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There was some one coming along the quiet streets, with a stealthy, shuffling gait that caught his attention. So, for instance, might a weary or a wounded man drag along. Exactly so, indeed, had Peter Niburg shambled into his house but two hours gone. The footsteps paused, hesitated, commenced a painful struggle up the ascent. Nikky moved behind his column, and waited.
"Ah!" he said, and straightened up. "After all it is not so bad as I feared. They got nothing." He made a manful effort to walk, but tottered reeled. Nikky caught him. "Careful!" he said. "The colossus was doubtless the one who got us boxy, and we are likely to feel his weight for some time. Where do you live?" Peter Niburg was not for saying.
He let his royal rage beat on that unlucky individual while the agent stood, white and still. Not until it was over, and Karl, spent with passion, was pacing the floor, did Nikky venture a word. "If this is not what Your Majesty expected," he said, "there is perhaps an explanation." Karl wheeled on him. "Explanation!" "The man Niburg was attacked, early last evening, by three men.
A man who stood behind his linens, and hated with his head down. And he hated Peter. God, how he hated him! The cashier was gone, having married a restaurant keeper, and already she waxed fat. But Herman's hatred grew with the days. And business being bad, much of the time he stood behind his linens and thought about a certain matter, which was this: How did Peter Niburg do it?
A moment later a man, with the springiness of youth, mounted the steps and confronted the messenger. Nikky saw a great light. When Peter Niburg put his hand to his breast-pocket, there was no longer room for doubt, nor, for that matter, time for thinking. As a matter of fact, never afterward could Nikky recall thinking at all. He moved away quietly, hidden by the shadows of the colonnade.
He reported that, during an evening stroll, before he met me, he was attacked by three men, with the evident intention of securing the letter. He was badly beaten up." His companion started. "Niburg," he said. "Then " He glanced at the letter he held. "We must find some one else," he muttered. "I never trusted the fellow. A clerk, nothing else. For this work it takes wit."
Nikky drew himself up. "I have brought the envelope which was given me." Without a word Karl held out papers and envelope to the other man, who took them. Then he turned to Nikky, and now he raised his voice. "Where did you get this hoax?" he demanded. "At the cathedral, from the man Niburg." "You lie!" said Karl. Then, for a moment, he left Nikky and turned on his companion in a fury.
After that, arriving in the capital, they had driven to the little office in a back street, and there Nikky had roused himself again enough to give a description of Peter Niburg, and to give the location of the house where he lived.
"But I know why they came," he said unguardedly. "Some early morning, my friend, you will hear of man lying dead in the street, That man will be I." "The thought has a moral," observed Nikky. "Do not trust yourself out-of-doors at night." But he saw that Peter Niburg kept his hand over breast-pocket. Never having dealt in mysteries, Nikky was slow recognizing one.
Up and up, weary step after weary step. The shadowy figure, coming close, took a form, became a man became Peter Niburg. Now, indeed, Nikky roused. Beaten and sorely bruised, Peter Niburg should have been in bed. What stealthy business of the night brought him out? Fortunately for Nikky's hiding-place, the last step or two proved too much for the spy.
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