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."
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.
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.
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 manœuvring 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.