have done my best and
have failed; there is nothing more that I can do. I did get one
concession for you, however. You will not be roughly handled or
otherwise maltreated when your vessel touches at Falmouth."

I had to make a serious effort to keep a straight face while
leaving the train with this last realistic touch of "British
brutality" ringing in my ears. Tower, I might add, had voiced the
extraordinary myth one hears in the Fatherland about the terrible
manner in which the British treat passengers on neutral steamers
touching at their ports.

The man with the reddish hair followed me to the office of the
Holland-America Line, where I made application for a reservation on
the boat which would sail in a week or ten days. From there I went
to a small restaurant. He seemed satisfied and left me, whereupon
I followed him. He hurried to the large Cafe Central, stepped
straight to a table in the front room, which is level with the
street, and seated himself beside a thin, dark German of the
intellectual type who appeared to be awaiting him. From my seat in
the shadows of the higher room I watched with amusement the
increasingly puzzled expression on the face of the intellectual
German while the man with the reddish hair unfolded his tale. When
they parted my curiosity caused me to trail after the thin, dark
man. He went straight to the German Legation.

For two days I nervously paced up and down the sands at
Scheveningen looking out upon the North Sea and waiting for the
call. It came one short drizzly afternoon. The Germans, of
course, knew the whereabouts of the vessel on which I should embark
for England, though it is highly improbable that they knew the
sailing time, and they did not know when I should go on it.

I did everything possible to throw any possible spies off the trail
as I made my way in the dark to a lonely wharf on the Maas River
where I gave the password to a watchman who stepped out of a black
corner near the massive gates which opened to the pier.

I went aboard a little five hundred ton vessel with steam up, and
stood near two other men on the narrow deck, where I watched in
considerable awe the silent preparations to cast away.

A man stepped out of the cabin. "I presume, sir, that you are the
American journalist," he said. He explained that he was the
steward. From the bridge came the voice of the captain, "We can
give them only a few minutes more," he said.

Two minutes