Spies of the Kaiser: Plotting the Downfall of England

And that man was, I reflected, the head of a horde of secret agents which the German War Office had flung upon our eastern coast. To expose and crush them all was surely the patriotic duty of any Englishman.

The magnificent old mansion with its splendid paintings, its antique furniture, its armour, its bric-à-brac, old silver, and splendid heirlooms of the Edgcotts rang with the laughter of the assembly as two young subalterns indulged in humorous horse-play.

The appearance of the old sphinx-like family butler, however, compelled us to leave our point of observation, and for an hour I strolled with William out in the park in the balmy moonlight of the summer night.

"There'll be a sensation before long," declared the valet to me. "You watch."

"In what way?" I inquired, with curiosity.

"Wait and see," he laughed, as though he possessed knowledge of what was intended.

Next day I drove my master and the German Colonel over to Nottingham, where we put up for an hour at the Black Boy Hotel. This struck me as curious, for I recollected that William had been sent down from London with a message to some person named Raven staying at that hotel.

All the way from Edgcott, through Oakham, Melton Mowbray, and Trent, I had endeavoured to catch some of the conversation between the pair in the car behind me. The noise and rattle, however, prevented me from overhearing much, but the stray sentences which did reach me when I slowed down to change my speeds showed them to be on the most friendly terms.

Evidently the spy was entirely unsuspicious of his friend.

At the hotel, after I had put up the car, I saw my master and the German speaking with a tall, thin, consumptive-looking man in black, whose white tie showed him to be a dissenting minister. He was clean-shaven, aged fifty, and had an unusually protruding chin.

All three went out together and walked along the street chatting. When they had gone I went back into the yard, and on inquiry found that the minister was the Reverend Richard Raven, of the Baptist Missionary Society.

He had been a missionary in China, and had addressed several meetings in Nottingham and the neighbourhood on behalf of the society.

Why, I wondered, had Bob Brackenbury, so essentially a man about town, come there to consult a Baptist missionary, and accompanied, too, by the man he was scheming to unmask?

But the ways of the Secret Service were devious and crooked, I argued. There was method in it all. Had Ray and I been mistaken after all? So I, too, lit a cigarette, and strolled out into the bustling provincial street awaiting my master and his friend.

After an hour and a half the trio came back and had a drink together in the smoking-room – the missionary taking lemonade – and then I brought round the car, and we began the return journey of about sixty-five miles.

"What do you think of it now?" asked my master of his companion as soon as we were away from the hotel.

"Excellent!" was the German's reply. "It only now lies with her, eh?" And he laughed lightly.

Dinner was over when we returned, and Captain Kinghorne was profuse in his apologies to his host. I had previously been warned to say nothing of where we had been, and I heard my master explain that we had passed through Huntingdon, where a tyre-burst had delayed us.

I became puzzled. Yes, it was certainly both interesting and exciting. Little did the gallant German Colonel dream of the sword of England's wrath suspended above his head.

Nearly a week passed. Captain Kinghorne, D.S.O., and Mr. Pawson, of Goldfields, Nevada, shared, I saw, with the Colonel the highest popularity among members of the house-party. With Mr. Henry Seymour they had become on particularly friendly terms. There were picnics, tennis, and a couple of dances to which all the local notabilities were bidden. At them all Kinghorne was the life and soul of the general merriment. A good many quiet flirtations were in progress too. Kinghorne seemed to be particularly attracted by the pretty little widow whom I had first seen in pale blue, and who I discovered was French, her name being the Baronne de Bourbriac. She seemed to divide her attentions between Mr. Seymour and the German Colonel.

From mademoiselle, her maid, I learned that Madame la Baronne had lost her husband after only four months of matrimony, and now found herself in possession of a great fortune, a house in the Avenue des Champs Elysées, a villa at Roquebrune, and the great mediæval château of Bourbriac, in the great wine-lands along the Saône.

Was she, I wondered, contemplating matrimony again? One evening before the dressing-bell sounded, I met them quite accidentally strolling together across the park, and the earnestness of their conversation caused my wonder to increase.

Careful observation, however, showed me that Colonel von Rausch was almost as much a favourite with the little widow as was the Honourable Bob. Indeed, in the three days which followed I recognised plainly that the skittish little widow, so charming, so chic, and dressed with that perfection only possible with the true Parisienne, was playing a double game.

I felt inclined to tell my master, yet on due reflection saw that his love affairs were no concern of mine, while to speak would be only to betray myself as spying upon him.

So I held silence, but nevertheless continued to watch.

Several times I took out Brackenbury, Shand, von Rausch, and others in the car. Twice the widow went for a run alone with my master and myself. Life was, to say the least, extremely pleasant in those warm summer days at Edgcott.

Late one afternoon the Honourable Bob found me in the garage, and in a low voice said:

"You must pretend to be unwell, Nye. I want to take von Rausch out by myself, so go back to the house and pretend you're queer."

This I did without question, and he and the Colonel were out together in an unknown direction until nearly midnight. Had they, I wondered, gone again to meet the consumptive converter of the Chinese to Christianity?

I took William into my confidence, but he was silent. He would express no opinion.

"There's no moss on the guv'nor, you bet," was all he would vouchsafe.

Thus for yet another four days things progressed merrily at Edgcott Hall. William had been sent away on a message up to Manchester, and I was taking his place, when one evening, while I was getting out "the guv'nor's" dress clothes, he entered the room, and closing the door carefully, said:

"Be ready for something to happen to-night, Nye. We're going to hold up the spy and make him disgorge all the secret reports supplied by his agents. Listen to my instructions, for all must be done without any fuss. We don't want to upset the good people here. You see that small dressing-case of mine over there?" – and he indicated a square crocodile-skin case with silver fittings. "Well, at ten o'clock go and get the car out on the excuse that you have to go into Peterborough for me. You will find Shand's bag already in it, so put your own in also, but don't let anybody see you. Run her down the road about a mile from the lodge-gates and into that by-road just beyond the finger-posts where I showed you the other day. Then pull up, put out the lights, and leave her as though you've had a breakdown. Walk back here, get my dressing-case, and carry it back to the car. Then wait for us. Only recollect, don't return to get my bag until half-past ten. You see those two candles on the dressing-table? Now if any hitch occurs, I shall light them. So if I do, leave my bag here and bring my car back. You understand?"

"Quite," I said, full of excitement. And then I helped him to dress hurriedly, and he went downstairs.

We were about to "hold up" the spy. But how?

Those hours dragged slowly by. I peeped into the hall after dinner and saw the Honourable Bob seated in a corner with the Baronne, away from the others, chatting with her. The spy, all unsuspicious, was talking to his hostess, while Shand was playing poker.

Just before ten I crept out with my small bag, unseen by any one, and walked across the park to the garage. The night was stormy, the moon was hidden behind a cloud-bank. There was nobody about, so I got out the "ninety," started her, and mounting at the wheel was soon gliding down the avenue, out of the lodge-gates, and into the by-road which the Honourable Bob had indicated. Descending, I looked inside the car and saw that Shand's bag had already been placed there by an unknown hand.

In that short run I noticed I had lost the screw cap of the radiator. This surprised me, for I recollected how that evening when filling up with water I had screwed it down tightly. Somebody must have tampered with it – some stable lad, perhaps.

Having extinguished the head-lights, I walked back to the Hall by the stile and footpath, avoiding the lodge-gates, and managed to slip up to my master's room, just as the stable-clock was chiming the half hour.

The candles were unlit. All was therefore in order. The dressing-bag was, however, not there. I searched for it in vain. Then stealing out again I sped by the footpath back to the car.

Somebody hailed me in the darkness as I approached the spot where I had left her.

I recognized the spy's voice.

"Have you see Herr Brackenbury?" he asked in his broken English.

I halted, amazed. The spy had, it seemed, outwitted us and upset all our plans!

Scarcely could I reply, however, before I heard a movement behind me, and two figures loomed up. They were my master and Shand.

"All right?" inquired the American in a low voice, to which the spy gave an affirmative answer.

"Light those lamps, Nye," ordered my master quickly. "We must get away this instant."

"But – " I exclaimed.

"Quick, my dear fellow! There's not a moment to lose. Jump in, boys," he urged.

And a couple of minutes later, with our lamps glaring, we had turned out upon the broad highway and were travelling at a full forty miles an hour upon the high road to Leicester.

What could it all mean? My master and his companion seemed on the most friendly terms with the spy.

Ten miles from the lodge-gates of Edgcott at a cross-road we picked up an ill-dressed man whom I recognised as the Baptist missionary, Richard Raven, and with the Honourable Bob at my side directing me we tore on through the night, traversing numberless by-roads, until at dawn I suddenly recognised that we were on the North Road, close to Codicote.

A quarter of an hour later we had run the car round to the rear of Shand's pretty rose-embowered cottage, and all descended.

I made excuse to the Honourable Bob that the screw top of the radiator was missing, whereupon von Rausch laughed heartily, and picking up a piece of wire from the bench he bent it so as to form a hook, and with it fished down in the hot water inside.

His companions stood watching, but judge my surprise when I saw him of a sudden draw forth a small aluminium cylinder, the top of which he screwed off and from it took out a piece of tracing-linen tightly folded.

This he spread out, and my quick eyes saw that it was a carefully drawn tracing of a portion of the new type of battleship of the Neptune class (the improved Dreadnought type), with many marginal notes in German in a feminine hand.

In an instant the astounding truth became plain to me. The Baronne, who was in von Rausch's employ, had no doubt surreptitiously obtained the original from Mr. Henry Seymour's despatch-box, it having been sent down to him to Edgcott for his approval.

A most important British naval secret was, I saw, in the hands of the clever spies of the Kaiser!

I made no remark, for in presence of those men was I not helpless?

They took the tracing in the house, and for half an hour held carousal in celebration of their success.

Presently Brackenbury came forth to me and said:

"The Colonel is going to Harwich this evening, and you must drive him. The boat for the 'Hook' leaves at half-past ten, I think."

"Very well, sir," I replied, with apparent indifference. "I shall be quite ready."

At seven we started, von Rausch and I, and until darkness fell I drove eastward, when at last we found ourselves in Ipswich.

Suddenly, close to the White Horse Hotel and within hailing distance of a police-constable, I brought the car to a dead stop, and turning to the German, who was seated beside me, said in as quiet a tone as I could:

"Colonel von Rausch, I'll just trouble you to hand over to me the tracing you and your friends have stolen from Mr. Henry Seymour – the details of the new battleship about to be built at Chatham."

"What do you mean?" cried the spy. "Drive on, you fool. I have no time to lose."

"I wish for that tracing," I said, whipping out the revolver I always carried. "Give it to me."

"What next!" he laughed, in open defiance. "Who are you, a mere servant, that you should dictate to me?"

"I'm an Englishman!" I replied. "And I'll not allow you to take that secret to your employers in Berlin."

The Colonel glanced round in some confusion. He was evidently averse to a scene in that open street.

"Come into the hotel yonder," he said. "We can discuss the matter there."

"It admits of no discussion," I said firmly. "You will hand me the tracing over which you have so ingeniously deceived me, or I shall call the constable yonder and have you detained while we communicate with the Admiralty."

"Drive on, I tell you," he cried in anger. "Don't be an ass!"

"I am not a fool," I answered. "Give me that tracing."

"Never."

I turned and whistled to the constable, who had already noticed us in heated discussion.

The officer approached, but von Rausch, finding himself in a corner, quickly produced an envelope containing the tracing and handed it to me, urging:

"Remain silent, Nye. Say nothing. You have promised."

I broke open the envelope, and after satisfying myself he had not deceived me, I placed it safely in my breast-pocket, as further evidence of the work of the Kaiser's spies amongst us.

Then, with excuses to the constable, I swung the car into the yard of the White Horse Hotel, where the spy descended, and with a fierce imprecation in German he hurried out, and I saw him no more.

At midnight I was in Ray's chambers, in Bruton Street, and we rang up Mr. Henry Seymour, who had, we found, returned to his house in Curzon Street from Edgcott only a couple of hours before.

In ignorance that spies had obtained the secret of the Neptune or improved Dreadnought, he would not at first believe the story we told him.

But when in his own library half an hour later we handed him back the tracing, he was compelled to admit the existence of German espionage in England, though in the House of Commons only a week before he had scorned the very idea.

CHAPTER VIII

THE GERMAN PLOT AGAINST ENGLAND

"When last I had the pleasure of meeting mademoiselle, both her nationality and her name were – well – slightly different, eh?" I remarked, bending forward with a smile.

From her pretty lips rang out a merry ripple of laughter, and over her sweet face spread a mischievous look.

"I admit the allegation, M'sieur Jacox," was her rather saucy response in French. "But I had no idea you would again recognise me."

"Ah, mademoiselle, beauty such as yours is not universal, and is always to be remembered," I said, with an expression of mock reproval.

"Now, why do you flatter me – you?" she asked, "especially after what passed at Caux."

"Surely I may be permitted to admire you, Suzette? Especially as I am now aware of the truth."

She started, and stared at me for a moment, a neat little figure in black. Then she gave her shoulders a slight shrug, pouting like a spoiled child.

There were none to overhear us. It was out of the season in Paris, and on that afternoon, the 15th of August, 1908, to be exact, we had driven by "auto" into the Bois, and were taking our "five o'clock" under the trees at Pré Catalan, that well-known restaurant in the centre of the beautiful pleasure wood of the Parisians.

I had serious business with Suzette Darbour.

After our success in preventing the plans of the improved Dreadnoughts falling into German hands, I had, at Ray's suggestion, left Charing Cross in search of the dainty little divinity before me, the neat-waisted girl with the big dark eyes, the tiny mouth, and the cheeks that still bore the bloom of youth upon them – the girl who, at the Hôtel d'Angleterre, in Copenhagen, had been known as Vera Yermoloff, of Riga, and who had afterwards lived in the gay little watering-place of Caux under the same name, and had so entirely deceived me – the girl whom I now knew to be the catspaw of others – in a word, a decoy!

Yet how sweet, how modest her manner, how demure she looked as she sat there before me at the little table beneath the trees, sipping her tea and lifting her smiling eyes to mine. Even though I had told her plainly that I was aware of the truth, she remained quite unconcerned. She had no fear of me apparently. For her, exposure and the police had no terrors. She seemed rather amused than otherwise.

I lit a cigarette, and by so doing obtained time for reflection.

My search had led me first to the Midi, thence into Italy, across to Sebenico in Dalmatia, to Venice, and back to Paris, where only that morning, with the assistance of my old friend of my student days in the French capital, Gaston Bernard, of the Prefecture of Police, I had succeeded in running her to earth. I had only that morning found her residing with a girl friend – a seamstress at Duclerc's – in a tiny flat au cinquième in a frowsy old house at the top of the Rue Pigalle, and living in her own name, that of Suzette Darbour.

And as I sat smoking I wondered if I dared request her assistance.

In the course of my efforts to combat the work of German spies in England I had been forced to make many queer friendships, but none perhaps so strange as the one I was now cultivating. Suzette Darbour was, I had learned from Ray Raymond a few months ago, a decoy in association with a very prince of swindlers, an American who made his head-quarters in Paris, and who had in the past year or two effected amazing coups, financial and otherwise, in the various capitals of Europe.

Her age was perhaps twenty-two, though certainly she did not look more than eighteen. She spoke both English and Russian quite well, for, as she had told me long ago, she had spent her early days in Petersburg. And probably in those twenty years of her life she had learnt more than many women had learned in forty.

Hers was an angelic face, with big, wide-open, truthful eyes, but her heart was, I knew, cold and callous.

Could I – dare I – take her into my service – to assist me in a matter of the most vital importance to British interests? The mission upon which I was engaged at that moment was both delicate and difficult. A single false move would mean exposure.

I was playing a deep game, and it surely behoved me to exercise every precaution. During the years I had been endeavouring to prove the peril to which England was exposed from foreign invasion, I had never been nearer failure than now. Indeed, I held my breath each time I recollected all that depended upon my success.

Ray Raymond, Vera Vallance, and myself had constituted ourselves into a little band with the object of combating the activity of the ingenious spies of the Kaiser. Little does the average Englishman dream of the work of the secret agent, or how his success or failure is reflected in our diplomatic negotiations with the Powers. Ambassadors and ministers may wear smart uniforms with glittering decorations, and move in their splendid embassies surrounded by their brilliant staffs; attachés may flirt, and first secretaries may take tea with duchesses, yet to the spy is left the real work of diplomacy, for, after all, it is upon the knowledge he obtains that His Excellency the Ambassador frames his despatch to his Government, or the Minister for Foreign Affairs presents a "Note" to the Powers.

We had for months been working on without publicity, unheeded, unrecognised, unprotected, unknown. A thankless though dangerous task, our only reward had been a kind word from the silent, sad-faced Prime Minister himself. For months our whereabouts had been unknown, even to each other. Ray generally scented the presence of spies, and it was for me to carry through the inquiry in the manner which I considered best and safest for myself.

"Suzette," I said at length, looking at her across the rising smoke from my cigarette, "when we last met you had the advantage of me. To-day we stand upon even ground."

"Pardon! I don't quite understand?" asked the little lady in the sheath costume with just a slight tremor of the eyelids.

"Well – I have discovered that you and Henry Banfield are friends – that to you he owes much of his success, and that to you is the credit of a little affair in Marienbad, which ended rather unpleasantly for a certain hosiery manufacturer from Chemnitz named Müller."

Her faced blanched, her eyes grew terrified, and her nails clenched themselves into her white palms.

"Ah! Then you – you have found me, m'sieur, for purposes of revenge – you – you intend to give me over to the police because of the fraud I practised upon you! But I ask you to have pity for me," she begged in French. "I am a woman – and – and I swear to you that I was forced to act towards you as I did."

"You forced open my despatch-box, believing that I carried valuables there, and found, to your dismay, only a few papers."

"I was compelled to do so by Banfield," she said simply. "He mistook you for another man, a diplomat, and believed that you had certain important documents with you."

"Then he made a very great mistake," I laughed. "And after your clever love-making with me you only got some extracts from a Government report, together with a few old letters."

"From those letters we discovered who you really were," mademoiselle said. "And then we were afraid."

I smiled.

"Afraid that I would pay Banfield back in his own coin, eh?"

"I was afraid. He was not, for he told me that if you attempted any reprisal, he would at once denounce you to the Germans."

"Thanks. I'm glad you've told me that," I said, with feigned unconcern. Truth to tell, however, I was much upset by the knowledge that the cunning American who so cleverly evaded the police had discovered my present vocation.

Yet, after all, had not the explanation of the pretty girl before me rather strengthened my hand?

"Well, Suzette," I said, with a moment's reflection, "I have not sought you in order to threaten you. On the contrary, I am extremely anxious that we should be friends. Indeed, I want you, if you will, to do me a service."

She looked me straight in the face, apparently much puzzled.

"I thought you were my enemy," she remarked.

"That I am not. If you will only allow me, I will be your friend."

Her fine eyes were downcast, and I fancied I detected in them the light of unshed tears. How strange it was that upon her attitude towards me should depend a nation's welfare!

"First, you must forgive me for my action at Caux," she said in a low, earnest voice, scarce above a whisper. "You know my position, alas! I dare not disobey that man who holds my future so irrevocably in his hands."

"He threatens you, then?"

"Yes. If I disobeyed any single one of his commands, he would deliver me over at once to the police for a serious affair – a crime, however, of which I swear to you that I am innocent – the crime of murder!"

"He holds threats over you," I said, tossing away my cigarette. "Describe the affair to me."

"It is the crime of the Rue de Royat, two years ago. You no doubt recollect it," she faltered, after some hesitation. "A Russian lady, named Levitsky, was found strangled in her flat and all her jewellery taken."

"And Banfield charges you with the crime?"

"I admit that I was in the apartment when the crime was committed – decoyed there for that purpose – but I am not the culprit."

"But surely you could prove the identity of the assassin?"

"I saw him for an instant. But I had no knowledge of who he was."

"Then why do you fear this American crook? Why not dissociate yourself from him?"