There was a ripple of interest and a good deal of curiosity that
afternoon, in the lounge and entrance hall of the Hotel Plaza, when a
tall, grey-moustached gentleman of military bearing descended from the
automobile which had brought him from the station, and handed in his
name at the desk, inquiring for Mr. Fischer.
"Will you send my name up--the Baron von Schwerin," he directed.
The clerk, who had recognised the newcomer, took him under his personal
care.
"Mr. Fischer is up in his rooms, expecting you, Baron," he announced.
"If you'll come this way, I'll take you up."
The Baron followed his guide to the lift and along the corridor to the
suite of rooms occupied by Mr. Fischer and his young friend, James Van
Teyl. Mr. Fischer himself opened the door. The two men clasped hands
cordially, and the clerk discreetly withdrew.
"Back with us once more, Fischer," Von Schwerin exclaimed fervently.
"You are wonderful. Tell me," he added, looking around, "we are to be
alone here?"
"Absolutely," Fischer replied. "The young man I share these apartments
with--James Van Teyl--has taken his sister out to Baltusrol. They will
not be back until seven o'clock. We are sure of solitude."
"Good!" Von Schwerin exclaimed. "And you have news--I can see it in
your face."
Fischer rolled up easy chairs and produced a box of cigars.
"Yes," he assented, with a little glitter in his eyes, "I have news.
Things have moved with me. I think that, with the help of an idiotic
Englishman, we shall solve the riddle of what our professors have
called the consuming explosive. I sent the formula home to Germany, by
a trusty hand, only a few hours ago."
"Capital!" Von Schwerin declared. "It was arranged in London, that?"
"Partly in London and partly here," Fischer replied.
Von Schwerin made a grimace.
"If you can find those who are willing to help you here, you are
fortunate indeed," he sighed. "My life's work has lain amongst these
people. In the days of peace, all seemed favourable to us. Since the
war, even those people whom I thought my friends seem to have lost
their heads, to have lost their reasoning powers."
"After all," Fischer muttered, "it is race calling to race. But come,
we have more direct business on hand. Nikasti is here."
Von Schwerin nodded a little gloomily.
"Washington knows nothing of his coming," he observed. "I attended the
Baron Yung's reception last week, informally. I threw out very broad
hints, but Yung would not be drawn. Nikasti represents the Secret
Service of Japan, unofficially and without responsibility."
"Nevertheless," Fischer pointed out, "what he says will reach the ear
of his country, and reach it quickly. You've gone through the papers I
sent you?"
"Carefully," Von Schwerin replied. "And the autograph letter?"
"That I have," Fischer announced. "I will fetch Nikasti."
He crossed the room and opened the door leading into the bedchambers.
"Are you there, Kato?" he cried.
"I am coming, sir," was the instant reply.
Nikasti appeared, a few moments later. He was carrying a dress coat on
his arm, and he held a clothes brush in his hand. It was obvious that
he had studied with nice care the details of his new part.
"You can sit down, Nikasti," Fischer invited. "This is the Baron von
Schwerin. He has something to say to you."
Nikasti bowed very low. He declined the chair, however, to which
Fischer pointed.
"I am your valet and the valet of Mr. Van Teyl," he murmured. "It is
not fitting for me to be seated. I listen."
Von Schwerin drew his chair a little nearer.
"I plunge at once," he said, "into the middle of things. There is
always the fear that we may be disturbed."
Nikasti inclined his head.
"It is best," he agreed.
"You are aware," Von Schwerin continued, "that the Imperial Government
of Germany has already made formal overtures, through a third party, to
the Emperor of Japan with reference to an alteration in our relations?"
"There was talk of this in Tokio," Nikasti observed softly. "Japan,
however, is under obligations--treaty obligations. Her honour demands
that these should be kept."
"The honour of a country," Baron von Schwerin acknowledged, "is,
without doubt, a sacred charge upon her rulers, but above all things in
heaven or on earth, the interests of her people must be their first
consideration. If a time should come when the two might seem to clash,
then it is the task of the statesman to recognise this fact."
Nikasti bowed.
"It is spoken," he confessed, "like a great man."
"Your country," Von Schwerin continued, "is at war with mine because it
seemed to her rulers that her interests lay with the Allies rather than
with Germany. I will admit that my country was at fault. We did not
recognise to its full extent the value of friendship with Japan. We did
not bid high enough for your favours. Asia concerned us very little. We
looked upon the destruction of our interests there in the same spirit
as that with which we contemplated the loss of our colonies. All that
might happen would be temporary. Our influence in Asia, our colonies,
will remain with us or perish, according to the result of the war in
Europe. But our statesmen overlooked one thing."
"Our factories," Nikasti murmured.
"Precisely! We have had our agents all over the world for years. Some
are good, a few are easily deceived. There is no country in the world
where apparently so much liberty is granted to foreigners as in Japan.
There is no country where the capacity for manufacture and output has
been so grossly underestimated by our agents, as yours."
Nikasti smiled.
"I had something to do with that," he announced. "It was Karl Neumann,
was it not, on whom you relied? I supplied him with much information."
Von Schwerin's face clouded for a moment.
"You mean that you fooled him, I suppose," he said. "Well, it is all
part of the game. That is over now. We want your exports to Russia
stopped."
"Ah!" Nikasti murmured reflectively. "Stopped!"
"We ask no favours," Von Schwerin continued. "The issue of the war is
written across the face of the skies for those who care to read."
Nikasti looked downwards at the dress coat which he was carrying. Then
he glanced up at Von Schwerin.
"Perhaps our eyes have been dazzled," he said. "Will you not
interpret?"
"The end of the war will be a peace of exhaustion," Von Schwerin
explained. "Our loftier dreams of conquest we must abandon. Germany has
played her part, but Austria, alas! has failed. Peace will leave us all
very much where we were. Very well, then, I ask you, what has Japan
gained? You answer China? I deny it. Yet even if it were true, it will
take you five hundred years to make a great country of China. Suppose
for a moment you had been on the other side. What about Australia?...
New Zealand?"
"Are those things under present consideration?" Nikasti queried.
"Why not?" Von Schwerin replied. "Listen. Close your exports to Russia
within the next thirty days. Build up for yourselves a stock of
ammunition, add to your fleet, and prepare. Within a year of the
cessation of war, there is no reason why your national dream should not
be realised. Your fleet may sail for San Francisco. The German fleet
shall make a simultaneous attack upon the eastern coast of
Massachusetts and New York."
"The German fleet," Nikasti repeated. "And England?"
Von Schwerin's eyes flashed for a moment.
"If the English fleet is still in being," he declared, "it will be a
crippled and defeated fleet, but, for the sake of your point of view, I
will assume that it exists. Even then there will be nothing to prevent
the German fleet from steaming in what waters it pleases. If our shells
fall upon New York on the day when your warships are sighted off the
Californian coast, do you suppose that America could resist? With her
seaboard, her fleet is contemptible. For her wealth, her army is a
farce. She has neglected for a great many years to pay her national
insurance. She is the one country in the world who can be bled for the
price of empires."
Fischer, who had been smoking furiously, spat out the end of a fresh
cigar.
"It will be a just retribution," he interposed, with smothered
fierceness. "Under the guise of neutrality, America has been
responsible for the lives of hundreds of thousands of my countrymen.
That we never can, we never shall, forget. The wealth which makes these
people fat is blood-money, and Germany will take her vengeance."
"For whom do you speak?" Nikasti inquired.
Von Schwerin rose from his place.
"For the greatest of all."
"Do I take anything but words to Tokio?" the Japanese asked softly.
Fischer unfolded a pocketbook and drew from it a parchment envelope.
"You take this letter," he said, "which I brought over myself from
Berlin, signed and written not more than three weeks ago. I ask you to
believe in no vague promises. I bring you the pledged faith of the
greatest ruler on earth. What do you say, Nikasti? Will you accept our
mission? Will you go back to Tokio and see the Emperor?"
Nikasti bowed.
"I will go back," he promised. "I will sail as soon as I can make
arrangements. But I cannot tell you what the issue may be. We Japanese
are not a self-seeking nation. Above and higher than all things are our
ideals and our honour. I cannot tell what answer our Sovereign may give
to this."
"These are the days when the truest patriotism demands the most sublime
sacrifices," Von Schwerin declared. "Above all the ethics of
individuals comes the supreme necessity of self-preservation."
The Japanese smiled slightly.
"Ah!" he said, "there speaks the philosophy of your country, Baron, the
paean of materialism."
"The destinies of nations," Baron von Schwerin exclaimed, "are above
the man-made laws of a sentimental religion! One needs, nowadays, more
than to survive. It is necessary to flourish."
Nikasti stood suddenly to attention.
"It is Mr. Van Teyl who returns," he warned them.
He glided from the room, shaking out a little the dress coat which he
had been carrying. The two men looked after him. Fischer threw his
cigar savagely away and lit another.
"Curse these orientals!" he muttered. "They listen and listen, and one
never knows. Van Teyl won't be here for hours. That was just an excuse
to get away."
But there was a smile of triumph on Von Schwerin's lips.
"I know them better than you do, Fischer," he declared. "Nikasti is our
man!"