The Austrian shook his head.
"I cannot say off-hand," he replied. "In fact, I think he appears on the list of prisoners only as a number."
"Is he tractable?"
"Like a caged bear; but by cutting down his rations we have tamed him a bit. Starve an Englishman, and you develop the comparatively mild strain of the Latin and Gallic blood in his veins; feed him, and the hardy Teutonic, Norse, and Keltic characteristics become paramount. That's the secret, I fancy, of the mongrel British nation. A cross-bred dog is invariably hardier than a pure-bred animal."
"Then there ought to be a future before the Austro-Hungarian Empire," remarked the Englishman.
"Alas, no," rejoined Major Hoffer. "There seems to be a hard-and-fast line between the German Austrians and the Magyars. They are like two large tributaries running into one broad channel, flowing side by side, but each preserving its characteristics; for instance, like the swift-flowing Rhone and the sluggish Saône after their confluence at Lyons."
"I'll see this Englishman," decided the pseudo baron. "If you want to get rid of him, a little German discipline will work wonders. The prisoner interests me. So much so that I feel inclined to take him in hand myself. You can spare two soldiers to guard him?"
"Half a dozen, if you like," replied Major Hoffer, only too glad to escape the after-consequences of having charge of a British naval officer, who, according to the rules of war ought to be receiving honourable treatment. "And you will make a point of writing to von Loringhoven and explaining matters?"
"Two men will be sufficient," said the Baron, studiously ignoring the second question, but resolving at some future date to communicate with the vindictive von Loringhoven.
At the appointed hour the Englishman, arrayed in the full splendour of his "borrowed" trappings, presented himself at the wicket-gate in the double-barbed wire fence surrounding the Ostrovornik sulphur mines. A guard of honour composed of Hungarian reservists turned out and saluted, the distinguished visitor noting with a certain amount of satisfaction that the men did not show any great signs of mental alertness. They were of a type used to being ordered about, and accustomed to carry out their instructions with stolid acquiescence.