The Man Without a Memory, Arthur W. Marchmont [best business books of all time .txt] 📗

clapped eyes on the both of ye!" and the tears welled in her eyes as she rushed to Nessa, took off the cap and kissed her. "Ah, ye poor Mavourneen, ye! And, saints alive, look at the lovely hair it is. And to think ye're from England, only I wish it was dear old Oireland, that I do! Whisht now, or Oi'll be making an ould fool of mysilf. We'd best just shpake in German. That I should live to see the day! And out in this divil of a hole of a place! It's making for the frontier ye are, of course! And it's glad that I am I can help ye, so I can. And it's breakfast ye want, is it? Sure I'll see to it; but I must dry my eyes first and get sober."

She kissed Nessa again and almost kissed me also in her joy, wiped her eyes, looked in the glass to see that all was right and bustled out to see about the breakfast.

"Something like a stroke of luck, this," I said; but Nessa was too cast down at her failure in the part to answer, so I looked out of the window to give her time to get over it.

She rose presently and I felt her hand on my shoulder. "I'm a failure, Jack," she said wistfully, struggling to smile at it.

"And thank Heaven for it, sweetheart."

"But even that brute of a farmer found me out. I wouldn't care so much if it had only been this good soul."

"She spotted me as English too," I reminded her.

"I know. You're trying to make it easier for me; but that man didn't spot you, the beast!" She smiled then at her own vehemence. "Well, it's good-bye, Hans, I suppose," she said with a sigh.

"And good riddance, too."

"And yet you said I was doing it so well."

"And so you were, child, for the stage, but this is different."

"It's taken all the fun out of the picnic for me."

"What? To be my wife?"

She laughed and shook her head. "Well, there's one thing, you won't be the boss any longer."

"We'll see about that, young 'un."

"Don't, Jack. Don't ever dare to refer to this again or I'll—I'll—I don't know what I'll do!" she cried with a stamp of the foot. Then she caught sight of Han's cap. "It's that horrid thing that's the cause of it all;" and she picked it up and flung it from her.

That was the overt act of renunciation of the part; and as she turned to me I put my arm round her and kissed her.

"I thought there was to be no more 'anything else,'" she laughed.

"Mustn't a man kiss his own wife?" I cried.

"That hopes to be, Jack," she whispered.

And that was Hans' funeral ceremony.

CHAPTER XXV A FRIEND IN NEED

When the woman returned to us she had quite thrown off her emotional outburst at our meeting, and her first words were a warning not to speak another word of English.

"I couldn't help it at first, I was so excited; but it would ruin me if it was known that I'm British," she declared, and over the breakfast she told us her story.

She was from Cork, where she had married a German baker named Fischer, had come to Germany a few years later, had been a widow for five years, and had continued to carry on the business of the inn. She was very curious to learn the truth about the war; and when I had satisfied her, we settled down to the consideration of her own affairs.

We returned confidence for confidence: that Nessa and I were engaged to be married; how I had come from England to find her; the plight she had been in owing to von Erstein's persecution; that we had been in the train smash, and had escaped with our lives, but had lost the passports.

She knew the von Erstein type of German well enough to sympathize deeply with Nessa and listened in tears to that part of the story.

"I can help you both, and I will; but you'll have to be as cautious as a pair of wild birds. They're just grabbing the men into the army with both hands, for one thing, and they'll take you at sight, and then what would she do, poor thing?"

"But aren't a lot of mechanics exempted?"

"Do you know anything about such things really?"

"Most there is to know about motors and aeroplanes."

"Oh, that's better," she cried, rubbing her hands. "They're making that sort of thing now at a place called Ellendorf, out Lingen way; and they're wanting men badly. You can say you've heard of it and are on your road there, and it may help you through. But understand that all strangers about here are suspected and the police are mighty curious; and it's worse the closer to the frontier you get. Have you thought how you're to get across?"

"If we're as lucky there as we have been here, it mayn't be so difficult. My rough idea was to join up with some of the folk who are smuggling things over and look for a chance to slip across."

"I'd thought of that, too, and I can help you," she said, and then explained her plan.

She declared that nearly every one near the frontier was taking a hand in the smuggling game and that the authorities, both police and military, not only winked at it, but secretly encouraged it. Lately, however, owing to the more drastic rounding up of men for the army, there had been a good deal of the slipping over which we wished to do, and stringent measures were being taken in consequence.

"That makes it more difficult," she continued; "but my late husband's brother, Adolf Fischer, lives there. I'll give you a note to him and he'll help you."

"Is he one of them?" I asked.

She smiled and nodded. "He's getting rich at it and has several people working with him. I'll have to lie for you; but I don't mind. I'll tell him I know all about you and that you want to join him; but don't say a word about skipping over, or he'll put the police on you. He's very thick with them, but that needn't scare you. They won't touch one of his men."

"We're awfully obliged to you."

"I only wish I could do more. Of course, I'll find some clothes for you," she said to Nessa. "They'll only be rough working things; but then nothing else would do; and if you'll both be guided by me, you won't think of risking the walk to Lingen. What you'd better do is to stop here and rest till to-morrow morning, get away early and foot it to Massen; it's only a matter of four or five miles: and catch the train there; and it would be all the better if you were to wear overalls. I can get you some."

"I have some already," I put in.

"All the better, but whatever you do, don't carry that grip with you. Might as well write who you are on your back. Much better carry a tool or so in your hand as if you were off to a job in a hurry; and she might have a small market basket. She'll be your wife till ye reach Lingen; and don't forget that most Germans treat their wives pretty gruffly. There are plenty of spies about with sharp eyes for trifles of the sort. They might even see that you don't eat like them. I should have known you by it," she declared.

We both laughed as we thanked her again; and soon afterwards she took Nessa away to see about the change of dress.

We had fallen on our feet in all truth. Her help was literally invaluable. Every one of her suggestions was practical and opened my eyes to the many little difficult details and pitfalls which had never occurred to us when planning our escape.

An hour or two later she came back saying she had left Nessa making some few necessary alterations in the dress and wanted to speak to me alone. "Just like me, I've put my foot in it with her. I told her what's only the truth, that you'll never be able to get over the frontier together, and she swears nothing shall make her go alone. You must talk her round or——" and she shook her head doubtfully.

"That'll be all right."

"Perhaps. She's just the bravest darling in the world, but my, what a will!" and she threw up her hands and smiled. "The frontier men will always wink at a woman crossing, but if they catch a man trying it they shoot him and done with it. Now what'll you do if she won't give in?"

I shrugged my shoulders.

"Well, I'll tell you. Go to that factory at Ellendorf and get a job. You'll both be safe there; they'll find you a cottage, and you'll have to wait till a chance comes to get away together. Tell my brother-in-law you're going there and that you can do his work from there. But if she sticks out, don't try anything from Lingen; he's sure to hear about it, and then you may look out. Don't forget that and think that because he speaks you fair, he's soft. He isn't. He daren't be, either."

She went on to give me a host of details about the smuggling, and I took an opportunity to ask about the farmer whose car I had repaired.

"Old Farmer Glocken, you mean. He's deep as a well and as dangerous as St. Patrick found the snakes. If he can make use of you, all right; he'll do it so long as it pays him; but he'd sell his own wife, poor wretch, for a few marks. Don't go near him."

"He does a little smuggling?"

"A little! He's in it up to his eyes. He could get you both across easily enough, if you paid him, supposing he didn't take your money first and then sell you. And that's as likely as not."

Some one knocked at the door then and she went out, returning with a servant who clumped noisily after her and began to lay the cloth for dinner.

"Be careful, Gretchen," she said sharply as the girl nearly let some glasses fall. She was a stoutish, rather slatternly girl, with particularly grimy finger nails, and a shawl over her head which concealed most of her face. She was very clumsy, too, and set everything down awkwardly with a guffaw.

"What do you think of Gretchen?"

I started and they both laughed. It was Nessa, of course, and she whipped off the shawl, clapped her hands, and turned completely round so that I might study her get-up.

"Better than the boy, eh?" laughed Mrs. Fischer.

"It's wonderful. I should have passed her in the street with that shawl over her head."

"It's how the workgirls wear it."

"Look at my boots, Jack," cried Nessa, holding up a foot. "Aren't they just lovely?" Great clumsy thick-soled things they were.

"Her own were just danger signals. But she'll do as she is. Now, I've told my servants you're old friends of mine, and that you'll be here till to-morrow morning. You had better not go out. A day's rest and a long night's sleep won't hurt either of you;" and with that she hurried away.

"Isn't she a dear old soul? She's been mothering me up there, as if she couldn't do enough for me, and ransacked every nook and cranny to fish out these things."

"She's a very shrewd old party, too."

"And are you proud of your wife, or sister, whichever I'm going to be?"

"Which would you prefer?"

"Don't be silly. Don't you think this is ripping? And she's been drilling me about how to behave. I think she's wonderful."

"What sort of drilling was it?"

"No end of things. How to eat; what to do; how to walk; always to have my knitting in hand; not to talk to strangers, especially women; one or two phrases I was