That sent the manager flying to the
telephone, and in due course of time set the police officials at the
nearest police station bustling. Within half an hour a car dashed up
to the gates of the sugar factory, and the most important and imposing
of individuals commenced an official investigation on the spot. This
investigation, sternly carried out, weighed every point so very
closely, and went with so much minuteness into every little incident,
that it set the unfortunate manager perspiring, and, indeed, after a
while, made him begin to wonder whether he himself were a party to the
theft which he had suffered, or a party to assisting the fugitives.
The important official, if he did not actually accuse the manager of
having aided the prisoners supposed to have purloined the articles of
clothing, inferred it certainly, glared at the unhappy man, browbeat
him in regular Germanic manner, and made him regret deeply that he had
ever called for police assistance.

"You'll be ready to report personally at the police station," he was
told. "Now I'll return and set a search in progress. Without doubt
the three men who broke out of Ruhleben have paid you a visit; for we
know already that they went to a farm farther back along the road and
obtained supplies of food. Since then we have lost all sight of them,
and it may very well be that they have been in hiding; and that may
mean," he added severely, as he stood above the unhappy manager and
glared down at him, "that someone has been providing a refuge for them,
some unpatriotic and treacherous individual, who, if discovered, will
certainly be shot in the morning--be shot in the cold, early morning,"
he added in unpleasant tones which did not fail to have their effect on
the man he was addressing. "Yes, Herr Winterborgen, this is an
important matter--so important, indeed, that for your own sake you will
see that you attend promptly when called for."

It was with a gasp of relief that the manager saw the car driven away
at furious speed, while he stood staring out of the window, mopping his
forehead with a handkerchief. His thoughts were still in a whirl, and
even then he could not shake from his mind the more than half belief
that in some unconscious way he had indeed, unwittingly and
unwillingly--for he was as good a patriot as anyone--aided the
runaways. In such a dilemma, feeling vexed and sore at his own loss,
and indignant at the cross-examination he had just suffered