*CHAPTER XXX*
*BEFORE BREAKFAST*
Irving dismissed from his mind for the time being the mystery concerningthe middle-aged man in civilian clothes who had followed him through thestreets on two occasions. His fears regarding the incident weredispelled, for he felt that Blau, the intelligence operative on theopposite side of the street, would take care of that matter veryefficiently. Everything was coming his way now, and he in his missionthan he had felt at any other time walked alone; with greater confidenceof success since landing with his parachute.
It was a ten minute walk to the quartermaster's headquarters. At theentrance of the building, his curiosity concerning the game of "shadowchase shadow" which he presumed to be going on behind him was aroused bya sudden reverting of his mind to the subject, and he turned and lookeddown the street by which he had come. There was Blau, half a squareaway, but the "middle-aged man in civilian clothes" was not in sight.
"I wonder if he got onto the fact that somebody was directed to watchhim," Irving mused. "But that ought not to have stopped him. He hadnothing to fear from an agent of another department if he was engaged inlegitimate government business."
The spy delivered his requisition for a soldier's uniform and was givenin turn an order on the supply house and directions how to reach it.Then he left the building and took a car for the place where he was toget his suit.
Blau took the same car, but the "shadow" he had been ordered to "shadow"was not there unless he had disguised himself so successfully thatIrving was unable to recognize him. The operative appeared to besomewhat puzzled, too, but he made no sign of recognition to the soldierin enemy uniform, and the latter maintained a like pretense ofunacquaintance.
An hour later the spy was clad in a first lieutenant's uniform and onhis way back to the hotel. Blau kept within hailing distance of him,but his shadowing seemed to be futile, for the "middle-aged man incivilian clothes" had not appeared in any recognizable guise ordisguise. Indeed, Irving was certain that nobody except the operativehad followed him since he came out of the quartermaster's office andstarted for the store-rooms.
The applicant for an army uniform was required to enlist for service inthe army before it could be supplied. Irving was not surprised at this,but he was very much surprised by the kind of uniform given him. Itbore the insignia of a first lieutenant's rank.
"That's certainly generous on the baron's part," he said to himself. "Idon't understand it. I didn't read his note to the quartermaster, northe quartermaster's order. Maybe they would have afforded someexplanation. Maybe I shall have to earn my rank and meanwhile will goabout like an automobile for which a license has not been issued butbears a tag 'license applied for.' Maybe that's my case here--firstlieutenant's commission applied for. It looks kind of irregular, but Isuppose 'the baron' knows his business. Anyway, mine is a special caseall around, however one looks at it."
When he filled out his enlistment papers, of course Irving signed thename of Adolph Hessenburg, late of Toronto, Canada, and on the "historysheet" that he had to fill out he entered data given him by the boy ofthe original tattooed cubist-art message. Then he was granted the useof a room where he discarded his Canadian uniform and put on his newPrussian military disguise.
He felt that he was disguised now as he at no time had hoped to be sinceplanning his spy expedition into the heart of the kaiser's kingdom. Hesurely must have the full confidence of the Prussian officials with whomhe had come into contact, or he would not have been elevated to themilitary rank and position of trust that now were virtually his.
Irving was particularly pleased with the ease he had experienced inpicking up the idioms of the German language. He had an excellentmemory and scarcely a word or a phrase that was taught to him at schoolor behind the Canadian lines, or that he had heard since landing with aparachute on territory held by the Prussian armies, had failed to make alasting impression on his mind. Moreover, he was very quick to putideas together and in that way get their associated significance; sothat he skillfully "figured out" the meaning of not a few words that hehad never heard before they were used in conversation with him by "thebaron" and other persons with whom he came in contact. And he wasalmost as quick and skillful in his use of those same words for theexpression of his own ideas.
After leaving the quartermaster's supply depot, Irving visited ahaberdashery and bought several suits of underwear, shirts, collars, andsocks, and then returned to the hotel. As he entered his room anddeposited his bundles on the bed a funny thing happened.
He stopped short--true, he could not have gone much farther withoutfalling over the bed, but nevertheless there was a decided "shortness"to his "stop."
"My goodness!" he exclaimed, clapping his hand to his appetite region."I haven't had any breakfast yet."
Which being a sufficiently thrilling climax for the closing of achapter, we will carry the reader over in suspense to the next.
*CHAPTER XXXI*
*AT WORK IN THE SPY OFFICE*
Irving laughed and felt hungrier than ever. The humorous relaxationafforded him great relief from the nervousness of his morning'sactivities, which had been associated enough with doubt and apprehensionto make a coward run and a brave man extremely cautious.
"Well, that's a good one," the young pseudo-boche lieutenant continuedin soliloquy. "Here it's nearly 2 o'clock and I haven't eaten mybreakfast, and meanwhile I'd forgotten all about it. And I'm as hungryas a bear. I wonder if the British blockade has left enough food in thekaiser's kingdom, to fill up the vacuum inside of me. I think I'll goand find out. That'll be worth-while information to carry back to theCanadian commanders."
So out he went to a restaurant two squares away, where he had smalldifficulty in getting all he wanted to eat, the only qualification beingthat he had to pay prices so out of proportion to his income that heinstinctively began to figure out the financial problem of how to makehis salary carry him through to the end of the month.
"I'm starting out too swell," he concluded after several minutes'reckoning. "I'll have to eat at cheaper restaurants and get a cheaperroom. That makes me think I don't know how much my room at the hotel isgoing to cost me; but it's bound to be pretty steep. Anyway, I don'tcare, so long as I can pull through on my salary. I don't want to carryany of this money with me when I go back to the other side of No-Man'sLand."
Irving did not ask how much the hotel was charging for his room. Hemerely announced that he would check out that evening after engagingquarters in a comfortable rooming house in a semi-residence districtnear the Tiergarten. Economy was not the only motive that caused him tomake this move. Being now in German uniform, he reasoned that he mightbe able to throw off of his trail the "middle-aged man in civilianclothes" who had been shadowing him, if he changed his living addressalso. As a further precaution he made this change late in the evening.
Next morning he reported for duty at the office of "Mr. Herrmann" as hehad been instructed by "the baron" to do. Mr. Herrmann proved to be incharge of a suite of offices in the intelligence building in which wereemployed more than a hundred persons, most of them men, varying in agesfrom 20 to 70. Irving, for want of detailed information regarding theirduties, classed them all as clerks, stenographers and typists at firstglance, and this in general was a very good classification, althoughmany of them performed special work that entitled them to rankingpositions of greater dignity. And he had not been employed there morethan two or three days when he learned that half of them held suchranking positions together with salaries proportionate to the grades ofwork they did.
"Can you operate a typewriter?" asked Mr. Herrmann after conducting thenew employe through one large and several smaller work-rooms under hissuperintendence.
"With two fingers," Irving replied with a smile.
"Learned it at home, eh? Well, you won't need a lot of speed. Iunderstand your education i
n German is not very far advanced."
"Not very far," the spy replied.
"Can you read the script?"
"Yes, I can work it out. I know the letters, but they come to me ratherslowly."
"You'll make it all right after a few days' practice. I'm going to setyou at work first copying some translated cipher messages." (The boy'sheart began to thump eagerly, but the thumping became a weaker reflexpattering as the superintendent continued.) "They don't amount to much.We get masses of indifferent material from numerous sources, but we keepit all carefully cataloged, indexed, and cross-indexed several times.Any little insignificant item of information may be worth a good deal tous at any time. That's one secret of the great value of the German spysystem. Now I'll leave you with this budget of communications and letyou work it out with your own intelligence. That's one way we have offinding out what a man is worth."
Irving longed to ask him how he protected such an intricate system ofconcentrated information from leaks that might be of value to the enemy,but wisely refrained.
"I'll find that out by keeping my eyes and ears open," he told himself."I mustn't ask any questions except such as bear directly on my dutiesand are calculated to promote my efficiency."
He sat down at the desk assigned to him and was soon diligently, eagerlyat work. His eagerness, however, was a well-camouflaged secret.
*CHAPTER XXXII*
*A STARTLING RECOGNITION*
For two weeks Irving continued his work in the record offices of thegreat German espionage system. His experiences there during this timewere without special incident, except that they evolved before his minda continuous motion picture of scientific detail far more intricate,comprehensive, and deep-reaching than he could ever have imagined.
There could be no doubt that "the baron," Mr. Herrmann, and the staff ofexperts, clerks, stenographers, and typists looked upon the "parachutehero" as a bona fide fatherland loyalist. The story of his "camouflagedescape" by parachute from an enemy aeroplane to deliver a cryptic-codemessage that he carried all the way from America had circulated amongthem, and the glee with which they commented on his skill and successindicated the intense feeling with which they, one and all, regarded thecause for which the Teutonic race was fighting--the supremacy of theempire founded by Prince Bismarck. Irving discovered also anotherimportant human factor in this relation, namely, that the initiatedmembers of the great spy organization of the central powers coulddiscuss among themselves the secrets of their system without becoming inthe least gossipy; hence, the danger of their inadvertently droppinghints of important state matters never intended for "outside ears" wassmall indeed.
A more secretive group of employes it would be difficult to imagine.Moreover, their secrets seemed to be grouped in sections and degrees.And the most peculiar feature of the whole system, perhaps, was the factthat few instructions were given, defining these sections and degrees.Irving received none himself, and in all the time he was connected withthe bureau he learned of nobody else who had been told what, or whatnot, to do or say in this regard.
"Here seems to be another instance of the requirement of instinctiveunderstanding," he told himself a good many times. "They seem to giveme credit of being an extremely intelligent fellow. Well, I hope Iexceed their estimate of me. If I do, they may find it necessary corevise their system somewhat."
The degrees of secrecy Irving learned in the course of a week or morewere of a graduated character. For instance, he soon discovered that hemight talk about his own work to any and all other members of the force,but all of them outside of his class would not discuss their work withhim. After he was advanced to the next higher grade of work he found,as he had already had reason to suspect, that there were two degrees ofthe great spy system within the "circumscribed freedom" of hisintelligence. This "freedom" was circumscribed by a prohibition,forbidding him to discuss any spy subject to anybody outside the officeexcept on special direction from superior authority.
Irving progressed rapidly in his work. He exhibited such readycomprehension of details and purposes that he was soon marked by theentire office force as a "coming man" in the government secret service.Undoubtedly his spectacular method of transit from the Canadian to theGerman lines helped materially to boost along his growing reputation,but it would also be unfair to put too much emphasis on this feat ofdaring and skill. Irving really deserved much credit for innateability.
In his efforts to create a general feeling of satisfaction andconfidence in order to ward off any suspicions which might ariseregarding his purpose and motives, the young spy did a good many thingsthat almost caused in him a rebellious boiling over of patrioticsentiment. He did much to perfect a filing system that had beenneglected because of illness of the man previously in charge, andoffered a number of suggestions for certain other efficiencyimprovements which brought forth complimentary notice fromSuperintendent Herrmann. But all the time, while doing these things,Irving kept in mind the big purpose of his mission which outmeasured sogreatly in importance his services to the enemy that his feelings ofself-reproach for the aid he was incidentally giving the kaiser's spymachine were short-lived.
Evidently it was the purpose of Mr. Herrmann to advance his spy pupil asrapidly as possible. Undoubtedly he was under orders to do this from"the baron." Although the reason for this method of procedure had notbeen stated in so many words, the understanding seemed to be clearenough that it was the purpose of the department to send him back toAmerica equipped for very important work at an early date.
Three weeks after he entered the office he began to accumulate theinformation for which he had been sent. He then was given access to thecard-index system of the great world-spy organization. It was like acity-library catalog, with references to files of interminable databuried away in metal boxes in a large vault.
In his work with this catalog and files he was associated with a manwhose countenance was strangely familiar to him from the first. Hetried to assume that there was merely a resemblance in the face of thisman to that of some other man he had known on the Canadian front or athome, but such assumption failed to satisfy him. He could not driveaway the feeling that he had met this fellow somewhere since he droppedfrom the sky with a parachute behind the German battle lines, butalthough he studied over the matter for hours while busy with his workhe was unable by such efforts to solve the mystery.
The solution came during a period of relaxation, as the solution of manymysteries come. On the third day since his last advancement in theservice, while making entries on certain catalog cards, there recurredto him a mental picture of his experiences with the unidentified man whohad shadowed him through the streets while he was still in Canadianuniform. Two weeks before he had dismissed this incident from his mind,being convinced that the man had given up his quest, whatever it was.
But the returned picture did not rest long peacefully in his mind. Itwas followed closely by a thrill that almost made him drop the card thathe held in his hand. He looked quickly, almost involuntarily, at hisassociate worker, who was bent over a task at his desk.
Irving knew at once that he was not mistaken. Before him was the"middle-aged man in civilian clothes" who had shadowed him more thanthree weeks before from the intelligence building to the hotel where hewas living and to other places in the city.
*CHAPTER XXXIII*
*A SURPRISING OFFER*
Emil Strauss was the name of Irving's coworker in the card index room.One could hardly say that he was either an agreeable or a disagreeablefellow. He had little to say. It was generally understood that he wasvery efficient in his work and ranked as one of the leading, if not theleading, experts in the department.
Strauss was not a typical Teuton in appearance. Irving thought he lookedas much like an Irishman as a German, that he might have passed foreither or a Swede. He was of medium height, somewhat slender of build,and had a s
mooth, round face, out of which shone two piercing blackeyes--that is, they shone and pierced when the camouflage of heavyeyelashes and eyebrows was lifted. Otherwise one would have noticedalmost everything else about him first.
There was no doubt in Irving's mind as to his identification, but hecaught not even a surreptitious glance of recognition from the fellow atany time. He attended strictly and diligently to his own business, andthe spy did likewise from the moment of his recognition of the man. Hewas determined his new associate should see no evidences of uneasinessin him as a result of this development.
Three days elapsed after Irving's last advancement to the card-catalogdivision, and still the conversations between him and his workingcompanion were of the "yea, yea, nay, nay" character. Finally, however,the boy decided to attempt to draw Strauss into conversation. He didthis by reference to humorous incidents in the war as brought out incartoons and pointed paragraphs in Berlin newspaper and magazines.
He was somewhat surprised, and pleased also, to note that the"middle-aged man in civilian clothes" did not meet his advances withcoldness or indifference. The fellow proved, indeed, to be much morepolite than it had at first seemed possible. He appeared to enjoyIrving's palaver, for the youth was something of a wit, but preferred tolisten rather than talk himself. Finally, however, he grew morecommunicative and manifested something of interest in his associate'spersonal affairs.
"They're telling some great stories about you around here," he said oneday as they were preparing to go out for lunch. It was the first timethey had quit work for the noon hour at the same time. Usually Irvingwent first and his companion went out after he returned, althoughStrauss was virtually "his own boss" and came and went as he chose.