STRATEGY
As he rose from the sofa, stretching his arms to ease his cramped
muscles, Guild became conscious that he was very tired.
He had had little sleep the night before and none at all this night. He
glanced at his watch; it was four o'clock in the morning. He went to the
port, unscrewed it, and looked out into pitch darkness. There was not a
light to be seen on the sea, no flare from any headland, no spark which
might indicate a lighthouse, not a star overhead, not a sparkle save for
the splintered reflection of the vessel's own lights running over the
water alongside, through which foaming, curling waves raced and fled
away into the black obscurity astern.
He turned and looked gravely at Karen. The girl still lay unstirring
among the pillows on the sofa. One arm covered her head as though to
shield it from some blow.
He bent beside her, listening to her breathing. It was quiet and
regular, and on her cheek was a flush like the delicate colour of a
sleeping child.
He had no mind to disturb her, yet he could not make her more
comfortable without awaking her.
All he dared do was to unbutton her spats very cautiously, and slip off
the little brown suede shoes.
Over her he laid the blankets from the bed, lightly, then opened wide
the port.
His own toilet for the night was even simpler; he folded together the
batch of damning papers, originals, his own notes, the forged passports,
strapped them with an elastic band, buttoned them inside his breast
pocket, reached over and extinguished the electric globe, and, fully
dressed, lay down on the stripped bed in darkness.
They had been traveling sixteen hours. Allowing for their detention by
the ill-omened _Wyvern_, they should dock at Amsterdam in five or six
hours more.
He tried to sleep; but his nerves were very much alive and his excited
brain refused to subscribe to the body's fatigue.
All that had happened since he first saw Karen Girard he now went
over and over in his mind in spite of himself. He strove to stop
thinking, and could not; and sometimes the lurid horror of the
_Wyvern_ possessed him with all its appalling details made plain to
his imagination--details not visible from the liner's decks, yet perhaps
the more ghastly because hidden by distance and by the infernal glare
that fringed the doomed ship like a very nimbus from hell itself.
This obsessed him, and the villainous information which he had wrested
from the papers which this young girl had been carrying--information
amply sufficient to convict her and to make inevitable the military
execution of the man Grätz and the grinning chauffeur, Bush.
And if the wretched maid, Anna, had been arrested with papers similar to
these on her person, her case, too, was hopeless. Because the very
existence of England depended upon extinguishing forever people who
dealt in secret information like that which lay folded and buttoned
under his belted coat of tweed.
He knew it, knew what his fate must have been had the satchel been
searched on Fresh Wharf--knew what Karen's fate must have been, also,
surely, surely!
And had those papers been taken aboard the _Wyvern_ it had not been very
long before the simplicity of the cipher had been discovered by anybody
trained in code work.
For, in spite of its surface complexity, the cipher was a singularly
simple one, even a stupid code, based on simple principles long known
and understood in all of their hundreds of variations.
And all such ciphers, granted time and patience, could be solved by the
same basic principles. The only function of that kind of code was to so
multiply its intricacies and variations that, with a time limit for
delivery understood, measures could be taken at the other end to
minimize the effect of discovery, the elapsing of the time limit serving
as an automatic warning that message or messenger were under forcible
detention within the enemy's lines.
Yes, it had been a stupid cipher, and an easy one.
A trained man would have solved it in half the time he had required.
Nothing about the message remained really obscure except the Japanese
dancing girl playing with her butterfly and fan, and the lack of
information concerning the "fleet" at anchor or cruising near "Lough
Swilly" on the Irish coast.
As far as the fleet was concerned, Guild was very confident that he
understood. The whereabouts of the British battleship fleet was not
known, had been carefully guarded. Without a doubt Lough Swilly was its
rendezvous; and the German spy system in England had discovered it and
was sending the information to Berlin with a suggestion that submarines
"follow the birds," i. e., take that dotted course around the northern
Scottish coast, slip south into Lough Swilly, and attack the first line
of battle squadron where it had been supposed to lurk in safety,
awaiting its call to action. That was as clear as daylight, but the
Japanese figure he could not understand.
* * * * *
He was utterly unable to sleep. After an hour's staring into the
darkness he rose cautiously, opened the stateroom door and stepped into
the lighted corridor.
Here he lighted a cigarette against regulations and began to pace up and
down.
Presently the sharp nose of a steward detected the aroma of tobacco, and
he came prowling into the corridor.
So Guild nodded and tossed the cigarette out of the open port at the end
of the corridor.
"We ought to dock by nine," he said.
"About nine, sir."
"We're lucky to have run afoul of nothing resembling a mine."
"God, sir! Wasn't it awful about the _Wyvern_! I expect some passenger
steamer will get it yet. Mines by the hundreds are coming ashore on the
coast of Holland."
"Have you had any news by wireless?" asked Guild.
"A little, sir. They've been fighting all night south of Ostend. Also,
we had a wire from London that a German light cruiser, the
_Schmetterling_, is at Valparaiso, and that a Japanese cruiser, the
_Geisha_, and a French one, the _Eventail_, have been ordered after
her."
Guild nodded carelessly, stretched his arms, yawned, and returned to the
stateroom, knowing that now, at last, he was in possession of every item
in the secret document.
For the Japanese dancing girl was the _Geisha_, the fan in her hand was
the French cruiser _Eventail_ and the butterfly fluttering about her was
the German light cruiser _Schmetterling_--which in that agreeable
language means "butterfly," and which no doubt had made an attempt upon
the _Geisha_ and had been repulsed.
And this warning was sent that the _Schmetterling_ had better keep her
distance, because the _Eventail_ had now joined the Japanese ship, and
the two meant mischief.
As for the drawing of the Pike, perhaps on the German naval list there
might have been a vessel named the _Hecht_. He did not know. The symbol
of the most ferocious fresh-water fish in Europe was sufficient to
indicate the nature of the craft even had the flight of the "birds" not
made it unmistakable. There could be no doubt about it that the Hecht
with the three little Hechts following had been explicitly invited to
cruise in the North Sea and have a look-in at Lough Swilly. And that was
quite enough to understand.
* * * * *
He turned on the cabin light, went to Karen's side and looked at her.
She had moved, but only in her sleep apparently. The back of one hand
lay across her forehead; her face was turned upward, and on the flushed
cheeks there were traces of tears.
But she still slept. He arranged her coverings again, stood gazing at
her for a moment more, then he extinguished the light and once more lay
down on the bare mattress, using his arm for a pillow.
But sleep eluded him for all his desperate weariness. He thought of
Grätz and of Bush and of the wretched woman involved by them and now a
prisoner.
The moment he turned over these papers to the British Consul in
Amsterdam the death warrant of Grätz and Bush was signed. He knew that.
He knew also that the papers in his possession were going to be
delivered to British authority. But first he meant to give Grätz and
Bush a sporting chance to clear out.
Not because they had aided him. They cared nothing about him. It was
Karen they had aided, and their help was given to her because of von
Reiter.
No, it was not in him to do the thing that way. Had he been a British
officer on duty it had been hard enough to do such a thing.
As it was he must give them their chance and he knew of only one way to
do it. This point settled he dismissed it from his mind and, with a
slight sigh, permitted his harassed thoughts to lead him where they
seemed always now inclined to lead him when permitted--back to the young
girl he had known only a few hours, but in whose company it seemed to
him that he had already lived a century.
He was not a man given to easy friendships, not a man in whom sensations
were easily stirred. Under ordinary circumstances, perhaps, neither the
youthful beauty of this girl, nor her talents and accomplishments had
stirred him to more than an amiably impersonal interest. He had known
many women and had been friends with a few. But on his part the
friendships had not been sentimental.
Women of all sorts and conditions he had known: fashionable idlers,
professional women, domesticated women; women with ideas, women without
them, busy women with leisure for mischief, mischievous women whose
business was leisure, happy women, unhappy ones, calm ones, restless
ones, clever ones, stupid ones and their even more irritating sisters
who promised to amount to something and never did, all these varieties
of the species he had known, but never a woman like this.
Usually he could place a woman after seeing her move and hearing her
speak. He could only place Karen on a social par with any woman he had
ever known, and he was afraid she didn't belong there, because well-born
German Mädchens don't interne themselves in nun-like seclusion far from
Vaterland, Vater, and maternal apron-strings, with intervals of sallying
forth into the world for a few months' diversion as a professional
actress on the stage.
At least Guild had never heard of any girls who did such things. But
there remained the chance, of course, that Karen Girard was a perfectly
new type to him.
One fact was evident; her father was a Prussian officer and belonged to
the Prussian aristocracy. But gentlemen of these castes do not permit
their daughters the freedom that Karen enjoyed.
There was a mystery about the matter, probably not an agreeable one.
Antecedents, conditions and facts did not agree. There was no logic in
her situation.
Guild realized this. And at the same time he realized that he had never
liked any woman as much--had never come to care for any woman as easily,
as naturally, and as quickly as he had come to care for Karen Girard.
It stirred him now to remember that this young girl had responded,
frankly, fearlessly, naturally; had even met him more than half-way with
a sweet sincerity and confidence that touched him again as he thought of
it.
Truly he had never looked into such honest eyes, or into lovelier
ones,--two clear, violet wells of light. And Truth, who abides in wells,
could not have chosen for her dwelling place habitations more suitable.
She seemed to possess all qualities as well as all accomplishments and
graces of mind and body. The quality of courage was hers--a courage
adorable in its femininity. But there was nothing hard about it, only
firmness--like the white firmness of her skin. And her intuitive
generosity was as quick and melting as the exquisite motives which
prompted it.
Never could he forget that in the dreadful peril of the moment, she had
tried to give him a chance to escape the consequences of his
companionship with her,--had tried to send him ashore at the last moment
so that she alone might remain to face whatever there was confronting
her.
It was a brave thing to do, generous, self-forgetful, merciful, and
finely just. For though she had not tried to deceive him she had
gradually realized that she herself might be deceived, and that she was
in honour bound to warn him concerning her suspicions of the satchel's
contents.
And now--in the end--and after danger was practically over, how did they
stand, he and she? How had they emerged from the snarl of circumstances?
Had his gentle violence killed forever a very wonderful beginning of
what they both had spoken of as friendship? And she--he reddened in the
darkness as he remembered--she had begged him in the name of friendship
not to violate it--had spoken of it, in the excitement of emotion, as
_more_ than friendship.
It had been the most difficult thing he ever had had to do.
Was it true that her friendship had turned to hatred?
He wondered, wondered at the dull unhappiness which the thought brought
with it. And, wondering, fell asleep.
* * * * *
In the grey of dawn Karen sat up, wide-eyed, still tremulous from the
dream of death that had awakened her.
Through the open port a grey sky glimmered. She rose to her knees and
gazed out upon a grey waste of water heaving to the horizon.
Then she turned and looked across at the bed where Guild lay, his blond
head cradled on one arm, asleep.
Her eyes rested on him a long while. Then she caught sight of her shoes
and spats on the floor--looked down at the blankets and covers that had
kept her warm. The next moment her eyes fell on her satchel where it
stood open, the key still in the lock, and her silver toilet articles
glimmering dully inside.
The vague tenderness in her blue eyes vanished; _he_ had done _this_,
too!--shamefully, by force, treading mercilessly on the frail bud of
friendship--ignoring everything, sacrificing everything to a dull,
obstinate determination which he had characterized as duty.
She turned and looked at the man who had done all this, her eyes darkly
beautiful, her lips stern.
Duty? He had not considered the duty she owed. He had not respected her
promise to bring back what had been intrusted to her. And when the
discussion had tired him--when her warnings, pleadings--even her appeals
in the name of the first friendship she had ever given--had been
ignored, he had coolly used violence.
Yes, violence, although, perhaps, the violence had not been very
violent. But it was force--and hateful to her who never before had been
obliged to endure the arrogance which her caste only knew how to
dispense.
"So brauch' Ich Gewalt!" kept ringing in her ears like a very obsession
as she knelt there, sitting back on her own supple limbs, and watching
the sleeping man out of beautiful hostile eyes.
_That_ man! That _American_--or Belgian--whatever he was--with his clear
grey eyes and his short yellow hair and that mouth of his which could be
faintly humorous at times and, at times be so ugly and set--what was
there about him that she liked--or rather _had_ liked?
Not his features; they were only passable from an ornamental point of
view--not his lean but powerful figure, which resembled many other
figures she had seen in England--not his manner particularly--at least
she had seen more deferential attitudes, more polish of the courtly and
continental sort, more empressement.
_What_ was it she liked,--had _once_ liked in this man? Nothing!
_Nothing!_--the tears suddenly glimmered in her eyes and she winked them
dry, angrily.
And to think--to remember in years to come that she--_she_ had pleaded
with that man in the name of friendship--and of something _more_ than
friendship!--The hot colour mantled face and throat and she covered her
eyes in a sudden agony of mortification.
For a few moments she remained so, then her hands fell, helplessly
again.
And, as she knelt there looking at him through the increasing daylight,
suddenly her eyes narrowed, and her set face grew still and intent.
Crowding out of the shallow breast pocket of his Norfolk where he lay
were papers. _Her_ papers!
The next instant, lithely, softly, soundlessly on her unshod feet, she
had slipped from the lounge and crossed the stateroom to his side, and
her fingers already touched the edges of the packet.
Her papers! And her hand rested on them. But she did not take them.
There was something about the stealth of the act that checked
her,--something that seemed foreign, repugnant to her nature.
Breathless, her narrow hand poised, she hesitated, trying to remember
that the papers were hers--striving to aid herself with the hot and
shameful memory of the violence he had offered her.
Why couldn't she take them? This man and she were now at war! War has
two phases, violence and strategy. Both are legitimate; he had played
his part, and this part was strategy. Why shouldn't she play that part?
Why?
But her hand wavered, fell away, and she looked down into his sleeping
face and knew that she could not do it.
After a moment his eyes opened and met hers, pleasantly.
She blushed to her hair.
He said: "Why didn't you take them, Karen?"
"You couldn't understand if I told you," she said with youthful
bitterness.
He looked very grave at that. She turned, picked up shoes and spats, and
seated herself on the sofa.
So he got up, opened the door and went up on deck, leaving her the
stateroom to herself.
At the office of the wireless station the operator seemed to have no
objection to sending a message for him to the British Consul in
Amsterdam, and obligingly looked up the address. So Guild sent his
message and prepaid reply.
Then he went into the smoking-room and lit a cigarette.
He was dozing when a steward awoke him with a reply to his wireless
message:
Kervyn Guild
On board S. S. _Feyenoord_
Will call at American Consulate. Many thanks.
CHURCHILL, Consul.
He sat thinking for a few minutes. Then remembering that he did not know
where the American Consul was to be found, he went again to the wireless
office and procured the address.
Turning, as he was leaving, to thank the boyish operator, he found that
youth's shrewd eyes fixed on him intently.
"Look out, sir," said the operator, in perfectly good English. "There's
a lot o' talk about you on board."
"What do you mean?"
"Wasn't it you the _Wyvern_ was wanting?"
"Yes."
"You're friendly to us, I take it?"
"Do you mean to England?"
"Yes, sir."
"Yes, I am."
"I fancied so. Be very careful aboard this boat, sir. Half the crew and
most of the stewards are German."
"Thanks," said Guild smilingly.
But as he walked slowly away he realized rather uneasily what an object
of interest he had become to the personnel of the ship since the
_Wyvern_ had honoured him by her wireless inquiries concerning him.