“Pale-blue,” he admitted.
“Well, mine is scarcely that—is it?” I asked, as he stood beside me.
The “bonnet” was open, and by the light of the policeman’s lantern he was admiring the six bright cylinders.
“No,” he responded. Even now, however, the bearded fellow seemed only half convinced. But German officials are a particularly hide-bound genus of mankind.
He saw, however, that I had now grown exasperated, and presently, after putting a few further questions to me, he expressed his regret that I should have suffered any delay or inconvenience, and politely wished me a pleasant journey to my destination.
A lucky escape, I thought, when once again I was out on the broad high road to Magdeburg, my head-lamps showing a stream of white light far along the dusty way.
Instead of getting into Magdeburg, as I believed, I found myself, an hour later, in a dark, ill-lit town upon a broad river, and discovered that I was in Schönebeck, on the main road to Hanover. The distance to the latter city was one hundred miles, and, as I could get away from there by half a dozen lines of railway, I decided to push forward, even though for the past eighteen hours I had only had a piece of bread and a mug of beer at Dessau.
About eleven o’clock on the following morning, after two tyre troubles, I was passing out of the quaint mediæval town of Hildesheim, intending to reach Hanover before noon. I had come around the Haupt Bahnhof and on to the highway beyond the railroad, when my heart gave a leap as a policeman dashed out into the road in front of me and held up his hand.
“Your name?” he demanded gruffly.
“William Hartley—an Englishman,” was my prompt response.