When he reached this
point, he suddenly quickened his footsteps because he saw that
someone else was approaching it with an air of intention. It was
a man, not quite as tall as himself but of heavier build and with
square held shoulders. As the man set his foot upon the step,
Coombe touched him on the arm and said something in German.
The man started angrily and then suddenly stood quite still and
erect.
"It will be better for us to walk up the Place together," Lord
Coombe said, with perfect politeness.
If he could have been dashed down upon the pavement and his head
hammered in with the handle of a sword, or if he could have been
run through furiously again and again, either or both of these
things would have been done. But neither was possible. It also was
not possible to curse aloud in a fashionable London street. Such
curses as one uttered must be held in one's foaming mouth between
one's teeth. Count von Hillern knew this better than most men
would have known it. Here was one of those English swine with whom
Germany would deal in her own way later.
They walked back together as if they were acquaintances taking a
casual stroll.
"There is nothing which would so infuriate your--Master-as
a disgraceful scandal," Lord Coombe's highbred voice suggested
undisturbedly. "The high honour of a German officer-the knightly
bearing of a wearer of the uniform of the All Highest-that sort
of thing you know.
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