The adventures of Heine
All was now moving like clockwork--and let me say that the smoothness
of the arrangements was due largely to the very thorough and
painstaking organisation-work which I had carried out in the piping
days of peace. We Germans have a passion for detail and for
thoroughness and for this reason (apart from the inherent qualities of
simplicity and honesty, apart from the superiority of our kultur and
our lofty idealism) we have been unconquerable throughout the ages.
For example, we had foreseen the necessity in organizing our
Intelligence Department, to employ, not Germans, but subjects of
neutral states wherever possible. People who talk of “German spies” or
“the uninterned German peril” cannot realise that from the moment war
broke out, all Germans, known as such, were under the observation of
the police, and not only the police but their own neighbours. It would
be impossible, as I had foreseen, for such men to offer assistance to
our great and splendid cause, because the least suspicious movement on
their parts would result in their arrest. I have a considerable
respect for the Scotland Yard routine investigation. No, my sirs, you
do us no justice when you talk of “German spies.” Search not for the
“Hun,” as in the bitterness of your impotent rage you call us, but for
the----
I think that I have said that much of my time was taken up by
answering telephone calls.
You must remember that I was in London as the representative of a
Chinese News Bureau. I was also an agent for a firm of importers in
Shanghai. It was therefore only natural that I should be called up all
hours of the day and night with offers of goods.
“I can let you have a hundred and twenty bales of Manchester goods at
125.”
Now 120 and 125 added together make 245, and turning to my “simple
code” to paragraph 245, I find the following:
“2nd Battalion of the Graniteshire Regiment entrained to-day for
embarkation.”
The minor agents carried this code (containing 1,400 simple sentences
to cover all naval or military movements) in a small volume. The code
is printed on one side of very thin paper leaves, and the leaves are
as porous and absorbent as blotting paper.
One blot of ink dropped upon a sheet will obliterate a dozen--a fact
which our careless agents have discovered.
Clipped in the centre of the book (as a pencil is clipped in an
ordinary book) is a tiny tube of the thinnest glass containing a
quantity of black dye-stuff. The agent fearing detection has only to
press the cover of the book sharply and the contents of the book are
reduced to black sodden pulp.
Need I say that this ingenious invention was German in its origin.[2]
My days were therefore very full. There came reports from all quarters
and some the most unlikely. How, you may ask, did our agents make
these discoveries?
There are many ways by which information is conveyed. The relations of
soldiers are always willing to talk about their men and will tell you,
if they know, when they are leaving, the ships they are leaving by,
and will sometimes give you other important facts, but particularly
about ports and dates of embarkations are they useful.
Also officers will occasionally talk at lunch and dinner and will tell
their women folk military secrets which a waiter can mentally note and
convey to the proper quarters. Our best agents, however, were barbers,
tailors, chiropodists, and dentists. English people will always
discuss matters with a barber or with the man who is fitting them with
their clothes, and as almost every tailor was making military uniforms
and a very large number of the tailors in London were either German or
Austrian, I had quite a wealth of news.
Tailors are useful because they work to time. Clothes have to be
delivered by a certain date and generally the man who has the suit
made will tell the fitter the date he expects to leave England. Other
useful investigators are Turkish-bath attendants and dentists. A man
in a dentist’s chair is always nervous and will try to make friends
with the surgeon who is operating on him. Of all agents the waiter is
in reality the least useful, because writers have been pointing out
for so many years the fact that most waiters were German. But the
truth is that most restaurant waiters are Italian, and it is amongst
the bedroom waiters that you find a preponderance of my fellow
countrymen.
Another department of my work which kept me busy was the money-lending
department. I had initiated a system of inquiry into the financial
affairs of officers and I was able to keep track of all officers who
were in financial difficulties. This department had been a very great
disappointment to us, for in spite of the fact that we had the power
to ruin hundreds of careers, we have never been able to employ that
power profitably. The British officer is absolutely unscrupulous and
has no sense of honour. Often our agents have offered to release them
from their liabilities in return for some trifling service and these
people have preferred to live under the odium of owing people money,
to securing an honourable release from their debts; by some simple
little obliging act, such as giving us particulars of their brother
officers’ losses at cards, and the like. And that is what is called
English honour!
Is it not more dishonourable to owe money you cannot pay than to
whisper a few little secrets about men who probably are as
dishonourable as yourself? However, to return to Alexander and his
inamorata.
Prompt at eight o’clock, I took my place at the table and ordered an
excellent dinner (my waiter was naturally a good German) and a bottle
of Rhenish wine. A few minutes after I had given my order Alexander
and the girl arrived. She was dressed in a long travelling coat of
tussore silk, and carried--as I was careful to note--a shiny brown
leather portfolio. This she placed carefully on her lap when she sat
down and raised her veil.
She looked a little pale, but smiled readily enough at Alexander’s
jests.
I watched her as she slowly peeled off her gloves and unbuttoned her
coat. Her eyes were fixed on vacancy. Doubtless her conscience was
pricking her.
Is it the thought of thy home, little maid, from whence thou hast fled
never to return? Is it the anguished picture of thy broken-hearted and
ruined father bemoaning his daughter and his honour? Have no fear,
little one, thy treason shall enrich the chosen of the German God, the
World Encirclers, Foreordained and Destined to Imperial Grandeur!
So I thought, watching her and listening.
“Are you sure that everything will be all right?” she asked anxiously.
“Please trust me,” smiled Alexander. (Oh, the deceiving rogue--how I
admired his sang-froid!)
“You are ready to go--you have packed!” she asked.
“As ready as you, my dear Elsie. Come--let me question you,” he
bantered; “have you all those wonderful plans which are going to make
our fortunes after we are married?”
So he had promised that--what would the gracious Frau Koos-Mettleheim
have said to this perfidy on the part of her husband?
“I have all the plans,” she began, but he hushed her with a warning
glance.
I watched the dinner proceed but heard very little more. All the time
she seemed to be plying him with anxious questions to which he
returned reassuring answers.
They had reached the sweets when she began to fumble at her pocket. I
guessed (rightly) that she was seeking a handkerchief and (wrongly)
that she was crying.
Her search was fruitless and she beckoned the waiter.
“I left a little bag in the ladies’ room--it has my handkerchief; will
you ask the attendant to send the bag?”
The waiter departed and presently returned with two men in the livery
of the hotel.
I was sitting side by side and could see the faces both of the girl
and Alexander, and I noticed the amusement in his face that two
attendants must come to carry one small bag.
Then I heard the girl speak.
“Put your hands, palms upward, on the table,” she said.
I was still looking at Alexander’s face.
First amazement and then anger showed--then I saw his face go grey and
into his eyes crept the fear of death.
The girl was holding an automatic pistol and the barrel was pointing
at Alexander’s breast. She half turned her head to the attendants.
“Here is your man, sergeant,” she said briskly. “Alexander Koos, alias
Ralph Burton-Smith. I charge him with espionage.”
They snapped the steel handcuffs upon Alexander’s wrists and led him
out, the girl following.
I rose unsteadily and followed.
In the vestibule was quite a small crowd which had gathered at the
first rumour of so remarkable a sensation. Here, for the first time,
Alexander spoke, and it was curious how in his agitation his perfect
English became broken and hoarse.
“Who you are? You have a mistake maken, my frient.”
“I am an officer of the British Intelligence Department,” said the
girl.
“Himmel! Secret Service!” gasped Alexander, “I thought it was not!”
I saw them take him away and stole home.
They had trapped him. The girl with the sprained ankle had been
waiting for him that day on Blackheath. She had led him on by talking
of the plans she could get until he had told her of the rough plans he
already had. Whilst (as he thought) he was tightening the net about
her, she was drawing the meshes tighter about him.… Phew! It makes me
hot to think of it!
Was there a secret service in England after all?
For myself, my tracks were too well covered; for Alexander I could do
nothing. He would not betray me. I was sure of that. Yet to be
perfectly certain I left the next night for Dundee, and I was in
Dundee when the news came that Alexander had been shot in the Tower of
London.
CHAPTER II.
THE MAN WHO DWELT ON A HILL
When I left London hurriedly, after the arrest of Alexander Koos, I
must confess that my mind was greatly disturbed. I sat half the night
in my sleeper, turning over all the circumstances leading up to the
arrest of my good friend. We Germans are the most logical people in
the world. We argue with precision from known facts, and we deduce
from those facts such subtle conclusions as naturally flow.
We do not indulge in frivolous speculations--we Germans are a serious
people with a passion for accurate data.
Thus I argued: (1) If a secret police force had been established it is
a post-war creation. Otherwise our general staff would have known of
its existence and have advised us. (2) Supposing a secret service had
been initiated where would its agents be found? Naturally in the
vicinity of the great arsenals and military camps. Under these
circumstances it was not surprising that Koos, confining his
investigations to Woolwich, had been brought into contact with a
member of this new organisation. (3) It was humanly impossible that
the operations of an improvised secret service could be extended in a
few days to areas other than military and arsenal areas. Therefore, it
behoved the investigator to avoid as far as possible arousing
suspicion by pursuing his inquiries in the neighbourhood of arsenals
and camps.
When I had reached this conclusion I was much comforted. I had no
desire to take unnecessary risks. It seemed certain to me at that
time, that the war would not last longer than three months. Koos had
thought it would be over in two months, but I felt that he erred on
the side of optimism. So that the period of risk was not a very
prolonged one, and if I were wise and discreet and succeeded in
impressing my subordinates with the necessity for similar discretion,
there was no reason why we should not return to the Fatherland with a
flawless record to receive those honours which the Supreme War Lord
bestowed upon the faithful servants of our beloved Deutschland.