Waldron opened the door, and at once a soldier, aged about thirty, with a thin face and rather crooked nose, sprang to attention. He wore the dark blue uniform with crimson facings of the renowned Bersiglieri, or riflemen, with his large, round hat with cock’s plumes at the side.
“You are Corporal Tonini?” asked Waldron kindly, as he closed the door and advanced into the bare, severely furnished room, which smelt of stale cigars, as do all the rooms in the Italian Ministries.
“Yes, signore,” replied the soldier, looking askance at the civilian foreigner who had come to question him.
“Sit down,” Waldron said, taking a seat himself. “I had better explain. I am acting on behalf of His Majesty your King, in order to clear up the mystery of the theft of those plans from His Excellency’s room.”
“The plans?” gasped the man, and by his accent Hubert knew that he was not a Roman. “Then you know, signore?”
“You come from Tuscany, Tonini?”
“Si, signore.”
“What part?”
“My home is at Signa, near Firenze.”
And from that moment Hubert Waldron, whose knowledge of Italian was practically perfect, spoke in the Tuscan tongue, using all the aspirated “c’s” and substituting the “r’s” for “l’s” which is the betrayal of the true Florentine or the Livornese.