"I met Colonel Z---- S---- at 10 today. My head was not clear. Guess I
had too much at Kempinsky's last night.... A saturnalia of spending on
the theory that the Allies will pay.... Even the ride in the Grunewald
this morning didn't clear the cobwebs away. I was constantly thinking
of that girl at the Métropole with her long eyelashes and dimpling
smile; resembles the veiled lady at Buckingham,--and I was trying to
make out why she managed to occupy a seat at the next table to mine at
the Admiral's Palace an hour or two later. She seems to know some of
the performers who mingled in the audience, especially the energetic
dark-eyed Circe with the Greek nose, and said to be some sort of
a Baroness, who so often approached my table. I wonder what the
connection is between these two.... There is _certainly_ some
sympathetic tie between those girls! This I know, for when I had
breakfast at the Cafe Bauer, U.d.L., they were BOTH there, slightly
disguised, and occupying _the same_ table!... Who is Syvorotka? Her
lover?... I wonder what the game is.... Come to think about it, the
titled performer of the Métropole looks like a twin sister of Marie
Amelia, Countess of [Cszecheny] Chechany, a perfect composite of
Juno and Venus and Hebe all rolled into one.... These enigmatical
personages crowded everything else out of my mind as I walked into
Colonel Z---- S----'s office....
"... Without any preliminaries he said, 'Come with me!'... We entered
a cab and a few minutes later I entered the Wilhelmstrasse and was in
the presence of that tall, iron-gray, wiry gentleman with eyes like a
searchlight and the manners of a Chesterfield. 'Thank you, Colonel,'
he said. The Colonel sprang to attention, bowed, saluted and backed
away. We were ALONE!... 'In ten minutes,' he said, 'you will be
conducted to another room. When you arrive advance to the middle, make
a right wheel and stand at attention facing the portière.
Maintain perfect silence, answer all question,--make NO
inquiries--understand?'... I was taken downstairs, along a wide
corridor to a solid-oak door guarded by two sentries and an attendant
in the Royal livery. The door was opened by an officer of the Erste
Garde; I entered a large room, advanced to the center and faced the
divided portières of an adjoining chamber! There sat the man whose
nod shook the earth!... Behind a heavy, old-fashioned desk, in a
dim light, apparently absorbed in writing, sat a deeply tanned,
lean-faced, blue-gray-eyed counterpart of Frederick the Great,--the
very embodiment of Majesty!... Eyes that blazed in their defiant
depths with a steady and consuming fire--the kind of eyes that seem to
defy the world.... I stood there fully five minutes before I heard the
sharp, high-pitched voice pierce through the portière saying: 'Adell,
I will see the C----'... I was conducted to within six feet of the man
at the desk and in the same shrill voice asked how familiar I was with
Russia, with Turkestan, India, and the Far East.... My answers seemed
to convince my questioner.... Handing me a note he said: 'No one
besides ourselves is to know that you are to undertake the mission
outlined in that note.' Then he sat forward abruptly, his elbows
resting on the desk, his head between his hands, his eyes fixed on
space.... I began to study the note.... I was dumfounded!... I had
thought all along that this man was the mortal enemy of the persons
this note commanded me to rescue from danger.... I could not
understand HOW there could be the slightest co-operation between this
man and the other great ones of the earth that note commanded me to
call upon for assistance in case I should need it. It was utterly
incomprehensible! Yet THERE were the directions in plain black and
white.... And I could not ask a solitary question!... In the same
shrill voice the man asked: 'Have you memorized it?' I had! It was
burned into my very soul. I could not forget a syllable of it!...
Without another word he took the note, struck a match and watched it
curl into shapeless ashes.... Then making a quick gesture he plunged
into the documents before him.... I backed away until the door closed
and shut out the sight of the lonely figure enveloped in a green
light, his face illuminated against the shadowy background of
an underground chamber of the Foreign Office.... On the way to
Friedrichstrasse depot I met that girl of the Métropole again!"