His disappointment coaxed him. He groaned:

"_Ach Gott_, I am so lunly. My own people doand trust me. These Yenkees also not. I get no chence to proof how I loaf my _Vaterland_.

But the time comes soon, and I must make patience. _Eile mit Weile!_"

"You'd better tell me what's on your mind," Mamise suggested, but he shook his head. The car rolled into the gloom of the park, a gloom rather punctuated than diminished by the street-lamps. Mamise realized that she could not extort Nicky's secret from him by a.s.serting her own dignity.

She wondered how to persuade him, and found no ideas except such silly schemes as were suggested by her memory of the vampire picture. She hated the very pa.s.sage of such thoughts through her mind, but they kept returning, with an insistent idea that a patriotic vampire might accomplish something for her country as Delilah and Judith had "vamped" for theirs. She had never seen a vampire exercise her fascinations in a fur coat in a dark automobile, but perhaps the dark was all the better for her purpose.

At any rate, she took the dare her wits presented her, and after a struggle with her own mutinous muscles she put out her hand and sought Nicky's, as she cooed:

"Come along, Nicky, don't be so cantankerous."

His hand registered the surprise he felt in the fervor of its clutch:

"But you are so colt!"

She insinuated, "You couldn't expect me to make love to you the very first thing, could you?"

"You mean you do like me?"

Her hands wringing his told the lie her tongue refused. And he, encouraged and determined to prove his rating with her, flung his arm about her again and drew her, resisting only in her soul, close to him.

CHAPTER II

But when his lips hunted hers she hid them in her fur collar; and he, imputing it to coquetry, humored her, finding her delicate timidity enhancing and inspiring. He chuckled:

"You shall kiss me yet."

"Not till you have told me what you sent for me for."

"No, feerst you must give me one to proof your good fate--your good face--" He was trying to say "good faith."

She was stubborn, but he was more obstinate still, and he had the advantage of the secret.

And so at last she sighed "All right," and put up her cheek to pay the price. His arms tightened about her, and his lips were not content with her cheek. He fought to win her lips, but she began to tear off her gloves to scratch his eyes out if need be for release.

She was revolted, and she would have marred his beauty if he had not let her go. Once freed, she regained her self-control, for the sake of her mission, and said, with a mock seriousness:

"Now, be careful, or I won't listen to you at all."

Sighing with disappointment, but more determined than ever to make her his, he said:

"Feerst I must esk you, how is your feelink about Chermany?"

"Just as before."

"Chust as vich 'before'? Do you loaf Chermany or hate?"

She was permitted to say only one thing. It came hard:

"I love her, of course."

"_Ach, behut' dich, Gott!_" he cried, and would have clasped her again, but she insisted on discipline. He began his explanation.

"I did told you how, to safe my life in England, I confessed somethings. Many of our people here will not forgive. My only vay to get back vere I have been is to make--as Americans say--to make myself skvare by to do some big vork. I have done a little, not much, but more can be if you help."

"What could I do?"

"Much things, but the greatest--listen once: our Chermany has no fear of America so long America is on this side of the Atlentic Ozean.

Americans build ships; Chermany must destroy fester as they build.

Already I have made one ship less for America. I cannot pooblish advertisink, but my people shall one day know, and that day comes soon; _Der Tag_ is almost here--you shall see! Our army grows alvays, in France; and England and France can get no more men. Ven all is ready, Chermany moves like a--a avalenche down a mountain and covers France to the sea.

"On that day our fleet--our glorious ships--comes out from Kiel Ca.n.a.l, vere man holds them beck like big dogs in leash. Oh those beautiful day, Chermany conquers on lent and on sea. France dies, and England's navy goes down into the deep and comes never back.

"_Ach Gott_, such a day it shall be--when old England's empire goes into history, into ancient history vit Roossia and Rome and Greece and Bebylonia.

"England gone, France gone, Italy gone--who shall safe America and her armies and her unborn ships, and her cannon and sh.e.l.l and air-ships not yet so much as begun?

"_Der Tag_ shall be like the lest day ven _Gott_ makes the graves open and the dead come beck to life. The Americans shall fall on knees before our Kaiser, and he shall render chudgment. Such a payink!

"Now the Yenkees despise us Chermans. Ve cannot go to this city, to that dock. Everywhere is dead-lines and permissions and internment camps and persecutions, and all who are not in prison are afraid. They change their names from Cherman to English now, but soon they shall lift their heads and it shall be the Americans who shall know the dead-lines, the licenses, the internment camps.

"So, Marie Louise, my sveetheart, if you can show and I can show that in the dark night ve did not forget the _Vaterland_, ve shall be proud and safe.

"It is to make you safe ven comes _Der Tag_ I speak to you now. I vish you should share my vork now, so you can share my life efterwards.

Now do I loaf you, Marie Louise? Now do I give you proof?"

Mamise was all ashudder with the intensity of his conviction. She imagined an all-conquering Germany in America. She needed but to multiply the story of Belgium, of Serbia, of prostrate Russia. The Kaiser had put in the shop-window of the world samples enough of the future as it would be made by Germany.

And in the mood of that day, with defeatism rife in Europe, and pessimism miasmatic in America, there was reason enough for Nicky to believe in his prophecy and to inspire belief in its possibility. The only impossible thing about it was that the world should ever endure the dominance of Germany. Death would seem better to almost everybody than life in such a civilization as she promised.

Mamise feared the Teutonic might, but she could not for a moment consent to accept it. There was only one thing for her to do, and that was to learn what plans she could, and thwart them. Here within her grasp was the long-sought opportunity to pay off the debt she had incurred. She could be a soldier now, at last. There was no price that Nicky might have demanded too great, too costly, too shameful for her to pay. To denounce him or defy him would be a criminal waste of opportunity.

She said: "I understand. You are right, of course. Let me help in any way I can. I only wish there were something big for me to do."

Nicky was overjoyed. He had triumphed both as patriot and as lover.

"There is a big think for you to do," he said. "You can all you vill."

"Tell me," she pleaded.

"You are in shipyard. This man Davidge goes on building ships. I gave him fair warning. I sinked one ship for him, but he makes more."

"You sank his ship?" Mamise gasped.