundred or even more."
+
+"I understand. But it's odd that Feldmann should know all this about
+him."
+
+She smiled. "That's what I thought, and Oscar said I might tell you the
+real reason. The fact is this Graun works with the police. He got into
+trouble once and they made things easy for him on his promise to act as
+their spy. There's a lot of this false identification card business
+done, and he reports every transaction to them, and they are able to
+watch all the people who go to him. When any one is wanted, they give
+him a description, and he just keeps the man waiting while he
+communicates with them."
+
+"That's cheerful. He'll tell them about me, then."
+
+"Oscar says you needn't worry about it. So long as any one is not known
+to be an alien or a criminal, nothing happens; but you're to be careful
+to get the things at once."
+
+"I don't quite see why."
+
+"I didn't quite understand it, either. Oscar only told me at the last
+minute just as he was hurrying away. I fancy he said something about a
+second visit being risky, lest the man should have one of the police
+there to have a look at you."
+
+"I'll be off then. Tell Nessa I'll see her as soon as possible and tell
+her everything."
+
+"Oh, I do hope you'll get away safely. If the Baron lets you have the
+permit and tickets, I'll never say another word against him as long as
+I live," she declared as we shook hands.
+
+"It will be all right one way or the other."
+
+"Yes; but if you could really travel by the mail a few hours would end
+everything. I shall be so anxious."
+
+"Of course your mother mustn't know anything about Nessa leaving."
+
+"She's in bed, after yesterday's upset. So that will be all right."
+
+"Not really ill?"
+
+"Oh, no; only a bad headache. Nessa and I are booked for a concert this
+evening, and I shall tell the servants not to sit up for us, so that
+she won't be missed till to-morrow morning; and by that time you two
+ought to be in Holland;" and with that I set off to interview the
+tricky old Jew in the Futtenplatz.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+A SINISTER DEVELOPMENT
+
+
+On the way to the Futtenplatz I made up a little fairy tale to account
+for my visit to the Jew, Graun. I didn't like the job, and what Rosa
+had told me about his relations with the police didn't make it any
+pleasanter.
+
+A very little knowledge of German police ways was enough to render it
+quite credible. It was just the sort of low cunning which would chime
+with their methods. There were plenty of people, besides aliens, who
+were anxious to get out of Berlin at such a time, and it would suit the
+authorities admirably to have this secret means of finding out who they
+were and acting accordingly.
+
+Rosa's description of the Futtenplatz was well deserved: a squalid,
+dirty place, with mean shops of the poorest sort. The Jew's second-hand
+clothes shop was one of the meanest and dirtiest, and Graun himself
+fitted thoroughly into the picture.
+
+When I entered he was bargaining with a man who wanted to sell him a
+coat, and while the transaction proceeded--while the old Jew was
+beating down the price to the last pfennig, that is--I had ample time
+to observe him.
+
+Red-haired, with red tousled beard and whiskers, pronounced Hebraic
+features, small suspicious eyes, and filthy from the top of his narrow
+forehead to the tip of his clawlike finger-nails, he was one of the
+most repulsive specimens one could wish to avoid.
+
+"What do you want?" he asked in a high-pitched rasping voice, squinting
+at me, when his customer went out, cursing him for the smallness of the
+amount he had received for the coat.
+
+I told him straight out. The remembrance of Feldmann's tips was one
+reason, and my desire not to stop one unnecessary moment in such
+unsavoury surroundings was another.
+
+He shook his head. "You've come to the wrong shop, my man. Given up all
+that sort of thing long ago. Too risky."
+
+"All right; sorry to have troubled you. Good-day," I replied casually,
+and turned to leave.
+
+He let me get to the door and then called me back. "Wait a moment. Who
+sent you here?"
+
+"No one in particular. It's pretty well known, isn't it? Good-day."
+
+"Here, wait. Come here; I know some one who might be able to do it for
+you."
+
+I didn't go back. "It isn't of the least consequence," I said with an
+airy wave of the hand. "I told the man he'd better go to the police and
+just tell them how he lost his card."
+
+"Come in here a minute;" and he shuffled off to a door at the back of
+the shop.
+
+I hesitated, took a couple of paces toward him, stopped and shook my
+head. "No. I don't want to have anything to do with it, if there's any
+risk attached to it, as you say."
+
+This worked all right. "When I said that, I thought you wanted it for
+yourself," he said slily.
+
+I burst out laughing and turned again as if to go away. "Good-day, my
+friend. That's rich and no mistake."
+
+"Here, don't be in such a hurry," he said, coming a step toward me. "If
+your friend's in any trouble, I might----"
+
+"What the devil do you mean by that?" I cried, and cursed him royally
+for the suggestion.
+
+He came up and laid his filthy claw on my sleeve. I shook it off with
+another choice epithet or two. "Come into my room a minute and we'll
+talk it over. Don't lose your temper."
+
+I allowed myself to be pacified: not too quickly, of course; and with a
+great show of reluctance allowed him to take me into his room, which
+was, if possible, filthier even than the shop and smelt vilely.
+
+"Now, tell me all about it. Of course most of those who come to me are
+in trouble of some sort or other and I have to be careful. If the
+police knew anything, well----" and he gestured to indicate the trouble
+it would mean for him.
+
+"All right, but don't try that rot with me. Either you can sell me what
+I've asked for, or you can't. So out with it. I don't care which way it
+is; and this place of yours stinks so that I don't want to stop in it
+and be suffocated."
+
+He leered as if this were rather a good joke or a compliment. "I might
+be able to manage it, but----"
+
+I broke in with an impatient oath. "I don't want any 'might be.' Can
+you or can't you? Be quick about it, too. If you can, how much?" This
+was evidently the right line with him and he grinned appreciatively.
+
+"That's the way to talk. Shall we say 150 marks?"
+
+"How much?" I cried with a regular spasm of astonishment. "Say it
+again, man."
+
+"A hundred and fifty marks."
+
+I sat back and stared at him. "Do you think I want to deal wholesale
+and set up in the business myself? I only want one, you infernal old
+humbug;" and I roared with laughter.
+
+He was accustomed to being abused and joined in the laugh, combing his
+tousled red beard with his filthy fingers. "Well, how much then?"
+
+"Oh, a couple of marks or so."
+
+He threw up his hands, gesticulating violently, as if the offer was an
+insult, appeared to work himself into a furious rage, and fumed and
+fussed and stormed, until I got up. Again he tested me; let me leave
+the room and reach the door of the shop, following with a mixture of
+lamentations and appeals to Heaven to bear witness to my lunacy.
+
+I did not so much as turn round, remembering Feldmann's caution, and I
+was all but in the street, before he changed his tone, apparently
+satisfied that I was sincere.
+
+"It's no use to part like this. Come back and talk it over again." Once
+more a similar pantomime was played; but this time I was much slower to
+give way. "It can't be done at the price. Impossible. Think of the risk
+I should----"
+
+"Then don't do it. I tell you if you mean there's any risk in the
+thing, I won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. I thought a few marks was
+all that would be necessary; but if you offered to give it me for
+nothing and there's any risk I wouldn't take it. Get that into your
+head."
+
+"Do you think I give things away?"
+
+"Not I, seeing how you cling to the dirt on you."
+
+This was also accepted as a joke and he wagged his head and winked. "It
+takes too much time to clean things; and time's money," he replied,
+with one of his repulsive leers. "But I like you. You say what you
+mean. I'll take a hundred marks from you."
+
+"Will you? You'll be cleverer than I take you for, if you do."
+
+"But there's the----" He was going to repeat about the risk, but
+checked the word as bad business; and a long chaffering began in which
+he tried to squeeze me first to seventy-five marks, then to fifty,
+coming down by tens and fives to twenty-five.
+
+He stuck at that point a long time; and lest he should think even that
+sum suspicious, I held out at the five marks to which I had increased
+my offer during the bargaining.
+
+Once more he let me all but leave the shop, and when he again called me
+back I refused to go and struck out a fresh line.
+
+"I'll tell you why I've stopped so long as it is, Graun," I said. "I've
+never met any one quite like you before, and you're a very interesting
+character. I do something at times in theatricals and you're worth
+studying; but I've had enough of you now. It's been worth a few marks
+to have such a chance as this, and, while I don't care two straws
+whether I get what brought me here or not, I'll give you five marks for
+the fun I've had," and to his consummate astonishment I put the money
+in his dirty palm. "If I were you, I'd spend it on soap or something
+that will get rid of some of this beastly stink."
+
+"You give me this?" he cried in amazement.
+
+"Yes, give it you. Good-day."
+
+It was the turning point of the conference. He clawed hold of my arm.
+"You can come and study me any time you like at the same price," he
+said with a grin. "I don't mind how often. And look here, you shall
+have the card if you'll make it ten marks."
+
+"Another five, do you mean?"
+
+"Oh, no. Oh, no. Another ten," he cried greedily.
+
+I shook my head at first and then smiled. "I tell you what I'll do.
+I'll give you the other ten, if you'll throw in another cursing and
+lamentation scene, like the last. Five for that and five for the card.
+You do it so beautifully, Graun; and it's all put on, I know."
+
+He grinned, but shook his head. "It wasn't put on."
+
+"You're a dirty, stinking, money-grabbing Jew, Graun," I cried, with
+every appearance of fierce earnestness.
+
+He seemed to take it as meant, and he did repeat the cursing scene with
+the utmost energy and wild gesticulation, to my intense amusement.
+
+"It wasn't quite so good as the first, Graun, but it's worth the money
+all the same. Here you are; get me the card. I believe you're quite a
+decent sort really and just put on this manner for business."
+
+More leers as he shuffled off, and in a minute or two later I left with
+an identification card in the name of "Johann Liebe, mechanic."
+
+Whether he would tell the police of my visit, I neither knew nor cared.
+He was obviously satisfied that things were pretty much as I had
+pretended, and the little hint that I might wish to "study" him again
+was quite likely to make him hold his tongue.
+
+I had all that I needed; the way to leave was now open; and in a very
+few hours Nessa and I would have seen the last of Berlin for many a day.
+
+The interview had taken longer than I had expected, however, and after
+snatching a hasty meal in the first decent place I came to, I hurried
+to the Karlstrasse to fix up the final arrangements for our departure.
+
+Nessa was as jubilant as I at the news of my success. "Rosa told me all
+you said and where you'd gone and that we were to go to-night. Oh,
+isn't it splendid!" she exclaimed.
+
+"You'll be ready?"
+
+"Oh, no. I shall take care to miss the train, of course. Make a point
+of it," she cried, her eyes as bright as diamonds. "I shall have a cab,
+tell every one I'm going to England and---- How can you ask such a
+silly question, Jack?"
+
+"Steady. Not that name till we're in Holland anyhow."
+
+"Do you expect me to be steady at such a time, Herr Lassen?" with mock
+emphasis on the name.
+
+"I shan't be Lassen after this, mind. This thing I've got in my pocket
+christens me Johann Liebe."
+
+She laughed. "Let me look at it. I declare I could almost kiss it," she
+exclaimed, when I showed it to her. "And now we'll be sensible. What
+are my marching orders?"
+
+"Flying orders, we call them. Well, I still hope we shall travel in
+state under Government patronage, and----"
+
+"I hope not," she broke in. "I'd much rather go on the 'third wheel,'
+you know. It would be glorious fun. I don't want to have to scrap my
+disguise and have had all my trouble for nothing."
+
+"That's all right; but the other wheel's both safer and quicker, thank
+you. All the same you'd better bring the props along in case things go
+wrong. One never knows. Do you want to bother with any luggage?"
+
+"A comb and a toothbrush, a few hairpins and a pair of scissors. That
+too much?"
+
+"Rather not; but why scissors?"
+
+"You don't want your assistant to have long hair, do you? And it might
+be injudicious to worry a barber."
+
+We both laughed. "I never thought of that. By Jove, it would be a
+beastly shame to have to cut off that lovely wig of yours." She had
+most beautiful hair of a rich dark auburn.
+
+"A thousand times better than an internment camp," she replied, sobered
+by the mere thought of it. But only for the moment; she was too wildly
+excited at the prospect of going home for anything to damp her spirits.
+"Why, I'd do it only to play the part of Hans Bulich for an hour."
+
+"Who's Hans Bulich?"
+
+"Your assistant that hopes to be, of course. You're surely not going to
+begin by forgetting essentials?"
+
+"I had forgotten for the moment."
+
+"Well, don't forget again. Shall I spell it for you?"
+
+"Don't give me any of your lip, 'Hans,'" I retorted smartly.
+
+"All right, matey, keep your hand on the brake," she replied in her
+excellent assistant's tone; and worked in a number of motor parts to
+show she had been swotting them up as I had suggested.
+
+"You'll do, boy," I said, laughing. "And now let's remember this isn't
+going to be all mere chaff," and I told her my plan. She was to be at
+the station a quarter of an hour before the train started and look out
+for me in the waiting-room. "If things go right with von Gratzen,
+that'll be the ladies' room; if not, then the third class. I'll manage
+to 'phone you in time for the necessary make-up. As for the rest, it's
+up to us to manage the best we can."
+
+"If we have to go disguised, are you going to risk the mail train then?"
+
+"There won't be any risk to speak of now that I've got this;" tapping
+my pocket. "Of course we can't go all the way because I haven't a
+passport; but we'll get as near the frontier as we can. Osnabrueck,
+probably; but I'll have the tickets all right. And now I must be off."
+
+"I wish my silly heart wouldn't beat like a racing 40 h.p., but I'll
+have it in good order when we meet again."
+
+"It's a good thing I don't make it beat, eh?"
+
+"Hands off, matey," replied "Hans," but with a very un-boylike blush.
+
+"You must drop that habit, young 'un. You've got to think about other
+40 h.p.'s, you know;" and with that I went, little thinking of all that
+was to happen before we met again.
+
+I hurried to my rooms to put the final touches to my preparations; pack
+the one or two trifles I needed for the journey; make sure that no
+inquisitive eyes had discovered my hidden suit case; and have
+everything ready for instant departure.
+
+This did not take more than a few minutes, and I had just finished and
+was replacing the suit case in its hiding place, when the telephone
+rang.
+
+"Hullo?" I asked, wondering who could want to call me up.
+
+"Herr Lassen?" came in a woman's voice I did not know.
+
+"Yes. What is it?"
+
+"I'm to tell you Anna Hilden wants to see you at once."
+
+"Who is it speaking?" There was no answer, and none again when I
+repeated the question. Who could it be? And the meaning of it? It
+certainly wasn't Anna's voice, although the 'phone has a trick at times
+of changing the voice considerably.
+
+It was still nearly an hour before the time she had fixed for me to go
+to her, and I couldn't understand how she could have got hold of my
+telephone number. But she wouldn't have telephoned if it hadn't been
+urgent. It looked as if she had made up her mind at last to admit
+everything, and the sooner I had the confession the better chance there
+was of catching von Gratzen at his office. So I hurried off, was lucky
+enough to get a taxi, and reached her place within ten minutes of
+getting her message.
+
+To my surprise the door of her flat was ajar. Not perhaps an unusual
+thing, considering that she was a somewhat casual person. I pressed the
+electric bell and heard it ring all right; but she didn't come to the
+door. Probably slipped out for something, I concluded; and after a
+second ring, I pushed the door wide and went in.
+
+She was not in the sitting-room, and I was just dropping into a chair
+to wait for her, when a glance through the open door of the adjoining
+bedroom brought my heart up into my mouth, as if I'd come on an air
+pocket a thousand feet deep.
+
+She was lying asprawl on the bed in a most unnatural attitude.
+
+In a second I was in the room and knew the truth.
+
+She was dead, and the marks on her throat could only mean one thing.
+
+"Murder!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+MURDER
+
+
+Some horror-filled moments passed before I grasped the full
+significance to me of the unfortunate woman's death. I turned dizzy and
+bewildered like a drunken man, and could do nothing but just stare at
+the body, literally stupefied by the suddenness of it.
+
+It wasn't the fact of death that startled me; I had seen too many dead
+bodies at the Front to be much concerned.
+
+But I made a big effort to pull myself together. I examined her to be
+certain that she was really dead, for the body was still warm. There
+was no doubt about it. The poor thing had been choked, and the marks of
+the murderer's fingers showed on her throat.
+
+There had been a struggle in the room, and some of the wretched
+furniture had been overturned. My wits were beginning to clear by that
+time; and I was glancing about the room wondering who had been brute
+enough to commit the murder and what I had better do, when I made a
+discovery that told me everything and turned the blood in my veins icy
+cold.
+
+In examining the body I had disarranged the bedclothes slightly, and by
+the side of the neck, just where it would have fallen from the
+murderer's finger, lay a ring.
+
+Von Erstein's! The puzzle ring he had once shown and explained to me!
+It was impossible to mistake it; and there was probably not another
+ring like it in Berlin.
+
+I didn't lose my head that time; the instinct of self-preservation was
+too strong to allow of any other feeling. My one absorbing thought was
+to get away before any one could come.
+
+I darted back into the sitting-room and snatched at my hat which I had
+left on the table. In my flurry I fumbled. It fell to the floor and
+rolled under the table; and when I grabbed for it again, the quaint
+little card case which Rosa had given me lay open just beside it.
+
+Too obsessed by the desire to get out of the place, I had no other
+feeling than a faint satisfaction at finding it again; not realizing
+for an instant the full significance of the incident I pocketed the
+thing, picked up my hat and left the flat. I took care to shut the
+door; this would serve to postpone the discovery of the murder; went
+down the staircase without undue hurry, made sure there was no one to
+see me leave, walked leisurely away until I turned the first corner and
+then made off at a rapid pace.
+
+A sensation of profound relief that I was safe for a time at any rate
+was followed by some minutes of acute reaction in which I was incapable
+of consecutive thought. A mental blank from which I awoke pretty much
+as a man might wake from sleep-walking. I gazed about me unknowingly,
+and seeing the gate of a small public garden close at hand, I went in
+and sat down.
+
+I soon began to get my wits in working order and bit by bit pieced
+things together. Curiously enough, almost the first thought was about
+the comparative trifle of the card case. I remember that I took it out
+and looked at it, wondering stupidly when I could have dropped it in
+Anna's room. Then I recalled that I had missed it in the morning when
+with von Gratzen. It couldn't have been in my pocket therefore when I
+went to Anna; and in a few seconds I understood.
+
+The last time I had touched it was on the previous night when I had
+taken Rudolff's statement out of it to show von Erstein and he had
+tried to snatch the paper away and had only got the little case. I
+remembered that he had thrown it down close to him and had fiddled with
+it nervously afterwards.
+
+It was clear that he had taken it away with him and had intentionally
+left it in Anna's room to shift his villainous deed on to me. It was
+worthy of him; and it would have succeeded but for that wonderful slice
+of luck--ineffably blessed luck, indeed--by which I had found the card
+case.
+
+That helped me to piece the rest together. Panic-stricken by what I had
+told her about von Gratzen, Anna had no doubt threatened to expose
+everything; Erstein's whole scheme would be ruined the moment she
+opened her lips: and this had roused the brute in him until he had been
+driven to strangle her. The ring had slipped from his finger without
+his noticing the loss of it in his rage. Then he must have tossed my
+card case down under the table to connect me with the crime.
+
+He had obviously left the door ajar for the same reason; had probably
+rushed to the first public telephone box and called me up in a voice
+which was enough like a woman's to mislead me; and intended to send
+some one to catch me red-hot on the scene of the crime.
+
+Two points were not clear. Why no one had caught me? There had been
+ample time, supposing that he was hiding in wait for my arrival. And
+why had the murder been committed in Anna's room, seeing that she had
+gone from me to find him?
+
+One of two suggestions seemed to answer the last question. Either she
+had not found him at first and had left a sufficiently urgent message
+to make him hurry to her, or that after a first interview he had
+induced her to go home and had followed at once. The plan to kill her
+must have been in his mind then, and obviously he couldn't do it in his
+own rooms.
+
+The first question--why I had not been caught--wasn't so readily
+solved; but the ring might well account for it, if he had only
+discovered the loss of it in the interval of waiting for me. With that
+damning bit of evidence against himself, the bottom had dropped out of
+his scheme against me, and he would not dare to try and have me caught
+in the act.
+
+And now I had fortunately shut the door against him. He couldn't go
+back for the ring even if he had the pluck, which I doubted.
+
+This was another stroke of luck, indeed; and it was needed in all
+truth, for the mess was bad and black enough to need a heap of it, if I
+was to escape being charged with the murder. Such a charge would ruin
+me lock, stock and barrel. Even if I could clear myself--and that was
+almost impossible--all the truth about myself would be ferretted out,
+and it was thousands to one that I should be shot for a spy.
+
+Only one expedient occurred to me at first--to bolt. But that looked
+hopeless in the new circumstances. It would be tantamount to a
+confession of guilt; von Erstein would tell some plausible lie about
+the ring belonging to Anna; and it would be believed easily enough if
+suspicion were lifted from him by my flight; the hue and cry would be
+raised all over the country; old Graun would tell his story--that I had
+a workman's papers in the name of Liebe; and my arrest would be a
+matter of hours possibly, certainly one of days at the outside.
+
+That idea had to be set aside, therefore. Before there could be any
+thought of flight suspicion must be fastened on von Erstein. But how?
+Not by sitting on a public seat and nibbling my nails; so I got up and
+started back to the centre of things.
+
+I had completely recovered from the disturbing panicky condition which
+had so confused me in the first rush of things. I don't think I was
+even afraid. My chief feeling was that I was in the very devil's own
+mess and that I should go under, unless my own wits could save me. If
+Feldmann had been in Berlin I should have gone to him; but he wasn't,
+and it was no use wishing he had been.
+
+There was only one other man in the whole city--von Gratzen; and the
+moment that became clear and plain, I hailed a taxi and was driven
+straight to his office.
+
+He was still there, but refused to see me, sending von Welten to ask my
+business. I said that it was on personal business I wished to see his
+chief.
+
+This didn't work, however. Von Welten returned, saying the Baron was
+exceedingly busy and would I state my business in writing. This looked
+ugly; but after thinking a second, I wrote on my card: "Please see me
+for the sake of the Untergasse affair;" placed it in an envelope and
+sent it in. If anything would induce von Gratzen to have me in, that
+would.
+
+I was right. Von Welten came back smiling. "The chief will see you in a
+minute or two, Herr Lassen. I'm glad." He was an exceedingly pleasant
+fellow and stayed chatting with me until von Gratzen's bell rang and I
+was shown in.
+
+"You're giving me a lot of trouble, young man, as you can see," he
+said, pointing to a portfolio in which there appeared to be a lot of
+papers on the top of which were the coveted tickets for Nessa and me.
+"And now what about this Untergasse affair? Found anything out that's
+valuable? I can't give you many minutes."
+
+"I'm in a devil of a mess, sir, but it has nothing to do with that. I
+wrote that because I was compelled to see you."
+
+"I agree with you. You've been in one ever since you reached the city,
+it seems to me, indeed. Nothing fresh, I trust?"
+
+"There is, and the worst of all, sir. I'm in danger of being charged
+with murder."
+
+"With what?" he cried in amazement. "Phew! Well, tell me."
+
+"When I saw you this morning I gathered that the reason those tickets
+for Miss Caldicott and myself could not be used was because of the
+trouble about the woman, Anna Hilden."
+
+"True, but you yourself said you wished it cleared up first."
+
+"So on leaving here I went to see her again."
+
+"Good God, you don't mean to say you lost your head and laid hands on
+her in this awful way?" The thought of it appeared to affect him deeply.
+
+"Oh dear no, sir. I hope I'm not capable of such a thing. From what she
+said, I became certain the whole thing was a fraud and----"
+
+"So it is," he interposed, nodding. "You are right. We know all about
+the woman already. Go on."
+
+"I tried persuasion first; but that was no use, so I let her know that
+the matter was in your hands."
+
+"I hope that frightened her."
+
+"It did, sir. She was almost out of her wits and promised to tell me
+everything this afternoon. I was to call at five o'clock."
+
+"Where did you go next?" he shot in abruptly.
+
+"To the von Reblings."
+
+"To tell Miss Caldicott about these, I suppose?" holding up the tickets.
+
+"Yes. I knew she would be very anxious."
+
+He put the pinned set of tickets, etc., into the portfolio, under a
+couple of papers, and leant back, with his fingers interlocked, and
+stared at me with frowning intentness. "You're not a fool, my boy, and
+you must see that your zeal on that young lady's account is likely to
+rouse a lot of suspicion. What do the von Reblings say about it?"
+
+"They are extremely anxious that she should be allowed to go home."
+
+"Umph!" a grunt and a nod, both of which were repeated. "And where did
+you go next after leaving them?"
+
+I started and hesitated.
+
+"Are you going to tell me the whole truth? We get to know many strange
+things here, you know."
+
+"I went to see a man named Graun----"
+
+"I know you did. You were followed and he was questioned. I won't ask
+you why you got what you did from him; but don't attempt to use it. Now
+go on about this other affair. Just everything; everything, and quite
+frankly."
+
+"I will, sir. Let me get my thoughts in order again. You've taken me
+considerably by surprise." I paused a few seconds and then told him
+exactly what had occurred, from the moment of my receiving the
+telephone call, down to my discovery of von Erstein's ring under Anna's
+body.
+
+He jumped up excitedly at that. "Why didn't you tell me that first?" he
+cried. "There isn't a moment to lose. I must see about it instantly;"
+and he hurried out of the room.
+
+For the second time the tickets were within reach and I was alone in
+the room. He had apparently forgotten them in his excitement, and that
+I had only to stretch out my hand and secure them. Or had he gone out
+deliberately intending to give me the chance? He knew how eager I was
+to get away; the old Jew's tale must have shown that.
+
+I didn't hesitate this time. I whipped them out of the portfolio and
+pocketed them. Had I better bolt, or stay to face him? A mighty
+difficult question. If I ran away, he might suspect; if I stayed, there
+was a chance that he might not miss them. If they were missed, they
+wouldn't be worth a pfennig. We should certainly be stopped at the
+station; there would be a scene and Nessa would be hopelessly
+compromised. That was unthinkable.
+
+There was nothing for it, therefore, but to stay and face it out. It
+wasn't easy to do; and nothing in the world except the thought of the
+consequences to Nessa, could have glued me to my chair for the minutes
+I had still to wait for von Gratzen. It was a positive relief when the
+strain ended and he came back.
+
+He was looking very grave and stern, and there were still traces of the
+excitement he had shown when he had left me.
+
+How I watched him! The next moment would decide everything for me. He
+was thinking closely, paused with his hand to his forehead when halfway
+to the desk, nodded in response to a thought, and went on to his chair.
+I had to hold my breath, as he sat down and laid his hand on the
+portfolio. I was ready to throw up the sponge as he slightly lifted the
+top paper and toyed with it.
+
+The thought flashed through my head that the only thing left was to
+admit everything; who I was; why I had come; why I was so eager to get
+away; and then ask him to help me in return for what I had done in the
+Untergasse affair.
+
+But the moment for that hadn't come yet at all events. Whether he
+noticed the absence of the tickets it was impossible to say. He
+appeared to be entirely lost in thought; he was staring abstractedly at
+nothing; not once had I seen his eyes drop to the desk; not so much as
+a side glance came my way; but then he was such a wily old beggar that
+that might all have been pretence to mislead me.
+
+After a time that seemed hours to me, he nodded to himself again, took
+the hand from the papers to pass it across his forehead, and smiled. A
+smile of infinite meaning it was too. Then he closed the portfolio and
+put it away in a drawer.
+
+"Now tell me the rest, boy," he said, turning to look at me for the
+first time. "Hallo, you look a little done up. Room too hot? Open the
+window a bit."
+
+I jumped at the excuse to get out of range of his keen eyes for an
+instant. He might well say it was hot, for the strain had brought the
+perspiration in great beads on my forehead.
+
+"Stand there a while and get a breath of the fresh air. A thing like
+this is sure to shake you up," he added.
+
+Did he know? Was this intended to give me an opportunity of pulling
+myself together? Had he noticed everything and been thinking out some
+further subtle move in the game? Who could tell?
+
+"Better?" he asked, as I returned to my seat. "There's no hurry. I've
+put off my other matters and shall have to keep you here for an hour or
+so. I'll tell you why presently. Oh, by the way, you'd better give me
+the card you got from old Graun. It may help you if I'm able to say you
+gave it to me; and, of course, it's no use to you now."
+
+Was this his way of telling me that he knew? was the question in my
+mind as I gave it him. Then I resumed the story of the afternoon.
+
+"You brought that card case away?" he shot in when I mentioned it.
+
+"Yes. I have it here. Will you take it?"
+
+"Perhaps I'd better," he replied after a pause, and then opened the
+drawer containing the portfolio, tossed it in carelessly, and let me
+finish the rest of the story without interruption, when he once more
+lapsed into close thought.
+
+Von Welten came in before he spoke and handed him a note. "Not a second
+later than seven o'clock, mind, von Welten. Not a second, mind," he
+said when he had read the letter. "That'll do;" and we were alone again.
+
+"Now I'll tell you something in my turn," he said. "You have rendered
+us a very great service; a much greater service than you can imagine.
+You have only made one mistake, for you ought to have hurried to me as
+fast as possible from that woman's rooms; but you're evidently lucky,
+for no harm has been done."
+
+"I don't quite understand, sir," I stammered in surprise.
+
+"I'm going to explain it to you. In the first place let me tell you I
+believe absolutely that you have told me the truth--about this murder,
+I mean--perhaps not in everything else."
+
+"There is only one thing, and if you wish----"
+
+"Don't interrupt me, boy. I don't like it," he exclaimed testily. "It
+puts me out. Now about this affair. We know all about this woman, Anna
+Hilden. That isn't her name at all; but that doesn't matter now. She
+is, or was, one of von Erstein's mistresses; not the only one, by the
+way. The real Anna Hilden was another--years ago, of course--and that
+is how he knew all about that sale of the secret information to France."
+
+I had not said anything about that and he noticed my start.
+
+"You needn't be astonished. I tell you we know many things here. It is
+our business to know them. The man who betrayed us in that affair was
+von Erstein himself, and you, if you are really Lassen, were merely the
+go-between and scapegoat. But he was too cunning for us to be able to
+prove a thing against him. There are many things we think we know about
+him and can't prove, and others we don't wish to prove," he said, with
+a very meaning side glance.
+
+"I can understand that."
+
+"We'll hope you don't come under either head, my boy. Well, we've been
+waiting for von Erstein, and now, thanks to you, we've got him. This
+woman went to him to-day after you left her; she was with him a
+considerable time; she left in great agitation; and he followed later
+to the flat which had been taken for this affair of yours. That he
+murdered her, there is no doubt, after what you've told me; but it's
+got to be proved. You won't be sorry if it is, probably."
+
+"He ought to be hanged," I exclaimed impulsively.
+
+He fixed his keen eyes on me, and in an instant I saw what I had done
+and that this was one of his infernal traps.
+
+"You're either forgetting yourself, or beginning to remember things,
+aren't you?" he asked deliberately, with one of his queer inscrutable
+smiles. "It's in England that they hang murderers, you know."
+
+I could have cursed myself for the idiotic slip, as his eyes bored
+right into my brain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+VON GRATZEN'S WILINESS
+
+
+Abashed and confused by this unexpected trap, I sat cudgelling my wits
+for something to say, and at last stammered out, "I--I meant lynched,
+hanged on the nearest lamp-post, sir."
+
+It was the lamest of lame dogs; but he appeared satisfied. He leant
+back in his chair. "Oh, I see. Yes, of course. Your American
+experiences, I expect. Well, we can talk about that another time. I was
+going to say that in von Erstein we have to deal with a very cunning
+individual indeed, and I shall expect you to help us. One of the
+necessary steps may be your arrest."
+
+"Arrest!" I echoed in dismay.
+
+"I said arrest. It may be necessary. It is essential he should not
+believe that a jot of suspicion attaches to him. You'll appreciate
+that?"
+
+"I can appreciate it perhaps, but----"
+
+"Don't be alarmed. I promise you very good treatment."
+
+"But I thought you wished----" I pulled up on the brink of blurting out
+about my going to England.
+
+"No matter for the moment what I wished, my boy." I was beginning to
+hate that term of familiarity, for I knew now what it covered.
+"Everything must wait upon this now," he continued. "The arrest will
+not be made at once, however, as there is one thing you have to do
+first."
+
+This was better. If it wasn't done at once, it never would be done, I
+was resolved. "What is that?" I asked.
+
+"You must return that ring to von Erstein."
+
+"Do what?" I cried aghast. The ring was the only evidence against him!
+
+"Do try to listen carefully. You must return it to him and lead him to
+believe you brought it away from that room. Let him snatch it from you
+while you are threatening to denounce him; or give it him as the terms
+of a truce between you; anyhow you please. But mind, it must be done so
+that he is convinced no eyes but yours have seen it. That's vital."
+
+The light was beginning to break through even my thick skull then.
+
+"We have it here; our people found it exactly as you said."
+
+"Then the murder is known?"
+
+"Oh, yes; the police have it in hand by this time; but they know
+nothing about that ring. We sent two men to the place who are suspected
+of being in his pay; and they will be able to report to him that
+nothing of the sort was found on the spot. We have taken every
+precaution, of course. It has been photographed from a dozen different
+points and a replica is being made. I am waiting now for the impression
+of the mould."
+
+"It has occurred to you, of course, that he may destroy it?" I
+suggested.
+
+He shook his head. "There's no fear of that. For one thing he's much
+too proud of it; there isn't another exactly like it in all Europe,
+probably not in the whole world; for another, he looks on it as a sort
+of mascot; there's some kind of legend or other about it; and lastly,
+if you do your part well, he will feel he can keep it with absolute
+safety."
+
+The scheme was subtle enough to be worthy even of von Gratzen, and it
+increased my dread of his almost diabolical cunning. "When will you
+make him account for it?"
+
+"That depends. He's a vindictive devil and is sure to denounce you for
+the murder, the instant he thinks he can do it safely. The most
+effective moment to deal with him would be when we get him in the
+witness box, giving evidence against you. But we shall see."
+
+"And when am I to be arrested?"
+
+"As soon as he lays the information against you, unless I find on
+consideration we can avoid quite so drastic a step. It is not
+altogether impossible; but the pith of everything is that you get the
+ring back to him as soon as possible."
+
+A pleasant look-out for me--to be charged with murder of which he knew
+I was innocent in order to help him carry out plans. "You will scarcely
+expect me to be deliriously joyful at the prospect of being tried for
+my life," I said with a feeble smile.
+
+He didn't like that at all and frowned at me. "Worse than that might
+happen to you, perhaps; and in the end it would be immensely to your
+advantage," he replied with unpleasantly deliberate significance.
+
+I dropped that line like a hot coal. "I'm in your hands, sir."
+
+"I'm glad to hear you say that. Of course, as I said just now, it may
+not come to that; I have another possible plan, indeed. But the other
+part is essential. You will give me your word of honour to carry out my
+instructions faithfully?"
+
+"Yes, I give you my word of honour. Would it be sufficient if I were to
+let him have it with a letter?"
+
+"Why?" Like a pistol shot came the question and his eyes snapped.
+
+"I might bungle the personal business. I'm not much of a hand at
+acting, I'm afraid."
+
+"I see," he replied; nodding; and something uncommonly like a smile
+hovered about the corners of his mouth. "I thought you said something
+to that Jew about theatricals and your studying his character. I have
+looked on you as a particularly good actor, my boy. But let's think. It
+would depend on how you worded any letter."
+
+He considered for a while, started suddenly, nodded to himself, smiled,
+wrote hastily, and handed me the paper. "Just memorize that."
+
+"Von Erstein, you will know where I found the enclosed just as I know
+why you left what I found there. You think to ruin me. I am not the man
+you believe me to be and can prove my innocence by means of which you
+can have no conception. Enough that I tell you I have sufficiently
+recovered my memory to protect myself against your devilish malice. The
+enclosed proves I am ready to cry a truce.--Johann Lassen."
+
+What I felt as I read this under the keen piercing gaze he rivetted on
+me the whole time, no words can describe. "Well, my boy?" he asked.
+
+"I--I'll memorize it, sir," I stammered to get time to think.
+
+"Just read it out. Let me hear how it sounds."
+
+Fortunately, or intentionally, I couldn't determine which, he put his
+hand before his face as I read it in none too firm a tone. "It'll do.
+Oh, yes. The recovery of your memory seems to explain the word 'means,'
+and he'll think you are only bluffing him. He'll never dream you've
+told me all about it; and, of course, that's what I intended. You
+understand I much prefer your seeing him; but if you can't, you can
+send that letter."
+
+I began to breathe freely again. "I'll see him to-night, if possible,"
+I replied.
+
+"I'm sure you will. It's now all but seven. He generally goes to dinner
+at eight, and between now and then you ought to be able to catch him at
+his rooms. Mind, I depend on you."
+
+"You may, sir."
+
+"They ought to be ready for us now," he said; and as he rang his bell
+von Welten came in, bringing the ring, the replica and the photographs;
+and we all scrutinized them carefully.
+
+The facsimile of the ring was absolutely perfect. It was either in wax
+or some harder material and had been gilded, and as it and the original
+lay side by side on the table it was impossible to distinguish the one
+from the other.
+
+"Very good indeed. Clever work, in the time," said von Gratzen. "Of
+course he understands that the finished facsimile must be in gold and
+will take to pieces in the same way as the original."
+
+"Oh, yes. He has a number of small moulds of the individual parts.
+Would you like to see them, sir?" replied von Welten.
+
+"Not necessary at all. He knows his job. That'll do, von Welten. Leave
+the real thing with me;" and he picked it up and examined it with a
+gloating and almost satanic smile, as von Welten left the room. "At
+last!" he murmured under his breath.
+
+Then he wrapped it up and handed it to me. "You see how I trust you, my
+boy. I know you won't fail me, too. And now you had better go. Just a
+last word. As soon as you've returned that to him disappear for a time.
+Leave Berlin and go, oh anywhere; the farther the better for the time;
+and don't on any account come to me again until I send for you."
+
+Utterly mystified by all this, I ventured: "But can I go away without a
+permit?"
+
+Another of his queer inscrutable smiles greeted this. "Perhaps it would
+be better; but you haven't any too much time to spare--if you're going
+to catch von Erstein," he added as an afterthought. He rang his bell
+and wrote furiously. "Get that stamped officially at once. As quick as
+you can," he told von Welten, who hurried away. "He'll give it you as
+you go out," he said to me, rising and gripping my hand. "And now,
+good-bye, my boy--for a time at any rate. You're a good lad, and
+whatever happens, if you do what I've asked, I'll always stand by you."
+
+Von Welten met me with the permit as I left the room. "You're in luck
+to have got on the right side of the chief in this way," he said, as we
+shook hands.
+
+Were they all living enigmas? was my thought as I left the building,
+for von Welten's manner was as veiled and significant as his chief's.
+Did von Gratzen know that I had taken the tickets? Had he worded the
+letter I was to write to von Erstein in order to tell me that he knew
+my lost memory was a fraud? Did that remark, "You haven't any too much
+time to spare," refer to my having to catch the mail? He had qualified
+it by saying something about seeing von Erstein; but that had seemed to
+be just an afterthought.
+
+It was beyond me; and I was even more astounded when I read the paper
+which von Welten had given me. It was much more than a mere permit. It
+amounted to an official authority that I was travelling on business of
+State; was to go where I would and when; that all assistance was to be
+given to me; and any inquiries were to be telegraphed straight to von
+Gratzen.
+
+I was indeed lucky, as von Welten had declared. He little guessed what
+luck it was! Or did he? Was it all intended to make my path to the
+frontier clear?
+
+There was no time to puzzle about it then, however. I could write and
+ask for the reply to the riddle when Nessa and I were safely in Holland
+or home in England; what I had to do now was to get this business with
+von Erstein finished as quickly as possible.
+
+I drove to his flat; but he was not there, and I could not learn where
+to look for him. I was rather glad of this. It would be much easier to
+write the letter arranged. I went then to the Karlstrasse to tell Nessa
+that she could travel in her own character.
+
+Rosa was with her, and both were nervous at not having heard earlier
+how matters were going, for it was then more than a quarter past seven.
+
+"I've been worrying awfully," said Nessa. "Is anything wrong?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Everything's gloriously right. I've got our tickets,
+and all you've to do is to be at the station."
+
+"But what's happened?" exclaimed Rosa.
+
+"I haven't time to tell you now. I'm sorry; but I have to rush back to
+my rooms and get something.--By Jove!" I broke off in a cold sweat as
+the meaning of von Gratzen's look at my suggestion about writing dawned
+on me. I had told him before that I could neither write nor read
+writing! I had even given him a specimen of my new pothook fist! Of
+course I must keep it up, and it might take me Heaven knew how long. "I
+must go this instant," I said, and shaking hands with Rosa I rushed
+away to my rooms and set to work at once.
+
+It was a deuce of a business. Every letter had to be printed in clumsy
+fashion; my fingers were trembling under the stress of my impatience; I
+made blunders and had to begin all over again, and every lost minute
+was of vital importance.
+
+If I hadn't given my word of honour to von Gratzen I'd have wrapped the
+beastly ring up, scribbled a word or two and have left it at that. It
+was on the table by the side of the paper as I wrote, and I had just
+started on the second edition absorbed in the work, when a hand was
+stretched over my shoulder and grabbed the ring.
+
+It was von Erstein; I was never more glad to see any one in my life. I
+could have forgiven him everything for such a service.
+
+"Very good of you to leave the door open, Lassen," he said, with a
+sneering laugh. "Just going to return it to me, eh? I thought I'd
+dropped it here last night."
+
+There were still minutes enough left for me to put up a show of a
+struggle, and get in an explanation. So I grabbed hold of him, taking
+care that he should not get away and also that he kept possession of
+the ring.
+
+"I _was_ going to send it you, von Erstein. You can see I've begun
+the letter there."
+
+He stooped to read it and was puzzled. "What the devil does that mean?"
+he growled.
+
+"I'm willing to come to terms. We both know where I found it."
+
+"How do I know where you put it?"
+
+"Don't lie, man. You know very well that it was on your finger when you
+left here last night, and"--I paused for the sake of emphasis--"two
+people saw it there this morning."
+
+This hit him hard, and he winced and drew a deep breath. "Rubbish!" he
+muttered.
+
+"I've made sure about that. I've just come from your flat, remember," I
+said meaningly.
+
+"Have you been spreading that lie about me?"
+
+"Do you take me for an idiot to let any one want to ask where I found
+it?"
+
+He was satisfied, and his relief showed itself in his immediate change
+of manner. "All right, we'll bury the hatchet if you like," he said
+with a very poor attempt to hoodwink me.
+
+"You can go then;" and I moved to let him leave. I was anxious to get
+rid of him now, as it was time for me to be off to the station. I must
+have betrayed my impatience somehow, for he started, stared a moment,
+and sat down. "You're in a deuce of a hurry."
+
+"Dinner time, and I'm hungry. Clear out."
+
+"Nice room you've got here, Lassen," he answered, squinting round, and
+started again as his eyes fell on my suit case. "O-ho, that's the game,
+is it?" he chuckled. "Going to bolt? No good, my friend, no good at
+all."
+
+His fat insolent chuckle roused the devil in me. "You'd better drop
+that tone with me, von Erstein, and not interfere with my movements."
+
+"Shall we go and dine together?" he sneered. "It'll be safer, for there
+are a few inquisitive friends of mine waiting outside."
+
+I had noticed one or two men hanging round the building as I entered,
+and it wouldn't do to be shadowed. So I went out, locked the front door
+and put the key in my pocket.
+
+"What's that for?" he growled uneasily.
+
+"So that our chat shan't be disturbed. I've sampled your friends
+already, remember," I said drily.
+
+"Let me go," he cried in a dickens of a stew.
+
+"You wanted to stop, and stop you shall."
+
+To my intense joy he came for me and thus saved me from the unpleasant
+job of knocking him out in cold blood. I did it quite satisfactorily,
+and as he fell he struck his head against the corner of a writing desk
+and saved me the trouble of hitting him again.
+
+Then I collared my suit case, clambered out of the bathroom window down
+by the fire escape, and got away by a passage into a side street. A
+single glance satisfied me that none of his "friends" saw me, and I
+rushed off to the station.
+
+I reached it with only a few minutes in hand, and Nessa was waiting for
+me in the door of the waiting-room.
+
+"I was afraid you'd be late and that something had happened," she said
+nervously.
+
+"It's all right. We've plenty of time. Don't be nervy and not too
+friendly yet. There may be eyes about. We'll find a carriage at once."
+
+It was all right enough to tell her not to be nervy, but I was on pins
+and needles, wondering if my theft of the tickets had been discovered,
+whether at the last moment we should be stopped, and a hundred other
+wonderings.
+
+My eyes were all over the place as we walked to the train; and to my
+infinite dismay I caught sight of the old Jew planted close to the
+barrier through which we had to pass. That was not the worst, moreover,
+by any means. He was talking to a man who had policeman written all
+over him.
+
+And then, as if that wasn't bad enough, on the platform just beyond von
+Welten was strolling up and down smoking.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+OFF!
+
+
+The sight of the old Jew, his police companion, and von Welten knocked
+me all to pieces for the moment. We were done. That was a certainty. I
+could have bluffed the Jew, probably, with the official authority which
+von Gratzen had given me; but von Welten was what Jimmy Lamb would have
+called a very different proposition.
+
+"I think I'll have a cigarette," I said; and pulled up to light it and
+try to think what to do.
+
+"Whatever's the matter, Jack?" whispered Nessa. "Your hand shakes like
+anything and you're looking awful."
+
+"Nothing to what I'm feeling. I'm afraid it's all up. I can't tell you
+all about it now. Just shake hands with me and trot back to the
+waiting-room. If you see me stopped--wait till the train has actually
+started, of course--make a bee line back to the von Reblings. If it's
+all right, I'll beckon to you."
+
+"But if there's any trouble why should I leave you in it alone?" she
+protested, like the brick she was.
+
+"Let me be boss now. If you're with me, you may never get away at all;
+and if you're not, it may only mean a postponement. Be a good sort.
+Good-bye, Miss Caldicott;" and I held out my hand.
+
+She took it reluctantly. "I'd rather be with you," she replied with a
+glance for which I could have kissed her. Then she did as I wished.
+
+I put as bold a face on things as I could, walked quickly up to the
+barrier, putting my hand in my pocket as if for my ticket.
+
+"Good-evening, sir," said the Jew as I approached.
+
+"Hullo, you here, Graun?" very much astonished.
+
+"Herr Johann Lassen?" asked his companion.
+
+"That's my name, certainly. Who are you, and what do you want? I'm in a
+hurry to catch the train."
+
+"I'm a detective and have to ask you a few questions."
+
+"Fire 'em out, quick as you can, please."
+
+"There's no such hurry as all that. You can't go by this train. You
+paid a visit to this man to-day."
+
+"We shall be here half the night at this rate. I went to purchase an
+identification card and he sold me one in the name of Liebe."
+
+"Your object?"
+
+"That's my affair. I haven't it with me and am not going to use it."
+
+"That's your story. I don't believe it. Give it to me."
+
+"I've told you I haven't it."
+
+"Give it to me."
+
+"I would if I had it. As it is, I can't."
+
+"Give it up at once," he repeated very sharply.
+
+This looked like a deadlock and moments were flying fast. There was
+nothing for it but to try the effect of my official authority, and I
+was fingering it, when von Welten caught sight of me and hurried in our
+direction. I threw up the sponge. To produce the authority in his
+presence would be only to make bad worse, so I put it in my waistcoat
+pocket.
+
+The detective knew von Welten and saluted him.
+
+"Well, Grossbaum, what is it? How do, Herr Lassen?"
+
+"This man had a deal with Graun to-day and is travelling----"
+
+Von Welten interposed angrily. "Hold your tongue, you fool. I've always
+thought yours was the woodenest head in the force. I suppose you
+brought this disreputable old scoundrel here. Get away, both of you.
+Think yourself lucky if I don't report this last cleverness of yours.
+Be off, I say;" and the precious pair slunk away like a couple of
+whipped curs. "I'm awfully sorry about this, Herr Lassen; but why on
+earth didn't you show the fool that paper the chief gave you?"
+
+"I was going to," I stammered, utterly bewildered by the turn of
+affairs and gaping in wonder what would happen next. I was prepared for
+almost anything except what did happen.
+
+"I knew you would travel by this train and thought I'd like to be
+certain that everything was all right about the ring;" and he dropped
+his voice to a whisper.
+
+"Yes. He came to my rooms and I gave it him."
+
+"The artful devil! Of course he's planted some of the woman's things
+there. I told the chief I thought he would; and I'll see to that in the
+morning. But where's Miss Caldicott?"
+
+"Eh?" I asked stupidly.
+
+"Do you mean to say she isn't going after all?"
+
+"N-no. I mean--yes. She's over there," I stammered.
+
+"Well, she'd better be here if you wish to catch the train. There's
+only another minute and they'll start on the tick."
+
+Oh, I was surely dreaming. In a dream I beckoned to Nessa, who came
+hurrying up; in a dream von Welten was introduced and rushed us through
+the barrier to a compartment he'd already secured for us; in a dream he
+stood by the carriage door till we started, saying he thought it better
+for us to travel alone; and in a dream we shook hands out of the
+carriage window, and he waved to us as the train steamed out of the
+station.
+
+Even when we quickened up speed through the outskirts of the city, I
+had hard work to wake up from that tremendously splendid dream. But
+Nessa was very much awake and boiling over with excitement, curiosity
+and delight. "What's the matter with you, Jack? Aren't you just mad
+with joy? I am."
+
+"That's all right," I nodded.
+
+"But you look so odd."
+
+"Only intoxicated a bit."
+
+"Surely you haven't been taking some drug or other! You came along the
+platform as if you were walking in a dream."
+
+"Are you sure it isn't one? Are we really in a railway carriage?"
+
+"Of course it is, and a very comfortable one too. But whatever do you
+mean? Are you trying to frighten me or just fooling as usual?"
+
+"I don't know, but I simply can't believe it all yet."
+
+"Why? Do you understand that I'm bubbling over with curiosity? Do wake
+up and make haste and satisfy it, if you don't want to drive me out of
+my senses. Good heavens, you're on fire!" she exclaimed in alarm, as
+she wrapped her hand in her cloak and pressed it against my side
+excitedly.
+
+That roused me effectually. My waistcoat was smouldering and I plunged
+my hand into the pocket and discovered the reason. In my stupid
+absent-mindedness I had shoved the lighted end of my cigarette into the
+pocket and it had set fire to a couple of papers and singed the cloth.
+
+"Nothing to worry about," I said. But there was. When I unfolded one of
+the papers, I found that it was the authority von Gratzen had given me.
+A fair-sized hole had been charred right through the folds and the
+tinder dropped as I opened out the sheet. It was hopelessly unreadable
+and thus useless. "I didn't think I could be such a gorgeous idiot," I
+exclaimed staring fatuously at the ruin.
+
+"It's serious then?" asked Nessa, who had watched me anxiously.
+
+"Try if you can make anything out of it."
+
+She studied it and shook her head. "A word or two here and there are
+readable. That's all. What is it?"
+
+"The proof that I ought to be shut up in a lunatic asylum. But it
+_was_ something that would have taken me anywhere and everywhere
+through this beastly country and forced every one to help me."
+
+"That's delightfully intelligible," she cried, laughing. "Are you going
+to keep this up much longer, or tell me things?"
+
+"I'm going to tell you everything; but that silly ass trick of mine has
+knocked me. I'll smoke a cigarette. You don't mind?"
+
+"Providing you don't put the end in another pocket," she quizzed. "I
+thought it was agreed we were not to take things too seriously," she
+added as I lit up.
+
+"I've learnt my lesson." I had indeed. It had cost me the best safe
+conduct a man could have wished for, and if any unexpected trouble
+arose, there was now no possibility of undoing the mischief. As the
+guard passed along the corridor a little later, I decided to report the
+loss at once, and beckoned to him. "I've had an unfortunate accident,"
+I said. "I'm travelling on special State business and have burnt this
+very important paper;" and I handed it to him.
+
+He looked at it, turned it over, and shrugged his shoulders. "I'm
+afraid I can't be of much help, sir."
+
+"It is my authority signed by Count von Gratzen; you can just make out
+a part of the official seal; and you will have seen that Herr von
+Welten was on the platform when we left Berlin."
+
+"Yes, sir. He gave me orders to reserve this compartment for you,
+but----"
+
+"You can't do anything, I know; but I wish you to make a note that I
+told you of the loss. That's all."
+
+"Would you telegraph to his Excellency, sir?"
+
+"Where's the first stop?"
+
+"Not till Hanover, sir; but as it is State business and so important, I
+could stop at the next station for you to send a message, and you would
+have a reply wired to Hanover, or Osnabrueck, if you are going so far."
+
+"A good idea, guard. I'm much obliged to you. I'll think about it; just
+give me a form." He took one from his pocket and went off, saying he
+would come back for the message.
+
+Nessa had listened in the greatest amazement. "Who on earth am I
+travelling with?" she cried. "Do you mean that you are able to have
+trains stopped at your mere nod?"
+
+"I'll tell you who you're travelling with in a moment, but let me think
+whether I dare send that wire." It wasn't long before I decided to risk
+it. Von Gratzen himself had suggested I should get out of the way for a
+time: even go to a distance: and would understand the importance of the
+ruined authority, since I could not return when he needed me without
+it. He would therefore wire me all I should require, pending the
+receipt of a new authority. That was all clear enough.
+
+But there was a fly in the ointment. He might have discovered the theft
+of the papers. But even in that case there wasn't very much risk, as
+the von Erstein affair was so vastly more important that he would
+hesitate before sending any instructions to get me into trouble. So I
+wrote the message and gave it to the guard, with a ten-mark tip, and
+the train was accordingly stopped for it to be despatched.
+
+Then I was ready to satisfy Nessa's acute curiosity. "Now you want to
+know who your fellow traveller is, eh? I'll tell you. He's a composite
+individual: an Englishman, a German, a State official, a spy, a thief,
+and an alleged murderer. I hope you're proud of him."
+
+"I don't care what he is if he's going to get me out of Germany. I
+needn't know him afterwards, I suppose."
+
+"If you're disrespectful and don't behave yourself I'll--I'll----"
+
+"Dock my wages, mate?" she popped in in her slangy voice.
+
+"That reminds me. There's a little thing to be done in case of
+accidents;" and I took her bag from the seat.
+
+"You don't mean to tell me you're going to keep me waiting any longer!"
+
+"I'm not going to have young Hans' clothes found in your possession;
+much too risky;" and I packed them into my suit case.
+
+"But your risk?"
+
+"There's none for me. I'm travelling on business of State and may need
+disguises of any sort. And now I'll read you the riddles; but we shall
+have to be quick about it."
+
+"If you dare to hurry over it and not tell me every little detail, I'll
+never speak to you again, Jack," she declared with great energy.
+
+"We must drop that Jack business, and speak in my language. And I have
+to be quick because it's nearly bedtime."
+
+"You don't imagine for an instant I'm getting into any sleeping berth
+to-night surely! I couldn't sleep a wink. I want to do nothing but
+talk."
+
+"All right, let it go at that;" and I began the long story. It is
+needless to say that her interest was acute. She was literally hungry
+for every detail and interrupted with innumerable questions, so that it
+took hours to tell, and I hadn't quite finished when we reached
+Hanover, where I broke off to get something for us to eat.
+
+A number of officers and soldiers were on the platform there, many of
+whom stared pretty hard at me; surprised probably to see a man of
+military age in civilian clothes. I did not take any notice of them;
+but there was a rather unpleasant incident on my return to the
+carriage. A couple of officers were in hot altercation with the guard
+because he would not allow them to enter our compartment.
+
+They grumbled, declaring there was no room anywhere else; but he stood
+his ground, and in the end they went off in just such a rage as one
+might expect Prussian officers to show.
+
+Nessa was greatly relieved to see them go, and as soon as the train
+started we commenced our meal.
+
+"I'm only a nervy idiot," she said; "for I declare I was awfully scared
+and couldn't help thinking they knew about the tickets. Do you really
+believe von Gratzen didn't know you took them?"
+
+"I'm absolutely fluster-bustered about it. Sometimes I thought he knew
+I was a fraud; sometimes that he didn't; he acted both ways, and----"
+
+"But that von Welten was at the station," she broke in.
+
+"Evidently he knew I had them, but must have thought old Gratz gave
+them to me. He said he had come to make sure I had planted the ring on
+von Erstein, all right. Otherwise, he'd have stopped us; but he
+actually asked where you were. It knocked me bang over."
+
+"I'd bet he knew all about it, and so did von Gratzen. I expect the
+truth is that after you'd saved his wife and Nita that day, he guessed
+everything and determined to give you a chance to get out of the
+country. Why, he almost told you to take them when you were with him in
+the morning. And then that authority he gave you! It's as plain as a
+pikestaff he meant that to get out of any bother on the way; and, as if
+that wasn't enough, there was von Welten at the station to see that we
+got away without any trouble."
+
+"Let's hope you're right."
+
+"Of course I am. Naturally in view of all that happened he couldn't
+give you the things openly or he might have got into a mess over it
+which couldn't be explained away. But everything else could. His plan
+about von Erstein, the brute, gave him an excellent excuse for allowing
+you to leave Berlin; in fact you can see he was clever enough to cover
+his tracks at every step. Surely that's clear enough."
+
+"It may be to you, but I gave up long ago trying to understand him, and
+if you'd seen as much of him as----"
+
+"I don't want to see him, not till after the war anyhow, although he's
+just the dearest old thing in Germany. If I ever do see him again, I
+shall want to hug him."
+
+"Hug him as much as you like, by all means; all I wish is that he won't
+hug me in the way he probably would if he got the chance. And now
+hadn't you better try forty winks?" I suggested.
+
+"What time is it?"
+
+"Nearly one o'clock."
+
+"What time shall we cross the frontier?"
+
+"About an hour after we leave Osnabrueck, and we get there at half-past
+three."
+
+"Then I'll go to sleep at four o'clock. Not a moment before. I simply
+couldn't. Oh, to think that in four hours all the suspense and horrors
+of the last months will be at an end! When shall we reach home? Think
+of it, Jack! Home!"
+
+"Depends on our getting a boat. We'll go right through to Rotterdam and
+shall reach there by nine or ten to-morrow morning, say before midday
+anyhow; but we may have to wait for a boat."
+
+"I shan't mind that. We must wire to mother as soon as we're over the
+frontier. Not likely to have any bother there, are we?"
+
+"Can't think of any. We've got all the necessary papers."
+
+"How perfectly glorious! And to think that I owe it all to you."
+
+"That rather takes the cream off, doesn't it?"
+
+"Don't fish. I might say something to make you blush. I'm quite capable
+of it and not a bit responsible for what I say. I want to revel in the
+thought of it all."
+
+"State business, is it? What do I care about State business? I want a
+seat and I'm going to have one," broke in a harsh ill-tempered voice
+from the corridor.
+
+"Going to have travelling companions to Osnabrueck," I said. "Some of
+those officers who got in at Hanover. Better let them come in."
+
+There was no question of letting them. The man whose voice we had heard
+came in. "We've got to sit here; there's not another seat in the
+train," he said bluntly.
+
+"By all means," I agreed. There was nothing else to do.
+
+"Come on, you fellows," he called, looking out into the corridor.
+"Plenty of room here."
+
+I stiffened as I caught a glimpse of one of his companions. He was a
+man named Freibach who had been at Goettingen with me, and both Nessa
+and I had known him in London before the war. I tried to warn Nessa,
+but it was useless; and her start as she saw him was enough to give
+everything away.
+
+Would he recognize us? If he did--what?
+
+A minute settled it and judgment went dead against us. He knew us both.
+
+"Hullo! This is a surprise if you like. How do you do, Miss Caldicott,
+and you too, Lancaster?" he exclaimed in English, and after shaking
+hands with Nessa held out his hand to me.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+CHECKMATE
+
+
+I'm not a particularly blood-thirsty person, but considering the hosts
+of Freibach's countrymen who had fallen in the war, I certainly did
+bitterly regret that he had been spared.
+
+Poor Nessa! Just when she had been at the height of ecstatic delight at
+the near prospect of escape, this infernal thing had come to plunge her
+back into the abyss. It seemed to break her up.
+
+And well it might! If it had been almost any other man than Freibach it
+might have been possible to face it out. Indeed, if he had been alone,
+or had even thought what he was doing, I believe he would have been
+decent enough to hold his tongue. But his surprise had betrayed us.
+
+And that we were betrayed his companions' looks proved plainly. The man
+who had come in first looked up with a scowl as I shook Freibach's hand.
+
+"What's that, lieutenant? Do you mean to say these people are English
+and dare to try and keep us out of here with a pretence of State
+business? What's the meaning of it, and what the devil are you doing
+here?"
+
+My friend realized then the bad turn he had done us and looked the
+regret he dared not express.
+
+I put the best face on it I could. "There is no need to adopt that tone
+with me, sir----"
+
+"Isn't there? Oh! I'm accustomed to use what tone I please with you
+English. I'm Major Borsch of the 23rd Potsdam regiment; and it's my
+business to know all about you both." That he was a bully of the best
+Prussian type was evident. "What was that humbug about State business?"
+
+How I regretted that burnt authority at that moment! "This lady, Miss
+Caldicott, is on her way to England. She has been in Berlin since
+before the outbreak of the war and is returning by the order of Baron
+von Gratzen; and acting under his instructions I am escorting her to
+the frontier."
+
+He burst into loud coarse laughter which made Freibach wince. "A pretty
+tale, but not good enough for me. And who are you, pray, that you are
+detailed off as escort?" The sneer on the last word was worthy of even
+von Erstein.
+
+"I am travelling as Johann Lassen. I have all my papers here. I am on a
+special mission for Baron von Gratzen, who gave me a written authority
+for that purpose."
+
+"Did he indeed? Very nice of him. I should like to see that special
+authority. A swine of an Englishman on a special State business! What
+next, I'd like to know."
+
+It wasn't easy to keep one's temper with this sort of brute; but there
+was Nessa to be thought of. "Unfortunately I have partially burnt it."
+
+"Dear me! What a misfortune, eh?" he sneered. "Let me look at the
+precious fragments and your other papers."
+
+I handed over the burnt paper. "I have already reported the accident to
+Baron von Gratzen by telegraph." I dragged in the Baron's name as much
+as possible, for I had noticed that the mention of it had had some
+impression even on him.
+
+He scrutinized the authority and shook his head over it. "A forgery, of
+course;" and he was going to tear it up when I interposed.
+
+"I shall have to report the destruction of it to the Baron, of course,"
+I said quietly.
+
+The officer who sat next him whispered something and the paper was not
+destroyed. "And your other papers? I must see them."
+
+I did not reply, and he repeated his demand angrily. But I had taken
+his measure by this time. He had not ventured to destroy the remnant of
+the authority; and although its destruction didn't matter two straws
+either way, it mattered very much to see that he was sufficiently in
+awe of von Gratzen to abstain.
+
+"Do you want me to take them from you?" he thundered.
+
+"Do so, if you think it safe," I said in a very different tone.
+
+"Don't you dare to threaten me, you swinehound," he roared.
+
+"Go to blazes!" I answered in much the same tone. "Who the devil are
+you to come blustering in here in this way? I'm on Baron von Gratzen's
+business, not yours; I've no instructions to show his papers to any and
+every boorish clown who dares to ask for them. If you want to see them,
+telegraph to him, and when he instructs me to tell you his business
+I'll do it, and not before."
+
+I fired this at him with all my lung power and tried to look even more
+angry than I felt, and shouted him down when he tried to interrupt me
+once or twice.
+
+He cursed volubly.
+
+"If you don't behave yourself I'll have you put out of the carriage," I
+cried. "Do you imagine that Baron von Gratzen sent his confidential
+secretary to secure this compartment for me and this lady that we might
+be insulted by such a foul-mouthed brute as you? Ask your questions
+civilly, and I'll answer them; but don't imagine you can bully me."
+
+That his three companions relished all this was apparent in their
+looks; but the effect on the bully himself was a sheer delight to
+witness. He tried to bluster, but he was frightened. The sting of my
+attack was the reference to von Welten's reservation of the
+compartment, and I promptly drove it home by asking Freibach to have
+the guard called.
+
+He hesitated; the other man was his superior officer, of course, and
+looked to him. "He'll be able to confirm what I say," I added.
+
+The major nodded and nothing more passed until the guard arrived.
+
+"Who saw these people off at Berlin?"
+
+"Herr von Welten, sir, and he told me that the compartment was to be
+strictly reserved for them by Baron von Gratzen's orders. I explained
+that the train was sure to be full; but he said that under no
+conditions was I to allow any one to enter it."
+
+The major's face dropped at this. "You can go," he ordered.
+
+"Wait a minute, guard. Tell Major Borsch about the telegram."
+
+The man told his story succinctly; and it had an excellent effect upon
+the bully, and a whispered conversation followed between him and the
+man next him. I began to hope. The worst was over for the moment,
+apparently; and the next scene was likely to take place when we reached
+Osnabrueck. What would happen there was on the lap of the gods.
+
+The only thing that really mattered was to contrive somehow that Nessa
+should be allowed to continue the journey, and it wasn't impossible
+that Freibach might be able to see to that. He would be willing enough,
+because he had been very kindly treated by the Caldicotts in London.
+Moreover, he had got us into this mess and was obviously distressed
+about it.
+
+The whispered conference at the other side of the carriage ended by the
+major jumping up and leaving the carriage, muttering something about
+not being able to breathe the same air with us, and then his companion
+turned to me.
+
+"You will appreciate the seriousness of the position to us, Herr
+Lassen, and that we are compelled to investigate it," he said. His tone
+was somewhat curt, but more official than offensive.
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"We are to understand that Baron von Gratzen has employed you on a
+special mission, knowing that you are an Englishman?"
+
+"I have already given you the facts, but of course I am not at liberty
+to explain to you all his Excellency's reasons. He would not have given
+me that authority otherwise."
+
+"It is unfortunately too mutilated to be intelligible."
+
+"It was couched in the widest terms. It was to notify to all concerned
+that I was to be allowed to go where I pleased and that every
+assistance was to be afforded me. You can still see a part of the
+official stamp."
+
+"It is most extraordinary. Incomprehensible."
+
+"Not if I were free to explain why it was given to me."
+
+"Who gave it you?"
+
+"Baron von Gratzen wrote it himself in my presence. If you know his
+handwriting, there is enough of it left unburnt for you to identify it."
+
+"I do not."
+
+"Again in my presence he handed it to his secretary, Herr von Welten,
+to be stamped, and von Welten gave it to me as I left the office. You
+have heard that he was at the station and himself reserved this
+compartment for Miss Caldicott and me."
+
+"That's the most remarkable thing of all."
+
+"On the contrary, it was a perfectly natural step. There was a matter I
+had to arrange before leaving, and his chief was anxious to know that
+it had been done exactly in accordance with my instructions."
+
+"What was that?"
+
+"That is a question to be put to the Baron. My lips are sealed."
+
+"And you an Englishman! It sounds incredible."
+
+"Do you suppose I should have telegraphed to Baron von Gratzen if it
+were incredible?"
+
+This worried him not a little, and he sat thinking with his hand
+pressed to his head. Not having the key to the riddle, he might well be
+baffled. "And your companion, Miss Caldicott, is going to England?"
+
+"Certainly. You have been quite courteous and I have no objection
+whatever to show you her papers;" and I took them out and handed them
+over. "You will see that they also bear the official hallmark of Baron
+von Gratzen's office."
+
+He was obviously impressed. "Both tickets are through to Rotterdam, I
+notice. Are you going to England also?"
+
+"My instructions are to see Miss Caldicott across the frontier, and to
+return to Berlin as soon as my task is finished, unless his Excellency
+sends for me sooner."
+
+It was such a lovely mixture of the truth and the other thing that it
+appeared quite flawless, and he couldn't make head or tail of it. "Of
+course you understand that you will have to remain at Osnabrueck while
+this is being investigated?" he said at length, returning the tickets.
+
+"That is for you to decide, and so far as I myself am concerned it is
+not of the least consequence. But it's different with Miss Caldicott.
+It is essential that her journey should not be interrupted."
+
+Nessa started at this and spoke for the first time. "I shall not go on
+without you," she protested.
+
+"I must ask you to recall that, Miss Caldicott, if you please. I shall,
+of course, be placed under some sort of restraint until this
+gentleman----"
+
+"I am Captain Brulen," he interposed.
+
+"Until Captain Brulen has satisfied himself. His Excellency's
+instructions are that you proceed at once; and for you to remain there
+would be extremely invidious and possibly unpleasant."
+
+"I shall not go on if you're stopped," she insisted. It was like her to
+wish to stick by me in the coming trouble, but impossible, so I adopted
+an official tone.
+
+"If you persist in your refusal, Miss Caldicott, it will compel me to
+take a line I should deeply regret. My instructions _must_ be
+carried out; they were very peremptory."
+
+"I don't care what you do. I won't go on without you," she declared.
+
+"Any delay at Osnabrueck will render it impossible for me to see you
+across the frontier personally, and I shall have to ask Captain Brulen
+to detail some one for the purpose, Miss Caldicott. I can, of course,
+rely upon your doing that?" I asked him.
+
+The poor man didn't know what to make of this little interlude and
+replied with a perplexed gesture.
+
+"I won't go," cried Nessa obstinately. "And if you send me as a
+prisoner, I'll come straight back. I've made up my mind absolutely."
+
+This dogged attitude was growing dangerous and it became necessary to
+explain it, so I asked the Captain to come into the corridor, and he
+complied after a slight hesitation.
+
+"I had better explain one point to you in reference to that young lady.
+Until quite recently I have been living in London--on Baron von
+Gratzen's instructions, of course. I met Miss Caldicott's friends there
+frequently; they are influential people and were extremely useful to
+know, you will understand. They have always regarded me as an
+Englishman, and at one time there was a sort of engagement between us.
+That was when your fellow officer, Lieutenant Freibach, met me. He also
+takes me for English. You will now understand her attitude just now."
+
+He swallowed it like mother's milk. "Why on earth didn't you tell us
+all this before?"
+
+"Partly because of Major Borsch's disgusting manner; but mainly for the
+reason which is on the surface, surely. It is not impossible I may
+receive a wire to go on to England. You see my meaning. Under no
+circumstances must either of them know what I have told you. You will
+now see why Miss Caldicott must go on to-night and must not be allowed
+to return. The whole of my work in London would be utterly ruined if
+she and her friends knew I was a German."
+
+"Of course. I am at liberty to tell Major Borsch this?"
+
+"Emphatically not. It is for your own ears solely. I never trust that
+type of man. Personally, all I care about is to get Miss Caldicott off
+my hands; and the sooner the better. This business about me will be
+cleared up in half an hour when we reach Osnabrueck; but not in time for
+me to continue in the train, probably. There will be a wire from the
+Baron; but that may not be considered sufficient. I don't blame you in
+the least; but I shall certainly report the Major's conduct."
+
+"I can probably get Freibach to see to Miss Caldicott."
+
+"Nothing could be better. Please von Gratzen immensely," I replied,
+smiling. "And if you leave us two alone again, no doubt I could
+persuade Miss Caldicott to agree."
+
+He did this; and as soon as Nessa and I were alone I told her the
+arrangement and began the persuasion campaign.
+
+Her reception of the news was just what might have been expected. She
+was furiously indignant. Was that my opinion of her, she demanded. Did
+I think she was a German and likely to desert any one who had run all
+this risk to help her? Did I take her for a despicable coward? Was she
+so abominably mean a thing in my eyes? And a great deal more to the
+same effect.
+
+It's always best to let that sort of thing empty the petrol tank; so I
+just listened with becoming meekness which appeared to keep the engine
+running long after the tank was exhausted. Then: "And how do you think
+you can help me?" I asked smoothly.
+
+Another vigorous outburst. She didn't care about that. No one should be
+able to say she had run away in such a case; and so on.
+
+"Now do listen to me a moment. I don't think anything of the sort. It's
+splendid of you, Nessa. But----"
+
+"I can't leave you in the lurch, Jack, and I won't," she broke in.
+
+"If there was the faintest use in your stopping, I wouldn't ask you to
+go. There isn't. On the contrary, it would make matters infinitely more
+awkward. It was getting awkward just now, and that's why I took that
+man out. I've told him that you take me for an Englishman, and that
+Freibach knew us in London when we were engaged, and----"
+
+"That's true."
+
+"Yes; but he understands it differently--that I was in London as a
+German spy."
+
+"He doesn't!"
+
+"Indeed he does, and it altered his tune entirely. I said I wanted to
+get you off my hands as soon as possible----"
+
+"Is that also true?" she interposed, with such a smile.
+
+"At the present moment, yes."
+
+"Thank you. Almost enough to make me say I'll go," she cried with a
+toss of the head.
+
+"Naturally. But it is true, for this reason. When we get to Osnabrueck
+there will probably be a telegram from old Gratz; these people are
+likely to want something more than that, however; and I am sure to be
+detained while they communicate with him. But he can't let me down,
+even if he guesses I've helped myself to those tickets, because I'm
+necessary to him for the von Erstein affair: a much more vital matter
+to him than the tickets. The whole thing will be cleared up and I shall
+be able to follow you home. Very likely catch you up before you leave
+Rotterdam."
+
+"Then if it's going to be so easy, why shouldn't I stop?"
+
+"For the simple reason that the papers for you are only to be used on
+this particular date, and there would be no end of a fuss in getting
+any others."
+
+"You really and truly wish me to go on?"
+
+"If you care a rap for my safety you won't hesitate another moment."
+
+She looked very troubled. "If I do, I won't go a step farther than the
+first town across the frontier, and if you don't join me soon I shall
+come back," she declared. "I shall. I'll tell every one that you've got
+into all this solely on my account and that I'm quite ready to go even
+to an internment camp."
+
+Knowing her detestation of such a thing, I could appreciate all that
+lay behind this statement. It touched me too closely for me to reply
+immediately. Thank Heaven, she wouldn't be allowed to come back; but
+there was no need to tell her so. "Let it go at that, Nessa. The first
+town you'll stop at will be Oldenzaal, and I'll come to you there.
+You're due there about five in the morning; but you won't get there by
+that time if we keep stopping in this fashion. It can't be Osnabrueck
+yet; there's half an hour before we're due there. I wish they'd hurry
+up."
+
+We had stopped at some station the name of which I couldn't see and
+stuck there some minutes.
+
+"Can't be anything wrong, can there?" asked Nessa nervily.
+
+"Probably a troop train. It's all right, we're off again."
+
+But it was not a troop train that had stopped us. It was a very
+different cause, as we soon knew, for the brute of a major burst into
+our compartment flourishing a telegram and cursing me volubly.
+
+"So we've got the truth about you, Mr. Englishman, at last. You
+infernal scoundrel," he cried viciously. "You wanted a telegram from
+your friend and patron, von Gratzen, did you? Well, read that!" with
+another string of oaths.
+
+He held the message up and I did read it, with feelings which may
+perhaps be imagined although I can't describe them. It was to the guard.
+
+"Detain passengers Johann Lassen and companion. Suspected of murder.
+Acquaint police at next station and have them arrested.--Von
+Gratzen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+WITHIN A HAIRSBREADTH
+
+
+Major Borsch stood gloating over me as I read the telegram. "Well, what
+do you think of your friend the Baron, now?" he sneered.
+
+He expected me to be completely crushed, so I shook off my first
+feeling of dismay and looked up with a bland smile. "I'm much obliged
+to you for showing it to me," I replied, as if it were the merest
+trifle. I must have done it pretty well, for even Nessa, who had been
+overwhelmed by the news, was surprised and pulled herself together.
+
+"Perhaps you'll also be obliged for what will follow," he roared,
+aggravated by my coolness.
+
+"What an exceedingly unpleasant person this is," I said to Nessa. "I'm
+sorry he can't behave himself; but you must try not to let it worry
+you. I suppose he can't help it."
+
+"He doesn't worry me in the least, thank you," she replied
+contemptuously.
+
+"You hold your tongue, you baggage," he shouted, turning on her.
+
+"Major Borsch!" I cried, rising.
+
+"Sit down, you infernal swinehound! And as for you, you----"
+
+The sentence was not finished. My temper flew out of the window. If I
+was to be charged with murder, a little extra such as a smack on the
+mouth of even a major wouldn't make much difference, so I gave him one,
+and put enough behind it to knock him down.
+
+An involuntary scream from Nessa was drowned in his yells for his men;
+and two of them rushed in and seized me. He didn't get up until I was
+thus rendered helpless and then kept far enough away, pouring out a
+torrent of cursing abuse while he staunched the blood on his cut lips.
+
+Captain Brulen arrived in the middle of it, with Freibach close on his
+heels; and the bully declared I had tried to murder him in order to
+escape. It was such a palpable absurdity that Freibach turned his face
+away to smile.
+
+"This man was insulting the lady in my charge and I struck him, Captain
+Brulen," I explained. "You probably know him well enough to understand
+it is just what he would do."
+
+"It is a very grave position," he replied. "Very grave indeed."
+
+"You mean because of that telegram? Nonsense. It's a palpable forgery."
+
+The major burst out into raucous laughter. "Forgery! Forgery, is it?
+Well, forgery or no forgery, you'll answer for that attack on me.
+Search him, and if he resists knock him on the head," he ordered the
+two soldiers.
+
+"Is this man the senior officer on the train, Captain Brulen?"
+
+"Hold your insolent tongue; and, Captain Brulen, stay where you are. Do
+as I told you," he ordered the men.
+
+It would have been madness to resist. There was nothing on me of any
+consequence; and as Nessa was sitting on the suit case with her dress
+entirely covering it, nothing of importance was found, except the
+passports and our tickets. These the bully promptly pocketed.
+
+"Can I speak to you a moment, Major?" said Brulen then.
+
+"No. Mind your own business. This is my affair, not yours."
+
+"Very good, sir," and with that he and Freibach went away. Both looked
+very disturbed, although for quite different reasons, as I knew.
+
+"Take the man to the other end of the carriage; see that the two
+prisoners have no chance of speaking to each other; remain between them
+in the middle until we reach Osnabrueck, and if any attempt is made to
+escape, use your bayonets. You're answerable for them."
+
+"I'm going to sleep," said Nessa as the brute was leaving the carriage;
+and she put her legs up on the seat with excellently acted unconcern.
+
+"Good idea, so will I," and I threw myself full length on the seat.
+
+"Silence," roared the brute. "If they speak, club them both," and with
+this amiable command to our guards he left us.
+
+The men would in all probability have obeyed him to the letter, so we
+prudently gave them no occasion.
+
+Except for the desire to try and reassure Nessa, there was nothing to
+be said. The disastrous telegram had ruined everything. What did it
+mean? It didn't seem possible that von Gratzen could have sent such a
+message. It was too blunt, too crude, and altogether too brutal a thing
+to fit with all I had seen of him. He was wily enough in all truth, but
+such a method was so lacking in finesse, so devoid of cunning, that I
+could not believe it had really come from him.
+
+It was possible that he had been infuriated at discovering I had stolen
+the passports; but even then he would have resorted to some far more
+adroit means of arresting me. There was another consideration, too. It
+was not in accord with his plans to denounce me as the murderer in this
+fashion. His object was not to have me accused, but to catch von
+Erstein in the web so subtly woven.
+
+At the same time it must have been sent by some one having high
+authority, because the train had been stopped in order that it might be
+delivered to the guard. The police could have done it. The detective at
+the station had probably reported my flight, and, if von Erstein had
+already accused me to them, they might resort to such a means to have
+me arrested. But in that case the message would not have been sent in
+von Gratzen's name. That killed that theory therefore.
+
+There was only one alternative suggestion--that the telegram was a
+forgery and that von Erstein had ventured to use von Gratzen's name,
+relying upon his influence to get him out of trouble for it. He had
+guessed I was going to bolt, and he would have little difficulty in
+finding out where I had gone; I might even have been followed to the
+station without knowing it; and it was just such a step as would appeal
+to his cunning vindictive nature.
+
+The truth would soon be out, as a few minutes would see us at Osnabrueck
+at the pace we were rushing through the night; and until we reached
+there, nothing could be done. Despite the mysterious telegram I still
+had faith in von Gratzen's concluding assurance--"Whatever happens I'll
+stand by you, my boy."
+
+All the same it was a deplorable business, especially for Nessa; and
+that worried me desperately. We were both sure to be locked up; and
+Germany is one of those insalubrious countries where it's very
+difficult to get out of gaol when once the doors have closed on you.
+Even if the thing were explained at Osnabrueck, it would be impossible
+for her to continue her journey that night; and when she would be able
+to do so, Heaven alone knew.
+
+It was such a devil of a mess that no amount of wit-racking suggested a
+way out which did not involve a heap of delay and trouble. But the knot
+was cut nevertheless, in the most unexpected fashion.
+
+We were nearing Osnabrueck, running at some thirty or forty miles an
+hour, when the engine whistled furiously, and we were far enough in the
+front of the train to feel the grinding of the brakes quickly applied.
+Before they could do much to reduce the speed, however, there was a
+tremendous crash, the heavy carriage collapsed like a card house, the
+lights were extinguished, and the coach rocked a moment, seemed to rear
+right up, and then toppled over on its side.
+
+I was flung half a dozen ways at once; against the opposite side of the
+compartment, then back again and next down, so that I lay sprawling
+across the door. Something hit me a smack on the head and something
+else came floundering down on top of me, amid a shower of splintered
+glass and other fragments.
+
+The "something else" turned out to be Nessa as I discovered when I
+called out to her in deadly fear that she had been killed. Thank Heaven
+we were both unhurt, save for the few bruises and slight cuts caused by
+the shuttlecock shaking we had experienced.
+
+We owed our escape to the fact that we had been lying with our legs up.
+The result to our two guards showed that. They had been pinned down and
+lay groaning and moaning piteously in desperate agony.
+
+Nessa was too overwhelmed by the shock to be able to move for a time.
+But she was awfully brave; not a cry had escaped her lips; and although
+she was trembling so that she could scarcely speak, she assured me she
+was not hurt in the least. "I shall be all right in a moment, Jack. I'm
+not hurt. I was afraid you were killed," she stammered.
+
+It was then I found that the first something which had hit me was my
+suit case; and never was anything more welcome. There was a flask of
+brandy in it and a flash lamp, and I managed to get them both. The
+spirit soon revived us, and I flashed the light round the compartment
+and took my bearings.
+
+It was a gruesome sight. The two unfortunate soldiers were unconscious;
+fearfully injured, bleeding terribly, and in such a mess as made one
+think of the trenches. The carriage lay on its side and the corridor
+over our heads. That offered the only way of escape, and to reach it I
+had to stand on the men's bodies. By this means I succeeded in getting
+a grip on the side of the doorway opening into the corridor. I pulled
+myself up and scrambled through the opening. Everything was smashed to
+splinters; there was an ominous smell of gas; part of the train was
+already on fire, the flames lighting up the weirdly awful scene; and
+the wind was blowing them right down on our carriage. There wasn't a
+second to lose if we were not to be roasted alive.
+
+Lying at full length to get a purchase for my feet among some of the
+wreckage, I leant down to help Nessa out.
+
+She kept her head splendidly. She had presence of mind to remember the
+suit case, handed it up to me, caught my hand, and I swung her up
+beside me. It was touch and go even then, for the flames leapt the
+intervening space at that moment and a flare of gas soon set everything
+in a blaze.
+
+We had still to get off the carriage, and, although people were
+hurrying up with assistance, there was no time to wait for them.
+Crawling over the wreckage to a spot where the side of the carriage had
+been shattered, I threw the suit case out, sprang after it, and held
+out my arms, calling to Nessa to jump. She did it without a second's
+hesitation, falling right on top of me with sufficient suddenness and
+force to send us both sprawling to the ground.
+
+We were up again in a moment. Nessa laughed strangely and hysterically.
+"I'm all right, Jack," she cried breathlessly. "Mind the suit case;"
+and then clutched me convulsively and fainted.
+
+It wasn't surprising, considering that we had had so narrow a squeak
+for it, and I could estimate the effect upon her by my own general
+shakiness. What amazed me was that in such a crisis, when death had
+been a matter of seconds almost, she had seemed to think more about
+that blessed suit case than her own safety. But she told me the reason
+afterwards; and of course it was on my account.
+
+I wasn't sorry she fainted. The whole scene was so painful and
+horrible, that it was a mercy she was spared the sight and smell and
+sounds of it. Then again it helped to rally me, as I had to see to her.
+I picked her up and carried her right away to a distance where neither
+sight nor sound of the disaster was likely to be too obtrusively
+harrowing, found a shed, and gave her some brandy, and had a swig of it
+myself.
+
+She soon came round, but was much too overcome by the shock to be moved
+for a long time, or even to talk. So I let her lie where she was,
+wrapped her up in some of the clothes in the suit case, lit a
+cigarette, and set to work to think what our next move had better be.
+
+It wasn't the easiest of problems. There was no chance of getting
+across the frontier that night, for we had neither tickets nor
+passports. That bully of a major had kept them. What had happened to
+him in the smash couldn't be even guessed, of course; but whatever it
+might be, there was no recovering our papers. That was a certainty.
+
+Could any others be got? Not at Osnabrueck. That telegram had been sent
+to the guard of the doomed train and, if he was alive, he would
+undoubtedly inform the police; and the instant I turned up as Lassen,
+we should both be clapped into gaol.
+
+It looked as if it would be extremely unhealthy to attempt to ask for
+any message from von Gratzen. A very aggravating poser. It was galling
+to think that a message might be waiting which would clear the road for
+us effectually, and yet be unable to go for it.
+
+There was the unpleasant contingency that it might not be there,
+moreover; in which case I should have to put my head in the lion's
+mouth, with a great probability of the jaws closing on it. A very
+awkward risk. It didn't affect me so much as Nessa. Even if the police
+held me in custody as a suspected murderer, it would only be a
+temporary trouble. But Nessa? What would happen to her it was
+impossible to foresee; so I ruled out that course.
+
+If we were to get out of the country it must be done under strictly
+unofficial patronage. Our own. The less we bothered von Gratzen or any
+one else, the better. That meant going on in our disguises; and then I
+realized how invaluable Nessa's thought of the suit case had been.
+
+It wasn't a particularly cheerful outlook; but there was one big thing
+in our favour. Our carriage had been burnt; scarcely any one had been
+on the spot at the time; certainly no one who could possibly recognize
+us; and the conclusion every one would draw was that we had perished in
+the flames. That was another virtual certainty; but in our favour.
+
+There was more than enough on the other side of the ledger, however. I
+had no identification card; Nessa was in rather a bad shape, and it
+looked as if she would have to go to bed and stop there for a time,
+whereas if we were to get away, we ought to be some miles from
+Osnabrueck before daylight; and to go to any hotel or other place for
+the purpose was very much like asking for more trouble when we had
+quite sufficient already.
+
+At the same time her safety was the pivot on which everything else
+turned; it would be idiotic to try and get away, if it meant knocking
+her up permanently; and that must be the first and prime consideration.
+She lay so still and seemed so weak and done up, that it was clearly
+necessary to do something instead of merely thinking about it.
+
+"Can you make an effort, Nessa?" I whispered, bending over her.
+
+"Make an effort? Of course I can. I thought you were bowled over.
+That's why I kept quiet. I'm all right," and to my surprised relief she
+sat up at once. "What shall we do?"
+
+"I thought you were almost down and out," I exclaimed.
+
+"Because I fainted? That was the reaction, I expect. I've never done
+such a thing before that I can remember. But I'm all right again now.
+I've been thinking."
+
+"I've been doing a bit of that myself. Are you sure you're fit?" It was
+difficult to believe it after what she had gone through.
+
+"Of course I am, except for being a little shaken. It was an awful
+business while it lasted; but it's over and got us out of all that
+trouble. Of course every one will believe we were burnt alive;" and she
+shuddered. "I suppose it's an awful disaster."
+
+"Better not think of it. The last glimpse I had showed that our
+carriage and the one behind it were in flames. You can see the glare
+through the door there."
+
+"Oh, Jack! And they were crowded with people!"
+
+"We can't do anything to help, and we'd better think of ourselves," and
+to distract her thoughts from the horrors of the train wreck I told her
+the reasons against venturing into Osnabrueck.
+
+"I've been thinking the same. Surely there's only one thing to do?"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"The 'third wheel', of course. It's been in my mind from the very
+moment of the collision. I don't know how it was, but that rushed into
+my head instantly; and when you weren't hurt, I could think of nothing
+but that;" and she pointed to the suit case.
+
+"It was the last word you spoke before fainting."
+
+"And the first when I came round. I was so thankful when I saw you'd
+brought it away all right. I didn't care after that. You didn't seem
+really hurt; only shaken; I knew I should be all right soon; and I felt
+a sort of certainty that the third wheel would carry us into safety.
+Hadn't we better go?"
+
+"Yes, if you feel fit to do a few miles before daylight?"
+
+"You'll soon see that, if you'll go to your own room and change and
+leave me to do the same."
+
+My "room" was the back of the shed outside, and I lost no time in
+getting off my own clothes and putting on the workman's dress over what
+my flying friend had called the "tummy pad." Then I lit up and waited,
+thinking what a plucky soul Nessa was, until she called to me.
+
+"How's this, matey?" she asked in her new character and laughed.
+
+It was a wonderful transformation indeed!  I should never have
+recognized her; and the few little scratches on her face from the
+broken glass in the collision, combined with some artistic smudges she
+had added, made her into a lifelike young workboy.
+
+"What have you done with your hair?" I exclaimed.
+
+"Just messed it up under the cap. Of course it'll have to come off; but
+we'd better not waste any time about it now, had we? We can see to it
+later in the morning."
+
+"Righto," I agreed; and we set to work to finish the other
+preparations. We had to dispose of our own clothes, of course; so we
+rolled them up tightly, put the overalls in the suit case, and were
+ready.
+
+"Now for the frontier," I said. "Let's hope the luck's with us."
+
+"Cheero, matey; if it isn't, you'll get us through somehow," she
+replied with the most plucky confidence.
+
+I loved her for that, for I knew that she understood the difficulties
+and risks that lay ahead quite as well as I did. I lost my head for a
+minute then; and just as we stood on the threshold of the dingy little
+shed, I put my arm round her, drew her quickly to me and kissed her on
+the lips.
+
+She held to me for an instant, kissed me in return, and then drew away
+quickly.
+
+"Not so much of it, matey. Do you take me for a girl? You've knocked my
+cap off, clumsy," she cried, laughing and blushing, as her glorious
+hair fell over her shoulders and down to her waist.
+
+"A fine sort of a girl you'd make, and no mistake," I replied, picking
+up the cap and giving it to her.
+
+In a few moments she had it in place again, pulled the cap down over it
+and was once more ready.
+
+"Come on, clumsy," she called, stepping out into the night.
+
+And in that way we started on the journey to the frontier.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+NESSA'S DOWNFALL
+
+
+The chief event of the hours following the railway smash was histrionic
+rather than serious, although Nessa regarded it as both humiliating and
+tragic. And tragic it might easily have been.
+
+Her courage was wonderful. Nothing could damp her spirits nor lessen
+her high confidence. She laughed at the idea of risks or danger,
+scoffed at difficulties, and made light of every obstacle as if ours
+was a mere holiday jaunt. An optimist to the very tips of her pretty
+fingers.
+
+To be Hans, the mechanic, was just a delightfully farcical joy; she
+took pride in her skill in playing the part, and was so eager to show
+me how carefully she had studied it that I hadn't the heart to be a
+candid critic and point out that it was one thing to act a part for an
+hour or two on an amateur stage or when we were by ourselves, and quite
+another to keep it for days in circumstances when even a slight trip
+might spell grave trouble.
+
+And that our situation was full of difficulties and even dangers was
+certain. She was still suffering from the inevitable shock of the
+railway smash; she was done up and sorely in need of rest; it was out
+of the question to think of seeking a lodging in Osnabrueck; the best we
+could look for was to shelter in some barn or out-of-the-way shed;
+fifty miles or more lay between us and the frontier, any yard of which
+might bring some incident which would involve discovery; and even if we
+got through safely, the job of crossing the frontier would be the most
+difficult and dangerous of any.
+
+The little incident in the shed as we were leaving kept us both silent
+for a while. It was the first sign since we had met in Berlin to
+suggest the renewal of our old relations; and it was not until we
+reached a good spot for ridding ourselves of our own clothes that the
+silence was broken.
+
+We struck out to the north of the town and turned along a footpath
+which would lead us round the outskirts. This took us across a broad
+stream, and Nessa pulled up on the bridge to suggest we should sink the
+clothes. We made them into two parcels, put some heavy stones in each,
+and I sunk them under some trees which overhung the stream a little
+distance along the bank.
+
+"And when do you propose to put your thinking cap on about our plans,
+Jack?" she chipped when I rejoined her.
+
+"I'm not going to think of anything else from this minute."
+
+"Hear, hear. The 'anything else' must wait, eh?" she cried, with one of
+her bright silvery laughs.
+
+"That's not very much like a German hobbledehoy's laugh, is it?"
+
+"Righto, matey, I forgot. That was Nessa; this is Hans;" and she
+guffawed in her best Hans' manner.
+
+"Not so much of your forgetting, young 'un. This may be no mere picnic."
+
+"Keep your hair on; but I'm going to have the time of my life. By the
+way, what's your name?"
+
+"Been christened so often lately that I'm not too clear about it. You
+can call me boss."
+
+"Boss, eh? Then you expect to be master, I suppose?" with a mischievous
+meaning chuckle. "Am I to keep it up always?"
+
+"Jack's the English for it."
+
+"Anything else?" she chuckled again.
+
+"Wait till the time comes, my lad;" and she decided to drop the chaff.
+
+"And what about our plans, boss?" she asked after a pause.
+
+"I don't see anything for it but to tramp it, if you can stick it."
+
+"How far?"
+
+"The nearest road to the frontier is about thirty odd miles; but as we
+can't take that, we can put it down at fifty, say. There's no need to
+rush things, and if we can manage ten or fifteen each day, it ought to
+do the trick."
+
+"Nothing in that to hurt me, boss. I've often padded twenty or
+twenty-five in a day, looking for a job, you know. But what's waiting
+for us at the end of the tramp?"
+
+"I wish I could tell you. My rough idea is to make for a place called
+Lingen. There are two little dips in the Dutch frontier which come down
+close to it, and it looks like a fairly good jumping-off place. I'm out
+of it, if we don't run against some of the smuggling lot there, and the
+best plan I can think of is to try and join up with some of them and
+get across in that way."
+
+"Looks all right. If we can get there, that is."
+
+"Needn't worry about that, young 'un. We can tramp it at night, at the
+worst; but we're not likely to be interfered with. We can always be
+going to a job just a few miles farther on. I always thought of
+Osnabrueck as the place where we might have to start our tramp, and I've
+a road map. What we want at the moment is a place where we can rest for
+an hour or two."
+
+We plodded on steadily, avoiding the roads as much as possible, until
+we had left Osnabrueck well in our rear, and then Nessa pointed to a
+cottage on the fringe of a wood, which appeared to be deserted.
+
+"Looks like the very spot for us, young 'un. Stop here and I'll go and
+have a squint at it."
+
+"Look sharp about it, boss, I'm getting a bit leggy and could do with a
+doss for an hour or two."
+
+I reconnoitred the place cautiously from the back, where there was an
+untilled garden patch, and first made enough noise to rouse a dog, if
+there was one. All remained quiet; so I slipped along the garden and
+flashed my torch lamp through a broken pane of a back window. The room
+was quite bare, and I opened the window and went over the cottage.
+
+It was deserted right enough. A four-roomed shanty, dirty and
+dilapidated, but good enough for a shelter; so I fetched Nessa. "A
+rough shop, young 'un, but better than none."
+
+"Better quarters than those English swine get in the concentration
+camps, I'll bet," she said as we went up the ricketty stairs to an
+upper room.
+
+"Bare boards only. It's a good thing you can rough it."
+
+"Nothing to what our brave fellows have to put up with at the front,"
+she replied; and without more ado she lay down with the suit case as a
+pillow and was soon fast asleep.
+
+I crept out of the room, lit a pipe, and strolled round the cottage
+trying to think out a definite plan of operations. The most practical
+question was that of supplies. There would not be any serious risk of
+trouble with the police even if we kept to the main roads; and this
+would both shorten the tramp and enable us to get food at
+out-of-the-way inns.
+
+The one thing that offered difficulties was Nessa's disguise. She was
+overacting her part considerably and, what was much worse,
+involuntarily had dropped now and then into her own dear self. The boy
+business was a blunder. She must turn woman again. It would be much
+safer if she passed as my sister or even my wife, or perhaps both at
+turns, according to circumstances.
+
+She would probably kick against it a bit, considering the trouble she
+had taken and the pride and pleasure she felt in the part. But safety
+must come first. There was another consideration. If we were stopped, I
+should be asked for my identification card; and the lack of it might
+mean trouble. As my wife she wouldn't need one. I must therefore be
+re-christened and become Hans Bulich.
+
+Over a second pipe the prudence of the change became more obvious, and
+I regretted the hurry we had been in to get rid of her dress, realizing
+the difficulty of replacing it without rousing suspicion. We should
+come across plenty of places where such things could be bought; but for
+a man and a boy to buy such things were almost certain to lead to
+awkward questions, especially anywhere near the frontier.
+
+It was broad daylight before I finished wrestling with these new
+problems, and, as it was better not to run a risk of being seen about
+the cottage, I went into a little shed belonging to it, propped myself
+in a corner and dozed off. I was tired and must have slept heavily, and
+was awakened by a kick and the angry shout of a man asking what the
+devil I meant by sleeping on his premises. "Get up and be off with you,
+you lazy tramp," he said, when I rubbed my eyes and blinked at him.
+
+"I'm not a tramp, guv'nor," I protested, getting up.
+
+"Then I'm no farmer, you skulker;" and he looked like repeating the
+kick.
+
+"Steady, man, steady. Keep your temper. I'm a mechanic on my way to a
+job in Osnabrueck. My boy and I lost our way in the wood yonder and came
+here to ask the road. Finding the place empty, we decided to doss it
+till daylight. My mate's only a youngster and was regularly done up."
+
+"You look dirty enough for a tramp anyhow," he growled. "I'm pestered
+with them. Got any money on you?" A rough-and-ready test of his tramp
+theory.
+
+"Hope so. More than enough to pay for this sort of bed. Times are
+pretty good with us chaps now;" and I pulled out a handful of money.
+
+His surly look cleared. "I don't want any of it. What sort of a
+mechanic do you call yourself?"
+
+"Motors and aeroplanes and that sort of thing."
+
+"The devil you are!" he exclaimed, and, after a pause: "Care to earn a
+mark or two?"
+
+"Don't mind if I do? How?"
+
+"My motor's in the lane yonder, and something's gone wrong with it. Do
+you think you could patch it up?"
+
+"I'll have a look at it for you. I'd better get what tools I have with
+me. They're with my lad."
+
+He opened the front door of the cottage and I ran up to fetch Nessa,
+fastening her hair up tightly. I told her about the farmer, and found
+him waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs. He squinted so
+curiously at Nessa that I feared he suspected her sex.
+
+"My name's Glocken," he said as we went to the car.
+
+I didn't respond to the evident invitation. "Farmer are you?"
+
+He nodded. "Got a couple. One here; the house is just over the hill
+yonder;" jerking a thumb in the direction; "and one out Lingen way."
+
+"That's where we're padding it, ain't it, boss?" asked Nessa.
+
+A nasty slip, but my fault, for I had not told her I had said I was
+going to Osnabrueck. The farmer noticed it, of course. "Thought you
+spoke of a job at Osnabrueck?" he said meaningly.
+
+"Did I? Must have been half asleep, I suppose. It's Lingen we're bound
+for."
+
+"No concern of mine. Here we are. Now let's see what you can do."
+
+It was a curious composite; a cross between a touring car and a
+delivery van. The seats of the tonneau had been taken out to make room
+for goods, and there was a moveable arrangement for raising the sides
+at need. There were a few swedes and a tiny truss of hay in it,
+suggesting the use to which it was put; but there was something else
+which prompted very different thoughts.
+
+"They've taken all my horses, so I have to fall back on this, to carry
+the fodder round," he said, noticing my curiosity.
+
+I nodded and threw back the bonnet to find the trouble. It was a
+splendid engine, 40 h.p. but very dirty; and the dirt had caused the
+stoppage. Half an hour would put everything right; but I tinkered and
+fussed over it, as I wished to investigate what I had noticed in the
+tonneau.
+
+The farmer watched me for a time; then talked to Nessa, who made great
+play with the Hans impersonation; and I found my chance. I was right.
+The farmer fed his cattle on very original diet; coffee, sugar, and
+cocoa seemed to be considerable ingredients, judging by the evidences I
+found under the swedes and hay. And his other farm was at Lingen! And
+Lingen was close to the Dutch frontier!
+
+If circumstantial evidence went for anything, this meant that the chief
+use of the car was for smuggling, and that the agricultural produce was
+to pull the wool over the eyes of the curious.
+
+I finished my work quickly, trying to see how to turn the knowledge to
+the best account. It looked like the chance of chances for us, for he
+might be the very man we wanted to find near the frontier.
+
+"She'll do now, farmer," I called, and started the engine to prove it.
+
+"You know your job, I see," he said, highly pleased, and gave me five
+marks, which I pocketed.
+
+"She wants cleaning badly if you don't want to have her break down in
+running to and from that farm of yours at Lingen."
+
+"No fear of that, is there?" he asked in concern.
+
+"I wouldn't answer for her any time in the state she's in."
+
+"Could you do the job for me?"
+
+"Not now; but I may have a bit of spare time when I get to Lingen. I
+reckon you pack some weight into her at times, too. Groceries tot up,
+you know. Which is our road for Lingen?"
+
+"What d'ye mean by groceries?"
+
+I gave him a smile and a wink. "No concern of mine, farmer. I never
+talk about other men's business."
+
+"I'll come along the lane and show you a short cut," he said and went
+off. "What are you two after?"
+
+"Grub," exclaimed Nessa promptly. "Ain't had a bite since yesterday
+forenoon, 'cept some berries I picked to give my belly something to
+do." It was very naturally said, but a blunder, of course.
+
+"Funny. You must have been off the track a lot," he said. "There's
+plenty of places everywhere. Which way did you come?"
+
+"It's which way we've got to go, that matters now, farmer," said I.
+
+"That's true, and here's the footpath. You strike me as the sort of man
+one could work with. Come and see me when you get to Lingen;" and he
+told me how to find the farm and offered his hand.
+
+He let us get a few yards and then called me back. "It's no concern of
+mine, but that's a delicate youngster of yours; any one would more
+likely take him for a wench than a lad, when he's off guard. Anyhow,
+come and see me at Lingen;" and without waiting for my reply, he walked
+off.
+
+"What did he want?" asked Nessa.
+
+"Spotted you for a girl."
+
+"Jack! He couldn't!" she protested indignantly.
+
+"He did;" and I used the fact as a text to urge the change I had in my
+thoughts. She did kick at it, as was to be expected; but a little later
+we had a powerful practical proof of its necessity.
+
+We turned into the first inn we came to for some breakfast, and I was
+talking to the woman of the house, a very kindly-looking motherly
+person, about it when there was a commotion outside. I ran out to find
+Nessa being rough-handled by a man who was trying to snatch her cap
+off. A word or two stopped any mischief, but it also drew the woman's
+attention very pointedly to Nessa.
+
+"You can have your breakfast in my room, if you like," she said, and,
+when I thanked her, led the way to it, and closed the door and stood
+with her back to it. "You've taken your cap off, can't the lad do the
+same?" she asked very meaningly.
+
+"Got a sore place on it, mum; 'fraid of a chill," said Nessa.
+
+"I'm good at curing places of that sort, let me have a look at it."
+
+"No, thank you, all the same, I don't take kindly to coddling," replied
+Nessa, colouring.
+
+The woman smiled. "You do it very well, my girl, but I'm a woman myself
+and know my own sex," she replied drily. Then to me: "You're an honest
+man, I'll wager, by your looks. Hadn't you better tell me what it
+means?"
+
+"She's my wife," I said. "She's English and----"
+
+"Glory be to God!" she interposed excitedly, in English, with a strong
+brogue. "If I didn't guess it the instant I clapped eyes on the both of
+ye!" and the tears welled in her eyes as she rushed to Nessa, took off
+the cap and kissed her. "Ah, ye poor Mavourneen, ye! And, saints alive,
+look at the lovely hair it is. And to think ye're from England, only I
+wish it was dear old Oireland, that I do! Whisht now, or Oi'll be
+making an ould fool of mysilf. We'd best just shpake in German. That I
+should live to see the day! And out in this divil of a hole of a place!
+It's making for the frontier ye are, of course! And it's glad that I am
+I can help ye, so I can. And it's breakfast ye want, is it? Sure I'll
+see to it; but I must dry my eyes first and get sober."
+
+She kissed Nessa again and almost kissed me also in her joy, wiped her
+eyes, looked in the glass to see that all was right and bustled out to
+see about the breakfast.
+
+"Something like a stroke of luck, this," I said; but Nessa was too cast
+down at her failure in the part to answer, so I looked out of the
+window to give her time to get over it.
+
+She rose presently and I felt her hand on my shoulder. "I'm a failure,
+Jack," she said wistfully, struggling to smile at it.
+
+"And thank Heaven for it, sweetheart."
+
+"But even that brute of a farmer found me out. I wouldn't care so much
+if it had only been this good soul."
+
+"She spotted me as English too," I reminded her.
+
+"I know. You're trying to make it easier for me; but that man didn't
+spot you, the beast!" She smiled then at her own vehemence. "Well, it's
+good-bye, Hans, I suppose," she said with a sigh.
+
+"And good riddance, too."
+
+"And yet you said I was doing it so well."
+
+"And so you were, child, for the stage, but this is different."
+
+"It's taken all the fun out of the picnic for me."
+
+"What? To be my wife?"
+
+She laughed and shook her head. "Well, there's one thing, you won't be
+the boss any longer."
+
+"We'll see about that, young 'un."
+
+"Don't, Jack. Don't ever dare to refer to this again or I'll--I'll--I
+don't know what I'll do!" she cried with a stamp of the foot. Then she
+caught sight of Han's cap. "It's that horrid thing that's the cause of
+it all;" and she picked it up and flung it from her.
+
+That was the overt act of renunciation of the part; and as she turned
+to me I put my arm round her and kissed her.
+
+"I thought there was to be no more 'anything else,'" she laughed.
+
+"Mustn't a man kiss his own wife?" I cried.
+
+"That hopes to be, Jack," she whispered.
+
+And that was Hans' funeral ceremony.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A FRIEND IN NEED
+
+
+When the woman returned to us she had quite thrown off her emotional
+outburst at our meeting, and her first words were a warning not to
+speak another word of English.
+
+"I couldn't help it at first, I was so excited; but it would ruin me if
+it was known that I'm British," she declared, and over the breakfast
+she told us her story.
+
+She was from Cork, where she had married a German baker named Fischer,
+had come to Germany a few years later, had been a widow for five years,
+and had continued to carry on the business of the inn. She was very
+curious to learn the truth about the war; and when I had satisfied her,
+we settled down to the consideration of her own affairs.
+
+We returned confidence for confidence: that Nessa and I were engaged to
+be married; how I had come from England to find her; the plight she had
+been in owing to von Erstein's persecution; that we had been in the
+train smash, and had escaped with our lives, but had lost the passports.
+
+She knew the von Erstein type of German well enough to sympathize
+deeply with Nessa and listened in tears to that part of the story.
+
+"I can help you both, and I will; but you'll have to be as cautious as
+a pair of wild birds. They're just grabbing the men into the army with
+both hands, for one thing, and they'll take you at sight, and then what
+would she do, poor thing?"
+
+"But aren't a lot of mechanics exempted?"
+
+"Do you know anything about such things really?"
+
+"Most there is to know about motors and aeroplanes."
+
+"Oh, that's better," she cried, rubbing her hands. "They're making that
+sort of thing now at a place called Ellendorf, out Lingen way; and
+they're wanting men badly. You can say you've heard of it and are on
+your road there, and it may help you through. But understand that all
+strangers about here are suspected and the police are mighty curious;
+and it's worse the closer to the frontier you get. Have you thought how
+you're to get across?"
+
+"If we're as lucky there as we have been here, it mayn't be so
+difficult. My rough idea was to join up with some of the folk who are
+smuggling things over and look for a chance to slip across."
+
+"I'd thought of that, too, and I can help you," she said, and then
+explained her plan.
+
+She declared that nearly every one near the frontier was taking a hand
+in the smuggling game and that the authorities, both police and
+military, not only winked at it, but secretly encouraged it. Lately,
+however, owing to the more drastic rounding up of men for the army,
+there had been a good deal of the slipping over which we wished to do,
+and stringent measures were being taken in consequence.
+
+"That makes it more difficult," she continued; "but my late husband's
+brother, Adolf Fischer, lives there. I'll give you a note to him and
+he'll help you."
+
+"Is he one of them?" I asked.
+
+She smiled and nodded. "He's getting rich at it and has several people
+working with him. I'll have to lie for you; but I don't mind. I'll tell
+him I know all about you and that you want to join him; but don't say a
+word about skipping over, or he'll put the police on you. He's very
+thick with them, but that needn't scare you. They won't touch one of
+his men."
+
+"We're awfully obliged to you."
+
+"I only wish I could do more. Of course, I'll find some clothes for
+you," she said to Nessa. "They'll only be rough working things; but
+then nothing else would do; and if you'll both be guided by me, you
+won't think of risking the walk to Lingen. What you'd better do is to
+stop here and rest till to-morrow morning, get away early and foot it
+to Massen; it's only a matter of four or five miles: and catch the
+train there; and it would be all the better if you were to wear
+overalls. I can get you some."
+
+"I have some already," I put in.
+
+"All the better, but whatever you do, don't carry that grip with you.
+Might as well write who you are on your back. Much better carry a tool
+or so in your hand as if you were off to a job in a hurry; and she
+might have a small market basket. She'll be your wife till ye reach
+Lingen; and don't forget that most Germans treat their wives pretty
+gruffly. There are plenty of spies about with sharp eyes for trifles of
+the sort. They might even see that you don't eat like them. I should
+have known you by it," she declared.
+
+We both laughed as we thanked her again; and soon afterwards she took
+Nessa away to see about the change of dress.
+
+We had fallen on our feet in all truth. Her help was literally
+invaluable. Every one of her suggestions was practical and opened my
+eyes to the many little difficult details and pitfalls which had never
+occurred to us when planning our escape.
+
+An hour or two later she came back saying she had left Nessa making
+some few necessary alterations in the dress and wanted to speak to me
+alone. "Just like me, I've put my foot in it with her. I told her
+what's only the truth, that you'll never be able to get over the
+frontier together, and she swears nothing shall make her go alone. You
+must talk her round or----" and she shook her head doubtfully.
+
+"That'll be all right."
+
+"Perhaps. She's just the bravest darling in the world, but my, what a
+will!" and she threw up her hands and smiled. "The frontier men will
+always wink at a woman crossing, but if they catch a man trying it they
+shoot him and done with it. Now what'll you do if she won't give in?"
+
+I shrugged my shoulders.
+
+"Well, I'll tell you. Go to that factory at Ellendorf and get a job.
+You'll both be safe there; they'll find you a cottage, and you'll have
+to wait till a chance comes to get away together. Tell my
+brother-in-law you're going there and that you can do his work from
+there. But if she sticks out, don't try anything from Lingen; he's sure
+to hear about it, and then you may look out. Don't forget that and
+think that because he speaks you fair, he's soft. He isn't. He daren't
+be, either."
+
+She went on to give me a host of details about the smuggling, and I
+took an opportunity to ask about the farmer whose car I had repaired.
+
+"Old Farmer Glocken, you mean. He's deep as a well and as dangerous as
+St. Patrick found the snakes. If he can make use of you, all right;
+he'll do it so long as it pays him; but he'd sell his own wife, poor
+wretch, for a few marks. Don't go near him."
+
+"He does a little smuggling?"
+
+"A little! He's in it up to his eyes. He could get you both across
+easily enough, if you paid him, supposing he didn't take your money
+first and then sell you. And that's as likely as not."
+
+Some one knocked at the door then and she went out, returning with a
+servant who clumped noisily after her and began to lay the cloth for
+dinner.
+
+"Be careful, Gretchen," she said sharply as the girl nearly let some
+glasses fall. She was a stoutish, rather slatternly girl, with
+particularly grimy finger nails, and a shawl over her head which
+concealed most of her face. She was very clumsy, too, and set
+everything down awkwardly with a guffaw.
+
+"What do you think of Gretchen?"
+
+I started and they both laughed. It was Nessa, of course, and she
+whipped off the shawl, clapped her hands, and turned completely round
+so that I might study her get-up.
+
+"Better than the boy, eh?" laughed Mrs. Fischer.
+
+"It's wonderful. I should have passed her in the street with that shawl
+over her head."
+
+"It's how the workgirls wear it."
+
+"Look at my boots, Jack," cried Nessa, holding up a foot. "Aren't they
+just lovely?" Great clumsy thick-soled things they were.
+
+"Her own were just danger signals. But she'll do as she is. Now, I've
+told my servants you're old friends of mine, and that you'll be here
+till to-morrow morning. You had better not go out. A day's rest and a
+long night's sleep won't hurt either of you;" and with that she hurried
+away.
+
+"Isn't she a dear old soul? She's been mothering me up there, as if she
+couldn't do enough for me, and ransacked every nook and cranny to fish
+out these things."
+
+"She's a very shrewd old party, too."
+
+"And are you proud of your wife, or sister, whichever I'm going to be?"
+
+"Which would you prefer?"
+
+"Don't be silly. Don't you think this is ripping? And she's been
+drilling me about how to behave. I think she's wonderful."
+
+"What sort of drilling was it?"
+
+"No end of things. How to eat; what to do; how to walk; always to have
+my knitting in hand; not to talk to strangers, especially women; one or
+two phrases I was to use; how to carry my market basket; a regular
+rehearsal of everything, and we're to have another this evening. Look
+at my hands;" and she held them out.
+
+"I saw your nails when you put the tray on the table."
+
+"Yes, but look how she's managed to make them coarse. We scrubbed them
+all over with bath brick and then rubbed in the dirt. They're smarting,
+as if they were chapped. And look at my hair, plastered right down on
+my head. Did you ever see such a fright as I am? And then this bunchy
+business on my hips;" and she laughed as she looked at herself in the
+glass.
+
+"That all?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. There was a regular lecture on the proper behaviour
+of working men's wives; sort of fetch and carry dogs with the tails
+always between their legs and never a wag except when the master
+condescends to give them a nod or so."
+
+"Going to do it all?"
+
+She was fingering her hair and started, glancing sharply at me in the
+glass. "Sisters don't, by any means. But I know that tone of yours. You
+mean something. What is it?"
+
+"Mrs. Fischer told me she had been giving you some hints."
+
+She paused and then turned and faced me, putting her hands behind her
+back with her head thrown well back--a pose I knew well. "I think I
+know what you mean and I'm not going to do it, Jack."
+
+"Do what?"
+
+"Innocent!  But it's no use, Jack, I won't."
+
+"Very well."
+
+"You don't mean that a bit. I know. You mean just the opposite. It's
+about my getting over the frontier alone. Isn't that it?"
+
+"She said something to me about it."
+
+"Of course. She tried all she knew to persuade me and now she's been at
+you, of course. I'm ready to listen to you; but I warn you it won't
+make a pennorth of difference."
+
+"Very well."
+
+"Oh, don't 'very well' me in that tone. You don't expect me to desert
+you when you've done all this and got into this mess solely for me, do
+you?" she cried vehemently.
+
+"We won't worry over it now; but there's just one point you might keep
+in mind. It may turn out to be necessary for my safety. What then?"
+
+Her face clouded at that. "How could that be?" she asked.
+
+"We can answer that better later on," I said with a shrug. "But if it
+should be?"
+
+"Did Mrs. Fischer say anything about that to you?"
+
+I nodded. "Said it might be easy enough for you to get over, but very
+risky for us both to try it together. Suggested that if you held out I
+had better get a berth at Ellendorf; but there's the question of my
+leave. It's nearly up, and either you or I must be able to wire
+explanations from Holland within the next day or two."
+
+"I never thought of that. What would happen?"
+
+"Possibly nothing; but it doesn't help a man to play the absentee.
+They've a nasty term for that in the army."
+
+"You always mean such a lot when you speak in that casual tone of
+yours," she exclaimed. "Of course, if my stopping meant any sort of
+trouble to you, it would be different. Nothing else would make me go.
+And if you're only saying it to force me you're--well, it's cowardly
+and you ought to be ashamed to do it."
+
+"Well, think it over, and we'll see how the cat jumps. I promise you
+this, faithfully, I won't ask you to do it if it isn't necessary."
+
+She paused and then came and laid a hand on my shoulder. "You won't ask
+me to go unless it's necessary for your sake, will you, Jack? It would
+be awful for me to feel that you were left here in danger. I know
+you're thinking all about me and not about yourself, and--oh, Jack, I
+don't believe I could bear it."
+
+"We won't worry any more about it till the time comes. I think it's
+splendid of you to want to stick it, but it's better to tell you;" and
+we let the matter drop.
+
+But Nessa did worry about it exceedingly for the rest of the day. She
+spoke very little and appeared to have lost interest in things; and
+just before she was going to bed she came with a suggestion that we
+should make at least one attempt to cross the frontier together. I
+yielded very reluctantly, as it meant the hash of a great part of our
+plans. But she was so downcast, so troubled, and pleaded with such
+wistful earnestness, that I hadn't the heart to refuse.
+
+Mrs. Fischer declared it was rank madness; that if we tried it, we
+mustn't go near her brother-in-law; and that we had better go straight
+to Ellendorf.
+
+Nessa was in much better spirits early the next morning when we bade
+good-bye to our new friend.
+
+"How are we to repay you for all this?" I asked.
+
+"It isn't money you mean, is it?" she asked, almost indignantly,
+although she was so affected at parting from us that the tears were in
+her kind motherly eyes.
+
+"No money could repay all your kindness and help."
+
+"Then don't offer it to me. Sure, it's enough that we're all of the
+same blood, and all I'll want is to know that you get home safe and
+sound. I'd like to know that," she said wistfully. "Sure my heart's
+still over there. There, be off with you, or I'll be making a fool of
+myself."
+
+"I'll write to you, Mrs. Fischer," said Nessa, kissing her.
+
+"Not on your life, child. It's in gaol I'd be in no time, the divils
+that they all are!" she exclaimed, relapsing into English.
+
+"We'll manage to let you know," I promised, shaking her hand warmly;
+and we were turning to leave the room when Nessa had a most happy
+thought.
+
+"We'll send you a sprig of shamrock, dear."
+
+The thought of it broke the dear soul up entirely. "Oh, the blessed
+darlin'!" she cried, seizing Nessa and kissing her again. "What my ould
+eyes would give for a sight of it!" and she burst into a passion of
+sobs. "Go now, go, the pair of ye, or I'll----" Sobs choked her
+utterance and she leant her head on the table, motioning us to go.
+
+Nessa touched my arm and we stole out, both of us deeply moved by the
+emotion which Nessa's offer had stirred in the heart of the lonely
+Irish exile.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+THE HUE AND CRY!
+
+
+On the walk to Massen we concocted our story. I was to be Hans Bulich
+and Nessa my sister; we were alone in the world except for an aunt in
+Holland; Nessa had recently lost her lover on the Russian front, and
+her supposed grief at this was to account for her gloomy silence; I was
+likely to be called up, and as this would leave her without friends or
+money, she was anxious to get to the aunt in Holland.
+
+They were parts easy to play, thanks to our warm-hearted Irish friend;
+we looked the characters quite well enough to pass muster. The absence
+of any luggage, my overalls and tools and a big German china pipe, and
+Nessa's market basket and knitting were shrewd little touches of
+realism which carried us through the preliminary difficulties without
+any trouble.
+
+There were several people in the carriage with us, one of whom, an old
+man who sat next me, was going as far as Lingen. The men were soon
+talking and the one subject was the food supply, which was evidently
+becoming a serious matter. I didn't pay much attention until a question
+was asked about the frontier smuggling. The matter interested them all
+keenly, and I threw in a remark now and then to draw the rest.
+
+The old fellow next me seemed to know a good deal about it, and when we
+three were left alone in the carriage he let drop a remark which showed
+he had noticed my interest in the subject, and then asked if I'd been
+at the front yet.
+
+"They think I'm more use at my trade," I replied, making play with the
+spanner in my hand.
+
+"Engineer's mechanic, may be?"
+
+I nodded. "Motors and aeroplanes and so on."
+
+"Going to Lingen, aren't you?"
+
+"Yes. How far's Ellendorf from there?"
+
+"A matter of a league or two. I hear they're making these new
+aeroplanes there. Got a job there?"
+
+"Shan't know till I get to Lingen; have another little matter to see to
+first, anyway."
+
+"A good few people have little matters to see to there, these days," he
+replied drily, with a suggestive glance out of the corner of his eye.
+"I live there, and you can take it from me that if you're any good at
+your job, there's plenty of work waiting for you."
+
+"Government work?"
+
+"If they weren't all blind, yes;" and he launched into a description of
+the extreme difficulty of getting repairs done. "Can't get so much as a
+screw driven in without one of their infernal permits. I've been to
+Osnabrueck about it now trying to get a man. Might as well have asked
+for the moon!" he said disgustedly, and went on grumbling about it, at
+intervals, for the rest of the journey.
+
+When we reached Lingen he said he'd like to have a chat with me and
+suggested we should go to his shop. "Won't do you any harm to be seen
+with me, either; I'm well known; and what with escaped prisoners and
+our skulkers trying to jump the frontier, the police are pretty curious
+about strangers of your age and build especially."
+
+He was well known, as he had said. Several people nodded to him on the
+platform, and one man came after him. "Good-day, Father Fischer, can I
+have a word with you?" and they stopped to talk together.
+
+"Hear that, Nessa?" I asked excitedly. "By Jove, we're in luck if it's
+our man!" and when he rejoined us I asked him if he was Adolf Fischer.
+
+"I am. Every one in Lingen knows Adolf Fischer."
+
+"Have you a brother out Massen way?"
+
+"I had, but he drank himself to death five years or so back, poor fool.
+Why do you ask?"
+
+"I've a letter for you;" and I gave it him.
+
+He read it and pocketed it with a chuckle of pleasure. "Couldn't be
+better. Friends of Martha's are friends of mine. Come along."
+
+We had not left the station before we had a proof of our good luck. We
+were in front of him as we went out and the police sergeant at the door
+stopped us and was beginning to question me, when he intervened.
+
+"It's all right, Braun. They're friends of mine. A stroke of luck,
+too," he said with a wink, which suggested there was a mutually
+satisfactory understanding between them.
+
+We were allowed to pass at once, and he stayed talking to the sergeant
+for a couple of minutes. "Lucky you gave me that letter when you did,"
+he said when he caught us up. "They've been ordered to keep a special
+look-out for a couple such as you. But they won't worry you while
+you're with me."
+
+Ominous news in view of what had occurred just before the train smash
+outside Osnabrueck, and it made me more anxious than ever to get Nessa
+safely over the frontier.
+
+"You'll bide with me, of course," he said when we reached his house, a
+flourishing grocer's store in the main street of the little town. "I
+don't have any one in the house nights. We'll have a bite of food and
+then talk things over."
+
+He was silent and thoughtful during the meal, and the trend of his
+thoughts was shown in a question he put.
+
+"There's nothing black against you, is there?"
+
+"Nothing to make me afraid to face any man in the Empire," I replied
+positively. It was the truth, if not quite as I meant him to understand
+it.
+
+"I only asked, because I have to be very careful," he said; and nothing
+more passed until we were smoking, while Nessa had resumed the knitting
+which she had kept up incessantly in the train.
+
+"Now, you'd like to tell me your story," he opened.
+
+I told him the tale we had prepared and he put a question or two which
+were easily answered.
+
+"I'm sorry for you, my lass," he said to her. "Very sorry; you're only
+one among too many thousands; and you shall get away all right. They're
+not particular about women and girls, you know," he added to me. "But
+it's different with men. Their orders are to shoot first and ask
+questions afterwards. Three were found trying to jump the frontier last
+week and were shot. Two the week before; and one of 'em was our only
+engineer. So if that's what's brought you here, I can't help you. We'd
+all the trouble we wanted over the last affair."
+
+"I'm no skulker, I assure you. If they call 'em up, I'm ready any time."
+
+"You'll give me your word to stop here then?"
+
+"Unless I have to go anywhere else. I'm pretty handy at my job, you
+know."
+
+He seemed satisfied, and then told me his plans.
+
+Nessa was to leave that night. He had a nephew in the Landwehr regiment
+at present guarding a part of the frontier, which was especially
+promising for the scheme, and we were to run out there in his car. I
+was to stay with him in Lingen, partly to help in the smuggling
+operations but largely to keep in order his and his associates' motors.
+There were a number of Lingen people in the thing, which was winked at
+by the authorities, who would not ask any questions about me if I was
+known to be in the swim.
+
+He gave me a host of details, took me out later to see the place where
+I was to work; a very well-equipped place it was, too, but with only a
+lad and a doddering old fellow as the staff: explained that they often
+lost considerably by breakdowns; and then left me to return to Nessa,
+saying that he must go and arrange about the night's venture.
+
+I found Nessa very dejected, buried in thought, with her knitting on
+her lap.
+
+"Looks good enough, eh?" I said to cheer her.
+
+It wasn't a success. She did not answer for a while. "Do you trust
+him?" she asked, looking up at length.
+
+"Why not? He was frank enough; and we should have been in a deuce of a
+mess without him. It can't be worse even if he gives us away. But he
+won't. I'm sure of that."
+
+"But about you?"
+
+"Meaning?" I knew what was coming, however.
+
+"You heard what he said about those men being shot. It brought my heart
+up in my mouth."
+
+"It's no more than we heard at Massen."
+
+"We agreed to try together, remember."
+
+"I haven't forgotten. We'll see what happens to-night."
+
+"You don't want me to go by myself? You promised, Jack."
+
+"Better one than neither of us, surely. That reminds me. You must have
+some money in case I fail;" and I offered her some notes.
+
+She shook her head and pushed them away. "I have more than enough for
+my purpose."
+
+I knew what she meant. She was resolved not to go alone, and it worried
+me considerably. It was splendidly staunch and lovable and brave, but
+none the less quixotic and a serious blunder. "You heard what that
+police sergeant had told old Fischer?"
+
+"Of course," she nodded casually, as if it didn't make the least
+difference.
+
+"You shall settle it for yourself, Nessa." There was nothing to be
+gained by trying to dissuade her then, so I left it until the moment
+for action should arrive. After my promise, it was impossible for me to
+think of going with her.
+
+Fischer came back chuckling. "We're in luck," he declared. "I met my
+nephew, Fritz, in the town just now. He'll do it all right. He'll be on
+guard at one of the roads; the very spot of all others for us; near a
+little thicket they call the Pike Wood. We're to be there about nine. I
+explained everything to him, and of course I've pledged my word that
+only your sister's going over. That's right, eh?"
+
+"Quite," I assured him.
+
+Nessa's needles stopped clicking for an instant and I heard her catch
+her breath. It augured badly for the night's enterprise; but if I had
+wished to renew the attempt to persuade her, I could not have done it,
+as we were not left alone altogether again until the time came for us
+to set out.
+
+I drove the car with Fischer at my side, and by his instructions, Nessa
+lay on the bottom of the tonneau which was constructed much like that
+of the farmer's I had mended at Osnabrueck. She was hidden under a rug
+and a tarpaulin, and he told her to cover up even her head if any one
+spoke to us on the way.
+
+We had some dozen miles to run, and for the greater part of the way no
+one attempted to interfere with us. The old fellow seemed to be hugely
+pleased by the way I handled the ramshackle machine; and even more so
+when I explained the reason of some of the queer noises and jumps which
+the engine developed. "You're the man for us!" he exclaimed more than
+once.
+
+When we reached the outskirts of a village close to the frontier, he
+bent over and told Nessa to hide herself completely. "We shall be
+questioned here; but it won't matter. Go slow for a bit," he added to
+me; "and pull up at once if they order us."
+
+The village was full of soldiers, and I began to realize in earnest
+then the difficulties of our escaping without his help. We were pulled
+up twice in the village, but allowed to proceed the moment he was
+recognized and produced some authority he had.
+
+After we left the village behind us there were plenty of people, both
+men and women, all with their faces turned frontierwards. "What are all
+these doing?" I asked.
+
+"Crumb-hunters, we call 'em." Descriptive enough, too; and he told me
+they were out in all weathers to pick up any trifles from the Dutch
+side, and that passes were given to them for the purpose.
+
+"And what about the Dutch guards?"
+
+"Getting fat on it," replied Fischer, rubbing his palm and then putting
+a finger to the side of his nose. "Bleed us to a tune, too. Their
+people try to stop it; change the men often enough; but it only means
+that Peter gets a greasy palm instead of Paul. We turn off into the
+next lane on the right: it runs across the frontier; the Pike Wood's
+just there; but you'll have to stop a little short of it to turn the
+car."
+
+We ran about half a mile along the lane to the spot where I turned and
+we all got out. He led the way across a field or two, and, as we were
+rather before our time--nine o'clock--he posted us at a point in the
+thicket from which we could see the guards at the gate which marked the
+boundary on the German side, and then left us.
+
+I was beginning to get a little excited by that time, but Nessa seemed
+quite unmoved, except that she shivered once or twice, for the night
+air had a nip in it. Whether she persisted in her intention not to go
+without me, I could not say. She had heard me tell old Fischer that I
+wasn't going; but she maintained a sphinxlike silence all the time he
+was away.
+
+He went up to the guards and I could just make out their figures as he
+stood talking to them; and presently he disappeared into the darkness
+through the gate. A minute or two later some shots were fired from the
+other side of the barrier; soon afterwards a loaded wagon came dashing
+from that side, the three horses galloping at full stretch, and a man I
+took to be Fischer jumped from it.
+
+An exhibition of organization followed. A number of men sprang up from
+nowhere; the wagon was unloaded almost instantly; and they scuttled off
+into the night with cases and barrels and packages of all descriptions
+and sizes. It was done like a flash; and the wagon was galloped back
+across the frontier. It had just disappeared when an officer rode up,
+presumably to learn the cause of the firing. Just then Fischer rejoined
+us, out of breath, but hugely pleased.
+
+"A near thing," he panted. "If that officer had been a minute earlier
+he'd have commandeered the lot. He's a swinehound. You must lie doggo
+till he's gone; but it's all right. Fritz will give you the tip. You're
+to go forward the moment you hear him whistling 'The Watch on the
+Rhine.' Don't lose a second. Give him a twenty-mark note; it's for his
+two pals. And now I can't stop with you, I must see to things. I'll
+wait for you at the car."
+
+"What was that firing?" I asked as he turned away.
+
+"To fool the Dutch officers," he said over his shoulder as he went.
+
+Nessa's intention was still a riddle. She stood leaning against a tree,
+motionless as a statue and up to this point as silent. But the time had
+come when I must know what she meant to do.
+
+"You're going, Nessa?" I whispered.
+
+No answer; not even a shrug of the shoulders.
+
+"Nessa, dear, you're going?"
+
+"Are you?"
+
+"No. I gave my word. Besides I've half a notion that this is a sort of
+test. Fischer has told the men that I am not, and even if they didn't
+shoot us both, I should be ruined with him. And you can see for
+yourself there isn't one chance in a hundred of our getting through."
+
+She listened but made no reply.
+
+"We shall have that signal in a moment. That officer is riding away."
+
+A long tremulous sigh from her. "Do you wish me to go, Jack?"
+
+"Yes, most certainly. It's the luckiest chance in the world."
+
+"Is it?"
+
+"You can see it for yourself, dearest." I tried to put my arm round
+her, but she drew away.
+
+"Don't, Jack! After what you've just said."
+
+There was a pause in which we could catch the guttural tones of the
+guards and hear them stamping their feet. Precious seconds were flying
+and I was getting into a positive fever of impatience and anxiety.
+
+"I'm only thinking of you, Nessa. You know that. Do make up your mind
+to go. You must surely see that it's the one course for you. There's
+the road to England and your mother and----"
+
+"And you're to stop here in all this danger alone."
+
+My patience began to give out. "I know you're thinking of me, but I can
+get out of it all ever so much better alone. But there, if you won't,
+you won't, and there's an end of it."
+
+"You promised to make an attempt together. Have you done it?"
+
+"For Heaven's sake, Nessa, don't let us split hairs at a moment like
+this. Here's the chance of chances for you, and you may never have
+another. If you wish ever to see England again, or at all events until
+after the war's over, you'll take it."
+
+"That shows what little chance you think you have of getting away," she
+retorted, and made me wish I'd said something else.
+
+"I didn't mean anything of the sort, only that it will be infinitely
+easier for me alone."
+
+She didn't answer, and in the pause the first bars of the "Watch on the
+Rhine" were whistled in a low cautious pitch.
+
+"Come, dearest," I whispered and put my arm about her.
+
+"Oh, I can't go, Jack. I--I can't be such a coward!" she whispered,
+trembling in her agitation.
+
+"For Heaven's sake, dearest!"
+
+The whistling had ceased, but she still hesitated.
+
+After an interval, very short, the whistle came again, slightly louder.
+
+There was only one last plea I could think of. "It may cost me my life
+if you don't go, Nessa."
+
+I felt her shudder convulsively as she yielded, and clung to me for an
+instant. "I'll go. Oh, God!" she moaned piteously under her breath.
+
+I hurried her across the intervening field, and as we reached the other
+side of it, the man at the gate called to us impatiently to hurry.
+
+But Nessa stopped. "I've forgotten, Jack," she whispered. "I must have
+that money after all."
+
+I had it ready, thrust it into her hand, and helped her over the field
+gate. In her agitation she fell and dropped the notes. It was as dark
+as pitch on the ground at that spot and I had to grope with my hands to
+find them.
+
+The man called to me urgently to come at once, and I had just found
+them when we heard the sound of a horse galloping in our direction.
+
+"Back to the wood," growled the man almost fiercely. "If the captain
+noses you, you'll be shot."
+
+I lifted Nessa over the gate and we darted back to cover, as the
+officer rode up. We waited for some breathless anxious minutes for him
+to go, hoping that the signal could be repeated.
+
+But he did not go; and soon afterwards the guard was changed.
+
+The chance was gone and there was nothing for it but to return to the
+car.
+
+The failure was bitterly disappointing, but Nessa was glad, and
+laughed. "Here's the money, Jack," she said as we left the wood.
+
+I pocketed it in silence.
+
+"I suppose you're awfully angry and disappointed and all that, but I'm
+not. The only thing I regret is that I was persuaded to go."
+
+"I'm not angry about it. It's a great pity; but the only thing to do is
+to wait for another opportunity. I dare say Fischer can manage it."
+
+"You needn't look for one, if you mean me to go alone. I won't do it.
+You'll never get me to consent again; and you said I was to settle it,
+remember."
+
+"I remember," I replied.
+
+"I'm absolutely determined," she declared; but something was to happen
+that night which shook that determination to ruins.
+
+Fischer expressed great surprise at seeing her; but I explained that at
+the last moment the money had been lost and that the officer had come
+back in time to prevent Nessa's escape.
+
+The car was now loaded with some of the spoils from the wagon and Nessa
+had to ride in front with us. We made a quick run back to the town,
+where I helped in the unloading, and then with Nessa took the car to
+the place where I was to overhaul it in the morning.
+
+"I feel a thousand times more light-hearted, Jack," she said slipping
+her hand in my arm as we walked back to Fischer's shop.
+
+"That's as it should be. I was rather bearish over it, I'm afraid; but
+it was such a chance."
+
+"You won't ask me again to---- Good heavens, look, Jack, look!" she
+broke off, her voice shaken with agitation as she clutched my arm
+convulsively and pointed to a small poster outside the police station.
+
+She might well be agitated. The poster was headed:
+
+        MURDER
+  1,000 Marks Reward
+
+
+The murder was that of Anna Hilden and the reward was for my capture.
+
+Two portraits were in the middle. One an excellent reproduction of
+Nessa with the words: "Nessa Caldicott, Englishwoman," beneath it; the
+other a villainous splash drawing: "Johann Lassen, German"; who were
+"known to have left Berlin together on the night of the 23rd in the
+train which had been wrecked outside Osnabrueck."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+FARMER GLOCKEN AGAIN
+
+
+This "Hue and Cry" poster alarmed Nessa intensely. Her fears were all
+on my account, however; and so far as concerned herself, she did not
+even then seem to regret that her chance to cross the frontier had been
+missed.
+
+As we hurried to Fischer's I tried to reassure her that the trouble was
+not so serious as it looked at first blush; for the reason that the
+photograph of her was so good that no one would recognize her in her
+present make-up, while mine was execrable enough to amount to a
+positive disguise. But this did not allay her agitation; and after we
+reached the house, there was no opportunity for further discussion.
+
+We both realized that the consequences might be very serious; and after
+she had gone to bed, I sat racking my wits over the perplexing problem.
+It was either von Erstein's doing or von Gratzen's; and in the end I
+put it down to von Erstein, whose influence was quite sufficient to
+enable him to stir up the police in this manner.
+
+For me there was only the risk of arrest and trial for the murder;
+hugely unpleasant, of course, but not dangerous, because von Gratzen
+knew who had killed the woman and had the proofs. It was very different
+for Nessa, however, although she had, of course, nothing to fear in
+connection with the murder charge. But she would certainly be kept in
+the country; and Heaven alone knew what the consequences would be and
+what price she might have to pay for her fatal hesitation at the
+frontier that night.
+
+I had no chance of speaking to her about it until about noon the
+following day when Fischer sent her with some lunch for me to the shed
+where I had put his car into shape again. As the "staff"--the gawky lad
+and the decrepit old man--were present, it was difficult to say much to
+her, but I managed at intervals to let her know what I thought.
+
+To my concern, however, she was determined to stay in the country.
+Instead of regretting her refusal to go, she appeared to glory in it.
+If there was to be trouble for me, she was resolved to share it,
+declaring that she could help me by confessing her part.
+
+I was still doing what I could to shake this determination and show her
+the fallacy of it, when there was another unpleasant surprise.
+
+Fischer arrived bringing the farmer Glocken whose motor I had mended at
+Osnabrueck. If there was one man in all Germany I wished to avoid at
+that moment, it was certainly Glocken.
+
+"Hullo! so it's you, is it?" he exclaimed.
+
+Fischer was obviously as much astonished at the recognition as I was
+concerned. "You know Bulich, then?" he asked.
+
+Glocken paused and appeared to sense something of the position and
+answered with a cunning squint at me: "I know him for a first-class
+workman."
+
+"You're right," agreed Fischer, and then explained the object of the
+visit. Glocken was in the smuggling ring and looked after a very
+important and profitable branch--the smuggling of chemicals for
+ammunition. These were brought by aeroplane; it being deemed too risky
+to resort to the ordinary method. A consignment had arrived the
+previous evening, the pilot, a Dutchman named Vandervelt, had had an
+accident in landing, and I was wanted to put the thing right.
+
+There was no way of getting out of it, and what objection there might
+have been was more than compensated for when Fischer drew me aside and
+told me he had arranged with Glocken that if my sister would venture
+the flying trip, she could go with the Dutchman. I agreed without
+asking Nessa; and as Fischer's car was now ready for the road we drove
+away in it.
+
+Glocken sat in front with me and promptly started his questions. Very
+awkward questions some of them were too: about our former meeting; why
+I had not mentioned I knew Mrs. Fischer at the inn; why I had said I
+was coming from Osnabrueck, when old Fischer had told him a very
+different story; and at last enough to show that he had seen the murder
+poster and was inclined to connect it with me.
+
+Having in this way thoroughly scared me, as he thought, he broached the
+subject of Nessa's flight and asked what it was worth, hinting that
+Vandervelt was something of a bloodsucker. I had still an ample supply
+of money; about a couple of hundred pounds, some four thousand marks;
+and being prepared to part with every pfennig to get Nessa away, it was
+a considerable relief to find that it was to be a matter of bribing.
+
+"Couple of hundred marks, enough?" I suggested.
+
+"You don't know Vandervelt, or you wouldn't offer a trifle like that,"
+he said, shaking his head.
+
+"How much then? I'm not yet a partner in Krupp's, remember."
+
+"What's it worth to you?"
+
+"Fischer was going to do it for nothing last night. He's almost as
+sorry for my sister as I am."
+
+"Vandervelt isn't Fischer," he replied drily. "Doesn't a thousand marks
+strike you as cheap?" he said with a wily significant leer. That was
+the amount of the reward!
+
+"Out of the question, Glocken. She must have something in her pocket
+when she lands; and in any case Fischer's going to arrange it in a day
+or so."
+
+"Hadn't she better be off at once? Delays are apt to be dangerous
+sometimes, you know."
+
+"Why?" I asked, turning to him.
+
+Our eyes met in a mutually intent stare, and his dropped first. "You
+know your own business," he muttered with a shrug. "But you'd better
+give the thousand, if you want her to go."
+
+It was clearly best to haggle, so I advanced to five hundred, then to
+seven hundred and fifty, and at last to a thousand, protesting it was
+an imposition. He pretended to fire up at the word; but it was only the
+preface to asking for the money to be paid at once.
+
+It was all going into his own pocket, of course; and after more words I
+agreed to give him half the amount when we reached his farm if I found
+my sister would risk the venture, and the remainder as soon as she was
+safely off.
+
+I broached the matter to Nessa as soon as we arrived, and she met it at
+first with a flat refusal. "I won't go, Jack. I thought something of
+the sort was meant when you asked me to come here. I don't care what
+happens to me. I can't go."
+
+"But I want you to care, Nessa. It's----"
+
+"Well, I don't--and I won't."
+
+"You're not afraid of the trip?"
+
+"I'm not that sort of coward, thank you," she retorted sharply.
+
+"I'm going to arrange with the pilot, Vandervelt's his name, for him to
+look after you when you land and see you to some station."
+
+"I'm not taking the least interest in all this."
+
+"You'd better book right through to Rotterdam and go to our Consulate,
+and I'll look for you there."
+
+"I'm not going, Jack."
+
+"You'd rather be clapped into an internment camp?"
+
+"I don't care for fifty internment camps. They can do what they please
+with me, but I won't be coward enough to desert you."
+
+"You can tell everything at the Consulate and----"
+
+"Is that a Home for strayed cowards?" she cried, springing up and
+stamping her foot, her eyes flashing indignantly.
+
+"No, it's the best meeting place for us and a safe refuge for quixotic
+girls."
+
+"They're welcome to it, then. I shan't disturb them. If you wish to
+make me hate you, you'll persist in all this."
+
+"I'd rather have you hate me than that you should stop here."
+
+"How can you say such a thing as that?"
+
+"Because I mean it; every syllable of it, Nessa, on my honour."
+
+This appeared to make some impression. She winced and paled slightly.
+"I've never been thought a coward before," she said after a pause, but
+without so much of the former snap.
+
+"What I do think is that if what you talk of doing is cowardice, I'd
+rather be thought a coward than anything else."
+
+"That means that you approve of it then?"
+
+"On the contrary. Don't let us get at cross purposes. I must be off to
+this job. The thing is this. If I'm alone here, I can get through
+everything without risk; and I can't if you stop. It's splendid of you
+to wish to stick it with me; but it'll be fatal to me; fatal to both of
+us, indeed."
+
+"I don't care about myself."
+
+"Then care for me. Do it for my sake."
+
+"How would my stopping hurt you?"
+
+I lost patience then. "There isn't time to go over it all again, Nessa.
+But if you persist in this, there's no use in continuing a useless
+struggle to get away. I've made the arrangement; and if you won't
+leave, I shall go straight from here to the police, tell them I'm
+Lassen, and leave them to do what they will."
+
+"You wouldn't be so mad! You're only saying it to force me to give in,"
+she exclaimed, firing again.
+
+"Call it what you like; but I shall do it. Keep that in mind when the
+time comes for you to decide;" and without waiting to give her time to
+reply I left her. It went against the grain to have to use such a
+threat, knowing that her motive was nothing but a chivalrous regard for
+me; but persuasion had failed, and matters were too serious to be over
+nice in the choice of means to convince her.
+
+There wasn't much wrong with the bus. Vandervelt, a very decent fellow,
+was a good pilot, it seemed, but not much use as a mechanic. A couple
+of hours or so sufficed for the job; but as I hoped that Nessa would be
+his passenger, I went most carefully over every part and made tests
+until I was satisfied. This occupied a considerable time, so that I had
+not finished until late in the afternoon.
+
+The arrangement was that Vandervelt should start about sunset, as that
+would give him time to reach his landing place before dark. He agreed
+readily to get Nessa to the nearest station and to see her safely off
+for Rotterdam. If all went well, she ought to reach there somewhere
+about noon the following day.
+
+He said nothing about the passage money for Nessa, and I avoided the
+subject. So long as Nessa got away, it was nothing to me whether old
+Glocken swindled his companion or not. They could settle their own
+differences; and it would have been the act of a fool to set them by
+the ears at such a moment.
+
+All I saw of the farmer tended to confirm the Irish-woman's estimate of
+him. He had blackmailed me in the matter of the payment for Nessa, and
+I had very little doubt that, having scooped in a thousand marks for
+her, he would start another attempt with me on the same lines.
+
+He watched me at work for most of the time; joined with Vandervelt in
+praising my skill; repeating with unnecessary frequency something about
+what extraordinary good luck it was for them that I had come to Lingen,
+and his hope that I should remain with them a long time.
+
+He didn't mean a word of it, of course, and for a long time left me
+guessing as to his motive for all this waste of breath. At length,
+however, it struck me that all this rot was intended to keep me
+slogging away because he was anxious about the bus and that he wished
+to have it in good shape before something was to happen which he had up
+his sleeve.
+
+He had my five hundred marks in his pocket, and, if he broke the
+contract and refused to let Nessa go at the last minute, he might be
+getting the thousand for the reward instead of only the balance of five
+hundred from me. I knocked that little dodge on the head, therefore.
+
+Waiting for a repetition of his oxish praise of my skill, I laughed and
+said: "You're right, farmer; you've got to know how to handle them.
+They're difficult enough to repair sometimes, but easy to damage. A
+blow or two with the hammer in the right spot, and I could make this
+old bus fit for nothing but the scrap heap;" and I gave him a meaning
+look and raised the hammer as if going to smash things.
+
+He tumbled to my meaning right enough and grabbed my arm. "Mind what
+you're doing, man. Do you know what that thing cost?" he cried.
+
+"Oh, yes. A good deal more than a thousand marks. I was only showing
+you how easy it would be to make it worth about as many pfennigs."
+
+He laughed uneasily and went off, grunting something I didn't catch.
+But he knew now what it would cost him to earn the police reward.
+
+Half an hour later came the confirmation of my suspicion. The police
+sergeant from Lingen, Braun, arrived and Glocken took him into the
+house and then brought him across the fields to us. I was making great
+play with the hammer when they reached us.
+
+Whether the old beggar had brought him there to arrest me, I couldn't
+tell of course, but no hint of the sort was dropped; and after a few
+questions about the bus, the two went off and I saw Braun start on his
+return to Lingen. Without me, thank goodness.
+
+It was now nearing the time for Vandervelt to start, and I had still to
+see Nessa and get her final decision. Suspecting treachery, I tested
+the engine to show Vandervelt that it was all right, and then without
+his knowledge, manipulated matters, pocketed a small bit of the engine,
+so that she wouldn't move, and went into the house to Nessa.
+
+Her mood had changed meanwhile; she was abjectly miserable and
+woebegone.
+
+"I wonder you think it worth while to come to me again," she said.
+
+"Time's nearly up, dear, and Vandervelt is getting ready."
+
+No response except a desolate gesture.
+
+"I hope you've been thinking over all I said."
+
+"I've been thinking of part of it--the last part; the cruel part."
+
+"I'm sorry you look at it in that light. It wasn't meant to be cruel,
+Nessa; but there, you know that. Have you decided?"
+
+"Have you succeeded in forcing me, you mean?"
+
+"I told you no more than the plain truth. The position's bad enough as
+it is, without anything more. For me I mean."
+
+"As if I didn't know that! And as if it isn't that which is driving me
+distracted!"
+
+"There's no time to go into things again, dear. I said it should rest
+with you to decide."
+
+"Yes, and then used threats to force me!"
+
+"I haven't threatened you, Nessa."
+
+"It doesn't matter what you call it. The change of a word doesn't
+change the act. It's what you're doing, not what you're saying, that I
+care about."
+
+"Are you going? That's what I care about."
+
+"Shall you go to the police if I don't?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Do you understand that it's just breaking my heart to go--unless you
+wish to break it?"
+
+"Will you give me a chance of mending it when we meet at Rotterdam?"
+
+She leant back in her chair, elbow on knee, and rested her chin on her
+hand. "We shan't meet there."
+
+"Nessa!"
+
+"You will never get there. I shouldn't care so much if----" She dropped
+her eyes to the floor and left the sentence unfinished.
+
+I knelt by her side and took her hand. "You must go, dearest," I urged.
+
+She flung her arms round my neck and clung to me. "Don't make me go,
+Jack! Don't, if you love me," she pleaded. "I--I can't bear the thought
+of leaving you."
+
+"It's because I do love you with all my heart that I wish you to go.
+It's the only way in which our love can ever end as we wish." I pressed
+my lips to hers. She was trembling like an aspen.
+
+"Bulich! Bulich! Are you ready?" It was the farmer's voice, and Nessa
+shuddered convulsively at the sound.
+
+"You'll do this for me, dearest?"
+
+"Oh, God, if there were only some other way!" she moaned.
+
+"There isn't, sweetheart. It's the only one in which you can really
+help me. We shall meet again in a day or two. That's all."
+
+"I shall never see you again."
+
+"You may not unless you go. You're ready?"
+
+Her grasp tightened on me and she did not answer.
+
+"Bulich! Bulich!" came Glocken's voice again, more insistently.
+
+"In a minute now," I called in reply.
+
+"How shall I ever know what happens to you?"
+
+"I'll tell you all about it myself in Rotterdam; we shall just laugh
+over it together."
+
+"Laugh!" she echoed. "I shall never laugh again. I shan't be able to
+bear the suspense, Jack. I know I shan't. I shall come back."
+
+"Well, give me a week's grace, before you do."
+
+"I may come back then?" she asked, looking up quickly.
+
+I knew that she would not be allowed to recross the frontier; but it
+seemed a case where the truth would do no good. "Yes," I said.
+
+"Promise?"
+
+"If you won't come earlier."
+
+"Oh, what a week of suspense it will be!" she moaned.
+
+"Come along, Bulich. Vandervelt's getting restless," called Glocken.
+
+"I'll go, Jack." It was no more than a whisper, but it meant so much.
+Of her own dear will she kissed me again and again with more passion
+than she had ever shown, and then made a desperate effort for
+composure. "What an end to our picnic, Jack!" she said, trying to
+smile. A brave effort, but a failure; and she began to tremble again,
+closing her eyes and clenching her hands tightly under the searching
+strain of it, and turned away.
+
+For a full minute she stood in this tense silence, until Glocken called
+again. The sound of his voice roused her, and when she faced me again,
+she had regained self-control.
+
+"I'm ready, Jack," she said steadily.
+
+I pushed some notes into her pocket.
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Money. You must have it, dearest," I said, as she seemed about to
+protest. "And now, good-bye, for a day or two."
+
+"Good-bye. Don't kiss me, or I shall break down again;" and with that
+we went down to the two men who were impatiently waiting for us.
+
+"You've been a long time," said Glocken in a surly tone. "There's
+something gone wrong with the machine."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I tried to start," said Vandervelt. "Glocken told me your sister had
+decided not to go with me."
+
+"That was a misunderstanding. I forgot I had this in my pocket;" and I
+showed them the little part I had brought away. "Rather lucky, wasn't
+it, Glocken?"
+
+He looked as if he would gladly have struck me, and muttered something
+about being sorry for the mistake.
+
+Nessa did not speak a word as we crossed the fields, dropping a pace or
+two behind us, and keeping her eyes on the ground. She could scarcely
+have been more dejected had she been on her way to the scaffold.
+
+I repeated the instructions to Vandervelt about Nessa, and again he
+promised to carry them out faithfully. When we reached the bus a minute
+or two put her in trim again, and I made a final test of the engine.
+Then I got down, helped Nessa into her place, fastened the strap round
+her, and held her hand while the Dutchman climbed to his seat.
+
+She returned the pressure with a choking sigh, but could not trust
+herself to speak.
+
+Then I shook hands with the pilot, thanked him, and at the same time
+punished the farmer for his intended treachery. "I know you'll take
+good care of my sister, Vandervelt; and don't forget I'm paying Glocken
+a thousand marks passage money. Good luck."
+
+"What's that?" he asked sharply.
+
+"You can settle with him on your next trip. You won't get in before
+dark if you stop to discuss it now."
+
+"I will," he said, with a muttered oath and a glance at the discomfited
+farmer.
+
+Then he set the engine going, we stood back, Nessa waved her hand to
+me, and they were off.
+
+I watched the bus across the field, rise, circle round on the climb up,
+point her nose frontierwards, and I strained my eyes after her until
+she entered a cloud and passed out of sight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+RECOGNIZED
+
+
+Glocken was furious at the trick I had played him. "You think yourself
+mighty smart, don't you?" he said with an oath as we went back.
+
+"One too many for you, eh?" I chuckled. Relief at Nessa's safety made
+me comparatively indifferent about everything else. The job which had
+brought me to Germany was done, and for the moment nothing else seemed
+to matter.
+
+"I'll make you smart in another sense, I promise you," he snarled.
+
+"You can't do it, Glocken, and you'd better not make a fool of
+yourself. There's a lot behind all this you don't understand. Here's
+your money;" and I gave him the balance.
+
+"Where did you get it? In Berlin--Johann Lassen?"
+
+"You don't look pretty when you snarl like that, Glocken; and if you
+believe I'm Johann Lassen, you're a braver man than I think. We're
+alone here; and if I were that man, do you think I'd let you live to
+tell the police when a tap from this spanner of mine would silence you
+for ever?"
+
+That hadn't occurred to him and he jumped away from me as if dreading
+an instant attack.
+
+"I'm not going to touch you, man; on the contrary I'm going to make it
+easy for you. I'll give you a lift into Lingen in Fischer's car and
+we'll stop at the police station, if you like. I saw your game in a
+second this morning and it suited me to play up to it. I was told you
+were a treacherous skunk, but I didn't think you were such a gorgeous
+fool. Come along and we'll have that chat with the police."
+
+He hung back, either because he was afraid to trust himself in the car
+with me or because my bluff puzzled him. It turned out to be the latter.
+
+"I don't want to do you any harm, Bulich," he muttered.
+
+"You wooden-headed ass, do you think I'd let you, if you could? Come to
+the police and tell your story; but I warn you beforehand that if you
+dare to utter a word against me like that, you're a ruined man, lock,
+stock, and barrel. Behind me in this affair is one of the most powerful
+men in the whole Empire, whose arm is long enough to reach even cunning
+Farmer Glocken, squeeze him to a jelly, and leave the remnants to rot
+in gaol. And he'll do it, Glocken, as sure as my real name isn't Hans
+Bulich, the instant I tell him the scurvy tricks you've tried with me
+to-day." I said this with all the concentrated sternness at my command,
+and it went right home and frightened him through and through.
+
+"What--what is your name, then?" he stammered.
+
+I shoved my face close to his. "Look at me, you clown, look at me well,
+and then ask it--if you dare."
+
+It was a beautiful bluff. Whether he thought he recognized some one of
+the innumerable princelings of the Empire or not, I can't say; but he
+drew back and doffed his hat, with a muttered: "I beg your pardon, sir."
+
+"That's better. Now I'm Hans Bulich again; and don't forget it," I said
+with a change of manner and tone, as I climbed into the car and
+beckoned to him to get up beside me. We ran back to Lingen in silence,
+and I pulled up just before reaching the police station. "Here you
+are," I suggested.
+
+"I'm going back by train, sir, if you please," he answered with
+delightful deference; and I took him to the railway and dismissed him
+with a last sharp caution to hold his tongue.
+
+I was well over that fence and, if the rest could be as easily
+negotiated, I should soon be after Nessa. Glocken was the only man I
+feared, because he had seen us so close to Osnabrueck. The fright he had
+had would probably keep him quiet for a day or two, until he had had
+time to digest the matter; and the interval must be turned to the best
+account.
+
+Old Fischer was glad to see me, asked about the day's happenings, and
+was relieved to know that Vandervelt had been able to make the return
+trip. During the evening we discussed our plans; and after a really
+refreshing night's sleep, I went off to the shed to continue the work
+there.
+
+Fischer was so elated by his discovery of a mechanic that he brought
+several people in during the morning; members of the smuggling ring, I
+gathered, for they seemed as pleased about it as he was: chatted to
+each other and to me as they watched me at work, asked all sorts of
+silly questions about cars and engines and parts; each of them fussing
+over me like a hen with one chick.
+
+About midday I knocked off to dine with Fischer, and we were smoking a
+pipe afterwards when the police sergeant, Braun, arrived in a somewhat
+excited mood and called the old fellow out of the room.
+
+"I'd better be getting back," I said; but Braun stopped me, saying he
+had come about me.
+
+This gave me a twinge, and I passed a decidedly uncomfortable ten
+minutes while they were jawing with their heads together in the shop.
+But there was no cause for alarm, it turned out.
+
+Fischer explained it all. My fame as an aero mechanic had reached the
+ears of the proprietor of the Halbermond Hotel where an army flying man
+had arrived, and when he had inquired for a man of the sort, the
+proprietor had mentioned me, and I was ordered to go to him.
+
+Fischer didn't like the business at all, fearing that it might
+interfere with his plans; and it was this which he and Braun had been
+discussing so earnestly.
+
+"You'll have to be very careful, Bulich. If he thinks you're half as
+good a hand as you are, he's likely to want you for the army."
+
+"I'll be careful. Do you know what the job is?" I asked Braun.
+
+"Pulitz didn't know either," he said, shaking his head.
+
+"Who's Pulitz?"
+
+"The blabber who keeps the Halbermond," replied Fischer irritably. "He
+must have lost his head to say a word about you. It wouldn't matter if
+you were twenty years older; but there, he was always a fool and always
+will be, I suppose."
+
+"Who's the flying man?"
+
+"I don't know. Stranger here; just driven up in his car. If he'd been
+any one any of us knew, we might have done something."
+
+"Doesn't the Halbermond man, Pulitz, know him?"
+
+"Never set eyes on him before, and there wasn't the least need to tell
+him a word about you. But that's the fool all over, trying to curry
+favour and not a thought of the mischief he could do," grumbled Fischer.
+
+"Well, shall I chance it, and not go?"
+
+"That won't do," cried Braun. "He'd report me and have the whole town
+hunting for you. You must go, right enough."
+
+"Do the best you can to get out of it," chimed in Fischer. "Let him
+think you're no better than a clumsy fool."
+
+"All right, I'll do my best," I replied, laughing, and set out for the
+hotel.
+
+I was in two minds about the thing. It would never do to be called up
+as an ordinary ranker; but it might be another matter to go as an air
+mechanic. Enrolled in the name of Hans Bulich, I should be safe from
+the trouble which was waiting for Johann Lassen. There were other
+possibilities, moreover. If I could get hold of some valuable
+information about the German aero service and their types of new
+planes, it would go a long way with the people at home to condone any
+breakage of my leave. I had no wish to turn spy, but to be driven into
+it was a very different proposition.
+
+More than that, it was not at all improbable that when they found I did
+really know something worth knowing about a bus, I might be told off to
+take one up; and in that case, well, they wouldn't see it again, if I
+was within flying distance of the frontier.
+
+It was best to be careful, however, as Fischer had urged, and not say
+too much until I could learn what the flying man really wanted. So I
+turned into the shed before going to him, mucked myself up a bit with
+black grease, paying particular attention to my face, to avoid the
+remote but possible chance of recognition, shoved my hands in my
+pockets and slouched along to the interview.
+
+The luck was with me at the start. The porter was just going out, told
+me hurriedly where to find the officer's private room, and then ran
+off, saying he had to catch a train. He was thus the only person to see
+me enter the hotel: the importance of which fact I realized later. The
+officer was alone and had been lunching, and the array of drinks
+testified to his having done himself remarkably well. Next I recognized
+him; but he had drunk too much to remember me. He was a coarse-tongued
+bully named Vibach, who had been at Goettingen in my day, and had a
+well-deserved reputation as a blustering coward.
+
+"What the devil do you mean by keeping me like this?" he said angrily.
+"Do you suppose I've nothing to do but kick my heels waiting for scum
+like you?"
+
+"I'm very sorry, sir, but I only just heard you wished to see me," I
+replied, with appropriate servile nervousness.
+
+"I've a good mind to put you under arrest. And are you the man these
+Lingen fools think a good mechanic? You look more like a dirty street
+sweeper, coming into my presence in that filthy state."
+
+"I thought it best----"
+
+"Who the devil wants to know what you think?" he burst in, pouring out
+another bumper of wine and draining it at a draught. "Answer my
+question, can't you? Not stand there gibbering like a lunatic." There
+was scarcely a sentence without an oath to punctuate it.
+
+"I came at once without stopping to clean myself, sir."
+
+"Then some other fool must have bungled my message. I said you were to
+come immediately, and when I say a thing I mean it." Another oath for
+garnishment. "What's your clownish name, confound you?"
+
+"Hans Bulich, sir."
+
+"Do you know a plough from an aeroplane?"
+
+"Yes, sir," I answered with Teutonic stolidity.
+
+"Ever been in one?"
+
+"Not in a plough, sir."
+
+He roared an expletive at me. "Are you a fool, or trying to joke with
+me? That won't pay you, you clod."
+
+"I never joke with my betters, sir. I've been up in an aeroplane, sir."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Schipphasen, sir."
+
+"Oh, you've been there, have you? How long were you there?" It was a
+well-known training school and he began to change his opinion of me.
+
+"About a year. I have my certificates and----" I searched in my pockets
+as if to find them, and said: "I've left them at my lodging, sir."
+
+"Why the devil didn't you tell me that at first?"
+
+"You didn't ask me, sir."
+
+"What are you doing in this hole, then?"
+
+"I was going to Ellendorf, but they asked me to stay here a week or so
+to do some repairs and things."
+
+"Did they? Like their infernal insolence at a time like this. I'm on my
+way to Ellendorf now to fetch a new machine, and my fool of a mechanic
+has got drunk, or lost himself, or something. Can you take his place?"
+
+Could I not? Up with him in the bus, what couldn't I do? But I shook my
+head doubtfully. "I don't know that I could pilot----"
+
+"You wooden-headed idiot, do you suppose I want you to pilot it?" he
+roared, with a shout of laughter. "I want you as a mechanic, you fool."
+
+"I didn't know, sir. Of course I could test the plane and see that
+she's all right for you. That was part of my job at Schipphasen, sir;
+that and trial flights."
+
+"If that's the case, you ought to be in the army. Have you served?"
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Why not? You've been in the ranks, I can see that."
+
+Up to that point I had done very well, indeed; but then I tripped. "I
+was a one-year man, sir." The one-year men were a comparatively limited
+number drawn from the better class; served for only one year instead of
+three, and had either passed an examination or been at one of the
+Universities, and mixed freely with the officers.
+
+"What regiment?" was the next question.
+
+I named one at random; I think it was the 54th Hanoverians. My luck was
+clean out, for it chanced to be the same in which he himself had served.
+
+"That's devilish funny. Let's have a look at you;" and he straightened
+up a bit and stared hard at me. "I don't remember any one of your name.
+Bulich. Bulich. There was never a man of that name. I mean to know some
+more about you, my man. Now that I look closely at you, I believe I've
+seen you before. You remind me of some one. Just walk across the room."
+
+Smothering a curse at the change of luck, I obeyed and slouched across,
+overdoing it probably in my eagerness and fluster.
+
+"Stop there," he ordered. "Now face round, and come back in your proper
+walk. Don't try that game with me again. That's a little better, but a
+long way from right, as you know well. Now, who are you? Out with it
+and don't try any fool game with me."
+
+"I've come down a bit in the world, and no one knows me now by any
+other name than Hans Bulich."
+
+"I mean to know it. Out with it," he shouted.
+
+I was at my wits' end and didn't answer.
+
+"If you don't tell me you'll have to tell the police, mind. I'm going
+to bottom this. You've lied to me once, remember."
+
+Suddenly a thought occurred to me. I picked up a tumbler and made a
+peculiar motion with it--the secret sign of a Goettingen students'
+society, half-masonic, half-drinking club, of which both of us had been
+members.
+
+He laughed, swore, and held out his hand. It was part of the ritual we
+had been bound to observe by the pledge of the society. I gripped his
+hand in the approved manner.
+
+"So that's it, eh?" he said, filling his glass again and motioning me
+to fill one for myself. The ice was still of the thinnest, for in my
+time there had not been more than a dozen members, and I could see that
+he was searching his memory for my name. If he remembered, what was I
+to do? I knew what he would do--have me arrested as a spy, and then----
+There was only one possible "then" in war time.
+
+The long pause while he was thinking back gave me time to think
+forward. My life was in the balance, and it didn't take much
+consideration to decide that it was just as well to die at his hands in
+that room in an attempt to escape as to be placed against a wall with a
+firing platoon in front of me.
+
+At such a moment of crisis one thinks quickly, and under the spur of
+this one a wild idea flashed into my thoughts, and the way to carry it
+out developed almost instantly. He was a man of my own height and build
+and colouring; he was a stranger; no one had seen me enter the hotel;
+his uniform would fit me sufficiently well to pass muster; and I was
+already quite convinced that if I did not leave the place in his
+clothes, I should never do it in my own, except under arrest.
+
+After a very long pause, lasting perhaps five minutes although it
+seemed an hour to me, he started, stared at me and got up. "I can't
+remember you," he said with a nervous smile, which told me it was a
+lie. "Ring that bell for me."
+
+Fortunately I was between him and it. "What for?" I asked.
+
+He was still a coward, I was glad to notice, by his flinching movement,
+ebbing colour, and nervous licking of the lips. "I want some more
+wine," he said lamely.
+
+"Why not say you've recognized me, Vibach? You know you have, and you
+want to bring some one here. We can't have that."
+
+He did precisely what a coward would be expected to do. He lied that he
+didn't remember me at all, tried to hold me in talk about our Goettingen
+days, and when he thought I was a little off guard, made a dart for the
+door to shout for assistance.
+
+The shout died still-born. My hand was on his throat before a sound
+could escape, and I held on with a bulldog grip which choked the breath
+out of him, as he clutched at my wrists in frantic but vain efforts to
+free himself. I had twice his strength and was as hard as nails, while
+he was flabby and soft with drink and self-indulgence.
+
+He tried to make some sort of fight of it and began drumming his heels
+on the floor; so I lifted him off his feet, locked the door, plumped
+him down on a sofa and choked him until his struggles ceased and he lay
+half dead from funk and want of breath, shamming unconsciousness.
+
+Then I sat on him, shoved the sofa cushion over his face lest he should
+try to shout again, unfastened my "tummy pad," and got out my silken
+cord and the "send-you-to-by-by" powder, pushed the cushion back, and
+shook him.
+
+"It's no good shamming with me, Vibach; I've no time for it. Stop it,
+if you don't want me to knock you on the head and be done with it," I
+said.
+
+He was too thoroughly scared not to obey, and he opened his eyes and
+started whimpering and begging for mercy.
+
+"You can stop that, too, and listen to me. I don't want your blood on
+my hands; but I'll brain you as I would a rat, if you utter a single
+cry and don't do what I tell you."
+
+"For God's sake don't," he whined.
+
+"Get your uniform off, and be quick about it too."
+
+He was shaking with funk and could scarcely undo the buttons, so I
+played valet and helped him. Then I peeled my own things off and made
+him put them on while I got into his. Next, I mucked his face with the
+grease and dirt from my own face and hands and rumpled his hair, with
+the result that he looked very much the working man. His arms and legs
+I tied up securely with a length of my cord and gagged him while I
+popped the "by-by" powder into a glass of wine.
+
+He made a little fuss about drinking it, believing it was poison; but
+very little persuasion of the necessary sort overcame his scruples; and
+in a few minutes he was off, and I knew he would not wake for some
+hours.
+
+As I wasn't a thief, I went through the pockets, and was rolling his
+money and valuables and so on into a napkin, when I found a paper which
+gave me an idea.
+
+It was the army authority to the firm at Ellendorf to deliver the bus
+to him.
+
+A veritable gift from the gods! That was the short cut to freedom, and
+I made up my mind in a second to use it.
+
+The only thing remaining to do was to hide the man. There was no place
+in the room, except under the sofa, where he was likely to be seen when
+the servants came to clear the table. The door communicating with the
+next room was ajar, and a peep into it suggested possibilities. It was
+a bedroom, and I took him in, packed him inside a roomy wardrobe, laid
+the napkin of valuables by his side, locked him in, and tossed the key
+under the bed.
+
+Then I washed my hands and face and braced myself to face the next act
+in the comedy or tragedy, whichever it was to be.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+LIEUTENANT VIBACH
+
+
+The first scene was a comedy one. Vibach's car was waiting outside the
+hotel, and the soldier chauffeur would almost certainly know that I was
+not the lieutenant, and how to fool him till we were out of Lingen was
+no easy problem.
+
+Still it was no time to count risks; so I drew my cap well down,
+buttoned my overcoat as high over my face as possible, and pretended to
+be drunk.
+
+It was all ridiculously easy. Pulitz, the hotel proprietor, met me in
+the hall with obsequious servility, hoping I had enjoyed my lunch. I
+swore at him in true Vibach style, cursed the lunch, told him to give
+me the bill, swore again at the charge as an imposition, and lurched
+out hiccoughing profanity and demanding my car.
+
+Truly the gods were on my side, for it turned out that the chauffeur
+had gone to get something to eat. The car was mine; and a very
+excellent car it was. I lurched up to the wheel with the assistance of
+Pulitz, who waited on me bare-headed in obvious awe of the uniform,
+started the engine, growled out an order that the man was to wait for
+me, and still hiccoughing profanity, fumbled with the levers, and drove
+away.
+
+I laughed in my sleeve as I rattled past Fischer's shop and saw him and
+Braun at the door in earnest conversation, probably canvassing the
+reason for my lengthy absence. Braun saluted me and I lifted a hand in
+response. What would he have done had he known!
+
+I let the car rip along to Ellendorf. The sooner I reached the factory,
+the sooner I should get away--if I was to get away at all, that was. So
+far as could be judged only one really serious danger threatened
+me--that Vibach was known to the people at the factory--and even that
+might be averted, by giving another name and vamping a reason to
+explain his absence.
+
+Any one who knows the attitude of the average German civilian toward
+the army will understand the strength of the cards I held. The
+officer's uniform, an army motor, the fact that Vibach was expected,
+the possession of an official authority duly signed and stamped, all
+these were so many self-evident proofs of my good faith, thoroughly
+calculated to impose on even a sharp-witted business man. If I were
+accepted as Vibach, nothing short of some stupid blunder could cause
+the scheme to fail. There was scarcely room even for a blunder, indeed,
+for the plan seemed almost fool proof.
+
+It was nevertheless only prudent to consider what was to be done,
+should the unexpected happen. It was clearly best not to give my name
+until I was sure that Vibach was unknown, and to have a story ready to
+account for his absence. His name was in the order, and no doubt there
+would be difficulties raised about delivering the bus to any one else.
+That could be got over by saying he had told me to see that it was
+ready for him, and a little manoeuvring would probably allow of my
+going for a trial spin. They might send up a mechanic or a
+representative of the firm with me; but that would be no great matter.
+Once we were off the ground, he could be readily dealt with.
+
+I had burnt my boats now and was in too tight a corner to stick at
+anything, even violence, to win my way to escape.
+
+If even the trial trip was refused, it would still be possible to get
+away under the pretence of testing the engine. Let me be on board with
+the engine going, it would need a lot of mechanics to keep me from
+making a start.
+
+There remained the chance that even this might not be possible,
+however, and in that case the only thing to be done was to leave the
+place under a cloud of vituperative indignation and threats. For this
+possibility, it was necessary to leave the motor where I could reach it
+readily and without trouble.
+
+The opening scene was all that could be desired. The fact that I was
+expected caused me to be led at once to the managing proprietor, whose
+name was Harden; he received me with all the respect due to my uniform;
+put me at ease by expressing a regret that he had never had the
+pleasure of seeing me before, although he had heard of my prowess in
+the air; and declared that he felt honoured at making my personal
+acquaintance.
+
+I was condescendingly patronizing, thanked him a little boastfully for
+his compliment, and got to business.
+
+"You have everything ready, of course?" I asked.
+
+"Quite. I'll have the plane run out," was the reply as he rang his
+table bell and gave an order that No. 14 should be made ready for me at
+once. "Have you tried one of ours yet?" he asked as the clerk went out.
+
+"I expect so, but I'm not sure. I've been up in so many."
+
+"You've seen the specifications for the new make, of course."
+
+"I should like to glance over them again."
+
+"It will be an honour to explain the new improvements;" and he produced
+the plans and drawings and told me all about them, pointing to various
+differences and improvements, especially those which were his own
+inventions, on which he enlarged with immense self-satisfaction.
+
+I had my own reasons for studying the drawings carefully, and
+condescended to flatter him on his inventive ingenuity. All this took
+up some time and I began to be anxious to start. I suggested that I had
+better have a look at No. 14; and we went out together.
+
+She was a beauty and no mistake; but to my chagrin the men had damaged
+one of the planes slightly in getting her out of the hangar. Only a
+simple matter involving renewal of a couple of the wire supports; but
+it meant a loss of time, and I had an uneasy speculation as to what was
+happening in that hotel bedroom at Lingen.
+
+I ordered the men to be quick about the repair, and was watching them
+when some one came out to tell Harden he was wanted on the telephone.
+
+This was not on the agenda and I sensed unpleasantness. There were two
+other planes on the field close to No. 14, and I strolled over to see
+if their petrol tanks were full, under the pretence of curiosity. It
+was a case of any port in a storm.
+
+There wasn't a gallon in the two, so my curiosity died instantly. I
+returned to hurry on the work with No. 14. The men knew their job and
+had all but finished it, when Harden came out wearing a look of worried
+perplexity.
+
+"May I beg a moment with you, Lieutenant?" he asked.
+
+"Certainly. What is it? Nothing gone wrong, I hope."
+
+"That telephone call was from Lingen, from Captain Schiller; and I
+can't make head or tail of it. You will not be offended with me, I
+trust, if I tell you what he says--what I understood him to say, at
+least."
+
+"My dear Mr. Harden, I hope I am not so foolish."
+
+"Well, he appears to be under the impression that you are not here."
+
+I burst out laughing. "Poor Schiller! He's always got a bee in his
+bonnet; keeps a regular hive always on tap. I wonder what the devil has
+put that rot into his head."
+
+"From what I could gather--I trust you'll pardon my even mentioning
+it--he appears to think that you were too--well, that you had had more
+wine at the Halbermond for it to be quite safe for you to go."
+
+I cursed Schiller, whoever he might be, volubly and sincerely, for an
+interfering jackass. "I think you can settle that for yourself, Harden."
+
+"Oh yes, I told him so, but--but his reply was--was very singular. He
+said that you had had to be assisted into your car at Lingen, that it
+wasn't possible you could have thrown off the effects in the short
+time, and, in fact, that if you appeared to have done so, you could not
+be Lieutenant Vibach."
+
+More cursing of Schiller from me. "He'll have to answer for this, I can
+assure you," I exclaimed fiercely. "What did you reply?"
+
+"I explained the exceedingly awkward position in which it placed me;
+and he instructed me very peremptorily on no account to deliver No. 14
+to you, even in face of the army order. Of course I was at a loss, so I
+asked him to speak to you on the telephone."
+
+"I'd better do that," I replied readily. "There'll be the devil to pay
+if I don't turn up with it and the Colonel's told I was too drunk to go
+up. Schiller must be mad; stark, staring mad. He'll get me cashiered."
+
+"He's holding the line, if you will come to my office."
+
+It was the deuce of a crisis, and how to get over it worried me. But as
+we neared the office a thought struck me. "Look here, Harden, this must
+be met somehow. I'll get Schiller to run over here at once and we must
+be ready with proofs that I'm as sober as a judge and perfectly fit to
+take up No. 14. I understand your position entirely and don't mean you
+to be compromised in any way. I won't ask you to deliver No. 14; but I
+shall be personally obliged if you'll have the petrol tank of one of
+those planes out there filled, or any other you like, of course, and
+I'll show him whether I'm fit to take No. 14 up. Your evidence, too,
+may save me from absolute shipwreck."
+
+"I'll do it with pleasure;" and he turned back to give the orders to
+the mechanics, while I went to the telephone in his office.
+
+"Hullo!" I called.
+
+"That you, Harden?" came the reply in an excited tone.
+
+"Yes." I was likely to get more information as Harden, and tried to
+imitate his voice.
+
+"I didn't recognize your voice for the moment. You haven't parted with
+No. 14, I hope?"
+
+"No. Lieutenant Vibach's coming to speak to you."
+
+"That's all right. This is a thousand times more serious than I knew
+just now. Vibach's here."
+
+"What!" I cried.
+
+"It's true. I've seen him. He's been half-killed, drugged, and stripped
+of his uniform. He was found locked in a wardrobe of one of the
+Halbermond's bedrooms."
+
+"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, appropriately flabbergasted. "Then who's
+the man here?"
+
+"The ruffian who did it, of course. Evidently a plot to get hold of one
+of our newest planes. The ruffian has stolen Vibach's uniform so as to
+personate him."
+
+"Never heard such a thing in my life. What shall I do?"
+
+"Keep him till we can get over."
+
+"But he's armed, I expect."
+
+"He'll have Vibach's revolver, of course. You'll have to be careful.
+Perhaps the best thing will be to keep him in play. Let him think
+you're going to give him the bus, and let your men tinker with it for a
+quarter of an hour or so; I shall be with you by then; and when he
+speaks to me, I'll put him off the scent by saying I can't get over for
+an hour."
+
+"I can manage that easily. He's coming now," I said, hearing Harden's
+voice in the outer room. I paused a moment or two, shuffled my feet,
+and then spoke in my own voice. "You there, Schiller?" I asked sharply.
+
+"Yes. That you, Vibach?"
+
+"I should think it is. Look here, what the dickens is this tale you've
+been telling about me?"
+
+He repeated the pith of what he had first told Harden, explaining that
+he was quite as anxious for my safety as for that of the plane. Harden
+entered as he was speaking, told me the bus was nearly ready and that
+he wished to say a word to Schiller when I'd finished. I nodded; and as
+he could only hear my half of the conversation, of course, I dovetailed
+it in to fit the position. The result was good enough to incline me to
+put a saint's halo round the head of the man who invented the 'phone.
+
+"Of course that puts a different look on it, but you really ought to be
+more careful, Schiller. I'm as sober as a judge, man; Harden's standing
+by me now and he'll tell you the same in a minute."
+
+"He told me so; but I was bound to take notice of what I heard. We
+can't risk the life of one of our best airmen and the loss of our
+newest type of bus----"
+
+"Don't talk rot, man. I was never fitter in my life than I am at this
+moment. I've just arranged with Harden to prove that by taking up one
+of the old ones here."
+
+This woke him up. "Eh? What's that?"
+
+"Don't fool like that. Of course I'm not. Just a little spin round to
+show him that I can take charge of No. 14 all right."
+
+"You'd better not do that, Vibach."
+
+"Of course he does, man. Do you think he doesn't know enough to tell
+whether a man's drunk or sober. I can't make you out."
+
+"Wait till I come over, Vibach. I can't get away directly; but I'll be
+with you in about an hour."
+
+I laughed. "That shows which you're thinking of most, the bus or the
+pilot. But all the same I'm glad you approve the scheme. I don't
+want----"
+
+"Let me speak to Harden a moment," he burst in very sharply. "I've
+forgotten something I want to tell him."
+
+"Of course I'll be careful, you silly ass."
+
+"Did you hear what I said, Vibach?" he demanded in the tone of
+impatient authority. "Tell Harden to speak to me at once."
+
+"Has that mechanic of mine turned up?"
+
+Whoever Schiller might be, he was a hot-tempered fellow and curses
+began to be waved over the line. Intelligible enough, seeing that I had
+told him how I meant to escape.
+
+"Not, eh? Well, clap him under arrest when he does. And look here, that
+woodenhead Fritz who drove me over chose to leave the car just when I
+wanted him to bring me here. That must be dealt with too. It might have
+been most serious. Any one could have run off with the car, you know."
+
+Even this gratuitous piece of further information did not soothe him
+and more curses came along.
+
+I laughed. "I thought you'd like to know that, Schiller."
+
+The laugh provoked him beautifully and stimulated his blasphemy as he
+ordered me again to let Harden speak to him.
+
+"I can't very well do that, can I? You'll understand why."
+
+"What the devil do you mean by that?"
+
+"Think, man, think. It would stop my getting off with No. 14 in time to
+reach Schipphasen before dark, if I were to wait an hour before making
+this trial trip."
+
+"But you mustn't do anything till I come, Vibach," he growled.
+
+"Good. I thought you'd see that." I paused and added: "Of course I
+will. I've told him we're awfully obliged to him. All right, good-bye.
+Don't make it longer than an hour. The days are none too long."
+
+I made as if to hang up the receiver when Harden put out his hand to
+take it. That was according to specification; and I started as if
+remembering he wished to speak to Schiller, stumbled against a chair
+behind me, nearly fell, holding tight to the receiver, and in
+recovering myself, pulled it clean off the flex and put the 'phone out
+of action.
+
+A mouthful of apologies for my clumsiness was met by a smile from the
+good simple man whose conviction of my good faith had been assured by
+the half of the conversation he had overheard.
+
+"It is of no consequence at all. My people will put it right in a few
+minutes," he declared, little guessing what those few minutes meant to
+me. "What I had to say to Captain Schiller can quite well wait until he
+arrives," he added.
+
+"He may be a bit put out, but I'll explain that it was my fault
+entirely. He reckons to be over in about an hour," I said as we
+returned to the field; "and that will give us nice time for the little
+experimental flight--our little bit of convincing evidence, eh? He
+likes the idea, and is as much obliged to you as I am."
+
+"I am only too pleased to be of any service, I assure you. I myself
+should be quite prepared to deliver No. 14 to you; but I hope you'll
+understand my position."
+
+"Certainly, Harden, certainly. Just as clearly as I do my own. I
+shouldn't think of taking it until he comes. He's a good man to keep in
+with; a bit crochetty, but influential. It placed you in a nasty fix,
+and you couldn't do otherwise than you have."
+
+"It's a great relief to me to hear you say that, and please don't talk
+about obligation."
+
+"That's all right; but Schiller's a useful man to oblige. What sort of
+a plane is this?" I asked as we reached the men.
+
+"An old type, but quite reliable. We use it for lessons chiefly. The
+petrol tank filled, Max?" he asked the foreman.
+
+"Yes, sir; but there's something wrong with the engine; keeps missing
+fire," was the reply.
+
+Pleasant news, seeing that in about ten minutes the mysterious Schiller
+would be on the scene raising Cain!
+
+"Take long to put right, Max?" asked Harden.
+
+"Can't exactly say, sir. I can't quite get at the mischief yet."
+
+"Let's have a look at her," said Harden; and he and the man wasted five
+of the invaluable minutes over the examination.
+
+There was only one thing to do. The way out being closed, I must get
+away in the car.
+
+"It doesn't matter, Harden. After all it's not necessary, you know."
+
+"I'm afraid it would take an hour or two at least," he said, looking up
+from the engine. "I'm really most annoyed about it."
+
+"Well, I'll stroll back to my car, I've left some papers there I want;"
+and I turned away when Max made a suggestion.
+
+"There's a No. 5 over there. She's not so good as No. 2 here, but she
+could take the lieutenant up. I filled her tank in case, when I found
+No. 2 was wrong."
+
+"Why didn't you say so before, Max?" cried Harden.
+
+If he had, he would have saved me from a very nasty heart spasm. As it
+was, there would only just be time to get off safely. But it might have
+been fatal to appear in any hurry, so I strolled over casually to the
+No. 5, pretended to look her over, as if time was no sort of
+consideration, and was climbing into the fuselage when we heard the
+furious tooting of a motor horn in the distance.
+
+"Hullo, what can that be?" exclaimed Harden.
+
+"Sounds as if some one had had a breakdown and was tooting for help," I
+suggested with a smile.
+
+A few seconds later the horn sounded again; much nearer this time.
+Schiller was in a hurry and no mistake. But all this hurry wouldn't
+help him now. The bus was an old type needing the help of the mechanics
+to get moving, and Max struggled with the propeller to start her.
+
+There was a little difficulty and I held my breath. It was a matter of
+seconds now; seconds which meant life or death to me.
+
+Fortunately Max knew his job thoroughly and knew the bus also and its
+little peculiarities. He got her going, just as the horn sounded once
+more and an officer, followed by a couple of soldiers and police, came
+running round the corner of the buildings and out towards us, shouting
+furiously and waving their arms.
+
+I shoved the lever and the bus began to move.
+
+"It's Captain Schiller; he's waving to us to stop," cried Harden.
+
+It was just too late. "He'll be able to see me start," I called over my
+shoulder. "Give him my love and tell him he ought to have been here
+sooner."
+
+"What do you mean?" shouted Harden.
+
+"He'll know," I yelled. The noise of the engine probably drowned the
+words, for she was running sweetly; the bus lifted like a bird in reply
+to the touch of the controls; and I was off.
+
+Not without a cheering salute from the captain, however. I wasn't far
+away before a bullet grazed the edge of the right plane, and glancing
+round I saw his soldiers emptying their magazines in the hope of
+satisfying his loving desire to embrace me.
+
+They were tremendously busy. But it's no easy job to bring a bus down
+with a rifle bullet, and the majority of Bosches are mighty poor shots;
+so I didn't worry about it, began to climb, pointing for the frontier,
+and was soon out of range.
+
+My last glimpse earthwards showed me a little group of dots hurrying to
+and fro excitedly, like a number of disturbed ants infuriated by the
+ruin of their nest.
+
+No doubt that was about the condition of things in that Ellendorf nest.
+Rather a pity I couldn't be present, perhaps.
+
+But it didn't seem worth while to go back.
+
+I could enjoy the scene sufficiently from the air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+THE END
+
+
+I had a lovely trip in that old practice bus. She was quite a decent
+old thing and I let her rip, all out, as long as the daylight lasted.
+
+I had half expected No. 14 would have been sent up in pursuit, but I
+had too good a start to trouble about that and was a trifle
+disappointed that this was realized at Ellendorf. It would have been
+rare fun to have had a game of chivy chase over Dutch territory; quite
+good sport; but I had to travel without escort.
+
+In the language of the communiques, there was "a certain liveliness" as
+I crossed the frontier. The Dutchies could see the German crosses on
+the planes and a couple of archies expressed their resentment at the
+trespass; but I was then too high up for anything to ruffle my
+feathers, and the storm in a teacup was soon left far behind.
+
+About dusk I went down to spy for a landing-place, spotted one near a
+railway station, and decided in its favour out of consideration for
+Harden. He had been very decent and unwittingly had done me such a
+really good turn, that it was only fair to return the bus to him.
+
+Lots of people had seen me, of course, and when I landed I had quite a
+reception at the hands of the police, some soldiers and other gapers,
+all of whom very naturally mistook me for a German officer. I was
+arrested amid much fussation and great babble of tongues and hauled off
+to the mayor of the town, after having arranged for the safe-keeping of
+the machine.
+
+He was a fat jovial little man with twinkling, merry eyes, and when I
+told him my story, he laughed over the telephone incident until the
+tears literally streamed down his cheeks and I feared he'd have an
+apoplectic fit.
+
+He was Anglophile to the finger-tips, made me consent to remain the
+night in his house, promised to see to the return of the bus, and found
+me a rig-out of clothes; but stuck when I suggested the return of
+Vibach's uniform also. He declared that nothing should induce him to
+part with such a delightful memento of the incident.
+
+I spent a jolly evening with him. He brought in a few congenial friends
+and I had to tell the story over again, to the running accompaniment of
+shouts of laughter, prodigalities of Schnapps, and comments on the
+Germans which would have meant ages of penal servitude if uttered on
+the other side of the frontier.
+
+Most of his friends turned up at the station the next day to see me off
+to Rotterdam; and the train steamed off amid a storm of cheers, waving
+of hats, and cries of good luck. Then some one started "God save the
+King," which they were all yelling at full lung power until I was out
+of hearing. I might have been His Majesty himself, judging by the
+enthusiasm; and my fellow passengers looked as if they thought I was
+some important big-wig.
+
+I reached Rotterdam late in the afternoon, got the name of Nessa's
+hotel after a little trouble at the Consulate, and was going to 'phone
+to her, when an irresistible temptation seized me.
+
+I was fearfully bucked over my lucky escape and I simply could not help
+trying a last wheeze with her as a good wind up. I hunted up a good
+barber's shop, bought a black, glossy-haired wig and a toothbrush
+moustache and imperial to match, darkened my eyebrows and made up with
+a few wrinkles and little artistic touches of the sort.
+
+It was quite a good disguise; and a pair of black cotton gloves, two
+sizes too large, and a sort of lumpy gamp umbrella helped to suggest
+the character I had in my mind. Then I scribbled on a dirty piece of
+carefully crumpled paper a note introducing myself.
+
+"You can trust the bearer, Van Heerenveen by name, a true friend in
+need to us both. Jack."
+
+I went to the hotel in the dusk and sent in the name, saying I wished
+to see her on important private business; a tip secured me the sole use
+of what was called the Reception Saloon, a dingy little room with one
+window; I dimmed the already poor light by drawing the blind half down,
+and chose my seat so that my back should be to it.
+
+I had a qualm and nearly gave the show away when I saw the trouble and
+anxiety in her dear pale face; but I checked the impulse, knowing how
+delighted she would be the instant she recognized me, and what laughs
+we should have over it together in the delicious afterwards.
+
+She was intensely puzzled by the odd figure I cut, but didn't spot the
+disguise, although she stared hard enough to see right through me. Her
+nervousness at such an unexpected visitor helped to blind her sharp
+eyes.
+
+She paused on the threshold with a start and a frown of concern and
+perplexity. "You wish to see me, sir? I could not quite catch your name
+from the servant," she said in German.
+
+"Van Heerenveen is my name, madam," I replied. I was chiefly afraid
+that my voice would betray me; so I spoke slowly, made a big mouthful
+of the name, deepened my tone and put a little husk into it, talked out
+of the side of my mouth, and rolled out in deliberate guttural
+gibberish what I intended her to take for a question in Dutch.
+
+"I do not speak Dutch, sir; only English, German, and French."
+
+I nodded slowly and made a little play with the loose finger-tips of my
+ridiculous gloves. "Will you not sit down, if you please?" I said in
+German. "Do not be alarmed, I beg you. There is no need, if you are
+Miss Nessa Caldicott."
+
+She had been holding the door half open and now closed it and sat in
+the chair I had placed in readiness, and I sat on the opposite side of
+the room at a safe distance.
+
+"I am Miss Caldicott, of course."
+
+"It is necessary for me to be quite sure of that, madam. Have I your
+permission to ask you a few questions?" The voice had passed muster all
+right, and, as she was close to the door and I so far away, her anxiety
+soon gave way to curiosity. She was absolutely puzzled.
+
+"Certainly, sir."
+
+"You have come from Germany? Is that so?"
+
+"Yes, I arrived yesterday."
+
+"May I ask for your passport, if you please?"
+
+She started. "Why? As a matter of fact I haven't one; but I am known at
+the British Consulate here. They suggested my coming to this hotel."
+
+"No passport? Umph!" I grunted with a solemn wag of the head. "Is it so
+that you came from Berlin and left there somewhat hurriedly?"
+
+"Oh, yes. I was there at the outbreak of the war and they meant to send
+me to an internment camp; I ran away."
+
+"Umph!" I grunted again, fingering my imperial with my glove
+monstrosities; a gesture which she noticed with a flickering smile.
+"Were you alone, madam?"
+
+She hesitated. "No; but I cannot say more than that." Staunch little
+beggar, she wouldn't give me away until she knew more.
+
+"You must speak frankly to me, madam. I know the person who accompanied
+you. I ask you because I must be certain who you are."
+
+She wasn't to be drawn by that. "I must know first why you come to me,"
+she said with one of her quick head gestures.
+
+"I come as a friend, madam."
+
+"Pardon me, but how am I to know that?"
+
+I pushed her hard, but nothing would induce her to give me the name.
+"Very well, I will try another course. There were certain incidents on
+the journey. You will tell me them?"
+
+"There was a collision and the train was wrecked."
+
+"But before that?"
+
+Again she jibbed and would not utter a syllable to bring me into it. It
+took all my restraint to refrain from making a dart forward to take her
+in my arms.
+
+"Well, what occurred afterwards, then? How did you leave Germany?"
+
+She thought for a second or two. "I can tell you that. I was brought
+over the frontier in an aeroplane and the pilot saw me afterwards to
+the station at Almelo, and from there I travelled here."
+
+Vandervelt had kept his word loyally. "You will tell me that man's
+name, madam?"
+
+"I cannot do that. He treated me with the greatest kindness and
+consideration and asked me not to do so."
+
+"Was the name Vandervelt, madam?"
+
+"How do you know that?" she rapped quickly.
+
+"It is enough that I do know it and that you were known to him as the
+sister of a man who called himself Hans Bulich."
+
+Her eyes widened in astonishment. "Who are you?" she asked; and I made
+sure she had begun to suspect, so intent was her stare. If the room had
+not been so gloomy she would certainly have seen through the disguise.
+
+"I am satisfied," I replied, holding my head down while I fumbled in
+one of my gloves and took out the note I had scribbled. "This is from
+Hans Bulich."
+
+Dear heart, how excited she was! She sprang up eagerly and rushed
+across as I held it up, her hands trembling and the tears of joy in her
+eyes. "Give it me, please, give it me," she cried shakily. "Is he safe?
+Is all well? Oh, Mr. Heerenveen, do--do tell me everything."
+
+"Quite safe, madam," I managed to reply, for I was fast getting as
+excited as Nessa herself.
+
+"Oh, thank God for that! Then you have seen him since I left? Where is
+he? Still in Lingen? Please don't keep me in suspense."
+
+"He is in Holland, madam. I crossed the frontier with him."
+
+"And you've come to take me to him, of course? Oh, you are indeed what
+he says, a friend. Can't we go now, this instant? I am ready. You're
+sure he's not in any trouble? Do tell me, please, at once."
+
+"He is not in trouble, but he does not wish me to take you to him,
+madam. There is something you must learn first. You know that he is
+suspected of murder; I do not wish to call him a scoundrel----"
+
+"Scoundrel indeed! I should think not," she cried, blazing with
+indignation. "He is one of the noblest----"
+
+I couldn't have her saying this sort of thing under false pretences, so
+I stopped her by waggling one of my ridiculous gloves protestingly.
+"Stay, madam, stay, I cannot hear that," I exclaimed. "I have still
+something to show you. Permit me;" and I went to the end of the room,
+stood with my back to her, and under pretence of fumbling in my
+pockets, I pulled off the moustache and imperial. "If you knew what he
+is doing at this moment, madam, you also might be tempted to call him a
+scoundrel."
+
+"Never! Never!" she exclaimed almost fiercely.
+
+"Then I must decline to take you to him at all!"
+
+"Why? In Heaven's name, why?"
+
+"Because I'm here already, of course," I replied as I whipped off my
+wig and faced round.
+
+She was petrified for a second, and then with a glad cry made a rush at
+me. "Jack! Jack! Then you are a scoun----"
+
+"Didn't I say you'd call me one?"
+
+"But I didn't; I stopped halfway. Oh, Jack, how mean of you! And I've
+been talking to you all this time and----"
+
+I stopped her halfway that time. You can guess how. And it was quite a
+long time before we could get over our rapturous excitement and settle
+down to the story of my escape.
+
+How we laughed at it all together! What lovely little interludes there
+were every now and then! What innumerable questions she had to ask,
+ferretting out every detail! How we went over it again and again! Then
+back to the first part of the journey when we had been together! How we
+laughed lightly, now that they were over, at the difficulties and risks
+which had seemed so real in the Lassen period! And how we discussed,
+with eager smiling perplexity, the still unsolved puzzles!
+
+We were just two happy kids together. The hours slipped away like magic
+and we hadn't even begun to think of our plans for getting to England,
+when a servant came in to say that the hotel was being closed for the
+night, and I had to rush off in search of a bed.
+
+I found out the next morning that a steamer was leaving in the
+afternoon and booked our passages, before going to Nessa. She was
+writing the good news to Rosa when I arrived and told me that
+Vandervelt had promised to take her letters on his next trip and post
+them in Germany, so as to dodge the censor.
+
+I thought of some to write also. One was to von Gratzen, explaining
+that I was not Lassen, but an Englishman; but not giving him my name.
+Another was to Harden, telling him that his aeroplane was being
+returned and asking him to forward an enclosure to Captain Schiller.
+
+
+"Dear Captain Schiller,--
+
+"I am the 'desperate ruffian' with whom you had that interesting chat
+over the 'phone the day before yesterday. I wish to confirm what Harden
+has probably told you, that after your first talk with him, the rest of
+the conversation was entirely with me. I am most grateful to you for
+having warned me that the affair with Lieutenant Vibach--a most
+offensive bully, by the way--was discovered sooner than I had expected.
+Naturally it increased my wish to get away and made it impossible for
+me to satisfy your eager desire to make my personal acquaintance at
+Ellendorf. That eagerness, combined possibly with your excitement and
+temper, no doubt prevented your detecting the difference in the two
+voices. Your characteristically national dulness and gullibility will
+remain an abiding joy to me. You have, however, the satisfaction of
+knowing that you stopped my bringing away the new type of aeroplane.
+But the old one served my purpose well enough, for it carried me out of
+your country and so out of your reach. We are not likely to meet again,
+unless the fortune of war should bring us together on one of the
+fronts, when I shall be pleased to tell you the name of the 'desperate
+ruffian.'"
+
+
+There was no time for more letters as we had to hurry to the Consulate
+to clear up things there to enable us to avoid trouble on landing in
+England.
+
+We had a smooth passage disturbed by neither mine nor submarine. We
+scarcely ceased chattering together the whole time, discussing two
+topics chiefly--the question of our marriage and the riddle of von
+Gratzen's conduct. The first was settled a fortnight later to our
+mutual satisfaction, and we went to Ireland on the honeymoon in order
+to send the promised sprig of shamrock to our warm-hearted Irish friend
+at Massen.
+
+The von Gratzen riddle was not solved until three months later when I
+was home on a week's leave and received a German newspaper from
+Switzerland containing a marked paragraph. Von Erstein had shot himself
+sooner than face the charge of having murdered Anna Hilden.
+
+I handed it to Nessa, who dismissed it with, "Serves him right," and
+then drew attention to some little marks and dots scattered about the
+same page. "I'm sure they mean something," she declared.
+
+I laughed at the idea and chipped her about it.
+
+But she was right and puzzled over them until she found it out. The
+marks were microscopic numbers under various words and letters, and
+when she had written them down she read out the result.
+
+"You did not deceive me. You are the image of my dear old friend, your
+father. Von G."
+
+The von Gratzen riddle was solved at last.
+
+And didn't Nessa chortle. "What did I tell you, Jack!" she cried,
+flourishing the paper triumphantly. "The old fox! He knew you all the
+time and you imagined you were so clever. Poor Jack!"
+
+I couldn't stand this, of course; so I punished her.
+
+We were still very much lovers, and you can perhaps guess the nature of
+the punishment when I tell you that it made her blush, disarranged her
+hair, and prompted the question whether I wished every one to think we
+were still honeymooning.
+
+Of course I said yes, and punished her again.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+_Printed by_ Butler & Tanner, _Frome and London._
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Man Without a Memory, by Arthur W. Marchmont
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