ahwah's feet lay the gilt-lettered ship's
ribbon, the letter addressed to Waldemar von Oldenbach and the thin
sheets of paper, and in her hand she still clutched the bottom half of
one of the pages of the stolen letter, the half that bore the prince's
signature and the name of Atterbury in one of the lines."

CHAPTER XX

ANOTHER'S SECRET

"Tell me something about this artist who called himself Eugene Prince,"
said Lieutenant Allison, who, propped up in bed with Mr. Wing and the
Winnebagos around him, had been looking over the contents of the
sketching portfolio which Sahwah had just brought in.

Mr. Wing, still dazed from the shock of learning that the man he had
looked upon as such a good friend had played him false, described the
artist as well as he could. The lieutenant listened with a puzzled frown
until he heard about the funny little drawings that the artist used to
make, and then he interrupted with a triumphant exclamation.

"That's he!" he exclaimed. "The very same! Eugene Prince is Waldemar von
Oldenbach himself!"

Then he told about him.

"Waldemar von Oldenbach! His father is a German count, his mother was an
American. He was educated in England and afterward came to America and
entered Cornell. That's where I met him. He was the cleverest scapegrace
that ever lived. He could sing like an angel, draw like St. Peter, and
knew more languages than an Ellis Island interpreter. He made friends
wherever he went. To look at him and hear him talk you would never think
he was a German; he's the picture of his American mother, and being in
England so much he had learned English perfectly. At the same time he
could make himself up like a Frenchman and you'd swear that he and all
his ancestors were born in the shadow of Notre Dame. He was a great old
actor, all right. After he'd been in America a year or so he went back
to Germany and entered the navy and became a first lieutenant on the
_Eitel Friederich_. That's where he was when the war broke out and the
_Eitel Friederich_ was interned. But Von Oldenbach wasn't interned with
her, not much. He got away before they had a chance to photograph him
and label him, and so no official search was ever made for him as it was
in the cases of the other sailors from the _Eitel Friederich_ who
escaped. I have often wondered what became of him, because I knew he was
on the _Eitel Friederich_ when she first came into port, but his name
didn't show up among the ship's