Читать книгу Secret History of To-day: Being Revelations of a Diplomatic Spy онлайн

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‘So you are going with me?’ I observed.

‘With you!’ Kehler exclaimed.

‘It appears so. No doubt you have been instructed?’

Kehler denied it energetically.

‘But you refused to participate in a certain design,’ he reminded me.

‘I laid down certain conditions, which you declined to fulfil, but which have since been complied with by your principal.’

The Bavarian was thunderstruck. I relied upon his having reported his failure to whomever it was that had sent him to me; and there was nothing impossible in the suggestion that I had in consequence been approached directly.

‘You have credentials, I suppose?’ he asked.

I nodded carelessly.

‘You will convince me, perhaps?’ he persisted.

‘Are you authorised to convince me?’ was my retort.

‘You know it—no.’

I shrugged my shoulders and remained silent.

So commenced the most extraordinary journey I have ever taken, a journey which was destined to end only at Havana. Across France and Spain and the Atlantic Ocean we travelled side by side, each unwilling to lose sight of the other; I, resolved to find out and if possible thwart the designs of my companion; Kehler, unable to determine whether I was an opponent, a rival, or a spy set over him by those on whose behalf he was engaged.


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