doors. Without doubt Maastricht authorities were waiting for us even
as we stepped off the train, showing that we were doomed from the
time we left the border. Our captor, an unctuous, pink-cheeked
politzei, made his appearance not far from the internment camp.
Where were we going, and why?

"To see the prisoners," we said.

"It is possible," said the spider to the fly, "zat I can get for you
permission if you will come to ze guardhouse. Ze capitain is there."

The "guardhouse" proved a precinct police station, and the captain
was not there: instead we found a mixed crowd of civilians and
militaires who looked us over and shook their heads. Next we were
taken to military headquarters \n the center of the town. For fifteen
minutes we hunted the evasive captain while I ran through my head
the various sets of credentials stuffed in different pockets; for, being
in Dutch territory, although only a few miles from the Belgian frontier
on one side and the German frontier on the other, I was not quite
certain which to produce. Among my letters I carried one from the
German Ambassador, Count von Bernstorff, to the Foreign Office in
Berlin; one from Professor Hugo Munsterberg at Harvard, and a note
from the secretary of the Belgian Legation at The Hague.
Unfortunately I did not have with me at the time a very helpful letter
from Colonel Roosevelt, ending with the statement that the bearer "is
an American citizen, a non-combatant, and emphatically not a spy." I
had promised the Colonel to use this, my trump card, only in case of
necessity--and once, on a later occasion, I did so with immediate
effect. On the whole, I now decided in favor of a United States
passport decorated with my picture and enough vises to resemble the