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

stared hard at me. "I don't remember any one of your name. Bulich. Bulich. There was never a man of that name. I mean to know some more about you, my man. Now that I look closely at you, I believe I've seen you before. You remind me of some one. Just walk across the room."

Smothering a curse at the change of luck, I obeyed and slouched across, overdoing it probably in my eagerness and fluster.

"Stop there," he ordered. "Now face round, and come back in your proper walk. Don't try that game with me again. That's a little better, but a long way from right, as you know well. Now, who are you? Out with it and don't try any fool game with me."

"I've come down a bit in the world, and no one knows me now by any other name than Hans Bulich."

"I mean to know it. Out with it," he shouted.

I was at my wits' end and didn't answer.

"If you don't tell me you'll have to tell the police, mind. I'm going to bottom this. You've lied to me once, remember."

Suddenly a thought occurred to me. I picked up a tumbler and made a peculiar motion with it—the secret sign of a Göttingen students' society, half-masonic, half-drinking club, of which both of us had been members.

He laughed, swore, and held out his hand. It was part of the ritual we had been bound to observe by the pledge of the society. I gripped his hand in the approved manner.

"So that's it, eh?" he said, filling his glass again and motioning me to fill one for myself. The ice was still of the thinnest, for in my time there had not been more than a dozen members, and I could see that he was searching his memory for my name. If he remembered, what was I to do? I knew what he would do—have me arrested as a spy, and then—— There was only one possible "then" in war time.

The long pause while he was thinking back gave me time to think forward. My life was in the balance, and it didn't take much consideration to decide that it was just as well to die at his hands in that room in an attempt to escape as to be placed against a wall with a firing platoon in front of me.

At such a moment of crisis one thinks quickly, and under the spur of this one a wild idea flashed into my thoughts, and the way to carry it out developed almost instantly. He was a man of my own height and build and colouring; he was a stranger; no one had seen me enter the hotel; his uniform would fit me sufficiently well to pass muster; and I was already quite convinced that if I did not leave the place in his clothes, I should never do it in my own, except under arrest.

After a very long pause, lasting perhaps five minutes although it seemed an hour to me, he started, stared at me and got up. "I can't remember you," he said with a nervous smile, which told me it was a lie. "Ring that bell for me."

Fortunately I was between him and it. "What for?" I asked.

He was still a coward, I was glad to notice, by his flinching movement, ebbing colour, and nervous licking of the lips. "I want some more wine," he said lamely.

"Why not say you've recognized me, Vibach? You know you have, and you want to bring some one here. We can't have that."

He did precisely what a coward would be expected to do. He lied that he didn't remember me at all, tried to hold me in talk about our Göttingen days, and when he thought I was a little off guard, made a dart for the door to shout for assistance.

The shout died still-born. My hand was on his throat before a sound could escape, and I held on with a bulldog grip which choked the breath out of him, as he clutched at my wrists in frantic but vain efforts to free himself. I had twice his strength and was as hard as nails, while he was flabby and soft with drink and self-indulgence.

He tried to make some sort of fight of it and began drumming his heels on the floor; so I lifted him off his feet, locked the door, plumped him down on a sofa and choked him until his struggles ceased and he lay half dead from funk and want of breath, shamming unconsciousness.

Then I sat on him, shoved the sofa cushion over his face lest he should try to shout again, unfastened my "tummy pad," and got out my silken cord and the "send-you-to-by-by" powder, pushed the cushion back, and shook him.

"It's no good shamming with me, Vibach; I've no time for it. Stop it, if you don't want me to knock you on the head and be done with it," I said.

He was too thoroughly scared not to obey, and he opened his eyes and started whimpering and begging for mercy.

"You can stop that, too, and listen to me. I don't want your blood on my hands; but I'll brain you as I would a rat, if you utter a single cry and don't do what I tell you."

"For God's sake don't," he whined.

"Get your uniform off, and be quick about it too."

He was shaking with funk and could scarcely undo the buttons, so I played valet and helped him. Then I peeled my own things off and made him put them on while I got into his. Next, I mucked his face with the grease and dirt from my own face and hands and rumpled his hair, with the result that he looked very much the working man. His arms and legs I tied up securely with a length of my cord and gagged him while I popped the "by-by" powder into a glass of wine.

He made a little fuss about drinking it, believing it was poison; but very little persuasion of the necessary sort overcame his scruples; and in a few minutes he was off, and I knew he would not wake for some hours.

As I wasn't a thief, I went through the pockets, and was rolling his money and valuables and so on into a napkin, when I found a paper which gave me an idea.

It was the army authority to the firm at Ellendorf to deliver the bus to him.

A veritable gift from the gods! That was the short cut to freedom, and I made up my mind in a second to use it.

The only thing remaining to do was to hide the man. There was no place in the room, except under the sofa, where he was likely to be seen when the servants came to clear the table. The door communicating with the next room was ajar, and a peep into it suggested possibilities. It was a bedroom, and I took him in, packed him inside a roomy wardrobe, laid the napkin of valuables by his side, locked him in, and tossed the key under the bed.

Then I washed my hands and face and braced myself to face the next act in the comedy or tragedy, whichever it was to be.

CHAPTER XXIX LIEUTENANT VIBACH

The first scene was a comedy one. Vibach's car was waiting outside the hotel, and the soldier chauffeur would almost certainly know that I was not the lieutenant, and how to fool him till we were out of Lingen was no easy problem.

Still it was no time to count risks; so I drew my cap well down, buttoned my overcoat as high over my face as possible, and pretended to be drunk.

It was all ridiculously easy. Pulitz, the hotel proprietor, met me in the hall with obsequious servility, hoping I had enjoyed my lunch. I swore at him in true Vibach style, cursed the lunch, told him to give me the bill, swore again at the charge as an imposition, and lurched out hiccoughing profanity and demanding my car.

Truly the gods were on my side, for it turned out that the chauffeur had gone to get something to eat. The car was mine; and a very excellent car it was. I lurched up to the wheel with the assistance of Pulitz, who waited on me bare-headed in obvious awe of the uniform, started the engine, growled out an order that the man was to wait for me, and still hiccoughing profanity, fumbled with the levers, and drove away.

I laughed in my sleeve as I rattled past Fischer's shop and saw him and Braun at the door in earnest conversation, probably canvassing the reason for my lengthy absence. Braun saluted me and I lifted a hand in response. What would he have done had he known!

I let the car rip along to Ellendorf. The sooner I reached the factory, the sooner I should get away—if I was to get away at all, that was. So far as could be judged only one really serious danger threatened me—that Vibach was known to the people at the factory—and even that might be averted, by giving another name and vamping a reason to explain his absence.

Any one who knows the attitude of the average German civilian toward the army will understand the strength of the cards I held. The officer's uniform, an army motor, the fact that Vibach was expected, the possession of an official authority duly signed and stamped, all these were so many self-evident proofs of my good faith, thoroughly calculated to impose on even a sharp-witted business man. If I were accepted as Vibach, nothing short of some stupid blunder could cause the scheme to fail. There was scarcely room even for a blunder, indeed, for the plan seemed almost fool proof.

It was nevertheless only prudent to consider what was to be done, should the unexpected happen. It was clearly best not to give my name until I was sure that Vibach was unknown, and to have a story ready to account for his absence. His name was in the order, and no doubt there would be difficulties raised about delivering the bus to any one else. That could be got over by saying he had told me to see that it was ready for him, and a little manœuvring would probably allow of my going for a trial spin. They might send up a mechanic or a representative of the firm with me; but that would be no great matter. Once we were off the ground, he could be readily dealt with.

I had burnt my boats now and was in too tight a corner to stick at anything, even violence, to win my way to escape.

If even the trial trip was refused, it would still be possible to get away under the pretence of testing the engine. Let me be on board with the engine going, it would need a lot of mechanics to keep me from making a start.

There remained the chance that even this might not be possible, however, and in that case the only thing to be done was to leave the place under a cloud of vituperative indignation and threats. For this possibility, it was necessary to leave the motor where I could reach it readily and without trouble.

The opening scene was all that could be desired. The fact that I was expected caused me to be led at once to the managing proprietor, whose name was Harden; he received me with all the respect due to my uniform; put me at ease by expressing a regret that he had never had the pleasure of seeing me before, although he had heard of my prowess in the air; and declared that he felt honoured at making my personal acquaintance.

I was condescendingly patronizing, thanked him a little boastfully for his compliment, and got to business.

"You have everything ready, of course?" I asked.

"Quite. I'll have the plane run