"There are some sailors' taverns here, where I hope to get on the track.But they are desperate fellows, and it is dangerous to meddle with them.""If you will point out the taverns to me, I will have all the customers arrested to-night.""For Heaven's sake, don't, Herr major! We should ruin everything by that.These men would let themselves be cut to pieces rather than betray anything to you.If anyone can get them to speak, it is myself.""Wouldn't you be trusting them too much?""No, no.I know best how to deal with them, and I know many ways of making them open their mouths.""Well, do what you can.The matter is important.I am very anxious to find someone to obtain trustworthy information about the British fleet, and you know we don't spare money."Penurot was ready to attempt his difficult task at once, and took leave of Heideck, promising to meet him soon after midnight at the same tavern.Heideck left the restaurant soon after him, and walked along the quay Van Dyck, to cool his heated brow.In time of war the town presented a strangely altered appearance.There was a swarm of German soldiers in the streets; the usual busy traffic at the harbour had entirely ceased.There had been no trade since the German warships, like floating citadels, had been lying in the Schelde.And yet it was almost incomprehensible, how the change had come about so rapidly.Antwerp was an almost impregnable fortress, if the flooding of the surrounding country was undertaken in time.But the Belgian Government had not even made an attempt at defence, when the vanguard of the seventh and eighth army corps had appeared in the neighbourhood of the town.
It had surrendered the fortress at once, with all its strong outer forts, to the German military commanders and had withdrawn its own army.The Imperial Chancellor was certainly right in attaching such importance to the possession of Antwerp by Germany.The population was almost exclusively Flemish, and Antwerp was thus in nationality a German town.
From the general political situation Heideck's thoughts returned to Edith and her letter, and at last he decided to write to her that very evening.
To carry out his intention, he went back to the restaurant where he had met Penurot, and called for ink and paper.When he had finished his letter, he looked over the words he had written, in which, contrary to his usual practice, he had given utterance to his real feelings:--"MY DEAR EDITH,--In the exercise of my duty, I accidentally came into possession of your letter to Frau Amelungen.I was looking for something quite different at the time, and you can imagine how great was my surprise at the unexpected discovery.
"From the hour when we were obliged to separate and you, possibly not without resentment and reproach, held out your hand at parting, I have felt more and more how indispensable you are to me.Itreasure every word you have said to me, every look you have bestowed upon me, and your image is before my mind, ever brighter, ever more beautiful.I have never met a woman whose mind was so beautiful, so refined, so keen as yours.I must confess that your ideas at first sometimes terrified me.Your views are often so far removed from the commonplace, so far above the ordinary, that it needs time to estimate them correctly.If I now recall to mind what formerly seemed strange to me, it is only with feelings of admiration.From day to day the impression you made upon me at our first conversation has sunk deeper into my mind, and the comforting certainty, that love for you will fill my entire life in the future, grows more and more unshakable.
"Nevertheless, I may not regret that I had the strength to leave you at Naples.The beautiful dream of our life together would have been disturbed too soon by the rude reality.My duty calls me from one place to another, and as long as this war lasts I am not my own master for an hour.We must have patience, Edith.Even this campaign cannot last for ever, and if Heaven has decreed that Ishall come out of it alive, we shall meet again, never more to part.
"You may not be able to answer this letter, for communication with Frau Amelungen is interrupted.But I know you will answer me if it is possible, and I am happy to think that, by letting you know I am alive, I have given you a pleasure, soon, I hope, to be followed by the still greater happiness of meeting again.Let us wait patiently and confidently for that hour!"He sealed the letter and put it in his pocket, in order to hand it over to Brandelaar on the following day.He then waited for the reappearance of Penurot, who had promised to be back at midnight.
But although he waited nearly an hour over the time in the tavern, he waited in vain.The terms in which Herr Amelungen's natural son had spoken of the people he intended to look for that evening made the Major anxious about his fate.Before returning to his quarters, he paid a visit to the town police office, requesting that a search might be made in the less reputable sailors' taverns near the harbour for M.Camille Penurot, of whose appearance he gave a careful description.
As there was no news of him on the following morning, Heideck felt almost certain that the affair had turned out disastrously for Penurot.However, for the moment, he could not stop to investigate the young man's whereabouts.
He was informed by the Lieutenant-Colonel that Brandelaar, whose vessel actually lay off Ternenzen, had been arrested with his crew, examined, and liberated during the course of the night, as had been agreed between the two officers.
Heideck now set out for Ternenzen to give Brandelaar the information for Admiral Hollway that had been collected at his office, together with the private information that was of such importance to him.
At last, having paid Brandelaar a thousand francs on account, Heideck also gave him the letter to Edith, with careful instructions as to its delivery.The skipper, whose zeal for the cause of Germany was now undoubtedly honourable, repeatedly promised to carry out his orders conscientiously and to the best of his power.
On returning to Antwerp at noon, Heideck found a communication at his office from the police to the effect that Camille Penurot's body had been found in one of the harbour basins, stabbed in several places in the breast and neck.A search for the assassins had been immediately set on foot, but up to the present no trace of them had been discovered.
