I stopped her halfway that time. You can guess how. And it was quite a long time before we could get over our rapturous excitement and settle down to the story of my escape.
How we laughed at it all together! What lovely little interludes there were every now and then! What innumerable questions she had to ask, ferretting out every detail! How we went over it again and again! Then back to the first part of the journey when we had been together! How we laughed lightly, now that they were over, at the difficulties and risks which had seemed so real in the Lassen period! And how we discussed, with eager smiling perplexity, the still unsolved puzzles!
We were just two happy kids together. The hours slipped away like magic and we hadn't even begun to think of our plans for getting to England, when a servant came in to say that the hotel was being closed for the night, and I had to rush off in search of a bed.
I found out the next morning that a steamer was leaving in the afternoon and booked our passages, before going to Nessa. She was writing the good news to Rosa when I arrived and told me that Vandervelt had promised to take her letters on his next trip and post them in Germany, so as to dodge the censor.
I thought of some to write also. One was to von Gratzen, explaining that I was not Lassen, but an Englishman; but not giving him my name. Another was to Harden, telling him that his aeroplane was being returned and asking him to forward an enclosure to Captain Schiller.
"Dear Captain Schiller,—
"I am the 'desperate ruffian' with whom you had that interesting chat over the 'phone the day before yesterday. I wish to confirm what Harden has probably told you, that after your first talk with him, the rest of the conversation was entirely with me. I am most grateful to you for having warned me that the affair with Lieutenant Vibach—a most offensive bully, by the way—was discovered sooner than I had expected. Naturally it increased my wish to get away and made it impossible for me to satisfy your eager desire to make my personal acquaintance at Ellendorf. That eagerness, combined possibly with your excitement and temper, no doubt prevented your detecting the difference in the two voices. Your characteristically national dulness and gullibility will remain an abiding joy to me. You have, however, the satisfaction of knowing that you stopped my bringing away the new type of aeroplane. But the old one served my purpose well enough, for it carried me out of your country and so out of your reach. We are not likely to meet again, unless the fortune of war should bring us together on one of the fronts, when I shall be pleased to tell you the name of the 'desperate ruffian.'"
There was no time for more letters as we had to hurry to the Consulate to clear up things there to enable us to avoid trouble on landing in England.
We had a smooth passage disturbed by neither mine nor submarine. We scarcely ceased chattering together the whole time, discussing two topics chiefly—the question of our marriage and the riddle of von Gratzen's conduct. The first was settled a fortnight later to our mutual satisfaction, and we went to Ireland on the honeymoon in order to send the promised sprig of shamrock to our warm-hearted Irish friend at Massen.
The von Gratzen riddle was not solved until three months later when I was home on a week's leave and received a German newspaper from Switzerland containing a marked paragraph. Von Erstein had shot himself sooner than face the charge of having murdered Anna Hilden.