The Great Secret

E >> E. Phillips Oppenheim >> The Great Secret

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Guest tapped on the table with his forefinger.

"We have submitted our proofs," he said, "and they have been received
with derision. Your ambassador, Monsieur Bardow, has spoken for us--and
in vain! In what different manner can we approach this wooden-headed
government? You have come here with something to propose! What is it?"

Monsieur Bardow nodded assent. He opened his mouth to speak. Suddenly his
expression changed. He pointed to the door. The words came from his lips
with the crisp rapidity of a repeating rifle!

"Who is that man?" he demanded. "Look! quick!"

I was just in time to see Hirsch's figure disappearing through the swing
doors.

"A man named Hirsch," I answered.

"Who is he?"

"One of the committee of the Union," I answered.

"He left something with a waiter. Call the waiter quickly," Monsieur
Bardow demanded.

I obeyed at once. The waiter, a Swiss-German, hurried to our table.

"What did Mr. Hirsch want?" I asked.

"He said that he was coming back to dinner this evening, and he left a
bag," the waiter replied.

"Bring the bag here at once!" Bardow ordered.

Already he had risen to his feet. Something of his excitement had become
communicated to us. In obedience to a peremptory gesture from Guest, the
waiter hurried off, and returned almost immediately carrying a small
black bag. Bardow held it for a moment to his ear. We were all conscious
of a faint purring noise. Nagaski began to whine. Monsieur Bardow laid
the bag gently down upon the table.

"Out of the place for your lives!" he commanded in a tone of thunder. I
took Adele's arm, we all rushed for the door. We had barely reached it
before the floor began to heave, the windows to fall in, and a report
like thunder deafened us! We emerged into the street, wrapped in a thick
cloud of curling smoke, with masonry and fragments of furniture falling
all around us. But we emerged safely, though of the Cafe Suisse there was
scarcely left one stone upon another.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

A LAST RESOURCE

From all sides a great crowd gathered, with almost inconceivable
rapidity. We pushed our way through, and gained a side street in safety.
Monsieur Bardow arrested the attention of a four-wheeled cab galloping
towards the scene of the disaster, and motioned us to enter. We all
crowded in, and Monsieur Bardow, who entered last, gave an address
to the driver.

"My friends," he said, as he finally stepped in, "I am afraid that it was
my presence which has brought this disaster upon your cafe. My disguise
is good, but not good enough to deceive the cleverest rogues in Europe.
Let us take up our conversation where it was interrupted."

Guest nodded.

"The cafe has served its turn," he declared. "I am glad it is gone,
although it was a close shave for us. Monsieur Bardow, I believe that you
have something to suggest. There is no time to lose!"

The little Frenchman nodded.

"I have," he admitted. "It is, perhaps, a forlorn hope, but it is our
only chance. You have appealed to the government--you have failed!
Appeal, then, to their masters."

"The people!" Guest exclaimed. "But how? There is no time!"

"There is only one way," Monsieur Bardow declared, "but it is a royal
way. The things which we four in this cab know could be driven home to
every living Englishman in little more than twelve hours' time, if we can
only find--!"

"The Press!" I cried.

"If we can only find," Monsieur Bardow continued, with a little nod, "an
editor man enough to throw the great dice!"

"Staunton!" Guest exclaimed.

"We are on our way there," Monsieur Bardow declared. "He is our one
hope!"

I glanced towards Guest. There was a new fire in his eyes. I saw that the
idea appealed to him. Nervously he flung down the window and let in the
fresh air.

"A newspaper agitation," he muttered, "takes time, and if that destroyer
does not leave by four o'clock to-morrow afternoon--"

Monsieur Bardow held up his hand.

"We go no further," he said. "It shall leave!"

The cab drew up before the palatial offices of the _Daily Oracle_.
Monsieur Bardow took the lead, and with very little delay we were
escorted to a lift, and into a waiting-room on the third floor. Here our
guide left us, but only for a moment. In less than five minutes after we
had entered the building we were in the presence of John Staunton, Editor
and Managing Director of the _Daily Oracle_, a paper whose circulation
was reported to be the largest which any English journal had ever
attained. He was sitting, a slight, spare man, before a long table in the
middle of a handsomely furnished room. Before him were telephones of
various sorts, a mass of documents, and a dummy newspaper. He held out
his hand to Monsieur Bardow, and half rose to his feet as he noticed
Adele.

"You have something to say to me, Monsieur Bardow?" he said rapidly. "As
quickly as possible, if you please! This is the busiest hour of the day
for me."

"You may reckon it, also," Monsieur Bardow said, "the greatest hour of
your life, for I am going to give you an opportunity to-day of making
history for all time."

Staunton raised his eyebrows. Yet it was easy to see that he was
impressed.

"Your friends?" he asked, glancing towards us.

Monsieur Bardow turned to Guest.

"Forgive me," he said, "but it must be truth now, and nothing else. This
is Lord Leslie Wendover, third son of the Duke of Mochester. You may
remember Lord Leslie Wendover's name in connection with the Berlin
scandals fifteen years ago. This," he added, turning to me, "is Hardross
Courage. You have heard of him, no doubt. The lady is Miss Van Hoyt of
America."

Mr. Staunton bowed to all of us.

"Well?" he said.

"Each one of us," Monsieur Bardow said, standing, a slim, calm figure at
the end of the table, with his fingers resting upon its leather top, "has
a story to tell you. The stories vary only from their point of view. The
end of all is the same. It is this: unless the English government sends a
fast destroyer to Kiel before four o'clock to-morrow afternoon, the
Germans will command London before seven days have passed. And to the
best of my belief, Mr. Staunton, you are the only man who can save this
country."

"I will hear the story in a moment," Staunton said calmly. "First! You
have been to the government?"

"We have," Guest answered. "They decline to hear us, believe us, or
receive us. They scoff at our facts and ignore our warnings."

"You have some proofs?"

"We have almost convincing ones," Guest answered. "A further one almost
cost us our lives a few minutes ago! The restaurant where we were
deliberating was blown up by a bomb, placed there by some one who
suspected us."

"The name of the restaurant?" Staunton asked.

"The Cafe Suisse," I told him.

From his look of interest, I knew that he had heard something about the
place.

"Well," he said, "let me hear the stories."

Guest told his first, I followed, Adele told hers, and Monsieur Bardow
rapidly filled in certain blanks. All the while Staunton listened in
silence. He had opened an atlas, and studied it carefully with a
cigarette in his mouth, whilst Monsieur Bardow was speaking. When he had
heard everything we had to say, he pushed the atlas back and leaned over
the table towards us.

"You ask me," he said slowly, "to publish this story to-morrow. With what
object?"

"That the people of this great country," Monsieur Bardow answered
quickly, "should at least have a chance to themselves arrest this
horrible disaster. Let them rise up and insist that before four o'clock
tomorrow that destroyer leaves Devonport, with orders to stop our fleet
entering Kiel harbor. Let them insist upon a general mobilization of the
fleet, and the breaking up of this traitorous Rifle Corps. Your ministers
have failed you! It is by favor of the people that they rule! Let the
people speak!"

The man at the table moved his position ever so slightly. His eyes were
fixed downwards. He seemed to be thinking deeply. Monsieur Bardow
continued.

"My friends here," he said, "have done all that can be done with members
of the Cabinet, not only themselves, but in the person of others of great
influence. The appeal to you is practically an appeal to Caesar.
Ministers are great, but you are greater. It is your hand to-day which
grasps the levers which guide the world."

And still the man at the table was silent. Monsieur Bardow had more to
say.

"I will tell you," he said, "what an American newspaper has done for us.
To-morrow, at twelve o'clock, ten million of dollars is due to be paid to
the agents of Prince Victor of Normandy, by the Credit Lyonnais of Paris.
To-morrow morning, the _New York Herald_, in great type, exposes as a
gigantic joke the whole affair! It will give the names of the American
citizens, and the titles which their contribution to the Royalist cause
in France is to secure. To-morrow, all New York will be convulsed with
laughter--and I do not think that that ten million dollars will be cabled
to the Credit Lyonnais."

The man at the table lifted his head. His face was the face of a man who
had been in pain.

"The two cases," he said slowly, "are not identical. The _New York
Herald_ perpetrates a huge joke upon its readers. Whichever way that
affair ends, the newspaper has little to lose! You ask me, on the other
hand, to risk ruin!"

"I do!" Monsieur Bardow answered. "I came to you, I and my friends
here, because, from the first, you have shown yourself the uncompromising
foe of German diplomacy and aspirations. I give you the chance to
justify yourself. I know what it is that you fear, you do not doubt our
faith--your only fear is lest we may have been deceived. Is that not so?"

Staunton assented gravely.

"You are asking me a great deal," he said. "The _Daily Oracle_ represents
a million of capital, it represents the life work of myself and many dear
comrades. You ask me to stake our prestige, our whole future, upon your
story. You ask me to publicly flout the government which we have
supported through thick and thin. You give me no time to consult my
colleagues--I must decide at once, yes or no! This is no small matter.
Monsieur Bardow!"

"It is a tragedy," Monsieur Bardow answered. "I tell you that the future
history of your country, perhaps of Europe, rests upon your decision.
Don't let any smaller issue weigh with you for a moment. Be thankful that
you are the man whose name will live in history as the savior of his
country."

"Do not be too sure even of that," Staunton said. "Polloch is an
obstinate man, and I know as well as any one, perhaps, how set the
Cabinet are upon this German _rapprochement_. Still--you have fastened
the burden on my shoulders, and I will carry it."

"Thank God!" Monsieur Bardow exclaimed, leaning over and shaking hands
with Staunton. "Have no fear, my friend! It is Heaven's truth which you
will print."

"I believe it," Staunton answered quietly. "Several mysterious things
have happened during the last few days, and late this afternoon, consols
began to fall in a most extraordinary fashion. The side-winds have blown
some curious information to us, even this last hour or so! Now,
gentlemen, and Miss Van Hoyt," he continued in a suddenly altered tone,
"I have to send for all my editors and break up the whole paper. I shall
be here till daybreak and afterwards. One condition I have to make with
you."

"Name it," Monsieur Bardow declared.

"You must not leave this building till the paper is out. At any moment we
may require information from one of you! You shall be made as comfortable
as possible! Do you agree?"

"Of course," we all answered. "In fact," Guest remarked, "I fancy this is
the safest place for us for a few hours."

Staunton looked at us all a little curiously.

"I suppose," he remarked, "you know the risk you have been running?"

"Our friends have reminded us," I answered.

An attendant came in, and Staunton handed us over to him.

"Show this lady and these gentlemen into the strangers' room," he
ordered. "See that they have food and wine, and anything they require."

We left at once. In the passage we passed a little crowd of hurrying
journalists on their way to answer Staunton's summons. In every room the
alarm bell had sounded, and the making-up of the paper was stopped!

CHAPTER XXXIX

WORKING _THE ORACLE_

We had food and wine, plenty of it, and very excellently served. The room
in which we were imprisoned was more than comfortable--it was luxurious.
There were couches and easy-chairs, magazines and shaded electric lights.
Yet we could not rest for one moment. Adele and I talked for an hour or
so, and we had plenty to say, but in time the fever seized us too. The
roar of the machinery below thrilled us through and through. It was the
warning which, in a very few hours, would electrify the whole country,
which was being whirled into type. I thought of Madame, and once I
laughed.

Three times Guest was sent for to give some information, mainly with
regard to earlier happenings in Berlin, before our fateful meeting at the
Hotel Universal. At last my turn came. It was interesting to visit, if
only for a moment, the room where Staunton himself was writing this
story.

He was sitting at his table, his coat off, an unlighted cigarette in his
mouth, an untasted cup of tea by his side. Two shorthand clerks sat
opposite to him, a typist was hard at work a few yards away. Staunton
called me over to him. His voice was hoarse and raspy, and there were
drops of sweat upon his forehead.

"Is it true, Mr. Courage," he said, "that you are still believed here to
be dead?"

"Certainly!" I answered. "I have not communicated even with my lawyers.
My substitute's fate was enough to make me careful!"

"Does any one know on this side?"

"My cousin, Sir Gilbert Hardross. He is with us. He saw Polloch and tried
all he could himself."

"Good!" Staunton declared. "One more question. You say that on the
committee of the Rifle Club was a German officer. Do you know who he
was?"

"I do," I answered. "I saw him at the club when I went to meet my cousin.
His name is Count Metterheim, and he is on the military staff at the
Embassy here."

"Better and better," Staunton grunted. "That's all, thank you!"

I went back to the room where the others were waiting. The few people
whom I passed looked at me curiously. Already there were rumors flying
about the place. In less than five minutes I was summoned again. Staunton
looked up from his writing.

"The news has come through of the wrecking of the Cafe Suisse," he said.
"So far your story is substantiated. A man and a woman are in custody.
Their names are Hirsch!"

"He's a member of the committee!" I exclaimed. "I saw him bring in the
bag. It was Madame, his wife, who distrusted me all the time."

"Do you think," he asked, "that you were followed here?"

"Very likely," I answered

Staunton turned to a tall, dark young man who stood by his side.

"Tell Mr. Courage what has happened," he said.

The secretary looked at me curiously.

"A man arrived about a quarter of an hour ago who insisted upon seeing
Mr. Staunton. He hinted that he had an important revelation to make with
regard to the Cafe Suisse outrage. He would not see any one else, and
tried to force his way into the place. In the scuffle, a revolver fell
out of his pocket, loaded in all six chambers."

"What have you done with him?" I asked.

"Handed him over to the police," the young man answered; "but I am afraid
they would never get him to the station. Have you looked out of the
window?"

"No!" I answered.

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Do so!" he suggested.

I crossed the room, and, drawing the blind aside carefully, looked out.
The street was packed with people! Even as I stood there, I heard the
crash of breaking glass below!

"What does it mean?" I asked, bewildered.

"Your Rifle Corps, I should think," Staunton said, without ceasing
writing. "We closed the doors just in time. They will try to wreck the
place."

"We have telephoned to Scotland Yard and the Horse Guards," the man who
stood by my side said, "and we have forty policemen inside the place now!
Good God!"

The sudden roar of an explosion split the air. The floor seemed to heave
under our feet, and the windows fell in with a crash, letting in the cold
night air. We could hear distinctly now the shrieks and groans from
below. It seemed to me that the roadway was suddenly strewn with the
bodies of prostrate men. I sprang back into the room, we all looked at
one another in horror. I think that for my part I expected to see the
walls close in upon us.

"A bomb," Staunton remarked calmly. "Listen!"

He leaned a little forward in his chair, his pen still in his hand, his
attitude one of strained and nervous attention. By degrees the tension in
his face relaxed.

"It goes!" he muttered. "Good!"

He bent once more over his work. I looked at the man by my side in
bewilderment.

"What does he mean?" I asked.

"The engine! The machinery is not damaged!" was the prompt reply.

I wiped the sweat from my forehead. The silence in the room seemed almost
unnatural, and behind it we could hear the dull, monotonous roar of the
machinery, still doing its work. Once more I turned to the window, and as
I did so I heard the sullen murmur of voices. A little way down the
street a solid body of mounted police were forcing back the people.

I made my way back to the other room, almost knocked down in the passage
by a man, half-dressed, tearing along with a bundle of wet proofs in his
hand. Adele was standing by the wrecked window-frame--there were
no more windows anywhere in the building--and she turned to me with a
little cry.

"Jim!" she exclaimed, "Look! Look!"

I saw the line of fire and the policemen's saddles emptying fast. The
people were closing round the building. Guest stood frowning by our side.

"This is what comes," he said, "of making London the asylum for all the
foreign scum of the earth. How goes it, Courage?"

"Staunton is still writing, and the machinery is untouched."

"For how long, I wonder," he muttered. "The police are going over like
ninepins."

I looked below longingly, for my blood was up. It was no ordinary mob
this. They were beginning to fire in volleys now, and leaders were
springing up. As far as we could see there was a panorama of white faces.
It was easy to understand what had happened. We had been followed, and
our purpose guessed. Tomorrow's edition of the _Daily Oracle_ was never
meant to appear!

"The place will be at their mercy in another few minutes," Guest said
gloomily. "Twenty-four hours ago who would have dared to predict a riot
like this, in London of all places? Not all the police in Scotland Yard
would be of any avail against this mob."

"They may stop the paper," I said; "but Staunton's word--and these
events--should go for something with Polloch."

Guest looked at me and away out of the window. Adele was behind us, and
out of hearing.

"Do you suppose," he said in a low tone, "that Staunton or any of us are
meant to leave this place alive? I am afraid our friends below know too
well what they are doing."

The door opened, and Staunton himself appeared. He looked years older
than the strong, debonair man to whom I had told my story a few hours
ago, but in his face was none of the despair which I had feared. He
was pale, and his eyes were shining with suppressed excitement, but he
had by no means the air of a beaten man. He came over to where we were
standing.

"It is finished," he said calmly. "I read your story in print."

"Magnificent," I murmured, "but look! Do you think that a single copy
will ever leave this place?"

He stood looking downwards with darkening face. For several moments he
was silent.

"Look at them!" he muttered. "At last! The tocsin has sounded, and the
rats have come out of their holes! Half a million and more of scum eating
their way into the entrails of this great city of ours. For years we have
tried to make the government see the danger of it. It is our cursed
British arrogance which has shut the ears and closed the eyes of the men
who govern our destinies. Supposing your invasion should take place, who
is going to keep them in check? The sack of London would be well on its
way before ever a German soldier set foot upon our coast."

"The question for the moment," I remarked, "seems to be how long before
the sack of this place takes place. Look, the police are falling back.
The mob are closing in the street!"

Staunton was unmoved.

"The soldiers are on their way," he answered. "We received a message just
now by the private wire. The other has been cut. Look! My God, they've
brought the guns! There are some men at headquarters who are not fools."

We pressed close to the windows, and indeed it was a wonderful sight.
From the far end of the street, where the police had retreated, men were
flying in all directions. We caught a gleam of scarlet and a vision of
grey horses. There was no parley. The dead bodies of the police in all
directions, and the crack of the rifles, were sufficient. We saw the
gleam of fire, and we heard the most terrible of all sounds--the quick
spit-spit of the maxims. I drew Adele away from the window.

"Don't look, dear," I said, for already the ranks of the mob were riven.
We saw the upflung hands, we heard their death cries. Leaders leaped up,
shouting orders, only to go down like ninepins as the line of fire
reached them. There was no hope for them or any salvation save flight.
Before our eyes we saw that great concourse melt away, like snow before
the midday sun. Staunton drew a great breath of relief.

"In half an hour," he said, turning abruptly to Adele, "I will present
you with a copy of the _Daily Oracle_."

CHAPTER XL

_THE ORACLE_ SPEAKS

The issue of the _Daily Oracle_ which appeared on the following, or
rather the same, morning electrified Europe. Nothing like it had been
known in the memory of man. For one halfpenny, the city clerk, the
millionaire, and the politician were alike treated to a sensation which,
since the days of Caxton, has known no parallel. The whole of the front
page of the paper was devoted to a leading article, printed in large
type, and these questions were the text of what followed:

"1. Do the Government know that within eighty miles of Kiel are one
hundred and eighty thousand troops, with guns and all the munitions of
war, assembled there for the purpose of an immediate invasion of England,
assembled partly in secrecy, and partly under the ridiculous pretexts
of manoeuvres?

"2. Do the Government know that it is a skeleton fleet, the weedings of
the German navy, which awaits our squadron in Kiel waters, and that the
remainder of the German fleet, at its full strength and ready for action,
is lying in hiding close at hand?

"3. That there exists in London, under the peaceful guise of a trade
union, an army of nearly 200,000 Germans, who have passed their training,
and that a complete scheme exists for arming and officering same at
practically a moment's notice?

"4. That a German army is even now massed upon the French frontier,
prepared to support the claims to the throne of France of Prince Victor
of Normandy, and that a conspiracy has been discovered within the last
forty-eight hours amongst the French army, to suffer an invasion of their
country on this pretext?

"5. That an American paper is to-day publishing the names of some of her
richest citizens, who are finding the money for French Royalist agents,
to buy over the wavering officers of the army of our ally, the army of
the French Republic!

"There is ignorance which is folly," the article went on, "and ignorance
which is sin. The Government have proved themselves guilty of the first;
if they show themselves guilty also of the second, the people of this
country have the right to hurl from their places the fools who have
brought them to the brink of disaster, and to save themselves. In their
name, we demand two things:

"The dispatch of a gunboat with orders to the Channel Squadron to at once
return to their waters.

"The mobilization of our Mediterranean Fleet."

With this text Staunton had written his article, and he had written it
with a pen of fire. Every word burned its way home. With the daring of
those few hours of inspiration, he had turned inference into fact, he had
written as a man who sees face to face the things of which he writes.
There could be but one result. At ten o'clock a Cabinet Council was
called, and Staunton was telephoned for. Before midday, everything that
he had suggested was done.

Even then, we knew that the question of peace or war must be trembling in
the balance.

"Let it come if it will," Guest declared from his easy-chair in Gilbert's
study, "the great plot is smashed. I pledge you my word that to-morrow
the German newspapers will hold us up to scorn, will seek to make of
us the laughing-stock of the world. They will explain everything. There
will be no war. A German invasion of England is only possible by
intrigues which will keep France apart, and treachery which will render
our fleet ineffective. This plot has taken five years to develop, and I
have been on its track from the first. Thank God, I can call myself
square now with the past! ..."

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