Not many months later Kim was the unconscious
cause of a radical change in my destiny. I have ceased to wonder at
such things.
By the time Kim had learned sorne of the duties of a body servant we
had reached Port Natal. War had broken out and I volunteered with a
Natal field force in a medical capacity. Field hospital work took me
where the fighting was thickest. During the battle of the Modder
River among the first of the wounded brought in was one of the many
foreign officers fighting on the Boer side. It was Kim who found him.
This officer's wound was fairly serious and necessitated close
attention. Through chance remarks dropped here and there, the officer
placed my identity correctly. It developed that he was Major Freiherr
von Reitzenstein, one of the few who knew the real reasons of my
exile.
In one of our innumerable chats that grew out of our growing intimacy,
he suggested my entering the service of Germany in a political
capacity. He urged that with my training and social connections I had
exceptional equipment for such work. Moreover, he suggested that my
service on political missions would give me the knowledge and
influence necessary to checkmate the intriguers who were keeping me
from my own. This was the compelling reason that made me ultimately
accept his proposal to become a Secret Agent of Germany. No doubt, if
the Count had lived, I would have gained my ends through his guidance
and influence, but he was killed in a riding race, three years after
our meeting in the Veldt, and I lost my best friend.
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