These men take up their quarters more or less permanently in the
country of their operations. A few are men in high places in the
social or commercial world, and are generally _nouveaux riches_,
anxious for decorations and rewards. But most of the residential spies
are of a more insignificant class, and in regular pay for their work.
Their duty is to act as agents to receive and distribute instructions
secretly to other itinerant spies, and to return their reports
to headquarters. For this reason they are nicknamed in the German
Intelligence Bureau "post-boxes." They also themselves pick up what
information they can from all available sources and transmit it home.
One, Steinbauer, has for some years past been one of the principal
"post-boxes" in England. He was attached to the Kaiser's staff during
his last visit to this country, when he came as the guest of the King
to the opening of Queen Victoria's memorial.
A case of espionage which was tried in London revealed his methods,
one of his agents being arrested after having been watched for three
years.
Karl Ernst's trial confirmed the discoveries and showed up the doings
of men spies like Schroeder, Gressa, Klare, and others.
Also the case of Dr. Karl Graves may be still in the memory of many.
This German was arrested in Scotland for spying, and was condemned
to eighteen months' imprisonment, and was shortly afterwards released
without any reason being officially assigned. He has since written
a full account of what he did, and it is of interest to note how his
correspondence passed to and from the intelligence headquarters in
Germany in envelopes embellished with the name of Messrs. Burroughs
and Wellcome, the famous chemists. He posed as a doctor, and sent
his letters through an innkeeper at Brussels or a _modiste_ in Paris,
while letters to him came through an obscure tobacconist's shop in
London.
One of these letters miscarried through having the wrong initial
to his name. It was returned by the Post Office to Burroughs and
Wellcome, who on opening it found inside a German letter, enclosing
bank-notes in return for services rendered. This raised suspicion
against him. He was watched, and finally arrested.
He states that a feeling that he was being followed dawned upon him
one day, when he noticed in his lodgings that the clothes which he had
folded on a chair had been since refolded in a slightly different way
while he was out. With some suspicion, he asked his landlady whether
anyone had entered his room, and she, in evident confusion, denied
that any stranger could have been there. Then he suggested that his
tailor might have called, and she agreed that it was so. But when an
hour or two later he interviewed his tailor, he, on his part, said he
had not been near the place. Graves consequently deduced that he was
being followed.
The knowledge that you are being watched, and you don't know by whom,
gives, I can assure you, a very jumpy feeling--especially when you
know you are guilty.
I can speak feelingly from more than one experience of it, since I
have myself been employed on this form of scouting in peace time.