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I simply answered,
"I am not readily surprised, M. Petrovitch. Neither, I imagine, are you."
The financier smiled.
"May I call you M. V——?" he asked. "His majesty has told me who you are."
"Were you surprised by that?" I returned with sarcasm.
Petrovitch fairly laughed.
"I hear you have been denouncing me to Nicholas," he said lightly. "Can't I persuade you to let our poor little Czar alone. I assure you it is a waste of breath on your part, and you will only worry a well-meaning young man who has no head for business."
This was plain speaking. It argued no ordinary confidence on the part of the intriguer to speak in such a fashion of the Autocrat of All the Russias.
Already the interview was telling me something. Petrovitch must have some strong, secret hold on Nicholas II.
I shrugged my shoulders as I answered in my friendliest manner,
"I have no personal feeling against you, my dear Petrovitch. But to use drugs—come, you must admit that that was a strong measure!"
"I apologize!" laughed the Russian. "All the more as I find you were too many for us after all. I would give something to know how you managed to hide the letter you got through."
It was my turn to laugh. I had reason to feel satisfied. Weak as the Russian Emperor might be, it was evident that he had not betrayed my secret.
"Well, now," the promoter resumed, "all that being over, is there any reason why we should not be friends? Be frank with me. What end have you in view that is likely to bring us into collision?"
"There is no reason why I should not be frank with you," I answered, racking my brain for some story which the man before me might be likely to believe, "especially as I do not suppose that either of us is likely to report this conversation quite faithfully to his imperial majesty. I am a Japanese spy."
Petrovitch gave me a glance in which I thought I detected a mingling of incredulity and admiration.
"Really, you are a cool hand, my dear V——!"
"Why, is there anything in that to make us enemies? You are not going to pose as the zealous patriot, I hope. I thought we had agreed to be frank."
The financier bit his lip.
"Well, I do not deny that I am before all things a man of business," he returned. "If your friends the Japanese can make me any better offer than the one I have had from another quarter, I do not say."
"I will see what I can arrange for you," I answered, not wholly insincerely. "In the meantime, I think you said something about an invitation?"
"Oh, yes, from Nicholas. He wants to see you. He has some scheme or other in which he thinks that you and I can work together, and he wants us to be friends, accordingly."
"But we are friends, after to-day, I understand?"
"It is as you please, my dear V——," replied the conspirator with a slightly baffled air. "You have made a good beginning, apparently, with the Princess Y——."
I put on the self-satisfied air of the man who is a favorite with women.
"The Princess has been extremely kind," I said. "She has pressed me to visit her frequently. Oh, yes, I think I may say we are good friends."
Petrovitch nodded. I had purposely prepared his mind for the story which I anticipated he would hear from my beautiful protector. Evidently it would be necessary for her to tell the Syndicate that she was feigning affection for me in order to draw me into a trap.
"Then, as my carriage is outside, may I take you to the Winter Palace?"
"That seems the best plan," I acquiesced. "It will convince the Czar that we are on good terms."
We drove off together, sitting side by side like two sworn friends. I do not know what thoughts passed through his mind; but I know that all the way I kept my right hand on the stock of my revolver, and once, when one of the horses stumbled, M. Petrovitch was within an instant of death.
At the Palace he put me down and drove off. I was admitted to the Czar's presence without difficulty, and found him, as usual, surrounded by piles of state papers.
Nicholas II. looked up at my entrance with evident pleasure.
"Ah, that is right, M. V——. I hope that, since you have come so promptly in response to the message I gave that worthy M. Petrovitch, you and he are now good friends."
I could only bow silently. I was a Japanese, related to the sovereign with whom he was at war, and I was acting in the service of Great Britain. Petrovitch had just forced on the war which Nicholas had wished to avert, and he was still acting secretly in the interests of Germany. And the Czar was congratulating himself that we were friends. It was useless to try to undeceive him.
"Sit down, if you please, M. V——. I have something of the greatest importance to tell you. Stay—Perhaps you will be good enough to see first that the doors are all secured. I dislike interruptions."
I went to the various entrances of the room, of which there were three, and turned the keys in the doors.
"Even M. Petrovitch does not know what I am going to tell you," Nicholas said impressively as I returned to my seat.
"Your majesty does not trust him entirely, then?" I exclaimed, much pleased.
"You mistake me. I do not distrust M. Petrovitch; but this is a matter of foreign politics, with which he is not familiar. He admits frankly that he knows nothing about diplomacy."
I gazed at the benevolent young monarch in consternation. It was the spy of Wilhelm II., the agent of the most active diplomatist in the world, of whom he had just spoken!
There was no more to be said.
The Emperor proceeded to put a most unexpected question.
"Are you a believer in spirits, M. V——?"
"I am a Roman Catholic, sire. Whatever my Church teaches on this subject, I believe. I am rather neglectful of my religious duties, however, and do not know its attitude on this subject."
"I honor your loyalty to your communion, M. V——. But as long as you do not know what is the attitude of your Church on this subject, you cannot feel it wrong to listen to me."
I perceived that if his majesty was no politician, he was at least something of a theologian.
The Czar proceeded:
"There is in Petersburg one of the most marvelous mediums and clairvoyants who has ever lived. He is a Frenchman named Auguste. He came here nearly a year ago—just when the difficulty with Japan was beginning, in fact; and he has given me the most valuable information about the progress of events. Everything he has foretold has come true, so far. He warned me from the first that the Japanese would force me into war, just as they have done. In short, I feel I can rely on him absolutely."
This was not the first time I had heard of the spiritualist who had established such an extraordinary hold on the Russian ruler's mind. The common impression was that he was a mystic, a sort of Madame Kruedener. At the worst he was regarded as a charlatan of the ordinary spirit-rapping type, cultivating the occult as a means of making money.
But now, as I listened to the credulous monarch, it suddenly struck me what an invaluable tool such a man might prove in the hands of a political faction, or even of a foreign Power astute enough to corrupt him and inspire the oracles delivered by the spirits.
I listened anxiously for more.
The Emperor, evidently pleased with the serious expression on my face, went on to enlighten me.
"Last night M. Auguste was here, in this room, and we held a private seance. He succeeded in getting his favorite spirit to respond."
"Is it permissible to ask the spirit's name?" I ventured respectfully.
"It is Madame Blavatsky," he answered. "You must have heard of her, of course. She was practically the founder of rational psychical knowledge, though she died a victim to persecution."
I nodded. I had heard of this celebrated woman, who still numbers many followers in different parts of the world.
"Last night, as soon as we found that the spirit of Madame Blavatsky was present, I asked Auguste to question it about the Baltic fleet.
"I had been holding a preliminary review of the fleet in the morning, as you may have seen from the papers. The officers and men seemed thoroughly nervous, and very doubtful whether it would ever be in a condition to sail. Even the Admiral, Rojestvensky, did not seem quite happy, and he found great fault with the stores and equipments.
"I had to authorize a delay of another month, and the Marine Department would not promise to have the fleet ready even then.
"Naturally, I wished to know what would become of the fleet when it did sail. Auguste questioned the spirit."
His majesty broke off to feel in his pocket for a small slip of paper.
"I took down the answer myself, as the spirit rapped it out." And he read aloud:
Baltic Fleet threatened. Japanese and English plotting to destroy it on the way to Port Arthur.
I started indignantly.
"And you believe that, sire! You believe that the British Government, which has been straining every nerve to maintain peace, is capable of planning some secret outrage against your Navy?"
"It does not say the Government," he announced with satisfaction. "The spirit only warns me against the English. Private Englishmen are capable of anything. At this very moment, two Englishmen are arranging to run a torpedo boat secretly out of the Thames, disguised as a yacht, and to bring her to Libau for us."
This piece of information silenced me. It was no doubt possible that there might be Englishmen daring enough to assist the Japanese in some secret enterprise against a Russian fleet. But I felt I should like to have some better authority for the fact than the word of Madame Blavatsky's spirit.
"The warning is a very vague one, sire," I hinted.
"True. But I hope to receive a more definite message to-morrow night. I was going to ask you if you would have any objection to be present. You might then be able to put pressure on the British Government to prevent this crime."
Needless to say I accepted the imperial invitation with eagerness.
And I retired to send the following despatch to Lord Bedale:
When Baltic Fleet starts prepare for trouble. Have all ports watched. It is believed here that attack on it is preparing in England.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE MYSTERY OF A WOMAN
Who was M. Auguste?
This was the question that kept my mind busy after my singular interview with the Russian Emperor.
In accordance with my rule to avoid as much as possible mentioning the names of the humbler actors in the international drama, I have given the notorious medium a name which conceals his true one.
He appeared to be a foreigner, and the Czar's weakness in this direction was too well known for his patronage of the quack to excite much attention; apparently it had occurred to no one but myself that such a man might be capable of meddling in politics.
In his more public performances, so far as I could learn, the revelations of the spirits were confined to more harmless topics, such as the nature of the future state, or the prospect of an heir being born to the Russian crown.
In my quest for further light on this remarkable personage, my thoughts naturally turned to the Princess Y——.
I have not concealed that at our first meeting the charming collaborator of M. Petrovitch had made a very strong impression on me. Her subsequent conduct had made me set a guard on myself, and the memory of the Japanese maiden whose portrait had become my cherished "mascot," of course insured that my regard for the Princess could never pass the bounds of platonic friendship.
But the strange scene of the day before had moved me profoundly. Vanity is not a failing of which I am ever likely to be accused by my worst detractor, yet it was impossible for me to shut my eyes or ears to the confession which had been made with equal eloquence by the looks, the blushes and even the words of the beautiful Russian.
Was ever situation more stupid in all the elements of tragedy! This unhappy woman, spurred to all kinds of desperate deeds by the awful fear of the knout, had been overcome by that fatal power which has wrecked so many careers.
In the full tide of success, in the very midst of a life and death combat with the man it was her business to outwit and defeat, she had succumbed to love for him.
And now, to render her painful situation tenfold more painful, she was holding the dagger at his breast as the only means of keeping it out of the clutch of some more murderous hand.
Had I the pen of a romancer I might enlarge on this sensational theme. But I am a man of action, whose business it is to record facts, not to comment on them.
I sought the mansion on the Nevsky Prospect, and asked to see its mistress.
Evidently the visit was expected. The groom of the chambers—if that was his proper description—led me up-stairs, and into a charming boudoir.
A fire replenished by logs of sandalwood was burning in a malachite stove, and diffusing a dream-like fragrance through the chamber. The walls of the room were panelled in ivory, and the curtains that hung across the window frames were of embroidered silk and gold. Each separate chair and toy-like table was a work of art—ebony, cinnamon, and other rare and curious woods having been employed.
But the rarest treasure there was the mistress of all this luxury. The inmate of the sumptuous prison, for such it truly was, lay back on a leopard-skin couch, set in the frame of a great silver sea-shell.
She had dressed for my coming in the quaint but gorgeous costume of ancient Russia, the costume worn by imperial usage at high State functions like coronations, weddings and christenings.
The high coif above her forehead flamed with jewels, and big, sleepy pearls slid and fell over her neck and bosom.
At my entrance she gave a soft cry, and raised herself on one white arm. I stepped forward as though I were a courtier saluting a queen, and pressed my lips to her extended hand.
"I expected you, Andreas."
Only two women in my life have I ever allowed to call me by my Christian name. One was the ill-starred lady who perished in the Konak in Belgrade. The other—but of her I may not speak.
But it was not for me to stand on ceremony with the woman who had interposed herself as a shield between me and the enemies who sought my death.
"You knew that I should come to thank you," I said.
"I do not wish for thanks," she answered, with a look that was more expressive than words. "I wish only that you should regard me as a friend."
"And in what other light is it possible for me to regard you, dear Princess?" I returned. "Only this friendship must not be all on one side. You, too, must consent to think of me as something more than a stranger whose life you have saved."
"Can you doubt that I have done so for a long time?"
It needed the pressure of the locket against my neck to keep me from replying to this tenderly-spoken sentiment in a way which might have led to consequences, for the Russian Empire as well as for the Princess and myself, very different to those which have actually flowed from our conjunction.
Conquering my impulses as I best could, I sought for a reply which would not wear the appearance of a repulse.
"You misunderstand me," I said, putting on an expression of pride. "You little know the character of Andreas V—— if you think he can accept the humiliating position of the man who is under obligation to a woman—an obligation which he has done nothing to discharge. Not until I can tell myself that I have done something to place me on a higher level in your eyes, can my thoughts concerning you be happy ones."
A shade of disappointment passed over Sophia's face. She made a pettish gesture.
"Does not—friendship do away with all sense of obligation?" she complained.
"Not with me," I answered firmly. "No, Sophia, if you really care for me—for my friendship—you must let me do what I have sworn to do ever since I first saw you and heard some rumors of your tragic story."
"You mean?"
"You must let me break your odious bondage. I can deliver you, if you will only trust me, from the power of the Russian police, or any other power, and set you free to live the life of fascination and happiness which ought to be yours."
The Princess seemed plunged in meditation. At length she looked up——
"You would undertake a hopeless task, my dear Andreas. Not even you can fathom all the ramifications of the intrigues in which I find myself an indispensable puppet. Those who control my movements will never let go the strings by which they hold me, and least of all, just now."
I was distressed to see that the Princess was disposed to evade my appeal for confidence. I answered with a slightly wounded air:
"I may know more than you think, more even than you know yourself on certain points. But of course you are not willing to confide in me fully——"
"There can be no perfect trust without perfect"—The Princess, who spoke this sentence in Russian, concluded it with a word which may mean either friendship or love according to circumstances. As she pronounced it, it seemed like love.
"There can be no perfect love without perfect trust," I responded quickly, striving to assume the manner of an exacting lover.
And then, a happy thought striking me, I added in an aggrieved voice,
"Do you think it is nothing to me that you should be associated with other men in the most secret enterprises, holding private conferences with them, receiving them in your house, perhaps visiting them in theirs; that you should appear to be on intimate terms with the Grand Duke Staniolanus, with M. Petrovitch, with a man like this M. Auguste——"
At the sound of this last name, to which I had artfully led up, Sophia sprang into a sitting posture and gave me a look of anger and fear.
"Who told you anything about M. Auguste?" she demanded in hoarse tones. "What has he to do with me?"
"Nay, it is not you who ought to ask me that," I returned. "You may be a believer in his conjuring tricks, for aught I know. He may be more to you than a comrade, or even a prophet—more to you than I."
"Who told you that he was my comrade, as you call it?" the Princess insisted, refusing to be diverted from her point.
"No one," I said quite truthfully. "I should be glad to know that he was only that. But it is natural for me to feel some jealousy of all your friends."
The Princess appeared relieved by this admission. But this relief confirmed all my suspicions. I now felt certain that the medium was an important figure in the plot which I was trying to defeat. I saw, moreover, that however genuine my beautiful friend might be in her love for me and her desire to save my life, she had no intention of betraying the secrets of her fellow conspirators.
Her character presented an enigma almost impossible to solve. Perhaps it is not the part of a wise man ever to try to understand a woman. Her motives must always be mysterious, even to herself. It is sufficient if one can learn to forecast her actions, and even that is seldom possible.
"Then you refuse my help?" I asked reproachfully.
"You cannot help me," was the answer. "At least, that is, unless you possess some power I have no idea of at present."
It was an ingenious turning of the tables. Instead of my questioning the Princess, she was questioning me, in effect.
I made what was perhaps a rash admission.
"I am not wholly powerless, at all events. There are few sovereigns in Europe whom I have not obliged at some time or other. Even the German Emperor, though I have more than once crossed his path in public matters, is my personal friend. In spite of his occasional political errors, he is a stainless gentleman in private life, and I am sure he would hear with horror of your position and the means by which you had been forced into it."
Sophia looked at me with an expression of innocent bewilderment which I could scarcely believe to be real.
"The German Emperor! But what has he to do with me?"
"He is said to have some influence with the Czar," I said drily.
My companion bit her lip.
"Oh, the Czar!" Her tone was scathing in its mixture of pity and indifference. "Every one has some influence with the Czar. But is there any one with whom Nicholas has influence?"
It was the severest thing I had ever heard said of the man whom an ironical fate has made master of the Old World.
Suddenly the manner of the Princess underwent a sudden change.
She rose to her feet and gave me a penetrating glance, a glance which revealed for the first time something of that commanding personality which had made this slight, exquisite creature for years one of the most able and successful of secret negotiators, and a person to be reckoned with by every foreign minister.
"You do not trust me, Andreas V——. It is natural. You do not love me. It is possible that it is my fault. But I have sworn to save your life, and I will do it in your own despite. In order that I may succeed, I will forget that I am a woman, and I will forget that you regard me as a criminal. Come here! I will show you into my oratory, into which not even my confidential maid is ever allowed to penetrate. Perhaps what you will see there may convince you that I am neither a traitor nor a Delilah."
With the proud step of an empress, she led the way into the adjoining room, which was a bedroom sumptuously enriched with everything that could allure the senses. The very curtains of the bed seemed to breathe out languorous odors, the walls were hung with ravishing groups of figures that might have come from a Pompeiian temple, the dressing-table was rich with gold and gems.
Without pausing for an instant the mistress of the chamber walked straight across it to a narrow door let into the farther wall, and secured by a tiny lock like that of a safe.
Drawing a small key from her bosom, the Princess inserted it in the lock, leaving me to follow in a state of the most intense expectation.
The apartment in which I found myself was a narrow, white-washed cell like a prison, lit only by the flames of two tall wax candles which stood on a table, or rather an altar, at the far end.
Besides the altar, the sole object in the room was a wooden step in front of it. Over the altar, in accordance with the rule of the Greek Church, there hung a sacred picture. And below, between the two candlesticks, there rested two objects, the sight of which fairly took away my breath.
One was a photograph frame containing a portrait of myself—how obtained I shall never know. The portrait was framed with immortelles, the emblems of death, and the artist had given my face the ghastly pallor and rigidity of the face of a corpse.
The other object on the altar was a small whip of knotted leather thongs.
Without uttering a word, without even turning her head to see if I had followed, the Princess Y—— knelt down on the step, stripped her shoulders with a singular determined gesture, and then, taking the knout in one hand, began to scourge the bare flesh.
CHAPTER XIX
THE SPIRIT OF MADAME BLAVATSKY
At the hour appointed by the Czar I presented myself at the Winter Palace to assist at the spiritualist experiments of M. Auguste.
I shall not attempt to describe the impression left by the weird scene in the Princess Y——'s oratory.
To those who do not know the Slav temperament, with its strange mixture of sensuality and devotion, of barbarous cruelty and over-civilized cunning, seldom far removed from the brink of insanity, the incident I have recorded will appear incredible. I have narrated it, simply because I have undertaken to narrate everything bearing on the business in which I was engaged. I am well aware that truth is stranger than fiction, and I should have little difficulty, if I were so disposed, in framing a story, full of plausible, commonplace incidents, which no one could doubt or dispute.
I have preferred to take a bolder course, knowing that although I may be discredited for a time, yet when historians in the future come to sift the secret records of the age, I shall be amply vindicated.
I shall only add that I did not linger a moment after the unhappy woman had begun her penance, if such it was, but withdrew from her presence and from the house without speaking a word.
The feelings with which I anticipated my encounter with the medium were very different. Whatever might be my doubts with regard to the unfortunate Sophia—and I honestly began to think that the suicide of Menken had affected her brain—I had no doubt whatever that M. Auguste was a thoroughly unscrupulous man.
The imperial servant to whom I was handed over at the entrance to the Czar's private apartments conducted me to what I imagine to have been the boudoir of the Czaritza, or at all events the family sitting room.
It was comfortably but plainly furnished in the English style, and was just such a room as one might find in the house of a London citizen, or a small country squire. I noticed that the wall-paper was faded, and the hearth-rug really worn out.
The Emperor of All the Russias was not alone. Seated beside him in front of the English grate was the beautiful young Empress, in whose society he finds a refuge from his greedy courtiers and often unscrupulous ministers, and who, I may add, has skilfully and successfully kept out of any entanglement in politics.
Rising at my entrance, Nicholas II. advanced and shook me by the hand.
"In this room," he told me, "there are no emperors and no empresses, only Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas."
He presented me to the Czaritza, who received me in the same style of simple friendliness, and then, pointing to a money-box which formed a conspicuous object on the mantel-shelf, he added:
"For every time the word 'majesty' is used in this room there is a fine of one ruble, which goes to our sick and wounded. So be careful, M. V——."
In spite of this warning I did not fail to make a good many contributions to the money-box in the course of the evening. In my intercourse with royalty I model myself on the British Premier Beaconsfield, and I regard my rubles as well spent.
We all three spoke in English till the arrival of M. Auguste, who knew only French and a few words of Russian. I remarked afterward that the spirit of Madame Blavatsky, a Russian by birth, who had spent half her life in England, appeared to have lost the use of both languages in the other world, and communicated with us exclusively in French.
The appearance of M. Auguste did not help to overcome my prejudice against him. He had too evidently made up for the part of the mystic.
The hair of M. Auguste was black and long, his eyes rolled much in their sockets, and his costume was a compromise between the frock coat and the cassock.
But it was above all his manner that impressed me disagreeably. He affected to be continually falling into fits of abstraction, as if his communings with the spirits were diverting his attention from the affairs of earth. Even on his entrance he went through the forms of greeting his host and hostess as though scarcely conscious of their presence. I caught a sly look turned on myself, however, and when I was presented to him as "Mr. Sterling" his reception of the name made me think that he had expected something else.
The Czar having explained that I was a friend interested in spiritualism, in whose presence he wished to hear again from Madame Blavatsky, M. Auguste rolled his eyes formidably, and agreed to summon the departed theosophist.
A small round table was cleared of the Czaritza's work-basket—she had been knitting a soldier's comforter—and we took our seats around it. The electric light was switched off, so that we were in perfect darkness, except for the red glow of the coal fire.
A quarter of an hour or so passed in a solemn silence, broken only by occasional whispers from "Mr. Nicholas" or the medium.
"It is a long time answering," the Czar whispered at last.
"I fear there is a hostile influence," M. Auguste responded in the jargon of his craft.
Hardly had the words left his lips when a perfect shower of raps seemed to descend on all parts of the table at once.
Let me say here, once for all, that I am not prepared to offer any explanation of what happened on this occasion. I have read of some of the devices by which such illusions are produced, and I have no doubt a practised conjurer could have very easily fathomed the secrets of M. Auguste. But I had not come there with any intention of detecting or exposing him.
The medium pretended to address the author of the raps.
"If there is any hostile influence which prevents your communicating with us, rap twice."
Two tremendous raps nearly drowned the last word. The spirit seemed to be quick-tempered.
"If it is a woman, rap once——"
No response. This was decidedly clever.
"If it is myself, rap."
This time, instead of silence, there was a faint scratching under the surface of the table.
"The negative sign," M. Auguste explained blandly, for our benefit.
Then, addressing himself once more to the invisible member of the party, he inquired:
"If it is Mr. Nicholas, rap."
Silence.
"You must excuse me," the medium said, turning his face in my direction. "If it is Mr. Sterling——"
A shower of raps. I really thought the table would have given way.
This was discouraging. The Czar came to my rescue, however.
"I particularly wish Mr. Sterling to be present," he observed with a touch of displeasure—whether intended for M. Auguste or the spiritual visitant I could not tell.
The hierophant no doubt saw that he must submit. His retreat was executed with great skill.
"If the obstacle is one that can be removed, rap once."
A rap.
"Can you spell it for us?"
In the rather cumbrous alphabet in use among the shades, the visitor spelled out in French:
"Son nom."
"Is there something you object to about his name?"
A rap.
"Is it an assumed name?"
A very loud rap. Decidedly the spirit was indignant.
"Can you tell us his real name? His initials will do?"
"A. V." spelled the unseen visitor.
"Is that right?" M. Auguste inquired with well-assumed curiosity.
"It is marvelous!" ejaculated the Emperor. "You will understand, of course, Auguste, that this must be kept a secret among ourselves."
"Ask if it is Madame Blavatsky," said the Czar.
We learned that the apostle of theosophy was indeed present.
"Would you like to hear from any other spirits?" M. Auguste asked the company.
"I should be glad of a word with Bismarck," I suggested.
In five minutes the Iron Chancellor announced himself. His rap was sharp, quick and decided, quite a characteristic rap.
"Ask if he approves of the present policy of the German Emperor?"
A hearty rap. Evidently the spirit had greatly changed its views in the other world.
"Ask if he remembers telling me, the last time I saw him, that Russia was smothering Germany in bed?"
"Do you refuse to answer that question?" M. Auguste put in adroitly.
An expressive rap.
"Will you answer any other questions from this gentleman?"
Then the spirit of Bismarck spoke out. It denounced me as a worker of evil, a source of strife, and particularly as one who was acting injuriously to the Russian Empire. I confess M. Auguste scored.
"In his lifetime he would have said all that, if he had thought I was working in the interest of Russia and against Germany," I remarked in my own defence.
The spirit of the Iron Chancellor was dismissed, and that of Madame Blavatsky recalled.
It was evident that the Czar placed particular confidence in his late subject. Indeed, if the issues at stake had been less serious, I think I should have made an attempt to shake the Emperor's blind faith in the performances of M. Auguste.
But my sole object was to read, if I could, the secret plans and intentions of a very different imperial character, whose agent I believed the spirit to be.
M. Auguste, I quickly discovered, was distracted between fear of offending Nicholas by too much reserve, and dread of enabling me to see his game. In the end the Czar's persistence triumphed, and we obtained something like a revelation.
"Tell us what you can see, that it concerns the Emperor to know," M. Auguste had adjured his familiar.
"I see"—the reply was rapped out with irritating slowness—I quite longed for a slate—"an English dockyard. The workmen are secretly at work by night, with muffled hammers. They are building a torpedo boat. It is to the order of the Japanese Government. The English police have received secret instructions from the Minister of the Interior not to interfere."
"Minister of the Interior" was a blunder. With my knowledge of English politics I am able to say that the correct title of this personage should be "Secretary of State for the Domestic Department." But few foreigners except myself have been able to master the intricacies of the British Constitution.
"For what is this torpedo boat designed?" M. Auguste inquired.
"It is for service against the Baltic Fleet. The Russian sailors are the bravest in the world, but they are too honest to be a match for the heathen Japanese," the spirit pursued, with some inconsistency.
I could not help reflecting that Madame Blavatsky in her lifetime had professed the Buddhist faith, which is that of the majority in Japan.
"Do you see anything else?"
"I see other dockyards where the same work is being carried on. A whole fleet of warships is being prepared by the perfidious British for use against the fleet of Russia."
"Ask her to cast her eye over the German dockyards," I put in.
"Spirits have no sex," M. Auguste corrected severely. "I will ask it."
A succession of raps conveyed the information that Germany was preserving a perfectly correct course, as usual. Her sole departure from the attitude of strict neutrality was to permit certain pilots, familiar with the North Sea navigation, to offer their services to the Russian fleet.
"Glance into the future," said the Czar. "Tell us what you see about to happen."
"I see the Baltic Fleet setting out. The Admiral has issued the strictest orders to neutral shipping to retire to their harbors and leave the sea clear for the warships of Russia. He has threatened to sink any neutral ship that comes within range of his guns.
"As long as he is in the Baltic these orders are obeyed. The German, Swedish and Danish flags are lowered at his approach, as is right.
"Now he passes out into the North Sea. The haughty and hostile English defy his commands. Their merchant ships go forth as usual. Presuming on their knowledge of international law, they annoy and vex the Russian warships by sailing past them. The blood of the brave Russian officers begins to boil. Ask me no more."
M. Auguste, prompted by the deeply interested Czar, did ask more.
"I see," the obedient seeress resumed, "torpedo boats secretly creeping out from the British ports. They do not openly fly the Japanese flag, but lurk among the English ships, with the connivance of the treacherous islanders.
"The Baltic Fleet approaches. The torpedo boats, skulking behind the shelter of their friends, steal closer to the Russian ships. Then the brave Russian Admiral remembers his promise. Just in time to save his fleet from destruction, he signals to the British to retire.
"They obstinately refuse. The Russian fleet opens fire.
"I can see no more."
The spirit of the seeress, it will be observed, broke off its revelations at the most interesting point, with the skill of a practised writer of serials.
But the Czar, fairly carried away by excitement, insisted on knowing more.
"Ask the spirit if there will be any foreign complications," he said.
I had already remarked that our invisible companion showed a good deal of deference to the wishes of Nicholas II., perhaps in his character of Head of the Orthodox Church.
After a little hesitation it rapped out:
"The English are angry, but they are restrained by the fear of Germany. The German Michael casts his shield in front of Russia, and the islanders are cowed. I cannot see all that follows. But in the end I see that the Yellow Peril is averted by the joint action of Russia and Germany."
This answer confirmed to the full my suspicions regarding the source of M. Auguste's inspiration. I believed firmly that there was a spirit present, but it was not the spirit of the deceased theosophist, rather of a monarch who is very much alive.
The medium now professed to feel exhausted, and Madame Blavatsky was permitted to retire.
I rose to accompany M. Auguste as soon as he made a move to retire.
"If you will let me drive you as far as my hotel," I said to him, "I think I can show you something which will repay you for coming with me."
The wizard looked me in the face for the first time, as he said deliberately:
"I shall be very pleased to come."
CHAPTER XX
THE DEVIL'S AUCTION
I said as little as possible during the drive homeward.
My companion was equally silent. No doubt he, like myself, was bracing himself for a duel of wits.
As soon as we were safe in my private room at the hotel, with a bottle of vodka and a box of cigars in front of us, I opened the discussion with my habitual directness.
"I need not tell you, M. Auguste, that I have not invited you here to discuss questions of psychology. I am a politician, and it matters nothing to me whether I am dealing with a ghost or a man, provided I can make myself understood."
M. Auguste bowed.
"For instance, it is quite clear that the interesting revelations we have had to-night would not have been made without your good will. It is to be presumed, therefore, that if I can convince you that it is better to turn the Emperor's mind in another direction, you will refuse to make yourself the medium of further communications of that precise character."
M. Auguste gave me an intelligent glance.
"I am as you have just said, a medium," he replied with significant emphasis. "As such, I need not tell you, I have no personal interest in the communications which are made through me."
I nodded, and took out my pocket-book, from which I extracted a hundred ruble-note (about $75).
"I promised to show you something interesting," I remarked, as I laid it on the table.
M. Auguste turned his head, and his lip curled slightly.
"I am afraid my sight is not very good," he said negligently. "Is not that object rather small?"
"It is merely a specimen," I responded, counting out nine others, and laying them beside the first.
"Ah, now I fancy I can see what you are showing me," he admitted.
"There is a history attached to these notes," I explained. "They represent the amount of a bet which I have just won."
"Really! That is most interesting."
"I now have another bet of similar nature pending, which I hope also to be able to win."
"I am tempted to wish you success," put in the medium encouragingly.
"The chances of success are so great that if you were a betting man I should be inclined to ask you to make a joint affair of it," I said.
"My dear M. V——, I am not a bigot. I have no objection to a wager provided the stakes are made worth my while."
"I think they should be. Well, I will tell you plainly, I stand to win this amount if the Baltic Fleet does not sail for another month."
M. Auguste smiled pleasantly.
"I congratulate you," he said. "From what I have heard the repairs will take at least that time."
"But that is not all. This bet of mine is continuous. I win a similar stake for every month which passes without the fleet having left harbor."
M. Auguste gazed at me steadily before speaking.
"If your bet were renewable weekly instead of monthly, you might become quite a rich man."
I saw that I was dealing with a cormorant. I made a hasty mental calculation. Half of one thousand rubles was about $375 a week, and the information I had led me to believe that Port Arthur was capable of holding out for another six months at least. To delay the sailing of the Baltic Fleet till then would cost roughly $10,000—say 15,000 rubles.
I decided that neither England nor Japan would grudge the price.
"I think your suggestion is a good one," I answered M. Auguste. "In that case, should you be willing to share the bet?"
"I should be willing to undertake it entirely," was the response.
The scoundrel wanted $20,000!
Had I been dealing with an honest man I should have let him have the money. But he had raised his terms so artfully that I felt sure that if I yielded this he would at once make some fresh demand.
I therefore shook my head, and began picking up the notes on the table.
"That would not suit me at all," I said decidedly. "I do not wish to be left out altogether."
M. Auguste watched me with growing uneasiness as I restored the notes one by one to my pocket-book.
"Look here!" he said abruptly, as the last note disappeared. "Tell me plainly what you expect me to do."
"I expect you to have a communication from your friend Madame Blavatsky, or any other spirit you may prefer—Peter the Great would be most effective, I should think—every time the Baltic Fleet is ready to start, warning 'Mr. Nicholas' not to let it sail."
M. Auguste appeared to turn this proposal over in his mind.
"And is that all?" he asked.
"I shall expect you to keep perfect secrecy about the arrangement. I have a friend at Potsdam, and I shall be pretty sure to hear if you try to give me away."
"Potsdam!" M. Auguste seemed genuinely surprised, and even disconcerted.
"Do you mean to say that you didn't know you were carrying out the instructions of Wilhelm II.?" I demanded, scarcely less surprised.
It was difficult to believe that the vexation showed by the medium was feigned.
"Of course! I see it now!" burst from him. "I wondered what she meant by all that stuff about Germany. And I—a Frenchman!"
It is extraordinary what unexpected scruples will display themselves in the most unprincipled knaves. Low as they may descend, there seems always to be some one point on which they are as sensitive as a Bayard.
M. Auguste, of all men in the world, was a French patriot! It turned out that he was a fanatical Nationalist and anti-Semite. He had howled in anti-Dreyfusite mobs, and flung stones at the windows of Masonic temples in Paris.
I was delighted with this discovery, which gave me a stronger hold on him than any bribe could.
But I had noted the feminine pronoun in his exclamation recorded above. I did not think it referred to the revealing spirit.
"You have been deceived by the woman who has given you your instructions," I remarked to him, when his excitement had subsided a little. "I fancy I can guess her name."
"Yes. It is the Princess Y——," he confessed.
Bewildering personality! Again, as I heard her name connected with an intrigue of the basest kind, a criminal conspiracy to influence the ruler of Russia by feigned revelations from the spirits of the dead, I recalled the sight I had last had of her, kneeling in her oratory, scourging herself before—my portrait!
There was no longer any fear that M. Auguste would prove obdurate on the question of terms. He pocketed his first five hundred rubles, and departed, vowing that the Baltic fleet should never get farther than Libau, if it was in the power of spirits to prevent it.
Desirous to relieve Lord Bedale's mind as far as possible I despatched the following wire to him the next morning:
Sailing of Baltic Fleet postponed indefinitely. No danger for the present. Watch Germany.
I sent a fuller account of the situation to a son of Mr. Katahashi, who was in England, nominally attached to the staff of the Imperial Bank, but really on business of a confidential character which it would be indiscreet on my part to indicate.
I may say that I particularly cautioned the young Japanese to avoid any action calculated to give the least color to the German legends about warships being secretly manufactured in British yards to the order of the Mikado's Government.
Every reader who has followed the course of the war with any attention will recollect the history of the fleet thus detained by my contrivance.
Week after week, and month after month, the Baltic Fleet was declared to be on the point of departure. Time after time the Czar went on board to review it in person, and speak words of encouragement to the officers and crew. And every time, after everything had been pronounced ready, some mysterious obstacle arose at the last moment to detain the fleet in Russian waters.
Journalists, naval experts, politicians and other ill-informed persons invented or repeated all sorts of explanations to account for the series of delays.
Only in the very innermost circles of the Russian Court it was whispered that the guardian spirit of the great Peter, the founder of Russia's naval power, had repeatedly come to warn his descendant of disasters in store for the fleet, should it be permitted to sail.
M. Auguste was earning his reward.
CHAPTER XXI
MY FUNERAL
The extreme privacy with which I had managed my negotiation with M. Auguste completely baffled the plotters who were relying on the voyage of the Baltic Fleet to furnish a casus belli between Russia and Great Britain.
They realized, of course, that some powerful hand was interfering with their designs, and they were sufficiently intelligent to guess that that hand must be mine.
But they were far from suspecting the method of my operations. They firmly believed that M. Auguste was still carrying out their instructions, and sowing distrust of England in the mind of Nicholas II. Indeed, on one occasion he informed me that the Princess Y—— had sent for him and ordered him not to frighten the Czar to such an extent as to make him afraid to let the fleet proceed to sea.
Unable to detect and countermine me, it was natural that they should become impatient for my removal.
Accordingly, I was not surprised to receive an urgent message from Sophia, late one evening, requesting me to come to her without delay.
By this time our friendship, if such it could be called, had become so intimate that I visited her nearly every day on one pretext or another.
Her greeting, as soon as I had obeyed the summons, showed me that a fresh development had taken place in the situation.
"Andreas, the hour has come!"
"The hour?"
"For your removal. Petrovitch has been here. He suspects something. He has rebuked me severely for the delay."
"Did you tell him I was not an easy man to kill?"
"I told him anything and everything. He would not listen. He says they have lost confidence in me. He was brutal. He said——"
"Well, what did he say?"
"He said—" she spoke slowly and shamefacedly—"that he perceived it took a man to kill a man."
I smiled grimly.
"History tells us differently. But what then?"
"To-morrow I shall no longer be able to answer for your life."
"You think some one else will be appointed to dispose of me?"
"I am sure that some one else has been appointed already. Most likely it is Petrovitch himself."
"Well, I shall look out for him." I did not think it necessary to tell Sophia that I had been expecting something of this kind, and had made certain preparations.
"It will be useless, Andreas. You do not know the man with whom you have to deal."
"The ignorance may be mutual," I observed drily.
The Princess became violently agitated.
"You must let me save you," she exclaimed clasping her hands.
"In what way?"
"You must let me kill you here, to-night.
"Don't you understand?" she pursued breathlessly. "It is absolutely necessary for your safety, perhaps for the safety of both of us, that they should think I have carried out my instructions. You must appear to die. Then they will no longer concern themselves about you, and you will be able to assume some other personality without being suspected."
The scheme appealed to me strongly, all the more that it seemed as though it could be made to fit in very well with my own plans.
"You are a clever woman, Sophia," I said cautiously. "How do you purpose to carry out your scheme? They will want to see my corpse, I suppose."
She drew out the little key I have already described.
"Come this way."
I followed her through the bedroom as before to the door of the locked oratory.
She opened the door and admitted me.
By the light of the wax candles I saw what was surely one of the strangest sights ever presented to mortal eyes.
It was myself, lying in state!
On a high bier draped in white and black cloth, I lay, or, rather, my counterpart presentment in wax lay, wrapped and shrouded like a dead body, a branch of palm in the closed hands, and a small Russian coin resting on the lips, in accordance with a quaint custom which formerly prevailed in many lands.
In spite of my habitual self-command I was unable to repress a cold shiver at this truly appalling spectacle.
"Your stage management is perfect," I observed after a pause. "But will they be satisfied with a look only?"
"I do not think so. It will be necessary for you to put on the appearance of death for a short time, till I have satisfied them. Afterward I can conceal you in here, while this—" she pointed to the ghastly figure—"is buried under your name."
"Let us get back to the other room, before we talk about it," I urged. "This is not altogether a pleasant sight."
As we passed out of the oratory I stealthily took note of the fastening of the door. The lock was on the outside only; in other words, if I permitted myself to be immured in the cell-like chamber, I should be a prisoner at the mercy of my charming friend.
"And now, by what means do you purpose that I shall assume the appearance of death?" I inquired as soon as we had returned to the boudoir.
The Princess opened a small cabinet, and produced a tiny stoppered bottle.
"By swallowing this medicine," she answered. "I have had it specially prepared from a recipe given me ten years ago at a time when I thought of resorting to the same contrivance to escape from my taskmaster."
I took the bottle in my hand, and examined it carefully. It bore no label, and the contents appeared perfectly colorless.
"In five minutes after you have swallowed the contents of the bottle," Sophia explained, "you will begin to turn cold, at first in the feet and hands. As the cold mounts to the brain you will gradually lose consciousness, and become rigid. You will look as pale as if you were actually dead, and your heart will cease to beat."
"And how long will this stupor last?"
"About twenty-four hours, more or less, according to your constitution."
I looked carefully and steadily into her eyes. She flushed and trembled violently, but did not quail.
"What does it taste like?" I asked.
"It is a little bitter."
"I will take it in water, then."
"You can take it in wine, if you like. I have some here."
She moved to a small cupboard in the wall.
"I shall tell them that I gave it to you in wine, in any case," she added.
"I prefer water, thank you. May I fetch some from the next room?"
"I will fetch it," she said hastily, going to the bedroom.
On an ebony stand beside me there was a large china bowl containing a flowering plant in its pot. In a second I had removed the stopper, emptied the bottle into the space between the flower-pot and the outer bowl, and put the stopper back again.
"Tell me," I said to the Princess as she hurried back with a carafe and tumbler, "have you thought how I am to get away from this house without exciting attention?"
"It will be easy for me to procure you a dozen disguises. I am always going to masked balls. But are you in such a hurry to leave me?"
"I shall find the air of your oratory rather confined, I am afraid."
She hung her head in evident chagrin.
"But where will you go?" she demanded.
"Oh, that is all arranged. I have taken a small house and furnished it, in another name."
"Where?" she asked breathlessly.
"Perhaps I had better not tell you till this excitement is over. I must not burden you with too many of my secrets."
Sophia's eyes filled with tears.
"You distrust me still!" she cried. "But, after all, what does it matter? I have only to ask Petrovitch."
"That will be quite unnecessary as well as useless. I pledge myself to tell you before I leave this place, and I have not favored M. Petrovitch with my new address."
She smiled scornfully.
"And do you believe that you have succeeded in taking a house in Petersburg without his knowledge? You do not know him, I tell you again. He has had you watched every hour of the day while you have been here."
"Please credit me with a little resource, as well as your friend," I answered with some slight irritation. "I have no doubt the spies of M. Petrovitch have watched me pretty closely, but they have not been able to watch every person who has come in and out of the hotel. Two of my most capable assistants have been in Petersburg for the last month—since the day you hinted that my life was not quite safe, in fact."
The woman before me looked completely overwhelmed.
"One of them," I proceeded with cutting severity, "has taken the house I speak of. The other is watching over my personal safety at this moment."
The Princess fairly gave way. Sinking on the couch behind her, she exclaimed in a faint voice:
"You are a demon, not a man!"
It was the finest compliment she could have paid me.
"And now," I said carelessly, "to carry out your admirable little idea."
The unhappy woman put up her hands, and turned away her head in sheer terror.
I splashed some water into the tumbler, and then trickled in a small quantity afterward, to imitate the sound of adding the poison. This done I respectfully handed the bottle to my companion.
"To our next meeting!" I called out lightly, as I lifted the tumbler to my lips and drained it.
It was the Princess who swooned.
Although I had not foreseen this weakness on her part I took advantage of it to draw the tiny key of the oratory from her bosom, and hide it in my mouth.
I then touched the bell twice, the signal for the Princess's maid to appear.
"Fauchette," I said, when she entered—for this was the assistant I had alluded to as watching over my personal safety—"Madame has just given me the contents of that stoppered bottle. Do you know anything about them?"
Fauchette had made good use of her time since obtaining her situation. These things are so easily managed that I am almost ashamed to explain that a bribe to the former maid had brought about a convenient illness, and the recommendation of Fauchette as a temporary substitute.
"Yes, Monsieur," she said quietly. "I filled the bottle with water this afternoon, in case of accident. I have preserved the previous contents, in case you should care to have them analyzed."
"You have done well, very well, my girl."
Fauchette blushed with pleasure. I do not often say so much to my staff.
"Madame does not know that I had just emptied the bottle into that china bowl," I added carelessly.
"It is useless to try to serve Monsieur; he does everything himself," murmured the poor girl, mortified.
"Nonsense, Fauchette, I have just praised you. It is always possible that I may overlook something."
Fauchette shook her head with an incredulous air.
I have found it good policy to maintain this character for infallibility with my staff. It is true, perhaps, that I do not very often blunder.
"And now," I went on, "it is time for the poison to take effect! As soon as I am dead, you will awake Madame."
I lay down on another couch, and composed myself in a rigid attitude with my eyes closed. I did not believe, of course, that it would be possible to deceive a close observer, but I trusted to the wild emotions of the Princess to blind her to any signs of life.
I heard Fauchette dart on her mistress with a well-acted scream, and sprinkle her face and neck with cold water.
Sophia seemed to revive quickly.
"Andreas!" I heard her gasp. "Where? What has become of him?"
"M. Sterling has also fainted," the maid replied with assumed innocence.
"Ha!"
It was more like a shriek than a sob. I heard a hasty rustling of skirts, and then Sophia seemed to be kneeling beside me, and feeling for the beat of my heart.
"Go, Fauchette! Send Gregory instantly to M. Petrovitch to inform him that M. Sterling has been taken ill in my house, and that I fear he is dead."
The Princess began loosening my necktie.
Had Fauchette been present I should have been able to point to this as a proof that I was not incapable of an occasional oversight.
As a matter of fact, I had not anticipated this very natural action on Sophia's part. Yet it should have been evident that, were it only to keep up appearances before any one who might come to view my supposed corpse, she would be bound to free my neck.
And I was wearing the locket which contained the portrait of my promised bride!
I lay, really rigid with apprehension, while Sophia's caressing fingers tenderly removed the necktie, and began unfastening my collar and shirt.
Suddenly I heard an ejaculation—at first striking the note of surprise and curiosity merely, but deepening to fear.
In a moment the locket was lifted from my chest, and forced open with a metallic click.
"Ah!—Ah!"
She let the open locket drop from her fingers on my bare throat.
Instantly it was clutched up again. I could picture the frenzied gaze of jealousy and hate in those burning eyes of deepest violet; I could actually feel the passionate breathing from between the clenched teeth of whitest ivory.
"Miserable child!" she hissed, the hand that held the locket trembling so that I could feel it against my neck. "So you have robbed me of him!"
She paused, and then added, forcing out each word with a passion of distilled hate——
"But you shall never have him! He shall be mine! Mine! Mine, in the grave!"
CHAPTER XXII
A PERILOUS MOMENT
I lay with every nerve strained to its utmost tension, listening for the least movement on the part of the maddened woman which might indicate she was about to stab me then and there.
In the silence that followed, if she did not hear the beating of my heart it was only because her own stormy emotions had rendered her deaf and blind to everything else.
For a time her rapid breathing continued to warm my uncovered neck. Then she snapped-to the locket and let it fall, and rose from my side to pace the floor of the room with swift, irregular steps.
Fauchette, who must have been anxious to know how I was faring, now came back without waiting to be summoned.
"Well?" the Princess demanded, halting in her promenade.
"Gregory has gone for M. Petrovitch, Madame. Is there anything I can do?"
"I have tried every restorative," came the answer. "See if you can detect any signs of life."
The last command seemed to come as an afterthought. No doubt, Sophia wished to test her work before Petrovitch arrived.
I was encouraged to think that she had no immediate intention of killing me; and as the maid bent over me I contrived to give her hand a reassuring squeeze.
"He is quite dead, Madame," the girl said, turning away. "Would you like to have the body carried into another room?"
"No. Wait till M. Petrovitch comes," her mistress replied. "You can go."
As my assistant withdrew I again became on the alert for any dangerous move on the part of the Princess.
It was not long before I was conscious that the room had grown darker.
I gathered that Sophia had switched off some of the lights in order to make it more difficult for Petrovitch to detect her fraud, and again I took courage.
Some muttered words helped me to understand the plan of the desperate woman.
"I will give him one chance. He shall choose. Men do not die for love in these days."
There was little doubt that she intended to lock me up in her oratory and hold me a prisoner till I consented to sacrifice my faith to her Japanese rival.
Satisfied that there was little risk of any immediate violence, I waited calmly for the arrival of Sophia's colleague, or master.
The head of the Manchurian Syndicate lost no time on the way. Very soon I heard the door open and the familiar voice, with its slightly affected accent, saying,
"Permit me to offer you the expression of my sincere regrets, dear Princess!—And my sincere congratulations," he added in a more business-like tone, as the door closed again.
A sigh was the only audible response.
"It has cost you something, I can see," the man's voice resumed soothingly. "That fact gives you a still stronger claim on our gratitude. I confess I began to fear seriously that you were deceiving us, and that would have been very dangerous."
Another obscure sound, between a sigh and a sob, from the woman.
"Now we can proceed with light hearts. Within three months from now Russia and Great Britain will be at war. I do not mind answering for it. There was only one man in Europe who could have prevented it, and he lies there!"
"You would have it so! I still say it would have been enough to imprison him somewhere."
"You talk foolishly, believe me, Princess. A man like that is not to be imprisoned. There is no jailer in the world who would venture to undertake to keep the famous A. V. under lock and key."
"I would have undertaken it," came the answer. "I would have locked him in my oratory, the key of which never leaves my bosom."
"Nevertheless if it was important to that man to steal it from you, it would not remain in your bosom very long."
A startled cry interrupted the speaker, and told me that Sophia had made the fatal discovery of the loss of her key.
I held my breath in the most dreadful suspense. Everything now depended on this woman. If she allowed the least hint, I knew that Petrovitch would never leave the room without at least an attempt to change my supposed trance into death.
Fortunately the Princess was equal to the emergency. I heard her give a slight laugh.
"I am punished for my assurance," she confessed. "I am not quite hardened, as you know; and when I realized that M. V—— was actually dead, I was obliged to pray for him. I have left the key in the door."
"Go and fetch it, then."
The tone in which these words were spoken was harsh. I heard Sophia going out of the room, and in an instant, with a single bound, as it seemed, the man was leaning over me, feeling my pulse, listening for my heart, and testing whether I breathed.
"If I had brought so much as a knife with me, I would have made sure," I heard him mutter to himself.
Fortunately Sophia's absence did not last ten seconds. She must have snatched up the first key that came to hand, that of a jewel-box most likely, and hurried back with it.
Petrovitch seemed to turn away from me with reluctance.
"You doubt me, it appears," came in angry tones from the Princess.
"I doubt everybody," was the cool rejoinder. "You were in love with this fellow."
"You think so? Then look at this."
I felt the locket being picked up, and heard the click of the tiny spring.
A coarse laugh burst from the financier.
"So that is it! Woman's jealousy is safer than her sworn word, after all. Now I believe he is dead."
The Princess made no reply.
Presently the man spoke again.
"This must be kept a secret among ourselves, you understand. The truth is, I have exceeded my instructions a little. A certain personage only authorized detention. It appears he is like you in having a certain tenderness for this fellow—why, I can't think. At any rate his manner was rather alarming when we hinted that a coffin made the safest straight-jacket."
It was impossible for me to doubt that it was the Kaiser whom this villain had insulted by offering to have me assassinated. I thanked Wilhelm II. silently for his chivalrous behavior. M. Petrovitch could have known little of the proud Hohenzollern whom he tempted.
At the same time, it was a source of serious concern for me to know that, just as I had learned that my real opponent was my friend the Kaiser, so he in turn had acquired the knowledge that he had me against him.
It had become a struggle, no longer in the dark, between the most resourceful of Continental sovereigns and myself, and that being so, I realized that I could not afford to rest long on my oars.
From the deep breathing of the Princess, I surmised that she was choking down the rage she must have felt at the other's cynical depravity. For Sophia, though capable of committing a murder out of jealousy perhaps, was yet incapable of killing for reward.
"Well," I heard Petrovitch say in the tone of one who is taking his leave, "I must send some one 'round to remove our friend."
"Do not trouble, if you please. I will see to the funeral," came in icy tones from the Princess.
"What, still sentimental! Be careful, my good Sophia Y——, you will lose your value to us if you give way to such weaknesses."
I heard his steps move across the carpeted floor, and then with startling suddenness, the words came out:
"Curse me if I can believe he is dead!"
My blood ran cold. But it turned out to be only a passing exclamation. At the end of what seemed to me minutes—they can only have been seconds—the footsteps moved on, and the door opened and closed.
"Thank God!" burst from Sophia.
Her next words were plainly an apostrophe to myself.
"So you did not trust me after all!"
I was within an ace of opening my eyes on the supposition that she had found me out, when I was reassured by her adding, this time to herself,
"He must have done it when I fainted!"
I saw that she was referring to my theft of the key.
There was a soft rustle of silk on the floor, and I felt her hands searching in my pockets for the stolen key.
"Fool! To think that I could outwit him!" she murmured to herself at last.
She had taken some time to learn the lesson, however.
CHAPTER XXIII
A RESURRECTION AND A GHOST
It was soon evident that the Princess Y—— had taken her new maid into her confidence to a certain extent.
She must have rung for Fauchette without my hearing anything, for presently the door opened again, and I heard my assistant's voice.
As the result of a hurried consultation between the two women, in which Fauchette played to perfection the part of a devoted maid who is only desirous to anticipate the wishes of her mistress, it was decided to wheel the sofa on which I lay into the oratory, and to bring the wax dummy into the Princess's bedroom, to lie in state till the next day.
The arrangement did not take long to carry out.
Partly from what I was able to overhear, and partly from the report afterward furnished to me by Fauchette, I am able to relate succinctly what took place.
To begin with, I was left in the oratory, while the counterfeit corpse was duly arranged in the adjoining room.
Unable to lock me in the smaller apartment, Sophia declared her intention of locking both the outer doors of the bedroom, one of which gave on a corridor, while the other, as the reader is aware, opened into the boudoir where the previous scene had taken place.
The Princess retained one of these keys herself, entrusting the other to the maid, of course with the strictest injunctions as to its use.
To keep up appearances before the household, the Princess arranged to pass the next few nights in another room on the same floor, which usually served as a guest chamber.
It was explained to the servants that the death which had occurred had upset the nerves of their mistress, and rendered her own suite of rooms distasteful to her for the present.
Fauchette, who thus became my jailer, brought me a supply of cold food and wine during the night. I had part of this provision under the altar of the oratory, to serve me during the following day.
My cataleptic condition was supposed to endure for nearly twenty-four hours. The enforced seclusion was intensely irritating to a man of my temperament; but I could not evade it without revealing to Sophia that I had heard her confession, and thereby inflicting a deadly wound on a woman who loved me.
Meanwhile the arrangements for my funeral had been pressed on.
Already a telegram had appeared in the London papers announcing the sudden and unexpected death from heart-failure of the well-known English philanthropist, Mr. Melchisedak Sterling. One or two of the journals commented on the fact of Mr. Sterling's death having taken place while he was on a mission of peace to the Russian capital, and expressed a hope that his death would have a chastening effect on the War Party in Petersburg.
My friend, the editor of the Peace Review, very generously sent a wreath, which arrived too late for the funeral but was laid on my grave.
Unfortunately these newspaper announcements were taken seriously by my exalted employers, as well as by the enemies whom I wished to deceive, but this could not be helped.
By noon the undertaker's men had arrived with my coffin. The Princess played upon their ignorance of English customs and burial rites to pretend that the work of coffining must be done by women's hands. In this way she and Fauchette were able to enclose the dummy in its wooden shell, leaving to the men only the task of screwing down the lid.
The burial took place in the English cemetery. I am glad to say that the Princess contrived to avoid the mockery of a religious service by alleging that Mr. Sterling had belonged to a peculiar sect—the Quakers, I fancy—which holds such ceremonies to be worldly and unnecessary.
I may add that I have since visited my grave, which is still to be seen in a corner of the cemetery. It is marked by a stone slab with an inscription in English.
In the afternoon the faithful Fauchette persuaded her mistress to go out for a drive, to soothe her over-strained nerves.
Before quitting the house, the Princess came in to take a last look at me.
She lingered minute after minute, as though with some premonition that our next meeting would be under widely different circumstances.
To herself, I heard her whisper, sighing softly:
"Andreas! O Andreas! If I could sleep, or thou couldst never wake!"
She crept away, and the better to secure me locked both the bedroom doors herself, and carried off the keys.
On her return, two hours later, Sophia, with a look that told the watchful Fauchette of her uneasiness, hurried straight up-stairs, toward the door of the little oratory.
She found it locked from the outside, with the key in the door.
It had cost me something to break my pledge to the Princess Y—— that I would give her my new address before leaving her.
But her unfortunate discovery of the portrait I wore around my neck and her plainly-declared intention to hold me a prisoner till she could shake my fidelity, had rendered it necessary for me to meet treachery with treachery.
The secret service, it must always be borne in mind, has its own code of honor, differing on many points from that obtaining in other careers, but perhaps stricter on the whole.
For instance, I can lay my hand on my heart and declare that I have never done either of two things which are done every day by men holding high offices and high places in the world's esteem. I have never taken a secret commission. And I have never taken advantage of my political information to gamble in stocks.
The manner of my escape was simplicity itself.
My assistant had not come to live with the Princess without making some preparations for the part she was to play, and these included the bringing with her of a bunch of skeleton keys, fully equal to the work of opening any ordinary lock.
As soon as her mistress was safely out of the way, Fauchette came to receive my instructions.
I told her that I did not intend to wait for my jailer's return. We discussed the best way for me to slip out, without obstruction from the servants, and I decided to take advantage of the superstition of the Russian illiterate class, by enacting the part of my own ghost.
The report that I had been buried without any funeral service had already reached the household, and had prepared them for any supernatural manifestation.
Fauchette first brought me a little powdered chalk, with which I smeared my face. I then put on a long flowing cloak and a sombrero hat, part of the wardrobe accumulated by the Princess in the course of her gaieties.
I slipped a damp sponge into my pocket and directed the girl to lead the way.
She went down-stairs a few yards in front of me, turned into the servants' part of the house and threw open the back door, which led out into a courtyard giving on a street used only by tradesmen's carts. At this hour of the day it was deserted.
I followed cautiously in Fauchette's wake, and got as far as the back door without meeting any interruption.
But at that point, the porter, who must have been roused by an unfamiliar step—though I understand he swore afterward that the passage of the ghost had been absolutely noiseless—came out and stood in the doorway.
Without hesitating for an instant I assumed an erect posture and advanced swiftly toward him with my whitened face well displayed.
The fellow gave vent to a half-articulate call which died down in his throat, and bolted back into his room uttering yell after yell.
Fifteen seconds later I was out in the street, sponging the chalk from my face.
And five minutes after that I was comfortably seated in a hired droshky, on my way to a certain little house in the seafaring quarter of the city, which possessed, among other advantages, that of commanding an exceedingly fine view of the Admiralty Pier.
CHAPTER XXIV
A SECRET EXECUTION
I now come to a part of my chronicle which I plainly foresee must expose me to grave criticism.
To that criticism it is no part of my purpose to attempt any reply.
In the long run, I have found, men's minds are not much affected by argument and advocacy. Facts tell their own story, and men's judgments are usually the result of their personal prejudices.
For that reason I shall confine myself to relating facts. I have already told the story of my murder—for such it was in the intent—by Petrovitch. I shall now tell the story of the justice meted out by me on the assassin.
As soon as I was safely lodged in my house on the Alexander Quay, I despatched my assistant, a clever young Frenchman named Breuil, with a message to the promoter of the Manchurian Syndicate—the real moving spirit of that War clique in which even the bellicose grand dukes had only secondary parts.
The wording of the message had been carefully calculated to arouse curiosity, but not apprehension.
"The agent of a foreign Power," Breuil was instructed to say to this self-styled patriot, "with very large funds at his disposal, desires to see you in strict secrecy."
The bait took. Petrovitch, naturally concluding that he was to be offered a heavy bribe for some act of treachery to Russia, greedily accepted the invitation.
The infatuated man did not take even the ordinary precaution of asking for guarantees. He consented to accompany Breuil at once, merely asking how far he had to go. This recklessness was the result of his supposed triumphant crime. Believing that I was safely interred in the English cemetery, he thought there was no one left for him to fear.
On the way he did his best to extract some information out of my assistant. But Breuil returned the same answer to all his questions and hints:
"I am under orders not to converse with you, monsieur."
The doomed man was in good spirits as the droshky put him down at the door of my house.
"Decidedly an out-of-the-way retreat!" he commented gaily. "I should hardly be able to find my way here again without your assistance!"
The silent Breuil merely bowed, as he proceeded to open the street door with a latch key.
Perhaps Petrovitch had been a little more nervous than he allowed to appear. When he noticed that his escort simply closed the door on the latch, without locking or bolting it further, he said in a tone of relief:
"You are not much afraid of being visited by the police, I see."
Breuil, as silent as ever, led the way into a back parlor, overlooking the Neva, where I was waiting to receive my visitor.
The room was plainly furnished as a study, and I had placed myself in an arm-chair facing the window, so that my back was turned to the door as Petrovitch entered.
I pretended to be writing furiously, as a pretext for not turning my head till the visitor had seated himself.
Breuil said quietly, "M. Petrovitch is here," and went out of the room.
As the door closed I tossed away my pen and turned around, facing my assassin.
"I am pleased to see you, M. Petrovitch."
"Monsieur V——!"
I thought he would have lost his senses. His whole countenance changed. He clung to his chair, and his eyes were fixed on me with an expression of panic.
So complete was his collapse that he did not attempt to speak or excuse himself. I saw that he was hardly in a condition to listen to anything I had to say.
"I fear you are unwell, M. Petrovitch. Allow me to offer you a little brandy."
The wretched man watched me with bewildered looks, as I took a bottle and glasses from a cupboard and helped first him and then myself.
"It is quite wholesome, I assure you."
As I said the words I raised my own glass to my lips and sipped.
A choking cry escaped from the author of the war. He seized the glass I had set before him and feverishly drained it.
I saw that he was burning to know by what means I had escaped the fate prepared for me. But I had no object in gratifying his curiosity, and mere boasting is not a weakness of mine.
Steadfastly preserving the tone of a business interview between men who understand each other, I went on to say:
"I am here, as you know, in the joint interests of England and Japan."
My murderer nodded faintly. I could see him making a tremendous effort to control his nerves, and enter into conversation with me on my own terms.
"I think I should be glad of a little more brandy. Thank you!—I am not at all myself."
I shook my head compassionately.
"You should be careful to avoid too much excitement," I said. "Any sudden shock is bad for a man with your nerves."
The promoter gasped. The situation was clearly beyond him.
"You," I went on in my most matter-of-fact tone, "on the contrary, are acting on behalf of Germany."
"Who says so!" He was beginning to speak fiercely; but his eye met mine, and the words died on his lips.
"We will say I dreamed it, if you like," I responded drily. "I have very remarkable dreams sometimes, and learn a great deal from them.
"To confine ourselves to business. I have caused the sailing of this Baltic Fleet to be put off, because——"
"You—have caused it!"
The interruption burst from him in spite of himself.
I affected to shrug my shoulders with a certain annoyance.
"Your opinion of my powers does not seem to be a very high one, unfortunately," I remarked with irony. "It would be better if you accepted me as a serious antagonist, believe me."
Petrovitch lowered his eyes in confusion, as he muttered,
"I apologize, Monsieur V——. I have blundered, as I now perceive."
"Let us resume. I was about to say that I had prevented the sailing of this fleet, because I feared that its voyage might be marked by some incident likely to bring Great Britain and Russia into collision."
The financier raised his head and watched me keenly.
"You, yourself, M. Petrovitch, have been active, I believe, in preparing the mind of the Czar and the Russian public for something of the sort. Doubtless you have not done so without very good grounds."
"My information leads me to think that a flotilla of torpedo boats is being kept ready in the English ports for a night attack on our fleet during its progress through the North Sea."
I smiled disdainfully.
"That is a false report. I have asked you to call here in the hope that I might find you ready to assist me in discrediting it."
The Russian continued to watch me out of his narrow eyes.
"And, also," I added, "to assist me in preventing any attempt to give color to it."
"I am not sure that I understand you, Monsieur V——."
"That is quite possible. I will speak more plainly. There are some prophets who take a little trouble to make their prophesies come true. I wish to know whether you and your friends have determined that this particular prophesy shall come true—perhaps to fulfill it yourselves?"
Petrovitch frowned and compressed his lips.
"So that is why you got me here?"
"I wished to see," I said blandly, "if it was possible for me to offer you terms which might induce you to alter your views altogether—in short, to stop the war."
The financier looked thunderstruck.
"Monsieur V——, you don't know what you ask! But you—would a million rubles tempt you to come over, to be neutral, even?"
"I am a member, by adoption, of the imperial family of Japan," I replied laconically.
Petrovitch was past surprise. If I had informed him that I was the Mikado in disguise, I think he would have taken it as a matter of course.
"This war is worth ten millions to me," he confessed hoarsely.
I shook my head with resignation.
"The price is too high. We must be enemies, not friends, I perceive."
The author of the war, who had regained his self-possession, did not blanch at these words.
"I regret it," he said with a courteous inclination.
"You have reason to."
He gave me a questioning glance.
"Up to the present I have been on the defensive," I explained. "I dislike violent measures. But from this moment I shall hold myself at liberty to use them."
"I am afraid I have gone rather too far," the promoter hesitated.
"You have drugged me. You have robbed me. You have murdered me."
"You are alive, however," he ventured to retort with an impudent smile.
"Unfortunately," I went on sternly, "in murdering me you exceeded your instructions."
"How——"
"I dreamed that I heard you tell your accomplice so," I put in, without giving him a chance to speak.
He ceased to meet my gaze.
"You are therefore not even a political criminal. You are a common felon. As such I warn you that I shall execute you without notice, and without reprieve."
The Russian scowled fiercely.
"We will see about that," he blustered. "I have a loaded revolver in my pocket."
I waved my hand scornfully.
"Undeceive yourself, George Petrovitch. I am not proposing a duel. I cannot be expected to fight with a condemned murderer. I sentence you to death—and may the Lord have mercy on your soul."
"By what right?" he demanded furiously.
"I am accredited by the Emperor of Japan to the Emperor of Russia. This house is Japanese soil. Farewell!"
Petrovitch rose from his chair, wavering between indignation and alarm.
"I shall defend myself!" he exclaimed, edging slowly toward the door.
"You will do better to confess yourself. Is there no prayer that you wish to say?"
The Russian smiled incredulously.
"You seem very confident," he sneered.
I saw that it was useless to try to rouse him to a sense of his peril. I pointed to the door, and pressed a knob on the wall.
The murderer made two steps from me, laid his fingers on the door-handle—and dropped dead instantly.
CHAPTER XXV
A CHANGE OF IDENTITY
I now approach the crucial portion of my narrative.
The incidents already dealt with, though not without a certain interest, perhaps, for those who value exact information about political events, are comparatively unimportant, and have been given here chiefly in order to inspire confidence in what follows.
At all events, their truth is not likely to be disputed, and I have not thought it necessary, therefore, to insist on every corroborative detail.
But I am now about to enter on what must be considered debatable ground.
I had taken the little house on the Alexander Quay, as the reader will have guessed, as a post of observation from which to watch the proceedings of the Russian Ministry of Marine, more particularly with regard to the fleet under the command of Admiral Rojestvensky.
It is my subsequent observations and discoveries which compel me, greatly to my regret, to give a direct contradiction to the gallant Admiral's version of what took place in the North Sea on the night of Trafalgar Day, 1904.
It is for that reason that I desire to exercise particular care in this part of my statement.
Such care is the more incumbent on me, inasmuch as I was requested by the British Government to furnish a confidential copy of my evidence in advance, for the use of the members of the international court which sat in Paris to inquire into this most mysterious affair.
The following chapters should be read, therefore, as the sworn depositions of a witness, and not as the carelessly worded account of a journalist or popular historian.
The electrocution of the murderer, Petrovitch, already described, furnished me with a valuable opportunity which I was quick to seize.
I have not extenuated this act, and I will not defend it. I content myself with recording that this man had been the principal instrument in promoting the Russo-Japanese war, and the principal obstacle to peace. In this he was acting as the paid agent of a foreign Power, and was therefore guilty of high treason to his own country. On these grounds my execution of him, although irregular at the time, has since been formally ratified by the highest tribunal of the Russian Empire, the Imperial Council of State.
A justification which I value still more, consists in the fact that the removal of this man proved the turning point in the history of the war.
Within a month of his death I had the satisfaction to be made the medium of an informal overture for peace. The negotiations thus opened have proceeded with great secrecy, but before these lines meet the public eye, I have every hope that the calamitous struggle in Manchuria will have been suspended indefinitely.
To return:
Owing to the secret life led by the deceased man, it was some time before his absence from his usual haunts excited remark.
When it became evident that something must have happened to him, people were still slow to suspect that he had come to a violent end. Many persons believed that he had been ruined by the ill-success of the war, and had gone into hiding from his creditors. Others supposed that he had been secretly arrested.
Some of his fellow-plotters in the Russian capital imagined that he had fled to Germany to escape the penalty of his treason. In Germany, on the other hand, I afterward learned, he was supposed to have been sent to Siberia by order of the Czar.
For weeks the "Disappearance of M. Petrovitch" was the general topic of discussion in the newspapers and in private circles; but no one came near guessing the truth.
There was one person who must have divined from the first what had happened. But she held her tongue.
So far as I could gather from the reports which continued to reach me from Fauchette, the Princess Y—— had sunk into a lethargy after my evasion. She seemed to wish only to be left alone to brood, perhaps to mourn.
The only sign she gave was by depositing a wreath on the empty grave in the English cemetery, a wreath which bore the solitary word, "Remembrance."
In the meanwhile I had gratifying evidence that the loss of the chief conspirator had completely disorganized the schemes of the plotters in the Ministry of Marine.
My first proceeding, after disconnecting the powerful battery which I had installed in my house for the purpose of the execution, was to summon my assistant Breuil.
With his aid, the corpse was stripped and sewn up in a sheet, together with some heavy weights. In the middle of the night it was committed to the waters of the Neva, almost within sight and sound of the fleet.
The papers which we found in his clothes were not numerous or important. But there was one which I thought worth preserving.
It was a passport, made out in the name of the deceased, issued by the Russian Foreign Office, and vised by the German Ambassador. This passport I still have in my possession.
I now disclosed to my assistant a plan which had been in my own mind for some time, though, true to my principle of never making an unnecessary confidence, I had not previously mentioned it to him.
"I have decided," I told him, "to assume the personality of Petrovitch."
Breuil stared at me in consternation. It is only fair to say that he had not been with me very long.
I could see that some objection was trembling on the tip of his tongue. He had learned, however, that I expect my staff not to criticize, but to obey.
"You may speak," I said indulgently, "if you have anything to say."
"I was about to remark, sir, that you are not in the least like Petrovitch."
"Think again," I said mildly.
He gave me an intelligent look.
"You are much about the same height!" he exclaimed.
"Exactly."
"But his friends, who see him every day—surely they cannot be deceived? And then his business—his correspondence—but perhaps you are able to feign handwriting?"
I smiled. The good Breuil had passed from one extreme to the other. Instead of doubting me, he was crediting me too much.
I proceeded to explain.
"No, as you very properly suggest, I could not hope to deceive Petrovitch's friends, nor can I imitate his hand. But remember, that in a few days Petrovitch will have disappeared. What will have become of him, do you suppose?"
Breuil was still puzzled. I had to make my meaning still plainer.
"He will be in concealment—that is to say, in disguise."
Breuil threw up his hands in a gesture of admiration.
"As the disguised Petrovitch I may manage to pass very well, more particularly as I shall be meeting people who have never seen the real Petrovitch."
Breuil did not quite understand this last observation.
"I am going," I exclaimed, "on board the Baltic Fleet."
"Sir, you are magnificent!"
I frowned down his enthusiasm. Compliments are compliments only when they come from those who pay us, not from those whom we pay.
"Go and procure me the uniform of a superintendent of naval stores. And ascertain for me where Captain Vassileffsky usually passes his evenings."
Captain Vassileffsky was the naval officer who had been present on the occasion when I was drugged at Petrovitch's table.
CHAPTER XXVI
TRAPPED
The clock was striking eight as I entered the restaurant of the Two-Headed Eagle, in the seaport of Revel on the Gulf of Finland, about a week after the mysterious disappearance of Petrovitch had become the talk of Petersburg.
Picking out a table at which an officer in the uniform of a Russian naval captain was already seated, I went up to it, and sat down in front of him with the formal bow prescribed by etiquette in the circumstances.
The ships intended to sail to the relief of Port Arthur were lying at this time some at Revel and others at Libau on the Baltic. From time to time their departure was officially announced for a certain date, reviews were held, and one or two preliminary trips had been undertaken.
But each time some unseen obstacle was interposed, and M. Auguste continued to draw his weekly stipend.
Nevertheless it was beginning to be evident that the game of see-saw could not go on forever. Autumn was approaching, the nation was becoming impatient, and the scoffs of the foreign press were severely galling the naval pride of Russia.
I had picked up a certain amount of information in the capital itself, where a great number of the officers were on leave. But I wished to get in direct touch with the one man who, I believed, was most likely to be in the confidence of Petrovitch, and, finding there was no chance of his coming to Petersburg, I had been obliged to make the journey to Revel.
Vassileffsky acknowledged my bow with cordiality, at the same time fixing his dark, wicked eyes on me with a look which I well understood.
I was wearing the uniform which I had ordered my assistant to provide me with, and the Captain had been quick to take note of it.
It may be said that the most valuable part of a naval officer's income in Russia is derived from the peculation of government stores. To carry on this lucrative system of plunder there is always a good understanding between officials of the Stores Department and the combatant officers.
Captain Vassileffsky now studied my face like a man expecting to receive some proposal of the kind. I, on my side, made it my business to say as little as possible to him till dinner was over. |
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