Nessa did not speak a word as we crossed the fields, dropping a pace or two behind us, and keeping her eyes on the ground. She could scarcely have been more dejected had she been on her way to the scaffold.

I repeated the instructions to Vandervelt about Nessa, and again he promised to carry them out faithfully. When we reached the bus a minute or two put her in trim again, and I made a final test of the engine.

Then I got down, helped Nessa into her place, fastened the strap round her, and held her hand while the Dutchman climbed to his seat.

She returned the pressure with a choking sigh, but could not trust herself to speak.

Then I shook hands with the pilot, thanked him, and at the same time punished the farmer for his intended treachery. "I know you'll take good care of my sister, Vandervelt; and don't forget I'm paying Glocken a thousand marks pa.s.sage money. Good luck."

"What's that?" he asked sharply.

"You can settle with him on your next trip. You won't get in before dark if you stop to discuss it now."

"I will," he said, with a muttered oath and a glance at the discomfited farmer.

Then he set the engine going, we stood back, Nessa waved her hand to me, and they were off.

I watched the bus across the field, rise, circle round on the climb up, point her nose frontierwards, and I strained my eyes after her until she entered a cloud and pa.s.sed out of sight.

CHAPTER XXVIII

RECOGNIZED

Glocken was furious at the trick I had played him. "You think yourself mighty smart, don't you?" he said with an oath as we went back.

"One too many for you, eh?" I chuckled. Relief at Nessa's safety made me comparatively indifferent about everything else. The job which had brought me to Germany was done, and for the moment nothing else seemed to matter.

"I'll make you smart in another sense, I promise you," he snarled.

"You can't do it, Glocken, and you'd better not make a fool of yourself. There's a lot behind all this you don't understand. Here's your money;" and I gave him the balance.

"Where did you get it? In Berlin--Johann La.s.sen?"

"You don't look pretty when you snarl like that, Glocken; and if you believe I'm Johann La.s.sen, you're a braver man than I think. We're alone here; and if I were that man, do you think I'd let you live to tell the police when a tap from this spanner of mine would silence you for ever?"

That hadn't occurred to him and he jumped away from me as if dreading an instant attack.

"I'm not going to touch you, man; on the contrary I'm going to make it easy for you. I'll give you a lift into Lingen in Fischer's car and we'll stop at the police station, if you like. I saw your game in a second this morning and it suited me to play up to it. I was told you were a treacherous skunk, but I didn't think you were such a gorgeous fool. Come along and we'll have that chat with the police."

He hung back, either because he was afraid to trust himself in the car with me or because my bluff puzzled him. It turned out to be the latter.

"I don't want to do you any harm, Bulich," he muttered.

"You wooden-headed a.s.s, do you think I'd let you, if you could? Come to the police and tell your story; but I warn you beforehand that if you dare to utter a word against me like that, you're a ruined man, lock, stock, and barrel. Behind me in this affair is one of the most powerful men in the whole Empire, whose arm is long enough to reach even cunning Farmer Glocken, squeeze him to a jelly, and leave the remnants to rot in gaol. And he'll do it, Glocken, as sure as my real name isn't Hans Bulich, the instant I tell him the scurvy tricks you've tried with me to-day." I said this with all the concentrated sternness at my command, and it went right home and frightened him through and through.

"What--what is your name, then?" he stammered.

I shoved my face close to his. "Look at me, you clown, look at me well, and then ask it--if you dare."

It was a beautiful bluff. Whether he thought he recognized some one of the innumerable princelings of the Empire or not, I can't say; but he drew back and doffed his hat, with a muttered: "I beg your pardon, sir."

"That's better. Now I'm Hans Bulich again; and don't forget it," I said with a change of manner and tone, as I climbed into the car and beckoned to him to get up beside me. We ran back to Lingen in silence, and I pulled up just before reaching the police station. "Here you are," I suggested.

"I'm going back by train, sir, if you please," he answered with delightful deference; and I took him to the railway and dismissed him with a last sharp caution to hold his tongue.

I was well over that fence and, if the rest could be as easily negotiated, I should soon be after Nessa. Glocken was the only man I feared, because he had seen us so close to Osnabruck. The fright he had had would probably keep him quiet for a day or two, until he had had time to digest the matter; and the interval must be turned to the best account.

Old Fischer was glad to see me, asked about the day's happenings, and was relieved to know that Vandervelt had been able to make the return trip. During the evening we discussed our plans; and after a really refreshing night's sleep, I went off to the shed to continue the work there.

Fischer was so elated by his discovery of a mechanic that he brought several people in during the morning; members of the smuggling ring, I gathered, for they seemed as pleased about it as he was: chatted to each other and to me as they watched me at work, asked all sorts of silly questions about cars and engines and parts; each of them fussing over me like a hen with one chick.

About midday I knocked off to dine with Fischer, and we were smoking a pipe afterwards when the police sergeant, Braun, arrived in a somewhat excited mood and called the old fellow out of the room.

"I'd better be getting back," I said; but Braun stopped me, saying he had come about me.

This gave me a twinge, and I pa.s.sed a decidedly uncomfortable ten minutes while they were jawing with their heads together in the shop.

But there was no cause for alarm, it turned out.

Fischer explained it all. My fame as an aero mechanic had reached the ears of the proprietor of the Halbermond Hotel where an army flying man had arrived, and when he had inquired for a man of the sort, the proprietor had mentioned me, and I was ordered to go to him.

Fischer didn't like the business at all, fearing that it might interfere with his plans; and it was this which he and Braun had been discussing so earnestly.

"You'll have to be very careful, Bulich. If he thinks you're half as good a hand as you are, he's likely to want you for the army."

"I'll be careful. Do you know what the job is?" I asked Braun.

"Pulitz didn't know either," he said, shaking his head.

"Who's Pulitz?"

"The blabber who keeps the Halbermond," replied Fischer irritably. "He must have lost his head to say a word about you. It wouldn't matter if you were twenty years older; but there, he was always a fool and always will be, I suppose."

"Who's the flying man?"

"I don't know. Stranger here; just driven up in his car. If he'd been any one any of us knew, we might have done something."

"Doesn't the Halbermond man, Pulitz, know him?"

"Never set eyes on him before, and there wasn't the least need to tell him a word about you. But that's the fool all over, trying to curry favour and not a thought of the mischief he could do," grumbled Fischer.

"Well, shall I chance it, and not go?"

"That won't do," cried Braun. "He'd report me and have the whole town hunting for you. You must go, right enough."

"Do the best you can to get out of it," chimed in Fischer. "Let him think you're no better than a clumsy fool."