“There is a service—a very important service—which only you can perform,” says he. “More than that I can’t say, at the moment. But that is why you were brought to Munich—oh, it was all most carefully planned. Lola’s letter—dictated by me, incidentally—was not altogether inaccurate. ‘Most delicate’ really sums it up.”

“But what service could there possibly be that only I—”

“You’ll have to wait and see, and for heaven’s sake stop expostulating like the victim in a melodrama. Take my word for it, we didn’t go to so much trouble for nothing. Now, you’re a sensible man, I’m sure. Will you bow to the inevitable, like a good chap?”

“That bitch Lola!” I growled. “She’s up to the neck in this—this villainy, I suppose.”

“Up to a point, not up to the neck. She was the means of getting you to Germany, but it wasn’t her idea. We employed her assistance—”

“‘We? Who the devil’s ‘we’?”

“My friends and I. But you shouldn’t be too hard on her, you know. I doubt if she bears you any ill-will—in fact, I think she’s rather sorry for you—but she knows which side her bread is buttered. And powerful as she is, there are those in Germany whom even she finds it wise to oblige. Now, no more silly questions: are you going to be a good boy or aren’t you?”

“It seems I’ve no choice.”

“Excellent. Now, we’ll have that crack in your head seen to, get you a bath and some clean linen, and then—”

“What then?”

“You and I will make a little journey, my dear Flashman. Or, may I call you Harry? You must address me as Rudi, you know; ‘dirty dog’ and ‘devil’ and ‘swine’ and so on are all very well between comparative strangers, but I feel that you and I may be on the brink of a really fruitful and profitable friendship. You don’t agree? Well, I’m sorry, but we’ll see. Now, if you’ll come along, I have a closed carriage waiting which will take us to a little place of mine where we’ll have you repaired and made all klim-bim, as the Prussians say. Devilish places, these jails, aren’t they; no proper facilities for a gentleman at all….”