The Spy in Black   By: J. Storer Clouston (1870-1944)

BY

J. STORER CLOUSTON

AUTHOR OF

'THE LUNATIC AT LARGE,' ETC.

William Blackwood and Sons

Edinburgh and London

1917

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

TWO'S TWO. THE LUNATIC AT LARGE. THE ADVENTURES OF M. D'HARICOT. OUR LADY'S INN. GAR MISCATH. THE PRODIGAL FATHER. THE PEER'S PROGRESS. HIS FIRST OFFENCE.

CONTENTS.

PART I.

THE NARRATIVE OF LIEUTENANT VON BELKE (OF THE GERMAN NAVY). TOC I. THE LANDING II. NIGHT IN THE RUINED HOUSE III. BEHIND THE WALL IV. THE NAILS V. WAITING ETOC

PART II.

A FEW CHAPTERS BY THE EDITOR. TOC I. THE PLEASANT STRANGER II. THE CHAUFFEUR III. ON THE CLIFF IV. MR DRUMMOND'S VISITOR V. ON THE MAIL BOAT VI. THE VANISHING GOVERNESS ETOC

PART III.

LIEUTENANT VON BELKE'S NARRATIVE RESUMED. TOC I. THE MEETING II. TIEL'S STORY III. THE PLAN IV. WHAT HAPPENED ON SUNDAY V. A MYSTERIOUS ADVENTURE VI. THE VISITOR VII. AT NIGHT VIII. THE DECISION IX. ON THE SHORE ETOC

PART IV.

LIEUTENANT VON BELKE'S NARRATIVE CONCLUDED. TOC I. WEDNESDAY II. THURSDAY III. THURSDAY NIGHT IV. FRIDAY ETOC

PART V.

A FEW CONCLUDING CHAPTERS BY THE EDITOR, TOC I. TIEL'S JOURNEY II. THE LADY III. THE EMPTY ENVELOPE ETOC

PART I.

THE NARRATIVE OF LIEUTENANT VON BELKE

(OF THE GERMAN NAVY)

I.

THE LANDING.

If any one had been watching the bay that August night (which, fortunately for us, there was not), they would have seen up till an hour after midnight as lonely and peaceful a scene as if it had been some inlet in Greenland. The war might have been waging on another planet. The segment of a waning moon was just rising, but the sky was covered with clouds, except right overhead where a bevy of stars twinkled, and it was a dim though not a dark night. The sea was as flat and calm as you can ever get on an Atlantic coast a glassy surface, but always a gentle regular bursting of foam upon the beach. In a semicircle the shore rose black, towering at either horn (and especially on the south) into high dark cliffs.

I suppose a bird or two may have been crying then as they were a little later, but there was not a light nor a sign of anything human being within a hundred miles. If one of the Vikings who used to live in those islands had revisited that particular glimpse of the moon, he could never have guessed that his old haunts had altered a tittle. But if he had waited a while he would have rubbed his eyes and wondered. Right between the headlands he would have seen it dimly: a great thing that was not a fish rising out of the calm water, and then very stealthily creeping in and in towards the southern shore.

When we were fairly on the surface I came on deck and gazed over the dark waters to the darker shore, with I don't mind confessing it now a rather curious sensation. To tell the truth, I was a little nervous, but I think I showed no sign of it to Wiedermann.

"You have thought of everything you can possibly need?" he asked in a low voice.

"Everything, sir, I think," I answered confidently.

"No need to give you tips!" he said with a laugh.

I felt flattered but still my heart was beating just a little faster than usual!

In we crept closer and closer, with the gentlest pulsation of our engines that could not have been heard above the lapping of the waves on the pebbles. An invisible gull or two wheeled and cried above us, but otherwise there was an almost too perfect stillness. I could not help an uncomfortable suspicion that someone was watching. Someone would soon be giving the alarm, someone would presently be playing the devil with my schemes. It was sheer nonsense, but then I had never played the spy before at least, not in war time.