For the second time to-day a heavy hand slapped him upon the back and a voice boomed in his ear.
“Falken! Still speaking to your old friends? Or are you waiting to dine with the Fuehrer?”
It was Hegger again. Otto did his best to be polite—but it must have been a poor attempt, for soon the man edged away and was caught up by other companions. Otto stayed where he was—and people left him alone. . . .
The press began to thin. In twos and fours, and even singly, officers began to leave. Otto, still wrapped in the impalpable dream-sensations, did not notice their going until he realized that the room was already three-fourths empty.
He was startled. He began to think, untidily. He had four weeks’ leave and no idea what he was going to do with it. He did not know many people in Berlin. He went so far as to wonder whether Hegger were still around. He turned his head to look for him—and felt a light touch upon his shoulder.
He turned to find himself—all six feet and more of him—looking up into the grey, lined face of a towering man in S.S. uniform with badges which, although unfamiliar to Otto, seemed certainly to be those of exalted rank.
“Captain Falken?” said this person.
Otto nodded, trying to keep bewilderment from his eyes.
“Follow me, please.” The man turned and strode away.
Otto followed—not towards the entrance which he and his fellows had used, but to another door, in the rear of the room, which was covered by a heavy curtain bearing golden swastikas upon a background of black velvet. . . .
Behind this door was a dark, narrow passageway dimly lit by yellow bulbs. His guide’s feet rang echoingly ahead of him—and Otto followed. Under the tonic of this mystery his mind was functioning almost at its normal and decisive speed.
At the end of the passageway was another door—and they passed through it into a little high-walled court-yard. There was a car there, with a nondescript, hunched-over man behind the wheel. Its engine was running. It was a black limousine, and blinds were down over its windows.
The S.S. officer opened the tonneau door. “Get in, please,” he said.
Otto paused with one foot upon the running board. This was too much. He said:
“Where are we going? And what for?”
The thin-lipped mouth of the escort twisted in what was doubtless meant to be a smile. “You are not under Arrest, Captain. Important personages wish the pleasure of your company.”
Otto did not answer the smile, and he did not move to enter the car. In silence, he looked steadily into the other’s eyes.
“I have orders,” said the man. He put a hand to his breast pocket and produced a folded paper. He smiled again.
Otto made up his mind. He waved aside the paper and climbed into the car and sank into its soft upholstery.
The S.S. officer climbed in beside him, slamming the door. The car started—and Otto saw with surprise that the glass partition behind the driver was curtained like the side-windows. He was in an opaque, luxurious box which at once began to move. . . .
The box came to a standstill. They had driven, Otto judged, for some fifteen minutes. They had twisted and turned on some devious route which might have led them through the heart of Berlin. The driver opened the door on the pavement side; the door nearer Otto.
Otto got out, looking about him curiously. He thought that the street, which he did not know, must be somewhere in the western suburbs. He was before a solid stone house of some size and no distinction, which stood separated by drab strips of garden from other identical houses. The S.S. officer stood beside him and the car drove quietly away.
“Come, please.” His guide opened a squeaky iron gate, and Otto followed him up stone steps to a door which was opened as they reached it and closed as they passed through.
“Wait, please.” His guide disappeared into a door at the far end of the square hall. The manservant who had opened the door walked away without so much as a glance behind him.
Otto surveyed his surroundings with questioning eyes. He was in the entrance hall of what certainly seemed nothing more than the slightly old-fashioned home of some retired businessman of comfortable means and a solid bourgeois taste in decoration. And yet . . .
The tall S.S. man came back—but this time through a door upon the other side of the hall.
“Please,” he said to Otto, and led the way to the door he had first gone through. He opened it and stood aside and closed it again as Otto crossed the threshold into a small book-lined room.
A heavy-set, broad-shouldered man in civilian clothes stood up behind a desk which filled the small bay window. He raised his arm in official salute. “Heil Hitler!”
“Heil Hitler!” Otto returned the greeting.
The man came towards him now with outstretched hand. He said, in a rich, deep voice:
“Captain Falken! I am delighted and honoured to make your acquaintance.” But he did not, as normal manners demanded, give his own name nor make reference to the omission.
Otto took the hand in silence. When he did not know what to say, he always said nothing.
The other regarded him with a benevolent smile. “You are wondering, no doubt. Your mind is full of questions, is it not?” He chuckled. “Who? . . . Why? . . . Where? . . . And what?”
Otto smiled—the chuckle was infectious. He said:
“You mean you’ll give me the answers?”
The chuckle came again, richer than before. “I’m afraid not. But you will have them—and very soon.” He tilted his head on one side and looked up at Otto and the smile left his face. He said:
“Captain Falken, you have already done major service for Germany and the Reich. But you are on the threshold of far greater things!”
He looked steadily at Otto for a moment; then raised a hand and beckoned and crossed to a door in the right-hand wall and threw it open.
“Captain Otto Falken!” he said loudly—and guided Otto over the threshold and closed the door behind him.
This time Otto stood in a large, square room which seemed to contain only three desks and a number of plain wooden chairs. Upon each desk were several telephones, and, upon the wall behind the central desk, a case of gigantic maps. There were three men in the room, all seated. Behind their desks they were a horse-shoe facing Otto. The flanking men behind the smaller desks were in civilian clothes, one bespectacled and bald; the other shaggy-haired with a wild black beard. These two did not rise. But the man behind the big desk—a man in Staff uniform and with the badges of a Generaloberst—got to his feet. His face and name were familiar to Otto, thrillingly familiar. He gave the formal salute—and Otto, very stiff at attention, replied in kind.
The General sat. He said, pointing to a chair in the exact centre of the horse-shoe:
“Sit down, Captain.” It was more order than invitation.
Otto took the chair. He sat stiffly, facing his superior officer, ignoring the civilians.
The General’s eyes, black and polished-looking beneath thin grey brows, surveyed him unfeelingly. There was a long silence. Somewhere a clock was softly ticking: it kept time with the beating of Otto’s heart. He did not let his eyes fall from the General’s and he did not move a muscle in his body.
The General dropped his gaze to a file upon the desk before him. He opened it with a flick of his finger. He began to read out of it—a series of statements which all ended upon a note of interrogation. Throughout his reading he never once raised his eyes to Otto.