“The Berlin train has gone, Herr Doktor, but...”

“The Berlin train gone?” I said.  “But my business brooks no delay.  I tell you I must be in Berlin to-night!”

“There is no question of your taking the ordinary train, Herr Doktor,” the fat man replied smoothly, “but unfortunately the special which I had ready for you has been countermanded.  I thought you were not coming again.”

A special?  By Jove!  I was evidently a personage of note.  But a special would never do!  Where the deuce was it going to take me?

“The Berlin train was to have been held back until your special was clear,” the Major went on, “but we must stop her at Wesel until you have passed.  I will attend to that at once!”

He gave some order down the telephone and after a brisk conversation turned to me with a beaming face: 

“They will stop her at Wesel and the special will be ready in twenty-five minutes.  But there is no hurry.  You have an hour or more to spare.  Might I offer the Herr Doktor a glass of beer and a sandwich at our officers’ casino here?”

Well, I was in for it this time.  A special bearing me Heaven knows whither on unknown business...!  Perhaps I might be able to extract a little information out of my fat friend if I went with him, so I accepted his invitation with suitable condescension.

The Major excused himself for an instant and returned with my overcoat and bag.

“So!” he cried, “we can leave these here until we come back!” Behind him through the open door I saw a group of officials peering curiously into the room.  As we walked through their midst, they fell back with precipitation.  There was a positive reverence about their manner which I found extremely puzzling.

A waggonette, driven by an orderly, stood in the station yard, one of the Customs officials, hat in hand, at the door.  We drove rapidly through very spick-and-span streets to a little square where the sentry at an iron gate denoted the Officers’ Club.  In the anteroom four or five officers in field-grey uniform were lounging.  As we entered they sprang to their feet and remained stiffly standing while the Major presented them, Hauptmann Pfahl, Oberleutnant Meyer ... a string of names.  One of the officers had lost an arm, another was very lame, the remainder were obvious dug-outs.

“An American gentleman, a good friend of ours,” was the form in which the Major introduced me to the company.  Again I found myself mystified by the extraordinary demonstrations of respect with which I was received.  Germans don’t like Americans, especially since they took to selling shells to the Allies, and I began to think that all these officers must know more about me and my mission than I did myself.  A stolid orderly, wearing white gloves, brought beer and some extraordinary nasty-looking sardine sandwiches which, on sampling, I realized to be made of “war bread.”