Her Majesty's Minister

When I alighted from the train which had brought me down from Waterloo on the third day after leaving the sunshine of the Mediterranean, a cold cast wind was blowing, and the platform was covered with finely powdered snow. I had as companions three plain-clothes officers from Scotland Yard, one of whom was Inspector Chick of the special political branch of the Criminal Investigation Department. Application for assistance to the Commissioner had quickly been responded to, and outside the station we were met by the local plain-clothes constable of the T Division, who had been informed by telegraph of our advent. On my arrival in London that morning I had received a telegram from the police at Bordighera stating that Paolo Bertini was already under arrest.

We at once inquired the whereabouts of Cypress Cottage, and the local officer explained that it was a lonely house, situated nearly three miles away across the plain beyond Ashford, towards the valley of the Thames. We therefore obtained a wagonette at the station inn, and were very soon driving in company over the snow-covered road towards the spot indicated.

About a mile beyond Ashford village Chick, who directed the operations, ordered the coachman to stop, and he and I descended. In the distance we could see outlined against the gloomy, snow-laden sky a small, whitewashed cottage, standing where the road we were traversing made a junction with the high road between Staines and Kingston. This the local constable pointed out as our goal. It was a truly lonely place of residence, for there seemed no other house within a radius of several miles.

Chick, nimble of wit and resourceful, decided that we both should approach the place on foot, investigate, and endeavour to enter upon some pretext, while our three companions, at the moment of our entry, should drive up, leave the wagonette, and surround the place.

As soon as we had arranged our plan of operations, I buttoned my coat and strode on beside the inspector, who now took from his hip pocket a police-revolver and placed it in readiness in the outside pocket of his overcoat. With what resistance we might meet, or what was to be the nature of our discovery, we knew not. The revelation made by Edith was, to say the least of it, one of the strangest in my experience.

At last, after trudging through the snow, which lay thickly upon that road, we reached the cottage, a rather ill-kept place of about six rooms, and walked up the pathway to the door. That it was inhabited was shown by the smoke ascending from one of the chimneys and the stunted geraniums which screened the windows on the inside.

Chick knocked at the door, but for some anxious moments no response was made to his summons. Both of us listened attentively, and distinctly heard the shuffling of feet within, accompanied by an ominous whispering and the low growl of a dog, which was apparently being ordered to remain quiet.

“I hope these good people are not out,” Chick exclaimed in a loud voice, with a meaning look. “It’s evident we’ve lost our way.”

His words were heard by those within, and apparently at once disarmed suspicion, for in a few seconds the door was thrown open, and a tall, bony-faced woman of middle age confronted us with a look of inquiry. She was grey-haired, with a face which bore evident signs of the burdens of life.

“I’m very sorry to trouble you,” explained the inspector. “But we have unfortunately lost our way. We are strangers here. Could you direct us to the road to Littleton?”

“Certainly, gentlemen,” she answered. “Take the road along here to the left, and the Littleton road is the first on the left again. You can’t mistake it. There’s a sign-post up.”

Scarcely had the woman finished her sentence, however, before Chick pushed her aside and entered the place, I following close behind. The height of the woman was uncommon, and it occurred to me that she was the mysterious female who had watched me on the Calais boat some months before.

She gave a warning shout, and an ugly bulldog, released from the room beyond, came bounding fiercely upon us. Quick as thought Chick drew his revolver and shot the brute dead. The woman screamed “Murder!” So well-timed was our raid that at this very moment we heard outside the shouts of our companions, telling us that they had surrounded the place.

Those moments were full of wild excitement. From one room to another we dashed quickly, but discovered absolutely nothing to arouse any suspicions until we started to ascend the narrow flight of stairs, when, on doing so, we were suddenly confronted by the dark figure of a man standing at the head, with a revolver pointed straight at us. He spoke no word, but I was amazed to recognise him as the man who had once before made a dastardly attempt upon my life – Rodolphe Wolf! Then I knew that that cottage, as Edith had declared, contained the key to the mystery.

“If you attempt to come up here, I shall shoot!” cried the spy in English.

“I call upon you, in the name of the law, to surrender as my prisoner,” responded Chick firmly in his loud, ringing voice. “I don’t know your name, but I arrest you all the same.”

“His name is Wolf,” I explained breathlessly. “He is Rodolphe Wolf, the French spy!”

It seemed that then for the first time did the fellow recognise me, for, peering down, he cried: “It is you – you! Gerald Ingram!”

“Yes,” I answered. “Your secret is out! We know the truth! Surrender!”

“Never!” he shouted, standing at bay. “Advance a step, and I’ll shoot you both dead.”

“The place is surrounded. You cannot escape,” Chick replied. “I am an officer of Metropolitan Police, and command you to lay down your weapon.”

But he refused, and we both saw that to ascend that narrow staircase in face of his revolver was a very risky proceeding. A dozen times Chick repeated the demand, but the adventurer was nothing daunted. The secret, if anywhere, was in that room, and he was evidently determined to guard it with his life.

Of a sudden the inspector, handing me the revolver, whispered to me to remain there, covering Wolf so as to prevent his escape, and assured me that he would return instantly. He rushed outside, but returned to my side in a few moments.

The vituperation which Rodolphe Wolf heaped upon me I need not repeat. Suffice it to say that during the few minutes which elapsed while we faced one another in that narrow way, each unable to move, he invoked upon my head all the curses of the evil one, vowing a revenge swift and terrible, not only upon myself, but also upon Léonie and Edith.

With a suddenness that startled all of us, however, there was a loud crashing of glass in the room behind him, and, thus taken by surprise, he turned to see how it had been caused.

In an instant Chick had sprung up the stairs, and we were both upon him. The spy fired his revolver, but at random, and the bullet pierced the ceiling. The inspector closed with him in deadly embrace, and a second later was assisted by one of the detectives, who had broken the window and entered the room by a ladder.

The fellow still held his weapon in a desperate grasp, and, having succeeded in pinning Chick against the wall, raised the revolver to his face. At that instant the other officer threw himself upon the pair. Wolf’s revolver exploded, but the bullet, instead of entering Chick’s head, penetrated the spy’s own neck, close behind the ear.

“Dieu!” he shrieked, “I’m shot! I’ve shot myself!” and as his grip relaxed, the two detectives allowed him to stagger and fall back upon the ground.

In endeavouring to murder the inspector he had inflicted a fatal wound upon himself.

Chick, who had had such a narrow escape from death, only brushed his clothes here and there, and remarked with a smile:

“That was pretty tough, sir, wasn’t it?”

Then, ordering his assistant to look after the wounded prisoner, we both searched the room. At first we saw nothing to account for Wolf resisting our progress so desperately. It was a bare place, with a couple of tables, a chair or two, and a few papers that had been strewn about in the struggle. I picked up some. They were copies of the Figaro, the Libre Parole, and the Petit Journal.

But in a corner by the fireplace, I saw a twisted heap of pale-green paper, like ribbon, and a moment later found beneath the table a broken telegraph-receiver. On taking it up I saw upon the small brass plate the words “General Post Office,” while near it lay the other portions of the apparatus, which was one of those which print upon the paper ribbon, and are worked by clockwork.

“Hulloa!” cried Chick, crossing the room and bending over the instrument, “what’s that?”

“A telegraph-receiver,” I replied, at the same moment examining the ceiling of the room and at once discovering two loose ends of wires suspended from a corner.

The instrument had evidently been torn hurriedly from the wires, and an unsuccessful effort made to destroy it and remove all traces of its existence. Wolf, however, had not had time to accomplish his object.

While the wounded man lay groaning, we all proceeded to make further search, and the result of our investigations proved startling indeed. We found that from the room there ran two wires outside, which, after being buried in the garden and along a field on the left, emerged beside one of the telegraph-posts on the main road, and joined one of the lines running to London.

At first we did not realise the extreme importance of our discovery, but from the telegraph-tape found in the room and the deciphers of official despatches which we discovered locked in a cupboard, the amazing truth was disclosed.

The wire so ingeniously tapped was the Queen’s private wire, which ran from Windsor Castle, along the road through Staines and Kingston, to the Foreign Office, and over which Her Majesty constantly exchanged views and gave instructions to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and others of her Ministers.

In that comfortless room we found transcripts of all kinds of official despatches and confidential messages, which, although sent in cipher over the wire, had been deciphered by the spies, who had unfortunately also obtained a copy of the secret code in use. The interchanges of views included much that concerned England’s attitude in the Boer war, then still in progress, and had without doubt been communicated to the Boers through their Continental agents. Not a single secret of State was safe from those emissaries of our enemies. Thus it was that before the suggestions or instructions of our Sovereign reached Downing Street, they were in the possession of those who aimed at our downfall, for every message transmitted between Windsor and Downing Street, every decision of the Sovereign or of the Cabinet, passed through that inoffensive-looking little instrument, and was registered upon the pale-green snake-like tape before it reached its destination.

A thorough search of the place revealed a perfect system of receiving and deciphering the despatches, all of which had been carefully registered by number in a book and the copies sent to the Quai d’Orsay. Hence it was, of course, that the knowledge of England’s decision regarding the attitude to be adopted towards the Transvaal and of our policy in reference to Ceuta, had been obtained before the Marquess had even written his despatch; while the secret instructions which I myself had carried from Downing Street to Paris had actually been known to the spies before the Chief had put his pen to paper. They did not seek to secure the despatches, because they were always in possession of the decisions and line of our diplomacy beforehand.

Having taken possession of the whole of the papers, some of which I was amazed to discover were in Edith’s handwriting, we removed the whole into the wagonette, placed a constable in charge of the cottage, and ordered the wounded man’s removal to the Cottage Hospital at Staines, as being the nearest institution where he could be treated.

That same evening I had a long interview with the Marquess at his private house, and, assisted by Chick, showed him the papers secured as the result of our investigations. Afterwards, when he had gone through them, I related to him the whole story, concealing nothing. While I sat recounting the incidents a telegram arrived for the inspector, to whom it had been forwarded from Scotland Yard. It was an official police message stating that the prisoner Wolf had died in the hospital at half-past six, having made no statement.

Her Majesty’s Minister heard me through, listening with breathless interest, and when I had concluded bestowed upon both of us many complimentary words.

“Both your Queen and your country owe a debt of gratitude to you, Ingram; for by dint of care and perseverance you have rescued us from our secret enemies,” he said. “Rest assured that your claim to distinction as an Englishman will not be forgotten.”

That night I sent a telegram from Charing Cross announcing to Léonie the death of the spy, which to her meant freedom. The same wire also carried a second message of comfort to Edith, with the promise that I would leave London for Bordighera on the following morning. Then, entering the telephone-box, I had a long conversation with Lord Barmouth, explaining to him the truth, and receiving his heartiest congratulations and best wishes for my happiness on my marriage with Edith Austin, who, he declared, had saved England’s prestige.

Chapter Thirty Seven

Conclusion

Two days later I was again seated with Edith under the olives on the sunny hillside behind Bordighera.

I had told her all that had happened, explained what we had discovered in that upper room at Cypress Cottage, and demanded to know the reason why some of the copies of those messages were in her own handwriting. Our hands were clasped in fervent affection, and now, fearing not the revenge of either Wolf or Bertini, she revealed to me the plain and ghastly truth in regard to her connection with that band of unscrupulous spies who had sought to bring about England’s downfall.