he place of honour in the drawing room
at Consistorial-Rat von Mayburg's at Bonn.

"I therefore had the prior claim," Clubfoot continued, "to be entrusted
with the important task of fetching the document and of handing it back
to the writer. But the gentleman was in a hurry; the gentleman always
is; he could not wait for that old slowcoach of a Clubfoot to mature his
plans for getting into England, securing the document, and getting out
again.

"So Bernstorff is called into consultation, the head of an embassy that
has made the German secret service the laughing-stock of the world, an
ambassador that has his private papers filched by a common sneak-thief
in the underground railway and is fool enough to send home the most
valuable documents by a jackass of a military attache who lets the whole
lot be taken from him by a dunderheaded British customs officer at
Falmouth! _This_ was the man who was to replace _me!_

"Bernstorff is accordingly bidden to despatch one of his trusty servants
to England, with all suitable precautions, to do _my_ work. You are
chosen, and I will pay you the compliment of saying that you fulfilled
your mission in a manner that is singularly out of keeping with the
usual method of procedure of that gentleman's emissaries.

"But, my dear Doktor ... pray fill your glass. That cigar is good, is it
not? I thought you would appreciate a good cigar.... As I was saying,
you were handicapped from the first. When you reach the place indicated
to you in your instructions, you find only half the document. The wily
thief has sliced it in two so as to make sure of his money before
parting with the goods. They didn't know, of course, that Clubfoot, the
old slowcoach, who is past his work, was aware of this already, and had
made his plans accordingly. But, in the end, they had to send for me.
'The good Clubfoot,' 'old chap,' 'sly old fox,' and all the rest of
it--would run across to England and secure the other half, while Count
Bernstorff's smart young man from America would wait in Rotterdam until
Herr Dr. Grundt arrived and handed him the other portion.

"But Count Bernstorff's young man does nothing of the kind. He is
one too many for the old fox. He does not wait for him. He runs away,
after displaying unusual determination in dealing with a prying
Englander--whose fate should be a lesson to all who interfere in other
people's business--and goes to Germany, leaving poor old Clubfoot in the
lurch. You mu