Invasion_ and my campaign against the Hun I had received a number
of threatening letters, all of which I sent to the Department. The
Metropolitan Police, feeling that I was in personal peril while
the country was still swarming with Germans, very properly placed
a police guard night and day on my house--for I was then living at
Upper Halliford, near Sunbury-on-Thames, which is in the Metropolitan
Police area. Indeed, the detective inspector who saw me expressed
the view that I was in grave danger, and for that reason they had
resolved to give me protection. So a constable lurked each night in
the summer-house in my garden.
Two days later, at orders from a higher quarter, my police protection
was suddenly withdrawn! By the Hidden Hand, of course--the hand of
someone who hoped every day that something might happen to me, for I
was a _person who knew too much_!
A few weeks later I was lunching at Lady Owen Philipps’s when my
friend Mrs. Eckstein, who sat next to me, said:
“Oh, Mr. Le Queux, do you know the latest about yourself? It is all
over London that you are really a German spy! I’ve heard it from half
a dozen people during the past week. I wonder who started such a
wicked report?”
I only smiled. I knew that it had come from the traitors, in order
to hound me down and discredit me in case I broke my vow of silence
concerning them.
Further, I greatly incensed the authorities by my campaign that
demanded that all Germans of whatever class should be interned. I
was, however, assisted by Lord Leith of Fyvie, Sir W. Joynson-Hicks,
an old friend and a true Englishman, the Duke of Newcastle, another
old friend, the Earl of Crawford, Earl Clarendon, Lord Galway, Lord
Headley, and others.
For months the wire-pullers resisted. Sir Edgar Speyer, Privy
Councillor, put his fingers to his nose at the King and crossed to
America; yet not till after we held a violent meeting at the Mansion
House, where many hard things were said, did the authorities at last
yet very reluctantly resolve to intern enemy aliens. I happen to
know that, so bitter was their opposition to our just demands, they
actually interned two Germans who, being employed in our own Secret
Service, were doing valuable work for us! Hundreds of dangerous
aliens were allowed to slip through the meshes of the net by those
who, bent on our downfall, were awaiting the landing of the Germans.
Indeed, at no period of the war were they all interned. Further,
though I pointed out to the authorities that Detective-Sergeant
Wegner, who was Russian born and spoke German like a native, and had
been conveniently “retired” from Scotland Yard at the outbreak of
war, should be re-employed, it was refused, even though he had been
an expert on alien enemies in the West End!
I myself undertook some investigations on the Clyde, assisted by
Alexander Morton, the messenger-at-arms, of Glasgow; and in one case
I found a German carrying on a typewriting school, actually training
secretaries--some thirty of whom he had managed to get posts at the
naval base at Rosyth! I published the results of my investigations
in the _Glasgow Sunday Post_, and by doing so further incensed the
authorities, who were anxious to suppress me.
After that I wrote a book, _German Spies in England_, and in open
defiance of the idiotic censorship published it. There were fierce
official threats to prosecute me and also my publisher, Mr. Stanley
Paul. But I presume it was feared that I might make some rather nasty
accusations, and bring proof against certain highly-placed persons,
so the matter was allowed to drop. Then I went further, and wrote
another fearless exposure of the truth, which I called _Britain’s
Deadly Peril_, and again defiantly published it, well knowing that
I had a patriotic circle of good friends behind me. I awaited
prosecution, but none came.
About this time a Danish bookseller, who sells my books in
Copenhagen, wrote to me telling me he had just returned from Berlin,
where he had heard of the naval raid on Scarborough _three days
before it took place_! He was often in London before the war, and in
the course of his interesting letter he wrote:
“I always thought the spy mania in England exaggerated, but
now I am absolutely persuaded that even those Englishmen who
recognize this peril do not realize the lengths to which it
goes. They have been suspecting waiters and servants, whilst
the spies are in high social positions; they have contented
themselves with searching the houses of German barbers and
grocers, whilst neglecting the hands which collect and forward
to Berlin the information gathered by more humble satellites.
“It is very sad to have to say such things, but I think the
most dangerous spies still in England are not Germans, whether
naturalized or not, but are people belonging to neutral
countries--even to countries actually fighting Germany--and
also subjects of Great Britain herself.
“I would not have written this if I was not sure of it; the
diplomat from whom I got the information assured me that there
are some English and French of both sexes who come regularly
to Berlin, or to frontier towns through neutral countries,
and have conversations with officials and then return. The
restrictions as to luggage and passports, both in France and
in England, are not half so severe as they should be; _they
are even slacker than at the beginning of the war_. I know,
personally, of a number of stolen American passports under
the shelter of which German spies are now travelling, and
an Italian Consul with whom I happened to travel a few days
ago said he had discovered two fellows with false Italian
passports almost perfectly imitated.
“In Berlin I heard people, well-informed people, saying that
in every English town of importance, and on every spot of
strategical value on the British coast, Germany has got _few
friends_ keeping their eyes open, and ready to receive an
eventual German raid, and to give their friends as strong a
hand as possible.”
That letter bore out exactly what I was trying to preach every day.
* * * * *
One day while lunching with Lord Northcliffe at his house in St.
James’ Place--I having assisted Lady Northcliffe and the Duchess of
Roxburghe in the organization of a field hospital for Serbia--he said
to me:
“Quex, my dear fellow, why don’t you lecture? Tell the people about
spies and their ways. Having been our spy yourself, you know the game
better than anybody. I’m sure it would interest people.”
As first I demurred, but he pressed me, assuring me that it would
cause the people to think.
“There are spies everywhere among us, as you are aware. The
authorities are most reluctant to arrest one, for reasons we already
know. Now and then one is caught, just in order to make pretence of
our great vigilance and keep incompetent people in their jobs.”
So I decided to lecture. Perhaps some of those who read this book
may have listened to me while I spoke from one or other of the two
hundred and twenty-eight different platforms I occupied, in as
many different towns, from Aberdeen to Brighton and from Cromer to
Carmarthen.
Lord Headley, who is a great humorist, often took the chair, and
among other chairmen I had the Earl of Midleton, ex-Minister for War,
the Earl of Clarendon, the Marquis of Linlithgow, Lord Rochdale,
Lord Leith of Fyvie, and many peers, parsons, provincial mayors, and
distinguished people.
Now Lord Headley is a ventriloquist inasmuch as he can speak without
moving his lips. He lives at St. Margaret’s, near Twickenham, and
I introduced him to Douglas Sladen, who lived across the Thames
at Richmond; so the pair became great friends. But it was his
lordship’s ventriloquial abilities that worried me. We would travel
down from London together by car to some distant town, arrive about
six o’clock, eat a chop, and go to the place where I was “billed” to
lecture, usually for some local charity, so I paid the expenses! Duly
we arrived on the platform amid applause, and duly he would rise and
make an eulogistic speech that caused me to blush.
Then, when I rose and began to try and entertain my audience for an
hour and a half without the aid of “pictures”--no easy task in these
days, if one is not a variety performer, I assure you--he would
presently _sotto voce_ give his humorous impressions of the audience.
I heard whispered loudly, though nobody else could hear, something as
follows:
“Good Lord! What a funny crowd! Putrid! Look at that old girl at
the corner of the third row! What a guy! She’ll look under the bed
to-night to make sure there’s not a spy there!”
Then a pause.
“That’s it! They’ve all got their mouths open now. Tell them a funny
story. Yes, they’re right with you--with you every time--look at the
reporters scribbling it all down--lots in the papers to-morrow. Phew!
The place is packed. I’m tired--beastly tired!”
I was compelled to endure this, and much more, for he would single
out persons in the audience, indicate them, and criticize their
personal appearance in such a manner that I had to clench my hands
and set my jaws hard to keep myself from laughing in the faces of my
listeners.
One hot summer’s night I was advertised to lecture in the Town Hall
at Windsor, and we drove down together by car from London. It was for
charity. I was suffering from a bad cold in the head, and I could
hardly speak. Indeed, I had been in bed till four o’clock, but was
determined not to disappoint those who wished to hear me. I had been
told, too, that, the Court being in residence at the Castle, a number
of officials attached to it had taken tickets.
On the way down I said to my chairman:
“Look here, Headley, no humour to-night. I’m horribly ill, and really
can’t stand it. How I shall get through it I don’t know.”
“My dear fellow, I can see you’re queer,” he replied. “I won’t utter
a single word. Dry up early, and let’s get back as soon as we can. We
have to go up to Newcastle to-morrow, remember.”
And so it was arranged.
The big hall was packed. His lordship explained that I was suffering
from a very bad cold and had risen from my bed to fulfil my promise
in the cause of charity.
Then I rose, and I started in a voice that I fear was very harsh and
hoarse. Though feeling only half awake I nevertheless did my best.
For nearly half-an-hour I went on, till suddenly I heard that
familiar voice exclaim in a whisper:
“I know that you will forgive me. I humbly apologize, but I--I really
can’t help it. Don’t kick me when you get me outside, will you? But
we’ve actually come across It at last! Great Scot! Look!”
I continued lecturing, determined to take no notice of his lordship’s
remark.
A few minutes later he said:
“Ah! It’s quite evident that you’ve lost your sight as well as your
voice. No! You’re not looking in the right direction! You’re blind!”
I continued with my lecture, telling a story that made the audience
laugh.
“My dear fellow,” whispered my chairman, “do look down below--in the
first row of the stalls.”
I did so, and at once I burst out laughing with the audience. I could
not help it.
In a seat right beneath where I stood sat an elderly lady in black,
with a double-sized old-fashioned ear-trumpet, covered with a little
black lace curtain, and as she listened intently, she turned the
whites of her eyes upwards to me. She was the wife of a famous
headmaster whose name I think I may as well omit.
When we got outside, Lord Headley said:
“I knew, my dear Le Queux, that you would, in such circumstances,
forgive me for breaking my promise. But I couldn’t resist. Oh! What a
time we have on these lectures, don’t we?”
I had many other humorous adventures on my lecture tour. More than
once I found Horatio Bottomley lecturing in the same town as myself,
and staying at the same hotel. On such occasions we always had supper
together.
I knew him in London quite well, for I used to write for _John Bull_.
Almost the first week I went out lecturing I met him on the railway
platform at Perth, on a winter’s day, both of us going up to Dundee.
“Well, Le Queux,” he asked, bustling up with his secretary behind
him, “what are you doing here?”
I told him that I was out lecturing.
“So am I, dear boy,” he said in his breezy way. “So am I. Just trying
to turn an honest penny, you know!”
At his trial he alleged that he made nothing by his tub-thumping
lectures that drew such big crowds because he was such a fine
showman, but I happen to know that he would turn up his nose at a fee
of a hundred guineas to lecture. He told me so.
At that moment Horatio was the idol of the middle and lower classes.
They believed in him, and certainly he was very outspoken in his
criticisms, and, like myself, was hated by the authorities because he
dared to tell the truth. One afternoon I strolled in at one of his
lectures in a mining town, where quite unexpectedly he pointed to me
and told his audience what I had done for England. I was cheered to
the echo, and felt most embarrassed.
I could write a volume about my amusing experiences while lecturing.
Travelling in war-time was bad enough, and what with food-rationing,
lack of motor-cars, and such-like inconveniences, it was really a
dog’s life.
Both Mr. Lloyd George and Lord Colwyn were extremely good to me
during my lecturing, for they both took a great interest in my
propaganda against the enemy. Both knew that my attitude was correct
and reliable beyond attack, for, had it not been, I should have been
prosecuted and probably imprisoned for publishing books in defiance
of the Government’s censorship.
Here I will say a word concerning the censorship of letters. The
reader will recollect that a huge department was formed to open
and read everyone’s correspondence. Hundreds of men, women, and
flappers were engaged in Kingsway and its vicinity in order to throw
dust in the eyes of the public, in pretence of preventing enemy
communication. And one’s letters were marked with the words, “Opened
by the Censor.”
This was all too funny for words, though you, my reader, and
myself had to pay for it, even to the flappers’ teapots. The whole
department was a delusion and a fraud. I know this is a sweeping
statement to make, but I make it because the German Secret Service
had discovered a means of secret writing between the lines of an
ordinary letter that, even if suspected and treated with chemical
reagents, as so many hundreds were, the invisible writing, instead
of being revealed, was instantly destroyed! I feel half inclined to
explain the matter, but I hesitate to do so for fear that it may not
be in the public interest.
I know Herr Steinhauer, who acted as chief director of German
espionage throughout the world. In 1913, while on one of my
periodical visits to Turkey, I was staying as usual at the Pera
Palace Hotel in Constantinople.
Before dinner Fred Stevens, who was one of the known crooks in
Constantinople--now dead--lounged in, and we took our glass of
sherry in the bar. As we lifted our glasses there entered a tall,
round-faced, smart-looking man of about forty, with a well-trimmed
fair moustache and typically German, whom he introduced to me as
Dr. Beutner. I understood that he was a representative of the big
furnishing house of Heewart Wolfe in Berlin, and that he was their
buyer of Turkish, Persian, and Angora carpets, of which he was an
expert.
I strolled about with him for several days, and Stevens accompanied
us. On two evenings we went together to the Concordia, the gay
music-hall in the Grand Rue, and one afternoon we crossed the
Bosphorus to Scutari and spent a delightful evening there. It was not
till two months later that, to my great surprise, I discovered that
my entertaining friend Dr. Beutner was none other than the notorious
Herr Steinhauer, the Kaiser’s bosom friend and confidant, and head of
the service of German espionage in Great Britain.
About eighteen months before the war I met another highly interesting
person, whose name was afterwards on everyone’s lips. It was in
a far-off log-built fishing town, a black, treeless settlement,
which for three months in the year endures the Arctic night. It
was snowing hard when I stepped off the black old tramp-steamer,
laden with dried fish and whale-oil, on to the new landing-stage of
what was afterwards to be an important strategic point, the little
place founded in 1900, called Alexandrovsk. At that time public
works had just been ordered from Petrograd--the Catherine Harbour
to be deepened and a new quay built. I lunched with the captain of
the ship, the engineer in charge of the works, the stout military
commander in a grey uniform too small for him, and a scraggy-bearded,
long-haired, ill-conditioned-looking man in a greasy black robe.
His eyes were bloodshot and deep-set, he spoke the Russian of the
_mujik_, but he wore, suspended by a heavy silver chain, a crucifix
of magnificent emeralds.
I wondered what could be the worth of those splendid gems. After
we parted and I returned again to the ship, I inquired of Captain
Thurstrup as to whom the priest might be.
“Oh,” he replied, “I ought to have told you. He is the Monk Rasputin,
the great friend of the Emperor. There are all sorts of wonderful
tales afloat as to his influence over the Imperial family, and many
of them are, I believe, true. He has come down to see the place and
report to the Emperor.”
Little did I dream that the dirty, unkempt, pasty-faced priest with
his sinister smite and damp, flabby hand was the Kaiser’s creature,
who would eventually throw Holy Russia into the melting-pot.
* * * * *
I think it is well-known that after the murder of the Mock-monk
in Petrograd the Kerensky Government handed to me, in confidence,
a great quantity of documents which had been found in the safe in
the cellar of his house, in order that I might write an account of
the scoundrel’s amazing career. This I did, from the documentary
evidence, under the title of _Rasputin_, which met with great
interest all over the world. Now among that huge mass of letters,
telegrams, and compromising correspondence from the Empress and
others--for Rasputin was a blackmailer, as well as a priest--I found
the greater part of a manuscript which he himself a criminal, had
evidently intended to publish, entitled “Great Russian Criminals.”
It was in French, a language which the monk knew only slightly,
and being typed, had evidently been dictated. In it I found to my
amazement _the actual truth concerning the “Jack the Ripper” crimes_!
I did not publish it in my book because I have been unable, until
recently, to verify any of the facts alleged. I will, however, quote
from Rasputin’s own manuscript which, before I returned it to the
Revolutionary Government, I copied, as follows:
“London was horrified by the evil work of a mysterious
criminal known as ‘Jack the Ripper,’ who killed and mutilated
a number of women of ill-repute in the East End of the
capital. The repetition of the appalling crimes mystified the
world. The true author of these atrocities was disclosed by a
Russian well-known in London, named Nideroest, a spy of our
Secret Police, who was a member of the Jubilee Street Club,
the Anarchist Centre in the East of London. One night in the
club the identity of ‘Jack the Ripper’ was revealed to him by
an old Russian Anarchist, Nicholas Zverieff. The mysterious
assassin was Doctor Alexander Pedachenko, who had been on the
staff of the Maternity Hospital at Tver, and lived on the
second floor in the Millionnaya, but had gone to London, where
he lived with his sister in Westmorland Road, Walworth. From
there he sallied forth at night, took an omnibus across London
Bridge and walked to Whitechapel, where he committed his
secret crimes.
“Alexander Pedachenko, according to Zverieff--whose record
appears in the reports of the Secret Police--was aided by a
friend of his named Levitski, and a young tailoress, called
Winberg. The latter would approach the victim and hold her in
conversation and Levitski kept watch for the police patrols,
while the crimes and mutilations took place. Levitski, who had
been born in London, wrote the warning post-cards signed ‘Jack
the Ripper’ to the Police and Press. It was through Levitski
that Zverieff knew the truth.
“The report of Nideroest’s discovery amused our Secret Police
greatly, for, as a matter of fact, they knew the whole details
at the time, and had themselves actively aided and encouraged
the crimes, in order to exhibit to the world certain defects
of the English police system, there having been some
misunderstanding and rivalry between our own police and the
British. It was, indeed, for that reason that Pedachenko, the
greatest and boldest of all Russian criminal lunatics, was
encouraged to go to London and commit that series of atrocious
crimes, in which agents of our police aided him.
“Eventually at the orders of the Ministry of the Interior
the Secret Police smuggled the assassin out of London, and
as Count Luiskovo he landed at Ostend, and was conducted by
a secret service agent to Moscow. While there he was, a few
months later, caught red-handed attempting to murder and
mutilate a woman named Vogak and was eventually sent to an
asylum, where he died in 1908.
“After the return to Russia of Levitski and the woman Winberg
the Secret Police deemed it wise to suppress them, and they
were therefore exiled to Yakutsk. Such are the actual facts of
the ‘Jack the Ripper Mystery’ which still puzzles the whole
world.”
I venture to give this quotation from Rasputin’s unfinished work
because I have only recently discovered that a doctor named
Pedachenko did actually live in Tver, and his homicidal tendencies
were well-known. Again, I have further found out that a man named
Nideroest was a member of the Jubilee Street Club and was known in
connection with the Anarchist affray at Tottenham, and also with the
Sidney Street affair.
In addition, it must be remembered that during the war, Rasputin was
plotting with Protopopoff, Minister of the Interior, for the downfall
of Russia, and therefore he had access to all the secret archives of
that Department, from which it is plain he obtained his facts.
Hence, without agreeing that our police system is defective, I print
these disclosures among “Things I Know.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Stories of Famous Folk--Mr. Lloyd George Chaffed by Lord
Birkenhead--We Journey Together to Eat Oysters--Sir John
Foster Fraser, Max Pemberton and Myself Make a Bet--How
the Ex-Premier “Pulled Our Leg”--Sir Robert Horne and the
New Zealand Mutton--General “Brab” Brabazon and His Good
Looks--Eveleigh Nash’s Funny Stories--Coulson Kernahan
Recounts Some Amusing Episodes--Miss May Edgington and
the Film Producer--How a Novelist Rode a Race--Sir Rider
Haggard and Myself Have an Adventure.
Last October I went as fellow-guest with Mr. Lloyd George, Lord
Birkenhead, and Sir Laming Worthington Evans down to the annual
oyster feast at Colchester. The Mayor of Colchester had asked me
to propose the toast of “The Colne Oyster Fisheries”--why I know
not--but as Mr. Lloyd George was available at the last moment I
happily escaped the necessity of telling a lie as excuse.
We were a merry party on the way down, for it included T. P.
O’Connor, the Lord Mayor of London and Lady Mayoress, Sir John Foster
Fraser, Max Pemberton, and Mr. Lloyd George, who made us laugh with
his many humorous remarks. He was wearing a particularly shabby felt
hat, and Lord Birkenhead, always smartly groomed, chipped him about
it.
Mr. Lloyd George took off his faded hat, regarded it critically, and
said:
“Do you think anybody will notice it? It’s moving day to-day, for
we are clearing out of Downing Street; the fact is, I couldn’t find
another!”
Sir John Foster Fraser, Max Pemberton, and myself, then made a bet
that somebody at the coming feast of oysters would in the course of
his speech, certainly refer to “the succulent bivalve.”
Later we all three listened intently to the speeches, after we had
eaten dozens of delicious oysters, washed down with Chablis.
Suddenly Mr. Lloyd George, beaming with good humour, rose, and in
the course of his speech said: “And now that we have just partaken
of these very succulent”--and then he paused and looked across to
where Max and I were seated, and smiled slyly--“these very succulent
oysters,” he went on.
I heard a distinct groan from Foster Fraser, near by.