William Le Queux

Spies of the Kaiser William Le Queux

Book Excerptnfidence--myself and Vera, the pretty, fair-haired daughter of Vice-Admiral Sir Charles Vallance, the Admiral-Superintendent of Portsmouth Dockyard, to whom he was engaged. Indeed, from the first I suspected that it had been her influence that had roused him to action; she who had promised him her assistance, and who had pointed out how, by watching and unmasking the spies, he might render his King and country signal service. At dusk that day we had, on arrival from King's Cross, left our baggage with the hall porter of the North British Hotel in Edinburgh, had travelled from the Waverley Station to Dalmeny, and descending the hundred or so steps to the comfortable Hawes Inn, at the water's edge, had dined there. Thence we had taken the old ferry-boat over to North Queensferry, on the opposite shore, where, in the rather bare parlour of the little Albert Hotel, directly beneath the giant arms of the Forth Bridge, we were resting and smoking. Outside the November night was dark and squally