The Great Impersonation by E. Phillips Oppenheim (books to read now txt) 📕

the month, is fixed. I am recalled from here to take the place for which I was destined. You know what that place is? You know why I was sent to an English public school and college?”

“I can guess.”

“I am to take up my residence in England. I am to have a special mission. I am to find a place for myself there as an Englishman. The means are left to my ingenuity. Listen, Schmidt. A great idea has come to me.”

The doctor lit a cigar.

“I listen, Excellency.”

Von Ragastein rose to his feet. Not content with the sound of that regular breathing, he made his way to the opening of the banda and gazed in at Dominey’s slumbering form. Then he returned.

“It is something which you do not wish the Englishman to hear?” the doctor asked.

“It is.”

“We speak in German.”

“Languages,” was the cautious reply, “happen to be that man’s only accomplishment. He can speak German as fluently as you or I. That, however, is of no consequence. He sleeps and he will continue to sleep. I mixed him a sleeping draught with his whisky and soda.”

“Ah!” the doctor grunted.

“My principal need in England is an identity,” Von Ragastein pointed out. “I have made up my mind. I shall take this Englishman’s. I shall return to England as Sir Everard Dominey.”

“So!”

“There is a remarkable likeness between us, and Dominey has not seen an Englishman who knows him for eight or ten years. Any school or college friends whom I may encounter I shall be able to satisfy. I have stayed at Dominey. I know Dominey’s relatives. Tonight he has babbled for hours, telling me many things that it is well for me to know.”

“What about his near relatives?”

“He has none nearer than cousins.”

“No wife?”

Von Ragastein paused and turned his head. The deep breathing inside the banda had certainly ceased. He rose to his feet and, stealing uneasily to the opening, gazed down upon his guest’s outstretched form. To all appearance, Dominey still slept deeply. After a moment or two’s watch, Von Ragastein returned to his place.

“Therein lies his tragedy,” he confided, dropping his voice a little lower. “She is insane⁠—insane, it seems, through a shock for which he was responsible. She might have been the only stumbling block, and she is as though she did not exist.”

“It is a great scheme,” the doctor murmured enthusiastically.

“It is a wonderful one! That great and unrevealed Power, Schmidt, which watches over our country and which will make her mistress of the world, must have guided this man to us. My position in England will be unique. As Sir Everard Dominey I shall be able to penetrate into the inner circles of Society⁠—perhaps, even, of political life. I shall be able, if necessary, to remain in England even after the storm bursts.”

“Supposing,” the doctor suggested, “this man Dominey should return to England?”

Von Ragastein turned his head and looked towards his questioner.

“He must not,” he pronounced.

“So!” the doctor murmured.

Late in the afternoon of the following day, Dominey, with a couple of boys for escort and his rifle slung across his shoulder, rode into the bush along the way he had come. The little fat doctor stood and watched him, waving his hat until he was out of sight. Then he called to the orderly.

“Heinrich,” he said, “you are sure that the Herr Englishman has the whisky?”

“The water bottles are filled with nothing else, Herr Doctor,” the man replied.

“There is no water or soda water in the pack?”

“Not one drop, Herr Doctor.”

“How much food?”

“One day’s rations.”

“The beef is salt?”

“It is very salt, Herr Doctor.”

“And the compass?”

“It is ten degrees wrong.”

“The boys have their orders?”

“They understand perfectly, Herr Doctor. If the Englishman does not drink, they will take him at midnight to where His Excellency will be encamped at the bend of the Blue River.”

The doctor sighed. He was not at heart an unkindly man.

“I think,” he murmured, “it will be better for the Englishman that he drinks.”

III

Mr. John Lambert Mangan of Lincoln’s Inn gazed at the card which a junior clerk had just presented in blank astonishment, an astonishment which became speedily blended with dismay.

“Good God, do you see this, Harrison?” he exclaimed, passing it over to his manager, with whom he had been in consultation. “Dominey⁠—Sir Everard Dominey⁠—back here in England!”

The head clerk glanced at the narrow piece of pasteboard and sighed.

“I’m afraid you will find him rather a troublesome client, sir,” he remarked.

His employer frowned. “Of course I shall,” he answered testily. “There isn’t an extra penny to be had out of the estates⁠—you know that, Harrison. The last two quarters’ allowance which we sent to Africa came out of the timber. Why the mischief didn’t he stay where he was!”

“What shall I tell the gentleman, sir?” the boy enquired.

“Oh, show him in!” Mr. Mangan directed ill-temperedly. “I suppose I shall have to see him sooner or later. I’ll finish these affidavits after lunch, Harrison.”

The solicitor composed his features to welcome a client who, however troublesome his affairs had become, still represented a family who had been valued patrons of the firm for several generations. He was prepared to greet a seedy-looking and degenerate individual, looking older than his years. Instead, he found himself extending his hand to one of the best turned out and handsomest men who had ever crossed the threshold of his not very inviting office. For a moment he stared at his visitor, speechless. Then certain points of familiarity⁠—the well-shaped nose, the rather deep-set grey eyes⁠—presented themselves. This surprise enabled him to infuse a little real heartiness into his welcome.

“My dear Sir Everard!” he exclaimed. “This is a most unexpected pleasure⁠—most unexpected! Such a pity, too, that we only posted a draft for your allowance a few days ago. Dear me⁠—you’ll forgive my saying so⁠—how well you look!”

Dominey smiled as he accepted an easy chair.

“Africa’s a wonderful country, Mangan,” he remarked, with just that faint note of patronage in his tone which took his listener back to