The Big Book of Espionage

by The Big Book of Espionage (retail) (epub)

  “He might have been free the next day after his capture if he had given up his ideas to M. Mobrikoff. But he would not. M. Mobrikoff is chief of the Bureau of Engineers and Ordnance. It was he who knew that M. Gaylord had completed his new gun which he would make for the United States.

  “When M. Gaylord refused to tell him how it was done, he told M. Gaylord that he should remain prisoner until he did so. A prisoner, then, he has been for two years, but nothing would he say.

  “Three months ago, M. Mobrikoff, who is also a colonel and a noble of Russia—a count—made up his mind that M. Gaylord should tell what he knew. So M. Gaylord was ordered to be knouted if he would not tell.”

  The teeth of his listener came together with a savage snap, and he crumpled the letter in his hand into a shapeless mass. The man who called himself Dumercier looked up quickly. His auditor had begun to straighten out the paper and was now tearing it slowly to pieces.

  “Proceed,” he commanded.

  “So M. Gaylord was knouted. You know the knout, m’sieur? It is long and has brass ends to it. With this M. Gaylord was scourged—fifty strokes he received.

  “But he would not tell what they wished to know. The count then said that each week would the knout be given him. But he would not answer. He only closed his mouth as you did but a moment ago; closed his mouth and ground one tooth against another. And what he said was in your English tongue. The language I do not know, but so many times has M. Gaylord said this that I have learned it, too. ‘Gotter ’ell!’ he said—only that, no more—‘Gotter ’ell!’

  “Now, as for me, I was foolish. I was an officer. I was a noble, too, then, for one may not be an officer without he be noble. But Poland—they wish to be free there. And I—but that is concerning myself, m’sieur. It only serves for you to know that I determined to leave Russia before it was so arranged that I might never leave it.

  “M. Gaylord I liked. I went to him. I told him that I was coming out of Russia. So then he told me this. I dared not write it down, for I knew I might be searched, but this I learned from him and repeated it again and again:

  “ ‘I have been beaten like a dog and caged like a criminal. I love my country, but if my country cannot aid me, or will not, I must aid myself. As yet Russia knows nothing of my new weapon. Three months from to-day, if I am not free, she will know all.’ ”

  The paper in the hands of the other had been reduced to the tiniest fragments. He looked up.

  “That was all?” he inquired.

  “All except that if I succeeded in carrying the message the person to whom I gave it should pay me ten thousand rubles, and collect the same from his brother, Douglas Gaylord, of Birmingham, Alabama. If he were freed, ten thousand more he would himself pay me.”

  “This man Mobrikoff—what of him?”

  “I have told you. He is a noble and a colonel in the army. He is also the chief of the engineers and of the ordnance. He has Romanoff blood.”

  They talked more. The monocled one asked many questions—searching questions which went into the history of Mobrikoff’s past career and all those connected with him; his likes and his dislikes; his habits and his manners.

  There was a satisfied gleam on the questioner’s face when the information was elicited that Mobrikoff’s failings lay in the direction of women.

  “Ah, yes!” the Pole said. “The chanteuses of the Palermo. They indeed are the favorites of M. Mobrikoff. To one he threw a thousand-ruble note. I was there, m’sieur, for a girl from my village danced. Afterward she told me. It is that, m’sieur. Stage women—I know not why—he seeks his feminine society among them——”

  He was cut short by the other rising.

  “There is a note for five hundred francs, M. Dumercier,” he said, curtly. “I will see more of you again. I will write you. Meanwhile I must think——”

  “But the ten thousand?”

  “All in good time. I must see for myself. I go to Moscow to-night. But have no fear. It is but a trip of inspection. I will return before the week is out. Au revoir, m’sieur.”

  He saw him to the door, and then sat down in the reception room. For some minutes he sat perfectly still. Then he lighted a cigarette, and after that many more, his slender fingers meanwhile drumming a devil’s tattoo on the arm of the chair in which he sat.

  That evening the six o’clock express for the north bore the person of M. Lemaire, described in his passport as a French-American; occupation, the management of theaters; residence, New York City, and object in visiting Moscow, business connected with the theaters. The passport was signed by the minister of the United States to France.

  In Moscow M. Lemaire remained several days. He exhibited a tourist’s curiosity with regard to the old city. M. Mikhaelovitch, the manager of the cafe chantant—the Palermo—gratified this curiosity personally. In his company M. Lemaire visited the Kremlin, the Cathedral of Ostankino, the Church of the Nativity, and that weird architectural monstrosity, the Church of St. Basil the Beatified, with its forest of bell towers, ornamented with heraldic designs, pots of flowers and many grotesque figures.

  Naturally, from the Church of St. Basil, it was not strange that the mind wandered to the prison of the same saint. So thither they went, too. M. Lemaire seemed to take but little interest in the grim criminal institution, so they remained but a short while.

  When M. Lemaire left Moscow and M. Mikhaelovitch, he promised the proprietor that his chanteuses would arrive within several weeks. Whereupon M. Mikhaelovitch smiled in a gratified manner, soon afterward conferring with the disreputable journalist who aided him in his work, when he was not overfull of vodka. The disreputable journalist wrote a sonnet which exalted the beauty and ravishing charms of certain English and American singers who would delight the inhabitants of the Kitai-Gorod with ballads sung in M. Mikhaelovitch’s charming resort, the Palermo. This sonnet was published in the newspapers of Moscow and was read by noblemen and officers of the navy and marine who sojourned within the Kitai-Gorod. These exalted personages were frequenters of M. Mikhaelovitch’s cafe chantant. Consequently they were interested.

  Meanwhile two cablegrams had been despatched by M. Lemaire as soon as the train left the realm of the Great White Czar. Both were in code, and the German telegrapher who handled them scowled, for such messages were not liked in his Teutonic majesty’s realm. But they were despatched nevertheless.

  One was to the secretary of state, and requested that Miss Adelaide Hardesty be ordered to Paris immediately to join Theophile Lemaire at the Hotel Continental. The other was to Miss Hardesty herself and is perhaps worth quoting:

  Secretary wired to-day request for your assistance. Select three prettiest show girls in Manhattan. Bring them with you. Consult secretary regarding reasons.

  Thus Edna Follis, Mabel Dupree, and Nanette Edmonds forsook the Rialto and journeyed with Miss Adelaide Hardesty to Paris.

  A letter fully explaining the reasons for the two cablegrams reached the secretary of state by the Campania. It bore the postmark of Paris. In part it read:

  The man who gives the information is a Polish nihilist, formerly an officer in the Russian army. If we were to take the matter up legally with Russia, his oath would not be worth the word of a Chinese diplomat. He is discredited and disgraced, and acknowledges the fact himself. To make a serious charge against another power on the strength of such a man’s statement would be impossible and absurd. It would be denied, and if things came to the worst Gaylord would probably be sacrificed and his body put into some vault of the fort. My plan seems to be the only feasible one. If it fails, be assured that I am quite aware of the fact that I can expect no assistance from the United States—officially.

  This screed was signed with the initials of Yorke Norroy.

  CHAPTER II

  THE GIRL FROM BROADWAY

  For two w
eeks, the American chanteuses had sung and danced before the critical audience which nightly gathered in the cafe chantant of M. Mikhaelovitch. Incidentally, their twinkling feet, coquettish gestures, trim forms, and speaking orbs had caused the Odessa Jewesses and Georgian beauties, hitherto such favorites, to fill the position commonly denominated as “facing the wall.” Even Yvette d’Alencon, Parisian and consequently charming, was not acclaimed as of yore. The American beauties had caused her star to wane and become dim.

  The Americans brought rag-time with them. Moscow had heard rag-time before, but not sung as the Rialto girls sang it, nor accompanied with the complement of “goo-goo” eyes and buck and wing dances.

  The receipts of M. Mikhaelovitch increased, and he one day, in an excess of jubilance, embraced M. Lemaire and kissed him affectionately on both cheeks; which was Russian sentiment and meant that he cherished M. Lemaire as a brother. M. Lemaire, being French, should have appreciated this, but evidently his residence in America had deprived him of the mental light which approved of osculation between those of the same sex. As it was, M. Mikhaelovitch narrowly missed being stunned into unconsciousness by a blow from M. Lemaire’s fist. M. Lemaire, however, remembered his part and restrained himself.

  Back in the dressing-rooms, the girls chatted among themselves.

  “Talk about your New York Johnnies,” sniffed Mabel Dupree. “Why, they’re not in it for a minute with these fly Russian guys. Say, Edie, you remember that chap that sat in that second walled-off pen last night and threw me a pearl bracelet, eh? Well, he’s here again to-night. I just peeped out behind the curtain and saw him.”

  Edna Follis adjusted her pompon. “You’d better leave the new ones alone and stick to the old,” she said, warningly. “That Captain Wishtoff——”

  “Wesshoff,” corrected Mabel, indignantly.

  “Well, anyhow, he’s a good fellow. You won’t find many will hand you out a diamond brooch like the one he gave you. He’ll be angrier than the seven Satans if you throw any eyes at this other fellow. I know——”

  “Victor?” suggested Mabel, pleasantly.

  “Shut up! You don’t know anything about Victor. Why don’t you try to act as though you had some sense? Act like Adelaide. Adelaide hasn’t mixed up with any smelling Russkis.”

  The third girl, who had been silent, now spoke. “Adelaide is a fool,” she commented. “There’s that fellow who comes here every night. Sends her candy and flowers and—everything. I know who he is. Lieutenant Ogareff told me. He’s Count Mobrikoff, and he’s related somehow to the czar’s family. And Adelaide won’t pay any attention to him.”

  “I believe Adelaide has a mash on Lemaire, and hasn’t got any time for anybody else. Can’t say I like him much. Do you?” observed Miss Follis.

  “No, I don’t. He’s altogether too fond of browbeating people. Say, do you know I have my doubts about him being French? I heard him talking to Adelaide day before yesterday in the corridor, and he spoke as good English as you or I.”

  There was a rap on the door and the call for Miss Follis was made. Whereupon Miss Follis donned her light top-coat over her red skirts, and, taking her beribboned cane, departed to delight the souls of the children of the czar with the amatory strains of “I’ve Got a Feelin’ for You.”

  There was no dearth of auditors for Miss Follis’s coon song. The brass-railinged tiers of the pit had their tables crowded with men in the various uniforms of the army of the czar; the blue-black of the marine, the sky-blue of the infantry, the red of the telegraph, the orange of the light cavalry—all were represented there. The sight catching the singer’s eye from the stage was reminiscent of a rainbow. The electric lights shone on patent leather boots, gold braiding, silver spurs and jingling swords. The spectators themselves were mostly of the same class—army officers, naval officers, employees of the government in some shape and form, all wearing uniforms, and all ready to cast upon the stage money extorted from the government, as evidence of their pleasure in the antics of those who appeared before them.

  But there was one man in all this crowd who was immediately brought to the attention of any who entered. He sat on a raised platform, almost on a level with the stage, and it was known that this platform was one which was occupied by none save those of high rank. The man who occupied this place was attired in the uniform of colonel of engineers, and he wore on his breast the Order of St. Nicholas. He was a well-known patron of the Palermo, this nobleman—the Count Mobrikoff.

  To Miss Follis, Mobrikoff paid little heed, only frowning when she was recalled for the fourth time to sing over the ballad regarding the “sneaking feeling.” Miss Dupree, who followed her, likewise gave him no pleasure, to judge from the scowl with which he favored the inoffensive waiter on ordering his second bottle of Paul Roget. After Miss Dupree came Mlle. Yvette d’Alencon, who was received coldly and encored but once, and that only by a few of the faithful.

  The entrance of the next chanteuse was preceded by loud applause and clapping of hands, for Miss Adelaide Moray, as the bills styled her, had made more than an ordinary hit with the patrons of the cafe chantant. At her appearance Mobrikoff leaned forward and watched closely, with the light of admiration in his eye. At the conclusion of her song he joined in the applause and tossed a tiny box upon the stage. Adelaide stooped down and secured it.

  She was forced to repeat her song several times, but after the ordeal had been gone through with she made her way hastily to her dressing-room and opened the box. It contained a heart-shaped pin set with diamonds and rubies, around which was wrapped a note in French. A few moments later M. Lemaire and she were conversing over the note.

  “H’m, h’m!” Lemaire was reading it. “ ‘Scorned my advances, refused my gifts, beg interview’—h’m, h’m—‘wear the pin as token of acceptance.’ ” He looked up and, speaking in English, said: “Johnnies are the same the world over, aren’t they, Adelaide?”

  She nodded. “Shall I accept? It seems to me I’ve held him off enough already.”

  He meditated. “You have the necessary liquors in your reception room to satisfy his lordship?”

  “Considering that you sent them there, you should know. I haven’t touched any of them. You know how I despise intoxicants.”

  “And you have—the other?”

  She eyed him scornfully. “Kindly give me credit for having some foresightedness.”

  He examined his watch. Then he looked at her thoughtfully. “Do you know, Adelaide, you’re rather a stunning-looking girl?” he said.

  If healthy, rounded form, milk-white skin with the faintest ruddy tinge, and deep black eyes constitute “stunningness,” then M. Lemaire was correct. Adelaide Hardesty—or Moray—was the type of a woman who appeals to the mind looking for outward charm. The finer workings of her mind were not apparent to many, for she chose not to reveal them, passing rather as a woman whose sole desire in life was to cling to the wheel of pleasure as long as life held forth within.

  She looked out at Lemaire from under her long lashes. “That is part of the game,” she returned, without the faintest show of emotion of any kind. “I suppose your examination of your watch is a question which I am to answer. I think if you enter my reception room at the hotel at twelve o’clock you will find the gentleman in a condition fit for our ends.”

  As he smiled and patted her shoulder paternally, her smile was very bitter. When he had gone, after giving a few further instructions, she became pensive. “A good tool for his ends, that is all,” she told herself. The bitterness was gone, there was only sadness in the whisper.

  When she went on for her second turn, she wore the pin which M. Mobrikoff had thrown to her. The eyes of the Russian nobleman lighted up, and he ordered more champagne. She watched him as she sang and threw him several looks which she strove to make unstudied.

  At eleven o’clock the droshky of Cou
nt Mobrikoff was at the narrow door out of which the performers passed from the stage, while within the outer room the owner of the droshky sat, rubbing his booted legs together, toying with his sword, and watching the door to Miss Hardesty’s dressing-room with ill-concealed anticipation.

  When she emerged, clad in sealskins, her masses of heavy hair adorned with a toque of the same material, he sprang to his feet. Her dark eyes fell upon him rather shyly.

  “I am your slave, mademoiselle,” he said, in French, and with the customary extravagance of the Russian. He took one of her little gloved hands and pressed it to his lips.

  “Almost every night for two weeks past I have watched you. I had thought that you were cold to me, and that you preferred another——”

  “Merci, m’sieur,” she returned. “But I must hurry on now. Some other time, perhaps——”

  “What! will you leave me so soon, now that I have found you? Ah, no, mademoiselle—ah, no! You must come with me to the Ulamen. There we will have a little supper and some wine—and I will feast my eyes upon you.”

  She blushed. The blush was real. Adelaide Hardesty had not yet hardened herself to playing the part which her chief had assigned her. The scraping Russian disgusted her. She knew what lay behind this flattery. She knew of the knouting of Gaylord and of other things. At the thought of the last, she braved herself to the ordeal.

  “If you insist, m’sieur,” she said, smiling faintly, “I will allow you to go with me to my hotel.”

  “Ah, yes! You have lifted me out of Hades into Heaven. My droshky awaits without.”

  He took her arm, and she allowed him to help her into the vehicle. A word to his driver, and they were whirling across the snow in the direction of the Hotel d’Angleterre, where Adelaide Hardesty maintained a suite of rooms. She strove to make it appear to the Russian that she was interested in him, and, thanks to his egotism, her rather studied attempts passed for realities. And now the hotel loomed up before them. He stepped to the ground and helped her to alight.