“I am waiting!”

Clubfoot’s voice broke stridently upon the silence.

Should I tell him the truth now?

It was three minutes to the hour.

“Come!  The two addresses!”

I would keep faith to the last.

“Herr Doktor!” I faltered.

He dashed the pencil down on the table and sprang to his feet.  He caught me by the lapels of my coat and shook me in an iron grip.

“The addresses, you dog!” he said.

The clock whirred faintly.  There was a knock at the door.

“Come in!” roared Clubfoot and resumed his seat.

The clock was chiming twelve.

An officer stepped in briskly and saluted.

It was Francis!...  Francis, freshly shaved, his moustache neatly trimmed, a monocle in his eye, in a beautifully waisted grey military overcoat, one white-gloved hand raised in salute to his helmet.

“Hauptmann von Salzmann!” ... he introduced himself, clicking his heels and bowing to Clubfoot, who glared at him, frowning at the interruption.  He spoke with the clipped, mincing utterance of the typical Prussian officer.  “I am looking for Herr Leutnant Schmalz,” he said.

“He is not in,” answered Clubfoot in a surly voice.  “He is out and I am busy ...  I do not wish to be disturbed.”

“As Schmalz is out,” the officer returned suavely, advancing to the desk, “I must trouble you for an instant, I fear.  I have been sent over from Goch to inspect the guard here.  But I find no guard ... there is not a man in the place.”

Clubfoot angrily heaved his unwieldy bulk from his chair.

“Gott im Himmel!” he cried savagely.  “It is incredible that I can never be left in peace.  What the devil has the guard got to do with me?  Will you understand that I have nothing to do with the guard!  There is a sergeant somewhere ... curse him for a lazy scoundrel ...  I’ll ring ...”

He never finished the sentence.  As he turned his back on my brother to reach the bell in the wall, Francis sprang on him from behind, seizing his bull neck in an iron grip and driving his knee at the same moment into that vast expanse of back.

The huge German, taken by surprise, crashed over backwards, my brother on top of him.

It was so quickly done that, for the instant, I was dumbfounded.

“Quick, Des, the door!” my brother gasped.  “Lock the door!”

The big German was roaring like a bull and plunging wildly under my brother’s fingers, his clubfoot beating a thunderous tattoo on the parquet floor.  In his fall Clubfoot’s left arm had been bent under him and was now pinioned to the ground by his great weight.  With his free right arm he strove fiercely to force off my brother’s fingers as Francis fought to get a grip on the man’s throat and choke him into silence.

I darted to the door.  The key was on the inside and I turned it in a trice.  As I turned to go to my brother’s help my eye caught sight of the butt of my pistol lying where Schmalz had thrown it the evening before under my overcoat on the leather lounge.