live in a lodging-house room. Yet he was marching on air because of his pride in the party and
its achievements. He worked nights and Sundays at a variety of voluntary tasks, and had never
received a penny of compensation—unless you counted the various party festivals, and the
fact that the party had power to force his employers to grant him a week's holiday to attend the
party superior would keep Karl happy for months. He thought of the Führer as close to God,
and was proud of having been within a few feet of him, even though he had not seen him. The
"treasure" had been one of many thousands of Brownshirts who had been lined up on the street
in Nürnberg through which the Führer made his triumphal entrance. It had been Karl's duty to
hold the crowds back, and he had faced the crowds, keeping watch lest some fanatic should
attempt to harm the holy one.
Elsa told how Karl had seen the Minister-Präsident General Göring riding in an open car
with a magnificent green sash across his brown party uniform. He had heard the solemn words
of Rudolf Hess, Deputy of the Führer: "I open the Congress of Victory!" He had heard Hitler's
own proud announcement: "We shall meet here a year from now, we shall meet here ten
years from now, and a hundred, and even a thousand!" And Reichsminister Goebbels's
excoriation of the foreign Jews, the busy vilifiers of the Fatherland. "Not one hair of any Jewish
head was disturbed without reason," Frau Magda's husband had declared. When Irma told
Lanny about this, he thought of poor Freddi's hairs and hoped it might be true. He wondered
if this orgy of party fervor had been paid for out of the funds which Johannes Robin had
furnished. Doubtless that had been "reason" enough for disturbing the hairs of Johannes's head!
III
Lanny took Hugo Behr for a drive, that being the only way they could talk freely. Lanny
didn't say: "Did you write me that letter?" No, he was learning the spy business, and letting the
other fellow do the talking.
Right away the sports director opened up. "I'm terribly embarrassed not to have been of any
use to you, Lanny."
"You haven't been able to learn anything?"
"I would have written if I had. I paid out more than half the money to persons who agreed
to make inquiries in the prisons in Berlin, and also in Oranienburg and Sonnenburg and
Spandau. They all reported there was no such prisoner. I can't be sure if they did what they
promised, but I believe they did. I want to return the rest of the money."
"Nonsense," replied the other. "You gave your time and thought and that is all I asked. Do
you suppose there is any chance that Freddi might be in some camp outside of Prussia?"
"There would have to be some special reason for it."
"Well, somebody might have expected me to be making this inquiry. Suppose they had
removed him to Dachau, would you have any way of finding out?"
"I have friends in Munich, but I would have to go there and talk to them. I couldn't write."
"Of course not. Do you suppose you could get leave to go?"
"I might be able to think up some party matter."
"I would be very glad to pay your expenses, and another thousand marks for your trouble.
Everything that I told you about the case applies even more now. The longer Freddi is missing,
the more unhappy the father grows, and the more pressure on me to do something. If the Detaze
show should prove a success in Berlin, I may take it to Munich; meantime, if you could get the
information, I could be making plans."
"Have you any reason to think about Dachau, especially?"
"I'll tell you frankly. It may sound foolish, but during the World War I had an English friend
who was a flyer in France, and I was at my father's home in Connecticut, and just at dawn I was
awakened by a strange feeling and saw my friend standing at the foot of the bed, a shadowy
figure with a gash across his forehead. It turned out that this was just after the man had
crashed and was lying wounded in a field."
"One hears such stories," commented the other, "but one never knows whether to believe
them."
"Naturally, I believed this. I've never had another such experience until the other night. I was
awakened, I don't know how, and lying in the dark I distinctly heard a voice saying: 'Freddi is
in Dachau.' I waited a long time, thinking he might appear, or that I might hear more, but
nothing happened. I had no reason to think of Dachau-it seems a very unlikely place—so
naturally I am interested to follow it up and see if I am what they call 'psychic' "
Hugo agreed that he, too, would be interested; his interest increased when Lanny slipped
several hundred-mark notes into his pocket, saying, with a laugh: "My mother and stepfather
have paid much more than this to spiritualist mediums to see if they could get any news of our
friend."
IV
Hugo also had been to the
