no arguments,' the Kaiser says. 'I suppose you're going
to tell me these here

8 5-12 doz asstd bombs $3,200

was some Saturday specials you picked up in a bargain basement. What was
they filled with, rubies?'

"'Bombs is awful high, Boss,' Bernstorff says. 'Ask Dernburg what he
used to pay for bombs; ask Von Papen; ask this here judge of the New
York Supreme Court--I forget his name; ask anybody; they would tell you
the same.'

"'Should I also ask 'em if spies gets paid in America the same like
stomach specialists in Germany? Look at this:

To one week's salary 12,235 spies $1,223,500

What have you been doing, Bernstorff? Keeping a steam-yacht on me and
charging it up as spies?'

"'Listen, Boss,' Bernstorff says. 'If you would know what an awful
strong organization spies has got in the United States, instead you
would be talking to me this way you would be thanking your lucky stars
that I didn't let 'em run the wage scale up on me no higher than they
did. Why, before I left Washington a deputation from Local Number One
Amalgamated Spies of North America comes to see me and--'

"'What the devil you are talking nonsense?' the Kaiser shouts. '_Moost_
you got to employ union spies? Couldn't you find thousands and thousands
of non-union spies to work for you?'

"'That only goes to show what you know about America,' Bernstorff says.
'There's a whole lot of people in America which would stand for blowing
up factories, sinking passenger-steamers, shooting up hospitals, and
dropping bombs on kindergartens, y'understand, but when it comes to
people employing scab labor, they draw the line. And then again, Boss,
spies is very highly thought of in America. Respectable people, like
lawyers and doctors, gets arrested every day over there, and even once
in a while a minister, y'understand, but a spy--_never_!'

"At this point when it looks like plain sailing for Bernstorff, the
Kaiser picks out that fifty-thousand-dollar item, and right there
Bernstorff makes his big mistake, for as soon as he starts that
Congressmen story the old man begins to figure that if Congressmen are
so cheap and spies so dear, y'understand, the only thing to do is to
call up the _Polizeiprasidium_ and tell 'em to send around a
plain-clothes man right away to number Twenty-six A Schloss Platz, ring
Hohenzollern's bell."

"Then you really think that Bernstorff and Von Papen and all them crooks
didn't spend the money over here that they