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Page 97
"The letter was intercepted. How it was done and by whom we have never
found out, but Lichnowski never saw that letter. Nor did the courier
leave London. With the Imperial letter still in possession, apparently,
he went to a house at Dalston, where he was arrested on the day after we
declared war on Germany.
"This courier went by the name of Schulte. We did not know him at the
time to be travelling on the Emperor's business, but we knew him very
well as one of the most daring and successful spies that Germany had
ever employed in this country. One of our people picked him up quite by
chance on his arrival in London, and shadowed him to Dalston, where we
promptly laid him by the heels when war broke out.
"Schulte was interned. You have heard how one of his letters, stopped by
the Camp Censor, put us on the track of the intercepted letter, and you
know the steps we took to obtain possession of the document. But we were
misled ... not by Schulte, but through the treachery of a man in whom he
confided, the interpreter at the internment camp.
"To this man Schulte entrusted the famous letter, telling him to send it
by an underground route to a certain address at Cleves, and promising
him in return a commission of twenty-five per cent on the price to be
paid for the letter. The interpreter took the letter, but did not do as
he was bid. On the contrary, he wrote to the go-between, with whom
Schulte had been in correspondence (probably Clubfoot), and announced
that he knew where the letter was and was prepared to sell it, only the
purchaser would have to come to England and fetch it.
"Well, to make a long story short, the interpreter made a deal with the
Huns, and this Dr. Semlin was sent to England from Washington, where he
had been working for Bernstorff, to fetch the letter at the address in
London indicated by the interpreter. In the meantime, we had got after
the interpreter, who, like Schulte, had been in the espionage business
all his life, and he was arrested.
"We know what Semlin found when he reached London. The wily interpreter
had sliced the letter in two, so as to make sure of his money, meaning,
no doubt, to hand over the other portion as soon as the price had been
paid. But by the time Semlin got to London the interpreter was jugged
and Semlin had to report that he had only got half the letter. The rest
you know ... how Grundt was sent for, how he came to this country and
retrieved the other portion. Don't ask me how he set about it: I don't
know, and we never found out even where the interpreter deposited the
second half or how Grundt discovered its hiding-place. But he executed
his mission and got clear away with the goods. The rest of the tale you
know better than I do!"
"But Clubfoot," I asked, "who is he?"
"There are many who have asked that question," Red Tabs replied gravely,
"and some have not waited long for their answer. The man was known by
name and reputation to very few, by sight to even fewer, yet I doubt if
any man of his time wielded greater power in secret than he.
Officially, he was nothing, he didn't exist; but in the dark places,
where his ways were laid, he watched and plotted and spied for his
master, the tool of the Imperial spite as he was the instrument of the
Imperial vengeance.
"A man like the Kaiser," my friend continued, "monarch though he is,
has many enemies naturally, and makes many more. Head of the Army,
head of the Navy, head of the Church, head of the State--undisputed,
autocratic head--he is confronted at every turn by personal issues
woven and intertwined with political questions. It was in this sphere,
where the personal is grafted on the political, that Clubfoot reigned
supreme ... here and in another sphere, where German William is not only
monarch, but also a very ordinary man.
"There are phases in every man's life, Okewood, which hardly bear the
light of day. In an autocracy, however, such phases are generally
inextricably entangled with political questions. It was in these dark
places that Clubfoot flourished ... he and his men ... 'the G gang' we
called them, from the letter 'G' (signifying _Garde_ or _Guard_) on
their secret-service badges.
"Clubfoot was answerable to no one save to the Emperor alone. His work
was of so delicate, so confidential a nature, that he rendered an
account of his services only to his Imperial master. There was none to
stay his hand, to check him in his courses, save only this neurotic,
capricious cripple who is always open to flattery...."
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