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Page 17
Then she added in her hard harlot's voice:
"You needn't worry your head about _him,_ there! Leave him to me! It's
my trade!"
At those words, which covered God only knows what horrors of midnight
disappearances, of ghoulish rites with packing-case and sack, in the
dark cellars of that evil house, I felt that, could I but draw back from
the enterprise to which I had so rashly committed myself, I would do so
gladly. Only then did I begin to realize something of the utter
ruthlessness, the cold, calculating ferocity, of the most bitter and
most powerful enemy which the British Empire has ever had.
But it was too late to withdraw now. The die was cast. Destiny, knocking
at my door, had found me ready to follow, and I was committed to
whatever might befall me in my new personality.
The German woman turned to go.
"Der Stelze will be here at eight, then," she said. "I suppose the
gentleman will take his early morning coffee before."
"I shan't be here," I said. "You can tell your friend I've gone."
She turned on me like a flash.
She was hard as flint again.
"Nein!" she cried. "You stay here!"
"No," I answered with equal force, "not I ..."
"... Orders are orders and you and I must obey!"
"But who is Stelze that he should give orders to me?" I cried.
"Who is...?" She spoke aghast.
"... And you yourself," I continued, "were saying ..."
"When an order has been given, what you or I think or say is of no
account," the woman said. "It is an order: you and I know _whose_ order.
Let that suffice. You stay here! Good night!"
With that she was gone. She closed the door behind her; the key rattled
in the lock and I realized that I was a prisoner. I heard the woman's
footfalls die away down the corridor.
That distant clock cleaved the silence of the night with twelve
ponderous strokes. Then the chimes played a pretty jingling little tune
that rang out clearly in the still, rain-washed air.
I stood petrified and reflected on my next move.
Twelve o'clock! I had eight hours' grace before Stelze, the man of
mystery and might, arrived to unmask me and hand me over to the tender
mercies of Madame and of Karl. Before eight o'clock arrived I must--so I
summed up my position--be clear of the hotel and in the train for the
German frontier--if I could get a train--else I must be out of
Rotterdam, by that hour.
But I must _act_ and act without delay. There was no knowing when that
dead man lying on the floor might procure me another visit from Madame
and her myrmidons. The sooner I was out of that house of death the
better.
The door was solid; the lock was strong. That I discovered without any
trouble. In any case, I reflected, the front-door of the hotel would be
barred and bolted at this hour of the night, and I could scarcely dare
hope to escape by the front without detection, even if Karl were not
actually in the entrance hall. There must be a back entrance to the
hotel, I thought, for I had seen that the windows of my room opened on
to the narrow street lining the canal which ran at the back of the
house.
Escape by the windows was impossible. The front of the house dropped
sheer down and there was nothing to give one a foothold. But I
remembered the window in the _cabinet de toilette_ giving on to the
little air-shaft. That seemed to offer a slender chance of escape.
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