However,
the loose cape of horizon blue resembled charity in covering defects.
As a dummy, sitting motionless in the rear of the automobile, my captors
felt that I would pass.
By this time I was enchanted with the plans I was concocting. I might
look like an opera-bouffe hero,--no doubt I did,--but my hour would
come. Meanwhile events were marching. My transformation being complete,
Blenheim gave a curt order in German, the candles were blown out, and
lighted only by the torch, we turned toward the door. There was an
inarticulate cry from Schwartzmann, just conscious enough, poor beggar,
to grasp the fact of his abandonment in the strategic retreat his
friends were beating. Then we were out in the courtyard, beneath the
stars.
Down the hill, sheltered behind the stones of a ruined house, the gray
car was waiting, and Blenheim climbed into the driver's seat, meanwhile
giving brief directions. There was no noise, no flurry; the affair, I
must say, went with an efficiency in keeping with the proudest Prussian
traditions. I was installed in the tonneau, and I was hardly seated
before the motor hummed into life, and we jolted into the moonlit road.
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