Meanwhile, the medal had to be returned to the hands of its owner,
who must, P. C. Breagh was firm on that!--consent to receive it from
the hands of the finder, if he wanted it back again. P. C. Breagh
knew the Foreign Office, in the Wilhelm Strasse--the shabbiest
residence in all that street of official palaces--with its
high-pitched, red-tiled Mansard roof, its shabby gray stuccoed front
(a main building with two short wings, pierced by twelve windows, and
decorated with a sham-Hellenic frieze and shallow pilasters),--and
its big, park-like garden stretching away behind.
So, clutching the precious token, P. C. Breagh plunged back into the
crowd. It was dense, but no longer solid, and, still lustily
singing, with intervals of cheering, it bore him down the Linden as
far as the Brandenburg Gate.
There it split into three vociferating rivers of humanity. One of
which streamed north-westward toward the offices of the Great General
Staff, where Moltke, the ancient war-wizard, was busy over his maps!
Another, desirous of refreshment, surged onward in the direction of
the Thiergarten. The third flowed down the street of palaces, and
with it went P. C. Breagh.