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VON STROMBERG CATECHISES

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while waiting for you to get wraps. I hid it in right sash of motor. Copy and original of message the same. You and I are enemies. Therefore ignore me. Rizzio acted for Scotland Yard. As to the rest tell truth exactly and no harm can come to me. I will find means later to communicate. Burn this immediately.

 

Her heart beating high, she read the paper through twice to familiarize herself with the instructions which she perfectly understood. Then she found a matchbox on the candlestick, put the paper in the hearth and burned it. After that she sat at the table and ate. It was there that Captain von Winden found her some moments later when he came to request her presence in the room on the ground floor.

•••••

During the time that Doris slept, in the living-room downstairs General von Stromberg sat with John Rizzio. A peaceful winter landscape looked in at the windows, the sun slanted in a yellow rhomboid upon the floor, a cheerful fire was burning upon the hearth and General von Stromberg, his left hand tapping gently upon the back of his right, was gravely listening to John Rizzio’s story. All of the pieces of the little game were upon the board. He was now about to move them skillfully from one square to another until only one piece remained, and that one piece, the victor in all such games, was—himself.

“And what was his manner,” went on von Stromberg, “when you showed your credentials?”

“He was surprised—very much surprised—and I think alarmed.”

“And what arguments did you use to make him give the packet up?”

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