Chapter Eight.Describes a Mysterious Incident.Two days later, the ugly bandages having been removed from my head, Natalia was seated in the afternoon in my den.Exquisitely neat in her dead black, with the long crape veil, she presented an altogether different appearance to the radiant girl who had sat before me on that fatal drive. Her sweet face was now pale and drawn, and by the dark rings about her eyes I saw how full of poignant grief her heart had lately been.She had taken off her long, black gloves and settled herself cosily in my big armchair, her tiny patent-leather shoe, encasing a shapely silk-clad ankle, set forth beneath the hem of her black skirt.“I was so terrified. Uncle Colin, that you were also dead!” the girl was saying in a low, sympathetic voice, after I had expressed my deepest regret regarding the unfortunate death of her father, to whom she had been so devoted.“I suppose I had a very narrow escape,” I said cheerfully. “You came out best of all.”“By an absolute miracle. The Emperor is furious. Twenty of those arrested have already been sent to Schusselburg,” she said. “Only yesterday, he told me that he hoped you would be well enough in a day or two to go to the Palace. I was to tell you how extremely anxious he is to see you as soon as possible.”“I will obey the command at the earliest moment I am able,” I replied. “But how horribly unfortunate all this is,” I went on. “I fully expected that you would be in England by this time.”“As soon as you are ready, Uncle Colin, I can go. The Emperor has already told me that he has placed me under your guardianship. That you are to be my equerry. Isn’t it fun?” she cried, her pretty face suddenly brightening with pleasure. “Fancy you! dear old uncle, being put in charge of me—your naughty niece!”“His Majesty wished it,” I said. “He thinks you will be better away from Court for a time. Therefore, I have promised to accept the responsibility. For one year you are to liveincognitoin England, and I have been appointed your equerry and guardian—and,” I added very seriously, “I hope that my naughty niece will really behave herself, and do nothing which will cause me either annoyance or distress.”“I’ll really try and be very good, Uncle Colin,” declared the girl with mock demureness, and laughing mischievously. “Believe me, I will.”“It all remains with you,” I said. “Remember I do not wish it to be necessary that I should furnish any unfavourable report to the Emperor. I want us to understand each other perfectly from the outset. Recollect one point always. Though you may be known in England as Miss Gottorp, yet remember that you are of the Imperial family of Russia, and niece of the Emperor. Hence, there must be no flirtations, no clandestine meetings or love-letters, and such-like, as in the case of young Hamborough.”“Please don’t bring up that affair,” urged the little madcap. “It is all dead, buried and forgotten long ago.”“Very well,” I said, looking straight into her big, velvety eyes so full of expression. “But remember that your affection is absolutely forbidden except towards a man of your own birth and station.”“I know,” she cried, with a quick impatience. “I’m unlike any other girl. I am forbidden to speak to a commoner.”“Not in England. Preserve yourincognito, and nobody will know. At His Majesty’s desire, I have obtained leave of absence from the service for twelve months, in order to become your guardian.”“Well, dear old Uncle Colin, you are the only person I would have chosen. Isn’t that nice of me to say so?” she asked, with a tantalising smile.“But I tell you I shall show you no leniency if you break any of the rules which must, of necessity, be laid down,” I declared severely. “As soon as I find myself well enough, you will take Miss West, your old governess, and Davey, your English maid, to England, and I will come and render you assistance in settling down somewhere in comfort.”“At Eastbourne?” she cried in enthusiasm. “We’ll go there. Do let us go there?”“Probably at Brighton,” I said quietly. “It would be gayer for you, and—well, I will be quite frank—I think there are one or two young men whom you know in Eastbourne. Hence it is not quite to your advantage to return there.”She pouted prettily in displeasure.“Brighton is within an hour of London, as you know,” I went on, extolling the praises of the place.“Oh, yes, I know it. We often went over from Eastbourne, to concerts and things. There’s an aquarium there, and a seaside railway, and lots of trippers. I remember the place perfectly. I love to see your English trippers. They are such fun, and they seem to enjoy themselves so much more than we ever do. I wonder how it is—they enjoy their freedom, I suppose, while we have no freedom.”“Well,” I said cheerfully, “in a week or ten days I hope I shall be quite fit to travel, and then we will set out for England.”“Yes. Let us go. The Emperor leaves for Peterhof on Saturday. He will not return to Petersburg until the winter, and the Court moves to Tzarskoie-Selo on Monday.”“Then I will see His Majesty before Saturday,” I said. “But, tell me, why did Your Highness write to me so urgently three days ago? You said you wished to see me at once.”The girl sprang from her chair, crossed to the door, and made certain it was closed.Then, glancing around as though apprehensive of eavesdroppers, she said:“I wanted to tell you, Uncle Colin, of something very, very curious which happened the other evening. About ten o’clock at night I was with Miss West in the blue boudoir—you know the room in our palace, you’ve been in it.”“I remember it perfectly,” I said.“Well, I went upstairs to Davey for my smelling-salts as Miss West felt faint, and as I passed along the corridor I saw, in the moonlight, in my own room a dark figure moving by the window. It was a man. I saw him searching the drawers of my little writing-table, examining the contents by means of an electric-torch. I made no sound, but out of curiosity, drew back and watched him. He was reading all my letters—searching for something which he apparently could not find. My first impulse was to ring and give the alarm, for though I could not see the individual’s face, I knew he must be a thief. Still, I watched, perhaps rather amused at the methodical examination of my letters which he was making, all unconscious that he was being observed, until suddenly at a noise made by a servant approaching from the other end of the corridor, he started, flung back the letters into the drawer, and mounting to the open window, got out and disappeared. I shouted and rushed after him to the window, but he had gone. He must have dropped about twelve feet on to the roof of the ballroom and thus got away.“Several servants rushed in, and the sentries were alarmed,” she went on. “But when I told my story, it was apparent that I was not believed. The drawer in the writing-table had been reclosed, and as far as we could see all was in perfect order. So I believe they all put it down to my imagination.”“But you are quite certain that you saw the man there?” I said, much interested in her story.“Quite. He was of middle height, dressed in dark clothes, and wore a cloth peaked cap, like men wear when golfing in England,” she replied. “He was evidently in search of something I had in my writing-table, but he did not find it. Nevertheless, he read a quantity of my letters mostly from school-friends.”“And your love-letters?” I asked, with a smile.“Well, if the fellow read any of them,” she laughed, “I hope he was very much edified. One point is quite plain. He knew English, for my letters were nearly all in English.”“Some spy or other, I suppose.”“Without a doubt,” she said, clasping her white hands before her and raising her wonderful eyes to mine. “And do you know, Uncle Colin, the affair has since troubled me very considerably. I wanted to see you and hear your opinion regarding it.”“My opinion is that your window ought not to have been left open.”“It had not been. The maid whose duty it is to close the windows on that floor one hour before sunset every day has been closely questioned, and declares that she closed and fastened it at seven o’clock.”“Servants are not always truthful,” I remarked dubiously.“But the intruder was there with some distinct purpose. Don’t you think so?”“Without a doubt. He was endeavouring to learn some secret which Your Highness possesses. Cannot you form any theory what it can be? Try and reflect.”“Secret!” she echoed, opening her eyes wide. “I have no secrets. Everybody tells me I am far too outspoken.”“Here, in Russia, everyone seems to hold secrets of some character or other, social or political, and spies are everywhere,” I said. “Are you quite certain you have never before seen the intruder?”“I could only catch the silhouette of his figure against the moonlight, yet, to tell the truth, it struck me at that moment that I had seen him somewhere before. But where, I could not recollect. He read each letter through, so he must have known English very well, or he could not have read so quickly.”“But did you not tell me in the winter garden of the Palace, on the night of the last Court ball, that Marya de Rosen had given you certain letters—letters which reflected upon General Markoff?” I asked.She sat erect, staring at me open-mouthed in sudden recollection. “Why, I never thought of that!” she gasped. “Of course! It was for those letters the fellow must have been searching.”“I certainly think so—without the shadow of a doubt.”“Madame de Rosen feared lest they should be stolen from her, and she gave them over to me—three of them sealed up in an envelope,” declared my dainty little companion. “She expressed apprehension lest a domiciliary visit be made to her house by the police, when the letters in question might be discovered and seized. So she asked me to hold them for her.”“And what did you do with them?”“I hid them in a place where they will never be found,” she said; “at a spot where nobody would even suspect. But somebody must be aware that she gave them to me for safe-keeping. How could they possibly know?”“I think Your Highness was—well, just a little indiscreet on the night of the Court ball,” I said. “Don’t you recollect that you spoke aloud when other people were in the winter garden, and that I queried the judiciousness of it?”“Ah! I remember now!” she exclaimed, her face suddenly pale and serious. “I recollect what I said. Somebody must have overheard me.”“And that somebody told Serge Markoff himself—the man who was poor Madame de Rosen’s enemy, and who has sent both her and Luba to their graves far away in Eastern Siberia.”“Then you think that he is anxious to regain possession of those letters?”“I think that is most probable, in face of your statement that you intend placing them before the Emperor. Of course, I do not know their nature, but I feel that they must reflect very seriously upon His Majesty’s favourite official—the oppressor of Russia. You still have them in your possession?” I asked.“Yes, Uncle Colin. I feared lest some spy might find them, so I went up to my old nursery on the top floor of the Palace—a room which has not been used for years. In it stands my old doll’s house—a big, dusty affair as tall as myself. I opened it and placed the packet in the little wardrobe in one of the doll’s bedrooms. It is still there. I saw it only yesterday.”“Be very careful that no spy watches you going to that disused room. You cannot exercise too much caution in this affair,” I urged seriously.“I am always cautious,” she assured me. “I distrust more than one of our servants, for I believe some of them to be in Markoff’s pay. All that we do at home is carried at once to the Emperor, while I am watched at every turn.”“True; only we foreign diplomats are exempt from this pestilential surveillance and the clever plots of the horde ofagents-provocateurscontrolled by the all-powerful Markoff.”“But what shall I do, Uncle Colin?” asked the girl, her white hands clasped in her lap.“If you think it wise to place the letter before the Emperor, I should certainly lose no time in doing so,” I replied. “It may soon be too late. Spies will leave no hole or corner in your father’s palace unexamined.”“You think there really is urgency?” she asked.I looked my charming companion straight in the face and replied:“I do. If you value your life, then I would urge you at once to get rid of the packet which poor Madame de Rosen entrusted to you.”“But I cannot place it before the Emperor just at present,” the girl exclaimed. “I promised secrecy to Marya de Rosen.”“Then you knew something of the subject to which those letters refer—eh?”“I know something of it.”“Why not pass them on to me? They will be quite secure here in the Embassy safe. Russian spies dire not enter here—upon this bit of British soil.”“A good idea,” she said quickly. “I will. I’ll go home and bring them back to you.”And in a few minutes she rose and with a merry laugh left me to descend to her carriage, which was waiting out upon the quay.I stood looking out of the window as she drove away. I was thinking—thinking seriously over the Emperor’s strange apprehension.Two visitors followed her, the French naval attaché, and afterwards old Madame Neilidoff, the Society leader of Moscow, who called to congratulate me upon my escape, and to invite me to spend my convalescence at her country estate at Sukova. With the stout, ugly old lady, who spake French with a dreadfully nasal intonation and possessed a distinct moustache, I chatted for nearly an hour, as we sipped our tea with lemon, when almost as soon as she had taken her departure the door was flung open unceremoniously and the Grand Duchess Natalia burst in, her beautiful face blanched to the lips.“Uncle Colin! Something horrible has happened; Those letters have gone!” she gasped in a hoarse whisper, staring at me.“Gone!” I echoed, starting to my feet in dismay.“Yes.They’ve been stolen—stolen!”
Two days later, the ugly bandages having been removed from my head, Natalia was seated in the afternoon in my den.
Exquisitely neat in her dead black, with the long crape veil, she presented an altogether different appearance to the radiant girl who had sat before me on that fatal drive. Her sweet face was now pale and drawn, and by the dark rings about her eyes I saw how full of poignant grief her heart had lately been.
She had taken off her long, black gloves and settled herself cosily in my big armchair, her tiny patent-leather shoe, encasing a shapely silk-clad ankle, set forth beneath the hem of her black skirt.
“I was so terrified. Uncle Colin, that you were also dead!” the girl was saying in a low, sympathetic voice, after I had expressed my deepest regret regarding the unfortunate death of her father, to whom she had been so devoted.
“I suppose I had a very narrow escape,” I said cheerfully. “You came out best of all.”
“By an absolute miracle. The Emperor is furious. Twenty of those arrested have already been sent to Schusselburg,” she said. “Only yesterday, he told me that he hoped you would be well enough in a day or two to go to the Palace. I was to tell you how extremely anxious he is to see you as soon as possible.”
“I will obey the command at the earliest moment I am able,” I replied. “But how horribly unfortunate all this is,” I went on. “I fully expected that you would be in England by this time.”
“As soon as you are ready, Uncle Colin, I can go. The Emperor has already told me that he has placed me under your guardianship. That you are to be my equerry. Isn’t it fun?” she cried, her pretty face suddenly brightening with pleasure. “Fancy you! dear old uncle, being put in charge of me—your naughty niece!”
“His Majesty wished it,” I said. “He thinks you will be better away from Court for a time. Therefore, I have promised to accept the responsibility. For one year you are to liveincognitoin England, and I have been appointed your equerry and guardian—and,” I added very seriously, “I hope that my naughty niece will really behave herself, and do nothing which will cause me either annoyance or distress.”
“I’ll really try and be very good, Uncle Colin,” declared the girl with mock demureness, and laughing mischievously. “Believe me, I will.”
“It all remains with you,” I said. “Remember I do not wish it to be necessary that I should furnish any unfavourable report to the Emperor. I want us to understand each other perfectly from the outset. Recollect one point always. Though you may be known in England as Miss Gottorp, yet remember that you are of the Imperial family of Russia, and niece of the Emperor. Hence, there must be no flirtations, no clandestine meetings or love-letters, and such-like, as in the case of young Hamborough.”
“Please don’t bring up that affair,” urged the little madcap. “It is all dead, buried and forgotten long ago.”
“Very well,” I said, looking straight into her big, velvety eyes so full of expression. “But remember that your affection is absolutely forbidden except towards a man of your own birth and station.”
“I know,” she cried, with a quick impatience. “I’m unlike any other girl. I am forbidden to speak to a commoner.”
“Not in England. Preserve yourincognito, and nobody will know. At His Majesty’s desire, I have obtained leave of absence from the service for twelve months, in order to become your guardian.”
“Well, dear old Uncle Colin, you are the only person I would have chosen. Isn’t that nice of me to say so?” she asked, with a tantalising smile.
“But I tell you I shall show you no leniency if you break any of the rules which must, of necessity, be laid down,” I declared severely. “As soon as I find myself well enough, you will take Miss West, your old governess, and Davey, your English maid, to England, and I will come and render you assistance in settling down somewhere in comfort.”
“At Eastbourne?” she cried in enthusiasm. “We’ll go there. Do let us go there?”
“Probably at Brighton,” I said quietly. “It would be gayer for you, and—well, I will be quite frank—I think there are one or two young men whom you know in Eastbourne. Hence it is not quite to your advantage to return there.”
She pouted prettily in displeasure.
“Brighton is within an hour of London, as you know,” I went on, extolling the praises of the place.
“Oh, yes, I know it. We often went over from Eastbourne, to concerts and things. There’s an aquarium there, and a seaside railway, and lots of trippers. I remember the place perfectly. I love to see your English trippers. They are such fun, and they seem to enjoy themselves so much more than we ever do. I wonder how it is—they enjoy their freedom, I suppose, while we have no freedom.”
“Well,” I said cheerfully, “in a week or ten days I hope I shall be quite fit to travel, and then we will set out for England.”
“Yes. Let us go. The Emperor leaves for Peterhof on Saturday. He will not return to Petersburg until the winter, and the Court moves to Tzarskoie-Selo on Monday.”
“Then I will see His Majesty before Saturday,” I said. “But, tell me, why did Your Highness write to me so urgently three days ago? You said you wished to see me at once.”
The girl sprang from her chair, crossed to the door, and made certain it was closed.
Then, glancing around as though apprehensive of eavesdroppers, she said:
“I wanted to tell you, Uncle Colin, of something very, very curious which happened the other evening. About ten o’clock at night I was with Miss West in the blue boudoir—you know the room in our palace, you’ve been in it.”
“I remember it perfectly,” I said.
“Well, I went upstairs to Davey for my smelling-salts as Miss West felt faint, and as I passed along the corridor I saw, in the moonlight, in my own room a dark figure moving by the window. It was a man. I saw him searching the drawers of my little writing-table, examining the contents by means of an electric-torch. I made no sound, but out of curiosity, drew back and watched him. He was reading all my letters—searching for something which he apparently could not find. My first impulse was to ring and give the alarm, for though I could not see the individual’s face, I knew he must be a thief. Still, I watched, perhaps rather amused at the methodical examination of my letters which he was making, all unconscious that he was being observed, until suddenly at a noise made by a servant approaching from the other end of the corridor, he started, flung back the letters into the drawer, and mounting to the open window, got out and disappeared. I shouted and rushed after him to the window, but he had gone. He must have dropped about twelve feet on to the roof of the ballroom and thus got away.
“Several servants rushed in, and the sentries were alarmed,” she went on. “But when I told my story, it was apparent that I was not believed. The drawer in the writing-table had been reclosed, and as far as we could see all was in perfect order. So I believe they all put it down to my imagination.”
“But you are quite certain that you saw the man there?” I said, much interested in her story.
“Quite. He was of middle height, dressed in dark clothes, and wore a cloth peaked cap, like men wear when golfing in England,” she replied. “He was evidently in search of something I had in my writing-table, but he did not find it. Nevertheless, he read a quantity of my letters mostly from school-friends.”
“And your love-letters?” I asked, with a smile.
“Well, if the fellow read any of them,” she laughed, “I hope he was very much edified. One point is quite plain. He knew English, for my letters were nearly all in English.”
“Some spy or other, I suppose.”
“Without a doubt,” she said, clasping her white hands before her and raising her wonderful eyes to mine. “And do you know, Uncle Colin, the affair has since troubled me very considerably. I wanted to see you and hear your opinion regarding it.”
“My opinion is that your window ought not to have been left open.”
“It had not been. The maid whose duty it is to close the windows on that floor one hour before sunset every day has been closely questioned, and declares that she closed and fastened it at seven o’clock.”
“Servants are not always truthful,” I remarked dubiously.
“But the intruder was there with some distinct purpose. Don’t you think so?”
“Without a doubt. He was endeavouring to learn some secret which Your Highness possesses. Cannot you form any theory what it can be? Try and reflect.”
“Secret!” she echoed, opening her eyes wide. “I have no secrets. Everybody tells me I am far too outspoken.”
“Here, in Russia, everyone seems to hold secrets of some character or other, social or political, and spies are everywhere,” I said. “Are you quite certain you have never before seen the intruder?”
“I could only catch the silhouette of his figure against the moonlight, yet, to tell the truth, it struck me at that moment that I had seen him somewhere before. But where, I could not recollect. He read each letter through, so he must have known English very well, or he could not have read so quickly.”
“But did you not tell me in the winter garden of the Palace, on the night of the last Court ball, that Marya de Rosen had given you certain letters—letters which reflected upon General Markoff?” I asked.
She sat erect, staring at me open-mouthed in sudden recollection. “Why, I never thought of that!” she gasped. “Of course! It was for those letters the fellow must have been searching.”
“I certainly think so—without the shadow of a doubt.”
“Madame de Rosen feared lest they should be stolen from her, and she gave them over to me—three of them sealed up in an envelope,” declared my dainty little companion. “She expressed apprehension lest a domiciliary visit be made to her house by the police, when the letters in question might be discovered and seized. So she asked me to hold them for her.”
“And what did you do with them?”
“I hid them in a place where they will never be found,” she said; “at a spot where nobody would even suspect. But somebody must be aware that she gave them to me for safe-keeping. How could they possibly know?”
“I think Your Highness was—well, just a little indiscreet on the night of the Court ball,” I said. “Don’t you recollect that you spoke aloud when other people were in the winter garden, and that I queried the judiciousness of it?”
“Ah! I remember now!” she exclaimed, her face suddenly pale and serious. “I recollect what I said. Somebody must have overheard me.”
“And that somebody told Serge Markoff himself—the man who was poor Madame de Rosen’s enemy, and who has sent both her and Luba to their graves far away in Eastern Siberia.”
“Then you think that he is anxious to regain possession of those letters?”
“I think that is most probable, in face of your statement that you intend placing them before the Emperor. Of course, I do not know their nature, but I feel that they must reflect very seriously upon His Majesty’s favourite official—the oppressor of Russia. You still have them in your possession?” I asked.
“Yes, Uncle Colin. I feared lest some spy might find them, so I went up to my old nursery on the top floor of the Palace—a room which has not been used for years. In it stands my old doll’s house—a big, dusty affair as tall as myself. I opened it and placed the packet in the little wardrobe in one of the doll’s bedrooms. It is still there. I saw it only yesterday.”
“Be very careful that no spy watches you going to that disused room. You cannot exercise too much caution in this affair,” I urged seriously.
“I am always cautious,” she assured me. “I distrust more than one of our servants, for I believe some of them to be in Markoff’s pay. All that we do at home is carried at once to the Emperor, while I am watched at every turn.”
“True; only we foreign diplomats are exempt from this pestilential surveillance and the clever plots of the horde ofagents-provocateurscontrolled by the all-powerful Markoff.”
“But what shall I do, Uncle Colin?” asked the girl, her white hands clasped in her lap.
“If you think it wise to place the letter before the Emperor, I should certainly lose no time in doing so,” I replied. “It may soon be too late. Spies will leave no hole or corner in your father’s palace unexamined.”
“You think there really is urgency?” she asked.
I looked my charming companion straight in the face and replied:
“I do. If you value your life, then I would urge you at once to get rid of the packet which poor Madame de Rosen entrusted to you.”
“But I cannot place it before the Emperor just at present,” the girl exclaimed. “I promised secrecy to Marya de Rosen.”
“Then you knew something of the subject to which those letters refer—eh?”
“I know something of it.”
“Why not pass them on to me? They will be quite secure here in the Embassy safe. Russian spies dire not enter here—upon this bit of British soil.”
“A good idea,” she said quickly. “I will. I’ll go home and bring them back to you.”
And in a few minutes she rose and with a merry laugh left me to descend to her carriage, which was waiting out upon the quay.
I stood looking out of the window as she drove away. I was thinking—thinking seriously over the Emperor’s strange apprehension.
Two visitors followed her, the French naval attaché, and afterwards old Madame Neilidoff, the Society leader of Moscow, who called to congratulate me upon my escape, and to invite me to spend my convalescence at her country estate at Sukova. With the stout, ugly old lady, who spake French with a dreadfully nasal intonation and possessed a distinct moustache, I chatted for nearly an hour, as we sipped our tea with lemon, when almost as soon as she had taken her departure the door was flung open unceremoniously and the Grand Duchess Natalia burst in, her beautiful face blanched to the lips.
“Uncle Colin! Something horrible has happened; Those letters have gone!” she gasped in a hoarse whisper, staring at me.
“Gone!” I echoed, starting to my feet in dismay.
“Yes.They’ve been stolen—stolen!”
Chapter Nine.The Little Grand Duchess.In the golden September sunset, the long, wide promenade stretching beside the blue sea from Brighton towards the fashionable suburb of Hove was agog with visitors.A cloudless sky, a glassy sea flecked by the white sails of pleasure yachts, and ashore a crowd of well-dressed promenaders, the majority of whom were Londoners who, stifled in the dusty streets, were now seeking the fresh sea air of the Channel.I had dressed leisurely for dinner in the Hotel Métropole, where I had taken up my abode, and about seven o’clock descended the steps, and, crossing the King’s Road to the asphalted promenade, set out to walk westward towards Hove.Many things had happened since that well-remembered afternoon in July when Natalia had discovered the clever theft of Madame de Rosen’s letters, and I had, an hour later, ill though I was, sent to His Majesty that single word “Bathildis” and was granted immediate audience.When I told him the facts he appeared interested, paced the room, and then snapped his fingers with a careless gesture. The little madcap had certainly annoyed him greatly, and though feigning indifference, he nevertheless appeared perplexed.Natalia was called at once and questioned closely; she was the soul of honour and would reveal nothing of the secret. Afterwards I returned to the Embassy and summoned Hartwig, to inform him of the Grand Duchess’s loss. The renowned police official had since made diligent inquiry; indeed, the whole complicated machinery of the Russian criminal police had been put into motion, but all to no avail.The theft was still an entire mystery.As I approached the Lawns at Hove, those wide, grassy promenades beside the sea, I saw that many people were still lingering, enjoying the warm sunset, although the fashionable hour when women exercise their pet dogs, and idle men lounge and watch the crowd, had passed and the band had finished its performance.My mind was filled by many serious apprehensions, as turning suddenly from the Lawns, I recrossed the road and entered Brunswick Square, that wide quadrangle of big, old-fashioned houses around a large railed-in garden filled with high oaks and beeches.Before a drab, newly-painted house with a basement and art-green blinds, I halted, ascended the steps and rang.A white-whiskered old manservant in funereal black bowed as I entered, and, casting off my overcoat, I followed the old fellow past a man who was seated demurely in the hall, to whom I nodded, and up thickly-carpeted stairs to the big white-enamelled drawing-room, where Natalia sprang up from a couch of daffodil silk and came forward to meet me with glad welcome and outstretched hand.“Well, Uncle Colin!” she cried, “wherever have you been? I called for you at the ‘Métropole’ the day before yesterday, and your superb hall-porter told me that you were in London!”“Yes. I had to go up there on some urgent business,” I said. “I only returned to-day at five o’clock and received your kind invitation to dine,” and then, turning, I greeted Miss West, the rather thin, elderly woman who for years had acted as English governess to Her Imperial Highness—or Miss Gottorp, as she was now known at Hove. Miss West had been governess in the Emperor’s family for six years before she had entered the service of the Grand Duchess Nicholas, so life at Court, with all its stiff etiquette, had perhaps imparted to her a slightly unnatural hauteur.Natalia looked inexpressibly sweet in an evening gown of fine black spotted net, the transparency of which about the chest heightened the almost alabaster whiteness of her skin. She wore a black aigrette in her hair, but no jewellery save a single diamond bangle upon her wrist, an ornament which she always wore.“Sit down and tell me all the news,” she urged, throwing herself into an armchair and patting a cushion near by as indication where I should sit.“There is no news,” I said. “This morning I was at the Embassy, and they were naturally filled with curiosity regarding you—a curiosity which I did not satisfy.”“Young Isvolski is there, isn’t he?” she asked. “He used to be attached to my poor father’s suite.”“Yes,” I replied. “He’s third secretary. He wanted to know whether you had police protection, and I told him they had sent you another agent from Petersburg. I suppose it is that melancholy man I’ve just seen sitting in the hall?”“Yes. Isn’t it horrid? He sits there all day long and never moves,” Miss West exclaimed. “It is as though the bailiffs are in the house.”“Bailiffs?” repeated the girl. “What are they?” I explained to her, whereupon she laughed heartily. “Hartwig is due in Brighton to-night or to-morrow morning,” I said. “I have received a telegram from him, despatched from Berlin early yesterday morning. But,” I added, “I trust that you are finding benefit from the change.”“I am,” she assured me. “I love this place. I feel so free and so happy here. Miss West and I go for walks and drives every day, and though a lot of people stare at me very hard, I don’t think they know who I am. I hope not.”“They admire your Highness’s good looks,” I ventured to remark. But she made a quick gesture of impatience, and declared that I only intended sarcasm.“I suppose Miss West, that all the men turn to look at Her Highness?” I said. “Englishmen at the seaside during the summer are always impressionable, so they must be forgiven.”“You are quite right, Mr Trewinnard. It is really something dreadful. Only to-day a young man—quite a respectable young fellow, who was probably a clerk in the City—followed us the whole length of the promenade to the West Pier and kept looking into her Highness’s face.”“He was really a very nice-looking boy,” the girl declared mischievously. “If I’d been alone he would have spoken to me. And, oh, I’d have had such ripping fun.”“No doubt you would,” I said. “But you know the rule. You are never upon any pretext to go out alone. Besides, you are always under the observation of a police-agent. You would scarcely care to do any love-making before him, would you?”“Why not? Those persons are not men—they’re only machines,” she declared. “The Emperor told me that long ago.”“Well, take my advice,” I urged with a laugh, “and don’t attempt it.”“Oh, of course, Uncle Colin; you’re simply dreadful. You’re a perfect Saint Anthony. It’s too jolly bad,” she declared.“Yes. Perhaps I might be a Saint Anthony where you are concerned. Still, you must not become a temptress,” I laughed, when at that moment, old Igor, the butler, entered to announce that dinner was served.So we descended the stairs to the big dining-room, where the table at which she took the head was prettily decorated with Marshal Neil roses, and, a merry trio, we ate our meal amid much good-humoured banter and general laughter.As she sat beneath the pink-shaded electric lamp suspended over the table, I thought I had never seen her looking so inexpressibly charming. Little wonder, indeed, that young City men down for a fortnight’s leisure at the seaside, the annual relaxation from their weary work-a-day world of office and suburban railway, looked upon her in admiration and followed her in order to feast their eyes upon her marvellous beauty. What would they have thought, had they but known that the girl so quietly and well-dressed in black was of the bluest blood of Europe, a daughter of the Imperial Romanoffs.That big, old-fashioned house which I had arranged for her six weeks ago belonged to the widow of a brewery baronet, a man who had made a great fortune out of mild dinner-ale. The somewhat beefy lady—once a domestic servant—had gone on a voyage around the world and had been pleased to let it furnished for a year. With her consent I had had the whole place repainted and decorated, had caused new carpets to be provided, and in some instances the rooms had been refurnished in modern style, while four of the servants, including Igor, the butler, and Davey, Her Highness’s maid, had been brought from her father’s palace beside the Neva.For a girl not yet nineteen it was, indeed, quite a unique establishment. Miss West acting as chaperone, companion and housekeeper.Seated at the head of the table, the little Grand Duchess did the honours as, indeed, she had so often done them at the great table in that magnificent salon in Petersburg, for being the only child, it had very often fallen to her lot to help her father to entertain, her mother having died a month after her birth.Dinner over, the ladies rose and left, while I sat to smoke my cigarette alone. Outside in the hall the undersized, insignificant little man in black sat upon a chair reading the evening paper, and as old Igor poured out my glass of port I asked him in French how he liked England.“Ah! m’sieur,” he exclaimed in his thin, squeaky voice. “Truly it is most beautiful. We are all so well here—so much better than in Petersburg. Years ago I went to London with my poor master, the Grand Duke. We stayed at Claridge’s. M’sieur knows the place—eh?”“Of course,” I said. “But tell me, Igor, since you’ve been in Brighton—over a month now—have you ever met, or seen, anybody you know? I mean anyone you have seen before in Petersburg?”I was anxious to learn whether young Hamborough, Paul Urusoff, or any of the rest, had been in the vicinity.The old fellow reflected a few moments. Then he replied:“Of course I saw M’sieur Hartwig three weeks ago. Also His Excellency the Ambassador when he came down from London to pay his respects to Her Imperial Highness.”“Nobody else?” I asked, looking seriously into his grey old face, my wine-glass poised in my hand.“Ah, yes! One evening, three or four days ago, I was walking along King’s Road, towards Ship Street, when I passed a tall, thin, clean-shaven man in brown, whose face was quite familiar. I know that I’ve seen him many times in Petersburg, but I cannot recall who or what he is. He looked inquisitively at me for a moment, and apparently recognising me, passed on and then hurriedly crossed the road.”“Was he a gentleman?” I asked with curiosity.“He was dressed like one, M’sieur. He had on a dark grey Homburg hat and a fashionable dark brown suit.”“You only saw him on that one occasion?”“Only that once. When I returned home I told Dmitri, the police-agent, and described him. You don’t anticipate that he is here with any evil purpose, I suppose?” he added quickly.“I can’t tell, Igor. I don’t know him. But if I were you I would not mention it to her Highness. She’s only a girl, remember, and her nerves have been greatly shaken by that terrible tragedy.”“Rely upon me. I shall say no word, M’sieur,” he promised.Then I rose and ascended to the drawing-room, where Natalia was seated alone.“Miss West will be here in a few minutes,” she said. “Tell me, Uncle Colin, what have you been doing while you’ve been away—eh?”“I had some business in London, and afterwards went on a flying visit to see my mother down in Cornwall,” I said.“Ah! How is she? I hope you told her to come and see me. I would be so very delighted if she will come and stay a week or so.”“I gave her Your Highness’s kind message, and she is writing to thank you. She’ll be most delighted to visit you,” I said.“Nothing has been discovered regarding Madame de Rosen’s letters, I suppose?” she asked with a sigh, her face suddenly grown grave.“Hartwig arrives to-night, or to-morrow,” I replied. “We shall then know what has transpired. From his Majesty he received explicit instructions to spare no effort to solve the mystery of the theft.”“I know. He told me so when he was here three weeks ago. He has made every effort. Of all the police administration I consider Hartwig the most honest and straightforward.”“Yes,” I agreed. “He is alert always, marvellously astute, and, above all, though he has had such an extraordinary career, he is an Englishman.”“So I have lately heard,” replied my pretty companion. “I know he will do his best on my behalf, because I feel that I have lost the one piece of evidence which might have restored poor Marya de Rosen and her daughter to liberty.”“You have lost the letters, it is true,” I said, looking into her splendid eyes. “You have lost them because it was plainly in the interests of General Markoff, the Tzar’s favourite, that they should be lost. Madame de Rosen herself feared lest they should be stolen, and yet a few days later she and Luba were spirited away to the Unknown. Search was, no doubt, made at her house for that incriminating correspondence. It could not be found; but, alas! you let out the secret when sitting out with me at the Court ball. Somebody must have overheard. Your father’s palace was searched very thoroughly, and the packet at last found.”“The Emperor appeared to be most concerned about it before I left Russia. When I last saw him at Tzarskoie-Selo he seemed very pale, agitated and upset.”“Yes,” I said. Then, very slowly, for I confess I was much perturbed, knowing how we were at that moment hemmed in by our enemies, I added: “This theft conveyed more to His Majesty than at present appears to your Highness. It is a startling coup of those opposed to the monarchy—the confirmation of a suspicion which the Emperor believed to be his—and his alone.”“A suspicion!” she exclaimed. “What suspicion? Tell me.”Next moment Miss West, thin-faced and rather angular, entered the room, and we dropped our confidences. Then, at my invitation, my dainty little hostess went to the piano, and running her white fingers over the keys, commenced to sing in her clear, well-trained contralto “L’Heure Exquise” of Paul Verlaine:La lune blancheLuit dans les bois;De chaque branchePart une voixSous la ramée...O bien-aimée.
In the golden September sunset, the long, wide promenade stretching beside the blue sea from Brighton towards the fashionable suburb of Hove was agog with visitors.
A cloudless sky, a glassy sea flecked by the white sails of pleasure yachts, and ashore a crowd of well-dressed promenaders, the majority of whom were Londoners who, stifled in the dusty streets, were now seeking the fresh sea air of the Channel.
I had dressed leisurely for dinner in the Hotel Métropole, where I had taken up my abode, and about seven o’clock descended the steps, and, crossing the King’s Road to the asphalted promenade, set out to walk westward towards Hove.
Many things had happened since that well-remembered afternoon in July when Natalia had discovered the clever theft of Madame de Rosen’s letters, and I had, an hour later, ill though I was, sent to His Majesty that single word “Bathildis” and was granted immediate audience.
When I told him the facts he appeared interested, paced the room, and then snapped his fingers with a careless gesture. The little madcap had certainly annoyed him greatly, and though feigning indifference, he nevertheless appeared perplexed.
Natalia was called at once and questioned closely; she was the soul of honour and would reveal nothing of the secret. Afterwards I returned to the Embassy and summoned Hartwig, to inform him of the Grand Duchess’s loss. The renowned police official had since made diligent inquiry; indeed, the whole complicated machinery of the Russian criminal police had been put into motion, but all to no avail.
The theft was still an entire mystery.
As I approached the Lawns at Hove, those wide, grassy promenades beside the sea, I saw that many people were still lingering, enjoying the warm sunset, although the fashionable hour when women exercise their pet dogs, and idle men lounge and watch the crowd, had passed and the band had finished its performance.
My mind was filled by many serious apprehensions, as turning suddenly from the Lawns, I recrossed the road and entered Brunswick Square, that wide quadrangle of big, old-fashioned houses around a large railed-in garden filled with high oaks and beeches.
Before a drab, newly-painted house with a basement and art-green blinds, I halted, ascended the steps and rang.
A white-whiskered old manservant in funereal black bowed as I entered, and, casting off my overcoat, I followed the old fellow past a man who was seated demurely in the hall, to whom I nodded, and up thickly-carpeted stairs to the big white-enamelled drawing-room, where Natalia sprang up from a couch of daffodil silk and came forward to meet me with glad welcome and outstretched hand.
“Well, Uncle Colin!” she cried, “wherever have you been? I called for you at the ‘Métropole’ the day before yesterday, and your superb hall-porter told me that you were in London!”
“Yes. I had to go up there on some urgent business,” I said. “I only returned to-day at five o’clock and received your kind invitation to dine,” and then, turning, I greeted Miss West, the rather thin, elderly woman who for years had acted as English governess to Her Imperial Highness—or Miss Gottorp, as she was now known at Hove. Miss West had been governess in the Emperor’s family for six years before she had entered the service of the Grand Duchess Nicholas, so life at Court, with all its stiff etiquette, had perhaps imparted to her a slightly unnatural hauteur.
Natalia looked inexpressibly sweet in an evening gown of fine black spotted net, the transparency of which about the chest heightened the almost alabaster whiteness of her skin. She wore a black aigrette in her hair, but no jewellery save a single diamond bangle upon her wrist, an ornament which she always wore.
“Sit down and tell me all the news,” she urged, throwing herself into an armchair and patting a cushion near by as indication where I should sit.
“There is no news,” I said. “This morning I was at the Embassy, and they were naturally filled with curiosity regarding you—a curiosity which I did not satisfy.”
“Young Isvolski is there, isn’t he?” she asked. “He used to be attached to my poor father’s suite.”
“Yes,” I replied. “He’s third secretary. He wanted to know whether you had police protection, and I told him they had sent you another agent from Petersburg. I suppose it is that melancholy man I’ve just seen sitting in the hall?”
“Yes. Isn’t it horrid? He sits there all day long and never moves,” Miss West exclaimed. “It is as though the bailiffs are in the house.”
“Bailiffs?” repeated the girl. “What are they?” I explained to her, whereupon she laughed heartily. “Hartwig is due in Brighton to-night or to-morrow morning,” I said. “I have received a telegram from him, despatched from Berlin early yesterday morning. But,” I added, “I trust that you are finding benefit from the change.”
“I am,” she assured me. “I love this place. I feel so free and so happy here. Miss West and I go for walks and drives every day, and though a lot of people stare at me very hard, I don’t think they know who I am. I hope not.”
“They admire your Highness’s good looks,” I ventured to remark. But she made a quick gesture of impatience, and declared that I only intended sarcasm.
“I suppose Miss West, that all the men turn to look at Her Highness?” I said. “Englishmen at the seaside during the summer are always impressionable, so they must be forgiven.”
“You are quite right, Mr Trewinnard. It is really something dreadful. Only to-day a young man—quite a respectable young fellow, who was probably a clerk in the City—followed us the whole length of the promenade to the West Pier and kept looking into her Highness’s face.”
“He was really a very nice-looking boy,” the girl declared mischievously. “If I’d been alone he would have spoken to me. And, oh, I’d have had such ripping fun.”
“No doubt you would,” I said. “But you know the rule. You are never upon any pretext to go out alone. Besides, you are always under the observation of a police-agent. You would scarcely care to do any love-making before him, would you?”
“Why not? Those persons are not men—they’re only machines,” she declared. “The Emperor told me that long ago.”
“Well, take my advice,” I urged with a laugh, “and don’t attempt it.”
“Oh, of course, Uncle Colin; you’re simply dreadful. You’re a perfect Saint Anthony. It’s too jolly bad,” she declared.
“Yes. Perhaps I might be a Saint Anthony where you are concerned. Still, you must not become a temptress,” I laughed, when at that moment, old Igor, the butler, entered to announce that dinner was served.
So we descended the stairs to the big dining-room, where the table at which she took the head was prettily decorated with Marshal Neil roses, and, a merry trio, we ate our meal amid much good-humoured banter and general laughter.
As she sat beneath the pink-shaded electric lamp suspended over the table, I thought I had never seen her looking so inexpressibly charming. Little wonder, indeed, that young City men down for a fortnight’s leisure at the seaside, the annual relaxation from their weary work-a-day world of office and suburban railway, looked upon her in admiration and followed her in order to feast their eyes upon her marvellous beauty. What would they have thought, had they but known that the girl so quietly and well-dressed in black was of the bluest blood of Europe, a daughter of the Imperial Romanoffs.
That big, old-fashioned house which I had arranged for her six weeks ago belonged to the widow of a brewery baronet, a man who had made a great fortune out of mild dinner-ale. The somewhat beefy lady—once a domestic servant—had gone on a voyage around the world and had been pleased to let it furnished for a year. With her consent I had had the whole place repainted and decorated, had caused new carpets to be provided, and in some instances the rooms had been refurnished in modern style, while four of the servants, including Igor, the butler, and Davey, Her Highness’s maid, had been brought from her father’s palace beside the Neva.
For a girl not yet nineteen it was, indeed, quite a unique establishment. Miss West acting as chaperone, companion and housekeeper.
Seated at the head of the table, the little Grand Duchess did the honours as, indeed, she had so often done them at the great table in that magnificent salon in Petersburg, for being the only child, it had very often fallen to her lot to help her father to entertain, her mother having died a month after her birth.
Dinner over, the ladies rose and left, while I sat to smoke my cigarette alone. Outside in the hall the undersized, insignificant little man in black sat upon a chair reading the evening paper, and as old Igor poured out my glass of port I asked him in French how he liked England.
“Ah! m’sieur,” he exclaimed in his thin, squeaky voice. “Truly it is most beautiful. We are all so well here—so much better than in Petersburg. Years ago I went to London with my poor master, the Grand Duke. We stayed at Claridge’s. M’sieur knows the place—eh?”
“Of course,” I said. “But tell me, Igor, since you’ve been in Brighton—over a month now—have you ever met, or seen, anybody you know? I mean anyone you have seen before in Petersburg?”
I was anxious to learn whether young Hamborough, Paul Urusoff, or any of the rest, had been in the vicinity.
The old fellow reflected a few moments. Then he replied:
“Of course I saw M’sieur Hartwig three weeks ago. Also His Excellency the Ambassador when he came down from London to pay his respects to Her Imperial Highness.”
“Nobody else?” I asked, looking seriously into his grey old face, my wine-glass poised in my hand.
“Ah, yes! One evening, three or four days ago, I was walking along King’s Road, towards Ship Street, when I passed a tall, thin, clean-shaven man in brown, whose face was quite familiar. I know that I’ve seen him many times in Petersburg, but I cannot recall who or what he is. He looked inquisitively at me for a moment, and apparently recognising me, passed on and then hurriedly crossed the road.”
“Was he a gentleman?” I asked with curiosity.
“He was dressed like one, M’sieur. He had on a dark grey Homburg hat and a fashionable dark brown suit.”
“You only saw him on that one occasion?”
“Only that once. When I returned home I told Dmitri, the police-agent, and described him. You don’t anticipate that he is here with any evil purpose, I suppose?” he added quickly.
“I can’t tell, Igor. I don’t know him. But if I were you I would not mention it to her Highness. She’s only a girl, remember, and her nerves have been greatly shaken by that terrible tragedy.”
“Rely upon me. I shall say no word, M’sieur,” he promised.
Then I rose and ascended to the drawing-room, where Natalia was seated alone.
“Miss West will be here in a few minutes,” she said. “Tell me, Uncle Colin, what have you been doing while you’ve been away—eh?”
“I had some business in London, and afterwards went on a flying visit to see my mother down in Cornwall,” I said.
“Ah! How is she? I hope you told her to come and see me. I would be so very delighted if she will come and stay a week or so.”
“I gave her Your Highness’s kind message, and she is writing to thank you. She’ll be most delighted to visit you,” I said.
“Nothing has been discovered regarding Madame de Rosen’s letters, I suppose?” she asked with a sigh, her face suddenly grown grave.
“Hartwig arrives to-night, or to-morrow,” I replied. “We shall then know what has transpired. From his Majesty he received explicit instructions to spare no effort to solve the mystery of the theft.”
“I know. He told me so when he was here three weeks ago. He has made every effort. Of all the police administration I consider Hartwig the most honest and straightforward.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “He is alert always, marvellously astute, and, above all, though he has had such an extraordinary career, he is an Englishman.”
“So I have lately heard,” replied my pretty companion. “I know he will do his best on my behalf, because I feel that I have lost the one piece of evidence which might have restored poor Marya de Rosen and her daughter to liberty.”
“You have lost the letters, it is true,” I said, looking into her splendid eyes. “You have lost them because it was plainly in the interests of General Markoff, the Tzar’s favourite, that they should be lost. Madame de Rosen herself feared lest they should be stolen, and yet a few days later she and Luba were spirited away to the Unknown. Search was, no doubt, made at her house for that incriminating correspondence. It could not be found; but, alas! you let out the secret when sitting out with me at the Court ball. Somebody must have overheard. Your father’s palace was searched very thoroughly, and the packet at last found.”
“The Emperor appeared to be most concerned about it before I left Russia. When I last saw him at Tzarskoie-Selo he seemed very pale, agitated and upset.”
“Yes,” I said. Then, very slowly, for I confess I was much perturbed, knowing how we were at that moment hemmed in by our enemies, I added: “This theft conveyed more to His Majesty than at present appears to your Highness. It is a startling coup of those opposed to the monarchy—the confirmation of a suspicion which the Emperor believed to be his—and his alone.”
“A suspicion!” she exclaimed. “What suspicion? Tell me.”
Next moment Miss West, thin-faced and rather angular, entered the room, and we dropped our confidences. Then, at my invitation, my dainty little hostess went to the piano, and running her white fingers over the keys, commenced to sing in her clear, well-trained contralto “L’Heure Exquise” of Paul Verlaine:
La lune blancheLuit dans les bois;De chaque branchePart une voixSous la ramée...O bien-aimée.
La lune blancheLuit dans les bois;De chaque branchePart une voixSous la ramée...O bien-aimée.
Chapter Ten.Reveals Two Facts.When I entered my bedroom at the Hotel Métropole it wanted half an hour to midnight. But scarce had I closed the door when a waiter tapped at it and handed me a card.“Show the gentleman up,” I said in eager anticipation, and a few minutes later there entered a tall, thin, clean-shaven, rather aristocratic-looking man in a dark brown suit—the same person whom old Igor had evidently recognised walking along King’s Road.“Well, Tack? So you are here with your report—eh?” I asked.“Yes, sir,” was his reply, as I seated myself on the edge of the bed, and he took a chair near the dressing-table and settled himself to talk.Edward Tack was a man of many adventures. After a good many years at Scotland Yard, where he rose to be the chief of the Extradition Department on account of his knowledge of languages, he had been engaged by the Foreign Office as a member of our Secret Service abroad, mostly in Germany and Russia. During the past two years he had, as a blind to the police, carried on a small insurance agency business in Petersburg; but the information he gathered from time to time and sent to the Embassy was of the greatest assistance to us in our diplomatic dealings with Russia and the Powers.He never came to the Embassy himself, nor did he ever hold any direct communication with any of the staff. He acted as our eyes and ears, exercising the utmost caution in transmitting to us the knowledge of men and matters which he so cleverly gained. He worked with the greatest secrecy, for though he had lived in Petersburg two whole years, he had never once been suspected by that unscrupulous spy-department controlled by General Markoff.“I’ve been in Brighton several days,” my visitor said. “The hotel porter told me here that you were away, so I went to the ‘Old Ship!’ and waited for you.”“Well—what have you discovered?” I inquired, handing him my cigarette-case. “Anything of interest?”“Nothing very much, I regret to say,” was his reply. “I’ve worked for a whole month, often night and day, but Markoff’s men are wary—very wary birds, sir, as you know.”“Have you discovered the real perpetrator of that bomb outrage?”“I believe so. He escaped.”“No doubt he did.”“There have been in all over forty persons arrested,” my visitor said. “About two dozen have been immured in Schusselburg, in those cells under the waters of Lake Ladoga. The rest have been sent by administrative process to the mines.”“And all of them innocent?”“Every one of them.”“It’s outrageous!” I cried. “To think that such things can happen every day in a country whose priests teach Christianity.”“Remove a certain dozen or so of Russia’s statesmen and corrupt officials, put a stop to the exile system, and give every criminal or suspect a fair trial, and the country would become peaceful to-morrow,” declared the secret agent. “I have already reported to the Embassy the actual truth concerning the present unrest.”“I know. And we have sent it on to Downing Street, together with the names of those who form the camarilla. The Emperor is, alas! merely their catspaw. They are the real rulers of Russia—they rule it by a Reign of Terror.”“Exactly, sir,” replied the man Tack. “I’ve always contended that. In the present case the outrage is not a mystery to the Secret Police.”“You think they know all about it—eh?” I asked quickly.“Well, sir. I will put to you certain facts which I have discovered. About two years ago a certain Danilo Danilovitch, an intelligent shoemaker in Kazan, and a member of the revolutionary group in that city, turned police-spy, and gave evidence of acoupwhich had been prepared to poison the Emperor at a banquet given there after the military manoeuvres last year. As a result, there were over a hundred arrests, and as reprisal the chief of police of Kazan was a week later shot while riding through one of the principal streets. Next I know of Danilovitch is that he was transferred to Petersburg, where, though in the pay of the police, he was known to the Party of the People’s Will as an ardent and daring reformer, and foremost in his fiery condemnation of the monarchy. He made many inflammatory speeches at the secret revolutionary meetings in various parts of the city, and was hailed as a strong and intrepid leader. Yet frequently the police made raids upon these meeting-places and arrested all found there. After each attempted outrage they seemed to be provided with lists of everyone who had had the slightest connection with the affair, and hence they experienced no difficulty in securing them and packing them off to Siberia. The police were all-ubiquitous, the Emperor was greatly pleased, and General Markoff was given the highest decorations, promotion and an appointment with rich emoluments.“But one day, about four months ago,” Tack went on, “a remarkable but unreported tragedy occurred. Danilovitch, whose wife had long ago been arrested and died on her way to Siberia, fell in love with a pretty young tailoress named Marie Garine, who was a very active member of the revolutionary party, her father and mother having been sent to the mines of Nerchinsk, though entirely innocent. Hence she naturally hated the Secret Police and all their detestable works. More than once she had remarked to her lover the extraordinary fact that the police were being secretly forewarned of every attempt which he suggested, for Danilovitch had by this time become one of the chief leaders of the subterranean revolution, and instigator of all sorts of desperate plots against the Emperor and members of the Imperial Family. One evening, however, she went to his rooms and found him out. Some old shoes were upon a shelf ready for mending, for he still, as a subterfuge, practised his old trade. Among the shoes was a pair of her own. She took them down, but she mistook another pair for hers, and from one of them there fell to her feet a yellow card—the card of identity issued to members of the Secret Police! She took it up. There was no mistake, for her lover’s photograph was pasted upon it. Her lover was a police-spy!”“Well, what happened?” I asked, much interested in the facts.“The girl, in a frenzy of madness and anger, was about to rush out to betray the man to her fellow-conspirators, when Danilovitch suddenly entered. She had, at that moment, his yellow card in her hand. In an instant he knew the truth and realised his own peril. She intended to betray him. It meant her life or his! Not a dozen words passed between the pair, for the man, taking up his shoemaker’s knife, plunged it deliberately into the girl’s heart, snatched the card from her dying grasp, and strode out, locking the door behind him. Then he went straight to the private bureau of General Markoff and told him what he had done. Needless to relate, the police inquiry was a very perfunctory one. It was a love tragedy, they said, and as Danilo Danilovitch was missing, they soon dropped the inquiry. They did not, of course, wish to arrest the assassin, for he was far too useful a person to them.”“Then you know the fellow?”“I have met him often. At first I had no idea of his connection with the revolutionists. It is only quite recently through a woman who is in the pay of the Secret Police, and whose son has been treated badly, that I learned the truth. And she also told me one very curious fact. She was present in the crowd when the bomb was thrown at the Grand Duke Nicholas’s carriage, and she declares that Danilo Danilovitch—who has not been seen in Petersburg since the tragic death of Marie Garine—was there also.”“Then he may have thrown the bomb?” I said, amazed.“Who knows?”“But I saw a man with his arm uplifted,” I exclaimed. “He looked respectable, of middle-age, with a grey beard and wore dark clothes.”“That does not tally with Danilovitch’s description,” he replied. “But, of course, the assassin must have been disguised if he had dared to return to Petersburg.”“But I suppose his fellow-conspirators still entertain no suspicion that he is a police-spy?”“None whatever. The poor girl lost her life through her untoward discovery. The police themselves knew the truth, but on action being withdrawn, the fellow was perfectly free to continue his nefarious profession ofagent-provocateur, for the great risk of which he had evidently been well paid.”“But does not Hartwig know all this?” I asked quickly, much surprised.“Probably not. General Markoff keeps his own secrets well. Hartwig, being head of the criminal police, would not be informed.”“But he might find out, just as you have found out,” I suggested.“He might. But my success, sir, was due to the merest chance, remember,” Tack said. “Hartwig’s work lies in the detection of crime, and not in the frustration of political plots. Markoff knows what an astute official he is, and would therefore strive to keep him apart from his catspaw Danilovitch.”“Then, in your opinion, many of these so-called plots against the Emperor are actually the work of the Kazan shoemaker, who arranges the plot, calls the conspirators together and directs the arrangements.”“Yes. His brother is a chemist in Moscow and it is he who manufactures picric acid, nitro-glycerine and other explosives for the use of the unfortunate conspirators. Between them, and advised by Markoff, they form a plot, the more desperate the better; and a dozen or so silly enthusiasts, ignorant of their leaders’ true calling, swear solemnly to carry it out. They are secretly provided with the means, and their leader has in some cases actually secured facilities from the very police themselves for thecoupto be made. Then, when all is quite ready, the astute Danilovitch hands over to his employer, Markoff, a full list of the names of those who have been cleverly enticed into the plot. At night a sudden raid is made. All who are there, or who are even in the vicinity are arrested, and next morning His Excellency presents his report to the Emperor, with Danilovitch’s list ready for the Imperial signature which consigns those arrested to a living grave on the Arctic wastes, or in the mines of Eastern Siberia.”“And so progresses holy Russia of to-day—eh, Tack?” I remarked with a sigh.The secret agent of British diplomacy, shrugging his shoulders and with a grin, said:“The scoundrels are terrorising the Emperor and the whole Imperial family. The killing of the Grand Duke Nicholas was evidence of that, and you, too, sir, had a very narrow escape.”“Do you suspect that, if the story of the woman who recognised Danilovitch be true, it was actually he himself who threw the bomb?”“At present I can offer no opinion,” he answered. “The woman might, of course, have been mistaken, and, again, I doubt whether Danilovitch would dare to show himself so quickly in Petersburg. To do so would be to defy the police in the eyes of his fellow-conspirators, and that might have aroused their suspicion. But, sir,” Tack added, “I feel certain of two facts—absolutely certain.”“And what are they?” I inquired eagerly, for his information was always reliable.“Well, the first is that the outrage was committed with the full connivance and knowledge of the police, and secondly, that it was not the Grand Duke whom they sought to kill, but his daughter, the Grand Duchess Natalia, and you yourself!”“Why do you think that?” I asked.“Because it was known that the young lady held letters given her by Madame de Rosen, and intended to hand them over to the Emperor. There was but one way to prevent her,” he went on very slowly, “to kill her! And,” he added, “be very careful yourself in the near future, Mr Trewinnard. Another attempt of an entirely different nature may be made.”“You mean that Her Highness is still in grave danger—even here—eh?” I exclaimed, looking straight at the clean-shaven man seated before me.“I mean, sir, that Her Highness may be aware of the contents of these letters handed to her by the lady who is now exiled. If so, then she is a source of constant danger to General Markoff’s interests. And you are fully well aware of the manner in which His Excellency usually treats his enemies. Only by a miracle was your life saved a few weeks ago. Therefore,” he added, “I beg of you, sir, to beware. There may be pitfalls and dangers—even here, in Brighton!”“Do you only suspect something, Tack,” I demanded very seriously, “or do you actually know?”He paused for a few seconds, then, his deep-set eyes fixed upon mine, he replied.“I do not suspect, sir, Iknow.”
When I entered my bedroom at the Hotel Métropole it wanted half an hour to midnight. But scarce had I closed the door when a waiter tapped at it and handed me a card.
“Show the gentleman up,” I said in eager anticipation, and a few minutes later there entered a tall, thin, clean-shaven, rather aristocratic-looking man in a dark brown suit—the same person whom old Igor had evidently recognised walking along King’s Road.
“Well, Tack? So you are here with your report—eh?” I asked.
“Yes, sir,” was his reply, as I seated myself on the edge of the bed, and he took a chair near the dressing-table and settled himself to talk.
Edward Tack was a man of many adventures. After a good many years at Scotland Yard, where he rose to be the chief of the Extradition Department on account of his knowledge of languages, he had been engaged by the Foreign Office as a member of our Secret Service abroad, mostly in Germany and Russia. During the past two years he had, as a blind to the police, carried on a small insurance agency business in Petersburg; but the information he gathered from time to time and sent to the Embassy was of the greatest assistance to us in our diplomatic dealings with Russia and the Powers.
He never came to the Embassy himself, nor did he ever hold any direct communication with any of the staff. He acted as our eyes and ears, exercising the utmost caution in transmitting to us the knowledge of men and matters which he so cleverly gained. He worked with the greatest secrecy, for though he had lived in Petersburg two whole years, he had never once been suspected by that unscrupulous spy-department controlled by General Markoff.
“I’ve been in Brighton several days,” my visitor said. “The hotel porter told me here that you were away, so I went to the ‘Old Ship!’ and waited for you.”
“Well—what have you discovered?” I inquired, handing him my cigarette-case. “Anything of interest?”
“Nothing very much, I regret to say,” was his reply. “I’ve worked for a whole month, often night and day, but Markoff’s men are wary—very wary birds, sir, as you know.”
“Have you discovered the real perpetrator of that bomb outrage?”
“I believe so. He escaped.”
“No doubt he did.”
“There have been in all over forty persons arrested,” my visitor said. “About two dozen have been immured in Schusselburg, in those cells under the waters of Lake Ladoga. The rest have been sent by administrative process to the mines.”
“And all of them innocent?”
“Every one of them.”
“It’s outrageous!” I cried. “To think that such things can happen every day in a country whose priests teach Christianity.”
“Remove a certain dozen or so of Russia’s statesmen and corrupt officials, put a stop to the exile system, and give every criminal or suspect a fair trial, and the country would become peaceful to-morrow,” declared the secret agent. “I have already reported to the Embassy the actual truth concerning the present unrest.”
“I know. And we have sent it on to Downing Street, together with the names of those who form the camarilla. The Emperor is, alas! merely their catspaw. They are the real rulers of Russia—they rule it by a Reign of Terror.”
“Exactly, sir,” replied the man Tack. “I’ve always contended that. In the present case the outrage is not a mystery to the Secret Police.”
“You think they know all about it—eh?” I asked quickly.
“Well, sir. I will put to you certain facts which I have discovered. About two years ago a certain Danilo Danilovitch, an intelligent shoemaker in Kazan, and a member of the revolutionary group in that city, turned police-spy, and gave evidence of acoupwhich had been prepared to poison the Emperor at a banquet given there after the military manoeuvres last year. As a result, there were over a hundred arrests, and as reprisal the chief of police of Kazan was a week later shot while riding through one of the principal streets. Next I know of Danilovitch is that he was transferred to Petersburg, where, though in the pay of the police, he was known to the Party of the People’s Will as an ardent and daring reformer, and foremost in his fiery condemnation of the monarchy. He made many inflammatory speeches at the secret revolutionary meetings in various parts of the city, and was hailed as a strong and intrepid leader. Yet frequently the police made raids upon these meeting-places and arrested all found there. After each attempted outrage they seemed to be provided with lists of everyone who had had the slightest connection with the affair, and hence they experienced no difficulty in securing them and packing them off to Siberia. The police were all-ubiquitous, the Emperor was greatly pleased, and General Markoff was given the highest decorations, promotion and an appointment with rich emoluments.
“But one day, about four months ago,” Tack went on, “a remarkable but unreported tragedy occurred. Danilovitch, whose wife had long ago been arrested and died on her way to Siberia, fell in love with a pretty young tailoress named Marie Garine, who was a very active member of the revolutionary party, her father and mother having been sent to the mines of Nerchinsk, though entirely innocent. Hence she naturally hated the Secret Police and all their detestable works. More than once she had remarked to her lover the extraordinary fact that the police were being secretly forewarned of every attempt which he suggested, for Danilovitch had by this time become one of the chief leaders of the subterranean revolution, and instigator of all sorts of desperate plots against the Emperor and members of the Imperial Family. One evening, however, she went to his rooms and found him out. Some old shoes were upon a shelf ready for mending, for he still, as a subterfuge, practised his old trade. Among the shoes was a pair of her own. She took them down, but she mistook another pair for hers, and from one of them there fell to her feet a yellow card—the card of identity issued to members of the Secret Police! She took it up. There was no mistake, for her lover’s photograph was pasted upon it. Her lover was a police-spy!”
“Well, what happened?” I asked, much interested in the facts.
“The girl, in a frenzy of madness and anger, was about to rush out to betray the man to her fellow-conspirators, when Danilovitch suddenly entered. She had, at that moment, his yellow card in her hand. In an instant he knew the truth and realised his own peril. She intended to betray him. It meant her life or his! Not a dozen words passed between the pair, for the man, taking up his shoemaker’s knife, plunged it deliberately into the girl’s heart, snatched the card from her dying grasp, and strode out, locking the door behind him. Then he went straight to the private bureau of General Markoff and told him what he had done. Needless to relate, the police inquiry was a very perfunctory one. It was a love tragedy, they said, and as Danilo Danilovitch was missing, they soon dropped the inquiry. They did not, of course, wish to arrest the assassin, for he was far too useful a person to them.”
“Then you know the fellow?”
“I have met him often. At first I had no idea of his connection with the revolutionists. It is only quite recently through a woman who is in the pay of the Secret Police, and whose son has been treated badly, that I learned the truth. And she also told me one very curious fact. She was present in the crowd when the bomb was thrown at the Grand Duke Nicholas’s carriage, and she declares that Danilo Danilovitch—who has not been seen in Petersburg since the tragic death of Marie Garine—was there also.”
“Then he may have thrown the bomb?” I said, amazed.
“Who knows?”
“But I saw a man with his arm uplifted,” I exclaimed. “He looked respectable, of middle-age, with a grey beard and wore dark clothes.”
“That does not tally with Danilovitch’s description,” he replied. “But, of course, the assassin must have been disguised if he had dared to return to Petersburg.”
“But I suppose his fellow-conspirators still entertain no suspicion that he is a police-spy?”
“None whatever. The poor girl lost her life through her untoward discovery. The police themselves knew the truth, but on action being withdrawn, the fellow was perfectly free to continue his nefarious profession ofagent-provocateur, for the great risk of which he had evidently been well paid.”
“But does not Hartwig know all this?” I asked quickly, much surprised.
“Probably not. General Markoff keeps his own secrets well. Hartwig, being head of the criminal police, would not be informed.”
“But he might find out, just as you have found out,” I suggested.
“He might. But my success, sir, was due to the merest chance, remember,” Tack said. “Hartwig’s work lies in the detection of crime, and not in the frustration of political plots. Markoff knows what an astute official he is, and would therefore strive to keep him apart from his catspaw Danilovitch.”
“Then, in your opinion, many of these so-called plots against the Emperor are actually the work of the Kazan shoemaker, who arranges the plot, calls the conspirators together and directs the arrangements.”
“Yes. His brother is a chemist in Moscow and it is he who manufactures picric acid, nitro-glycerine and other explosives for the use of the unfortunate conspirators. Between them, and advised by Markoff, they form a plot, the more desperate the better; and a dozen or so silly enthusiasts, ignorant of their leaders’ true calling, swear solemnly to carry it out. They are secretly provided with the means, and their leader has in some cases actually secured facilities from the very police themselves for thecoupto be made. Then, when all is quite ready, the astute Danilovitch hands over to his employer, Markoff, a full list of the names of those who have been cleverly enticed into the plot. At night a sudden raid is made. All who are there, or who are even in the vicinity are arrested, and next morning His Excellency presents his report to the Emperor, with Danilovitch’s list ready for the Imperial signature which consigns those arrested to a living grave on the Arctic wastes, or in the mines of Eastern Siberia.”
“And so progresses holy Russia of to-day—eh, Tack?” I remarked with a sigh.
The secret agent of British diplomacy, shrugging his shoulders and with a grin, said:
“The scoundrels are terrorising the Emperor and the whole Imperial family. The killing of the Grand Duke Nicholas was evidence of that, and you, too, sir, had a very narrow escape.”
“Do you suspect that, if the story of the woman who recognised Danilovitch be true, it was actually he himself who threw the bomb?”
“At present I can offer no opinion,” he answered. “The woman might, of course, have been mistaken, and, again, I doubt whether Danilovitch would dare to show himself so quickly in Petersburg. To do so would be to defy the police in the eyes of his fellow-conspirators, and that might have aroused their suspicion. But, sir,” Tack added, “I feel certain of two facts—absolutely certain.”
“And what are they?” I inquired eagerly, for his information was always reliable.
“Well, the first is that the outrage was committed with the full connivance and knowledge of the police, and secondly, that it was not the Grand Duke whom they sought to kill, but his daughter, the Grand Duchess Natalia, and you yourself!”
“Why do you think that?” I asked.
“Because it was known that the young lady held letters given her by Madame de Rosen, and intended to hand them over to the Emperor. There was but one way to prevent her,” he went on very slowly, “to kill her! And,” he added, “be very careful yourself in the near future, Mr Trewinnard. Another attempt of an entirely different nature may be made.”
“You mean that Her Highness is still in grave danger—even here—eh?” I exclaimed, looking straight at the clean-shaven man seated before me.
“I mean, sir, that Her Highness may be aware of the contents of these letters handed to her by the lady who is now exiled. If so, then she is a source of constant danger to General Markoff’s interests. And you are fully well aware of the manner in which His Excellency usually treats his enemies. Only by a miracle was your life saved a few weeks ago. Therefore,” he added, “I beg of you, sir, to beware. There may be pitfalls and dangers—even here, in Brighton!”
“Do you only suspect something, Tack,” I demanded very seriously, “or do you actually know?”
He paused for a few seconds, then, his deep-set eyes fixed upon mine, he replied.
“I do not suspect, sir, Iknow.”
Chapter Eleven.His Excellency General Markoff.What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.What, I wondered, had occurred?I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.I crossed the big, walled-in courtyard of the Embassy, and entering the great sombre hall, where an agent of Secret Police was idling as usual, the flunkey in green livery showed me along to the secretary’s room, a big, gloomy, smoke-blackened apartment on the ground floor. The huge house was dark, sombre and ponderous, a house of grim, mysterious shadows, where officials and servants flitted up and down the great, wide staircase which led to His Excellency’s room.“His Excellency left for Paris to-day,” the footman informed me, opening the door of the secretary’s room, and telling me that he would send word at once of my arrival.It was the usual cold and austere embassy room—differing but little from my own den in Petersburg. Count Kourloff, the secretary, was an old friend of mine. He had been secretary in Rome when I had been stationed there, and I had also known him in Vienna—a clever and intelligent diplomat, but a bureaucrat like all Russians.The evening was a warm, oppressive one, and the windows being open, admitted the lively strains of a street piano, played somewhere in the vicinity.Suddenly the door opened, and instead of the Count, whom I had expected, a stout, broad-shouldered, elderly man in black frock-coat and grey trousers entered, and saluted me gaily in French with the words:“Ah, my dear Trewinnard! How are you, my friend—eh? How are you? And how is Her Imperial Highness—eh?”I started as I recognised him.It was none other than Serge Markoff.“I am very well, General,” I replied coldly. “I am awaiting Count Kourloff.”“He’s out. It was I who telegraphed to you. I want to have a chat with you now that you have entered the service of Russia, my dear friend. Pray be seated.”“Pardon me,” I replied, annoyed, “I have not entered the service of Russia, only the private service of her Sovereign, the Emperor.”“The same thing! The same thing!” he declared fussily, stroking his long, grey moustache, and fixing his cunning steel-blue eyes upon mine.“I think not,” I said. “But we need not discuss that point.”“Bien! I suppose Her Highness is perfectly comfortable and happy in herincognitoat Brighton—eh? The Emperor was speaking of her to me only the other day.”“His Majesty receives my report each week,” I said briefly.“I know,” replied the brutal remorseless man who was responsible for the great injustice and suffering of thousands of innocent ones throughout the Russian Empire. “I know. But I have asked you to London because I wish to speak to you in strictest confidence. I am here, M’sieur Trewinnard, because of a certain discovery we have recently made—the discovery of a very desperate and ingenious plot!”“Another plot!” I echoed; “here, in London!”“It is formed in London, but thecoupis to be made at Brighton,” he replied slowly and seriously, “a plot against Her Imperial Highness!”I looked the man straight in the face, and then burst out laughing.“You certainly do not appear to have any regard for the personal safety of your charge,” he exclaimed angrily. “I have warned you. Therefore, take every precaution.”I paused for a few seconds, then I said:“Forgive me for laughing. General Markoff. But it is really too humorous—all this transparency.”“What transparency?”“The transparency of your attempt to terrify me,” I said. “I know that the attempt made against the young lady and myself failed—and that His Imperial Highness the Grand Duke was unfortunately killed. But I do not think there will be any second attempt.”“You don’t think so!” he cried quickly. “Why don’t you think so?”“For the simple reason that Danilo Danilovitch—the man who is a police-spy and at the same time responsible for plots—is just now a little too well watched.”The man’s grey face dropped when I uttered the name of his catspaw. My statement, I saw, held him confounded and confused.“I—I do not understand you,” he managed to exclaim. “What do you mean?”“Well, you surely know Danilovitch?” I said. “He is your most trusted and usefulagent-provocateur. He is at this moment in England. I can take you now to where he is in hiding, if you wish,” I added, with a smile of triumph.“Danilovitch,” he repeated, as though trying to recall the name.“Yes,” I said defiantly, standing with my hands in my trousers pockets and leaning against the table placed in the centre of the room. “Danilovitch—the shoemaker of Kazan and murderer of Marie Garine, the poor little tailoress in Petersburg.”His face dropped. He saw that I was aware of the man’s identity.“He is now staying with a compatriot in Blurton Road, Lower Clapton,” I went on.“I don’t see why this person should interest me,” he interrupted.“But he is a conspirator. General Markoff; and I am giving you some valuable information,” I said, with sarcasm.“You are not a police officer. What can you know?”“I know several facts which, when placed before the Revolutionary Committee—as they probably are by this time—will make matters exceedingly unpleasant for Danilo Danilovitch, and also for certain of those who have been employing him,” was my quiet response.“If this man is a dangerous revolutionist, as you allege, he cannot be arrested while in England,” remarked the General, his thick grey eyebrows contracting slightly, a sign of apprehension. “This country of yours gives asylum to all the most desperate characters, and half the revolutionary plots in Europe are arranged in London.”“I do not dispute that,” I said. “But I was discussing the highly interesting career of this Danilo Danilovitch. If there is any attempt upon Her Imperial Highness the Grand Duchess Natalia, as you fear, it will be by that individual. General. Therefore I would advise your department to keep close observation upon him. He is lodging at Number 30B, Blurton Road. And,” I added, “if you should require any further particulars concerning him, I daresay I shall be in a position to furnish them.”“Why do you suspect him?”“Because of information which has reached me—information which shows that it was his hand which launched the fatal bomb which killed the Grand Duke Nicholas. His Imperial Highness was actually killed by an agent of Secret Police! When that fact reaches the Emperor’s ears there will, I expect, be searching inquiry.”“Have you actual proof of this?” he asked in a thick, hoarse voice, his cheeks paler than before.“Yes. Or at least my informant has. The traitor was recognised among the crowd; he was seen to throw the bomb.”General Markoff remained silent. He saw himself checkmated. His secret was out. He had intended to raise a false scare of a probable attempt at Brighton in order to terrify me, but, to his amazement, I had shown myself conversant with his methods and aware of the truth concerning the mysterious outrage in which the Grand Duke Nicholas had lost his life.From his demeanour and the keen cunning look in his steely eyes I gathered that he was all eagerness to know the exact extent of my knowledge concerning Danilo Danilovitch.Therefore, after some further conversation, I said boldly:“I expect that, ere this, the Central Committee of the People’s Will has learned the truth regarding their betrayer—this man to whose initiative more than half of the recent plots have been due—and how he was in the habit of furnishing your department with the lists of suspects and those chosen to carry out the outrage. But, of course, General,” I added, with a bitter smile, “you would probably not know of this manufacture of plots by one in the pay of the Police Department.”“Of course not,” the unscrupulous official assured me. “I surely cannot be held responsible for the action of underlings. I only act upon reports presented to me.”I smiled again.“And yet you warn me of an outrage which is to be attempted with your connivance by this fellow Danilovitch—the very man who killed the Grand Duke—eh?”“With my connivance!” he cried fiercely. “What do you insinuate?”“I mean this, General Markoff,” I said boldly; “that the yellow card of identity found in Danilovitch’s rooms by the girl to whom he was engaged bore your signature. That card is, I believe, already in the hands of the Revolutionary Committee!”“I have all their names. I shall telegraph to-night ordering their immediate arrest,” he cried, white with anger.“But that will not save youragent-provocateur—the assassin of poor Marie Garine—from his fate. The arm of the revolutionist is a very long one, remember.”“But the arm of the Chief of Secret Police is longer—and stronger,” he declared in a low, hard tone.“The Emperor, when he learns the truth, will dispense full justice,” I said very quietly. “His eyes will, ere long, be opened to the base frauds practised upon him, and the many false plots which have cost hundreds of innocent persons their lives or their liberty.”“You speak as though you were censor of the police,” he exclaimed with a quick, angry look.“I speak, General Markoff, as the friend of Russia and of her Sovereign the Emperor,” I replied. “You warn me of a plot to assassinate the Grand Duchess Natalia. Well, I tell you frankly and openly I don’t believe it. But if it be true, then I, in return, warn you that if any attempt be made by any of your dastardly hirelings, I will myself go to the Emperor and place before him proofs of the interesting career of Danilo Danilovitch. Your Excellency may be all-powerful as Chief of Secret Police,” I added; “but as surely as the sun will rise to-morrow, justice will one day be done in Russia!”And then I turned upon my heel and passed out of the room, leaving him biting his nether lip in silence at my open defiance.
What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.
A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.
Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.
Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.
The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.
I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.
What, I wondered, had occurred?
I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.
I crossed the big, walled-in courtyard of the Embassy, and entering the great sombre hall, where an agent of Secret Police was idling as usual, the flunkey in green livery showed me along to the secretary’s room, a big, gloomy, smoke-blackened apartment on the ground floor. The huge house was dark, sombre and ponderous, a house of grim, mysterious shadows, where officials and servants flitted up and down the great, wide staircase which led to His Excellency’s room.
“His Excellency left for Paris to-day,” the footman informed me, opening the door of the secretary’s room, and telling me that he would send word at once of my arrival.
It was the usual cold and austere embassy room—differing but little from my own den in Petersburg. Count Kourloff, the secretary, was an old friend of mine. He had been secretary in Rome when I had been stationed there, and I had also known him in Vienna—a clever and intelligent diplomat, but a bureaucrat like all Russians.
The evening was a warm, oppressive one, and the windows being open, admitted the lively strains of a street piano, played somewhere in the vicinity.
Suddenly the door opened, and instead of the Count, whom I had expected, a stout, broad-shouldered, elderly man in black frock-coat and grey trousers entered, and saluted me gaily in French with the words:
“Ah, my dear Trewinnard! How are you, my friend—eh? How are you? And how is Her Imperial Highness—eh?”
I started as I recognised him.
It was none other than Serge Markoff.
“I am very well, General,” I replied coldly. “I am awaiting Count Kourloff.”
“He’s out. It was I who telegraphed to you. I want to have a chat with you now that you have entered the service of Russia, my dear friend. Pray be seated.”
“Pardon me,” I replied, annoyed, “I have not entered the service of Russia, only the private service of her Sovereign, the Emperor.”
“The same thing! The same thing!” he declared fussily, stroking his long, grey moustache, and fixing his cunning steel-blue eyes upon mine.
“I think not,” I said. “But we need not discuss that point.”
“Bien! I suppose Her Highness is perfectly comfortable and happy in herincognitoat Brighton—eh? The Emperor was speaking of her to me only the other day.”
“His Majesty receives my report each week,” I said briefly.
“I know,” replied the brutal remorseless man who was responsible for the great injustice and suffering of thousands of innocent ones throughout the Russian Empire. “I know. But I have asked you to London because I wish to speak to you in strictest confidence. I am here, M’sieur Trewinnard, because of a certain discovery we have recently made—the discovery of a very desperate and ingenious plot!”
“Another plot!” I echoed; “here, in London!”
“It is formed in London, but thecoupis to be made at Brighton,” he replied slowly and seriously, “a plot against Her Imperial Highness!”
I looked the man straight in the face, and then burst out laughing.
“You certainly do not appear to have any regard for the personal safety of your charge,” he exclaimed angrily. “I have warned you. Therefore, take every precaution.”
I paused for a few seconds, then I said:
“Forgive me for laughing. General Markoff. But it is really too humorous—all this transparency.”
“What transparency?”
“The transparency of your attempt to terrify me,” I said. “I know that the attempt made against the young lady and myself failed—and that His Imperial Highness the Grand Duke was unfortunately killed. But I do not think there will be any second attempt.”
“You don’t think so!” he cried quickly. “Why don’t you think so?”
“For the simple reason that Danilo Danilovitch—the man who is a police-spy and at the same time responsible for plots—is just now a little too well watched.”
The man’s grey face dropped when I uttered the name of his catspaw. My statement, I saw, held him confounded and confused.
“I—I do not understand you,” he managed to exclaim. “What do you mean?”
“Well, you surely know Danilovitch?” I said. “He is your most trusted and usefulagent-provocateur. He is at this moment in England. I can take you now to where he is in hiding, if you wish,” I added, with a smile of triumph.
“Danilovitch,” he repeated, as though trying to recall the name.
“Yes,” I said defiantly, standing with my hands in my trousers pockets and leaning against the table placed in the centre of the room. “Danilovitch—the shoemaker of Kazan and murderer of Marie Garine, the poor little tailoress in Petersburg.”
His face dropped. He saw that I was aware of the man’s identity.
“He is now staying with a compatriot in Blurton Road, Lower Clapton,” I went on.
“I don’t see why this person should interest me,” he interrupted.
“But he is a conspirator. General Markoff; and I am giving you some valuable information,” I said, with sarcasm.
“You are not a police officer. What can you know?”
“I know several facts which, when placed before the Revolutionary Committee—as they probably are by this time—will make matters exceedingly unpleasant for Danilo Danilovitch, and also for certain of those who have been employing him,” was my quiet response.
“If this man is a dangerous revolutionist, as you allege, he cannot be arrested while in England,” remarked the General, his thick grey eyebrows contracting slightly, a sign of apprehension. “This country of yours gives asylum to all the most desperate characters, and half the revolutionary plots in Europe are arranged in London.”
“I do not dispute that,” I said. “But I was discussing the highly interesting career of this Danilo Danilovitch. If there is any attempt upon Her Imperial Highness the Grand Duchess Natalia, as you fear, it will be by that individual. General. Therefore I would advise your department to keep close observation upon him. He is lodging at Number 30B, Blurton Road. And,” I added, “if you should require any further particulars concerning him, I daresay I shall be in a position to furnish them.”
“Why do you suspect him?”
“Because of information which has reached me—information which shows that it was his hand which launched the fatal bomb which killed the Grand Duke Nicholas. His Imperial Highness was actually killed by an agent of Secret Police! When that fact reaches the Emperor’s ears there will, I expect, be searching inquiry.”
“Have you actual proof of this?” he asked in a thick, hoarse voice, his cheeks paler than before.
“Yes. Or at least my informant has. The traitor was recognised among the crowd; he was seen to throw the bomb.”
General Markoff remained silent. He saw himself checkmated. His secret was out. He had intended to raise a false scare of a probable attempt at Brighton in order to terrify me, but, to his amazement, I had shown myself conversant with his methods and aware of the truth concerning the mysterious outrage in which the Grand Duke Nicholas had lost his life.
From his demeanour and the keen cunning look in his steely eyes I gathered that he was all eagerness to know the exact extent of my knowledge concerning Danilo Danilovitch.
Therefore, after some further conversation, I said boldly:
“I expect that, ere this, the Central Committee of the People’s Will has learned the truth regarding their betrayer—this man to whose initiative more than half of the recent plots have been due—and how he was in the habit of furnishing your department with the lists of suspects and those chosen to carry out the outrage. But, of course, General,” I added, with a bitter smile, “you would probably not know of this manufacture of plots by one in the pay of the Police Department.”
“Of course not,” the unscrupulous official assured me. “I surely cannot be held responsible for the action of underlings. I only act upon reports presented to me.”
I smiled again.
“And yet you warn me of an outrage which is to be attempted with your connivance by this fellow Danilovitch—the very man who killed the Grand Duke—eh?”
“With my connivance!” he cried fiercely. “What do you insinuate?”
“I mean this, General Markoff,” I said boldly; “that the yellow card of identity found in Danilovitch’s rooms by the girl to whom he was engaged bore your signature. That card is, I believe, already in the hands of the Revolutionary Committee!”
“I have all their names. I shall telegraph to-night ordering their immediate arrest,” he cried, white with anger.
“But that will not save youragent-provocateur—the assassin of poor Marie Garine—from his fate. The arm of the revolutionist is a very long one, remember.”
“But the arm of the Chief of Secret Police is longer—and stronger,” he declared in a low, hard tone.
“The Emperor, when he learns the truth, will dispense full justice,” I said very quietly. “His eyes will, ere long, be opened to the base frauds practised upon him, and the many false plots which have cost hundreds of innocent persons their lives or their liberty.”
“You speak as though you were censor of the police,” he exclaimed with a quick, angry look.
“I speak, General Markoff, as the friend of Russia and of her Sovereign the Emperor,” I replied. “You warn me of a plot to assassinate the Grand Duchess Natalia. Well, I tell you frankly and openly I don’t believe it. But if it be true, then I, in return, warn you that if any attempt be made by any of your dastardly hirelings, I will myself go to the Emperor and place before him proofs of the interesting career of Danilo Danilovitch. Your Excellency may be all-powerful as Chief of Secret Police,” I added; “but as surely as the sun will rise to-morrow, justice will one day be done in Russia!”
And then I turned upon my heel and passed out of the room, leaving him biting his nether lip in silence at my open defiance.