and did not, as I had feared, suggest that his efforts should be seconded by those of the police. On the contrary he appeared, from an unobtrusive hint or two, to be anxious that I should know that his discretion could be trusted.
"You must not think of moving for a couple of days," he said; "but then I think we can get you away without danger and quite quietly."
I thanked him; he promised to look in again; I murmured something about his fee.
"Oh, thank you, that is all settled," he said. "Your friend Herr Schmidt has seen to it, and, my dear sir, most liberally."
He was hardly gone when "my friend Herr Schmidt"—alias Rudolf Rassendyll—was back. He laughed a little when I told him how discreet the doctor had been.
"You see," he explained, "he thinks you've been very indiscreet. I was obliged, my dear Fritz, to take some liberties with your character. However it's odds against the matter coming to your wife's ears."
"But couldn't we have laid the others by the heels?"
"With the letter on Rupert? My dear fellow, you're very ill!"
I laughed at myself, and forgave Rudolf his trick, though I think that he might have made my fictitious inamorata something
