“Ah!” I cried eagerly. “Tell me, who is he?”
“An Italian named Bertini—Paolo Bertini.”
“Bertini,” I repeated, the name sounding somewhat familiar. “Surely I’ve heard that name before!”
“Of course. You remember, when you were in Brussels, the bold attempt he made one afternoon in your room at the Embassy?”
“Ah! I remember. Why, of course! And is he actually the same man?”
In an instant I recalled the face of Edith’s midnight visitor, and recollected where I had seen it on a previous occasion.
Kaye’s words brought back to me in that moment an incident which showed plainly the dastardly tricks of the foreign spies who constantly hover about every legation or embassy on the Continent. One afternoon, years ago, in Brussels, a well-dressed, gentlemanly man called to see His Excellency, and was shown into my room. Half an hour before, a Foreign Office messenger had arrived from London with despatches, and I was busily engaged in deciphering them when the servant showed in the stranger. The latter, who introduced himself as a shipowner of Antwerp, was seated near my table, and was talking to me about a complaint he had recently lodged against one of our consuls, when suddenly he stopped, turned pale, and fell back in a faint. I sprang up, and, rushing out of the room, went to get a glass of water. Fortunately I had on thin shoes, and the carpet in the corridor was so thick that my feet fell noiselessly. Judge of my surprise when, on my return, I saw my visitor standing in a perfect state of health with one of the deciphered despatches pinned against the wall and a camera in his hand! He had actually photographed it during my absence.
Without an instant’s hesitation I sprang upon him from behind, wrenched the camera from his hand, shouted for help, and held him until some of the servants came, when he was taken in charge by the police. After a short trial, during which it was proved that he was one of the cleverest spies employed by France, he was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment for attempted theft, while the camera, together with the photographic films, was returned to us. The latter, on being developed, proved extremely interesting and very valuable, for not only did we find the photograph of our own despatch, but those of three other secret documents taken in the Italian Embassy in Brussels.
And it was this artful adventurer who had become Edith’s lover. She, young and inexperienced, had no doubt fallen his victim. She had become enmeshed in the net he had spread for her, and was the subordinate by means of whom he intended to operate further against us.
“What you tell me, Kaye, really staggers belief,” I said after a pause. “That man is absolutely unscrupulous.”