An Imperial Marriage Part 21

I had not an idea where I was, except that I knew my way lay up stream; so I struck across country until I came to a road leading in the direction I had to go, and I set off to walk until I could ascertain where to find a station.

I knew I should have to be very cautious about asking any questions.

German police methods were very different from English, and a man garbed as I was, without any papers of identification and carrying a loaded revolver, was pretty sure to be an object of suspicion. It would be exceedingly difficult for me to give any acceptable account of myself without telling all that had occurred; and that would certainly mean that I should be detained, and probably left to cool my heels in a police-cell while the c.u.mbersome wheels of the law were put in motion to investigate my story.

I plodded along for an hour or two, keeping my ears at full strain for any footsteps ahead of me, and taking the greatest care to make as little noise in walking as possible.

In my weakened state, I found this extremely fatiguing, and more than once I had to sit down and rest. Eager as I was to reach the capital, I grudged every second of these intervals of inaction.

I was on fire with impatience to ascertain what had happened to Althea in my absence. How long I had been away from home I could not tell; and I tortured myself with a hundred fears on her account.

Von Felsen was not the man to lose a minute in getting to work, as soon as he knew I was out of his way; and of course his creature, Dragen, would have told him at once of the success of the attempt to kidnap me.

Until I had left the launch, the consideration for my own safety and the weighing of the chances of escape had kept me from fretting about matters in Berlin; but now that I was free and on the way back, every minute seemed to be of vital consequence, and the thought that I might be stopped by the police hara.s.sed and worried me into a positive fever of dread.

Fortune did me a good turn, however. I heard the rumble of a train as I was sitting by the roadside, and presently I saw it rush rapidly past a few hundred yards above the road where I was.

This did more to revive my strength than anything else could have done, and a moment later I was striding across the intervening fields to reach the line. I knew I should not meet any one there, and I pushed ahead with more confidence than I had yet felt.

Soon afterwards the gloom began to lift, and the sky grew grey in the east. Dawn was near; and as the light grew stronger, I saw a station not far ahead.

If all went well, an hour or two would see me out of my fix and speeding toward Berlin. But everything depended upon the "if." I was already committing an offence in walking on the line; and I knew that my greatest difficulties might easily come at the station itself.

I left the line, therefore, while still at a considerable distance from the station, and made my way back to the road again. In doing this I stumbled into a rather broad ditch and made myself in a pretty mess.

Under ordinary circ.u.mstances I should have laughed at this; but as so much might turn on my appearance, already dishevelled enough, it irritated me and promised to prove an additional handicap, when the time came for questions to be asked.

I looked very much like a tramp, and the German law is not kindly disposed toward tramps at any time, and certainly not when they are found wandering about armed in the early dawn. Still, I had to make the best of things, so I plodded along until I reached the station.

But the door was locked and, although some one must have been attending to the signals, I could not see any one. The name on the end of the building was Wilden; but that did not help me much, as I had never heard of the place.

I was debating what to do when a very sleepy-looking official came lounging up to the door, unlocked it and entered, eyeing me with glances full of suspicion the while.

"When is the next train to Berlin?" I asked him.

He looked me up and down carefully and then grinned. "Do you want a first-cla.s.s ticket?"

I took his impertinence lightly. "You needn't judge by my appearance,"

I said with a laugh. "I have money to pay for any ticket I want," and I repeated the question.

"Where did you get it from? And what are you doing hanging about here at this time in the morning?"

"I'm going to wait for the next train to Berlin."

"Well, you won't wait in here;" and with that he slammed the door in my face.

It is very little use to argue with a man who is on the right side of a locked door, so I turned away and walked a little distance along the road by which I had come, and sat down under a tree to wait.

I was cold, intensely weary, and famished with hunger; and although I fought against sleep, nature would not be denied, and I was soon off.

The thunder of a train woke me, and jumping up I saw a train running into the station.

I hurried back to the station and the man I had seen before met me at the entrance. "Hullo, you again, is it?" he cried.

"I want a ticket for Berlin."

"That train doesn't go to Berlin. You'll have time to go and wash yourself first"; and he deliberately blocked my way.

As all railway officials were Government servants, I had to be cautious in dealing with him. "Where does that train go, then?" I asked very civilly.

He sneered. "Ah, I thought as much. Anywhere, eh, to get away from this place? But you're not going by it, my friend."

It was getting difficult to keep my temper, but I replied quietly:

"You are evidently making a great mistake about me."

"Oh no, I'm not," he laughed, with a knowing shake of the head. "Where did you sleep last night? And who are you?"

"I am going to Berlin," I said. But as the train started at that moment there was nothing to be gained by continuing to wrangle with the man, so I turned away.

Then he said in a less surly tone: "There's no train for two hours. You can wait in the station."

I was glad enough to have the chance, and sitting down on one of the benches in the waiting-room, was soon fast asleep again.

When I woke I saw the reason for his apparent concession. A police officer was with him and had roused me. I blinked at him confusedly.

"Come along with me," he ordered curtly.

"I want to go to Berlin. I must get there without delay."

"Come with me, I tell you," he repeated very sharply. "We must know something about you first."

With a shrug I rose, and he walked me off to the police station, the railway official accompanying us. I concealed my bitter irritation as best I could, and tried to think of the best story to tell. The railwayman said what he knew, and the officer in charge of the station questioned me. "Who are you?"

"There has been a great mistake made by this gentleman. I am an Englishman, Paul Bastable, 78, Miedenstra.s.se, Berlin, a newspaper correspondent. I have been away in search of information about some events I cannot tell you, and must return to Berlin at once."

"Where have you come from?"

"I am not at liberty to tell you; but you can send some one with me to Berlin if you wish, and I can satisfy him of the truth about me."

"Have you searched him?" he asked the man who had taken me there.

He did it at once without any ceremony, and together they examined the contents of my pockets. When they looked next at me, it was with obvious suspicion, and the constable turned back the collar of the reefer jacket at the back and then nodded to his superior.

"Paul Bastable, English, are you? Then how come you to have the papers of Johann s.p.a.ckmann, engineer, with you, and to be wearing his coat?"

What a stroke of ill luck! I had seen the man take a paper from the inside pocket of the jacket I had annexed from the launch. I hesitated and then forced a laugh. "I suppose you know that newspaper men have to be somebody else at times. I have told you the truth. Send some one with me to Berlin."

"I knew there was something wrong about him," put in the railwayman.

"But I must be off, the Berlin train is due."