Horizon by Helen MacInnes Page B

She’s staying there.”
    “Eva Mussner,” Paul Mahlknecht said thoughtfully. “A skinny little thing with straight hair, if I remember.”
    “She is hardly that now,” Frau Schichtl answered tartly. “She met me in the village today. She was very upset about what happened. So she said.”
    There was a pause. Mahlknecht was lost in his thoughts.
    “What was it you were going to tell me,” Frau Schichtl asked at last, “about that mess of mud on my best sitting-room floor?”
    “We had two visitors this morning. American flyers.”
    Frau Schichtl glanced at the ceiling. “They are sleeping now, I suppose.”
    “No. We sent them away.” Mahlknecht began to light his pipe. “We don’t think they were Americans, although they were dressed correctly. We think they are Germans.”
    “But, Paul, what if they aren’t?” Frau Schichtl was roused once more. “How could you be so sure?”
    “They said their plane had crashed many miles away, and that explained why they could arrive without us hearing their plane. But the houses are scattered so much over the Schlernthat someone must have heard and seen the crash. And when flyers are dragged from their planes or are found wandering near them our rule is that someone accompanies them to the places where they can get a guide out of the mountains. They said a house had sheltered them near where they had crashed. But no one had been sent with them to prove to us that they had crashed. That made me wonder. The only men who would come as quietly and unannounced as they did would have been men who had parachuted on to the Schlern. That is what I thought they were when I went downstairs to meet them: but they didn’t ask for Peter or for me, and they didn’t give any of the right identifications. So I called Johann and Peter downstairs just to make sure that they were Americans. The slightest doubt, and we couldn’t help them. Peter found a doubt.” Mahlknecht began to laugh. He threw back his head as he had done when Lennox had first explained his trick, and his teeth were white against the dark beard. He was explaining it now, all over again. Frau Schichtl smiled too, and then a new worry appeared.
    “If they were Germans, and you called Peter down here so that they could see him...” Frau Schichtl began. “Paul, how could you!”
    “He didn’t talk English, Frieda. In fact, he gave a good imitation of old Schroffenegger’s style of conversation.”
    Lennox grinned self-consciously. He had often watched Josef Schroffenegger, one of the Committee men who came up to visit Frau Schichtl on Saturdays, with a good deal of amusement. Now that he considered it, he had given a sizable imitation of the old warrior.
    “What else could I have done, Frieda?” Mahlknecht wenton. “I had to know if these men were real Americans. It was logical to believe that Peter would know more about judging them than we do. He has fought and lived beside them. And our risk did work. He did find out.”
    “Then they will blame him.”
    “No. I took care to do all the deciding. It is I whom they will blame. Anyway, all they can report is that we refused to help American flyers.”
    Lennox said, “Won’t the Germans expect us to report these flyers?”
    Mahlknecht smiled. “That is a good idea,” he said. “But perhaps it is too good. The Germans might begin to wonder why we were suddenly so helpful. The only informers they have found are people like Mussner, and the Germans know them all. From the rest of us, they may not expect actual trouble, but they have learned this winter not to expect help either. They think we are a slow, pig-headed, selfish lot of peasants. They think we are inefficient and lazy. Unbiddable thickheads. No, we don’t have to worry about reporting to the Germans. It would seem out of character.” He smiled again, encouragingly, as he watched the younger man’s face. “It was a good idea, well worth suggesting,” Mahlknecht added. “We would have used