et, I guess
they'd be on my trail like a knife, and I should be shot as a spy
inside of a week or doing solitary in the Moabite prison. But they
lack the larger vision. They can be bluffed, Sir. With your approval I
shall visit the Fatherland as John S. Blenkiron, once a thorn in the
side of their brightest boys on the other side. But it will be a
different John S. I reckon he will have experienced a change of heart.
He will have come to appreciate the great, pure, noble soul of Germany,
and he will be sorrowing for his past like a converted gun-man at a
camp meeting. He will be a victim of the meanness and perfidy of the
British Government. I am going to have a first-class row with your
Foreign Office about my passport, and I am going to speak harsh words
about them up and down this metropolis. I am going to be shadowed by
your sleuths at my port of embarkation, and I guess I shall run up hard
against the British Legations in Scandinavia. By that time our
Teutonic friends will have begun to wonder what has happened to John
S., and to think that maybe they have been mistaken in that child. So,
when I get to Germany they will be waiting for me with an open mind.
Then I judge my conduct will surprise and encourage them. I will
confide to them valuable secret information about British preparations,
and I will show up the British lion as the meanest kind of cur. You
may trust me to make a good impression. After that I'll move
eastwards, to see the demolition of the British Empire in those parts.
By the way, where is the rendezvous?'

'This is the 17th day of November. If we can't find out what we want
in two months we may chuck the job. On the 17th of January we should
forgather in Constantinople. Whoever gets there first waits for the
others. If by that date we're not all present, it will be considered
that the missing man has got into trouble and must be given up. If
ever we get there we'll be coming from different points and in
different characters, so we want a rendezvous where all kinds of odd
folk assemble. Sandy, you know Constantinople. You fix the
meeting-place.'

'I've already thought of that,' he said, and going to the writing-table
he drew a little plan on a sheet of paper. 'That lane runs down from
the Kurdish Bazaar in Galata to the ferry of Ratchik. Half-way down on
the left-hand side is a cafe kept by a Greek called Kuprasso. Behind
the cafe is a garden, surrounded by high walls which w