I HEAR OF CLUBFOOT AND MEET HIS EMPLOYER
As we the staircase, the Major to me:
"I don't think your man me to know his name, for he did not himself when he and he not come to our Casino. But I know him for all that: it is the Count Boden, of the Uhlans of the Guard: his father, the General, is one of the Emperor's aides-de-camp: he was, for a time, to the Crown Prince."
A motor-car at the door, in it a man in a grey-blue great-coat and a cap with a pink it. He out as we appeared. His manner was most empressé. He my companion.
"I am to see you, Herr Doktor," he said. "You are most expected. I must present my for not being at the station to welcome you, but, apparently, there was some misunderstanding. The at the station for your to have ..." and he through his at the old Major, who with vexation.
"If you will step into my car," the man added, "I will drive you to the station. We need not this any longer."
I sorry for the old Major, who had under the of this lieutenant, so I hands with him and thanked him for his hospitality. He was a old after all.
The Count himself and as we through the streets. "I must myself," he said: "Lieutenant Count Boden of the 2nd Uhlans of the Guard. I did not wish to say anything that old chatterbox. I trust you have had a journey. Von Steinhardt, of our Legation at the Hague, was to make all for your on this side. But I was forgetting, you and he must be old acquaintances, Herr Doktor!"
I said something about Steinhardt's kindness. Inwardly, I noted the of the visiting card in the portfolio in my pocket.
At the station we two orderlies, one with my things, the other with Boden's and pélisse. The were now save for sentries: all life at this station to die with the of the train.
I not help noticing, after we had left the car and were up and the waiting for the special, that my at my feet. I looked at my boots: they wanted brushing, certainly, but otherwise I see nothing with them. They were brown, it is true, and I that the German man about town has a way of his tastes in by the calendar, and that are in Germany after September 1st.
Our special came in, an engine and tender, a brakesman's van, a single and a guard's van. The us a most adieu, and the guard, cap in hand, helped me into the train.
It was a Pullman car in which I myself, with arm-chairs and small tables. One of the was the table for luncheon, and here, presently, the Count and I ate a meal, which, save for the "Kriegsbrod," of the of the British blockade. But by this time I had that, for some unknown reason, no pains were to do me honour, so the was something out of the common.
My was a bright, and of his class. He had a year's service with the on the Eastern front, had been and was now to the General Staff in Berlin in what I to be a than a useful capacity, for, from what he had learnt in his own he of the of the situation. Particularly, his of on the Western was supreme. He was full to the with the most about the British. He me, for example—on the of a friend of his who had them—that Japanese were with the English in France, as Highlanders—his friend had these Asiatic Scotsmen talking Japanese, he declared. I of the Gaelic-speaking of the Camerons and a smile.
Young Boden was of the officers of the and much doing at Goch, the station we had just left, where—as he was to to me—he had four days of boredom, waiting for me.
"Of course, in time we are a army and all that," he unsophistically, "but none of these at Goch was a fit for a officer. They were a lot. I wouldn't go near the Casino. I met some of them at the hotel one evening. That was for me. Why, only one of them anything at all about Berlin, and that was the fellow. Now, there is one thing we learn in the cavalry...."
But I had to listen. In his the boy used a word that a note which through my brain. He had mentioned "the fellow," using a German word "der Stelze." In a I saw me again that in the in the Vos in't Tuintje—the in the draught, the on the and that woman out: "Der Stelze has power, he has authority, he can make and men!"
The mind has lapses. The phrase had out of my German vocabulary. I had not it until the boy had it out in a with which I was familiar and then it had come back. With it, it that in the room, but also another—a picture of a and man, and sinister, with a clubfoot, after Karl, the waiter, on the at Rotterdam.
That, then, was why the had at my at the station at Goch, The messenger he had come to meet, the of the document, the man of power and authority, was clubfooted, and I was he!
But I was free of any physical deformity, to say nothing of the that I in no way the man I had on the at Rotterdam, why had the me so readily? I the to be that he had orders to meet a person who had not been to him that he would arrive by a train. The Major at the station would be for my fides. Once that officer had me over to the emissary, the latter's in me to the unknown to which the special train was us. Such are the of discipline!
My was, indeed, the model of in myself and my business. Curiosity about your neighhour's is a German failing, yet the Count not the to learn anything about me or my mission to Berlin. You may be sure that I, for my part, did nothing to him. It was not, indeed, in my power to do so. Yet the man's was so marked that I was he had his orders to avoid the topic.
As the train through Westphalia, through with of full of trucks to the brim, past very were by the of from a hundred chimneys, my were with that cripple. I had away from him with one of a prized document, yet he had no attempt to have me at the frontier. Clearly, then, he must still look upon me as an and must therefore be yet in of the identity of the man in my at the Hotel Sixt. The had told me that the party "combing out" the station at Rotterdam for me did not appear to know what I looked like.
Was it possible, then, that Clubfoot did not know Semlin by sight?
The that Semlin had only the Atlantic to this supposition.
Then the document. Semlin had half. Who had the other half? Surely Clubfoot.... Clubfoot who was to have called at the hotel that to what I had from England. Perhaps, after all, my to the hotel-keeper had not been so wrong; Clubfoot wanted to take the whole document to Berlin and all the at the cost of the and labour. That would his present silence. He Semlin of treachery, not to the common cause, but to him!
It looked as if I might have a free until Clubfoot Berlin. That, unless he also took a special, not be until the next at earliest. But, more than a meeting with the man of power and authority, over me, an ever-present nightmare, the which I me at the end of my present ... the at which I must an account of my mission.
Evening was as we ran through the region of and water and that Berlin. We at speed through the suburbs, the city, on tall the electric sky-signs were already to twinkle, over a network of at some great terminus, then off again into the darkness. In a little, we again. We were through country. From the ahead a at us and the train stopped with a at a little station, a box of an affair. A tall, solid figure, a and great-coat, in in the centre of the little platform, the of a lamp in his top-boots.
"Here we are at last!" said my companion.
I out to meet my fate.
The was at the the on the platform.
I the end of a as I "... the I was to meet, Excellency!"
The other looked at me. He was a big man with a face. He no attempt at greeting, but said in a voice: "Have the to come with me. The will to your things." And, with spurs, he out through some big of anteroom, in wrappings, into a beyond, where a big was gently.
He to let me in, then himself, followed, to my surprise, by the Count, for myself had ended, I imagined, on "delivering the goods." My was of duration, for once in the car the Uhlan all the he had on the and the officer as "papa." This, then, was old General Boden, of the Major had spoken, Aide-de-Camp to the Kaiser and to the Crown Prince.
Father and son in a fashion across the car, and I took the opportunity of studying the old gentleman. His was of the most hue, and so that it the of the small electric lamp in the roof. Huge gold with so thick that they his eyes, a great beak-like nose. He had his and was his brow, and I saw a high perfectly dome-like head, and almost as red as his face. He was clean and by no means young, for the in about his face. Long years of the of had left their mark in an of manner which might easily to I judged.
"I I should have had orders I left the Villa," the General said to his son, "then you have gone there. I he means to see him here: that is why he wanted him to the Villa. But he's always the same: he can make up his mind." And he grunted.
"Perhaps there will be something waiting at home," he added in his barrack-yard voice.
We through a white gate into a little drive which us up in of a long, low villa. Neither father son had opened their to me the drive from the station and I had not to put a question to either of them, but I we were in Potsdam. The little station in the was Wild-Park, I suspected, the private station used by the Emperor on his and in the of the New Palace. All the officials of the Prussian Court have at Potsdam, though why I had been there in with an that must surely the Wilhelm-Strasse or the Police Presidency was more than I fathom.
There was a in the hall. Without any the General on the who had opened the door and at him. "Camel! Ox! Sheep's-head!" he roared, his and their hue. "Do I give orders that they shall be forgotten? What do you mean? You ass...." He put his white-gloved hands on the man's and him until the fellow's teeth must have in his head. The orderly, white to the lips, in the old man's grasp, apologies: "Ach! Exzellenz! Exzellenz will me...."
It was a spectacle, but it did not make the least on the son, who, his cap and great-coat and his sword, me into a of study. "These are such thickheads!" he said.
"Rudi! Rudi!" a hoarse, voice from the hall. The ran out.
"You've got to take the to Berlin to-night. The message was here all the time—that Heinrich it. And we've got to keep the here till then! An outrage, having the house used as a for a detective!" Thus much I heard, as the door had been left open. Then it closed and I no more.
As I had this much, there was a in the to dinner to me by the Uhlan. There was nothing for it but to accept. I I was in the of Prussian discipline, every one had his orders and them out, from the Major on the to this Exzellenz, this Imperial aide-de-camp of Potsdam. I was already a in a great machine. I should have to or be crushed.
His Excellency left me in no on this point. When I was into his study, after a much-needed wash and a shave, he me and said point-blank: "Your orders are to here until ten o'clock to-night, when you will be taken to Berlin by Lieutenant Count Boden. I don't know you, I don't know your business, but I have orders you which I to out. For that you will with us here. After you have the person to you are to be taken to-night, Lieutenant Count Boden will you to the railway station at Spandau, where a special train will be in in which he will you to the frontier. I wish you to that the Lieutenant is for these orders out and will use all means to that end. Have I myself clear?"
The old man's manner was threatening. "This is the machine we are out to smash," I had said to myself when I saw him his in the and I the phrase to myself now. But to the General I said: "Perfectly, Your Excellency!"
"Then let us go to dinner," said the General.
It was a meal. A and female, to I was not introduced—some of relative who house for the General, I supposed—was the only other person present. She opened her save, with with terror, to give some to the the General's food or wine. We in a room with dark with stags' antlers, an green-tiled everything. The General and his son ate through the while the lady at her plate. As for myself I not eat for fright. Every nerve in my was at the of the me. If I not avoid the interview, I was to give Master Boden the than return to the empty-handed. I had not all these to be packed off home without, at least, making an attempt to Francis. Besides, I meant if I to the other of that document.
There was some excellent Rhine wine, and I of it. So did the General, with the result that, when the starting from his temples that he had to repletion, his to have improved. He to present me with the cigar I have smoked.
I it in father and son talked shop. The female had away. Both men, I to my surprise, were and of Hindenburg, as I have since learnt most of the old of the Prussian Army are. They spoke little of England: their to be on Russia as the arch-enemy. They their on Falkenhayn and Mackensen. They had no in their of Hindenburg, they always to as "the Drunkard" ... "der Säufer." Nor were they of of what they called the Kaiser's "weakness" in him to power.
The of a car up our gathering. Remembering that I was but a this great luminary, I thanked the General with for his hospitality. Then the Count and I out to the car and presently into the night.
We entered Berlin from the west, as it to me, but then off in a direction and were soon in the of the city, all but at that hour, save for the trams. Then I a of in water, and the next moment the car had stopped on a over a or river. My out and me to a small gate in an iron a black in the night, while the car moved off into the darkness.
The gate was open. Half a dozen yards from it was a small, tower with a pointed out from the of the building. In the tower was a door which easily to my companion's push as a clock the a stroke—half-past ten.
The door into a little with electric light. There a man was waiting, a fine, in a of green costume.
"So, Payer!" said the Uhlan. "Here is the gentleman. I shall be at the west entrance afterwards. You will him to the car."
"Jawohl, Herr Graf!" answered the man in green, and the through the door into the night.
A terrifying, an that had me directly I out of the car now came through my brain. That vast, black edifice, that tower at the corner—did I not know them?
Mechanically, I the man in green. My with every step. In a little, they certainty. Up a and stair, along a long and corridor, with rich tapestries, the in the light, through of with old pictures and furniture... here a with on a landing, there a in field-grey a door...I was in the Berlin Schloss.
The Castle to sleep. A over all. Everywhere lights were dim, into emptiness, away into solitude. Now and then an in dress past us or an officer a corner, save for a of spurs.
Thus we traversed, as it to me, miles of and of twilight, and all the time my blood at my temples and my as I of the that me. To was I thus bidden, secretly, in the night?
We were in a and passage now, in light with red hangings. After the of the State apartments, this had at least the of leading to the of man. A in field-grey with a his by a up and the passage, his making no upon the soft, thick with which the was covered.
The man in green stopped at the door. Holding up a hand to me, he his and listened. There was a moment of silence. Not a was to be the whole Castle. Then the man in green and was admitted, me outside.
A moment later, the door open again. A tall, man with and that air of good that you in every man who has a life at court, came out hurriedly. He looked and harassed.
On me, he stopped short.
"Dr. Grundt? Where is Dr. Grundt?" he asked and his to my feet. He started and them to my face.
The had out of earshot. I see him, as a statue, at the end of the corridor. Except for him and us, the passage was deserted.
Again the man spoke and his voice his anxiety.
"Who are you?" he asked almost in a whisper. "What have you done with Grundt? Why has he not come?"
Boldly I took the plunge.
"I am Semlin," I said.
"Semlin," the other, "—ah yes! the Embassy in Washington about you—but Grundt was to have come...."
"Listen," I said, "Grundt not come. We had to and he sent me on ahead...."
"But ... but ..."—the man was now in his anxiety—"... you succeeded?"
I nodded.
He a of relief.
"It will be awkward, very awkward, this in the arrangements," he said. "You will have to to him, everything. Wait there an instant."
He into the room.
Once more I and waited in that place, so and so still that one in a world from the angry of nations. And I if my interview—the meeting I had so much dreaded—was at an end.
"Pst, Pst!" The man at the open door.
He me through a room, a place, of leather furniture, to a door. He opened it, across a narrow another door. On this he knocked.
"Herein!" a voice—a harsh, voice.
My the and, opening the door, me into the room. The door closed me.
I myself the Emperor.
