The spy seemed rather disappointed, and I made a feeble effort to keep my five shillings by saying:
"Couldn’t you get to the police-station? They’d be sure to have tons of money there."
But at the mention of a police-station he showed the utmost annoyance, combined with contempt. He said: "What’s your name?"
"Well, Briggs," he said, "let me tell you, if there’s one thing the Secret Service hates and despises more than another, it’s a police-station; and if there’s one bigger fool on earth than another, it’s a policeman. It would very likely be death to my whole career as a spy, if I went to a policeman and told him who I was."
"Don’t you ever work with them, Mr. Baden-Powell?" asked Travers; and he said:
So he had the six bob, much to my regret, and told us to be at "The Wool Pack" public-house at Mudborough on the following Saturday afternoon. He asked what would be the most convenient time for us to be there, and we said half-past three, and he said "Good!"
Then Travers asked rather a smart question and said--
"I shall be disguised as a farmer, in gaiters and the sort of clothes farmers go to market in on Saturdays; and I shall be in the bar with other men. And one of these men will be a very dangerous German secret agent, who has a ’wireless’ at his house. And when we’ve got him, we shall go to his house and destroy the ’wireless.’ And now you’d better be getting on, or people will think it suspicious. And you shall have your money again next Saturday."
So we left him, and the six shillings with him, and I was by no means so pleased and excited about it as Travers minor. Still, I was excited in a way, and hoped the following Saturday would be glorious; and Travers said it would undoubtedly be the greatest day we had spent up to that time.
We had gone two hundred yards, and were wondering what the German would look like, and if he’d make a fight, when we were much startled by a man who suddenly jumped out of the hedge and stopped us.
It was a policeman in a very excited frame of mind.
"What did that bloke up the road say to you?" he began; and Travers minor, remembering what contempt the great spy had for policemen, was rather haughty.
"Our conversation was private," he answered, and the policeman seemed inclined to laugh.