Ten minutes later the clerk returned, saying that a Spaniard named Aranda had arrived from Paris early that morning with a young lady named Sabin, and that they were staying at the Central Hotel, opposite the Friedrich-Strasse Station. Upon this information I went to the "Central," and from the hall-porter discovered that Aranda had left the hotel an hour before, but that his supposed niece was upstairs in her room. Afterwards I hurried back to Potsdam as quickly as possible, only to find that the Crown-Prince was out with Knof motoring somewhere. Of the Crown-Princess I inquired whither he had gone, but, as usual, she had no idea. "Willie" was ever erratic, and ever on the move. Six o'clock had already struck when he returned, and the sentry informed him that I was extremely anxious to see him. Therefore, without removing his coat, he ascended to my room, where he burst in breezily. When I told him what I had discovered in Berlin the light died instantly out of his face. "Is the fellow really here, Heltzendorff?" he gasped. "I had a letter from him a week ago declaring his intention to come here." "You did not reply, I hope?" "No. The letter I found upon my dressing-table, but I have not discovered who placed it there," he said. "The fellow evidently intends to carry out his threat and expose me to the Emperor." "What can he expose?" I queried. But "Willie" was not to be caught like that. He merely replied: "Well--something which must at all hazards be concealed. How this Spaniard can know I cannot in the least imagine--unless that woman gave me away!" For the next two days I was mostly out with his Highness in the car, and in addition the Kaiser reviewed the Prussian Guard, a ceremony which always gave me much extra work. On the third day I had in the morning been out to the Wildpark Station, and, passing the sentries, had re-entered the Palace, when one of the footmen approached me, saying: "Pardon, Count, but there is a gentleman to see his Imperial Highness. He will give no name, and refuses to leave. I called the captain of the guard, who has interrogated him, and he has been put into the blue ante-room until your return." At that moment I saw the captain of the guard striding down the corridor towards me. "A bald-headed man is here to see His Highness, and will give no name," he told me. "He is waiting now. Will you see him?" "No," I said, my suspicions aroused. "I will first see the Crown-Prince." After some search I found the latter lolling at his ease in his own smoking-room in the private apartments, reading a French novel and consuming cigarettes. "Hulloa, Heltzendorff! Well, what's the trouble?" he asked. "I see something is wrong from your face." "The man Aranda is here," I replied. "Here!" he gasped, starting up and flinging the book aside. "Who let him in?" "I don't know, but he is below demanding to see you."