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Page 81
The door by which he had entered stood open. Without taking his eyes off
me or deflecting his weapon from its aim, he called out:
"Schmalz!"
A light step resounded, and the one-armed lieutenant tripped into the
room. When he saw me, he stopped dead. Then he softly began to circle
round me with a mincing step, murmuring to himself: "So! So!"
"Good evening, Dr. Semlin!" he said in English. "Say, I'm mighty glad to
see you! Well, Okewood, dear old boy, here we are again. What? Herr
Julius Zimmermann ..." and he broke into German, "_es freut mich!_"
I could have killed him where he stood, maimed though he was, for his
fluency in the American and English idiom alone.
"Search him, Schmalz!" commanded Clubfoot curtly.
Schmalz ran the fingers of his one arm over my pockets, flinging my
portfolio on the billiard-table towards Clubfoot, and the other articles
as they came to light ... my pistol, watch, cigarette-case and so
forth ... on to a leather lounge against the wall. In his search he
brushed me with his severed stump ... ugh, it was horrible!
Clubfoot had snatched up the portfolio and hastily examined it. He shook
the contents out on the billiard-table and examined them carefully.
"Not there!" he said. "Run him upstairs, and we'll strip him," he
ordered; "and let not our clever young friend forget that I'm behind him
with my little toy!"
Schmalz gripped me by the collar, spitefully digging his knuckles into
my neck, and propelled me out of the room ... almost into the arms of
Monica.
She screamed and, turning, fled away down the passage. Clubfoot laughed
noisily, but I reflected mournfully that in my present sorry plight,
unwashed and unshaven, in filthy clothes, haled along like a common
pickpocket, even my own mother would not have recognized me.
There was a degrading scene in the bedroom to which they dragged me,
where the two men stripped me to the skin and pawed over every single
article of clothing I possessed. Physically and mentally, I cowered in
my nudity before the unwholesome gaze of these two sinister cripples. Of
all my experiences in Germany, I still look back upon that as almost my
worst ordeal.
Of course, they found nothing, search as they might, and presently they
flung my clothes back at me and bade me get dressed again, "for you and
I, young man," said Clubfoot, with his glinting smile, "have got to have
a little talk together!"
When I was once more clothed--
"You can leave us, Schmalz!" commanded Clubfoot, "and send up the
sergeant when I ring: he shall look after this tricky Englishman whilst
we are at dinner with our charming hostess."
Schmalz went out and left us alone. Clubfoot lighted a cigar. He smoked
in silence for a few minutes. I said nothing, for really there was
nothing for me to say. They hadn't got their precious document, and it
was not likely they would ever recover it now. I feared greatly that
Francis in his loyalty might make an attempt to rescue me, but I hoped,
whatever he did, he would think first of putting the document in a place
of safety. I was more or less resigned to my fate. I was in their hands
properly now, and whether they got the document or not, my doom was
sealed.
"I will pay you the compliment of saying, my dear Captain Okewood,"
Clubfoot remarked in that urbane voice of his which always made my
blood run cold, "that never before in my career have I devoted so much
thought to any single individual, in the different cases I have handled,
as I have to you. As an individual, you are a paltry thing: it is rather
your remarkable good fortune that interests me as a philosopher of
sorts.... I assure you it will cause me serious concern to be the
instrument of severing your really extraordinary strain of good luck. I
don't mind telling you, as man to man, that I have not yet entirely
decided in my mind what to do with you now that I've got you!"
I shrugged my shoulders.
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