The feeling still remained within him that somewhere in that stolid-faced crowd a shadow lurked. It was the same sinister hand which had come out with him through the guarded gates of Dartmoor. It was the long arm of the Yard, reaching, reaching. He felt its fingers and turned swiftly. He went on. No one of all that throng showed a familiar face.
He retraced his steps by rounding a square and doubling back almost to the little hotel. He searched each figure, in passing. He saw few English in that throng.
Spies, commercial agents of the seven governments, oversea soldiers on furlough, interned or invalided troops—the backwash and the riffraff of a war that was over—filled the ancient streets.
He threw off the feeling of being shadowed, and took the shady side of a broad avenue. It would lead him past the embassy wherein was the strong-box and the key to the dye cipher.
More bold, now, and decidedly English, he advanced with head thrown back, and that keen smile upon his lips which brought answering warmth from the passers-by.
It was nice to be alive upon that glad day. The bright sun had doubled its grandeur when freed from the grip of the morning fog. The long lines of trees, the well-clipped hedges, and the rare bulbs of Holland were out in their spring clothing.
“Gad!� said Fay to himself. “This is living!�
He drew out his cigarette-case, removed a cigarette, tapped it on the palm of his hand and struck a match with a quick jerk of his heel. It came to him, as he inhaled the rich Turkish fumes, that the action of lighting a match on his heel was foreign to the country of Holland and even to the English. It was a flaw in his disguise!
“Trifles!� he said, half aloud. “That was a slip. I must be careful.�
He went on and crossed the avenue at the square below the embassy. He drank in its details as he passed along. He photographed the front so that he could have made a drawing of every detail—the long windows, the high marble steps, the flunky in purple and knee-breeches, the insignia near the great door, the semi-basement with its iron-grilled apertures.