E. Phillips Oppenheim - 21 Greatest Spy Thrillers in One Premium Edition (Mystery & Espionage Series)

“Why are you so difficult?” she asked. “You do not like me, perhaps?”

“On the contrary,” he assured her, “I like you very much. I find you very attractive but far too distracting.”

“How distracting?” she demanded.

“Because, as we all know—you and I and the others—” he went on, “love-making is not part of our present scheme of life. It might complicate it. It would not help.”

“All the time you reason,” she complained. “It is not much that I ask. I make no vows. I ask for none. I should like very much, as we say in Germany, to walk hand in hand with you a little way in life.”

“To share my life,” he reflected, “my thoughts, and my work—yes?”

There was a tinge of colour in her cheeks.

“Leave off thinking,” she cried almost passionately. “Many men have lost the sweetest things in life through being choked with suspicions. Cannot you—”

There was commotion outside. The opening of a door, heavy footsteps, a thundering knocking at the inner door flung open almost immediately. Krust entered, out of breath, his clothes disarranged with travel, yet with something of triumph dancing in his blue eyes. He was carrying his heavy spectacles, he flung his hat upon the table and struggled with his coat.

“My friend,” he exclaimed, “and little Greta! Good. I wanted to speak to you both. Listen. I have talked with Berati.”

“You are to go to Rome?” Fawley demanded.

“I have abandoned the idea,” Krust declared. “For the moment, it is not necessary. There is another thing more important. I say to Berati—‘Give me a trusted agent, let him visit the places I shall mark down, let him leave with me for three days in Berlin and then let him report to you. No rubbish from inspired newspapers with Jew millionaires behind them. The truth! It is there to be seen. Give me the chance of showing it.’ I spoke of you, Fawley, indefinitely, but Berati understood. Oh, he is swift to understand, that man. To-morrow you will have your word. To-morrow night you will leave for Germany. I ask pardon—for half an hour I spoke on the private wire at the Royal Hôtel in San Remo. From there I jump into the car and we have driven, I can tell you that we have driven! You excuse?”

A waiter had entered the room with two bottles of beer in ice pails and a large tumbler. Krust filled it to the brim, threw back his head and drank. He set down the glass empty.

“It is good news which I bring?” he asked Fawley anxiously. “You are satisfied to come?”

Fawley’s eyes travelled for a moment to the dark line of mountains beyond Roquefort. There had been rumours that the French were combing the whole Principality, looking for a spy. Monsieur Carlotti had spoken of it lightly enough, but with some uneasiness. Fawley tapped a cigarette upon the table and lit it.

“A visit to Germany just now,” he admitted, “should be interesting.”

* * * * *

Krust in his own salon an hour later looked curiously across the room to where Greta was standing, an immovable figure, at the open window. He had rested and eaten since his journey, but there were unusual lines in his smooth face and his expression of universal benevolence had disappeared. Greta half turned her head. Her tone was almost sullen.

“You had success with our impenetrable friend?” Krust asked.

“I did my best,” she replied. “You came back too soon.”

Table of Contents

On his way down to the quay the next morning Fawley read again the note which had been brought to him with his morning coffee. It was written on the Hôtel de France note paper but there was no formal commencement or ending.

I am very anxious to talk to you privately but not in the hotel, where you seem to have become surrounded by an entourage which I mistrust. One of my friends has a small yacht here—the Sea Hawk —lying on the western side of the harbour. Will you come down and see me there at half-past eleven this morning? It is very, very important, so do not fail me. E.

The horse’s hoofs clattered noisily on the cobbled road fringing the dock. Fawley slowly returned the letter to his pocket. It seemed reasonable enough. The Sea Hawk was there, all right—a fine-looking schooner yacht flying the pennant of an international club and the German national flag. Fawley paid the cocher and dismissed him, walked down the handsome gangway and received the salute of a heavily built but smartly turned-out officer.

“It is the gentleman whom Madame la Princesse is expecting?” the man enquired, with a strong German accent. “If the gnädiger Herr will come this way.”

Fawley followed the man along the deck to the companionway, descended a short flight of stairs and was ushered into a large and comfortable cabin fitted up as a sitting room.

“I will fetch the Princess,” his guide announced. “The gentleman will be so kind as to repose himself and wait.”

Fawley subsided into an easy-chair and took up a magazine. In the act of turning over the pages, however, he paused suddenly. For a moment he listened. Then he rose to his feet and, crossing the room swiftly, tried the handle of the door. His hearing, which was always remarkably good, had not deceived him. The door was locked! Fawley stood back and whistled softly under his breath. The affair presented itself to him as a magnificent joke. It was rather like Elida, he decided, with her queer dramatic gestures. He pressed the bell. There was no response. Suddenly a familiar sound startled him—the anchors being drawn up. The Diesel engines were already beating rhythmically. A moment or two later they were moving. The grimmer lines in his face relaxed. A smile flickered at the corners of his lips.

“Abducted,” he murmured.

He looked out of the porthole and gazed at the idlers on the quay from which they were gliding away. There was a pause, a churning of the sea and a swing around. The Sea Hawk was evidently for a cruise. She passed out of the harbour and her course was set seawards. Fawley lit a cigarette and took up a magazine. It appeared to him that this was a time for inaction. He decided to let events develop. In due course, what he had expected happened—there was a knock at the door of the very luxurious and beautifully decorated green-and-gold cabin in which he was confined. Fawley laid down his magazine and listened. The knock was

repeated—a pompous, peremptory sound, the summons of the conqueror in some mimic battle determined to abide by the grim courtesies of warfare.

“Come in!” Fawley invited.

There was the sound of a key being turned. The door was opened. A tall, broad-shouldered man with sunburnt cheeks and a small, closely cropped yellow moustache presented himself. He was apparently of youthful middle age, he wore the inevitable mufti of the sea—blue serge, double-breasted jacket, grey flannel trousers and white shoes. He had the bearing of an aristocrat discounted by a certain military arrogance.

“Major Fawley, I believe?” he enquired.

“You have the advantage of me, sir,” was the cool reply.

“My name is Prince Maurice von Thal,” the newcomer announced. “I have come for a friendly talk.”

“Up till now,” Fawley observed, “the element of friendliness seems to have been lacking in your reception of me. Nevertheless,” he added, “I should be glad to hear what you have to say.”

“Monte Carlo just now is a little overcrowded. You understand me, I dare say.”

“I can guess,” Fawley replied. “But who are you? I came to visit the Princess Elida di Vasena.”

“The Princess is on board. She is associated with me in our present enterprise.”

Fawley nodded.