For my eyes were opened, and I saw, and saw with bitter regret, what I had done. We had been bound together by all the ties of the service. We had lived side by side for weeks, we had shared many an hour of work and some of cordial companionship, we had been friends after a fashion. And then with danger ahead, in the teeth of clear warnings and of my own apprehensions, I had left him to face the peril! In a moment of irritation — and how petty, how unworthy seemed its cause now I looked back — I had abandoned him, I had deserted him, and consigned him to the fate that I now felt certain had been his.
In Bronberg’s presence I had hidden my feelings, though already they had tormented me; but now that I was free to think, it seemed to me that I could never make up for the past, never hold up my head again, never put off the burden of self-reproach.
For I was sure that had I been with Ellis, this would not have happened. Together we could have borne with ease a burden too great for one. Together we could have stood back to back, and baffled this miserable scheme. And at least and at worst he would not have spent his last hours alone and unsupported, watched only by alien eyes and entangled in the unseen toils that he knew to be closing about him.
And why, I asked myself, had I deserted him? Why had I abandoned him — and my duty? Alas, for reasons so small and so petty that I could not recall them without shame, nor formulate them without humiliation! Poor Ellis! Poor Perceval! How could I face his wife, his family, his friends — and tell them the tale?
It was a most wretched hour that I spent, wandering through the Thiergarten, heedless whither I went, and blind even to the change caused by the removal of the Chariot and Horses from the Brandenburg Gate. I saw only the mean Post House at Perleberg, and the dark road before it, the shapeless bulk of the laden carriage, and beside it, pacing distractedly to and fro, the figure of my friend, the friend whom I had abandoned!
But if I could not save him, at least I might avenge him. And slowly, as I passed along in sorrowful meditation, that thought took possession of me. I might avenge him! And the despatches? It might still be possible to undo my error there. They were lost, but they might not be lost beyond finding; and to recover them were it practicable, were it possible, was the only reparation I could make.
True, what the Prussian police and their French masters had failed to find, it was unlikely that I could find. But I might try; it was my duty to try, and with so strong, so overwhelming an inducement as moved me, I might succeed, and in doing so might also avenge Ellis’s death.
The thought gave me some consolation. For a moment it lifted the dark cloud, and I fell to considering the four theories which, according to Bronberg, exhausted the facts. The first — that the French had obtained the despatches, I discarded; it was clear that had they seized them they would have used them.
They would have demanded the dismissal of Metternich and taken other steps; and I had the Baron’s word that they had taken no such steps. The second alternative — that the Ball Platz had taken fright and manoeuvred to recover them, I could not stomach. I knew the Austrian Ministers well, and I could not think so ill of them.
Then for the theory of a casual robbery which the complete disappearance of the papers seemed to support? It failed in one point. It did not account for the warnings against Klatz. Those warnings, if they were, as seemed likely, given by the guilty party, pointed to something deeper and more deliberate than a casual guet-apens having for its object a diamond brooch or a fur cloak.
So there remained only the fourth alternative — that Klatz in the pursuit of the papers had had his rivals who had succeeded where he had failed. This theory also had its difficulty, in the complete disappearance of the despatches. But inasmuch as it implied that the authors of the crime were also the authors of the warnings, given at Grossenhayn and Kyritz, it was tempting, since it provided at least one clue; the conspirators or someone acting for them must have been at these places and also at Perleberg at the time Ellis was there.
I cast my thoughts backwards. Could I recall anyone? Anyone who had been at Grossenhayn? And also at Kyritz, according to the story.
At Grossenhayn? Of course, the French-dressed postilion! The very man, beyond doubt, who had vanished at Perleberg! Of course! In the excitement of the moment I stood and, heedless of observers, I struck the tree I was passing a resounding blow with my cane.
Two ladies who were walking down an adjacent allée, divided from mine by a row of trees, glanced at me, surprised by my sudden action, and their astonished looks recalled me to myself. As they passed on, the younger glanced back, and our eyes met a second time. Plucked sharply from my thoughts, I recognized her.
With astonishment, for unless I was much mistaken, she was the girl of the courtyard at Wittenberg, the girl whom I had seen starting at daybreak from the door of the “ Golden Stag.” If so, the face turned to me was also the face of the portrait — of the Grand Duchess’s governess, who should have arrived at the Schloss two days before! A strange coincidence, I thought, as I stood gazing after her and her companion. Two men were strolling a few paces behind them, who might or might not be of their party, but otherwise they were alone.
And stranger coincidence still! I had been thinking, when the girl passed, of the French postilion, and now I remembered that the woman with whom she had departed from Wittenberg that morning had been the very woman whom I had seen a day or two earlier travelling in a carriage conducted by that very postilion.
By Jove! But it was not that thought that after a moment’s startled reflection led me to turn and follow. It was partly curiosity, the desire to view the girl more nearly, and to learn if the attraction which her portrait had possessed for me attached to herself; and partly the idea that I might through her, more speedily than through the post, convey to my kind friend the Duchess the news of my safe arrival in Berlin.
The two women were walking quickly, and by the time I had made up my mind they were at such a distance that the intervening trees hid them. But once I had started, I gained on them, and on the two men who seemed to belong to them, and by the time they reached the Branden-burger Thor I was not more than thirty yards behind them. The Unter den Linden was moderately crowded, though not with the well-dressed crowd of other days; but having them now well in hand, I slackened my pace to consider how I should explain my intrusion. And then suddenly I missed them.
A moment later I picked them up again; they were hastening down an alley in the direction of the Schloss-brucke, and I made after them, not without a suspicion that they had observed me following them and were evading me. But though I mended my pace, I was only just in time to see them turn into — of all places — my hotel.
There was no longer need of haste, for they could not escape me now, and it would be more seemly, if they were staying in the house, to send up my name. I entered, and a little within the entrance I came on Herr Jager. I asked him if a young lady of the name of Mackay was staying there.
He shook his head. “Nein,” he said. “ Not to my knowledge, sir.”
“She has just entered with another lady,” I explained.
“Ah? With Frau Waechter, then, it must be. There is a young lady of her party, I remember.”
“They are staying here?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “For the night only. They make an early start to-morrow.”
I reflected then that if I sent up my name, Fraulein Mackay would not know it, and “If you will tell me where their rooms are,” I said, “I will go up.”
“That is easy. They are on His Excellency’s corridor, the last suite on the same side. Not our best rooms, but—” with a deprecatory gesture, “for the night only.”
“Thank you, Herr Jager,” I said. “I have a message which I wish to send by the lady. That’s all.”
He smirked. “ A charming messenger,” he said, “ Ein schones Fraulein!”
I did not reply but went up the stairs. The hotel, like most of the houses in Berlin, covered much ground, being of two storys only
. My suite was the one next the head of the staircase, about the middle of a long corridor, which ran both ways — a wide passage bare and pink-washed, with here and there one of those faded daubs of frescoes, trellises of vine-leaves and grapes and the like, with which the Germans delight to adorn their houses.
I turned into my bedroom to brush my hair and settle my stock, and then proceeded hat in hand along the corridor in search of the strangers’ rooms.
I found that the last suite did not open directly on the corridor, but lay back and was approached by an entry a few feet deep. This entry was dark as well as narrow, and the first thing I did was to stumble over some article of luggage left in it; so that, as far as heralding a caller went, my knock, executed after I had suppressed a cry of pain, and nursed my shin, came late.
Perhaps for that reason, it was promptly answered. The door opened. The person who opened it was a woman, and that was all I could see, for the window was behind her and I could only guess from her height and outline that she was the lady I had seen in the girl’s company.
“A thousand pardons, madam,” I said, with my best air. “I beg you to forgive this intrusion. But I think that I recognized in the young lady with you just now—”
“My daughter?”
“No, but—” with a little hesitation—” if I have made no mistake, Fraulein Mackay — of Zerbst. I must needs seem impertinent as I have not the honour of her acquaintance, but I believe that she is on her way to the Schloss, and—”
“There is no one of that name here,” the woman said, cutting me short. Her tone was abrupt, not to say harsh.
I stared, a good deal at a loss. I had been so certain of the recognition. “But, madam, one moment,” I ventured. “I think—”
“Of the name of Mackay, you say? No, I know no one of that name. And I am busy, sir. More, I have had to complain before of persons following my daughter in the streets — and if I am again to be troubled in this way—”
“Oh, but,” I said, thinking this a little too strong. “ I assure you that this is nothing of that kind. Of course if I have made a mistake, and the young lady is not Fraulein Mackay, I offer you my most sincere apologies. But unless I am mistaken—”
“You are mistaken,” she replied, rudely. “Completely mistaken, and your apologies, as they occupy my time, sir, only make it worse. I wish you good morning!” And the woman shut the door in my face.
I confess that I sneaked back to my rooms, feeling rather small. Could I have mistaken the suite? But no, Herr Jager’s directions had been precise. And the height and the figure of the woman, as I had seen her silhouetted against the window, tallied with those of the Fraulein Mackay’s companion. No, I had made no mistake — unless it was in my recognition of the girl. Of course if I was wrong in that, some annoyance on the mother’s part was reasonable — young men will at times follow pretty girls and seek their acquaintance in offhand ways.
But it seemed to me that there had been something offensive in the woman’s manner; something that, as I dwelt upon it, awakened suspicion. She had been so very quick to repudiate the Fraulein Mackay’s presence, so very rude in repelling my overture! And had I really overheard — at some stage in the interview but I could not say at what stage — a low cry, as of surprise, in the room behind her? Yes, now I thought of it, I felt sure that I had, although at the moment, my attention taken up with the woman, I had paid no heed to it.
However, the matter, if annoying, was of little moment, and even if the girl was Fraulein Mackay and her companions chose to deny her to a stranger, it was no business of mine. I had other and sadly more important things to deal with, and I sighed as they flocked back upon my mind. I had wasted enough time on the girl and had indeed been a fool to meddle where I was not wanted.
I had ceased from the moment of my meeting with Baron von Bronberg to trouble about my personal safety. But when I left the “Russie” to keep my appointment with him I happened to look back and I noticed that I was followed by a man whom I had seen a little earlier standing opposite the hotel. The fact did not alarm me, for I felt that I was safe in the Baron’s hands. But I kept it in mind.
I found the Baron in talk with a middle-sized man, sallow and flat faced, with bald temples, and a close secretive mouth. He was not a man of pleasant aspect, but Bronberg seemed to be on easy terms with him. “This is my friend, Herr Oberst Offizier Gruner of the Berlin Police,” he said. And after the exchange of a few formal phrases, “I have told him all you have told me, Cartwright,” Bronberg continued, “and it interests him, but it does not alter his point of view.”
“It confirms it,” Gruner said laconically. He had a way of speaking with his eyes lowered which gave no clue to his thoughts.
“In what way, Herr Gruner?”
“I am clear, mein Herr, that the parties who assaulted and searched you near Dessau were the same who later disposed of His Excellency.”
“Yes, I think so myself,” I said. “ It seems likely.”
“It is certain. Having made sure that the despatches were not on you, they followed your Chief and the day and a half he wasted at Kyritz enabled them to come up with him at Perleberg.”
The Baron nodded his big head. “Gruner is right,” he said. “That was the way of it, no doubt.”
“And the fact is proof,” Gruner continued, his eyes still on the floor, “that the despatches were their object.”
“But are you quite sure, Herr Oberst Offizier,” I said, “that it was not Klatz who—”
He showed his teeth in a close smile. “ No, it was not Klatz,” he said. But he seemed to be unwilling to say more.
“Yet if their object,” I argued, “was the despatches and they obtained the despatches — this should make itself plain in one way or another?”
He raised his eyebrows.
“You cannot explain that, Herr Gruner?”
“No, If I could—” He shrugged his shoulders.
I confess the man puzzled me, and annoyed me. I felt myself brought up against his reticence as against a wall. I tried another line “You have no doubts of Captain von Kalisch?”
He shook his head. “ No, sir, none.”
“And the girl’s story — that she saw His Excellency in the town at nine o’clock? Is that to be trusted?”
“She believes it, but—” He shrugged his shoulders.
The Baron laughed his big hearty laugh. We amused him. “Our friend, Herr Griiner — I am going to be quite candid, mein Herr — has a difficult part to play, Cartwright.
He is head of the Berlin police, but—”
“Better not,” said the other.
“Well.” I cried, rather warmly “ if you will not trust me, Herr Oberst Offizier, I must take my own line, and I have already determined what that must be. I intend to look into this myself, and I shall go to Perleberg for that purpose. And make my own inquiries on the spot.”
“Impossible,” he said. “Out of the question.”
“Why?”
“Because my orders, sir, are that you leave the country by the shortest road and without an hour’s delay.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed. This was a blow indeed!
“We can allow you four days to cross the frontier — under escort.”
I was very angry. “ But this is infamous!” I cried “You murder my Chief and — Baron,” I turned impetuously to him, “I must apply to you. You must — you are bound to protect me.”
But the Baron, toying with a paper knife which he had taken from the table, only looked grave. “ I am afraid that Gruner is within his rights,” he said slowly. “ And I am afraid, too, that he is wise, my friend. To begin with, I do not believe that you could effect anything or discover anything. And you would be running a risk, and I think a considerable risk, for nothing. For consider, if our friend here with his network of agents, his many connections and his power of control cannot get to the bottom of this mystery how should you — a foreigner and single-handed, my friend? Frankly, it is out of the q
uestion — it is absurd!”
“But I am determined to try,” I said.
The silent man shook his head.
The Baron also shook his big bald head. “You might try,” he said. “And if that were all, though you would certainly fail, no harm would be done, Cartwright. But that is not all. What the Oberst Offizier means is that he does not want—”
“And is not going to have,” Gruner put in sourly.
“Another disappearance and a fresh scandal. It is his duty now to see you safely — safely, my friend — out of the country. And I am afraid that he is determined to do it.”
“But he might send an agent with me,” I remonstrated. “That would effectually secure my safety. You do not suppose that the villains who murdered poor Ellis would dare to come into the open again and murder me?”
“It is not of them I am thinking,” Gruner muttered, his eyes on the floor, “ though there is risk on that side.” The Baron nodded. “Yes,” he said. “Perhaps a good deal — if they thought that you were on their track. But it is not of them, Cartwright, that our friend is thinking. I will tell you what is in his mind. Suppose that by some wonderful turn of good fortune you recovered these precious papers — of which I confess I am sick of hearing! Will that suit Klatz’s employers? Have you thought of that?”
“The French?”
“Just so,” said the Baron, with his eyes on the door. Gruner shook his head in reprobation of the other’s candour. “This is waste of time,” he said, “ just waste of time, Herr Baron. This gentleman must be at Hamburg in four days. That is my last word.”
“Yes, I am afraid that that is the last word, Cartwright,” Bronberg agreed. “Gruner means you well — he means you well, I assure you, but I can understand his anxiety to see the last of you. Now that you are found the Prussian authorities are responsible for your safety, and circumstances might arise, if you did what you propose, which would make their task — embarrassing.”
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 691