When the night had swallowed up both the yacht and the cruiser, Topham
drew a long breath and turned to Lillian.
“Great Scott!” he exclaimed boyishly, “what a yarn this would make for
the Gazette--if you could only print it.”
Lillian bubbled toward him. “Mayn’t I?” she asked, plaintively, but as
one who knew the answer already.
But Topham laughed. “Not a word,” he said. “The situation is too
ticklish. Do you know, young woman, that your respected chief,
Mr. McNew, thought it so serious that he brought your dispatch to
Washington and showed it to the President without publishing it--to the
President, mind you! Your chief and the President! It took something
mighty serious to bring those two together. Do you know that the United
States and Germany were on the brink of war tonight?”
Lillian nodded. “I suppose so,” she answered, seriously, “I suppose,
too, that that German officer--Commander Metternich was he?--will have
trouble over letting us get away.”
Topham nodded, but before he could speak Rutile struck in. “No,” he
said, “I think not. His captain may give him a wigging, but it’s
nothing to what the Kaiser would have done to him if he had gone a
little too far. Wilhelm doesn’t want war. He’s merely bluffing.”
“But”--Topham was amazed. “But he--”
“Yes! I know. But things are not just as you would suppose. I’ve had
nearly a month’s time and first-class opportunities to learn the ins
and outs of the whole conspiracy. If we can go below and sit down, I’ll
try to explain just what I think Wilhelm was after.”
In a few minutes the party was sitting around the table in Quentin’s
cabin. Rutile leaned across it.
“I don’t need to point out,” he began, “that Germany wants colonies
and would prefer southern Brazil if she can get it. Nor do I need
to do more than call attention to the fact that Germany is building
dreadnoughts supposedly to make her equal to England, but that they
really make her much more nearly a rival to the United States. She is
also--but I haven’t heard any very recent news--Is she by any chance
intriguing in Japan?”
“She is,” replied Topham, grimly.
“I suspected so. Well! Here’s the situation. Wilhelm wants Brazil. Ouro
Preto, half a German and son of the richest and most influential man
in southern Brazil, wants a German dukedom. Wilhelm says all right;
earn it if you want it. Go back to Brazil. Start something in the three
southern states. I will help you with arms and officers and munitions.
Make good and I’ll recognize their independence. Then let them ask me
to annex them. You’ve got 2,000,000 Germans down there. They won’t
object. Do this and you’ll get your dukedom.”
Miss Byrd nodded. “That’s about true,” she confirmed. “The count showed
me a letter from the Emperor saying that when south Brazil became a
German colony he would make Ouro Preto the Duke of Hochstein.”
“But,” objected Topham. “The Monroe doctrine--”
“Tush! Tush! The Monroe doctrine is to protect American republics
against European conquest. What’s it got to do with voluntary
annexations?”
Topham knitted his brows. “Of course you are right,” he said
didactically, “as to the original meaning of the Monroe doctrine. But
the meaning has changed. Today it is analogous to the ‘balance of
power’ in Europe, to maintain which so many wars have been fought.
Whatever our motives in establishing it, we support it now as a
measure of protection to ourselves. If we permit one European country
to acquire land over here, others will crowd in and our geographical
isolation--an isolation that saves us from the military terrors and
burdens of Europe--will be at an end. For our own sakes we must keep
Europe away from our doors. I judge the doctrine would be held to
apply.”
“You _judge_!” Rutile snorted “Pish!! Likewise tush! You _judge_! You
are not by any means certain, but after splitting a few hairs you
_judge_ it would apply! Well, how do you suppose twenty or thirty
million German-Americans would judge?”
“Why! They--”
“I’m not saying anything against German-Americans; I’m one of them
myself in the second degree. If it comes to fighting, they’ll fight,
even against the fatherland. But they won’t want to fight Germany.
They’re mighty apt to say ‘Mein Gott! Vas ist loss mit der Dagoes that
we should go to war for them, ain’t it?’ And if the German-Americans
did want to fight, what would the rich man say--the fellows who have
got trade to lose? Don’t you know they’d say ‘To hades with Brazil; we
sell more to Germany in a minute than we do to Brazil in a year!’ And
so it would go. When it came down to a count of noses, you’d find about
the only people that wanted to fight to keep the new republic down in
south Brazil from following their God-twisted noses into the German
fold would be you navy fellows and a few chaps whom the papers would
call jingoes. And if Germany had a fleet as powerful as the United
States, and if the United States had other foreign complications on its
hands--with Japan if you like--how many people would insist on fighting
to save a lot of greasers who didn’t want to be saved. Now, do you
begin to see?”
Topham nodded. The logic of the situation was too strong for him.
Rutile’s words brought into vivid consonance all the scattered facts
that he himself had noted. He was beginning to understand, as Europe
had understood long before, that the warlord of Germany was the most
wonderful diplomat the world had known for a century--one who knew how
to mask the cunning of a Machiavelli beneath the bluffness of a soldier
and the reckless speech of a boy. His was not the iron hand in the
velvet glove. With him glove was iron, but the hand was not in it; it
was outside, pulling the strings that made the puppets dance.
Topham saw it all. Yet he ventured one more objection, not because he
put much faith in it, but because he wanted to hear Rutile’s answer.
“But,” he said, “suppose the people of the new republics should
not want to be annexed,” he began. “Suppose they wanted to remain
independent--”
“Bosh! Much the people would have to say about it! The leaders would
decide, and by the time the people woke up, Germany would be in
possession. Wilhelm has got the leaders, body and soul; you can bet on
that. This isn’t the first time he’s tried it, you know. It was all
framed up ten or fifteen years ago when the Mello rebellion came off.
Germany was behind the rebels then, and Washington knew it. Didn’t the
President rush a fleet down to Rio, and didn’t Admiral Benham smash
the rebellion when he found the Brazilian government couldn’t do it?”
“Oh! I know he didn’t profess to do so. I know he only stood up for
American rights and all that. But he smashed it all the same, and not
a minute too soon either. And Germany didn’t have any dreadnoughts in
those days, and she wasn’t more than middling anxious for colonies
either. It’s different today!”
“And Japan!”
“Japan! What does Germany care about Japan? It could fight or funk
as it pleased when the time came, if only it would make faces until
Germany got settled in South America. There’s more ways of getting
chestnuts out of the fire than burning your own fingers--and Wilhelm
knows every one of them.”
“But what is to be done?”
“Done! Smash the rebellion in Brazil before Wilhelm can recognize it.
Send a fleet to aid Brazil to blockade her southern coast and cut off
the supplies that Germany is sending. Do? Well! That isn’t your part
nor mine. Our part was to get information. We’ve got it. The President
will do the rest. It’s up to him now.”