The Secrets of Potsdam

"No, Countess. His Imperial Highness is not here," was my reply. "This afternoon he mysteriously disappeared from the forester's lodge at Neue Schenke, and we are unable to trace him."

"Disappeared!" gasped the old lady, instantly pale and agitated.

"Yes," I said, looking her straight in the face.

"Do you know whether he had a visitor to-day – a young, dark-haired man?"

"He had, Countess. A man called, and saw him. At His Highness's request I left him alone with his visitor at the forester's house. The man's name was Karl Krahl."

"How did you know his name?" she asked, staring at me with an expression of distinct suspicion.

"Because – well, because I happen to have learnt it some time ago," I said. "And, further, on returning to the house we found this little bag in the room wherein I had left the Crown-Prince."

"Why! – a lady's bag!" she exclaimed as I held it out for inspection.

"Yes," I said in a somewhat hard tone. "Do you happen to recognize it?"

"Me? Why?" asked the old woman.

"Well, because I think it is your own property," I said with a sarcastic smile. "I have some recollection of having seen it in your hand!"

She took it, examined it well, and then, with a hollow, artificial laugh, declared:

"It certainly is not mine. I once had a bag very similar, but mine was not of such good quality."

"Are you really quite certain, Countess?" I demanded in a low, persuasive voice.

"Quite," she declared, though I knew that she was lying to me. "But why trouble about that bag while there is a point much more important – the safety and whereabouts of His Imperial Highness?" she went on in a great state of agitation. "Tell me, Count, exactly what occurred – as far as you know."

I recounted to her the facts just as you have already written them down, and as I did so I watched her thin, crafty old face, noticing upon it an expression full of suspicion of myself. She was, I now realized, undecided as to the exact extent of my knowledge.

"How did you know that the young man's name was Krahl?" she asked eagerly. "You had perhaps met him before – eh?"

But to this leading question I maintained a sphinx-like silence. That the little old woman who had so unexpectedly become a lady-in-waiting was playing some desperate double game I felt sure, but its exact import was still an enigma.

"In any case," she said, "would it not be as well to return to the Neue Schenke and make search?"

I smiled. Then, in order to let her know that I was acquainted with Italian, the language she had spoken on that well-remembered night in her own conservatory, I exclaimed:

"Ahe! alle volte con gli occhi aperti si far dei sogni." (Sometimes one can dream with one's eyes open.)

Her thin eyebrows narrowed, and with a shrug of her shoulders the clever old woman replied:

"Dal false bene viene il vero male." (From an affected good feeling comes a real evil.)

I realized at that moment that there was more mystery in the affair than I had yet conceived. His Imperial Highness was certainly missing, though the female element of the affair had become eliminated by my recognition of her own handbag. She, too, had been in secret to the forester's house – but with what object?

Half an hour later we were back at the little house in the forest.

The guests had all returned to the castle, and only Eckardt, the police commissary, remained, with the forester and his underlings. Already search had been made in the surrounding woods, but without result. Of his Imperial Highness there was no trace.

In the long room, with its pitch-pine walls, and lit by oil lamps, the crafty old Countess closely questioned Eckardt as to the result of his inquiries. But the police official, who had become full of nervous fear, declared that he had been sent off by His Highness, and had not since found any trace of him. He spoke of the little black silk bag, of course, and attached great importance to it.

Within half an hour we had reorganized the beaters from the neighbourhood and, with lanterns, set out again to examine some woods to the east which had not been searched. About ten o'clock we set forth, the Countess accompanying us and walking well, notwithstanding her age, though I could see that it was a fearful anxiety that kept her active. To the men with us every inch of the mountain side was familiar, and for hours we searched.

Suddenly, not far away, a horn was blown, followed by loud shouts. Quickly we approached the spot, and Eckardt and myself, as we came up, looked upon a strange scene. Close to the trunk of a great beech tree lay the form of the Crown-Prince, hatless, outstretched upon his face.

Instantly I bent, tore open his shooting jacket, and to my great relief found that his heart was still beating. He was, however, quite unconscious, though there seemed no sign of a struggle. As he had left his hat and gun in the house, it seemed that he had gone forth only for a moment. And yet we were quite a mile from the forester's house!

The Countess had thrown herself upon her knees and stroked his brow tenderly when I announced that he was still living. By her actions I saw that she was filled by some bitter self-reproach.

With the lanterns shining around him – surely a weird and remarkable scene which would, if described by the journalists, have caused a great sensation in Europe – the Crown-Prince was brought slowly back to consciousness, until at last he sat up, dazed and wondering.

His first words to me were:

"That fellow! Where is he? That – that glass globe!"

Glass globe! Surely His Highness's mind was wandering.

An hour later he was comfortably in bed in the great old-world room in the castle, attended by a local doctor – upon whom I set the seal of official silence – and before dawn he had completely recovered.

Yet, even to me, he declared that he retained absolutely no knowledge of what had occurred.

"I went out quickly, and I – well, I don't know what happened," he told me soon after dawn, as he lay in bed. Strangely enough, he made no mention of the man, Karl Krahl.

Later on he summoned the Countess von Kienitz, and for twenty minutes or so he had an animated discussion with her. Being outside the room, however, I was unable to hear distinctly.

Well, I succeeded, by bribes and threats, in hushing up the whole affair and keeping it out of the papers, while by those who knew of the incident it was soon forgotten.

I suppose it must have been fully three months later when one evening, having taken some documents over to the Emperor for signature at the Berlin Schloss, I returned to the Prince's private room in the Palace, when, to my great surprise, I found the man Karl Krahl seated there. He looked very pale and worn, quite unlike the rather athletic figure he presented at the forester's house.

"If you still refuse to tell me the truth, then I shall take my own measures to find out – severe measures! So I give you full warning," the Crown-Prince was declaring angrily, as I entered so unexpectedly.

I did not withdraw, pretending not to notice the presence of a visitor, therefore His Highness himself beckoned the young man, who followed him down the corridor to another room.

The whole affair was most puzzling. What had happened on that afternoon in the Harz Mountains I could not at all imagine. By what means had His Highness been rendered unconscious, and what part could the little old Countess have played in the curious affair?

In about half an hour the Crown-Prince returned in a palpably bad humour, and, flinging himself into his chair, wrote a long letter, which he addressed to Countess von Kienitz. This he sealed carefully, and ordered me to take it at once to the Stulerstrasse and deliver it to her personally.

"The Countess left for Stockholm this morning," I was informed by the bearded manservant. "She left by the eight o'clock train, and has already left Sassnitz by now."

"When do you expect her to return?"

The man did not know.

On going back to His Highness and telling him of the Countess's departure, he bit his lip and then smiled grimly.

"That infernal old woman has left Germany, and will never again put her foot upon our soil, Heltzendorff," he said. "You may open that letter. It will explain something which I know must have mystified you."

I did so. And as I read what he had written I held my breath. Truly, it did explain much.

Imposing the strictest silence upon me, the Crown-Prince then revealed how utterly he and the Crown-Princess had been misled, and how very narrowly he had escaped being the victim of a cunning plot to effect his death.

The little old Countess von Kienitz had, it seemed, sworn to avenge the degradation and dismissal of her son, who had been in the famous Death's Head Hussars. She had secretly traced the Crown-Prince as author of a subtle conspiracy against him, the underlying motive being jealousy. With that end in view she had slowly wormed her way into His Highness's confidence, and introduced to him Karl Krahl, a neurotic young Saxon who lived in London, and who pretended he had unearthed a plot against the Kaiser himself.

"It was to tell me the truth concerning the conspiracy that Krahl came to me in secret at Ballenstedt. He remained with me for half an hour, when, to my great surprise, we were joined by the Countess. The story they told me of the plot against the Emperor was a very alarming one, and I intended to return at once to Berlin. The Countess had left to walk back to the schloss, when presently we heard a woman's scream – her voice – and we both went forth to discover what was in progress. As I ran along a little distance behind Krahl, suddenly what seemed like a thin glass globe struck me in the chest and burst before my face. It had been thrown by an unknown hand, and, on breaking, must have emitted some poisonous gas which was intended to kill me, but which happily failed. Until yesterday the whole affair was a complete mystery, but Krahl has now confessed that the Countess conceived the plot, and that the hand that had thrown the glass bomb was that of her son, who had concealed himself in the bushes for that purpose."

Though, of course, I hastened to congratulate His Highness upon his fortunate escape, yet I now often wonder whether, if the plot had succeeded, the present world-conflict would ever have occurred.

SECRET NUMBER SEVEN

THE BRITISH GIRL WHO BAULKED THE KAISER

"How completely we have put to sleep these very dear cousins of ours, the British!" His Imperial Highness the Crown-Prince made this remark to me as he sat in the corner of a first-class compartment of an express that had ten minutes before left Paddington Station for the West of England – that much-advertised train known as the Cornish-Riviera Express.

The Crown-Prince, though not generally known, frequently visited England and Scotland incognito, usually travelling as Count von Grünau, and we were upon one of these flying visits on that bright summer's morning as the express tore through your delightful English scenery of the Thames Valley, with the first stopping-place at Plymouth, our destination.

The real reason for the visit of my young hotheaded Imperial Master was concealed from me.

Four days before he had dashed into my room at the Marmor Palace at Potsdam greatly excited. He had been with the Emperor in Berlin all the morning, and had motored back with all speed. Something had occurred, but what it was I failed to discern. He carried some papers in the pocket of his military tunic. From their colour I saw that they were secret reports – those documents prepared solely for the eyes of the Kaiser and those of his precious son.

He took a big linen-lined envelope and, placing the papers in it, carefully sealed it with wax.

"We are going to London, Heltzendorff. Put that in your dispatch-box. I may want it when we are in England."

"To London – when?" I asked, much surprised at the suddenness of our journey, because I knew that we were due at Weimar in two days' time.

"We leave at six o'clock this evening," was the Crown-Prince's reply. "Koehler has ordered the saloon to be attached to the Hook of Holland train. Hardt has already left Berlin to engage rooms for us at the 'Ritz,' in London."

"And the suite?" I asked, for it was one of my duties to arrange who travelled with His Imperial Highness.

"Oh! we'll leave Eckardt at home," he said, for he always hated the surveillance of the Commissioner of Secret Police. "We shall only want Schuler, my valet, and Knof."

We never travelled anywhere without Knof, the chauffeur, who was an impudent, arrogant young man, intensely disliked by everyone.

And so it was that the four of us duly landed at Harwich and travelled to London, our identity unknown to the jostling crowd of Cook's tourists returning from their annual holiday on the Continent.

At the "Ritz," too, though we took our meals in the restaurant, that great square white room overlooking the Park, "Willie" was not recognized, because all photographs of him show him in elegant uniform. In a tweed suit, or in evening clothes, he presents an unhealthy, weedy and somewhat insignificant figure, save for those slant animal eyes of his which are always so striking in his every mood.

His Imperial Highness had been on the previous day to Carlton House Terrace to a luncheon given by the Ambassador's wife, but to which nobody was invited but the Embassy staff.

And that afternoon in the great dining-room, in full view of St. James's Park and Whitehall, the toast of "The Day" was drunk enthusiastically – the day of Great Britain's intended downfall.

That same evening an Imperial courier arrived from Berlin and called at the "Ritz," where, on being shown into the Crown-Prince's sitting-room, he handed His Highness a sealed letter from his wife.

"Willie," on reading it, became very grave. Then, striking a match, he lit it, and held it until it was consumed. There was a second letter – which I saw was from the Emperor. This he also read, and then gave vent to an expression of impatience. For a few minutes he reflected, and it was then he announced that we must go to Plymouth next day.

On arrival there we went to the Royal Hotel, where the Crown-Prince registered as Mr. Richter, engaging a private suite of rooms for himself and his secretary, myself. For three days we remained there, taking motor runs to Dartmoor, and also down into Cornwall, until on the morning of the fourth day the Crown-Prince suddenly said:

"I shall probably have a visitor this morning about eleven o'clock – a young lady named King. Tell them at the bureau to send her up to my sitting-room."

At the time appointed the lady came. I received her in the lobby of the self-contained flat, and found her to be about twenty-four, well-dressed, fair-haired and extremely good-looking. Knowing the Crown-Prince's penchant for the petticoat, I saw at once the reason of our journey down to Plymouth.

Miss King, I learned, was an English girl who some years previously had gone to America with her people, and by the heavy travelling coat and close-fitting hat she wore I concluded that she had just come off one of the incoming American liners.

One thing which struck me as I looked at her was the brooch she wore. It was a natural butterfly of a rare tropical variety, with bright golden wings, the delicate sheen of which was protected by small plates of crystal – one of the most charming ornaments I had ever seen.

As I ushered her in she greeted the Crown-Prince as "Mr. Richter," being apparently entirely unaware of his real identity. I concluded that she was somebody whom His Highness had met in Germany, and to whom he had been introduced under his assumed name.

"Ah! Miss King!" he exclaimed pleasantly in his excellent English, shaking hands with her. "Your boat should have been in yesterday. I fear you encountered bad weather – eh?"

"Yes, rather," replied the girl. "But it did not trouble me much. We had almost constant gales ever since we left New York," she laughed brightly. She appeared to be quite a charming little person. But his fast-living Highness was perhaps one of the best judges of a pretty face in all Europe, and I now realized why we had travelled all the way from Potsdam to Plymouth.

"Heltzendorff, would you please bring me that sealed packet from your dispatch-box?" he asked, suddenly turning to me.

The sealed packet! I had forgotten all about it ever since he had handed it me at the door of the Marmor Palace. I knew that it contained some secret reports prepared for the eye of the Emperor. The latter had no doubt seen them, for the Crown-Prince had brought them with him from Berlin.

As ordered, I took the packet into the room where His Highness sat with his fair visitor, and then I retired and closed the door.

Hotel doors are never very heavy, as a rule, therefore I was able to hear conversation, but unfortunately few words were distinct. The interview had lasted nearly half an hour. Finding that I could hear nothing, I contented myself in reading the paper and holding myself in readiness should "Mr. Richter" want me.

Of a sudden I heard His Highness's voice raised in anger, that shrill, high-pitched note which is peculiar both to the Emperor and to his son when they are unusually annoyed.

"But I tell you, Miss King, there is no other way," I heard him shout. "It can be done quite easily, and nobody can possibly know."

"Never!" cried the girl. "What would people think of me?"

"You wish to save your brother," he said. "Very well, I have shown you how you can effect this. And I will help you if you agree to the terms – if you will find out what I want to know."

"I can't!" cried the girl, in evident distress. "I really can't! It would be dishonest – criminal!"

"Bah! my dear girl, you are looking at the affair from far too high a standpoint," replied the man she knew as Richter. "It is a mere matter of business. You ask me to assist you to save your brother, and I have simply stated my terms. Surely you would not think that I should travel from Berlin here to Plymouth in order to meet you if I were not ready and eager to help you?"

"I must ask my father. I can speak to him in confidence."

"Your father!" shrieked Mr. Richter in alarm. "By no means. Why, you must not breathe a single word to him. This affair is a strict secret between us. Please understand that." Then, after a pause, he asked in a lower and more serious voice:

"Your brother is, I quite admit, in direst peril, and you alone can save him. Now, what is your decision?"

The girl's reply was in a tone too low for me to overhear. Its tenor, however, was quickly apparent from the Crown-Prince's words:

"You refuse! Very well, then, I cannot assist you. I regret, Miss King, that you have had your journey to England for nothing."

"But won't you help me, Mr. Richter?" cried the girl appealingly. "Do, do, Mr. Richter!"

"No," was his cold answer. "I will, however, give you opportunity to reconsider your decision. You are, no doubt, going to London. So am I. You will meet me in the hall of the Carlton Hotel at seven o'clock on Thursday evening, and we will dine together."

"But I can't – I really can't do as you wish. You surely will not compel me to – to commit a crime!"

"Hush!" he cried. "I have shown you these papers, and you know my instructions. Remember that your father must know nothing. Nobody must suspect, or you will find yourself in equal peril with your brother."

"You – you are cruel!" sobbed the girl. "Horribly cruel!"

"No, no," he said cheerfully. "Don't cry, please. Think it all over, Miss King, and meet me in London on Thursday night."

After listening to the appointment I discreetly withdrew into the corridor on pretence of summoning a waiter, and when I returned the pretty English girl was taking leave of "Mr. Richter."

Her blue eyes betrayed traces of emotion, and she was, I saw, very pale, her bearing quite unlike her attitude when she had entered there.

"Well, good-bye, Miss King," said His Highness, grasping her hand. "It was really awfully good of you to call. We shall meet again very soon – eh? Good-bye."

Then, turning to me, he asked me to conduct her out.

I walked by her side along the corridor and down the stairs, but as we went along she suddenly turned to me, remarking:

"I wonder if all men are alike?"

"Alike, why?" I asked, surprised.

"Mr. Richter – ah! he has a heart of stone," she declared. "My poor brother!" she added, in a voice broken in emotion. "I have travelled from America in order to try and save him ere it is too late."

"Mr. Richter is your friend – eh?" I asked as we descended.

"Yes. I met him at Frankenhausen two years ago. I had gone there with my father to visit the Barbarossa Cavern."

"Then you have lived in Germany?"

"Yes, for several years."

By this time we were at the door of the hotel, and I bowed to her as she smiled sadly and, wishing me adieu, passed out into the street.

On returning to the Crown-Prince, I found him in a decidedly savage mood. He was pacing the floor impatiently, muttering angrily to himself, for it was apparent that some deeply-laid plan of his was being thwarted by the girl's refusal to conform to his wishes and obtain certain information he was seeking.

The Crown-Prince, when in a foreign country, was never idle. His energy was such that he was ever on the move, with eyes and ears always open to learn whatever he could. Hence it was at two o'clock that afternoon Knof brought round a big grey open car, and in it I sat beside the Emperor's son while we were driven around the defences of Plymouth, just as on previous occasions we had inspected those of Portsmouth and of Dover.

On the following Thursday evening we had returned to London, and the Crown-Prince, without telling me where he was going, left the Ritz Hotel, merely explaining that he might not be back till midnight. It was on that occasion, my dear Le Queux, you will remember, that I dined with you at the Devonshire Club, and we afterwards spent a pleasant evening together at the "Empire."

I merely told you that His Highness was out at dinner with a friend. You were, naturally, inquisitive, but I did not satisfy your curiosity. Secrecy was my duty.

On returning to the hotel I found the Crown-Prince arranging with Knof a motor run along the Surrey hills on the following day. He had a large map spread before him – a German military map, the curious marks upon which would have no doubt astonished any of your War Office officials. The map indicated certain spots which had been secretly prepared by Germany in view of the projected invasion.

To those spots we motored on the following day. His Imperial Highness, at the instigation of the Emperor, actually made a tour of inspection of those cunningly-concealed points of vantage which the Imperial General Staff had, with their marvellous forethought and bold enterprise, already prepared right beneath the very nose of the sleeping British lion.

From the Crown-Prince's jaunty manner and good spirits I felt assured that by the subtle persuasive powers he possessed towards women – nearly all of whom admired his corseted figure and his gay nonchalance – he had brought the mysterious Miss King into line with his own cunningly-conceived plans – whatever they might be.

We lunched at the Burford Bridge Hotel, that pretty old-fashioned house beneath Box Hill, not far from Dorking.

After our meal in the long public room, newly built as an annexe, we strolled into the grounds for a smoke.

"Well, Heltzendorff," he said presently, as we strolled together along the gravelled walks, "we will return to the Continent to-morrow. Our visit has not been altogether abortive. We will remain a few days in Ostend, before we return to Potsdam."

Next afternoon we had taken up our quarters at a small but very select hotel on the Digue at Ostend, a place called the "Beau Séjour." It was patronized by old-fashioned folk, and "Herr Richter" was well known there. There may have been some who suspected that Richter was not the visitor's real name, but they were few, and it always surprised me how well the Crown-Prince succeeded in preserving his incognito – though, of course, the authorities knew of the Imperial visit.

Whenever "Willie" went to Ostend his conduct became anything but that of the exemplary husband. Ostend in the season was assuredly a gay place, and the Crown-Prince had a small and select coterie of friends there who drank, gambled and enjoyed themselves even more than they did at Nice in winter.