Читать книгу The Day, or The Passing of a Throne - Fred M. White - Страница 10

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Colonel von Korner's haggard, anxious face relaxed for a moment. He looked like a man crushed and broken down by the weight of some great burden. His moustache dropped, he had none of the self-assured swagger that is almost the birth right of a German cavalry officer. His uniform was grimy and soiled, he might have been sleeping in it for weeks, which indeed was the truth. For the history of the war was no sealed book to him. The great Over Lord might deem it policy to conceal from a deluded people the long chapter of failure and reverse which had dogged the German Army from the start. He might pose before the population in the heart of his capital as their champion, and pretend that the sword had not shattered in his grasp, but those in authority knew the truth, and how terrible a retribution was at hand.

And von Korner was one of the enlightened type of patriot, who had never cherished any delusions. He had known from the first what it meant to defy the might of the Triple Entente, what it meant to flaunt defiance in the face of the British Fleet. He knew how near famine and revolution were, he knew that the right man in Berlin could start a rebellion which would drag the Hohenzollern throne from its pedestal and break it in the dust. He knew that the German Army had gone sullenly to the front with Socialism eating into its very vitals. He knew this because he was a Socialist himself, a pure minded and brave patriot who was prepared to fight, not for the Potsdam clique or the War Gang in the Friedrichstrasse, but for the coming and inevitable German Republic.

All this he told Leroux and Ludwig as they sat there in that plainly furnished room. But Leroux knew it already, had known it for the last three years. It was to strike a blow for the real freedom of the German people that these men were gathered there to-night.

"So far all has been well," Leroux explained. "As I have just told you, I have had to use a certain amount of violence, indeed without it Rosslyn would never have consented to join us. But he will not be so bitter against me when he knows the truth. Now listen to me, Citizen Korner. As I always told you, there is no enmity between the British and German peoples. We are bound together too closely by ties of blood and money for that. The destruction of Germany would ruin hundreds of thousands of Englishmen—it would be a two-edged sword reaching half across Europe. I tell you the English are a great people, and they will help us to be free. Ah, it is the Kaiser and those he has gathered about him that the English hate and detest. They say that the Mad Dog of Europe has for twenty years been a menace to the civilisation and commerce of the world. It is he they would destroy, he and his ridiculous navy. Once they are out of the way, and you will see a friendship between Teuton and Anglo-Saxon such as has not been witnessed since the overthrow of Napoleon. But I waste time, Ludwig, my friend, the antidote if you please."

Half an hour later Rosslyn struggled to his feet, and looked about him in half-blind amazement. He was like a man tired to death yet awakened after a few moments from deep slumber. He threw off his stupor presently, he was conscious of no racking headache, nothing beyond a fierce desire to eat and drink. He was in the hands of the foe, but there was no reason why he should not make the best of life so long as it was left to him. With a certain cynical indifference he accepted von Korner's offer of a cigar.

"Would you mind telling me where I am?" he asked.

"You are in the Fortress of Wilhemshaven," Leroux explained. "It doesn't matter how you got here, though I've no doubt you could give a pretty good guess. But you are here, and so is that wonderful aeroplane and engine of yours. Now let me explain. You regard me as a German spy who has got the better of you. In a way I am a German spy. But I happen to be a trusted servant of the Democratic Federation. Now we have our followers everywhere. They are even in the Palace of Potsdam, in the office of Bethmann-Holwegg, acting with Von Gwinner without his knowing it, of course—and listening to the plans of von der Goltz; we are in workshops of Krupps by the hundred. And we knew three years ago that this war would take place just at harvest time in nineteen hundred and fourteen. It was then that I came to London after six years in Paris. And for three years my London business was no more than a blind. So, my dear Rosslyn, it was small wonder that you were deceived. To a certain extent you forced my hand, and when you raided my little establishment it was too late for explanations. So I had to resort to force. Do you believe me now?"

"It is a plausible story," Rosslyn said guardedly.

"Then so far, so good," Leroux went on. "The three of us here are the type of Socialist who would save their country from further useless bloodshed. And we are going to strike a blow. It is necessary to strike a blow through the heart of the nation, for it is from the heart that the arteries are fed. Berlin has been cruelly deceived. They know nothing of all these reverses, they have not yet realised that Germany is in a ring of steel, in a kind of chamber of horrors, the walls of which are gradually closing. They do not know. They do not know that we are no more than a gigantic beleagured fortress, which must fall in the end from sheer exhaustion. Now we are going to tell Berlin the truth. We have all our documents ready, vouched for by the heads of our Federation, and it should be for you and your aeroplane to fly from here to Berlin and drop those leaflets by the thousand from the sky over the capital. Most of the good seed will fall on fertile ground, most of the inhabitants of Berlin are Socialists. There will be a tremendous reaction, a great wave of public indignation, arms will spring from everywhere, and the few troops around the Imperial Palace will be overpowered. Within eight-and-forty hours the Kaiser and his Army Council will be prisoners, and the Provisional Government formed. The flame will spread like wildfire. Now, sir, will you join with us and permit me to be your passenger?"

Rosslyn saw it all in a flash. These men were in grim earnest, and he could see no wrong in helping them. It was a chance to strike a blow for the flag, a chance hitherto only to dream of.

"Then you can count me in," he cried. "I am ready at any moment. Long life and prosperity to the German Republic."