od German
bank-notes, in exchange for those slips of paper."

The man's suavity had all but vanished: his voice was harsh and stern.
His eyes glittered under his shaggy brows as he looked at me. Had I been
less agitated, I should have noted this, as a portent of the coming
storm, also his great ape's hands picking nervously at the telegram in
his lap.

"I have already told you," I said firmly, "that I don't want your money.
You know my terms!"

He rose up from his seat and his figure seemed to tower.

"Terms?" he cried in a voice that quivered with suppressed passion,
"terms? Understand that I give orders. I accept terms from no man. We
waste time here talking. Come, take the money and give me the paper."

I shook my head. My brain was clear, but I felt the crisis was coming. I
took a good grip with my hands of the marble slab covering the radiator
behind me to give me confidence. The slab yielded: mechanically I noted
that it was loose.

The man in front of me was shaking with rage.

"Listen!" he said. "I'll give you one more chance. But mark my words
well. Do you know what happened to the man that stole that document? The
English took him out and shot him on account of what was found in his
house when they raided it. Do you know what happened to the interpreter
at the internment camp, who was our go-between, who played us false by
cutting the document in half? The English shot _him_ too, on account of
what was found in letters that came to him openly through the post? And
who settled Schulte? And who settled the other man? Who contrived the
traps that sent them to their doom? It was _I_, Grundt, _I_, the
cripple, _I_, the Clubfoot, that had these traitors despatched as an
example to the six thousand of us who serve our Emperor and empire in
darkness! You dog, I'll smash you!"

He was gibbering like an angry ape: his frame was shaking with fury:
every hair in the tangle on his face and hands seemed to bristle with
his Berserker frenzy.

But he kept away from me, and I saw that he was still fighting to
preserve his self-control.

I maintained a bold front.

"This may do for your own people," I said contemptuously, "but it
doesn't impress me, I'm an American citizen!"

He was calmer now, but his eyes glittered dangerously.

"An American citizen?" he said in an icy tone. Then he fairly hissed at
me:

"You fool! Blind, besotted fool! Do you think you can trifle with the
might of the German Empire? Ah! I'