“Aha!” cried Mr. van Hoorn. “Your sweetheart’s getting impatient. She wants you to go back to her.”
I tore open the envelope, unfolded the paper. The message was only three words:
Please return immediately.
I read it over several times. I smiled. “As a matter of fact,” I told Mr. van Hoorn, “you’re quite right. She does.” The telegram was signed “Ludwig.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Something had happened to Arthur. That much was obvious. Otherwise, if he’d wanted me, he’d have sent for me himself. And the mess he was in, whatever it was, must have something to do with the Party, since Bayer had signed the tele—
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gram. Here my reasoning came to an end. It was bounded by guesses and possibilities as vague and limitless as the darkness which enclosed the train. Lying in my berth, I tried to sleep and couldn’t. The swaying of the coach, the clank of the wheels kept time with the excited, anxious throbbing of my heart. Arthur, Bayer, Margot, Schmidt; I tried the puzzle backwards, sideways, all ways up. It kept me awake the whole night.
Years later it seemed, though actually only the next afternoon, I let myself into the flat with the latchkey; quickly pushed open the door of my room. In the middle of it sat Frl. Schroeder, dozing, in the best armchair. She had taken off her slippers and was resting her stockinged feet on the footstool. When one of her lodgers was away, she often did this. She was indulging in the dream of most landladies, that the whole place was hers.
If I had returned from the dead, she could hardly have uttered a more piercing scream on waking and seeing my figure in the doorway.
“Herr Bradshaw! How you startled me!”
“I’m sorry, Frl. Schroeder. No, please don’t get up. Where’s Herr Norris?”
“Herr Norris?” She was still a bit dazed. “I don’t know, I’m sure. He said he’d be back about seven.”
“He’s still living here, then?”
“Why, of course, Herr Bradshaw. What an idea!” Frl. Schroeder regarded me with astonishment and anxiety. “Is anything the matter? Why didn’t you let me know that you were coming home sooner? I was going to have given your room a thorough turn-out tomorrow.”
“That’s perfectly all right. I’m sure everything looks very nice. Herr Norris hasn’t been ill, has he?”
“Why, no.” Frl. Schroeder’s perplexity was increasing with every moment. “That is, if he has he hasn’t said a word about it to me, and he’s been up and about from morning to midnight. Did he write and tell you so?”
“Oh no, he didn’t do that … only … when I went
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away I thought he looked rather pale. Has anybody rung up for me or left any messages?”
“Nothing, Herr Bradshaw. You remember, you told all your pupils you would be away until the New Year.”
“Yes, of course.”
I walked over to the window, looked down into the dank, empty street. No, it wasn’t quite empty. Down there, on the corner, stood a small man in a buttoned-up overcoat and a felt hat. He paced quietly up and down, his hands folded behind his back, as if waiting for a girl friend.
“Shall I get you some hot water?” asked Frl. Schroeder tactfully. I caught sight of myself in the mirror. I looked tired, dirty and unshaved
“No, thank you,” I said, smiling. “There’s something I’ve got to attend to first. I shall be back in about an hour. Perhaps you’d be so kind and heat the bath?”
‘Tes, Ludwig’s here,” the girls in the outer office at the Wilhelmstrasse told me. “Go right in.”
Bayer didn’t seem in the least surprised to see me. He looked up from his papers with a smile.
“So here you are, Mr. Bradshaw! Please sit down. You have enjoyed your holiday, I hope?”
I smiled.
“Well, I was just beginning to …”
“When you got my telegram? I am sorry, but it was necessary, you see.”
Bayer paused; regarded me thoughtfully; continued:
“I’m afraid that what I have to say may be unpleasant for you, Mr. Bradshaw. But it is not right that you are kept any longer in ignorance of the truth.”
I could hear a clock ticking somewhere in the room; everything seemed to have become very quiet. My heart was thumping uncomfortably against my ribs. I suppose that I half guessed what was coming.
“You went to Switzerland,” Bayer continued, “with a certain Baron Pregnitz?”
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Tes. That’s right.” I licked my lips with my tongue.
“Now I am going to ask you a question which may seem that I interfere very much in your private affairs. Please do not be offended. If you do not wish it, you will not answer, you understand?”
My throat had gone dry. I tried to clear it, and made an absurdly loud, grating sound.
“I’ll answer any question you like,” I said, rather huskily.
Bayer’s eyes brightened approvingly. He leant forward towards me across the writing-table.
“I am glad that you take this attitude, Mr. Bradshaw… . You wish to help us. That is good… . Now, will you tell me, please, what was the reason which Norris gave you that you should go with this Baron Pregnitz to Switzerland?”
Again I heard that clock. Bayer, his elbows resting on the table, regarded me benevolently, with encouraging attention. For the second time, I cleared my throat.
“Well,” I began, “first of all, you see …”
It was a long, silly story, which seemed to take hours to tell. I hadn’t realized how foolish, how contemptible some of it would sound. I felt horribly ashamed of myself, blushed, tried to be humorous and weakly failed, defended and then accused my motives, avoided certain passages, only to blurt them out a moment later, under the neutral inquisition of his friendly eyes. The story seemed to involve a confession of all my weaknesses to that silent, attentive man. I have never felt so humiliated in my life.
When, at last, I had finished, Bayer made a slight movement.
“Thank you, Mr. Bradshaw. All this, you see, is very much as we had supposed… . Our workers in Paris know this Mr. van Hoorn already very well. He is a clever man. He has given us much trouble.”
“You mean … that he’s a police agent?”
“Unofficially, yes. He collects information of all kinds and sells it to those who will pay him. There are many who do
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this but most of them are quite stupid and not dangerous at all.”
“I see… . And van Hoorn’s been making use of Norris to collect information?”
“That is so. Yes.”
“But how on earth did he get Norris to help him? What story did he tell him? I wonder Norris wasn’t suspicious.”
In spite of his gravity, Bayer’s eyes showed a sparkle of amusement.
“It is possible that Norris was most suspicious indeed. No. You have misunderstood me, Mr. Bradshaw. I have not said that van Hoorn deceived him. That was not necessary.”
“Not necessary?” I stupidly echoed.
“Not necessary. No … Norris was quite aware, you see, of what van Hoorn wanted. They understood each other very well. Since Norris returned to Germany, he has been receiving regularly sums of money through van Hoorn from the French Secret Service.”
“I don’t believe it!”
“Nevertheless, it is true. I can prove it, if you wish. Norris has been paid to keep an eye on us, to give information about our plans and movements.” Bayer smiled and raised his hand, as if to anticipate a protest. “Oh, this is not so terrible as it sounds. The information which he had to give was of no importance. In our movement, we have not the necessity to make great plots, as are described of us in the capitalist Press and the criminal romances. We act openly. It is easy for all to know what we do. It is possible that Norris can have been able to tell his friends the names of some of our messengers who are going frequently between Berlin and Paris. And, perhaps, also, certain addresses. But this can have been only at the first.”