The Secrets Of Potsdam Part 9

"You lie!" she cried fiercely. "They are not true. You cannot prove them."

"Very well," answered the Emperor in that tone of cold determination that I knew too well. "I will prove the charges to my entire satisfaction."

I was startled at the manner in which the Princess had dared to call the Emperor a liar. Surely n.o.body had ever done so before.

I drew a long breath, for as I crept away unseen I recollected the Kaiser's unrelenting vindictiveness.

Poor Princess! I knew that the red talons of the Hohenzollern eagle would sooner or later be laid heavily upon her.

She left Berlin two hours later, but half an hour before her departure I found a hurriedly-scribbled note upon my table explaining that she had had "a few unpleasant words with the Emperor," and that she was leaving for Dresden a day earlier than had been arranged.

A fortnight pa.s.sed. Twice Baron von Metzsch came to Potsdam, and was on each occasion closely closeted with the Emperor, as well as having frequent consultations with Judicial Councillor Lohlein. I had strong suspicion that the vile conspiracy against the lively daughter of the Hapsburgs was still in progress, for I felt a.s.sured that the Kaiser would never forgive those words of defiance from a woman's lips, and that his vengeance, slow and subtle, would a.s.suredly fall upon her.

I did not know at the time--not, indeed, until fully three years later--how the blackguardly actions of Von Metzsch, who was a creature of the Kaiser, had from the first been instigated by the All-Highest, who, from the very day of the Prince's marriage, had, notwithstanding his apparent graciousness towards her, determined that a Hapsburg should never become Queen of Saxony.

For that reason, namely, because the Emperor in his overweening vanity believes himself to be the Heaven-sent ruler of the destinies of the German Empire, was much opposed to an Austrian princess as a potential queen at Dresden, he set himself the task to ruin the poor woman's life and love and to arouse such a terrible scandal concerning her that she could not remain in Saxony with every finger pointing at her in opprobrium and scorn.

A fresh light, however, was thrown upon what I afterwards realized to be a dastardly conspiracy by the receipt of a cipher message late one November night at Potsdam. I was at work alone with the Emperor in the pale green upstairs room, reading and placing before him a number of State doc.u.ments to which he scrawled his scribbly signature, when the telegram was brought.

"Decipher that, Heltzendorff," he commanded, and went on with the work of reading and signing the doc.u.ments, while I sat down with the red leather-covered personal code book which bore the Imperial coronet and cipher, and presently found that the message, which was from Dresden, read:

"Frau von Fritsch to-day had an interview with Giron, the French tutor to the Crown-Princess's children, but unfortunately the latter refuses to admit any affection for Luisa. Giron angrily declared his intention to leave Dresden, because of Von Fritsch's suggestion. This course, I saw, would be unfortunate for our plans, therefore I urged the King to induce Luisa to request him to remain. She has done so, but to no avail, and Giron left for Brussels to-night. May I be permitted to come to discuss with your Majesty a further elaboration of the plan?--VON METZSCH."

The Emperor read the secret message twice. Then he paused, with knit brows, and brushed his moustache with his hand, a habit of his when perplexed.

"We go to Erfurt to-morrow, do we not?" he said. "Telegraph in cipher to Von Metzsch to meet us there to-morrow evening at seven. And destroy that message," he added.

I obeyed his orders, and afterwards continued to deal with the State papers, much enlightened by the news transmitted by the Emperor's creature.

The Imperial hand was slowly destroying the conjugal happiness of a pair who really loved each other, even though they were of the blood royal.

The long arm of the Emperor was outstretched to crush and pulverize the soul of the woman who had dared to defend herself--who had defied the imperious will of that man whose hand he had, with awful blasphemy in addressing his Brandenburgers, declared to be the hand of G.o.d.

I confess that I felt the deepest sympathy for the helpless victim. At the Schloss, high above the old-world town of Erfurt, the sneaking sycophant Von Metzsch had a long conference with the Emperor but I was unable to overhear any word of it. All I know is that the Controller of the Saxon Household left Erfurt for Dresden by special train at midnight.

A quarter of an hour after the Saxon functionary had departed I was with the Emperor receiving orders for the following day, and found him in high spirits, by which, knowing him so intimately, I knew that he was confident in his ultimate triumph.

Poor, defenceless Luisa! You, my dear Le Queux, to whom the Princess a few months afterwards flew for advice, know well how sterling, how womanly and honest she was; how she was one victim of many of the unholy, unscrupulous intrigues by which the arrogant War-Lord of Germany, aided by his devil's sp.a.w.n, has until the present managed to retain his now tottering throne.

Well, I watched the course of events; watched eagerly and daily. Twice I had received letters from Her Imperial Highness, short notes in her firm, bold handwriting.

From Von Metzsch came several cipher messages to the Emperor after we had returned to Potsdam, but Zorn von Bulach, my colleague, deciphered all of them, and, as he was not my friend, I did not inquire as to their purport. I knew, however, that matters in Dresden were fast approaching a crisis, and that the unfortunate Hapsburg Princess could no longer sustain the cruel and unjust pressure being put upon her for her undoing. That a hundred of Germany's spies and _agents-provocateurs_ were busy I realized from the many messages by telephone and telegraph pa.s.sing between Berlin and Dresden, and I felt certain that the ruin of poor Princess Luisa was nigh.

A significant message came to Potsdam late one December night--a message which, when I deciphered it and handed it to the Emperor, caused him to smile in triumph.

I bit my lip. The Princess had left Dresden!

Three days later, on December 9th, a further cipher telegram came from Von Metzsch, the Emperor's sycophant in Dresden, which read: "Luisa has learnt of the Sonnenstein project, and has left Salsburg for Zurich, her brother accompanying.--VON METZSCH."

Sonnenstein! That was a private lunatic asylum! I held my breath at the awful fate which the Emperor had decided should be hers.

In a few moments the Kaiser had summoned, by his private telephone, Koehler, then chief of the Berlin secret police, and given orders that the Princess was to be watched in Switzerland. Half an hour later three police agents were on their way to Zurich to follow and persecute the poor, distracted woman, even beyond the confines of the Empire.

She was, no doubt, in deadly fear of being sent to a living tomb, so that her mouth should be closed for ever.

The Emperor, not content with casting her out of Germany, intended to wreak a terrible and fiendish revenge upon her by closing her lips and confining her in an asylum. She knew that, and seeing herself surrounded by enemies and spies on every hand--for even her brother Leopold, with whom she had travelled to Switzerland, now refused to a.s.sist her--she adopted the only method of further escape that at the moment presented itself.

Alone and without anyone to advise her, she, as you know, took a desperate resolve, one, alas! fraught with disastrous consequences.

The iron had indeed entered the poor Princess's soul.

NOTE BY WILLIAM LE QUEUX

_The denouement of this base intrigue of the Emperor's will be best related in Her Imperial Highness's own words. In one of her letters, which I have on my table as I write, she says:_

_"I saw before me in those never-to-be-forgotten days all the horrors of a 'Maison de Sante.' What could I do? I was friendless in a strange hotel. Even Leopold seemed disinclined to be further troubled by a runaway sister. I knew Frau von Fritsch, that unscrupulous liar, had accused me falsely of having secret love affairs, and that the Emperor had directed the whole plot which was to culminate in my confinement in an asylum. Suddenly a solution occurred to me. I remembered that Monsieur Giron, who had already suffered greatly through his friendship with me. If he joined me, then my flight from Dresden would be considered as an elopement, and I should escape a living death in a madhouse! Monsieur Giron was at that moment my only friend, and it was for that reason that I telegraphed to him at Brussels. Well, he joined me, and by doing so completed the Emperor's triumph."_

_The subtle, ever-scheming Madman of Europe, warped as he is in soul as in body, had, with his true Hun craftiness and unscrupulousness, aided by Judicial Councillor Lohlein and the spy Von Metzsch, succeeded in hounding down an honest, defenceless woman as high born as his own diseased self, and casting her in ignominy and shame out of his now doomed Empire._

SECRET NUMBER FOUR

THE MYSTERIOUS FRAU KLEIST

The clever intrigues of Frau Kleist were unknown to any outside the Court circle at Potsdam.

She was indeed a queer personage, "only less of a personality than His Majesty," as that shiftiest of German statesmen, Prince Bulow, declared to me one day as we sat together in my room in the Berlin Schloss.

Frau Kleist was the Court dancing-mistress, whose fastidious judgment had to be satisfied by any young debutante or officer before they presumed to dance before Royalty at the State b.a.l.l.s. Before every ball Frau Kleist held several dance rehearsals in the Weisser-Saal (White Salon) at the Berlin Schloss, and she was more exacting than any pompous General on parade. Perhaps she was seventy. Her real age I never knew.

But, friends that we were, she often chatted with me and deplored the flat-footedness of the coming generation of Teutons, and more than once I have seen her lift her skirts and, displaying neat silk-stockinged ankles on the polished floor of the Weisser-Saal, make, for the benefit of the would-be debutantes, graceful tiptoe turns with a marvellous grace of movement.

Truly Frau Kleist, with her neat waist and thin, refined face, was a very striking figure at the Berlin Court. The intricacies of the minuet and gavotte, as well as those of the old-world dances in which she delighted, were taught by the old lady to Prince Joachim and Princess Victoria Luise, both of whom always went in deadly fear of her caustic tongue and overbearing manner.

The Emperor never permitted any dancing at Court which was not up to a high standard of excellence, and all who sought to dance were compelled to pa.s.s before the critical eye of the sharp-tongued old lady in her stiff silken gown.

Once, I remember, certain young people of the smart set of Berlin sought to introduce irregularities in the Lancers, but they soon discovered that their cards were cancelled.

Whence she had come or who had been responsible for her appointment n.o.body knew. One thing was quite certain, that though at an age when usually rheumatism prevents agility, yet she was an expert dancer.

Another thing was also certain, that, if a debutante or a young military elegant were awkward or flat-footed, she would train them privately in the Terpsich.o.r.ean art, especially in the old-world dances which are so popular at Court, and, accepting a little palm-oil, would then pa.s.s them--after squeezing them sufficiently--as fit to receive the Imperial command to the Court b.a.l.l.s.

The old woman, sharp-featured and angular as became her age, with her complexion powdered and rouged, lived in considerable style in a fine house close to the Glienicke Bridge at Potsdam, beneath the Babelsberg, a power to be reckoned with by all who desired to enter the Court circle.

Regarding her, many strange stories were afloat. One was that she was an ex-dancer, the mother of the famous Mademoiselle "Clo-Clo" Durand, _premiere danseuse_ of the Paris Opera, and another was that she had been mistress of the ballet at the Imperial Opera in Petrograd in the days of the Emperor Alexander. But so great a mystery were her antecedents that n.o.body knew anything for certain, save that, at the age of nearly seventy, she had access at any hour to the Kaiser's private cabinet. I have often seen her whisper to His Majesty strange secrets which she had picked up here and there--secrets that were often transferred to certain confidential quarters which control the great Teuton octopus.

Those at Court who secured the benignant smiles of Frau Kleist knew that their future path in life would be full of sunshine, but woe betide those upon whom she knit her brows in disapproval. It was all a question of bribery. Frau Kleist kept her pretty house and her big Mercedes car upon the secret money payments she received from those who "for value"