But seeing I was free of any physical deformity, to say nothing of the fact that I in no way resembled the clubfooted man I had seen on the platform at Rotterdam, why had the young lieutenant accepted me so readily?  I hazarded the reason to be that he had orders to meet a person who had not been further designated to him except that he would arrive by a certain train.  The Major at the station would be responsible for establishing my bona fides.  Once that officer had turned me over to the emissary, the latter’s sole responsibility consisted in conducting me to the unknown goal to which the special train was rapidly bearing us.  Such are the marvels of discipline!

My companion was, indeed, the model of discretion in everything touching myself and my business.  Curiosity about your neighhour’s affairs is a cardinal German failing, yet the Count manifested not the slightest desire to learn anything about me or my mission to Berlin.  You may be sure that I, for my part, did nothing to enlighten him.  It was not, indeed, in my power to do so.  Yet the young man’s reserve was so marked that I was convinced he had his orders to avoid the topic.

As the train rushed through Westphalia, through busy stations with glimpses of sidings full of trucks loaded to the brim, past towns whose very outlines were blurred by the mirk of smoke from a hundred factory chimneys, my thoughts were busy with that swarthy cripple.  I had broken away from him with one portion of a highly prized document, yet he had made no attempt to have me arrested at the frontier.  Clearly, then, he must still look upon me as an ally and must therefore be yet in ignorance of the identity of the dead man lying in my chamber at the Hotel Sixt.  The friendly guide had told me that the party “combing out” the station at Rotterdam for me did not appear to know what I looked like.

Was it possible, then, that Clubfoot did not know Semlin by sight?

The fact that Semlin had only recently crossed the Atlantic seemed to confirm this supposition.

Then the document.  Semlin had half.  Who had the other half?  Surely Clubfoot....  Clubfoot who was to have called at the hotel that morning to receive what I had brought from England.  Perhaps, after all, my random declaration to the hotel-keeper had not been so far wrong; Clubfoot wanted to take the whole document to Berlin and reap all the laurels at the cost of half the danger and labour.  That would explain his present silence.  He suspected Semlin of treachery, not to the common cause, but to him!

It looked as if I might have a free run until Clubfoot could reach Berlin.  That, unless he also took a special, could not be until the next evening at earliest.  But, more redoubtable than a meeting with the man of power and authority, hung over me, an ever-present nightmare, the interview which I felt awaited me at the end of my present journey ... the interview at which I must render an account of my mission.