“Say, Topham! I’m mighty glad to see you.” Stites, secretary of
legation in Tokio, lifted his wine glass and leaned across the spotless
cloth. “Mighty glad to see you. A glass of wine with you, old man.”
Topham lifted his glass and smiled. “Thank you,” he answered. “It makes
a fellow feel good to be welcomed like this. You people have been
mighty good to me.”
“Oh! Well!” Stites laughed. “We’ll show you the other side of it
tomorrow.”
The two young men sat at a little round table at the English Hotel
where nightly the foreigners and the fashionable world of Tokio dined
and criticized each other’s clothes. Around them were men and women
of all types--Germans, English, a few Americans, fewer French, many
Japanese, some in native dress and others looking strangely awkward
in European garments. Little dark waiters slipped swiftly, though not
hurriedly, through the throng. The hum of conversation, punctuated
by the click of ice on the rims of delicate glasses rose above the
thrumming of the quaint oriental music. The night was heavy with the
perfume of lilies. Far away, through the broad windows, across the
roofs of the city, the bay gleamed silvery in the moonlight.
Topham took it all in. “It’s beautiful,” he said. “Beautiful! I’ve
never been to Japan before and it--well, it’s overpowering.”
“Of course! Everything is, in this country. We’ve got maids at the
embassy--the custom of the country, my boy--that are dreams of
loveliness. Madame l’Ambassadrice objected and to please her I tried to
get ugly ones. Nothing doing, my boy. There aren’t any in Japan--except
those that wear Melican man’s clothes.”
Topham smiled. “I like it,” he said.
“Oh! Do you, indeed! Naturally you would. All sailors do. But look
out, old man. Times aren’t what they used to be. Don’t trust the old
romances on Japan or you’ll get into trouble.”
“I won’t.” Topham stared around him. All about were interesting-looking
men and pretty women. “Who’s that?” he asked. “The tall man at the
table to your right?”
“That’s Cosdon, the British naval attaché! There’s the Spanish attaché
just beyond. Most of the attachés dine here. I’ll introduce you to a
bunch of them after a while. You’ll be the whole works at our shop, you
know. We haven’t had any sort of attaché, navy or army, for six months.
And we’ve needed ’em; needed ’em like the devil.”
“Why?”
“Why what? Why did we need them? Well, you can’t play chess without
pawns. You fellows are the pawns. We diplomats can’t play spy, you
know; but you navy and army men are licensed.”
Topham raised his eyebrows. “Why not use the natives?” he asked; “or
are they too patriotic?”
“Patriotic nothing! That’s all bunkum just like the jiu jitsu. The Japs
are no better than any other nation and I guess they’re a little worse.
They’ve got cowards and traitors just like other people--maybe more
so. But you can’t trust traitors, you know; they won’t stay hitched.
Besides, we need skilled men. The Chief has been cabling to Washington
for attachés for six months, but the cotillions didn’t seem willing
to spare anybody until you came. And they sent you in the end by the
longest way round.”
Topham looked his sympathy. It had been three months since he had left
Berlin. The Nevada, which he had joined at Brindisi, had dawdled along
via Port Said, Aden, and Singapore and had reached Manila just too late
to enable him to catch the swift, direct passenger steamer for Japan
and compelling him to take a much slower and roundabout boat.
“I could have come quicker,” he admitted. “But the Nevada needed a
watch officer, and--”
“And so you spent three months in coming by water instead of ten days
coming by Siberian railway. And all the while the need for you here was
increasing. I understand you speak Japanese, Topham.”
“A little!”
“Only a little?” The secretary was disappointed. “That’s bad--unless
it’s only your beastly polite way of disdaining knowledge. Well! you’ve
got your work cut out for you here! The Japs mean to fight us, and we
have been grossly negligent in preparing for them. We haven’t even
informed ourselves as to the extent of their preparations. The Chief
has done what he could, but it hasn’t been much.”
Topham leaned back and let his eyes rove over the expanse of city and
bay beneath the windows. No scene could be more peaceful. War seemed
to him far-off and impossible.
“You really think they mean to fight?” he questioned. His tones
expressed doubt, though much less than he felt.
“Of course! Of course! No doubt at all! They want to fight and they
will fight. The only question is as to when they’ll fight. Japan means
to be the England of the Pacific, and she means to dominate China,
including Corea and Manchuria. The open door--Bah! No Japanese intends
to allow it a moment longer than he must. Oh! they’ll fight! And
they’re getting ready to fight now.”
Topham listened respectfully. Listening was Topham’s long suit. But he
did not for an instant believe.
“Is there anything new,” he asked. “Things seemed quiet enough in
Manila. Of course, I was there for only a day and hadn’t much time to
pick up details. There was something in one of the papers about some
trouble in San Francisco, I believe; but--”
“That’s the opening. A sort of gambit, you know. The Japs there claim
they have a treaty right to send grown Japanese men to study in the
public schools with white boys and girls--girls, you understand. It’s
intolerable, of course! But they are using it as a pretext to stir
up bad blood. They’re cunning. They are trying to make capital for
themselves in Europe and particularly in England. Blood is thicker
than water and they’ll have to have a mighty good excuse for war with
the United States if they want England’s sympathy. And what’s more,”
the secretary leaned forward, “I have reason to believe that they are
dickering with Germany!”
Topham started and picked up his glass hastily, to mask his movement.
Since he had met the Countess Elsa, any mention of Germany made his
pulses stir.
“Natural enough, isn’t it?” he questioned. “Of course Japan would want
to be on good terms with Germany. Probably she would like to be on
terms with France, too; and perhaps even with Russia. But why should
that mean anything against the United States. Frankly, Stites, I’m from
Missouri on the Japanese question. You’ll have to show me!”
“Events will do that all right,” rejoined the other, a trifle grimly.
“But, with Germany, it’s scarcely a question. Ever since that woman got
here--”
“What woman?”
“The smartest, prettiest woman I ever knew and that’s saying something.
Say, Topham, did you ever play stud-poker?”
“Well, I’ve _heard_ of it,” admitted the officer, grinning.
“Oh! Have you? Well! you know how it’s played? The dealer deals one
card around face down, and everybody looks at it secretly. Then he
deals around again and again, card by card, all face up, until each man
has a full poker hand. After each round, you bet what you like. All
the cards in all the hands except one are exposed. It’s the one secret
card that makes the doubt in the game. Only one card, and yet it makes
the game more exciting than if all five were hidden. Well! diplomacy is
much like that--especially diplomacy as this woman plays it. She has
shown all her cards except one--what Germany is to get out of it all. A
mighty clever woman, Topham, and as pretty as she is clever.”
“Who is she?”
“Well, now, who knows. She calls herself--” the secretary broke off
and craned his neck, trying to make out more clearly the identity of
a little group of people who had just entered the dining-room. “She
usually comes here to dine,” he went on, slowly, “And maybe--yes! There
she is. She’s the lady approaching--the one in grey. She calls herself
the Countess Elsa del Ouro Preto. Sounds Spanish, but she is really
German as they make ’em.”
Topham never knew how he got to his feet. There was a roaring in his
ears and the lights danced around him. Only one thing held steady--the
splendid eyes of the Countess Elsa.
She was coming toward him. Her tiny jewelled slippers made no sound on
the mats that covered the floor, but her silken robes swished as she
moved. In the aureole of her hair trembled a single diamond; a belt of
rubies clasped her waist. Ah! How beautiful she was. How she fitted
into the scheme of things in this bizarre eastern world! Topham’s glass
shattered in his hand and the pieces tinkled on the floor as he looked.
Then she saw him. For an instant the traitor blood ebbed to her
heart, leaving her face whiter than man had ever seen it before.
Then it rushed back in a crimson tide, burning. But she walked on.
Her eyes held Topham’s for a second; then wandered indifferently
past. Carelessly she turned to the huge blonde German who walked by
her side--a man with the broad ribbon of the Black Eagle across his
breast--and made some laughing remark. Indifferently, without sign of
recognition, she passed--passed to where an obsequious waiter held a
chair ready.
Topham’s legs gave way under him. It needed not the protests of the
horror-stricken secretary to drag him down into his chair.
“For God’s sake, man! Careful! Everybody is watching you! Do you know
her?”
Topham shook his head slowly. “I thought I did,” he muttered. “But--I
do not.”