If he wanted revenge for my last remark, he had it.  I looked at the girl beside me, so watchfully composed and fearless, then at the fixed, terrified glare of the motionless Marie-Jeanne.  With a little rudimentary intelligence on my part this situation would have been spared us.

“Yes,” I acknowledged bitterly; “I did.”

“Except for that,” he grinned, “it went like clockwork.  There wasn’t even enough danger in the thing to give it spice.  Do you know, there isn’t a capital in Europe where I can’t get disguises, money, passports within twelve hours if I want them.  Oh, you have a bit to learn about us, you people on the other side!  I’ve crossed the ocean four times since the war started; I’ve been in London, Rome, Paris, Petrograd—­pretty much everywhere.  I’m getting homesick, though.  The laissez-passer I’ve picked up, or forged, no matter which, takes me straight through to the Front; and I’ve got friends even in the trenches.  Before the Frenchies know it I’ll be across no-man’s-land and inside the German lines!”

For a moment, as I listened, I was dangerously near admiring him.  He was certainly exaggerating; but it couldn’t all be brag.  The life of this spy of the first water, of international fame, must be rather marvelous; to defy one’s enemies with success, to journey calmly through their capitals, to stroll undetected among their agents of justice—­were not things any fool could do.  He carried his life in his hand, this Franz von Blenheim.  He had courage; he even had genius along his special lines.  His impersonation on the liner, shrewd, slangy, coarse-grained, patronizing, had been a triumph.  Then, suddenly, I remembered a murdered boy beside whom I had knelt that morning, and my brief flicker of homage died.

“You think I can’t do it, eh?” He had misinterpreted my expression.  “Well, let me tell you I did just a year ago and got over without a scratch.  To get across no-man’s-land you have to play dead, as you Yankees put it; you lie flat on the ground and pull yourself forward a foot at a time and keep your eye on the search-lights so that when they come your way you can drop on your face and lie like a corpse until they move on.  It’s not pleasant, of course; but in this game we take our chances.  And now I think I’ll be claiming my winnings if you please.”

I straightened in my chair, recognizing a crisis.  With his last phrase he had shed the bearing of Mr. John Van Blarcom, and from the disguise all in an instant there emerged the Prussian, insolent, overbearing, fixing us with a look of challenge, and addressing us with crisp command.  No; the kaiser’s agent was not a figure of romance or of adventure.  He was a force as able, as ruthless, as cruel as the land he served.

“Miss Falconer,” he demanded briefly, “where are those papers?  I am not to be played with, I assure you.  If you think I am, just recall this morning, and your chauffeur.  We didn’t kill him for the pleasure of it; he had his chance as you have.  But when we went for our car he was there in the garage, sleeping; he seemed to think we had designs on him, and tried to rouse the inn.”