THE POLICE RAID
The strange boy vanished before Dick could ask him what he meant, and he
went on, wondering. His whole manner had been friendly, but it was also
puzzling in the extreme. Instinctively Dick had told him where he was
staying in Semlin, and then the other had disappeared at once. Dick
could make nothing of it.
"Oh, well, it can't make any difference," he said to himself. "He didn't
want to know for Mike Hallo, because Mike must know all about where I'm
staying, and if he doesn't, he can find out--in a place where the police
get the names of everyone who takes a room for a night."
So Dick resolved not to worry about the future, but to have a look
around the town. He didn't think much of Semlin. It might be old, but it
was not especially interesting. It seemed to him dirty, for one thing,
and he didn't like dirt. Belgrade, across the river Save, however,
fascinated him. There was something romantic about the great citadel. He
knew that it had withstood siege after siege in the olden times, and the
fact that it probably wouldn't be used as a fortress at all if war broke
out that day didn't detract a bit from the interest of its history.
"Some fort, all right!" he said to himself. "I can just see those old
Johnnies trying to rush that hill, in days when men fought hand to hand,
instead of laying off a few miles and pounding away at a place with big
guns. If they're going to have another scrap here, I hope I'm around to
see some of it. I'd like to see a war."
He was to be gratified in that modest wish!
There was one noticeable thing. Semlin was a garrisoned town; a regiment
of the Austrian army was always there. But now a great many extra troops
were always more or less in evidence. Trains would come in, with
soldiers looking out from every window. The men would detrain, march
through the town, and disappear. After leaving Hallo's office, Dick saw
a full regiment arrive like that, march through the streets, and
disappear to the west. Now he stopped and began doing a sum in mental
arithmetic.
"Gee!" he said, to himself. "I bet the consul's right! I bet the
Austrians do mean to start something! That makes about fifteen thousand
men I've seen brought in here just since I've been here. I wonder if the
Servians know about it? I should think it would be a pretty good thing
for them to have a few people here in Semlin just sort of keeping their
eyes open."
Dick did not know to the full how serious the situation was. But then
very few people in Semlin did. Here news was being suppressed. At this
point, where the border brought masses of Servians and Hungarians into
such close contact, it was not considered wise to allow the newspapers
to print all they knew. It was understood that Austria had made certain
demands, but it did not seem to occur to anyone in Semlin that it was
possible for tiny Servia to defy the mighty Austrian empire. But as a
matter of fact, the final steps that led to the great war were being
taken, and war was already regarded as inevitable by those who, like
Consul Denniston, were in a position to know the truth.
The consul had told him to come back for dinner at six o'clock, and so
Dick had a good deal of time to kill. He determined, therefore, to go
across to Belgrade and see if there was a message there yet from the
Abercrombies, the family with which he had traveled as far as
Buda-Pesth. He was to engage rooms for them when they wrote or
telegraphed to him that they were ready for him to do so, and he decided
that he might as well see if the message had come, though he was pretty
sure that there had not been time yet.
To his surprise, he found some difficulty in passing the guards at the
centre of the bridge. Luck favored him, however. One of the soldiers was
a Hungarian who had been a waiter at a famous Hungarian restaurant in
New York, and had returned to serve his term with the army. When he
heard Dick say that he was an American, he offered to question him, and
began to ask Dick about New York.
"He's all right. He knows all the places I know!" said the soldier,
after that.
And so Dick was able to proceed. In Belgrade, inquiring at the bank the
Abercrombies had named, he found a message, but not the sort of message
he had been looking for.
"We are going to London as fast as we can get there," ran the message.
"Should advise you to do the same. Situation looks very serious."
There had been more in the original message, for the blank was plainly
marked "Censored." Dick was indignant at the idea that anyone should
interfere with a telegram sent by as distinguished an American as Judge
Abercrombie, but, after all, he decided there was no one here to blame.
The censoring had been done at Buda-Pesth in all probability. And the
essential fact was there. He was a good deal disappointed, for he had
rather hoped that Judge Abercrombie might be able to help him in his
dealings with Mike Hallo. However, there was no help for it.
So, having nothing else to do now, he spent a part of the afternoon in
wandering about Belgrade, and making himself familiar with the strange
old town. The older part of the city he found to be much more romantic
when viewed from Semlin. At close quarters it was incredibly dirty, and
the houses were rabbit warrens, inhabited by a wretched mixture of Turks
and mixed breeds. He managed to learn there were not so many Servians;
for Servians are not fond of living in towns. They are farmers and
herders, and by choice they live in the open country, which is why they
are a hardy and long-lived race.
But the new palace seemed to him a fine building, and he was lucky
enough to see old King Peter, with his white hair and his fine, sturdy
face, drive out of the grounds. A crowd had assembled, knowing that he
was going to drive out, and it cheered the old man to the echo. Dick
remembered how, for many years, King Peter had lived in Paris alone, in
poverty, longing always for the time when he might return to the land
his ancestors had helped to free from Turkish tyranny. And now this old
man was an idolized king, who had led his people in two victorious wars
and to-day was being urged by them to defy a country many times the size
of his own. Dick took off his own hat and cheered with the crowd when
the carriage passed him.
"I'm not a Servian," he said, to himself, "but he's a real man, and it
won't hurt me to take off my hat to him, I guess."
Here in Belgrade there was far more excitement over the prospect of war
than there had been in Semlin. Dick decided that this was because here
much more of the truth was known.
He liked the looks of the newer part of Belgrade, beyond the palace.
Here there were pleasant white houses, in green gardens, and everything
was clean and well kept. The people, too, seemed to him more like real
folks, as he put it. There wasn't a servile respect for a uniform. One
reason for that, had he known it, was that when Servia went to war it
meant that every man, and every boy old enough to carry arms, was
engaged. It was a nation that fought, not just an army.
So it was with a pleasanter impression of the Servian capital than he
had expected to acquire that Dick returned to Semlin. When he got back
the sun was already low over the hills in the west, and he had just
about time to hurry to his lodgings and change his clothes.
There he found something that surprised and angered him. In his absence
someone had been through all his few belongings; few because he had of
necessity traveled with little baggage. He could see that everything had
been ransacked, and he guessed that the police had paid his room another
visit in his absence. It hadn't done them any good, for of course he
carried no papers that would have been of the slightest interest to
anyone else, and his money, the only valuable thing he had, was always
in the belt that he wore next to his skin, under all his clothes.
But he was angry, none the less, and he carried his anger with him to
the consulate, where, arriving promptly, he had to wait a little while
for the consul to finish some business. When he told Mr. Denniston what
had happened the consul frowned.
"I'm not surprised," he said. "I couldn't prove this, Dick, but I've
learned enough to be perfectly certain that Hallo is behind the police
interest in you. I don't believe that anyone really thinks you are
English, or has the slightest idea that you may be a spy."
"A spy! What kind of a spy would I make? Is that their line?"
"In a time like this almost anyone may be accused of being a spy, Dick.
You see, the argument is that it's just the one that's apparently least
likely to be guilty, who can be the most dangerous spy. But, as I say,
in your case it's just an excuse. I have sent a cable message to the
State Department, asking them to satisfy themselves through your
scoutmaster at home that you are an American citizen. When I hear from
that message, you see, you'll have an official standing, and I can do
something. What I am afraid of is that the answer will be delayed. But
come in to dinner. I shall have to leave you right afterward."
At the dinner table Mr. Denniston explained the situation more in detail
to Dick.
"Hallo's powerful enough to have his way. That's the size of it," he
said. "I've decided to have you come here, as my guest. They wouldn't
dare to take you from the consulate for that would mean trouble with the
United States. And if I don't read the whole situation mistakenly, they
are going to have enemies enough before long without embroiling
themselves with us, even for the sake of pleasing Mr. Michael Hallo!"
"I hate to trouble you, sir," said Dick. "But it is most awfully good of
you to invite me, and, of course, I'd be safe here."
"It's no trouble--I'll be glad to have you. As soon as we've finished
dinner, go and get your things, and then come right back here. They gave
you twenty-four hours, you said, didn't you? And that was this
morning?" returned Mr. Denniston.
"Yes, sir."
"Then I think you have time enough. But there is no use in leaving
yourself in their power when the time is up. When they move here, they
move very quickly indeed."
"All right, sir. I'll go along, and get back at once."
Dick hurried through his dinner, and then went back to his lodgings. In
his room he began packing, but he had not finished his task, light as it
was, when he heard a heavy pounding on the street door, which was at the
bottom of the stairs, directly in line with his own, his room being on
the first floor. He was curious enough to open his door to listen, and
he saw the woman of the house open the street door.
"In the name of the law," he heard a heavy voice say. "We have come to
take one Richard Warner, calling himself an American, who is accused of
being a spy, and is to be sent immediately to Buda-Pesth. Stand aside!"
"Yes, sir--yes--right up the stairs, there," stammered the frightened
woman.
Dick was aghast for a moment. Then, by a sheer instinct of
self-preservation, he flung the door shut, locked and bolted it. It was
stout and would hold for a moment. He rushed to the window. It was an
easy drop to the garden below. But of what use to drop? What chance was
there for him to make his way through the streets to the consulate,
where, could he but reach it, he might find asylum? It might be better
to yield. Though he was not a coward, he knew that the police might
shoot him.
And then, just as heavy footsteps came up the stairs, a voice spoke in
his ear.
"Will you trust me?" it said.
He turned with a start, to see the boy of Hallo's office beside him!
"Follow me--through the window. I can save you," said this boy. "It is I
they should seek--I _am_ a spy!"