Something important was being attempted, but what it was neither Ray Raymond nor myself could make out.
We had exerted a good deal of vigilance and kept constant watch upon Hartmann's house in Pont Street since my return from Poland, but all to no purpose.
Vera had been staying in London with her aunt and had greatly assisted us in keeping observation upon two strangers who had arrived in London about a month ago, and who were staying in an obscure hotel near Victoria Station.
Their names were Paul Dubois, a Belgian, and Frederick Gessner, a German. The first-named was, we judged, about forty, stout, flabby-faced, wearing gold pince-nez, while the German was somewhat younger, both quiet, studious-looking men who seemed,however, to be welcomed by many of the prominent members of the German colony in London.
On five separate occasions we had followed the pair to King's Cross Station and watched them take third class tickets to Hull. They would remain there perhaps two or three days, and then return to London.
After a while they had grown tired of their hotel, and had taken a small furnished house at the top of Sydenham Hill, close to the Crystal Palace, a pleasant little place with a small secluded garden in which were several high old elms. They engaged a rather obese old Frenchwoman as housekeeper, and there they led a quiet life, engrossed apparently in literary studies.
I confess that when it came my turn to watch them I became more than ever convinced that Raymond's suspicions were ungrounded. They seldom went out, and when they did, it was either to dine with Hartmann, or to stroll about the suburban roads of Norwood, Sydenham, and Penge.
Late one afternoon, however, while I was down at Sydenham, I saw them emerge from the house, carrying their small suit-cases, and followed them to King's Cross Station, where they took tickets for Hull.
Instantly I rushed to the telephone and informed Ray in Bruton Street of my intention to follow them.
That same night I found myself in the smoke-grimed Station Hotel in Hull, where the two foreigners had also put up.
Next day they called at a solicitor's office at the end of Whitefriargate, and thence, accompanied by a man who was apparently the lawyer's managing clerk, they went in a cab along the Docks, where, at a spot close to the Queen's Dock, they pulled up before an empty factory, a place which was not very large, but which possessed a very high chimney.
The managing clerk entered the premises with a key, and for about half an hour the pair were within, apparently inspecting everything.
I was puzzled. Why they were in treaty to rent a place of this description was an utter enigma.
They returned to the hotel to luncheon, and I watched them engaged in animated discussion afterwards, and I also noticed that they despatched a telegram.
Next day they called upon the solicitor, and by their satisfied manner when they came forth from the office, I guessed that they had become tenants of the place.
In this I was not mistaken, for that same afternoon they went together to the factory and let themselves in with the key, remaining within for over an hour, evidently planning something.
That night I wrote a long report to Raymond, and next morning spoke to him over the telephone.
"Vera wants to know if you want her in Hull. If so, she'll come," my friend said. "I'm just as puzzled as you are. Those two men mean mischief—but in what manner is a mystery."
"If Miss Vallance can come, I'll be only too thankful," I replied. "I fear the men know you, but they don't know her. And she can greatly assist me."
"Very well, Jacox," was his reply. "She'll leave this evening. She'll wire to the hotel. She'd better not be seen with you. So, to the hotel people, you'll be strangers. Meet outside, and arrange matters. 'Phone me when you want me up there."
"Right, old chap," I replied. "I'll ring you up at eleven to-morrow and report. So be in. Good-bye."
And I rang off.
Vera arrived just before eleven that evening. I was in the hall of the hotel when the porter entered, carrying her dressing-case. She passed me and went to the office, but I did not acknowledge her. Shewore a neat dark blue travelling gown, well cut by her tailor, and a little toque which suited her face admirably. She possessed perfect taste in dress.
Half an hour later I sent a note up to her room by a waiter, asking her to meet me outside on the railway platform at ten o'clock next morning.
She kept the appointment, and in order to escape observation we entered the refreshment-room.
"The numbers of the rooms occupied by the two men are sixty-eight and seventy-two," I explained. "Perhaps it will be as well if you watch them the whole of to-day. They are at present in the writing-room, so you can at once pick them up."
"Certainly, Mr. Jacox," she said. "Jack is intensely anxious. He's very puzzled as to what they intend doing."
"Yes," I replied, "it's quite a mystery. But we shall discover something ere long, never fear."
Vera laughed as she sipped the glass of milk I had ordered.
Then I briefly explained all that I had discovered, telling her how the two men had evidently taken the factory on a lease, and how they were there every day, apparently making plans for future business.
"But what business do they intend starting?" she asked.
"Ah!" I said; "that's what we have to find out. And we shall do so before very long, if we are careful and vigilant."
"Trust me," she said; "I am entirely at your orders."
"Then I shall wait and hear your report," I said. "When you return to the hotel send a line to my room."
And with that arrangement we parted.
That day I spent idling in the vicinity of the hotel. It was mid-August, and the atmosphere was stifling.That district of Hull is not a very pleasant one, for it is one of mean provincial streets and of the noise of railway lorries rumbling over the granite setts.
The afternoon I spent in playing billiards with the marker, when about six o'clock a page-boy brought me a note from my enthusiastic little friend.
"I shall be in the station refreshment-room at half-past six. Meet me.—Vera."
Those were the words I found within the envelope.
Half an hour later, when I sat at the little marble-topped table with her, she related how she had been following the pair all day.
"They were in the factory from half-past one until four," she said. "They've ordered a builder to put up ladders to examine the chimney. They appear to think it isn't quite safe."
She told me the name of the builder, adding that the contract was to have the ladders in position during the next three days.
"They are leaving for London to-night by the last train," she added. "I heard the Belgian telling the hall-porter as I came out."
"Then we'll wire to Ray to meet them, and keep an eye upon them," I said. "I suppose you will go up to town?"
"I think so. And when they return I will follow them down if Ray deems it best," replied the pretty girl, who was just as enthusiastic in her patriotism as ourselves.
So still mystified I was compelled to remain inactive in Hull, while Vera and the two foreigners whom we suspected of espionage went up to London.
For the next four days I heard nothing until suddenly, at eight o'clock one morning, Ray entered my bedroom before I was up.
"I've found out one thing about those Johnnies!"he exclaimed. "They've been buying, in Clerkenwell, a whole lot of electrical appliances—coils of wire, insulators, and batteries. Some of it has been sent direct to the place they've taken here, and the rest has been sent to their house down in Sydenham."
"What can they want that for?" I queried.
"Don't know, my dear chap. Let's wait and see."
"Perhaps, after all, they are about to set up in business," I said. "Neither of them has struck me as being spies. Save that they've visited Hartmann once or twice, their movements have not been very suspicious. Many foreigners are setting up factories in England, owing to the recent change in our patent laws."
"I know," said my friend. "Yet their confidential negotiations with Hartmann have aroused my suspicions, and I feel confident we shall discover something interesting before long. They came back by the same train as I travelled."
After breakfast, we both strolled round to the factory. The ground it covered was not much, and it was surrounded by a wall about twelve feet high, so that no one could see within the courtyard. It had, at one time, been a lead-mill, but for the past eight years had, we learned, been untenanted.
Even as we loitered near, we saw the builder's men bringing long ladders for the inspection of the chimney.
We watched for a whole week, but as each day passed, I became more confident that we were upon a false scent.
The chimney had been inspected, the ladders taken down again, and once more the German and the Belgian had returned south to that pleasant London suburb.
In order to ascertain what was really in progress I called one morning upon the solicitor in Whitefriargate, on pretext of being a likely tenant of the factory.I was, however, informed by the managing clerk that it was already let to a firm of electrical engineers.
Thus the purchase of electrical appliances was entirely accounted for.
Once again I returned to London. They seemed, by the electrical accessories that had been delivered, to be fitting up a second factory in their house in Sydenham.
That, being a private house, seemed somewhat mysterious.
They had become friendly also with a tall, rather well-dressed Englishman named Fowler, who had the appearance of a superior clerk, and who resided in a rather nice house in Hopton Road, Streatham Hill.
Fowler had become a frequent visitor at their house, while, on several occasions, he dined with Dubois at De Keyser's Hotel, facing Blackfriars Bridge.
In consequence of some conversation I one evening overheard—a conversation in English, which the Belgian spoke fluently—I judged Fowler to be an electrician, and it seemed, later on, very much as though he had been, or was about to be, taken into partnership with them.
As far as we could discover, however, he had been told nothing about the factory in Hull. More than once I suspected that the two foreigners were swindlers, who intended to "do" the Englishman out of his money. This was impressed I upon me the more, because one evening a German woman was introduced to their newly-found friend as Frau Gessner, who had just arrived from Wiesbaden.
Whether she was really Gessner's wife I doubted. It was curious that, on keeping observation that evening, I found that the lady did not reside at Sydenham, but at a small hotel in Bloomsbury, not a stone's-throw from my own rooms.
There was certainly some deep game in progress. What could it be?
Vera had watched Fowler on several occasions, but beyond the fact that he was an electrical engineer, occupying a responsible position with a well-known telegraph construction company, we could discover nothing.
After nearly three weeks in London, Dubois and Gessner returned to Hull, where, while living at the Station Hotel, they spent each day at their "works." They engaged no assistant, and were bent apparently upon doing everything by themselves. They were joined one day by a shrivelled-up old man of rather seedy appearance, and typically German. His name was Busch, and he lived in lodgings out on the Beverley Road. He was taken to the works, and remained there all day.
A quantity of electrical appliances were delivered from London, and Dubois and Gessner received them and unpacked them themselves.
Ray Raymond was down at Sheerness upon another matter—a serious attempt to obtain some confidential naval information—therefore I remained in Hull anxiously watching. Vera had again offered her services, but at that moment she was down at Sheerness with Ray.
Day by day old Busch went regularly to the factory, and by the appearance of the trio when they came forth, it was apparent that they worked very hard. I was intensely inquisitive, and dearly wished to obtain a glance within the place. But that was quite out of the question.
Busch, it seemed, had lived in Hull for a considerable period. Inquiries of his neighbours revealed that he was a well-known figure. He did but little work, preferring to take long walks into the country.
One man told me that he had met him twice away near Spurn Head, at the estuary of the Humber, and on another occasion he had seen him wandering aimlessly along the low-lying coast in the vicinity of Hornsea. In explanation of this, it seemed that he had once lived for a whole summer in Withernsea, not far from Spurn Head, and had grown fond of the neighbourhood. Everybody looked upon him as a harmless old man, a trifle eccentric, and a great walker.
That constant rambling over that low-lying district of Holderness had aroused my suspicions, and I determined to turn my attention to him.
One day the old man did not go to the factory, but instead went forth upon one of his rambles. He took train from Hull to Hornsea, where the railway ends at the sea, and walked along the shore for several miles; indeed until he was three parts of the distance to Bridlington, when he suddenly halted near the little village of Barmston, and producing a neat pocket-camera took a long series of snap-shots of the flat coast, where I saw there were several places which would afford an easy landing for the invader.
The truth was in an instant plain. Old Busch was a "fixed-agent," who was carrying on the same work along the Yorkshire coast as his ingenious compatriots were doing in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex. The remainder of that day I kept a sharp eye upon him, and witnessed him making many notes and taking many photographs of the various farms and houses near the sea. He noted the number of haystacks in the farmyards—for his report on fodder stores, no doubt—and made certain notes regarding the houses, of great use, no doubt, when the Germans came to billet their troops.
It was not until nearly midnight that I was back at the hotel in Hull. Then, by judicious inquiry ofthe hall porter—who had become my particular friend—I ascertained that Gessner had left for London by the last train.
Should I follow, or should I remain in Hull?
I decided upon the latter course, and retired to bed, thoroughly fagged out.
Early next morning I went round to the telephone-exchange, rather than use the instrument in the hotel, and rang up Raymond.
To my delight he answered my call. He was at home.
I gave him a rapid digest of what I had discovered, and told him that the German had returned to Sydenham.
"All right, old chap," came his voice over the wire. "Vera will watch at this end, while you watch yours. If what I guess is right, they're doing something far more serious than surveying that flat coast north of the Humber. Be careful not to betray yourself."
"Trust me for that," I laughed. "Are you going back to Sheerness?"
"Yes. I'll be there all day to-day—and to-morrow I hope to get one of our friends the enemy arrested. That's what I'm trying for. Good-bye—and good luck," and he rang off.
Busch went to the factory where Dubois was already awaiting him. As I stood outside that building of mystery I wondered what devilment was being plotted within. It had not been cleaned or painted, the windows being still thick with soot, and several of them, which had been broken, were boarded up. The place had certainly not been cleaned down for years, and no wonder they had been suspicious of the stability of that chimney which towered so high towards the murky sky.
There was no sign whatever of activity within, or of any business about to be carried on. Thus, dayfollowed day, Busch and Dubois spending most of their time within those high walls which held their secret.
One curious thing was the number of telegrams delivered there. Sometimes they sent and received as many as fourteen or fifteen in a day. How I longed to know with whom they were in such constant communication.
Suddenly, after the third day, the shoal of wires entirely ceased. Busch and Dubois, instead of going to the factory, spent the day in the country, taking train to Patrington and walking through Skeffling went out to Kilnsea, opposite Great Grimsby at the entrance to the Humber.
From the point where I watched I could see that the old man with considerable gesticulation was standing upon the shore facing seaward and explaining something to his companion.
The Belgian apparently put many questions to him, and had become intensely interested. Then presently his companion produced a paper from his pocket—evidently a plan, for he pointed out something upon it.
They both lit their pipes, and sitting down upon a rock discussed something quietly. Apparently Busch was making an elaborate explanation, now and then pointing with his finger seaward.
Where he pointed was the channel through which passed all the shipping into the Humber.
Then, after a time, he rose from where he sat, and seemed to be measuring a distance by taking paces, his companion walking at his side over the level expanse of sand.
Suddenly he halted, pointing to the ground.
Dubois examined the shore at that point with apparent curiosity. With what object I could not imagine.
They remained there for fully an hour, and the sun had already set when they returned to Patrington, and took the train back to Hull.
That old Busch was a spy I had proved long ago, but what part Dubois and Gessner were playing was not yet at all clear.
On the following evening, about ten o'clock, I saw Dubois near the Dock office, and on watching him, followed him to the factory, which he entered with his key. Beyond the gate was the small paved courtyard in which rose the high chimney. Within the factory he lit the gas, for I could see its reflection, though from the street I could not get sight of the lower windows.
The night was bright and moonlit, and as I waited I heard within the grinding of a windlass, and saw to my surprise, a thin light iron rod about six feet long and placed vertically rising slowly up the side of the chimney stack, evidently being drawn up to a pulley at its summit.
Dubois was hoisting it to the top, where at last it remained stationary, its ends just protruding beneath the coping and hardly visible.
Scarcely had this been done when Busch came along, and I had to exercise a quick movement to avoid detection. He was admitted by Dubois, and the door was closed and locked as usual.
I stood beneath the wall, trying to overhear their words. But I could understand nothing.
Suddenly a dull, crackling noise broke the silence of the night, as though the sound was dulled by a padded room.
Again I listened. Then at last the truth dawned upon me.
The spies had put in a secret installation of wireless telegraphy!
Those intermittent sounds were that of the Morse code. They were exchanging signals with some other persons.
Gessner was absent. No doubt the corresponding station was at that house high upon Sydenham Hill to the south of London, two hundred miles distant!
I waited for a quarter of an hour, listening to those secret signals. Then I hurried to the telephone, and fortunately found Raymond at home. I told him what I had discovered, and urged him to take a taxi at once down to Sydenham and ascertain whether they were receiving signals there.
This he promised to do, telling me he would 'phone me the result to the hotel at eight o'clock next morning.
Therefore I returned to the factory, and through the long night-hours listened to their secret experiments.
At eight next morning the telephone rang, and Ray briefly explained that Gessner, who had placed his apparatus upon the high flagstaff in his garden, had been receiving messages all night!
"Have you seen anything of Fowler?"
"No. But Hartmann has spent the night with Gessner, apparently watching his experiments. Couldn't you manage to watch your opportunity and get inside the factory somehow? I'll come north at noon, and we'll see what we can do."
At five o'clock he stepped from the London express, and together we walked down to the Imperial Hotel, to which I had suddenly changed my quarters, feeling that I had been too long in the close vicinity of the spy Dubois.
"It seems that they carry out their experiments at night," I explained. "For in the daytime the wireless apparatus is no longer in position. I see now why they engaged a builder to examine the chimney—in order to place a pulley with a wire rope in position at the top!"
"But Gessner and Dubois are expert electricians, no doubt. Members of the Telegraphen-Abtheilung of the German army, most probably," remarked my friend.
"And who is Fowler?"
"A victim, I should say. He appears to be a most respectable man."
"In any financial difficulty?"
"Not that I can discover."
"But why have they established this secret communication between Hull and London?"
"That's just what we have to discover, my dear fellow," laughed Ray. "But if we are to get a peep inside the place it's evident we can only do so in the daytime. At night they are down there."
"At early morning," I suggested, "after they have left."
"Very well," he said; "we'll watch them to-night, and get in after they leave. I've brought a few necessaries in my bag—the set of housebreaking implements," he added, with a grin.
"Well," I said, "neither of us know much about wireless telegraphy. Couldn't we get hold of an operator from one of the Wilson liners in dock, and take him along with us? A sailor is always an adventurer."
Ray was struck with the idea, and by eight o'clock that evening we had enlisted the services of a smart young fellow, one of the operators in the Wilson American service, to whom, in strictest confidence, we related our suspicions.
That night proved an exciting one. Fortunately for us it was cloudy, with rain, at intervals. Murphy, the wireless operator, listening under the wall declaredthat we were not mistaken. The men were sending messages in code.
"Most probably," he said, "they have another station across at Borkum, Wilhelmshaven, or somewhere. I wonder what they're at?" he added, much puzzled.
Through those long hours we watched anxiously; but just before the dawn Dubois and Busch lowered their apparatus from the top of the chimney, and a few minutes later emerged, walking together towards the hotel.
As soon as they were out of sight we held a consultation, and it was decided that, while Murphy and I kept watch for the police, Ray should use his jemmy upon the door and break it open. He would admit us and remain himself outside to give us warning.
Those moments were breathless ones.
We parted, the wireless operator walking one way, while I went in the opposite direction. Suddenly we heard the cracking of wood, followed by a low cough.
By that, we knew all was well.
We hurried back, and a few seconds later were in the courtyard of the disused factory. Ray had handed me his jemmy, and with it I broke open the second door of the empty place, flashing a light with the electric torch I carried.
We passed into the small office, but no second glance was needed to show that the place was completely fitted with a wireless installation of the most approved pattern.
"We'll try it," suggested young Murphy, and taking out the apparatus we hauled it up to the top of the chimney. Then re-entering the office, he placed the receiver over his ears, and listened intently, in his hand a pencil he had found ready upon the paper pad.
I stood watching his face. Apparently he heard nothing.
Then he touched the key of the instrument andinstantly a great blue spark, causing a crackling noise, flashed across the room.
He was calling.
Suddenly his face brightened, and he was listening. Then he grew greatly puzzled.
Taking the receiver off his head he began to search the table upon which were several books; but at that instant I heard a light footstep behind me, and as I turned I felt a heavy crushing blow upon the top of my skull.
Then the blackness of unconsciousness fell upon me.
I knew no more till, on opening my eyes, I found myself lying in bed with a nurse bending over me.
I gazed around in amazement. There were other beds in the vicinity. I was in a hospital with my head tightly bandaged.
For a whole day and night I lay there, the nurse forbidding me to speak.
Then suddenly there entered Ray, whose arm was in a sling, accompanied by young Murphy.
"The spies came back—unexpectedly, and went for me before I could raise the alarm," Raymond explained. "Dubois hit you over the head with a jemmy, and by Jove! it's a mercy you weren't killed. He's cleared out of the country, however, fearing a charge of attempted murder. I've informed the police, and they are looking for both him and Busch, as well as Gessner, who is missing from Sydenham."
"Yes, but why had they established these two wireless stations?" I asked.
"Yes," replied Murphy, "it's a most ingenious piece of work. By some unknown means both the station here, and at Sydenham, had been tuned with the one which I daresay you've seen stretched across the top of the new Admiralty, in Whitehall, hence they could read all the orders given to the Home andChannel Fleets and the reports received from them, while I have to-day discovered that there is a similar secret station existing somewhere near Borkum also in tune with these, and with our Admiralty. Therefore the Germans are aware of every signal sent to our Fleet! The station at Sydenham was only temporary, but the one here was evidently devised in order that the German admiral in the North Sea, on seizing Hull and establishing a base here, might have constant knowledge of our Admiralty orders and the whereabouts of our ships. When I was listening I was surprised at the code, but the truth was made plain by the discovery of a complete copy of the British naval code lying upon the table. By means of this, the spies could decipher all messages to and from our ships. The Civil Lord of the Admiralty and three officials have arrived in Hull, and I have been with them down at the factory this afternoon. The chief wireless engineer declares that the secret of the exact tuning must have been learnt from somebody in the office of the constructors."
And both Ray and I then remembered the man Fowler, who had, as we afterwards discovered, been on the verge of bankruptcy, and had suddenly gone abroad, a fact which was sufficiently instructive for our purpose.
Next day I was well enough to leave the hospital, and I guided the superintendent of the Hull police and two detectives to Busch's house, where, on searching his room, we discovered a volume of plans and reports of defences of the Humber and its estuary, estimates of food and fodder supplies in the country north of Hull, together with a list of the foreign pilots and their addresses, as well as an annotated chart of the river, showing the position where mines would be sunk at the river's mouth on the alarm of invasion.
But what, perhaps, would have been even more alarming to the general public, had they but known, was the discovery of several great bundles of huge posters ready prepared for posting up on the day of invasion—the Proclamation threatening with death all who dared to oppose the German landing and advance—a copy of which I have given in these pages.
It shows, indeed, what careful preparation our enemies are now making, just as the installation of the secret wireless showed the tactful cunning of the invader.
For our exertions, Raymond, Murphy, and myself received the best thanks of the Lords of the Admiralty, at which, I confess, we were all three much gratified.
On the 20th of December, 1908, it rained incessantly in London, and well I recollect it. After lunch I sat in the club-window in St. James's Street, idly watching the drenched passers-by, many of them people who were up from the country to do their Christmas shopping.
The outlook was a gloomy one; particularly so for myself, for I had arranged to spend Christmas with an aunt who had a pretty villa among the olives outside Nice, but that morning I had received a telegram from her saying that she was very unwell and asking me to postpone my visit.
The club was practically deserted save for one or two old cronies. Every one had gone to country houses, Ray was spending Christmas with Vera's father at Portsmouth, and in view of the message Ihad received I felt dull and alone. It is astonishing how very lonely a man may be at Christmas in our great London, even though at other times he may possess hosts of friends.
I had received fully a dozen invitations to country houses, all of which I had declined, and was now, alas! stranded, without hope of spending "A Merry Christmas," except in the lonely silence of my own bachelor chambers. So I smoked on, looking forth into the darkening gloom.
The waiter switched on the light in the great smoking-room at last, and then drew the heavy curtains at all the long windows, shutting out the dismal scene.
A man I knew, a hard-working member of Parliament, entered, threw himself down wearily and lit a cigar. Then, idler that I was, I began to gossip.
He was going up to Perthshire by the 11.45 from Euston that night, he remarked.
"Where are you spending Christmas?" he asked.
"Don't know," I replied. "Probably at home."
"You seem to have the hump, my dear fellow," he remarked, with a laugh, and then I confided to him the reason.
At last, about six o'clock, I put on my overcoat and left the club. The rain had now stopped, therefore I decided to walk along to my rooms in Guilford Street.
Hardly had I turned the corner into Piccadilly, when I heard a voice at my elbow uttering my name with a foreign accent.
Turning quickly, I saw, to my great surprise, a man named Engler, whom I had known in Bremen. He was a clerk in the Deutsche Bank, opposite the Liebfrauen-Kirche, and popular in a certain circle in that Hanseatic city.
"My dear Meester Jacox!" he exclaimed in brokenEnglish in his enthusiastic way. "My dear frendt. Well, well! who would have thought of meeting you. I am so ve-ry glad!" he cried. "I have only been in London since three days."
I shook my friend's hand warmly, for a year ago, when I had spent some time beside the Weser watching two men I had followed from London, we had been extremely friendly.
I told him that I was on my way to my rooms, and invited him in to have a chat.
He gladly accompanied me, and when we were comfortably seated in my cosy sitting-room he began to relate to me all the latest news from Bremen and of several of my friends.
Otto Engler was a well-dressed, rather elegant man of forty, whose fair beard was well trimmed, whose eyes were full of fire, and who rather prided himself upon being something of a lady-killer. He was in London in connection with an important financial scheme in which his brother and a German merchant in London, named Griesbach, were interested. He and his brother Wilhelm were over on a visit to the merchant, who, he told me, had offices in Coleman Street, and who lived in Lonsdale Road, Barnes.
There was a fortune in the business, he declared, which was the discovery of a new alloy, lighter than aluminium, yet with twenty times the rigidity.
That evening we dined together at the "Trocadero," looked in at the Empire, and returned to the club for a smoke.
Indeed, I was delighted to have found an old friend just when I was in deepest despair of the dullness of everything, and of Christmas in particular.
Otto Engler had one failing—his impudent inquisitiveness. After he had left me it occurred to me that all the time we had been together he had beenconstantly endeavouring to discover my recent movements, where I had visited of late, where I intended spending Christmas, and my subsequent movements.
Why did he desire to know all these particulars? He was a busybody, I knew, and the worst gossip in the whole of that gossip-loving city on the Weser. Therefore I attributed his inquisitiveness to his natural propensity for prying into other people's affairs.
"Ah! my dear friend," he had said as he gripped my hand on leaving me, "they often speak of you in Bremen. How we all wish you were back again with us of an evening at the Wiener Café!"
"I fear I shall never go back," I said briefly. "Business nowadays keeps me in London, as you know."
"I know—I know," he replied. "Remember, you have always had a true friend in Otto Engler—and you always will, I trust."
Then he had entered the taxi which the hall-porter had called for him.
Next afternoon he called upon me at New Stone Buildings, as we had arranged. Ray Raymond was seated with me. I introduced him, and we spent a pleasant hour, chatting and smoking. Ray had also been in Bremen, and the two men had, they found, many mutual friends. Then, when he had left, Ray declared himself charmed by him.
"So different to the usual German," he declared. "There's nothing of the popinjay about him, nothing of the modern military fop of Berlin or Dresden, men who are, in my estimation, the very acme of bad breeding and degenerate idiocy."
"No," I said. "Engler is quite a good fellow. I'm glad he's found me. I expected to be deadly dull this Christmas."
"So do I," replied my friend. "I've got a wirethis morning from the Admiral saying he is down with influenza, and the Christmas house-party is postponed. So I shall stay in town."
"In that case we might spend Christmas day together," I suggested.
This was arranged.
My German friend Otto saw me daily. I was introduced to his brother, Wilhelm, a tall, thin, rather narrow-eyed man who, from his atrocious German, I judged was from Dantzig. It was one evening in the Café Royal that I first saw Wilhelm, who was seated playing dominoes with a rather stout, middle-aged man in gold-rimmed spectacles, Heinrich Griesbach.
Both men expressed delight at meeting me, and I invited the trio to my rooms for a smoke and a gossip.
We sat until nearly two o'clock in the morning. Griesbach had been many years in London, and was apparently financing the scheme of the brothers Engler, a scheme which, on the face of it, seemed a very sound undertaking.
All three were thorough-going cosmopolitans, cheery, easy-going men of the world, who told many quaint stories which caused my room to ring with laughter.
Next day was Christmas Eve, and Griesbach suddenly suggested that if I had nothing better to do he would be delighted if I would join their party at dinner on Christmas night at his house over at Barnes.
"I regret very much," I said, "but I've already arranged to dine with my friend Raymond, who shares chambers with me in Lincoln's Inn."
"Oh!" exclaimed Otto Engler, "I'm sure Herr Griesbach would be very pleased if he came also."
"Of course!" cried the German merrily. "The more the merrier. We shall dine at eight, and we'll expect you both. I'll send a note to Mr. Raymond, if you'll give me his address."
I gave it to him, and nothing loath to spend the festival in such jovial company, I accepted.
I entertained a shrewd suspicion that by their hospitality they wished to enlist my aid, because I had one or two friends in the City who might, perhaps, assist them materially in their scheme. And yet, after all, Otto Engler had often been my guest in Bremen.
Next day I heard on the telephone from Ray that he would go down to Barnes with me, and would call for me at six at Guilford Street. Curiously enough, I had become so impressed by the possibilities of the new alloy about to be exploited with British capital, that I had really become anxious to "go in" with them. Ray Raymond, too, was much interested when I showed him the specimen of the new metal which Engler had given me.
"Do you know," said he when he called for me at six o'clock on Christmas evening, "I was about town a lot yesterday and I'm quite certain that I was followed by a foreigner—a rather big man wearing gold spectacles."
"Nonsense!" I laughed. "Why should you be followed by any foreigner?"
"It isn't nonsense, my dear Jacox," he declared. "The fellow kept close observation on me all yesterday afternoon. When I got back to Bruton Street, I looked out half an hour afterwards and there he was, still idling outside."
"Some chap who wants to serve you with a writ, perhaps!" I laughed grimly. "A neglected tailor's bill!"
"No," he said. "He's watching with some evil intent, I'm certain. I expect he's somewhere near, even now," he added.
"Why!" I laughed. "You seem quite nervy over it! Next time you see him, go up to the Johnnie and ask him what the dickens he wants."
Then, half an hour later, I put on my hat and coat, and together we took a taxi past Kensington Church and Olympia, to Hammersmith Bridge, over which we turned off to the right in Castelnau, into a long ill-lit thoroughfare, running parallel with the river. Bare trees lined the road, and each house was a good-sized one, standing in its own grounds.
Before one of these, hidden from the road by a high wall, and standing back a good distance from the road, the cab pulled up, and, alighting, we opened the gate, and passing up a well-kept drive pulled the bell.
Our summons was answered by a thin, rather consumptive-looking German man-servant, who took our coats and ceremoniously ushered us into a big well-furnished drawing-room, where Griesbach and his two friends were already assembled awaiting us. All were smoking cigarettes, which showed that no ladies were to be present.
The instant Ray entered the room I saw that he gave a start, and a few moments later he seized an opportunity to whisper to me that the man who had so persistently followed him on the previous day was none other than our host Griesbach.
"Don't worry over it, my dear old fellow," I urged. "What motive would he have? He didn't even know you!"
And then the gossip became merry in that room so seasonably decorated with holly, while Griesbach assured us of his delight in having us as his guests.
Dinner was served in the adjoining room, and a most excellent and thoroughly English repast it was. Our host had been long enough in England, he told us, to appreciate English fare, hence we had part of a baron of beef with Christmas pudding afterwards, and excellent old port and nuts to follow.
Two young Germans waited at table, and the partywas as merry a one as any of us could wish. Only Ray seemed serious and preoccupied. He was suspicious I knew—but of what?
I now openly confess that I pretended a gaiety which I certainly did not feel, for after Raymond had told me that he had recognised Griesbach, a very strange thought had occurred to me. It was this. As we had entered the garden to approach the house, I felt certain that I had caught sight of the figure of a man crouching against one of the bushes in the shadow. At the time I had thought nothing of it, so eager was I to meet my friends. Yet now, in face of Ray's whispered words, I grew very suspicious. Why had that man been lurking there?
When the cloth had been cleared and dessert laid, the elder of the two servants placed upon the table before our host a big box of long crackers covered with dark green gelatine and embellished with gold paper.
"These are German bon-bons," remarked Griesbach, his grey eyes beaming through his spectacles. "I get them each Christmas from my home in Stuttgart."
The conversation had again turned upon the splendid investment about to be offered to the British public, whereupon I half suggested that I was ready to go into the affair myself. Griesbach jumped at the idea, just as I expected, and handed round the box of crackers. Each of us took one, in celebration of Christmas, and on their being pulled we discovered small but really acceptable articles of masculine jewellery within. My "surprise" was a pair of plain gold sleeve-links, worth fully three or four pounds, while Ray, with whom I pulled, received a nice turquoise scarf-pin, an incident which quite reassured him.
Our host refused to take one.
"No," he declared, "they are for you, my dear fellows—all for you."
So again the box was passed round, and four more crackers were taken. That time Ray's bon-bon contained a tiny gold match-box, while within mine I found a small charm in the form of a gold enamelled doll to hang upon one's watch-chain.
As Ray and I pulled my cracker, I had suddenly raised my eyes and caught sight of the expression upon the face of my friend Engler. It struck me as very curious. His sallow cheeks were pale, and his dark eyes seemed starting out of his head with excitement.
"Now, gentlemen," said our genial host, after he had passed the box for the third time, first to his two compatriots, who handed the remaining two bon-bons across the table to us, "you have each a final bon-bon. In one of them there will be found a twenty-mark piece—our German custom. I suggest, in order to mark this festive occasion, that whoever of you four obtains the coin shall receive, free of any obligation, five shares in our new syndicate."
"A most generous proposal!" declared my friend Engler, a sentiment with which we all agreed.
The two Germans pulled their bon-bons, but were unsuccessful. The prize—certainly a prize worth winning—now lay between Ray and myself.
At that instant, however, Griesbach rose from the table suddenly, saying:
"You two gentlemen must settle between yourselves. It lies between you."
And before we were aware of his intention he had passed into the adjoining room, followed by his two friends.
"Well," I laughed to Ray when we were alone, "here goes. Let's decide it!" And we both gripped the long green-and-gold cracker. If the coin were within, then I should receive a very handsome present, worth a little later on, perhaps, several thousand pounds.
At that instant, however, we were both startled by a loud smashing of glass in the next room, curses in German and loud shouts in English, followed by the dull report of a revolver.
We both sprang into the room, and there, to our surprise, found that six men had entered through the broken French window and were struggling fiercely with our host and his friends.
"What in the name of Fate does this mean?" I cried, startled and amazed at that sudden termination to our cosy Christmas dinner.
"All right, Mr. Raymond," answered a big brown-bearded man. "You know me—Pelham of Scotland Yard! Keep an eye on those bon-bons in the next room. Don't touch them at peril of your life!"
"Why?" I asked.
Then, when our host and our two friends had been secured—not, however, before the room had been wrecked in a most desperate struggle—Inspector Pelham came forward to where Ray was standing with me, and said:
"My God, Mr. Raymond! You two have had a very narrow escape, and no mistake! Where are those bon-bons?"
We took him into the dining-room, showed him the remaining two, and told him we had been about to pull them.
"I know. We were watching you through the window. Those men were flying from the house when they ran into our arms!"
"Why?"
"Because they are a dangerous trio whom we want on several charges. In addition, all three, and also the two servants, are ingenious spies in the service of the German General Staff. They've been busy this last two years. They intended to wreak uponboth of you a terrible revenge for your recent exposures of the German system of espionage in England and your constant prosecution of their spies."
"Revenge!" I gasped. "What revenge?"
"Well," replied the detective-inspector, "both these bon-bons contain powerful bombs, and had you pulled either of them you'd both have been blown to atoms. That was their dastardly intention. But fortunately we got wind of it, and were in time to watch and prevent it."
"And only just in the nick of time, too!" gasped Ray, pale-faced at thought of our narrow escape. "I somehow felt all along some vague presage that evil was intended."
The three spies were conveyed to Barnes police-station in cabs, and that was the last we ever saw of them. The Government again hushed up the matter in order to avoid international complications, I suppose, but a week later the interesting trio were deported by the police to Hamburg as undesirable aliens.
And to-day, with Ray Raymond, I am wondering what is to be the outcome of all this organised espionage in England.
What will happen? When will Germany strike?
WHO KNOWS?