OCR Text |
Show ing IjOHimy By George A. Birmingham Copyright by Bobbs-Mci rill Co. W. N. U. Service er the existence of a Mrs. Heard would be another obstacle. If Calypso objected ob-jected to a mnn who was engaged to he married, she might very well object ob-ject even more strongly to a man who had been married for at least seven yea rs. CHAPTER XV The princess. Janet Church and Tommy snt at lunch on the third day after their arrival in Breslau. Thanks to the kind's Influence with the manager man-ager of I he hotel, they had a very pleasant table, placed In a bow window win-dow from which they had a view of the town's market place. A large motor car drove slowly across the square ami pulled up at the door of the hotel. The driver was remarkable. He wore a high cap of black fur with two long black ribbons hanging from the back of it. a brown overcoat, double-breasted and adorned with great silver buttons. The collar and cuffs of the coat were of curly black fur. Even while he sat at the steering wheel it could be seen that he was a very big man. probably tall, certainly broad and strongly built. A thick black mustache covered his mouth. He had heavy eyebrows which met across his forehead. His face was uliuost mahogany-colored. Tommy stared at him with interest and pointed hiiu out to the princess. 111 lie took the passports ont of his pockets and handed them over. The oflicer scrutinized them carefully. He appeared to read through all the vlsat and to examine nil the official stamps. At last he fixed his eyes on the photograph. pho-tograph. As a rule, passport photographs photo-graphs are' totally useless for the purposes pur-poses of Identification and might just as well represent any one else. But Colonel Heard had a heavy mustache. Tommy was clean shaved. The oflicer of-licer looked at the photograph, looked at Tommy, looked at the photograph and became suspicious. Mrs. Heard was a plump, good-natured lady of about forty-five, with ' round cheeks, a double chin and fuzzy hair. The oflicer looked at her photo and compared It with Janet's lean face and sinewy neck. ,Then he tr.ied to see If It In any way resemble ''alyp-so. ''alyp-so. It did not. "These are not your passports." he said. Tommy was actually uncomfort- j able; but he was not yet desperate. The officer was not searching for Colonel Col-onel Heard's passports. He was merely mere-ly looking out for suspicious travelers. travel-ers. It was possible that a bold attempt at-tempt at bluff might cow the man. "Here," he said, "I've had about enough of this tomfoolery. Hand over those passports at once and let us get away out of this." The man did not understand a word that was said to him, hut he was impressed im-pressed by the confidence with which Tommy spoke. He might possibly have given back the passports, if the princess had not tried a plan of her own for getting away. She Ipaned forward and whispered to the driver of her car. The man stepped out of the car and stood, a huge and threatening figure, in front of the oflicer. He deliberately unbuttoned his long overcoat, (lung It open and displayed a whole row of weapons tucked into his belt. There were two large pistols, silver mounted, mount-ed, with very long barrels. They looked as If they might be of some value as antiques. There was also a heavy modern revolver which was certainly cer-tainly valuable as a weapon of offense. of-fense. There were five large knives, two of them straight and pointed like daggers, the other three curved in a manner that struck Tommy as horribly horri-bly murderous. These were evidently the man's favorite weapons. His fingers fin-gers closed round the handle of one of them. But the police officer was a man of courage. Ho had, besides, help at hand. From various parts of the market mar-ket square tmiformed men appeared, all of them with swords, some of them with revolvers. They gathered round the group in front of the hotel. The swarthy driver was not at all dismayed. His heavy eyebrows were slightly raised. The eyes under them shone with a joyful anticipation of battle. He gripped his revolver with his left hand. His right hand held over the curved knife. Tommy was frightened. A fight In the streets of Breslau might end In a victory for the German police, or It might end that seemed almost probable prob-able In a victory for the militant chnuffeur. Either way Tommy and his party would get Into serious trouble. trou-ble. "Look here, he said to the officer, "if you don't believe we're the people we say we are, send In to the hotel and nsk for Mr. Allen. He'll Identify us." The officer, who did not understand a word Tommy said, stared at him angrily. "Oh, hang it," said Tommy. "Why, can't the fool understand plain English? Eng-lish? Say It to him," he turned to Janet, "in German or some language he does understand. And at the same time tell this swashbuckler to stop fiddling with his revolver and get back into the car." Janet, who was quite as frightened as Tommy was. began with the orders to the chauffeur. She gave them in German, and the man took no notice of them at all. lie understood German Ger-man no better than the oflicer understood under-stood English. "You tell him," said Tommy to the princess. Calypso spoke to the man in a language lan-guage which sounded as If several hungry ducks were quacking, all at the same time. ' The- man replied with a number of deep bass quacks, which sounded threatening. Calypso quacked back at him. The man bowed low, to her, kissed her hand, and stepped hack into the car. (TO BE CONTINUED.) CHAPTER XIV Continuad 19 In the end Tommy got out of his illiculty In a way which struck him s neat. He led Allen across the dining din-ing room at luncheon next day and brought him to the table where the princess and Janet sat. "Allow me to Introduce Mr. Allen lo fou," he said. Then, turning to Allen, he murmured: "My wife, and my lecretary, Miss Gisborne." That left Allen to decide for hiin-seif hiin-seif which was the wife and which the secretary. He was puzzled. He looked at Janet and then at Tommy. He looked at Calypso, and thought of his sister and the other unruly maidens maid-ens In the canteen. At last lie decided de-cided In favor of Janet. "I want to thank you." he said to her, "for all your kindness to ray sister." sis-ter." Janet took that very well. She bad been kind, after her own fashion, to so many different people that she could not possibly recollect them all. She Inquired graciously for.. Miss Allen, Al-len, and received an account of her marriage to a young otlicer she had met at the canteen. The Introduction passed off surprisingly surpris-ingly well ; but Tommy was by no means done with Allen. That evening eve-ning they met again. "Ever see any of the fellows from the old regiment nowadays?" said Allen. Tommy would have been glad to know what the old regiment was. He wished very much that he had thought of asking Casimir and the king for a little more Information before he undertook un-dertook to be Colonel Heard. "I ran into Simpson the other day," said Allen. "You remember Soapy Simpson and the old Frenchwoman in the rest billets behind Givenchy." "Rather," said Tommy heartily, "that's how he got the name Soapy, wasn't It?" "Was it?" he said., "But there wasn't any soap in that business, was there?" "It may have been cheese," said Tommy. "One gets confused about these things." j "Oh," said Allen, "you're thinking of Collins. They always said it was on account of that cheese that you recommended rec-ommended Collins for the D. S. O." "That," said Tommy, "is a gross Blunder. As a matter of fact, Collins' recommendation for the D. S. O. went In before any one beard a word about the cheese." He felt that he owed that much to Colonel Heard's reputation. Whatever Collins had done about the cheese, whether he had eaten it, refrained from eating It, stolen It, or baited a mousetrap with It, no conscientious colonel would have recommended him for a D. S. O. on that account alone. "Oddly enough," said Allen, "I heard from Collins the other day. I suppose sup-pose you know he married that little red-haired V. A. D. who used to be at Wimereux." "I always expected he would," said Tommy, "though in my opinion she was a great deal too good for him. I can't imagine what any girl could see In Soapy Simpson?" "It was Collins who married her, not Simpson. Did I say Simpson?" "Oh, Collins," said Tommy. "That's different, of course. What's Collins doing now?" "He and she are running a chicken farm in Monte Carlo." said Allen, "making quite a good thing out of it, I believe." ' After that Tommy escaped and went to bed. But Allen came at him again the next morning. He bad a passion for reminiscence, and seemed to have known every siugle officer in "the old regiment" except Colonel Heard himself. him-self. Young Bright had come to grief over a dud check which he cashed in a night club in London. Tommy expressed ex-pressed great regrei for his fate. Pfwir Styles was still limping about and would never get back the use of bis leg. Tommy regretted that, too. After a while Allen got hack to the subject of his sister, and Mrs. Heard and the canteen. "She'll be surprised when I tell her I've met Mrs. Heard out here." said Allen. "That last letter I had from her she said she'd been invited to meet Mrs. Heard at a teaparty somewhere some-where in Kensington. Unfortunately she couldn't go." "That must have teen a long while ago," said Tommy. "Nit so long." said Allen. "1 only got the letter last week " "If your sister had gone to that tea-party," tea-party," said Tommy, "she wouldn't have mot my wife. She's been out here for the last six months." That, he felt, ought to pur a stop 1 to any chance meeting in London he-I he-I tween Mrs. Hoard and Miss Allen, j whose name of course was not Allen i any longer, for she had married an of-) of-) ticer whom she met in the canteen a thing which showed that Mrs. Heard had not kept a light enough hand over her. Tommy went to bed very well sar-IsRed sar-IsRed with himself. It had proved surprisingly easy to play the part of CoIodc Heard. It would, no doubt, have oeen equally easy to' play thai af Lord Norheys. He began to feel sorry that he had not done so instead in-stead of claiming his own name and position. Then he remembered Miss Temple and felt glad that he had re-ruseu re-ruseu to be Lonl Norheys. Miss Tem-;.ie Tem-;.ie would, apparently, have been a nopeless obstacle to his marriage with Calypso He wondered a little wheth- A Large Motor Car Drove Slowly Across the Square and Pulled Up at the Door of the' Hotel. The moment she saw him she jumped to her feet anil clapped her hands In excitement and delight. "It's Sandor," she said, "Sfndor from the schloss. He. has come to take ine home." Tommy realized that they wer? entering en-tering a new stage of their adventure, that the journey into Lystria was to begin. They hurried over luncheon. They spent half an hour In frenzied packing. pack-ing. Hotel porters dragged down bags anil rugs. The little party gathered in- the porch of the hotel. But the start was delayed. An official in uniform, perhaps a policeman, po-liceman, perhaps a military officer, appeared ap-peared from the room of the hotel manager, and walked up to Tommy. He halted, saluted and in a long speech asked to he allowed to see the passports of the party. Tommy did not understand anything the man said except the word passport. That made him uneasy. Breslau is not a frontier town. The examination of travelers' passports there is unusual, and in most cases unnecessary. Tommy turned to Janet. "Is it our passports lie wants?" Janet, who knew she was traveling with a stolen passport, became nervous. nerv-ous. She spoke to the oflicer had-tem-peredly, asking him what right he bad to inspect their passports. It was the worst thing she could have done. Her nervous irritation aroused the man's suspicions. Her question did not frighten him. at all. His uniform gave him a right to do almost anything lie chose. "(.'ome on.", said Calypso. "We can't stand here all day." She seized Janet Church by . the arm and pulled her into the car. The otlicer hesitated and stepped forward to stop them. He was a shade too late, but he stood between Tommy anil the car. clearly determined that be at least should not get into it. Tommy's mind worked quickly. One of two things had happened. Perhaps Colonel Hoard bad discovered the loss of his passports and set the German police looking for them. In that case Tommy saw no hope at all for himself him-self and his party. -Colonel Heard's passports w-ould be recognized at once. But perhaps it was Prince von Stein-veldt Stein-veldt who had set the police in motion. mo-tion. He might have changed his mind about leaving Tommy free to go where he liked. He might not care to run the risk of allowing the princess to enter Lystria. Eut he would a n know wuat passports the party held. It might be possible to persuade this troublesome officer that he was Colonel Col-onel Heard and that the two ladies I were tits wife and secretary. |